The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Kershaw’s Collapse, Plus ‘The Irishman’ and ‘Joker’ With Adnan Virk | The Ryen Russillo Podcast

Episode Date: October 11, 2019

Russillo discusses missing the LSU-Florida game and Clayton Kershaw’s meltdown (04:45) before jumping on the phone with DAZN’s Adnan Virk to have a (spoiler-free) talk about ‘The Irishman,’ ��Joker,’ and life after ESPN (17:30). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm excited about today's pod we have Adnan Burke from DAZN my buddy back at ESPN in the day and he is as you know a host of a movie podcast so we'll probably hear about that from him a bunch of different times. Did I want to talk Joker? I saw it last night. And also The Irishman, a book that I read, the Jimmy Hoffa story and all that stuff. So I knew he would be on it earlier

than anybody else because he's a huge Pacino guy instead of De Niro. He likes De Niro, but a lot. But he likes Pacino more than De Niro, which I'm going to tell you, I think more people would pick De Niro, but maybe that's Niro, which I'm going to tell you, I think more people would pick De Niro, but maybe that's just me. I'm also going to tell you the names of all the books that you guys keep asking about. Here's a tip. When somebody says the name of the book and the

author in the podcast, you can just hit rewind and find out, but instead inundated, which I appreciate your passion for history. So let's make it a positive instead of me being negative and going, why don't you just rewind the podcast? So before we do that, we want to let you know about Belvedere. Produced in one of the world's longest running distilleries, Belvedere vodka is the world's finest all natural vodka. Part of a 600 year Polish vodka making tradition, Belvedere is made with 100% Polska rye, pure water and no additives.

Before I was a bartender, I was a door guy. And when I was a door guy at age 19, I was really skinny. And not that I'm tough now, but I definitely wasn't then. And I was really insecure about it. So I wore two t-shirts underneath a sweater and checked IDs. And that was the start of my bar career. And there was never, I don't think there was ever one fight in the place. So I was good to go. And there was a bunch of huge guys in the gym that all liked me anyway. So they were like, look, we know if it all goes down, you're not going to be our one seed. So you can just hang in the back and we've got you covered. And there were rarely, rarely any, um, any brawls in those places. Anyway, then later on, I went back to college

and went up to the bar owner and I just said, Hey, why haven't I gotten a gig here? And he was like, well, what are your qualifications? And somebody walked up to the door and I just grabbed the ID from the person. I looked at the person, I looked at the idea, I handed it back to him and waved him in. I said, see, I can do this. And I got a job hired on the spot. So it was a good story. Uh, remember to always drink responsibly, especially when you're working the door. And that was my good friend, Brian Bernadette, the owner of the well-respected Blarney Stone in the early nineties to mid nineties until it got shut down. But it shut down for political reasons, which I can get into on another podcast. There's nothing more political

than a place called the Blarning Stone where, well, you know what? I'm going to leave all this stuff alone. It just lets you know that when the city of Burlington shuts down, it wasn't because of commerce. It wasn't because of safety. It was because if somebody needed to make a statement and we happened to be busy the first Wednesday after there was a supposed riot in Burlington, which wasn't really much of a riot, but it ended up on CNN. And councilmen get freaked out, and then they go, we need to do something, make an example of somebody, and that was us. I feel like now I'm actually doing the shutting of the Blarney Stone story down

circa 19, I think that's 99. I'm going to go, yeah, I think it was 99, definitely. All right, no one cares about this. I want to talk Clayton Kershaw, but before I do that, I'm looking at my bookshelves in front of me right now. The Ulysses S. Grant and Washington books are their biographies by Ron Chernow. Okay. C-H-E-R-N-O-W. The book on Cuba is the corporation TJ English. The Dollar Whale book, which I think we're going to have that author on, is Billion Dollar Whale, Tom Wright. Bad Blood is John Carragoo, which I think I always am really insecure about saying his last name, but Bad Blood, you already know about

Theranos and that disaster of a human being, Elizabeth Holmes. The Bruce Lee book is Matthew Polly. We're trying to get him on, but I haven't heard back from him. So I'd love to get Chernow on, but I'd be a little intimidated. And we're going to have Nathan. Well, no, I shouldn't say that we're going to have Nathan Philbrick on because I don't know. I would think there'd be maybe a Vineyard Nantucket connection where he'd want to come on. Mayflower is his best one, I believe. Bunker Hill is the most recent one where we talked about Joseph Warren, Dr. Joseph Warren, Warren's Tavern. And In the Hurricane's Eye is also Phil Brick. And I'm reading Normandy 44, the new one.

And I think I'm going to pick up the Rockefeller Chernow book. I have it. I'm staring at it right now, but I want to read this Rockefeller one because people have actually said that Chernow's best. So there you go. You don't have to tweet at me or DM anymore. Is today's podcast good? I don't know. LSU, Florida. Yes. I wish I were there. A bunch of people are asking. That's really nice. Feels almost like a brag. Probably was. I'm not going to make it. I have family in town now and I have a, well, it's not really family. It's, well, it is. It's my niece. She's turning one. So you got to be there for the life-changing moments. And honestly, my brother's like, I can't believe you're not going to Baton Rouge instead of my daughter's one-year-old birthday.

I was like, yeah, the more I've thought about it, the more I can't believe I'm not going to Baton Rouge too. So I'm definitely having some FOMO. On paper, I don't think Florida is close to LSU. They're better with Trask than they are Felipe Franks. I actually left that Auburn game still thinking maybe Auburn was better, but Bo Nix just... If Bo Nix is going to beat Alabama,

I know weird things happen in rivalry games, but that doesn't feel right. And then as soon as the number came out on Florida LSU, it told you that Vegas thinks LSU is much better, like a two-touchdown number plus on the open. But it's always a close game. It just is. So we'll see Saturday night. On paper, I feel like LSU is the superior team, but it's always a close game. It just is. We'll see Saturday night. On paper, I feel like

LSU is the superior team, but Florida's edge, rush, and depth at corner. Florida's always going to have some guys on defense, you would think. Again, I like Trask better than Frank, so I think it helps them offensively. They've had different receivers step up. Tight end's pretty good, receivers step up tight ends pretty good uh but you know we'll see we'll see i mean am i gonna be surprised if it's close saturday night ssc game tiger stadium no not at all but just on paper going into it uh you know when i looked at auburn i was like you know i think they're the better team but i don't really know that i trust bo nicks in the swamp there you go um this one i feel like lsu is just the superior football team, but we shall see. Hey, Ry, when are you going to talk a little baseball?

