The Right Time with Bomani Jones - The Current QB Market, the Justin Tucker Allegations, and IYHH/Voicemails | 3.3

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

On today's episode of The Right Time, Bomani Jones discusses some NFL hot topics. Bo starts the show by sharing why he visited a hypnotist (1:06) and why the NBA needs to find a way to make the regular season matter again. (3:09) With the NFL Combine wrapped up, Bomani talks about the quarterbacks at the top of this Draft and why they wouldn't be in consideration for the top pick in years prior. (7:07) Bo moves onto the ugly Justin Tucker situation and asks why he's still employed by the Baltimore Ravens? (21:44) And finally, we have another round of If You Haven't Heard stories involving a Texas BBQ feud, the rising cost of coffee and why entry level jobs are going away. Then Bomani listens to some voicemails about TV characters you hate the most. (30:23) If You Haven't Heard Contributors:  Lindsay Dodgson, Senior Reporter at Business Insider: “Entry-level job openings are shrinking. That's not just a problem for Gen Z.” https://bit.ly/43eVPrq Rachel Monroe, Contributing Writer at the New Yorker: “Texas’s Barbecue Schism” https://bit.ly/43lntmC  Meg Duff, Reporter at Insider: “Coffee's bitter future” https://bit.ly/43dVPYK  . . . Subscribe to The Right Time with Bomani Jones on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts and follow the show on Instagram, Twitter, and Tik Tok for all the best moments from the show. Download Full Podcast Here: Spotify:  https://open.spotify.com/show/6N7fDvgNz2EPDIOm49aj7M?si=FCb5EzTyTYuIy9-fWs4rQA&nd=1&utm_source=hoobe&utm_medium=social Apple:  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-right-time-with-bomani-jones/id982639043?utm_source=hoobe&utm_medium=social Follow The Right Time with Bomani Jones on Social Media:  http://lnk.to/therighttime Subscribe to Supercast for Ad-Free Episodes: https://righttime.supercast.com/ Support the Show:  They Swoosh, You Save: when any player scores 50 or more points in a game during the 24/25 NBA regular season, DashPass members save 50% on an order, up to $10 off. 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're going to talk in a little bit about, but it's a lot of NFL stuff we're going to talk about today.

Sean, actually, I am going to talk very briefly about what I was just talking to you before we got here, right? So, you know, I've been reading these books that have merited a revisiting of my relationship with technology. And I realize, I don't know about you, but I am a compulsive scroller, right? If I have dead time, I'm scrolling something, right? I don't transmit as much as I used to. I found it even like when I had gone on social media stops, I would then scroll the news app, right? Or consistently check my email and text or whatever, but scrolling, it was just too much. So, I know it's going to sound crazy to some people.

I call it a hypnotist. And I need you to understand, hypnosis is not like the cartoons. You know what I'm saying? You don't be up in that motherfucker tweeting your arms and all this stuff and everything else. Like, it don't work like that, right? Like, but, you know, you go into a trans state, all this stuff, whatever. So I was like, cool, I'm going to give it a try with the scrolling. And it was interesting because obviously I can't stop using.

technology. I have a job that requires some measure of it. Okay. So it became a matter of basically cooking up a plan that's very similar to if someone has an issue with overeating, right? You don't want to stop eating, but you don't want to eat as much. Curb the appetite a little. There you go, right? Just you don't want it to be compulsive, right? I want to use these things when I want to use these things rather than I am just always there. I was finding it to. ultimately be unsatisfying and if I'll be honest that I'm saying this to you who are my friends and those of you who are not my friends um you're not that interesting and the stuff that you're sending out there is generally kind of whack and I need to take in less of it anyway I did that

Sean the problem obviously is how am I supposed to keep up with all this bullshit that I do for work that's it's the catch 22 of it all it's like uh you know I want to log all offer be off grid and then I realize come Sunday it's like, I texted you. I was like, what are we going to talk about? You know, and I'd have to like catch up on news or like scroll,

like you said. Yeah, I feel like we've, I picked maybe not the greatest weekend to make this decision because baby, we were scraping the bowl to figure it out, right? And maybe, here's the thing,

though, even if I was in it all the time like that, I would still be scraping the bowl. Totally. Just given the season of it all, but like, It was a tough weekend, guys. We make the NBA regular season matter again.

Can we do that, please? Can we have another LeBron goes to the heat? Let me tell you something. This is something that I do not think that people remember about that time. Sean, you were like early 20s probably when this happened late teams. You have the decision, yeah. Okay, I was knee deep in the game by then, all right? But I was early knee deep in the game.

And I really think I took for granted how great it was to have a story every day. You could not talk enough about LeBron. You could not talk enough about the heat. And Sean, that was for four years. And we got like the Luca trade, which granted us like maybe a week and a half, two weeks of content in a really like week period of time. But even then, it's not the same as the LeBron Heedles and all of that. And it ain't the same. And LeBron gave us, it became a polarizing thing because I was squarely on team LeBron, right?

I was squarely on team villain when that whole thing went down. It hurt when they lost that series to the Mavericks. Not because I cared about the heat, but all the people I hated were entirely too happy and included among those people I hate, people from Dallas. Like, like, like, like, as if it wasn't enough for your boy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But, man, that run, man, was just. four years of excellent stuff.

