The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Ranking NFL QBs Most Likely to Be Replaced Next Season, Plus a Chris Paul–Warriors Check-In With Logan Murdock

Episode Date: November 10, 2023

Russillo opens the show with his quarterback replacement rankings (1:00). Then, he’s joined by The Ringer’s Logan Murdock to discuss how Chris Paul is jelling with the Warriors and the chaos that is Draymond Green (19:00). Finally, Ceruti and Kyle join to make this week’s Alliance Parlay (41:00) before closing the show with some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (45:00). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Logan Murdock Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Available now. Eligible U.S. Spotify Premium subscribers will have access to 15 hours of monthly listening time from a catalog of more than 200,000 audiobooks alongside ad-free music and podcasts. Spotify's audiobook catalog includes many of the world's most beloved titles as well as new releases including over 70% of best-selling titles. This includes books from all the Big Five publishers and many independent publishers and authors. I went through it. It is loaded. History alone, imagine the waves crashing as man is exploring uncharted territories or perhaps just super into maps and trying to rechart the coastline. You are a minute away from doing that on your own. Check it out on Spotify.

On today's pod, the exercise is the quarterback replacement rankings. Now, there's usually a lot of turnover at the position, but I'm going to try to come up with a top five based on all the different factors with a bunch of different names on who will likely not have their starting gig at the start of next year. Logan Murdoch on the Warriors,

the Chris Paul fit, and also an amazing quote from Draymond Green. We've got the Alliance back at it, undeterred, and life advice, including a vending machine challenge. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Winter is here, undeterred and life advice, including a vending machine challenge. No, but blueberry muffins with the delicious crumb topping? Total yes. Get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol and select markets.

Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Hey, did you guys watch sports last night? I did. Kind of regretted it. Hawk's Magic was good. That was a fun one. Tough camera angle. Not sure who was running the clock

there in Mexico city. And then right as Franz went for that drive, I lost my screen, but then it came back, but amazing pass by Trey to DeJounte for the three. So anyway, we're not going to do any NBA because it was very light slate last night. And we had a matchup of draft pick order with Carolina and the bears because the bears own the Panthers pick. And I'll be honest with you. I wasn't bummed out when the Panthers missed that last field goal to send it in overtime. So what I wanted to do today, because we're looking at a number one pick and Bryce young and on the other side, Bajan, I feel like the agent's a bit like a guy you run into at the airport and have airport beers, have a great time, catch up two or three beers. You don't even know

them actually. So you don't really catch up. You just meet him. And then you just were like, man, that guy was fun. And then you never run into him again. Uh, so it's, it's been interesting. He got the win. Uh, but what I really wanted to do was focus on my NFL quarterback replacement rankings, looking at everyone who could potentially lose their starting job. And it's a long list. Uh, and then try to put it in some kind of order of the top five when we're done. So if you look at 23, the start of this season, as we're halfway through it, there were 10 teams with new starters. Some were draft picks.

Obviously, there's some different transactions out there, like the Garoppolo deal. If you look at the Colts, they had a draft pick. They also brought in Minshew. But basically, if you look at it and you go, okay, who had the gig last year and then who has it now? Jordan Love is certainly somebody that counts because it became his team once Rodgers was out. So basically, you're looking at almost a third of the league having turnover at that position from who the starter was versus the projected starter of this year. So if we look at how it's shaping up halfway through the year now, it almost feels like there's, I don't know, 16, 17 names to mention,

which is not realistic. That's not going to happen. We'll go over some of the money stuff because it's really challenging for some of these teams. But I just like revisiting this at the end of the year and see how it feels in comparison to how it feels today. Three teams, it's already happened. All right. Tannehill has lost a job in Tennessee. That was not the expectation, even though they had spent the resources on Will Levis at some point. He was going to take over. He's taking over. It's been good early and feels like

it's his job. And I wouldn't expect Tannehill to be the starter next year. And that's kind of the way you look at this is like, would you be surprised if this person had their job next year? I'd be surprised if Desmond Ritter was the starter for the Atlanta Falcons next year. He's lost the gig to Heineke. And then with Cousins, clearly with the injury, but also the contract situation, you know, maybe, maybe he just says, I like Minnesota. I'm going to rehab. Everything's going to work out. I don't make as much money. It makes sense for Minnesota. Maybe that's something resolves itself. But at this point, that's three guys that have already lost the gig and are not getting it back. So then there's the money group. I remind myself of this with NBA trades all the time, being like, no one's going to trade for that guy. And then they trade

for him. It's different in the NFL, but what seems impossible is perhaps possible. But some of the way the contracts are structured and the pain that you would have to feel by a team, by either trading a player before June 1st of next year, or just outright cutting them, especially when the owners, you have to remember this. You can look at the salary structure stuff for different contracts in the NFL and go, oh, there's the dead cap hit, and it's going to mean this. But there's also an ownership part of this is like, I already paid all of that cash to this guy, and we're already going to part of this is like, I already paid all of that cash to this guy and we're already going to move on. So the headliner of that group is Deshaun Watson.

Now, do I think Deshaun Watson would actually lose the starting job going into next year? He's been way worse than I ever expected. I know he's dealt with injuries. I just still can't imagine that happening. So I'm bringing it up to cover all bases here, but I don't think it's likely. We know the contract, five years, $230 million, all of it guaranteed. If he were to be traded after this year, it'd be a $60 million dead money hit for 24. That is unheard of. Russell Wilson, who's definitely been better this year, but three of the last four games, not necessarily great.

There's the pain element of this where the Wilson transaction is not on him. It was very clear this offseason that he was going to try to change things around. Again, it's been better than it was for Wilson last year. The way that contract is structured, I mean, again, you can get out if you want to get out. And there's a weird thing with Wilson where if you just aid it now after this year, it would actually save you more cash down the line, but you'd be looking at a two-year cap hit that would still be significant unless there's some kind of trade. I don't know what the market would be for a trade for Wilson because he's not one of the younger guys who you feel like shows you something. You just look at him as somebody who's just declining. Kyler, speaking of money, he got a five-year $230

million deal, $160 million guaranteed, which at the time felt like a massive leap of faith for an Arizona franchise that doesn't really like doing this kind of stuff. On paper, it looks like an out after four years from now. There's no way that's going to happen. If you were traded before June 1st, again, that date is really important because of how the numbers work. It'd be a $46 million cap hit in 24, which would be an NFL record for dead money, surpassing Matt Ryan with Atlanta back in 21 when he was traded earlier. And that was a $40 million cap hit. So when you look at the cap increasing and you're like, well, no one's done that. And this has happened in the past. I remember the Antonio Brown was the big one where the reporters were like, Hey, the Pittsburgh Steelers are going to

move on from this. That's an unheard of cap charge. And then they went ahead and did it. So Kyler though, could be different in that he could just straight up demand a trade. And I just don't imagine with Arizona in the draft situation, him coming back from the injury, I mean, unless he has a nice stretch here, but that team is so bad, arguably the worst roster talent-wise in the entire NFL, but I could see him personality-wise just going like, look, this hasn't worked.