It's the playoffs, you know. Okay, I'm going to do it right now. Let's talk about some things in general because today's Open is about Clayton Kershaw. Now, soccer guy over the years was probably the biggest roadblock from other people enjoying soccer because soccer guy made you feel like shit about anything with soccer, you know? And look, if I watched soccer for a bunch of years, I would figure it all out. I'd be able to figure out who was worth it in the free agency market, even though it's not really free agency and guys are purchased to move around, which is actually really exciting. Like imagine if Kawhi played for the Raptors last year, but halfway, like in January, the Clippers

bought him, and he got to play the rest of the year with the Raptors. That seems impossible, but that's kind of some of the stuff that goes on. And I'm sure if I just spent a couple years watching it, I could get it down and figure it out. I really don't think it would be that hard. But I started to like soccer more and more, and I started to not worry about Soccer Guy. And I think Soccer Guy went from like, hey, you're hanging out listening to my band

that I liked before anybody else did, to, you know what, I'm really psyched that my band's more popular. Now, does it mean I'm going to be doing soccer segments here on the podcast? I've done one, I think, ever, and that was with Taylor Twelman, where we just basically talked about Paris

when it looked like Paris was just loaded with everybody in the World Cup. And it was a lot of of fun because I just love watching that World Cup stuff. I've done a complete 180 from thinking it's cool to not liking soccer. I've been over this before. But baseball guy over the last few years has lapped soccer guy in making you not want to say anything about baseball. I understand that covering baseball means you have to be borderline Stephen Hawking to understand, or at least that's what baseball guy will let you think. But game two Dodgers Nats to me is a prime example. I just, I stayed home. I, that's all I wanted to do was watch that game. I wanted to see that matchup with Strasburg against Kershaw.

I, in the beginning of the Kershaw playoff thing, was one of the few people going, this is totally overblown. And yeah, if you go back to those early things, 2008, two relief appearances, gave up a run. And then in 2009, he had three starts, or excuse me, two starts where two runs, five runs. And then he pitched in the fifth and sixth inning, looks like here, actually six days later against Philadelphia, and he gave up a couple runs. Then he had a really good stretch in 2013. He hadn't been in the postseason there for four years, and then he has this really good stretch, and all of a sudden he gets shelled in a blowout game five loss to the Cardinals.

When you look at Kershaw's overall playoff numbers, you can make an argument. You're like, you know what? They're not terrible, right? They're not terrible. Innings pitch 158, hits 130. So maybe that's a better number than the 443 ERA. And this guy was absolutely unhittable. Some of the strikeout walk numbers are just so stupid. And I know that that's not who Kershaw is right now, but who Kershaw was in game two was somebody who ends up with a quality start, who was giving up warning track outs and line drives left and right. So even though he retired a bunch of people in a row, I don't look at the number. I don't look at the box score there. I look at the three plus hours I sat in front of a television and go, man, he doesn't have it tonight. Whether it's velocity, whether it's

whatever's going on with him mentally, which has to be a factor now with Kershaw, where it's just immediately you feel like you're out of the game because Strasburg's on the other side dealing, right? And I argue with some of you guys about this. Now, look how many he's shut down in a row. Look at all these different things. And then, of course, what happens is we start to use this word narrative as if the definition of narrative is something that is being said about somebody that is untrue. So I'm going to slap the narrative label on it. When a lot of times when I hear

people say narrative, they're the people arguing against what's actually happening. And that's the truth. So if you look at all of the baseball numbers from Kershaw, you could talk yourself into this not being as bad as it seems, but then he comes out in game five, he gets that out in the seventh, he comes back out for the eighth. I don't care about the lineup switch. I don't care about a double. I don't care about any of those things. I actually was thinking that day going, if there's a tight spot, because Buehler's the better pitcher and Buehler was terrific in game five, why would they even want to put Kershaw in a high leverage situation if they're up, knowing that they don't want to really have that carry over. Because again, game two wasn't terrible. It was obvious he doesn't

have it. And then he has the pitch to Rendon, which I think was 89. The Soto pitch, the next pitch is like not even 90. We can talk about tipping pitches, which always becomes this automatic thing where some guy starts getting roughed up. It's happening with one of the Tampa Rays pitchers now against Houston. And then when it's Houston, everybody's like, oh, well, Houston always seems to know what's going on. Well, look, if it's not the Astros, it's the Red Sox. It's the two teams that are just consistently named as having a little bit more information than everybody else on what the other team is doing. So if it's tip pitches, if it's his psyche, if it's all these things that I'm going,

are they really going to bring Kershaw in this spot? Knowing that there's just probably something a little off every time he has to take that mile now with 150 innings of playoff performance that we've seen from Kershaw. He gets the seventh. He's out there in the eighth and it happens again. And we all see that shot of Kershaw in the dugout. Now, Kershaw, let's get this rule out of the way. It's a little bit like the China Open that I did earlier this week, where most of you liked it.

I don't want all of you to like it. I don't want everyone to agree with everything I'm saying the entire time. It's kind of like a columnist that's in town for too long in a tough city. And I don't necessarily want to be that guy. But opinion people, over time, usually have some expiration date because you just get sick of hearing from us, right? And the longer a columnist is working for a paper, a big paper in a tougher city, the more often you'll hear people say like, I hate that guy. Because eventually he just started coming up with theories that were anti what the fan base wanted, or he's too close to the teams and starts disliking some of the coaches and players on a personal level. And then all of a sudden, all these different

things. Look, I'm not saying that I want to become your 60-year-old curmudgeon columnist that everybody in the city hates and thinks is rooting against the teams. But what I'd like to do is not have to hold everybody's hand. And most of you get this. A few of you don't, and that's okay because we're not always on the same page. But when I do my China, NBA, Daryl Morey, Colin not always on the same page. But when I do my China, NBA, Daryl Morey, Colin Kaepernick, selfishness of just the human being in general segment, when I do that as my open earlier this week, and then I have a few of you guys say, yeah, but does that mean you like China? No, no, no, no, no. I thought we were all in agreement here. There's some stuff going on in China that is really despicable. I didn't think I needed to point that out for some of you.