It wouldn't matter who the heat played last weekend. I would have been able to turn something out of it and blow, let it be one of them times where LeBron was getting shook at the end of the games. Woo, man, it was a never-ending reservoir of content. And today, I'm going to talk about

a kicker who is allegedly a sex pervert, but that's later. Right now, I'm going to talk about quarterbacks, right? Because we as a country have become not terribly dissimilar to, what's it called, Canada. And what I mean that is we're not going to start spelling honor and favor with yous. No, no, no. I'm not saying that. We're not going to spell check with a cue. We're not going to do anything, you know, going that far. But what we are going, what we are doing is football is our hockey. They talk about hockey all the time.

It does not matter what time a year it is. They could talk about it. I did a talk at the University of Florida last week. Shout out to Dr. Canton and Dr. Brown, who brought me down. And Dr. Brown was from Canada. I could tell that because he was talking about Aboot. He had a lot of Aboots going on with him. But I heard him telling the story because he played American football in college.

And I heard him telling the story of watching, I forget, what big football games. it was in Canada, and then they switched the game off and they cut on a U-19 junior, like youth hockey. Like, not even though professionals, right? Amateurs. They just, they put that on TV. That's what they did. That's where we are in this. And again, we know this because as I have discussed before, y'all be watching the largest job fair. Y'all be watching that job fair on television, bruh.

Y'all be watching that job fair on television. You'll be watching them dudes, do them workouts, run around, around cones and shit. You'll be watching that stuff. Y'all know y'all do, okay? I refuse to watch that. But that's what America is. And while I refuse to watch that, I show I'm going to come out here and talk about that kind of stuff because I get the people what they want.

Anyway, I was thinking about this a bit yesterday and really coming into it this morning. This draft is coming up. I was texting with the homie Corey, and we talked to. a lot about this. And it's the discussion of the idea that these quarterbacks at the top of this draft would not be at the top of other drafts, which feels like a fairly accurate statement. Like, I'm not the greatest draft guy, and that's largely out of protest, right? We all got to draw a line somewhere.

But at the same time, I can tell that Cam Ward or Sodor Sanders, that's not Trevor Lawrence that's out there. That's not either of the three guys that went at the top last year. Caleb Williams, Jane Daniels, and Drake, Drake May. He's not those guys. Like, we're not talking about an Andrew Lut type player or a supremely talented, crazy, raw talent like Cam Newton was coming out. We're not talking about that with him.

That's not to say to Cam Ward isn't very good. Shadour, I think, is a little bit of a different discussion, though I think he was a very good college quarterback. But Cam Ward, I was watching some of them clips, man. That boy got an arm, okay? I don't really think he's that athletic necessarily. He is not that big. He is Houston adjacent.

All of these things. Just throwing that out there. The Houston adjacent thing is not a reason to be skeptical. I just had to put it all for the greater area. But anyway, he's a first round pick, but he's generally not like a number one overall pick. Got you. Ever since this all got going,

the Titans have made it clear to anyone that they will not pass up a franchise changing player and that they are open to take the number one. one overall pick in the draft, they are going to take Cam Ward with the number one overall pick. If they do not take Cam Ward with the number one overall pick, somebody else is going to take Cam Ward with the number one overall pick. Now, Sean, keep a hold on that thing. I saw you would get ready. We'll get to that in a second. But I just want to talk about the general idea before we get to the actual scenario. Now, I really, and I thought about this in the sense of the

broader world because I always think it's important to look at these matters more than anything else in the sense of the broader world, right? Okay. You know what it feels like when you got to get something done, but for whatever reason you haven't gotten it done and that weight that it feels like is just on you? Because you know until you get this one thing done, nothing else really matters. Yeah, you got a little stuff that you got to do along the way, but you know, if you don't get this one thing done, everything else falls apart. Sean, you know what that. Like, that's a, stressor. That would be a commercial for that one company we do stuff for every now and then. You know what I mean, right? Yeah, totally. It's just weighing, it's just weighing over you

until you get it done, but there's this like procrastination or this fight of like, do I want to do it? Case of point, we got a book a guest for this week, right? Yeah, yeah. We're down a guest. It's going to be on us both until we get that. It's all I'm thinking about. Yes, yes, that's it. Who is this guest? I was actually thinking about that because we were talking about this about 30 minutes ago. And I was just like, damn,

we were both going to be out here trying to figure out who this guest is going to be for quite a while. And in the end, buddy, it's just a guest. We will get somebody.

They will there. And by the way, not that this has ever happened before, but if we don't have a guest, you know, the guest is going to be Sean, you. That's who the guest is going to be.

But if worse come to worse, we will be just fine, but we need a guest. Right. The audience wouldn't mind hearing from you for another episode. But again, we're a little stressed. You know, like it's just moving. We are acutely aware of needing a guest.

Sean, that's just a guest. The quarterback is like we need a microphone. How am I supposed to do this show? If I don't have a microphone, well, maybe you could go get like some of your wireless headphones and then run it through and da-da-da and everything. But we can't do no professional caliber show with them things. I need a microphone to actually do this show. Sean, the Titans, the last time I checked, do not have a microphone.

