The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Knicks Ceiling, LeBron Trade Rumors, and NBA Ref Drama, Plus Domonique Foxworth

Episode Date: February 2, 2024

Russillo starts the show with his thoughts on the Knicks winning streak, a LeBron trade, and officiating in the NBA (0:43). Then, he’s joined by Domonique Foxworth to explain what makes Patrick Mahomes special, debate Josh Allen vs. Lamar Jackson, discuss why the coaching cycle ended without Bill Belichick getting a job, and share his lean for the Super Bowl (27:47). Plus, Life Advice with Ceruti and Kyle! Is it okay to send a coworker flowers on Valentine’s Day (67:39)? The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Host: Ryen Russillo Guests: Domonique Foxworth Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

today in the pod some serious knicks love this is a fun story what does it mean palo over scotty barnes for the all-star team i'll give you my thoughts a laker rumor with LeBron that was put to bed mid-preparation. And my day arguing about calls. It was interesting. We've got Dominic Foxworth. We're going to recap a bunch of stuff.

We're going to talk this Alan Lamar thing that I've always wanted to do and his early leans on the Super Bowl and a bonus edition life advice extensive Friday cut.

This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Winter is here, so be prepared and get almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. What do I mean by almost anything? Well, Extensive Friday cut. Total yes. Get almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol in select markets. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Let's start with the Knicks. Nice win last night against the Pacers,

but it's really a bigger thing with this team and how well they've been playing. So let's get into all of it. All right, last night, no Randall, no OG against the Pacers who have Halliburton on a minutes restriction. so he played 22 minutes. This game came right down to the wire. Brunson hits the shot with 146 remaining, puts the Knicks up 101 to 100. He's got 40 in a night where he's not even hitting his threes like he normally does.

And I think the postgame moment, if you've seen the video where he's being interviewed by Alan Hahn, it's just awesome stuff. The crowd's going crazy. where he's being interviewed by Alan Hahn. It's just awesome stuff. The crowd's going crazy. His popularity in New York City right now is maybe up there with any other athlete, maybe until the Yankees start. The other part of the Brunson story is that for him to be the guy, and the guy and a guy could be two different things,

but for him to be announced to the all-star game, to have another night like this in MSG, where I don't care if you hate New York City, that place is so much fun when it's on. And for all the years of the Knicks waiting to kind of get their guy, and Carmelo was in a way that, but there clearly wasn't the playoff success. For to be somebody who's been an underdog essentially his entire NBA career, this is just one of those moments that I think anybody would feel good about. By the way, how about an aside there after the OG trade? Precious Achua, 12 points, 16 boards, four steals, two blocks. I couldn't believe he took 16 shots last night. That's the most shots he's taken in a game in over a calendar year. You're going to go all the way back to

January 23. He's just super active and he was gonna take more shots because randall's not there and obviously mitchell robinson's still out so the knicks have won nine straight they were 17 and 15 to now 32 and 17 so they're 15 and 2 in their last 17. uh let's look at the stats in january 1st when this whole thing started their offense is seventh in the league the defense is number one they have number one net rating. Some of the other numbers I was looking at, I was like, okay, they do seem to go slow because of Brunson dictating the pace. That is the case since January 1st, 28th in pace. But then when you look at the other teams down at the bottom of pace, how about this list? The Clippers, 25th. That's because of Harden. 26th is Minnesota. 27th

is Denver. And then you have New York, 28th. And even 29 Minnesota. 27th is Denver. Then you have New York 28th. Even 29th and 30th are Orlando and Miami. Despite Miami being through a really disappointing stretch and Orlando flattening a bit, these are actually all pretty good teams. I don't know if that means anything, but you just can't look at pace and be dismissive of a team that plays a little bit slower and continues to win. I think there could be something to be said about it being the schedule. The Knicks are 20th in strength, the schedule in the NBA so far this season. The stretch has a couple of nice wins in there. They've got Denver, they've got Philly with Embiid, Minnesota, but there's also just a lot of

stuff in there. And that plays out if you look at their expanded standings on how they do against the good teams versus the bad teams. The Knicks are still just 11 and 16 against teams that are 500 or better, but they're 21 and 1 against teams below 500. If you look at Boston, they're still 21 and 10 against teams over 500. Milwaukee's 14 and 10. Minnesota's 19 and 10. OKC's 16 and 10. The Clippers are 15 and 11, which is probably misleading in itself because they feel like two different teams this year but that could also be something in New York's favor which I'll get to so the Knicks are a half game behind the two seed Milwaukee loses to Portland like Milwaukee and we'll see what happens with Doc once he's been there a month but every time you hear about all

the turmoil with Milwaukee or you're watching them and you go okay but look at the record like they're still good and then they just have this incredibly bad loss where you're like, what's wrong with these guys? Shout out to Deandre Ayton saying, this is what we do. Boston's had a brutal week. Ass is handed to them by the Clippers. You know, they had lost to Denver for their first home loss. That game was a bit of a toss up. But then last night against the Lakers, Doc Rivers theory in effect, no LeBron, no AD, and the Lakers just shot him out of the building. And then you have Philly now without the Embiid stuff, or without Embiid because of the stuff involving his knee injury. So if you're looking at the Knicks as of today, and the season is just a

bunch of different snapshots, and I'd say that even the best teams have usually one or two stretches where you're like, what's wrong with those guys? But the Knicks are rolling. And the only thing that, well, they're overshadowing Cleveland because it's New York, but the Cleveland story is remarkable because they were 13 and 12 to now 30 and 16. They've won 12 of 13. But if you look at the strength of schedule and some of the scheduling opponent stuff, there's a very similar story there in who Cleveland has been is also the same as New York. Cleveland's strength of schedule is 21st. They're 10 and 14 against teams 500 or better

and 20 and two against the sub 500 team. So both these teams are just, if you're not good, you're losing to them. But really the lesson might be here that it's about judging the Knicks with OG and Inouye. Despite missing last night, he's played 14 games. This is the best he has ever shot it in his career. And some of my hesitation with OG in the past has just been like the numbers,

for the way he would get talked about, knowing what he is going to cost. I always felt like, man, I don't really know if he's that kind of guy. Everybody'd want him, but is he really going to be that kind of dude that deserves that kind of cash? Because there's some numbers if you dug into them, especially the numbers, the metrics with him with Toronto this year, they just actually got legitimately not great. So the trade made sense because OG provides them somebody that can match up against the bigger perimeter players defensively in a way RJ Barrett could never even dream of. Um, and OG, despite some of the handle stuff that I worry about,

his corner three stuff is, is ridiculous. He's 42% from corner threes for his career. He's 48% on corner threes right now with the Knicks. So this is great. They're rolling. Brunson continues to shatter through any limitations you put on him as a player. The record stuff gives me a bit of pause here against the good teams versus the bad teams. But when you watch him play, you're like, man, they have nine guys. When you look at their top nine, and that's without Mitchell right now, there's not a lot of minutes where you're like, why is that guy getting minutes? It feels like everybody makes sense out there.

I mean, we could nitpick here and talk about Myles McBride, but he's out there for his defense, and he shot it well in January. Grimes is a rotation player in a ton of teams. Devin Chenzo, this is the best he's ever played. Hartenstein is terrific. That guy is all over the place, all game long. Everybody could use a Josh Hart. And instead of having quickly kind of just come in with that second unit and just do whatever he wants to do, despite it being really good, especially last year on big nights. And then RJj who you just wanted to click but i don't think tibbs was ever that big of a fan defensively he's not even close to og and when you factor in that really barrett had one good year shooting it from three and then the rest of it was kind of disappointing for somebody who's

a smaller perimeter player that was going to take a lot of shots, like 14, 15 shots a game, well, you give those shots to OG, or in other cases, you're splitting them up. So I really like what I see from them. And even though that schedule stuff, and there'll probably be a moment where you go, why were the Knicks so good during that stretch? Well, maybe it's just baked into who they were playing. But it's a little dismissive to just break it down to only that, knowing that with OG, despite the spike of the numbers that he's had here with New York, because some of them are outliers for his career, that that's who we need to judge this team being moving forward.

Eastern Conference Finals? Maybe. I know I'm supposed to say it because they're 15-2 in the last 17. I still am not there yet. The Knicks winning the fact that I'm working myself through it is probably the biggest concession that I can make on the Knicks to this point, which I would have been completely dismissive of even that idea 30 days ago. One other story that I want to get to. Powell, Ben Carroll on the all-star team. Scotty Barnes is off. The coaches pick the reserves.

The coaches like teams that win. If you look at the standings today, Orlando's seven and a half games up on Toronto, who, yep, they're moving their pieces out now and clearly starting this thing and rebuilding it around Scottie Barnes. But Toronto, for most of the season, has been one of the more disappointing teams in the NBA.

I love both these guys. If you want to look at the old stats, Barnes is 28-6 on 48-36% shooting. Paolo's 23-7-5, 45-36% shooting. So very, very similar numbers. But I knew what was going to happen is that people were going to look at Barnes being left off with the analytics story, liking him a lot more than Paolo, and act like this was some massive snub. PER, Barnes has got him there. Go win shares of 48, pretty significant in favor of Barnes. The box score plus minus, significantly better for Barnes. But I don't know that that should always be the default.

And I can always kind of tell like, oh, I know that this person who covers the league will be mad about this. And I know exactly what they'll be looking at and why they're mad. will be mad about this, and I know exactly what they'll be looking at and why they're mad. It's incredibly dismissive of who Paolo has been at the very end of 23 into those first couple weeks in January without Franz. Franz got hurt in the Sacramento game, and he missed, I think, just under three weeks. Paolo had a stretch. You just had to see it. The Sacramento game, he goes for 43 points from Franz Gettert. That overtime one, they lost.

I don't care. Denver, 32 in the win where it was all him. 35 in the win against Atlanta in overtime. Again, it's the Hawks. The Miami loss where he missed the tip. Then there was another big one against Miami. You had to see what he was doing and what he was carrying on his own. And as I was watching those weeks with Paolo, and granted, I'm a huge fan of both players in

Barnes and Paolo, but when we were arguing about Paolo being number one overall, I just said, man, I think there's just some stuff to his game where like, if you need it, he can carry you more offensively than say Chet or Jabari Smith. And who knows, like Chet's a perfect, perfect compliment to everything that's happening there. This is only the first year we're even watching this guy play. But I let this thought creep into my head when I'm watching Paolo go off for these long stretches where he just felt like he was doing it on his own and no one could really do anything with him because with his ball handling and at his size and the fact that he's a willing passer. And I think he just checks a lot of like teammate boxes. That's why I fell in love with him so much in college. The top five thing that we throw around with the NBA is fun, even though we do it all the time, because it's a really special group.