Apparently I did. And something that is not nearly as important as human rights in China, it's how should I feel about Kershaw? And some of you guys do this thing and, and it's like, Hey, I feel bad for Kershaw. Why do you feel bad for him? He's making 30 million. Okay. Is it at all possible to have some decency as another human being to see somebody else going through something this bad? Cause Kershaw is going through something this bad. And I still can't believe Dave Roberts put him in the spot, seeing him in game two, realizing that his velocity was shot. And yes, I know he's not the same guy as this just cyborg during his prime years. But I don't know why an organization would even want to do this.

Francona would retire. I saw, and again, I was closer to Francona because I watched all those games all the time. If he put a pitcher in a bad spot that could shake his confidence, you would have thought Francona would retire. And I think Francona is one of the best managers I've ever seen. Now, I think it's okay to feel bad for millionaires. If we can't feel bad, if we can't feel good for people, we can't feel bad for people, what the hell are we even doing here? And then if you don't feel bad for him, then there's always this thing where it's, well, you know, how can you not have compassion for this guy? You're like,

well, I don't want to argue who should or shouldn't. You know, it's one of my favorite rules about like, well, you couldn't do it. If the rules were that if you can't do what the famous guy is doing, that you're not allowed to talk about it, then none of us should have opinions on anything. If you're not in political office, does that mean you can't criticize someone who is? If you're not a writer, an actor, actress, comedian, comedian, that you can't say, I disapprove of this or I really like this. I mean, what the hell are we doing here if we can't criticize or be critical of or be compassionate for people that are more successful than us? And one of my favorite things is, is your financial advisor retired? Where's your realtor's pool?

You know, why is your therapist divorced? So just because people can do things better than you or have a better resume on paper throughout their lives, it doesn't mean that you can't still feel sorry for them, but it also doesn't mean that you can't be critical of them. So as I look at the Kershaw story, I don't know what to make of it. I don't know why he's this bad. I hate it. The left on base stranded numbers are way worse than the playoffs. The fly ball numbers are worse than the playoffs. The strikeout numbers look the same. And like anything, especially with

baseball numbers, if you want to package it and talk about his lack of rest, because I've seen that where it's Kershaw's lack of rest versus other guys' lack of rest, and that's actually why he's bad. He's just not who you'd expect in the playoffs and he's not who you'd expect right now in 2019 even based on what's a a good year for Clayton Kershaw but not a great year but a really good year by anybody else's standards I don't like even players that I'm not fond of I don't like when the great players have these awful playoff performances because that's when everybody's watching and that's what will end up being his legacy. And there'll be a generation of baseball fans

telling younger kids that don't like baseball anymore, yeah, Clayton Kershaw, he was pretty good, but let's talk with Adnan Virk of the DAZN coming up next. Getting into debt is easy. Getting out of debt is hard. Thankfully, now there's Upstart.com, the revolutionary lending platform that offers smarter interest rates to help you pay off high interest credit card debt because

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to do is do this again, where just because I have an inquiry during the middle of a mortgage processing thing, no. And that's why Upstart has your back. All right, let's talk with Adnan. I feel like you could have watched De Niro and Pacino throw cow dung at each other for 90 minutes and you would have given it four maple leaves. Fair or not? Chino throw cow dung at each other for 90 minutes and you would have given it four maple leaves. Fair or not? It is true that I am unnaturally biased in favor of Bob and Al, not just the fact that my kids are named after them, not just the fact that I revere them, but I'm being completely honest, Ryan. Before The Irishman started, and I paid hundreds of dollars for this experience of watching at the New York Film Festival. For those who are unaware, The Irishman played, and I paid hundreds of dollars for this experience of watching at the New York Film Festival.

For those who are unaware, the Irishman played Friday night, September 27th, at the New York Film Festival. And in order to get opening night passes for it, you had to pay $4.50, and then you get tickets for 10 other movies, or you can go see five movies, two tickets. As you and I both know, nobody's got time to go watch 10 movies in seven days, unless you're a college student or you're just taking time off work. So essentially, you're dropping $4.50 just to go watch The Irishman, which I did, which was spectacular. And to your point about being biased, I'll be honest, before it started, and this is the world premiere, right? 3 p.m. showing. Before it started, my producer who does Cinephile with me, subscribe on Apple Podcasts, said,

don't go on Twitter. And I said, why? And he goes, well, some reviews are already coming in. And I said, oh God. And a buddy of mine, actually, my cousin actually texted me. He goes, I said, I'm ready for the greatest movie of all time. And he goes, well, I would temper expectations. So I'll be honest, a part of, yeah, but part of me first, oh my God, it's about to be a flaming dung of a movie. Did Marty just Marty just lose his mind and they gave him, you know, Netflix gave him $165 million and we know even the best athletes, even the best actors, they all make mistakes.

Maybe this is just three and a half hours of self-indulgent nonsense. Thankfully, it was not. It was epic and it lived up to the hype. And you, of course, have also read the book. I heard you pay analysis. So, it's nice. I mean, obviously, we're not going to spoil it for people. But when I say to you it's faithful to the telling of the book, since you've read it, you understand that.

I remember when you and I were first talking about the book, you joked with me about the fact that De Niro is playing the lead. How Frank Sheeran, the character, comes across as like this ladies' man and how much of this is going to be in the book. So I don't want to spoil anything for you except to say it's tremendous. And I think you'll really like it for a couple of reasons. One, you really like American history and the stories about Hoffa and the Teamsters

and the JFK assassination. And two, because you've read the book, I think you'll appreciate the depth of which Scorsese told the story. Okay, yeah. I don't want to do any spoiler alerts because I also want to talk Joker because I watched it last night

and I sent you a text this morning being like, hey, have you seen it yet? As if you wouldn't have seen it immediately knowing that deniro was in it um and you just that's that's your world you know cinephile i like that we got the plug in there i'm just going to warn you ahead of time if you do a richard deitch name drop on this pod like you did his we're just going to put those at the end like a movie credit is that all right well i can't recall the last time i did your pod i we know we a technical issue, so I got cut off while I was telling a story at Racket Coop about Andy Katz. And so I didn't actually get to plug Cinephile.