This team isn't any good. We've gone through all of this soap opera here. Let's move on and find somewhere else where I think his trade value in comparison to like a Russell Wilson would make a little bit more sense because there was a stretch for Murray where it felt like he actually was doing it all on his own and he was terrific at times. I just don't know how that guy ever stays healthy because even when he was playing, you were always worried about him taking kind of a hit and throughout the course of a game as he gets older, there's a concern there,

but still probably more trade value than anybody like Russell Wilson. Daniel Jones is another money guy. Remember the 50-year option decision the Giants had to make, and they were like, you know, we're just going to give him the extension. It was four years, $160 million, but there is an out after 24. Now with the ACL tear, who knows? He could just be on the team, but not be the starter because he probably wasn't going to be the starter anyway going into next year. Maybe. Who knows? ACLs, quarterbacks, but the guy that runs like that. Derek Carr's got a big deal with the Saints. Four years, $150 million. It's really a three-year deal. The offense has obviously been disappointing for the Saints. The number's a little bit better. He's really kind of about the same guy numbers-wise, even though you'd expect it to be better than what it's been because the

Saints were just with that defense going, if you could just get somebody back there who can be a top 15 quarterback, they'd have a chance to win that division, and yet it's still probably disappointing. Carr, money-wise, I just don't see how that would be something that would happen after this year, even if they remain a disappointment on offense because the money's pretty significant for him in the front end of that contract. Jimmy Garoppolo had a three-year deal. There's definitely an out after 24 here. It looks more like a two-year deal. Garoppolo is an interesting one. You take away the first three seasons from New England when he was behind Brady, so they don't really count. But for his career, or you can take those three out, he still really only played two full seasons.

And some of the overall numbers for him are terrible in comparison to the bottom end of the quarterbacks that have qualified as starters in some stats. So if you look at how significant the money is for all of these quarterbacks in the money group that I just mentioned, every time you start to chart a path of, well, what if they just decided to do it now? There's a benefit to Russell Wilson, but also some pain. Watson, it doesn't make any sense. There's not much trade value there. Kyler, the way the contract is structured, it would be painful and there's no immediate out there for Arizona, but maybe more valuable on the trade market. But when you look at the NFL cap projections and where it's been, it was $188 million in 2019. It's around $225 million now. Some of the

projections that are out there have it going to $250 million plus in 2024, maybe even way beyond that, high $270 million in 2025. So when I brought this up with Sando and looking at some of these higher price guys that have been disappointments, you may see teams get more aggressive eating some of this stuff, whether it be a trade or just an outright cut, because there's just more of a buffer now because this cap looks like in six or seven years, it may increase like almost 30% from where it was in 2019. So again, it can feel impossible, but it is possible and it may actually hurt less than any year prior to this with these massive cap projections that you see online. So now let's focus on the guys that really are in danger because money isn't that much of an issue and they just haven't done enough to warrant being a starter going into next year. Mack Jones, fifth-year option. Teams have to make a decision on this 21 draft class

right around the draft in 24. I don't know why you'd pick up the fifth-year option for Mack Jones. I will allow the sympathy for the coaching stuff that happened last year, the lack of weapons despite all of the cap spending on tight ends and wide receivers, but it hasn't worked. I think it looks worse.

The numbers are a slight tick up depending on what you want to look at from this year to last year. I think he's seeing pressure when it's not even there, which is a really alarming thing. And when you start factoring some of these teams and where they'll be in the draft, it doesn't make a lot of sense to be bringing back a Mac Jones. Justin Fields, also another fifth-year option decision. A lot of excitement for him. I think a lot of that had to do with his runs on Twitter because from just a pure passing standpoint, the stuff wasn't very good. He's also another weapons guy.

He's also another offensive line guy where you can pass some of the blame around. But some of that stuff with the sacks and the pressure is also on him. And some of the interceptions when he was playing, you're like, I don't even know what he's looking at because as I've said, all interceptions are not created equal. Some are just, you didn't see it again with the way the coverage was aligned. And considering the Bears have their pick and the Panthers pick, would Justin Fields be somebody, would any of these guys, would you go, hey, let's do the Zach Wilson and keep them around? Now, keeping Zach Wilson around for the Jets, who we'll get to in a second, with Aaron Rodgers coming in, is a lot different than, say,

Mac Jones, or maybe even so, Fields, who felt like he had more of a resume than Mac Jones, felt more like it was his job. And now he's going to be a backup to a Caleb Williams or a Drake May just because they're cheaper for one more year without the 50-year option picked up. I don't think teams would want to do that. Kenny Pickett, I'm putting on the list because I don't think he looks very good. But he's younger than these dudes as far as service time. He has two more years left, $8 million total. It means nothing,

and he feels like somebody you could keep around. The Steelers, draft-wise, they always find a way to still be competitive, even if I don't think they're necessarily that good. I don't think they're going to be in the draft range of some of these other teams that we're talking about. Zach Wilson's a no-brainer. 50-year option decision again for him. Rodgers has a three-year deal. You could call it a two, but there's a real good chance Rodgers, when healthy, is going to be the starter. And if you're this Jets team with this amazing defense, seeing it have to find a way to be competitive.

I mean, the fact that they're competitive most weeks is incredible because I just think that what we do is if the Jets win a close one, we start talking ourselves into a couple Zach Wilson throws when the bigger landscape of what we're looking at here with him is that it just isn't going to happen. So why would you bring him back as a backup even more so? So remember that when I get to the rankings. Sam Howell, I put him down only because Sam Howell always feels like if you're an NBA team with a point guard who's pretty good, but the depth at that position is

absurd. And you're like, man, I wish, I wish we had like one of those guys. You're like, yeah, but your guy's pretty good. Be like, yeah, but I kind of want one of those guys. How, if he actually survives this season, he's been sacked 44 times, which is 13 more than the number two sacked quarterback in the NFL this year, Zach Wilson. Um. But he's actually number two in yards. He's only behind Tua. I think Hal has been all right. So to listen to me put him on this list may seem unfair, but we all know how this game works, is if there's a trade. If there feels like there's something that raises our ceiling

at the position that is available to us in trade or the draft, that could be potentially there. So I just threw him on the list. Baker is also worth mentioning. He's not in the money group. One-year deal, $4 million. He's been better this season than he was last year. He is starting to show some leaks a bit from where he was, say the first four weeks of the year with the last few games. And then you've got Minnesota. So there's a Cousins decision. I don't think anyone, despite the love of what Dobbs did this past week, again, his fifth team since week 15 of last year, but he was behind Jaron Hall. And he was only behind Jaron Hall

because, look, they'd spent the pick on him. They didn't expect Dobbs to be ready, and he didn't look ready for a long time. But if I'm telling you next year, week one of 24, Jaron Hall or Dobbs are the starter, I think we'd all be a little surprised. So basically, it's like 16 teams with 17 names when you include the Minnesota thing. So if I had to rank the top five quarterbacks most likely to not be the starter on this team going into 24 based on where we're at right now in this season. Zach Wilson feels like cheating, putting him number one, but it's the safest bet. Not just because of Rodgers, but because I don't think the Jets would do this with a backup again.

Number two, Mac Jones. Fields, Mac Jones, you could debate it. Fields, though, there's probably still a little bit more hope from all of us because he's dealing with a thumb injury now. Whereas Mack, I'll admit, I'd be shocked if this thing ever turned around. So Fields is three. My own Mack thoughts, that breaks the tie to put him at two. Number four, I'm going to put Kyler. I don't see Kyler as a mentor to a quarterback that could be drafted this year. I don't see it. And I don't know why,

if Arizona represented anything in the trademark, I don't know what he is. Is he a second rounder as far as what he's worth? Would another team not have anybody lined up in the draft? Would they be whiffing? Would they just feel like, hey, we can figure him out? Is there a team out there that has a quarterback need that's watched the good tape and gone, we can make this work? Or do they watch the good tape and they're like, hey, we agree with Rosillo. We just don't think this guy's ever going to stay healthy for a full season. I can't imagine he's going to like almost any scenario with Arizona going into next year. So that one could get to a point of demands where it just has to be solved by him not being on the team. Number five, I originally had Daniel Jones, but you know what? Now that he's hurt and they

just signed him, they might be like, look, he'll be on the team where the more you dig into the Russell Wilson decision, as much as it might hurt, it might hurt more to keep him around and then have to pay him even more cash. And the Peyton factor is a huge part of this. So I'll put Russell Wilson at number five. Score early this NFL season with FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 Moneyline bet wins. Let's take a look at the board. There was a little temptation with the Colts minus one and a half at New England. It feels like some of the Pats spreads are still a little bit too...

