The Pat McAfee Show - PMS 2.0 630 - Feel Good Friday LIVE From Jerry World, Kofi Kingston, Ian Rapoport, and AJ Hawk

Episode Date: April 1, 2022

Pat and the boys are LIVE from Jerry World in BEAUTIFUL Dallas, Texas for the most STUPENDOUS WrestleMania ever. Pat and the boys break dahn Bobby Wagner's new contract with the Rams, Dan Snyder & the Commanders' congressional probe problem turning financial, DK Metcalf's one meal & 3 bags of candy diet, and more. WWE Superstar Kofi Kingston joins the show (0:22.00-1:00.26) in the first hour and talks about growing up a WWE fan, his love for tossing pancakes with The New Day, bringing the WWE Championship back to Ghana, Big E's recent neck injury, and more.  In the 2nd hour, Pat and the boys find out the USA Men's team is facing Iran and England in the group stage of the Soccer Lombardi, and welcome AJ Hawk to break dahn Pat & Dude Perfect unveiling the WrestleMania Set and latest news in the NFL. Plus, Pat shares an INSANE video message Vince McMahon sent him last night. In the 3rd hour, Pat, AJ, and the boys break dahn a report that Ohio State Wide Receivers will go early in the NFL Draft and why it's unfair to compare them to NFL legends. Insider Ian Rapoport joins the show (1:52.58-2:19.27) to tell us why April Fool’s Day stinks, dispute rumors of an Arians Brady fallout, and report that the Brahns won’t get a 2nd rounder for Baker Mayfield. We wrap up with some Tone’s Tasty Tournament Talk. Use #PMSAustinTheoryStinks to send Pat a motivational quote on Twitter for a chance to win some cash. Make sure you subscribe to youtube.com/thepatmcafeeshow to watch the show. We appreciate the hell out of you. Cheers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Pat McAfee Show. There'll be no rules for our guests, for us, for the things we can talk about. Speaking his mind. I've never had a problem expressing my opinions or my thoughts or anything like that. While being relatable. I haven't had that manufactured fake-ass celebrity that a lot of people have whenever they go on those big networks. I've had a chance to really build my crew, build my following, build my audience. And ridiculous.

What am I supposed to do? So I'm supposed to look at something that I can definitely afford and say, nah. Is that what I'm supposed to do? The Pat McAfee Show starts in three, two, one. Hello, beautiful people. It is Wrestlemania

Friday, April 1st, 2022. Rabbit, rabbit, this sports show begins now. Can't thank you enough for joining us here on this glorious Friday. Feel good Friday at youtube.com forward slash the Pat McAfee show. I got a spray tan this morning. It is currently settling in. I had an opportunity last night to be a part of the big stage and set reveal for the most

stupendous WrestleMania of all time. I got to meet the Dude Perfect guys. Ooh, nice. It was nice to shake their hands. Let's go shake their hands. Good energy from them. Very positive. They threw a football really far.

Went into a hole. Pyro went off. All of a sudden, there was fireworks off the top of this stadium that we're currently in. It was magical. WrestleMania weekend has officially begun. All of a sudden, there was fireworks off the top of this stadium that we're currently in. It was magical. WrestleMania weekend has officially begun. Before we dive into all of that, there's a lot going on in the NFL. Two guys joining me live at AT&T Stadium here in Jerry World.

The nicest stadium I've ever been in my entire life. I'm going to say it. This thing's 13 years old. It looks like it was just created yesterday. The upkeep is second to none. The views are spectacular. And the inside of that thing, I got to be in there last night, obviously, for a little bit. This place is awesome.

We're very lucky to be here. Shout out to our folks at SeatGeek for making the connection. Shout out to Shane. You know, I just met Shane here for the Cowboys, and he kind of set this whole thing up. Good guy. This has been a dream come true this week. It's only going to get better. The two guys joining me at Boston Connor, at Nick Morata. Oh, Nick, you got an Undertaker shirt on, huh?

Hey, I bought it. For shoot, Pat, I'm fully marking out while we're here. It's WrestleMania week. I could not be more pumped. Thank you, Take. Love you, Take. What? Take's going into the Hall of Fame tonight.

Obviously, he's the headliner. That is after SmackDown, 8 o'clock Eastern on Fox, and then the Hall of Fame immediately after on the Cock. Hell yeah. Speaking of on the Cock, the boys that are on the clock are the Hammerdown boys who are always up to something. Obviously, the United States gets into the World Cup. We'll be seeing what group they are in.

But also, there is March Madness to be had the next few days, so that means we're going to have to take a trip to T4 Town. Tone Diggs, Bubba Gumpino, how are you boys doing back there? Feeling really, really, really well. It's a huge weekend for not only T4, but also the four teams that are

playing this weekend. What the fuck? Clear the pipes. Pat, I'm not sure if you know this or not, because you're in Dallas. We were 70 the day that you left. It was 25 and snowing this morning. Are you serious?

We got another winter back there? Yeah, the little weather changes got me there. I was not prepared for that. Wow, dude. I thought it was spring. What happened? I mean, the goddamn Pucks' Tony Phil. He tried to tell us, I guess.

That rat. That living in a hole, pop out once a year, deliver bad news rat. This is the fourth different fake spring, right? I mean, we've had four different fake springs right into winter. When's this one over? At least. I have no idea. I was also up until probably around 3 a.m. or so,

waiting for the set reveal to come out. I was on pins and needles all night. I'm not sure what was so, waiting for the set reveal to come out. You know, I was on Pins and Needles all night. I'm not sure what was taking so long for the set reveal, but when it did reveal, it was fucking awesome. It was. It was absolutely awesome. Yeah, I saw they, you know, they dropped it overnight. It was like a Taylor Swift, Beyonce-type album. Just kind of surprised.

Yeah, 3 a.m., actually. I think it was 3 a.m., 2 a.m., midnight drop. Midnight West Coast, of course. Yeah, just kidding. Exactly, obviously. Last night was an awesome night. It was a fun night. It was a.m. actually. I think it was 3 a.m., 2 a.m., midnight drop. Midnight West Coast, of course. Yeah, just kidding. Exactly, obviously. Last night was an awesome night. It was a fun night. It was a long night.

At Bubba Gumpino, how are we feeling gambling, pal? Soccer seems to be all the way back. How are you doing? This draw is huge today. I mean, any team can go anywhere. England, Canada, USA. It's a great day for footy. College basketball this weekend.

Final four, Duke, UNC. Great matchup. Kansas as well. I mean mean these are massive games this weekend all right so let's not give away too much there's also a free to play happening on fando i think you just have to be 18 years or older don't even have to be in a state where gambling is legalized and you can uh enter in to win ten thousand dollars worth of prizes whoa yeah you just gotta pick what's gonna happen at wrestlemania they're not allowed to say that because Fando is not an exclusive partner of WWE. And who knows if I'm even allowed to say that while describing this particular free-to-play. But somebody fucking come and get me.

Either side. Whoever wants to come get it, come. Free-to-play. Pin them, pick them. You just have to go through basically the entire card. Pick what you think is going to happen. My match is in there. You know.

Whoa. Hey, you want to win that thing? You know. Once the spray tan starts coming, oh, it's starting to cook a little orange down there. Damn it. Life is pretty good, man. All right, let's talk about what's going on in the NFL. Bobby Wagner. Immediately

upon this show ending yesterday, which always seems to be the case with awesome news, Bobby Wagner signs a five year, $50 million deal with the Los Angeles Rams. That's via Ian Rappaport, who will join us in the third hour today. $50 million contract that can be worth up to $65 million. After weeks of talking, Wagner lands back in the division as he wanted. Richard Sherman said yesterday, I believe, hey, look for some Wagner news to come.

And he ruled out the Niners, and he ruled out the Chargers. Yes. He was in L.A. He went and visited the Rams, and everybody's automatically assuming he's going to go to the Rams. But how will the Rams be able to afford Bobby Wagner? How will the Rams be able to have all the superstars that they have coming fresh out of a Super Bowl?

And, no, they haven't re-signed Odell Beckham Jr. yet, but he's got surgery. He's going to take his time. And I know that they lost Vaughn Miller to Buffalo because he got a six-year $120 million deal, which is like a three-year $60 or $50 million deal, whatever the case. How are they going to be able to continue to build,

continue to realign? But now they've got Aaron Donald on the D-line alongside some other freak shows who are very, very talented. Then you've got Bobby Wagner roaming at the linebacker position, and then Jalen Ramsey on the back end. Offense is still absolutely packed to the gills. That whole team's concept

of we hate young NFL players. Listen, if you're young, you might be great. We're pulling for you. We hope you make all the money in the world. You can cover a punt or two for us if you fucking need to, but we're going, you might be great. We're pulling for you. We hope you make all the money in the world. You can cover a punt or two for us if you fucking need to, but we're going to make sure this core is a bunch of dudes. And Bobby Wagner fits their team perfectly.

He'll be able to fly around. Good for the Rams, and I love when teams go all in. And this is another example of the Los Angeles Rams doing exactly what we had wished every other team would do. Yeah, there's 31 other teams. Usually I'd take a shot at the Colts now, like, hey, you have so much cap space. But, I mean, even the Patriots. It's like everybody should have probably had an offer in for Wagner.

And also the Rams losing Von Miller almost helping them a little bit because they got Allen Robinson, too. Freed up some cap. Yeah, freed up a little cap space, and they basically replaced him immediately. And, you know, Leonard Floyd's still on that defensive line, like you were saying. I mean, they're going to be unbelievable. I saw the boy, Will Compton. He cut a promo yesterday about the salary cap.

Excuse. Will, you and me, I think he's been in the NFL nine years. I don't know how many years he's been. Probably longer than me. I was in there for eight. Everything we were told was a lie, Will. Literally everything. Everything that every media person has told you for this entire time

to kind of cover for NFL teams for not spending money has been a lie now Tyreek Hill I guess debunks that Devante Adams I guess debunks that but they could have scripted or set up those contracts to be long term with kind of spread it out throughout there and be a 1 million 2 million dollar cap hit that is what the LA Rams have done that's what the Buccaneers have done that's what the Chiefs were able to do before they had to lose Tyreek Hill. At some point it'll catch up to them. And then when it does, by the way, they can just move the shell again. They can just kind of move the

shell game and just kind of keep it going if they really wanted to. So I don't know if the salary cap is a complete myth because there has been some cap casualties over the years. But with that being said, if a team wants a guy, they can make it happen. No questions asked. Just like old Bobby Wags goes to the Rams.

Tone Diggs, this is a big piece. I mean, did we expect him to go to the Rams? Did we expect him to get $50 million? I did not expect $50 million from Bobby Wags. I might have been wrong there. No, I didn't expect $50 million at all. I don't know how it was reported. I don't know if it was reported in the way it should report it

or if it was reported in the way that, you know, people like to sensationalize things. So it was not a $50 million deal, you're saying. It says it's worth up to $65 million. It was worth $50 million. So I thought they were covering it how, you know, the Pulitzer Prize winning journalists here at the Pat McAfee Show, this program, do cover contracts.

It could have been. I'm not sure to be exact. But I think it was Nick and I maybe when he became a free agent we were talking about it how these guys like these really good guys when this happens sometimes and it feels like it happens a lot they tend to stay in their division and they go to a club that they've respected and watched for years and years and years and then they're they that's where they want to go that's where they tend to go and i believe he's from la too but when you talk about like great defenses and i was just thinking about this like i grew up on sealers and ravens stuff like that like the sealers ravens always had a guy on the d line that's aaron donald for them and then they always had a guy

linebacker like ray lewis or james ferry or something like that so they got bobby wagner there and then they had ed roy ed reed Reed or Troy in the back. And then Rams have Jalen Ramsey. So when great defenses are built, it seems like they have a guy at every level when the Rams went out. They didn't have a guy, it seemed like, at linebacker. And they still won the championship Super Bowl last

year. So it feels like now they can get back to where they were two years ago, like the number one defense in the league potentially. Well, congrats to Bobby Wagner and the Rams. Way to go, Bob. And congrats to every other team that's just got to sit back and watch Russell Wilson congratulate Bobby Wagner.

You deserve it all, legend. As we always say, hey, what do we always say? Don't get bored with consistency. Love you forever, bro. By the way, don't get bored with consistency is such a good life motto, especially if you're in a high level job or whatever, because people get bored of doing the right thing. And then they start cooking up their own shit, start adding it. And I think I saw this, uh, I went into

a studio one time and it was, uh, somebody was recording some music or whatever. And there was this picture on the wall. I just, I believe I was on some vitamins and I shouldn't have been there. I was riding a coattail with somebody else. And there was a picture on the wall of this drummer, basically. And this drummer, he had his arms everywhere, right? Had his arms everywhere. They're like, great drummer. This is a drummer. And then the next picture was like, this is the drummer we need.

We just need you to sit here and just do this. This is all we need you to do. Just do this. So all the show and everything, the only thing this song song is gonna need is for you just to do your job At whatever level you need just be as consistent as possible And I think that can carry over into so many other professions because people get bored with doing the right thing It happens everywhere you get complacent you get comfortable you get bored with it. It becomes second nature It becomes easy

So you start cooking up some more shit and that whole whole Russell Wilson, Bobby Wagner always talking to each other like, hey, don't get bored with doing this shit. Don't get bored with always going, hey, clear eyes, full hearts, we can't, hey, here we go. Because you can get sick of doing that type of stuff. You can get sick of putting in the extra reps that you've done thousands and thousands and thousands of times that are maybe so minuscule,

but at the end of the day, you're going to fall back on those and that's really the difference between winning and losing. The fact that Bobby Wagner and Russell Wilson seem to have the same mindset, and he's on the defensive side, and he has like a championship pedigree, what a win for the Los Angeles Rams. Now, the Colts didn't need any linebackers. We are stacked across the board there, so I'm not necessarily upset about this. But I assume there are some teams around the NFL that are like,

what the fuck, how come we didn't get Bobby Wagner? Pat, what's going on with the Ravens? They were in on Bobby Wagner. They were in on Zedaria Smith. We were told Zedaria Smith was signing there. He walks out on that deal, goes up to Minnesota. Bobby Wagner seemed like a guy that could end up with Ravens. This is what they do.

They pick up veteran free agents who are cut, and they kind of revive their careers there and become studs again. Doesn't happen for them. Lamar Jackson isn't signing the long-term deal there. There's a lot of controversy going on. What's going on in Baltimore? I don't know what's going on in Baltimore. This fall is last year's offseason.

Remember whenever Juju came out and said the Ravens made him an offer, he went back to Pittsburgh. T.Y. said the Ravens made him an offer, he went back to the Colts. I do wonder what's going on. Harbaugh just signed an extendo. So Harbaugh's going to be there for some time. Hopefully this year the Ravens don't have to deal with all the booze they had to deal with last year.

COVID, injuries, everything like that. Maybe Lamar's waiting for another great season to kind of set the market again for himself. But you're right. If you're a Ravens fan, I'm sure you're asking a lot of questions on what the fuck's going on. Yeah. Honey Badger also just responded to a tweet like, hey, Honey Badger's coming to Baltimore or some bullshit. And he actually responded to it saying like, no, I remember what happened last time. And I'm not sure exactly what he was referencing, but just add that to another list of guys that don't want to go to Baltimore. So much like the insiders, we got got yesterday with that Billy Davis.

Oh, yeah. Billy Moss. David. Tony Ross. Tony Ross. Tony Ross. No, he wasn't. Tony Moss.

Billy Moss. Billy Moss. And if at Billy Moss NFL. At Will Moss. At Billy Moss NFL. At Will Moss. At David Moss NFL. At Dave Moss NFL. Said that the Steelers are going all or nothing on Tyron Matthew. Everybody on the internet told us that was a bunch of bullshit,

and we kind of said that as we were reporting it, but we still had to report the news because that guy had a shield behind. Willie Moss was appearing to be a professional, but now here on April Fool's Day, it's getting everybody, Todd. Yeah, as soon as the all or nothing in the tweet came out, or like the phrasing in the tweet, so the Steelers have never done anything where they're all or nothing. And then I did later in the day see that Twitter account

was Kevin Colbert last week. Oh. So that's a new McCockner. He's a mover. Which is troubling because if you can't trust a guy with the shield behind him in their profile pic, who can you trust? On the internet. With NFL in his

name. Suit and tie? I mean... Hey, what's that other dude's name? Billy Spikes? Yeah. Oh, yeah. The original. Who is it? Dove? That was the report, yeah. The original. Who is it? Dove? Yeah.

That was the report, yeah. I love Dove. He breaks a lot of news. Speaking of news, Dan Snyder is going to have to sell the team. Okay? There's been hit piece after hit piece about the toxic culture that has been run in the Washington football team's building for years and years and years. RG3 almost wrote a book.

We don't know what happened with that, explaining about how he witnessed all of this. There's been testimony. The Congress has gotten involved. The Washington Post has had private investigators in there. There has been so much that has been learned about the Washington football team over the last year that you can't help but wonder, like, man, is that the worst operating building on planet Earth? And somehow they were able to wade through all those murky waters, and Snyder was able to keep the team.

He kind of fell to the back. His wife became the new focal point, the new spokesperson. You get Jason Wright in there as president. You change the name. Ron Rivera comes in. They're trying to move past everything that happened in the past that we all learned about in a rather quick fashion. It was like boom, boom, boom.

This place stinks. You don't believe us? Here's another. Boom, another one. Here's another. Boom. Scandal was coming out of that whole place from everything that has happened, whether it's with the cheerleaders, with the workers, with the team,

with the ideas, with the decisions, with the trips, with the money. Oh, the money now. So not only is, you know, poop pipes bursting in the stadium over there at FedEx Field because it's a trash place, not like this AT&T stadium. No, no, no. And I don't have a dog in the fight in the NFC East, but I will say this is the stadium you want to play in. First class.