So this time, you know what? In case Ryan and I have an issue with technical stuff, I'm going to get it done. I'm relying, by the way, on the Rosillo Army to keep my podcast afloat. So Cinephile Apple Podcast, as you would often say with me, subscribe, unsubscribe, and resubscribe again. I appreciate it. Okay. There we go. We got two in. That's good. That's good though. Never change. So when I read the book, it's not my favorite mafia American crime book that I've ever read. Paddy Whacked is probably as good as any I've read, but it was still really interesting and

it's all first person, kind of him and the paint houses line that's in the, one of the trailers about painting houses, which means you're a killer. And he's just kind of this guy, you know, he's kind of like a simple guy. And then De Niro plays him because he's kind of like whenever De Niro's had to play kind of a clown in the movie. Like, Mean Streets is hilarious because he's such a clown in it. And it's like, no, wait a minute. Later on, this guy becomes like the man in every single scene. So is there a way to not give it away that you can talk about how De Niro portrays Frank, where Frank is really nothing more than kind of a simple mercenary, right? Yeah. I mean, the reason why you and I both love Mean Streets,

I remember you and I talked about it. You re-watched it a year or two ago, and that was what you said to me. Yeah. And here's DuPaul. He's this guy who can't pay back the money, and Keitel is going to keep fronting for him because it's family. He's going to look out for the guy, but he's just an idiot. He sucks.

Everybody knows a guy like that, right? Either you had a guy in your crew or you were that guy. You're never responsible, unreliable, total doofus. And De Niro played it so well. But in the character of Frank, you know, I think of Goodfellas. The book is so good by Nicholas Pellecci, wise guy. And there was an early line, it talked about Henry Hill. And Pellecci said, he interviewed a lot of mobsters.

And he said, one of the problems with these guys is they're so narcissistic and they're so obsessed with themselves, they don't see the world around them. But in the case of Henry Hill, he was all eyes. I never forgot that line. I think about it all the time. And in the case of Frank Sheeran, he was all eyes. He was, as you put it, a simple mercenary. He's a very passive character in his own life story. And so the Irishman, he almost seems like this guy who's in the forefront of major events in American history, almost by accident. He's a guy who follows instructions. He carries them out ruthlessly, but he's relatively impassive. And I think one of the best strengths of De Niro's performance

is the fact that he shows that this guy doesn't have much depth beneath the surface. He simply follows instructions. He carries them out, and he gets it done. And there's no useless emoting. There's no emotion about it. It's just the guy getting the thing done just as if he was working in a butcher shop 9 to 5. And, of course, you get a great fire and ice when you have Pacino and De Niro together.

I know in Heat, you know, some, I remember you said, you thought Pacino was over the top or flamboyant, etc. But I think what Michael Mann was trying to do was trying to say, listen, De Niro is laying to beat. Pacino is going to be over the top. I think what Scorsese did here is he kind of reined in some of Pacino's excesses, but still has what makes Pacino great, which is that if you think his acting is outsized or over the top, well, he's playing a guy in Jimmy Hoffa who is outsized and over the top. So it actually is a really great melding of an actor, maybe with some find to be his deficiency, which is perfect in the case of Hoffa, who, again, as you know, I haven't read the book,

if you know anything about Jimmy Hoffa, he was a blustery, bellowing guy, Napoleon complex, over the top, you know, and Pacino just knocks it out of the park. So in terms of the acting styles, I would say the film to me, you know, Pacino is really captivating in a way he hasn't been to, you know, I think it's his best performance, Donnie Brasco, which was 1997. It's been a long time. And Pesci's in the movie and he's much different than he was in Goodfellas or Casino. It's a much more quieter, thoughtful role. But to your point about De Niro, yes, he's much more of a passive character, except for, I will say, the final 30 minutes. And I think his character comes alive and you get to see what a good actor he is.

Yeah. And when you read The Irishman 2, and it's always kind of funny, like I think back to like when Costner and JFK came out as a kid, I'm going, man, it's amazing. They can't figure out who killed this JFK guy. And then you get older and you read a few books, you read some on the Bay of Pigs, read The Corporation by TJ English, who also did Paddywhack, which also has bootlegging history in there with the Kennedy family. And by the time you've read a handful of different books, read about Nixon, you go, it's not who killed Kennedy. It's trying to eliminate suspects because he basically, I mean, it's an unbelievable list of people that were interested

in killing him. And in the book, it definitely plays out as a storyline where you go, oh, wow. So I don't want to give any of that away. But in the book, there's a real connection where Frank is basically saying, like, I don't want to exaggerate this, which a lot of mobsters do. Mobsters love going back and telling these versions of stories that are just true in the sense of, like you said, what's the best, baddest way to describe myself or describe my deal. the end of the book that's um that made the end of the book where you go okay first of all let's put to bed this whole idea that hoff was underneath giant stadium and number two um you know the the kennedy stuff all right um i want to i don't want to speak because i don't know i only have like 30 minutes with you i don't want to go 30 minutes on the irishman so you loved it i'll check it out i'm obviously not going to do the thing where a university makes you pay for the hockey tickets by also paying for volleyball and field hockey and everything else.

You saw The Joker. Brian, I was going to say, since you are in LA, make sure you see it in the theater. I know you will. November 1st, it opens in theaters. Do not wait till Netflix. You know as well as I do. You got to see this kind of movie on the big screen. Yeah, no doubt.

No doubt. And that's why I went to go see The Joker last night. And I loved it. It is the most polarizing film, I want to say, since like Natural Born Killers. People either walk out of that movie and love it as you just told me you did, or as when I texted you earlier today,

I didn't like it. You want to go first why you loved it? Or you want me to say why you didn't like it? I really think you should go first because I know you're not going to change. This is one of those things where somebody's mind is going to be changed, so I'm not going to talk to you like you're changing. I just want to know why you didn't like it. So go. You go first.