They have, if I am not mistaken, Will Levis, who is like headphones that are plastic on top and got like the old joints. You know what I'm saying? And they plug in. He might be like the cup with the string. you know, the stuff kids are doing the projects, that might be will leave it. This is exactly it. That is who they got.

And they really try to convince me that they go trade out of that when you can get Cam Ward. Okay. I am not saying that Cam Ward is the most talented quarterback in the world. What I am saying, though, and I say this as a person that understands, respects and appreciate the teams that are able to stay patient and not jump too hastily just because they need a quarterback. I get that. But there is no way in the world that you are going to tell me that the Tennessee Titans can afford to pass up on that guy.

You can't do this. I'm looking around this whole league. All right, Sean, I'm going to name teams, and you tell me if I'm wrong in all of this. And what I'm going to give you is teams that ain't got no quarterback. I ain't talking about no quarterback in the future, okay? I'm saying teams that ain't got no quarterback. For example, the New York Jets ain't got no quarterback.

Nope. There is not a quarterback in the state of New Jersey. There's one in the state of New York because the bills have one. But the Giants and the Jets ain't no quarterbacks, bro. Ain't no quarterbacks. The Cleveland Browns, they ain't got no quarterback. Certainly don't. The Pittsburgh Steelers ain't got no quarterback.

They had two and now they're, like you said, now they're out. Yeah, and even then, those are, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, Minnesota got. too. Oh, greedy asses. I don't know if Indianapolis has a quarterback, but they got reason to think so. The Titans ain't got no quarterback. The Saints don't really

have a quarterback, but they got somebody they can trot out there, right? Like, there we go. They got somebody that they can try it out there. Yes, the Raiders ain't got no quarterback. That fair? A hundred percent fair. And they have a brand new coach, you know, who's got something

approved coming back. So they really need a quarterback. The Cardinals, thought they might not, not the Cardinals, the Rams, excuse me, for a moment, we thought the Cardinals, the Rams might let, no, they're not letting Matthew Stafford. Because if they let Matthew Stafford go, then they wouldn't have no quarterback. Like, if you ain't got no quarterback, if anything looks like a quarterback, you've got to solve it. Because I'm looking at all these teams that don't have a quarterback. One of them is going to have Sam Darnel.

And then you know what we're going to say about that team one year from now? That they ain't got no quarterback. Yes, I know I just said that Minnesota has. two of them. But come on, dog, you can't be serious. We just saw that. This is the free agent quarterback list. And it's the first three are Sam Darnold, Aaron Rogers, Justin Fields. It's bleak. But if you are in the we ain't got no quarterback zone, you take Sam Donald so quickly. And you know why you take Sam Donald so quickly? You take Sam Donald so quickly, not because you think he's your quarterback of the future, not because you think he's a good quarterback.

because if you get Sam Darnold, even if only for a couple of months, you ain't got to think about getting a quarterback no more. That's it. Got that one off the plate. Just for this brief moment, I can take a reprieve and not have to think about the fact

that I don't have a quarterback. And Sean, that's why somebody's going to mess around and go get them some, what's his name? some Aaron Rogers, right? That's exactly why somebody's going to jump on that. Is that a good idea? Probably not. But you know what?

I won't have to think about not having a quarterback. Yeah, and you know, we were discussing before the show, you're like, you know, as bleak as getting a quarterback in Aaron Rogers might be, he's going to get you four to five wins as a floor. Yeah. You know? Yeah. He's going to mess up your ability to get you a quarterback the next time.

Now, now here we go. Do we have that, the Connor Hughes tweet? Okay. I know it may be tough for some of you to read, but I'm going to just, I'm going to read this to you for those who can't see it. Because Connor Hughes, he covers the Giants. And I thought that this really spelled out like how tough it is, but you ain't got no quarterback. The Giants took their big swing on Matt Stafford.

That failed. Now multiple sources expect them to concentrate their efforts on getting the number one pick from Tennessee and pairing the quarterback they select with a veteran. That could be Aaron Rogers, but I'm told the former Packer, slash Jets QB is more of a, quote, discussion at this point than immediate Stafford fallback. Russell Wilson and Sam Donald are two others the Giants are discussing per sources. A couple I talked to believe Wilson to be the most likely outcome. As for the rookies, I couldn't find anyone affiliated with the team who as Chodore Sanders ranked

ahead of Cam Ward. A couple had others as the number two quarterback in this class. All felt any trade to number one is for one player, Ward. That doesn't mean the Giants won't take Sanders. They'd just be on an island with their evaluation. That also doesn't matter as long as they end up right. Sean, I know that that was a lot of words. I really do. But all I see for the Giants there is a slew of bad ideas.

Yeah, it's like it really is bleak and there is no real solution. You know, like they're just, there isn't a good one other than like you said, like you get Donald or Wilson and wait till the other year the next year. Yeah. So it's like this, right? If you're the Giants and you trade up with the Titans. And again, you can make that trade if you want to. If you're the Titans, you just got to go tell everybody we're going to be sorry this year.