We got to walk around it. This place is incredible. But we wondered how Dan Snyder was going to be able to survive all of this. And everybody that was a Washington football fan, everybody that was an NFL fan would say, no, no, this is what Dan Snyder does. And there's actually memes that are like, oh shit, Dan Snyder ain't going to survive this.

Then the next one is, Dan Snyder survives it. And then right after it's like, well, how did that happen? And then just kind of something else comes in and then boom, Dan Snyder gets buried again. Now there's alleged reports that the Congress has found out that he has been running two different books to paint two different pictures about the team's finances.

Congress will now expand its probe into the team's toxic workplace to include the finances. That's via Front Office Sports, who I do believe we could still buy if we had to. Now, with that being said, we appreciate Front Office Sports with this breaking news. Dan Snyder can get around all of the toxic exposés coming from Bezos' company somehow.

We didn't think he was going to be able to survive, but he was able to somehow. This one, whenever you get into the finances and you have the government involved, you're only taught a couple things. Don't fuck with the IRS. The IRS is going to get you. They've got more people. They got more money they want to get. If he's painting two different books, as if he's running some sort of Ponzi scheme,

as if he's hiding money, the government's got nothing else to do but snoop around. This could be the breaking point for Snyder having to sell that team. And in Washington, with a brand-new name, now granted Carson Wentz is the quarterback, so I guess he's going to have to be who you go forward with. And by the way, if he's playing great football, I think that's a great pick. This is a very desirable team to get, especially in a place with all the power in the world, basically.

Yeah, and we were just talking yesterday about the process of acquiring a new team. Even if nothing comes of this for Snyder, if someone goes to Goodell, like Bezos you were just mentioning, says, hey, look, Roger, I'll give you $7 billion and I'll give you three more and I'll pay for the new stadium all on my own. Like with all the drama surrounding Snyder, like isn't this a new chapter for the football team and commanders?

Like get a new owner if you're going to do that. Gumpy, let me know. The internet, you know the internet better than anybody. The internet told me that Snyder and Goodell are just boys. Is that why Snyder always gets past all this, or is it just because he's a billionaire and he's an NFL owner so he can do whatever he wants whenever he wants? That sounds right.

It sounds like everything, no matter what happens, somehow gets swept under the rug, like the Gruden stuff, like how none of those emails got released. It feels like no matter what happens, he gets saved, Pat. I do not know why, so that would make sense. Yeah, hold on. In the United States of Goodell, okay? Oh, yeah.

In the United States of Goodell, his rules, you know, far exceed the states in a lot of different things. But if the Congress and the government get involved in a potential Ponzi scheme, two different books, hiding of money, that means you're hiding of taxes, plus all these exposés. It's going to get real loud. Not that it hasn't been already, but once the money thing gets involved and the government feels like they've potentially been fucked, they are going to come.

I mean, they are going to be the big bad wolf. They were showing up at league meetings, what, last year the Congress was showing up and saying, excuse me, what are we doing about this asshole team in Washington? What are we doing over here? I'm fascinated by it all because I think the way the selling of teams goes, and I know at the league meetings they said they are looking for diversity and ownership and they hope that one of the next teams that goes for sale, that happens. But I looked into it a little bit more.

I think the only way teams are sold is blind auction. I think it's like a blind auction. Like you just put in a bid. You have to get okayed, I believe, by all the other owners. Then once you get okayed, you're allowed to put in like a blind auction. I think it's like a blind auction. Like you just put in a bid. You have to get okayed, I believe, by all the other owners. Then once you get okayed, you're allowed to put in like a blind bid. So like if Bezos really wants that, and they say, well, the team's worth $4 billion or $5 billion. But if some ridiculously rich group of people just want to come in and say, hey, we'll go $10 billion. It's like, bang, that's being sold like that.

I'm pretty sure that's how it all goes. bang that's being sold like that i i'm pretty sure that's how it all goes and i don't know how snyder escapes that especially with bezos you know jacked up on his yacht just dreaming about being an nfl owner all day i was gonna say as some of my mom's been an accountant for 40 years i was an accountant for three years in college and balanced quite a bit of books and phil had a really incredible tweet yesterday on do you know how hard this is he wasn't keeping two separate books just for the fun of it like when they when they dig into this there's gonna be some shit like oh those numbers people love catching other numbers people's too like that's like that's like whenever uh when phil has to sit down with whoever the accounting people is at whatever other company we're at and the excel

spreadsheets come out oh it is awesome it's like i'm in a nerd super bowl there you know what i mean well this number doesn't make sense how'd you get to this and oh yeah we actually did get that wrong let me go ahead and in there he had to do it with two different books what was that movie where old buddy the rich guy the accountant no yeah not the accountant where he was killing people the um that documentary about that super rich guy that was fucking bamboozling like princes and everybody. Oh, not the Tinder swindler. Was it that one?

No, no. Tinder swindler was a catfish. I'm talking about a guy who was Ponzi scheme. With the stocks, right? Madoff? Bernie Madoff? Was it Madoff? Madoff.

Madoff had like princes and governments and everything investing with him. And they had that own floor, that own office where somebody else was keeping all the books. And they had to keep the fake books just as accurate as they had to keep the real books so for every move they made on the real book they had to make it look smaller on the fake book that is double the amount of work immediately and you can't tell anybody else about it because the bigger it gets the more people know i wonder how many people knew they had multiple books because that's an easy thing to crack it had to be just one or two people and whenever you're talking about billions and billions of dollars, that's a lot of numbers that they have to put in the Excel spreadsheet.

It is wild. All right, let's get to a break here on this glorious Feel Good Friday, April 1st. Rabbit, rabbit, don't fall for any of the bullshit today. Everybody's foolish today. Ian Rappaport's already fallen for two fake trades. Don't be like Ian Rappaport. Come on, Rappaport. On the other side of the break we have absolute

living legend kofi kingston joining us and i am so thankful he is here i am so thankful to be in att stadium i am so thankful it's wrestlemania weekend let's enjoy the hell out of this we'll see in four minutes welcome back to the pat mcafee show here on this glorious Feel Good Friday, April 1st, 2022, WrestleMania Friday. We're being joined by one of the best vibes of all time, a man who's been in the WWE for 14 years, the first African-born WWE champion in history from the greatest tag team in the history of WWE. Ladies and gentlemen, Patriots fan, which kind of sucks, Kofi Kingston. I'm sorry, you can't just throw that in there like that.

Why would you say that? You gonna lie to all these people? You have an international audience, you're just gonna sit there and lie? Well, there's a build up, a lot of build up. You heard me, compliment, compliment, compliment, compliment. Now let's point out the flaw. This guy likes the patriots just like that guy right there it's like you guys don't like greatness when people say that you know what i mean like you can't achieve greatness yourself unless you can appreciate greatness you got to appreciate the

dynasty that is the patriots you understand that and only and only when you appreciate it can you then have similar success i'm not gonna say're going to have the same level of success. Yeah. Similar success. Yeah. Hell yeah. Come on, man. Shut up.

Don't do me like that, Pat. No, not you, Kofi. You keep talking. I appreciate you, Kofi, but you need to shut up. He makes a lot of good points. I just think they need to be emphasized. You know? Yeah, I mean.

Come on, man. I haven't won a playoff game in three years. Same amount of playoff wins as the Colts in the last three years. Robert Kraft actually told me that. Let's talk about the body of work. If you want to, you know, talk about the Colts in the last three years. Robert Kraft actually told me that. I mean, the body of work. If you want to, you know, talk about the Colts and the Patriots.

I don't want to start anything. You want to talk about the body of work. You talk about the Colts, you talk about the Patriots. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know what I'm saying. The Patriots are the standard, by the way. Greatest dynasty in the history of sports. Not sure it'll ever happen again, actually.

It's special. Very special. Did you play football growing up? What did you do growing up? I did. I played football in high school. I played D-back and a little bit of running back, but my hands are very small. I couldn't catch.

You see? You see, I couldn't catch out there, but I could swat the passes down. Athlete. You know what I mean? Yeah, I was out there, and I actually wrestled, too, in high school. Okay, yeah, I heard you wrestled, by the way. I believe Connor from Simba. Go, Seychelles.

You know what I'm saying? Seychelles, baby. Yeah. Same high school. Joe Satrips. You know what I'm saying? Satrips, baby. Yeah. Same high school. Woo. You know? Same team you like in the NFL. Yeah.

Same hatred from every other fan base. What? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Yeah, we just went back to it. Yeah. It's a thing. You know, you expect it, though. Professional wrestling.

Yes. Was that always the dream? Was it always something you wanted to get into? Because I talk to everybody that's in the WWE right now, especially the black dudes. Kofi, you are a guy that everybody looks up to. Obviously, like Booker T, and there's greats that have come before you. But with this generation, you are the guy that everybody's looked up to.

Even the guys in New Day, I've talked to them. Big E, Xavier Woods, they're like, well, actually, we looked up to Kofi, and then now getting to work with him was a big deal. So did you always want to do it? Did you know you were going to be a wrestler? Yeah, it's crazy because I feel like everybody has a moment where they realize, like, oh, I saw this match,

and then I knew I wanted to be a wrestler, or this happened. I met this guy. For me, I feel like I've always been a fan. I can't remember a specific moment. I used to watch Saturday morning superstars, you know what I mean? And just, like, it was a part of my routine every saturday like religiously that's what i watched when rock came out initially and wrestling wasn't cool you know i was one of the only people that liked it but then stone cold and the rock and the attitude

era come around and then everyone's giving each other like stone cold stutters in the hallway and i'm like wait a minute this you guys this wasn't cool to you yesterday you want to jump on the bat you didn't even ask me you know what i I'm saying? This is my thing. But yeah, I feel like I've always been a fan, man. And I've just been attracted to the glitz and the glamour and the fireworks. And particularly, like, you know, for example, Ricky the Dragon Steamboat was one of my guys. And he had like the martial arts, the high flying, you know, and I, you know, the bright colors. He came with a Komodo dragon breathing out fire. Like, how could you not be attracted to this?

You know what I mean? How can you not be drawn to this? So yeah, man, just the spectacle of it all really drew me in. And I've always been a fan. Well, and I think the WWE is very thankful that you've been a fan forever because your athleticism, the way you go, your energy, the mic work like New Day is a groundbreaking trailblazing group that's going to be talked about 50 100 years from now yeah it's been a lot of fun and it's funny that you

say that because like we don't really think about like so far down the line because we're still in it right we're still trying to make great moments we're still trying to be great and um but when you look at like our body of work and the things that we've done, we've done so many just special things. Why do you guys work, you think? Why do you think you guys work? It's just the chemistry, man. It's the chemistry. It's a very real brotherhood.

I'm getting emotional even thinking about how much love I have for Woods and E. And we talk about it probably at least a couple of times a month. We'll sit there and just start gushing just how much we appreciate each other on text. It's a very real bond man i feel like if you are lucky enough to meet one person that you connect with that you bond with that you identify with it you're you're lucky right like it's uh it's a you know but just it's very unique you're not supposed to meet people that you get this close to and i met two in the same industry we have the same vibes we travel together I think we've been a group officially since what 2016 I think we debuted we've never had any kind of like argument any kind of fights or you know disagreements we're always supporting one another and we just want

the best for each other so it's just a real bond when we're out there like we're trying to pop ourselves man we're trying to just have fun and make each other laugh and make each other break out there and everybody gets to watch it and uh and enjoy it yeah some of the stuff you guys yeah yeah you need to relax you know like in the commercial break we go straight to pat we start messing with them taking pictures and you know i think i was uh i got kofi twerking that's what i was about to say you know me like i'll shake my hips i i'm a i'm a twerker yeah two minutes straight this guyking in front of me. That's what I was about to say. You know me. I'll shake my hips. I'm a twerker. Two minutes straight, this guy.

Right in front of me. Look at me. And then you want to make eye contact. He's screaming, yeah, look at me. And then Big E, look at him, man. And I'm like sitting there like, all right. Don't look away. Don't look away. He hit me with a pancake in New Orleans.

You guys are coming out. He hit me square in the face. Pinpoint accuracy. You got to keep your head on a swivel out there. A lot of people, they'll be sitting there texting. I don't know who you're talking to, but you need to be focusing on what i'm doing in there because if you're not you might catch that pancake right in the cheek you know you just might catch a pancake how many years you guys throw those pancakes for i think it what maybe

like three four years or something like that every show they're coming out with pancakes there had to be a thousand of them made oh Oh, yeah. And you guys were throwing pancakes at them. Slanging them, bro. Slanging them. That was also with the Booty-Os, I believe. We had Booty-Os. We tried to get ice cream. That didn't become a real thing.

But, you know, we do what we can out there. The fact that we even had pancakes out there. Like, I think we had a, it was a lumberjack match with me and E versus, I think, Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn. Woods was on the outside. It was all the lumberjacks all the wrestlers outside making sure that when we got thrown out of the ring they throw us back in but wood they beat you up you know yeah they give you a little something and then throw you back in get your ass back in there you know but woods is on our team so he's like not just a

lumberjack he's the chief jack you know he's the chief jack so he's got to stand out so lumberjacks of course they wear their uh their flannel right so woods had i don't know like where you find flannel in a towel you know what i mean like a flannel vest he just went out found one got a flannel vest cut the sleeves off you know he's wearing that he's wearing his like lumberjack hat and of course lumberjacks have pancakes so now he's out there with the pancakes and the only thing that people cared about in that entire match was the plate of pancakes that Woods was sporting. We're out there taking bumps, getting hurt, getting thrown out, getting beat up. And everyone's talking about, we want pancakes.

I'm like, gosh, you're going to cheer for me or what? You know? So pancakes were born the next week. We just went to Vince and we were like, hey, can we bring these out again? He's like, do you want to bring them out? Is that what you want to do? I said, yeah, yeah. We think the people might like it.

All right, go ahead, take them, go ahead. And pancakes were born, you know? So we just were slinging those pancakes. Then like six months later, you go and you're like, hey, I think we're done with the pancakes. Nope, they love the pancakes. God, God, God, I have the pancakes. So you know, Woods played Strombone,

and for a while, it was me, Ian Woods. We would have six-man tag team matches, and we have Woods plays trombone. And for a while, like it was me, Ian Woods. We would have like six man tag team matches and we have three people on our team. So like the logical thing would be like the three of us were a team. We'd be out there. But there was a period of about like six months to a year where we would have another random wrestler on our team. Because Vince was like, oh, what was I just I got to have that trombone. I got to have that trombone out there. We're like, no, what was I just, I gotta have that trombone. I gotta have that trombone out there. We're like, all right.

So for like two years, we were just out there just. And that's what they wanted, you know? So yeah, it's all good. In the history of wrestling, normally the people that bring good times, good vibes, funny, everything like that. Not champions, right? There's like different roles for everybody so you have had to kind of balance it i mean you came in with a jamaican accent what you talking about cold school coffee kingston you're talking about throwing back coffee kingston i rude boy

you're talking about the you're talking about jamaica oh whoa throwback excuse me sorry sorry i Didn't mean to go back right there. Didn't mean to take it back on you. No, but that was an incredible, that was how, obviously, we were all introduced to you. And then, you know, a couple weeks later, you come back, you're a completely different character. But the entire evolution of you, you've always been upbeat, high energy, funny. And you even had a championship run in the middle there, which is not normal at all.

Is that something you have to think about? Because you know the business a lot better than a lot of people. Like, what are dreams and aspirations while you're making all these decisions? Yeah, I think the most important thing to having an extensive career is being able to adapt. For example, you look at The Rock. He started off as Rocky Maivia with all the, you know, traditional, like, tassels and animal print and curly hair.

He becomes The Rock. Triple A started out as terrorizing all right you know and then becomes the game the triple a stone cold steve austin remember when he was speaking french yeah yeah coming out yeah but but he applied like aspects of that to you know pompous triple h and then he you know becomes this badass character that comes out with a sledgehammer and skull so it's an evolution i mean uh stone cold steve boston the ringmaster right like so there's an evolution of of characters you know you always have to find a way to adapt and and move forward so with me um that's really kind of what it's all about right like i started off as jamaican when i first got signed and i was doing the jamaican

accent um all the agents at my trial were like, well, we've never seen that before. So you had Ricky the Dragon, Steamboat, Steve Kern, Tim Horner from Midnight Express, Simon Dean, you know, Mike Bucci, they were all there and they were all talking about Dean Malenko, Arn Anderson, talking about something they had never seen before. So I'm like, oh my God,

like how hard is it to impress these guys? So that was what got me in the door. And then over time, you just have to figure out a way to keep on building on what you have. So now I twerk and throw pancakes. I don't know if that's an evolution or like a de-evolution, I don't know.

You twerk in a pretty large part of the Caribbean community. I think I've been down there. I've seen some gyrations happen. But you are black. You have dreads. But you are not Jamaican. You are actually from Ghana. Yes.

And whenever you became champion, the trip back to Ghana, I remember seeing it all over social media. And I think as a wrestling fan, we immediately go like, all right, is this bullshit or not? And I just asked you, like, I think the first time I actually asked you was right here beforehand. Yeah. Shoot born in ghana yeah go haven't been back there since like not you went back in 96 yeah then you win the championship you go back and it was legit

everything we saw like hey our our hero has returned that had to be so fucking amazing bro i can't even like as amazing as it looked on film and all the clips, it was like 20-fold in person. I'm even getting goosebumps and things. Yeah, you should. It was cool. The way that I'm feeling about it, right? So my mom has wanted me to go back to Ghana for a real long time. Like you said, the last time I had been there was in 1996 when I went for a summer.