Sure. So I went into it expecting to love it. I think the trailer's fantastic. The poster's great. I love Joaquin Phoenix, and I love two of the movies which Todd Phillips is paying homage to, which are Scorsese classics and Taxi Driver and King of Comedy. And in the movies, you know, biggest wink to the audience, the fact that King of Comedy, if you haven't seen it, people have got to see it. It's a brilliant, brilliant movie. De Niro plays an obsessive comedian named Rupert

Pupkin who ends up kidnapping a talk show host so he can get on his show. And so in this time, De Niro is playing the talk show host played by Jerry Lewis. And so clearly Todd Phillips is having fun with it. And as far as the set decoration, the look of it, Lawrence shares his cinematographer. He clearly looked at Taxi Driver. And I thought the first opening was very strong. It reminded me of this New York City of the past in the 70s where everything is depraved and debauched. But for me, the film didn't work a variety of ways, one of which Todd Phillips is not a bartender. And I thought the film was very derivative.

It's one thing to pay homage to other movies, but I just think he's lifting it. Like, there's literally a scene of Joaquin Phoenix pretending he's on a talk show. I'm like, well, you know, I preferred that

when I saw it in 1903. Having said that, there's nothing wrong with paying homage and having sex, but the film is relentlessly bleak, and to me,

just a thoroughly unpleasant film experience. And I like dark. You know me. I'll take a dark movie as much as anybody, but I don't understand why this is... I think people are confusing nihilism with art. To me, even the bleakest film, you have some moments of levity or some moments of romance.

And I'll point to Taxi Driver. That's a really dark movie about a lonely guy who suffers from loneliness and urban alienation. But there's still a scene of Travis picking up Betsy. There's still a really cute flirtation. He still at least gets scene of Travis picking up Betsy. There's still a really cute flirtation. He still at least gets to go out with her for coffee. There's still Albert Brooks, who's really funny, talking about stool pigeons. There's still really funny moments between Peter Boyle playing wizard talking to De Niro about life.

This movie is none of that. You know, character arc, Ryan, to me, the characters start somewhere, and, you know, endures a journey, and away we go. We can laugh about movies like Robert McKee talking about adaptation and where characters end up, but I really think that's true. To me, this is a straight line.

This is a depressed guy suffering from mental illness who just becomes more depressed and acts out with violence and all of a sudden feels some sort of release. I never thought, to me, it worked as an impactful film. To me, he's just cribbing from other movies, and I'll give it some redeeming value in the Joaquin Phoenix's performance, although I'll be honest with you, people are

saying Oscars. To me, this is exactly the kind of showy, flamboyant performance of the Oscars reward, and they always shouldn't. I mean, again, this movie and his performance is about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the groin. I mean, it's full with text and mannerisms, and it's not raining at all. The third time he started dancing and he started playing Gary

Glitter, I said, okay, I think I'm good with this. Like, I got it. It really just didn't work for me at all, man. Okay, I know that there's probably a bunch of people listening right now that are mad that haven't seen it because it is fairly new in theaters, and I should have said, spoiler alert,

we're going to talk about this, but I really think the only spoiling that you did was that you just think this movie's terrible and that no one should go see it. So I don't think you gave away any storyline. And let's be fair, too. The 30th time we're telling the Joker story, at this point, you're yelling spoiler alert. All right, so I'm going to disagree.

I love Dark. I think it's important that people still make movies like this because immediately people are like, well, it glorifies violence. There's really not as much violence in this as you would have thought going in. Oh, it takes, I guess, a negative light on mental illness. Well, what did you think it was before you saw this movie? Is this the first time in 2019 you were like, man, mental illness is really challenging and difficult, and we should be more sensitive to it. I think it's great that movies like this can exist. I love that it's depressing the whole way through.

I like that it isn't something that has some sort of happy ending. I think the way that they told the story arc of his transformation from a guy that was disturbed and trying to find his way through life and then becoming fed up and having these triggers and then realizing like, you know what? If I actually commit these bad acts, as he says, when he's at the mental institution, the first time looking for his

mother's file and he's like, you know, I didn't really, it didn't really bother me all that much. And we see this, the evolution of the character. And then, you know, the one part that I was having a really hard time with was, was with his girlfriend, the black girl in the hallway. And I'm going, this girl would have a thing for this dude. This doesn't make any sense. They just forced her in there. They forced this interracial relationship and this doesn't make any sense. And then you're like, oh, okay, this makes way more sense now. So I like that it isn't the perfect example of beginning, middle, end. I like that there isn't some um ending that you know makes you have

value on it i i think what it does is it says okay we've done this joker thing a bunch of times how can we make it original how can we peer into this iconic comic book character and figure out the beginnings because i always think like once something becomes huge and we're talking decades of of joker material batman etc etc like when you can really go back and sell an origin because I always think like once something becomes huge and we're talking decades of Joker material, Batman, et cetera, et cetera. Like when you can really go back and sell an origin, that's when it becomes even more interesting. And I know there's always this battle about the Marvel universe versus DC. The reason the Marvel characters have worked, and I believe this, and this isn't an original thought, but like Peter Parker was the everyman, the insecure high school

kid that people could see themselves in. And then he was also Spider-Man. Wolverine has like real issues with his history. He's a recluse and he's probably depressed. He's all of these things, which makes his overall character more interesting. And as this Avengers universe is expanded and expanded, which I think the studio is giving us what we want as an audience, where it's a million more characters and less story and just character, character, character. And then it's all of a sudden I'm supposed to care about some robot with a crystal on his head. And I'm like, eh, I'm not really feeling it. They humanized the Joker in a way he's never been humanized before. And I thought that there was a connection to something which so many of these superhero

comic book movies are really having a hard time with. Yeah. All that sounds great in theory. And that's why I said, yeah, going in, I thought it was one of my favorite movies of the year. I do appreciate that they're trying to do something different with it and original. But again, I don't think the film is enjoyable in the slightest, and I think it's masquerading as art. I really think it's stylism, and there's really nothing that's unique about the film, and there's nothing I'd recommend about it. I mean, like I said, you mentioned Joaquin Phoenix. I mean, even the supporting cast is relatively wasted. There's no other character I think is of note.

Rachel McKean-Phoenix, the media supporting cast, is relatively wasted. There's no other character I think is of note. As far as the other topics you brought up, which, by the way, has completely helped the film, the fact that there's this controversy about violence in movies, I have no issue with that. I don't think that a movie all of a sudden makes somebody want to go on a killing spree. I think that movies like this should exist. I'm all for unflinching, provocative cinema. That's not my issue with the film.

