The Right Time with Bomani Jones - Micah Parsons trade demands proves Jerry Jones's decline. Noah Lyles sparks controversy, Top 25 Athletes 10-6 | 8.04

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

On today's episode of The Right Time, Bomani Jones breaks down Micah Parsons' trade demand from the Dallas Cowboys and wonders what Jerry Jones is trying to accomplish. He then reacts to Noah Lyles wild antics after winning the 200m at the US track championships. After the break, Bo to name athletes #10 through #6 to join his list of the top 25 athletes of the last 25 years. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time, a wave original. My name is Beaumani Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you get your podcast. Thanks for watching us on YouTube. Subscribe, like, rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are a hater. We are going to continue our list of the top 25 athletes of the last 25 years,

10 through six are this episode. We're coming down the home stretch. Also, going to talk about somebody. all seem to hate, but it's kind of winning me over. First, we talked on Friday, Dominique and I about the Michael Parsons situation and just how simple and obvious it is that you're going to have to pay him. I think the analogy that Dominique made that was perfect is there are a lot of cars that you might be able to haggle and get a deal on, but a Lamborghini is not one of them.

And Michael Parsons is a Lamborghini. I think we all agree that he is a Lamborghini. I believe since Dominique and I recorded that. podcast, Michael Parsons requested a trade. I've seen some people refer to it as a trade demand. Now, only basketball players can demand trades. Football players just acts for. Okay? That's all they can really do. And he asked for a trade. And I don't know too much about this place. Honestly, I'm not even fully assured that this place exists. But I reckon that when people first get to hell, they ask for ice water all the time before people tell them that

the bar is close. They ain't got that down there, right? It's not happening. He can ask for this trade all he wants. He will be a Dallas cowboy for the next three years, unless he's really willing to pass up some checks. And as far as I can recall, only two people have actual, factual, really been willing to pass up checks in similar situations. One of them is, Sean Gilbert, and that was 30 years ago. The other one is Levi-on-Bell, and if you follow him on Twitter, it's clear. That boy dumb as a sack of hammers. Now, I have generally thought that the idea of sitting out and missing those checks is really not the worst idea in the world because you're missing checks, but you're also missing, like, hits and damage to your body.

But them boys love playing football, man. They want to get out there and play football. I assure you to when Michael Parsons is at these practices that he goes to because he kind of got to, He wants to bet. He wants to play. He wants to get out there. And so, okay, you want to be traded. Jerry's not trading you. Let's just get this out of the way right now. Jerry Jones is not trading you, period. But again, worse he can do is say no. Doesn't really hurt you to ask. But that's where we've gotten in this. Now, we also learn, I think, some interesting things. things, and I think we may have known this before we had Dominique on the last time, and I don't remember how in-depth we talked about this, but Jerry Jones says that he often negotiates deals directly with players without their agents there. And what seems to be a sticking point in this negotiation is that Jerry felt like he had a deal and then David Mulgetta got involved,

Michael Parsons' agent, and now all of a sudden, he ain't got no deal, and Jerry refuses to move off of the previous deal. Now, I have been in a very similar situation where you felt like, for whatever reason, a deal was predicated on some agreed upon fact. whatever it happens to be.

And then something happens, and now you guys have a disagreement about whether that fact was truly agreed upon, and now it gets tense, right? I know how that goes. I also know that Jerry know that that was some snake shit. And the reason I know that Jerry knows that some snake shit is that Jerry knows what an agent is for.

Or if nothing else, Jerry knows that even if he negotiates this deal directly with the player, the player still going to have to pay the agent to 3%. right he has an agent for a reason and that reason is very simple to talk to you that's what he's there for um it actually reminded me of something and i don't know if anybody saw this a few weeks ago maybe a few months ago but cameron and chad johnson had some sort of beef online it didn't seem to be some sort of major beef but it was something about some money or whatever and cam was making a point about how he tried to cut some deal with Chad

and Chad told him either talk to my agent or I got to talk to my agent. And Cam's thing was, I guess that's just how y'all do over there. Like, I handle deals myself. I guess you football players, y'all got to run it through other people, which he wasn't fully offering his shade,

but certainly partially, right? Oh, you can't handle your own business. But the truth is, yes, they do go get their agents. That is what they do. Athlete game is a little bit different in the sense that someone like Cam came up getting money, his own ways, all kinds of ways, right?

He's the one that's going to stand in front you and negotiate the deal because in truth with rap, especially at the era in which he came up. Yeah, there were agents to get the job done, but a lot of the cats that was doing, it was just street cats, right? There was no reason to believe that you necessarily needed to get somebody with this like a scribe level of expertise. I've told you guys this all the time about being an agent, right?

I'm not saying everybody can be an agent, but anybody can be an agent. As long as you got the stomach, that's 90% of the job, maybe. It's just the stomach to stand there and hold out for the money that you want and an innate sense of timing and leverage. You can do that. But football world is different in the sense that these cats got people like rap don't have coaches. I think it's the best way to put it, right? there's not a culture of somebody like being there as an advisor or whatever capacity to help guide you and get you through the stuff and to tell you let me take care of this all you got to do is play ball you know there are levels of the entertainment game where that's like that but the rap especially that era of the rap gang not quite so much right anyway i say that to say in that world yes camera you get your agent and the agent does the stuff That's how it goes over there.

