The Pat McAfee Show - PMS 2.0 458 - The Cleveland Guardians, Drama In The NFL, Ian Rapoport, Darius Butler, & AJ Hawk

Episode Date: July 23, 2021

On today's show, Pat and the boys chat about the Cleveland Indians changing their name to the Cleveland Guardians (starting next year), the drama surrounding the NFL essentially making players get vaccinated or they will make your season very difficult. They also cover the news that Davante Adams and the Packers have officially ended extension talks and things are seemingly not in a good spot. Joining the program to chat more about that situation is NFL Insider, Ian Rapoport. Rapsheet also lays out the implications of not getting vaccinated this upcoming season, and how he thinks that process is going to play out (41:20-54:20). Later, Darius Butler joins the show to chat about what he's hearing from a lot of players in the locker room, and how he thinks it's going to play out between the players, the NFLPA, and the league itself (58:39-1:17:06). Make sure you subscribe to youtube.com/thepatmcafeeshow and listen every day on Mad Dog Radio, Sirius XM Channel 82. We appreciate you all for listening, come and laugh with us, cheers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up everybody, it is Friday, July 23rd. You are listening to the Pat McAfee Show 2.0. Pat had to hop on a bird to get to Cleveland for Smackdown. Tonight at 8pm on Fox, John Cena, Roman Reigns. It's going to be a good one, check it out. Darius Butler and Rap Sheet, AJ Hawk also stopped by today. It's a fun show, it's a good feel-good Friday. Let's get to it.

by today. It's a fun show. It's a good feel-good Friday. Let's get to it. Absolute chaos happening in the sports world. Two teams have left the conference in the Big Five college football standings. Somebody that was a six-time champion and counting. So we're getting the fuck out of this conference. Texas and Oklahoma leaving the Big 12 to go to the SEC. It's almost all but official at this point. Yesterday, Big 12 officials met on the phone talking about something and stuff. Two teams, two schools, two administrators were not involved in that phone call.

It was Texas and Oklahoma. This came just a couple hours after it was rumored that Texas and Oklahoma had reached out to the SEC to ask if they could join the SEC. Texas and Oklahoma. Now, there's going to be a ripple effect here that is going to cause a lot of people problems. Okay, Oklahoma six-time champion. They literally have, if they go and don't go back to the Big 12, they don't get that settled, which it sounds like they will not, and the SEC is a done deal for them.

Oklahoma is about to do what Bret Hart was trying to do before that night in Montreal, by the way. Oklahoma said, we got your title six times. Six in a row. Six straight. Yeah, yeah, sorry, six straight. And we're leaving. Wow. Taking the championship with them to the SEC,

the conference that has demolished basically everybody but Clemson for the last 15, 20 years. The rich get richer in powerhouses in the SEC, Texas, and Oklahoma. Bringing a lot of tradition, money, fans, and everything like that. A couple good basketball teams down into the SEC. And what does this mean for the Big 12? What does this mean for Iowa State? A team that hadn't been good for a long, long time.

They get a coach. They become good. They got a squad. They're going to go. But the two big dogs. Texas hasn't won shit in a long time. They got Steve Sarkeesian now. Let's see if old Sarkeesian can somehow get Arch Manning to go there.

And now that it's in the SEC, maybe this has all happened. But Arch Manning might have told Steve Sarkeesian, hey, pal, if you want Arch to go, it's going to have to go down the SEC. Who knows? I'm just throwing things out there. But whatever the reason is, the Big 12 now takes a massive shot. That's big money, a lot of eyes. People are going to watch Oklahoma games regardless if they're from Oklahoma or not. They're one of the

draws. And the reason why we're talking about this early is because anytime you do talk about college football, normally the ratings just go straight down for this show. People like watching the spectacle that is college football. Not sure everybody loves the day-to-day conversation about college football, but this is a massive ordeal. West Virginia, the school that I went to, I did not graduate, but I got a chance to ride the coattails of incredible football players to magical moments, the biggest and the hottest run that that school has ever had football-wise.

It was cool to be a part of that. Go ahead and retire Pat White's number, Steve Slayton's number, and Owen Schmidt's number while you're at it and just continue to do that whole thing if you're West Virginia. But if you are West Virginia, you're trying to get to the ACC right now. And whenever the Big East disbanded and kind of fell apart

quickly, just like the Big 12 might. I'm not saying Big 12's been around a long time. It's one of the Power 5 conferences, okay? I was in the Big East. We won four straight BCS Bowcs bowls and then just a couple years later boom big east doesn't even exist anymore now there's a power five conference all it takes is for a couple of schools to maybe move for everything to potentially get realigned what's going to happen with the sec who's going to fall where are alabama oklahoma and texas and

uh anybody else georgia are they going to run into each other ever are they going to realign this thing what are the seasons going to look into each other ever? Are they going to realign this thing? What are the seasons going to look like? And with the 12 teams getting into the playoffs, there's going to be some more losses, I think. Two lost, three lost team maybe out of the SEC might find its way into the top 12, and people are not going to be happy about it. I mean, we are just staring that down.

But what's going to happen with West Virginia? Allegedly, when the Big East fell apart, and my information might not all be correct, but from what I was hearing, the ACC didn't want us. Whoa. I think if I do recall, the ACC, and somebody will probably fact check me there, but I think the ACC was not about us joining the ACC. And then if you look right above us, the Big Ten is just basically all right there. Did the Big Ten not want us either? What's going on? And then south

of us is actually, I mean, ACC, SEC too. I mean, that's pretty close. The only, if we would end up in the Pac-12, that would have been the only more interesting thing. When West Virginia ended up in the Big 12 and Oliver Luck made the deal and the move, I don't know how much money was involved. I've heard it was a lot. I

was so confused. That is insane. It's an insane setup. Not a lot of Morgantown fans get to travel to a lot of games anymore, but business-wise, you know, we got into a Power Five conference. We started doing well in that Power Five conference doing our thing, but everybody's got to be wondering, should they be getting the fuck out of Dodge here? Iowa State should be like, we can get in the Big Ten right there. West Virginia is in the ACC already pretty much if we really need to make that happen. And there's some other teams over there that they might start dabbling and dancing. Is this what this is going to lead to? You have to automatically assume that.

COVID Cowboy at Tone Diggs, your thoughts. Yeah, I already got it figured out. So the SEC now has 16 teams with Oklahoma and Texas. The ACC has 15. They pick up West Virginia. They now have 16. The Big Ten The ACC has 15. They pick up West Virginia. They now have 16. The Big Ten right now has 14. They pick up Iowa State and, say, K-State.

Now they have 16. The rest of those teams move to the Pac-12. They would have 17 teams. Maybe one team gets left out. We're all equal. Kansas, good at basketball, though. I immediately thought Kansas, but they're good at basketball. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Football-wise, though. TCU. Kansas State, maybe. Baylor's proud. Baylor's really good. People are going to want Baylor. kansas but they're good at back yeah yeah yeah football wise tcu tc and kansas state maybe baylor's private baylor's really good people are gonna want baylor especially with the basketball but everything's even if you kind of do it that way plus then there's just one action so then the big 12 is gone there's going to be some people that are going to mourn that but the people that are mourning that are who texas oklahoma people right aren't they kind of the original founders of this whole thing and they're like now get us the fuck out of here okie state probably

not exactly thrilled they probably looking at oklahoma like you motherfuckers yeah because that now they won't play each other well they'll they could still do like the bedlam game i guess but it west virginia pit they stopped once because then the contracts start rolling in and then you start picking up games it becomes like a whole, and that was a massive game. West Virginia, Maryland used to be a massive game, any border game. Virginia Tech, because they were in the Big East, and when they went to the ACC, everybody's like, oh, these are massive rivalry-like games. Now Bedlam's huge.

Red River rivalry's moving over to the SEC. The SEC gets to market that now too. Jeez. Which is awesome. Absolutely awesome. The SEC will try to get Ohio State, Michigan if they can. Yeah. They'll try to figure that out if they can go for it. But, yeah, now you're starting to see like three power conferences go.

And then does that mean that the Cincinnati's and the Coastal Carolina's and maybe the BYU's have a better chance because there's only three and then you can kind of separate from there? Or are we assuming that's just going to be five probably from one, four from one, three from the other, and it's just going to be status quo in this whole thing? Yeah, I mean, like, Cincy could try to leave the AAC or whatever, or like the Mountain West could try to pick up some of these Big 12 teams

that are left over to try to strengthen them. Like, there's a bunch of different options. It's going to be exciting to see what happens. All right, so let's say West Virginia bails. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay, Neil Brown, I trust the climb, but I don't think we're going to be flying all that fucking way for this.