But then- Family's still there? Family's still there, yeah. Grandparents, aunts uncles cousins you know we keep uh great you're keeping great touch through through facebook it's a beautiful thing social media you know well i mean it is beautiful for that but i guess be careful whatever the case it is beautiful yeah my family through facebook yeah man so um yeah i i you know when i went back.

So, finally, you become like a WWE superstar. You don't have time to do anything. You don't have time to go to weddings and, you know, even funerals you miss and just a lot of different life events. But after I won the championship, I was like, man, hey, maybe I can bring the title back to Ghana. Like, maybe we can bring the film crew and do it. And I talked to, like, Stephanie McMahon, and she was all about it.

And, you know, it just happened. And it was four days there. And from the moment that I got off the plane, I was surrounded. It was almost like when, like, Ali was in South Africa, right? And you saw, like, everybody in the town and the village, like, surrounding him. The champ is here. Bro, the entire time time, like walking through the airport, you know, I don't even know if I went through customs or not. They just wanted to get me out there. Like, oh, here you go. And, and I get out there and there's a whole bus and everybody is there.

They brought like dancers and people are just celebrating in the streets. And it's just so amazing to me. We went to my parents' hometown. So even, like, driving the van through the dirt roads, people are banging on the sides of it. Man, you're the Beatles. Kofi Kingston is back. It's crazy, man. And then security, too. We had to have, like, ten cops.

They all surrounded me in a circle, and they're all holding hands, and we're just in the middle of it. And everyone is just so excited, wanting to, like 10 cops they all surrounded me in a circle and they're all holding hands and we're just in the middle of it and everyone is just so excited wanting to like you know touch my arm or just like the the the level of happiness on their face was like it's just crazy is that pinnacle it's it's yeah that's what you're looking for right and that's it man like a genuine like you know just authentic emotion like it's it's just it, at the end of the day, like, to me, it's so crazy because I'm just a dude that decided to follow his dream. You know, that's it. Anybody could potentially be in this position. And the fact that I am the, I mean, in theory, in theory, I think with hard work, you know what I mean?

There's got to be a lot of luck involved. There's a lot of luck for me. Luck, yes. But yeah, to have that kind of an impact on people's lives. And then to go to the schools, we did a whole little tour. I went to a school, and there were kids who were three, four, five, six years old. And I get to show them the most prestigious title, the WWE title. And on the nameplate is one of the most popular Ghanaian names ever on it.

And I'm like, this is possible. So to me, like, if that inspires you to believe that you can do whatever it is that you want to do, that is like, it's so exciting for me to think about that. To have an impact on someone's life where you motivate them and push them in the direction of their dreams. Cause sometimes that's all you need is man is, is, is a little push, you know, someone to believe in you, someone to get you to like, believe in yourself. Right. So yeah, man, it was just incredible on so many levels. Hey man, that's awesome. Job well done in that whole thing. Cause you're inspiring people. And we talked to Randy about this yesterday, you know, WWE, whenever you're the king of the cast you can take a lot of heat yeah for a lot of every

decision that is made especially in this business and the fans are so passionate so loyal especially yours i mean there is very very passionate fans of the new day that every single decision every single thing that gets decided for you guys to do or every outcome that happens there is this automatic negative drawback almost about it on instagram on twitter on in the dirt sheets do you pay attention to that or you have to stay about 14 years into this i mean you have to pay attention i i see it i see it but the thing about it is that um i feel like we have a general like a uh an intrinsic drive to fit in even when you're a kid and you're in like middle school you want so

desperately to fit in to the point where you might compromise your own morals or beliefs just to fit in with this group so you can be accepted so when it comes to social media there's so many people that like in an effort to fit into this like toxic group you want to go in there and make like you want to run people down so you can get likes on your comments so that people can so it's it's very toxic in a lot of ways but for me like i hold myself to the highest standards so nothing that anybody says can make me feel like worse than i feel you know what i mean or any better because i just hold myself to a high standard so i don't really allow any of that to really affect me. I certainly do appreciate the positivity that's out there.

And again, like just having an influence on people's lives to to push them in a positive direction. But, yeah, I mean, I see I think a lot of it is real comical in a lot of it, because like, bro, like you're at the house and you're going to take time out of your day to pull out your. I'm going to type this in and see if he reads it. He's going to know what I said. Like, who cares, man? Like, yo, do something else, bro. Like, come on, man. You got to have something better to do than that.

You mentioned Stephanie McMahon. You were talking to her about going back to Ghana. And obviously, her Triple H, Shawn Michaels, unveiled a new Undertaker statue yesterday at AXS. And it was an emotional moment. But the longer I'm here, the more I realize, like, this is WWE wwe is a family like very much a family how do you feel now and i talked about this with like biggie and xavier woods and then there's gonna be a lot of younger guys that are gonna continue to come in that look up to you like you're an og now around here yeah and that's a real thing like i'm

gonna ask you for advice on my match probably at some point in the next couple days and i assume that happens to you on a very regular basis you You enjoy that? You love that? It feels like you're the perfect person. Yeah, for sure, man. I think that I've been real lucky to have experienced so much success and so many positive moments in this industry. And that's what this is supposed to be, man. Like, this is a dream. There's nothing else that is like this.

So whatever I can do to help people get to that point and taste how the sweet nectars of the industry and you know what I mean, like feel it the way it's supposed to be felt. Of course, I'm going to be right there to like to help you or give you advice. And it's just an opinion to like, I don't get mad if like people don't listen to what I have to say, because it's really like what you feel, man, I don't get mad if, like, people don't listen to what I have to say because it's really, like, what you feel, man. Like, do what you feel. Do what's in your heart. This might be what I would do in that situation.

It might work. It might not. I don't know. But if I can help anybody to, you know, to attain a little bit of success and have a feel-good moment in this industry, then I'm all about it. So it's cool to be in that role where it's like, I look around and I'm like, man, there's a lot of people here who I don't really, I don't know, people be telling stories about this guy was there. And I'm like, I have no idea who you're talking about. You know what I mean? It's like me, Dolph Ziggler, Miz. I don't know who else. Seamus has been around. Randy randy right you know the the longer you hang

around this business the uh smaller the crowd yeah the smaller the smaller your circle of familiarity i guess gets but it's it's part of it what are some mistakes you think you see a lot of the young folks making this business what do you think it is is it in ring is it out of ring is it just um i i think a lot of people, and I did this too, but I feel like people take themselves very seriously and you forget to have fun.

To me, that's the biggest mistake and I'm real lucky that I had Scott Armstrong as a ref for the majority of my early matches. He's had some blown calls though. Let's not get crazy. He's a quick tapper.

Everyone's about that guy. Bullshit. You gotta do what you gotta do. He's lucky I wasn calls, though. Let's not get crazy. He's a quick tapper, everyone. That guy. Bullshit. You got to do what you got to do. He's lucky I wasn't on commentary for that. I call out the refs every day. Look at the damn. I enjoy it. You know?

But he was a guy where, like, initially I would come out and I'd be so nervous. And you'd be thinking about, like, what's supposed to happen in the match. Okay, I need to be here. And you come out and you, you know, slap hands with the people. But you're not actually, like, there. You're not feeling it. You're not taking that moment. And then you get in the ring and you're waiting be here and you come out and you you know slap hands with the people but you're not actually like there you're not feeling you're not taking that moment and then you get in the ring and you're waiting for your opponent to come out and scott will be like hey boy hey man take take that take this all in man take a moment breathe look at all these people here man they're here for you and you take a look around it's like wow this is actually really

really cool so why is that guy tell me to go fuck myself? Why doesn't he like me? He doesn't even know me. But it's still pretty cool. He's talking to me out there, you know? Being present, it feels like. Yeah, being present. And especially early in your career because there's nothing.

It never really gets old, I guess. It's always exciting when you get in there and you're out in front of the crowd but it's never quite like it was when you first come in you'll never have that you know those initial butterflies and that just feeling of wanting to go out there and kill it more than anything like this is your opportunity i think people get nervous in that moment but i would hope that you would take that nervousness and make it into something positive. And let it drive you to have a good match or have the best match on the card. So, yeah, I think being present would be a lot quicker way to set that up. No, no, it's a great description. I'm long-winded now.

No, you should be. You're a great talker. You're a great talker. I mean, I've been given the chance to do one promo, and the music got hit in the middle of my thing. So I'm a long-winded person. Yeah. I think you're in the middle of that whole thing.

You said you're chasing that. I think as a fan of wrestling, we've seen the older guys come back and chase that feeling again, chase that feeling again. Yeah. Have you thought about, because you're 14 years into this, you can go for another decade plus if you if you want to have you thought about all that or are you just trying to be in the moment it's yeah man i just kind of try to like i said before like i'm still kind of in it but if i was to tell you that

i've never thought about like when to end it you know that would be a lie i don't know i still feel pretty good i think that when you show up to work and this goes for like any job but if you show up to work and you're not having fun and but if you show up to work and you're not having fun and you're miserable and you're complaining and the environment is weighing on you and you're taking that negative emotion home then from a mental health perspective like you should probably get out but for me right now i'm having fun out there anytime i'm out there with woods and e like it is just we're on cloud nine man we're having so much fun out there and then just to be able to interact with the people and especially like you look into our audience and you see such a diverse crowd.

You see all the kids out there. And to put a smile on a kid's face is a pretty cool thing. I think that one of the things I say this a lot, but one of the things I miss the most is when we got to be bad guys and I came out and I could yell at kids. I could berate kids. I could threaten the ground kids. I could tell you to respect me because I'm an adult. Don't make me come out there and do what your parents should have. You know what I'm saying?

I miss that so much. But just to be able to make people react and feel a certain way is the best part about our business. Yeah, it's fantastic watching you work. The commercial breaks you guys are on the entire time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's one thing I've realized about the separation of who it seems like, oh, these people, whenever it goes, when they're out there,

this is a show the entire time. Even if the lights are off, even if there's something going on somewhere else, like you, Xavier, and Big E, even if there's something going on somewhere else, like you, Xavier and Biggie, even if you were in the background of a shot, it's like, Hey, the new day is going to be an additive to this particular scene because they're only getting however many opportunities,

like the viewing, the way you guys view your opportunities. I think he's very, very inspiring. Yeah, man. Yeah. Now follow up.

That Biggie shit was crazy. That was right in front of me, dude. So I almost, that was, I almost got like, almost got like sick almost. So the crazy thing about it is that like what was supposed to happen was I was in there. He was supposed to have that interaction on the outside.

I came over to like check on him, and then we end up going into the end of the match. So I was in the ring. I've still not seen the actual video and the impact. I'm not re-watching either i'm not gonna watch it it's it's crazy that you had you you probably had the closest view out of anybody in the entire arena yeah so i could tell like it kind of like i from where the ring was like they went up and it looked a little bit wonky and he came down i was like was like, ah, okay. I think it might be okay. But now I go over there to actually shoot check on him. And I'm like, okay.

Shoot, by the way, means real. Shoot, real. That's the insider speak. Shoot, check on him, for real. So I went to go look, and I'm like, okay, he looks like he might be okay. And then we end up going to the rest of the match. And it wasn't until the match was over and the ref came over and said, I don't know if he's okay i said so then all of a sudden like it becomes there's a level of just like tension and nervousness and you don't know what's going on and i went out there and he still

had moved from the spot that um oh yeah he landed in. and my brothers and the thought of like losing one of them like it just makes me sick to even think about that like a piece of me would be gone so um but on a positive note um a it's best outcome that could have been bro if you could choose a way to to break your neck this is the way that you would choose oh you know what i mean in that city too by the way with those doctors in birmingham like this is where we send everybody to get rehabilitated, to get surgeries. Ivar actually broke his neck a few months back. The doctor that operated on him was actually in the crowd chasing the ambulance. Dr. Dugas, who works with all of us on our surgeries, he was there and out there on the floor.

So he was in really really good hands and then after the um uh the the x-ray uh he found out that there was no um there was no misalignment there was no spinal cord damage it was just a fracture only a broken and his c c1 and c6 you know and his and his um you know uh vertebrae so hey we're happy you're gonna be all right it could have been it could have been we could be having a very different conversation right now he posted something too about like uh the doctor and he's looking at his x-ray doctor said if you would have broken your neck this way you would have been paralyzed if you would have broke it an inch this way you would have had a stroke if you broke it this way you would have died so when you when you think about the gravity of that situation and how like if somebody is like one step forward one step back

or like you know we could be having a very different conversation but again like on a positive note he you see him on his instagram he's out there rocking his new fits and everything with his neck brace on and he's just got to wait for it to heal so we just take it one day at a time and hope for the best and uh he's gonna be i mean he's already back on his feet already but he's gonna be uh he's gonna be just fine that's great hey biggie we miss you pal yeah we miss you pal that was scary man i got sick wow literally it was right in front of me and i think the narrative by some people and you talked about the toxic people and people trying to you know jump in the mob mentality and feel accepted like yeah i'm against this as well everybody that was on my headset in my ears everybody that was around me all the people

everybody you know we got live tv though everybody had no like it felt like everybody was like oh man biggie's one of our guy like this is it was a sad scene happy biggie's okay and it's because by the way it's because he's an absolute tank all every shrug every rep yeah up until this point was all into this but man if his neck wasn't so thick, it's crazy. All those muscles. Happy he's going to be okay, but that's real. It's very, very dangerous out there.

What you guys do on a very regular basis is what I'm going to attempt to do on Sunday. There is real life danger happening every single moment out there. From all of us to you, man, thank you for your years of dedication and sacrifice for your body for our entertainment.

Connor went to your high school. He has a question for you. Yeah, Kofi, I'd ask you who's going to win the Super Bowl, but for shoot, we know it's the New England Patriots. For shoot. Shut up. For shoot. For shoot, Pat.

We already know that. We already know that. Pat mentioned the guys coming in who might be new looking to you. Was there anyone you kind of look to to for your career and also for like new day as a whole yeah so for myself um all my everyone always asks like who your favorite wrestler is and for me my three guys are ray mysterio because he was undersized i was undersized i was always told i was never going to make it because i wasn't big enough and then i'd look on tv and see ray winning championships and just being awesome um so it's ray uh ricky the dragon steamboat like i mentioned for the reasons earlier

and then sean michaels like come on man like sean is the greatest of all time he's never had a bad match most of his matches were not good but great so those are the guys i looked up to and the crazy part is that like uh as time goes by people transition from in the ring to like these producer roles and Ricky the Dragon Steamboat was one of the like head producers like and he would like produce my matches and we'd be there'd be so many times where like he'd be giving me suggestions and whatnot I'm just sitting there I'm like whoa that's the dragon oh I didn't hear what he said you know so I got so every day man I think about um just how like if i were to have a conversation with eight-year-old me and be like oh you like these guys you watch it

on tv you like this wrestling one day you're gonna be talking with undertaker and trading stories about your kids you know what i mean like it's just wild to think about that how crazy life is hey how come everybody's so nice too i was told everybody's supposed to be an asshole that's what i was told i was told told everybody in WWE is bad people. Don't trust anybody. They'll burn you. Everybody's mean. I have not got that sense at all.

Now, granted, I do feel, and this is self-awareness, I get treated differently by a lot of people because of how lucky I am to have this particular job, what I've been able to do in the past and everything like that. But I feel like I have seen nothing but respect from basically everybody to everybody in this yeah man i think a lot of it is that like again and i've said it like three or four times now but there's nothing quite like this industry and i think we're all grateful that we have this opportunity for as long as it lasts so um you think about so so when i graduated college, I worked for the Staples Corporation. I worked in a cubicle.

Oh, that works. Bro, my God. So I was told it was going to be like an advertising job, but it was like we were proofreading these big buyer's guides that went out, and I had to make sure that everything was spelled right or the period didn't add. There wasn't a space between the last word and the period, and the chairs all had to face the inside. And the kicker is that we put so much into it, man. And the kicker is like, I know when I into it man and the kicker is like i know when i

got one of those buyer's guides in the mail straight in the trash so i'm working hard i'm getting yelled at that my my pages aren't looking right and i know i'm like well it doesn't really matter like this is going in the trash anyway like why are you getting so man i i think like uh a bad day in wwe beats the best day at Staples you know and again I have no offense to anybody at Staples some people love it some people love it they love the consistency and you know you know what your job is gonna be and I and great people but for me like being in that cubicle and like like the the gray walls and my IMAX sitting right there and I'm just like bro this can't be life this can't be the rest of my life you know so luckily I uh I followed right there, and I'm just like, bro, this can't be life. This can't be the rest of my life.

So luckily, I followed my dream, and here we are. But I think all of us have that. You realize how special it is, what we do is. It's a business, though. I mean, it's a fine balance. It's an interesting, interesting balance, especially when you've been around for 14 years. Yeah, man. Crushing it.

Oh, yeah. I'm out here trying to do my thing. Pat. Hey, Nick, go ahead, pal. Kofi, it's fascinating to me. Randy Orton sat there yesterday and he talked to us, and you guys have completely different backgrounds, right? It was kind of your dream to be a superstar. Randy, although a third

generation guy, said it wasn't like his first choice, really. He didn't really love it like that. You guys, you have this super positive attitude. He was self-described as a dick. A judgmental dick is what he calls himself. So I'm just curious. You come from these different backgrounds.