Okay. And Jerry knows that's how it goes over there. In any attempt to try to negotiate a deal without an agent there is an attempt to save some money, right? It's attempt to get over. Maybe the NFL need a, what they call it, I see it on law and order all the time. Miranda. Miranda. You got to be like, well, look, you want us to get your agent.

They didn't even got to do that. But you got to be able to be like, hey, you know, I'm going to call my, I think I'd like to call an agent. and if you ain't even got an agent, one is provided to you free of charge, right? They need an NFL constitution. Now, granted, this may be Amendment 38 on this constitution. That would be necessary to protect these boys. But maybe that's what they need. I don't know.

But Jerry knew he was on some bullshit when he did that. There's no way around that. He fully understands it. And the idea that you're going to try to stand on it, what it does is make you seem like an unserious person. And once it gets to the place where you guys see, CD Lamb sending tweets out saying the same old, same old. You had to Marcus Lawrence leaving the Cowboys talking about,

hey, man, ain't anybody going to win no Super Bowl over here? It's one thing when those of us on the outside talk about how unsurious you are. And by the way, I'm not one of those people, generally speaking. I actually think that throughout these 30 years since they won a Super Bowl, Jerry has largely gotten a bad rap, right? His ego has gotten in the way of things. But like, for example, and this is outside of the 30 years. If Jerry didn't run Jimmy Johnson off, Jimmy Johnson was going to have to go, right?

He was burning out. He was burning them out. And I would like to make the point that it's not like Jimmy Johnson went to the Dolphins and won four Super Bowls. Just throwing it out there. Right. I think Jerry got a little bit of a bad rap, though he was absolutely complicit in the way that it played out. I think they've had some bad luck at points, but I think they've overall put together

very strong rosters. They've been in an interesting space for the last, wow, it's almost 20 years now of having very good but flawed quarterbacks that had some ceiling issues that could make it like, hey, I don't know if you can get there with that guy. But they've also had very good quarterbacks, one of whom was undrafted and the other one was drafted in the fourth round. Like they They've done things correctly. They've had great players in this stretch. They've had great rosters in this stretch. They got Michael Parsons with the number 12 pick.

Other people have the opportunity to get that dude. Okay? You know, there's a whole list of these things that we could go through as it relates to him. But now you look in like a clown, not just a person who likes attention because we notice about Jerry, that he likes the attention. And if any of us had to guess, he's going to sign a Michael Parsons to a really big deal right

before training camp because in part Jerry likes the attention. But this looks like clown behavior. And your players think it looks like clown behavior. And some players who have been like venerated veterans for you are looking at your operation and saying, hey man, I need to get out of here because I ain't a loser. And this looks like a losing operation. That's what you're putting together. That's what you have. And to me, that is fundamentally what it came down to in this situation, right? You look like a loser right now, and you can't do this with this player. You can kind of do it with C.D. Lamb, right? It's probably your top three or four receiver in the league, but you can kind of do it with him. I don't think he really went clown with Dak,

or it doesn't feel like he went clown with Dak, and the reason is very simple, because Dak bought that bread. Now, Ryan, you're a Saints fan, not a Cowboy. fan. Correct. All right, you Louisiana boys could go in either direction. Yeah, it's right, it's right around I-10 is the cutoff point. Yep, and Dak, I-10, right? He's of your world also, but we know

that Dak about getting every single one and a die. Yeah, every single dollar. I don't think anybody fully gets the leverage and timing. Dak is, what if Kirk Cousers was just a little bit better. Yeah, and also like, you see these quarterback deals, like, you're only the highest-paid

quarterback for only, you know, a month, sometimes two. Jack's been the highest paid quarterback for a whole year. Dak has what Kirk Cousins had, though, the willingness to take a short deal to get that money. Yeah. Right? And he's done this at every time. But when it goes along with Dak, on our side, we are absolutely saying, hey, man,

you might as well just go ahead and take care of this. But you can make an argument on Jerry's side, but that, that, that drives a hard bargain. Right? Right. And it's like, oh, okay, cool. I can halfway get it. We don't even think that's necessarily what's happening here in large part because Michael Parsons was willing to hear him out. It was apparently thought he was having conversations in March.

Right. And now we're in August. Right. Let me tell you who would have had word the first with Jerry in March under those saying circumstances. Jack Prescott. Jack Prescott. Yeah. No way into world.

He'd be like, hey, Dad, can you come to the office for a second? Oh, we could come talk at my agent's office. Yeah. What do you think? What'd you think? What'd you think? What are you talking to you? What are you talking about?

And I bet you Jerry tried it once. Yeah, and they realized, no, no, no, no, no, this ain't going to happy here. And so look, everything anybody wants to say about the Cowboys, yeah, yeah, I get you. All of that seems fair. Look, you know why I'm here, the Cowboys are great for business. And I'm telling you, this one may wind up being a bit of an inflection point. We talked about it last show, but now Jerry's starting to seem old. Now he's starting to seem ridiculous inside his own house.

that. No, no, no, baby, you can't. You can't have that. Okay. So I have often discussed in my own life. I'll probably talk about it a couple times here. I don't know. It is amazing that we only care about track and field once every four years because we all like track and field. Like, I don't know if this is still the case. I imagine it is. Track and field is like the sport. And that has the highest participation rate in schools, for example. It is the easiest thing for you to understand very often. It doesn't require very much of you because the races ain't necessarily that long. All of that.

