The Ryen Russillo Podcast - NBA Is Back, Officiating Stories With Monty McCutchen, and Chris Mannix Reports From the Orlando Bubble

Episode Date: July 30, 2020

Russillo shares his thoughts on “player lists," more specifically the NFL Top 100 (3:15), before he is joined by longtime NBA referee and head of referee and development training Monty McCutchen. McCutchen tells some stories from his long career as a referee, and the two get into the weeds on flops, charges, and blocking fouls, the values Monty tries to instill in NBA refs, and more (15:04). Then Ryen talks with SI’s Chris Mannix, who is currently in the Orlando bubble awaiting the NBA restart. They discuss some buzz around the Bucks, Clippers, Rockets, 76ers, Celtics, Thunder, and more (52:08). Finally, Ryen talks about Joe Kelly’s eight-game suspension for throwing at Alex Bregman, leading to a melee, before answering a listener-submitted “Life Advice” question (1:21:37). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

today's amazing episode this is a really good one folks and it should be because it's the return of the nba today's episode of the ryan russo podcast on the ringer podcast network is brought to you by state farm just like basketball the game of life is unpredictable talk to a state farm agent get a teammate who can help you navigate the unexpected. Shaq Milton appears to be everything. It's a little unexpected. He's in the mid-40s, I think, from three in this new version of it. But we're going to talk with Chris Mannix a little bit later

who says that Ben Simmons is the best player in Orlando. I don't think he means that he's actually now the best player in the league, but you get the point. And then also Monty McCutcheon. So that's the plan for today. Anyway, get a teammate who can help you navigate the unexpected. Talk to a State Farm agent today. And you're going, Monty McCutcheon, how do I know that name?

I know I know that name. Well, of course you know it because he was a 25-year official in the NBA. We're going to get some stories on what it was like to be an official. And now that he is in head, basically at the head and charge of officials in the development and keeping this referee core together and developing these guys. He's a guy that I've talked with very infrequently of different NBA events, but you know who he is, and that's going to be really good story stuff. So we've got Mannix from the bubble. We've got McCutcheon from the bubble. The NBA is back, and I can't wait for a couple games tonight. I can't wait for it. So before I get to this week's

open, I also want to remind you since the NBA is back and you're sitting back, maybe a little baseball, a little hockey, sports are finally back and that means you can order in a little bit more or get some takeout and bring it back because you could just justify it. Say finally, you know what I mean? All those weekends you've been working around the house. Well, now you can get your wings from Buffalo Wild Wings and if you're missing the sports bar as much as we are you need to get to buffalo wild wings to watch all the action where the beer is cold and the wings come in 24 sauces in seasonings i didn't even know 24 sauces was legal and fans can still be fans but if you'd rather watch at home make sure you watch them with a wing bundle and please drink responsibly and i know uh looking

at some of the numbers, big thanks to everyone that subscribes, rate, and reviews the podcast. Please keep getting the word out. This week's pod with Mike Sando on the QB tiers, we knew it would do well, but it went to top 20 in all categories. And that's with some of the Joe Rogan pods,

which are popular, Bill, and my part of my take guys, and then a bunch of New York Times pods that maybe at times want to make you feel bad about yourself. True Crime is very popular, but when the Rosillo pod cranks into the top 20 in all categories,

that's a huge, huge sign and a big thank to all of you guys. It turns out you guys like listening to the pod and ramble about whether it's life advice hoops or lists, which I'm going to do very shortly here. I'm here to thank all of our listeners for following us on Spotify because the podcast made it on to the top podcast charts. Yeah, that's right. We did really, really well on the Spotify charts as well. So I love doing the show for you guys and we wouldn't be able to do it without each and every one of you. So keep listening, and we lists. I think we love lists, but we love complaining about lists even more. And there's no list that's worse than the NFL top 100. It's terrible. And it came out again and it comes out this time of the year, every year, because usually there's no sports

and it's good content. And that's just what happens. Dot com. We'd have stuff. It would come up slow time of the year, slow time of the sports year. Hey, let's throw a list together. Okay. The list is up now. Everybody's mad about it. And then we now have content. I mean, it's kind of like a really cyclical thing here. But the NFL Top 100 one is especially bad. Okay. Now, I've gone and researched this, which I'm probably embarrassed to say. I found something from 2013 from Pro Football Talk. But then I asked a couple of people that worked with the NFL network and then a couple of players that voted in it on like how this actually works. And back seven years ago, when they were trying to figure out how this list was so bad, uh, the NFL network explained that they send out ballots to all the players late in the season. And then I think they have until April

to finalize these. They have months, which is actually the worst way to get anything done. You should probably just say, hey, these are due at the end of the week. And apparently of like the 2,000, almost 2,000 players that get a ballot, the year in 2013, only 480 players actually filled out the ballot.

And they don't do their top 100, which makes a lot of sense because that's like a real assignment. Apparently they only do the top 20. And then that means, depending on how all the votes work, then you fill, they only do the top 20. And then that means, depending on how all the votes work, then you fill out the rest of the top 100. I had one person say, no, it's actually only the top 10, but I don't think that's possible. That means, and I'll give you an example, Josh Allen is number 87 in this year's NFL top 100.

That means that if it's the top 10, that enough people voted him top 10 to get him to 87, that seems insane. Top 20, maybe. But then you're like, who would even vote Josh Allen top 20? Well, let's look at the voters because players are the worst voters at this. They just are. I asked one player, I said, hey, how did you do this? And he goes, oh, I didn't even want to do the ballot. I was like, okay, there's one off my list.

Connor Barwin years ago played for the Eagles. He tweeted out, and this is years ago. He said, quote, everyone knows no players actually vote for this and who's on this list. Right? So that means that not only are the players not voting, the players that are voting, they're not even doing their own vote. Um, I don't know, Jeff Schwartz, uh, his mitchell who was on the show from kansas city he tweeted out the nfl 100 list is silly it's something for off-season programming agreed when i was playing i got asked to do it i put mitch's name first although he did great out

really well in the postseason then my teammates then my favorite lineman not sure how uh many guys take it seriously or apparently no one takes this seriously but the point is that it comes out and it's bad the only thing you need to know about this year's is that lamar jackson's one and patrick holmes is fourth there's your problem right there i could go on and i could spend way too much time going over all the historical ones that don't make any sense i was on the cowherd this week he goes how's carson wentz not in the top 100 i go look i get some of the anti-wentz stuff i think some people around the league uh whether it's players or media are kind of sick I was on with Cal Heard this week. He goes, how's Carson Wentz not in the top 100? I go, look, I get some of the anti-Wentz stuff. I think some people around the league,

whether it's players or media, are kind of sick of hearing about the talent. Although I will tell you that his talent, and you don't have to listen to me, listen to the guys that really break it down or play the position. His arm talent is as good as anybody in the league. And if you're enamored with that

and you overlook some of the other things, the risk stuff, because he doesn't seem to be risk averse. That's fine. There's not 100 players better than Carson Wentz in the NFL right now. There just aren't. You know who one isn't? It's not Josh Allen. That's ridiculous. I made the case that in 2000, I think it's 17, Case Keenum was the 51st best player. And if you want to say, well, this is just because of the previous year, that's not the way it works. It's just not. If you're telling me this is the top 100, I am stubborn about rankings.

If somebody says, who's your top five list? I don't go off of who the three guys were that were the best statistically the year before because sometimes we have anomalies. Just like we have with Cam Newton in 2015. His MVP year is not who Cam Newton is. For the rest of his career, that's not who he is. He came in in 2016 as the number one player in the NFL. Doesn't make any sense.

It doesn't make any sense that Mahomes is behind three other guys. This list should be the Mahomes list and then the top 99. Josh Allen shouldn't be over Carson Wentz. Miles Garrett shouldn't go from 49 to 80 and have Clowney actually go up 20 spots after a three sack year. And again, sacks aren't the end all be all, but it doesn't really make any sense. Now, again, who cares? We care. We care because they come out and because we talk about them.

But you know who cares less than we pretend we care? The players. Players are just bad at voting on everything. In the NBA, the player vote for all-star starters is consistently the most laughable content that we have access to in sports. In 2020, for the All-Star vote, 380 NBA players voted. Giannis was on 68% of the votes. You go, okay, well, isn't that good? No, that means 32% of the players didn't vote for Giannis to be a starter. Okay? Now, the player-voter-fan-media breakdown is 25% player, 25% media, 50% fans. That's why you have some corrections like Zaza Pachulia, who a fan vote led to him having

768,000 votes coming out of Russia. I think there was some influencer. I don't want to make this political about Russia right now in different areas. You know, I'm not going to do that. Can't win. But luckily, Zaza was not a starter despite a massive social media push. So we're not always great at it either. But let's go back to the 2020 player vote. LeBron was off of 38% of the ballots. 38% of the 380 players that voted for starters

left LeBron off. Zion got two votes. He hadn't played yet. Taco Fall had seven votes. I think this number, it's so absurd that I can't believe it. I don't even know if it's true, even though I saw it reported by the AP. 292 different NBA players were voted as starters, which is a new record breaking last year's record by three new players. Mie Oni got a vote. He hasn't scored yet. I forgot who he was, and I cover basketball. Now, baseball, not to leave them out, I couldn't find the actual results, but SI used to do a player's poll, and there was a year where they voted A-Rod the third best third baseman, basically because nobody likes A-Rod. I think they put Eric Chavez ahead of him in the American League and Chavez had been hurt again that year. I don't remember the specific

year. I just remember the specific content because it was very, very early in my ESPN career. And I was doing the overnights and I was with this other host and she was one of the meaner people I've ever worked with. And she said something very nasty to me on the air where we were going over that. And she was like, hey, that's ridiculous that A-Rod is third. I was like, yeah, but it's because the players don't really like him. And then she was like, what do you mean the players don't like him? I'm like, well, look, the players don't like him. She's like, how would you know?