You get into the WWE, and then he mentioned how he had a moment where a light bulb went off. We forget, okay, I'm going to appreciate this. I'm going to learn how to work, and I'm going to take care of everybody. I was wondering if you had a similar moment where a light bulb went off,

or it was like, okay, this is how it's done. I see how it's done from the older guys, and I'm going to take care of everybody. I was wondering if you had a similar moment where like a light bulb went off or it was like, OK, this is how this is how it's done. I see how it's done from the older guys. And I'm going to pass this along. My light bulb moment was, again, like I always wanted to do this. And I always say, like, so when you're a kid, right, like people tell you you can be whatever it is that you want to be. But then when you get to be an adult, you start getting to like college and everyone's like, OK, well, you got to focus. You got to get through. You got to get to your corporate job. you got to be able to climb that corporate

ladder and when you tell someone you want to do something that's outside of the box a lot of people don't support you because it's so atypical it's like you can't be a wrestler well you're not big enough you know you don't look like these guys your your legs are real so you got real chicken legs bro you you got all sternum you don't have any chest muscles you know what i'm saying you can't be a wrestler you know so for me like um my light bulb moment was when I did actually pull the trigger and decide to start training um like the first day that I walked into the chaotic training center the same actually uh same foundation is where triple h went now you know I'm a name dropper you know what I'm saying killer kowalski's old school. One of the last students in that generation, myself, Tommaso Ciampa, Ivar, no big deal.

But when I walked into that school, the feeling of this is where I belong. I'm going to do whatever I have to do to make it here. So it was a lot of just sacrifice and a lot of hard work, a lot of long days. I worked those nine hour days at Staples, drive an hour to practice, practice for two or three hours, drive back to my apartment in Boston, you know, wash, rinse and repeat, you know, but I, but, but I knew that it was like, I was working towards what I loved and what I wanted to do. So I didn't care. Right. Like if it was a cold day outside having a drive to Staples, I would be pissed off. You know what I'm saying? But if I

was like sore and I couldn't walk and move, I'm like, yeah, can't wait to go to practice. I can't wait to go to practice. I can't move, but I love it. So that was kind of my light bulb moment is that, um, like I just realized that I really wanted to achieve my childhood dream, and then there was a realistic chance that I could do it. That's awesome. He starts throwing pancakes at people. And now we throw pancakes and we twerk, and here we are. We're impacting the lives of millions.

Tomorrow night, obviously SmackDown tonight, I don't know what's going on there, but tomorrow night, you and Xavier Woods, welcome back. Yeah! The King has returned. Surprise returned surprise surprise mother soca the king is back yeah you see what i said there i don't want to get fine you guys cuss a lot on this show but if i cuss i'm gonna get fine i like my money i like my money i got money but i don't like to waste money you know what i'm saying i don't want to get fine so mother soca just when they try to replay that did your cuss on the past Matt McAfee show?

No, I said soca. That is not a cuss. I just want to emphasize that. Hey, I appreciate it. I might use it tonight. I'm like, look at these mother soca. Mother soca. Yeah.

Tomorrow night, though, you and King Woods take on Seamus and Ridge Holland with Butch. Whoa. Hey, listen. He be lurking, bro. That son of a bitch Butch. Whoa. Hey, listen. He be lurking, bro. That son of a bitch Butch, I know that guy. Now, I don't know him as long as Seamus and Ridge Holland have known him. They've been rubbing the streets over there. They've been calling each other different names than everybody else forever.

They're long, long friends, obviously. And I didn't even know Butch had that nickname because that's how quickly we kind of interact with each other. They're a problem, though, Kofi. Yeah, they are a problem. Do you feel like shortchchanged that, like, Butch never told you about that nickname when you guys were all hanging out? So you thought you were, like, close friends,

but if you were really close, he would have told you, hey, this is my nickname, by the way. So you were, like, friends, but you weren't, like, in the fold. As soon as I got to that SmackDown, and they were like, all right, Ridge, Sheamus, and Butch are coming out. I'm like, oh, I can't wait to see who the hell Butch is. And then Butch came out, and I'm like, that guy never can't wait to see who the hell Butch is. And then Butch came out. I'm like, hold on, man.

That guy never told me his name was Butch. Butch is a great name. I paid that guy a lot of money to be on my team at NXT. He gave you his real name. And he would always say to me, Pete, probably. That's what he always would say. And then I guess his childhood name was Butch. But whatever the case, he's a problem.

The Butch is a problem. Butch is a problem, man. But I think all of those guys, man, Seamus, Ridge, and Butch, they fit together really, really well, man. It's a great little faction. The chemistry is there. Seamus, obviously, he's been around. They've been friends since kids.

Yeah, you know, the childhood of friends. Of course, yeah. They've been hanging out, and their chemistry is there. So I think they've got something special for sure. They've been giving me problems over the past few weeks. But like you said, man, the king is back. And now me and Woods get to take on Seamus and Ridge. And we got to keep our head on a swivel out there, just like the pancakes, right?

Keep your head on a swivel. You got to watch out for pancakes. You got to watch out for Butch. You know what I'm saying? So those are the two things you got to watch out for. But it's going to be great, man. Butch is a son of a bitch, you know? Yeah.

Son of a Butch? Mean. He's mean. He's Butcher with those joints. Hey, he's going to try to rip those little fingers off your hands. Good luck trying. You know what I'm saying? My hands used to be a lot longer, and someone tried to rip them off before. You know what I'm saying? And now they're

smaller. So I've had my fingers ripped. What can you do to me that hasn't been done already? You know what I'm saying? Butch! It's going to be great, though, man. I'm excited for those guys. And you know what I mean? Like, your first WrestleMania, man, like, there will never be another first. So for me to be involved with these guys and be a part of their, like, first WrestleMania

experience is pretty special to me from a performer's aspect, you know? Like I said, man, I want everybody who's in this industry to be able to feel what this business is supposed to be. Like the great feeling of being in front of a crowd of people that come from all over the world to feel this unique feeling and that energy. So I can't wait to be able to do that for those guys. We're very thankful you stopped by. You're the absolute best. Have an incredible, stupendous WrestleMania weekend. You're the absolute best, bub.

Thank you, man. Ladies and gentlemen, from Ghana, former Jamaican Kofi Kingston. Yeah, Kofi! We'll be back in four minutes. AJ Hawk will join us with more NFL chatter and WrestleMania chatter. I also got a text message at 3 a.m. from Vince McMahon. I can't wait to show you what that video was. We're back in about four minutes. You're the best. Cheers.

It's hour two on this feel-good Friday. WrestleMania Friday, April 1st, 2022. Let's go now. Can't thank you enough for joining us. We're live in AT&T Stadium. Kofi Kingston just joined us for a nice 35-40 minute chat about life as a wrestler on this WrestleMania weekend. He has been so incredibly Pat, thank you enough for joining us. We're live in AT&T Stadium. Kofi Kingston just joined us for a nice 35, 40-minute chat about life as a wrestler on this WrestleMania weekend. He has been so incredibly nice to me. His only downfall is the fact that he's a Patriots fan. Speaking of Patriots fan, at Boston Conners here, you look fantastic, Pat. Pat, so do you.

That tan's really coming in there. It is. Yeah, I just saw my face. I'm very excited for the shower. That's going to wipe this off. What do you mean? It's only going to settle in louder and more orange,

I feel like, as the day goes on here. But this is something you need whenever you're going to get in that ring and, you know, beat the hell out of a guy

in front of like 100,000 plus, by the way. When I went out there for the whole set reveal and I looked around, I don't think I, you know, remember just how fucking big and they're

like yeah every seat in this place actually sold out and everything on the floor I'm like man this is gonna be awesome and my intro is gonna be pretty sick too from what I've been told it should be a good time I'm excited to take it all in especially with this incredible spray tan Nick Morado's here the boys Bubba Gumpino and Tone Diggs back in the Indianapolis office. Hey, I know we got big news coming out of the soccer Lombardi world. The drawings for who was in each group have

been officially announced for the soccer Lombardi happening in Qatar in November. The United States is in a group with who? I, Ryan. What? In fucking England. Ooh. Yeah.

That's right. At Bubba Gumpino, who is from Canada but has been paying taxes to the Queen his entire life, he's been singing his Common Hand. And how it's common hand. Which is a song that a bunch of drunk Brits sing whenever they're talking about the Lombardi or the Europes coming back to England because England obviously is a massively traditionally great soccer

place. With that being said, sorry about it. Not going to make it out of the fucking bracket. Hey, Gumpy, I know Canada found this out on Twitter. Couldn't be in our group. I kind of wish it could. What are you going to do when the United States and Iran run a train on England in that group for the World Cup, pal.

Hell yeah. Top two go through. We can both go through. No worries. USA has beaten England in the World Cup and tied England in the World Cup. England has never beaten the U.S. in the World Cup. 2010, the U.S. tied England.

Guess what? Top two go through. Not two for the U.S., okay? We're top two, not two. Who else is in the group? It's us, England, Iran. They're waiting on the fourth right now. It just got announced.

Whoever wins the European playoff, which I believe is between Ukraine and somebody else. Ukraine and the winner of Wales and somebody. Whoa, whoa, whoa. We don't want Ukraine. No, do not. This is troubling. Listen, Ukraine, hey, hope everything's okay. But, I mean, that's going to be a tough game, you know, because we've been.

Yeah. I don't want them to win. Don't have some experience. I'm happy. Yeah, you don't really want to root for them to lose. Yeah, sorry. When we beat them 10-0, I mean, there's nothing we can do. It's soccer.

It's not our fault. We're not, you know, we beat them 10-0, I mean, there's nothing we can do. It's soccer. It's not our fault. We're not on the pitch. If we were, we'd let them win, but Polithic isn't going to just lay down. Speaking of Polithic and soccer Lombardis, joining us from Manatee, Ohio, ladies and gentlemen, A.J. Hawk. Yeah! A.J., so we get to beat the shit out of Iran in soccer and in England for the world to see.

9 noon and 3 o'clock games in the middle of November while the NFL is going on. This is a glorious day to be from America and a terrible day to be from England. They thought the 4th of July in 1776 was tough. You thought it was bad when all that goddamn tea got tossed into the harbor. It ain't nothing for what's going to happen here in November. Ain't that right, AJ? I guess, but is England looked at as a team that is superior to our American squad? We beat them and we tied them.

We were pissed when we tied them. We beat the shit out of England. That's what we do, okay? Is that old Harry Kane? Is he England? Harry Kane is. Harry Kane is English. He's a stud. I've watched that guy play. He's he England? Harry Kane is. Harry. Harry Kane is English. Unfortunately.

He's a stud. I've watched that guy play. He's a pretty good goal scorer. He can't keep up with Gio, though. Uh-uh. That's the issue. He can't keep up with the big blonde guy we got in the back, too. That's right.

The guy in the back. They call him big blonde guy. Yeah, big guy in the back. Big Viking guy. Is that the Abramovich character that played for the L.A. team? No, that's Zlatan Ibrahimovic. He does not play for the United States team that's seeking our first soccer Lombardi. They need to give that big blonde the band.

They need to give the big blonde the band. Don't put that pressure on Polithic. Let Polithic just go be an asshole and play all he's got to do. Because we're going into Qatar for one thing and one thing alone. First of all, to knock Iran in England. And then we're about to run right through everybody to our first soccer Lombardi. And I don't think there's ever been an easier road now that I think about it. What a great group.

I mean, it is a group of death because it's a group that we're in. But this is a great draw for us, right, Gumpy? I mean, England stinks. Iran stinks. And whoever wins that game is going to stink too right i would worry about if wales gets in in the last spot if they beat scotland and ukraine wales is a good team and will put up a fight in that group but iran yes so realistically it should be england and the u.s going through my friend is well is gareth bale Welsh? Gareth Bale is still playing for Wales. Well, listen, Wales is a country the size of AT&T Stadium.

Bingo. If we can't beat them, I got big-time problems. You hear me? I got big-time problems. So it's either Ukraine, Scotland, or Wales? Yes, sir. Listen, Ukraine, you've gone through a lot all right how the hell are they even continuing to practice right now like what are they up to well I don't think they're in

Ukraine right now very where are they they got out hopefully yeah I think I assume I think they ran out of something sort of cardio you know soccer players run yeah they can run for days hope they stay safe and uh hope you lose by 20 to us. Tease and peace. And I ain't ever worried about the Welch in my life. Really? Not one time have I ever concerned myself with the Welch people. I'm not even 100% sure I know where Wales is.

Is that near Ireland there? Where is Wales? I think it's part of the Ireland English panhandle. Tony mentioned Gareth Bale, but he's 50 years old. A million years old. So is Harry Kane, though, and Harry Kane's still a problem. Yeah, but he brushes his teeth with rocks like all British people. Yeah, but is Landon Donovan coming back for this team or not?

We need a little bit of a leader. Congrats to the United States at least qualifying and getting this Sweet 16. Hell yeah. We should, by the way. We're ranked in the top, in our eyes eyes too, but top 15 in the entire world. So we should make it out of our group. Let's hope for that case. A.J. Hawk joining us here from Manatee, Ohio.

Obviously Super Bowl champion, all-time leading tackler for the Green Bay Packers. Can I ask a question real quick? No. I know you're going to try to brush past it, but there was a big announcement yesterday. You said you were possibly going to meet a great group of individuals i assume the i watched the youtube video of you kind of prevail hey here we go here's the new set to wrestlemania but honestly i understand that this dude makes it on his first throw there's no way your first punt went in that hole okay come on that's some movie magic what did it do what did the video say the video he drained his first shot obviously i know

they do. And then you punted one all haphazardly, and it somehow magically went in. I was in the Casey boots. Whatever you say, dude. I mean, I got video. You can just talk whatever you want to talk. But, yeah, the Casey boots, fucking big belt buckle, whatever the case. That was sweet, though.

Honestly, that was a good job of, like, you were born for that, to bring all the juice that you do. And then your reaction shots, Michael Cole is great. That was a good job of like, you were born for that, to bring all the juice that you do. And then your reaction shots. Michael Cole is great. Yeah, I like the little vibe you guys have going there. It was pretty sweet to meet the dude perfect guys. Dude, that was the perfect ceremony. How many are there?

Well, I don't know. I dropped it by not screaming, dude, in the sky. And then when that thing hits, perfect. So you were there for what, like four minutes? He drains the first one. I'm sure you didn't expect that. The video was two minutes and like 30 seconds long or something like that, so it was kind of all clipped through there, everything like that.

I mean, it was quick in and out, obviously. The drone fly, too. I mean, WWE production is obviously insanely quick and efficient. And there's Kobe to my left electrifying. I got to hang out with him a little bit before the shoot, not during the shoot, obviously. We got to hang out for him a little bit before the shoot, not during the shoot, obviously. We got to hang out for like an hour, two hours together before the shoot even started.

He is a great guy. For shoot, was it fun? Like for shoot? Yeah. Yeah, I have a blast wherever I'm at. I mean, you know, I'm going to have a good time. But yeah, this was the end of it. You know, they inspired me.

I said, hey, Kobe, give me the damn ball. I accidentally dropped the GD in conversation with them. know they're super religious so i felt bad about it immediately i apologize that belt buckle got in the way a little bit of the leg swing i look kz cayman's on tyler who's made like 14 billion views worth of trick shots is watching and then i mean hey aj you tell me pat look at you huh? You know they got – what? AJ? You're right. You cannot fake that reaction. That ball went in.

That's genuine. Thank you. Big Beard is pretty yoked. Tyler? Yeah. Yeah, Tyler, he can spin that pigskin. He was a high school quarterback down here in Texas. Oh.

Are they on tour right now? They were on tour. I'm not 100% sure if they still are. Over 14 billion views, those dudes. Dang. Okay. We just cracked a billion. We're pumped.

They've been doing it for 13 years they've been doing that. So nothing short of impressive. It was very nice to meet them. And the new WrestleMania stage is very nice. My hair, I don't know what I'm doing with the hair. Put that video back up. One second. All right. I thought your hair was – It adds to the whole thing.

Your excitement, your hair goes crazy and gets taller and taller. I know, but towards the end there, if we can get to whenever there's a zoom in on me, do you go in banana lands? Pretty good swing, by the way. Cowboy boots, no grip. We're on carpet. I mean, you tell me. That's a tight little circle inside the one right here.

This, I mean, my hair, this is, I got to do something about the hair. I think it's sweet. Yeah, but it looks like a tarp up there. Don't here this i mean my hair this is i gotta do something about the hair i think it's sweet yeah but it looks like a tarp up there don't you i mean look old buddy look how juiced they are behind you yeah it looks like a rug i put on my head and then obviously fireworks went off so i don't know how i feel about the hair i might have to get that changed before the weekend but i want to let you know it's been fantastic and meeting dude perfect guys was awesome and that is who i was referring to when i said i'm about to meet a legendary group they got 14 billion views you tell me that's not legendary aj is that what you're saying and meeting Dude Perfect guys was awesome. And that is who I was referring to when I said, I'm about to meet a legendary group. They got 14 billion views.

You tell me that's not legendary, AJ? Is that what you're saying? No, it is. It's 100%. It wasn't like when you told me you were going to meet some people that night. That was not like, I wasn't going to guess them, I guess. That kind of took me by surprise. Well, guess who? Dude Perfect.

Okay, the guys who run the goddamn internet. Oh, sorry, sorry. Run the damn internet. Okay, let's get back to some NFL talk now, shall we? Bobby Wagner, five years, $50 million, worth up to $65 million. It was reported immediately upon us ending the show yesterday. Okay? It would have been nice if they'd do it like 20 minutes earlier.

We're still live. We could have got our immediate reactions. Now we got to sit on it a little bit. The Los Angeles Rams at all three levels on that defense got monsters. Obviously got Aaron Donald and Floyd down on the D-line. You bring in Bobby Wagner, who's championship pedigree, and then in the back, you got Jalen Ramsey and the boys. The Rams still have this ability to pay everybody they possibly want. They still have this incredible ability to keep a team around. They lose Vaughn Miller. Odell Beckham Jr. is going to rehab. Lesley still

doesn't have any picks and doesn't give a damn. I love what the Rams are doing. If you're Bobby Wagner, you've got to be incredibly pumped because we think that's where he's from, and they're a Super Bowl team. This is win, win, win, and he got paid. Good for Bobby Wagner, AJ. Yeah, doesn't this feel like, okay, yeah, if Bobby Wagner's not in Seattle, this feels like the proper home for Bobby.