There's a clear top four right now. It's Jokic, it's Embiid, it's Giannis, it's Luka. I'm not really saying it's necessarily in that order and then if you want to go to five I think there's a lot of arguments there's arguments for like that five to nine ten however many deep you want to go just because we say it's top five because it sounds better it doesn't mean that there's necessarily like five total guys willing to be in that conversation and right now I'm only willing to go four deep but I wondered if Paolo could ever get to that that second, which is still saying a lot. We can all like him. He just made an all-star team. But is Paolo actually going to be somebody

who's like six to 10 in the league four or five years from now? It's not impossible. It's going to be really, really hard. But if he ever does, I feel like those two weeks were kind of his origin story. Remember we saw him go on that run. That was the clue that tells us who he ended up becoming if he gets to that level. And that I think is as important as any analytic number that you're going to counter me with. And by the way, I don't mind that there are snubs. I know everybody's in a big push to expand the all-star rosters. I don't want to expand them. And by the way, with Embiid out with the injury and Randall out now with a shoulder thing,

you're probably going to get two more spots. So if you expand it to 15 and then you have injury replacements, it just starts to become more and more diluted. And I'm not talking about the quarterback situation with the Pro Bowl where you're like, wait, that guy made two Pro Bowls? Like what? Scott Mitchell? I don't even know Scott Mitchell made the Pro Bowl, but you understand the point. I think things that are special should be exclusive. I want people to feel left out. That's not a political stance.

I'm not talking about the board. I'm just simply saying that, you know, these things are supposed to mean something. And I'd rather a couple people be left out than just letting everybody do it because of feelings. Speaking of feelings, LeBron James trade rumors. A local reporter here in LA who has a pretty good track record threw out a tweet yesterday that had all NBA people going like, I threw out a tweet yesterday that had all NBA people going like, what is going on? Where it was theorized, according to the report of that, you could see the Lakers move LeBron because they were making calls on it. I don't know where the fit is. We can just keep listing teams all day if we wanted to. Would Philadelphia with assets and flipping a pick there be enough for the Lakers to want to do it? That might make some sense. Would Miami want to bring him back? Would he be comfortable with Miami where he kind of knows the place even at the exit? There are some hurt feelings, which there always are after breakups. Back to the how good is Tyler Hero debate, which we did all summer. New Orleans would have plenty of assets to do it. Would he even want to

go there? OKC, would they be like, we don't care if you get a thousand picks, we'll throw you a pick. He'd fit in perfectly with us, exactly what we would need, a little leadership. But then you start thinking about the basketball fit. Like whenever I thought about like, OK, but Denver, not that they would, but are you actually taking away from LeBron's strengths when you know you still need the ball in Jokic's hands the whole time? Are they both basketball geniuses and they'd figure the whole thing out. Then there's a Golden State conversation. Again, if you just wanted to do this all day and you didn't have anything else to talk about,

three-hour radio show, let's do it. Destinations for LeBron. But Golden State, if you run through their assets, Koff, you could probably do something for Kaminga. Maybe this season is a bit of him turning the corner. I still think there's just a lot of inconsistent play for a guy that's been playing in the league now for a few seasons. I don't know what Chris Paul is worth because you'd think post-injury and his expiring contract

and it being a big number in the final year here that that would be somebody a good team would want, but who would be the good player that Golden State would get back that would make sense on their timeline. Wiggins, who other than the finals run, which is terrific, I think for the most part is kind of who he is and always a little disappointing as a player. I don't know what Clay is worth. I don't know if they'd actually want to do that. I don't know if Clay still thinks he's getting a big contract. When you go through the list of what Golden State would have around Curry, it gets really complicated trying to figure this all out. And that might lead to a much more difficult conversation about

Curry's future as he still has some really good years left. You know, like what he's expecting to just kind of wait on a rebuild around him because that doesn't make a ton of sense. So, you know, that's kind of talking it out with Curry there, but also wondering like, would LeBron actually solve any of Golden State's problems? But it really comes down to this. What does LeBron want? Well, Windhorse, as I was writing this out this morning, tweeted and then reported on ESPN.com that he spoke with Rich Paul, the agent for LeBron James, saying, we are not seeking a trade and he is not going to be traded. And that kind of makes way more sense because I don't know that he has the power. And that was always fear in the past.

When you do those short-term deals, especially the second time around with Cleveland, where it's like, okay, we he's doing shorter deals. So he always has the hammer on us to make sure that we're doing everything we can every single season to win. Like he wanted to trade the Colin Sexton pick,

I think for Deandre Jordan years ago when I didn't think he was going to stick around. It's always been something of when you get into business with him, he's going to deliver for you, but you have to be cautious and understand he's in charge. Well, I don't think he has that anymore. And I always feel guilty criticizing LeBron, the player, and some of the other stuff because what he's done is, there's nothing to compare it to. It's like getting on De Niro's case for bad grandpa. I'm like, all right, yeah, I know you made the movie, but I don't want to sit here and start a discussion about Robert De Niro with that. So yeah, there's always a little bit of guilt, but if you look at who LeBron is now, the numbers are absurd historically, but I felt like he slowed a bit

in January, but there's still some good numbers in there. He's played 44 of 50 games, which is incredible because he usually misses a pretty good chunk of every season going all the way back to his last full season where he played 82 with Cleveland, 17 and 18. You go 18, 19 on, you're like, okay, he's always going to miss some time. So now if he's playing a full slate now and these games early where it felt like Ham was just desperate to win some of these games and he's playing all these big minutes, you wonder what you're even getting with him in the playoffs or if the new team would actually have to shut him down. But it just never made any sense from a LeBron standpoint. Would he actually demand a trade? I think he likes being able to say that he's never done that, that he only left through free agency and he wasn't

somebody that was going to sabotage his own team, at least mid-season. I also would laugh if the Lakers ever did trade him. And then you'd have Jordan guys going, well, Jordan never got traded. So, all right, finally, the conversation is over. But there's also a part of this where the Lakers pride themselves on the way they treat stars. When they gave Kobe the extension that really didn't make any basketball sense when they gave it to him, their talking point was very specific. Hey, we want stars to know that the Lakers take care of them. And that's why they did the Kobe deal. Could they ever look at LeBron and say, do you want to be traded?

Him say no and saying, sorry. That's not really been their MO. That would kind of go against everything they've done. But if we're talking about ownership that who know down the road, if it's transitional and they say, we need to do something a little bit different. Okay, fine. But then you have to ask yourself realistically, what are you getting for somebody with a player option this summer in sending him to a place he might not even want to be. Last thing I want to talk about my interaction with the NBA officials on Twitter. I watched a play the other night. It was Philly at Golden State. Pat Bev comes around

a screen. Steph goes under, tries to stay parallel with Pat Bev. Pat Bev initiates the contact into his hip, gets the shot up, and gets the free throw. Stan Van Gundy on the call called it a good call. My feeling is after seeing so many offensive players initiate contact, more so this season than any season before, that I don't think this is a good call. The rules have me, but I've read it. There's talk of head in front of torso and all these kinds of things. There's also another thing that's more egregious than the clip that I even use where I'm just seeing it more and more where if a player drives parallel to the paint, you can't really square up in front of

him because then you'd be giving him the paint, but they're driving not on a straight line to the rim. They're driving parallel to the paint. So they're not actually like going A to B to the rim and then you get on their side and then it's very easy for your position defensively to be compromised. Okay. So I've seen it over and over and over again. And I clipped it just, I wasn't going to say, hey, here's a bad play clip. Refs are terrible because I don't feel that way. I'm talking about the evolution of certain things that I see that become more and more favorable to the offensive player. So the at official NBA refs, which is run by the union and look, they're looking out for their guys, the same way the players union looks out for players. They're

looking out for the officials. I thought their response to me, um, was dismissive and basically quote tweeted me, I think a bit to try to drag me through it for a couple of days. So they were like, quote, by rule, this is a defensive foul as Curry has turned sideways illegal and moving into the path of Beverly. The contact clearly impedes the progress of Beverly to the basket and was correctly judged as a defensive foul. Beverly is driving to the rim and by rule, this is a responsibility to the defender to be in legal guarding position. We were trained to judge the legality of the defender unless the offensive player does something over or abnormal that would trump a defender that is not in a legal guarding position. We were trained to judge the legality of the defender unless the offensive player does something over or abnormal that would trump a defender that is not in legal

guarding position. Legal guarding position, good luck with that one. And what Beverly does, he knows exactly what he's doing. I'm not a fucking idiot. All right. So I didn't love the tweet. And I went with the mad rule where I was like, if I'm mad about this in 10 minutes, I'll respond. It was chess day. I was still mad about it 10 minutes later. So I responded, I guess every rule is perfect then. Are you interested in making the game better, protecting the interpretations of the rule? This specific call puts the defender at a massive disadvantage. I watch it every night.

Drive to the side, initiate the contact, get a bad shot up attempt, two free throws. You need to adapt. Stop letting the game devolve into your crews getting tricked all night. If it makes me want to turn it off, you have a problem. You don't want to lose me. Some people took that as self-aggrandizing. That was just being honest about what my life is. I just watch a lot of hoops. There's some nights where I go, what the fuck? That was one of them. It's not that I think the NBA needs me. I've never felt like any place, no matter how good of a job I'm doing, actually needs me. I don't think anywhere I've ever worked definitely needs me. And the NBA, if I decided I don't want to watch it today,

they're probably still going to tip it off tomorrow night. So that was not the intent there, unless it was read that way. I apologize. And then I just wouldn't let it go because I was still mad. This is actually so insulting. Hey, here's the rule. Sorry. How many times did you have to explain that an offensive player jumping backwards into a trailing player was actually a foul? Why every coach looked at you like it was the dumbest thing ever. What rule was that? No response. This Twitter feed isn't always my favorite. If you remember LeBron last year in January in Boston, where he did get fouled after he traveled, tweeted, like everyone else, referees make mistakes. We made one at the end of last night's game, and that is gut-wrenching for us.

This play will weigh heavily and cause sleepless nights as we strive to be the best referees we can be. The reason I'm even sharing any of this with you is I applaud so many of you. You're like, yeah, dude, I'm not on that site. I don is I think in the, I applaud so many of you are like, yeah, dude, I'm not on that site. I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Um, good for you. I don't really like going at anybody cause it's just kind of a waste of time, you know, every now and then you might feel like doing it, but I don't know that, you know, usually the five to 10 minute rule. I'm like, yeah, I don't care. I'm not, usually the five to ten minute rule, I'm like, I don't care. I'm not going to do this.