But we typically only pay attention to track and field during the Olympics. I don't know why, but I wound up watching a track and field race yesterday. It was the 200 meters, not even the 100 meters. And hold on, Ron. I got to look up what race it was. Oh, it was the U.S. track championships. I bet my buddy Gabe was there. He goes to all that stuff.

Yeah, up in Oregon. Yes. Yes, that is he's, hey, look, man, Gabe's like, why not? Yeah, why not? It's right down the street. Two things for Gabe. There's a why not factor and it's outside factor.

Yeah. Gabe is by, games outdoors. And guys, I love that guy. Anyway, I'm sure Gabe was there. I need to hit him up and find out what Devon. lives were, but if you didn't see it, is this dude named Kenny Betnaric and goodness gracious. It's B-E-D-N-A-R-E-K, and I wish it was B-E-D-N-A-R-I-K, so I could come up with somehow, some way that he was related to Chuck Betnaric.

If there was a world in which somehow he had Chuck Badnerick were related, good gracious, I would love to know what it was, especially if he was just a little bit more light-skinned it than wavy, you know what I'm saying? You get it. Anyway, they were running the 200, and from what my track friends tell me, a couple things here. One, his badneric dude had won every race this year. We'll get to two in a minute, but he had won every 200 that he had run this year, and he's running against Noah Liles, and they get off the blocks, Benerick is up,

and then Noah Liles, walk that boy down. down, got to the finish line, stared him down, then ran into his lane a bit, and Bet and Eric pushed him, and then Ben Eric came up and tried to dapp him up, at which point Noah Lyles told him that he expected an apology. It is at this point that everybody does what they do with Noah Lyles, which is, be mad at him. Okay. I understand fully why it is that you react that way. But I got to be honest with you. I'm starting to become a Noah Liles fan. And the reason I'm starting to become a Noah Liles fan is not because he's my kind of guy. Because hell no. Not at all. You're talking about. I can't imagine hanging out with somebody like him. No chance. However, Me and my buddy Rick got something in common. We love nothing more than watching people be irrationally angry.

And people are irrationally angry. He, at Noah Miles. Every time he does anything, he'd be having y'all hot. He's just, he's just a habitual line steper. He's a, well, he's a habitual line stepper. But he's a heel. Yeah. And the game needs more heels.

Every game needs more heels. I said this about Dylan Brooks back in the day. I don't like Dylan Brooks, but I'm so glad we got him. We got to have a real live heel. Like Marcus Smart could have been the heel, but he never played into it enough. He just did shit like dye his hair green. You know what I'm saying? He was a good heel until he started, you know, choking everybody.

Yeah. And I also have to admit that, like, how I feel about the heel. like Duke basketball is a heel in ways. But I don't like Duke basketball for being heel because I'm one of the people that's mad. You know what I'm saying? Like I admit that my appreciation for the heel has to do with whether or not the heel makes me mad.

Dylan Brooks didn't make me mad. He just not my type, right? Noah Lyles does not make me mad. So I watch how mad everybody gets with him. And in every case, everybody assumes that he is in the wrong. And in this case, I disagree. I am fully on his side with this, and that is because of thing number two that ties to the thing number one that I have brought up before. So apparently, right, I don't know if you know about this, but apparently there was some Twitter account track something, and it was dishing a bunch of gossip about different people in the track world.

I had not see that stuff. And it had a lot of information about Noah Lyles. and his girlfriend stayed trashing him. And then at some point, you know the internet, right? You know how they be getting, how they be sleuthing, right? People figured out that the people running that account were Ben Narik and his girlfriend. Of course. So let me get that you find out that this man been dogging you from a burner.

Yeah. You and your fiance from a burner, you get out there at the championships where Burner boy hasn't lost all year. He gets ahead. You walk his ass down and you don't get to stare at him? You kidding me? I thought this was America. Okay, okay, okay.

So now he stares at him and you're like, well, he got to push him. Well, he ran into his lane. You don't get to run into his lane? And then on top of that, you try to tell me that after this happens and after he runs into his lane and buddy pushes him, the dude that created burner accounts to dog you and your queen among others, then tries to walk up on you and dab you up. And then when he's asked after the race, what was Noah talking about when he said about an apology and y'all want to answer for it? And y'all are on the side of the burner boy talking about? No, no, no, no, no. Even if you don't like Noah Liles, you got to admit that was pretty gangston on his part. He went out there and got what we call it, a small measure of justice.

He did that. But baby, y'all wrong. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. And I get it. I get it. Y'all just don't like that boy. I understand why y'all just don't like him. I watched that, the sprint joint, him and his mama.