Like I just don't. And you're still trying to get this figured out. Like I guess it depends on what you think the floor on Cam Ward is because you don't need a superstar quarterback. Again, we just saw this, right? It would be helpful to have a superstar. You don't need one. You need a quarterback.

And if you think that Cam Ward can be a quarterback, you go ahead and you do that. But for the Giants, if you need a quarterback that bad, because even if you get Aaron Rogers this year, you still got to think about it because you know he owned, right? So you give up capital, draft capital, to get a quarterback that is not a give up draft capital quarterback in the eyes of most of us. Even if he's a quarterback you take, is that a quarterback that's worth two first round picks, right? the one you have and the one next year. Is he that? Probably not. But again, you just got to get this off your plate, right? Yeah, get Russell Wilson or maybe Sam Darnel. Sam Darnel, if you got really, really, really good players everywhere around, Sam Darnel, maybe it could work. And maybe

the Giants believe that Malik neighbors will soon be Justin Jefferson. Hey, I got it right, Justin Jefferson. Maybe they think he'll soon be Justin Jefferson and then he'll be okay until he falls apart at the end like he did the last time. I don't know. I just know that if you're in a place where you feel like you got to trade multiple picks to go get Cam Ward, you are in a place where all you are saying to yourself is, dude, I got to do. I just can't think about this no more. They sound like buddy of a house party.

Man, I'll be alone with my woman and I'll be thinking about this dude. Whoa. Hey, but at the same time, she'll leave you if you ain't got no job. I want to start by saying that I have generally found it to be a bit dishonest the ways that people, when the Justin Tucker story came around, threw it out there and were like, well, we talked about Deshawn Watson. How come we ain't got that same energy for Justin Tucker? And, I mean, I understand that we live in some what about times, but I also think everybody understands why that's stupid, right? You know, I'm not really in the business of letting

the white man off the hook, but like, that's stupid guys. Like, he's the kicker. Deshaal Watson was a superstar quarterback. It was a far more, if nothing else, it was a far more interesting story. But no, I know on this show I didn't really talk about the thing with Justin Tucker because it was just kind of like, wow, that's a little messed up. But I didn't really have that much to go. Like, I don't know. I found it to be a story that I, obviously made me uncomfortable, but I didn't, like, it wasn't a talker, I guess is the way to put it. And in the end, when people would do this job, it really becomes about what's the best talker going to be. Like, I didn't feel like I had a moral obligation to talk about Justin Tucker.

Well, I got bad news with Justin Tucker. Today, Sean, is what they call a slow news day. Yeah, we have time today to talk about this. Yes. And on a slow, yes, I got to open it on my calendar. and Justin Tucker, today is your day. I don't feel bad about this either. I don't feel bad about this either. Your turn.

Let me send that tweet out. Your turn, Justin Tucker. Let's see if we could, let's see if we can goose these numbers up a little bit on these show because there's some people that be doing that, man.

Is that What About Game? Like, people used to play that What About Brett Fav game with me? and I was like, hey, dog, he'd be suing people. I did my Brent Farf thing. By the way, I will know, and I did the Brett Farth thing when I was at Game Theory because we had a team of lawyers, and not what are you what about motherfuckers patty me on the back? Not one single time.

Just want to throw it out there. But, Sean, you and I have talked about the Justin Tucker thing, like, to eat with each other for a while. And I think you and I were both fascinated by the same thing, which is he ain't even good no more. That's the thing to me is especially the last, at least this past year where everyone was like, you know, Justin Tucker, anything under 50 yards is an automatic make and this and that. And he was not making kicks last year for the Ravens on a team that really needed him to make kicks, especially in the playoffs. Like to me, this seems like a no-brainer decision.

And not just because he is an alleged sex pervert. this seems like a no-brainer decision because he's the kicker and he's not good. Like, look, maybe, maybe just maybe. What came out of after all the social upheaval of the last like 15 years, man, maybe after George Floyd and everything else, what we all learned is kickers of people too.

Because back when I was a kid, hey man, we ain't tolerating nearly this much off of kickers. Think about this. You didn't know Pat McAfee was like that until after he played. Yeah, exactly. You ain't know that, right? Now, kicker in Kansas City got the nerve to have controversy of politics.

Where is this coming from? Yeah, when did that happen? When do we start deciding? And that was the way that you could live. Kickers out here getting accused of being sex perverts and everything else and they get to keep. Even when they're not making kicks, at least the dude in Kansas City, by and large, have been making kicks. Justin Tucker, normally, man, they take one of y'all out back behind the shed. And then we just don't talk about it no more.

Like, you know, in one week if you miss two kicks. historically you've been fired or put on the bench. There's this one comment from Bonzino, Ravens are waiting until after June 1st to cut him because if they do it before, they will get hit with major cap penalties if they cut him after June 1st. How major could the cap penalty be?

Exactly. That was my point to bring up. He's like, he's a kicker. He's not that expensive. And number two, and this is where it gets to be somewhat important as we were talking about it. During the season,

he was bad for business, during the season. What are we doing here? You remember when Mike Vanderjad, who at the time was like the best, like the most accurate kicker ever. Yes. He said that stuff he said about Peyton Manning

in that interview and he was there for one more year. And then as a free agent, they let him go. And by the way, he was never to say him again. Right. Like this is, this is how this go. So I am so confused. by the fact that he still has a job.