But it was chest day, so I was super amped up and it was the middle of that. Big dumbbell numbers. And this is just an overall frustration of the pivot. Like, I think about the Zaza Petrulia Kawhi play play where Zaza gets underneath Kawhi's landing spot, intentional or not, it's terrible. Kawhi gets hurt, ruins the Spurs' chances in that series. Why are Kawhi's ankles more valuable than Cam Reddish's ankles? Now, the simple answer is, because Kawhi's ankles are worth more than Cam Reddish's ankles. But you get my point. more than Cam Reddish's ankles, but you get my point. We were so worried about protecting the offensive player on that play that the unintended consequences become now,

after 60 years of jump shooters landing perfectly fine, they've decided to land all over the place and get these calls, and then sometimes even have it turn into a flagrant just because you're trying to get out there and contest. So, you know, officiating basketball is kind of this living organism that adapts and changes. And then it's up to everybody else to kind of figure it out. But the offensive player initiating the contact and then that play specifically. Like if you go by the rule book, I know it like you've got me. But I also know what I see.

And I see somebody driving into somebody's hip. So if at any point I have the ball and the other person is at a compromised defensive position and I just make contact with them, then by rule, then that's just a foul. And there's just too much of that stuff. That wasn't cut and dry. That's why I used it. I'll finish here. And I don't know how to say this without making it feel like I'm trying to be important. And that's not the goal. And I don't know how to say this without making it feel like I'm trying to be important.

And that's not the goal. It's just that after the 24 hours of that tweet and people reaching out to me, I feel like I'm right. Now, I probably wouldn't do the monologue where I'd close and be like, hey, I heard from a ton of people and boy, am I wrong. All right, let's talk some hoops. Thanks for downloading the pod. It may not be by the rules a problem, but it is a problem. If that makes sense. Happy Super Bowl to all who celebrate from FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook.

If you're like me, Super Bowl Sunday is all about scoring the best seat on your couch, grabbing your favorite football snacks, and placing some super bets. Here's where we're at right now. FanDuel Sportsbook. Go to it. The line has moved. San Francisco is now favored by two and a half points in this one. Prop bet.

One that has no chance. You want one of those? Any player to record 506 or more passing yards is going to pay out at plus 18,000. That's a lot of yards. Any non-QB to throw a passing touchdown plus 3,500, that one almost seems like it should be. Although with Kelsey or maybe even McCaffrey, maybe there's a good stuff. I don't even know that you'd want to give up that kind of possession.

Usually that stuff kind of leads to maybe blowouts or the Philly special, which was not a blowout. So a couple of Philly special related ones there. The total is still at 47 and a half. We'll be giving out all of our picks and props on this game next week. FanDuel has so many ways for you to end the season with a W or two or maybe three. Not only can you bet on who will win the Super Bowl, but FanDuel also has bets for which players will score a touchdown,

how many points are going to be scored, and so much more. If you're new to FanDuel, join today and you'll get $2,000 in bonus bets when you win your first $5 bet. Join FanDuel.com slash Ryan, R-Y-E-N, to sign up. That's FanDuel.com slash Ryan, R-Y-E-N. Make every moment more with FanDuel, an official sports betting partner of the NFL. Must be 21 and older and present in select states. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit TheRinger.com forward slash RG. $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued is non-withdrawable. Bonus bets expire seven days after receipt.

See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Always enjoy having him on from ESPN NFL Vet. He has his own podcast three days a week. It's Dominique Foxworth of The Dominique Foxworth Show. What's up, man? What's up, buddy? How you been? I'm good. I want to talk some football to start, which would make sense with the Super Bowl coming up here. We spent a lot of time trying to figure out the right thing to say about Mahomes, and it just feels like all of it's fair. It's incredible that this team with this offense at some point,

you're like, can they find a way to get back in here? Now you feel like you never, ever want to pick against him. What do you have left to say about Mahomes that feels unique, that feels worth sharing? I mean, his body is a little bit disappointing. I feel like we're still – that's the most – we found a flaw. One flaw is my man is not doing too much cardio. A lot of flexibility i guess to

make sure he stays healthy but he he don't seem like he loves the treadmill his dad his mom like i don't know where it came from genetically because they look pretty fit like his dad looked like he could still he got a couple innings left in his body how about his dad it's the best. He's the best, man. He is the best. I think there was a lot about his dad. And I feel like the more you like that family, I feel like it's a pretty extended family. And I thought watching quarterback, these documentaries can make you believe or think anything. That one did wonders for me for how much I like Patrick Mahomes. Because I think prior to this year, we thought of Patrick Mahomes as kind of the like perfect quarterback, always says the right things, does the right things, makes everyone happy, never gets in trouble. And then we watched that and he says things like, you know, woke up the wrong motherfucker. Stuff like that reminds me that Patrick Mahomes is the son of an athlete.

And Patrick Mahomes, when he said, I think he was talking about Rasheed Rice, said he's from Texas, so I know he got that dog in him. I forget that Patrick Mahomes behaves like a quarterback in front of the camera, but he's kind of an asshole in some ways, which you need to be. Yeah, that's a good point. When I saw the shirts off pic and there was a little Dunlap over the belt there, I always remember Dilfer talking to me about, you know, his body and Trent's a big guy. Like he's a big framed guy. He's, he's thick. I mean,

there's just people that can even weigh the same as somebody else, but you're like, that guy just feels like he looks like he's thicker. And Dilfer's thing is like, I wanted to come in like 15 pounds overweight. I wanted to come in to camp knowing that that was just protection against getting hit all the time. And, you know, I don't know if every workout is, is the right, you know, the way working out and nutrition changes at such a fast pace, it makes you sometimes think like, so what are you trying to tell me? Like the three-year window of that being the thing was all now incredibly wrong. And now the thing that's right is probably going to be wrong in like three years. I am in favor of thick quarterbacks at the midsection, even in an era where they're far more protected than when Dilfer

was playing. Yeah. I mean, I think that there's a body type to optimize any style of play. And I think you would not expect josh allen to look like that with his shirt off i could guarantee you i've never seen him with his shirt off but i'm sure i could find some video josh allen doesn't have that tummy uh i'm excuse me jackson doesn't have that what's that when brady took his shirt off and it was it was the tv uh the tb12 stuff and then you're kind of like now here's what's unfair about that is that brady's entire thing was about stretching stretching stretching elongating them all these different things like i'm not i'm not taking my shirt off here to win some beach contest

but the hard part would be launching a fitness brand like here's our guy and you know man there's a reason why when you're a little kid and you're going through the magazines being like no i want to look like this dude you know there's a um i think there's something approachable if you're launching a fitness brand for regular dudes it's kind of scary if you see a guy that's super ripped you don't want to get there you don't have like i feel like it's intimidating i have to do do the workouts to get me to look like this? That's a workout that's going to kill you. You see Brady, you're like, oh, that's just a couple weekends of not drinking

and some hard working. You know, like his combine picture that we always used to bring up and laugh at, he's just a plain body guy. And I think we forget that the fat that's on top of these guys is different. I mean, it covers up what's underneath because while Mahomes' outer layer, like his paint job, looks like a regular old dude who likes to watch games and drink beer, I imagine what's happening under there,

the muscles that Mahomes has are probably significant, at least the ones that are useful to the job that he's doing. I like there was this mashup of some of his off-season training and there was one where he was rolling around, like rolling down hill but he's not going down a hill he's just rolling across the floor and he's holding a heavy chain out above his head and all I could think about was like how both of my shoulder blades would pop out if I was trying to do that because you're basically putting your body in these weird contortions while you're trying to stay rigid and strong with this thing above your head and then they mashed it up with the hit that he took against the Ravens where it could have been,

you know, when does the Niners parade start kind of hit. And yet, you know, look, he was, he was lucky, but he also felt like that's the athleticism. That's the stretchiness. That's where he is at his age as an athlete where he got hit like that and he still found a way to even try to keep the play alive and then be able to play the next one the um i was just thinking about this i remember i imagine that you were uh like me when you were a kid you probably watched the nfl films that they used to put on espn like the season um and review type things that they would have those like yearbook things i used to put on ESPN, like the season and review type things that they would have. Those like yearbook things. I used to enjoy watch those.

And after those would go off, they would put on they like advertise the world's strongest man. And the world's strongest man was I'd be excited. I was about to see the world's strongest man. I remember the first couple of times that it come on. This would be really cool. And then they would go to the world's strongest man and like show the the opening slate. And I think that I'm going to see super ripped guys they all look fat and it's like you it's just a reminder that you train for certain activities and to optimize like mahomes doesn't have to be a cornerback he doesn't have to move that way he doesn't have to have all the explosion and um athleticism coordination or coordination he needs or um agility is the word i was looking for to do those things and yeah a little bit of body fat I think does probably help out and even when you're doing

those like it's not just taking the hits but I think having that extra layer is something that all the players or all the players who play that position could certainly use okay when you're at this level and whether that's a Brady or the Manning, can we go over some of the best guys that you went up against and what that was like the week of prep? Like why you knew the rules were just different for somebody like Mahomes against the guys that were at the top of the game when you were playing? Yeah. So like Manning, Brady, I played against those guys, Rivers and Roethlisberger played against a lot of really great quarterbacks. and Roethlisberger, played against a lot of really great quarterbacks. And the thing that sucked is for my issue with Brady.

And I never beat Peyton Manning. I think played him four or five times, and my team's never beat him. Held him to like 13 points one time in Baltimore, our team did. And he was much harder to play. He was the hardest quarterback to play against for me, not including quarterbacks that could scramble. Those weren't, they weren't as hard to play with because if we lost, it wasn't my fault. I mean, that ain't my problem.

He started running, that's on y'all. That's you up front. Peyton was hard to play because Peyton's preparation was such that he knew what you were in and he would put his team in the right play. And I talked to Jeff about this a lot. They didn't have that many plays like, and everyone knows this about, about the, um, about Manning.

And I think that was part of the issue in the post season. And we see, we saw that, I think with the Cowboys this year, where they ran their same, I don't know, 10, 12 plays and Peyton didn't, they didn't install a bunch of new stuff. They come into the week and they recognize that this, that a a couple players are good for certain coverages and certain defenses. He tried a hard count to get you to show and only needed one person to show. And then he would change the play to get into the play that he wanted to get into. And that was the stressful part about him is you always felt like he was attacking just the right spot.

just the right spot. And then why I think he had some trouble, especially early in his career in the playoffs, is because then we would prepare and game plan a little bit more adventurously in anticipation for him. And I think the same thing happened to the Cowboys in that they, Dak was doing a lot of the same stuff. And then they got into the playoffs and it was like, oh, Savage knows that when you blitz in this formation,

we're going to do the double slant and hit the second one. It just snuck up on – yeah, I think it's like you're not sneaking up on anybody in that situation. And the tough thing about – I always say people ask all the time, like, who's the toughest receiver you faced? And I would name the guys that they wanted to hear. Like, obviously, Moss and T.O., and those guys are hard. But the hardest receivers to cover was the little quick ones with an accurate quarterback and that was the hell that

i felt like i was in a couple times against um against brady when deon branch was out there it's like deon branch was not gonna like run away from me but he could get just enough space and brady could hit him so like playing against dante, who was that guy who could change direction, but Trent Green wasn't as consistently accurate. So, like, it was hard as hell to stay close to Dante Hall. But you couldn't... The ball wasn't going to be in the exact right place. Whereas Deion Branch, like, it was hard to stay close to him,

but Brady was going to put it in the right spot. He had that Breeze-level accuracy. I played against Breeze a bunch, and that was just... that was just tedious and exhausting and demoralizing when you've done your job as well as you possibly can, but they still succeed. And I guess you get some of that with Moss too, but it's a lot more embarrassing when he just jumps up and takes it off your back.

