The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Big Cat on the First CFB Playoff Rankings. Plus, Giannis, Embiid, and NBA Trade Demands.

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

Russillo opens the show by explaining why Philly and Milwaukee have gotten off to such slow starts and shares what could happen next (0:42). Then, he’s joined by Big Cat to recap the first College Football Playoff rankings, reveal what surprised them, and give their Heisman picks (13:52). Finally, Life Advice with Ceruti and Kyle (71:16). Why were the Raptors so willing to forgive Vince Carter and retire his jersey? Check us out on YouTube for exclusive clips, livestreams, and more at https://www.youtube.com/@RyenRussilloPodcast. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Big Cat Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's pod, I want to talk a little bit about Giannis and the bad start for the Bucks. It was a bad start for the Sixers, but it's because Embiid hasn't even played yet. And hypothetical NBA type things that may not even be accurate right now, but we're doing it anyway. We've got Big Cat from Barstool ever heard of them. We're talking college football, playoff rankings. The rankings came out last night. We ran through all of the teams, different scenarios, and then, um, he started questioning me quite a bit at the end.

I don't know if that's going to help the pot a ton and we've got life advice. I want to talk about Yannis and Bede to start today's podcast. There's a couple different things depending on where the timeline is. So I'll just kind of jump into it. So if we look at the start of the season from Milwaukee Bucks, not great, Bob. They're 1-6. We can keep talking about Chris Middleton coming back. But even with him back, I don't know.

Like, hey, everything's fixed. I can't imagine that they're going to be this bad. I think I'll always hold out hope for them to be competitive or, hey, that's a tough out in the playoffs just because of Giannis. To me, he's top three player in the league. He's still fantastic. But when you look back at their timeline, you know, you go through the franchise index. When was the last time you were scared of them? Well, two years ago, they won 58 games, but we all know they lost the heat in the

one eight matchup, Giannis missed half of that series with that back entry. But that was alarming. And when a team dies, it's different than when a person dies because when a person dies, there's the date that we know that it happened. And when it happens to a team, we usually don't know the date until after it's happened, where you'll look back and go, Oh, that's when it all went downhill. And I think at this point, there's an argument to me two plus years later. Like that might've been it, but because of Janice, I don't like doing that. Um, we can look at the rest of the future stuff and say, okay, well,

Dame probably hasn't been the ceiling razor that you would have hoped, but they weren't healthy last year going into the playoffs. So, you know, here we go again. Their draft capital has been talked about a lot. They don't control any of their first round picks until 2031. And it's important to remember that control and then not having any are two entirely different things where if a swap doesn't happen or if a swap does happen and then they have the other team's pick, it means on draft night

they could trade that pick. So it's not like there's no possibility of pulling anything off. They burn five second rounders on Jay Crowder, which should be a lesson. And I've seen a lot of like looking at their picks in the late first, early seconds, these rotation hopefuls that haven't worked out, or I think that part becomes a little unfair to franchise just because of how hard it is and be nice to hit on one and feel like it's a real rotation contributor, but is it realistic that you're going to draft anybody in that spot?

Sure. Tyrese Maxey worked out, but it was just a brilliant pick. It worked out. It's beyond expectations. But for the most part, like, I just think you start to pile on some of these franchises where it feels like they're losing all kinds of momentum. So when Janis was talking with Sam Amick, who had relayed this joke where he basically was asking Janis like, what do you think will happen?

And Janis kind of jokingly grabbed a staffer and said, Hey, if we don't win, like, do you think you'll get fired? And then he alluded to, and I'm paraphrasing the entire quote here, because the point of the quote, it felt like it was a joke that got turned into something else where it was a hint when Janus was like, who knows? Maybe I would get traded. And then you're thinking, all right, is, is this anything? Does this, does this actually mean anything? And then they get off to this awful start.

All right. So let's hold that thought for a second. Embiid has had a different week. Um, he had some media availability where he said, cool, I've done too much for this fucking city. Um, and when that made the rounds, I'll admit the first time I saw it, I went, uh-oh, like that's, that's pretty heavy. Then when you went and looked at all of the available audio and why he was up so, uh, so upset, it was directly related to the fact that the columnists that made

one of the toughest transitions and one of the worst points you'll make, like you want to get on a beat or not playing enough fine. You wanna point out that if he wants to have some kind of legacy in the city okay fine but you can't do that without playing and honoring. Your brother died in the car accident i cannot leave somebody wrote that was like. Yep that's the point i wanna make so and be was really more upset about that specific thing that motivated that quote where when that quote lived by itself without more depth, I thought, is this some kind of hint about how Embiid feels about his relationship with the organization and the city and all these different things.

And then of course he gets the altercation this weekend. He's been suspended three games. Yes. I've seen the joke about the real suspension should make him play three games. Um, I've, I've seen, I've seen the joke about the real suspension should make him play three games. I've seen the joke hooks. So Embiid signed a three-year extension in September with Philadelphia. So what does that mean?

Well, the extension was three years, 193 million that takes him through 28, 29. He declined a player's option in 26, 27. So that's two years, get rid of the option, add the three new ones. So that means in 28, 29 at 35 years old, Joel Embiid will be making 69 million a year. That 69 million a year number sounds staggering right now when the cap goes up as it does and everything will happen. Like, I don't know if there'll be a world where you're like, oh, it's not even that bad. But yeah, the blow will be lessened. But today, as we start the 24, 25 season, you're like, man, 70 million for

Embiid, five years from now, what's that going to look like? Uh, you could, and if you want to look at his career earnings, that's going to put him fourth behind LeBron Steph and teammate Paul George, you could focus on just the basketball part of Embiid's quote about, I've done so much for the city. I mean, if you really wanted to be nasty, you could go, well, fourth highest in career earnings and you've done, I think, are you talking about second round appearances? But that's not, I don't know that that's entirely, I mean, I guess from just a basketball sense, you could say that it's entirely fair, but

I think there's probably more to it when you're in bead you're not Sitting around like the relationship with a pro athlete in the organization in the city Like how many athletes would be like I've been really well compensated and all my dreams have come true and I haven't done enough so It's all my fault. It's usually not what happens. So the frustration of the week, maybe there's nothing to worry about here. Unless, unless it has been really quiet in the NBA trade landscape.

Next mad NBA player. My default rule was always when it's quiet, just give it a few more months because that's how this league had been going for a really long time. We had nothing really of significance this summer. The trade deadline show I did with Simmons Super Bowl week, we spent 30 minutes on Bogdanovic going to the Knicks Because there was nothing else to talk about. A little cap clear there for an OKC Charlotte deal. I mean, that was a dead trade deadline show. And I remember thinking about Bogdanovich going, knowing Tibbs, I wonder if Bogdanovich will even be part of the closing group with the Knicks.

But we had nothing else to talk about. So the reminder is once again, it's been kind of quiet. It's been kind of quiet since the pardon three trade requests in three years run. I guess you could say Donovan Mitchell a little bit, but that was more about a team that was entirely ready to turn the page and go in a different direction after they'd already moved Royce O'Neal and then the go-bare part of that shot out to Windhorse. And then Mitchell ends up in Cleveland. I think the Cleveland thing is kind of funny because there were so many behind the scenes

rumblings which I want to bring up with Giannis here where it's like, ah, Mitchell's probably gone and that was just what everybody was kind of saying the same thing and repeating everything else. And then Mitchell ends up staying and signing his extension, right. With Cleveland. So we're going to know that part of it. So after our timeline of Ben Simmons, I didn't even know if Ben Simmons counts. I feels like he shouldn't, but he, he does, you know, I probably could bring up

Dame Lillard as like a soft version of it. The Garnett trade request where you definitely want to be traded, but you definitely care, especially coming from a smaller market of how you're perceived. You want it to be like a friendly divorce, like, Hey, I'm still going to be in the kid's life. You know, if you need any help around the house, like, you know, I love using the DeWalt.

So the Lillard one is, is real. It's just not like full blown. Anarchy like we've had with some other ones. Uh, I've also brought up this point, which I think is an interesting point, but not necessarily, uh, not necessarily like a predictor of the future that the U S guys and the international guys, the stars in the NBA, the track record is that it's two different approaches. The U S guys, when they're over it, are I like I'm out. I'm over it.

You figure it out. The international guys have not done that. They just haven't. It doesn't mean it's never going to happen. I believe it will happen at some point, but I only bring it up, not as a predictor, but as an interesting part of the discussion. So I think the question you have to ask is, did we get any real clues? Did we get any real clues throughout any of this? Well, my first thing would be as bad as the Bucs are, talk to me 20 plus games.

I don't want to really think I know anything about a basketball team, especially one with somebody like Giannis still on it. I don't want to, like, it's an awful start. I get how bad it is, but let's see where we're at. 20 plus games in. All right. The Sixers, the real Sixers haven't even started yet. So that record is completely irrelevant. Like I can't judge a basketball thing.

That's not even the real thing yet. They just got Paul George back and a beat after the suspension is going to at least he's scheduled to be making his season debut here. So the real part of what the Sixers are, I can't even tell you what it looks like because none of us have even seen it. But I guess because I love talking about the NBA and this is part of the NBA product, I do have those moments where I wonder like, what if it really did get that bad in Milwaukee this year?

What if it was just a disastrous year for the Sixers? Like what if it just doesn't work out? What would happen? Because the other part of this, that's the more modern version of what we've seen in the NBA. And I don't know that that is a direct correlation to the lack of angry trade demands that I've talked about here is that you could see this happening a few years ago where the players just

take the extensions, right? It is the NBA transfer portal. They don't it's like, all right, well, sure. If you're going to like embed, he could have waited it out, but based on his track record and his history of health issues, like when the Sixers are the extension, you could have waited it out, but based on his track record and his history of health issues. Like when the Sixers did the extension, you could argue, he just wanted the extension already. Is that a good thing?

Is that a good sign? And they did it. And even with that extension, I don't think the stigma exists anymore of, well, you just signed this extension, like the rant, the rant's four year extension with the Nets hadn't even kicked in yet and he was like, fire everybody. Okay.

You're not now I want out of here. And then he came back and they played up until the deadline. So the extensions feel irrelevant now about like, well, how will this look? If I've signed an extension and it's going out until 28, 29, and I were to hint at the soft launch into a trade demand. Look, even within Beats Health and how bad the back years could look, I think most front offices, if he were ever available, would say, oh my God, that's awful at the end. Okay, cool.

Let's do it because we don't have anything that matches that. Like maybe it's a two year window here and then we take all of our medicine later on. Maybe some smart teams would just go like, look, we cannot, we can't do something like that. And I think a Yannis thing, if it were to get to that, would be in a different market altogether. And it's why we're like, when you look at OKC, even though they've been like frugal about everything and saying, well, we don't want to do this we don't do that.

I mean the crazy thing is okay see could maybe win this whole thing this year. Can you make some kind of argument of like would you want to disrupt that but that's not usually how basketball teams operate there we go what. Are we gonna look like when our five best players are out there all at the same time? And we could add Giannis to that mix on top of everything that we already have. Like that would feel like the one time our press would be like, okay, these picks have been fun. It's fun to read all the stuff. And I have 17 and control of 31.