I don't know if it's faith or wondering if they're ever going to turn this around and become a little bit more competitive, not based on what I've seen. I'm going to go Titans plus one and a half at Tampa. The total on that one is 38 and a half. It's a bit of a Will Levis support play here. Also, Tampa's lost four straight. We know about the shootout this most recent week. So they've been in three games. They've lost four straight, as I mentioned, but only the Lions was the one that was more than a score there. So they've been in all of these despite not turning it around.

So yeah, it's a bit like, hey, can Levis, is that actually a good number there? Getting some points against the Tampa team, maybe going in the wrong direction. All right, so there you go. That's the play for the NFL bet for this week. If you've been thinking about joining FanDuel, there's no better time to get in on the action.

The app is so easy to use, and there's so many different ways to bet. Live same-game parlays. Find bets in the new Explore tab. Dive into the Parlay Hub, the best way to find popular parlays and more. So visit FanDuel.com slash Ryan, R-Y-E-N, and kick off the NFL season. FanDuel, official partner of the NFL. Must be 21 and older and president-select states. $5 pregame wager, money line required,

first online real money wager only, $10 first deposit required, bonus issued and non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Joining us now, let's talk some hoops. He is great on the NBA, and he has spent some time covering the Warriors.

It's Logan Murdoch, who has a great piece up now on the ringer, looking at Chris Paul's early run here with the Warriors and kind of the backstory of it all. What's up, man? Good to see you. What's up, bro? Good to see you too, man. This is a really nice background you got there, man. A lot of water, a lot of beautiful thing. I'm trying to go to your house. What's up? It's all CGI. So don't get too excited. I'm back in Hartford. Damn. Oh, okay. All right. Where's that? Yeah. No.

Yeah, man. Come on down. We'll watch some hoops. I was really excited about the Chris Paul part, but I was also cautious, right? Because clearly I've been a huge fan, but I also think I've watched him enough and watched the Warriors enough to know what makes them great. Constant movement, constant flow, playing to the very last second of every single shot clock and knowing that that's not the way that he plays. makes them great constant movement, constant flow playing to the very last second of every single shot clock.

And knowing that that's not the way that he plays. And then the pushback on the starter bench thing. Uh, the first thing I wanted to see Logan was like, okay, what are they actually going to do? And it was clear from even him starting the beginning, they were like,

we're still going to stagger Steph and CP three as much as they possibly can. They abandoned the whole starter thing after like two games. Uh, the second unit stuff I've really liked. I know the shooting numbers aren't necessarily there, but then there's still the question of what it will really look like and what the offense will look like when it closes. And sometimes it's looked really good. They've had a couple of game winners, the Denver closers, a couple of sessions I didn't really like. A few weeks into this, how do you see the fit? Because I really enjoy what you wrote on

it. Thank you, man. One, thank you. And two, I think first I want to put a little bit more context to the fact that he started the first two games. That was because Draymond was out and they needed a secondary ball handler. The Warriors did, and they wanted to have somebody lead that second union while also being a secondary ball handler alongside Steph and see how that fit was. In terms of the fit, I was a little skeptical when the trade went down for two reasons. First reason being the fact that Chris Paul has not been healthy in the postseason when the Warriors will need him the most. He's a little long in the tooth going into his 19th season.

I was a little concerned with that. And the secondary thing I was concerned about was how he was going to fit into that locker room and the dynamic of, you know, Chris Paul has been an op for the Warriors for the last decade from when he was time with the Clippers and his time with the Rockets. And I didn't know how that was going to translate into a locker room that has big personalities like a Draymond Green, who is coming off of a season where we all know what happened last year. And so far, he's been Chris Ball's been great in the locker room, specifically with the young guys and a guy like Jonathan Kamiga and Moses Moody have really thrived under Chris Paul's tutelage and specifically with that second unit and you you see that I think even in a Denver game when um when Steph Curry is out there isn't really a drop off in terms of of of production from the team I think in that story I put uh Chris Paul is is is one of the best um the best secondary options for the Warriors.

And you get that because he is somebody that can elevate guys around him. He's a Hall of Fame level point guard, one of the best of all time. And now you have that with your second unit. It's a luxury that the Warriors have never had. So, so far, it's been rosy. But there are some things on the horizon specifically Chris Paul's health and there's also some other issues that I'm sure we'll get into with the Warriors that are non-Chris Paul issues that could erode the team but so far so good for the partnership between Chris Paul

and the Warriors okay well we'll get back to some of the other Chris Paul stuff I have here but I mean I have to ask you were like okay there's other things potentially that are probably that are non-Chris Paul related as far as like the Warriors hopes. Yeah, like Andrew Wiggins is a big thing, right? And he was someone that the Warriors were hoping could bounce back after a season that he had last year. He had some personal issues that had him away from the team. And now, you know, to start this season, you know, he's coming into camp out of shape. But to start this season, you know, you're coming into camp out of shape.

A lot of staff and players are pretty disappointed with that notion, considering the fact that they held him down all of last season when he was going through the personal issues. And now when they need him to be a secondary scorer with the Warriors, he's not there. And they need a secondary scorer to help, you know, offset the Steph big nights when those don't happen. And he hasn't been there. And those are one of the things that the Warriors need to keep an eye out on going forward. And that's something that they're hoping can be rectified in the coming weeks. But that has been a big disappointment to start this season. I like what you said in the piece about Chris Paul with the younger guys, in that

essentially like Kaminga is somebody he's put a lot of time into. And I'd say, look, Moody looks like he belongs more in the early part of this season than probably any part of his career. Just the way he's playing, it's not just a numbers thing for me and more minutes and more opportunities. He just looks more comfortable than he's ever looked before. And Kaminga still has his highs and lows. But what have you seen firsthand in that relationship that's certainly different than anything else Kaminga's experienced, having a guy like that with that kind of personality now being there? Well, it's the first time that Kaminga's had a vet on the floor with him at all times.

I mean, his vet last year and a couple of years before that was Andre Godala, who was in and out of the lineup, couldn't play alongside him and actually put those lessons to use on the floor. And now you have a guy like Chris Paul, who is a big micromanager who will tell you what you need to do, but also in a way that maybe Draymond wouldn't. Draymond is somebody that only knows one way to lead, and it's going to be fear and fury. And Chris Paul is a guy that has a bit more a softer touch with younger guys. Right. Going to go into direct them where they need to be on the floor, go on a film study with them, make sure that they're doing good. And that's something that the Warriors didn't have last season, which led to the divide during During their championship season, they had guys that can both talk to the older guys and the younger guys.

And last year, they did not have that, and it wound up being to their detriment. And this year, Chris Paul is that bridge between young and old where he can talk to the young guys, make sure that they're good, and then also speak the language of a Draymond Green, a Klay Thompson, and a Steph Curry. And that has, in turn, made sure that Kaminga has been seen throughout this time. And also that comes with a good summer from Kaminga in the gym. He's worked really, really hard to be in a position to take that next step. And we'll see how that goes. We're only a couple months into the season, but Kaminga is really showing strides because he has that veteran presence of a Chris Paul and of a guy that seems to believe in him.

Um, when in past years, he didn't feel that, um, some of the older guys believed him in him, um, over the old years in his first years coming into the league. Yeah.