A little too close. You know what I mean? But you got to remember, he had like real bad asthma. I mean, look, man, no allow they put that boy in homeschool. You know, this is all within the realm of, you know, homeschool. possibilities, right? It's right there. This is what it could be. But no, I got to say, the matter y'all get, the more I'm going to have to ride with Big Dog, man, because who, who, who, who, when that dude pushed him, pushed him, push, because he didn't punch him. When he pushed him,

who, that was so funny. Also funny, the idea of somebody of Noah Lyle's personality type staring you down. Man, I have to say, I'm going to still this out here right fast. In spite of how I may enjoy the Noah Lyles be making y'all mad. He do in fact be making y'all mad. And I am going to say to Noah Lyles, hey, hey, little homie, one of them will punch you in the face. In fact, one of them wakes up every day hoping that the opportunity comes when they can justify to be punch you in the face. Just keep that in mind. And what would be more funny than finding out that Noah Liles got hands? All right, Ryan, the time everybody's been waiting on 10 through 6 in our list of top 25 athletes of the last 25 years for this year 2025, right? So just to run it down for people,

every athlete on this list is under 25 at the January 1st year 2000. That was a qualification. They are all North Americans. And I think that pretty much covers the ones, the big ones that people need. Yeah, that's basically the only rules. Okay. Now we will let you guys know who we have already listed so far. Who have we've already taken down on the list? Actually, I don't think I have that list in front of me. All right. Number 25, Randy Moss.

Number 24, Cam Newton. Number 23, Albert Pooholes. Number 22, Ray Lewis. Number 21, Tim Duncan. Number 20, wild cards. So you can put whoever you want there. Number 19, Katie Weddekie. Number 18, Mike Trout.

Number 17, Lamar Jackson. Number 16, Aaron Rogers. Number 15, Aaron Donald. Number 14, Peyton Manning. 13, Kevin, Durant, 12, Kobe Bryant, 11, Steph Curry. And now we are to our top 10. Okay.

Now, I am going to tell you this about this top 10. It is at the point of this top 10 that we can stop asking the question, are we sure you're better than Tim Duncan? I think everybody in the top 10 is not only better than Tim Duncan, but everybody in the top 10 has a legitimate claim within their sport to being the greatest player of all time. I don't think that I could say that about anybody that was below these guys on the list. Everybody that's up here higher can't say not just the greatest at their position, but can say that they are the greatest player of all time.

We will start with number 10, Patrick Mahomes. Now, Ryan, I think the rest of the list may get us to are you sure he's better than Patrick Mahomes place. But we value peak over here more than longevity. Not that longevity doesn't matter at all, but we value peak here more than longevity. And he's the best quarterback that I have ever seen. Right. At his best, I have never seen a quarterback. Who was this good?

We had a similar discussion about Aaron Rogers. No, I take the best of Mahomes over the best of Aaron Rogers, the criticism of Aaron Rogers being risk conversion. Right. Yeah. And I mean, not to go, you know, full meta here. But with Patrick Mahomes, we have a demonstration. clutch gene that we cannot say with the same with Aaron Rogers.

Aaron Rogers, what's amazing about Aaron Rogers is that he seems primarily concerned with not making mistakes but could still make high-end plays. But there's a long stretch of his career where they weren't, he wouldn't winning no games down by 10 points or more because of the level of risk aversion. Right. It's an irony

because it's a similar criticism of the guy who was taking number one overall the same year that Aaron Rogers went 24 or 25, which is Alex Smith. Yeah, with it to Patrick Mahomes. Yeah, I'm just going to not make a mistake. That's what I'm going to do. Mahomes, three Super Bowls, three Super Bowl MVP's,

and that is in, as a starter, 18, 19, 20, seven years. Yeah, seven years. And been to two more. Never lost. Well, hold on. Has only played, what is it, two road playoff games in this whole time, played two. the only has only lost two playoff games prior to the Super Bowl both in the aFC title game both in the AMC title game has lost in the Super Bowl but I still contend

and I don't care what anybody says and this is not what them kids try to call it glazing that game against Tampa Bay is the wildest I've never that's the first one on 11 NFL game that I have ever seen and it had some of the most incredible individual plays ever ever ever ever ever ever ever we have already seen mahomes at that place where you put up the giant numbers the dam merino 1984 type numbers we also seen him be at the place where it's just like oh i just got to do what it takes to get it done just keep moving these chains okay cool we're going to do that we've seen him do it i think we feel like we've seen him do it with great offensive talent we've seen him do it without great offensive talent we have not seen him do it with a team that was

great on offense and great on defense. For example, we lose sight of how good the 49ers with Joe Montana were on defense. We have seen some Patriots teams. The Patriots teams are kind of like that too. Great on offense, maybe great and great on defense. At the same time, not quite so much, but you still felt like, yeah, Bill Belichick over there, right? We don't know where this story is going to end with Mahomes, but they just came off a really disappointing 15-win season. Think about what I just said here. There came off a really disappointing 15-win season, and they got better in the off-season.

Now, I'm sure there's going to be a point in which Rashid Rice has got to sit for a stretch or whatever, but the idea that Mahomes catches Tom Brady and Super Bowl wins is not off the table. It is also fair to say it's a somewhat crazy thought. Like the thing to remember by and large, with Tom Brady maybe being the exception, very rarely has anybody won their last Super Bowl, their last NBA championship, their last major, and people assume that that was the last one. That's not really how it works, right? One day you just look back and you're like, damn, that was the last one. Because why would you think it? They just won it now.