And I have all these swaps. It's like, no, you just go ahead and do it. I don't even know if we would even get to that point. It's gonna be a tough rumor season though, for Bucs fans. Like if you're a parent of a Bucs fan, you're gonna be updating them a lot and a lot of different stuff. I think Bucs fans. Like if you're a parent of a Bucs fan, you're going to be updating them a lot and a lot of different stuff. I think Bucs fans are looking at it as just all the other teams trying

to mess with their franchise. Um, I don't think it's just that. I think it's just what this sport is and always having to be kind of on edge or at least just aware of what scenarios could play out if things are way below expectations. Well, the results are in and we're doing a special taping late at night because it's probably the number one topic in America and that is the college football rankings are out and to join us at nighttime taping. I'm excited. We've got Big Cat.

What's up, man? Hey, I feel good. I just passed the kidney stone. This is the first show I'm doing after that, literally like 30 minutes ago. So I'm feeling good. I'm ready to go. We got some rankings.

We got, everyone's tweeting politics. I'm tweeting a picture of my kidney stone and Maxion clips. So I feel like I'm in the perfect sweet spot right now Yeah, that's right. So what do you got one stone down three to go? Yeah So the other three are still in the kidney and they're smaller. So hopefully they just stay there I don't know if I don't know if that's how that works But yeah, I'm ready to go. I did vote today. I wanted to say I I'm not looking for credit Okay

But I thought of you because I, I don't want to get into the whole thing. You know, we're going to do a redraftable in a minute. But there was a question, should you tax millionaires more? And I voted yes. So listen, not looking for credit, but if anyone wants to say, hey, good job, big cat,

you're looking out for everyone else that hurts you, that's fine. Yeah, and you're not broke. So that means you're really scared. I saw the question. I just thought of you while I'm standing in the voting booth. It was whatever. I can't wait no matter what I say.

Can I just say two other things before we get into the college football. I didn't know when we were very good friends I don't know when it became that I had to be booked to come on your show And your book or Alison is wonderful. She's the best but I know that was a thing She texted me and I was like, oh, I guess Ryan just lost my phone number but I Was happy to do this. I'm excited to talk college ball with you. I didn't fully put it all together until two nights ago. And I was like, wait, we're doing this podcast at 8 PM

central time on election night. OK, but that's more about your schedule. Yes, true. That we're doing it tonight. So I would have done it tomorrow morning as both of us have one eye over to what's potentially going down here. No, I got Maxon.

On the booking thing. Yeah. On the booking thing, this is coming up. It's becoming a thing with people that I'm friends with. Like Sarah Walsh, who was the most offended of anybody, where she goes, you have to, I have to go through like an intermediary with you. And I went, look, it's not a big time thing at all. It's that Saruti and Allison put the puzzle pieces together for me. And I don't have, if I don't have it visually

in front of me at that time, it's just way easier than having to go back to them and coordinate the whole thing. So once you and I were like, Hey, we're going to do this. Then it was just way easier for me to be like, Allison, reach out to him so that you plug him into the right slot. You, you, to your credit, you do it correctly. Cause we have our booker, Josh, who's phenomenal. If you're coming on, I'll text you and be like, Hey, you want to come on. And then like on a Tuesday at like four o'clock, he'd be like, wait, do we need a guest? I'm like, no, we already taped with for Silo. So you're right. You're, you do it correctly. I do it incorrectly. You're thinking about everyone else, the whole guest? I'm like, no, we already taped with Trisillo. So you're right. You do it correctly, I do it incorrectly.

You're thinking about everyone else, the whole team. I'm not. Yeah, team guy, which, you know, may surprise you with some of your political thoughts. Uh, let's get to it. Let's get into this because as we have argued about this now for years and my position is, is well documented that I didn't want to come to this,

but much like the playing game, when the playing games happen in the NBA, it doesn't mean I will just sit and stew and not enjoy enjoyable basketball with things at stake. And it's the same thing with this. I think the most surprising thing was the lack of surprises. I was trying to figure out as I looked at the AP stuff again, before the show was on ESPN and all those guys were great on the show. And we get the 12 teams, you count it down 25 and then it's the first two out 13 and

14. And I'm looking at it, I'm going, where are the, I was trying to figure out like, because the committee usually would give us a couple of surprises where then the AP would almost catch up to the selection committee a week later if nothing was like dramatically changed and Saturday slate. And if you look at this, the top 13 schools the same 13 the only change is they have Ohio State 2 and Georgia 3 so if you were to ask me like what was the surprise the first thing was that there wasn't really something that felt

completely out of whack in comparison to how the AP has been going the last couple weeks okay so I have a couple surprises but I want to address first your wrong take about the college football playoff. Now, I'll admit, I got to the right answer with like bad work. Remember like when you would have to like scribble work and you're like, you're looking in the back of the book for the math answer and you're like, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna pretend that I did the work here

and I'm, oh, I got it right. So the 12 team playoff is perfect. If you look at this field right now, I don't think it's just four teams that can win it all like it has been in years past. So the 12 team playoff is perfect for right now in college football. If this was a 12 team playoff five years ago, 10 years ago,

I think you would have been right. But because the NIL and the transfer portal has flattened the competition a little bit and there's more parity, I'm very, very excited for the 12-team playoff. So I got to the right answer that we needed a 12-team playoff. I just didn't expect it to be beneficial for the NIL and the transfer portal to get us to this point where there's more parity in a sport that usually has no parity. Because remember those years where it was like, there's two teams that can sport that usually has no parity. Because remember those years where it was like, there's two teams that can win it all, maybe three, and we do a four-team playoff.

Now I really do think, like, there are four, there are five or six teams that I could confidently say could win the whole thing. And yeah, of course, Oregon has looked better than everyone. And Georgia is, you know, Georgia's had its bumps, but they look really good still. So that you have been wrong, but I was, I'm right, you're wrong, I just got there in a fucked up way. Does that make sense? Yeah, because you told me I was wrong forever, then you actually apologized to me in August

for saying that I was right about this, and then a couple weeks ago you sent me a text, and now I think there was a public statement made where you were attracting the apology that just once again proved, here's what I'll tell you, there's still hope though for you being wrong. Because you and others that think now parody is the new normal because we're nine weeks into one season.

Like I do not understand this. Like I look at the world through like plate tectonics. Okay, I think you have to see things move for a long period of time to come up Do not understand this. I look at the world through plate tectonics. I think you have to see things move for a long period of time to come up with some definitive answer. Did the NIL and the transfer portal really lead to parity or did there happen to be a year that feels like there is parity? Because if you're saying it's only happening for that, then you're completely flawed part

of the position is that, so that means prior to this, we've never just had a season of parity because that was an older system. So maybe there is parity, maybe it's wide open, maybe we get to nine teams who are not going no way, they can't win a national championship, which is an exercise that we should do.

But for everyone to be in a rush, the college football is now forever changed and this is the new norm. I need multiple seasons of seeing this play out before I'm ready to accept it is the new norm. I need multiple seasons of seeing this play out before I'm ready to accept it as the new normal. And that is the difference between you and me. We are like yin and yang oil and water. When it comes to this stuff, you need like five years of data to then be like, all right, here's my opinion. I need maybe a week and a half to be like, yup, this is what it's

going to happen for the rest of my life. My pushback on that would be Diego Pavia. That's a transfer portal guy who Vanderbilt doesn't have the season they're having if they don't get a Diego Pavia. The entire Indiana roster, Cam Ward at Miami, these are the moves that you can get some of these big time players that can change the scope of where your program is going in a flash

and it doesn't take years and years and years of stacking recruiting on recruiting on recruiting that only the big dogs could do. Right, like a homegrown guy like Cam Nune. Yeah, right, exactly. Well, he stole some laptops. Accused. Accused.

Don't say anything, because I haven't got to that episode of the Hernandez. Okay, wait, all right, so here are my surprises you ready for my surprises Yeah, yeah given to you. I think I am one I understand the case against Indiana. I'll make the case for Indiana they've killed everyone and I know how the committee usually works. They need like the the data point of a good win Outweighs, you know a weak undefeated schedule outweighs a weak, undefeated schedule. But if you look at Indiana and like in Ohio State,

and I get it, Ohio State, their win against Penn State on the road is better than anything Indiana's done. They have two common opponents, Nebraska and Michigan State. Indiana killed both. Ohio State struggled with Nebraska. So I think Indiana should have been a little higher. I also think BYU should be ahead of Indiana.

And BYU is getting a ton of disrespect because BYU, what have they done? They have won, they killed Pitt on a ranked Pitt team, which I know they were a little fraudulent, but they killed them. They beat Louisville, ranked Louisville team on the road and their only loss or sorry, they're undefeated and then they beat SMU at SMU who's really, really good. So like what, what does BYU because they've, they've had some close calls like BYU should be higher ranked in my opinion. I, I'm a big believer, especially at this point of the season when it's the first rankings, why not just put the undefeated teams higher?

Like you know, it's going to all figure out, you know, Indiana and Ohio state are going to play each other, reward those teams. And obviously it doesn't mean anything ultimately, but like Indiana and BYU do have not lost and they've, and they've, and Indiana especially has killed everyone. Why, why are we, why are there one lost teams that far ahead of them? Okay. Um, a couple of different things. I think you might've been confusing BYU schedule somebody else. Oh wait, I was thinking SMU, Sorry. SMU should be higher. SMU should be higher. BYU I think also should be higher cause they are undefeated. BYU did beat SMU. SMU beat Pitt. SMU beat Louisville on the road.

SMU only has one loss to BYU. That's where I got my confusion. SMU should be in the top 12 as well. All right. So a better host would have done this before. Um, Oregon's one, Ohio state's two, Georgia's three, Miami's four. Um, but it's also important to remember that since Ohio state is not the conference champ in this, they would be a five seed that would put BYU as the big 12 champ as the four seed. There's also a Boise BYU conversation or a Boise big 12 champion conversation because they're still open to be in the

four seat and all this. And then the rest of the way through five through 12, it's Texas, Penn State, Tennessee, Indiana, BYU, Notre Dame, Alabama, Boise State rounding out your 12. SMU, A&M, they put that up as like the next two out. Starting at A&M though, there's that SEC block of all those two lost teams. There's still five SEC teams with only one conference loss.

So the SEC thing, I was wondering if they were maybe going to be in love with the SEC the way the committee has been accurately. So I would argue in the past where you maybe saw, you know, them ahead of SMU, maybe Boise was 14, you know, maybe it was going to be Notre Dame 12. And then all of a sudden, like, you know, they didn't want to do it with the second loss, they gave it to Bama with their second loss, um, because of the Georgia win. But I, let's start with the BYU Indiana conversation, because I don't want to turn this into not, not liking Indiana, but if they lose to Ohio state, I wonder, are

they still in this thing, avoiding also in a big 10 championship game because they have them where they have them. It seems like more people want them higher because they're unfeeded. Uh, the argument against is pretty simple. Their strength of schedule is 103. Yeah. Um, their best win is a five and four Nebraska. You're right.