My issue with the film is that I just thought it was tedious and uninspired. And for me, the only thing when it comes to Joker, the joke's on us. The joke is on anybody who thinks that you'd be winning Oscars because that's the furthest thing at least I was watching when I was watching it. Yeah, I don't know. I think it was dark and then it had these moments of comedy and it actually tried to tell a good backstory instead of just slamming. I think you're upset because De Niro was only in it for like seven combined minutes out of two hours. Well, your question, your question,

my, uh, uh, honesty when it comes to De Niro, I'll even say this. I thought he was miscast in the world. I didn't think that he should, but I saw him and I love the guy,

but there's no way I'm buying him as a talk show host. I mean, anything you've seen Bob on a talk show, there's nobody who wants to get out of there. He was not telling me it's Johnny Carson type. Yeah. You didn't like when he did his little dance or saying that's life at the end? When him doing the really cheesy talk show host,

like almost old guy version of an Ellen DeGeneres thing, I had to laugh because it was like De Niro going, yeah, all right, you guys want me to be stupid? I'll give you stupid. I just think Joaquin's that special too. I do. I don't think if he were somebody else, maybe we'd be more impressed, but he's been such an odd guy throughout his career that when you're like,

oh, he'll nail this. Look, we disagree, and I totally get what you're talking about. I think you are a harsher critic when it comes to something like when you're seeing notes being played, and it's not an influence, but you feel like it's just a cover song. I get why that would bother you as a guy that cares about film this much. Yeah, you mentioned his performance, by the way. I don't think, by the way, it was terribly original. I thought it was almost like an extension of a movie you and i both like which is the master i thought his character was a little

bit like freddie quell to me he was a little bit stranger and a little bit darker but to me i said he's kind of you know playing off of that persona that image which was a good i think a much better movie and also a good performance that is crazy though because some of these actors that we get really excited about we love their range and then i go what the hell's brad pitt's range you know like he's i love brad pitt but i go is he really doing that many different things and then you had owen wilson who basically played himself for 15 years and then you go somebody get on walking case here because he's doing the master thing but maybe they felt like they needed somebody like deniro in the big scene to be as big as Joaquin Phoenix's performance so they needed somebody that you looked at and respected

a little bit more much like in the master where it's um Philip Seymour Hoffman where it's that scene is the two of them and you go okay nobody's honestly Philip's the better actor probably I think we we'd agree but you sometimes you need like the audience needs to be told hey by looking at these two guys you have to know how important this scene is and that's why we're doing it this way and i think movies do do that a lot yeah that is true i do appreciate the fact that when you get certain actors playing at the fest they're going to bring it and to your point about other actors doing it i mean joaquin phoenix certainly put a stamp on the role and you can't imagine any other actors being able to do that,

right? It's already imposing enough playing a character who others have played and won Oscars for like Heath Ledger and obviously Nicholson's version which I,

at the time I enjoyed because it was so cartoonish and he was hamming it up but probably now if you and I watch Batman again it may not be nearly as memorable as Joker

but credit to Joaquin Phoenix for saying, you know what, yeah, I'm going to step up to the plate and I'll give it my own spin and I think it'll work. Yeah, all right so what else is new with you man you know what I don't want to do is because you've done it a million times and I've already done a

few times you're with the zone you're arguably the face of well you are the face of the baseball coverage you're one of their most prominent guys and it's different but I don't want to do the the ESPN thing anymore because I know I'm sick of talking about it and I'm sure you're're sick of talking about it too, which isn't to say it wasn't really interesting at some point. So I'm not necessarily knocking anything else. I know you just did it with Taichung, so I don't want to do that again. But where are you at right now? How are you doing? Things are great, man.

I'm currently walking in Hohokas, New Jersey, which is a wonderful suburb here in North Jersey. I feel like I'm living in the land of the Sopranos. I drive to work. I drive by the Bing. I've never been in, obviously. I just drive by and living in the land of the Sopranos. I drive to work. I drive by the Bing. I've never been in, obviously. I just, you know, drive by and follow the girls, the sad and dolls.

And it's great, man. I mean, I'm having so much fun because it's been a real breath of fresh air, really something different. As you and I know, we only lived a few miles from each other in West Hartford.

You know, Connecticut's all right. I think it's a lot better if you're from there and you grow up there and you have friends, et cetera, like our man, Rudy. I think it's harder if you're not from there and you try to make friends and raise a living.

And, you know, my wife and I and our kids were there for nine years. I mean, it was fine. You make the best of it. But obviously, you're there for ESPN. So once that opportunity goes away and once I was let go, you know, I've been fortunate on multiple levels. As you mentioned, the zone is really cool because it's a streaming network. It's something different.

You feel like you're part of something fresh. And like Tony Soprano even said, one of the first Sopranos episodes, he said he's lamenting the fact the mob is in the decline phase where he feels they are. He goes, you know, you got to get into something

when it's at the ground up. And I'm sure you feel invigorated being at the ringer because, you know, obviously you're very popular and a hard worker, but you're also part of something that's new and different.

And similarly for me, you know, being at the zone and like I said, being one of the faces feeling like we're doing something different is great. And it's me, you know, being at the zone and like I said, being one of the faces, feeling like we're doing something different is great. And it's a really good partnership, I think, with MLB Network. I think it would have been harder, Ryan, if it was just the zone on its own. Okay, what are you guys?

We're your boxing network. And, you know, I get to host the aperture fights, which is great. I know you like the fights and Triple G was great on Saturday. I'll be at the Canelo fight and maybe the AJ Ruiz rematch as well. But, you know, beyond boxing, what do you guys got? Okay, baseball show, cool.

But I think the fact that we're there at MLB Network, like literally the studio's in Secaucus. So today I was on with Mark DeRozan and MLB Central. We got Al Leiter and Dan Pleszak and all those great guys on our shows as well.

It's really been fun, man. I remember Canelo said to you and me, you know, after he was let go by ESPN that, you know, he's really enjoying himself, but he feels like he has like five jobs to equate to one. And I definitely feel that way with DAZN and MLB Network and NHL Network and my podcast and I'm filming on the radio. And I thank you, by the way, because, you know,

all the radio stuff I ever got was because you were such a help to me and really supportive. And I filled in last week. I did a solo show on MLB Network Radio on Sirius. And I said, hey, my man Russell, he used to always say, it's the hardest thing to do in sports media. If you can do this well, you can do anything. And thankfully, it was only an hour of solo shows.