And so that made me think about a couple of things. Now, number one, the Ravens are the team that did not let go of Ray Rice until a video came out. And then they made the reactionary decision to let him go. But they rode it out with him the entire way. But we generally look at the Ray Rice thing as kind of a turning point on teams needing to handle things a little bit differently. Now, a lot of people have made the point that it spoke to the power of having video

rather than just simply an allegation. but I feel like a lot of things have happened in the intervening time period since then, including like the Me Too movement and everything else. And I thought that we took these things a little bit more seriously than we had previously. Or at the very, and look, maybe the society at large just no longer has the attention span, because I've said that our capacity for scandal has greatly diminished. Maybe that's part of it, right? I don't have the greatest answer for that.

But I did think that the sorts of allegations that are against Justin, Tucker, that no kicker could survive this, let alone what has become a bad kicker. Like, there's no way I ever thought at any point that a bad kicker could survive what he is surviving now, like the fact that he still has this. It never dawned on me. So I went back and I started reading, or read again rather, the article in the Baltimore banner of the independent newspaper about the Justin Tucker case. And something jumped out to me that I feel like I had been aware of, but I didn't like

fully internalize, which is we have had people who were online making these allegations about Justin Tucker. And for those who don't know, it's largely the same allegation as Deshaun Watson. He'd be acting bad during massages. The difference is Deshawn Watson was calling people like via Instagram and getting quasi-professionals to give these massages, and then he'd be out there trying to get them to rub everything, you dig. But the difference is that Watson was doing out calls, and most of Tucker's stuff is at these high-end spas. Like he was going to these places, like the Four Seasons, for example, to get these massages.

And then there was a long line of women who then said that, yes, he behaved inappropriately in various ways. the allegations span from the year 2012 through 2016. I didn't see anything about any of these allegations after the year 2016. And that gives me one question. What happened in 2016? Like, I feel like there's an answer to that question that could maybe answer a lot of other things that don't make any sense. because what is being described sounds like compulsive behavior. Like what is being described does not sound simply like someone who knows he ain't

supposed to do something, but he just does it because he feels like it. Again, we're talking about the kicker here. Like, why would he stop if the allegations are true? And I'm going to be honest with you. I read the articles and I thought about it more. I believe that what is being alleged about him is true. and I think that most people who are running a team in most situations with a kicker would see enough reason to think that it was true, that they would get him out of there

and go get a pack and get a new kicker. If for no other reason, then it's a little stressful to be having that dude in your crew. You know what I'm saying? I make everybody look at you funny because we're looking at you all funny now. But anyway, what happened in 2016? If anybody can find the answer for me of what made people stop accusing him of doing these things. what stopped? Did he stop? Did he start going about it a different way? Did they stop? What is it? Because it seems pretty clear that something stopped. Did he simply run out of places to go get massages? Did he start

getting on the road and going like to West Virginia or something like that or going to Delaware or some neighboring place and making it happen where they didn't know who he was? Right. What happened? What made it stop? Because everybody's behavior in this is so strange in a way that I just would like the answer to that question. And maybe that could spell out some other things. But Maybe I'm just a cynic. And maybe, hey, we're in the day and age where bad kickers get to keep their jobs no matter what. Maybe everything has changed. I don't know.

I just know that if you believe the allegations to be true, then you would think that something would have happened to have made the behavior stop. And the behavior would have stopped in 2016. You'd have to be just as curious as I am, wouldn't you? Shout out to Dash Pass and their members-only deal for the 24-25 NBA season. They swoosh, you save. When any player scores 50 or more points in a game, Dash pass members say 50% on an order up to $10 off. Sign up for DashPass and save more all year round

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All right, Bo, here's the first one of the day. My name is Rachel Monroe, and I'm a contributing writer for the New Yorker based in Texas. I recently wrote about Texas barbecue and one family feud that illustrates this ongoing battle over authenticity and tradition in a changing Texas. A lot of people assume that the best barbecue is going to be found in a family-run roadside shack in a small town. but over the past decade, we've seen Texas barbecue really transform, and the heart of it is now cities. This is probably because Texas itself has changed a lot. 89% of Texans live in urban areas, and the small farms and small towns that used to sustain these barbecue places, they're struggling. Meanwhile, over the past 10 years, you have the emergence of what's called craft barbecue, which is basically a chef's mentality applied to barbecue.

So this new world of craft barbecue is not cheap, as you might explain. you can easily end up paying upwards of $50 for lunch for what used to be known as, you know, working man's food. I spoke to Daniel Vaughn, who's the full-time barbecue writer for Texas Monthly Magazine. Over the past six months, he's eaten at more than 180 different barbecue places across the state. He told me about a family feud in Lockhart, which is the official barbecue capital of Texas. Black's barbecue has been serving up old school barbecue for nearly 100 years. as they say on their website, their business plan is to not change a thing.

