The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Kyrie’s Opt-In and John Wall to the Clippers. Plus: Arch Manning to Texas, NIL Drama, and Going Abroad with Kevin Clark

Episode Date: June 28, 2022

Russillo shares his thoughts on Kyrie Irving exercising his player option with the Brooklyn Nets, as well as reports of John Wall joining the Clippers for the 2023 season (0:30). Then Ryen is joined by Kevin Clark to discuss the F1 season after nine races, the intersection of NIL and college football, Arch Manning committing to Texas, and more (10:26). Finally, Ryen answers some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (48:05). Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Kevin Clark Producers: Kyle Crichton and Steve Ceruti Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

today's podcast we're gonna go abroad kevin clark but we're also gonna stay stateside talk nil we're gonna let him talk about the magic for a little bit i think we've probably maxed out our magic content for a little while uh and then i've got to open um on kairi irving and then life advice so enjoy today's open man i don't want to do this that much so maybe i'm going to go a little quicker again but kairi irving picked up his option for 37 million and staying with the brooklyn nets uh the deadline was tomorrow um Nets found out when we did, which is always a good feeling. And I want to kind of go back over some of the clues and what I always try to do three other teams in a sign and trade, Lakers, Knicks, and Clippers. It's like, yeah, sure, the Lakers would trade Russell Westbrook for Kyrie Irving because even if you think Westbrook at his worst wants to get out there and play in games, from a basketball fit, Kyrie's a much better basketball fit because Westbrook's one of the worst off the ball. Like high usage players, you know, a guy that plays a lot, has a certain stature in the league off the ball.

He's probably the worst that I've ever seen. So from a basketball standpoint, it made sense, even if Kyrie, as we've said a million times, the pursuit of him, did you ever have anybody in the room that goes, wait, what are we doing? Are we sure that we want to do this? So before Kyrie picked up the option yesterday, one week later, Jake Fisher had Bleacher Report,

had this story going around that Kyrie was willing to decline the $37 million option and play at the $6 million tax exemption for the Lakers. Now, when I saw that, I know my rule on this. There's no way I would have ever believed that if it was any other single player in basketball. But with Kyrie, you never quite know. So I allowed myself to go, well, you know, I wouldn't, I would not, I will not allow myself to be surprised by this, despite the fact that anybody else did it. I'd be like, no way, no way. I read the article and immediately dismiss it. And then I thought, okay, well, what if he doesn't decline the option and picks it up?

What does that mean about this story? Like, was this back-to-back Mondays where we had information being given to, you know, people who are in the information sharing business? It's how they're paying the bills and putting food on the table, which I totally understand. But when you report that, do you feel like I had this information correct

or was somebody trying to use me a week later trying to create a whole nother leverage story to get the Nets to do something that they don't want to do? And whatever it was, the Nets stared down two different days of information that ended up probably not being all that accurate. Because then why did Kyrie, if Kyrie was thinking about it, was it just as simple as like, Hey,

I may be different. I'm not that different. Although he did tweet out stuff. He had some social media stuff that was just, man, he had something like, yeah, you know, doing the path that's different. Is it for everybody? I'm like, no, I actually think it's pretty normal to opt into 37 million when you have one year left on it. And when that story got out, like I said, the Nets found out about it on social media, just like the rest of us did. There was some interesting wording that Kyrie would now, quote, fulfill his four-year commitment to the Nets and Kevin Durant. But here's the other part of this.

Do we know? Is there any part of this story where we find out that this completely changes again? I'm open to anything. I'm open to all possibilities uh when it comes to this and even if he does pick up the option which is reported yesterday and kairi is coming back to the nets there's still a lot of time before the start of the season right so i don't i don't know what any of this means um i don't know what it means for kevin durant where all of a sudden there was these weird phoenix rumors that were picking up a bunch of steam

yesterday and again i don't know if that's just Kevin Durant, where all of a sudden there was these weird Phoenix rumors that were picking up a bunch of steam yesterday. And again, I don't know if that's just stuff that was shared from somebody. Cause like, here's a really good lesson in information being shared. When I was at the NBA combine in Chicago, right? Week of the lottery. I do the lottery show with Bill and Kevin and everybody. And then you show up to Chicago and you're bullshitting with all the other people who do this for a living. This is their job. They work in the NBA and this isn't just thousands and thousands of fans this is a select number of maybe a couple hundred people that are in this gymnasium watching these combine and everybody was like it's jabari smith to orlando magic and i normally would go oh yeah

maybe yeah i guess so and then it was like no no it's done it's done deal jabari smith i'm like all right okay and that's what everybody kept saying. Hey, word, any other piece of information that I would read, like word from the, you know, the combine or land of magic's already zeroed in on Jabari Smith, Jabari Smith, their guy, all these different reasons. But I'll always kind of wonder, like, is anyone saying anything specific about why it's Jabari Smith? This thing that's just accepted as true six weeks out from when the decision actually

has to be made. And also kind of going back to like how information moves and how it works. Like, do we know that this is true or do we just think it's a room of 200 people that are all repeating everybody else? Because I never heard anything specific. I'd be like, well, what do you think specifically about that? Like, ah, it's kind of what everybody's saying. And then guess what? It wasn't. I think Jabari was third, by the way, in that race for the number one pick. So everyone just kept repeating everybody else and nobody really knew. So it's always, I think that should be a good reminder,

not to go around being like everybody's wrong about everything all the time, because that's not. And I'm not even saying the two reporters here are necessarily wrong. I just think that there were stories that were dropped in back-to-back weeks that were kind of thrown out there to see if any leverage could be created. And apparently the Nets didn't want to give in to this, even though I don't know, as Windhorse was saying yesterday, do we ever think that this Kyrie story is necessarily done?

I can't imagine where Katie's head is at with all this. I would love to know what those conversations are like between the two of them. But I always kind of land on this one with Kyrie is that after I listened to the Kevin Durant podcast where Durant wasn't on it, but it was Kyrie for like 30 minutes. And I did mention this once before, like I went and listened to it and thought,

you know, let me listen to this and just see if there's something that I just don't understand. And I think the thing I didn't understand is I think Kyi loves the attention of how it's like all these people are out to get him and i don't think people are actually out to get him i just think they think he's awesome at basketball wish he played more and his opinions on thing are just fucking weird man so i think it's pretty simple like he even

had a thing where he went back at barstool that made zero sense the barstool showed the joker meme the hospital's blowing up behind him and they were like kairi irving leaving every franchise he's ever been with right i'm paraphrasing a little bit but that's general and kairi responded to it it was like nba champion and gold medalist kairi irving it's like, wait a minute, which part are you correcting? The first part, but not the second part. And then he did what is very classic. And it happens a lot when people are sort of in arguments in the public figure space where it's like, you know, you continue to make money off of me, my name and the backs of others. You know, I've had that thrown at me a lot over the years. Well, if it weren't for basketball, you know how I feel about that? If it weren't for basketball, I'd do something else and be successful.

I'm not trying to be insensitive about it, but this idea, I wouldn't be under a bridge wondering where it all went wrong if there was zero basketball. I'd figure something else out. So yes, I get paid talking about athletes all the time, but I think it's one of the most insulting things you can say to somebody that makes money in a certain business where it's like, if it weren't for this, well, if it weren't for this, what? Then I would do something else. I would get a different job because that's how life fucking works. All right, John Wall.

Clippers. If this goes through, I like it. And here's what's crazy about that. He's, in the past five years, missed 41, 50 50, 82, 32 and 82 games. So that's 287 games. It looks like he could have played last year. Looked like Houston wasn't interested. That buyout number kind of came in where I thought it would be. We referenced it on Sunday. So if he makes up the 7 million that he's not going to get paid, he was at 47 million, looks at the buyouts. If we think that's true, around $40 million. And even him missing all of those games,

31, 32, I think, before the season starts this year, I kind of like it for the Clippers. I would take a chance on it. You're going to spend $7 million way worse with different players. And I always feel like as bad as Wall's rep is, there were some really high level moments unfortunately probably like five years ago i do think that 2017 he was he was flirting with like being a really

special player in this league and it has not worked out multiple injuries and then just a houston franchise that wasn't even interested in having him out there uh clearly there was no trade market for him the expiring contract is too much because you would have to you know what contract would be out there you'd be like all, all right, I'll take on Walt 47. We're taking the entire year off. We have multiple contracts with multiple years. I mean, it just, you know, it didn't make a ton of sense.