They've housed them. They've housed a lot of opponents having worked out one game against Washington. They still were in control of that game with a backup quarterback and Jax Davis, who played at least last year. So it wasn't a massive departure, but they'll have played six of the bottom, eight big 10 teams. So if you want to get mad about Indiana, you have to get mad about BYU first,

which is I think of what you're doing, because the strength of schedule 61 to 103, and the Nebraska win is not nearly as good as the win at SMU or the dominant, like, that K-State game was weird, but they still destroyed them. They destroyed them. Yes. And that so I screwed up because I did confuse SMU and BYU because they played each other. But yes, BYU should be higher than Indiana. I think Indiana should be higher overall again.

Okay. Then who then? How, how do you want to do it? Do you want to move Penn State down? You want to move Texas down? I mean, what, what, what is Texas hanging their hat on? Yeah, I know it's, it's fair to get into it and then I'll just Michigan because we could do this all day Yeah, your assumptions can be you know, you can throw assumption at me and I'm only gonna be able to counteract him with more assumptions But here's mine. I think Texas is better than a bunch of these teams agreed. I listen I'm not saying I We totally agree like in terms of if you're ranking it What you think is who what what you think is who, what team

you think is better, I get it, but I just am like, these first rankings don't mean shit because everything's still ahead of us and they got to play them out. I would just like to see rewarding and undefeated team. That's all. Cause I just, I think it goes back. Even if you haven't played anybody yet. Really? Yeah.

I mean, Indiana has been killing everyone I think it's more just I like the the story of Indiana and I'm biased here. I like the story of Indiana I like the story of BYU I like those teams that are they feel like party crashers and we've done the Texas thing a million times We've done the Ohio State thing the Penn State thing a million times where it's like I don't know. I just like the newness of them. And if you don't lose on the field, I just give you more credit. I don't know. I mean, again, Indiana has to play Ohio State. So we'll see. BYU does not have a tough schedule ahead of them. They should walk into the Big 12 championship. And if BYU wins the Big 12 championship, the interesting thing

is going to be if BYU wins the Big 12 championship, that's a one bid league. Kind of similar to if Miami beats SMU in the ACC, that's probably a one bid league. So now you're getting all the SEC and the Big 10 mess coming in, right? Like that's what's going to happen. That's what happened over the weekend with the Big 12 having chaos and Clemson losing the way they did, that it basically put those two conferences boxed into if their undefeated team ends up winning it all, they're going to have a tough time getting two teams in.

Yeah, because if you look at the dispersal of the first 12, SEC for Big 10 for ACC won, the Clemson loss kind of eliminates them from all of this. It's also kind of I'm going to have a really hard time with them at 12 and 0 of thinking, like, I don't even know if I would have them ahead of BYU if BYU is undefeated. Yeah, Miami's interesting because Cam Ward is so phenomenal and he can get them out of everything, but their defense gets them into these problems and it feels like they're playing that, you know, the Virginia Tech game, the Cal game, the Lakers, the Lakers, the Lakers, the Lakers, the Lakers, is so phenomenal and he can get them out of everything but their defense gets them into these problems and it feels like they're playing that you know the

Virginia Tech game the Cal game where it's like you came the Duke game yeah I mean they ended up killing Duke at the end but like yeah yeah the beginning of the game it was it was hairy there Notre Dame though why is SMU not ahead of Notre Dame that makes no sense to me Notre Dame has the worst loss of any of the teams in the top 12. They obviously have a very good win in Texas A&M on the road to start the season. But SMU has beaten, they have a loss that's aged very well with BYU. When that game happened, we thought BYU was nothing. They're undefeated.

And SMU has killed Pitt, a ranked Pitt team, and then went on the road and beat a ranked Louisville team. So why is SMU behind Notre Dame? That makes no sense to me. It doesn't make any sense to me either. And I might just be kind of down on Notre Dame from the summer and going like, yeah, they might be all right. I thought the A&M win was a really big deal

because I just thought it was a tough game. It's opening night, night game down there, the place is wild. And even though it wasn't pretty, it also looked like they had lost the game early on a penalty. And it's like, okay, this thing's probably over and they fought back and they found a way and the numbers just across the board. And you're like, what do I make of this? It's like, well, you had to watch and appreciate whoever won that game because that was a tough battle. And now since then, you're like, what else is there remaining with their schedule that's going to get me excited about them?

So SMU feels like they're trending in a better direction momentum wise. And Notre Dame does. Yeah. And it's probably a point, like some of these teams where if you go, okay, Indiana, Georgia, who you pick and all right, you really need to discuss it. You pick it like Notre Dame SMU to me is an actual conversation. Yeah, agreed. It absolutely is a conversation because I don't understand the resume. If you put them up against each other, I don't know why. You know, Navy, obviously the wind

that way that Notre Dame beat Navy was impressive and Navy was ranked at the time. I didn't think the Navy, I thought Navy was playing bad teams, kind of like your argument with Indiana and it's like a nice story. We all want to get around it, but I, I expected that result and that result happened. The other one that we should mention is there is that world where like army is still alive and everything ahead of them. And I know that Navy, you know, we saw what Notre Dame looked like against Navy. I think army is better than Navy, but it's crazy that Army Could crash the whole party and be you know, they could even get into a top four, right?

Like if if chaos happens if BYU loses Wait, you're talking about Army. Yeah winning as the group of five Yeah, you could have you're taking Boise out then right? Yeah, I guess you'd have to take Boise out too, but there would be chaos, but Army's still there, Tulane's still there, this is why I love the 12-team playoff, there are 21, 22 teams that can conceivably say they still have a shot at getting in, you know, and you have elimination games coming up this weekend

with LSU and Alabama, Ole Miss and Georgia's an elimination game for Ole Miss, this is why the 12-te great to me because we're at, we're in November and there are 20 teams that can say, Hey, if we win the rest of our games, we got a real shot. Colorado's got a real shot. Yeah. When you look at Boise, I mean, good luck trying to find a loss out of that

because the mouth West teams they have remaining in Nevada, who's terrible. Um, Wyoming isn't any good this year and then what is it San Jose State? Yeah because they just beat San Diego State. So San Jose State don't sleep on San Jose State. San Jose State has one of the best wide receivers in the entire college football. Have you seen him Nick Nash? The dude is ridiculous. Yeah no relation to the cash kid right? I don Yeah, no relation to the cash kid, right? I don't think any relation to the cash kit. He's got us here. Here's one of his lines. Now. This was against

Kennesaw State who it is back to back games for Nick Nash 17 receptions, 225 yards, three touchdowns, and then the next game was 16 receptions, 152 yards, two touchdowns. All right, let's go back to the top. We've got to work our way down here because the Oregon thing, we've got it. They like Ohio State better than Georgia as we told you at the top,

but Georgia would be the two seed. It's the SEC champ in Ohio State behind Oregon makes them the fives. We've already covered that. But who do you think is better? Who do you think has a better, give me both answers. Who do you think has a better argument to be number two?

Who do you think has a better, give me both answers. Who do you think has a better argument? Number two, who do you think should be number two? Hmm. I think Georgia should be number two and I think they're better than Ohio State. If I had to go gun to my head right now. I agree. Now the thing that I should be able to use is like, Hey, I like Beck better than Will Howard.

I don't like Beck at all right now. Neither do I. I think it's a mess. Neither do I. But too much eye black. Yeah, a lot. Way too much eye black. Now, like when he comes into the tunnel with that look, you're like, you've got to be really good.

You've got to stop throwing interceptions if you're going to go sleeve and some of the accessories and all that kind of stuff. And then it's like, man, like you don't want to have to tell a kid to get his sleeve filled in, but like you just stop throwing three picks a game. And some of them are so bad. He looks like when you, when you play NCAA football and you're like, let me just go crazy

with accessories and you're like, just chill out, man. Like just go play quarterback. You don't need to do this. So I'm with you on back. He's been, he's been bad. I, the, the case for Georgia over Ohio state would be Georgia. Obviously they've had a couple of games where it's like not look great. Kentucky, even the Mississippi state game was weird, but Georgia, when it boils down to it, Georgia had one really bad half, right? They had one really bad half. And I know that Ohio state only lost by one to Oregon, but Georgia then went into Texas.

And I think Texas is better than Penn state. So that win to me is, is more impressive. And they killed Texas. That wasn't really. So that win to me is more impressive and they killed Texas. That wasn't really a game that was close. Whereas Ohio State, like that was a coin flip game. So yeah, I would take Georgia over Ohio State right this second. I agree on all that.

I think the best Ohio State's looked all year as their loss. So even more so than the win against Penn State. And I think sometimes the history of Penn State kind of plays in all that, even though I still feel better about Penn State closing this season than I win against Penn State. And I think sometimes the history of Penn State kind of plays in all that, even though I still feel better about Penn State closing this season than I did them last season. I also just don't think the list is very long

of teams that could go into Texas and make them look that bad in that half and destroy them and on top of it, Beck not even playing that well. What that D-line did, and I said at the time, I think it's the most impressive unit, the most impressive performance by one unit I've seen in any game all season long.

And I think the list stops after Georgia of teams that could go there and do it. I'm assuming a lot, you know, assuming that no other team can do it. It's just the way they did it. And to that offensive line and to yours who, I mean, you start stacking up all these guys are ranked to be first round quarterbacks too. It's like, how many of these guys can actually go in the first round of benched your last season before the draft? But, um, we're on the same page there, but look, um, one of the things I always try to tell everybody about it after having the committee chair on the radio

show all those years and the podcast all the years, and then sitting in in mock runs of this thing with people from the committee, which was really just a great learning experience is that whoever's like it, they had, it was the media presence for the committee. Like they basically never want to be tied down to anything, knowing how annoying all of us would be is like, Hey, how much does conference rankings matter? And they're like, it doesn't. It's like, well, wait, you said, you know, if anybody had said, yeah, we actually thought like this conference was better than this conference.

This conference was third or this conference was fifth. Then we would hold it against them for like going into depth on any single explanation. So when they asked Ward Manuel on the Ohio State, Georgia part of it, it was pretty clear like he was entirely succinct about the whole thing, which is like the loss at Oregon is just better than the loss of Bama for Georgia. So done and done. So our whole Texas point that we agree on, it seemed like in the room that wasn't enough to just be more impressed with the loss at what is their number one team in the country, which again makes sense. Yeah.

And it could also be, you know, like I said, the Georgia has struggled in a couple of games. Maybe that's also against them. You know, I know Ohio State struggled against Nebraska, but the Georgia Kentucky game was weird. The Georgia Mississippi State game was it was Georgia. I never thought Georgia was going to lose that game. They were in control, but it was a 30 plus points spread and they only, you know, so it might be stopwatch. They gave up a bunch of yards of Amburin there at the end. At that point, like Mississippi State looked like the absolute doormat of

the SEC. Right. Right. So I think that had something to do with like that Saturday, you're thinking, do I have to check back in on the Georgia game? Right. Right. Which one of those deals, right? It's like every Arizona Cardinals game in the NFL. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Don't we, we got to, I have that on the list of things we're going to talk about at the end here. Okay.