But you just said something that clearly I'm aware of, but I also know that my understanding of it's incredibly limited. I've been watching this game a really, really long time, and we spend so much time on quarterbacks, and this gets back to something I'm far too repetitive about and trying to understand which quarterbacks are going to be good and which ones aren't. But you just described something I'd say 99% of us don't understand. And look, there's always the layman's terms like, oh, he called an audible and then it worked and be like, oh, that guy is so smart. But what you're talking about is a language that I don't know how any of us could ever understand it as it's happening live, watching a game, maybe a quarterback.

You know, maybe there's a quarterback on the call of the game, meaning certainly there's ex-players at other positions. game meaning certainly there's ex-players at other positions but without the coaches feeling all that kind of stuff like we're sitting here evaluating all these things without realizing perhaps the single most important part of who's good and who isn't um just because we don't even understand it and that's why I find like as much as I like the NFL I just think it's it's kind of an absurd thing that we talk about when we're far less educated on what's actually happening out there than any of the other sports it reminds me of a thought that I had. I was listening to, not your last show, the one before the one about the championship games. And I was listening to you talk about the comparison, the inevitable comparison that we're going to make between Allen and Jackson. They were in the same

draft. And for a number of reasons, as I'm sure you're aware of, and you've pointed out before, that there's more complex conversation about those two guys. And the thing that came to my mind while you were saying that is there's a, the game is so complex that there is a way to explain away any shortcomings that the player that you like has that, that makes it so it's not his responsibility. And it's so complex that there is a way to blame that player in any way you want. And, like, we want, because we're simple creatures, we want to be able to, like, this is the reason that this didn't work. We want to say Josh Allen turns it over too much.

He's not clutch enough. But actually, in the game, it's a whole bunch of other things. You want to say, and if you love Lamar or if you don't like Josh Allen, you're like, they ask too much of him or something like that. And in the Lamar game, I found myself watching the game and looking around for reasons why they could have done more to help Lamar Jackson. But I think this game was the worst one for the whole Lamar Jackson legacy conversation

because I think it's fair to have that criticism of the Greg Roman offense. But the tools that they've had and they've shown up until this season, this team had it all and had a perfect opportunity, a weakened Chiefs team at home. And all of a sudden, they stopped using the tools.

And that could be something there were obvious lamar mistakes but that could be on a number of different things but yeah it's just impossible to to um whittle all these like opinions down to one cause and effect but we like to do it but you're right though like when i'll go through stuff and i'll be like looking for something for a guy i don't like i I'll be like, hey, there's seven things that show that I'm right. And then every now and then I'll sort it again and be like, wait, he's really good at this, though. Like, wait, what's what's going on here? I mean, I'm just going to do it because if we ever had a podcast, you call it 48 hours.

So maybe we just call this segment 48 minutes. I love it. Do you think there are more white guys that are analysts that are anti Lamar? Or do you think there's more black guys that are anti that are analysts that are anti Josh Allen? I would say. I think that there's probably I'm going to disregard your questions to some degree and say that I think that there are probably more pro Lamar black guys, whereas immediately like it, because it's like, so let's be, let's be fair.

My favorite cornerback. I love it. First of all, I love that you were like, I'm not going to answer it the way you want me to, but you're basically right. No, I don't think my point is that I don't think that the,

that the black analysts are, or fans are like anti Josh Allen as much as they're like, Oh, there's Lamar. I like that. And I, let me say, I think it's human nature.

We can all pretend like it's not, but my favorite cornerback Cooper to Jean, I love him so much. He's an explosive athlete out of Iowa playing quarterback in punt returns. Bomani brought him to my attention two years ago, and I love him. And part of the reason why I love him is not just because he's an incredible athlete. He's definitely not an African. Because he's an incredible athlete is because it's different.

And I think with Lamar Jackson jackson like black quarterback now is not a unique thing like patrick mahomes is a black quarterback but we don't even talk about it because he's the best now we've gotten to some other conversation about him where we're comparing him other people like they're black quarterbacks all over the league the ravens whole quarterback room is black but we can't it by the way like just to jump it kind of feels like at least that part of it is is long been over now for a bunch of years i mean we're when you go through the list of who the best guys have been now when you start looking at like the top five i don't i don't think this is a conversation anymore so i'm just glad you said yeah i think that we are at a point where being a

being black and playing quarterback doesn't come with a stigma there is something about lamar jackson style that that does feel unique lamar jackson feels a lot more like the rest of the football players that i play with whereas it was always something different where we talk about like the ceo quarterback and that like fed into the idea why black players couldn't be quarterback. Like the way Lamar Jackson looks and talks is not like a quarterback that we've seen before. And of course, the way that he plays actually is like a pocket passer who is reluctant to scramble. But when they call design runs and they do scramble, he's incredible. And I think that

that Lamar Jackson showing up in that way and not trying to be something different is like it feels like something that needs to be protected and not stamped out. Because Lamar Jackson, as happens for minorities, is in a lot of different situations as you represent, whether you want to or not, you end up representing. Large swaths of your group. So like when you walk into a basketball gym, everybody says shooter. That's because that is what the expectation is for you because of what's around you. And you might be the most explosive athlete around, Cooper Dejean.

That doesn't stop analysts from putting that man as DB or safety, which is the dumbest shit that's happening in the pre-draft stuff where they're like, no, he's going to play safety. If he wants to play safety, by all means. But he's an incredible athlete at cornerback, and he could definitely play cornerback. So I think part of that is what draws a lot of support from black analysts and black fans. black analysts and black fans and i think the look that josh allen thing what was unusual about that is josh allen was not a good passer and not a great passer in college he was like inconsistent

he was a great athlete with all the tools and those that's the stereotype that sounds familiar yeah and so like it was unusual for us coming to the draft, like great athlete with all the tools. Oh, he's going to go high. Like that's never been the story. It was like, hey, great athlete with all the tools, struggles with accuracy, not a great decision maker. Like that's always the description that you get to the black quarterback and then the black quarterback doesn't go high. And it happens for Josh Allen. So I think that, and it sucks for Josh Allen because he came to represent something that he, I mean, he seems cool as shit.

Like he seems like a great guy, but he came to represent something that he didn't ask for and kind of sucks to be in that situation. And then he's having a rough start to his career and it felt like no one was, like when's the last time you seen a black quarterback who was a great athlete and blah, blah, all those things and then have a rough start his career.

And everyone's like, no, just be patient. And so I think a lot of us found ourselves looking around like, is this like the 1990s? What is happening? And then, and then Stepaw Dick showed up and then I shut the fuck up because he is amazing. And now I find myself on the other side where people are like, Josh Allen turns it over too much.

And I and I try to remind them tradeoffs. There are tradeoffs in life. You want a fast car? OK, well, you have to call your friend with a pickup truck when you're changing apartments. Like there's one guy in the league and his name is Patrick Mahomes. That is a Ferrari that also can be a U-Haul at the same time. So I'm not the one complaining about Josh Allen's shortcomings because I see what he does out there. And then it gets more complicated by them both getting out, getting put out of playoffs and back-to-back weeks by,

by Patrick Mahomes. And then we have the dichotomy of the reaction and back-to-back weeks, and then it feels like something much bigger than it actually is. Are you a Purdy guy? I am a Purdy guy. See, you ruined it. That would have been way funnier if you were like, yeah, I don't see it. Yeah. I'm a recent Purdy convert. Does that help? It's like the Josh Allen situation where the Purdy thing is interesting because,

and I don't want to retread stuff that I heard you talk about before, but Just go for it. Purdy is not a game manager. He never was a game manager. And I think that that characterization that Cam Newton brought up was a good one. If it wasn't for the fact that game managers and insult, because I do think that what we saw from Patrick Mahomes was him being a game

manager, which is a style of quarterback that I think is necessary sometimes, but Brock Purdy has never been that he's kind of a, a risk taker. And we see that that comes with some pros. He's a game changer. Sometimes the plays that he makes are going to change the game for him. And sometimes they're going to change against him. And it's ironic watching. I felt myself wishing that Lamar Jackson was acting more like Purdy, not just running the ball, but like, let that thing rip. So just throw it in

there and take a shot. I'm at the game, to your point about how complicated the game is, I'm at the game with my son last week. He's a Ravens fan. He named our cat Lamar. He's a big Ravens fan. And so you're talking about how we don't see, how the fans can't see all the things that are happening. So in the first half, I was watching,

I was explaining to him what the Chiefs were doing with the 4x1. And his fans around us, he barely understands. He's 11 or he'll be 11 on Super Bowl Sunday. But he barely understands the things that I'm talking about. It's like they're doing this to get them to declare. And they're also overloading their zones. Like they're doing all this stuff with the four by one. Then they go into halftime.

They come back out the very first drive. They get to third down and then they motion the back and flip uh the protection so they like motion the back or excuse me they i think they did a shift they motioned and it got the ravens to show where they were dropping to uncover their blitz then they flipped the back away from the blitz to make sure that the tackles could push that way and then i saw roquan smith yell at the nickel to switch sides and he switched the blitz over to the side of the back and i was explaining to my son like oh they must have recognized what the chiefs were doing in the first half with the four by one and the motion and the shift they did it the very first third

down they did it here he's looking at me like i don't know why don't i just get a set he doesn't want to hear all this but this goes back to the point that you're making like all this shit happened in the course of this one play and at the end of the day we're going to be like hey lamar jackson just stinks you know like lamar jackson's not good enough but all that complex all that complexity went into that play like we saw it in the super bowl last year where it's like uh if obviously hertz doesn't have that fumble they win and we feel differently about everything in philadelphia but also like if the Chiefs knew how to handle motion, essentially the last two big drives were all created by the Eagles' inability

to handle the Chiefs' motion. But, no, we come out of it with a different opinion of the quarterback because their defense couldn't figure it out. So if you want to defend your guy, give me a call. I can be your lawyer. If you want to denigrate some other guy, give me a call. I can help you figure out how to do that too. That might be a really good segment for you,

where just every week you do quarterback defense attorney. I love it. No, like wherever the tide is going on, get up and first take or whatever, and then you don't even have to believe it. You don't have to be right. You simply have to defend the client. It's a great construct. It's perfect.