It's one of the weirder misses that I, I think I've had in that. I always thought these lottery lottery picks they were bringing in, it's like, well, what a great setup. And in reality, it was the opposite because the vets were like, we're still competing for championships. The head coach is like, we're still competing for championships. So whatever you thought you were going to benefit from on the lack of attention to you, you're not going to get the opportunities. And our threshold for your mistakes is going to be far more limited. And that's why maybe having the three guys all around the same time when you include Wiseman into that as well made it that much worse. into that as well, made it that much worse. But I started thinking about the personalities too. And as much as I love Steph and Clay, I know that they're kind of passive guys. It's just their nature that they're more passive. And I can see Draymond being somebody young dudes are like,

yeah, this isn't actually the best. And so maybe Chris Paul not being there and living through the early Kaminga mistakes where there was a lot, because he's such a young dude, not a ton of basketball, coming into the NBA, that the piece, when you explain that, I was like, that actually makes sense from a personality part of it, where it's a new experience for Chris Paul. He's not frustrated with him in a way he obviously got frustrated with DeAndre Ayton, I would say say multiple different times on that timeline in Phoenix. But I don't know if... Certainly, Clay would not be the kind of guy to be like, let's bond, young man, and let's sit here and

figure it. Not that Clay's a dick. It's just not in Clay's nature. And I think Steph is more of the leader by example than he is somebody who's just going to constantly be working on mentoring every young draft pick that comes in. this needed other people in the locker room to offset how he leads. And back in the day, that was David West. That was Sean Livingston. That was Andre Guadalla. And, you know, in the time where he has to be a sole leader, and he doesn't have someone to offset that, that's when you get, you know, the clashes between him and a Jordan Poole, or him and some of the other young guys.

It's not a fault of Draymond. He is who he is but he I think the Warriors learned once again that you need someone to offset him and it's not going to be the uh Steph Curry's because Steph leans on Draymond for leadership to lead this team and you are going to need other types of voices to be able to, you know, help all of this go through. And I think, you know, also with Chris Paul, you know, he's in a unique position to where he's the only one of that new core of the Warriors that hasn't won a title. So he is of the mind of, I want to bring everybody along as much as I can, because if I bring them along, they're going to help me win my first ring.

And so there's more of an incentive for Chris to, you know, put his arm around young guys and make sure that they're good because also Chris is auditioning for this team. You know, he's in the last year of his deal and, you know, this is somebody that wants to be in this winning environment. So, you know, we'll see how it goes, but there is that bridge that Chris Paul is providing right now because he wants to, he title. And the way to win a title is to make sure the young guys are in line and also playing beyond what we think they can play. I love this quote, but I also had to laugh when you talked to Draymond about last year and this year.

And Draymond says, quote, last year was horseshit. It was hard to come to work, not fun. And so this year you see the joy on guys' face when they come in the building. Okay. I still think Draymond Green might be, if he weren't an NBA player, he'd be one of the great closers in the history of baseball because he'd have no memory whatsoever. He would feel zero remorse about the night before. I don't know if I'm taking that quote out of context, but when I read it, it reminded me a bit of last year when Draymond was promoting his documentary that was out on the TNT desk. And I was like, dude, what?

Like after everything that just happened and I'm not some like prude who goes, oh, I can't believe a guy hit another guy. I think Bill and I have disagreed a bit on like the magnitude of what that meant, but that quote would back Bill's point. But then for Draymond to be the one pointing it out to you as if you think people might have been bummed out last year, Draymond, how do we better understand what that quote meant or is that exactly what it meant? Well, I got two things on that. One, he told that to reporters. I was in the room when he said it, but he said that after a game, which was hilarious. It was, it was for, it was so funny. I remember looking at Marcus Thompson and being like, is he really talking?

Is he saying this? Is this really, are we in a twilight zone? That's number one. Number two was the thing with Draymond is he does tell the truth, his truth at all times. He just lacks self-awareness when he does it, right? Like, if you look at the quote line by line, he wasn't wrong that it was horse shit last year. Everything was, he just conveniently let out that he is the reason why it was horse shit and why no one wanted to come to work every day. It was because of him.

And that is the irony in all of this. And I think the, the, the biggest thing with, with Draymond is that is the reason why a lot of things have been messed up over the last few years. When you think about it, right.

It is Draymond's lack of self-awareness. Even when you talk about, you know, the, the Kevin Durant, um, situation in LA, when they played against the Clippers, self Kevin Durant situation in L.A. when they played against the Clippers.

Self-awareness, Draymond, passed the ball to either Kevin Durant, who's one of the best closers we've ever seen, or Klay Thompson, one of the best shooters we've ever seen. He didn't do either. He fell down, and they went into overtime, which was the start of Durant leaving. Or the quote that we just referenced last year.

The Warriors are trying to prop up Jordan Poole as this next guy. Nah, I'm going to I can't we can't have that habit. And he punches him in the face for whatever reason. Right. And so that's the biggest thing with Draymond is that he tells the truth at all the time, but he does lack that self-awareness or time to or tactness to be able to make sure that this he there is something about chaos that gets Draymond going at all times it's the reason why he has four wings is because he can thrive during chaos whether it is chaos

that he makes up on his own or someone else makes that remains to be seen but he is a guy that thrives in that and he kind of needs that because no one no one asked him about last year he just kind of brought it up like yeah last year was horseshit and we need to we need to get this right and i'm so glad to come to work every day it was like that's out of nowhere like it was just going great and that quote comes it was hilarious it was it was it was i laughed as soon as i heard him starting to talk about that i'll admit i'm not saying the punch is totally justified but with every new jordan pool quote i see i'm like like man maybe maybe maybe maybe i get it a little bit more than i did and i also don't know why that punch would have lingered with a team that already, its core, had won four titles and why they were just going to be bad defensively

and couldn't win on the road the entire time. And, you know, look, I still think the Lakers matchup, personnel-wise, was the best thing that could have happened for the Lakers because of the lack of depth. And we saw that play out in that series a little bit. Well, Ryan, I think the thing with the punch and why it eroded this season is because a lot of young guys that the Warriors needed saw Draymond punch somebody and lost all trust in Draymond.

Like we forget he signed that four year deal or however much he signed for. But there were rumors that he was about to get traded and get up out of there and he had to work to get back to that. But there was a lot of distrust in that locker room, not only from young guys, but from everybody around Draymond that he had to kind of earn back. I don't know if he's earned that back around young guys just yet, but he there was a real problem with what he did from everybody in that locker room. saying that Jordan Poole for a long time didn't garner any favor from a lot of people just because of you know his you know the way he you know carried himself in a lot of ways you know he carried himself with a lot of confidence while not playing defense but also being one of the hardest workers on the team you know second to Steph and a lot of people will tell you that and it's funny that that happened with

him and Draymond is because Draymond was one of his staunchest defenders when a lot of people in the front office were annoyed with the pick of Jordan Poole and guys like Steve Kerr, guys like other guys with who were annoyed with his defense, who did not think he was going to be an NBA player. Draymond was like, no, I like this brashness and I like this kid, Kiefer Vaughn. But once he, Jordan, lost Draymond, then it was all over with. And that was the beginning of the end to him. But Draymond, that punch did a lot for that team. That team should have been competing for a back-to-back title.

But there was no trust. There was eeriness every time he went into that locker room. And a lot of that had to do with because Draymond did what he did. Let's talk about on the court then to close games. Taking the ball out of Steph's hands is not anything I would want. And even if it's him starting the possession and then handing off and then resetting through the maze of what he runs a defense through is when they're at their best. We've seen it time and time again, but then you are kind of left like, it doesn't matter about starting bench. It doesn't matter in rotations. It matters,

okay, how are you actually doing this? And I'll notice with some teams, whether it's younger guys or older guys, they do kind of the fake, you're back with the closing group. But against Denver, it was real. And there was a possession where Clay got really frustrated in the right corner where he felt like Chris didn't get it to him immediately. And it'd be weird for Chris Paul to maybe not recognize that. But I think Clay's thinking, I need the ball in my hand for like an eighth of a second. So if you think I'm going to be closed out here, not me, and I wonder why Paul may have hesitated to get him to pass there. And then I'll notice maybe if it gets a little bogged down, then they'll run something different, or then Chris Paul is kind of watching.