Why couldn't they win it again or whatever? Seven would be a lot for him to get to. But we don't have the why not answer. Now, he's there. Now, it just, it becomes a matter of how well the chiefs can keep this up. And whether they're going to make the decision to operate on the premise of, we got Patrick Mahomes, let's fortify the defense, and let's just ask him to get the rest done.

I think maybe the most underrated part of this is he is doing this in a golden age of young quarterback. Okay? they're all in his conference and they're all basically the same age. Not exactly the same age, but his first year as a starter is the same as Josh Allen. It's the same as Lamar Jackson. If you want to extend it just a little bit farther, it's the same year as Baker Mayfield. He was in the same draft with, I mean, he's not good anymore. But Deshawn Watson, he'll nasty ass is pretty good there for a little stretch.

Like this isn't a down time. Joe Burrow comes in as a starter two years after he did. This isn't, these aren't slow times, right? He's not the one guy while this is going down. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. He's that dude. And I've seen someone make a point. I can't remember who it was.

It was on Twitter, but it was very interesting. But if you look back at the 1980s in the late 70s, the AFC had the quarterbacks. But then in the 80s, you saw the NFC became dominant it because the way they got things done was running the ball and with defense. That was how it went. You see something very similar now happening with the NFC also. You think about the Eagles, my Detroit Lions, America's team, for example, they run in the ball. Like, that's how they're getting it done while the other conference has those quarterbacks. The quarterbacks cost a little

bit more money. You can four to five more on the other side of the ball and then you see who wins in a Super Bowl when it comes down to it. But Mahomes is dictating a world in which in the AFC, you got to have a you don't feel like you can consider going up there in dealing with those guys if you don't have the quarterback. That's right. And nobody wants to feel that way. He is. I'm trying to think of who the analog. I have been comparing him to Michael Jordan for a very long time.

Right. But he's a Jordan analog in the sense that you can feel like you got everything going for you until you got to go over there and you see him. Right? Like, and the teams that have beaten the Chiefs in the Super Bowl with Mahomes is their quarter. quarterback were again, that Tampa team where I say it again, they put that, they put that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, had Mike Remmers at left tackle. And I was like, ooh, I have judged incorrectly on who's going to win this game. And then the Eagles who just were so much better at every position, right?

So it's not a situation where. we got my homes, nothing else matters. But picking against him still does not at all. No, I picked against Tom Brady many times. I ain't never felt like I thought that picking against this guy was going to be a good idea. Now part of that is because I watch a lot of football with Nick and I don't necessarily want to go home after I've already, you know, walked 20 blocks to get there. You know what I'm saying? But he's that guy. He's that one. And we saw it very very, very early. He is the rare example of these quarterbacks where you see it early and there really hasn't been the drop off. They're kind of has, right? Like the last couple of years,

he's not putting up the video game numbers in the ways that his peers have, right? And quarterback play kind of goes up and down like that where you can be better even though your statistics aren't as good. Josh Allen, I believe it was 2020 or 2021, one of those years where he had the Super Lightshouse stats. It's never going to be like that again. He is clearly much better than he was at that point. Like, that's why using, using stats for your quarterback comparisons get tricky and why you have to actually watch. It's because of all those things.

But this guy has walked in and basically been the king since the second he showed up. And even when people pass him his stats, even when he loses a Super Bowl, he is still the king and it's still the beginning. All right. Number nine, Michael Phelps. Now, I'm going to be honest with you guys. I watch swimming at the Olympics for the same reason you guys watch swimming at the Olympics. Because it's on.

And it's on because Americans are good at it. We have the kind of country where people can afford to just swim all day. Right? This is our bag. This is what we do. And I admit that it has taken. time for me at various points to really get on board with the greatness of Michael Phelps. And it is because on one hand, I do believe we overstate the metal count itself.

Oh, man, he won't. He ain't gold medals, right? Okay. It's the only sport where it's possible. Ironically because it's in the water, right? I don't know if that's ironic, but anyway, it's because it's in the water and your body can get back right, you know, those sorts of things. There's no, there's no way you can have a world where you can win eight gold medals and track a few. It's just not going to be it, right? At the same time, you do at some point have to get up and recognize that ain't nobody else doing that. I know I used to kind of be patronized and be like, well, if you had run forward and run back. it runs sideways, then maybe you can get these, you know, in track.

Okay, that's fine. But swimming forward and swimming backwards and doing it like that and doing it like this are distinctly different things. And he does them better than anybody else and then kept doing it like that for a very, very, very long time. I think the craziest Michael Phelps stat. I mean, obviously, he threw out the eight gold medals in 2008, but he won six gold medals in 2004 and won five in 2016. I don't think I realized the 2004.

Yeah. So the 2004, he comes into Athens. You know, he's a teenager. Right. And, you know, six gold medals. Some, you know, a lot of those are individual. And then you, you know, obviously have the great 2008. You know, his disappointing 2012, I think he only won four or five.