But you have this other half of the family that sees how things are evolving and wants to be part of this urban craft barbecue movement. And they start opening restaurants. They're called Terry Black's barbecue in cities. And then a couple of years ago, the open one in Lockhart, less than a mile from their uncle's place. So we wind up with a Blacks barbecue and a Terry Blacks barbecue within a mile of each other, both run by these two branches of this family that don't speak to each other and both claiming to make barbecue in the old school authentic way. So Sean, I had actually read this story before you send it to me and I found it to be really fascinating because I was really just thinking of it

in the context of like the changing like barbecue is barbecue is barbecue, okay? And just the idea that somehow barbecue has become fancy fair. And this has happened for a while, like North Carolina, that's a barbecue place, and you can go to a little classier barbecue joints. And there is something to be said about the idea of being able to go to a quote-unquote nice place, but still get barbecue, right? comma, however, did she say $50 for some barbecue?

Crazy. Got a bullshit his ad. And, you know, we were in Austin for South by, and I think you weren't able to join us, but me and our previous social producers said, went to Terry Blacks because it was right near our hotel. And I had like multiple friends reach out being like, and it was like a split. It was like a visceral split of like people being like, don't go to Terry Blacks. You should have went to these other places. And then other people being like,

oh, I love Terry Blacks. It's great. And so like it's fascinating what that like, as the article says, that schism in the barbecue world of Texas has like led to like people being very strong on one or very out on the other and it's it's creating such divide for something simple as barbecue. Yeah, so this was my thought. And I'm curious what you think about this. And I'm not like a foodie or any person. I'm not an expert in these matters. But I feel like because of the way that like excellent barbecue is made, especially with the emphasis on like slow cooking and stuff like that, is that it is a food that transfers itself over well to high class sensibilities. Yes. Right? Because it's done with, you know, it's done with such a care where that if, if,

I was a person that wanted to open like a classy restaurant, I could see how barbecue could be your bag while also you're like, yo, why does it have to be this kind of thing? Why can't it be? Everybody always has this problem when they love something that's supposed to be associated with the lower class that they feel the need to be like, well, why can't we put a tie on it? Right? And then, you know, and take it to another place. Like, I totally get that. But I also admit, while I can appreciate a fancy barbecue place, if you recommend a barbecue place to me, I expect my clothes, to come out smelling like that place. Yeah, it's tough when like everyone,

especially the Austin craze, it's like, go to Franklin's, go to Franklin's. And it's like, well, I don't want to wait two and a half hours in line for a brisket where like the difference is so minimal, like you're saying. Like it's, it's, I like food. I consider myself someone who like travels to go and get food. But like, I'm not going to be able to notice the difference of a great brisket from a good brisket. it from a good brisket, you know? Oh, yes. Yeah, no, no, yes, you go. But sometimes you will, right?

The moisture and it, but like the then wait in the two hour line, sometimes the convenience is better, or the like, maybe I'll pay a little extra for a white table cloth meal, but they still give it at the quality some degree of something where I'm like, it's a mom and pop shop. Yes, yes. No, I think that's fair. Um, but it's, I just, the family part in that they brought the fancy barbecue near the regular barbecue. And I'm kind of like, no, go ahead and do that. If I had the reel, I'd be like, yeah, bring your fancy ass right over there. We over here serving you two pieces of chicken with a piece of white bread and there go to hot sauce for whatever that costs these days.

Come holl at the reel. I feel like the fancy place would be the better commercial for the non-fancy place than vice versa. But yeah, check that story out. It's in the New Yorker. Like, again, the idea of craft barbecue, that makes sense to me. Totally. The idea of charging as much as they are, that is preposterous. Because I know I can get it just as good as somewhere else.

Yeah, with the economy and everything, it's like, when she said $50, I was like, whoa. All right, here's our next one. Hi, my name is Meg Duff. And when everything feels bad, I like to drink a nice cup of coffee to feel better. Well, jokes on me. Last month, the price of coffee hit an all-time high on the commodities market. I reported on this price spike for Business Insider. Higher coffee prices are already percolating down to consumers,

and we can expect the price we pay at cafes and especially at grocery stores to keep going up over the next few months. Commodity coffee prices are finally cooling off, but long term, it's safe to bet that coffee will get more expensive. That's because the big driver behind this year's price spike was climate change. Brazil is having its second best of the cost. harvest in a row thanks to two years of unprecedented drought in South America. That drought is hurting beans directly.

But what I hadn't realized is that it's also hurting supply chains. Last year, drought lowered the water level in the Panama Canal enough to back up ship traffic. Climate change is almost certainly making these droughts worse. One reason is that higher temperatures mean more evaporation. So even with the same amount of rain, a drought that might have been moderate 20 years ago is now extreme. Researchers expect this problem to get worse and predict double-digit losses in the land available for growing coffee over the next few decades. According to the UN, climate change

means we can also expect to see rising inflation for all sorts of food, especially if climate ambitions stall rather than accelerating. As a millennial, already mocked for buying coffee rather than buying a house, this news is so bitter. But I'm planning to double down and enjoy my good coffee while I still can. Hey, man, it's everything. Sean, uh, what eggs hitting foe around your way? I just got eggs yesterday at the grocery store for $10 and, uh, my wife was like, it's actually a good deal. How many? A dozen. How many? A dozen. Wow. We not, we in like the, I had like 850 a the fancy New York grocery store for a dozen. And I thought that was crazy.