I know it's all experimenting. They're playing a lot of guys. They're playing even more of the younger guys than the guys that we've even mentioned. And we know they have a good record, and they were right in it with Denver. Brandon Murray's going to be out for a month. So I think the total package of the nine games feels good, but I'm curious what you think of how those possessions will play out as we get further into the season.

I mean, this is coming from somebody who was really skeptical about this fit to start, and then I watched them in the preseason, and then you get the sense of, oh, wait, this is four Hall of Famers on the floor together. They should figure it out. And I think that you see that in spurts. I think that they're still in the process of figuring each other out. But I do think that that pass to Klay Thompson in the corner will come faster.

I do think that as we go along, and I think that they're still figuring each other out. This is a big stretch that they got coming up to kind of get that continuity again. They have, they have the calves tomorrow. They have two dates against the, the Timberwolves at home.

And then they have OKC on Thursday. They have a, this is going to be a good stretch to see how they can come together as a team. I do think that they do have, like I said before, if they have four hall of famers who are all invested into making this work, I think that they'll be good. And just from a chemistry standpoint, I think that they will

figure it out. Now, the Denver game was an interesting one because not only was Jamal Murray out for Denver, but they had GP2 out and Draymond out for Golden State. So neither, it was kind of a fill-out game with not a lot of players on the court that would be on the court if this was a playoff game. And so it was an impressive, I think it was an impressive night for the Warriors. They were in the game most of the time. They were playing a lot of young guys.

They had the rookie from Santa Clara. They had Kaminga in in stretches, and they had Moody playing really well. I think it was a good live-miss test, but they need to see what they do, uh, how they look at this film and how they go on forward because they have a tough stretch ahead of them. I think they're going to be good. You know, I really do.

Um, that's not exactly some amazing statement by me, but the Paul part of it, they can still be good without them, uh, because we've seen what they're capable of, but you mentioned it at the top, like, will he be healthy at the end of the year? And the thing with him from what I know of all of his stops is when he shows up, he wants to play. And I don't know if this will be the team that gets through to him that he needs to pace himself more because he's not going to pace himself in games. That's just not going to happen. He doesn't know how to play that way. And he doesn't want to just be sitting out games that he's healthy for. But considering how, like, I know the shooting numbers suck. I mean, he's not in any threes right now, but what I see with that second unit now and getting the starters real rest, like that's a

different weapon that they have with him because at least it's organized. It's organized where you don't feel like you're stealing minutes away from the Klay-Steph combo like you've had to in the past when you didn't feel like you felt really good about your first option of the second unit. Yeah, it's interesting, especially when we talk about the second unit. Chris Paul is everything the Warriors wanted Jordan Poole to be, to somebody that can offset the Steph minutes and someone that can also play alongside Steph, get him the ball when he's running through those million and millions of screens. He's been great on that way, but I think

the bigger key is, and I think that with Chris Paul and his health, a lot of that is going to be helped by the fact that he's coming off the bench. He's not expected to start and play 30-something minutes. Some days, he's going to play 18, 15, and that's just going

to be what it is. The more pressing issue in my mind, and I talked about this at the top of the show, they need secondary scoring. Now, I don't know if that's going to become consistently from Klay Thompson all the time or Wiggins going to get out of his funk, but that's something that they're going to need going into the postseason because what we saw in the Lakers series is they're just, whoever the Warriors play in the postseason are just going to collapse Steph. And they're going to force other people to try to win the game for them. And that means Klay can't play like he did last postseason. Wiggins, hopefully he's in the lineup by then.

You know, there's not a repeat of last season, but he's going to have to step up and be the Wiggins that was of 2022. It's going to have to step up and be the Wiggins that was of 2022. It's going to have to be by committee. And that's a bigger issue for me when I watch them than Chris Paul and him trying to get guys into the fold and his health. Because I do think that him playing off the bench and not having as much responsibility of carrying the offense will help him play into May and June. So we'll see what happens. but the Warriors need secondary scoring.

I urge you to check it out on The Ringer again. Logan Murdoch, Inside the Warriors, Chris Paul experiment just out recently. Can't wait, man. Looking forward to seeing the rest of the season. We'll catch up with you again soon, all right? Thanks, bud. See you in Vegas. The Alliance marches on uh if you could hear the angst before we hit record for this segment it is real just guys going all right what are we doing we're like oh we have to do the alliance

next met by so uh i don't like that i don't like the lack of confidence. We went 0-3 last week. I am, I think, 5-2-1 if I don't have Bama in the bet. You're 5-5-1 overall. Right. So, that's what I'm saying. I've picked Bama to cover against Texas, L. I picked A&M to cover. I picked LSU to cover. So, anytime I've invited Bama into the alliance, it's been, L. I picked A&M to cover. I picked LSU to cover. So anytime I've invited Bama

into the Alliance, it's been an L. And I actually liked Kentucky plus the 10.5 at home. Emotional win, Bama-LSU. But you never really know with Bama. You could see them being like, hey, we figured this thing out. I think it's kind of easy to figure out your offense against LSU's defense. I will not be picking Bama in mine. I think Bama is now on the banned list after 0-3 involving them in any of my picks. So what do we got, boys? That's like my Colorado. I think I'm 0-2 or 0-3 picking in Colorado-related things, and I actually do like Arizona this week, but I'm going to stay away from it. You do? It's minus 9.5, but nope, not going not gonna be my pick i'll go first if you guys want i'm i'm two and nine i'm the worst um but both of my both the times that i've i've hit my bet

we've hit the parlay so again we're not overall collectively doing that's how it works though like if you didn't we couldn't so well no no no no no no no no no no because i no no no no because i think i think i think there's only been one time where I've been the only one wrong, too. So it's not like I'm wrong. Kyle, you're 3-8. You're only one game better than me, dude. I don't want to do this here. Not for people.

I'm just saying we couldn't actually hit the parlay if you didn't get them right, though. That's what I mean. Correct. Correct. That's fair. Okay. So I'm 2-9. Kyle's 3-8.

Ryan's 5-5-1. I'm going to take UNC. Minus 13 and a half. It's minus 115, I believe, against Duke. Ryan's five, five and one. I'm going to take, I'm going to take UNC minus 13 and a half. It's minus 115, I believe, against Duke. Duke quarterbacks out. I think they're not,

they had a good start to the season. I don't think they're quite as good as people thought they were when they beat Clemson. I think this is a bounce back spot for Drake May and Carolina rivalry game at home.

I think they went by two touchdowns or more. Nice. I too am staying in the ACC, which means you can catch this game on the CW at 2 Eastern if you are so inclined. I'm going NC State at Wake Forest. I don't like that Wake Forest kind of took a little bit of the magic

off my Florida State Seminoles, so I'm not going to pick them this week. I'll give it a little rest. But, yeah, I'm just going to take the money line here because they're only minus two and a half. So NC State money line minus 134 at Wake Forest. I like it. Okay.

We'll pack. Pack pride. Was there a rule on money line on what the spread had to be? Right. Like we couldn't just go, hey, give me give me Kansas State money line. Right. That's why I'm not doing Florida State money line. Yeah.

You can't be like, give me the Michigan money line against Indiana. That would go over well with the public. Be like, oh, those guys hit their parlay again. Yeah. I won three bucks. Yeah. Right. They had Tennessee money line against UConn.

Fucking bunch of real sharps over there. Yeah. I don't like this. We're all picking favorites. That's not good. So I'm going to go. I'm just going to go with like, hey, how do I feel about two teams? And the number really isn't like what I thought it would be.