So we got through it. Then Dick Vitale called in, so I didn't have to do anything. No, he didn't. Did he really? Yeah, he was actually a huge Rays fan. So he just went off on the Rays. And by the way, you and I both know plenty of people who say they're fans of something. Then you meet them, you go, okay, he doesn't really know. Okay, Jon Hamm's a huge Rays fan, so he just went off on the Rays. And by the way, you and I both know plenty of people who say they're fans of something.

Then you meet them, and you go, okay, he doesn't really know. Okay, Jon Hamm's a Cardinals fan. What could he name the entire roster? Does he know Tommy Edmunds? But I mean, Vitale went pretty deep. I was impressed by his knowledge. He was not just mentioning Joe Maddon and Evan Longoria from years ago. He was well aware of Andy Diaz and how the Rays were going to size up.

Although, at one point, I wasn't sure if he knew I was no longer the UCN. No. At the end, he did say, hey, miss you, buddy. All the best. I'm like, oh, yeah, great. Cool. Yeah, it's always so funny with Vitale because just when you think like, wait, what's going on here?

And then it just, the switch goes on. And you go, no, this guy's still more locked in. I got to admit, though, and you know me as an all-time grudge holder, it bummed me out. There was three people when the corpse was still warm when I announced I was leaving ESPN Radio and it was my last show and I'd been unfollowed literally within hours. And Vital was one of them. Like, can you at least wait until I've signed off? You know what I mean? Give me a weekend. It was like Friday, 4 Eastern, done with this guy's content. And there's one guy I won't name. I'll name him.

Feinbaum was the other one. I was like, oh, but he doesn't really, you know, like if I wasn't doing college football all the time, you know, I actually kind of understand people unfollowing me because it's like, what is he, what's this? You know, just stay in this one lane. Like imagine if Woj all of a sudden tweeted hey i don't know about you guys but the riblets are as underrated as it gets as an opening you know appetite you know people would just be like what not to say

that any of us are woge but people really like you to stay in your lane and um yeah as soon as as soon as i was i announced that day and i just you know they come through and then all of a sudden you can see it and you're like, wait a minute, what? And I don't have like the who unfollowed me thing, but it was immediate. I went, oh, you know what? Like, seriously guys. So whatever. Um, there you go.

Yeah. I'd at least have a, I like it better when they have a reason, right? If I'm going to stop following another person, I'm tired of the movie stuff. I'm like, okay, totally. Like I get it. Like that's a legitimate reason. And yeah, if I'm not the movies, I'd probably be annoyed by my twitter feed as well i remember godly one time so people would challenge him how can we not follow me i did doug's credit he would tell me to bring him to the table like

yeah i see a good fall i'm not gonna spoil you just see in the hallway like give me a reason yeah i got i definitely got shamed into following some people there because like a bunch of people get together it was like he doesn't follow any of us and then there'd always be like this weird there was my favorite stat at one point was that greeny didn't follow anyone else didn't follow cowherd me vampel vampel only followed me cowherd didn't follow anybody um i only followed vampel and like every one of the guys of like the four well i'd say the five main guys and three main shows not one guy followed anybody else and then they make make us take Christmas pictures together all the time. And the thing is, nobody disliked each other.

And I'll tell you to this day, Cowherd's been a really good friend to me. Golik has been awesome. And Greeny and I actually really got along, despite us being probably completely different people. There was never any like, oh, I hate this guy, like a lot of radio places. any like oh i hate this guy like a lot of radio places but the christmas picture was always hilarious because it was just five minutes of like everybody totally being who they were so anyway let me before then none of this is interesting um what do you most want to do now because i'm at one point you're probably on a path and it is easy to go hey you know i'm just gonna put my flag in the ground here and i'm gonna be here 30 years and hopefully my kid gets state tuition to UConn and whatever. Um, what would you most want to do at this point in your career?

Well, I mean, I'm, I'm doing it. I think, you know, I mean, the fact that I think content is what matters most. I think maybe at another time in your life, you say, you look at the company and you say, I'd like to work at CBS or NBC or ESPN, wherever it is, but ultimately you have to, you know, do the work that you enjoy. And so for me, the fact that I get to be so enmeshed in Major League Baseball and do boxing and hockey and do an NFL podcast, like to me, that's kind of where I'm at. Let me focus on sports that I feel like I'm really comfortable with, that I know well. You know, I always felt very miscast with college football and college basketball.

It wasn't something that I lobbied for at ESPN. You know, Crantalee Fitting for putting me on it, Bill Graff, and I appreciate what those guys did for me. And it was obviously very important properties for ESPN. But as you and I both know, I did not grow up with the Iron Bowl. You know, let's see Reese Davis do Hockey Day in Canada. Like, it's a very hard thing to do if you didn't grow up with it. I remember there was nothing more stressful.

Reese is great. There's nothing more stressful than when, you know, I would be filling in the radio with you and you'd say, all the college, this was before I'd done it for a few years. But I remember it was all the college football coaches were coming, like, oh, my God, I don't know who the hell Frank Beamer is. What am I going to ask this guy? So I think it was always a challenge for me at ESPN,

and I obviously feel very comfortable with the sports I'm covering now, and the people are great. And I do think, you know, personal fulfillment is very important as well. As I said, I prefer living in North Jersey than I do to central Connecticut. I'm 35 minutes from Manhattan. I was able to see the Irishman. I was able to see some other films at the New York Film Festival. My wife and I can go out and enjoy a more fulfilling existence.

So all that together, man, I think that really makes someone happy. If you enjoy the content you're doing and you live in a great place, everything else takes care of itself. I remember the Virginia Tech, Virginia mess up. You messed up the quarterbacks on which team when we talked to Beamer. You know what's funny? The amount of mistakes that are made on a daily basis, you couldn't keep track of them all.

Everybody's on the air. Everybody's talking forever. But because that happened to me once. I didn't introduce Warren Moon as a Hall of Famer. And here I am, I put up my sports knowledge against any single person on the air in Bristol for a decade. I was like, I don't know. Look, I'll just say it. I think I could hang on any sport with anybody at any point. Definitely not baseball towards the end. But I made a mistake not saying Hall of Famer Warren Moon. And then management

decided to beat the piss out of me for two days because of it. And it's like two different meetings. And look, the managers that did it aren't even there anymore. And it was like this total, total waste of time. But I'll never forget because you got talked to about that. And all you did was make a mistake. You just made a mistake. And it's always funny the way mistakes are treated with certain people.