Now, he's not like a flashy, crazy guy that's out there all the time. He's obviously the leader of that team. Wherever he is, like, guys, he commands respect, and he doesn't even have to speak a ton from what I hear. But I'm glad he got really, really good money, and I'm glad that he has a chance to win another ring because the dude's an absolute monster. I love him.

Russell Wilson said, hey, GOAT, hey, legend, hey, dude. Clear-ass, full-heart, you can do great in L.A. Make sure you keep the main thing the main thing. That's God. A lot of devil walking around Los Angeles, especially on those streets where everybody's pooping. And then he said, as they always say, don't get bored with consistency. That's a powerful quote, I think. Honestly, I think that is a very powerful quote.

And I think that's what separates the great from the good. Those who are able to do the monotonous, like boring things over and over and over and over again. And at the time, it might not pay off. But five years, 10 years, a moment will pop up where all that work that nobody has seen pays off. And it's consistent. It's boring. It's the little things. And the attention to detail is what makes the greats great. And I love that Russell Wilson talked to Bobby Wagner as if he's a I love that Russell Wilson talked to Bobby Wagner as if he's a similar person to Russell Wilson. Because although we haven't heard Bobby Wagner mic'd up anywhere near

as much as we heard Russell, it sounds like he's a similar-like human being. What a leader going into L.A. And what a fucking stud, dude. Yeah, he is. And consistency, like, I'm sure you've had it, Pat, where people ask you, maybe it's a kicker or a punter, hey, what's like one or two things, like secrets you could tell me or one or two tricks you could tell me? I'm always like, there are no tricks.

When it comes to drops and stuff, there's specific things. But when they talk about the grand scheme of things, I'm like, I don't know, man. There's no secret. There's no special pill. There's no special thing I can tell you other than whatever you're strong, whatever you feel like you're good at, you need to make sure you maximize that and try to figure out whatever weaknesses you are but just be consistent just be there let's just show up and do what you say you're going to do if you do that you're probably going to have some success yeah there's no magic bullet obviously i

think it's what you were searching for there through all your different descriptions of no i've never said magic board i don't like to bring conspiracies into it i'm not into that jesus no i'm not talking about bending it like angelina jolie i'm talking about j never said magic bullet. I don't like to bring conspiracies into it. I'm not into that. Jesus. No, I'm not talking about bending it like Angelina Jolie. I'm talking about the magic. No, JFK magic bullet theory. That's the whole thing. I thought the magic bullet theory was like something just happens. But I might be wrong.

I could be wrong. I could be. Yeah, it was JFK because of the angle of the supposed shooter. Well, what's the angle, literally? Were they on the grass, you know, or not? I mean, that is really what people have to talk. But, yeah, like punters will ask me, hey, when did you, you know, take your next step or whatever?

I was like, oh, when I decided just to do this onto my bed at night like 2,000 times a night, just like dropping the ball flat. And just how boring is, yeah, just do this for like an hour every single night. And then when you wake up, do some more of those. And then get on the jugs machine and just catch like 100 balls a day to make your hands better. And then I think it'll inevitably happen. Oh, so there's nothing I can work on

in the weight room or with the way that I'm like, you can obviously get stronger. That's great news. But all these little tiny things that are just so boring. And I assume golfers talk about it with putting, right?

Like, hey, you talk to the great golfers. Like, how'd you get there? Well, I worked on my short game first. ain't nobody want to fucking go to the putting green whenever there's an opportunity to go to the driving range you know there's like those are the don't be bored with consistency it's like those little things that aren't necessarily the the highlights or the dreams or the things that are the most fun to do those little things are what's going to pay off in the end and although you're talking about just showing up and doing this you're on that damn thing every single morning this thing and is that similar to playing linebacker maybe but at some point it's going to end up working for you

and it's like yeah just do it every single day for how long forever what do we even just do that every single day for the rest of your life it's like not everybody has that commitment and that's the difference i think honestly well i think isn't everybody's goal to find something that they care about enough to have that commitment that's what we're all trying to search you for probably yeah and i don't want to get too you know like we're really going hard on a russell wilson tweet that we don't even know if team three tweeted it or if russell tweeted it good point but that that little line right there is such a good statement about what makes people separate themselves you know who can do the monotonous work at a more rapid level whenever

nobody else is watching and then whenever it's time to show up and do your job you do it all right let's move on aj hawk congress has dove in dove dove not billy spikes no no no no congress dove. Dove. Not Billy Spikes. No. No. No. No. Congress has dove deeper into the Washington football operation. Now there's reports via front office sports that the Washington football team after all the exposes from the Washington Post about being an incredibly

toxic culture being run very poorly. It's a billion dollar business. Kind of an embarrassment to the shield even though all the players are told protect the shield, protect the shield, protect the shield. Feels like through everything we learned, and I would assume in every office there is wrongdoings by people, either on purpose or not on purpose. But from what we learned about the consistency of terribleness coming out of that Washington building, you thought it couldn't get any worse. But somehow, someway, Dan Snyder was able to slither his way

through the entire thing you know he was able to survive his wife became the new focal point she was showing up at the one per club meetings she was the one doing the interviews hey Dan everybody hates you let's you know let's get you out of here and maybe we can survive another role and a lot of people on the internet said well Snyder's Roger Goodell's guy and we live in the United States of Goodell so that's all that matters. Now that Congress has an actual thing they can get pissed off about,

like we're learning that they were running two completely different books, accounting-wise, to paint different pictures on the team's finances, probably tax issues in this thing, probably overall valuation stuff in this, the amount of lies maybe for advertising, the amount of fraudulent situations that can pop up whenever you bring in finances and the amount of lies maybe for advertising, the amount of fraudulent situations that can pop up whenever you bring in finances and the government hopping in.

I think this could be the one that ends up pushing Dan Snyder's ass out of ownership because the government don't play if they feel like they got the raw end of the deal money-wise, AJ. We all understand that literally since we're children. Yeah, if you're withholding tax dollars that the government expects you to pay, yeah, good luck getting out of that. So if you add this to all of the other things that have been going on with this team and this ownership, yeah, how in the hell does he keep control

of the team, keep ownership? But if he is boys with Goodell, why? What's their connection? I may have had a couple of steaks and pops one night. Yeah, some M&Ms watching NFL football. He might have helped Roger get the gig. Yeah, he might have been one of his big advocates, right? He might have been one of his big sponsors.

Like, oh, I like this guy that's been running mail for 20 years here at the NFL, and this guy will basically do anything. I asked him to do a little toilet cleanse, and he just jumped in there and did it. Like, this is our guy. Let's pay him $40 million a year. Maybe that happened. I'd assume more than just Dan Snyder did that and goodell has to look out for everything not just how dan snyder's doing but there are so many memes on the internet about like oh this is

going to kill dan snyder because he there's no way he can come back from this and then like two months later uh dan snyder's okay he still got the team let's move along here it's just been now on repeat almost but money in the government this is a big deal right yeah is there any other what's another example of some other gigantic corporation keeping two books bernie madoff was running two books yeah and the whole ponzi situation all of it involved yeah like is it how deep does it go and how many people are involved because it's not just dan schneider doing it there's obviously a lot of people involved you can't have that many people involved and i asked our bookkeeper cfo phil and cfo phil's first response alongside digs who is a

former accountant in his mom's account it's like the amount of work that that is to keep two separate different books because every transaction now has to be at least documented in each book and it has to be documented in different fashions to paint a different picture oh we are making money uh we aren't making money oh like everything is you know has to be balanced i assume it's only one or two people i think madoff only had one person up in that one office cooking the entire thing i assume that person didn't sleep for like 20 years doing these books and when they got busted probably very fucking thankful but this whole thing is is very very interesting on top of that the uh the nfl and the government have a pretty good relationship and the nfl i feel like always

kind of treads a little bit lightly when it comes to government because of the antitrust exemption that allows them to negotiate as a single entity for those tv deals where they get that massive amount of money from so if you're messing with that money you're in trouble not only that right i think they have some tax exemption too because they're a necessary entertainment they were deemed yeah yeah i don't know if that's the antitrust thing you're speaking of but i do believe the nfl and the government have a long long relationship of hey we need the nfl the government says which as somebody who lives in a very sports stooge world with my blinders on hey we need the fucking nfl i understand that but there's some stuff that's popping off that I'm not sure that even the United States

and Goodell can dance around with the government if they're really pissed off. Yeah, this feels like the last straw. Everything before was, you know, one thing and they did their research and everything. But, like, when the government gets involved and as much as, you know, Goodell and Snyder might be buddies, Goodell doesn't want the NFL to get smeared ever. And if it's this serious and they're going to dive even deeper into it, like there's only so many people you're that close with where you're willing to risk, you know, 30 other owners, I guess, 29, and Mark Davis,

because the IRS is investigating him as well. Privately, though, I think, or is that professionally? I don't know. I don't know. What were you going to say, though, AJ? I didn't know. I thought Diggs was starting to talk. Oh, sorry.

I thought it was you. I had a question. You know, I mean, if this guy's been doing all this bad stuff, I think there's a way that if the NFL does make him sell the team, that his punishment is not $6 billion for his team being sold. I feel like it should be split equally amongst the other teams. That's very nice. I was thinking equally amongst the NFL media.

Yeah. That too. You know, like people that equally amongst the NFL media. Yeah. That too. Makes more sense. You know, like people that talk about the NFL every day. Hey, go build up the commanders. You know, this is a great new hire they have. Here is a billion dollars. Take command.

Yeah, maybe. We're going to take command. Maybe give it to Carson Wentz. Well, he doesn't need it. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. He's got enough money, I guess. Yeah, exactly. Hey, I tried to look into the process of buying a team, AJ.

Yeah, seems easy. Yeah, I'm not talking about for me. I'm talking about for other people, though. So, you know, everybody's putting money together. They're doing this entire thing. The Broncos are currently up. Who knows what's going on with the Chargers? That was kind of quiet.

That happened like one week, and then that kind of disappeared. If the Washington team goes up for sale, we're not saying it is. Might have to get money to pay back due taxes or whatever the fuck they're doing. Fraudulent. If it's advertising, who knows? That's a pretty broad statement there about running two different books. Who knows exactly what the books were cooking? Was it to up the value so that they can fraudulent, so they could lie to like advertisers and things like that? Maybe. Was it for tax purposes? Maybe. I guess we'll kind of find that all out. Whatever the case, that is tough.

I think it's a blind auction. Like, you have to get okayed if you're a group of money people or a singular money person, and you have to get okayed. But then whenever you get okayed, I think you put in your bid and like, hey, this is what I would like to do. So all these franchises, with how much success they're having ratings wise and media rights deals with all these big tech money that is out there and they know Apple's going to get involved. They know Google is going to get involved. Amazon's already involved.

There's a chance that some of these franchises and programs, if we look on the internet, how much they're valued, this is a $3 billion team. there's a chance i think goes for like seven to ten billion dollars just because it's a blind bid and somebody's like nah we want this team or whatever the nfl knows that right so whenever they're thinking about dan snyder potentially getting moved on or whatever and i i like to um was it war dogs yeah you know where they put in a bid 300 or 400 million dollars lower than the next person they're like like, God damn it, I wish we would have known that. I wonder how much of that happens whenever you're bidding on these NFL teams as well. When it comes to, you're talking about bidding multiple billions,

I would assume there's a wide range. I don't know. The fact that it's blind, if you are going to put a bid in, you obviously want to be taken serious. You want to be the are going to put a bid in you obviously want to be taken serious you want them you want to be the front runner possibly but yeah too uh let's just throw out let's just start with 4.2 bill today guys okay we'll see what they come back with well i don't think they come i'm not do they counter can you counter i would assume like whatever team that i don't know there's no negotiating like back and forth i wonder what's that called uh on ebay and uh on

meekum reserve the reserve has not been met. So maybe there will be like four groups of people or four people that get okayed by everybody to make a bid, right? Because you have to get okayed, I think, before you even make the bid. So you have to get in there. Then once you get okayed, you make your bid. And then Snyder comes back and says the reserve has not been met. So then everybody has to go back to the drawing board. And then that's when you go.

I wonder how the whole negotiation thing goes, because I do believe it is an auction, and I do believe you're just placing bids, and you do not know what other people are placing. Well, and just on the trajectory alone, like you probably would have to double the value that it is right now. Yeah, for lost earnings in the future. Lost future earnings, I assume the Washington football team,

if they were to sell, would want money for and everything like that yeah and just like with apple and all these other massive corporations that are clearly trying to get in on stuff like you know sunday ticket amazon just got in like there are so many the growth of the nfl on its own is going to be you know 10x in 10 years when that next media deal is up, it'll probably be $300 billion. All right, AJ Hawk, DK Metcalf said, I eat one meal a day, I drink one coffee, and I eat three to four bags of candy. And he has a 10-pack. He is the closest thing to Calvin Johnson that we have,

although I don't want him to hear that. He is DK Metcalf. Calvin Johnson's Calvin Johnson. But he was quoted as saying, yeah, man, my diet is not what everybody thinks it is. I would assume the one meal a day would definitely keep you shredded because you're not eating as much. But everything they say about, you know, candy and sugar is what it's supposed to do to your body. It just doesn't do to DK Metcalf. And I hate to break it to everybody. You know, they say, like, we're all created equally.

Yeah. That's not true. That is not true. That is not true. Maybe we're all created to be equals and be judged that way. But I have shared a locker room and in a weight room and a shower in life with humans that eat McDonald's three meals a day. Not everybody. Not everybody. But Ocho Cinco,

I mean, he's in the middle of this battle for science. Eat McDonald's three meals a day, able to go drink at night, have pizza afterwards, and then you see them 5.36 a.m. somehow going through a workout, taking their shirt off. Maybe they lose one of their eight abs, maybe, but after the workout, it is back. DK Metcalf is a freak. I'd assume there's a lot of working out that has to happen to continue to keep the muscles in there and the regimen in there, but I don't want anybody else thinking that just because that's what DK Metcalf does, that's the blueprint to become DK Metcalf. You have to look in the mirror and say, DK Metcalf ain't fucking me.

You know what I mean, AJ? What do we talk about all the time? Genetics are so different for everybody. There's genetic freaks. Obviously, DK works very, very hard, but you see a guy like him and everyone assumes, oh, he has probably a bodybuilder's diet year-round, 365 days a year. We played with a lot of guys, especially when you're younger, that you can just do whatever the hell you want, and you get a 12-pack and you're jacked and you're shredded and that's just how it goes now for some people eventually it slows down as they get older in life but yeah there's there's a lot of people like that not all of them and everybody is working most the majority of the nfl guys work very very

very hard diligent there's definitely there's definitely i don't know what the percentage would be but there's definitely like they're genetic freaks athletic freaks yeah so a lot of times i watch guys eat egg mcmuffins four times a day and four twix bars and then drink them out and do and go to bed and they get a 15 pack when they wake up and they'll run a four three the next morning it's like what there's just there's people like it you got to understand hey like what i say pat life's not fair and once you realize that you know you do say that you the one. You should put that on a shirt. The whole thing about watching these dudes do this and then go do what they do, I think that's why team sports help people mature quicker.

Because once you realize, like, there's going to be failures in life that are just completely out of your control. What you have learned about what you're supposed to do to your body, how you're supposed to act, and what will happen if you do that, you're going to run into somebody in team sports where they completely debunk that theory. And it's like, oh, those books have been lying to me. These doctors have been lying to me.

Hey, nutritionist, you're telling me I can eat all this terrible shit. I'll become more explosive. My man over here just hang clean 400 pounds. I literally saw him drink a case of Bud Light last night. I mean, more explosive. My man over here just hanged me in 400 pounds. I literally saw him drink a case of Bud Light last night. I mean, can we have a conversation? Well, alcohol actually slows down your digestive system and everything like that. Well, how come this guy

had an entire bottle of whiskey last night and he's still got a six-pack right there? Can you riddle me this? Why everybody's different? Well, then stop painting me in the same picture as you paint everybody else. As you get older, I assume DK will change. As he gets older, into the game, 10 years, 11 years into his career, he is obviously incredible.

He'll want to maintain that. But you think about like T.O. Like T.O. is, unless he's eating just bland-ass chickens, the A.J. Hawk diet and the people that really take care of their body and the bodybuilder type thing, that is bland-ass chickens. The A.J. Hawk diet and the people that really take care of their body and the bodybuilder type thing, that is bland-ass chicken. That is terrible rice every single meal on repeat every day. I'd assume that's not what T.O. is doing. No.

That is definitely not what Ocho is doing. That's certainly not what D.K. Metcalf is doing. And I think it's another reminder that, hey, be who you can afford to be. If you start eating some candy and become a fat ass, probably not the right thing. But if you can eat four bags of candy every single day and look like DK Metcalf, live your best life out there. Live your best life. Zito, were you going to say something? I saw you raise your hand.

That was fascinating. No, I was just wondering, was the one meal the four bags of candy or was it an actual meal? I was a little confused by that. Well, the one meal I believe was in a comma, then the four bags was like the his his snacks be very impressive for his candy so he every day he laid his schedule I was like to your point about him working out he works out like twice between 8 and 12 noon he drinks his coffee relax that's one workout then right I I've always assumed that you have to leave weight room, do something,

come back for that to be a second workout. He just has one incredibly long workout, or do you think he does things in between his two workouts in between 8 and noon? I don't know. I mean, I would think maybe he'd take a quick break, get a snack and a coffee. And then you're back in there? The coffee actually is at noon, and then the four bags of candy is at 4.30, and then the dinner is at 8.30.