But for the Clippers on the one year, see how it goes. Very limited money. Houston's paying most of the tab. If that ends up happening, I think it's a great move. Seré feliz, seré sano. Golazo, golazo, golazo! Continued economic responsibility demands restraint in government expenditure.

And last year we achieved the largest ever recorded reduction in the budget deficit, 1.5 billion. We're going abroad and then we're coming back home with Kevin Clark here. We haven't really had a great chance to do this. He's the host of a lot of our NFL stuff and also the F1 show here on Ringer. We're nine races in, Kevin. 12 to go, so still a lot of work to do. Max is 46 points up in the lead.

Red Bull's got the one in two spots. What to you has been the story of the season thus far? The top? It always is. I mean, the up one is a top-heavy sport. Silverstone, which is this weekend in England, is usually a turning point on the calendar. Kind of officially announces we're in the summer. If things are going to heat up, it heats up around now.

Certainly had it last year. The storyline to me is whether or not Ferrari can figure anything out. So just a quick refresher. Biggest regulation changes in 40 years, something like that, depending on which tech guy you ask. Ferrari comes out of the gate, has a better car than everybody else. Which tech guy do you ask usually? I have my tech guys like matthew summerfield he's a great a great tech guy um everybody's got their own tech guy i'd say that and you can look in all different directions go to yeah everybody gary anderson um all right so the thing is is ferrari and this is not a new

analogy it's kind of a texas back thing. They're the most famous team. They have all this history, but they can never get out of their own way. So they come out with the best car, and then guess what happens? They can't get out of their own way. So Charles Leclerc, who looks like he was going to win the championship after three races, he goes one, two, and one after three races. In two of his last four races, he's retired due to car trouble. In Monaco, there was a strategy error with the pits. He hasn't had a podium since Miami.

That's over four races. That is four races. So Red Bull takes control. And I guess the question is right now, can Ferrari, which doesn't seem to ever be committed to changing the way they go about business, the fact that they never are very good at strategy, their unreliability problems, who knows if it's going to get fixed from week to week. Can Ferrari actually get this together? Because they have a huge advantage. And I think this is the first year of this. And there were rumors last summer, Ryan, Ferrari had figured something out. They were going to have a really good 2022. They've got the edge on these guys.

That's only going to shrink as this regulation era goes on and Mercedes figures it out and some of these other teams start to figure it out. So if Ferrari is going to make a move, it's going to happen early in this era and they've got to figure this out. And I think that Verstappen is pulling away the driver's championship right now. 175 points for Max. Leclerc is 126. Sergio Perez is 129 so if ferrari's gonna make a move it has to be now and it has to start this weekend and they've got to show everybody that it's a new ferrari now how much of the ferrari stuff too if you look at like alfa romeo where they'll have a bad sunday and then it's like oh you know we know, we're talking about Ferrari. I felt like, oh, were we too soon to anoint Haas, the comeback kids of 2022?

Because it feels more often like other seasons. You know, I've been into this almost 24 months. And, you know, you're like, you could just hear the guys on the call being like, any time now, any car that has any relationship with a ferrari engine it's just all being packaged as to this massive engine problem where it sometimes it has been but i think on one of the most recent retirements it wasn't even the engine it was it was some sort of exhaust thing uh when one of the drivers had lost it yeah and and you know you compounding that um carlos sines had some real who's's the other Ferrari driver, had some problems with driving the car and some really bad luck. He ended up on the gravel a couple of times.

He had some of those bad luck retirements. So, you know, he had a couple of nightmare qualifying sessions. So it's been kind of a rough year. Yeah, we were early in anointing them. I certainly was because, A, I didn't know how bad that they were going to get and B, Red Bull was having, Red Bull was the Ferrari of March, right? Like they were the ones

getting the retirements. They were the ones who were having some of the errors. Red Bull traditionally does everything well. The pit stops are always amazing. The strategy is always really good. Max doesn't make a ton of mistakes. And so they're always going to be in the mix to take advantage of a team that starts to falter.

And Ferrari just faltered too much. I honestly thought there was a chance that Ferrari was going to run away with this thing. But Red Bull is too competent. And Ferrari, in some cases, is too incompetent. And that's kind of what you see over a full season. That's why, yeah, we kind of crown them too early. But do that with that we do that with everybody when texas wins or notre dame wins three games in a row in september we go here we go heisman watch you know national championship watch that's just what we do with teams that i think everybody kind of wants to be good let's talk mercedes yeah um at this point you've got George Russell and fourth, who just feels like the last, you know, it's more than handful of weeks, but it's like, Oh, there goes Russell

again. There's been a couple of times where you've wondered about how they'll handle the Lewis Russell strategy, but it's very clear that it's not just a given. They're going to let Lewis pass Russell every time where it's, I've gotten a sense that Lewis has had moments where he's like, wait, you're not going to let me pass this guy after basically having Botas around for a decade. But it's strategy wise, like it's, it's not exactly the same thing, especially when you look at the points part of it. It just feels like Russell's been more competitive. I know, you know, again, Lewis has had some bad luck there too. Then Lewis talked about the porpoising thing. Now that I understand what you're talking about, watching it in slow motion and how brutal it is down the straights for some

of these cars, specifically Mercedes. And then Lewis even saying he's getting micro concussions throughout all of it. I think if you were to pay attention to it every week without looking at the standings, the standings would surprise you because it's still Mercedes. It doesn't feel like they have any chance at this,

but I think the dynamic between this driver and Russell, who've wanted and Lewis who's maybe the greatest of all time and it's not an easy transition it's not an easy transition so there's a there's a thought out there shared by a lot of people that the reason George is doing well so George Russell comes into Mercedes first year and he's not finished lower than fifth and toto wolf called him mr consistency a couple weeks ago and that that name is stuck and the thought out there ryan is that the reason george has done better than lewis in some of these races is that george has been in crap cars for for two three years using williams before this um and he no offense to williams no a little bit of offense to williams a little bit um. But he's used to grinding it out.

When was the last time Lewis had to grind out a result in any way? That's the thought out there. Some of the drivers, some of the ex-drivers have said that. Some of the guys who just know racing style say that. I don't necessarily agree with that. I think the car has been so bad and the porpoising has been so bad. And, you know, basically, Lewis said two weeks ago that he was just biting down on his teeth

and just hoping that the pain would go away and that the concussion syndrome or the concussion symptoms and all that stuff. I mean, it's serious. These guys' heads are bouncing up and down. There was a joke made when one of the guys in Miami had a basketball helmet

in Miami to pay tribute to, to heat culture. And, and Lando said, we know the Mercedes should have the basketball helmet because they just bounce up and bounce down the asphalt. And like that, like literally that's what it is.

And it's funny because Daniel Ricardo made the same comparison where he was like, it feels like the, it feels like basically what he was describing was like a point guard picking up a dribble where it's just like really low to the ground and bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce. And so that's what your head is doing over the course of two hours and obviously qualifying practice and all that stuff. So with Lewis, he said time and time again that they're in a battle to understand the car. he said time and time again that they're in a battle to understand the car and I think that there's almost some experimentation going where like

the results and the strategy from a week to week basis they're almost a little bit secondary to me right now because they're just trying to figure out what's going on so the FIA and we'll get to the porpoising I think a little bit but the FIA said they were gonna they had some stays available to put in the car to help the porpoising last week

that didn't work at all. They didn't even use it on Sunday. So I think that they're just trying to figure it out. I've heard the theory that Mercedes knows what works, and they're sticking with this design. And I think that there's some people, my tech guys, have said that the fact that they're so almost stubborn about this and not changing the ride height suggests that they think that once they figure it out, they're going to be unstoppable. But that's a huge hurdle. But the fact that they haven't made wholesale adjustments suggests that they think they're on the right track. The problem is wind tunnels can't pick this up. The Mercedes tech guys said this a bunch. You can't figure out if you're going to have porpoising until you're porpoising. So it's really hard for a

team like Mercedes. It has all the advantages in tech, all the advantages in testing, all of that stuff, except for the wind tunnel time, which is the worst team to get now. But it's a hard problem to solve because it's a new era, and it's a hard thing to gauge until you're out there when it's too late. Let's transition then for that basketball analogy, right into basketball. It's been a week now, well, not even a week,

since the Magic took Palo Banquero 1. You sound like I thought Cerruti was bummed out in the moment. I thought he slept on it, felt a little bit different. It just feels weird, the reaction to how disappointed so many people seem to be about this. And you might be leading the charge. Am I leading the charge? Um,

you and I talk, can we bring Cerruti into this? Um, I don't know. I'm, I'm actually no offense. I'm so sick of talking about the magic five things I've been on, but I just feel like it's,

it's just a complete disservice to not ask you once about it. Part of it is I'd done a lot of research on the top two guys. And so it was a bit of a whiplash. We started getting an indication. Cerruti, you and I were in the same boat right before the draft that Ben Carrow was going to be the pick. And Chet

has the higher ceiling. And that's kind of been my argument for the past couple of weeks about why Chet had to be the pick. Cerruti, we just talked offline. Like, maybe Magic fans are starting to turn on him because of indications he didn't want to be in Orlando. I don't care. If we're only going to draft guys who wanted to be in Orlando, we're going to have a real tough time. Yeah, it's fair.