Because then at the end of the day, I can say when I inevitably am wrong about something, oh, no, I was defending my client, baby. It's the job. I get paid to do a job. I got to do it. No, but think like to your point, because I've thought about this with different teams, but I don't know enough about the position.

I don't know enough about it. So I don't, I'm not even saying like, Ooh, this is too good of an, I think you should do this. I think you should have a segment where you go, I'm just going to build the case for my guy. And it might be even funnier when you don't. Oh, you don't got to sell me twice. I have a three day aweek podcast that has to go.

You gave me a segment idea? Oh, we're going to give it a run. We're going to run it into the ground until we make it work. All right. I love it. Okay, so Belichick doesn't have a gig. You're 2-0 against him in the playoffs. Did anybody call you and be like, I don't see it?

Look, I thought Atlanta was a legitimate chance because Arthur Blank would just go, hey, I don't see it. Uh, I look, I thought Atlanta was a legitimate chance. Cause Arthur blank would just go, Hey, I can introduce this guy. I've tried a bunch of different things. Um, again, if you worked for Atlanta, you were probably not like, yeah, definitely bring this guy and it's going to be awesome. Um, Dallas never made any sense. And we've gone up, by the way, I'm thrilled for Raheem Morris because I felt like it was, it was such a tough intro press conference. Like we've seen with other guys. When he first got hired, he was clearly nervous and all that stuff. And then, of course, when you're young and you fail, you fail because you're young.

When you're old and you fail, you fail because you're old. For whatever reason, middle-aged people never fail because they're middle-aged. So I'm really thrilled for him. And then I'm kind of left wondering what happens here with Belichick because he's going to want the record. The coaches still want to keep coaching. But I'm actually a little impressed with ownership around the league in that they go, hey, we've got the Internet, too. We can look up your draft record on pro football reference. Like you want to run everything?

Well, that doesn't make any sense. That was the only thing that got me to believe that he was going to get fired in the first place. It's like when you try to put yourself in Robert Kraft's shoes or I could understand where he stood. Same thing with Bill Belichick. Like if I want you six Super Bowls, you better get the hell out of my office. Talk about you going to take some power from me or whatever. But anyway, we get to this point now where he's looking, presumably looking for a job. It's a tough spot to be in when you have so much, I guess, cachet that you feel like you're interviewing them also.

Because if you remember when this process started, we kind of disregarded the last several years of his career. It was like, Bill Belichick's on the market. It was kind of like, where does he want to go? And I imagine when you show up in these buildings with the recent resume that he had, they don't view it that way. I'd give him a shot. To your point about those morning shows that I spent a lot of time on, I found myself doing the build the case for for Bill in Dallas because I don't really believe it. But we had talked about it for so many days in a row.

All right. Let me try this angle. And I started to convince myself that it made sense and that it's the only thing that could possibly work in Dallas. Because I do believe that what Jerry Jones does hurts his team. Like his desire, and he's not a dumb man. Like him constantly in the media, constantly saying things that can get him onto our shows and get pieces written about him. That's by design. I think the point is to keep his team in the news. It increases franchise value.

And he's using Dak Prescott, it feels like, again, as like a character on a reality show. And he's undercut him in such a way that it's made family members of his teammates feel like it's appropriate to take shots at him on social media. And that's not going to happen for any other team in the league. Where Bill comes into this case is I think it does create division. And he's also undercut his coach by saying that he's friends with or he's close with Bill Belichick and he could work with him. That undercuts McCarthy. Where I do think that Bill's cachet has value there is that the culture that Jerry Jones is creating is divisive and you need kind of a us versus them mentality. But right now the them is unclear.

It feels like sometimes Dak is the them. Sometimes the head coach is the them and sometimes the media is them. But I think Bill Belichick does have the ability to come in and say, who gives a shit what that crazy man is saying? This is what we're doing in here. And my six Super Bowl rings bring some credibility that other coaches in this situation could not. I don't think it's something that Bill would want to sign up for. But I do think that he's uniquely accomplished enough to do that.

And if he needs 15 more wins, that's a place where he could get them in a couple of short seasons. This is a separate coaching issue, but would you ever want to coach on an NFL staff? When I ever want to, my wife asked me that question a couple of days ago. I always said no, because I believed that.

I mean, it's all the travel and the work and all that other stuff. And the first time I started to consider it realistically is like two or three years ago when I really started getting into the all 22 stuff. And I am not a great relationship guy. So like talking to people and like coaching hand to hand stuff would not be my favorite part of the job, but I do really like the strategy behind it. Like that shit is fun, man. When you sit in there and you're watching.

So I'm sending tapes back with Mina a couple of days ago about the 49ers and just the levels of their offense, the complexity of their offense, and how it's simple to them. I'm recognizing that the reason why Purdy had such a good running game is because Christian McCaffrey is such a good receiver threat.

I'm watching this game, and the Lions are dropping back into zone, but the one person who's not dropping back in the zone is an underneath coverage player who hugs up to Christian McCaffrey on a swing route. And it's like, why are we hugging to a running back on a swing route? Oh, this is because you'd rather get there before he throws it. You don't want him to catch it. You don't want him to catch it two yards behind the line of scrimmage.

So they're hugging to these swing routes. The other linebacker on the other side is turning to face up Debo Samuels to protect against the dig. And those are the big routes that you see. It's like, get it out to Christian Quick, hit the inside breaking route to Debo. They're doing that. And then Purdy looks up and is like, oh, this whole middle is open. And you normally think man coverage is where the quarterback gets all his scrambles.

No, zone two, when the guys are scared. So they're getting crazy depth to guard against the Debo dig and they're hugging to Christian because he's so effective. And then you're like, Oh, uh, parties being such an awesome,

incredible athlete. Like, no, this is the offense. And it feels like I'm taking something away. It's a decision that he made. So he still deserves credit for it. But this is the offense. And it feels like I'm taking something away. It's a decision that he made. So he still deserves credit for it. But this is the uniqueness of their offense

and how challenging it is to take away everything. You kind of need somebody to win. Like you need a D lineman to win. You need somebody to jump a route. You need somebody to be special because there are answers to everything in their plays. It feels like Kansas City has a secondary though that's special. Yeah, McDuffie is awesome, man. I love it. And Snead's. I don't want to sound like I'm talking bad about the Chiefs

players. They have good players on defense and great players on defense. But when we're divvying up the credit pie amongst players and coaches, what Spaggs is doing over there, man, is unique. And they are smart enough to execute it. What he's doing over there was special. Like re-watching that Ravens game. There was some special stuff in there.

And again, there were windows for Lamar to run the ball that he chose not to. But I give him credit. Like the Karloff, this sack felt like a coverage sack fumble for me. A lot of those things were just, the coverages were hybrid versions. So they were playing it like cover two, but the corners were getting crazy depth and like begging Lamar to like drop it off short. And Lamar was refusing to do that for whatever reason. And I think I get that concept.

It's like, look, you're not going to beat us us unless you're not going to beat us with lamar like drew breezin all the way down the field that was kind of what they were at they were that was where they were giving them the opportunity why the ravens didn't decide to run the ball is a whole nother conversation but watching the the um the chess match of these coaches does make me like, feel like, yeah, it's kind of cool. My wife just walked in the room.

Um, Ryan asked me if I ever thought about coaching. I told him you asked me that a couple of days ago. She said, hi. Tell her I said, Hey, back.

Uh, you have a lean then on the super bowl. Do you, have you, have you decided, have you let yourself talk yourself in or out of something? I mean, man, it's Patrick, man.

I don't know. This is the laziest stuff that I've ever done. I'd be the right one. Yeah, but it's like when you watch him, it feels different, man. And the one game that he lost, he doesn't have the O-line that he needs, but he didn't have the one Super Bowl that he lost. He didn't have that O-line. This O-line's not that bad.

The tackles need some work. So that's scary with Bosa. And, I mean, Chase Young is a big name, but not all that impressive right now. But Armstead and those guys up front, they haven't been super productive, but they still, in a game, can be incredible. So that scares me. It's like if the tackles can't hold up against that pass rush, we could be looking at something different. But it's not as if Pacheco isn't running the ball well and Mahomes completely disregarded his receivers for much of last week's game, much of the season, which I wish that.

Sorry to get back into the other stuff, but I wish that the Ravens just locked the corners and said, hey, you guys got them man to man. Do not expect any help. And just the rest of the team pretended like they didn't exist. And then let the safeties come into it. Well, the Ravens' defense played well, but I was hoping they would do that on the first or start to do that on the first couple of drives. But I thought their defense played well. But I also do think that they deserve a great deal of credit.

But I also think that Mahomes was to some degree waiting for them to make him take a chance because he recognized that the only way they're going to get in this game is I'm going to wait until they beat our defense and score to get them back in this game. Or I could fumble or throw an interception. These are the only other ways they could get in the game. And he wasn't going to take those chances until they forced him to. Back to the original question. Yeah, I think I want to go with Mahomes, but that offense, man.

Purdy, yeah. It's just, at the end of the day, it comes back down to, like, who do I trust more, a quarterback? That's the thing. As much as we talk about how great the Ravens' defense was, I asked this question to Bomani the other day when I was on his show. as much as we talk about how great the Ravens defense was, I asked this question to Bomani the other day when I was on his show. As much as we talk about how great the Ravens defense was, if Patrick Mahomes got the ball down by a score with two minutes left,

do you think he would have been able to score? And it's like, I kind of feel like, yeah. And that's... Well, look, the easy answer is to say yeah, but I had done this at one point late in the regular season where that Mahomes moment, right? It's your favorite thing in the NFL.

Like, hey, he's got the ball. They actually haven't done well in those moments multiple times this season. And then we chalked it up to, okay, he just doesn't have the weapons. The offense isn't good enough. So then you're telling me, sure, we can talk about it.

It's the playoffs, ACC championship on the line. But the way that Baltimore defense played, like I know that he was not going to take a ton of risk. But I don't think you start shutting down your offense to kill the clock on the first possession of the second half. Okay, being up 10. So I'll give you the last couple possessions. But those first three, they're out there making plays. Like I'm okay with Kyle Hamilton going into the hall of fame now all right that's i can't stop talking about him because it was that absurd when you really start like you don't even need to pay attention to 14 and you noticed him okay and

if you actually did pay attention on top of everything else so yeah i i would agree with like you and bamani like in that scenario you're're going, yeah, Pat would figure it out. But yet we have multiple examples from this exact season from this team where they didn't figure it out. And they're supposed to do it against that defense. They got them to punt five straight times and then take a knee and shut them out in the second half. That's a big assumption.