So then you can start getting into some of the stuff where, like the pollsters still love Tennessee more than I do. So I understand why I can't really tell them that they're wrong. But part of that also for me is I thought Tennessee had like a chance to be in one of these four slots. Like at one point this year, I was just all the way in and went, I think they have a chance to maybe be better than any of the teams in the SEC win the entire conference. And even though they have a better record than everybody that's not named Texas and Georgia I don't see it. I don't see it.

And they feel like they're still getting better for the doubt there. And obviously they still really like Bama to have them at 11 with the two losses over some of the other two loss options that you have in the SEC. Yeah I I, uh, I agree with you on Tennessee. It's just, and it's unfair to expect more out of Nico. He's a freshman, but, and I liked their defense a lot, but, uh, I agree with you. I think that they're in for a tough one against Georgia in a couple of weeks and that will kind of sort itself out. Yeah.

The rest of the schedules like A&M still has, well, they're, I don't know. It's the easiest. I mean, cause it's New Mexico state. It's at Auburn, but then they finish up with number five, Texas. LSU's got Bama this weekend at Florida, then Vandy, which is a sneakier one. It'd be classic LSU to win the next three and then lose the Oklahoma at home. Um, Ole Miss, Ole Miss still has Georgia. All right. At least that one's at home. So that whole block of all these SEC teams,

you know, they're just gonna start eliminating each other here throughout all this. So I don't know how they get more than four. Yeah. And there's a chance if Bayama loses to LSU, A&M loses to Texas, then LSU loses to somebody else. Like Ole Miss feels like it's almost impossible in front of them, because Florida's actually like a little bit of a tougher out now though. I don't know.

They're on their third. Yeah. Third quarterback kid who played in Yale. Yeah. So, um, I don't know. I guess I don't, I guess I can't get too upset. I guess like looking at all this, I don't have something that I'm ragingly upset about. No, the only two sticking points is like I said, I would put BYU and Indiana a little bit higher. And that's just a personal preference. Like I said, I don't think that Indiana is better than Texas, but I just would, I would do that right now, knowing it's all in front of them.

I would do it. And I would have SMU ahead of Notre Dame. That's the one, if you said I had to pick one thing, I think SMU has a better resume than Notre Dame. Notre Dame should still be in if they finish off their schedule. But SMU, their only loss is to BYU who's undefeated and Notre Dame lost to Northern Illinois at home. So I just, that one is the one that sticks out to me. The interesting thing with this whole thing is going to be if there is chaos in the ACC in the big 12,

how many teams from the SEC in the big 10 are going to make it in? Because you would think it's going to be Ohio State, Oregon, Penn State, and Indiana, no matter what, right? Or not no matter what, but those four feel like Indiana were to get throttled. You think they would get out? Well, at that point, if you get destroyed by the only real opponent, that's the whole part of the expansion thing that has driven me crazy since the very beginning is that you say you can go 11 games without playing anybody and then get destroyed by the one team. In some cases for like the Penn State model of previous years that everybody's heard me

talk about like way too much, but I just couldn't believe it when Fox ran that graphic. Yeah. It was a Penn State game weeks ago and they go, you know, in this system of the last, you know, for team expansion, Penn State being the playoffs six times. That's, that's. Everybody else. And you just go, well, why, why is that? Cause they were sneaky fucking awesome.

Well, no, it's because of what we're laying out here with Indiana. And so if you only play one big boy all year and you get housed by them and then it's like, all right Here's your playoff bid like I just we should have a problem with anyone getting in that way It has nothing to do with Indiana agreed. The only thing the only counterpoint I would I would say to that is you You don't know who's gonna be down year to year Nebraska has been a disappointment Michigan has been a massive disappointment. So Indiana beats Michigan this week by, you know, 30. You can't say that like, oh, well, Michigan, I understand what you're saying, but like that's kind of, I have a little bit

more leeway to a team that just catches a couple breaks in their schedule. And this might be because of the team I root for and we've had years where we're you know 12-1 and I know that we're not one of the top four teams. You would tell me constantly leading up to the Big Ten Championship game you're like don't pick us. Listen I'm having a crisis with my with my friends on the group text I have to be the voice of reason because I we're going through a crisis at Wisconsin I'm hopefully going to figure it out with some NIL, Stell Blue Coffee money. But we're going through a crisis and I have to keep

reminding them that we played in the Big Ten West for a decade. Even the years that we won 11 games, we were not as good as we thought we were. The fall off that we as perceived right now is not as severe as we thought we were. And the fall off that we as perceived right now is not as severe as we think it is. It's that everything's changed around us. And it's kind of like the inverse of Penn State where Penn State is now everything changed around them.

And now they're gonna get to say they go to the playoff every year when nothing has changed. So it's interesting navigating that where you're like, all right, where were we like 10 years ago now that we look at this? Like we weren't what we thought we were. We were good, but we weren't, we weren't an 11 in one team that, uh, you know, should have been in a top four spot.

So let me do it this way. If Indiana, all right, Ole Miss is 16 right now. If Indiana say gets destroyed by Ohio state and Ole Miss runs That sucks. So that was dirty. What you just did to me. Because it would be all this white Georgia. Yeah. Yeah. No, you have Ole Miss beating Georgia and right. They'll play it. They'll play it.

They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it.

They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it.

They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it.

They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They'll play it. They. Yeah. Yeah. No you have Ole Miss beating Georgia and right they'll play South Carolina They'll play the LSU Kentucky's really bad though. Kentucky's really bad and they lost it home to Kentucky. That was a really bad loss It was a bad loss. That was a really bad loss. That's a tough one though. I'm just rooting for chaos at this point really bad loss. That's a tough one though. I'm just rooting for chaos at this point. And I don't want chaos. I want chaos in the fact that like SEC and Big 10 kind of start beating each other. I don't really want the chaos where the scenario that I laid out earlier and BYU running the table, Miami running the table, I think would kind of suck because then you would let it, it would just be nine Big Ten or SEC teams, you know, like I, but what if they're the most deserving? I know, but I want to see, I like,

I want to see a Colorado. I want to see SMU. I want to see these teams crash it and, and boredom shouldn't be a reason to be invited to something. That's true. And this is, this is the other part is that you have 18 teams in the Big Ten. All right. So like when you look at Miami schedule, Miami may be one of the four best teams in the country. All right. I'm, I'm willing to go there with it because cam has been that good. The office is so good.

I love the receivers. You know, it's it there. You're right. As we've already touched on, there's like three up and down moments for them this year where you're going, when's this going to catch up to them? But when you look at what they run through and you can say, well, at the end of it, they're still going to have to play somebody in the ACC title game. It's like, yeah, but that's like an easy 12-and-oh

because of how screwed up the expansion has made the conferences. And like, not everybody's coming, like there are teams that are going through two entirely different experiences playing in the same conference. I agree. You know who the poster child of this is?

Is UCLA. UCLA, you didn't think I was gonna to say UCLA there, but you still know. But I love it because I already know what you're going to say. UCLA is playing good football. OK, UCLA is playing good football. I know that that sounds crazy. When you look back at UCLA schedule, they played Indiana, who we obviously didn't know at the time was going to be nine and oh, and really, really good. They played in these consecutive weeks.

Indiana at LSU, Oregon at Penn state, Minnesota. Like that's not a fair schedule. I agree with you. That's not like they're playing good ball. And they just went through a five game gauntlet. That was just not like that happened at the beginning of the year with new coach. And it was just like, this team looks dead. And now they, you know, they beat Rutgers they go to Nebraska they beat Nebraska like they're not as bad as as people have thought they were they just played a schedule that was way harder than anyone else in the country sounds like somebody likes UCLA plus the five and a half at home against Iowa maybe I but I can't do

that because and then people will be like well that's because I will beat Wisconsin 42 to 10 which which was very embarrassing. I have some questions for you. You ready for them? Yep, pain is ready. Heisman. Yeah. It's been Hunter for me for a while.

Okay. I think this is the kind of year where you go, why are we just defaulting to a quarterback on one of the playoff favorite teams? You know, cam wards terrific, but I just think if you explained it to somebody who didn't know anything about football and be like, well, who gets the award? Well, it's supposed to be for the person that's the best

player in college football. But what's that guy doing? Well, he's doing something nobody's ever done before. Yeah. Charles, Charles Wilson had 30 catches. This guy plays full games at both positions and is a lead. And by the way, a couple of weeks in, I was done with Colorado. I thought they were going to suck again. I

was totally wrong. Um, they fixed a lot of things and I think they're good enough to justify him getting the award. Okay. There you go. That's, that's a good answer. My unbiased take is it's Travis Hunter. Uh, and what he's been doing is, is it's not, it's not, we've never seen it. 120 plus snaps a game. He's one offensive and defensive player of the conference player of the week. At one point this season, he is legitimately a top 10 receiver and a top five cornerback in the in college football. Like that's stupid. And then my bias take is I have Travis 140 to one preseason. So that's all I've been talking about. When I did my open on him, you were like,

good stuff, keep it going. And then I was like, well, what kind of ticket do you have on it? I'm so fucked up in the head that I think that I actually could maybe influence like one or two voters. Cause we did this last year with Jaden. We bet on Jaden. You could do it. By the way, do you realize how many Heisman voters there are?

There's a million of them. So there's definitely a couple a couple I know we did this with Jaden last year where I like if you went back and Asked me maybe Michael Pettix because he was more impactful to the the story of college football that year But we bet on him like in the middle of the season and then every single week We were just like Jane Daniels gotta be the husband Yeah cuz like last year when I was making the Wemba Nyama push for defensive player of the year, cause I just felt like in those games and then the

argument was well overall defensively they're not as good as Minnesota. I was like, well yeah, but look at all the dogs that Minnesota has surrounding Rudy on top of everything else. And by the way, it's not like I thought Rudy sucked on defense, I voted him second. And then somebody was like, keep doing that, keep pushing that.

And I was like, oh, this guy's got a bet on it. He doesn't care about my basketball acumen. But you didn't. You didn't have a bet. I'll tell you what I bet. All right. No, not me, somebody else. Somebody else reached out.

I can't bet on it. Yeah, I know you can't. I know you can't. All right, next question. What does Penn State do with James Franklin? Be careful what you wish for. They win enough. He recruits at a really high level. And one year it'll probably break your way where you'll get Michigan and Ohio state down at the same year.

I mean, it doesn't seem likely, but Michigan went through a bunch of lean years where they wanted Harbaugh out. I've used this Harbaugh explanation numerous times because I always said throughout all of it, like he really only had the one disastrous year. He was flirting with the playoff spot in the 14 format. So he lost to Ohio state. Michigan hadn't beaten Ohio state for a bunch of years in a row, so nothing was really all that different.