I was like, well, I've talked to a couple players. And I think it's pretty safe to assume that guys just don't like A-Rod. And she was like, you talk to players on the air. Trying to destroy my credibility was one sentence. It's like, hey, your boy runs in these streets sometimes, and I know I'm on the overnight as well with a bad button down on that maybe I got on sale or had a promo code for,

but it doesn't mean that I'm not friends with Todd Walker. So leave me alone. All right, so back to the voting. Look, whenever it's about you, and Patrick Mahomes tweeted out something where he's keeping a list and he can motivate you and he can do all these different things, I'll share another story with you. Scott Van Pelt, he and I had a radio show for a long time. There is a sports talk show list, the top 100 sports talk shows in the country. And the fourth year of SVP and Russillo, we were not named in the top 100 shows in the country. Okay. And so you go, are you serious? And I told Scott, I go, I'm glad I'm actually, I feel better. We're not on this list than actually being on it. And at the top, it was like always Francesa.

And then, you know, Mike and Mike would be up there and some of it was ratings based. Some of it was billings based, but it was basically industry people ranking their top 100 shows. And there'd be a ton of local shows in there as well. But we were out of the top 100. And Scott, you think I've got edge. There's an edge to Scott that is as nasty as mine can be, where you're like, are you fucking kidding me? You guys didn't name us.

And this was in year one. This was in year one this wasn't year one trying to work out the schedule we're still in a huge nfl studio room doing solo radio once once a month this was four years in and a pretty good run and good numbers good billing and all that stuff and you're like you guys left us off did you just forget or does somebody over there hate us we were behind the joe morgan magic hour that's. Joe Morgan, I believe, had a one-hour show on Yahoo.com. It was an internet show that I think was only an hour a week. And we were behind that.

I think the next year we went to 80. And then I found the picture too because ESPN used a promo picture of me. It was my publicist or PR pic where I looked like I was... I was like, why did you pick that one? They're like, you're smiling in that one. I was like, I also look like I'm dying. So I was like, do you guys really not want me to be successful? Because that picture is pretty bad. I asked him to change it for seven years. I never did. And of course that was in the talkers piece. So when I look at that list, I go, Hey, that list is, is really bad too. Not top 100. I mean,

give me a break. All right. So that aside, we know how the voting works out for the All-Star games. We know how it works out for the top 100, but I think the scariest part of all of this is if you go back to this most recent NFL CBA, 500 plus players didn't even vote for that. So you want to screw

around with the top 100 list. You want to vote your buddies on the All-Star team. You want to make it petty about who's the best player in baseball, that's fine. But I hate to break this to you. These guys just aren't very good when it comes to the voting stuff. Okay, so here's the plan. Chris Mannix, a little bit later at the end, we'll do life advice. And then we're going to start with Monty McCutcheon before we do that. FanDuel. The NBA is finally back and FanDuel Sportsbook is celebrating by giving you the chance to get an even bigger win when you bet the Clippers versus Lakers game this Thursday.

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Payout at minus 110. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER. In West Virginia, visit www.1800gambler.net. In Indiana, call 1-800-9WITHIT. In Colorado, call 1-800-522-4700. Okay, this guy, a lot of you guys are going to know him.

25 years as an official, and he is now the Vice President of Referee Development and Training. He's a long-time official and still with the NBA. Monty McCutcheon. And Monty, I had no idea. I was in Boston. I've been at ESPN a while, and I was coming out of the tunnel, and

Monty and some of the officials are coming back to kind of their little changing room in Boston. It isn't all that great because I've changed in that room myself. And Monty McCutcheon came up and said, Hey, Ryan Russillo. And it was like such a cool moment for me. So, uh, I really appreciate your time, man. I know you're, uh, down in Orlando, ready to get this thing going. So thanks again. Well, it's great to be here, Ryan. Um've been a longtime fan of your work. Referees are sports degenerates, and we love all sports and being a part of it and listening and being involved in it allows us. Information is really powerful to referees. It allows you to extend yourself outside of the role of official and more into the role of relationships. outside of the role of official and more into the role of relationships, you know, we're an odd group in that we're with the same company for 30 years. And so we see players and coaches, players turn into assistant coaches,

into general managers, into head coaches. And you see and hear about, you know, their young ones and our young ones. And if you take the time through a lot of the work that you and other media members do to know your league and to know everyone, it allows you to build good relationships in an authentic way that, hey, I know we're going to disagree about calls. That's understandable. We're in a competitive environment where two teams are wanting to win. But when someone's child is sick, that supersedes the competition and it should supersede the competition. And we should, we should reach out in that way. And we often find that out through all of your good works. So I I'm appreciative of that. Yeah, that was, that was a cool moment for me. It was something like I called my dad. I was like, Hey, you know,

that guy, he's considered a good ref too. So I was like, that's good. He's one of the guys that's considered. So let's, let's talk about that. Let's talk about you a little bit. How did you how did you start? Like, how did this at what point you're like, you know what? I want to get yelled at for my entire professional career. Well, you know, it's interesting because I never quite viewed it that way. I played a year of junior college. My talent was obviously, you know, all backyard kind of small town school in Texas kind of career. you know, all backyard kind of small town school in Texas kind of career. And I was playing a year of junior college and not seeing the rewards of playing, to be honest, Ryan, you know, I was, my talent had run out at that level. And so I was committed to school in a, in an academic way that was important to me. And so I committed to that, those academics, but growing up under somewhat modest means is a nice way of saying it.

I needed money in college and in the local school that I went to, I was able to, you know, I had a little bit of a reputation as a player and so I could get started and it kept me fed in college, refereeing did. And I did it because of that and a way to stay involved in the game. But what I found out very quickly was that refereeing is very similar to golf, and I'm not a good golfer. I enjoy it. But it's similar in these ways in which you are competing against others, but you're really trying to put a puzzle together. You're trying to figure out this set of circumstances up against the standards of the rulebook, up against the standards of the interpretations from our competition committee,

as it's turned out to be professionally. And you have a real strong inner dialogue with yourself as a referee. You know, there's a lot of self-talk that goes on. When you miss a play, are you able to get on to the next play? When you have an interaction with a player, do you say and interact in an appropriate way that is both filled with strength and humility at the same time? And that's one of the balances we're trying to seek is, I don't want weak officials. I don't think our league wants weak officials. If you're on the road in game six and you need to extend to be able to go home, then you need a strength of an official to be able to uphold standards under undue amounts of pressure. What I don't want is that strength to drift or bleed into arrogance.

And that's something that is always a possibility because egos are involved, both for referees and players and coaches. And you have to learn how to provide a proper strength without giving in to arrogance and maintaining a humility about yourself so that you're always under the possibility that, you know, lo and behold, I may very well have missed that call, even though I didn't think so. And for me, that dynamic of having to answer my own inner landscape or my own inner journey in terms of, can I measure up to these critical moments when the league or when at lower levels, when the conference needs you to, was enthralling. I couldn't get enough of it because when I failed, it exposed me in a way that I had to answer myself. And when I succeeded, it felt like the hours in the rule book or the hours in the aerobic room practicing my signals so that they looked proper and conveyed what I wanted them to convey. The hours on the treadmill to stay in shape was all worthwhile at that moment. And that, that inner landscape exploration, um, was, was very addictive to me. You know, it's almost like you got ahead of me here and you knew what my question was going to be. Uh, so I don't, I don't think anybody leaked this stuff to you, but that's kind of leads into,

no, I know it's like, I can think of as anybody that's played at any level, you throw it out of bounds and then you look at the ref. And you know it's your fault. I saw a Kendrick Perkins clip the other night where he was trying to run the fast break and he just threw a 90-mile-an-hour fastball and he looks immediately at the baseline official. He doesn't think the official missed the call. He's mad at himself,

but he's trying to kind of transition the anger. The same thing with the coach, the coach isn't thinking about his paycheck. He's thinking about, I want to keep my job and I'm in this competitive thing, but I think, and I'm not an anti-ref guy. You guys have an impossible, impossible job. I think the amount of officiating sucks on social media is obsessive. Like people that are only dealing that content. I'm like, why do you even turn these games on? Yes. There are things that are frustrating to me, but I also, I think I understand at least the process to it. So I think just as, as a human being, how hard is that when it's like, I know no one wants to watch me, but this guy is jawing at me. And it's like a man that has pride

in myself. Like that has to be an incredibly challenging thing. Like I was looking at some stuff, like I found that Westbrook clip where you and he were going at it and it seemed like you were upset because he's like, I've got one dad. And you were like, so do I. And then you're like, if you're going to yell at me, I'm going to yell at you. And I was like, oh, here we go. I can't imagine how challenging that is, especially with somebody with the athletic background and a competitor to not be more frustrated at those times when we know that it's never personal, really, except for the rare occasions. I mean, there are rare occasions that maybe it was, but how challenging is that for not just you, but all officials?

It is challenging at times. I think one of the things that we've really tried to preach, for lack of a better description, since I've taken this job, Ryan, is that if you're ever saying to yourself, no one is going to speak to me that way, instead of we have a standard here, right? Then you've allowed yourself to go down a path that you need to reclaim and come back to. Such was the case that night. I can tell you the best part of that story is that Russell is, one of the things I love about Russell is, is that he's so authentic. And I would say that is very true of the vast majority of our players. I'm a huge proponent of our players. I think that they live in impossible circumstances in a fishbowl and they do an incredible job of handling that pressure that must be a daily, minute-by-minute feeling for them.

And when you put that kind of pressure into a confined space, then there's going to be some conflict. We did have that moment. And, you know, to start the second half, he came up and he was like, man, I let myself go there a little. And I said, yeah, so did I. I'm not so proud of that. And he goes, no, no, I should have come a different way. And I said, yeah, so did I. I'm not so proud of that. And he goes, no, no, I should have come a different way. And I said, well, let's think of it this way. We're just at the family reunion fighting over the last plate of food.