I'm certainly not arguing that he shut it down. I heard you say that too. I think managing the game was something different than shutting it down. And I want I tried to this is you still got some some argument television in your blood, because what I said is like a slightly different, but it framed it. But I guess the slightest doesn't count because I did say I want them to get a lot of credit and they are great. But Patrick Mahomes wasn't taking a risk. But I think you're right. It's a great point that he hasn't been able to do it all this at all this season. But what he was doing in those first couple of drives and I don't think they shut it down. They wanted to get points. They want to have success. But I do think that there are times. And this is like the story of patrick mahomes this is

why he fell in the draft is because patrick mahomes is very sensitive to the level of risk that he needs to take and like he went late in the draft because he had a lot of turnovers because as it's been chronicled many times he thought he had to score 100 points to win at texas tech so i felt like and i guess it doesn't matter what happens. That defense is great. I just want to do a Kyle Hamilton love fest with you at some point. We need a whole show to talk about how unique a player is and how special he is. He's like Debo Samuels, except on offense. Like his, his versatility makes it so that no matter what personnel you put on the field, you're at a disadvantage offensively. Like somehow he'll go do something to put you at a disadvantage.

They'll blitz him, put him in nickel. It's a great dynamic that a lot of teams wish that they had. And it reminds me of like the conversations about positional value and something that I say all the time is like absolutes are for children and dumb people because like I tell my kids, absolutely, do not cross the street unless you're at a crosswalk and the line and the little white man is blinking on the thing. That's it. But actually I'm smart enough. I feel like I trust myself enough. Like, yeah, I'll shoot across in

the middle of the street when the light's green. And I feel that way about when we have this positional value conversation, as we see that the inside linebackers are the feel like they're, if they're special, they're very important and safetiesbackers are the feel like they're if they're special they're very important and safeties if they're special they're very important so yes by and large that average safety and the same thing is true for like running backs yeah okay don't spend a first round pick on a running back if it's christian mccaffrey though like and it could build your whole offense it makes everybody's life easier. If it's Jameer Gibbs, it makes a little bit more sense. I was wrong on the McCaffrey deal because I always thought he was hurt too.

But you brought up a good point. Do you think we can get to a place in society where the crosswalk signal is a better representation of our population? Nope, never. We'll never get there. Why the hand got to be red? It's so offensive. I think the hand should be Commander's colors. You're the best, man.

This was a lot of fun, as always. We'll do it again soon, all right? Enjoy the Super Bowl. Appreciate it, buddy. You too. FanDuel and Rob Gronkowski are back with the kick of Destiny 2 as Rob tries to redeem himself after missing last year. He'll be kicking live right before kickoff,

and fans will be able to pick up whether he will make or miss in the FanDuel Sportsbook app for their chance at a share of $10 million in bonus bets if you pick correctly. Here are the deals. That was pretty disappointing last year. I think you look at it and you're like, Gronk can't kick a 25-yarder? I'd imagine he's been working on it. He's always been meticulous with his preparation. You tell

him he can't do something, he's going to try to do it. We love to have him on the pod, recruiting stories alone. Maybe the recruiting stories are why he missed it last year. Who knows? But I can't imagine he's going to miss this thing again, right? I think I'd rather see Gronk play middle linebacker than kicker, by the way. I can't imagine how good he would have been as a D3 hoops player. Anyway, he's got 25 yards to make this one. I doubt he goes over two, but who knows? I don't know. Maybe I should, maybe you should reach out. We should try to get him on again. Head to the FanDuel Sportsbook app to make your pick now and watch the kick before kickoff live on Super Bowl Sunday. You want details? Bye. I drive a Ferrari 355 Cabriolet. What's up?

I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you could possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid. So now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Our email address is lifeadvicerr at gmail.com. We've got a couple good ones here. We'll see how many we get to Friday. You know, a little extra spice for your weekend. Say what's up. We've got an L.L. Bean, quarter zip, Saruti, full on.

Looks comfortable. I'm not knocking it. knocking it out to the northeast uh kyle though big night last night usc courtside no big deal baseline courtside but i think that's still courtside if you ask me definitely is wait i mean thanks i mean thanks to usc is what i meant to say did you walk to the seats go baseline well i see i see jesse williams over there he gets like he was like the big star of the night um uh what is that uh er jesse williams or or he was on one of those shows guy didn't even watch the game all night he's just talking with his buddies every time something cool happened look over he's like jesse's not even paid attention

so uh i paid attention though and so did Tate. Shout out to Jomie. It was a really fun night. Still got my two chains on. I'm going to have to give it back soon. But I do feel a little powered up today. What does powered up mean? I've been a one chain guy. I've never had a two chain day.

And yesterday was great. And I got to give this back. But I'm just going to wear it out until I got to give it back later today. Who do you have to give it back to? My buddy, Blade. Shout out to Blade. Christ. I will say I did because I saw like there was the Instagram.

I forget if it's the stories or posts or whatever from it last night. Most of the comments are about the two chains. Good. I'm glad. I felt as if that's what the topic should have been when did the transaction happen uh yesterday day daytime yeah yeah okay he's uh he's the he's the daytime bartender at frolic so i just swing by right when they open to grab it what a great excuse to have to go back early today damn it it's like i gotta go down there again i have to go at two today before blade

leaves sorry honey blade needs his chain is this like a test out for you potentially buying another one or you would yeah oh i'm looking i just got to really figure out i think this is his is a little longer his is the 24 inch i think i might need them a little more spaced out so maybe i'd have to go 26 even which is kind of a lot but um yeah i'm i got a them a little more spaced out so maybe i'd have to go 26 even which is kind of a lot but um yeah i'm i got a couple lines out it's an expensive you know that's got to be real so it might take a little while for me to align the funds it's good to have goals yeah all right uh let's go to this one too early for a convo on space. 6'2", 270. I work out regularly, but can seem to put the fork down. That's on me.

I play basketball once a year. And pray I don't blow out these 40-year-old Achilles tendons. But if I was pressed for a basketball comp, I'd say I resemble a past-his-prime Tyler Hansborough who thinks he can regularly hit turnaround fadeaway jump shots. Anyway, I just matched with the girl on a scheduled date for Sunday night on Tuesday. But since then, she's been texting me a lot before she goes to bed when she wakes up. And it's usually just a standard late term relationship, small talk, chit chat that has no chance of creating a real conversation. Thusly, I'm growing annoyed and disinterested.

I guess my question is, am I the asshole for feeling like this? Should there be a pre-first date buffer, or should I just shut up and give this shot like a big boy? So basically what we're talking about here is you're already asking or contemplating asking for space before you've even gone on a date with this person, which that's going to be a record. You just skipped to this part already, which that's a, that's going to be a record. You just skipped to this part already. If that goes well,

you're going to be here anyway. I'd say it doesn't matter. Right. I mean, people meet all sorts of ways now and, and it doesn't have to be like, Oh, I'm super strange.

And before we do our first day, sometimes, you know, people, I think this is, if this goes well and you end up dating, this is the exact type of shit you're going to be rolling your eyes at anyway.

So I think it's fine i think you just you skipped ahead of the game maybe other stuff will go faster too who knows you're not you're not wrong and it is definitely weird but it's not it's not like a deal i would still go on the date like i would just like you know what if it's awesome like what if she's just like a nervous texture and she's actually way cooler in person you just you never know until you find out i will say it is incredibly strange to text like that before you've even gone on it. Like if you, if you met, I mean, I don't have a ton of experience in this, but if you match on Tinder or hinge or whatever

and say, you know, it's, it's Monday, Hey, we're going out on Thursday night. Cool. And she starts texting me morning and night, like, Hey, good night. Or, you know, good morning. How's your day going? Like that's, I don't want any of that. Like we'll figure it out on Thursday. Like Thursday is the day that we have all the icebreakers. Like I don't want like there to be any foreplay before that, unless you guys are really hitting it off in the app. So I get what you're saying. It would annoy me too, but I don't think it's worth, like I would go on the date. I know you don't have a ton of experience with this, but I want to know exactly how much you've got. What? In like the Tinder space? Yeah. No yeah no tinder when i when i started dating my wife tinder was

like a big thing so i had tinder and like i went on a few tinder dates but i never got in like i was too late for hinge uh i didn't get into bumble at all and i don't even know so actually you probably had the biggest crowd then right you were like when you know people used to watch tv in the 70s right there was three channels right that's right. It was the Wild West back then. Yeah, exactly. Now everything is too specialized. It was just like a big group of people who were looking to hook up. Yep.

What's the filthiest one? Isn't it Tinder now? Isn't Tinder like the weird? That's just the hookup one. I think it's probably Tinder or, you know, back when before I met my wife, I was like, are there any other dating apps out there? And it's like there's some like new ones that are like i don't know who knows if they're even real they're probably full of bots and stuff but those some of those look pretty filthy i'll tell you that i love that tinder in the beginning hearing about it where people were just like

oh yeah apparently it's it's like a dating site but it's just understood that it's on it's just understood that it's so it's like if you're signing up for it, you've already like let the community know. Yes. Look, I'm with you guys. I think he should go on the date. I get your point. We're really fucking annoying people in general.

And I'm talking about every single one of us. You know, you're on this site to meet somebody. You've met somebody. And by the way, if she's from the Midwest, then I would say that you need to just relax and understand that this is just her being a really sweet hearted Midwestern gal. So there could be that. But, um, you know, you want someone's attention and now you're getting it and now you don't want it, which is what we all do.

It's just, it's like, what is this person a loser? Like she's actually asking me how I'm doing or she said, like, I would admit before you've even seen each other, Hey, good night. Hey, how's your morning? Usually you don't have a ton to offer. Mornings usually are pretty standard. Okay. I mean, unless you're a fireman or something like you don't have that many great things to follow up on how's your morning well it's the fucking same as the last 38 you know there's not a ton that's different so now you feel like you're providing something else i just wish everybody could be a little bit more straightforward when you think about how somebody adapts their game over time or just to the pitchers and how they're pitching you like i remember i used to toy with different things they just straight up be like hey this is on i know it you know it like what's up and sometimes

it works and when it doesn't you fail miserably like i remember one time i somebody was like hey weren't you talking to her and i was like yeah i don't know what happened and then somebody else was like i know what happened patino your full court press move of the last like summer just just like hey what's up like let's stop with the bullshit let's just get there it sounds so good when you're rehearsing it in the shower you're like she's gonna fucking crumble for this one because the time because the time it works it's like yeah why was i screwing around with like writing it out for two hours and laughing at jokes i don't think are funny or asking follow-ups that i have no interest around with like writing it out for two hours and laughing at jokes I don't think are funny or asking follow-ups that I have no interest in? Just cut to it. And for some teams,

you know, you can play that way, right? But there's going to be a lot of people like, what's the thing? So my buddy was like, yeah, he goes, I'm friends with her roommate. Like, she was like, what a loser. Like, who the fuck do you think you are? Caprio? Yeah. No field goals. lower the loser like who fucking think you are caprio yeah right so so then you're like okay now i need to adjust i have to adapt a little bit you know and so i i think about like all the different ways you have to play things and unfortunately a lot of times like you want them streamlined to like your preferences when the reality is that when you're interacting with this many different people, what works for some isn't going to work with somebody else.