And I'm not even talking about specifically ESPN, but with others where it's always funny the way mistakes are treated with certain people and i'm not even talking about specifically espn but with others where it's like oh you know what we can kind of like get on adnan's case a little bit here because he made this frank beamer mistake and i remember going from like oh no that's a mistake to all right everybody can back off now like relax that sucked yeah and you know what it was actually the first show we did together and everybody else was like hey the show is really good. Do you want to run it? Good chemistry. Except for that one scroll.

Be careful. Yeah, of course. Other than that, we'll see you tomorrow. I remember we had two shows together. That was the first one. The second one, actually, I don't even think the second one was as good. But thankfully, I was able to be your sidekick for a number of years. We had enough good laughs along the way.

All right. I know you got to go, so we should do this another time. Do you have any other content, not necessarily promotional stuff, but is there something else, TV, movie, right now, that you're hot on, succession, whatever, the floor is yours

to make a case for something creative that is out there that everybody needs to pay attention to? Yeah, there's a great movie called Marriage Story, which will be coming out on Netflix in early December. I saw it at the New York Film Festival.

It's excellent. Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, Marriage Story, which will be coming out on Netflix in early December. I saw it at the New York Film Festival. It's excellent. Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, the director, Noah Baumbach. He did a movie called The Squint the Whale. I know you and I are both big Wes Anderson fans. Baumbach's a little bit of a Wes Anderson-like. But this is like a legitimately excellent film. And it's funny. I saw it the day after I saw Joker.

And I said to me, I wish that more people, or as many people, are going to see Marriage Story as they do Joker. Knowing, of course, that's futile. There's no chance people are going to watch a domestic drama compared to a superhero origin story. But Marriage Story is excellent, man. I hope people check it out when it comes out on Netflix. Obviously, the Irishman, I can't reiterate enough, people have to see it in theaters. It's not the kind of film you want to watch for an hour and then check your phone and go on social media or something. You've got to watch the film.

And so I know it's hard if you're listening in, like, you know, Wisconsin, but try to find a place that's playing, and it'll be November 1st in theaters, and November 2nd, something like that. So it's a great film, man. You know, when you watch art like that at the highest level, it honestly makes you weep with joy. I swear to God, because you go, man, no matter what your job is, you know, my brother's an engineer, so he can look at the arch in St. Louis and say, look at the craftsmanship.

Look at how this was built, et cetera. You know, your dad's a guy who did a lot of stuff with his hands, right? Building homes, building all these things. So he can appreciate things. If you love cinema, when you watch the Irishman, you just realize to yourself, these are people working at the peak of their power. And De Niro and Pacino have not made their best films the last two decades. Everybody knows that. Those guys are worth that.

have not made their best films the last two decades. Everybody knows that. Those guys are worth that. But to be able to go on with Scorsese and Joe Pesci at a retirement to knock it out of the park like that, it was a special, special feeling.

And I just caution people, do not expect Goodfellas 2.0 or Casino 2.0. Yes, it's a mob movie in that it's got familiar hallmarks to Scorsese, you know, the music and jump cuts and certainly lots of violence.

But in many ways, it's a character study, it's a historical piece, and it's beautifully written. It's very melancholy. It's a very mournful movie. So I can't wait to see it, man. I think you'll love it as much as I did.

Yeah, Noah Baumbach, Kicking and Screaming, which is 95. I graduated with college right after that. That was kind of like the first of those Generation X movies that came out in the mid to late 90s, where a lot of it was, you know, I would have, if I were into

writing then, that's what I would have written. Like, hey, right after college, where are the answers? What am I supposed to do now? And I'm sure everybody and their brother pitched that in Los Angeles back at the time and he got it made. He went to Vassar, I think. So I've heard about this marriage thing because Simmons and Klosterman were talking it up. I think one of them have seen it, both of them have seen it. And they were like, it's insane. It's so good. So yeah. Um, great job out of you by getting that in there because like minds, other guys that

I respect as far as movies and stuff, um, are really hot on that. So I, um, I love a good divorce movie. That's, that's what I'm hearing. Kramer versus Kramer has shades of that. If you love the Dustin Hoffman, Merrill from the early eighties. Good. All right. Next time we talk,

I'm going to update you on everything that's going out here with me. Cause you're like the only guy that I can, I can share the stuff with, but I have to be delicate in how I share it, but it's, it's really interesting. Some of it's good news, some of it's bad news.

And that's kind of what I signed up for. So let's do that again soon. All right. I'm thrilled for you, man. As I said, Ron, I always appreciate how much you did for me,

especially on the radio side. Nobody helped me more than you. As you and I both know, you don't often get criticism. People just say, good job, good job, and eventually they don't ask you back.

So you were smart enough to say, hey, good job. Next time, try this, or don't ask Joe Maurer some of these stupid questions. Let's do this like this next time. I'm like, all right, cool. But I like what you're doing.

Keep it up. And yeah, man, I'm thrilled for your success. I think the ringers are great i mean i'm thrilled for your success i think the ringers are great not that you asked me but i think the ringer is a great move for you they're obviously uh well respected awarded there i'm a huge fan of bill simmons he was given love to his own on the bs report i know he's a big boxing fan so i love it man kudos to you and hopefully one day i'll be reviewing one of those movies that you're writing i'll be reviewing it on cinephile and the great thing is if you do review anything i ever do i know you're gonna be nice to me to me. So I can't really lose. Even if it sucks, you'd be like, but the journey is this. Anyway, you can check out Adnan again, Cinephile,

a good friend, and we're going to have you on again. Thanks, man. Thanks, brother. Okay. Great job. Well, I guess I just complimented myself. So I don't want to do that. Not on a Friday. I'm in too good of a mood. You should be in a great mood. Late Friday drop. And we'll be back on Monday recapping another week in the NFL and potentially introducing clients

to Chris Long for Life Coach here at The Ringer. So please subscribe as many times as you can. Rate and review. And let us know how you feel about the pod. Thanks, sir.