It's just that he brought all this attention upon himself with the videos and who's got it better than us sleeping over at kids houses on recruiting trips and all that kind of stuff. And so it's like, okay, well, it was, you promised more than this. Yeah, sure. You were hoping that it would be more than this, but it still isn't that bad other than that one really bad COVID year where all these college football voices, some I like, some I don't like, were like,

just fire everybody party. That group of college football analysts who just like, I have nothing else to say, just fucking fire everybody all the time and I'll get a hit out of this. I think with Franklin, that you're, it's a light beer version of that. Yeah. Because the Penn State losses to Ohio State don't hurt as much as the Ohio State losses for Michigan do for a bunch of obvious reasons. You don't have to be that part of the country or be a big 10 fan to understand that. So you look at how often he wins, even though I think a lot of it's schedule inflated that we've already covered with their fake playoff appearances.

Um, be careful what you wish for because unless you're going to be like, I think have all the schools that look in the mirror and see like, think about what Oklahoma fans are thinking right now post venables. They're thinking like, okay well we'll get like, we're a top five job. It's like you're not a top five job anymore. Like Oklahoma, there's a bigger conversation that no one in Norman, like they're already mad about it pre-happening before they had a bad season. We'd have to see more seasons like this from the Sooners to like fully buy in.

But there's no way it's ever going to be what it was in the Big 12 where you just want it even in down years because Texas was messed up. So I'm just telling you, there's all of these fan bases and Penn State would certainly be one of them where it's like, you may think there's this hit list.

Like think who A&M ended up going with. And Elko looks like he's a perfect fit, but it was like at the time it was kind of like, oh, it's not the splashy thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with you. Um, the good news is Penn State, I think next year they play Ohio State, then they don't play them for like three or four years. So it will solve itself in that respect. That's cool. That's a good reason for expansion. Yeah. It is crazy though, cause he, he, it just, he can't get over that hump. And, uh, I would understand how it's frustrating, but I agree with you. Like you can't, it's, it's, it's, you basically are just hoping like, you know, with the limitations, but to change course at this point, you might get into serious, serious pain that you're

not having right now. My, uh, my terrible, uh, like fantasy, like fucked up how everything plays out. You ready for this? Yeah. Lincoln Riley takes a bear's job. James Franklin goes to USC. Kurt's signet Signetti goes to Penn State. Penn State stays good. USC gets good. The Bears suck even more. I love how it came back to it's still not working out. I gotta be honest, like when you started that thing,

you landed the plane. Yeah, I did. I did. You really did. Chris, he's a Pittsburgh guy. Franklin, Franklin has obviously flirted with USC and Lincoln Riley has, you know, Caleb Williams. So it's not the craziest thing. Yeah. Cause I mean, you just presented something like here's something that's not going to happen, but it'll be fun. So for me to take it seriously and go through all the reasons why, like defeats the purpose of the fun part of it.

The Lincoln thing in USC, you want to talk about like not like who's more disappointed post that USC or what has to be more so than Oklahoma. I would say Colin Coward. Yeah. Coward probably most disappointed. Yeah. Yeah. I love, look, I was on the phone with him right before we started this just bullshitting for a half

an hour. So you know, that's my guy. But when he got into the Lincoln going to the West coast, I texted him was like, did you just do a monologue based on the reasons why you moved to Manhattan beach and then just applied them to Lincoln riot? His, his video when USC was up against Michigan at halftime, no Penn State. Oh, it was up against Penn State Yeah, that's right. Yeah the the that video that was Credit to him. He was like it was like I left it up. It was like a 90s like

Adam Sandler villain Video like a like I like I got chills watching it. He was shooter McGavin somehow Did that it was something else but yeah USC it's it's that's a weird situation. All right next question. Are you ready? Are you ready to apologize about Jared Goff? Yeah, okay, great, but I wasn't wrong early on Okay, great. I wasn't wrong early on. And then I, I almost felt like I had to say something to him because, uh, well, Jesus Christ, Teddy Purcell gets a shout out. I think every time I'm on any podcast now. So Teddy's friends

with golf, uh, and I was with a buddy that played for the Kings. So we all got together and had a couple of beers together. And it was funny because like my buddy was the hockey guy. So he and Teddy were just like, you know, it's like they'd known each other years, right? And then Goff is asking me about the Warriors because he's like the biggest NBA guy. And I just kept being like, do I bring up the big cat thing with him

just to start like with a clean slate with Goff? Cause like we live in the same town or probably we were running into him a little bit. But I can't imagine after getting to know him for an hour that he would have ever cared. No, no, he wouldn't. And that was another one where I probably lucked into. You got weird about it with me at one point.

I mean, he's a friend. You got weird about it. You were nasty. Now, because you said something to me once, you were like, take it easy, he's a friend. I'm like, boy, he came in the pot a few fucking times. He's a friend. He's a friend. I think you're a little loose with friendship. No, no.

Jared Goff, he he he was he he wanted me to go when he got drafted. He got drafted here in Chicago and he he asked me to come to his party. And I was like, I don't know, dude, I'm like 33 or 32. I was like, I don't think this is for me. He's been a fan and a friend for a very long time. We stayed at his house. Okay, you actually are tighter with him than I realized. Yeah, he's my guy.

But yeah, that- Yeah, but you got weird about it. And then I was kind of like, I'm wrong when they traded him. I'm wrong. And then he's so good now. I'll admit that I am very loyal to my guys. I think Goff is so good now that when he has a bad game,

when I talk about it on the podcast, I'll be like, well, that's not happening again. Like it takes a long time for me to just get all the scars out of my head of like the times where I, and now like he'd had like two 40 QBR games in a row and they were still winning. And I was like, the great news is that's not gonna happen again.

Yeah. He's been awesome. He's got me. He great news is that's not going to happen again. Yeah. Um, he's, he's been, he's got me, he's got me and he got the extension. He deserves it. So that's, that's a win for big cat. Okay. Um, sounds like we have more a win for you. Win for you. I know you're a big, uh, stock guy. You trade, you, you're on the, you're on the market. You're on the street like Nancy Pelosi. Uh, have you ever, have you ever dumped a stock at a better time than the bears?

No, I couldn't. And like my picks, my picks have never been worse right now. Like the joke is that I'm usually always around 500. So like when people give you a hard time, you're like, oh, cool. So like you're fading me and you're also losing just as much as, you know, you give out picks. It's just, it's, it's a tough crowd. It's a tough crowd. My picks have never been worse. And I had this whole premise this year of like, what's my gut tell me. And that'll be the couch qualifier. Let's fade the public money.

That'll be the other qualifier. And then I'll get one pick in from guys that work in Vegas. Then I'm like, Hey, just give me the pick. That seems to kind of the momentum of the, of the smart people. I don't want to call it sharp money because that just leads to all this other idea that like, I think I'm super plugged in and I know that I'm not. I was like, let's have some fun with trying to attack this from three different ways.

The public money has been a fucking disaster. Okay. Uh, the sharp one's the only one that's even close to 500 and it's below 500. And then I had lost like five in a row from the couch and the last one was the Bears minus two and a half. So compounded with everything else. I am willing to renew it though. I'm not gonna auto non-renew my subscription

to the Bears random. I only made it seven games. But depending on who the new head coach, Cliff Kingsbury. No, Ben Johnson, but they won't hire Ben Johnson. They'll never hire anyone who's good because they don't want anyone who is who is bigger than the franchise since Dicca. That's just a fact. I think Kingsbury would be the answer. Okay. I have one last question. And I think we might need to get...

Speaking of stocks, you're checking this after hours stuff right now? What's going on? Whoa. What's going on in the stock market? Check out some of these tech after hours numbers. I don't. I'm so financially illiterate. Uh, I don't even know. I think I have stocks. I know I have stocks. I don't know what stocks I have. I think I got you into a couple. So you might know for, I know two that you have. Um, all right. The last question is going to be, uh, we might need someone to join us here. Um, Saruti, I had a question. Oh, okay. He made you guys share one core's light.

Cause I feel like I wish Kyle was here because I, I feel like I was the start of this a year ago when I basically submarine the podcast. Yeah, there was a lot of tension. They were. I apologize to all the Rossello heads out there. That was not my intention. I was just, I, I had no, I had no Kyle. I'd met him a couple of times when we were in

LA. So I thought that it was okay to air that DM mistake by me. But listen, things happened after that. And then we get to the point where you guys get the invite over and you watch Ryan take notes on NBA and you share a course like did you have a straw? Was it was it two straws for the one courseors Light? What happened? There was no straw. Um, it was, we each got one, one Coors Light, just one. Uh, I don't even know what the fridge situation was like. I kind of try to follow you in there and get like, get the scene, but you kind of blocked me off. So I didn't even know.

But there's a beer, there's a beer drawer. Yeah. It's, it's stocked cause we came over to Rossello Oh, yeah. No, no, no. He came over. He ordered us two dinners. He was pissed because one of the dinners they didn't show my order. He like he like, you know, called up and he got my he got everything fixed. He was I didn't call. Yeah, I did. Yeah, I know it did. It we we had the vibes going. There was no NBA to take notes on. It was a great night when we went over his house. I didn't even know that. You know what? If you would come over and it

was okay see Denver to start the season. True. But I also I would have had no problem with that because I feel like I could sit next to you and just not talk for hours. I mean it's like the best in show, we could talk or not talk for hours. But that's the thing, it wasn't, we were talking, we were having a good time. It was just, it's just classic Ryan. There was no planning, no nothing. And in his defense, it was a little last minute thing.

But if I, here's the thing though, if I didn't, and by the way, Big Cat, you are, you're developing a bit of a reputation here though for like tanking things. Like Paolo, have him on the pod out for two months. You know, talk about Ryan's pod. Now the rest, now the crew is really on rocks. Yeah.

A lot of our listeners were super mad at Big Cat. They were super mad at me and I understand, but I also, I thought it was funny. And you guys got an invite to Ryan's house out of it. So kind of job, you know, mission accomplished George Bush. Uh, Paulo, by the way, that, that one, I've been a Powell guy from day one. Everyone knows that Ryan kind of stole them from us. Um, so no, but I, that Palo I'll hand up. I have that one's on me. I'll take that one. So Rudy, that's fair. Yeah. Do you realize that the

day the Palolo interview aired, I went to the Clippers game that night to watch my guys scoot and I checked in at the media place to get my credential and the girl behind the counter was like, I'm a huge fan of the pod. And I was like, oh yeah. And she's like, I'm a magic fan. And then she's like, Paolo kind of cooked you though

on your pod. And I was like, awesome. It's the way we talk about that. Yeah. For the listeners, I want to say this right now. Ryan's the best guy because I listen, I, I, Ryan, I consider a very good friend. I called him after and I told him, I was like, we're going to cut this part because it was kind of like, you know, you tell us, tell, tell, tell everybody what happened in the interview for you. So we, we, so we obviously we, Paulo comes in great guy. We were like, I obviously know you're the biggest Paulo guy. You've been a Paulo guy from day one. So we obviously started doing a bit where we're like, you know, we're like Paulo, we're the biggest

guys like in your corner. Like we're going to, we're going to defend you everywhere. Like there is right off of the coach. Oh, LSU stuff that we had out this summer. Go ahead. Right. Right. Just show Max Holma. Just showing, just showing. Yeah. Little sprinkle of Max. Uh, and, and we're like, you, well, there's one other guy, Paulo, uh, Ryan Roussel. He's a good friend of ours. He, he defends you too. And Paulo was just like, Ooh, we're like, no, no, he went, you went on his show and he looked to his guys who were standing off camera. He's like, I went on, I went on his show and they're like, yeah, you went on Ryan Roussela

show. So this happens. I feel awful because like, obviously we were joking about being Paulo guys, but like that kind of sucks because you do a zoom interview. You don't expect someone to remember you, but I didn't want to set Ryan up for that moment. I called Ryan right after and I was like, Hey, Paulo kind of cooked you. We're going to cut that. And Ryan was like, no, fucking keep it in. That's hilarious. So that, that was, that was a cool move by, by Rossello because I was, I was like, this kind of sucks.