And so, you know, that's not apples to apples to exactly necessarily what you're dealing with, but you know, you do want to meet somebody. You do want attention. You're getting too much of it, but I think it'd be way too early unless you have all of these other options that you're just like, hey, this is more annoying than the other options, then fine, keep it moving. But I wouldn't, maybe this person is just a really, really sweet person. Maybe this is her version of the Patino full court press, where I want this person to know that I'm interested. I'm going to ask them how they're doing. I'm going to ask them about their day instead of being super fucking cool and pretending you didn't.

Oh, I totally forgot. We even talked. Oh, who are you again? You know, where you're like, you're trying to be T and swingers. So again, just be nicer. Yeah. There, there could be a day too, where, you know, hopefully it doesn't happen to you, but you know, maybe you're down in your luck and you're like, man, I really missed that. That girl just sent me a good morning text. Somebody would ask me what I'm doing right now. Pick me up every day, you know? So, you know, they'll take it for granted. Yeah. Right. Good dudes. Listen to this pod right now. Love. They want to know her handle. All right. Uh, send a coworker flowers for Valentine's day. Question mark.

First time, long time five five 150 no athlete comp but weights and cardio daily kind of a poor man's obviously shorter jake gyllenhaal whoa gyllenhaal by the way in the news uh recently a lot of people tagging you and me in that buddy a lot of people tagging us let me bring it up um yeah please do hold on hold on i don't even know what we're talking about i didn't click anything. Did he like open a towel or something? Is that what this is about? No. Hold on.

I had a bunch of people. Let me just go. Let me just start. We don't have a salt burn situation here, do we? No. I don't think it was that weird, but I guess it was. I don't think anyone's ever been that weird. There was some movie thing where it was like an indie movie or something,

and it sounded like he was like trying to get fired essentially where he was like talking in like a pepe lepew voice to everybody and it was like there was like it was filmed by the ocean he's like when i see the sea i have to go in the sea so he would just like jump in the water randomly even though it was cold out and it was like this all-around weird thing and i think they just like stopped production of the movie because he was a weirdo i can relate to wanting to jump in the ocean no matter what i signed up on that one i knew you were gonna say that we were just talking about different approaches with women you go pepe lepew has anybody ever tried that just go out all night and be like hey guys i'm gonna talk like pepe lepew all night that guy's never that guy's more happier than for a statue of limitations than pepe lepew

i actually have a a friend of a friend who they are now married to who when they first met the guy was doing a fake australian accent and like the next date he didn't have an australian accent and she's like what the hell i thought i was dating this like australian dude what the hell is going on and he was just he was just fucking with her and they're married now it's incredible they have two have two kids. Big swings, dude. Big swings. Yeah. Here are the details. Here are the details.

The movie, it was an indie movie called Suddenly. That's a true story? That's an actual, that's a true story. What did she say? She wasn't like, what a psychopath?

He must be good looking. Yeah, he's a good looking dude. But yeah. Do you think you needed to add the Aussie accent to that, to a good looking dude? I don't know.

I don't know them super, super well, but yeah. American girls love the accent. I know. They do. And I think she was disappointed, but he was able to overcome that. But here's the deal. So the movie was called Suddenly. He was stripping into his underwear and diving into the freezing cold ocean, saying, quote,

When I see the sea, I swim in the sea. He had constant script rewrite demands. He was doing the rehearsal in a Pepe Le Pew-like accent, and he was saying the set builders should sleep in their cars to prevent COVID spreads. So, not a great look for our guy,

but everybody has a bad day or two. It's alright. I was with him until the last part. The new Roadhouse trailer was sick though, so there you go. Yeah, aren't we supposed to get him on? We're trying. The ask is out, but he's a busy guy you know can't wait till that to get him on so rudy pops on the zoom after after you guys are done it's fine i'll be fine i've already met him you've met him a couple times his hair was incredible yeah

no we had a great that was he's he was like legitimately the coolest dude i've ever met so that's why i like him wait you told him his hair was awesome well it was it was right I've told this story it was before that it was before the movie Southpaw came out and I actually liked that movie it was a great movie and he he had a bun but he shaved his head he basically like did the you know the military just like buzz cut for for the movie and I asked him like hey was that like a bummer to cut your hair off he's like he gave me a genuine like yes it was like I do miss I did miss my hair before you dude too much of a pain in the ass to grow it out and i i think i had i think i had the bun at the time maybe or i was growing it so like we we connected

we had you know i was again i was thinking about asking if you want to get beers in west hartford but i didn't he made you feel like he would have said maybe he did yeah yeah he did yeah now there are plenty of guys that have done that i know i I'm falling for a trap here, but listen, he had me going. Yeah, he dominated that day. He came by and guys are like, can we just go to commercial break after the next segment? Recap. Okay, all right. So anyway, this guy wants to send flowers to a coworker. Kind of seems like a coworker and I have some chemistry. I say that based on our overall vibe and partly because it seems like she goes out of her way to greet me with a hug when we're both in office and has stated she wants to spend time together. The latter hasn't happened because of her late hours and some personal stuff. Nothing crazy.

Neither of us is the other's boss, so no issues there. In fact, we are only in the same department, but totally different divisions, i.e. practically speaking, we don't really work together. If you need backstory, I struck up talk by asking her how she preferred her name to be pronounced. Eventually started chatting on the work's chat platform, and she eventually gave me her number. So there is some texting. I'm always careful about what I put on the work platform. Side note, she once said I remind her of a young Dennis Reynolds from Always Sunny and insisted it was confident. I could go a lot of ways. Dennis was kind of the worst but also which letter in the

system are you on right now dude yeah that's right yeah i know she is in a relationship so i'm thinking of sending flowers not the traditional dozen roses to her at the office on valentine's day don't know her home address it's a hybrid schedule and i won't be in the office that day thinking the card could have a message more on the friendly side. I hope you like these. And I probably wouldn't put my name on it just in case coworkers get a look. I'm not looking to make this a totally romantic gesture, but just something to make her smile and let her know I'm thinking about her. The decision makes me think of how Cerruti says, shoot or shoot. I don't know about this one, dude.

Only on Valentine's Day. Yeah. My only concerns are that doing so could make things weird if I'm totally wrong in the chemistry. Maybe she's just really sweet and people gossiping about her in the office. I'm going to say no. No. Find an address and don't. Because if it comes back on you, even if she's into you, it sounds like she might be into you a little bit.

So I'm saying, you know, keep on that trail, right? Follow the tracks. But there's just a, there's a lot of opportunity for this to go wrong, even if she's interested in you and that somebody from work finds out, or somebody is like, who sent you the flowers? And then she tells them, or she doesn't want to tell them. And now there's a secret admirer. Right. Then she feels like she's being sketchy, you know? And then the next thing, Toby sent out a memo. So I think there's a better way to do this and express that you're interested where I know you may not want to say like, hey, what's your home address? But if you're already texting or whatever, and you feel like it's pretty good, it might be as simple as being like, hey, can I get

a mailing address for you? I wanted to do something. And maybe that takes the surprise element out of it, but there's far less risk of what, I'm not saying all of these things could happen. Maybe none of it happens. Maybe it's great. She knows it's you and it's cool. And you have an awesome little follow-up. I just think risk reward here at the workplace and just things you might not even be factoring in as consequences are not worth this transaction. Yeah. The lover's holiday is your first gesture. Why does it have to be this? Why does it have to be Valentine's day? I guess I know like maybe some people will be getting stuff like Phyllis in the office or whatever, and you don't want her to be Pam, but like, I don't know. I just

don't know why this is the time when you have to like, everyone else's like antennas are up for you to be doing something. You're like, well, I don't really want people to know. And you're going to send flowers anonymously with some version of hope you like these. It just sounds like this is, this is not the way that you should go about this. Maybe, I mean, Christmas would have been a better one. I know that's past, but if you like, that would have been a less charged holiday. If you wanted to just like, this is your first step, right? You've been texting and you've got some jokes maybe that are sexually charged about Dennis Reynolds.

I don't know. But like, other than that, like, you don't like, this is the first thing. This is the first thing that happens is you send flowers on Valentine. I just think,

I don't know. I don't think that's that. I don't think that's the thing that's wrong here. I think the problem is you're just putting on like a live version of a reality show, a dating reality show in front of all your other coworkers. And yeah, it might go great. It's the first thing in front of all these people, too. Like, it's yeah, a way better way.

It's uncomfortable. It's it's it's uncomfortable for it might make her uncomfortable. Even if she likes you, it might make her uncomfortable. She might not want that. So can you just like, can you just ask her out? Like, and then, and then bring flowers. Yeah. Right. So,

yeah, I don't, I don't know. I wouldn't do it. I do like shooting your shot. Like clearly there's something here. So try it, go for it.

But not in that, not in that way. Yeah. If you wanted to feel something on Valentine's be like, Hey, you want to go get Chinese food tonight? It's Valentine's day. I'm not doing anything.

Like we're not going to a prefix menu, obviously, but like, I don't know, maybe, maybe there's something like that. If you want her to know on Valentine's day. I'm not doing anything like we're not going to a prefix menu, obviously, but like, I don't know, maybe, maybe there's something like that. If you want her to know on Valentine's day that you like her, I just don't think you do this thing where like, Ooh, what's that? Who's that from? Like, maybe you don't, maybe that's not the way, especially if you're not, you're not, no one's, it doesn't say who it's from. So then you're going to text her like, by the way, those are for me. I just don't think you've thought this out.

Yeah. When are you going to tell her? It's all going to drive her like, by the way, those are for me. I just don't think you've thought this out. Yeah. When are you going to tell her? It's all going to drive her crazy. She might call the florist and then they're like, okay, here's the credit card on file. And she could be with a coat. Like it could be not like going around, you know, these corporate things like this could be a big day for everybody at the office. Yeah. That's an episode.

That's an episode. Okay. We got a lot of Valentine's stuff. Like hey what should i do is this wrong i'm just telling you ahead of time if you don't go out to eat i used to love bartending at it i mean this year i invited somebody to tool and the guy's like you do know i'm married right i was like oh is that valentine's day yeah he's like so you're gonna go to tool on valentine's day i was like spend it with who you love you know well yeah again this is the story of you calling me about doc rivers magic rumors on valentine's day so didn't even know oh you go to crypto my uh my sisters or my wife's sisters coming in on valentine's day and i was like oh we'll do sports or something all all there is during the time that she's here is two tool shows and some PBR beer fest or whatever the hell that is.