We can get past this. And we had a game about two weeks later. And the ball went out of bounds. And he thought it was different. And he was walking away. And he was in a good place. I was in a good place. And I asked him, I said, hey, Russell, how's your daddy doing? And he got a big grin on his face and said, oh, he's doing great. He goes, how's your daddy doing? I said, he's doing well, too. to this question, Ryan, is that we know each other for 30 years. And to think that we're not going to be in conflict is not an authentic experience to competition. And the idea is, and the hope is, and I know that this is true for me, is that I worked really hard and I love

my relationship with players because they worked hard at having authentic moments that you're allowed to own yourself, even if it's a moment you're not as proud of. You know, Russell and I laugh about that moment now, but I know on my end, I wish I would have handled it differently. But what I do know is I handled it authentically. And if you can handle, if you're not playing the role of official, but you're Monty McCutcheon, who is an official and you're authentic, and you're also not a jerk all the time that you had a moment, then we allow ourselves to get through that moment together. And I think that as long as players and coaches and referees handle themselves

authentically, and I use that word a lot because I think it's really as players and coaches and referees handle themselves authentically, and I use that word a lot because I think it's really important that if we're going to be with each other a long time, we have to be genuine with one another. And there are times when a technical foul isn't the answer, but you still have to use some component to run a game. Sometimes that's strength. Sometimes you step just ever so slightly. Being able to apologize and own the moment. I've apologized to players before in that sense, like, hey, I let myself get too competitive there in that moment. And with that kind of dynamic where people are giving and taking genuineness, relationships get built instead of being torn

down. You can't always be right as an official. That's just not possible because one, we're human and we do make mistakes. Two, we have to account for the possibility that we make mistakes both in our calls and in our interactions. And if we are able and capable of being strong and secure enough in ourselves that we can own our mistakes, you build even amongst something that you wish you would have done differently. This is coming from a place of not criticism, but it's more observation. And I put a lot of time into this, but I've had moments more over the last years, although I think it's cleaned up a bit now,

if I'm being totally fair. But the block charge, which we all know is like impossible. But when I think about, and I think you'll agree with me here as a player, where the charge was as a tool, as a defensive player, to what it's involved to now, I do not think the spirit of what the rule is, is the way it is called. And players, because they're so smart and they know what they can or can't get away with that it's been coached like that for you I mean Duke was just smart about it because K's like a lot of these officials have a problem with this so let's just make sure we go in

and not defend the ball not defend the rim let's just get in the way and impediment and then get knocked over and like when I'll see fast breaks where the defender sort of runs to meet the offensive player and just gets in front of him and stops and then gets run over, you're like, that's not in the spirit, at least the way I always understood the charge for like 20 something years. And then we've seen that change. And the reason why it still frustrates me is that I've seen the NBA and your group fix some of the plays that are basically tricking the official play. The rip through is a perfect example of that. The rip through kind of live for a couple of years.

And then it's like, hey, you know what, guys, we're not going to call this anymore. I mean, there's certain things with certain players. I mean, when Lowry, who is always taking charges, but I always wonder, like, do the officials go back and look and say, yep, he just fell down again, you know, or other guys in initiate contact. Why is it? I guess the question is, am I wrong in saying that it's evolved to a place that maybe isn't the greatest feature in an NBA game? Well, one, I want to make

sure I understand the question. There's on ball and off ball. So to answer the question about the off ball one, where someone stands in front of someone and they run through it because they don't see them coming, right? And they beat them to the spot. So one of the problems with how our game has evolved, problems, I don't know that it's a problem because we all benefit from the explosion of our game. But one of the issues that we see is that when I came into the league 30 years ago, Ryan, you had, well, that's the way we do it here at the NBA, kind of interpretations. And so you wouldn't have, if someone passed the ball and then the person was there,

but the pass had already been made and then they got run over, you know, the play I'm talking about, we would say when I came into this league, oh, that's not part of the play anymore. We don't call that. When you go to the rule book, there is no justification for that. The justification is, did someone beat someone to the spot? And did that offensive player then go on through their

space into contact? And as we became more scrutinized, and we called that play a certain way in a team, it may have impacted a game 15 years ago, 20 years ago. And we were posed with, show me in the rule book where you're allowed to have that interpretation. We weren't left with many answers, to be honest. And so you have to then decide how to write the rules. So for example, we don't like that play. There's lots of people who don't like the play. When I say we, I mean commentary. Yeah, right. I get it. But you're talking off ball. We're still off ball. So pass, cut, and then you could just tackle the guy in the 90s. You pass the ball and then you crash through a guy on a fast break. There's a lot of criticism.

Oh, that's not basketball. But we all agree that if someone is setting a pick, a legal pick, you can't just run through that legal pick and knock them over. You can't write a rule that separates out all these different scenarios. We're fine on that. You're fine on that. Okay, we're fine. Now let's talk about the on the ball play that you're talking about. When people beat someone to a spot and get run over and then flop, that's the worst case scenario for a referee because the flop adds to it,

but there's still an illegal act by the offensive player. We end up looking embarrassed as officials because you and everyone else see this flop at the end of it. But we had an offensive player who ran through a legal defender and blew him up. And now this defender wants to make sure that Monty McCutcheon sees this and flops at the end of it. I can't sit there as a referee and say, ah, they all equal out. Because he flopped, I'm not going to call this illegal act.

I'd have no problem with that. And that puts us in a bind. The one play I think that I would like to have a little discussion with you about is this. The force of the play does not equal the legality of the play. If I'm late to the play, and this is where we get fooled as officials and what we've really worked hard on to overcome. If I'm a little late to the play and we have one of our bigger, more aggressive players, what used to be a smaller power forward playing point guard per se,

or a forceful point guard that's a combo guard. And we've got lots of examples here in our league for that. And they're big and strong and fast. And if they know they've got you beat and they realize you're going to be late, they have every right to explode to the rim as long as they don't go off path. If they explode to the rim and that defender ends up in the first row, we get fooled sometimes as referee because we give into the force of the play instead of the legality of the play. They're late, but they get run over. And we'll call that an offensive foul, wrongly so sometimes. And we've worked hard at positioning being the key to this, not the force of the play. And I will tell you that I thought it hit like a low maybe five to seven years ago for me at home, where I was like,

it is better. It absolutely is better. And it's not because, you know, I remember the Institute of the fines and it was like, ah, that's not really working. And now you don't even hear about it anymore. I remember having Van Gundy on last year where he made this point. Jeff or Jeff? Jeff. Yeah. He does not like flopping. No, no, he doesn't like flopping. He doesn't like anything really. I mean, we could, we. No, no, he doesn't like flopping. He doesn't like anything. Really? I mean, we could, we could rank all the things he didn't like. I told Ray for Alston one night that, that I thought he flopped and he got, he was playing for Houston when Jeff was the coach and he got up and said, take it back, take it back, Monty. And I said, what are you talking about? And he says, take it back. If you say I flop, Jeff will take me out of the game. And I said, okay, I take it back. Maybe you got tripped. will take me out of the game and i said okay i take it back

maybe you got tripped i just didn't think it was an offensive foul and so it was a good moment but jeff jeff made this point and i'm not doing like hey jeff is because i think he complains the whole time but he said the old school guys which you've been now held the responsibility of trying to like get this next generation going but you lost a lot of old vet refs at the same time that were well respected as he goes they would they would kind of deal in this gray area which i know no one ever wants to believe in it's like look i may get you that call but if i see that you let's use just a random example uh james harden off the top of my head where hand off screen i know that actually wasn't off the top of my head. Just random off the top of your head. Harden, because he had one the other day,

and I go, I can't believe he's still getting away with this. Harden gets the ball off the screen, trailer, meaning defender, so not trail offense. Yeah, I understand. So the defender's coming around that screen. He's working to get over, too, because you've got to go over, and he's working like crazy. And then James knows he has him at this terrible angle

where he can't recover because all his momentum's coming to him. He has the ball. He knows the decision he's going like crazy and then james knows he has him at this terrible angle where he can't recover because all his momentum is coming to him he has the ball he knows the decision he's going to make and he jumps into the guy and then gets the free throws isn't that what all basketball is about putting people in a position in which you have them in which you have them compromised i'm more impressed by a crossover i'm sorry in the crossover put someone in the compromised position in which you can then get to the hoop and and and work it that's that's a very good but here's my point jeff said jeff's whole thing was if i if you get me and then i see that you did that he goes then i'm gonna screw you no screw you and i know not true. Jeff is wrong. Because what referees really want to do is innovation comes about in many ways. And what makes certain players so great is that they do find the innovation in which

they can maximize the situation. That's one way of putting it. Yes. Yeah. I mean, look. Yeah. Analytics has changed a lot of all of our work. It's changed our impact in refereeing and how we look at things.

But from a players and coaches standpoint, they know that corner threes, layups, and free throws are the most efficient basketball plays. And so if that's the case, what we want is we used to run pick and roll. When did Utah, where did Utah run pick and roll? They ran it on the wing. They ran it at the elbow. They either ran it low or they ran it high on the UCLA cut screen. Right. But now we've moved pick and roll to the center of the floor because we want to be able to get to the nail, the free throw line. And we want to be able to have all the options, the free throw line, and we want to be able to have all the options to us. I want to roll to the big for the lob. If they take that away, I have the floater. If they take both those away, I have my corner three. So pick and roll then becomes something

in the center of the floor. And with the center of the floor, you got to trail it as a defender because there's so much space. And players and coaches started to realize that if I run off the pick, but if I'm a shooter, Ryan, anywhere on the floor and you run into my legs when I'm going straight up, that's a foul. to see this in a way that teams are really good at, what we really defensive-minded coaches want to be able to say, well, I should be able to fight over that top of the screen. Well, you have to have space to fight over the top of that screen. You don't get to just bowl your way through it from a legal standpoint. And I think that what you see is this desire to win up against the ability to write rules that are fair for many situations. If you didn't, if you tried to write a rule for every specific type of play, your rule book would be 650 pages. You have to have some latitude. And that latitude then says, if I'm going up for a

jump shot, your legs aren't. So take, for example, the play a few years ago that we have where we started to see people coming up under jump shot, jump shooters from the front. Yeah, the Bruce Bowen. Okay, Bruce Bowen. So where they would come up underneath them. Yeah. All right.