No point. Texas and Oklahoma, right? I mean, Texas and Oklahoma are the big, they're the marquee people in there. West Virginia as well, obviously, and I hate to break it to anybody else that's in the Big 12 who has a great fan base. Okay, I understand that. I got a lot of respect for that. But Texas and Oklahoma leaving is a fucking massive, massive shot across the bow of credibility.

I mean, it really is. Hate to say it because I'm in the Big 12 at this point with West Virginia. We never played there, but I'm in there. The credibility now of the Big 12 is going to be called into question immediately. Were their contracts up at the same time? Can people just leave conferences whenever they want? And if their contracts were up at the same time, how did they let that happen, that those two would be up at the same time?

That's like kind of structuring the future of your business or company. Can't have that happen. I can't have those two potentially be up at the same time. Like is West Virginia locked in, or can we potentially bail before the season starts, too? Could be like a Blake Griffin situation where they've got to pay their way up. And the Longhorn Network, they don't give a damn. The SEC Network doesn't give a damn.

They've got money for days down there in the SEC. Go ahead, Ty. But that is a good point, though, because, I don't know, like you would think that this is going to be wrapped up in some sort of legalese for like a long time. Like when it said, like, oh, this is basically already done, like, that was very shy. It came out of nowhere. And they said they'd been working on it for six months, kind of, like, behind the scenes and everything.

But you would think, yeah, that these contracts run through. Because with, like you're saying, without Oklahoma and Texas, like, the Big 12 isn't a power conference anymore. No. It really isn't. No, and Oklahoma has won six straight. Okay. And Oklahoma has been the only representative of the big 12 in the college playoff.

So, I mean, this is quite a, from a football on-field perspective, especially with that freshman quarterback, then there's not going to be a sophomore Lincoln Riley sticking around, turning down a lot of other jobs to stay there. Obviously football wise, you're affected by Oklahoma, Texas, Texas. All right. Texas has been, they've won games, but they have been a massive disappointment.

So, football-wise, definitely affected. But just like the, Texas, they're never not a sellout. I mean, that is never not a sellout. Longhorn never, Oklahoma, that is never not a sellout. Primetime games are, Texas and Oklahoma are going to get a lot more opportunities

because of how big their fan base is. I mean, it is not just on the field, a massive, massive kick to the baby maker, but also off the field with aura and presence and business. It's huge. This is a massive ordeal. Did West Virginia know about this beforehand? Or horns flying down harder than ever you sons of bitches ruin the big 12 we're stuck here for four more years and teams are

bailing left and right is that what's going to happen here or how do they rebuild this uh from espn they reported thursday that both texas and oklahoma would likely owe the big 12 upwards of 76 million a piece to buy out of the out of the remainder of the media rights agreement, which runs until 2025. So that $76 million is coming to West Virginia, but all that money comes right back to the other schools, right? Yeah, it should. It's an even split.

Yeah, because I remember when we signed up, we were signed up for Oklahoma and Texas. Times have changed now. Boom. Hey, we are in much different situations now than we were there. If I'm West Virginia, I'm trying to get to the ACC now, right? Back up. What are we doing?

Let's get to the ACC. Is there anything negative that I am not realizing in my overreactive, short-thinking brain? Why don't we just move that team that's right in the middle of it? Just drop them in there. And ACC now has 16 even teams, 8-8. You're welcome. And our team's pretty fucking good, by the way,

both football and basketball and women's basketball. And we have a lot of great sports. Now, I don't know how the ACC rifle team is. Whoever is the head rifle squad in the ACC, they probably have quite a problem with us coming to town. Sure. You know, because the big bad wolf on the rifles are coming to town. Of course.

And we are now your champions. Oh, those are cool rings. We'll take them. That's what our rifle team will do if they drop in anywhere. But other than that, it's a perfect – and by the way, great fan base. They will travel. Hell, I mean, we got people in –

West Virginia and Charlotte, it is maybe the same damn city that it's so many people. Let's get West Virginia to the ACC. Texas and Oklahoma want to leave the Big 12? There has to be something wrong with the Big 12. Because Texas and Oklahoma are the fucking Big 12. If they're trying to get out of there, we got to see the writing on the wall as West Virginia. We got to see this and get the hell out.

And Iowa State, I don't like it. You guys are good. You got to coach. Somehow he's turned down NFL things. You guys have got to get into the Big Ten, by the way. I need you in the Big Ten this year. I need this to happen. I mean, everybody else up there, K-State, got a squad.

All right, we're moving a little bit. Okie State, is the mullet good or not? They were supposed to be great. The offense was unbelievable. The run game was good. Still never really won any big games. What's going on down there? Baylor's basketball team.

That might carry them in the ACC as well. Maybe they even get the ACC they could maybe Baylor gets in there because the who knows I don't know what they're going to do so I I'm sorry to everybody else but god damn it the school that everything's going to change from this this is going to be a massive ordeal and if it's only 76 million dollars only that is a massive amount of money but if you put two to three boosters together from a big name school they're all billionaires 76 million dollars can be found very quickly if people are going to start moving we might see that super conference we started uh hoping for last year whenever uncle coven came to town and some people wanted to play and some people didn't the people that wanted to play were all the great schools the people that didn't want to play weren't really so we thought

there was a chance that maybe some Big Ten schools, whenever they came out and announced, would go down to the SEC and play. Ohio State was like, we're playing. Nebraska was like, we're playing. Iowa, we're playing. And the SEC was like, we're playing. A couple of Big 12 schools were like, we're playing. We thought we were going to get a super conference,

and then cooler heads prevailed. Much slower in the Big Ten than everywhere else. A lot slower. But we had that thing. Super conferences are not far behind. much slower in the Big Ten than everywhere else. But we had that thing. Superconferences are not far behind. We talk about super teams in this Insta-gratification society that we live in right now where we want to know everything right now. We want to win everything right now.

We are all about right now. Players started getting like it. I loved it. It's like, hey, who knows how long your career is. If you want to travel to a team that is good and win, you deserve it. It's your legacy that they're going to talk about whenever you retire did he win any rings oh yeah yeah yeah he did but remember you play with good players to win those rings that's a lot better conversation did he win any rings no okay so there is there's a lot of benefit of just going to these super teams for players in

the nfl in the nba and everything like that Now we're seeing it kind of reach a conference place where it's like, hey, we have the opportunity and the ability to create something that nobody else can. Let's go ahead and do it. $76 million, pay me, get me the fuck out of here. $76 million, pay me, get me out of here. What other teams will look to do that to go elsewhere? What other leagues are going to be trying to maybe pry or recruit recruit some schools to there the pac-12 is basically dead like i hate to say it about the pac-12 because pac-12 after dark is a good time and i'm sure their schools and campuses are awesome and we've

learned a lot about some of their water polo schools and everything like that over there in the pac-12 but some of those schools might get plucked out of there too right are we looking at an inevitable super conference or super conference? I, uh, two of them. Well, you made the point.

And I think your private, like, do you think the other teams in the big 12 today are like panicking kind of like half to, I would imagine that a lot of them are thinking, Hey, that $152 million that Texas and Oklahoma are using that is going to be spread amongst us.

Like, Hey, that's just a nice little pool for when we're going to fucking buy out as well. Like, I mean, we don't know, but a lot of... Who collects all that money then? Just the commissioner of the Big 12? Because if everybody bails and has to pay, who's left sitting with the money?

Commissioner divvies it out to everybody. And even split for the remaining teams. So, like, let's say the teams that kind of... And we're thinking only athletically, but mostly that's where the conferences matter. I mean, although the money and paycheck go to the entire school and everything, and there's a lot of money made from the academia folks off of the athletia folks. Is athletia something?

Yeah, that's a word. Because they say academia. Is athletia something? I don't think so. No, it's got to be. Isn't it just athletics? Yeah, but it so. No, it's got to be. Isn't it just athletics? Yeah, but it's also academics, right?

Why is it academia? That's a good point. Sit on it. Because the academia have been making a lot of money off the athletia for a long time. A long time. But they never want to really talk about that because it is a university. It's furthering your education. Higher learning. It's about the academia.

But really, it's not, though, when it comes to a lot of the money that is used in a lot of the classrooms. There's a lot of it's furthering your education. Higher learning. It's about the academia, but really it's not, though, when it comes to a lot of the money that is used in a lot of the classrooms. There's a lot of other shit happening in the money. So you were saying, like, maybe, so if five teams stick around, they'll get all that money? So if it's a waiting game almost at this point, like, all right, if we just hang out, we'll be able to collect everybody's $76 million, and does everybody have to pay $76 million to get out of the contract?

That's the shit that we've got to dive into over the weekend and maybe figure out. College football is going to look mightily different. But that's not the only thing. Nick, you had a fact stat? No, I was going to throw a suggestion. If you're talking super conferences, how far until you just maybe make another division?

Like you had Division I, then you had Division IAA or FCS or whatever it is. Take all these elite teams, these teams everyone wants to see, and make a division of their own, their own tier. He wants to do what the Euros did. Super League. You have Capital One get involved? Absolutely. Yeah, they don't have to earn their way into the playoff.