I don't think I can get people into that. Yeah, I don't think I can get the whole crew on board for that one. I don't know if that was intentional because that sounds like the most single dude's activity of all time. They're like, okay, we're going to put a tool and PBR fest on Valentine's Day. Yeah, I don't know. I didn't even think about it. about it i was like hey are you free the 14th and he was like no oh no he was really nice about it but i do like going out to dinner for valentine's day though i don't i don't think that's that big i don't love a prefix menu i don't know i always feel like it's not exactly if you're by yourself if you're solo at the bar

right like i'm just telling you oh yeah if you're solo at the bar right like i'm just telling you oh yeah if you're not you're not gonna like i don't i'm immune to it all right but i thought you guys i thought you meant like don't if you're looking if you have a date like don't take her out to dinner on valentine's no you have because i'll do that yeah but you're just gonna be a planner you'd be a planner all right uh let's uh we'll table a couple of... We still have time before Valentine's Day, so we can table a couple of these. Did I ruin the birthday night or was I betrayed? What's up? Used to not like Ryan years ago. I didn't love myself 20 years ago. So now love the pod and feel like I was wrong about him the entire time. I don't know. You could still be right. 5'11", 235. Bench, four reps is 265. Deadlifts, 385. Squats, 365. Basketball comp,

end of career dream on green. My lady and I were recently out to eat and drink for a step sister's birthday dinner with her friends who, other than the husband, I would not consider friends, but are people I've become acquainted with over the years. A party at 10 on Saturday nights, a tough ask in the city, but I went early to the restaurant, bar, casual place, live music, nothing fancy to put our name on the wait list and grab some drinks from the bar. Get there at six, about an hour wait, no big deal. 6.30, everybody in the parties arrive. 6.45, I ask the hostess for an update. They're running behind, maybe another 45 minutes, no big deal. 7.15, everyone is hungry. I politely check check in they're working on it saturday night what can you do somebody sometime between 7 30 8 30 a large group of college kids are walking with the hostess to a large table to be seated what this can't be

i walk up a little less politely to the hostess ask for an update and say i know i was ahead of that group she even less politely and in serious per my last email vibes says no sweetie here is where your name is and this was where their name is however she pointed at my name they stole our table she's horrified when i tell her which triggers her memory of me coming up a couple times prior however fate had a table coming open almost immediately right next to the group that just stole our table as we get sat i cannot help myself i said to the guys at the table, I just want y'all to know that was pretty fucked up taking our table. Nothing too serious, but voice my frustration. At least one of them to feel some shame over what they did. My lover calls them and their

ladies at the table trash. Wow. It escalates. How does someone steal your table? I know. I'll let you finish, but I'm confused. Have you seen some of these Instagram videos from these fucking alpha bros just basically saying, just kick down the doors and take what you want? You know? You've got a whole generation of dudes. Well, I guess if he tricked the hostess but that's on her by saying i know that guy's name like let me just see which one i don't know i'll let you finish but i'm confused as to

how it's uh he did describe his his girlfriend is my lover is that normal that's not normal i love it i think it's passionate this This is a passionate guy. So let's keep reading. One guy, one little guy stands up. Damn. I loudly tell him we can go outside. The girls are arguing. Parentheses, eight known fist fights, by the way. Always throw the first punch.

Listen to a lot of G unit growing up. Word toyle oh no wonder you didn't like me like that guy you're keeping a record of your fights like yeah you don't like me um eventually a manager walks over we fill him in on the situation he asks if everything is good now we say sure someone in my groups a group asks if they're going to do anything to make up for it he says no and then asks if we want to order anything at this point i'm seeing red from looking at the table next to me and the manager not really caring about the situation i say that i'm not spending a dollar in that place and we're all leaving except no one else in the party not even my girlfriend agrees god damn it dude i don't feel bad for this guy they stay seated and don't join into my personal boycott because they're hungry and

we've been waiting two hours. I storm outside after 10 minutes of waiting and pacing and multiple texts and phone calls. I walk back in and begrudgingly rejoin my stepsister's birthday party. What should I have done? Stayed outside in the cold by myself for an hour and made the night about me. Should they have had my back? I'm not going to lie. It felt pretty humiliating walking back in. I didn't let it ruin my night, but I was a little standoffish towards everyone else for about an hour afterwards. Would love your thoughts. Hey man, I get it. I've been you. I had an altercation at the Ralph's grocery store here the other day. Pretty standard. And I had two items. I was going to my boat and BD and was like, let me grab a couple. NBD, and was like, let me grab a couple.

Yeah, right? I was like, let me grab a couple bottled waters right to the side of the entrance of the free checkout line. There was two lines that were open. It was very slow. There was somebody in one, and then the other one was wide open and empty. And just as I have, again, two items in my hands, I go, let me grab two bottled waters before I check out. And as I lean to my right, perhaps I was in illegal guarding position,

but a woman and her mother, so maybe seventies and then forties or fifties, uh, just darts right past me, cuts in front of me, and then puts her stuff on the belt. And I'm like, okay. Obviously, this is a very egregious thing that she just did. So what am I going to do? I'm like, I'm just not in the mood. I'm getting on the boat. Who cares?

And she puts down a divider among her two, like all of her booty. I was like, oh, wait. So now I'm done i go so what do we got we got two transactions on this one we got multiple transactions and she turns and looks at me goes you were over there you were over there to the side it's like no no you're saying that because you knew what you did was right and she's like you were over there you were over the line was open you were over and she's like ready like whoever she is this is her world yeah and i was gonna get mad and then i looked at her in a stern voice but said no you're right you're right you're right i'm wrong oh yes

and then just stood there yeah and then she wouldn't let it go because she wouldn't let it go because actually she knew she was wrong. So I'm with our emailer here. And what happened to you is way worse than what happened to me. But everybody was hungry, man. Everybody was hungry. They're adults. It's the city. It's cold. Then to join the boycott, which wasn't wrong by you. It just wasn't convenient. Yeah, but also maybe most importantly, it's not your birthday. Like, it's kind of you just kind of have to default. What does the birthday person want to do?

And like, yeah, I know it sucks, but I was back to the table. And I'm not like the birthday guy. You know, I don't even give it. I don't give a shit about my own birthday. It's your birthday week, bro. But you kind of have to default to what the birthday girl wants to do. Sorry.

Can you imagine how mad you would be? I'm on his side. Me too. You probably have to go back inside and eat. You can't protest on somebody else's birthday. You can't make it. It's like making a scene at somebody else's like wedding. Like,

it's not your thing, dude. Like, it's not your thing to take away or give. I don't think it's a wedding, but I don't think so either. Can you just catch me up on this one thing? And so it's not,

it's not this. I was grabbing two waters. The fist fight G unit guy. It's not. So it's not the case that he and his lover ruined the night. It's not the case. His love, because he's, So it's not the case that he and his lover ruined the night. It's not the case. Because he somehow thinks that a group of college guys tricked some hostess that's busy into giving them the table.

And then instead of being upset at the hostess for some mix-up, when it's all names and lists and times, right? Somehow these guys just walked in and they tricked some guy. And then you go to another group of aggro dudes while you're at a like a family birthday thing you're like hey just so you know that was pretty fucked up what you did and then you're and then your lovers over there gonna like trap those trash bitches over there sorry for cursing it's like it's like so it's not your fault it's not you guys who finally got sat down and you know there was some weird mix-up but sometimes you charge it to the game you're mad at the guys who got sat when maybe they didn't even do anything like i don't understand

it sounds like they did something though based on the way the hostess reacted or maybe to your point okay maybe that's the unknown here teach me how to trick a hostess then i don't know how the fuck they did that that's impressive how do you would you do it would you trick a hostess knowing you're jamming up another table would you point to someone else's name years ago i would have no no not not anymore years ago i would have that would have been a huge win for me i probably would have told somebody about it the next day but i love i don't know when we answer stuff with years ago i would have and i know i've done it a lot and i'd like to think it's true but it's also sometimes just a lie it's just the best way of saying no but it's not true i look being mad sucks okay and credit to you know all the namaste people out there that apparently never get mad about anything

and you can talk about it being a waste of energy some could even say like hey why would you even say anything to the lady of the checkout line for me because i wanted to because you know what i'm sick of i'm sick of people being mad and never saying anything when they're right. It's a solo situation and you're getting railroaded and you know whose fault it was. I just, I find like it's not cut and dry. Do you think he should have said nothing

and just been mad for two hours? I love that he said something. You say it to the group though? You say it to the group? Like what do they have to do? Like what do they have to do with it? That part is unclear to me. Like you haven't told me they pulled off like the dinner heist of the century so i don't know i feel like your anger was misplaced and then i feel like your lover just got super

charged up and now she's like mad at the the girls and it's just like i think you guys like really really put a damper on this uh birthday dinner that finally got off to the races after you were waiting i don't know i'm gonna just based on the way the email is written and his anger. I think that the large party was complicit in this somehow. So you don't think totally on the unit guys sometimes has a, maybe it has a short, short temper. Uh,

I'm going to guess that he might, you know, that he has a track record. Like he knows what his record and fights is like. That's not, I'm just wondering if he knows what his record in fights is like that's not i'm just wondering if he's like tom bradying it in that conference like what did that guy say to me did he disrespect me in any way like i wonder if that's how if that's how quick if that's how short the fuse is but okay but he never tells us that the opposing group the other table is like

hey we didn't even realize right it seems like don't you think if you were being accused of something i mean granted you could just lie because you're like screw everybody else but they might have been like we didn't even know what's happening like what are you talking about it sounds like maybe they were like fuck off whatever we got the table again when you say college kids let's face it there's there's a pattern there of like we get to do whatever we want sorry boomer yeah we might not even have tried to figure out if we're in college and some guy was like hey that was wrong what you did we might not even know we might just be like yeah fuck you we don't even know what you're mad like so i don't know whatever i don't know if we're gonna get to the bottom of this one love a follow

up yeah maybe a follow-up maybe a follow-up okay that'll do it for us thanks to steve thanks to kyle thanks to wargon. Ryan Rosillo, Podcast Ringers, podcast. We'll be right back. and Kansas under agreement with Kansas Star Casino, LLC. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit fanduel.com forward slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, Vermont, and Virginia. Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 in Arizona, 1-888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org forward slash chat in Connecticut. 1-800-9-WITH-IT in Indiana. 1-800-522-4700 or visit ksgamblinghelp.com in Kansas. 1-877-770-STOP in Louisiana. Visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland.

Visit 1-800-GAMBLER.NET in West Virginia or call 1-800-522-4700 in Wyoming. Hope is here. Visit GamblingHelpLineMA.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York.