I'm trying to get, you know, pasture free, you know, cage free, all this. But it's like, good Lord, it's crazy. Yeah, you'll, you'll, you'll take imprisoned eggs, huh? Like, you'll, that's what you, that's what you're going for. You'll, you'll take, you'll take some eggs off the chain egg. If that's what it takes. The opposite. Give me, I mean, it's come to that now, but I've always been like, let me get the cleanest

eggs possible because I eat so many. Like I love eating eggs and it's like a part of my every day. But yeah, it's brutal right now. Nah, thanks. This ain't the same for gangsters, man. Like that is in the coffee thing, I mean, coffee's not really my bag, but I just wanted to let everybody else know out there it's happening to you. And look, I'm a little worried. I'm glad I ain't got to go outside so much no more. I'm a little worried about a world where y'all can't get y'all coffee when y'all need it because that turned y'all into some things. Y'all need to highlight that hypnotist. Yeah, I was going to ask you if you were a coffee drinker because I'm certainly not, but there's people in my life who, if they wake up and don't get their coffee,

at least, you know, two or three times a day, they're like, you know, out of shape. For me, it's not, it's not like that. I was curious for you. Like, what do you, how do you get up in the morning? How do you just, you're up in about it? I just get up. Same way. I didn't get up. Like, I, like, I, I used to do coffee, but never as I need to get up sort of situation, right? Um, yeah, coffee's, coffee's not really my thing. But when I go to Vietnam, I'm going to see what the coffee hitting on. Oh, for sure. You know what I'm saying? Plus at those prices, I mean, you're going to feel like you get coffee 12 times a day. If I go to be, if I go to Vietnam and the

coffee hitting too hard, we're going to have a problem. My thing is, hey, man, I'm not, I, my stomach is not youthful. That's going to be, that's a little rough, boy, that's a little rough. Yeah, a little too strong caffeine. It might ruin your day. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or whoever the person is sitting next to me. Here's our last if you hadn't heard. Hi. Hi, I'm I'm Lindsay Dodson and I'm a senior reporter at Business Insider. I wrote this story about entry-level jobs and how they're kind of disappearing and what the impact is on Gen Z and the workforce more broadly. There's been much reporting on the dwindling number of entry-level jobs

and I was interested in what this means for not just young people entering the workforce, but companies and leaders too, who are missing out on Gen Z talent. There's a surplus of available workers right now, and this is only getting more true as highly skilled employees are being laid off from the likes of Meta, Google, and the federal government. The so-called unbossing of the workforce is also likely a factor, with millennial middle managers being squeezed out in the Great Flattening and wading into the hiring pool.

Without these people in companies and mentoring junior employees, more experience is necessary for new hires to thrive. When I spoke with Jennifer Moss, a workplace culture strategist and author, she also attributed it to youngism. Gen Zias are painted with so many stereotypes. They're labelled as difficult, demanding and even weird in interviews. But Zoomers can fight back against this by focusing on their strengths,

such as their natural ability to use AI tools, think outside the box and be collaborative. Leaders would do well to invest in Genzi as well and nurture these talents. At the end of the day, all generations have their value and isolating an entire cohort, whether that's purposefully or not, is pretty short-sighted. I don't think we gave anybody any good news. No, I guess the barbecue story was the only fun one, but in the heart of it was prices are going up.

And then I looked at the next two, I'm like, oh, God. Yo, the price going up on everything. The price going on, going up on if you haven't heard. Price is going up everywhere. And especially with the, I mean, the price of a good topic these days is a struggle too with the way our show is shaping up. Yo, like this is, I hate to be to bear a bad news. I really, really do. But, you know, this is what the world got out here.

I try to come up with at least what a happy thing. Let's move on to voicemails. Bo was a great prompt on Friday after Charles McDonald mentioned he's been watching The Wire and agrees with your thoughts on Stringer. Bo. You asked the audience, who is their least favorite or most hated TV character? We got some really good submissions. A lot of people who watch and hate characters on TV.

Here's our first one. What up, Bo? Hey, this man to go from Shreveport, Louisiana. And the character that I hated the most is none other than Wendy Eppin Bird from the Ozarks. Bo, Bird is the only person that had me screaming at the TV, and I was watching it by my damn self. When she left her brother at that diner for the cartel to get him, I was done. I was done with him. Anyway, you'd be hard-pressed to find him, more worse than Wendy Bird.

love to show keep doing your thing Sean do you watch Ozark so I don't and I texted a bunch of my friends who do and they were like yeah we I co-signed that they're like she's the worst oh really I mean I'm looking at the head being like she stinks

I'm looking at the description of her is what kind of person she is and so they white folks who live in Arkansas belong to money for the Mexican drug cartel so I bet she'd probably be saying wild racist stuff while also So, you know, is that the premise of the distaste? I have no idea.

Maybe I'm just being presumptuous, but it seems very reasonable to me. Oh, yeah, yeah. She a PR operative for political campaigns. You know what time it is. Yeah, tough look all around. All bad. All bad. Here's our next one.