And that's the one meal. And that's the one meal, dinner. That's how he laid it out. Good sugar rush at 4.30, 5 o'clock there. Well, that gets you past the coffee crash. Can I adopt this? Yes, eat. Do it.

I mean, Tito, I literally just want an entire speech about how some people can do this and some people can't, but, I mean, why not give it a go? Why not? Why not? The grass is green on the other side. You never know until you try. The first time you talked to Bobby Lashley, he told us something similar. And Bobby Lashley is a mountain of a man, absolute freak, totally shredded.

What did he say? He said he only works out maybe 30 to 45 minutes a day just to kind of maintain. Yeah, I don't really do any heavy weight either. I do lightweight now or whatever. I'm like, how come you don't post like you just you know benching like 600 pounds he's like i don't really do that anymore i do i do probably weight that you do i was like all right easy he does those push-up things right yeah and then he gave me a push-up challenge that i uh i've yet to start i'm gonna see him this weekend no i thought you did it i thought you did it last

night oh yeah yeah i started it i loved it yeah you got to like 22 yeah you got back you guys did the dude perfect you guys both hit it one shot and then you came back and that's what took up most of the times you were in your room doing the yeah i was up to about 4 a.m this morning eastern time aj a long night last night what's the video you say you got of Of what? I don't know. You said you got a message. Yeah, 3 a.m. I got a text message from Vince McMahon with a video in it. Okay? Interesting.

Very, very interesting that this happened. I'm assuming this was not filmed immediately before he sent it to me. Foxy put captions on it so everybody could see this. Imagine looking at your phone, and I was up at this time, you know, WrestleMania weekend, you know, long nights or whatever, and I see, you know, on my phone, old Vinnie Mack. I'm like, all right, what is this about? He must be thanking me for coming and humbling Austin Theory

and everything like that. I open it up. It's just a goddamn video. Watch and listen to this video coming from Vince McMahon, a 76-year-old man. A 76-year-old man sent this to me at 3 a.m. via text message go and run this thing Fox He put a thousand pounds right here on the pit shark. And he knocked out ten reps. Mike and I, another day at the office,

I didn't show you how it was done. A thousand pounds. A thousand pounds. How is the spirit going to to kick your ass. 3 a.m. This guy. 3 a.m. I get that message. When did he film that?

Are those fake weights? And why is a 76-year-old man still able to fucking squat 1,000 pounds? And why is he telling me Austin Theory is going to kick my ass ass i thought the entire purpose of this was i was going to kick austin's ass to humble him so that vince can you know take him to higher heights that was an absurd that was an insane message to get that i never thought i would receive in my entire life and by the way vince no he's not okay fuck you he's not much, AJ. Well, I mean, I think it's awesome. I love that he, and those were real weights. I could hear them clanging.

I mean, he's just showing you probably, I'm surprised that he cut off the end of the video where he said, I'm going to take one of these 45s off the end. I'm going to bash it over your head at WrestleMania if you try to beat this kid. He did not do that. That was the end of the video. I assume that was the end. You didn't show. By the way, I did not respond.

I didn't even know how to respond to that like i double tapped on the video like for like one of the reactions and i honestly didn't know which one to send like because it was it was impressive that he squatted a thousand pounds so i didn't want to do the thumbs down you know because like not impressive i didn't want to send one of you send one of you doing a thousand and ten all right let me find it. I don't know if there's a rack around here, unfortunately. It looks like he was back in Connecticut, right? Yeah, I think so.

I saw the WWE stuff there. So was that yesterday? Was that two days ago? How long ago was that? Because if that guy's squatting 1,000 pounds 10 times, his legs are going to be a little – he's going to have cement in his skates. Yeah, it's going to be a really tough move. You know what that was? That was probably a response.

He saw the video of you kick the ball one attempt in the hole. He's like, I got to match at least that feet. Oh, you think that's impressive. Wait until you see what I got. How about him literally at the end, Austin Thierry's going to kick your ass. I'm like, what's that all about? Yeah. What was that all?

I thought we were. That was after the long pause. He had the long pause where he stared at the camera. I liked it. He was perfect. A little senile. How about him saying, Mike and the long pause where he stared at the camera. I liked it. He was perfect. A little senile. How about him saying, Mike and I, this is another day at the office. Whoa, what did you say?

I'm just saying, I mean, he must be losing if he thinks Austin Derry's going to beat him. Yeah, you called him a clown, too. I mean, if he's saying stuff like that, sorry, you know, Mr. McMahon. You're looking like a clown when you say stuff like that. I mean, it's not my fault. Let's get to a break. We'll be back on the other side. All right. What if Sam Roberts was right? when you say stuff like that. I mean, it's not my fault. Let's get to a break. We'll be back on the other side.

All right? What if Sam Roberts was right? What if I am getting bamboozled here? Sam Roberts is a mark. He's never been right in his goddamn life. Big time mark. Vince did 1,000 pounds on the pitch chart, though, and was still able to gather himself and say, you're going to get your ass kicked.

Hey, Vince, fuck you. How about that? How about that? I'm not. All right? And you're lucky I didn't. Never mind. All right.

What? What are you going to do? Huh? What was going to happen? Well, the pitch shark is kind of a Fugue squad. A little rakey dink. It's kind of, you know what I mean? As somebody that's got the quad father here.

You know what I mean? You're saying put that bar on your back, right? I'm saying you don't just have to put it on your back. It's kind of, you know what I mean? As somebody that's got the quad father here, you know what I mean? You're saying put that bar on your back, right? You don't just have to put it on your back. Let's see you move some. You know, I know you're 76 and you can only do what you got to do, but get the fuck out of here, dude. All right. We're back in a few minutes.

Hour three will be on the other side. We have Ian Rappaport joining us, breaking down everything going on behind the scenes in the NFL. 3 a.m. Imagine looking at your phone. First of all, your phone vibr. 3 a.m. Imagine looking at your phone. First of all, your phone vibrates 3 a.m. It's like, well, what is this? Yeah.

You know, somebody in jail? Is somebody dead? That's the first thoughts. And no, this is a 76-year-old billionaire. Okay. What's going on here? What the fuck? What the fuck was that?

Shut the phone. Put it back in there. Well, we're going to run out on the show tomorrow for sure. All right, we're back in a few minutes. What the fuck? What the fuck was that? Shut the phone. Put it back in there. Well, we're going to run that on the show tomorrow for sure. All right, we're back in a few minutes. Can't take you long enough. Bye. Those prices up.

Regional price for WrestleMania weekend on spray tan up 150%. They got me for sure. Let's go around some more NFL news before Ian Rappaport joins us. Shout out to Kofi, by the way, who was right here chilling, having a good time. We appreciate the hell out of Kofi. Per Matt Miller's conversation with a high-level NFL scout. Matt Miller is at NFL Draft Scout, I believe. Is that him? Matt Miller at NFL Draft Scout had another conversation with another NFL scout, a high-level one.

What does that mean? What does that mean, AJ? Isn't every NFL, a high-level one. What does that mean? What does that mean, AJ? Isn't every NFL scout a high-level scout? I mean, yeah. Is there even different levels of scout? I mean, there's like a director of pro scouting, director of college scouting, and there's scouts. Well, there's like regional scouts, there's college scouts,

there's NFL scouts, but if you were in other team scouts and everything like that, if you were in the NFL and a scout at all, you'd be considered a high-level scout, right? Because you're not like a college scout. What about like a first-year scout? Would you consider them a high-level scout? No, they're just a Bush League bitch-ass scout. Like a veteran scout. Yeah, so this is a high-level means veteran.

Old man scout. Been around. Well, Matt Miller said that he had a conversation with a high-level scout. Okay, this guy he's saying his first rodeo in scouting in the nfl and uh he said the ohio statewide receivers are going to go a lot earlier than people think both of them olivet and wilson conversation with a high level nfl scout via at nfl draft scout those ohio statewide receivers are going to go a lot earlier than people think both of them sobacks go early. That's why we knew before the draft process

and before the free agency period, the conversation was these quarterbacks stink. Ain't nobody going to want these quarterbacks. Normally teams do whatever they can to get a quarterback. This year it ain't going to be like that. And we said, well, let's see what teams get quarterbacks and free agency and which teams don't. The teams that wanted a quarterback,

now all of a sudden Kenny Pickett, Malik Willis, Matt Corral, these guys are all of a sudden, hey, somebody might trade up and get them don't. The teams that wanted a quarterback, now all of a sudden, Kenny Pickett, Malik Willis, Matt Corral, these guys are all of a sudden, hey, somebody might trade up and get them up there. Five overall picks, six overall picks, all of a sudden. That was not the conversation before the free agency period ended up fruitless for some quarterback-needy teams. Now with the wide receivers, defensive ends go, quarterbacks go. Wide receivers is the, like right now in the NFL, the way

offenses are played, the way the rules are set up. If you can get an electrifying guy out at wide out, it's a game changer. And these young wide receivers over the last few years have come out of college ready for the NFL. Will that continue? We don't know. Were these last couple draft classes just anomalies? Maybe. Hindsight will tell us that 10 years 15 years down the road but that's good news for the ohio state buckeyes huh look at you guys getting some uh some shine here from high level nfl scouts aj yeah i'm glad to see that report from a high level nfl scout i think there's probably some truth to this like so brian hartline remember

receiver in the nfl for i don't know nine ten years played ohio state he's the receivers coach at ohio state he's considered one of the best assistants in the nfl, I don't know, nine, ten years, played at Ohio State. He's the receiver's coach at Ohio State. He's considered one of the best assistants in the NFL. He's a great recruiter. He has these dudes coming out of college polished. I mean, look at Terry McLaurin. What he's doing in Washington definitely helps guys like this because they're all, like, come from this system. And not only are they burners that can fly,

but they're also, like, polished route runners that know what to do day one when they walk in the facility. Hartline did something awesome when he was in the NFL. We don't have to dive all the way into it. I do remember his story. You know him personally? Good guy? Yeah, really good dude.

An awesome coach, too. He's a really good coach. Loves coaching. Everybody knew he was going to be a coach whenever he was playing. Oh, yeah. He's like on the fast track. I don't know if he wants to ever leave Ohio State, but, yeah, there's people that have tried to come get him.

I know that. Is he a FIFO? He's from Ohio. So, yes, of course. Yeah. Up north. Oh, where Ruppers from up there? FIFO.

Some of the worst kind. Canton area. Oh, Hall of Fame area. Yeah. Holy shit. Oh, heartline. All right. How about him, Ryan?

How old is he? Was he your age? My age? He's in between us? He might be 36, my age? He's in between us? He might be 36, 35. So he's in between us, I think. Yeah. He played in Miami?

He was with the Dolphins. He was with the Browns for a minute. I know when I was on the Bengals, I played against him when he was in the Browns. I don't know if there's any others. He ran like a 4-2 down a highway or something, right? Literally, that's what I'm thinking. He could fly. I know that.

Yeah, yeah. I do. I remember do i remember sorry but that's awesome news hopefully we're one of those teams because there's a lot of teams that need weapons the colts are one of them we got matt ryan that's awesome jim ursae is alleging uh that we're going to get some veteran defensive player and when he talked about the cap but the cap means nothing they just signed bobby wagner to a five-year 50 million dollar deal and they just re-upped matthew stafford for like 160 million guaranteed And he talked about the cap, but the cap means nothing. They just signed Bobby Wagner to a five-year, $50 million deal, and they just re-upped Matthew Stafford for like $160 million guaranteed. I mean, money's not real, okay? Salary cap is not real.

And every time I get attacked for saying that, and I might be wrong, like when Devontae leaves and Tyreek leaves, and that's the narrative now, salary cap's a real thing. It's not. There's some people that are just very good at it, and the Rams are one of those teams. But with a young wide receiver on a rookie deal that you can get, and if the production can be high, you can change a team like that. I don't know enough about Olive and Wilson to really talk about them, and I don't even know if I'm pronouncing their goddamn

names right, but I'm excited for draft night to see who gets these weapons, who decides to go out and make their team better. What'd you say, Gump? I said you are pronouncing them correctly. But I think it was last week when Dan Orlovsky said that Garrett Wilson is Julio Jones and Olave is faster Keenan Allen. So why wouldn't you take these guys one and two if it's guaranteed that they're Julio Jones and faster Keenan Allen? Hey, I fucking hate that. Like, Orlovsky was in the NFL too, so he should know this.

You know? Comparing him to current guys, you mean, or current legends? Yes. Because, okay, whenever you make that broad statement, the layman football fan is like, oh, this is who this person is going to be. It's like maybe body-wise that is who that person looks like, but the real differentiator on somebody being a keenan allen or being a fucking julio jones or whatever tom brady is the

brain it's the brain how do you know how this person is going to be as a pro how do you know what they're going to be like whenever they get money how do you know what they're going to be like whenever they get time those all those decisions that are made, that being bored, not getting bored with consistency is another one of those. So I hate, and I think a lot of former players hate, whenever people get on TV, and normally it's pundits, and normally it's people that haven't played, are like, this guy is Christian McCaffrey 2.0.

It's like, okay, so this guy's going to run into car crashes every single time he gets the ball? I just feel like that's a very interesting way to describe people. But I do understand why he's doing it, because he sees similar playing styles. But the difference between that guy and a guy that is just having a cup of coffee in the NFL is in between the years, and you can never fucking figure that out. And even sometimes in cases like DK Metcalf, we were just talking about, where you call him Calvin Johnson, and he's like,

no, no, no, don't fucking call me that. I'm going to be my own player. And I think that's why, you know, when Dan Orlovsky and these other people call these guys Hall of Famers, essentially, that sets them up for only criticism and failure. What's Orlovsky doing? He's a clock. What's he doing? He has a take, man.

Dan has a take, and he's not going to back off of it. That's why he's good on TV. We need to stop doing that i agree i think it's i know it's like a thing though when i was doing college games color commentary a lot of times if there was guys that were going to be drafted they would want me to come up hey can you give us like maybe two or three comparisons of what this guy is like compared to an nfl guy i'm always like i I mean, I can tell you, like you said, I can tell you who he's built like, really. I can't really exactly tell you who he plays like or what he's going to be at the next level.

That's like that white coming out of Penn State that ran a 4-2. This guy's the next Wes Welker. It's like, that motherfucker's running a 4-2. Can we maybe compare him to somebody else other than just who he potentially looks like? There was a kid out of Texas Tech that ran like a 4.3 or 4.4 a couple years ago. And they're like, oh, this guy is the next Edelman or something like that. And I'm like, listen, I got a lot of respect for Edelman.

Edelman's a dog. That is why Edelman's not running a 4.3. I think we can make a better comparison for the person as opposed to just what they look like. But it's always going to be difficult to see who can make and who can't because once money gets added into it the situation handling like relationship there is just so much that goes into it i don't like the whole especially to keenan allen and fucking julio keenan allen gets no love so then whenever you say oh this guy's a faster keenan allen it's like are you burying you're taking a shot at keenan allen how great he is by trying to compare him.

You're right. We love Orlovsky. Orlovsky has to talk on TV for 10 hours a day. I think he makes like 15 bucks an hour to do it. So he's going to say a lot of things. He's going to say a lot of things to do all that. We love Dan Orlovsky, but that whole and we're in draft season, I don't

like that whole thing. I guess if people are going to say that, like, they should go further. Like, he runs his routes like Keenan Allen did when Keenan Allen was young, just a little bit faster. Like, he ran his 40 a little bit faster than Keenan Allen. Like, I'm okay with that as opposed to saying, oh, this person's going to be a faster this person. It's like, do you know that?

Some guy that just ran a 4.8 might be the greatest wide receiver of all time because their football IQ is through the roof. They have a good rapport with the quarterback, and they can get open. Predicting all this stuff on who's going to be good, who's not going to be good is an absolute nightmare. All I know, if they're coming from Ohio State, they're probably taking a pay cut in the NFL. Happened for a long time.

Long before these NIL deals went through. Ain't that right, AJ? The oldest joke in the book, for sure. You guys are paying players. No, I mean any big-time school. Oh, he took a pay cut to come here. Okay. Yeah, it's like Cam Newton.

They're like, Cam Newton's taking a pay cut to go number one overall. He's like, really? He was making 50 million dollars that's amazing they're paying him 50 million dollars i got like a hundred dollar handshake one time and i thought i was king of the castle and i got a 40 000 loan out i'm like look at me balling that dude was making 50 million dollars on a college campus holy fuck yeah he's taking pay cut you remember his dad negotiated that deal with the two different things or whatever. It's like, all right. All right.

Per Tom Pelissero, the Browns wanted at least a second rounder without paying any of Baker's contract. You give us a second rounder and take his contract, we'll make a deal. Note, some teams didn't think he was a first rounder when he was drafted by the Cleveland Browns. So I believe the situation was – Number one overall? They didn't believe he was a first rounder when he was drafted number the Cleveland Browns. So I believe the situation was... Number one overall? They didn't believe he was the first rounder

when he was drafted number one overall? Some teams, allegedly. This is via the Aero Palacero, who just gets an absolute memo, and it was reported by Billy Spike, Stove Kleiman. The Browns initially wanted at least a second rounder and more for Baker Mayfield while refusing to take on any of the money of his contract,

per Tom Palacero. Also notes that some of the NFL teams didn't even believe he was a first rounder in the 2018 draft when the Browns drafted him number one overall. Now, that might just be a bunch of bullshit because I'd like to read their notes. I want to I want to see their notes from 2018 where they said they gave him a second round grade. That's it's easy to say that now. Yeah, it's very easy to be like, no, no, we didn't even like him coming out. We thought third rounder probably just way.