We'll just have the playoff every single week. Boom. Boom. It's actually, we'll call it the Division I championship, and then Division I, how you doing? Put 25 to 30 teams in there and let them play each other all season long. Yeah, and that would go against everything the old school college has. In West Virginia, whenever I got to school,

I don't think would have been invited into that D1, and then we would have went on a run, just like in the March Madness when a mid-major goes. I think that is why whenever you open up the playoff, that is like the exciting thing that maybe some team that you never expected gets in there and inevitably probably loses by 50 to 60. Sure, at least. Maybe to 70, depending upon who they run.

But if they just start creating different divisions, how do they then not just – because some company would just have enough money and they'll just pay for these schools and then now all of a sudden we have professional college football yeah because if you get a couple schools you got everybody basically yeah do you think like everything could change from this this is so dramatic we were acting so dramatic because this is a big deal we've seen this in every other walk of sport, basically, where people are making decisions more so for the moment. What can we do? And seizing an opportunity than they used to in the past.

We got a couple of years. We kind of sit on that. Now it's like, no, we'll pay that now. Let's get out of here because we can see that it could be awesome right now. This could be awesome right now. It seems like people that normally are very future thinking or or high-level-thinking individuals, like people that would be making the decision to just opt out of the conference that you are the champion of and you represent basically to the whole world

and just going elsewhere and paying the money for it, that's only going to lead to more because if Texas does it and Oklahoma does it, who knows who else is potentially going to think about doing it. There's a lot. There's a lot that could happen because of this. Yeah, for sure. I mean, and like you like you were saying i mean i don't know about the the pack 12 like that might be dead they might have to absorb like the mountain west but who's i mean usc what if they're just like ah fuck it we won't be in the big 10 we're done

with the big we're done with the big 12 and that athletic director over there by the way he's a mover and a shaker oh yeah big uh bone right big bone yeah big bone yeah dick bone i believe dick's own p bone maybe dick bone dick i think it's dick bone i think his name is dick bone i played catch with him yeah close mike bone right there it's okay okay mike bone good guy mike bone was good guy he's throwing seeds to you hey you say all the It's okay. B-O-H-N. I and a... B-O-H-N. Okay, Mike Bone. Good guy. Mike Bone was a good guy. He keeps throwing seeds to you. Hey, you say all-league clipboard quarterback.

Yeah. Oh, he's got an arm. Yeah, he could throw. He could spin it a little bit. He said he thought whenever he was at Cincinnati that he had one of the best balls maybe as an athletic director across the country. Whoa. He could spin it.

We were playing catch. They were very nice, by the way. He was all about whatever you need to win like that is why uh old fickle loved him so much he was whatever you need to win here and then that propelled cincinnati into going like almost undefeated a year or two and then all of a sudden he's at usc i don't know if you know new stripes can change the animal or not sure i don't know if the new uniform could change the bone but i know inside the bone is like hey let's go play and let's go win because i think even when the pac-12 was thinking about suspending the season or whatever mike bone very

new in there was like nah that ain't happening no way hey we are so i think if like usc gets a little bit greedy and by greedy i mean like looking out for themselves, which probably should do now that you see what could potentially happen. They might be looking to get out of the Pac-12 because there's a lot of stadiums. Pac-12 is awesome, okay? I'm not saying that there isn't awesome situations in the Pac-12, but I'm just saying as a whole, normally the thought is, okay, there's no fans. They were going to suspend the season. There wasn't much backlash at all.

It almost feels like, and this is just strictly from a football world, the Pac-12 is the bottom of the Power Fives. Well, even a couple of the teams were flirting around with like, hey, we might have to get rid of that. Remember, we went to Stanford, and it was a Thursday night game. I can't remember who it was against. Maybe UCLA. I mean, it was a decent Pac-12 game.

Beautiful night, and there were like 14 people in the stadium. Legitimately 14 people. And then last year, Utah, they're one of the best teams in the Pac-12. They were saying their athletic department couldn't operate during COVID. They couldn't pay anyone. They were talking about having, I mean, if there are troubled waters out there, they might, yeah, USC and Oregon just being like, all right, fuck it, let's get out of here. Where are we on?

Where's Oregon going? Big 10? Why not? I hope not. That trial would be worse than West Virginia's to the Big 12. Oregon, Big 10, would it be? Oh, yeah. Oregon's way over there.

Way up there. Very far. Can we get a map up here? Can we get the Big 12 map back up here? This is saying TCU, Baylor, and Texas Tech have reached out to the Pac-12. That makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah, TCU is not going to go to the SEC, right?

No way. Baylor has reached out. Baylor, by the way. So that means Pac-12 would be a buyer is what Gumpy's trying to say as opposed to a seller. Oregon's way down yonder, huh? Yeah, way up up there top left oh yeah so that'd be a hell of a hike uh yeah it'd be quite a hike but they're gonna be a hike

wherever but organ needs the pac-12 then to stick around because if not they're gonna have to travel unless unless the big 10 decides to make like a bracket where they pluck and pluck and they have like a two division see i feel like the big 10 is going to hold out they're going to do whatever they can to just wait until they can try to get notre dame he has brought in nebraska right then yeah that's the most recent is nebraska nebraska and then ruckers in maryland yeah you guys brought in ruckers out of the big east and i don't think you wanted us what's that all about i don't know were being good. I know they wanted the New York market. Yeah, we don't have that.

No, no, no. I think Kansas has reached out to Big Ten already to try to get in there. What's Rock Chalk J-Hawk? They still got a basketball team? Oh, yeah. Very good basketball team. This year, apparently, there's going to be the one. So are they all making the calls right now? I would assume so. For this upcoming season, though? Before school starts,

these people are all trying to change it. See I thought Texas and Oklahoma was, since the schedule's already set that it had to be next season, right? Yeah, it would have to be, right? Unless this upcoming basketball season it starts. But I'm saying for football, which we care about. Yeah, but then after that there's a spring season of something probably.

Oh yeah, baseball and soccer, field hockey. There's a bunch of shit. So when is the right time to move, I wonder? Is there a right? This is a big fucking decision. Summer when school's out. We're talking about it more than everybody else, I think, because there's so much other stuff going on in the world,

which we have to get to right now. Devontae Adams is not going to be a Packer after this year. Yikes. That might be incorrect, but all signs are indicating that davante adams and the packers were in great conversations about a negotiation for an extension with one year left on his contract as a green bay packer and now being talked about by everybody as top two wide receiver in the nfl not two is what everybody is saying about davontae Adams alongside Aaron Rodgers, whose future is obviously a massive question mark. Those two have to be tied together, though.

Aaron Rodgers has no idea what's going on with the Packers. The Packers have no idea what's going on with Aaron Rodgers. The Packers trying to negotiate with Devontae Adams. Who knows what the deal was? Somebody alluded to how the Packers normally make offers and what their offer probably looked like, as if it was maybe not as good as what Devontae was expecting Somebody alluded to how the Packers normally make offers and what their offer probably looked like, as if it was maybe not as good as what Devontae was expecting or could see elsewhere.

Devontae's people and the Packers have ceased that conversation. Trouble waters in Green Bay continue to pour in. Owner of the Green Bay Packers, Ty Schmidt. How's it going? You got A.J. Dillon still. Yeah. You got Big Bob Tanya. Jordan Love.

Offensive lineman. The defense is still pretty good. You can't be all down in the dumps, but, boy, it has to be an interesting feeling knowing that you could have maybe the number one and number one guy in two pretty pivotal positions. Pivotal positions? Two pivotal positions? You could have the number one guy? But it seems like because of maybe behind-the-scenes stuff,

you're probably out of that for the future of the Green Bay Packers. It's a shame, man. I love the Packers. It's a shame. Yeah, not going to have those two guys after next year, which it hurts. But, I mean what why would davante adams re-sign with the packers if he doesn't know if aaron rogers is going to be there never made sense just like whenever he was talking to derrick carr and uh like oh i love my best friend

and derrick was like oh he'd be great over here people like he's going uh he's gonna go to the raiders whenever he becomes a free agent then he had to address that he was uh i think he like was pretty nonchalant was like no and then people started talking about oh he's gonna stay with the packers and our first thought was he ain't gonna sign his thing if he doesn't know who the quarterback is right now that's not something he's gonna do that wouldn't be a smart money life everything decision for davante to do without knowing who the hell the quarterback's and from what we've seen he said he wants to and deserves to be paid like the top receiver in the nfl and said like the packers aren't willing to make him the top paid receiver in the nfl so it

doesn't like there's i mean that that's kind of just the end of that right like there's no wiggle room there that's kind of the end of that yeah so i mean i don't know we'll we'll see my worry now is that if they really don't know if rogers is going to show up and like they're thinking like okay he actually might not show up, that they might fucking trade Devontae before the season starts. Because it's like, all right, well if we're going to lose him after the season anyway, we might as well try to recoup some of his value.