We all recognize that should be a foul. There's turned ankles. There's everything else. It's dangerous. Absolutely. But we can't write the rule differently for coming to the side because I'm fighting over the pick. And if someone stops to shoot, they have to have the right to come back down. And that puts a position of referees that when people start to view that as manipulative,

as opposed to a smart basketball play we're going to get criticism as referees but the way the rule is written it is consistent with other jump shooters all over the floor yeah that makes sense that makes sense i just i'm not disagreeing i'm just saying that there appears to be certain plays that i go i can't believe like if I were an official, maybe that's why I'm not an official. I'd be like, Hey, I watched, I watched the, uh, the Raptors game last night and Lowry got us like five times. So the next time that dude falls down, like, I'm just going to look at him. And that was the Van Gundy theory. Yeah. Well, what you don't want is, you know, there are things like if I I'm allowed to go get the ball,

you know, like if I'm a shooter and I'm dribbling with my left, I have to be able to bring my right hand to the ball. And we allow defenders verticality, right? But if your hand is on a horizontal plane, you're in harm's way. Absolutely. Yeah. And if an offensive player is going to get the ball through that arm, I can't just capriciously as a referee with any hope say, yeah, that's not a foul. I can't say that because here's the problem with that, Ryan. If I say that because I have 25 years of experience, but Brandon Adir with two years of experience, he's going to interpret a different way. And that way from Wednesday to Friday to Monday, you may get three different interpretations of that. And you may be on the wrong end of it each night. One night you're on the wrong end of it because you're a defender.

And then on Friday night, you're on the wrong end of it because it gets interpreted differently by the only now you're on offense and you're not getting the benefit of the call. And we're all over the place when we have standards as rules. We're not perfect in our enforcement, but it does narrow that to where more consistency is possible. To close this out, I want to ask you five questions. We got a little rapid fire here for you. It's time for five questions. What's the most nervous you've ever been entering a game? This will sound odd, but the All-Star game was something that was nervous to me

because you're not trained for it. You know, do you call the post play? You know, we know that not many fouls are called, but you've got to recognize when they really turn it on and become competitive, you know? It's all fun and games until it's not and figuring that. If the ball's two inches in the rim, you know, and someone has a 64-inch vertical leap and they dunk it with their feet,

are you supposed to call offensive basket interference? Um, you know, and someone has a 64 inch vertical leap and they dunk it with their feet. Are you supposed to call off into basket interference? You know, there's, there's all those kinds of dilemmas that the all-star game placed on me that I felt a lot of stress about. Wow. That was not what I was expecting. I mean, you've done, you've done 169 playoff games, 16 finals. Hey, by the way, if you're one of the highest rated, which everybody agrees on and you're 25 years in, how come you only do 16 finals games?

Like, I understand it's a bit of a rotation, but I think looking back at that, that surprised me a little. Part of that is, is that, you know, there were other great referees ahead of you for the first 14, 15, 16 years of your career. I meant rotation in the assignment, not that everybody just gets games. Well, when I came off the floor, I had another 10 years of hopefully being in the finals. And so, you know, I made a decision to take this job and that sort of cut me off in the middle of how many finals games maybe ultimately I would have ended up with. I think the two game sevens, I had some butterflies that I wanted to make sure that I'm, you know, the finals game sevens that I were. Golden State, Cleveland, 2016. And Spurs, Miami in 13.

So those are epic, epic games. I mean, the 16 game, maybe the greatest comeback we've seen in NBA history as far as what was on the line and how good Golden State. Is there ever a moment, it's just, I imagine, you know, you're still a basketball kid out back taking shots where you go. Like, is there a moment to even appreciate the history that you're a part of yeah um there is um most of the day is pre is where you feel the butterflies is most of the day um i'm i was proud to work that game with danny crawford and duke callahan michael callahan uh affectionately known as duke and they're very close friends of mine and we trusted each other

and i think that that's the most rewarding game i ever worked in the sense that i felt like we measured up to the trust that the nba placed in us to put us on the game and i feel like we worked as a team and i felt like we served the game and that the game's focus remained on the players as it should in that moment and that that we didn't, you know, we didn't inject bad refereeing into a game that deserves such accolades to both teams. And they deserve those accolades for the series that they performed in, in that game.

It was a great series to be a part of. Once the game gets going, there are moments that you can appreciate that, you know, that you can say to yourself, all right, you've been trusted. You better live up to this. You know, you better honor the trust that's been placed in you. Most of the reflection, though, comes post-game. my wife told me that it took me a week to 10 days to come down off of that where I was normal again,

where you were so locked in that there was this slow comeback, come down where you weren't sort of, I don't want to say in a daze, but you were just locked into that kind of what it takes to get to that, that movement, that game moved very slow for all three of us. We've talked about, you know, to where we were so locked in, you could see where the things were going to take place. And that's very rewarding to be in a moment like that and to know that you did what you were capable of doing, the best that you were capable of doing. That doesn't mean I was perfect that night. I

don't mean to suggest that. I do mean that I'm proud of the work the three of us did. That was a very good answer. All right. Let's, uh, let's have a little fun here. Give me the coach that you just go, Hey man, you just, we, it's, you have to complain about every single call. I have a different approach to that. Um, I may or may not be accused of liking to talk. What is the answer? When you recognize that you like to talk, it may be more so that the coaches look at me and go, oh my God. Doc Rivers once told me, I said, Doc, how long have you known me? He was disappointed that I'd given Kendrick a technical foul, who I love. I just love Kendrick Perkins. And I'd given

Kendrick a technical foul, and he was upset with me. And he says, well, you know, I say, how long have you known me? He goes, sometimes I think not long enough, and then sometimes I think far too long. And I think that when you really do embrace this idea that this is a family of sorts, I don't have those kinds of feelings, Ryan. I never did. I enjoy the puzzle and the ability to meet that moment, meet that person midway and listen and try to give them honorable answers. You know, I have a great relationship with Doc. Doc has a similar approach to talking that I do. Yeah. Doc complains. Look, Doc complains as much as any coach I've ever seen, but I still love the guy. As do I. And I think that Doc would say we have a really great

relationship in that sense that he gave and he was willing to listen as well. And I think that's all any referee can hope to ask for. I've asked him about it. He goes, yeah, I complain way too much. And the funny thing too, is that whenever he's coaching a team, that team then complains more than like those Celtics teams complain nonstop. And then once they get to the Clippers, it was like, man, the Clippers always seem to be getting into it with other people. It's because the whole team complains all the time. I personally don't view that as you can't expect to put incredibly competitive people in an artificially competitive environment and then hope that they agree with everything

you do as an official. Yeah. See, this is why you have the job. These answers are perfect. That's why I'm going to have to adjust this last one because I wanted a good player story about you going at it with a player, but I think you're just too good at the job of being diplomatic. So feel free if you want to take the lead on that,

or I can ask it this way. Who was the toughest player for you to officiate? Rasheed Wallace was someone who knew the rules better than many, many, many, I mean, so many players. He's one of the smartest players that I've ever been around. And he, in many cases, appropriately held us accountable to those rules. And, you know, he knew them. And so you, if you thought you were going to give Rashid any kind of of sort of bs answer you were rightfully held accountable to that because he knew the rules and he took the time to know the rules and so you know even though there were

were some conflicted moments with Rashid I have great respect for him because he didn't just talk to be talking. He talked and he knew the game. He knew the game of basketball so incredible. His intelligence is so incredibly high that he wanted things to be right. And once again, you know, I've done a little rock climbing, Ryan. And one of the things that I read early on in rock climbing literature is, is that the approach long before you ever start to do the climb, some on some of these best climbs, the approach to get there is the hardest part of the work. And metaphorically, I like that because your approach to players who will hold you accountable determines whether you embrace that or endure that. And I don't mind embracing players who will hold you accountable determines whether you embrace that or endure that. And I don't mind embracing players who hold me accountable because I think, or coaches that hold

me accountable, because I think it makes me better at my work. And even now in this role, being held accountable by our general managers or our coaches or our players is not something that I shrink from. Because in many cases, they're correct. And it means that we have to learn how to get better at our work from something they've pointed out. And that excites me to be able to own up to that kind of challenge. And because I believe so wholeheartedly in the goodness of our league, you can then interpret the competition or that held accountability through that goodness and know that it's not mean-spirited. It's we want this right.

And my job is to make it as right as possible when I can. That was a great answer too, the Rashid thing. Although I'd say one year in Portland, I think he was up for getting some technicals that year. I think he might've been like, you know what? I think I've had it. And then as soon as he got to Detroit, the technicals went away, which I was like, wow, what an amazing transition. Imani, this was great. I could have done an hour, but I could have done longer. This was really cool. And I think it's very evident. I hope there's going to be so many

listeners that are hearing you in this way for the first time and probably hopefully look at some of the challenges of the job. Cause that's the way I try to look at it. Even when I get frustrated, it's a very, very challenging job and you're out there and really almost no one has your back. And it's kind of cool that you're the guy that's in the position to have the officials back and working with the NBA and your answers just prove why you're so good at this. So thanks a lot, man. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Ryan. I appreciate you having me. I look forward to seeing you down the road. Cool. I hope that was good guys. Um, yeah, I'm happy. I'm thrilled. I knew it was going to be good. I wasn't worried about it at all. Um, I, you know, there's, I have 10 other things I didn't even get to, but you know,

next time. All right. So you let me know if you want me back on again, you'll be on. And if you need anything from me, let me know if I can ever return the favor. Okay, Monty. So that sounds good. Thank you, Ryan. Tell your old man I said, hey. Yeah, I will. All right. Good stuff out of Monty. Before we get to Chris Mannix, remind you that Whoop is a fitness wearable that I've been using for the last few months to track my training, sleep, and recovery. And it's been awesome. I'm going to admit it right now. I'm just going harder, folks. I don't know if there's Instagram posts to follow, but I'm just going harder because of Whoop.