It opened. Penn State's at home against Michigan. So here we go. Penn state. Let's see Michigan with everything happening. You're finally playing somebody on paper that is supposedly real. Uh, but I've watched them both play. I'm just going to lay the four and a half of Michigan at Penn state.

So if you want to check out, all right. Okay. No, that with nothing. Um, if you want to check out, all right, okay, met with nothing. If you want to check that out, of course, you should go to sportsbook.fanduel.com. 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 could possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid. So, now you know what's possible.

Let me tell you what's required. Life advice. The email address is lifeadvicerr at gmail.com. We've had a lot of people send us pictures of girls named Shannon in the Austin area. What's up? I don't know. Yeah, right. Shout out to all the Shannons.

But I guess we could just forward those to the guy that lost the sunglasses. That sounds like something we're not going to do. We can create a fake Gmail, like a real Gmail, but one that we don't check. We'll give them the password, and anybody wants to help and could help them out. We're definitely not going to do that. I don't think anything's going to happen. Really? If we can get an intern on it, come on.

I mean, one girl was ridiculous. And I'd be like, you shouldn't care about the sunglasses. You should care about finding this person again. And then there was one with a kid. So we were like, well, what do we do there? So whatever. Efforting, still on it. And there you go. Okay. Let's do this one with the holidays around the corner. My wife is below average, 5'10", 200 pounds, pro comp, more aggressive bulls, Chris Duhon duhon i'll keep this short my wife of three years

is an eager beaver she's quick to volunteer for things likes to take on more than she can handle at times she's a bit overconfident on her abilities to do things which brings up my issue thanksgiving's a big deal in my family and my wife excitingly volunteered ourselves to host and take on a majority of the cooking problem she's not necessarily good at cooking not hard for me to muster through some of her meals when it's just us, but now she's taking her talents or lack thereof to the main stage. I've suggested maybe we do more of a potluck situation where she can make a side or two and let the rest of the family fill in. But she insists on doing the whole thing outside of desserts. I'm not saying that I'd be embarrassed for her to unveil her average to below average

cooking prowess to upward of 25 family members, dude. I want to talk about ratios being an issue, but I'm also not saying it. I want to protect my wife's feelings at the end of the day, because after she, or after the drinks get flowing, a couple walks around the neighborhood, I'm afraid some words might fly out of some people's mouths. Was that stuffing dry for anyone else? Yeah. How do i get out of this please help side note what's going on with the breathing or where there's a lot of breathing feedback that we're getting is anyone breathing really hard i breathe all the time but i don't

know if i can't hear it it's got to be me if i can't hear it it's got from years of xbox if i can't hear it i know it's got to be me like what happened to kyle oh he suffocated stop breathing um no i don't think that could be me it's my macbook microphone this can't be me dude i was i was i am sick i've been sick for like two straight months i did i had to pop a like a cough drop in last pot because i thought i was gonna die but i don't i don't think it was me i wasn't breathing heavily and i edited out all the parts where i coughed and gave the file to cliff afterwards so i don't think it was me i wasn't breathing heavily and i edited out all the parts where i coughed and gave the file to cliff afterwards so i don't think it was me but i did see a lot because it'd be hard it'd be hard to do a podcast if we were like hey we can't breathe um no it just it was something that's been pointed out a bunch no one knows no one knows the

answer just like shannon a mystery okay so this guy's wife can't cook and she wants to cook for 25 people. That's a problem. The potluck thing, Kyle, you seem to like that, but it seems like she doesn't. Yeah, but couldn't you just say like, listen, this is too many people to not do it this way. Like, it's not even like, I don't think you can do it. Just be like, it's just too many people. We have to rally as a family. That's what Thanksgiving is all about anyway. Maybe you could storybook it, get a little wedge of moral and shoehorn of moral into this argument and just be like, that's what this is all about. It's just too many people. And then the day is going to come and it's going to, you know, you don't want to fall apart. We're just taking precautions here.

Like we're just, we're hedging our bets. So it'll be fun. It'll be fun. Like maybe you could try to do it that way. And just, just the sheer numbers would suggest you need help more than a green bean casserole, I think. Yeah, 25 people's worth of mashed potatoes or sweet potato pie or stuffing, that's a lot for one person to do. So you just saying like, hey, we need to share the load is correct. I don't know that I've been to very many Thanksgivings and I have a big Italian family where one person, usually the person whose house is does the turkey, but everybody else brings the other stuff. So you could just make this into a tradition thing. And then you can get your family members in too and be like, no, we're bringing this stuff over.

We've done this before. This is what we want to do. Because, you know, I get you're trying to look out for your wife, but, you know, it's actually like a practical thing for her to not do all this stuff. Like, it's insane for her to try to do it, even if was a good cook like she's not she's not jada and you know i wouldn't even expect jada to do something like this so i think it's totally fair to be like let's bring the family in they're gonna get involved this isn't weird we're trying to help you out jada how about that love jada a lot of afternoons just with your weird work schedule you're like what's she doing with that pesto okay the problem The problem here is, is that, you know,

I think one of the cool things about like your different stages of life is that you think back to when you were a kid and how all these meals are set up and everything. And you'd hope one day to have a family that was big enough or that you liked enough and that you could be like, I want to do this for everybody. So there's a pride sense here. There's an excitement that you've already alluded to that I don't think you're going to be able to defeat. And I know your goal isn't necessarily to defeat her on this one, but you're dealing with something that she's so excited about because it's probably something she's always wanted to do. And that's like, you're just going to lose. you're just going to lose that deal there i don't know

why though she would think like there's no way she's doing this all on her own to saruti's point like isn't part of the whole preparation thing a bunch of the you know not trying to be misogynist here we go you know what let's not be misogynistic let's's just say, uh, wouldn't it be the people, right. For the people that were qualified male or female, you know, a little prep cook time back in the day. Uh, wouldn't that be part of it? You know, getting the old vino flowing and checking on the sauces, checking on all the different items. That's not a one person job. Even if it was smaller than 25, everybody kind of likes to do their thing. So I think that's the way that you have to attack it. Is there somebody who is either your mother or your sister or one of her sister or something?

Is there somebody that's super close to her? That's maybe a little bit better at this, that you can kind of go, Hey, look, can you make sure that you're in on this? Can you make sure you like coaching her up while she's cooking no just like hey what do you need we're here to help so that the helpers you know not necessarily take over but are monitoring it on track yeah yeah we'll keep this on track be like you know hey but why don't we add a little bit more salt to that you know you can you know do stuff and you could backseat quarterback kind of thing. Because besides the flavoring, it could just be you didn't have it.

You didn't get, you've never done, you never played on this stage before and you didn't game plan it enough and shit is not ready. And, you know, now it's, you know, now we're into the, you know, the second game and there's no food in sight or something like that. You know, like it could be, it could be just like she's not ready to have all the things going at once in one kitchen as well. So it might not even be just a flavor thing. You could just, you know, it's just about the sheer amount of food that's going to have to come out of this one kitchen. Look, I had, you know, somebody who I was dating, she was really excited to cook for me, right? She'd never really cooked. She was like, Oh, I found this awesome meatball recipe.

It's going to be amazing. She made enough to feed operation wolf. And I, you know, she came down with this crock pot and she was just so excited. Yeah. And I took a bite and it was awful. And I just said, Hey, did you did you uh did you season the meat at all

she was like what do you mean she's like i did the sauce and i did the i was like yeah but you like what kind of salt and pepper are we talking here she was like your spice wrap situation she didn't know she's like you don't put salt. She was like, salt and pepper was. I was like, literally, that's why, again, I've said this before, why wars were fought over salt. But you salt the meat. Spice trade, man. You salt the meat and pepper. And she was like, what? And they were terrible.