I didn't even think of that. That worries me quite a bit. Yeah, that should worry you. Because you trade him, then there's obviously no chance of that. Right. Now, Gunter Kuntz and Murphy are in a bed that they have created and the people that were there before them have created, okay? They have to do this.

But it is not a good position to be in, and I don't know how they get out of it. There's a lot of personal shit they've got to figure out as well as the professional stuff. I doubt it, though. I mean, hopefully they do, but there's not a lot of time. We have some big news for you yeah your favorite men's health care brand roman is now available at walmart roman's non-prescription products have got you covered

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They got hair supplements. Roman has everything to make you the best you possible. Visit your local Walmart store today and check out Roman's line of men, healthcare, products, all clinically tested to make you the best you possible. Joining all of us now in the attic in Ohio, college football national champion, Super Bowl champion, ladies and gentlemen, A.J. Hawk. Yeah! A.J., what up?

No. What's happening, man? How's the show going? The show's not bad. Darius Butler came on, and we talked about, you know, Cole Beasley, he and some others who have deleted tweets have kind of been the face of the NFL players and maybe even staff or anybody else. That's like we're being forced to take this vaccine and we are not happy about it. We are not happy about it.

Darius Butler is no longer in the NFL, but has a lot of friends in the NFL. He actually said that he put the tweet out about the forcing of a needle into an arm of a player after he got done FaceTiming with a 25-year-old who's in a league that he's probably mentored for a while. He was like, ah, they forced me to do this thing. The more memos and more protocols are coming out, the vaccine is going to have to happen for every player in the NFL. But Florio's come out and said, hey, there's one team that says, there's eight players that said, we ain't never going to do it.

Seven of them. One of them's kind of not worth a fuck, but seven of them, seven of them in regard is too good to be cut. We're staring down an inevitable situation here, I think, AJ. It is, this is not going to go away because the NFL is sinking their feet in more

to saying, no, everybody's going to get vaccinated. And then I think, and I might be wrong here, but this is just kind of like a psychology thing. I think that is then for the pillar players that are like, we're never going to do it. That might sink them in more too, right? I'm not 100% sure, but we might be staring down an interesting situation here. Oh, I mean, yeah, this is something that's never happened before in professional sports and hopefully we never have to deal with something like this again but i i mean it's a no-win situation wherever you are if you're an athlete if you're playing like

i mean i don't know yeah i don't know because football players play football that's what they specialize in that's what you would be an expert in so when you start diving into everything else like i where do you look for answer where do you you look for the truth? I have no clue, man. That's why I try to stay out of it. I don't feel passionate enough about anything really to argue with people, but especially in this situation, I do. Yeah. I mean, that's the right answer for you to give. It's the right answer that I have given numerous times, but there's a lot of people that are super passionate about this. And I think you would understand this. We're talking about as we were coming back in, I think the reason why some players were going to, and I tried to say this when I was talking

to Darius, like there's going to come names that are going to come out that are going to be not wanting to take the vac. I don't think they're anti-vaxxers by the way. I think, I don't think that's the case, but not wanting to take this particular shot yet that are going to surprise people maybe politically like everything i think there is each situation is legitimately its own situation oh situations are somewhat situational always situational especially in this situation and i was talking to them some guys you know your body is your tool if you're a professional athlete but some guys view it as like hey a full temple everything that goes inside of it is monitored weighed checked stripped everything is in there their body to work out this much you do this much there's so much science both

nutritional and physical science out there russell wilson has five people that work around him when he's on a peloton with a mask on there's so there's people out there that are the professional levels i think those guys are potentially going to be some of the guys that are like you're not shooting anything into me that and then what if their doctor or their nutritionist or their trainer is like no we don't know anything about that that would not mix well with blah blah whatever you got going on there's a chance that this could be a real fucking problem solves i hope not i hope not i hope we're all safe i hope we beat covid in the next day i hope we eliminate covid within the next day or two yeah get that d Yeah, get that D to C, us never.

You know what I mean? That's what I'm talking about. Get that Delta strain the hell out of here. That's what I'm thinking. That's what I'm thinking happens. Obviously, that's what I hope happens, but I don't think that's happening from what I've been told. I might be wrong, and we are going to stare down a Vax, non-Vax,

$70 million fine potentially for another billionaire thing. This is going to get wild. I mean, and these guys, do you think these numbers are going to to change at all like if there's seven or eight guys on that team and we know those guys aren't ever going to do it but if it's like that on a couple other teams like and they're like are these guys just going to decide in a week or two like if you're a bubble guy vaccinated now hey if you're a if you're a role player or a bubble guy i would imagine this will force you to get it real quick if you if you have been somebody that is holding out because the g GM even says

if we had to choose, we would choose a vaccinated player for the team. So what did the guy that's going to decide whether or not I work as an insurance salesman say? He said he would cut me if I was not vaccinated?

I'll fire you. Okay, yeah. Right now. Give me three of them. I'll fire you. Okay, yeah. Can I fire you? I'm scared for that. Yeah, right now. I'll give you three of them. Whatever. I'll take three. That's what happened yesterday. That's what happened yesterday.

But the ones that are the seven guys that are too good to be cut guys. What team? What team is that? Well, D-Butt said, I know what team it is. D-Butt said he knows because he's talked to a lot of guys around. You can start speculating on who it might be. But allegedly, the team that's in the city that we're currently in, the vaccination rate of the team is the lowest in the NFL, I think.

I think it's like one or two of the lowest in the NFL. That team is very good contenders. And if it's below 50%, you have to think they'd at least have some important players on there seven is a lot though in the game of nfl seven studs is a big deal especially if it's your quarterback i mean with when denver had to roll out uh kendall hinton or whatever the hell that guy's name was that was like embarrassing almost watch because it wasn't real football like if you don't have a quarterback you're absolutely screwed today they added that if you're unvaccinated and you miss a game because of it yeah your play bonus nothing games played bonuses nothing you don't get paid i don't think if you're sorry hey sorry about it where does that money go does it

go back towards the salary cap no that money goes to uh the foundation that they give from all of our fines where the fuck does that money go i mean you would think you would if you could find you could at least try to allocate where that money goes a little bit i mean you could thought you could vet it so guys can't take advantage of but yeah you would say that's what we've been fighting for for a long time like okay at least let us and then let us have it as a write off too because it's it's money that you were taking from us to donate but instead i don't think i mean i have been fined and i was not asked where i wanted the money to go and i did not write it off cfo phil might have tried because they take it out no they

take it out of your check so you would have to i think write a check to them to make it more legit to write it off yeah whatever the case the fine money where the fuck does it go this unpaid money for the non-vac where the hell was that go does that just stay with the company then does that stay with the team and is that probably go to the, that goes to the payment of the other team if they lose out on a game, $70 million. Probably. That's going to be a big deal. This is going to be a conversation that's not going to stop.

We could talk about this literally for the next two hours. We have Ian Rappaport joining us in five minutes. We might ask him about that, but there's some other NFL news we have to hit before we get with Rappsheet. some other NFL news we have to hit before we get with rap sheet. Ben Roethlisberger has come out on the record and stated that his camp is him, his wife, his trainer, and his agent. Ain't nobody talking to anybody. Now, we learned a lot about Ben because a member of his camp, him, told his testimony to a church on Zoom that immediately got released the next morning by Adam Schefter because somebody from within the house of the Lord on that Zoom decided to strip Ben of all of his privacy and ruin his life.

That was where we learned about Ben's forearms and everything of that nature. But this offseason, just a week ago, we learned that Ben was eating stricter than tom brady that ben roethlisberger knew his weight was a problem it's what he's focused on since the beginning of off season then we were told by brooke prior that he didn't make any drastic changes so now we're starting to wonder the shirt that ben wore to camp that said different written out on there in that jawline we could see is that just a fresh fade in a fresh cut beard? Does he not look different at all? Was that us just believing and buying into

the stricter diet than Tom Brady? Ben Roethlisberger spoke to the press afterwards. No, we don't have it. There it is. Now it's off. And we have it. There were reports coming out of my camp. And my camp is my wife, my agent, and my trainer. And I know that none of them talked to that person.

So I'm not really sure where that information came from. But like I said, naturally you do. You work on your diet. You work on exercise. And you have to do everything you can to get yourself ready to play this game at this age. And for this many years, you find ways to do it. But some things get exaggerated a little bit from golf analysts. So he didn't – hey, from the golf analysts, we didn't change –

To the shot, right? We didn't change anything, and I didn't talk. So that was just a – that was a troll breaking news. It's a shame, though, because I thought we were going to get a new banner. Are we getting – are we going to get the same old – Oh, no. Bopping Ben. That's fine.