Like, that is the kind of, you know, sustained success he had. And also, we talk about, remember, we had that conversation with Spencer Hall about athletes that felt like the future, you know, Michael Phelps was built to be a dominant swimmer. Yes. Yes. It's interesting. It's like big feet, short legs. Like, you know, like there is a body type that is necessary in order to do this. And I think, like, in talking about the magnitude and the greatness, I think it's also tricky because this is a sport that when you look, all the people are basically from like,

three, four places. And I know I'm going to use places very broadly, but it's like the United States. France, Australia. Yeah, China, Japan. Yeah. Like stretches of Europe. Right. Stret. Yeah, that's that, for whatever reason. Places that can afford indoor and outdoor pools. Or, you know, a legacy of communism. You know what I'm saying? Like the, the commies was all about, because think about it, man, what you put the water in the pool? Baby is paid for. You know what I'm saying? Oh, man, I bet that water in Russia, they used to swim in a little cold. Woo, we. That best.

Yeah, you could cut glass with them things when they was in there doing that swimming. But like it doesn't feel like a world event to me. That I think is probably where the holdup came for me about swimming. But you put the whole goddamn world out there. He still was going to be out there dusting them. Still. Like, he is that guy. was that guy. And 2008 was almost 20 years ago. We ain't heard about nobody coming up and doing this

again. There were 36 years between he and Mark Spitz or him and Mark Spitz. Right. Maybe it'll come up again 36 years later. I have no idea. Maybe that'll happen. But for now, you have to give credit to what he has done. And yeah, man, he has a strong argument for being the greatest Olympian of all time. and the greatest of all time at his sport, and that'll get you to number nine. Now, number eight, Shohei Otani. I actually, this tells you how much slipping in my pimper is

when it comes to baseball these days. I was doing a crossword puzzle the other day, and I needed that crossword puzzle to remind me that Shoah Otani had gone 50, 50. I forgot about that. Yeah, that's out. And that's not his top three baseball accomplishments. No, I had completely forgotten. So first of all, I understand that the steroid era kind of skewed the way we looked at 50 home runs, right? When I was a kid, Cecil Fielder hit 51 home runs in 1991. That was the first time in 14 years. that anyone had hit 50 home runs the first time.

Like that was an incredibly like scarce sort of number for somebody to get to. Now people do it a little bit more, obviously, right? Like I'm looking now and I would say totals that I would deem post-steroid. And it's a little tricky because Prince Fielder hit 50 home runs the same year as Alice Rodriguez. And none of us believe that Alice Rodriguez. Yeah. None of us believe Alex Rodriguez in size. Let's posterity.

Yeah, you can stop right there. You're correct. Like, I mean, we'll see. I guess you got the money to buy that team. You know what I'm saying? But you want you to want me to believe Alex Rodriguez? But it's like Jose Bautista, Chris Davis, John Carlos Stanton, Aaron Judge has done it twice.

Peter Lanzo, Matt Olson. Like, it happens. I don't want to pretend like it doesn't happen that guys hit 50 home runs. I mean, people are trying to hit more run runs. It's like the whole, the whole, The launch angle is like a whole change of baseball. It's completely different. The idea that Otani is hitting 50 home runs and can steal 50 bases and can pitch, can pitch.

Howard Brian came on and said he taught to C.C. Sabathia's thing was, oh yeah, this guy is the best baseball player of all time. And the argument was he's treating this like high school. Yeah, I'm just the best player at everything. Dude, did you realize this? That he has led the league in on-base percentage and slugging twice? And-back-to-back years. Right, we're talking Ted Williams type of stuff with hitting. Now, of course, Ted Williams of Ted Williams struck out 162 times, right?

You know, again, it is a different game. But to hit 300 and lead the league on all-base percentage and strike out 162 times is crazy. And so in looking at it, is he a better baseball player than Barry Bonds? Maybe, but I just can't say that right now. You just ask, like, that requires me to divorce myself

from a whole lot of things that I think about the world, right? Like, I'm not so sure that. I will just point out, and I don't know if you knew this, Ryan, because apparently they don't hit them like they used to, but show hey, old tiny wants led the league and triples. It's outrageous. Yes. Now granted, it was only eight because apparently guys don't hit triples.

Yeah, people, because people are, yeah, they're swinging for the fences. That's really disappointing, by the way. Triples are so much fun. Triples are fun. Triples are the most fun thing. You get the arm wave, you get the whole thing, yeah. That's right.

Triples are great. But he's got to be here. He does have a plausible argument at this point for being the best baseball player that any of us have ever seen in a world where I saw, all Barry Bonds. That's a lot, guys.

Like, that's a lot. He's that dude. He has earned his place on our list. And he also, you know, he's barely 31. He could keep hitting another. It's not outrageous for him to hit another 350 home runs. Yeah, yeah. At some point, this pitching thing is going to stop. Right.

Like, he's already, he's already done the Tommy John, you know, like at some point the pitching is going to stop. But for all we know, man, he's going to be able to hit forever and ever. and ever. By the way, and I don't pay this close attention to this, but Ryan, his war last year was, his batting war was 9.2. 9.2. When I do the Immaculate Grid and they want to use like a number to point out great, great hitting, I mean great, no, a great season. It's a plus six war season. 9.2.

All right, guys. Number seven. Floyd Mayweather. I mean, look, man, ain't nobody beat him. I'll be honest with you. Ryan, I don't think there's anything else to say.