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Joining us from the bubble, taping this the day the NBA gets its season started again from Sports Illustrated, it's Chris Mannix. I think we've done so much on the coverage of what it's like and everything, and you've probably done a ton of that. Because basketball's here, let's get into some of that.

Are there any early impressions that have made you change your mind about how you would have thought the playoffs would have played out under normal circumstances yeah i mean it goes beyond you know just who's here who's not right like we can talk about the lakers missing avery bradley or you know the trailblazers getting back Nurkic and Collins. But for me, a lot of what I'm looking at early is, you know, kind of like what these teams are made of and like what the mindset of these teams are. Like, I'll give you two examples. Like Milwaukee has been great since they've been down here. And I, for context, I spend most of my day sitting in the lobby of the Coronado

Springs hotel where there are three practice courts and I get more value on just hanging out there and, you know, watching teams go by coaches, stop GM, stop to talk. It's like summer league in that way. And just, you know, riffing with them, but what they've seen and, and how they've perceived the first couple of weeks. And so often, guys are talking about Milwaukee and just how they're playing and how locked in they seem to be. And when I talk to people within the Bucs about that, one thing they say that's worked for them is that when this whole thing was announced,

everybody on that roster wanted to be there. So different teams, players had different reasons for not wanting to go, whether it's family reasons, health reasons, social justice reasons. That really wasn't the case in Milwaukee. Like when this was announced, they were all like, all right, let's hop on a plane. Let's get down there. Let's finish what they started. So that mental edge, I think is going to work for Milwaukee, at least in the early stages of all this. The flip side of it is the Clippers. I mean, I'm legitimately worried about the Clippers right now. If you like, I could see the Clippers losing in the first round.

I really believe that because I'm telling you, because this is a team that on paper is what they were back in February, March when the season stopped, but they're not even close to that at this point. I mean, they haven't had their full complement since they got down here. I mean, Zubach just showed up like two days ago. Lou Williams is still doing his Lou Williams quarantine. Montrezl Harrell just came back.

You know, outside of Kawhi and Paul George, and those are obviously significant pieces, you know, guys have been going in and out of this Clippers lineup and Clippers rotation to the point where, you know, guys have been going in and out of this Clippers lineup and Clippers rotation to the point where, you know, talking to Doc Rivers about this, he's like, I haven't been able to put in new things. Our practices have been really short.

Now, the counter argument to that is, well, they got eight games to figure it out. And that's true. Like, you've got eight seeding games to get your legs under you and get back to being the team you were. But they're going into this just a total mess, a complete mess, where if they don't get these guys back

and these guys don't get in condition really well, which is a separate conversation, they could be in some trouble in that first round. I'm glad you said that, though, because I had done, and it's something I referenced earlier. Like I went on with cow herd and we just talked about a bunch of different things. And because the NBA is, has been so rest aware lately that, that some people feel like this is

an approach, like this is an actual by design approach with the Clippers and what they do with it. I was like, look, I've talked to enough people to know that the Clippers are internally, they've been frustrated all year. This isn't like, hey, let's never have any continuity all season. And then, by the way, this oddity of having four months off where everybody should be rested. So I still love that team on paper, but I also love the Sixers on paper. Like when you and I, you know how like, look, it's out of sight, out of mind for a few months. And then you start going back and you're looking at stuff and I'm going, how are the Sixers the sixth seed? I can't figure that out. And despite all of this, the Clippers are still right there as a two seed. So even though it hasn't worked out and maybe

you're right because you're down there and there's a vibe that's hard to explain, it's still really hard for me, even though like, what would it be Dallas in the first round? And they have the number one offense in the NBA, which I think surprises you. And you look at some of their numbers, you're like, man, maybe Dallas is a lot better than their record. I have a hard time believing that this team flames out. Although the lack of continuity has to scare you for a group that's never done it before too. That's the other thing is like Kawhi has done his thing, but the rest of this group has never done anything. This group collectively has never done anything. And that's a really important thing in the playoffs. I mean, like the conditioning is

going to be a huge factor. I mean, Zubach just got back to practice a couple of days ago. Like they've been rolling Joakim Noah out there, these scrimmages as the starting center. He hasn't played in over a year. Lou Williams is, you know, sitting in his room for 10 days and, you know, people keep saying he'll miss the first two seating games. He's not like he's going to walk out of his room ready to give you 30 minutes. I mean, teams are extremely concerned about these soft tissue injuries. So there's going to be a ramp up for Lou Williams

as he gets back in the rotation. Same thing with Montrezl Harrell, who's been gone for weeks as well. So, I mean, this is a team that's going to have to spend every minute of these seeding games getting into shape. Now, you mentioned Philadelphia. They're on the other side of all this.

I've watched a couple of their scrimmages from courtside. Ben Simmons might be the best player here so far. He's played the best of anybody that's been down. He's been out of his mind at that power forward position. And Shaq Milton looks like a 10-year pro out there. I'm waiting for shake Milton to start acting like the second year guard who has the jitters and is afraid of the moment. Granted, we're just in the early stages of this, but he looks incredibly comfortable

playing alongside Ben Simmons. And if you have Simmons at the four, whereas three point shooting isn't as big a concern as it would be at the one and shake Milton shoots somewhere close to like the 50%. He was shooting from three in the 16 games he played. Look, I can, it's not, I can tell you factually that every team in that top three is praying that Philadelphia leapfrogs,

Indiana for that four spot. They don't want anything to do with, with Philadelphia, let Miami and Philadelphia kick the crap out of each other. And then they'll take whoever comes out of it. Philly would never do it because they don't have enough equity, and Brett Brown's going to worry about how this playoff thing even goes for his job.

And I do think that the delay in play this year and the oddity of these playoffs maybe puts things on hold, some tough off-season questions that a lot of teams around the league would have to kind of answer, whether it's Houston or maybe Philadelphia or even a couple other teams. You never know because there's only as much change as that's available with other teams that want to do stuff. But wouldn't Philly be better off just staying in that six, playing Boston with a Kemba situation that is a major concern? I don't care what comes out of Boston because I just don't really believe anybody.

And I don't blame them for not telling us all the truth. But like, would it make sense to play boss and you beat him in the regular season 3-1 you've got mb'd against that front line which is a major problem for anybody who watched the steven adams celtics game you're like oh that's right celtics can't guard anybody around the hoop um and then you're on the other side of the milwaukee thing where you wouldn't seem to the east finals philly won't do it brett brown can't do it it'd be the weirdest thing ever but it actually may be smarter to tank into the stay in the six seat. I'm having like PTSD from watching that Oklahoma city, Boston game where, you know, Steven Adams looked like a character in Gulliver's travels, where he's just like, it was Daniel Tice. He's just like everybody. He's just manhandling everybody out there on the floor, which, you know, reminds that Boston coming into

the season had a massive size problem and still has a massive size problem. And look, I think you're right. You know, Philadelphia is easiest path to the finals is staying in that sixth seat because you would play Boston. And if you beat Boston, you would then play Toronto, which is a tough team, but not as tough as Milwaukee. You could avoid them all the way through. I mean, it's a scenario where I could see them losing in the first round to Miami, but getting all the way to the conference finals in that sixth seed, playing those two teams that I mentioned. The problem, and to your point about they won't do it, you almost can't strategize in these seeding games. It's gotta be all about the ramp up.

It's gotta be about, you know, getting Joel Embiid into game shape, getting Shaq Milton and Ben Simmons minutes together so they're comfortable. Like they're called seeding games, but these are eight more exhibition games. I mean, teams don't, except for the teams that are fighting for a spot,

they don't really care all that much about where they land. There's no home court advantage for anybody. So it's all about using these eight games and every single minute in them to get your guys back to a game-shaped level for when mid-August rolls around and gets the playoffs. Ben Simmons, huge scrimmage guy. But I'm telling you, you're right. Like watching them play.

And the funny thing, too, is as bad as the Horford fit has been for Philadelphia, when he's away from Embiid, it's totally different. And then to see defensively how bad Boston was with Steven Adams, and then to see what Horford did to Steven Adams just a few days later, I was like, oh, that's right. That's why Horford is actually missed in certain times. Is there a third team in the West? So your Clippers stuff, all right.

But I, I think we're on the same page, at least that like, you're not writing them off, but you have major reservations, but I still can't like, do you have another team behind the Lakers then out of the West? Cause I know everybody's kind of in love with this Houston thing. Um, I'm not sure the Eric Gordon ankle, it came back negative. It looked bad the way he reacted to it, but you never know what these guys, especially with the ankle stuff. Um, do you have a third team that you're taking really seriously?

Maybe so because you're more open to the idea of a Clipper failure. Yeah, I mean, it's not Denver. That's for sure because Denver's got the same problems, if not worse, as the Clippers. I mean, they, I don't know who was on that team flight to Orlando a few weeks back, but it must have been like, you know, four guys in the pilot because they were missing everybody with that team. I mean, they just got their last player into Orlando just this week.

And, you know, talking to Mike Malone earlier in the week, he still doesn't know who's going to play on Saturday. Like he's, the Nuggets roster right now is a total mess.

And I think that's something that's going to be a problem for them as this thing kind of moves forward. I am fascinated by Houston. I just am. I mean, maybe it's because I'm one of the most vocal Russell Westbrook defenders there is out there. I can't understand a lot of the Russell Westbrook hate.