I mean, he's a consistent Pro Bowl or two-time Super Bowl champion, three-time Super Bowl. I'd be fine with the same old Ben led the league in passing two years ago. Yeah, I'd take him. Okay, 11 wins straight. Sorry about 11-0. You'd take him. I mean, everyone forgets that last year he was coming off a Tommy John season,

did not have an offseason. Ben's got a full normal offseason. But nobody really had an offseason. He might have had a better offseason than everybody because he actually had doctors around him in the quarantine. He couldn't throw, though. No, Tommy John couldn't throw. I thought I saw him on a basketball court.

And he was on a plane. No. Wasn't he throwing a towel at some point? That was Jameis. Yeah. I'm sure. I thought they all do that, every quarterback. Yeah, yeah, it's easy because it takes a little strain off your arms

a little bit less. You've still got to get through it because the towel won't pow if you don't. The towel won't pow if you don't. Because if you just accent, it won't pow. But if you throw it, that thing will pow. You know what I mean? Pow. You got to snap it, right? You got to get that snap. Pow. Yeah, because

it doesn't really... You were one of those guys, weren't you? Oh, wow. Never. But you were. You definitely, you were. Yeah, you definitely, you had the old Sandusky snap up at it.

Oh, so I didn't play any of the locker room games in any of the sports that I played. AJ has an actual name for the move that he has.

I didn't know that. Yeah, he just called it the Sandusky flop. I mean, honestly, I just came up with that as you

were. Oh, yeah. Okay, pal. I think I'm snapping dudes. What am I in seventh

grade? I'm snapping dudes. Were you in seventh grade? Were'm snapping dudes? What am I, in seventh grade? I'm snapping dudes with a towel? Were you in seventh grade? Were you doing that? Because if you're doing it in seventh grade, I believe you were probably doing it as an adult. Carry on, yeah. And if you weren't doing it, General Bob was definitely snapping butt cheeks in the locker room. General Bob.

I cannot speak for Bob. I cannot speak for his shenanigans. But, no, I didn't take open showers in seventh grade, so I couldn't be snapping towels. Oh, okay. Respect. I saw one of those lead to quite an interesting physical. Is that right? A naked fight?

Yeah. I've seen numerous naked fights. Too many to, I mean, just, it's unbelievable. I walk out. You've got to back out when that happens. I'm not getting in between it is and I think Pat Anger

came on and told the story oh yeah Pat Anger and Dwayne Allen got into it one time and the way Pat Anger

tells it is he was on the wrong end of that whole thing but I think he was trying to get an arm bar he said or something but it was a that was an awesome one because that was one of the only fights I've ever seen that immediately upon it ending, by the way,

immediately upon it ending with people trying to help break it up, but kind of. I mean, there's arms flying and there's just body parts everywhere. They laughed about it immediately afterwards because everybody just started dying. Like, are you two fucking kidding me right now? It was a... Ian Rappaport just called me. Oh, no. Rap sheet.

Is he on? Ladies and gentlemen, joining us now, he might have more stories of naked fights. Oh. But the towel whip is definitely something that started one or two that I have seen in my life. Those are not my shenanigans, but if it is your shenanigans, you know that fisticuffs could follow immediately.

Joining us is a man who probably has never done any of the things that we just spoke about because all he does is get the information we need to know. From the NFL Network and NFL.com, the host of The Canceled Show, Rapsheet and Friends, ladies and gentlemen, Ian Rappaport. Rapsheet, what up, dude? Hang on a second. the host of the cancelled show, Rap Sheet and Friends, ladies and gentlemen, Ian Rapoport. Ian Rapoport! Rap Sheet, what up, dude? Hang on a second. Are you trying to tell me that you think that I've never had a naked locker room fight?

Huh. Yeah. That would actually be true. Yeah! I didn't want to judge you too much, but I feel like I got a pretty good read on you at this point. Like pretty good. I feel like I know where you're sitting on most cases, but let's dive into these things because I know you have a very busy day and it's only getting busier with every

protocol that the NFL sends out about the money in life that the players are going to lose that aren't vaccinated. Is there any end in sight for this? Florio said or put out a tweet that there's seven good players, two good-to-be-cut players on one team that say they're never going to get vaccinated. I just talked to Darius Butler, who has friends in a lot of locker rooms, and he said, hey, there's a lot of good players right now that are saying no. This is going to be a standoff, isn't it? Does the NFL understand that and expect that, you think?

Yeah, i would echo that by the way like there are some superstars who are saying as of now they are not going to get vaccinated could that change you know possibly i think what's going to be interesting guys is you get to training camp and you see the unbelievably different life that players are going to lead who are vaccinated compared to unvaccinated. Like players like to go away during the bye week. They like to go sometimes to tropical places or whatever it is. They're not going to be able to do that if they're unvaccinated. Like those sorts of life things, we'll see if those change minds.

But, you know, look, I think the NFL, me, a lot of people would like everyone to get vaccinated for a lot of different reasons. But everyone doesn't have to get vaccinated. There can be star players who are unvaccinated. The point is you have enough, you know, you have sort of the herd immunity of the NFL where you have 85 percent of the players, enough players who are vaccinated to where even if someone a star who's unvaccinated gets it it wouldn't spread in a way that would negatively affect the team i think that is sort of what the goal is it's not i don't i don't know if anyone believes 100 that every single player is going to get vaccinated you just need enough so if if they do have 85 i know that that has been thrown

out there do the unvaccinated players still have to follow all the same protocols and masks and social distance? Okay. Yeah. And then like forever, you know, it's, it's uncomfortable. Like it's really like masks and,

you know, you have to socially distance and meetings and like, you can't see family members on the road. you know, where you you're flying accommodations are drastically different. It's life will be very hard for unvaccinated players. And that's the goal, right? The NFL's goal was to get everybody vaccinated by making the life absolutely miserable for whatever reason.

And that's because they don't want any, there should be no reason a game should be moved or a game should be missed. Is that what the NFL is thinking? And if it's because of our own decisions happening in our own buildings, we are going to make people pay for that. Is that what it is? And when did they come to this decision? Was it after the date where guys could opt out and make money for the season, $350,000 on purpose?

Or did the guys know that these protocols were probably going to be coming whenever they opted in to the season? Well, it is the NFL and the NFLPA working on a lot of this together. Now, what came yesterday was from the NFL, but the NFLPA came out and said late last night that a lot of these things that were in the memo yesterday were actually on the books last year. You know, like if you, let's say you miss a game because you have COVID or you're on the COVID list, you don't get your per-game roster bonus.

That was on the books from last year. Now there's some things that changed. A forfeit possibly being in play. Obviously that changed. The inability to add a 19th week, you know, obviously was sort of the news yesterday. But a lot of this stuff was on the books last year. It's not like it has drastically changed.

It's just it kind of came up again because I think you do have players who are saying, I don't want to get vaccinated. Why are you forcing me? And then they see the rules and they're like, you're not forcing me, but you're coming very close. And to me, it's sort of like, you know, no one has to get forced to do anything, but if you're not going to get vaccinated, you have to understand the reality that has set in, like people could do what they want, the nfl also and the nflpa together can also do what it wants as well ian what about something i think that you're the one that broke this that reported it earlier that uh davante adams and the packers that talks are dead basically did something happen to hold them up and do you see them like is this going to drag on

it's going to drag on and i actually don't know when talks will be restarted and that's what's kind of interesting here uh is that the davante adams bobble that's aaron rogers i figured this is the reason why that stopped i thought that too but that is actually not the case i in my head like i knew they were having talks but i didn't know how serious they got because i thought Devontae wouldn't commit to the Packers until he knew about Rodgers, but they were having serious negotiations without knowing Aaron Rodgers' status. The problem is Devontae Adams wants to be, and probably should be, the number one paid receiver in the NFL. This guy should just host the show, by the way. Number

one receiver in the NFL, and the Packers are not willing to give him what DeAndre Hopkins got based on new money um so they broke off talks Monday everyone kind of waited to see if they would restart they have not there's no end in sight so those two sides are basically nowhere so does that mean that you're assuming or under the thought that this is the last season for Devontae and he's going to go to free agency? Is it like did it end bad, you think? Or is there like I want this, we're not going to give you this, there's no deal ever in sight? Because I think the way I read it was, okay,

so he doesn't know if Aaron's going to be there and he's going to be a free agent. They won't pay him that. Somebody will. If Aaron was there, wouldn't he more likely be like, okay, I'll take a little bit of a discount if I know that the MVP of the NFL is going to be there? Does it feel as if, in the way you tweeted, it sounded like it felt that way,

but there's a lot of people kind of counter-arguing that. You think Devontae Adams and the Packers are going to split, huh? You feel, yeah? I didn't think so. If you asked me two days ago, I would have said absolutely not. Now, I honestly don't know because they could franchise him next year, but the number's really high. It's like $20 million or something.