I mean, I'll find ways to stress this out, but ain't nobody beat him. Yeah, nobody beat him. He was the probably want to talk about, go back to our heel conversation. One of the all-time sports heels. you know, and still, you know, is, you know, the standard for boxing. The argument against him is obviously very selective in taking his fights and not really

taking fights that put him in a great deal of danger. And that is fair. However, just about every single boxer I can think of that reached the levels of greatness that he did get to. Somebody snuck him. Right. Nobody snuck him. Yeah. It's all one point

punch sport. Yeah. And I don't recall there even being a, I don't know, man, I think he lost that one. Right. Like, I don't recall anything as such being the case with him. He's the greatest defensive fighter probably that anybody

has ever seen. Yeah, maybe he fought Canello early. Maybe he fought Pacquiao late. All of those things are fair criticisms to make, right? However, nobody got him. And he did the thing that no boxer does. He walked away on his own terms and hasn't come back, not in a way that actually counts or actually matters. That's what he's done.

That by itself gets you a pretty high listing here, right? He definitely started in a weight class, lower than the one that he ended up in, right? So he did the things. And he's just, of course, very difficult to like for significant reasons, not just superficial ones. Yes, yes, yes. That is the best way to put this serious and under serious. But yeah, there's some serious reasons to dislike him. There are unsurious reasons also to do.

to dislike him. But I will say, when you talk about all-time great troll, Pablo made this point. I don't remember if he wrote something on Mayweather, but he always made this point. He started calling himself Money Mayweather

in 2008. In 2008, he started. That's when he went for being Pretty Boy Floyd to Money Mayweather. He was basically Ted DiBiasey for wrestling. right like he he basically he made that call to be ted dbyis for rassan there is also when he fought oscar de la hoyo he fought him a little late um when he fought oscar de la hoya and he shows up wearing a sombrero and a shirt

that says on the front mexico loves mayweather and says on the back mayweather loves mexico while he is being flanked by his uncle roger mayweather who referred to himself in his boxing days as the Mexican assassin because he would just be out there killing those Mexicans. Hey, man. I, you know, because boxing is the place where we allow this,

right? And boxing is the only place where we allowed, like, the outright race baiting for one very simple reason. They're going to go scrap it out. Yeah, no, if you have a problem, they'll solve it very quickly. That's exactly it, right? Like, the proper response to this sort of behavior is a fight, which there will be.

You will have your opportunity to air your grievances wordlessly very soon. You go out there and you get to do it, right? That is why we halfway tolerate this situation. But no, he is all-time, all-time, all-time troll and all-time great boxer, even if he is all-time jerk. Okay. Two more for the day. Excuse me.

one more for the day. Number six, Serena Williams. Sorry about that Ryan had to duck in case any of my sisters tried to throw something at me to this one. As we have said, Serena Williams has an argument like everybody else on this list for being the greatest tennis player of all time. I think that we all allowed Nike and a recency bias to get us a little caught up in this idea of greatest female athlete of all time or even greatest athlete of all time that they went with. And my point on that simply is, what's the argument against Steffie Groff here? You know what I mean? Like even if you can take Serena.

I'm not saying you can't. But this idea that it is like completely over the top, there's nothing to talk about here. You don't think there's some similarities in Groff Williams as there is to like Nicholas Tiger. So the demerit against Graf is kind of unfair, which is the whole, what if Monica Sellis didn't get stabbed? Yeah. But we can't assume that Sellis, it was going to stay like it was. Right. Forever.

Right. But I mean, Steffi Graf won a Grand Slam in 1988 with the gold medal. Like, like, we saw her. I think that Steffy Groff demonstrated tiger-like qualities in her prime. That Nicholas never did. In a way that Nicholas did not. Right. Like I think that's maybe the way that I would put it. I think there's arguments to go either way. But I say all that to say six is really high on this list. Yes. Right? Like that's, if we're only saying five people in the last 25 years were better than you, we're not hating.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And when we get to the five, you'll be like, oh, okay, I kind of see what you're saying. But let me tell you this. Let's get this straight right now. See, Ryan, you were A, a little bit young for when this happened. And B, just throwing it out here, probably not around as many. Black people as I was in 1997. Yeah, certainly that age. Okay, just throwing it out there. So 1997 is not to talk about Serena. It is to talk about Venus. And one of the indelible memories in my mind is the 1997 U.S. Open Final. When Venus Williams is there, I honestly do not remember who she played against off the top of my head with the beads and everything else.

And I realized what a big deal it was because it was my friend. year of college and we had just got there. And you know when you just get just get there, man, we out here on the yard. We out here in the streets. We ain't really trying to be inside. And in my all boys dorm, it was Venus about to come on. And we were all there in that lounge, right? Maybe one of the only times that it wasn't showing RAP City a video sold. And we was locked in. Like that mattered so much what it was that we were watching. And so as we're watching it, and I believe she lost that one. But I will never forget there Richard Williams told us Serena's going to be better.

And that seemed insane. But she was. She was. She was. She was better. and in line with Ryan's Tiger Woods comparison at points appear to be better than anybody that we had ever seen. There was a level of athleticism that we saw from her playing tennis that we just had not seen with all the other stuff. Right?