I would, I would kind of hate that if that happened to me. But Ryan was like, no, fuck it. That's funny. So he called me probably soon after that. And to be like, Hey, I have a funny story for you about Apollo. And he told me the story and I was like, I actually am like, I would be shocked if Apollo knew who you were.

I don't think that's that crazy. I don't think it's crazy at all. Exactly, that's the other thing. It was, you know, it's a young kid, it's over a Zoom. And like, we had a good time, I thought. I thought we enjoyed each other, but there's never any way that I would have expected it to be like, oh yeah, double R. Okay. The only reason I thought, well, first of all, I'm going to give you more

credit. You're, you're a big deal and a lot of people listen to the show. So it's like, I thought it was because Palo is into podcasting. Like he does podcasts. I think he does old man in the three with those guys, uh, every now and then. So I thought like, he's kind of aware and you are the number one Palo guy. So I would assume if a guy like someone in the media is just ride or die, you're tweeting about Palo every fucking night. So I made an assumption. Maybe I just, I love Ryan more than Palo clearly.

That was my bet. I think you'd have more, I think he would recognize you more and know you more if you were like, hey man, you know, playoff turnovers, inefficiency, not sure the jump shot. If you were like a follow-hater, that's how it works. That's how it works. Guys don't remember dudes that like them. They remember guys that don't like them. Because he did remember my tweets about Duke in Coach K's last year. So you're right on that. And I'll say this right now. That was so funny. I'm not stupid.

That was so funny. He was like, oh, Barstool big cat, we just lost. Here we go. The way he said it, like he wasn't 100% sure what it was while he was a kid at Duke. Just riding him. But I'm not stupid. If I walked into Palo right now on the street,

there's no way he'd know who I was. So I just thought because Ryan is number one Palo guy, and then he got hurt, so that's my fault. Wow, look, next time you and Goff get together, you can invite Palo over. That's true, that's true. So wait, back to the one core's light real quick. Are we gonna get a big day?

Each guy got one core's light. Each guy got one, individually. Everyone got one. Yeah, it's a school night, we all had to work. Saruti had to be up at 4.30 in the morning. Kyle got two sets of tailor-mades out of the thing and two bench-made knives. So, Keith was thrilled.

You were doing the cheater gift package. I was also offered a knife, by the way. I wasn't checking a bag. I was just handing out knives to everybody. No one else could take the knives. And then he tried, he forgot that I respect smokers. I respect smokers. Like I respect smokers defiance so much that I almost,

when I see a smoker now as a non smoker, I'm like fucking right. Yeah. Point at him or something. Like when the guys at ESPN were still outside and those rain tarps smoking, next to a dumpster. Where it would have been normal.

And I'm like, man, this guy's still just out there doing it. And I'd be like, just, I'd give them like a point, even though, and then they'd like hand me like, hold up the cigarette pack, like, do you want one? Like, no, no, it's fucking gross, but you guys are awesome. And so Kyle pretended he was like, oh, okay, well now I need a cigarette. When he immediately wanted one,

as soon as he walked in the house, cause he just got done with the drive and the convertible with these two guys. They was like, I think I'm gonna have a smoke. I'm like, fucking right, you're gonna have a smoke. Where do I do it? I was like, right out front, right in the street, right in front of my house. I want people. They was like, I think I'm gonna have a smoke. I'm like, you're fucking right. You're gonna have a smoke. Where do I do it? I was like, right out front, right in the street, right in front of my house.

I want people walking by being like, Hey, it's a big smoker over at that Quiet Guys place. So, um, I think the trip actually was a success, a success based on the parameters that we had. And they were all doing work stuff. So I'll give myself one more defense part. If they had shown up earlier, I was planning on getting this

like an early dinner reservation and then nuggets thunder later on. That makes sense. I just love that we had the conclusion of the story. Titus actually was the one, he came in one day, he's like, dude, did you hear about this one course light? It's in Priscilla's house. That's insane.

Here's one guys and we'll all take a sip let's go fast so it doesn't get warm I'm happy we got it we got it goes I never get warm though we got to get the whole PMT and and Rossella universe together sometime for at Ryan's house maybe we just won't even have Ryan there and just have a good time it might be more fun or maybe I'll just stay upstairs and watch a game and then I'll text how's it watch a game, and then I'll text, how's it going down there? He's on center duty.

I'll do like a van help. Yeah, yeah. All right, well, I'm happy that we got a conclusion, and Kyle was able to come over finally, because it did feel like a years long story arc that was about this time last year that it started. He was kind of bummed out about that for a while. That wasn't a joke.

Yeah, that's the part I missed. I, I misjudged that part. But then I think, I don't know. He got golf clubs, Kyle, Kyle's a, he's a valuable guy. He's all right. Yeah. He hit me up the other day to be like, these clubs are amazing. Like I'm so happy.

And I went, yeah, that's the whole point. Like I wanted you to be happy about it, but look, it's very simple. If I lived near him and had the ability to just throw a couple down on a Tuesday afternoon, we'd hang out more. Yeah. I live like an hour and a half away. It doesn't go to the frog room. I'm going to defend you.

I mean, I live close to all my guys and I don't hang out. Like, I mean, I have just shit going on. They don't even, I got invited to the Halloween party this past weekend that one of the guys one of the younger guys was throwing and I just wrote back I was like dude like legitimately thank you so much for inviting me there's 0% chance I'm going but I actually like really appreciate you just thinking of me because I don't get invited to shit I went out grab drinks and I forgot people were dressed up. You are a known holiday forgetter. Yeah. I was like, fuck.

I think I called Saruti like on Christmas once. He called me on Valentine's day. I was out there with my girlfriend. Well, how many times have I called you on Valentine's day? The famous story is you call me once and then you call me again and my phone's on the table. By the way, phone up. Cause I'm, you know, Valentine's Day. Four times? The famous story is you called me once, and then you called me again, and my phone's on the table. By the way, phone up, because I'm, you know, what's up? And my wife's like, all right, Ryan's called twice. You can answer it.

And it was Valentine's Day. You're like, oh, that's why it was so packed in West Harper. I didn't know. Totally. Right, but now this is what happens. We start telling these stories, and then you start getting more emails being like, hey, man, I'm autistic as well. No, well. I'm going to defend Ryan to forever. And whenever

anyone asks me, he is a, a, a very, very fun hang. And, uh, he just like, you get older, you don't, you don't go out as much, you know? But when Ryan, like, thank God, every time we hang out, I have the best time so that the people who think like oh Ryan Can't like hang out. It's like dude. He's one of the best guys standing out I'm I'm laying the the groundwork now for our New Orleans escape That's gonna be I'm trying to figure it out for us now because I was like Saruti the other day was like you're probably Not even going this year. Are you and I was like actually New Orleans I will be going yeah so yeah a couple LSU alma mater's you know alums going back well get us go get his hats water bottle at the airport

yeah you have anything coming up you what what days do you guys do in the shows now you're doing it Fridays Fridays and yeah Fridays every now and then big election we did we did This comes out on Wednesday afternoon. We did do, we elected a, pardon my take, president on tomorrow's, on Wednesday's show. And then in the title of the episode, we wrote, we elect a president just to try to piss people off.

So people are gonna see that and just be like, what the fuck? They're talking politics. I was so tempted just to do one show tweet where I was gonna say, is Harris a system president? And then just like, never talk about it. I wasn't gonna do it, I don't have a topic. But just quarterbacks or NBA guys, just to do it.

But people, this was not a fun year for that kind of stuff. No. So maybe in 28, we can do tweets like that again, but I don't know. If Trump wins, you guys will, you and Bill will do a 1980s read draftables on Friday. It was pre-recorded. Or no games. Ah, all right. Hey, this was, was, this was everything I hoped it would be. Yes, I loved it.

You want details? Fine. I drive a Ferrari, 355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you can possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid. So now you know what's possible.

Let me tell you what's required. Life advice. Life advice, rr at gmail.com. We've got Kyle. We've got Steve. Is there any way we just get a video and audio peek into what Wargon is doing right now? Because when he opened up the Riverside this morning, I mean, I couldn't,

I kind of wish this were just kind of a screen grab. No, can we actually get the audio feed just for a second? I know it's not gonna be great for the listeners, but dial it up. What's going on, Wargon? What's going on, man? How's it going? Where are you?

I'm at the beach, dude. Did a little getaway, a little escape for the end of the week here. Okay. Got construction in the background. Yeah, man, they're like putting up the house. I got this thing going on, baby behind me. Well, okay, thanks, buddy.

He's checking in with some shades. No days off. The angle of the roof and where he was, apparently he's just trying to get away for a little bit. The guy could have just taken the day off. Right. So people are aware that. Nah, yeah. No days off.

No? Well, we've been through this. Like he's a more of a half day, get a beverage in guy than he is take the full day off. And he checked back in, he checked back in. I thought he was roofing. When the whole screen opened up this morning.

I was like, is this guy tapping down some tall lighting what's going on? Yeah. So anyway, he's still at it this and it'll be good to go here shortly. My, my God. All right. Let's see here.

We have a couple, we may just save it for Friday feedback. Cause we had a few that kind of like. Waited, but you know what? In case somebody doesn't watch it on YouTube, you want to leave the audio audience out, so, um, somebody's checking in here real quick on trivia. The trivia snipe caused some real concern, approval rating down for me. It's been down now for a few weeks. Ryan's attempt to dunk on Cerruti for the dorky trivia night is the worst

post wannabe jock syndrome I've ever heard in a minute. Oh, I've heard in a minute. So not ever heard. So not all-timer, just he's heard last minute or so. I bet if Ryan's core guys got one organized and Ryan was actually invited plus 250 underdog, he'd glom on like everything else in his life. Order some food next time you ignorant jackass. Wow.