And obviously we're right you know a lot of obviously we're right conversations happening with insiders by gms i would assume and other people around the nfl just from what we read but this baker mayfield situation he might play this year they're saying they just signed jacoby brissett they have no idea what's going to happen with deshaun watson suspension roger goodell said a decision's not imminent roger goodell said maybe i don't know hey hey ro Rog, when are you going to decide what the punishment is for Deshaun? When we get all the information. What does that mean? All of the information? That could

be, what is he doing right now? How is this conversation going over? There is zero end in sight to that entire thing, I think, personally. After seeing one of the depositions, by the way, I don't know how many more of those we're going to see. Deshaun's going to probably hope none of those. I mean, that was very uncomfortable to watch as is the entire situation.

The Cleveland Browns are going through it right now. They bring in Jacoby. Deshaun Watson's deal is only worth $1 million next year. I think everybody in that place is thinking that Deshaun's probably not playing next year for a good portion of the season. Baker Mayfield might play again. They're going to be stuck with Baker unless they

cut him. I think the rest of the NFL knows hey you're fucked pal you just gave $230 million guaranteed to another quarterback Baker's people have already publicly said we want out of here I guess Baker is on he's going on the You Never Know podcast with Mike Studd and them I think he's going on there

there's going to be a lot of clips because we got an email from the producer of that podcast and said hey there's going to be a lot of things coming out of this podcast with Baker that you're going to want to talk to. And then this guy was like dead set on me calling him or FaceTiming him to talk about it. Who are these guys?

What show? The YNK podcast. Mike Studd, great rapper, singer. He's kind of transitioned into a media guy now at this point. He has a podcast. He lives a great life out in L.A. if his social media is anything like his actual life. Him and Manziel, I believe, are out there.

I believe there's an entire crew. I think Post Malone was running with him for a bit. I mean, it seems like a great time in the life they're living. But they had Baker Mayfield on, I guess, and they talked about everything. And the producer, I forget his name, Luke or something like that, he hit us up and he was like, hey, let's call and let's talk about it and i was i'm like dude perfect right now you know like i am so sorry but if you guys release this which i assume you're going to we will certainly talk about it because baker mayfield is a huge focal point to the entire drama happening

away from the football field right now well in baker's best case scenario and i guess this is what the browns aside from Sean just playing the entire year, if he goes out in those first four games and just absolutely lights it up, you've got to assume teams then will be like, okay, yeah, we'll give you a second rounder. We'll take on his contract for the rest of the year. Well, it's depending upon how desperate.

There's no way he's playing games for that team. There's no way. His agent, they're going to do everything they can to force them to cut him. He wants to be a free agent. And if he's cut, he's already guaranteed some money, right? Yes. So then he can double dip, get paid somewhere else, and go somewhere else.

But the Browns have openly said via their sources, we don't care. Hey, we're not trading you. We might have no fucking quarterback, dude. All right? You don't like us? We don't like you either. I mean, we didn't draft you.

Somebody else did. We kind of got handed you. Last year, you played every game. It didn't work out well. I mean, we didn't draft you. Somebody else did. We kind of got handed you. Last year, you played every game. It didn't work out well. I had a broken humerus. I had torn a ligament in my leg. You still threw the ball 65 times that one game. Well, that was your decision.

You guys were fucking me over. That whole bickering of conversation with what's going on with Jimmy G, and I saw Kyle Shanahan speaking, holding a coffee, sitting in the way. Yeah, buttoned to the top. They put him in an interesting spot there at the league meetings there. But he was talking about we have three quarterbacks we really like. And he talked about Trey Lance being a starter much sooner than later. So I think his plan is for Trey Lance still to be the starter.

And then he also admitted that this shoulder surgery with Jimmy has slowed down the process of the trade. And he said, I'm in no hurry. I have a great quarterback. If Jimmy G's on our team and we play him, cool. If not, we're happy with everybody else. And Jimmy has just been dead silent. Jimmy has not said anything about it.

If they ask Jimmy to play, Jimmy will go and play probably good football for them. And now he's already been paid. That is the difference between he and Baker. But I think the more and more it goes with the Baker situation with Cleveland Browns it doesn't make him more desirable for other teams I think it goes the opposite direction and I guess we just kind of got to see how it all pans out I can't wait for the the YNK podcast to hear what Baker Mayfield's saying if he saw us down the entire front office that'd be incredible to hear why do you think that guy wouldn't like call like hey let's call and talk about it it's like all right I don't have time

right now but maybe next week but I assume you're going to want. Like, hey, let's call and talk about it. It's like, all right, I don't have time right now, but maybe next week. But I assume you're going to want to put that out before next week or whatever. Maybe he had some tips or something like that about WrestleMania. Oh, you think he wanted to help me out? Maybe that's what he was going for. Hey, Baker's going to say this, but also when you're going after Austin Theory, I actually talked to the guy. He's a bum.

His left knee hurts or something like that. Oh, so I should have called. I'll make time to call for him. But I can't wait to hear what he has to say. I'm excited to hear what Baker Mayfield has to say, because all we've heard is what his team has told insiders that he's not. He wants trade. He wants this. And then there's the bickering. And we haven't heard from Baker yet, other than his entire post about thank you to Cleveland. So I think we might be painting the wrong picture here about Baker Mayfield. We'll have to hear it from his own words, but that's going to be a situation we're going to have to follow.

Speaking of following situations, that's all this guy does. Ladies and gentlemen, a man who got got more than once this morning because it is April Fool's Day, senior NFL insider for NFL Network and NFL.com, friend of the show, Ian Rapoport. Yeah, Ramsey! Just once. Just once. Yeah, but honestly, whenever you report something,

like it's like two actually because it's already been legitimized because you've already got another source, and you send the entire NFL world into a tizzy. April Fool's Day is what? Your biggest Achilles heel? Your biggest nightmare? So I don't like it. And I assume that some people think it's funny,

and I don't know what kind of a take this is because, like, most humans probably think it's dumb. But, like think it's funny, and I don't know what kind of a take this is, because most humans probably think it's dumb, but it's dumb. I don't know what's funny about, with all due respect to Julian Edelman, tweeting, I'm signing with the Bucks. Debra Fulstay! He did literally request a trade. It was two years ago, so it's not that far out of the realm of possibility. It's a good joke requesting another trade like anyway like i don't i don't think it's that funny and i don't know why anybody would want to do that side note david and joku now follows me on twitter so there you go okay so way to go build your sources your networks up with that being said great april fool stuff

yeah talk in joku and and you know, you saying Julian, it was a couple years ago he did ask for a trade. It's like, it makes it even better. It makes it even more believable. You know, they just kind of set that hook right in front of your mouth. And Ian Rappaport's like, oh, I need news. I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, Its there. Five-foot putt. By the way, we missed plenty more putts as I went on through the day.

I assumed after watching that one putt, you rarely made putts. Rarely. People look at my swing and they think I'm good. I'm not good. I'm bad because I can't putt. I didn't see your actual swing. I saw your putt swing. No one thinks so.

You're playing putt-putt. I don't know what you're doing out there. You look like a child at a putt-putt game, just hoping to make contact. This was a five-foot putt putt like i don't know what you're doing out there you look like a child at a putt putt game like just hoping to make contact this was a five foot putt we saw he was acting as if the break was coming off of like a windmill at a putt putt i mean you sent that thing out three feet to the left as if you're putting on like i don't know the oakmont golf course out there into the clown's mouth dude it was so bad it was one of the worst pots i've ever seen in my entire life and that is not a lie and the person i was playing with who was holding my phone as he was showing you was like wow that wasn't even close i'm like yes yes no i'm aware was it were you worried about us or was that just april fools that's how you put on on april 1st

that's what i'm saying that's what that's i should have gone with he also by the way as we were walking to the next hole well while I was riding, he was walking, he was like, so that guy who called you, was he exercising? And I'm like, no, that's just what he dresses. That's how he dresses. He's like, but he was wearing a tank top. I'm like, yes, that's how he dressed. He's like, oh, okay.

Does he exercise for a living? I'm like, he used to, but I actually all right ian we don't care and listen you and your yup friends missing pots on the course like i'm happy for you enjoy your life you deserve it how hard you work i i actually do have some important uh pat mcafee related news for you um so i wanted you to i was like really excited about this so i went to to an event on Thursday happened to meet Ian Walsh, who's a big time surfer. And the surfing community is huge on the Pat McAfee show. And Ian has brought the McAfee show to his fellow like world class surfers. And they all watching out and they

are big fans. That's it. That's my new service. Was that your little Traeger summit you went to? I saw you flexing that Traeger summit. You were getting gifts from everybody. You were living your best life. Yeah. But anyway, surfers, you're big in the surfer world. It's pretty good. Hey, I appreciate and love the surfers. There's no chance of me getting out there and doing it with you guys just because, you know, sharks and rocks and my balance and I got a hole in my

eardrum, but I have nothing but respect for the surf culture. I think we share a lot of similar hobbies. I think we share a lot of similar mindsets on a lot of things. But what you guys do out there is magical. And thanks for watching. Hey, I'll toss a shock anytime you guys need me from the beach. I'll throw you guys water too

if you need it. Sunscreen, whatever you got. I ain't getting out there, but I appreciate it because I heard you guys look like a seal. And when you look like a seal on that thing, you see the sharks come. And then you're dead. We're hoping for every single shark week and it has never happened.

I feel like that does actually happen to the surfers. So, hey, be safe out there. We appreciate the hell out of you. Let's move on. Baker Mayfield. He's allegedly doing a podcast. I don't know if I was supposed to break that news or not. I'm not 100% sure. He's doing a podcast, though, within the next week, I think. We're going to see clips of Baker Mayfield speaking publicly about his whole situation.

Allegedly, Tom Pelissero of the Arrow reported that they wanted a second rounder and for another team to pick up his entire contract. Is that real? Is that not real? Everybody's just waiting on them to cut him right because they're kind of they know that the Browns are stuck in a position but now we're here and there's a chance he plays next season like how does this whole thing shape up you think uh first of all I'm kind of interested to hear from Baker as well um my guess is that he probably

sounds a little bit like he sounded uh when he put that little note and i know the note was like pre-planned and whatever but i don't get the sense there's a lot of nuance to baker so like he's probably going to be hurt by this he probably is going to talk about how much he loved cleveland uh and explain you know why he wanted to be traded i get all of it um but baker mayfield would have been the quarterback of the browns had they not traded for Deshaun Watson. So even amid all this, I do believe this was something that was going to be fixable. As far as what Pelissero reported, I believe initially at the beginning of all this, that's what the Browns were hoping for Baker was for someone else to take on the salary

and the second rounder. It's not going to be that now. I think the salary is fully guaranteed. They're probably going to have to eat some of it. And there is precedent. I mean, last year, the Panthers traded Teddy Bridgewater to the Broncos right before the draft, ate some salary. It was a late round pick, I think a sixth rounder.

And that was a pretty fair deal for a guy who ended up starting. My sense is the trade ends up looking similar to that mid to late rounder the browns picking up some of the contract but not all of it and baker mayfield ends up in a new spot that's a win for everyone okay ian when's that timetable is that something that may happen like during the draft or when do you expect this i would say probably in the couple days before the draft is generally the window there because you know the the leverage I guess for the Panthers is to be like well we're just going to take a guy and maybe they do maybe they want to but if they don't want to if they're not in love with this group of quarterback at

you know in the top 10 where they are either six or seven I forget um then they could just get Baker Mayfield have him come in compete with Sam Darnold, may the best man win, and see if you can kind of reclaim what Baker probably would have been slash should have been before the injury. If it doesn't happen, then the Panthers take one, and then the market is holding on to him, waiting for someone else to get injured, which, you know, sometimes happens in the preseason, but doesn't always happen. So, like, that's the scenario where they could just hold him. Like, I don't get the sense they would cut him

because you're not paying him until the regular season anyway, so there's no option or anything you need to get out from under. They could just keep him and wait for someone to get injured. Bobby Wagner signs a five-year, $50 million deal yesterday worth up to $65 million. Is that the actual numbers or are you going back to your bullshit numbers? wait for someone to get injured bobby wagner signs a five-year 50 million dollar deal yesterday worth up to 65 million is that the actual numbers or you're going back to your bullshit numbers uh those are the first available numbers uh what i'm trying to find out now is how much is year one oh so it's a full game oh it's a classic that the year one number is lower than $10 million per year, which would make sense.

He's a 31-year-old linebacker who's awesome, but 31. And then my sense is the rest of the deal is kind of pay as you go. So the guarantee probably is limited to year one and change. But I'm working on getting additional information because that seems like a massive number but the rams structure contracts usually very smartly so my sense is for a 32 year old linebacker next year they probably have the option of what to do but we'll see we'll see kind of what it ends up like bobby wagner had a big market or i mean richard sherman reported much earlier than you and everybody else that Bobby

Wagner news is coming I believe it was the Niners and the Chargers potentially he's from LA was there anybody else that was in that game or was Bobby and the Rams kind of seemed like a no doubter no I believe it came down to the Ravens and the Rams and the Ravens actually had a nice offer on the table for him with guarantees into the second year. I think it wasn't quite 10, but it was close, a year. But, you know, I was told pretty early on that he wants to be in L.A. and don't be surprised if he lands in the division. Well, he's not going to Arizona.

San Francisco's got a ton of linebackers. He's from L.A. Like, that makes sense. So my thought all along was he would go to the Rams. I know the Ravens pushed hard and tried, but I would like – I'll have to see the contract to see what it actually is because, you know, I like to do that. No, you don't.

That's the problem. That's what we've been saying. You don't like to do that. Well, I'm turning over a new leaf. Ah, about time. April new leaf that actually works yeah yeah go ahead connor yeah rap sheet is uh dan snyder gonna have to sell the team and the commanders and do you think that that'll happen in these next couple you know years with congress getting why you yeah why are you asking that question well just because i want to know if there's a team up for sale, you know,

and also because of the fact that, you know, Dan Snyder and Carl Wentz, maybe there's a new, you know, relationship for them. There was a report from the front office sports that they were running two books, okay, for people that might just be listening now. There was two different books accounting-wise happening at the commanders at the Washington football team. And we all know, I think you know, A.J AJ knows, anybody that's been around any type of life, if the government thinks you're lying about your money,

whether it's taxes or fraudulent towards your advertisers or anything like that, the fact that there's two books, this is something Snyder's not going to be able to sneak out of, right? This seems like a much bigger deal than even the exposés that were very terrible in the past? The short answer is I don't know. Like everyone else, I need to let it play out. I need to see what is real and what is not. It does seem, though, based on the reports and based on what I know, that the congressional investigation, I guess it's called, has taken a turn and, you know, expanded its focus a

little bit. And we'll see what, you know, expanded its focus a little bit. And we'll see what, you know, is there two books? I have not confirmed that myself. I don't know. The reporter is pretty good. So my sense is he probably knows, but I do not know. If that is the case, it would be very serious because you're right. Once Congress gets involved and they start investigating something, they basically will follow it till wherever.

So they'll start on, you know, was there some sort of, you know, improprieties in the work environment or whatever? Was there sexual misconduct? And then they will just keep looking. And wherever it ends up, it ends up. Obviously, Congress is involved. That sounds serious to me. Would he lose the team? I don't know. But if there was, you know, if there was something financial that very serious that Congress can prove that there were improprieties and something very wrong, then I would say the consequences would probably be as grave as they could come. We just don't know enough yet to see where this is going. If I've learned anything from the Gabagool families, once the state starts looking, even if they get some smaller,

they're going to continue until they find or get whatever they think is potentially back there. I'm not saying it's not fair. I'm just saying once the government gets involved, that's always going to be something that's going to be very very deep, very in detail. And the tax potential evasion thing has gotten

so many people. Like that is the it's almost like we don't care. You can be a despicable human being, have a toxic culture expose, expose, expose. But if you're keeping money from the government, you hey, in this country, you're in deep from the government, you, hey, in this country, you're in deep shit. Yeah. I mean, that is, how would you find that out? You would just call people over there. You'd call the government like you personally, how would you, how would you

legitimize that story? Good question. Um, that would be difficult because I don't have a lot of great governmental contacts. Um, I would probably work it from either from the team angle or, you know, what the NFL knows. But I'm not sure how many people like Congress. Congress doesn't work like that. Congress isn't going to be, you know, tell the NFL, here's what we find today. Here's what we find tomorrow. So, like, unfortunately, you know, until it gets at its most serious point, if there is something actionable like does dan snyder's future with the commanders you know is it in doubt like you know until that point i'll probably be following along

with everyone else unless i get really good congressional sources which you know considering the state of what's happening there like i probably should go get some um it is really interesting and like i don't know what you do. You just got to D.C. Definitely has my attention. You just got to D.C. and say, oh, my. A hundred drinks for everybody in here. This is networking. I'm booze bag.

Right. Oh, you want a shot? Oh, you want a shot? Tell me. Are you guys. Is this going to get forced to go to jail or something? All right. We'll take another shot.

Yeah. Is that what it is there? I would imagine Congress is pretty similar to the nfl so like if it works in one place might it work at another place also you know take them on the golf course people like they got some nice courses in dc that would you gotta figure out how to putt then i mean once they see that putt they ain't gonna say it okay i'm a work in progress. We all are. Hey, we all are. Oh, yeah. Go ahead, AJ.

Ian, do you know what the process is like for some of these groups that are trying to acquire an NFL team? Pat and I were trying to figure out, is it like a blind bid? Do you throw in there? Do you have any idea who's been against you, what the price may be? Sometimes it is a blind bid. I don't believe. You're talking about the Broncos, I assume. And the Commanders after this whole thing. Let's assume right now that it is the Broncos.