Like there wasn't, as far as I can tell it, I'm not the greatest tennis expert, but Peaks Arena, where was the flaw? Where was the flaw? I did not see it. and she had a career that had ups and downs in a way where, you know, a lot of injuries type stuff, health type stuff, you don't automatically see people go back on the up, right? But an incredibly long career in a sport that does not necessarily guarantee you that while being one of the people who started off in this game when people really started off very, very young. Now, of course, one of the Richard Williams things that's important is not burning those

kids out when they were super young and why they could continue to do it because they were managed well. She won the French in 1999 in Wimbledon in 2016. Yes. Yes. Two completely different tournaments, by the way. To be as good on grass and on clay as she was capable of being is nuts, right? Like, it's interesting how it could have been difficult for me to fully grasp the magnitude of Michael's Phelps winning a different strokes, but it wasn't hard at all to tell the difference between who was winning in between playing on clay versus playing on grass and then playing on hardcore, all of that. She did that while also being a revolutionary figure in a lot of ways, right? Hardly anyone has ever been better at understanding everybody's looking at me and half of these people are looking at me because they can't

ain't staying to me, but I got something for since they're going to be looking at me. And yes, that is exactly what I'm talking about, fellas. Exactly what I'm talking about. I don't know if Ryan knows what it is that I'm talking about again, because this is an age gap situation. But for those of us who were there, if you know, you know, you know what I'm talking about. That's right. I'm talking about that cat suit.

And I ain't got no problem talking about this cat suit in front of y'all. You know why I ain't got no problem talking about this cat suit? Because she didn't wear it for us not to talk about it. She didn't wear it for us not to look at it. She knew exactly what time it was because we can all tell time. Okay? If the little hand go up and the bottom hand go straight down, you know what it is? It's 12.30.

There's no room for interpretation about that. That's just what it is. That cat's suit. You can tell time. You know exactly what the time was. There has never, ever been a point that I could think of in my life, in this era that we stand in, that not only was everybody allowed to sit there with their jaws, dropped on the ground, it was the expectation that would be the case. In fact, if you didn't do that,

you were the one who was being disrespectful. Right? If you've never seen the catsuit, go ahead and look it up. I've seen the catsuit, but this is a... No, no, no, baby. Everybody's, everybody's allowed here, dog. Everybody's allowed here. I'm just saying, she didn't do it for us not to do this. Correct. That's, that's, that's, you not, you're not, see, what you're not, see, what you're not going to do is do that and then tell me I got to act like you dress for church. You're not going to do that. It's not fair. It's not it. But it was a thing, right? Like it was the ultimate you, you are. I see you're looking with your looking ass. But in every way, in every single way. Like, Ryan, when you would like watch SportsCenter and everything around that happening,

nobody was saying the words, but it was just, we all knew. I sent it For the moment I sent it to my dad And his response was I can dig it Signed pops That's what I'm sorry

That's That and dominating Maria Sharapova And Wimbledon and then Crip Walking Those are the top two Seriaweger's moments of all time Yo I still wish that she would have owned the Crip Walk

rather than trying to I don't want to talk about what it is Come on now you went out here And you decided to do it But we'll talk about, you know, well, okay, I mean, you knew Tiger Woods is coming later. We'll talk about him later. But they tried a thing where they tried to invent rivals for Tiger Woods. They kept trying to come up with him, right?

And he just slew them all. Serena Williams and Maria Sharipova. We're going to look this up to make sure I get the numbers right. Okay. They played against each other. And by the way, there is a wiki page called Sharpova S. Williams rivalry. Okay. in their rivalry,

Maria Sharapova won the first two times that they played. Excuse me, no, got that wrong. Serena won the first two times they played. Maria Sharpova won the next two. One in the Wimbledon final, one in the finals at the WTA championships. And to be fair, Ryan, that sounds like the start of a rivalry.

Right. Serena beat her the next 19 times they played. clearly had and clearly enjoyed every every time every single time 19 times in a row the last one was 6161 the one before that 6 4 6 1 as a matter of fact in their last eight matches sheripoba didn't win a set she did win a set at the 2013 Miami masters in the first set and then lost 636 love for the next two before I that 6362, 6463. At the Olympics, it was 6-love 6-1, which is like the Tiger Woods 9 and 8 over that dude at the match play. Yeah. That one time. 6-1-6-3. There's very few sports where you can beat someone 19 times in a row. 19. And again, domination. Oh, there's 6162 in the 07 Aussie final. Oh, there's 6161 at the Miami Masters. Yeah, yeah. They're 6162. They're 6162. did a little too much.

And then did Maria Sharapova call her a home record at one time? I don't have a memory of that one, but I knew that rivalry was not just about the tennis court. So, yeah, just to put it simply. It was a lot going on. The only thing that wasn't going on was Maria Sharpova beating Serena Williams. That was not happening. Good gracious.

We got her. She is number six. We have five left. We will rattle off the top five on our list next week. We'll give you some context on this in our next episode. But ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much for joining us here on the right time. We do this three times a week. Ryan Bremley handling everything behind the scenes.

Thank you, sir. Remember, follow the right time. Subscribe, like, rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are a hater. We'll talk to you guys in a couple of days. Take it easy. Thank you.