Glom on. There might be some truth to that. I don't know that I've ever been accused of that. If I, can I be, be made fun of for never doing anything and then also be accused of glomming on. I don't know. I mean, you didn't hear this Kyle, because we taped this last night, but I will say the big cat and this is airing right after the big cat interview.

So I guess it flows nicely. It did dawn on me and it hurt a little bit because he's probably right. You know, big big cat PFT come over, you know, Titus, whoever, you know, a group of dudes. There's probably some sort of spread at Ryan's house. There's probably something. You probably know this isn't even about trivia anymore. No, I just, you know, it just, it's, I'm still processing the whole thing and that, that definitely hurt a little bit. I'm going to be honest because it was definitely true. I'm telling you right now if it's the beginning of the season it was Nuggets Thunder.

Yeah. I don't know how many people, you know, maybe I'll just do that in the next pod. I'd be like didn't watch last night, went to a movie, don't have it open. Coming up next, we've got shield Kapadia. I might just do it. Be easier on me. Wow. So this isn't even really about trivia anymore. No, it just made me think, can I share a fun fact then? This was years ago. You know those like life episodes you guys do when they come out to LA or whatever?

This was, I mean, this must have been four years ago. I don't exactly know when, but Tate and I went over, because Mark Titus was going over there, and we were like, we just basically sat outside while you guys did what seemed like a three hour podcast. I think we left before it was over. There was like four beers outside. It was cold. And yeah, that was like my first experience with those guys. So yeah,

I definitely felt like an outsider there too. I'll just say that. I mean, I wasn't, what was I supposed to do? Get me a mic or whatever. It was just funny that we went over there because Tideus was like, come with us, let's go. And then we like sat out on this cold patio. And I think I went in one time because we were out of beers, but that was like it I think we just we just kind of left and I don't know how it turned out But that was just an experience. I had wanted to share Well, I'll try to warm up the patio for you next time. Thank you Progress. Yes, or do you want to add anything to this? It just because he was saying that like if you if your buddies

Asked about trivia like would you you'd be excited to do trivia? I think there might be some truth to that I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's trivia is a group. You don't want to piss off They're just like I don't know if you'd say they're rabid fan bases apparently. Yeah, they're into it It's just one of those groups like like I don't know like if that Quinn was like hey, let's do trivia We used to tell me you wouldn't do trivia Probably not. I understand liking trivia. Okay.

I, but I also think like I'd have way too much pressure on me because it'd be like, don't you read all these books? I'd be like, yeah, do you think I retain all of it? You know, multiple choice, Napoleon exile. Like, I think I have it. I think I put it what I have it just without any multiple choice. Yeah, with trivia, I don't know if it's more important to get all of them or to get the

one that no one else knows that I feel like that's the better feeling when like, you know, you've been never been invited. Okay. I know I get a lot of texts from people that are cheating. So like, Hey, I'm a trivia right now. Like who was Mike Botecher traded for? Who was the fifth president of the United States? Let's see here. All right. So that was, that was a little feedback there. Um, I like this

email a lot. Let's do it. All right. Allow me to begin by saying how much I appreciate Rosillo is the least grading Boston sports personality. Please continue to call bill out on his shit. Smiley face. Okay. My name is, uh, Harry. I'm 18 years old from Toronto, Canada. So he just wants us to all know who he is.

I just graduated high school currently in the early days of a gap year. Kyle, you take a gap year for your parents on board with the gap year. No, there was no chance there. That train had to stay on the tracks and then it came off anyway, but it didn't start. Yeah. I guess I made a gap year half. I guess.

Yeah. More of a half time. Same thing. More of a half time. Like you don't want me to go to abroad. All right. Well, I'll stay at home and do nothing. All right.

As I write this, I am- Modell's is nothing. Sporting good department, managed it. Come on. No, I was talking about myself there. I'm not talking about your Modell still regrets their decision with you. Yeah. Look at, um, as I write this, I'm busy discovering myself in Cape town.

Um, this is this guy. Yeah. Unbelievable. Born you think. Um, but all that really means is legal alcohol consumption, a steady diet of high sodium instant noodles. Hopefully by the time next year, I'll have one of those healthy habits under control and maybe even a selected major program.

I know wishful thinking. All right. Well, thanks for letting us know more about you. Now for the meat and potatoes. Over the last few days, I've been tossing and turning not over my current stationary life, but over freaking Vince Carter of all people. Recently, the Toronto Raptors, whom I cherish dearly, decided to retire Carter's number 15, making him the first player in franchise history to get his jersey retired. Carter's legacy in Toronto is complicated. My father and many older

Raps fans are disappointed to say the least. My dad vividly remembers Carter quitting on the team. He frequently references Bill Simmons' shared disgust with Carter's antics. Carter played like crap, yapped the media, tanked his trade value, dragged his mom into the drama, and set the team back years. But younger fans like myself have no memory of this. Interestingly, a generational divide has pitted

the old and young Raptors fans against one another. Carter has actively rehabilitated his image as a media personality, and through his documentary, the Cartay effect, wait, is that, did he miss he misspell that I don't know I didn't see it unless that's Canadian like French Canadian probably not though yeah but that wouldn't really apply there I was just saying so although more French and British Columbia than I expected anyway uh I just don't like watching the player produce documentaries to me. I watch almost zero of them.

They did the documentary to court the younger fans with the nostalgia for vintage basketball. Young people hear Vince Carter and picture his vicious dunk package in Twitter highlights, oblivious to the ugly divorce that made Carter persona non grata in the six. What bugs me, good writer, this guy. Keep grinding, buddy. What bugs me is that Carter's jersey retirement is being marketed as the highlight of the Raptors season. Throwback jersey's new murals downtown, a never ending

social media tribute, and even a freaking Air Canada jet with Carter's silhouette and number 15 slap on the side. Carter is being treated like the savior of Canadian basketball and a hero of the organization. Watching his retirement ceremony made me cringe with Canadian shame. We're so desperate for attention that we'll honor the guy who wanted nothing to do with us.

I can't wait for the follow-ups to this email. I get that I'm being far too emotional about the retirement of another man's jersey. I'm hung up on events I didn't even live through, but transparency matters. There are two sides in every story, but what Vince did was shameful. It's embarrassing the whole city and organization as hell

bent on acting like it didn't happen or worse that we're the ones that need to grow up and forgive Vince. Vince has yet to apologize for what he did until he does. I don't think his Jersey has any right to hang in the Raptors. It's a shame that Carter is the one who received the glitz and glory of the first Raptor Jersey retired. The honor should be reserved for players who actually like playing here, or the very least played like they gave a shit.

Am I irrational or my concern, my concern is valid. This is, I, man, 18 education. should be reserved for players who actually like playing here or the very least played like they gave a shit. Am I irrational or my concern, my concerns valid? This is, I man 18 educational system has, has done you well. My friend. Um, I agree with everything you said. I can, I've never agreed with an 18 year old more on anything. I don't think, I hope not. Um, but yeah, I look, I think that season, everybody knew it was going to be really bad. I don't know what the timeline of the events for this to be in the mix.

We could all talk about like forgive and forget, but it was like really, really ugly. And we could make it a Toronto thing, but it's, it's not a Toronto thing. Um, you know, you can make some sort of Canadian where like, Oh, everybody's just nicer and all this different stuff that ended up in my experience. But, um, I would say that when teams are down, there's like a classic, let's retire a Jersey move. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

You know, right. Oh, so Saruti is well aware of this. So go ahead. Well, I'm, I'm two things. One, I am in a similar situation with Dwight Howard. I, I cannot forgive him. I don't like him, to be honest with you. Like I don't, Kevin Clark and I have talked about this

because I think Kev like kind of looks more fondly back at those times. Not that I don't look fondly on them, I guess, but it's just complicated because I just, I really don't like how it ended with Dwight. He was a huge asshole. He screwed himself and the team. It was just this disastrous situation. And then we had

to lose Stan Van Gundy, who I liked as a coach at the time, because of all of that. It was a 12-year reset. There's a lot of weirdness and pain that kind of goes into that. It's a bit like, oh yeah, just retire his jersey. You remember how awesome it was with Dwight? I'm like, wait, I'm just supposed to forget how much of a dick he was at the end and how much he just trashed the franchise and left us for dead for over a decade. So I'm kind of with you. I don't know that I will forgive Dwight. I certainly haven't yet. I magic fans may disagree with me, but I'm kind of with our guy on this one. The issue though that you have here is, and I can say this because the magic are not like a prestigious franchise, but like when you get to those like mid to

lower tier, at least franchiseises without a lot of history, the bar is just so much lower for those teams to want to retire people. It looks good. They want to put up somebody's name. You're right, Brian, if they're having a bad season, put the number up there. You get people in the stands,

sell some extra jerseys. That does work. So unfortunately, that's like kind of part of the business. I feel like when you're like anywhere from like 15 to 30 franchise wise, prestige wise, but I definitely agree with business. I feel like when you're like anywhere from like 15 to 30 franchise wise, prestige wise, but I definitely agree with you. Cause I don't know that I'll ever build. I'll ever forgive Dwight Howard.

Kyle. Yeah, I don't have much to add, but, um, I think it's cool for the, that side of the argument that they got a young guy who maybe is only used to, you know, trying to get, uh, Vince Carter on my two K my team or, or the, or like you said, the package highlights. Um, I think it's cool for that side that they got to do like you that's articulate and can really wow some people your own age. So maybe you can gain some ground there.

Yeah. Maybe there's a lesson of like, it's better to just recognize the greatness and forgive and move on. It was really nasty. All right. I mean, you know, me as an all first team grudge holder, like if I were involved with a team and I had been around there for that, I'd be like, I don't, I'm not in favor of that.

But I think to have a special night and to feel like you have this thing, it was nasty, dude, I mean, it was nasty when he left, but also the positive side of it. Like when he burst on the scene, it was the most fun thing to watch in basketball for years, it was so much fun. Like the beginning of the Curry part reminds me of that a little bit and just pushing the boundaries of like what somebody could do in games. I mean, that was it, the dunk contest, we were like excited about it and he delivered. Like when's the last time you went into a contest being like, I can't wait for this. I remember where I was, I think either I was bartending or is it that place that I worked and

it was on and like, can you imagine an entire bar of adults being excited and wanting the dunk contest audio up? Right. That's what he did. So yeah, I can see the it's been years. Let's appreciate this instead of being negative about it. Like I understand all of those parts of it, but I could also like go, yeah, the

guy that didn't want to play here didn't want to be in Canada. And we got the worst package back for this guy. And he was more, he was more excited to be now granted, maybe it's a New York thing with him, but like that was newer still. Okay. The key would rather be in Newark than Toronto. That's out. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, can I just throw this nugget in there? I believe Kyle Lowry has a statue. Is that true? I think he has a statue. And also, like Kawhi, would you rather retire Kawhi's number or Vince Carter's number? If you're a Raptors fan. Cause at least Kawhi was like, he, one, you know, he gets in there half a season, wins you a title, but he's honest about it. I was like, I don't want to be here. I'm going to leave. I actually respect the hell out of that. So there is a Kyle Lowry statue. I think there is, I remember saying that.