Hi, Bimani. Hi, Sean. This is Cici calling in basically to talk about the, character that I absolutely hate. And I'm sure you guys are going to get inundated with calls from Game of Thrones, people hating Joffrey, people hating Circe and Tyrion. But I got a dark horse for y'all. I hate Rob Stark.

Like, I hate him. I hate him so much. I hate... Okay. If you haven't seen the show, basically, I mean, he dies in a gruesome weight, but it is 100% his fault. Excellent foreshadowing, by the way, because he just found out that his daddy had his head separated from his shoulders from not standing on his tent. That's why he died. He told Waldorfrey that he was going to marry one of his old ugly daughters,

just so he could pass through his domain, right? Because Rob needed Walter Frey way, way more than Frey needed Rob. Right, right? He said he was going to marry a girl. He did not marry a girl. Instead, he's going to fall in love with some nurse, knock her up, and marry her. And if that was an insult to injury, because that is egregious, that is egregious. That is egregious.

But then, but then, to phrase, and Walda, phrase like, no, no, we ain't cool. I'm going to show you just how cool we aren't. Hence the red wedding. Grusome, traumatic, and 100% avoidable. All he had to do would just keep his word. And it's really, really funny because in the entire game of thrones, like saga, people backstabbing everybody. but, you know, she had just kept his word. He might have kept his head too.

Who knows, but I hate him. I hate him so much. Oh my God, I hate him. Because he's stupid. Anyways, let me calm down. Thank you. Bonani, thank you, Sean. Y'all have a good one.

Bye. I hate the way that you walk away. Literally. That's not our friend who was swinging a chair, was it? It was not. It sounded familiar. came with the same energy, though, which you got to appreciate. Shout out to our friend who was swinging the chair last episode, who sent me a message to say,

before I hope my joint guy chose it. And she absolutely did. And I wasn't sure I sent the message to Sean. I said, this has to be who I think it is. He's like, yeah, we only got one for one woman. And she was swigging the chair. But shout out to you, C.C. And this caller of the Rob Stark guy, I chose it specifically because, like, I was like,

This is one of those things where the caller, I was like, she knows ball. Because I've read the books. And like if you've read the books like Rob Stark is one of those guys who like had every opportunity to do the right thing and be super smart and be a great, you know, war general and won all these battles. And then every mistake he made, it's because he's careless and was a little too horny. So that's a really great pick by her. I don't even watch Game of Thrones, but my skepticism of Rob Stark is a skepticism. and I generally have a white people who'd be doubling up letters for no reason. Is it in R-O-B-B?

Yeah, no need. Yeah, the only thing I'm more skeptical of them than them than white people who spell C names with K's. Tough. Courtney with the K. Yeah, like Gary Kubiak does that with all his sons, and I got one question for all of them. What's your middle name, son?

Clint with a K Kubiak, what's your middle name? Here's our last voicemail. Hey, Beau, Moni, Sean, CV from Texas. So I know the voicemail is regarding a TV character, but I've got an actual actor that I can't stand, that I despise every time I see him. And that's Shamar Moore. The reason being one night, we had watched,

my wife watching some movie with Shamar Moore in it, and so I was watching, she was all checking him out. So I went to bed at night. I had a dream. I had a dream that I was going down the street trying to find where my wife was because she wasn't at home. I look up in the car, look up, she's in the car next to me with Shamar Moore. And she's smiling at me like, nah, nah, nah, nah.

I just got pissed off. And I'm trying to figure out why is she in the car with Shamar Moore. So I have been despising that dude ever since I had that dream. I want to allow her to watch TV shows or movies with that joke in it. And in the words of Nino Brown, I didn't like that. they're pretty in effort anyway. Thanks for the call, though. Thank you. When he said she was checking him out or whatever, I was like, oh, okay, I see what direction

this is going in. I have so many questions about that man's life, though, because not only was I not expected that voice to invoke Shamar more, though I can see how it happened. Once he started quoting Nito Brown, now I have lots of questions about how CB, that's what he said his name was. Yeah. I need to know. And for him, that's not even a dream. That's a pure nightmare for him.

No, no, it's not. No, it is not. No, it is not. No, it is not. And she was looking at him like nanny, nanny, boo-bo. Ponda, you got to work this out, man. You need to go talk to somebody about this before this gets bad. So good.

It's funny. I played that for my wife who she likes Shamar more. And she was like, what? Did he say anything about him being a bad actor? I was like, no. It's all about this dream that happened to him, which is even better. Sean. we made it happen today.

Like this is, this is a professional gets it done even when you don't want to and even when it's hard. Anybody can do it today after the Super Bowl. We did this thing. Hey, hey, but ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much for joining us here

on the right time. We do this three times a week. My man Sean Yue, he handles everything behind the scenes. Thank you, sir. Also, thank you, Tor, if you haven't heard, contributors. Thanks to Rachel Monroe of the New Yorker.

Check out her story about the schism in Texas Barbecue at the New Yorker.com. Thanks to Meg Duff of Insider. Check out her story on rising coffee prices at Insider.com. And thanks to Lindsay Doxton of Insider. Check out her story about entry level jobs shrinking

and how that's a problem for more than just Gen Z. 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.