So, you know, what the Packers have done sometimes is they waited the guys to get free right up against free agency. They did it with Aaron Jones this year and then strike a deal. Sam Shields, I think, got kind of a similar deal. The Packers have waited, waited, waited, and then done deals. They also will negotiate through the season as what happened with uh bakhtiari this year so i wouldn't say it's like over over over um but him becoming a free agent is way more viable and realistic now than i ever thought i'm

like i was actually really surprised by this news i will say that okay let's dive into the last little piece of information here that could be breaking news or consider breaking news from you michael thomas is getting surgery on his ankle he's expected to miss time didn't he have an ankle injury last year did he get surgery in the off season did they push this surgery off because now no drew breeze they had to lose like six people on the defensive side due to the salary cap michael thomas is out to start the season and they don't have a quarterback what What the hell is going on down in New Orleans? John Payton is a great coach and we will potentially find out this year. So here's what we know about Michael Thomas. The plan was for him to have a minor ankle cleanup right after

the season. What I found out actually late last night was that in June he had a major ankle surgery. So it was to repair torn ligaments in his ankle, about a four-month recovery. So what you're looking at is missing the first several weeks of the season, maybe it would be five, six, seven, something like that, if everything goes well. So either he put it off, put it off, and had surgery in June, or he's had two surgeries. One was early and the other was in June. I know he needed the surgery. So this was not a decision from Michael Thomas. Like it, he had to have it. The timing is unfortunate, but he had to have it. You know, you hope he comes back stronger, but this is absolutely going to test the Saints and Sean

Payton and Jameis or whoever the quarterback is like really just a difficult situation in New Orleans yeah he's top five player and top five wide receiver and everybody's conversation Michael Thomas down there and I've seen a couple situations like this before where somebody's had to correct a surgery after getting one in rehab maybe wasn't going exactly how they thought it would be at this time and then you find a time where you're like if we don't go now we're never going to get anything. Pretty unfortunate. Maybe we'll learn more as it goes on. Although HIPAA violations are a real son of a bitch.

Go ahead, Connor. Yeah, Ravshi, the Browns are reporting that they're going to extend Chubb and Denzel Ward before Baker. Is Baker's deal going to be closer to the 30 mark where Wentz is, or is it going to be as high as a a lamar jackson it's hard for me to well first of all i i believe that is the case that the browns are looking at potential extensions for chubb and ward now before baker makes sense you know i i don't think they have anything to decide on baker but more information is not bad like i think it's okay to do the extension next year as opposed to this year. I don't see any quarterback taking the $30 million extension. So to me,

Dak signs for $40 million. My guess is that Lamar and Josh Allen both come in over $40 million. So if you're Baker and you wait a year, and let's say the Browns go deep into the playoffs again, last year was a good season for Cleveland. He's going to be asking for the same. So we're probably talking in the low 40s if he gets an extension. It's a lot of money, but as I always say, like, it's the only thing worse than having to pay your quarterback. Like, $40 million is literally not having a quarterback to pay. That's probably the worst-case scenario.

Yeah, I think so. Or pay your quarterback, and then the coach and the quarterback hate each other just a year later, and you've got to ship them off to Detroit. That's not fantastic. Go off to Detroit. Not fantastic. Go ahead, Ty. Wrap sheet. Going back to Devontae Adams, is there any chance you think the Packers trade him maybe midseason

or at some point because they know they're probably not getting Rodgers back, so there's a good chance they're not going to get him back anyway so they can recoup some of his value? In any other situation, I would say that actually would make a lot of sense. If you're the Packers, and let's just say, like, let's say that Aaron Rodgers plays this season for the Green Bay Packers. That's what we think. We don't know, but that's what we think. Well, then they're going for it, right? You're going to try to win a Super Bowl. You'll figure out what happens after the season, after the season, and whatever. Well, you're not going to

trade your best receiver mid-season. You're just going to ride it out. You're going to go for it. You're going to hope you get it. And then if you're facing a massive rebuild without your top quarterback and top receiver, like, that sucks. But, you know, maybe you'll have a Super Bowl kind of in the background to help you deal with it. So I think this year, if this is the last year in Green Bay

with the whole band together, then I think they really are going to go for it and load up as opposed to kind of unloading first. They don't do that. Yeah, they don't do that. That's not what they do at all. Big Ben Roethlisberger has lied to us. He didn't change his diet. What's that all about?

You don't think he looks different? Yeah, I think he looks good. It might be a good haircut. And whenever I looked at him for the first time, I was in the mindset that he changed his diet to be better than Tom Brady's, which is remarkable. I thought I found that to be absolutely befuddling, but he did it.

And then he just said, nah, I didn't do anything. What are we talking about here? Sam Ben Roethlisberger's back. I mean, I actually looked up online. I heard earlier in the offseason that Roethlisberger changed his diet. And I looked up online, and there were four different times over the last, like, 15 years that there had been Roethlisberger changes diet and i looked up online and there were four different times over the last like 15 years that there had been roethlisberger changing diet stories so i'm like yeah i'll just leave that alone oh ian come on i'm sorry i mean i'm he looks great

i'm happy for him i like ben but what's next for you i mean you know i tell you what one of my friends texted me after seeing the picture brady should walk into training camp with a shirt that just says, same. Whoa. That would be quite a dunk on Ben. That'd be quite a dunk. Here's what I'll say about Ben, though, in all seriousness. I thought last year he looked not obviously great at the end of the year, but a year from surgery, really major surgery,

I think this year will be better. And the Steelers should be a really good team anyway. I think he's going to have a better physical year this year than last year just because he's a year removed from that major surgery. Diet-wise, I don't know. The guy looks good if you're into big dudes. But I think he's going to have a good year regardless. Yeah, I mean, that's going to be a tough division.

We'll see how it goes. Can't thank you enough. Good luck on TV. We'll watch with bated breath for the news you're about to break inevitably immediately upon getting off the show. Ladies and gentlemen, host of the canceled show, Rap Cheating Friends, Ian Rapoport. Thank you, Ian.

You deserve it. Have a great weekend, dude. A couple quick things before I got to bounce out here, AJ. The ticker alluded to it earlier, but this is a big deal. Huge. Massive. Huge. The Seattle Kraken kicked

down the NHL's door just a couple nights ago with Chris Fowler, Marshawn Lynch, Sean Kemp and the boys. Hell yeah. And created a whole new team they stole Tanev from Pittsburgh Penguins obviously just months after me falling

in love with him because he was the fastest guy we fucking had he's gone he's there hello to the Kraken is what everybody was saying hello to the Kraken Washington football team there was a lot of conversations about them changing their name is that going to happen this is absurd a franchise changes its name this far into an operation, into an organization, into a

legacy and everything like that. But for the betterment of everybody's happiness, have to do it. Nobody ever expects it to happen, but this is a massive ordeal. And the Washington football team knows that it's a big decision and knows that people are going to get pissed off regardless of what they call their team with that being said in the city that I'm about to hop on a plane and fly to literally in 30 minutes or so hop on a bird fly over to this city what once was known as a baseball team from Cleveland and Chief Wahoo, they are now the Cleveland Guardians. Wow. Let's go, Guardians.

Let's go, Guardians. We got the Guardians of the Galaxy. They fucking hold it down. Hell yeah. Got two Guardians on a bridge. It goes into Cleveland. They always hold it down. Now the Cleveland Guardians about to take the diamond by storm.

When the Guardians show up, they're going to get after it. They're going to hold it down. As Ohioan, AJ, how do you feel about the Guardians name? This came out of nowhere. I don't even think they did a focus group sample thing. The double G's around the ball.

Hey, this is the two-seam fastball coming right at your fucking face. It's Guardians. It's Guardians. We're coming at you, man. I mean, it is wild that this is real. This just happened. Yeah. And this is what Cleveland's probably very pumped up about going into tonight's SmackDown for sure.

Hey, but okay, so why do they do it in the middle of the season? Baseball still has plenty of months to go, right? They found the right answer. Yeah. Are they still going to start wearing these uniforms? Yes! Have to. No, this is for the 2022 season.

So they will remain. Actually, I don't know name-wise. I think they will remain the Cleveland Indians for the rest of this year. And Chief Wahoo. Yeah, and then starting next year, Cleveland Guardians. Hey, is Chief Wahoo going to get a Jeter-like salute? I hope. He better. I want to see hat tips all around the parks.

Yeah. Hell of a run. Now the Guardians are coming in and fucking clean house. Obviously, the Cleveland Guardians are in the AL. AL. And that means they have to play against the... Not the Pirates until the World Series. That's what I've been saying. Bo Sox.