It's downtown. Oh wait, I don't, I'm, I'm blue. Yeah. Kyle Lowry statue spotted down. So what did they just move it around a bunch and I don't know. It's like a where's Waldo statue. That's kind of sick. Like I have more Raptors thoughts, obviously, but like this DeRozan we would have won had we not traded me there.

Like I liked the Rose a lot. That's not true. Nope. Do you think anybody was ever remotely fucking scared of you guys when both he and Lowry in the playoffs have all those stretches with the Raptors like this? Nope. Do you think anybody was ever remotely fucking scared of you guys when both he and Lowry in the playoffs have all those stretches with the Raptors like this again? Like this isn't even close.

Don't talk to me about the six game series with the Gavs. Just, it wasn't a real thing. So there's some odd historical stuff, but then when you make it out to be like it's only Toronto that does that, that's not fair either. Cause we could just run through the exams and be like, why would they say this about this team years later? Cause that's not true either. But then I don't know the whole, the Rosen Drake thing got turned up again the last couple of days. Like Drake just stands up and stares at an NBA athlete.

Is that what that was? I don't know. You know what? I'm sick of talking about the Raptors. I mean, the Thunder retired Nick Collison's jersey. I love Nick Collison, but. Like, there are levels to this. Yeah, that one's worse than Vince Carter. That's it. I love Nick. I love Nick Collison. That's insane. Yeah. Is there some other part of that? You like rescue a small sawmill from burning that we don't.

I'm just opening the idea there. There may have been something else. I don't know. Maybe I hope so. It seems like a great guy, but I don't know. All right. Feel like Kyle felt left out on that one. So let's go back into a Kyle zone.

Do three days a week. All right. Big fan of the pod 34 and married toddler son, six, three, one, 85 pickup comp, 47 year old managed in Obly with less bounce. Mano had crazy bounce. Need some advice here. On Saturday night, my wife went out for a girls night with a few of her friends. She hasn't gone out much since our 18 month year old son was born. So I stayed home. I was happy to give her a break around- 18 month year old. 18 month year old. Yeah. Yeah. Well, good pickup.

He's super immature. Um, around eight 30 that night, one of my friends, Tom name change showed up at the house. He's not a close friend, but we know each other. His wife is good friends with mine. And she is one of the girls my wife was out with. I thought it was weird for him to show up, but he said he was bored and decided to pop by to see how things are going. Since our wives were out that night. We had a quick beer, watch them rockets warriors.

Then he left. Sounds like a night at my place. Uh, around midnight, it's never going to end. I'm going to have to throw like an all time bender with like a fog machine and hostess and waitresses and I don't know. See who I invite. Um, when he, you know, yeah, some chips.

I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. Titus was suggesting, as we covered in this, but Kyle didn't hear the interview because he's not going to go back and listen.

I don't blame him. Titus suggested I gave you one beer to share. Yeah, that's, all right. Well, that's not, there's no way. That's the content machine that is Mark to share. Yeah, that's true. All right, well, that's not. There's no way. That's the content machine that is Mark Titus. Yeah. Does he believe it or was he trying to add to that? No, no way.

Hey, Wargon, you've been sipping on that one a little long. Pass it around. Man, you know who's a terrible guy in a core's light rotation? Wargon. All right. So after around midnight, I get another knock on the door. It's Tom again. He said he left his phone and needed to grab it.

Sure enough, his phone was wedged into the couch cushion. When he showed up a second time, Tom was pretty drunk, but since he didn't drive and lives two blocks away, I didn't think much of it and let him walk home. The next morning, my wife and I were just discussing our evenings. She says, I hear Tom was over late last night. And I said, all I said back was, yeah, we had a beer and watched the Warriors game. Turns out Tom's wife

had been checking, find my phone and saw Tom was at my place until close to midnight. Now I'm thinking Tom dropped by so we can intentionally leave his phone here and use me as an alibi. As my wife is recounting her evening, she tells me that Tom's wife has some trust issues because she's caught him with dating apps on his phone. That's why she was checking his location constantly. Oh, so she was checking his location all that night. I never lied to my wife,

but clearly I've admitted some important info. Should I tell her, I'm not that close with Tom, if he was a core crew guy, I'd probably talk to him first, but in this case, I feel my loyalty is more to my wife or friend. Should I tell her I'm not that close to Tom? If he was a core crew guy, I'd probably talk to him first, but in this case, I feel my loyalty is more to my wife or friend. Should I wait and see what happens? I'm supposed to go to a dinner party on Friday where Tom and his wife will be there. I'm having a lot of anxiety about what's going to happen. I'm worried I'm going to be put in a spot where I either have to lie and corroborate the alibi or out Tom in public.

What does the gang think I should do? Wow. Tom is clearly in the middle of running some sort of scheme here and he's gonna get caught one way or another, that's the way I look at it. This is, I mean if you don't want that on your conscience, I can't say for sure, I would just be like, you know what, there was some fishy going on. I don't know if you wanna call it bro code

or whatever it is, it's just mind your own business sort of deal, but I think Tom is already been caught and he clearly thinks this is some bulletproof plan when like it's not a bad plan. It's not, no, it's actually the on paper. It's a little bit genius, but you know, teams don't run Statue of Liberty all the time because you know, a lot of stuff can go wrong.

So I think that he's, I think you could stay out of this. Tom's going to get what he deserves. And it just doesn't sound like he's, you know, Ocean's 11 over here. This isn't going to have a happy ending. So I don't know. I would probably just go to sleep at night. Well, no, I'm not in my own business. Now, see, you don't know what Tom's shit and he used you. So, and if your wife asks you, hey, was Tom over for five hours last night? And you just say the truth, that is,

no, he came by, he lost his money. Well, yeah, there you go. You're not telling on the guy. I don't know, you don't owe Tom shit. I'm not lying for Tom. I'm not admitting anything for Tom. I wasn't suggesting lying for him, yeah. No, I know what you're saying,

but like, honestly, fuck that guy. Like, you got used here. I would not, you don't owe him anything I'd say beyond not owing Tom shit. I think the most important thing is you don't know anything. You don't know shit You don't know So you don't have to do anything. You shouldn't have anxiety about it You should say exactly what happened and leave it up to the tribunal. Well probably the dinner that he's most worried about because she might just be

like, so what'd you guys do the other night? Not your wife but like when you go to dinner with this couple, Tom's wife like might use that as an opportunity to just like you might not want to be grilled you know while you guys are at Applebee's or whatever. Like I get I get get not wanting to do that, but no, no, but the loyalties of the wife part is a hundred percent here. And it's not even about like bro code. And by the way, if you're in the friend core group here, which is not the case here, like you shouldn't be putting your buddies in that kind of situation.

Like I remember. Like I remember there was, let's say a situation where a friend of mine, I had a nice place and he was like, Hey, is there any way I could like, if when you're out of town, like stay at your place? And I was like, yeah, I don't give a shit. Like go ahead. And I thought he meant, because it was nice and like, wanted to bring his wife. He'd left out the part where that was not the case. So then when I realized, I was like, oh, wait.

And then he was kind of like, well, is that a problem? He's like, I'm not really like involved in your stuff, but I'm dating somebody. Right, like I'm dating somebody. And if I have to explain that I'm willing to let you do this, then that opens up endless fucking windows and doors of what I'm potentially capable of. This isn't the last time we'll be talking about this,

I can guarantee that. Yeah, so I just was like, I'm not, you're putting me in a tough spot, even if I don't have anything to do with what's going on, because it wasn't like even close to being a core guy. It was just a moment of, yeah, I don't, I don't really know how to, like, I guess I could just let you, but I also, I don't know, like, there's nothing in this, like, it only

opens up potential issues for me. There's no point in this. Like whatever you're mapping out, like how do I benefit from this? Like never, like there's nothing that's ever going to benefit you. And the real problem with it is, I don't want to have to explain me signing off on something like this, right? So what you need to do is let it all play out in front of you.

These are not the same things, by the way, but you need to let it all play out in front of you. And if it comes up at the dinner, where it's like, yeah, we watched the game for a while and you're getting death stares from Tom, I don't know that you have to be like, well, yeah, but Tom left and he left his phone. I think you just, I would just go into it

being ready to be like entertained, endless possibilities. And if it comes back on you, you just gotta tell the truth, man. Will Smith. You guys got dating apps on his phone. He's done this before. This is not gonna be a youth thing. This may be the final thing that breaks the relationship, but clearly there's some shit that's going on

that's bigger than you are. Yeah, the wife that night is double-checking his location multiple times. I mean, look, that's blatantly what he did. You don't know him that well. He lives down the street. He had one beer. Came back a little hammered, right?

Yeah. The Rockets are a blast. So, they're one of my favorite League Pass teams. So I don't blame him for wanting to watch some Rockets basketball. But, yeah, I get why you're stressed out in case that moment comes up where he looks at you, he's like, yeah, I was over his place. You're drinking all night watching hoops. And then he looks at you and as a guy, you're supposed to be like,

yeah, it was awesome. This is kind of like old school. Speaking of your guy, Craig Kilburn, remember Craig Kilburn's character in old school when he's there in the bathroom and he's making out with the chicks? Don't tell, that's what chicks do. That's just like, this is what you're getting yourself into here. The delivery of that line from Kilburn is one of my favorite moments in cinematic history.

You gonna tell? You gonna tell? That's what chicks do. I was so happy. I was so happy for Craig. What would you do, Kyle? What would you do if you're the host here, the dinner is going off,

and then the guy who's not a poor guy. If my wife's good friends guy came over, I think I would initially be mad once I put it together, like, damn, you fucking used me. I was weird that you were here to begin with. I was trying to be nice. Then I find out you used me. I would be pissed.

Again, I think I would mind my own business, but if it comes up when I'm explicitly asked about the timeline, then I'd offer up some, you know, I'd offer up my, you know, what I saw. But other than that, I'm a firm believer in mind in your own business. If it's not something terribly gross, I mean, you have a little bit of the benefit of the doubt

where I think I'd sleep okay, just being like, yeah, you know, Tom's gonna get his, but I'm not the fucking sheriff around these parts. So I don't know. Not even deputized. Right. I just really like to share a fly. I think we got it.

I think we got it. It was a good one. Good luck. Love a follow up on that one. Yeah. After that dinner. After that dinner. We'll cue you right to the top.

Go ahead and star that one. Yeah. Put that one in a new folder. I may just email him next weekend and be like, how are things? Circling back. See Taris in the other night? Anything new with you?

Okay, shout out to Morgan for just the, I don't know if we can get a picture of that up there. Let's try to get his follower count up. I think he's at 700 now. Saruti, Kyle, as always. We have a Friday Feedback Mailbag. I don't know about this one, folks. I'm not sure. We taped it. It's out there on our YouTube page, so please subscribe. We'll be back on Friday. Ryan Russo, podcast, Ryan Russo podcast. Must be 21 and older, present in select states for Kansas, in affiliation with Kansas Star

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