Maybe it's because I think that he holds the Joe DiMaggio of NBA records. I don't think that anybody's ever going to average a triple double for three seasons. I don't think that's ever going to happen again. And we've kind of diminished that in recent years by saying it's it's stats, but only one guy did it before. So I, that I'm a big, it's a long way of saying I'm a big Russell Westbrook guy. I think their ceiling is a lot higher with this mini ball lineup than it was with Clint Capella and that group. I think they can force you to play down and create havoc with some of the teams they might play in the first couple of rounds, whether it's Utah or you know,

the Denver with Yoke, it's like they, they have the ability to take one of your best weapons off the floor and make you play their way. And if you have to play their way, I don't think you can beat them. I don't think you can beat the Rockets playing super small when that's the way they want to play. So I guess I'm bullish on the Rockets as that second or third team in the conference for that reason. Yeah, look, it's horrifying when Harden does what he did the other day. And I think Harden,

actually, he looks like he's out of shape. He totally looks out of shape. He looks like he put on some weight and then he dropped, what, 31 against the Celtics? And granted, that was the backup Celtics group. But still, I mean, some of the stuff that he makes off the dribble where you go, I can't even believe he's pulling up from there. I mean, there's almost times where I get so frustrated with him. And look, I've admitted it before. I don't like watching the team play. Um, but I, I try not to let that get in the way of the appreciation. I'm not the biggest Westbrook guy. So I don't know if we're going to go at it right now. I'm going to throw a theory at to you, a theory to you. Cause I could have said, well, the stats, he got a triple

double because no guards ever been allowed to grab every single rebound. But whenever I stopped myself from that, he also has rebounds that no guard has ever gotten in this league too so um i i always want to be a little fair but westbrook who there's so much i admire about it if he were a lumberjack and he showed up to the job site and they were like russ where's your axe he'd be like i forgot it at home and then he would walk up to a tree and just start punching it and it's awesome that you you were that hard of a worker, but I would be on the job site being like, what the fuck are we doing here? That's how I see Westbrook's approach to the game at times as impressive as it is. In his last two

months, once they unlocked that small lineup, he was a beast after a really, really tough first few months. And I think he kind of does his own thing. And I worry about that kind of forceful nature that can be so impressive that isn't always great in like tight last minute playoff possessions. Yeah. I mean, it's a genuine concern. It wasn't surprising to me that it took so long for Harden and Westbrook to figure it out. They were teammates, but they weren't really teammates.

I mean, this is not right. I mean, and being a ball dominant, high usage rate player signing up with another ball dominant, high use rate player that that obviously is going to have some bumps. What made me confident early on that it was going to work out is because even though Westbrook was traded to Houston, he chose Houston. He wanted to play with James Harden again. They wanted to play together. It's kind of like why I have optimism that Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant can work out

because they want to play together. And when you have that dynamic, it makes it a little bit easier to figure things out during the tough times. And we saw that in the final month plus of the season. They were starting to come alive offensively. The playoffs are an issue, but if Russ is not going to be required to be the last shot maker, which he won't be,

it's less of a concern. If he can just be a stat filler for three plus quarters and let Harden take over late in games if it's close, I think that makes it, it's almost like with Ben Simmons, it makes it less concerning. His flaws become less concerning to me than they would if he was the alpha

on a team in the playoffs. I don't believe, put it this way, I don't believe you can win with Russell Westbrook as your number one guy. I do believe you can win with Russell Westbrook as your number two guy. Yeah, we've seen it. I mean, we've seen it with Westbrook

in the early playoff exits, and I think that's another argument against him. And I, despite, you know, like, as I've said that my, my Houston angst, I know that that best version of them is scary as hell. And I just can't figure out if they become a little less predictable with some of their offensive sets, which are not complicated. Although their pace this year is way beyond. They're a top-five pace team, which is not who they've been with this same high-ball-screen, hard-and-do-everything approach. Because Westbrook's made them go faster, and the smaller lineup has made them go faster. But I also looked up their rebounding rate since, and it's not to the day, but since post-Capella.

And it's last in the NBA in the fourth quarter. I mean, it's third worst overall, and it's even worse kind of later in games in some of this stuff. So is their predictability on offense going to adapt at all? Is the small ball approach, and Maury can tweet all of his jokes about, will it work in the playoffs?

Well, it's a completely legitimate question because that Lakers game, which i reference all the time anthony davis was so thrown off by the mismatch that it screwed him up like they didn't do anything to him other than he just was uncomfortable with the mismatch like hey i know like it's always funny when you see a mismatch sometimes that leads to the worst shot because the guy's like all right i have to take the shot because i have the mismatch and that's what i think the lakers did in that game and i also think it's something that you would avoid if you played them regularly which again i think these are all fair things but you know maury maury's a big meme guy we both know that and uh i'm just kidding i know

although they they changed i mean they changed their the lakers changed their offense so much in that game because of what you're talking about like it's like screw them up yeah yeah they see anthony davis with a seven inch size advantage on who's over there. Like, wait a minute. We have, don't we just have to like get out of everything we're doing and just throw it into the post.

And they kind of played right into the Rockets hands in that respect. I don't think they're, I don't think they're all of a sudden going to become unpredictable in the playoffs. I think they're going to be very predictable in the playoffs and they're going to offensively anyway. And they're going to say, look,

our best guys are better than your best guys. And we're just going to destroy you in one-on-one type situations. Maybe it works. Maybe it doesn't. Their floor is so much lower. Like they can get swept in the first round too. Like there's like, if they play Denver in the first round and Yoke, it's just, you know, plays like Adam Sandler and Billy Madison, where he's just like swatting away everything and dominating through the post. That's, I mean, they can easily, you know, get beat in four games. I just think this move makes their ceiling that much higher.

I don't think with Capella, they were championship contenders. I think with this group, they're at least, the door's open for them to do something special. Yeah, that's still, I guess I have a harder time getting there because I, you know, and I look at the two LA teams

and I go, you really think that this thing is going to beat them? And if anybody just says, oh, well, they could get hot. It's like, okay, well, look, we're doing the hot goalie thing where that's not really a breakdown.

It's like, look, I understand them and the multitude of shots, but it's, I'll put it this way. I think we, it's at least incredibly, like there's eyes on them in a way that it's like, put it this way i think we it's at least incredibly like there's eyes on them in a way it's like what's gonna happen with these guys because i don't think we really know the answer all right um the celtics we touched on it briefly there they became kind of

the media darling during the shutdown as a young team that could make this run i've pushed back on it one because i'm like why is milwaukee not going to be as good just because they're in a bubble when they've been killing teams all year although there are certain things i worry about with their you know maybe limitations in the talent around them come playoff game you know scheme and and just different harder closeouts against them with what they run but that boston i think the numbers like their top five guys have played 14 games together so boston is the darling because they're young and it's like they can go through this grind. It's like, yeah, they didn't even go through the grind in the regular season all that well. And I do think the Kemba thing, anybody that's trying to sell me that it's fine, it doesn't make any sense.

He was hurt at the end of the year. He had four plus months off. He doesn't play in the scrimmages. And then I'm supposed to believe that he's going to turn that back on and be fine. Clearly, that is a bigger problem than I think people in Boston want to admit. No, I completely agree. You, you don't have a nagging injury that flares up over the all-star break and then you take four months off and the nagging injury is still there. Like it's not like it's, you know, it's a little hyperbolic to call it, but it reminds me a little of the

Isaiah Thomas stuff where, you know, Isaiah had a hip issue. And all of a sudden you're like into the summer and like, is he having surgery or not? Are we still discussing this? How significant is this? So it's definitely a concern. It is good to see. It was good to see Kemba out there for the first nine minutes. And I watched that game.

And, you know, in the nine minutes he played, he looked explosive. He was aggressive. He went to the basket, small sample size. You have to hope that the Celtics use these eight games. Like we talked about as a ramp up, like just keep playing Kemba 20 minutes in the opener on Friday, 25, 30. So that when you get to mid August, he can give you a 30 plus, but it is absolutely, you know, something, something that you have to watch. Like if, if, if he winds up having to sit out games, that's a big time problem. And I do, I am one of the people that think Boston has more than a puncher's chance of getting out of the Eastern conference. They still don't match up well with Milwaukee. Like that's, that's still

a major problem for them. But here, here's my quick prop thing on the bucks though. Like as well as they've played while they've been here, I'm still wary of teams coming back from a four month break that are so reliant on the three point shot. And the Bucs are extremely reliant on the shot. Shooting is a perishable skill and you can get it back to a degree, but a lot of these guys haven't done a lot over the last four months. So if you're a Milwaukee team and your three point shooting percentages dropped by like even one, two or three points, that's the difference in games. That might be the difference in a series. I mean, Giannis is not a three point shooter, but everybody else is out there around him from Brooke Lopez on down. So that to me is what I'm

watching mostly with the bucks in the first, you, seeding games, like how sharp are they from the perimeter? If they're the same team, I think it's lights out. I think they win the Eastern conference, but if they're, if there's any slippage there and they can't get it back as time goes on, I think the door's open for somebody to beat them. I'm going to throw one more team in the mix and it is a long shot. And that's Oklahoma city. I think we kind of looked at the roster going, all eventually one of the guys is gonna get hurt whether it's

danilo or chris paul paul just i think reminded everybody this year like no no this is this is how good i am and then that three guard lineup that looks incredible and gilchrist alexander looked awesome during the scrimmages you know i think we all i think all of us that love basketball always kind of wish you had a steven ad your team, because even with his limitations, you love every part of it. And there are nights where I look collectively at their wings, not Danilo, not the guards, where I go, all of these guys are terrible. And then there's some nights where I'm like, hey, do I sneaky kind of like all these guys? Do I like Lou Dort? I liked him in college. college uh but i don't know who i would pick them against but their fourth quarter numbers are incredible there isn't there isn't this glaring thing with them now that the lineup's set and if no one gets hurt in the ramp up and in the playoffs um they could give some teams you know i look giving a team a problem isn't the greatest analysis you're ever going to hear but i just would be far from writing them off.

I would go even further. I think they can beat the Clippers in the first round. I don't like the Clippers. Here we go. Like I like the Clippers on paper, but they're not what they, they're not what they are on paper. And people in that organization will, will tell you that right now.

And one thing, and I had this conversation here with Sam Presti before their first opener, was that, and it goes back to what I was saying about what continuity matters. The Thunder were never afflicted by the COVID bug. They had their guys in camp right when they were allowed to. They were there. They were careful. They were all working out.