But it was her excitement to do it. What did you do with the rest? Was she bummed out? Did you throw it out in front of her, or did you have to sneak it to the outside garbage? Yeah, because that was the thing. She's like, you can have them all week. There's a ton in there, and I put it in the fridge,

and then as soon as she was gone, I threw them away. Washed out the pot and then said, hey, next time, we're going to do it together. I'm going to show you. We'll do it together. It'll be fun. Yeah, she was cool. She was cool with it.

But yeah, she was definitely like a little disappointed. She was hoping the first bite I was going to go, oh my God, this is the most amazing meatball I've ever had in my life. But that wasn't going to happen anyway. Is this guy's mother, I would ask, is this guy's mother a good cook? Because, you know, then it can be.

Well, I don't know don't listen i don't know yes yes god damn it all right i'm the only one left boys uh well i only lean yeah i think you know why i asked because like it could be like a bonding thing where like maybe the mom kind of helps her out and shows her the way and says hey this is how i've done things on thanksgiving maybe we can share some recipes she give her some tips and that way your mom is kind of doing the like your mom's giving her the instructions even though your wife is the one doing the cooking uh i think right or maybe you have a male cousin who has an awesome apartment yeah maybe you got a chef in the yeah here we go yeah uh i think i think god just really likes a bear you know the answer has to be yes right because he would have a poor palate and wouldn't

even be able to tell that his wife is, you know, is like a five at best on the cooking scale. So he must, he must come from good stock if he's like, yeah, this is not going to be up to par for everyone else we know. So I would be doing some pre Thanksgiving recruiting is, is my point and soft, as soft as you possibly can. Sort of like make it like, make them ask, right? Cause it's like, when you want to have a sleepover, it's like, you know, she's going to say no if I ask. But if you ask in front of us, she's going to be so uncomfortable. She's totally going to let us have the sleepover.

Or you're just like, hey, my uncle, my cousin, dog. You know, my second cousin, Phil, he also wants to help. And you can't just box him out. You know, guilt or into this he needs this i can't believe like the main concern he's afraid after a few glasses of wine some of the other relatives would be like oh my god let's get takeout next year okay uh this one is great i've been saving this one for friday very excited about it it's called the vending machine challenge at work now over the years dudes love challenges they love to name them they love to see how for Friday. Very excited about it. It's called the Vending Machine Challenge at Work. Now, over the years, dudes love challenges. They love to name them. They love to see how there was a 6, 12, 18, 24 rolling around. I'm not going to get super into that one,

but that was out there a couple of years ago. Very aggressive. A clear answer to that, by the way. Maybe a future pod. Maybe. Maybe. After dark. So there's apparently this guy who works. Where is he here? Okay, he's in Tennessee. So 29 years old, Tennessee, 6'2", 260-pound, former D3 nose guard, pickup basketball, NBA comp, Zeebo, same footwork, silky touch around the basket. I work on a bond trading floor, and business has been extremely slow in this market

as banks aren't buying. To pass the time, the old vending machine challenge has reappeared its ugly head. We could say reared also. For those who don't know, each brave participant has one full workday to eat one of each item from the vending machine, excluding gum. Thank God, right? To summarize, there's a picture attached, 14 bags of chips, eight candy bars, four granola bars, three peanut butter cracker packs, two bags of peanuts, two bags of cookies, and one pack of gummy bears. I've, all caps, never seen this done, but urban legend has it. This has been accomplished decades ago. I've seen many large and confident men fail miserably. Most of whom will go into some type of sugar induced coma. I'm a big dude and pretty confident in my eating skills. That's what she said.

Does that work? Does that work well there? So my question to y'all and especially Kyle, all right, big guy, Kyle, getting some love here. What is my best approach? Take down the candy bars and M&Ms first. Ease into it with some sour cream and onion chips. I need help with the original strategy. The floor has raised $1,700 for anyone who can complete this thing without dying. I appreciate the feedback. All right.

So I'm going to run through it because he gave us the picture of all of the items. We've got some baked chips. We've got the classic Lay's. I think the smart food is a real danger item, not because it doesn't taste great, but smart food changes your day a bit because you're dealing with the kernel and flossing and all that kind of stuff.

I don't know if you can go last with it. Then there's some Bugles, which I think a great line from girls is when Hannah, who's not naked in this scene uh is eating bugles and says i don't even know if i like them i've just always eaten them yep yeah uh there's some fridays branded maybe oh the potato skin oh those are yeah maybe they are the crown jewel of every vending machine. Yeah, those are great. Okay. Bacon. Straight Doritos.

Loaded potatoes. Yeah. The sour cream and onion lays. Cheez-It regular and white cheddar. Love the white cheddar Cheez-It. Some of the Snyder's pretzels. Cheetos. OG brand.

A high-end potato chip here with the cracked pepper. It looks like barbecue Fritos. A veggie chip. And then, yes, six individual peanut butter cracker sandwiches per pack. So that's 18 of those. A marshmallow treat. Wait, there's two different kinds of peanut butter crackers? Three.

That's a waste of two lanes of a vending machine, but okay. Well, there's like a whole grain and then there's like the cheese cracker and I want to. Oh, so one is cheese. Nice. One could be, yeah,

but there's a cheese cracker and sometimes it's the cheese cracker with peanut butter. With the peanut butter. Maybe one's cheese. The marshmallow treat seems like a massive, massive wrong decision in this. Then they've got the high-end cookie thing.

There's also like the white vanilla cream cookie one from the same brand. Twix, two peanut M&Ms. Looks like a Snackwell's thing there. Maybe you take that one last for a little health boost. Regular M&Ms. Whatchamacallit. Baby Ruth. Nestle Crunch.

Oreo Pack. So there's probably, what, six cookies in there. A sausage stick of some sort. Nice. Protein. A granola bar. I think another kind of snack well thing here. A peanut bar that will just be the chaser to the peanut bag of original and then honey roasted.

And then there's the Welch's fruit gum. And then he has some Starburst just just out here which love that i look i think when people the reason i wanted to go into such detail there is i know how everybody is i know how dudes are been a dude a long time you hear us read the beginning of that email and half of you were in the car went i can fucking do that right when you see you see this picture, it's scary. It's a well-stocked machine. It's not one of those half-assed, sometimes we have the big Texas, sometimes we don't machines.

He has to eat all of this? Or pick from a row? What is the... No, no, no. It's everything. Literally one of these things. I think he said lanes. Lanes is like assuming the thing that goes back, you know?

Okay. Okay. Each little slot then. Okay. When he said lanes, I thought like one from each row or something all right now this is all of it it's awful it's a lot of stuff i was gonna say don't do it but they're like it's like everyone in the office is yeah you have to do it because everyone in the office is like have there's a pool like i thought you're gonna be like remember that one guy it's almost like you know when they dare like i just have didn't happen to me but like they dare you to eat a bug in school and then everyone's like hyping you up and you're like that guy ate a bug and you're always that guy

but everyone like is like put like no one's gonna look at you weird for this because there's a pool so at first i was like don't do this i know it seems cool but then everyone's gonna be like do you remember when he ate everything in that vending machine? Bond trainers? The fucking loser. Nah, this is tame. So what do you think the strategy is here, Kyle? I think use the chips to your advantage, right? As a dude of a larger build, two fun-sized bags of chips, easy, right? And then you pass that down with a sweet. And then you take those kind of breaks.

I think you blow through two bags of chips, and then you take those kind of breaks i think you could you get you blow through two bags of chips and then you and then you take maybe a candy bar or something get one of the get one of the desserts in the mix and then i think i think that's how you do it i think you go to too salty one sweet and see how how far you get with that can you show up early like can you show up at six or does this all have to be like just you know does the people at nine o'clock have to see you start i'd imagine there's some gentleman's agreement that it'd be a normal work day yeah yeah okay all right well it's 1700 bucks you know you're looking for every little edge um so yeah i think i think do that it's 11 o'clock do the salty uh two salty one sweet until you run out of salty and then it's just a it's just a fucking gauntlet at the end there i think i think kyle's on to something i would tweak it slightly though i think you have to separate all

of like the fruity sweet stuff from the like chocolate sweet stuff because the fruity sweet stuff you could use as a palate cleanser so if you eat like you know two bags of chips going for like the skittles right because it just are like the gummy bears there's no skittles it's it's well like starburst fruit snacks exactly and honestly i would say that if you had like a big like the Skittles, right? Or like the gummy bears. There's no Skittles. It's Welch's Fruit Snacks. Fruit Snacks, exactly. And honestly, I would say that if you had like a big pack of the Welch's Fruit Snacks,

I wouldn't eat that all in one sitting. Those have to be palate cleansers because those are going to... I do that. We have like the... Oh, like little aperitifs after dinner mints? Yeah, so what I do,

I do this like a lot usually. It's like after I have like our dinner dinner, which is obviously something savory, I'll have one of those like little Welch's Fruit Pack snacks that come with like six or seven fruit snacks i just pop those and it's a little palate cleanser nice little dessert at the end um and you

know like a sorbet you're thinking of it as a sorbet for like a bit okay yeah like a like a yeah like from costco though so um so that's what i would do i would i think you need to just like savor the or like like ration those and make sure you're mixing those up with pretty much everything else. Because even the sweet stuff, like the chocolate bars, that stuff's not going to, you're not going to want to eat that a ton after you eat a bag of Cheetos.

But you can kind of always eat a couple of Welch's fruit snacks and they're going to make you feel a little bit better. So that's what I would do. Also, we're skipping dinner the night before, right? Or do you think that's, do you think that will not help at all? So I found that whenever, so like if I'm going to like, like there's this awesome restaurant in this town i live in called

saulita it's a great taco place ryan knows about it and like if i know i'm going there at the end of the night i like won't eat a ton during the day but sometimes i find that i actually eat less i don't know if this is like a scientific thing that i actually will eat less and i get full faster on an empty stomach than i do if i just eat kind of normally so i don't i don't know you know there is a thing if i if i fuck up and i have something at like 11 o'clock at night, I wake up ravenous way. But if I, but if I like don't eat sexually or something,

I mean, if you've seen what I've done to some food, like you'd be like, what's, what's this really for? No, but I mean like it's when it's, when it's late.

Yeah. I do wake up absolutely starving. I feel like, but when I, when I'm responsible, I don't eat after like 8 or 9. I just wake up and can have a normal breakfast. I can make it till 12 if I really want to give it a go. You should probably get a personal day after this, by the way, too.

But the fruity candy part of this, the fruit snack starburst, we're talking one thing of starburst that I see in the picture and then the Welch's fruit snacks that we're all familiar with, even if you don't have kids. My input here would be the chocolates last okay this is hard enough but if you started with the chocolate that's going to disrupt you way more than the chip part of this so like you can't finish without the chocolate anyway, but if you start with the chocolate or you're working the chocolate in, I think the chocolate derails you for this kind of chocolate intake more so than the chips would.

So I would go basic chips first. I'd get the Lay's out of the way, classic sour cream. I know the aftertaste, maybe that's the Suri's point. You bring in a Welch's fruit snack, maybe a Starburst after that, the baked ones, the salt and pepper ones. That's easy. You're going to be looking at it and being like, hey, there's five empty bags and I don't feel nothing yet.

All right? You need mentally to feel like you have a chance at this. If you start in on the candy bars early, especially when most people aren't smashing a Twix and a whatchamacallit and a Baby Ruth and M&M's and peanut M&M's to start their day. God bless you if you are. But I would be putting that chocolate part off until the very end. No matter what order you do this in, it's going to suck. But if you do all the chocolate sugary stuff like too early in this process, it's going to be a real problem and i

cannot tell you like the the marshmallow treat the rice krispies treat thing it's so dense that's a real roadblock to this potentially happen you don't you don't want to end the the marathon with a quarter mile uphill right because that's like that's where you die on the hill i think that's the thing like we're not putting all the sweets we're just like we're you know and maybe we start with the the less aggressive of the sweets but i think i think mixing it is good because then you know there's still a lot of other stuff to get through and then when you when you look at the home stretch and it's like you know eight full size candy bars you're like what the fuck why didn't i break this up a little bit i think totally

agree i i hate to disagree with you ryan but i think i think you need to categorize them and then i think you need to power rank them and all and put the ones that you don't like a draft board exactly like mel kodnick mel kiper this thing big board also is is a puke worth 1700 to you could you just do it in secret maybe i don't know if you can wait but hold on because you i think i think you have to eat the shit that you don't like or that you know is not going to be enjoyable you have to eat that first because then like if you have that stuff last it's not happening but if you have like you know if you really like barbecue chips have those last put those towards the end you know stuff that because you want to be looking forward to stuff still and not having to say oh my god i have to eat this

whole bag of goldfish or whatever the thing you don't like is said no one put that stuff put that stuff first yeah the whole marathon analogy doesn't work though for me you know if you're out and somebody hands you a shot of rumple mints early in the night or at last call what are you more likely to do kyle yeah if it's like if i'm if i can have as much of what i like as i want and and yeah i would have it i would have it later i'd say please don't give me that in the beginning you're right because i don't i don't drink like a marathon sometimes it ends up that way but i don't i don't show up like how am i gonna make sure i stay until it gets dark or right because you're out or whatever you're out you're not a last call guy so um this enters a real another wrinkle though is can you sneak some beers in

because then you're gonna want to eat more like is this a possibility i know you're at work at work it's probably a hard no but i'm just saying like you get kind of like your steve i'm just saying i'm just saying like if you you know i don't think beers make any sense you're going to be bloated yeah but like then you're drunk eating kind of at the end of the day and it's you know what i mean those calories just i don't even know where they go yeah but then you have to be drunk and not a few beers you know then you got to be drunk like you a few beers. Then you got to be drunk. I'm going to assume that normal workplace. I mean, other than this guy going on this vending machine. Maybe it's not beer. Maybe you're just bringing nips in.

You're just hitting a few. So whiskey. Yeah. So whiskey. I think that would make it worse. How big is your backpack? Jesus Christ. I think you want to stick to water.

Maybe a mild soda water. Mix in a water. Because this is want to stick to water, maybe a mild soda water. Mix in a water. Because this is going to be really hard. It's going to be really, really hard. And, you know, if you don't like sour cream and onion, do you mess up your palate going too early to that? Those barbecue Fritos look dense, real dense. No, that's a tier one chip, by the way. Love that.

The twisties? Yeah, that's the tier one chip. Yeah way love that the twisties yeah they're that's yeah but you guys gotta think of this scientifically not like oh i still get to eat the barbecue free to let you're gonna feel like shit no matter what everything's gonna look like sand to you okay yeah i'm all right with that i just think i think too sweet one salty until you're out of salty and then it's a fucking gauntlet that's my so just i'm gonna stand here with sweet and salty intervals. And it's like you're starting a new tier. I say chocolate last, but whatever. Good luck, man.

Let us know. Okay. That's the podcast for today. Enjoy the weekend. Thanks to Mike. Thanks to Kyle. And of course, Steve. We will be back on Monday. We're on our solo podcast.

We're in your spot We'll be right back. problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit fanduel.com forward slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, and Virginia. Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 in Arizona. 1-888- 789-7777 or visit ccpg.org forward slash chat in Connecticut.

1-800-9-WITH-IT in Indiana. 1-800-522-4700 or visit ksgamblinghelp.com in Kansas, 1-877-770-STOP in Louisiana. Visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland, visit 1-800-GAMBLER.NET in West Virginia, or call 1-800-522-4700 in Wyoming. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-800-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York.