I mean, I think the Chet thing to me,, like I think the initial shock value was the initial hot value is probably why I was so weird on Bill's pod. And then you and I talked like a couple hours later. And I think I had sort of like wrapped my head around

why the decision was made and I could sleep on it if they think this guy is a franchise player. Like I understand you look at Apollo and go, this is the guy that has the best chance

of being like a franchise star and a guy that is like leading your franchise. I understand the logic behind that. I could disagree with it, but I understand the logic behind that. It just took me a couple hours to understand that and fully grasp it. Honestly, I think in some ways, I understand the pick more than

even taking Jabari at one now because I just think Jabari had so many limitations. I think he would have stepped into the magic and done all right. I think you and I are realists, Kev. And I think a lot of like we aren't like the fanboys who are like always sort of brooding and just say, hey, whatever, whatever the franchise says, like we're on board with it. I think you and I are more realists in this. And that like sometimes depresses fans and fans get angry about that.

But I think that's side of being a true fan. Like you could disagree with what your franchise does and still support the decision. I was surprised the amount of Magic fans already who were like, you guys are really killing the buzz here. What's our job? Are we here to lead parades? I love that question. I love it. Were you guys buzz

killers? Are you familiar with the man, the fat guy, Ryan? Ah, no. He's like a Magic superfan and he's a fat man. My apologies. He's a fat man And he runs around the arena And he leads the parade So if you're looking for that We got the fat guy for you

Who is beloved And he can lead parades And Saruti and I will watch tape That's all That is his name The fat guy Are isn't going to be that is his back no that's not are you allowed to say that just yeah no no he hasn't he hasn't he hasn't like okay statement or anything he's still known as the fat guy okay all right my friend my friend got a uh a charge he's a lawyer

in town my friend picked up a charge one time and the fat guy was his lawyer and we were just getting ready and the whole time the guy wouldn't take the charge seriously because he was like fucking fat guy's my lawyer dude wait your friend got charged with something in orlando and yeah that guy that guy was his lawyer was his lawyer yeah and he kept telling your friend to like take it seriously and he was like i can't no i don't know if the adult mascot i don't know i don't know if the fat guy picked up on the fact that that he he was you know it felt a little surreal all right okay i think we're good we've covered driving we've covered we've covered basketball we've covered adult male mascots let's talk a little nil yeah because you are also as big on the college football part of

this as as anybody i love talking ball with you um and because you care about the u uh they're front and center so yeah jordan roshado the quarterback who actually if you look at the overall rankings you're like wait a minute what's the story with this guy the reports were that he was going to do an nil deal worth nine and a half million. Those numbers have been shot down, but I don't know what that means. Like, okay, it's only eight. It's still, you know what I mean? It's still new. So there's a lot of people that get upset about this.

It still feels like the wild, wild west. We've also heard rumors the NCAA is going to go back retroactively, which I thought was a scare tactic just because nobody really knows what's going on. The NCAA just told the schools basically to follow state legislation. And there were some states that didn't even know what the rules were that were in place. Let me also continue with this. I'll admit that when I was at ESPN Radio, when Levitard's show was rolling and then you had Sedano and another show, I always felt like there was this self like this persecution complex that miami that i would hear from miami fans all the time

but it was also because i was hearing from so many miami fans for six separate hours during the radio lineup because i would listen to every other show religiously so i think even though i like both shows and i like both guys i go, do you really think this is only about you? Like, remember the Duke-Miami game where the call was blown? And I remember both shows being like, well, of course you remember it. But I remember both shows being like, the only reason people are making this big of a deal is because it's the Hurricanes. I'm like, you know, I actually don't think that's true.

I don't think that this NIL thing is only happening because of Miami. Maybe you disagree. When Ole Miss grabbed a bunch of dudes with Hugh Freeze, everybody freaked out. We just had Saban call out Jimbo and Deion Sanders. Tennessee. And then you also have the USC part where everybody's been pissed off about every announcement that they've had now

for two plus months. I think people are still having a really hard time reacting to the idea that kids are getting millions. I'm happy for them. i don't know how real any of this shit is but i never whenever it's a miami angle i'll always feel like the miami fan base feels like it's only happening to them when there's tons of evidence that it isn't so i'm going to broaden it and not make i will i will talk about miami specifically but i agree

with you i don't think i don't think we're being unfairly singled out number one we have the loudest booster who when they signed signed a basketball player from Kansas State a couple weeks ago, he literally announced the terms, which was two years, 400. And what I'll say about this, the numbers that you're hearing for quarterbacks, most people have said are inflated by a severe degree. In the same way, imagine this, Ryan. Think about free agency numbers when they come out in the NFL. And it's always like, oh, this guy signed four years, $40 million, $10 million. And everybody's like, what? And then it comes out like an hour later, but it's actually like, you know, 12 million in the first two years and everything else is a, we'll see kind of situation. So you have that on the front end,

but there's no mechanism to check. There's no, I mean, every contract in the NFL is eventually filed with the league. It's filed, you know, there's a salary cap. And so it's free agency lies mixed with no truth telling device. Like there's no incentive for anybody to do anything other than lie. So we're going to see inflated numbers everywhere for everything. And I also think that some of the reports are coming out that some of nationally, some of these collectives are promising kids money that they currently don't have and are kind of saying, hey, we're going to have this much revenue next year and this much donations. Maybe we can get more. And those kind of things are baked in.

I would say this Jaden Rashada thing is the future in that there are so many. So the announcement comes on Sunday. By Sunday night, there's warring over the collectives, which, by the way, if I'm Billy Napier, how great is it that I lost a bunch of recruits over the weekend? A bunch of top targets of mine are going to places like Penn State and South Carolina. And on Sunday, everybody's blaming the collective. That's a pretty amazing gig, I think. And everybody's saying, well, the collective couldn't get its house in order.

At Florida. And so the NCAA is not going to go after us. They have an outgoing president. They have almost no investigative capacity anymore. And by the way, with an outgoing president and such a complete chaotic market, like with an outgoing president and no, and such a, a,

a complete chaotic market while by West, as you said, like they really want to get mired in the courts over this. Like this, Brett Kavanaugh in a,

at a pretty narrow ruling a couple of years ago, basically said like the NCAA is, should be illegal, right? Like Brett Kavanaugh,

like Sonia Sotomayor has, has ruled against the NCAA in lower courts. Like the courts are begging the NCAA to come to them and try to get help and then lose. So I don't think that there's going to be much help at that sort of level. I think you maybe have the conferences buy into some sort of thing. But I just think that this is, Ryan, we've always known about the scammers and the

useless middlemen and all the creepy people in college sports. They've existed for 100 years. And now these guys get to be front and center. And I think that's the biggest change. The dollar signs have gotten bigger. I wrote a piece a couple weeks ago. I read Barry Switzer's book, which is amazing.

And in it, he talks about how he basically wanted to retire from recruiting. And then he talked to all these other coaches, he talks about how he basically wanted to retire from recruiting. And then he talked to all these other coaches who were like, yeah, we wanted to retire because recruiting sucked too. And then at the end, Barry was like, you know, recruiting never changes. It just gets more expensive. And that's, I think, what we're seeing now. Yeah. The NCAA point is a great one because I feel like, you know, Mark Emmert, when he first

got the gig, he was very front and center. And then he realized, hey, so pretty much no matter what I do or say, I just get shit on, huh? Yeah. Maybe I'll just stop doing stuff. And I also think Bill is turning that into like almost an online war. Like nobody like that. That ruined Emmert, too. I also had this theory that I'd ask other people about.