We'll run into them in the World Series. But if they get past the Boston Red Sox... Oh, yeah. Guardians was a wild name. Wild. But once they... You know, a lot of Cleveland bloggers started tweeting at me and telling me that... Actually, Guardians are on the bridge that goes right over the stadium.

Yeah, okay. Pretty sweet. Pretty sweet. are they gonna have that like go right up from the belt buckle straight up you know what i mean yeah see pretty cool it looked like a blue origin you know what i mean yeah kind of yeah yeah i just think they do that whole thing like do the whole guardian thing right up from here right up up the happy trail. Right up to the chest. That would have been sweet. And the name Guardians is okay. The logo they decided to go with is fucking

as Mickey Mouse as it gets. You don't like baseball. No, no, no. Hey, look. The crowd. You know what the crowd's going to do?

Crowd's going to go like this in the stands. They're just going to hold up their hands like this. Fastball, fastball. Two-seamer, two-seamer. Hey, I say guardie, you say ins.

Guardie. Ins. Guardie. Ins. Yeah, Cleveland, are you with me? Speaking of sleeping, I'm not sure if this guy did a lot of that last night. He was in the trenches. Ladies and gentlemen, nine-year NFL vet,

host of the Man to Man podcast and everything DB. Ladies and gentlemen, Darius Buckley. Hey, fellas. What are you? You just called like the dumbest dude on earth yesterday. Oh, you don't even know what you're doing. I was smart. I woke up yesterday smart.

By about 10 p.m., I had CTE. i was just stupid i'm an egg type vaccine all these different things man it was wow wow last night i saw your tweet and as soon as i saw you put it out uh the nfl is dead ass wrong with that new memo they sent out to teams today what's new though basically forcing these needles in the players arms at this point every player personnel should have an actual choice in the matter they are sending a clear message today darius butler played in the nfl for nine years has a lot of friends that are still in the nfl a good representation of the people that come from the nfl darius butler one of the smartest players to ever play very accomplished while respected by everybody he's ever been in a locker room with whenever you say what you just said

you're reiterating something that it's not just darius butler's thoughts been in a locker room with. Whenever you say what you just said, you're reiterating something that it's not just Darius Butler's thoughts. There's a lot of people in the NFL that are feeling this way. And I think the biggest thing about this is there's people that I've seen on the internet that are as far right as possible that say these vaccines are going to kill you.

Then there's people as far left as possible that I've seen politically say, I'm not going to kill you. Then there's people as far left as possible that I've seen politically say, I'm not going to be the research experiment for these things. This is not like a political thing. There is no one way or the other way. It seems like everybody's kind of running their own race in this thing. But you saw a lot of heat, which we knew was going to happen, because this is something that we haven't had to experience.

How does this get figured out? And do you think, just like I do, the NFL is only going to happen because this is something that we haven't had to experience. How does this get figured out? And do you think, just like I do, the NFL is only going to push up those things even more? And you're just going to be, hey, you're either getting it or you're getting the hell out. Yeah, I mean, they pretty much made the stands where it's kind of get down to lay down. And, you know, I stepped in the hornet's nest, obviously, but that's how a lot of players feel. And I got reached out to by a lot of players, you know, like, damn, you know, really appreciate you speaking up. You know, we're having these conversations in the locker rooms. You know, the Colts being one team, you know, they're one of the least vaccinated teams in the league.

And once again, I'm not telling everybody not to get the vaccine. Like, that's literally your choice. I got close friends, family members who have it. um you know obviously i'm team science i'm team safety i want the science to play out i'm just not comfortable getting it yet and i'm and it's a lot of other people who feel that way especially a community of people who are young and extremely healthy so when i'm talking to guys umTiming 25, 26-year-olds who are already making certain sacrifices when it's going into the season, they're already living their life differently with the experience of last season,

you're a professional athlete. You're going to put yourself in the best position possible to perform. You can still catch it, you know, being careful and all that, obviously. But these people, and now you're being, like, literally bullied into, like, getting the shot that you don't want to get yet, like, I don't feel like that's right, and that's my personal opinion, a lot of people feel that way, and a lot of people feel like, hey, you're an idiot, just trust the science, just trust the doctors, the top scientists in the world, they all came together, they came up with it, they've been studying this for decades,

which is all true, but these are the first trials in human in and it's just one and I honestly I didn't mind it yesterday I didn't mind a lot of it a lot of it was dialogue I think should be have Should be had more on a public platform and I think you're here because people are afraid to speak out about people afraid to get Cancelled perfected do whatever. You know, I don't really give a fuck but Hopefully it plays out everybody when we get over this. We've all been affected by it. And once again, I'm team science.

I'm team vaccine. I hope it works. But if you look at the timeline of every vaccine, every pandemic or epidemic, like where are we in this timeline with COVID? And that's why some people aren't as comfortable as others to getting, you know, getting a shot. And that's cool. You get the shot. I'm not trying to convince you otherwise, but I just don't think you should attack people and cyber bully people when they speak their opinion. But, you know, it's part of it. And, you know, it is what it is. That's the Internet, basically, in a nutshell. Anytime you say something that resonates with a lot of people, which I think like everybody was attacking Cole Beasley, right? Cole Beasley was getting attacked heavily.

Cole Beasley, Cole Beasley, Cole Beasley, this, Cole Beasley, that. And I'm like, I'm thinking to myself, I send a text to somebody in another locker room and then a text to somebody else in another locker room and somebody else. I'm like, hey, you guys got any people in your locker room that feel the same way way as cole they're like do we yes they're like do we i'm like yeah okay so then uh i started thinking then i started sending out more messages i was like hey who are they who are the players that that are again they're like hey pat it spans it's people from uh and it's just like the nfl by the way the nfl is a melting. And what I realize is it's not who a lot of people think or potentially. It's not a lot.

There's a lot of like, oh, that even. There was one stat that came out that said. It's coaches. It's, you know. Big names. People you would never expect to be like, hey, I know, you know, owner, GM. I know you want everybody to get it. But, you know, guys that aren't even that high on the totem pole.

But, nah, like I draw a strict line, a strong line here, and that's, you know, that's cool, it's, you know, it's a medical decision, like, and I feel like up until this point, that's always been cool, it's always been okay to take, you know, to, you know, go through your own process or whatever that is, but now it's like, hey, and I understand it from the point, from the standpoint of, hey, you're being selfish, and there's others you know and it takes all of us like i get that part of it but um the science is still you know you know we we're not sure how you know vaccinated has still been impacted in certain ways unvaccinated are so it's still a lot of things that are playing out i know a lot of people feel like they have the answers but honestly two years from now we'll have a lot more answers than we have today and regardless of what side of the fence you're on and um you know that's that's just a part of it

but um that's the interesting thing though whenever you said regardless of the side of the fence you're on like i think a lot of people are normally staring through a fence at somebody on the other side having to potentially be standing next to him on what the fuck are you doing why do you you're like it has been fascinating for me to learn who is for and who it is very much in individuals like very we'll never know we'll never know truly who because a lot of people probably on tv who feel like they have to say things or they're afraid to say things because of the attack that'll come with it and it's a lot of players who will never speak out publicly because you don't want to be a distraction in the locker room. You don't want to be a bad team. You're going into a season.

Obviously, everybody's trying to win a championship and things along those lines. But and then if you're in that locker room, like how do you I kind of remember it's kind of some feelings of like 2017 with like, you know, some guys were kneeling. Some guys weren't. It was guys like, dang, like, you know, how, how is that balanced? You know, what's right, what's wrong? What sacrifice am I going to make for my family? Am I going to, you know, so it's, it's a lot of, it's a tough spot to be in as a player. It's a tough spot to be in if you're in the public eye, because you know, your opinion does have reach. And I, like I said, and I want to, you know,

make that crystal clear as well. I'm not on here using my platform saying don't get vaccinated. Don't trust the science. Don't do this. I'm all for the vaccine. I have close, close friends, family members who are vaccinated. And I am team science. I'm team vaccine.

I want it to work. I want it to be right. But I also respect others' opinions that say, hey, you know what? I'm just not ready. I'm not comfortable with it right now. Yeah, it's a wild time to be alive. And we will talk about this not just two years, five years, ten years from now. And I think I am very much a person like, oh, yeah, do you.

You know, I'm like a big do you guy. I'm a big, hey, do you. I don't know your world, why you want to feel that way. I obviously, you know, getting back into arenas had happened and there's obvious positives that come from that, but then every day it feels like we're learning about different stuff as well.

Who knows what this is going to look like a week from now, two weeks from now, but I appreciate you going out and saying, listen, this is how some people feel because there's normally a time where people feel that way. They will not come out and say it. You definitely ate some bullets yesterday, though. I was thinking, but it was literally right after one of my guys FaceTimed me, like, with the Band-Aid.