And they got to Orlando, and there's been some consistency with that group. They've been able to keep working together, training together. I think that matters when you get into this resumed season. The question about the Clippers, and you've seen the numbers, Chris Paul's got to stay on the floor for like 40 minutes. When he gets off the floor, those numbers just crater. And that puts enormous pressure on guys that play well with him, like Dennis Schroeder, who might be the sixth man this year. Uh, Shea Gildas, Alexander,

who's just a stud. Uh, it puts enormous pressure on those guys to pick up the slack and they haven't done it this year. It's been Chris Paul minutes, great minutes without Chris Paul, just awful. So if he can stay on the floor for 35, 40 minutes, I think they can beat anybody like outside, maybe the Lakers. If he can't, uh, you know, they're, they're fodder probably in the first round. I want to leave you with this, um, because I was going back and looking at different articles and stuff, and I'm sure you've talked about this and this is probably, maybe it's annoying to talk about. Maybe you think it's awesome to talk about, but on your bio, uh, for those that don't know,

Chris is a double Eagle and that means BC high in boston college and so i don't know that anybody ever goes like there's a toughness factor there but i can only say that because when i say i'm from martha's vineyard i see the respect ooze out of people's pores just instantly they're like wait what you're from martha's vineyard but you cover boxing and you do it really well. And Juan Manuel Marquez, you sparred with him. You trained. Now what's your background and take us through that. Cause you, you have this line and I started reading about it. This is a really cool thing that you did. I mean, it's unbelievable that a pro boxer would do this with you, but what was that experience like the lead up to it? And then actually having to do that and exchange punches with a guy that knows what he's doing? Well, for full context, it was probably 10, 12 years ago now that I started reading all

the George Plimpton books, whether it was Paper Lion and he fought Archie Moore back in the day. He did a lot of that experiential journalism and I loved it. And SI had a section, it was like SI players or something like that, where they encourage this type of stuff, like doing unique outside-the-box things. So I started kind of pitching them offbeat stories that involved me doing crazy things. Like I got to play like 10 minutes in a G League game early on. I played for the Utah Flash for a minute and a half

and scored on Kobe Carl, which I've never let him live down after the fact. That's great. I'll remind you. He lives up the street. He knows. We talk about it every time. He saw me at a breakfast place here. He goes, Dave McMiniman. I was like, close. But I did that. And then I went bull riding, which was an insane experience because they don't even like prep you for anything that is sticky. You want to bull like on the first day. And I broke my collarbone, which to this day I can still feel like getting tossed off. So that was worth it.

That was, it's a war wound there. The boxing thing was like, obviously I was in the early stages of covering boxing over at SI. And I love the idea of boxing. I'd done several stories on Juan Manuel Marquez, who was at the time, 126 pounder or 130 pounder, something like that. And I'd been to Mexico.

I reported stories with him and his brother. So I had a relationship with him. So I pitched the idea to his promoter, which was golden boy, Oscar Delahoye's company at the time. They loved it. Matt Marquez was still trying to make a name for himself, so they liked the idea of him getting a profile-type thing in SI.

So they agreed not only to do it, but they said they'd fly him up to New York to do it. So I spent six months. I signed up. I hadn't boxed at all. I signed up. You had never boxed. No, never boxed.

Chris Mannix, not professional badass. No. had never boxed so not ever but chris mannix not professional badass no if you count the like abysmal street fighting record i had in uh suburban boston which town that's uh quincy quincy mass town show okay quincy you know the people it's not just boats it's so it's a lot of boats but it's uh it's not just boats it's people that i can probably claim that they beat the bejesus out of me at some point. But I had not boxed. So I went to Church Street Boxing, which is downtown, right by the Old World Trade and Freedom Tower now,

and spent six months training. I had a couple of guys that worked with me, and we went through the motions for six months, did like five days a week, got in pretty good shape for it. The day of the fight, all my Boston friends came up for it, right? Like they, excuse me, they, you know, packed their coolers. They came up and they were looking forward to seeing me get my ass kicked. I didn't know what to expect when Marquez showed up because not only did he show up, he rolled in there with his publicist, with his actual trainer, Nacho Beristain, a Hall of Fame level trainer, with his cut man, like he's going to need that in a situation like this.

And he rolled in with the whole crew. So we went to the back room of Church Street Boxing. And I'll never forget this. My editor who was there comes up to me, says, you know, Nacho, his trainer said to me, he goes, what round do you want this to end? My editor, his name is Rich O'Brien was like, no, no, no, no. We don't, we don't want to knock out here. Just, you know, a little light sparring there. So, um, we got in there, it's wild, man. We got in there, we did three rounds. I got off to my recollection, one good punch. It was like a straight right hand.

rounds. I got off to my recollection, one good punch. It was like a straight right hand. And I remember his reaction. He kind of nodded, slapped his gloves together, and then hit me with a body shot that there was a video of it somewhere that made me spaghetti legs. I didn't go down, but I spaghetti legs all the way off to the side and just basically ran away for the rest of the round. I made him matter when I hit him with something clean. So it was an unreal experience. Like when it was over, I was happy that I did it. But even standing in front of a guy that I had 50 pounds on, 50 pounds, we're wearing headgear,

I've got 50 pounds on, I was still, that's the most scared I've ever been in front of another human being ever before. And your buddies are there. They let your buddies come up and watch you. Oh, man. They were, I mean, they were all trash too. Like they all, and this is when we're all 26 to 28, something like that. I mean, they are. You think you're supposed to be drunk all the time. Oh, but they're like, they're booze cruising the whole way up. And like, they get there,

it's the middle of the afternoon and you know, they, they've got, I remember one of my buddy my buddy had a funnel i don't think he used it but he had a funnel with him and they were just just sitting there just ripping beers and rooting for marquez like you know like for mass yeah like knock him out knock him out so the whole thing was a wild experience but it's it's unforgettable that's for sure i appreciate you sharing that story with us because uh i don't know why i don't know how that slipped up i don't know why i I don't know how that slipped up. I don't know why I didn't know about that, but you can follow him at SI Chris Mannix. He does a terrific job. Tier one down in Orlando.

The stores will come in and that was great stuff, man. Thank you. Anytime, Ryan, allow me to, I already know what's going to happen. And this isn't like some big,

you know, cultural take here. This is strictly a baseball take on the Astros. So Joe Kelly throws a Korea. No one wants take on the Astros. So Joe Kelly throws Correa. No one wants to take the Astros side in anything. I don't. Because it wasn't even so much the way they cheated. It was

the way they handled themselves after the fact. And Correa in particular, who I like a lot. I like him as a player. I wouldn't pretend to say I know him. Having him come through a couple car washes, he couldn't have been nicer the whole time. But he was kind of ridiculous. And bregman who i like was you were like all right whatever i mean the whole thing collectively but you know what guys don't do like nobody fesses up to anything they was like hey yeah absolutely we cheated here's how we did it let me let me be so sorry because they're still thinking like deep down like yeah

we still won the world series or whatever it wasn't because of the cheating we're really good team and we did all these things and development development development um that's just the way they're going to look at it and i'm not saying that they're right just kind of going with the human nature thing here so they've throughout this entire thing been like hey everybody else can kind of fuck off all right and that pisses you off because you don't root for the astros all right almost everybody else other than astros fans that listen to this everybody hates your team okay all of you guys are looking at this. I did a college appearance on a Zoom call months ago, and it was strictly talking about career stuff. And then we opened it up with the questions. And I think one of the first questions was,

how come baseball won't vacate the Astros World Series and give it to the Dodgers? I was like, well, because you're only asking that because you're a Dodgers fan. The same reason why politicians in LA started coming out and standing behind a podium and saying, we're demanding that MLB investigate this, and they give the World series to the Dodgers. And you're like, this is so stupid, but it's what politicians do because they farm for these topics that have the highest approval rating. So they can just present an opinion and go, Hey, you know what? Everybody's going to like me for this. It's like steroids in baseball. There were very few people who were going to tell Congress, even though it may have been a waste of time. And it was pretty much an

act. Um, there weren't going to be a lot lot of people saying like, no, we want more steroids in baseball because we want kids to be taking them to be influenced by their heroes in Major League Baseball. Right. So you could see certain things that politicians do where you go, OK, that's a very high approval type topic. And at least in L.A. here for politicians to jump in and say, hey, let's be anti Astros. It played well as dumb as it was. OK, now back to what happened. So we know that Manfred didn't punish the Astros. And to remind you, as Ken Rosenthal did last night, he said, baseball chose to grant the Astros players immunity in exchange for honest testimony. Also, Manfred determined in September 2017, he would hold teams, GMs, and managers accountable

for sign-stealing misconduct. Potential grievances were another obstacle in issuing penalties to players. So let's take the last part of this first. For all the times that we want punishment to be held up to our standards, and I still think punishment-wise, the public, we are so off. Thank God the public is not in charge of punishment moments after something happens because everybody would be sentenced to shame island. Whenever we'll be like, well, why doesn't it happen? Why doesn't it happen what doesn't happen like there's so many times well potential lawsuit well that's not right yeah i'm not saying it's right but that's the reason why this decision was made and then all of a sudden you know that if you're

going to start suspending all the players how long was that going to drag out what kind of grievances were going to be filed and was that mean the story was going to get dragged out longer and longer and longer um you know a lot of times you know your answers is well how come how come this kind of employee gets to do this? And I'm not even trying to single out any, but you understand different industries. We're like, well, how come that person still has a job? Why does that person get this kind of deal? Like this guy's getting those kind of benefits 30 years later.