Sometimes they are blind bids. I don't think that this is. What I know is – so basically you get like a group, and it has to be – it can't be like it is in baseball where it's like a lot of people. And then like, you know, Jeter's the head, but like he's not really. Or, you know, A-Rod and J-Lo are kind of like the heads, but they're not really the ones putting in the most money. The NFL doesn't really work like that. It has to be one person owning enough, you know, past a certain threshold.

And then those people get vetted. They make a bid. Those people get vetted like to the highest level. And then, you know, the NFL gets comfortable with, I guess, a certain number of people. But in the Broncos case, because it's being run by a trust, when all the financials go through and the groups, the various groups or single people are, when they've gotten through all the different obstacles, because it's a trust, they have to take the most money. So that's just the way. It's not always like that.

Like if it was another team, theoretically the NFL could say, well, we prefer this owner. Or the person selling could say, I want to sell it to this guy. Because it's Pat Bowen's trust, they have to take the highest amount. They have to. Sorry, we don't want to. We just got to take the most amount of money. Or, you know, $4.5 billion.

Like, you got to take it. Sorry. Sorry about it. If it's a blind bid, though, you can see how some of these mega wealthy humans that have been created over the last could grossly overbid just to get it knocked out. You know what I mean? Like, that's what I'm thinking. But, like, you know, a lot of times these billionaires, like, they don't think like that. Like, they're like, oh, I'll just overpay.

They want the team. I am in Jerry Jones' house right now. Okay? I am in AT&T Stadium right now. And his exact quote. Yeah, I'm in Jerry. Hey, this place is beautiful. This is it.

You get a tour of all the, there's like a bunch of cool artwork and stuff. Have you gotten a tour? No, we're just in the bars down here. We're in the Champions Club here, the Champions Club, a lot of good champions in here. It's 13 years old. It looks like it was built yesterday.

Everything is so well maintained. Jerry Jones has a direct quote that goes like, everything that's ever been worth it, people have told me I've overpaid for. So I'm not 100% sure what you're saying is 100% right. I know that there are people that cut every corner and like, hey, we're not going to do this. We're not going to pay over there.

But I think there's some people out there, like Elon Musk, who spent a bunch of money to make a fucking flamethrower. You know, like there is, there's a new batch of money out there where, you know, Bezos is going to space on a penis-shaped thing. He's going up to space every single month, two months. Aren't all spaceships look like that, right? No, no, this one's got a tip.

The origin has a full on. Yeah. Was that? I don't want to know. But what I'm trying to say is i think there's this new batch of money though that's probably going to get into the nfl where they have like billions or literally like toilet paper to them at this point because of how much money that has been made and bezos is already what showcase that he wants to get in the nfl that's where everybody assumed

like the uh stuff about snyder and the washington and everything was coming from, or do you think that was all wrong? I don't know because I have not yet met Bezos. Maybe I will at some point. He wasn't at the Traeger Summit? I thought he was. Wow. No, I did meet the CEO, Jeremy Andrews, who's a very nice guy, but I did not meet Bezos. So what did they do?

They gave you a free grill for your wife to use, and you said, all right, I'll come out and reap the benefits of this? No, but listen. No, I did not get a free grill. But listen, it is your fault because the amount of people that said to me, like when I'd make a comment, they'd be like,

oh yeah, well, you know, I will generally like smoke you around. It's like, oh yeah, so your wife shovels it? Thank God. It's your god your fault well that's right i mean what we did was the right thing go ahead nick uh mr sheet uh bruce arians recently took a senior offensive management role in the front office now uh as soon as tom brady comes back and then you tweeted out uh something along the lines of that this has always been his dream to pass on the team to one of his assistants when it's in good hands like a total mark can you just tell

us the truth Tom came back and told Bruce to get the hell out of here it's his offense and his team now and then showed up to his press conference to salute him after kicking him out right absolutely well and Chuck Pagano actually gave us an entire great speech the day after this all happened about like he actually knows ba and all those coaches he like hit a home run here almost in the coaching world none of his coaches need to move none of his coaches need to leave and his coaches are all set up with a good team and once chuck said it i actually started to buy in but when you put that tweet out i think you saw it it was tough to believe that that particular story. Yeah.

It actually is really interesting. And, you know, in what I do, and you guys know, is I try to talk to as many people as possible, not just when something happens, like not just that night, but I've been talking to people in the box, coaches, players, executives, people who are close to them, people close to Brady for the last like three months first when Brady retired you know like everyone's like well you know he retired because the relationship with BA and then like you know not to doubt the reporting of Rich Ornberger who I enjoyed covering in New England is a very nice guy but everything needs to be you know vetted and figured out and none of it makes sense. So like the conspiracy theory that Brady faked his retirement, came back, kicked BA out, even though he's actually still working there,

he's got a job in the front office and then had Todd Bowles installed and then showed up at BA's press conference to salute him. None of it makes sense to me and like so all i can but like you're right i saw the reaction i saw what everyone said and i'm like no one is buying this but look was there tension i'm sure there was every place ba has ever coached has been tension with players but it's not like brady interacted with him that much like brady did the game plan with byron lefkowitz all week it's not like bruce arians that much. Brady did the game plan with Byron Lefkowitz all week. It's not like Bruce Arians came in with a red pen, like, I hate this play, I hate this play.

No, Brady and Lefkowitz basically did the offense. Bowles did the defense. Arians was, I don't want to say figurehead because that cheapens it, but he was kind of the overarching guy who did not get involved in nitty-gritty of offensive game planning. Brady had it set up fine. Getting Bruce Arians out makes zero sense to me. Do you think we'll just continue to learn more and more

because A.J. obviously laid out a scenario. And by the way, I know a lot of those coaches down there personally. I know B.A. personally. I know a lot of people down there. They're all very happy with how this is going. They get a team for – and Todd Bowles can coach for another 10 years yeah and if you're in that staff and they have success and they're good to go and it's a dream scenario for all coaches but like AJ laid out something like yeah maybe they do have a lot of respect for each other personally but there's a chance that Tom was

like all right we need to go we need a different thing we don't know if that's true or not obviously you would know much better than that and then you hear other people start thinking like, hey, maybe it wasn't just Tom. Maybe it was a bunch of people that are like, hey, we're going to go all in here. We don't necessarily, and maybe BA was a part of these conversations. Do you think we'll continue to learn the story? Or do you think this one is done with and over with and we're moving on? No, I'm sure that no one is going to move on because it is really interesting. It never happens. You have, like you said, the side of, like, B.A. is an awesome guy, and it's weird.

Like, you know, I've known him for a long time, and he was very honest with me, or I thought, when he said on the record after the season that he was definitely not retiring, and then he retires, like, two months later. So that's all kind of weird. Timing was weird. Timing was weird.

Timing was weird, but I guess what it sounded like he wanted was everyone to resign and everything to be settled before he handed it off like brady's back uh and i think in this again like i'm this is for my reporting and i feel like people don't believe it but i really believe that it is true that one of the main reasons Bruce Arians handed it over to Todd Bowles was because Brady came back because he was like, I'm handing over a rock star team to this assistant coach that I respect more than anyone. And I'm going to make sure that Todd Bowles is in a great situation. So like Bruce Arians did an awesome thing. Greatest friend of all time. And I kind of hate it a little bit because it seems like Brady kicked him out.

When in reality, Bruce Arians probably acted as maybe the greatest mentor we've seen in a very long time. Greatest friend of all time. Not just greatest mentor, greatest friend of all time. Just like you are to us, Ian.

Are you breaking any news on WrestleMania this weekend? Didn't you? Can I break some news on you or is that all out there? What is it? What did I do? I don't know. I'm saying I thought I'd be able to break some good McAfee WrestleMania news, but it seems like I got nothing. I'm in the greatest shape I've ever been in. My spray tan is settling in perfectly.

What? I mean, I'm a couple days away from my WrestleMania debut. What? Vince McMahon sent me a text at 3 a.m. this fucking morning. It was a video of him on a pitch shark squatting 1,000 pounds and telling me that my opponent is going to kick my ass. I mean, what type of news do you want? Come on.

What's that? That actually happened? Yes. At 3 a.m. I got a text that said Vinnie Mack on my phone. I'm like, what is this? And it was a video of him. Do we have the video? I don't know if we have it. We might

be able to run. This video was texted me at 3 a.m. this morning. I just want to let this video was sent to my phone. It wasn't filmed at this time obviously because you look out and you see the sunlight. This is what was sent to me at 3 a.m. this morning. Ian Rapport from Vince McMahon who I thought got along with me

and was excited to watch me kick the shit out of Austin Theory. Please. So, Pat, Austin Theory, your opponent is up in my face. Just enough to check. Look what he did here. He put 1,000 pounds right here on the pitch, and he knocked out 10 reps.

Mike and I, the other day at the office, I didn't show it off. 3 a.m. rep. Oh, my God. 76. Wow. What's that all about? Jesus.

I mean, he's probably right. No offense. What the fuck? That's weird. That's April Fool's. All right, get the hell out of here. Ladies and gentlemen, Ian Rapport. Thanks, man.

All right, see you. All right, take a hike. All right, good luck. Learn how to putt. You look like a four-year-old at a putt-putt course. Jeez Louise. Prick. Told you he was a mark. Yeah, shut up, Ian. Good luck. Learn how to putt. You look like a four-year-old at a putt-putt course. Jeez Louise. Prick. Told you he was a mark.

Yeah. Shut up, Ian. Fucking bum. And Vince, enough with the 3 a.m. text telling me people are going to beat my ass. Let's get to a break. On the other side, we'll wrap up this glorious Friday, April 1st. Can't thank you all enough. You're the best humans on earth.

Big giveaway. I mean, it's WrestleMania Friday. Here we go. We'll do a big giveaway i mean it's wrestlemania friday here we go we'll do a big giveaway on the other side of this break uh we'll be back in about four minutes and um i'm so incredibly thankful for everybody thankful for rap sheet even though he ended that thing like a complete stooge yeah thankful for kofi kingston stopping by earlier thankful for aj hawk being here the boys back and oh we got t4 on the other side. Here we go. And then we'll do a big giveaway. So Tones Tasty Tournament Talk will be on the other side of this four-minute break. And then whenever that ends, which, by the way, you're going to want to hear,

we'll do a giveaway, and then we'll propel ourselves into WrestleMania weekend in beautiful fashion. We'll see you in about four minutes. You all are the best. Bye. It is a glorious day wrapping up this show live from AT&T Stadium. We can't thank SeatGeek enough.

We can't thank Jerry World enough. We can't thank everybody. Zito, the production, all the boys, everything. I can't be any more grateful than I am right now for this somehow being operable and not that bad. Yeah. Thank you everybody for watching.

We're going to wrap this thing up in glorious fashion. It is time with the final four on the horizon for another segment of the show that's been captivating the globe. Ladies and gentlemen, it is time for T4 Tone's Tasty Tournament Talk! Yeah! Thought we were going to have two tones overlooking both sides there, but Tone, god damn,

it is great to see you. I can't wait to hear what you have to say about this tournament that's happening. I mean, it is great to be here, Pat. 350 some odd teams down to four. Four great programs. Four blue bloods. Those four will be playing tomorrow with the first game being Villanova, a four-point dog against Kansas. We got two great coaches in Bill Self and Jay Wright. Now, who do I think

is going to take down the crown of the first game? I think Kansas has got that pedigree. Wow! Villanova's a scrappy bunch, but Villanova's got guys. I think when you're in this part of the tournament and you have guys and you

have the coaching, there's no advantage there. These guys have both won national championship. Kansas has got player of the year candidates. So I think we go Kansas minus the four in the first one. Lower of a total there. One thirty three is the total in that one. So they think it's going to be a much slower game than what many are calling the game of destiny.

Coach K, his final season, a lot of people are saying it's destiny that Coach K wins this one. These two schools separated by eight miles and a couple shades of blue is what everyone says. Longtime rivalry here, Pat. A lot of people say some of the greatest rivalries in sports this weekend here in this matchup. Hubie Davis leads the Tar Heels

against Coach K. Higher total for this one, 151. These teams have been scoring. These teams have been running. Wait, we have a boost for that, I think. I believe we do as well. I heard it rumored this morning. I don't know if it is off. Both teams score 68 points. What's the over

under it? 151, I believe. I don't know if it is off. Both teams have scored 68 points. And what's the over-under at? 151, I believe. Okay, we're going to do value here. If we do recall from the last time we made one of these bets, both teams have scored at least 68 points. It is a super boost we're putting up on FanDuel. Sorry for cutting you off there, T4. No, no, no, no. No problem at all.

I mean, a lot of eyes are going to be on this one. This is the main one. It's going to have to be a two-TV night on Saturday night with WrestleMania and with Duke and UNC. You know, my heart is torn here. I am a longtime North Carolina guy. I hate Duke. But we just talked about having guys.

And Duke's got two of the favorites to win players of the tournament on their team. So I can't pick this one, Pat. I really can't. What is T4? Tony. Oh, this must be tasty. The integrity of the program.

This is bland. What do you mean it's bland? This ain't tasty at all. Tony. Duke's going to win, Diggs. Just pick Duke. Where's the flavor? I thought T4 was a tournament recap.

It's not a tournament take, and it's not tasty at all. Whenever you do shit like this, it's just bland. No salt, no seasoning, no nothing. Tastes like shit. I mean, I took North Carolina, but I didn't want to be a homer on his program. Okay. He wants some integrity. And AJ, by the way, diehard Duke fan.

He took Duke. It feels like everybody's kind of torn. What's the money like on these sportsbooks? Do you know, Diggs, do you know where everybody's betting, who people like? The money, so the lines opened at four and a half, and they've dropped down. So you would think that the money is coming in on the dogs in this one.

Surprising because Duke is normally a national favorite as far as taking money in. But the line is moving towards helping the puppies here. All right. Well, thank you, Tom. Thank you, Tom. 60% on UNC right now, Pat. Dumpy, who do you like in that game, pal?

UNC in the points. What's the spread? Four. Basketball's got to be so tough. Don't you always get screwed at the end? Yeah, free throws really. College kids and free throws is an issue, my friend. Because there's a chance one of these teams could end up winning by 13

when it was a three-point game with a minute and a half left. Yeah. I don't know how you do the money. I don't know how you do the spread in basketball. It seems so much tougher. Yeah, especially college basketball because it's, hey, it's not anarchy. Nope. It's just college basketball.

And I have to mention, who would I be not to mention, at some point in the next week, I think sometime around there, the women's Final Four is happening too. Thank you. Thank you, Tony. That's honorable, Tony. Seemed kind of disingenuous. Well, he did cut you off yesterday.

I'm surprised you didn't do that at the end of the day. No, no, no, no. This is Tony's show. Did I cut Nick off? Yeah, yesterday I said, hey, Nick, your thoughts on blah, blah, blah. Well, you did with the hand, but you had a great answer and then he had a good follow-up. You guys are a good tag team. I won't let you guys know that.

Pretty good gamblers. Let's do the hashtag PMSAustinTheorySucks. Hell yeah. Stinks, stinks, stinks. PMS, A-U-S-T-I-N-T-H-E-O-R-Y-S-T-I-N-K-S. And then just go ahead and give me your best motivational tweet that you can.

Have your cash tag in there as well. We'll give $20,000. Here we go. Wow. Hashtag PMSAustinTheoryStinks. Send me a motivational meme, motivational tweet, motivational picture. Have your cash tag in there. I'm going to need it because although I'm very confident,

and Peyton Manning once said, the only people that get nervous are the people that aren't prepared. I am as prepared as I'm ever going to be, in the greatest shape I can be. I took a cardio test yesterday, a standard cardio test that I've given myself for years. I passed it with flying colors. Here we go.

Flew right through it. It involves Stairmaster. It involves some push-ups. The body feels good. The lungs feel bigger. I might have just been eating vitamins as of late as opposed to maybe smoking them. So maybe that has made everything feel good.

I had a little bit of an allergy infection happening in there. That is out of there. I'm feeling lighter than I've ever been. I'm at like 230 right now, 235-ish. You know, put some muscle on. The spray tan's going in. But I need some motivational from my people. So hashtag PMSAustinTheoryStinks.

Put your cash tag in there via Cash App. Send me something awesome. If I read it, you'll automatically be put into a group. That group will then be randomly selected for $20,000. Let's go. Let's go. CFO Phil only keeps one book. We'll write the check. We'll send that over to you. Let's change the game. Let's change the go. CFO Phil only keeps one book. We'll write the check.

We'll send that over to you. Let's change the game. Let's change the world. Thank you all so much for watching. AJ, thank you for your time from the attic, pal. Hey, thank you. Good luck this weekend. I'm excited to watch, man.

I think it's going to be a fun weekend for you. Thank you. It starts with SmackDown tonight. Big show. Hell yeah. This is WrestleMania SmackDown. Okay? Last show before WrestleMania.

There's going to be some big shit that's going to pop off tonight. Gumpy, Diggs, all the boys back in Indy, I appreciate your guys' patience with this entire setup. Pat, I'd wish you good luck, but, you know, a windshield doesn't need luck

against a bug. This is your time. This is your time. This is your dream. This is your time. Let's go. Let's go. Gump hammered Don in 15 minutes.

They'll give out winners. Thank you to Kofi Kingston, Ian Rappaport, and to the boys that came here to Dallas to make sure this all happened. Connor, Nick, CFO Phil, Foxy, Zito, the home of Zito Productions. Thank you boys so much. This has been magical. Thank you, Pat.

Now I got business to tend to. Oh, yeah. See you guys on Monday for an Overreaction Monday where I will be an undefeated at WrestleMania wrestler. And there'll be more NFL news and more life to chat about. You are the greatest. Have the most stupendous WrestleMania weekend of all time. We'll see you on the cock, Peacock, Saturday and Sunday, tonight on Fox.

Goodbye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. សូវាប់ពីបានប់ពីបានប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពី Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.