They couldn't really give me a definitive answer because it still may not be accurate. But I even think it posted Nevin Shapiro and say, I went like, fuck it. What's the point? So like, like we try, but we don't really have the power that we want. And then as long as they didn't have to share their money, that's why this NIL thing is a free for all. And they, they didn't really necessarily have to be on the record, even though they hinted at this retroactive thing that makes zero sense um and i also think that it's a public much like you know bill and i were talking about kevin garnett coming out of the draft in high school and how mad people were and then it keeps happening and then you just become desensitized to it it's like patches on jerseys like we can't do that. Now you don't even notice it. You don't

care. You don't care. I remember signage in Fenway. You can't do that. You just do it. Then it happens. Remember how mad people were about a web on second base during baseball playoffs, or maybe just a Sunday game? Spider-Man. Yeah. I think, well, I meant Charlotte's Web promotion. So anyway so anyway the point is this is that anybody that's hysterical about even there could be times where i was anti something and then i didn't realize how quickly i'd be desensitized to the entire thing and i think that's just what this is it's just we're in the beginning part we're in the pre-desensitized part of the nil um because people just don't like younger people getting rewarded.

So I agree with that. And I also think that part of this... So I want to address a couple things you said there. So it's about the disensitized part. But the one thing I want to say is the least insightful thing I've heard during this entire debate is, well, once these guys start busting, there's going to be a market correction. If there was no chance of a bust, these guys would

go for more. Do you think that the guys who are giving... First of all, the people who are giving money in a lot of cases were already giving money when it was illegal. I have a friend who was texting me. This is not about anything in the state of Florida, any of those schools. They're texting me about this guy who's giving out cars to some of the players, and he's taking photos. And he was like, this guy's been giving out... He was like, this guy's been giving out cars for 20 years from that dealership, but now he just gets to take a photo and post it on Facebook.

And it's legal now, right? It's the same people. And they know how this works. And they were already paying guys who busted. And it's fine. I heard Bud Elliott say this a couple couple days ago like it's the the bust rate is baked into the price and you would see there's a lot there there is a almost infinite amount of guys at big schools who want to see their team win so bad and want to be the guy who went and now it's legal that if their guy scores, the guy they paid a million dollars

to scores the game winning touchdown, they want to be in the box as a bull gator or a golden cane or whatever it is and turn around and say, that's me. That's me. I did that. There is almost an infinite amount of that. And so the idea that there's going to be a market correction, I don't necessarily agree with. I mean, like Andrew Brandt made the point a couple weeks ago, and I think about it all the time where he was like, you know, agents are celebrating

this and agents are still going to pay college kids. But like agents used to say or said when this happened, like we funded college kids for the entire three years they were in school and now somebody else does it. So we only have to swoop in at the very end and give them their payment. And so it's a little bit of a different economy now. But it's just it's all flowing in a different direction. Can I just can I just add to that? I do think that there is a new money element, though, that's there, that the correction may come from the people that are new to it. They go, wait, this kid transfers. And that was always the thing, too, when you hear about somebody getting paid and then you

go, well, who gets to file a complaint when the kid goes, thanks for the money. Now I'm going to transfer. And they're both, it was two, I don't want to use the word crew, but it was two people that knew they couldn't really tell on the other one. And this one feels a little different because it's all out there, but I agree with your general point. I just think there's going to be some new money that gets burnt where that person in particular goes. Maybe this isn't the greatest plan ever.

I'd say the transfer portal thing is a harder thing to grapple with than NIL being used in recruiting. Because that's when Lane Kiffin, so there are two things that I think are sort of Rosetta Stone to this. When Lane Kiffin was talking about free agency in college football, he wasn't talking about recruiting.

He was talking about the transfer port. And when Ryan Day, a couple weeks ago, said it's going to take $13 million to keep Ohio State's roster together, he didn't mean it's going to take $13 million to get these recruits. He means like if Marvin Harrison's kid falls out and wants to stay an extra year in college, there is nothing, nothing preventing the damn University of Washington from saying, some Microsoft billionaire from saying, hey, instead of making $6 million in the NFL next year as a first round pick, why don't you make eight and play in beautiful Seattle?

There's nothing preventing that once they get to the college level. Totally legal. I think there's some rumors that maybe we saw that with an extremely notable wide receiver who went from the East Coast to the West Coast recently. So I think a lot of the NIL problems that coaches are complaining about are really just transfer portal problems masquerading as NIL problems. Yeah, no, it's a great point. are complaining about are really just transfer portal problems masquerading as NIL problems.

Yeah, no, it's a great point. But you're right about the bust part on that. There was always things that were said, and not that I'm not a reporter, but I've now traveled and done this for almost 15 years. I've heard a million stories, and it wasn't really my place to tell them because I just wasn't going to tell them anyway. but I could always kind of tell when somebody just had no fucking clue. And there's been a lot of that where it becomes these different issues that are debated and you're like, yeah, it's not really, it's not really what it was and that's not how it works. So like my all-time favorite would always be, well, now that you're paying them, you don't have to worry about these gray areas. And we're like, yeah, I don don't know the gray areas just might not be gray anymore but it's it's still the same stuff and they're still going to be middlemen and there's going to be high school

coaches and in basketball and football you know i don't know that all the money dries up for the guy who is the handler who is the middleman now it you should be asking. Yeah, you should just be asking for way more. Let's pivot this into Texas. They get Arch Manning. I have kind of an initial statement on this. Getting Arch Manning is good. All right? It's good.

And I know that he profiles as a different quarterback. He's much more athletic than his two uncles. There's a joke in there somewhere that would be like, there's a fourth. That's cooper's kid bro yeah right uh yeah yeah he was the playmaker that's what they used to call him there is a joke in there somewhere like there's a fourth brother um but because it's texas i felt like it got treated entirely differently where

it's like oh stupid te stupid Texas thinks this means something. I refuse to believe that Texas is going to continue to be this disappointing in the grand scheme of things. And it also, I think, proves once again that people buy into Sark. They just do. They spend time with him. They buy in.

We know he's had his issues in the past. But it's funny that when Texas lands the Manning kid, it's almost met with how dumb do you guys think you are that you're going to be back again? When one day it will happen, the Texas is back jokes will no longer be jokes. Well, we made a Texas is back joke, or I did earlier this podcast because of Ferrari.

Texas had one of the best offensive line classes in years last year for any school. They have Quinn Ewers already on the roster who was as good a prospect as Arch Manning was two years ago. He reclassified. But, man, they're going to break through at some point. And Arch Manning is probably, probably not

the top passer in the class this year. Malachi Nelson, Nico, some of those guys, Dante Moore. It's all in the mix. They're all in the mix. What you're getting, and the reason Arch Manning is important to me is I'm already reading about all the Texas guys who are silent commits or signed up this weekend or way

more than they were. You're buying... I know this is a weird thing to say, but go with me on this. You're getting Arch Manning to brand, and in recruiting, all that matters is perception. And here's a guy that could go anywhere in the country. I mean, he took a trip to Virginia. He was with Georgia. He was in Alabama.

And he decided to go to the University of Texas. That matters. And I think that the hype in recruiting, hype is as important as anything. The idea that the momentum started with Arch last week and will only continue. There's going to be NIL opportunities for the other guys. I'm sure Arch, if you wanted to, can cash in

on some NIL stuff, certainly once he gets into Austin. They're going to break through. They cannot be this bad with this much talent. I don't think that they're going to be the next Alabama or anything, but they're going to break through. They cannot be this bad with this much talent. I don't think that they're going to be the next Alabama or anything, but they're going to win games with the quarterback room they have. Remember, Hudson Card wasn't even that good last year. He was a five-star guy.

They just have talent on talent on talent. And when you stack that at some point, you get out of your rut, even if there's a mess on the board of the trustees or the boosters are too involved. Listen, you and I know this. You were just talking about it. Like, there's some absolute chaos in some of these places that win all the time in college. Like, just guys who think they run the school, guys think they should be able to call plays,

whatever it is. I mean, like, you know, Steven Goddard wrote this a couple years ago about the bag man thing. But like, boosters and bag men have thought they've been running the team for a decade. And that's not new with this NIL stuff. That's separate conversation, but like, yeah,

Texas has a, a booster problem and an alumni problem. But like at some point, Quinn, you were as an arch Manning in this old line, they're just good enough, uh, to,

to ball. Yeah. I watched viewers at the, uh, elite 11 thing when it was out here, it was actually right here in Manhattan beach. They had one of their workouts. And I was pretty impressed with them.

And then some other guys were like, yeah, I'm not sure. And then he was at Ohio State. And I remember somebody with the athletic, I forget his name. He does a great job covering Ohio State. And he was talking about Ryan Day's philosophy on the quarterback room. And it's a little bit like people, what they've wondered the NFL team should just do is like bring in as many as you possibly can. And one of them will figure it out. Just keep drafting them every single year.

Who cares? That Ohio State would would be like we're not going to skip a class because we brought in a five star like the previous year which i think was you would want to stagger it a little bit so now if you're yours you're going wait what happened here now he may just look at arch and say i'm better because this isn't the all-time you know this is not i think just Justin Fields maybe. I mean, I was reading some Elite 11 thing the other day that considered him the greatest Elite 11 quarterback that's ever gone through the program.

And Arch, I think, maybe was like in the teens, somewhere like that. So that's also important to remember. But what's that? I said, uh-oh. Yeah, right, right. But it's this odd dynamic now where it feels like the college football programs are going,

we're not worried about feelings anymore, and we're just going to sign as many as you. That Murphy kid who I saw who's also in their QB room, who's enormous, who I watched play, and I thought, wait, he's there too? So that's four guys once Arch gets there, and likely two of them won't be there anyway. Well, you mentioned Justin Fields. Like, there's a comfort. Maybe Joe Burrow was the jumping off point here. There's a comfort that you can go somewhere,

lose a quarterback competition to some guy who might be a little bit better. Or, I mean, in Joe Burrow's case, there were injuries, and guys didn't play spring ball, whatever. He didn't play spring ball. He got off track a little bit. Like, the transfer portal makes it so easy. Like, it used to be 15 years ago, you'd go to USC and then

you'd lose the quarterback battle. And remember that kid Aaron Corp? He transferred to Richmond. There wasn't a comfort level with just Florida State being like, yeah, we'll take you. Or South Carolina, Spencer Rattler with Oklahoma. There's a comfort level now where you can just bail.

And so why not go to a packed quarterback room and just see what it is, get some good coaching and go from there. Like, I think that fundamentally, again, going back to what I said earlier, like the transfer portal has changed college football and the way rosters are constructed far more than, than I think the NIL has at this point. I mean, like Miami went out and got some kids from West Virginia, UCLA. We had Jalen Phillips a couple years ago,

developed into a first round pick from UCLA. We got another kid this year on a defense from there. So like, it's just a different, it's just a roster. But like Mel Tucker may have changed football last year with the way he just went out and just like, okay, fine. Like, we'll just get portal guys and win.

And the portal thing is another great example of of all of us becoming desensitized to it because i remember hearing about some fifth or sixth year quarterback you know biden is time stay in the course not getting discouraged and he applauded right well i don't know the brady thing i think is always overblown like he did you read wickersham's book yeah boy i just i just feel like people look back at the Michigan experience. Like he was sitting there with a helmet for his last year, watching everything when he actually played, I think what 75% of the snaps,

but yeah, no, but, but, but he basically told his, his life coach at Michigan, he was going to transfer and they gave him some tough love and were like, see you bro.

And then he, he stayed because he was so pissed off. Okay. But not, maybe I should say it this way. I think a lot of us grew up in a certain way where it was, hey, you signed up for this. Stick it out. And you're like, all right. But when you think about that, it's like, hey, you signed up for this, but they went and recruited two other guys that are probably going to play ahead of you. And you're third on the depth chart when you thought you

had a chance to play on Sundays, but definitely stick it out. Cause that's what a man does. And now, you know, even though the sixth year guy was applauded, I, I don't know if I had a kid where I'd go,

no, you signed up for this. You have to not play for four years and learn how to be a man. Like that doesn't make any sense. Well, it reminds me a little bit of a GM who told me. So first of all, NFL teams do not care about any of this stuff. They do not care if you take a bunch of

NIL money. In fact, they probably think it's smart. They do not care if you transfer just to get some more playing time. All they care about is the tape and the makeup and the reviews that they get from scouts. I think there used to be this idea, and I remember I go back to it. There was a GM who told me, I want to get the story right.

Blake Bortles threw with the combine. Okay. And this was when guys started to not throw with the combine. And there was a GM who was like, man, GMs are falling all over themselves with Blake Bortles throwing at the combine, because that shows he's competitive.

He wanted to, he wanted to go in there and show that he's the alpha. And it's like, Oh, okay. Like, that's fine. But like,

maybe watch the tape. Maybe, you know, like there's just GMs kind of used to look at it differently. And it's like, oh, okay, that's fine. But maybe watch the tape. GMs kind of used to look at it differently. I think they now understand that the ideas that we had about mental toughness and competitiveness, we're measuring it in the wrong way. And so if a Joe Burrow goes to LSU for two years and balls out, yeah, he's going to be the first overall pick in the draft.

So I think that's the biggest thing is you're just looking for an opportunity. And I think that basketball, everyone says, oh, college basketball and this G League stuff, it all evolved to just get me to the league. Yeah, that's what's happening in college football too. And it has almost always been the case. They just talk about it differently because A, the three-year rule is a little bit different after high school and changes things. So a freshman can't jump. a little bit different after high school and changes things. So a freshman can't jump.

But then B, kind of the cult of the college coach kept the focus on the actual Saturdays a little more than maybe in college basketball. Because I remember having conversations with different college football fans, guys that worked in the media, but we all loved college ball. And it would be like, oh, okay, what was it?

Like Tate Martell. Be like, oh, this guy's transferred. And then you're like, how often does it work out for those guys? But I also think there's like an easy way to also look at it. Is it that the person is weak and that they're not tough enough and that's why they failed? Or the recruiting part of it got it wrong. He transfers in.

He's not as good. And now he's desperate to find any place where he can stay. So you could very simply try to put together some equation that goes, oh, if you transfer a lot, that means you're not going to play in the nfl because there's something wrong with you or is it a far more simpler explanation that if you transfer it a lot means that the evaluation was probably wrong and then you're actually showing up to these campuses and you're not as good as you thought you'd be and that's it not so much your personality had you not transferred but had the same talent it somehow works out for you i think is a very big leap.

I completely agree with that. I also say that showing you want to play is not a bad thing. Showing I am so addicted to the game of football that I have to play, even if it's for Vanderbilt this year instead of Georgia, I think that's inherently a sign of competitiveness as well. I think we covered it. I think this is a lot of good stuff. I just I think the NIL stuff is going to be so much funnier than we think like it's going to be so

much more chaotic funny and like I go back like Marcus Dupree that that amazing 30 for 30 like there's one of the best ones. Yeah, one of the one of the coaches was we're talking about paying him and he just looks at the camera and he just goes, there's always an uncle. This is like in the seventies and the eighties,

right? Where it's like, there's always an uncle. There's always a guy who's hanging around. Right. And he wants the money. We've had that in every sport. And now those guys get to give quotes to the media.

And that, that I think is, you cannot put a cap on how funny and chaotic this will be, Brian Rosillo. What do you got? Anything coming up that you're working on other than... I know you got the Sunday stuff and the football stuff. Yeah. All right.

So we have top 10 receivers today. We had Justin Jefferson join us for that episode to break down our top receivers. And then I didn't want him to rank himself. And then he ranked himself anyway. Where did he rank himself? He said at the end of this year he will be number one. For a wide receiver, that's pretty humble. And then Luke

Smith and John Arand, Luke Smith who covers F1, great journalist. They will be joining us on the F1 show. Silverstone preview with Luke and then John Arand on the new F1 TV deal, F1 on

media going forward and really interesting stuff that will be dropping tomorrow. Alright, sounds good. This is Kevin Clark. You want details? Bye. I driverari 355 cabriolet what's up i have a ridiculous house in the south fork i have every toy you can possibly imagine and best of all kids i am liquid so now you know what's possible let me tell you what's required life advice life advice rr at gmail.com um always some good feedback ones uh and i would say the group has been so good at this

as this has grown uh that i just wanted to let you know that maybe you know we don't get to a lot of them but it is appreciated that people care that much about them but you know i just didn't always want to do a ton of recap stuff. But here was one I thought was helpful on the equipment for the golf equipment guy. I worked for an NHL team for a number of years and always got the can you get me tickets question, right? Can you get me, meaning give me tickets, the way you phrase that, right? So always asking for free tickets. Much of the time, I kept a mental list of people, and when something came my way, I sent them out.

But the best advice ever about dealing with the annoying person that is asking with an air of entitlement that I got from my father. At a family event, when someone waited until they got their chance to interrupt and make the ask, my dad asked, you still work for IBM, don't you? Can you get him a computer and trade? That seems about the same for each of you, right? So whoever asks you for free stuff, be like, where do you work? Oh, you work at a car dealership?

Let's make a deal. Yeah, can I get some rims? How about a loaner? Just give them away? Yeah. I learned two things. You always find out where they work and if you don't know uh always find out if they where they work if you don't know it's good manners and then ask them directly return the favor with their products or services it always made sense

if it always made sense the other side uh i even once had a guy say i can't make money if we give away the product. Right. True. But I mean, it's also, there's, it is a little different because I would say, you know, people aren't giving away computers all the time, but it is a great comeback. It is a great comeback, but there is, there is an entitlement thing with tickets that just is attached with tickets. It's just, it's just what it is. Um, I've been on the fence about trying to get

a Apollo jersey for Cerruti and there's something about getting it from the team when in fact, I could probably just pay for it

and do it. You could. I could, but I didn't. There's something about it coming from the team to Cerruti, but we haven't asked

or maybe we just did. That's how we do it. Magic hooked me up with a, with a 23 special edition Cerruti jersey so I'm good on the jersey front. Thank you though. Shout out to Magic.

Oh they did? Yeah. This was like a couple months ago. Did I know about this? I don't think so. They just hit me up on they just hit me up on they hit me up on Twitter like hey thanks for being a fan. You want a jersey? I was like hell yeah 30 23 let's go cool i love that orange one city edition i think there's something about palo and one of the traditional ones is the pinstripes where it's

like now you have to be all well so you have the jersey if if you're talking like 90s era throwback palo number five jersey like maybe that like like electric blue color like the penny jerseys i i would take that i think those are the greatest jerseys in basketball history i'll i will die on that hill okay uh all right this guy says he wants a swole mate he's 29 5 11 currently 207 been really into the gym for about a year now uh this time last year i was at 260 pounds wow that's an impressive weight loss, man. More of a dumbbell bench press guy. Recently hit 80 pound dumbbells. No clue if that's good or not. It is good. I'm in a weird stage of my life where all my friends are married,

engaged, and or have kids. I know 29 isn't old, but it isn't getting young either. I'd like to date a girl that has similar interests than me. I've always been on the chubbier side until recently. So being fit is a goal of mine. That'd be something I'd like in date a girl that has similar interests than me. I've always been on the chubbier side until recently. So being fit as a goal of mine, that'd be something I'd like in a significant other. You know what I like about this is that you're fit now and you're looking for it as opposed to somebody who's not fit being like, I can't, can't be with some girl who let herself go.

Like, okay, okay, dude. All right. Now the question is in order to find that girl that prioritizes at least trying to have a healthy lifestyle, do I approach a girl at the gym and risk having those awkward moments if I get rejected?

I go to a public gym. However, it's pretty small, so running into them would be almost a certainty. If so, how do I approach one of them? We're talking about one of them as if it's this weird species of swole, like, quad IG girls, right? Because I'll tell you, they don't like a lot of dudes. There's a very specific lane of guys that they like. So most all of us

are going to face rejection, right? The girl that we see on Instagram that's usually dating a guy that looks like a barbarian. They are looking for something that is perhaps more absurd in men than we are in women. So I'm just warning you for the guys that are out there being like, I want my girlfriend to look like that.

It's not the easiest thing to pull off. There's just not a wide net of dudes that they're interested in and they all look great at the gym. So they're getting a ton of attention too. It's, it's almost like just being attractive in the early two thousands in Boston. Like if you were a woman and you were remotely attractive in Boston, in the early two thousands,

it was going to be an awesome summer for you. Uh, so he's asking basically how, how should we do this without being their creep zone? Are you just going to slow pay, slow play the hell out of it? Slow play the hell out of it. All right.

Don't even think that the girl will like you going with that way. You know, think of it that way. Like this isn't about, and I tried to screw it up. Cause like some of us can get a little anxious and you're like, all right, whatever.

Maybe I'm, maybe I'm, Oh wow, she smiled back. So now this means this and all this stuff and all the stupid shit we do in our head. I would just slow play it forever. Try to stand out by being friendly but not being the creep. Don't do the shit where you go over and all of a sudden you're doing dumbbell curls by the squat rack because she's in front of you. That's usually a you know, a pretty, pretty bad tell, uh, you know, you could maybe even be like, Hey, how many more do you have?

No one lets anybody work in on squats anymore. So that wouldn't be an invite to try to work in with her. Cause actually working in can be a bigger waste of time. Um, but just, you know, some little code breakers, maybe you time it right in the exit into the parking lot, something like that. Like, Oh, Mercedes Gers. Maybe you time it right in the exit into the parking lot. Something like that. Like, oh, Mercedes G-Wagon. I have even less of a shot now. You never know. Like there's some little tricks here or there, but you don't want any of them to lean into creepy, you know?

So unless you're a great looking guy and, you know, I'm just telling you the the fit the super fit swole mate girlfriends that you know again are not bad to look at there it's uh it's it's challenging it's challenging this is basically i'll leave with that so i don't know what else you guys have on this one but i think i have a good idea actually um okay you know i think generally if you're trying to do this and the the nice thing is there's not like one girl he's like obsessed with right he's just looking for somebody that fits this mold right so that's great you're you're already casting a wider net and then uh i always thought that like guys who do that in the gym a like it's probably creepy because they're wearing they're wearing like form-fitting clothes they're already like god i just feel like there's already

so many eyes on me and also if you end up like a lot of people, they're in the zone just like dudes. So it's like they probably don't want to be breaking concentration so you could have your awkward shot. So I'm like, I'm thinking maybe you could just take it outside of the gym because you're just not looking for where you can meet this one person. Maybe you go to GNC once a week instead of getting your stuff for a month. Maybe you go every week like grocery style and you just, you just get, get what you need. Maybe you could hang out at like a creation or like some sort of a juice bar or something, not hang out waiting. I just mean like, maybe you can maybe alter your life to be in that sort of place where you're not in this position where they're like working out, trying to get something

done. I already know for a fact that there's eyes on them, you know, at any given moment, maybe you can take it out of that and just go to another different watering hole where all these types of people would be this could be a stupid question um but with how specific he is about what his desires are is there not a dating app for people who are in shape or for people who like the gym or who are fit, you know, fitness fanatics or health fanatics. I just feel like that's a, if there's not,

we should probably invent one because there seems to be a pretty big population of people that like that kind of thing. So one, I would say Google that if that's around,

hop on that really quickly because, you know, otherwise he's going to be just like awkwardly staring at all these girls at the gym because that's the thing

you don't want to do at the gym is stare because then you're immediately the creep and that's what you're going to be doing when you're trying to find all these fit different women. I know you could do it in like somewhat of because then you're immediately the creep and that's what you're going to be doing when you're trying to find all these fit different women i know you

could do it in like somewhat of a you know a sneaky kind of way but i don't know i almost feel like he has such a streamlined outlook of like what exactly what he wants like it sounds like he's this is dating app material to me not someone that you would like try to meet at a bar or meet at a gym like you need an app to figure out exactly what you want how would you like gatekeep who gets on that app though that could get messed i don't know that would get messy you guys aren't gonna let me hey you're not bmi you're not jacked enough dude you're not gonna let me in i mean there's one for rich people right so there's got to be some sort of i don't know i i'm not sure like yeah maybe it's like you have to list your you know your your bench and your squats and all your specs i don't know like maybe that's

how you do it who knows yeah the raya one for guys that i i don't know what the standard is but you're i i don't know if you have to get invited by somebody else i've heard that you do on it yeah because i remember i had a pitch meeting with an executive and they said no to what i was pitching and the guy was like hey i can get you on raya though i was like yeah i'd rather you just pick up my fucking script but um thank you wait raya for tickets raya for uh clippers tickets would you have something on that's really i don't know no i was gonna say like that just why did he did you guys talk about you being single beforehand like why did he just be like i don't know i don't really give a shit about this guy's script but let me let me throw him a bone in the way out which is looking for a raya

subscription um he told me who he was dating and i was like oh wow that's cool and then he had said oh it's because of this and then he was like well you know if you're interested and i was kind of like nope not really like kind of built my day around this today but you know back then that was when i when you got rejections and you were like oh my god now you just become you know back then that was when i when you got rejections and you were like oh my god now you just become you're like hey it's just part of it you get you get nose all the time and if you're going to get discouraged easily do something else so uh i just thought that was funny because it was kind of like yeah i'm really feeling this you know but no one ever says

like straight up hey this sucks uh which is what you would want ironically you would want to be like actually this is trash yeah no i said i said like a bunch of stuff to this whatever i'm not gonna bore everybody to death with this i wish i'd never fucking ever brought it up but um i did it to not no i i did it to put pressure on myself and i did it to uh i don't know i guess cost myself a ton of money but i was basically basically like, Hey, don't, I'm really tired of hearing about how good I am. So don't be in a hurry to tell me how good I am. If you don't think I'm good. Cause you're not doing me any favors by telling me how good I am. And it was like, you got to understand, I get called a dick all the time. Like, so there's plenty of people just

think I'm terrible at everything I do. And now I'm desensitized to it. Like we're using that word earlier with Kevin. So I don't, I would rather have somebody be specific in their dislike of something. Um, because the other cool thing is that with writing or anything that's sort of in the art field, you could just disagree with their assessment of what they don't like anyway,

because it can be a little arbitrary. So, um, that ended up being, yeah, that ended up being a story about a script getting turned down and do an invitation to raya i don't know how you do jack raya you know we joked about gaia just dudes finding dudes but uh i'm probably there's probably

is something like that but who is the gatekeeper and that's a tough one and the other thing too is like you got to be a little careful about who you know who you like if you ask out two of the jack girls and then you're on to talking to the third one they're going to talk about you we're just going to get around yeah you also yeah i think the easiest way we're going to do at the gym is you have to be like the friendly guy that everybody likes and knows and that way like you're just like you seem approachable and you know that way when you talk to her or she maybe want to talk to you like that's what you have to do and if that's it's not if that's not in your personality profile it's probably going to be pretty hard for you it's very hard it's a very hard balance of

like figuring it out because then you know you'll talk to somebody who's really attractive to the gym it's like no one ever talks to me because i am attractive and like i actually don't get any attention i can see guys looking but they'll never come up because they're super intimidated to talk to me and it's like if somebody just would talk to me and then you're like, oh my God, this is amazing. You get that in your head and then you go talk to the person's like, fuck off. Don't talk to me. I'm doing you know, all trap bar work

today. And my husband isn't Jack, but he has a beach house. So there you go. All right. This one is titled Horny Houseguest. Uh-oh. 6'1", 225, former D2 athlete. Not bragging, but it's somewhat relevant to the story.

Curious on your thoughts about a friend that stayed with me recently. Names have been changed. Okay, there we go. Context. I have known Randy since we were college teammates. Not amongst my core friend group at the time, but being teammates, we were always friendly enough. Shortly after graduating, we ended up living and working in the same town and ended up living together for a year while i did not consider randy a bad roommate i was definitely ready to live on

my own once that lease was up and had the financial means to do so while it seemed to rub randy the wrong way that i moved out initially we would still hang out from time to time after that fast forward a few years and i've now bought a home where I live alone in the same town. And Randy ended up moving out of town, but is still relatively close by. And Randy is still around fairly often, as there is more to do around here for entertainment than where he currently lives. All right, that is a lot of detail, but I think it really sets a good foundation level across the top. Let's go. Here's where the conflict happens.

Randy recently hit me up saying he was planning on coming to town and asked if I grabbed dinner and drinks. I agreed to that. He then asked if it's cool if he can crash at my place and bring his dog along to stay, which I'm also fine with. I've never met his dog before, but I generally like dogs, although I do not have my own. All right. Once they arrived later that day, the dog drinks water from its bowl, proceeds to dribble drool all over the place,

including the hardwood floors that most of my main floors comprise of, with no attempt or offer from Randy to clean up after, so I'm left to follow his dog around cleaning up the mess while we're trying to catch up all right you're the one that said his dog could come but that's kind of what dogs do i'm not even a dog guy and like what'd you think fucking dog was gonna clean up after itself uh all right so that's not a great start we then head to dinner and head to a bar afterwards to hang out for a while. Shortly after getting to the bar, a woman greets Randy and sits down with us. I come to find out they got matched up on a dating app and this was their first meet.

Oh, come on. Not the end of the world. She was a good hang. I just felt a little weird. The third wheel on his first day. After a while, she ends up leaving and Randy and I head back to my place. I'm an early riser, so I quickly head to bed. Quote, a quick note that's relevant

my bedroom is on the second floor of my room and the guest bedroom Randy was staying is on the main floor so I cannot hear much of what is going on in the main floor once I go upstairs I wake up the next morning before Randy and notice an additional pair of shoes in the area where shoes and coats are stored

so I thought maybe this first date went a little bit better than my impression of it it's a very well written email I'll give the emailer this uh he's he's on top of a lot of things shoe inventory architecture all right so randy and his mystery guests do not end up getting up until around noon how old are these guys again uh which was annoying me because i felt the obligation to tiptoe around my own house all morning while I'm trying to get various things done, including some clanging, banging down in the home gym. When they finally wake up, I see his guest is not the woman we met the night before

at the bar, but a different woman entirely. And I've never met her. I don't think I'm out of line in thinking this is a very weird move to invite a stranger to spend the night in another person's house with at least a heads up to the homeowner. They end up leaving pretty quickly before I get a chance

to tell Randy how I feel house guest etiquette was violated in the various ways stated above. That's a very, that's a very, an official statement there. I should have just said

a very official statement. Individually, I think I could get over just about all of this, but with all of this happening the same night, I'm not sure I want to host Randy again the next time he asks. However, there's part of me that thinks I'm overreacting. Would love to hear which side of the fence Ryan, Kyle, and Roots are with this one. Wow. All right. You know what?

I just think you're two entirely different people at the same age, and that's okay. It doesn't mean you're right, and it doesn't mean you're wrong. It's your house. I think guys that are motivated to... Although I don't know that I'm the best case study. I couldn't wait to not live with anybody else. I haven't lived with anybody else in fucking forever. I remember some of our friends that stayed together for a lot longer. Other friends joked and be like, when are you guys going to become adults and not live with other guys in your 30s? But they were all having a blast, and they were all doing well. And they were like, when are you guys going to become adults and not live with other guys in your thirties? But they were all having a blast and they were all doing well.

And they were like, screw it. We all just sort of want to do this. So I don't, I wouldn't really want to judge anybody. I have my preference. Um, but I remember moving out here too. Like somebody was like, Hey, maybe I could live with you for a little while. I was like, Oh my God. I almost like laughed in his face. I think I did. Cause I just was like the concept of me having a roommate coming home to another dude watching shit on my couch like and why i have to get my own head and do my own little things and another person orbiting my space like that i can't even fathom all right so to this the whole point is is that randy if we want to go team randy we can say a couple things right like who cares if the dating app thing didn't go well? Uh, clearly another dating app thing that's maybe a little bit more to the point seemed to go

well for him a little bit later on. Uh, it sounds like if you guys are still in your twenties, I could totally understand this. He has since moved to a less entertaining city or town that you currently live in. So that's why he wanted to come in. And he's going to make the most of those 24 to 48 hours. And clearly, your guy did this. He is wired this way to think that this is what his weekend is supposed to be. Hey, I'm getting out of town. I'm going to meet a girl. And if it doesn't work out, I'm going to meet another girl.

And I'm going to get drinks. And then I'm going to sleep in because this is my goal. This is what I wanted to do. You feel used. And you're right to feel used because he came to your town to use the house and you don't like that. The stranger thing is completely up to the person. You know what I mean?

Like I would at a certain time tell one of my friends if I did something like this at their house, like, are you insane? You're mad at me for this? I could also see later on in life going, no, you're not doing this to my, I don't want a stranger in my house. Like you don't know what could happen.

You don't even know this person and they're going to come over here and you're going to have sex with them. And then I'm supposed to like, and by the way, it should have been on you to tiptoe around. Also very courteous. If you need to get a lift in,

that's your house. Go get that lift in. If they're going to sleep in like a couple of juniors on spring break, that's their fault. Cause I do think it's weirder when you're hung over and you're older and you actually sleep in. So, um, look, this isn't really about right or wrong. It's just about how you feel. And if this is how you feel and you don't like the dog being there and you don't like being third wheeled into this dating app thing, and you don't like Randy bringing strangers back to your house,

then it's a pretty simple solution. No more Randy. No more Randy. And he can be bad, but he, this is a perfect example of a disconnect. He cannot fathom that you would think this is a problem

and you can't fathom that he wouldn't think that this is a problem. And that's not going to get solved. And guess what? You're just buddies. You didn't get married, so you don't have to fucking worry about it long term. You're just buddies that will grow apart like almost all buddies do. I agree. I think, I think the reason this guy's a little bit

confused about what he thinks he should have done or might or should do in the future is because he said that like he knew him from college. So there's probably some fuckery going on that they both, both witnessed about each other. And they're like, oh, he's fine. I remember he did that thing one time. So he should be fine with me doing this thing. And then they lived together. And I think our emailer has been operating from the stance of sometimes like, ah, fucking Randy.

Like, I think they probably both thought that that's how things were going to go. But if you guys are that comfortable with each other, you should be able to be like, Hey, you know, that's that a line was crossed. You know, I'm happy. I'm happy that you come in and you know, you're welcome to stay. And I like, I like seeing, hearing from you and I appreciate that you like being in and out around the town, but you know, you just assumed a little too much and I'd leave the dog thing out of it because that's just going to, it's just like, Oh, so what, how many things could we be upset about but it's just like yeah you you smart kyle you leave the dog part out yeah it's really not that big of a deal um but it just now you're you're just beating up because you've been thinking about you've been thinking about shit for so long now you're like everything that was

like oh yeah and then that and then he fucking left water on the sink for some you know it's like you don't want to you don't want to go too far but you could just you could say the thing that really bothers like, Hey, you, you know, we don't, we're not roommates anymore. You can't just come here and, and just, and use it for whatever. Like you're, you know, obviously you're welcome to get something out of the fridge. If you need it, let me know. If you would've just let me know, I would've told you yes or no. But the fact that I don't even know how I would've felt about it if you asked me now, because all I can think about is how I showed up to a stranger. And then you guys were just basically my hotel guests that I didn't know I had.

So I think you should be totally fine to say that, call them up or whatever, even if you want to wait till the next time. I would just get it out. I know you felt like maybe you would have said something if they didn't bail by the time you knew what was going on. But I think you should be totally comfortable, especially knowing this guy for as long as you have

and being ex-roommates, to be able to be just completely honest and try not to overload him with every little thing that you hated that happened that day yeah i mean that's the thing is it's it's one of the one of each of those things the dog or you being third wheel or the random late night unannounced hookup like one of those things i guess you kind of could let it slide all three of them and then the additional just annoyance it sounded like you were pre-annoyed at this guy and it also it's kind of sounded like in the beginning like you're like i wasn't terrible roommate but you know there was something else there that clearly

like you were a little bit worried about what the situation was going to be which is maybe that he's just in like a more younger version of of the current lifestyle that you both live um but this is the equivalent like he's still in the life phase ryan you hit it perfectly he's still in the life phase of like remember when you'd like go visit a buddy in college and like you'd bring your xbox and you'd like set up your own station and like you try to like you'd be hitting on girls left and right trying to get them back to the apartment he's still in that phase of his life as kind of an adult and you are no longer in that stage of your life so like you're just never going to see eye to eye on this so at the end of the day like you could call him out for it but he's

not going to understand what you're saying and he's going to kind of think you're a dick about it. I would just not say a ton. And then next time he kind of asks, be like, hey, man, maybe bring up a couple of the things you said before and just say, hey, it didn't really go awesome last time. It's kind of complicated for me. I just have my place clean. Make up some excuses for why it's not going to be the same

as it was this time. And I think you can kind of get around the confrontation because if you just come and, you know, if you go head at this guy in the situation, it might, it might kind of create some, some unnecessary problems that you don't want to deal with. Well, I just understand this because I did it. I know what this is like. Like I was the guest, like our buddies were the first guys to get an apartment in a cool part of town. And I was still in Burlington. I'm still bartending. I'm still finishing up school.

You know, I'm subletting a room from one guy. I'm still in this mode, even though I'm 22 bartending. I'm still finishing up school. I'm subletting a room from one guy. I'm still in this mode, even though I'm 22 or 23, I'm supposed to be so much older. And because the appearance of my other friends that are the same exact age, we're the same number, but we're not the same age because they're getting up every morning. Sunday, shut it down. But I'm thinking like, wow, my friends must be pumped. I'm in town and I'm going to sleep on their couch. We're going to get after it all weekend. We're going to do dumb shit. And then they can't ever get mad at me for that because that's what we just got done doing. And I was not I didn't update the software, man.

So after a couple of times of it, one of the guys is like, look, there's three of us. One of the guys didn't even like you. I was like, oh, that's a bit of a wake up call. And he goes, it's his apartment, too. And like, we get it. You're coming to visit us and you're fired up. And we, we can't like, this is every weekend, everybody's rolling in. And this wasn't even, it wasn't even all about me. It was a, an accumulation of every single guy that came through town was like, Oh, I'm going to sleep on the couch. Like I'm going to

stay here. And these guys are trying to get their Sunday weirds out and get the recharge going. There's just dudes lingering still being like, hey, you guys want to sneak out and get one? What's going on tonight? They're like, dude, it's over. It's over. We're watching Sopranos. We're drinking milkshakes. We're trying to get to

bed early. Then suit and tie and cold call tomorrow morning. What are you doing, Rosillo? I'm going to, oh, I'm going to listen to the, I'm going to listen to the Allman brothers and drive back to Burlington. And, you know, I have a paper on Thursday. I think I got a hand in, but I'll probably get an extension, you know? Like, so it's not, and I can tell just from that sentence, when you say, um, before I got a chance to tell Randy how I feel his house guest etiquette or how house guest etiquette was violent. You are very mature. That's just a really mature order of words.

It's perfectly phrased. You're not wrong, man. You're not wrong at all. You're just totally different from Randy. And I don't think you really even like Randy that much anyway, because in the beginning, you're basically saying it matters that we've known each other. And like Saruti said, hey, when you did dumb shit or i did dumb shit or whatever you don't want to do the dumb shit anymore and you don't want to have this happen and so i think it's it's pretty simple here um and maybe you did get used but randy probably wasn't like hey dude you know we're not that tight anymore but i came to town this weekend to get laid and that's what i'm going to do and i don't care what kind of wake I spray here in the jetty

like I am I'm going over five knots captains understand that joke some passengers too you also have been a different financial situation too so it makes it weird like you know you can't really drop the hey get your own apartment kind of thing come hang out be a real adult because like you know you don't know if he has the kind of money to do

that or whatever and he's just I don't know like it's just an awkward situation you're going to create it more it's going to become more awkward if you start calling him out for his shit like hopefully he just kind of outgrows it hopefully he doesn't do like if he's doing this like every other month that's obviously a problem if he tries to come by like once a year or so i don't know you're right ryan it'll probably just go away pretty sooner than later yeah and you know what like when i got the pull call out and i wasn't getting the call out even specifically to me, I was getting a call out of just the guys were so over it after two years of it. Cause it just kept going on and on and on. Like, Oh, Hey, we're coming to Boston. We're staying with you. And then it was like, and I just got a hotel after that. I was like, okay, you know what? I actually don't want to be that burden on you guys. And they were like, Oh, and then it was actually a huge improvement for me. Cause they're like, dude, we're still goes hotel now. Like, and he's broke. Like, yeah yeah i don't know how he pulls it off but he he goes hotel now like that's great it's a great move the only problem is that when guys are staying together at a house and one guy goes hotel

you're sort of you just get left out of stuff some late night stuff you never know that's always that's a whole different topic all right that's life advice that's a full pod uh we will be back on thursday uh with the official guess, I don't know. We're going to have free agency stuff flying around. So we're still going to be pretty busy here up under the Summer League stuff as well. So please subscribe. Thanks to Kyle and Steve as always. The Ryan Russell Podcast.

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