Well, unions are the answers to a lot of those questions. And in this case, not all unions are certainly not the same, but in this case, the baseball union, the players union is very very strong so manfred's like look here's what i can do i'm going to give everybody immunity try to figure out exactly what happened get to the root of this thing and make sure we stop it we'll punish the people that were in charge but that wasn't good enough because most of you are not rooting for the astros and a lot of times when it comes to sports and punishment even though we want punishment to be consistent it isn't consistent anywhere so i don't know why we even

keep asking for that we are a lot like two kids two siblings in the backseat of a car on a long family road trip where you're like, she touched me first, as you consider and argue. That's what most everyone is like with this Astros thing. So I'm not defending the Astros, but I'm also realizing that the way you're upset about the whole thing is basically driven probably because of your rooting interest. So Joe Kelly throws a korea and then korean those guys mouth off and kelly then gets suspended eight games now people are really going overboard with the shortened season math thing where it's like hey losing a three game series is like losing 11 games in a row you know what it isn't it isn't like losing 11 games in a row i know what the math says i know what i know

like i understand that a certain number of home runs in a shortened season would equal this many home runs over 162. But you know what sucks? It's losing 11 straight days that you show up to the ballpark. It's not the same feeling as losing three in a row. People are going to lose three-game series in these shortened series. There's probably not going to be many teams losing 11 games in a row over 60 games. It's just not the same. And by the way, there are other teams that are going to be losing three games. So the whole thing kind of cancels itself out. So when the suspension turns into Joe Kelly,

eight games is really like 22 games. Okay, maybe I'll allow that more so than I will the losing streak math on this stuff. And I know there's a math guy going right now being like, what are you talking about? It's 2.74. There's no debate.

It's 11 games. I'm like, yeah, but it isn't. Like, I'm just, I'm refusing to accept the numbers there and what's to the right of it. But Kelly, you know why he got hammered? Because Manfred's like, all right, this is the deal, guys. This isn't going to be a tee-off on the Astros deal all season long. Oh, and by the way, in the middle of a pandemic,

I don't want you guys fighting each other. Because you know what? I just don't want you guys fighting each other in general. And now I especially don't want it when the season looks like it's falling apart because a bunch of guys can't stay out of a strip club and we may have to cancel the marlins who should have been relegated when it was samson and their other owner there ripping off the entire state of florida and the county in miami okay unfortunately like if the marlins have been just hey we're just done with you i wish it had been under that stewardship then

uh even though i know it doesn't seem like people are really huge fans of Jeter either after a couple of trades. So let's be grownups about this. And I know you don't like the Astros. I'm not defending the Astros, but to see Manfred hammer Kelly, which is fine, we can agree on that. It is very clear.

He doesn't want everyone. He's setting a tone that you are going to get massively punished for throwing at these guys. If you think you're going to do this all season long, that will potentially lead to fights that makes us look worse and even more selfish than we may already be because we're getting close to each other and fighting,

some of the social distancing stuff is like totally make-believe. That's what Manfred did. And this isn't a vote for Manfred. It's a vote for common sense, and it's a vote for explaining why the suspension happened the way it did. So there you go.

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

Let me tell you what's required. Okay, life advice. It is lifeadvicerr at gmail.com. Kyle sent over a big one here. This is going to bum some dudes out. All right. Ryan, first off, I've been listening about six years now, ever since I had a two-hour break in class and mid-morning and nothing else on TV except for you and Van Pelt. The number of people that watch this on campus middle of the day is always just amazing to me. It always makes me feel

good about it. I love hearing how much people love that show all the time. I reference it probably too much, but whatever. Proud of it. Anyway, I'm 24 now living in Arizona. Two years removed from college. One year removed from professional baseball. So athlete. I work in construction real estate. Oh, I thought this guy swung a hammer.

Okay. Coach high school baseball on the side. Okay. Net worth sitting in the low four figures. So what are we talking? Under 10 grand? I think that's what that means, right? talking under 10 grand i think that's what that means right net worth so he's in he's in the 9 000 1 000 and 9 000 club okay steady hey look i don't think i had 9 000 until i was when we say net worth are we talking about what's in the bank i never knew how to understand that net worth is very uh like what do you got if you sold your stuff yeah first of all it's always wrong um a lot of times i'll look at somebody and be like there's no way that's what the net when then other times it's like so low that you go well that doesn't make any sense but when basketball

like you know everybody i i get blamed for being a pro owner because i've i've defended owners versus some criticism that i just think is stupid sometimes like when something happens and they'll go well that guy's worth $2 billion. They can't, but you can't write a fucking check for 1 billion, okay? Do you not understand how net worth works? It's everything that you have on paper. And most of, look, Balmer is cash, okay?

He's cash and assets. Balmer can do whatever he wants. For Tita in Houston, there's arguments that he's actually very much paper and he's not liquid. There's a reckoning coming for certain NBA owners where if the revenue is cut massively for multiple seasons, if we can't

get out of this pandemic, which is a whole other topic. There's going to be some bills due here and then if there's multiple franchises available, then that drives down the overall franchise value or whatever. I mean, it probably correct at some point, but, um, every guy that owns all of this stuff, like I'll always read, like there's certain people that are with rich families that have stuff coming to them where their net worth is a really nice number, but it doesn't mean they have any cash. Okay. It doesn't

mean the net worth versus what can you actually go and do are two completely different things. Frank McCourt apparently had a nice net worth. I think Bud Selig's like, look, we're not even going to call Experian Frank. I'll handle it here. And he didn't have any money. He didn't have any money.

Like, fucking none. You know, look... I totally derailed this life advice. That's okay. That's all right. People like the net worth stuff. People are big net worth guys. I never actually understood what they meant so that's good thank you all right so as long as i explained it to you and then a few hundred thousand to a million people listening to this but uh okay so this guy's admitting yeah all right you know

what though he's right out of college you've got a few thousand in the bank or a car i don't know maybe you maybe you own a shed and it's just on paper and it's a sick shed. Okay. All right. Bought a house. Oh, he bought a house. He bought a house with a net worth in the four feet.

I don't think this guy is accurately describing what, uh, maybe he thinks four figures is four zeros. Could be. I think he thinks it's, I don't know what the hell he thinks here all right let's move on all right so he bought a house i have a decent starting salary no kids everything heading in the right direction except for my dating life okay mr lonely hearts here i have three to four

girls who i hang out with often. There's people listening to this right now that are so mad that this guy's saying, help. Let me read that sentence for you again. I have three to four girls who I hang out with often. So we've got a player on our hands here, folks. But the one I care about the most just moved 1,200 miles away. We've dated for three years, but in the past year, it's been more casual because of the combination of school, baseball, and work. I don't really care about the other three girls, but it's always a good time when I hang out with them. I already miss my ex-girlfriend that moved.

It's only been a week. What do I do? Do I give these other girls a chance? Plural. Do I let my ex-girlfriend know I still love her i don't know i guess that's why i'm looking for advice stay well be safe all right very good very very he said some nice things around there's people going like you dick all right so you're 24 here's what i'm going to tell you um i as i did my 2002 worst life ever thing which i randomly stumbled into the other day as i was trying to find something else online and i talked about bill where i had the girlfriend that i really wasn't um mature enough for was not um aligned with in any way whatsoever she wanted to move with me when i came to new jersey we were in vermont together

and i was like what are you nuts like this guy's got plans. I got real aspirations. So she had no choice but to tell me to fuck off. I deserved it. But as soon as she did it, I was obsessed with getting her back. I was more into the idea of us once I realized it might be over than when I had her. And she was totally team Russillo and down for any plan that I had. She was going to be along for the ride and was never going to get the way. But as a child of divorce, I felt like, yeah, sometimes when there's these marital breakups, I can really derail some plans. So I'm just going to stay focused here. And you can be like, hey, wasn't that like 20 years ago, dude? What are you doing? So the reason I'm bringing up that story is because I think that's what's happening to you here.

Girls clearly like you. Athlete, four-figure net income, value, net worth, house, no kids. You work with high school kids. That means there's a compassionate part to you. Look, I mean, sometimes guys are going to email the show that girls actually like, which is always a nice turn. But my guess is you probably are in this immature phase. And it's not wrong, but you're in this immature phase of you like the one that you can't have. So maybe you are totally in love with her and that's the right girl for you.

Um, 24 still is a little young, but everybody's different. And maybe you sound like you're planning out the whole deal. Maybe you want kids by 30 and all that kind of stuff. And that's great. That's what you want to do. Um,

but be very careful in talking yourself into caring about somebody for the wrong reasons. Because when she was there, I don't know what the problem was. But if you're in love with her and you really are like, hey, this is the girl I'm thinking about all the time, just be sure that you're thinking about her all the time because she is that person that you need in your life. And you're not thinking about her all the time because she's just not around and you have all these other options. Like as much as I love forgetting Sarah Marshall,

when Siegel just runs through the town after the breakup, you're like, you know, you should be doing a better job of getting over this because there's a lot of guys that break up that have no options and you're on a tear. Good point. And so stop crying and eating cereal and get over this girl.

Where there are some people that break up and have no options and nobody's interested in them. And women can smell the lack of confidence on you like it's the newest cologne where it's just, oh, this guy's definitely down on himself. I'm not giving him my phone number.

They can smell it on us, man. I'm just telling you right now. They can sense it immediately. This guy has no self-confidence. I'm not giving him my phone number. They can smell it on us, man. I'm just telling you right now. They can sense it immediately. This guy has no self-confidence. I will move on. I will talk to the drunk redhead kid in a flannel because that kid

has no self-awareness and he's actually so confident. And you're like, what the hell? And that's not an anti-redhead or flannel rant, but you get my point. You're like,

how come my friend who's not as good looking as me does so much better? And you're like, cause that guy doesn't care. He shows up and he goes, I don't care. I'm the man. And there's something to be said of just having that approach in life in general. But, uh, that's it. That's all I have for you. I just, I could only tell you like, I'm afraid at 24 that you like her cause she's not there that's all but if this keeps dragging out why don't you just tell her how you feel and then um if she says no then you're gonna like her even more so good luck with that that was a mega nba is back pod thank you to everyone that listens it was a really great week um the numbers are just so awesome and i'm i'm so uh excited you guys

digging what we're doing here and That's the plan, man. Please subscribe. Like I said, rate, review, and we will talk to you. Oh, by the way, Simmons and I are back on Sunday. Sunday's NBA returns. Bill and I are just ready to go on that one. We are so fired up to get those Sundays going again. Good stuff.

We'll talk to you Sunday. you