Like, bro, they got me. They got me. Like, you know, he's 25. He's been tested, you know, all greens. Never got it. Wears his mask, does all these things, and, you know, he's 25. He's been tested, you know, all greens. Never got it. Wears his mask, does all these things, and, you know, he's got it. And it didn't make sense to me from this standpoint. Even the NFL, you had a.08 positive test rate last year.

You didn't cancel a game. We got the entire season. We got the Super Bowl with no vaccines with the, you know, COVID running absolutely wild around the country, around the world. And then the following year with the vaccine, with other things in place, and now you're coming with these treatments. So it just didn't make sense from that standpoint either.

But, you know, it's the NFL. It's their private business. And, you know, you got a choice, guys. You can just say, you know, fuck you. I don't want to play football anymore. Well, DeAndre Hopkins put that tweet out and then deleted it. He said he doesn't know what his future is like. There was others that deleted tweets after saying things, I assume,

because the team reached out to him and said, hey, hey, hey, hey, let's calm it down here. We're going to figure this whole thing out. But one report came out and said that there was seven to eight, like, pillar players. Yeah, Florio says on Pro Football Talk, per source, one NFL team has eight players who refuse to ever get vaccinated. Seven of them.

So there's one of them that's, like, just hangs around. Seven of them are regarded as too good to be cut. So there's a team out there that the NFL is going to stare down, by the way. So we don't know who this team is. I got a very good idea of who that team is. Okay, so Darius knows who this team is. So if this team is a real team, though, the NFL is going to have to stare this team down then.

And this team is just going to stare. Because he says he refused to ever get vaccinated so these people these players heard that the team could potentially be fined seven million dollars they heard that they might have to do meetings from uh zoom call they might have to get tested every single day do the whole thing not be able to be at practice and they're like yeah that's cool with me i'm fucking doing it seven of them what team is you don't have to say the team, but that's a legit story. And is that happening in numerous places where there's a couple guys you think? It's happening.

And like I said, it's kind of similar to 2017. Like, you know, because typically, you know, a lot of, you got friends on all the teams, but a lot of locker rooms aren't really talking to each other, especially going into a season. But this is one of those things where it's like number one okay where the fuck is the nflpa on this and okay this is where they stand okay cool like let's talk about that and then we feel strongly about this over here uh who else who else is out there that feels this way we obviously can't send it out on twitter so now you gotta go gotta go through the back uh channels and get connected different and people having these conversations and lawyers are getting involved in things like that.

But it's just questions that people have. It's like, you know, because you saw, you know, it's just a lot of questions. It may get a little messy. It may not. You know, we know how these things go. Money talks at the end of the day and guys obviously want to play football. And the NFL is doing what they feel is right as far as a business standpoint. But these are like you said, these locker rooms like these are people and people have various uh feelings and thoughts and ideas when it comes to things like this so when you got a group of you know seven eight guys who are really your guys that dramatically changes things when you got a couple guys around the roster there to sprinkle because we know how the NFL works we

can just get that guy out of there. He's cut. But if it's the starting quarterbacks, you know, starting DBs, linemen, things along that line, like you can't go into the season without that. So it's some real concerns, and it's some real players and, you know, good teams that are involved, obviously. Well, and the thing, the leaders, the good players are the leaders. They kind of set the tone for everybody else too. So if there's seven of these... Pillars. Huh?

Pillars. Pillars, yeah. If there's seven pillars of your team, the younger guys see them and they're like, alright, so we are going to say fuck them. That's what we're going to do. That is a big deal. This is going to explode much like your timeline did yesterday. We appreciate you every time. I hope not you I hope not like that

yeah well that's the world though it's going to happen especially with this ladies and gentlemen Darius Butler thank you we miss you down here buddy see ya Bills Mafia is not going to be happy with those seven points that sucks that the Bills won't get vaxxed well I don't know if it's the Bills

but I do know that Old Bean came out after Cole Beasley was one of the faces of this thing, and he said, yeah, we will cut an unvaccinated player if it's going to affect our team over a vaccinated player or whatever. So now those quotes are coming out, those types of thinking. Buffalo Bills GM would cut unvaccinated player if it means operating like normal. Like, hey, Cole, everybody else did it. You're the only motherfucker. So I hate it. You've done

great work for us. You're going to have to go rap somewhere else, dude. The fuck out of here. We would like to have meetings again. We don't like it. Hey, we're all about your... And that is what Darius Butler was saying was, now, I don't want people to think that I'm out here promoting anything.

No way. The only thing I promote is, hey, you got to do what you got to do. I'm not a scientist. I'm not a doctor. I heard D-Butt say a couple times, I know the science says this and science says that. I don't even know that. I don't even know. I don't know what science says. I know there is some contradicting shit that has popped up in my timeline over the last 17 months or whatever.

So I don't really know what I don't dive deep enough. You do it. I did mine because it made everybody's life a lot easier. And I believed, OK, this one should help me out. Maybe that from what I read, this should help me out for going forward. This is good but then obviously there are some people who read into the weeds and especially professional athletes who care about their body so much everything that's going in and going out of their body they start reading researching they have their friends

research their doctors research their their trainers he said strength coaches people that like study the body look into this well it could do this it could do this and guys like i'm not doing that ever with my body my body is a goddamn uh what's that called temple temple yeah that's people there's players in a league a lot of people that are professional athletes that legitimately view their body as a temple but it's also their tool so i i thought early whenever the vaccinations came out i was like oh it's going to be fascinating to see what happens in the NFL. It's going to be very fascinating. And then as it's kind of rolled out here, hasn't been a big story.

Some teams had low percentages. And then up to yesterday, the NFL goes, bang, we ain't fucking around anymore. You're the dooner, you get the hell out of here. And there's going to be a lot of players that very much care about this passionately. This might be something that some players view as like a necessity to their life

because of how serious they treat their bodies. And for whatever reason, they have not been sold on them. I'm not going to ever tell those, be like, hey, you probably have done more research than I have to feel that way. But what the NFL is saying is like, hey, your whole life is a lot easier. Is that good for your body too if you do this?

And can you get them to sway or not? I don't know. We're running into a, just like the OTAs think, we're running into something here in the next couple of days. Big time standstill. And for Cole Beasley, sure. Standoff, yeah. Standoff, yeah.

If he gets cut or whatever, it doesn't seem like he's going to go to a different team and get the vaccine then. Do you think players are just going to retire and just be like, all right, fuck it, I'm done then? Yeah, will they take the year off because they all could have opted out and got that 350 000 they've all missed that though but this uh memo protocol thing didn't come till weeks after that so it's like well and even even then like yeah they take a

year off but is this next year are they going to change it or is it going to be the exact same thing and to his point of comparing that to 2017 i think what a lot of people outside the locker room didn't fully realize is the guys that maybe didn't kneel during the national anthem the way they were treated by their friends in their community and it's like i think that same thing will happen in this world for sure it's like oh you you let them oh okay okay okay like that is the type of you gotta remember the type of humans that are in the nfl and make it to the nfl that is the type I mean, there's a lot of mavericks that make it. And to be clear, whenever the entire world was telling me I have to do something, my entire life somebody tells me I have to do something,

there is about 100% chance I'm not doing it. You got to do this, you got to do this. I'm probably doing the complete opposite. Just naturally that my brain is wired that way. Like, oh, you got to do this, you got to do this, you got to do this. It's like I'm naturally wired that way like oh you gotta do this you gotta do this you gotta do this it's like i'm naturally gonna be like no i'm gonna do that i'm not fucking sorry i don't know why everybody thinks this and that's just i'm an asshole that's why i don't really want to have a kid because the kid's gonna have that as well and it's gonna be a nightmare but when the entire world was like there was commercials

every single where you need to do this i saw some some actor who's really good thespian telling me that if i didn't, I was going to kill people or whatever. And I was like, all right, see, I'm in it. I'm with it. But now that everybody is telling me to do something, I'm kind of a little bit more resistant. And then as I started reading about our business

and other businesses, we potentially do business with it. It was like, okay, I'll fucking get it. Let's go ahead and do that. But there's people that are going to naturally fight this just naturally their brains are wired to fight it because they're being told they have to do something you have to do something and they've seen that you don't actually uh there's been people that have proven that you don't it's going to be a big fucking deal though there's a bunch of people tweeting already deleting tweets rewording tweets the narrative of the tweet is i'm not happy I was forced to take this.

So if anything happens later, I mean, this is going to get sloppy. A tweet just came out from Daniel Kaplan. He's a sports business reporter for The Athletic. He said a vaccinated NFL player who is on COVID reserve will get his per game bonus if he has one. An unvaccinated player would not get the bonus if he's on. So here's even. I mean, there's just another another hook so sorry to interrupt but i want to let you know that if you're not gambling with fanduel you're wrong okay fanduel sportsbook is available in uh seven states i believe at this

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We'll see you guys on Monday. Thank you. សូវបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានវាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប� Bye. Thank you. so សូវាប់បានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបា you