The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Young NBA Players: Who Doesn’t Have Next? Plus, NFL Summer Story Lines and Going Abroad With Kevin Clark.

Episode Date: July 6, 2023

Russillo shares his thoughts on notable second- and third-year NBA players by placing them into four categories based on their standing in the league (0:32). Then Ryen is joined by The Ringer's Kevin Clark to discuss offseason NFL story lines, including Aaron Rodgers anticipation vs. Sean Payton anticipation, Stefon Diggs, rookie QBs, NFL players' gambling, and more (17:23). Then, they go abroad for a Formula One check-in (57:02). Finally, Ryen answers some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (1:08:56). Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Kevin Clark Producers: Kyle Crichton and Steve Ceruti Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

on today's podcast i'll take a look at kind of the four categories that i've come up with with younger nba players you get ready for summer league we will do some nfl camps of open bunch of questions with kevin clark and we abroad, bringing it back after a spot, another win by Verstappen and Red Bull. What is going on? Why is this team so dominant? And of course, Life Advice. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats.

Winter is here, so be prepared and get almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. What do I mean by almost anything? Well, you can't get a ski slope, but dish soap, definitely doable. Sunshine, that's no. A bottle of wine, yeah.

And a snow day, again, no. But blueberry muffins with the delicious crumb topping, definitely doable. Sunshine, that's no. A bottle of wine, yeah. And a snow day, again, 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.

With Summer League upon us and the draft in the rear view mirror, which put this whole channel in my rear view, I wanted to talk about some of these guys and not just the guys from this class, but the guys from previous classes. And essentially, like I said, we don't need to recap all that. It's in the past. But with the Summer League here, like even Brandon Miller, right? Because number two, if you're really into it, you can be really into the NBA, but you have to be into it in a whole different level to be like, all right, here we go. Salt Lake summer hoops. And then you go, Brandon Miller, oh, you know, made some nice buckets, man. He fouled a lot too. What does it mean? What's my role with summer league? I only let summer league confirm my thoughts, good or bad. And if the performance disputes, what I think about the player, I can just say, hey, it's Summerlee, right? Completely inconsistent, but that's the game. So we know with the three guys at the top

of this draft, right? Because it felt like it was the top three, then who's in the next tier. History tells us what? Of the three guys that we think are special, we're in that first tier. And really, Wim Banyama's in the first tier by himself, and then it's Scoot, and then it's Brandon Miller. But of those three guys, history tells us one's not gonna be too good i mean all three might end up being terrific right but a bit like the quarterback stuff in the first round you're like oh hey these five guys that went in the top 14 two of them are definitely gonna stink like they're gonna be in another team going all right right system and all this stuff we know all the hits replay them over and over and over again we keep doing ourselves all the time. So I don't think it seems

weird to go like, Hey, remember when we thought scoot Henderson was going to be good. Cause the weird thing about some of these early games is you're watching and you're thinking, wait, that doesn't look right. I mean, you remember the Trey young experience and people wondered if he'd make a team in Istanbul, right? And now he's one of the most prolific scores in the league, but those summer league games, you're like, what is, wait, what's going on here? And it's just a weird feeling because whether or not you're super into it or you pay attention to the draft or all that different kind of stuff, you're watching. And then when you see something that's completely different than what your expectations were of that player, you're like, wait, what's happening? And again,

like to the beginning of this, sometimes it's real, sometimes it isn't. There's a lot of fake stuff that happens. I think Lauren Woods won summer league MVP. I know he won it once. He went twice. Anyway, no one cares. So keep it moving. So looking at the top three guys to this class, the other thing that we're going to find out, and maybe it's not that one of them ends up being terrible because it just seems weird to go like, imagine Brandon Miller just isn't good. That seems weird. That big can shoot, move like that. That there's going to be somebody taking 6, 7, 8, 12 that we go, how did everybody miss on this guy? Well, welcome to the draft because it happens all the time and it will continue happening for however many years we're evaluating people and trying to predict how good they'll be at their jobs when it comes to sports. So I want to use the 19 draft class as a mini template here to then look at some more recent draft classes in a collection of players where I'm going to separate them into four categories. All right. One category is we're good. I like it.

I'm not worried about it. Now, a simple rule here with the categories, also remember this too, because instead of listening to try to dispute everything I do here, sometimes when you kind of listen to only dispute, which is basically Twitter, you can miss the point of some of the other things. My biggest point that I'm going to make with these categories is that I'm putting players in the same categories that I do not think are the same basketball players. All right. So same category does not equal same player, same player profile, same expectations. It's just, hey, here's a list of guys, recent drafts. I'm good with who they are right now and I'm not worried about it. The next group that's probably the most interesting is the TBD group where we've seen some things. Some things are really good. For some guys, it might be a little too early, but there may be some lingering concerns if your expectations of this player should be a little bit more than they are right now. Then there's the third group called the come on dude group where their top 10 picks where maybe there's those little flashes every now and then. And you're kind of like, wait, yeah, but if you don't do anything this year, like who are we kidding?

And then this group could be really like it could be longer, but I don't want to do this for multiple drafts where it's just over. It's not going to happen. I don't expect anything anymore. You are simply an addition in a trade to help salaries match up. There's some of the come on dudes that are just on a one-way track right now to the no group. Now that we understand the rules, one-way track right now to the no group. So now that we understand the rules, we hope. I'm going to run through some of these guys. Now let's start with 19 because they're not into this exercise. They're kind of like the template for what I want to talk about. Zion, yeah, and by the way, the 19 class was like really screwed up the whole process of this, but hang with me here. Zion, we know as a basketball player, is really special.

We know he's also never healthy. And it doesn't seem that he is, let's just say, locked in. I don't think we're ever going to see an Instagram video where he's on a podcast. He's like, I start my day at 2.45 a.m. By the way, I think those guys are such frauds. I'm sorry. You're eventually going to have to make up

to sleep somewhere else. You're at the gym at 3 a.m. Fucking sweet. You really would be that much of a loser if you went at nine? All right. Anyway, rant over. We've got Zion at the top of that class. I know it's like, wait, what group would you put him in here? If it were just basketball, I'm good with him the basketball player. And if he were to stay healthy for like a four out of five year stretch, play some games, win some playoff games, I don't know

that, you know, it doesn't feel like a great bet right now, but if it was just the basketball part and he would be able to play consistently, I think we'd see somebody who then would maybe be knocking on the door of like, is this guy going to be in every All-Star game every season? And then we're going to start arguing that he's a top 10 player. And then is he going to get to that top group, which I think is like maybe five or six guys

where he guarantees you a chance of competing for a title where it really may not even be five or six guys. Maybe it's two or maybe it's three. Look, I don't know if Zion can even get to that. But the fact that I'm still open to it because of how impressive I think he is just as a basketball player, I think it's still a fair thing to say about him. The problem is that once you get to that group,

then when you don't win, then we get to dump all over you in a new way. And Ja actually is a perfect segue into that because the basketball part about Ja is what? He probably can be a number one, maybe not a number one of like LeBron or Steph or that kind of stuff or Giannis or Jokic. And he's getting close to,

let's start seeing some of this stuff in the playoffs, but he's going to make probably every all-star team. He's somebody that may flirt with the fourth or fifth votes in an MVP season, you know, that kind of stuff. And just like Zion, if he were to have a really good statistical stretch, all-star games, five years, get through all the bullshit,

because I don't know that his non-basketball stuff is going to derail the basketball stuff the way it feels like Zion's potentially could. And I'm not talking about sex. I'm talking about his health. Jha's stuff just seems stupid. And he could probably turn this around if he wants to rather quickly.

And he'll be back on the court and be putting up huge numbers. It'd be really good. And then if they lose in the second round all the time we can shit on him again too like we love doing to all these top guys in the nba all right garland is in that group hey we're good he's made his money he's not the same concern as those other two players he may not be as good as those guys but i really like him all right so that's that's kind of what we're working with here at the top end so if i go through draft classes, which I've done in the past too, like going back to 2013, that was the Anthony Bennett class. I've been on this top 10 picks and how long they stay with teams. The average for the 2013 class was four and a half years for the top 10 picks, how long they lasted.

they lasted. 2014 was 4.85 years. 2015 was 3.8 years. The Ben Simmons class in 16, that class is the worst of the four that I'm looking at here. 3.35 years on average for those players. If I keep going further to more recent drafts, then it becomes a little unfair because the guys in those classes haven't had as many years to kind of bump up that average. But that's pretty crazy that four straight drafts, you're looking at these guys that are supposed to turn around your franchise, more so at the top and pick seven to 10. But the average is they don't even last like four years or after four years or not even on the team anymore. And a lot of times too, they're in trades because they're considered still somewhat valuable, even if the reality is they're not going to be real players. All right. So let's go through the categories. Good TBD. Come on, dude. All set. Which is like, nah, it's not going to happen.

All right. The first guy is Anthony Edwards. I think he's the best player out of this list of guys that I'm going to go through here. I'm not concerned at all. I think he has a chance to be like really, really special. It's not going to happen anytime soon. You don't come into the league in like three or four years in. Now you're helping your team win really special. It's not going to happen anytime soon. You don't come into the league in three or four years in. Now you're helping your team win a championship. It just doesn't really happen. Maybe in olden days

or a guy like LeBron. But even LeBron, it took a little while. So with him, I'm not remotely worried about any of it. Franz Wagner. Now you're saying,

wait, you think Franz is as good as he is? You think Franz is better than all those other draft picks? No, I don't think he's as good as Anthony Edwards. But from what I've seen, I'm not worried about it. He's going to get a nice contract after the rookie deal is up. He does a lot of things.

I think he plays well with others. I would love to have Franz on my team. I think he fits into a bunch of different things. I'm going to stay with another member of the Orlando Magic, Paolo. I really think he's going to be that good. I know it's only a year in. It feels too soon. It'd be way too soon if he were bad for a year to go, hey, I'm off of him.

But the positive of it, I feel really good about it. I don't know if he's going to be Anthony Edwards or any of that stuff. But the first year at least leads me to believe the trajectory of what my expectations could be for him as a player. They seem to be right on schedule. And then Josh Giddey. Again, don't think Giddey. Again, don't think Giddey's these guys, but from what I've seen from Giddey, how I think he fits in a bunch of different ways, the way he sees the game at such a young age. There's some other things

that I wish were better, but I'm not going to put him in the TBD thing because I think we already see the foundation of what he's going to be as a player. Let's get to the TBDs because I think this is where it starts becoming mistake prone. LaMelo Ball. Now, something came up when LaMelo got his max extension and Halliburton got his. A bit of a rule break here because Halliburton wasn't technically a top 10 pick. But if you watch Halliburton, watch LaMelo, and I understand that some of you would do the same or things that are similar are the same. And it's one of my favorite things now. If you want to put together resumes and make it look like they're the same guy, you could do it. Hey, LaMelo's hurt. Oh, so is Halliburton. LaMelo hasn't done anything with his teams. Hey, the same thing with Halliburton. If you honestly watch a lot of basketball and you feel like

LaMelo's the same person as Halliburton, then we just can't be friends. And that's fine. I don't want to be friends with you in the first place. That's why I think LaMelo, despite the great stuff that we see from him, and the injuries aren't entirely his fault. It's not like his injuries and missed games are the same concern that we've had with Zion, but he's missed a bunch. And I do think there's this high-end excitement that blinds some from the in-between plays where you're like, is he always locked into the winning part of this? Is his overall 35 plus minutes a night, is that always about winning basketball?

And I'm not sure of the answer yet. And it may seem unfair to put him in this group, but the reason I have him there is because I think the way he's talked about that the expectations of what he could be are beyond the actual player, even though the numbers are really nice and the money's there for him, which makes sense because he's Charlotte star. And that's why they did it. RJ Barrett, also TBD. He's getting real close to come on, dude. I don't even know if he's ever going to figure it out with the Knicks. I don't think Tibbs is a huge fan. We've been over that all season. I don't know if there's another national podcast that covered R.J. Barrett's minutes patterns more than this one did.

Honestly, I'm embarrassed I did it that much, but that's the point. He's a nice player, but when you go as high as he did, there's still some hope that maybe there's some other level. We're probably kidding ourselves that there's that next level. Cade Cunningham, TBD only because he missed his second season. The injuries are a concern. I loved what I saw from the first season. I think he's going to be terrific, but I can't put him down in the I'm good category until I get another year of him healthy. Evan Mobley, I like him. I like him a lot defensively. I also didn't like the playoffs,

just like the rest of you. Offensively, something needs to happen with him where he feels like he's more of a threat that was exposed in that playoff series. We'd all take Evan Mobley, but for those of us on the higher end of it, no more so than Bill Simmons, even more than me, there's going to have to be a step taken this season offensively where you feel like there's something in his game that's really tough to deal with defensively. I don't know that he has it yet other than the putbacks and transition stuff. The passing is great. But, you know, again, this is about big expectations for Mobley,

more so than a guy like Giddey, who I was okay with. Jalen Green is below Cade and Mobley in this category. I have no idea what's going to happen with Jalen Green this season. I can't wait to see it. The numbers are going to take a hit. So, yeah, if you're just going all the counting stats, you're like, wait, look at Jalen Green did this. Jalen Green did that. He did all these different things. Yeah. The counting stats are sweet. I also think there's like 20 other young perimeter players that they were just given the ball and the parents left

like Jalen Green had, like a bunch of those guys would have the exact same numbers. It was about opportunity. Yes, he's super talented. I remember the game at Boston where my buddies that were like, wait, you're on the fence about this dude. He's killing the Celtics tonight. I'm like, yeah, it was a really good game. And that's why you still hold out hope because Twitch wise, athletically, there's some really special stuff with him. I don't know if his life's going to get easier because the defenses are going to be less focused on him because Van Vliet's there, or he's going to be watching Van Vliet and Brooke shoot the whole time going, what do I do if I'm not shooting every other possession besides Kevin Porter Jr.?

So yeah, TBD on him. And this one hurts a little. Scotty Barnes of Toronto. Loved the rookie year, loved him before the draft. We knew the shooting was a concern. It looked like, wait, maybe there's a little bit more there his first year. Everything just felt like it was kind of a, it just wasn't what you wanted to see from him. You saw like, I don't know if regression is the right word, but it wasn't another step up. We'd all take Scotty Barnes,

much like a lot of the guys in this group. But I want to see that look more like rookie Scotty Barnes than sophomore Scotty Barnes, uh, moving forward into his third year. By the way, you know, LaMelo's middle name is LaFrance. La, interesting. Okay. Come on, dude. Kaminga. Pretty self-explanatory. Yes, there are flashes. You

know what? 450 plus guys are playing the NBA. They're all pretty good basketball. There's usually going to be some flashes. Now, granted, Kaminga's flashes are probably more impressive than 90% of the league, but the non-flash stuff, it's just not there enough. Jalen Suggs, still holding out hope. Smart, competitive, fights his ass off. Not sure how he fits into this guard rotation with Orlando. Defensively, maybe that's what he becomes, a defensive role player that hopefully develops a shot

by like year five, but based on what we thought he could be, when we thought the weird thing was that Suggs fell to the magic behind Scottie Barnes, and now it's like, is he going to be a defensive bench guy? Patrick Williams, a little bit more offense, probably feel better about him than I do Suggs at this point. You could put Denny Avdia here, maybe a little Obi Toppin, but I don't know maybe i'm pushing a little bit the mad dudes the guys i'm over i mean cam reddish have been over probably before the draft um and i'm just going to be excited to see lakers fans act like he's wing mo bamba uh james wise been self-explanatory killian hayes we could go all day with that but that's the difference i think you were watching

kaminga there's part of you that's still like maybe maybe, maybe. And then that no thanks group, you're like, wait, like who plays like this, this many years to start their career and then become somebody that's not even an all-star, just like a real rotation guy who figures it out later on. At least with Wiseman, I still feel like he plays hard. He just doesn't know what he's doing. And again, that list could have been a lot longer, but I don't want to keep going all this. And again, that list could have been a lot longer, but I don't want to keep going all this. Here's what I'd say to finish up.

It's too soon on Jabari Smith, Ivy, Shaden Sharp, Matherin, who I think I kind of know who he is right now. I like the way he plays. I like how aggressive he is. You could also argue he comes in with the second unit and he basically just attacked all the time.

So let's not freak out about it. Fair. I like him. But I think the biggest mistakes we make are the TBD group. And another year of the same or another year of regression, this is usually where we're telling ourselves the lies. This is where we usually start talking to ourselves in a way

where you're holding out hope for a player you know you shouldn't. And that's the group I think we end up making the most mistakes on. Kevin Clark joins us. Always excited to catch up with him. We will go abroad to update you on F1's season. But before we do that, let's talk some NFL storylines. Get ready. His camps open up.

So I don't have an overall title. It's more of individual categories here for different storylines. Are you ready? I am. Yeah. Okay. You gave me a couple different titles, and then I guess you backed out on all of them. Yeah, pretty much.

Okay. It's okay. It's okay here. It'll work. All right. So let's start with the doubt-off contest first. Aaron Rodgers with the Jets. Russell Wilson in Denver.

Some quick recap of what we're talking about here. Rodgers, 12 picks, the most since his first season as a starter when he had 13. You look at some of the EPA numbers, significant drop-off. He's going to be, well, 39 to start the season, 40, but the last time we doubted this guy when some of the numbers were showing us some things we

didn't like, then he won back-to-back MVPs. No Devontae Adams, obviously, last year. Messes with the numbers a bit. But there's part of me, Kevin, that wonders, is he going to be the guy that gets his wish and then you're like, careful what you wish for with New Jersey versus Wilson, whose QBR went from 72, 67, 54 to 37 last year, ranking 27th out of 31 qualifiers.

Here's what I like about the Wilson situation is that Sean Payton's going to win a power struggle. So if there's any ego thing, Russell Wilson is the one who needs to adapt. He was sacked 55 times last year. That was a league high. He held onto the ball, I think, second most in the league as far as

slow throwing. Zach Wilson was the only guy who took longer to throw last year. He threw it inaccurately downfield. He's completely different from Drew Brees in the sense that Brees I think had the lowest off-target

rate and got the ball out of his hands quicker than anybody. Wilson last year was basically the opposite of that. Sean Payton is just going to say, here's what I'm doing. And Russell Wilson can adjust that. He'll scheme up an actual run game. Nate Hackett last year, who obviously is the OC for Aaron Rodgers this year. Nate Hackett just didn't have a system last year.

And Russell Wilson held onto the ball too long and didn't make plays with his legs. And the whole thing just looked awkward and terrible. So I'm vaguely optimistic that something will work there in Denver. With Rodgers, Breer was on my show last week and he said that they think they're getting a different guy in New York and that Rodgers wasn't necessarily locked in last year. He didn't go to any OTAs. The year before, he only went to mandatory minicamps to skip most of the offseason. And what they're expecting is a different level of commitment.

I know. I've seen those training camp practices. Rodgers is obsessed with chemistry. He's obsessed with who he can trust. He will throw 50-50 balls in practice just to see if a guy will come down with it in the right spot. Rodgers and Mahomes are the two guys where, over the past few years, you've seen training camp reports where they're like, uh-oh, he's thrown four picks

in one 7-on-7 period. It's like, no, no, no, he's testing his limits. And with a young group of receivers last year, Rodgers wasn't there for OTAs and minicamp to test his limits. He's there now. He's getting chemistry

with that young core, with that offense, getting to know that offensive line, seeing how fast that defense is, just getting a snapshot and clocking all of this and what this would look like. I think there's real reasons to have doubts on both, but A, the Jets roster is better.

B, Rodgers is in a more comfortable environment. I thought it was amazing how LeFleur and Rodgers were able to blend their playbook over the past couple years, and LeFleur did things that Rodgers just didn't like. He didn't like a lot of the motion in practice. He liked a lot of the McCarthy-style West Coast offense plays. He liked spreading the defense out and then just using his cadence

to let these guys declare what they're doing. Nate Hackett is going to adapt to what Rodgers wants to do. There's no more compromising. So if you're saying, which one do I still have doubts on? It's Wilson because he looked, A, awful last year. And B, Sean Payton is not really going to care that much if he flops

because Sean Payton is going to be there for a long time and Russell Wilson isn't. And so I think everybody's hitched their wagon in Jersey to Aaron Rodgers. And I think that's why you're probably going to see more of. He's kind of the Max Verstappen of the Jets.

Everything has to be built around him. So I think they will force it to make it work. Yeah, that's probably the better bet. Him being motivated, him wanting to show everybody. And the fact that Gary Wilson is already better than any single receiver

that they had last year in Green Bay. That all... I think Rodgers is the one that you're less, I guess if we're framing it that way, doubtful of. The Wilson thing, I can't wait. I mean, I cannot wait. And seeing him, and I've talked about this before, just kind of the way he is, it was fine when he was winning. And it was fine because Seattle kind of let him do

everything he wanted to do. And then when it was like, actually, we don't want you to do all these things. And it was Pete Carroll's fault. It was the system's fault. He got, talk about somebody getting their wish. He got everything he wanted. And then when you see the teammates during certain times of the season, like show us that they're sick of it. Like that's not going to happen with Rogers. I think Rogers is somebody that comes into your camp and the other guys are in awe of, and then there's part of this that, that has nothing to do with quarterback play that just, that just defense at one point last season, I was like,

this team is stacked with guys. Like I loved that defense. And as far as Denver, when I look at it, I just don't see a roster that... I wouldn't feel like it's a roster capable of carrying an average or below average Russell Wilson. It reminds me, frankly, a little bit of the Tampa Bay Brady situation where he's going to a team with receiving help, certainly, and he's going to a team with a really fast defense that's young and has a nice core. And I think you're going to see at least some bump

in not only engagement in the offseason, but just confidence, all of that stuff. As you mentioned, Garrett Wilson, but also just the fact that it might take a while just because he doesn't know these guys for it to click, but it's going to click. And that's what happened with Brady. I remember mid-season with Brady in his first year,

people were saying, is this going to work? What's going on? And then they won the damn Super Bowl. And so there are shades of that a little bit. And I think the floor has been raised. And Zach Wilson was abysmal. And there are so many guys who would have made the playoffs, like so many guys would have made the playoffs with the Jets last year.

I think that, you know, Southgardner was on my show last month, and he literally said, it's going to be easy to made the playoffs, like so many guys would have made the playoffs for the Jets last year. I think that, you know, Salisgarden was on my show last month and he literally said, it's going to be easy to make the playoffs. And then he had a backtrack on Twitter when he quote tweeted and said, easier, I meant easier. He didn't mean easier.

He meant easy. It's going to be easy to make the playoffs. And I agree. Okay, here's a receiver question. Do you have more confidence in knowing where Stephon Diggs is or Brandon Cooks? So do you mean like, do you, are either of these, do I know where Brandon Cooks plays basketball?

Is this a, who he plays for thing? Who we play for thing? Yeah. I just think it's always great to update the audience on where Brandon Cooks. We play for the Dallas Cowboys, which is smart, by the way, because I was reading some of the contract breakdowns the other day. Like the Cowboys are about to become a very expensive roster. When digs has to sign lamb,

has to sign Micah Parsons as a sign, although maybe Micah could do some outside media work and, and maybe take a discount. Um, but I think that there's going and getting Steph Gilmore, going and getting a guy like Brandon Cooks.

That helps. And I really like this Dallas roster. And if you're an NFC team, you should be accelerating your timeline. It's unfortunate they're not going to win the division because Philadelphia is there. But I saw something the other day on PFF. They were ranking the rosters and they were like the weakness is quarterback play. And it's like, that's awesome. That's awesome that the other day on PFF. They were ranking the rosters and they were like, the weakness is quarterback play. And it's like, that's awesome. That's awesome

that Dak Prescott is your weakness because let me tell you who has an actual weakness of quarterback. Tampa Bay, Arizona, Washington. If Dak is your weakness, that's a really good thing. And so I really like the addition of Cooks. The Diggs thing,

Josh Allen said it yesterday, he thinks it's been overblown. I think Sean McDermott's the guy who over blew that. He's the one that kind of blew the lid off of it. I don't think the media would have reacted if Sean McDermott hadn't told them how to react. So I think Josh was, again, I keep having to say

this, but Josh was on my show a couple weeks ago and he called Diggs the best receiver in football. I don't think that was a coincidence that he kind of went out of his way to mention that. And so I think everything's kind of going to be fine. I also think that I think that they kind of know

stacked roster, not a lot of cap flexibility. At some point, I think everybody in Buffalo knows that they have to compete for a Super Bowl very, very, very quickly. And I think Diggs can get on the same page for five months. Because we're not quite sure. And I know, Alan, since the initial part of the report was that Diggs either left or was told to leave, which we apparently don't know the answer.

We'll forget about the story probably pretty soon if Diggs is back and everything's working out. And then we'll forget it at another level. If he has a good season, you expect Buffalo to be good. I guess I'm not entirely surprised that one of the best receivers in the league had an issue with his team. I just think that's kind of the position. He was fifth in yards, fourth in catches, third in touchdowns, second in touchdowns when you take out Kelsey going by receivers. But no one was ever going to say, hey, this is actually a way bigger deal than you guys realize. No one was ever going to say,

I'm surprised people aren't paying more attention to this or talking about it even more because, I don't know, when you're a really important player, and it's kind of funny because you said something about Rodgers, how he's obsessed with chemistry. Well, it's like he wasn't last year and he knew he needed to be, especially with the turnover at receiver and the unknown. he was like now i'm good like he was way more about his own deal a year ago uh when you're quarterback i don't think you can do a receiver you could probably get away with it it probably

isn't that big of a deal but no one was ever going to tell us anything other than it's not a big deal. Early on in our relationship, yours and I's, I saw something kind of professionally fucked up and I was telling you about it. And you were like, I worked in local radio for years. And you just kind of learned to just keep it moving and ignore it.

Because you've seen things in local radio that are so fucked up that nothing could ever come close to it. You said that to me. And I learned that and that was a very valuable lesson. And I think sometimes in football, the amount of things that happen behind the scenes can be so crazy. And a good glimpse of this,

Percy Harvin got in a fight with Golden Tate and Doug Baldwin and they still won the Super Bowl a couple days later. That kind of happens all the time. And I think that behind the scenes, you're seeing blowups a lot. And you're seeing guys who leave practice and nobody ever finds out about it.

I have a hard time saying this is a big deal versus this is not a big deal because I think there's kind of mini explosions every day in a lot of facilities. And I remember early on in my NFL career, I was talking to Bart Scott at the Jets when he was with the Jets about distractions.

And he was just like, because everyone was always hard knocks to distraction. We're talking about that because it was that year. He was saying like, you know who's distracted? Teams that are really bad. And they're distracted by the fact that they have no good players and they suck and they don't know how to run practice.

That's what the distraction is. And I've always carried that with me a little bit. Good teams have distractions too, but they're also just like, eh, whatever. Let's just go in this game because we have a bunch of good players. So it's always hard for me to parse

what a real distraction is, a bad distraction, when you actually have a bunch of talent. Because we've seen... Here's some of these stories about the damn Patriots when they're rolling and they're going 14-2

and they've got some crazy blowups happening. Like the locker room is just going insane or this guy doesn't want to be here anymore. Even the glory days Seahawks heard a story. I, I, you know, I I've heard stories about one guy in the Legion of boom gets a contract. Other guy just bails for, for a day. Cause he's pissed off, you know, something like that. I've heard those stories a bunch. Um, and that's not just seahawks specifically that's just good teams um there's a however wild do you think nfl locker rooms are they're wilder and and that's always when i hear stories like this i'm always like eh i i don't know how how worried i should be i like that answer okay nfl versus nba drama which is more fun in the nba you can be a Hall of Famer.

You're like, yeah, I want out. Yeah, but you signed an extension. Yeah, I want out. It's four years left in the deal. One of the highest salaries in the league. Yeah, I want out. And I want to be traded for Tyler Hero in a first-round pick in 2029. And everybody on NBA Twitter goes, you got to do it.

The NFL. So I don't know if that's more fun or maybe a happy ending cincinnati brings in orlando brown they're moving jonah williams from left tackle the right tackle he demands a trade since he says no the most recent jonah williams quote i saw it was a combination of a bunch of things but to sum it up it's quote i'm stoked he's so i just love if the nba were to be like no i think that um the nba has become a little bit more like the english primary league which is that or even any of european soccer where when a guy puts in a transfer request

they usually accommodate them whether it's that year or the next year and it's kind of weird and it's kind of strange and it's kind of strange. And I don't really know. I went through this with Dwight Howard, obviously, when he put in multiple trade requests in the same month a decade ago. But I think that the NFL, Aaron Rodgers, was trying to get traded for a couple of years and it didn't work. And it wasn't until the

Packers realized that they had reached the end of the road with him and Jordan Love got a little better in practice that they decided that was okay. Russell Wilson, the same way. I said this after the Russell Wilson trade because I said Broncos fans kind of killed me after the Russell Wilson trade. I said, I just don't think you improved your team very much. I just

didn't, especially certainly looking at that division. And what I said was I don't think a quarterback a team wanted to keep has ever been traded in the NFL. I don't think it's ever happened. And I said that after the Wilson thing and people killed me, but

like, find me the one. Because I think the Packers were kind of done with Rogers. I think the Seahawks were kind of done with Wilson. I just don't think it's ever happened. If Joe Burrow tomorrow says, I never want to play for Cincinnati again, which he will not do, if Justin Herbert says that,

then we can find out and we can test those limits. But I think that NFL teams are really good at only getting rid of the guys they want to get rid of. Okay, nothing to add to that. Give me your favorite rookie quarterback quote essentially saying yeah we love this guy um again i would always point out whenever you get the rookies that you just drafted in camp chances are because you just took them you do like them um i saw one with anthony richardson which i actually thought was really interesting it was like an in-depth radio

interview with a couple people that work in the front office, and one of the scouts said, it's the closest thing that we've seen to Vic, the ball getting out of his hand. So it doesn't have to be Anthony Richardson. You can just give me any rookie QB camp update that made you just smile with optimism. I've got it. It was from yesterday, and it's via Jeremy Fowler, our buddy. Orlando guy. Orlando magic fan in Connecticut.

Cerruti's on notice. We might have to update the Connecticut Magic fan power rankings. Fowler looks like he's got a good wingspan, too. So just to throw that in there. All right. So it's on Bryce Young. His mental aptitude has been as advertised. Okay.

Fine. Fine. He's a mental savant. He's a savant. That's it. He's processing so much and he's already got the install down. It's been a hard install.

That's what we know about Thomas Brown's offense. And guess what? It's just not a problem. They're taking everything and throwing it at Bryce Young and he's just eating it all up because he's a savant. Rank real quick for me. Savant,

student of the game, cerebral. Oh, so I think savant is number one with the bullet there. Student of the game I feel like is a bit of a loaded compliment.

I'd say it's someone who maybe studies hard, but maybe they're just trying. And then cerebral, I think cerebral can often mean just quiet. He's a cerebral type of leader. He's not going to be too flashy. And so I think Savant indicates that you're

a plus, as they say in baseball scouting. That's one of your tools. I agree on Savant. I think that's the best. I don't think there's anything above Savant for quarterbacks. Oppenheimer? No, Oppenheimer.

I think you have to do the thing. So I love the Bengals coaching staff and but there's no but. And the thing they do, especially Brian Callahan, their offensive coordinator who's with Peyton Manning in Denver, is they do

the I'm not comparing Joe to Peyton. I'm not but and then they give a comparative Peyton Manning. I think the biggest compliment is you can't do it. You can't compare anyone to Brady or Manning. You can't do it. But what you can do

is you can preface it by saying, I'm not comparing the two and then compare them. That, I think, is above spot. Peyton Manning mode means you're the coach. And that's also what the Bengals want to get with Joe Burrow and they keep talking about it. I love Florio stuff.

Mid-season forum already. We talked about gambling. A player essentially saying, as players kept getting busted for this, why can't we have something where the players are allowed to bet on their team to win? Florio basically said, why not carve out an exception?

Let guys make a money line wager on their team to win. Pete Rose style. Your thoughts? Okay, so boxers do this. They're known for doing that. The boxers bet on themselves. I don't think so. And so here's the problem.

I remember watching early 2000s ESPN documentaries were about all sorts of weird stuff, like Sports Century type stuff. And I was a big Sports Century guy growing up. Love Sports Century. Yeah, great. And so I remember watching, I think it was Sports Century,

maybe it's something else. I'm Pete Rose. They're saying like the problem that you get into that is if you bet on your team 16 times in a season and don't bet on the 17th game and the

guy who takes your bets is like, hang on. Why didn't Steve bet for his team this time? This isn't good. And there's implications there. There's also obviously the gambling debt issue. What happens if you go under? What happens? I mean, like, Calvin Ridley was betting on the Jaguars and

parlays, the Urban Meyer Jaguars. There was a... I don't think that it's just good for these guys to get involved. I think that the dumbest... I am pro sports gambling. I think I really enjoy sports gambling on things other than National Football League.

And for me, I just don't bet on NFL games as it currently really enjoy sports gambling on things other than the National Football League. And for me, I just don't bet on NFL games as it currently states. I bet a lot on golf and some college football and all that stuff. But this idea that any of these guys are absolved because the NFL

runs gambling ads is one of the dumbest ideas I've ever heard. The natural extension is that any league sponsor can be used at any time. That if Josh McDaniels is just drinking a beer on the sidelines, that's okay because they also run Coors Light commercials or the US military ads, you just call in some drone strikes in the middle of this thing. Where does that end? I just don't understand.

There's different rules for players and consumers. Is that so strange to everybody? You think you'll use that drone strike analogy again this year? We'll see where the year takes us. Look, I can... The Pete Rose stuff used to drive me crazy, okay?

Because anybody that's ever known anybody that really likes to gamble, okay? They would sell a kid for a winner. And beyond what happens when you don't bet on your team, if you're only betting on your team to win, what kind of indication is that? There's also access to health information of guys maybe betting the line heavy,

and who cares if it's their own team to win because they're like, hey, we know this guy actually was here in the walkthroughs and we're good to go and the line doesn't reflect that. There's just a lot of stuff where it's like, Hey, you know what's the easy thing to do? Be just,

you can't bet on the games or the league that you play in. It's not that big of a deal. And that's by the way, like I would never ever believe any of this stuff about Rose only betting on the team to win. And if you actually only believe that, um, think about the nights where,

again, it's a little different as a manager as opposed to a wide receiver. But think about the nights when he was going to decide, like, I need this one tonight. I'm bringing out somebody in the sixth inning or seventh inning. Maybe not so much back then with the way baseball was played. But you get the point. I just think it's really easy to not do. How about that?

It's just really easy to not do, even though it seems to pivot into this whole idea that, yeah, well, wait a minute. They take all their sponsorship money. Yeah, okay, they do. And guess what? That's part of the revenue split. So they're compensated for it. I don't understand why this is so hard or why we try to make something that's simple more difficult. I've seen very few issues where there are more bad points that people think they're crushing it with. Like the smugness in which these lines are delivered is unbelievable. And you're just like, okay, that was a stupid point.

So I don't know why you delivered it like that, because that was a bad point. Okay. A lot of going around. This, uh, this is not new. The craft Belichick stuff.

Yeah. And it gets back to kind of your point about distractions. Yeah. Distractions on bad teams. Yeah. And we can point to the distraction and say, oh, that's been a week eight. Remember when that happened?

It's also a really good chance this team wasn't any good. The Pats have been 25-25 the last three years with Bill without Brady. One playoff appearance, the blowout lost to Buffalo. And Kraft was asked about the future of the team recently at the owners' meetings, and it felt like he kind of pivoted to, hey, it's just about wins. And I don't know, because if you look at the timeline of stuff where Belichick at his last press conference had mentioned the Pats over these last two seasons

had been 27th in spending. And it felt a bit like after the Flategate stuff where Belichick had to talk about the ball and it was like, wait, this guy can't be bothered to tell us whether or not he thinks that another team is good

or not. Remember when he used to do like his team would suck. Be like, hey, what do you think about just go pick the Jags, I guess. 2007 Dolphins. I was at a press conference like that. They went 1-15. Yeah, and he'd be like their punt blocking

schemes are incredible. He said Ronnie Brown was the best player he'd seen on film all year. And they were like 0-9. It was the game where they... It was like the actual mossing game. And Harvey Fialca from the Sun Sentinel asked Bill. He was like,

Hey, Bill, in a game like this, how do you not be overconfident? And Bill threw the... It was a conference call. They used to do conference calls in those days. Bill just cuts him off and goes, I don't know what we have to be confident about. It was the 2007 Patriots against the cam cameron dolphins and it was the most offensive question he'd ever been asked but perfect all right so that's that's he the point is is that there's only been a few times i can think in his career, and I think I've watched it pretty closely, where he's gone out of his way to make a point that you felt like, wait, I can understand the matchup stuff where you're like, all right, fine.

He's just doing his normal routine of praising somebody that seems incapable of praise, as you pointed out with the 07 matchup. phrase, as you pointed out with the 07 matchup. But I remember during Deflategate, you're like, wait, this guy's giving us a dissertation now on air pressure and moisture and the dew point. Like, what's going on here? It's like he's really giving us a lot of stuff, but I don't know what the tactic is here. That, to me, is like an absolute shot across the bow by bringing up the spending. absolute shot across the bow by bringing up the spending. And it's funny that in Boston, where you were like, I remember doing this stuff back in 2003. Imagine what would it take for this town to ever turn on Belichick? And we even said back then, we were like, the Brady ending would

have to be bad. The Brady ending's about as bad as you can imagine it as far as being like, no, we're good. We're going to move on. Then he goes and wins the Super Bowl, and now Bill's there. I don't think it's fair to be like, oh, this guy's nothing without Brady. That's just inaccurate. He's a terrific coach. You don't win all of these games just because you got lucky with the right guy at QB. Clearly, with the lack of direction the changing the approach on the fly matt jones and kind of a make or break year i wonder i wonder if this is the beginning of hinting at an ending that would be actually kind of odd considering it was belichick who got rid of brady if craft would ever say after another 500 or below 500 season you're're like, alright, it's been four years. It's time to make a move. Yeah, I think that the root of all of this

is that, and you know this, following the Patriots as well as you do, knowing some people, a lot of people around that orbit. The problem is that for 20 years, everybody, people you've never even heard of

in the old Patriots organization thought they were the reason the Patriots succeeded. You know, like you get two beers and anybody in that organization and they go,

you know, I was, I was the guy who thought we should trade for Wes Welker. And, you know, like that kind of thing. And everybody,

but it was, it was, it wasn't an easy alliance by any means, but it was a nice alliance where everybody, again, we're talking about distractions.

Everybody's rolling in the right direction because it's a lot easier to say like, all right, maybe I'm not getting enough credit for this, but we're going to win the Super Bowl and I'm going to be able to do sponsorship stuff and I'm going to be able to go to the Cape and rent a $50,000 a month house or whatever the hell it is. And we're all going to live good.

We're all going to eat. And at the end of this thing, which is happening now, I mean, I didn't say Brady leaving was certainly the beginning of the end of all of this. I think you started to see a little more of dividing between this was mine, this was yours, this was mine, this was yours, as far as the credit for the past 20 years and retconning what that all looked like and a changing of the past. And Brady winning the Super Bowl, I don't think was good for anybody's psychic energy in New England who are still there. And so I think that Kraft is probably growing impatient with the fact that Bill Belichick did not have Tom Brady anymore and seems to be a little bit out of answers.

The Cam Newton thing didn't work. I certainly staked my claim in the Cam Newton thing having worked. Didn't work. I was wrong. Belichick was even wronger because he's the guy that actually gave a bunch of money. And I think that the Mac Jones

mishandling last year was interesting because there's, I think, two parts. Mac Jones could have been a lot better, but also Mac Jones was right to yell at his offensive coaches. Mac Jones was right to go outside the building and find outside help because the guys who were put in charge of his destiny, I mean, the biggest leap always in quarterbacking is year one to year two. year one to year two. And the guys put in charge of that leap were not equipped to do it. That's a mishandling that, and I was on Mina's show a couple weeks ago,

and she said, you know, it's, frankly, I think you could say one of the defining things that Belichick has done, which is that he didn't have,

he just didn't have the easy answers. He's always, throughout his career, whether that's on offense, about special teams, he's always like, how do we find the hidden yardage?

How do we find the found yardage? The nine-yard plays, whatever, the easy things? He makes life so much easier for everybody. That's the whole point. The reason Tom Brady, one of the reasons Tom Brady was so good at reading defenses is because they'd sit there on Monday, Belichick and Brady, and Brady would find out exactly how the defense would attack him because Bill Belichick's the best defensive line of all time. Charlie Weiss and Bill O'Brien and all those guys were not even allowed in those meetings.

That's one of the reasons Brady was so good. The Belichick ethos is how can we make life easier for everybody? Everybody just has to do their job and everything's going to go well. Then to take Mac Jones and give him to two clowns and say, here you go. These are the guys

that to me, it's not I'm not going to say it's unforgivable or something dramatic like that, but it's actually unbelievable in relation to the other things that he's done in his career. And now he's got Bill O'Brien. Things will be easier. But I'm just starting to wonder, with any

young quarterback, the clock ticks very quickly because you have extension talk. There is a very, very thin line in football between getting an extension as a young quarterback and being third in a Kyle Shanahan

quarterback competition this time next year. Okay? And Mac Jones has about five months to figure out which one he is. I still can't believe they did that with the staff. I can't believe. I mean, if any other coach does that with a second-year quarterback who you've invested some resources into, I think years from now, you'll be like,

remember when they did that? And you're going to go, wait, what did they do? And you may not care if you're from any other fan base, which I wouldn't blame you, but it's just crazy that somebody who's so good at having everybody, being like, hey, this is the approach. This is what we're going to do. And the familiarity with other coaches, I don't know.

It's screwed up. The other thing that's frustrating is that Belichick is also known for kind of taking things over if things aren't going well. I remember I heard the phrase that what he'll say is he'll say, we tried it your way, didn't work, we're going to try it my way. And that's like the death sentence. That means Belichick has taken over whatever you're in charge of, whether it's defensive backs or the defensive line or whatever. If you're Bill Belichick, and I don't know how much involvement he had, I'd rather be coached by Bill Belichick on the offensive side of the ball,

which he has experience on, than Joe Judge and Matt Patricia. Just do something. Help. Help, Bill. Okay. One of my favorite things about depth is sometimes we confuse depth with familiarity. We're like, man, look at how deep this team is. Are they deep, or do we just have an easier time in naming the

guys? Odell, Rashad Bateman, Zay Flowers, who I'll admit I did love out of the guys. Odell, Rashad Bateman, Zay Flowers, who I'll admit I did love out of the draft. Those are your starting wide receivers for Lamar Jackson of Baltimore. Have they done enough to get the full version of Lamar? And if healthy, he's probably on the, okay, if you're all that, let's see the playoff stuff,

which isn't entirely always fair for the quarterback. It may be more so with him. You're also talking about the depth of the position in that conference in general. There's probably going to be a really good team that's the fourth best team in this conference, but I know the headlines are there. I know the excitement is there for all the stuff they've put in. Duvernay is

their fourth receiver. Aguilar is on the squad as well. There's just a lot of names there that we're familiar with, but how good is the group? I think it's really good when you include Tom Uncant, the new offensive coordinator, because we're going to see more space. In reading some of the tape studies,

the problem with Greg Roman is he gave a lot of these guys freedom on option routes, and they'd all get bunched up together, and that was a huge problem. You're not going to have to worry about that with Todd Munkin, even though he runs a lot of bunch formations, he finds space, he spreads guys out. We're now doing this thing. Todd Munkin said that Lamar is going to run less. I will always sell that. I will always sell a guy changing his identity mid-career because you want to fit some sort of offense. And you want to take less unnecessary hits, but taking hits is part of what Lamar is going to do.

That's the thing that Josh Allen has talked about, where Josh Allen's always going to have to take hits throughout his career. Brandon Bean wants him to stop trying to truck Kyle Van Nooy for no reason like he tried to do in Miami a couple of years ago. So I don't think he's going to run significantly less. Remember when... You may not remember this. It might just be a stupid college ball thing I remember. You remember when Tim Tebow came back to Florida

and they hired Scott Loeffler as quarterback coach, Urban did, because the whole thing, he said, I owe it to Tebow to make him an NFL quarterback so he's going to run less and stuff. Do you remember this? And then after like a month, they were like, ah, fuck it, we'll just go back to the old Tebow. Like, that's just what you start to realize.

These guys have identities and that's just what they are. I'm intrigued to see how this all goes because Lamar's deep ball has been getting worse, not substantially, but getting worse for the last few years. I saw a

column a couple weeks ago that said that his accuracy on 20 yard passes has gone down over the last two years. Last year, he was 15-45, 33% on those throws, and that maybe having better receivers will help, although there were some accuracy issues.

Georgia, unbelievable red zone offense with Todd Munkin. Unbelievable use of the tight ends. We saw that. There's a reason that they have two future NFL guys, one of whom has already been drafted, one of whom will be a first-round pick next year. That's what they want to do with Mark Andrews.

And so Lamar is going to be nailing 10 to 19-yard throws. Same thing he's been doing a lot of times. He's going to run well. There's going to be enough space for him to run. The misdirection in the run game was really snazzy with Munkin in Georgia. And so I'm expecting the Greg Roman offense was great, but it had run its course. And I'm

expecting better personnel, better schemes, better play. I do think the Ravens are going to take a step forward. I think that division is crazy because the Browns are really good and the Browns roster is phenomenal 1-53. And so they could be pretty good

I think the Bengals are probably my early Super Bowl pick and then the Steelers are the Steelers and so it's hard for me to sort of parse where that all heads but I do know that the Ravens are going to be better than they were. Alright last one here who got better the Super Bowl contenders

KC or Philadelphia? KC's still the better team but Philadelphia got better? The Super Bowl contenders, KC or Philadelphia? KC's still the better team, but Philadelphia got better. I just... I came on this show after the draft, and I just talked about how much I love those Georgia guys. Sean Desai, the new DC, has some real work to do

with unlocking some of that athleticism, but I believe that they'll get there. And I just, I think Jalen Carter is a day one sort of space eater at the very least. I'd also say, this is important, being in the NFC right now is amazing.

And if you're an NFC team right now, you should go all in and the Eagles have a ton of restructures and it's not like they should have gone out and got Odell or something like that. But being in the NFC right now is an unbelievable advantage. The AFC right now, I have no idea how to parse one through five in the AFC.

I just don't know. And there's also teams, again, like I just mentioned, like the damn Browns, where it's like, would I be surprised if they're playing the AFC title game? Not in the least. Not in the least. And so if you're the Eagles right now, you get better for a couple reasons. Number one, and a bunch of NFC teams got worse. Number two, you don't have Jonathan Gannon anymore,

who's probably going to be coaching Caleb Williams this time next year. And so I don't think that, I think that there are circumstances around the Eagles that made their offseason, frankly, better. Last one, I lied. I had a quick one here. It's called the Jack the Shot Foley range on what his season could be for a quarterback. My man Jack could shoot it from deep back in the day, researching kids. Does Tua have the widest range of what you would allow yourself to believe on what his season could be? his season could be. No, because he has Mike McDaniel, and Mike McDaniel is him.

Last year, Tua was the most accurate passer with the deep ball, almost 70% on target percentage. Jalen Waddell was the best crossing route receiver in football last year.

I think that Mike McDaniel, I think, frankly, if Tua's not healthy and Mike White is the quarterback, I think you're still going to see a lot of positive results. Mike McDaniel is unbelievable. And his schemes just work. And they get guys open. And Tua with Mike McDaniel

is good against almost every coverage. I was looking at it the other day in True Media and just looking at the different coverages. And Tua was beating the hell out of a bunch of different defenses. I'm talking like number one in the league. And this goes back to something that I remember describing Phil Mickelson to my wife one time. And I was like, yeah, he's kind of a fraud, but he puts on this nice guy persona. He's been doing the nice guy persona for 30 years. And she was like, well, if he's been doing the nice guy persona for 30 years, how do you know he's not just a nice guy? And I was like, that's a great point. When does the persona and when does the facade, you know, whatever. So Mike McDaniel is propping up Tua

from a scheme standpoint. But at some point, Tua is just a good deep passer and you can't separate the two. Tua's not going to go and play for Arizona next year. He's not going to go play for New England with Joe Judge and Matt Patricia, like Matt Jones was last year.

So why does it matter if Tua is benefiting from the best games in the league? He's hitting the passes he's told to hit. And so I actually think the floor is really high with Tua because of the talent around him. As long as Tyreek Hill doesn't get suspended from his thing, I think this Dolphins team is going to be really good. And what's hurting my handicapping of the AFC East race is that I think Mike McDaniel is him.

That defense is awesome. Adding Jalen Ramsey to it, they have one of the best rosters in the league. I would not be surprised at all if the Dolphins make the Super Bowl. The ceiling is the roof. The ceiling, the floor is the ceiling and the ceiling is the roof.

Let's go abroad. Golazo! Golazo! Golazo! I wish to be happy, but more healthy. Golazo! Golazo! Golazo! Continued economic responsibility demands restraint in government expenditure. And last year we achieved the largest ever recorded reduction in the budget deficit, 1.5 million. All right, let's go abroad. The F1 season, Max Verstappen, seven wins, two seconds.

He's led 419 laps. Number two in lead laps is his teammate Sergio Perez with 113. Red Bull's 199 points ahead of Mercedes in the Constructors' Championship. It's been a dominant max in Red Bull season. That's also led some people to suggest, could F1 be losing momentum because it's not as exciting?

Because people that got into it a couple years ago being like, this is your season, you're like, this is insane. The thing is, is now that I understand it, I'm still watching the races yes i still love it i guess i'm enjoying the domination i kind of regret getting into it right as max became the guy because in the beginning you felt like you were rooting for him against hamilton and them taking over mercedes and now you feel like you're rooting for the house a little bit blackjack but i still kind of enjoy

his dominance and i still really enjoy the sport despite not getting the spectacular drama and unknowns of two years ago so first of all if you're looking for drama brad pitt is in the paddock this weekend filming his movie he's gonna race at silverstone he's just gonna race the car which is really uh one-upping tom cruise in the I Do My Own Stunts thing. He's driving an F1 car in an F1 race. So I've seen some photos from that. He looks great. He looks great.

He always looks great. Linen shirts. Linen shirts. And I think there's a couple of things. He's a Vacheron guy, too, as well. And so are you a Vacheron guy too as well. Mm-hmm. And so are you a Vacheron guy? No.

No. No. I just noticed. I think Vacheron is kind of like, oh, you know, I'm not knocking into the other brands, but it's just, oh, you kind of know what's up. The Watchers of Kings. J.J. Reddick has a Vacheron. It's a very nice one And I texted

Jason Gallagher and I was like Can you just tell J.J. I like his watch And I was like that's a weird desperate Honestly it was I'm not trying to be friends with J.J. But I was just like Hey Jason you know you talk to him every day We cover fashion We cover it all.

International goods. Somebody asked me last year why NASCAR's racing is more exciting but F1 has captured this market. My feeling on it was that

F1 has done a really good job with only 20 drivers. The Netflix show has created all these guys as TV characters. So Lance Stroll, we know who that is. And we know everything about him. And we know his backstory. And when you do that, it's almost like... I read Dick Ebersole's autobiography a couple months ago.

He's about the Olympics. And it's like, when you get people invested, they'll kind of watch anything. You just use the storytelling. And so these guys are legitimate. As's as my former colleague Josh Robinson calls it, the Real Housewives of Monaco. And if you see that Botas is 20th and a total passenger, and we have no idea what the hell is going on with Alpha this year, that's compelling because you know so much about him. And you think about how much he literally shows his ass on Instagram while swimming in creeks and stuff like that. You know that. You have a frame of reference. If Lewis Hamilton is running mid-pack and he's complaining about his car, that's compelling because we know so much about him.

And we know how he's going to react to it and seeing him down in the dumps. And he was so passive-aggressive, almost aggressive-aggressive in the last interview he gave after Austria, where he's just down in the dumps and he deserves a better car. He's one of the best drivers in the history of the sport. And Total Wolf comes on the radio and says, Lewis, we know that the car is bad. Just drive it. And that's

compelling because we know those guys so well. By the way, real quick, I just have to jump in. I love Spah. It's my favorite track. And watching this weekend and that exchange on the radio from Toto, I can't believe you just brought it up. I had it down in the notes.

Just that him telling him, hey, we got it, man. Just drive. Yeah. Just drive to a guy like Lewis Hamilton. He's trying to defuse the situation, and I can't think of a worse way to do it than tell one of the greatest drivers in history to stop complaining. It's really tough, man.

Imagine an NFL coach mic'd up, and it's like the second half, and they're one for eight on third downs, and the quarterback looks to the sideline on the play call, and he just puts his hands up. And then all of a sudden, Sean Payton's going, we know our receivers aren't very good, Russ. Just run the play.

Although that might happen. So the compelling part is, A, the personalities. B, as we've talked about before, it's basically just a travel show. You get to see Austria. You get to see Silverstone. You get to see Miami, Vegas, whatever, right? But then C, there's a real... I think there's a...

Like with subsections here, subheads. I think the most important thing is technologically, who can even come close to Red Bull? How does that work long-term? Can Mercedes ever figure it out? Can Mercedes ever figure it out? Can Ferrari ever figure it out? Is Aston actually making the leap that we think they are? Or is it just kind of a leap within the middle tier of teams?

I think it's really interesting. The problem with Red Bull is they make so few mistakes. Obviously, they have the best car designer of all time in Adrian Newey. But then the pit stops are amazing. The reliability after the first five races last year has been absolute nails. Max Verstappen is such a good driver. I just don't know.

The only people that can catch Red Bull or Red Bull if they get bored or they get their people hired away, which doesn't seem like it was going to happen, even though Adrian Newey and Christian Horner have been offered by Ferrari in the past. And it sounds like Horner was offered last year in Canada, the Ferrari job. He did not take it.

And so Verstappen has hinted a little bit. Maybe he's not long for the F1 world. Maybe he wants to dip at some point. But I just think that they're just going to keep dominating until someone takes a huge leap. There's a cost cap now where essentially you cannot spend your way to fix the problems, which I think is going to help Red Bull because someone can't say,

screw it, we're going to invest $100 million extra in this, in R&D, in Wind Tunnel, whatever, and we're going to make it. So I don't know where this goes, but I'm still like you. Spanners, who appears on our Sunday shows, says he thinks the American interest has maintained. He thinks it's actually the European interest that has dipped. So maybe

you and I are the only real F1 fans. Yeah, I don't even know if it was a real thing. I think it was just a real simple summary that may not even be accurate and be like, okay, this isn't as compelling. You're like, wait, not as compelling as one of the most insane finishes in any

season and forget just F1. How that season finished up two years ago is like all-time stuff, especially with emotional investment. I agree with that Ebersole point as much as anything I've ever talked to you about. It is the advantage that you have. And I think it's why we've seen so many times. Remember when the NFL draft got really weird, almost morbid, where it was like, hey, here's this pick. And by the way, here's who died.

And you were like, okay. And then after like 10 of those profiles, you're like, okay, this, this draft has a different feel. I think it's why the NBA draft is so, um,

so much coverage, so much importance on the sit downs with people. It's also why game day does a lot of those kinds of standalone features where you get to know the characters a little bit better. But for the F one series on Netflix, like, you know, I watched the most recent one again and it was just kind of like reminders of who some of these dudes are.

Like Lance Stroll in the beginning, I was like, oh, this guy's just a thanks dad deal. It's like, actually, he's a pretty good driver. And he's not at the top, obviously, but every weekend where I'm watching, I'm like, oh, he's in the mix a little bit more. Watching Alpine lose Piastri, and then it's like, oh my God, they're going to lose this guy, and it's actually not been that big of a deal to them. There's just these little things. At first, I used to think it would be more fun if it were

20 teams and 20 drivers, and I'm like, no, this team concept part of it adds this layer, and now that I understand it, that I'm still really interested in it. Instead of going back and forth on that, can you with a much better understanding of the mechanical part of it than me, because you've just been into it a lot longer, what is the reason, like why is Red Bull so dominant now, especially when you're talking

about going up against Mercedes and Ferrari? Why? Why is is that gap so other than max i mean what's that gap about with the cars so they have more straight line speed relative to anybody in the history of f1 if you listen to the f1 beat writers um a lot of that's engine power a lot of that is just little small things the rear wing for instance the shape of it it's more rounded. And the way that Adrian Newey understands ground effect and how to use the floor better than anybody in the history of car racing, frankly. And so that's why they have better grip on the corners, all of these things. So it's a million little things, but it comes down to a mixture of car design, aerodynamics. One of the best quotes I've ever heard is about Adrian Newey from Christian Horner. And he says that Adrian Newey is the only person in the world who can see air. that is like he can watch a car go through and see exactly or imagine exactly how the air is flowing over the car as it goes and then make little aerodynamic changes from there and that's all f1 racing is once you have the power and and all that stuff is understanding how the air flows

through it and that was the whole debate about having side pods and not having side pods or um you know how the how the front should look or whatever, where the where the battery should be. If there's a if there's a regulation change or whatever, the whole thing comes down to. So a couple of weeks ago, I don't know if you saw it, the floors were exposed in Monaco. And that's a huge, huge, huge thing, because if you can see the floor, you can start to rip teams off. huge, huge thing. Because if you can see the floor, you can start to rip teams off. And the reason the floors were exposed was because in Monaco, you have to use a crane to get the cars out because there's not a lot of space. And what a lot of the tech dorks were saying was, actually, Red Bull's floor is so complex that even knowing it is not going to help you because

you're not going to know how everything works together. And that's the beauty of Red Bull's car going to know how everything works together. And that's the beauty of Red Bull's car is that everything, and this is a Newey hallmark, is everything goes together so well that even if you can photograph every single inch of it and you're McLaren, you can't really close the gap. Newey is the reason that they're so good. And everything kind of flows through that. When you have the best guy building the cars, you're going to have success. What a way to introduce somebody. My buddy here, he can see air.

He can see air. Well, it's been dominant. I still enjoy the hell out of it. And for F1 fans and football fans, tell them where they can find you. Slow News Day is the football podcast pro and college. We just had

George Kittle, Josh Allen, Albert Breer, Lindsey Jones over the past couple weeks. Going back, we had Sus Garner, Von Miller, a bunch of fellas. It's been really, really fun. Great offseason. Ring of F1 show will be back on Sunday. Spanners and I will recap Silverstone. Meg Schuster, our normal third

is on vacation in Canada, which you might have some thoughts about. There's things I like about Canada. There's other things I don't. Thank you, Kevin. All right. Bye. you want details bye i drive a ferrari 355 cabriolet what's up i have a ridiculous house in the south fork i have every toy you can possibly imagine and best of all kids i am liquid so now you know what's possible let Let me tell you what's required. Life advice is lifeadvicerr at gmail.com.

We also want to announce we have something that we're launching here on the podcast, and that is Friday Feedback. We're going to do it maybe once or twice in the summer, and then maybe, I don't know, maybe it'll be a part of, I don't know. I don't know how we're going to do it. It was something we were thinking about doing is like a standalone thing once a month. So Rudy, I believe that was the original idea. So non-life advice questions, just trying to keep the community going.

Here's an example, right? It wasn't a life advice. It was Rosillo been with you since the SVP days. Great pod. I recently discovered an egregious error I made all along. I thought life advice was with kyle brandt okay i wonder what what like how did he find out it wasn't kyle brandt this whole time he's like man kyle brandt's edgy this isn't the guy saying good morning football the guy nfl network huh yeah yeah this guy might want to be on GMA one

day. He just talked about how he used to sell knives in high school. He's done cigarettes in college. That's pretty great. This guy goes to this dive bar a lot. He seems to keep his shit together though. That's an early call on NFL Network. Yeah, I'm pretty sure he's got kids, but

what's going on? You get married again. Uh, to me, they sound very similar. My mind was blown when I realized it wasn't. Uh, yeah, that would blow. I'm my mind's blown and I don't even know you. And I knew it was nephew Kyle the whole time. Yeah.

Look, I, you don't think Kyle Brandt might want to talk a little bit more. Yeah, exactly. He's just like, you know. Just laying out. He has a passion for editing podcasts. All right. So that's not a life advice email, but that could be Friday feedback. So it's fridayfeedbackrr at gmail.com.

Just, you know, we'll see where it goes. We just get a lot of emails that are sent to LifeAdvice that Kyle will be like, hey, do you want to take a look at this one? And I just don't want to derail what we're doing at the end, but we can maybe non-derail, derail it with something entirely new, maybe a standalone thing. I don't know.

So I think everybody understands. We'll see where it takes us. You know, just let it kind of evolve into whatever it evolves into. We're going to be throwing a third podcast up there come football season. So, you kind of evolve into whatever it evolves into. We're going to be throwing a third podcast up there come football season, so I'm sure there's room. Yeah.

It might suck. It might suck, and it'll be entertaining. Totally could suck. Could be really mean. Could be really mean, and I could leave being sad. Could be worst take all over again

where we just abandoned it two months in. Well, worst take is not a bad idea. We shouldn't have had a podium. We should have just brought them up and then argued. We tried to structure it too much. And then you went on maternity leave and that you were sort of the backbone of that, like keeping us like being in charge of it. So I'm not I'm not against bringing it back because people send us stuff all the time. I don't think we know how to structure

it yet though. Like, should we take a monthly winner? I, you know, at some point you confused me too, because you were like talking about Orlovsky's candy stuff. And I was like, wait, so what's the threshold here? Cause I got thoughts on a lot of things that wouldn't be necessarily considered sports takes. And you're like, yeah, fuck it. Do whatever you want. And then you left. So that's not me. I'll own that one. I did leave. I did leave.

But I could have done a better job in your absence, by the way. So this isn't to blame. So Rudy, we also had a couple of fire breathers like right off the start. I mean, we had the Gilbert Arenas one. Then we had Bart Scott. And it was like, nothing's ever going to beat Bart Scott saying the Chiefs are going to finish last in the AFC East. So, okay. I guess

you ruined the game. Fun. Thanks, Bart. That was pretty bad. Perk's saying that 80% of the voters are white. Not great. Not great. They didn't give a fuck. They're like, you're booked all day tomorrow.

Hey, we're going to issue a correction but he's back he's back man in a big way i mean actually i was i wasn't even offended by that one as much as i was that he said how come we give westbrook shit about stat padding we don't do it for yokich we're like i don't know because one guy's way fucking better do Did we start there? It just blows my mind when somebody actually played in the league. Like you got a uniform and played in these actual fucking games

and you don't go like, yeah, that's different. I don't know. I would agree. So worst take is back. Nice. It's back. Worst take is back. Yeah, look. Fall 2023. Yeah, yeah. It's back. It's back. All right. Good. I would agree. So worst take is back. Nice. It's back. Worst take is back. Yeah. Look. Fall 2023. Yeah.

Yeah. It's back. It's back. All right. Good. Executive meeting there. Okay. Here we go.

Life advice. RR at gmail.com. Golf trip ultimatum. 30 years old. 5'10". 250. I'm fat. I know.

Player comp. A poor man's rate. I think you just picked a thick guy. Yeah, I did. There is something, though, about guys that are overweight that you play and pick up that are just nasty. I love those guys.

Those are my favorite guys. You know what I'm talking about? You guys are all silent. You know, like the chubby guy who's just nasty at basketball who you play with. And you're like, this guy's awesome.

Not great at defense, usually. No, no, I totally know it. They hack, usually, the shit out of you. Yeah, they're on their way around. Yeah. They're usually shooters, too, I totally know it. They hack usually the shit out of you and they never want it. They're usually shooters too because they don't move a ton. Yeah, but if they drive,

they kind of suck to deal with. Like when you drive, when you're a heavy guy and you do that shoulder and you're just driving under the rim. Again, we've already talked about driving angles covered. Okay, happily married man, two kids.

I married way out of my league. Congrats on the hot wife. Nice. To cut right to the chase, I go on a golf trip each year for four or five days with a group of 11 older guys. Hot wife and friends. This guy's got it all. 11 friends.

My God. This year, the plan is to go to Canada in August. One of those 11 guys is my ex-brother-in-law. He divorced my wife's sister. This guy my ex-brother-in-law. He divorced my wife's sister. And this guy was one of my closest friends up until the separation.

Without going into too much detail, my wife does not like my ex-brother-in-law at all. No way. He divorced your wife's sister and she doesn't like him? Do you know how much of a disaster the immediate sibling has to be for the sibling to take the ex-husband or wife's

side. There's plenty of ex-wives or ex-brother and sister-in-laws, I guess is a better way to put it together. That person was clearly right the entire time, but the bloodline part of it, they're just like, look, I just can't take your side. I can't take your side. So not rare. Not rare. What's going on here? I do have an acquaintance where someone cheated on the spouse.

They got divorced and their family is mad at their own son. They like her. You really fucked this one up, man. And it's actually kind of awesome. It's kind of awesome. Because he's reminded all the time about how much he fucked up.

Well, hopefully they're all perfect. All right. So he was one of my closest friends until the separation. Doesn't like him. However, she knows how much these golf trips mean to me. So she gave me the okay to go on this trip.

Unfortunately, since getting the nod from her, I've done a few things to jeopardize the golf trip. The night before Easter Sunday, I went to my ex-brother-in-law's house for poker night. I did this without telling my wife. Bad decision. She obviously found out, was furious. A month or so later, I had text exchange with the ex-brother-in-law in this exchange we joked about me getting a divorce so i could golf as much as he does

she read the text exchange in her words she thinks that she's a joke to me and she feels betrayed she also thinks i would rather be with the boys than a family man there's some other things involved with the trip that she doesn't like gambling drinking and dude you're not going to fucking deadwood i mean come on uh she's now so completely against me going on this trip she wants me to cancel everything that i've booked airfare hotel tea times it will likely cost me about six hundred dollars to cancel the trip uh i gotta be honest six hundred for airfare hotel and tea times like maybe it's because of group rate I don't know I take your spot yeah

yeah it sounds like a great deal should we forward this to other listeners the boys have been the boys have given me until the 21st of July to come to a final decision and they have adequate time to find a replacement so they have adequate time to find a replacement we'll find like 10 guys today Do I risk it all to go on a four-day golf trip or do

I cancel? Is there any other potential solution to this issue? I obviously want to go on this trip, but I would like to stay married in the process. It sounds like you're fucked, to be honest with you. If your wife, like you screwed it up if you already had the green light, but we're only reading an email here. You know your wife. And my guess is she's probably a little tough to deal with. That text is a joke. All right. Now, seeing it actually written out and being the wife. And I know some people

will be like, whatever, but like, think about how many times people are married that joke about dumb shit. And by the way, like, yeah, maybe I'll get a divorce so I can play golf all the time. Like if she took it seriously, obviously her tolerance for some of this stuff, like this is what I'm reading and thinking about her tolerance for this stuff is very, very low. So if you go on this trip, she's going to fucking haunt you about it all the time. Like she seems to think that you can never be defiant at all. And if the rest of your game as a husband is really good, you're good with the kids, you provide, you do all this stuff, you watch the fucking terrible shows. You know what I mean? You ask her about her day and pretend you're interested. And then remember follow-ups, right?

If you do all the stuff that you're supposed to do and you decide to play some cards and drink while you're on a golf trip, what did she think you guys were going to do? Is she okay with the trip if there's no drinking or gambling, right? She's not okay because the ex-brother-in-law is there. But if you're saying in that one line, she already wasn't a huge fan of this whole idea because of some of the stuff that we're going to be doing, gambling and drinking, it sounds like she's pretty strict with all of this stuff. So if you go on this to save 600 bucks, and it's not the 600 bucks, it's the time, it's telling stories, it's repeating the same stories as you get older and older and guys messing with the stories a little bit and just wanting to hear those stories with your buddies for the hundredth fucking time because that stuff

matters it's fun it's not the 600 bucks if you're if you're in a spot where you go she's gonna like look how mad she got about stuff that doesn't really even matter like based on this you haven't really done anything that egregious. And she already is telling you that you already knew what you signed up for. This is who you married. And the chances are it's going to be way worse. If the texting bothered her that much that led to her wanting to cancel this, you're already fucked. And we have no solution for you.

Yeah. I mean, it sounds like she's just hot. I'm not going to say anything because i don't know anything else but i mean it's like i mean from what i hear she doesn't like joking drinking or or gambling so i don't i don't know do you guys just watch her stories or something at 4 p.m but uh i'm not even trying to be mean but i just mean like unless you're like frank the tank dude and it's like you're not telling us that something like you know some guy the night shift guy is actually fucking crazy. And she, and she doesn't want you around, uh, you know, guys who can handle it a little better. You know, I don't know how

long you've been married. And I don't know if this is like, you know, if this would be you stepping out of line for the first time ever, and you've bowed to a bunch of this stuff and you've actually not done a lot of things. And this is different because you have to cancel it. But if there's just a lot of stuff you wouldn't even dare ask to go on because you know how it goes, maybe I would say keep up the status quo. But if this is a thing where you're like, you know, I want to, I'm not making a stand here, but you're sort of making a statement a little bit like, yeah, I'm not just going to, you know, not do anything just because you, you know, rather I wouldn't. So, you know, I guess it's weird because of the, you know, the brother thing,

but you know, my, my parents were close with people and they like, you know, the guy messed up, did something that is pretty naughty. They're not together anymore, but my dad's like, Hey, still my friend, I'll just, I'll, I'll take him and you take the wife. And that's who you guys will hang out with. We won't bring them together, but you know, it's, it's accepted that, you know, even though the group is pretty mad at this guy for, you know, screwing this whole thing up, it's still like, he's still a person. Like you still gotta have that conversation where it's, it's accepted that, you know, even though the group is pretty mad at this guy for, you know, screwing this whole thing up, it's still like, he's still a person. Like you still gotta have that conversation where it's like, you know, I can't not ever see him again or something like that. You just maybe have to have the conversation of like, yeah, this is separate now and I'll keep

it separate. I'm not gonna, you know, I don't know. There's like, there's a couple of things here, but I guess just how, how has your relationship with this thing been? Is this like, is this first day in jail and you're going gonna like you gotta make a statement that you know you're not to be you're not gonna be walked all over or have you just been getting walked all over for years and this would be like way out of left field if you were like no actually i'm i'm gonna go on this so there's a lot of questions that i don't think can be answered right now yeah i would just say first and foremost you are you're not crazy for doing what you want to do like you're not in you're not in the wrong for one to go on this trip the question just straight

up is like what are we what's the level of repercussions that we're facing here like if you go on this you're gonna get divorced like if you go on this is she not gonna talk to you for a while uh like what's what is the ultimate end game here like is she just kind of like a lot of a lot of bark and no bite on these situations? And if that's so, and you really want to go, then all right. Maybe I think you probably go. And then you just put up with it for a couple weeks that she's mad and then move on. But yeah, like if it's like grounds for the relationship is ending, then obviously that's probably not the road you want to go down.

Or maybe it is, depending on how what your happiness level is. I don't really know. I'm just trying to think of like my, so I could put to put myself in his position and i've said this before like i hit you know definitely hit the jackpot i have a cool wife lets me do a lot of you know that lets me do a lot of stuff but like she just doesn't really care yeah she's all right i can attest she was cool thanks really nice you know i think she's pretty cool and you know but but if her if i was like hanging out and texting her sister's husband so that would be my brother-in-law but for the context. I don't think she'd be pumped about it. But I don't think she would also be like, no,

you can't go to this thing with like 10 other guys. It's not like it's just you two hanging out. There's 10 other guys there. Were you guys tight though for like, I don't know how many years, five years? Were you guys like tight and you're like, I can't believe this guy gets to be in the family. Exactly. So it's tough to cut that person out of your life. You're supposed to be mad.

I mean, like if it was like, and I know this is probably shitty to say, but it's the truth. If it was my sister's husband, yeah, fuck that guy. But it's a little bit different if it's not the blood kind of situation there. So maybe I'm being a dick there, but I think it is different. It's not different to your wife, obviously. But I don't know. At the end of the day, it's like, what are the repercussions? That's what I would say. Like, is this a grounds for relationship bender? And that's probably your answer. I mean, there's one other play where you go 36 and you get to put your foot down and establish that you're not just going to get to tell me what you want me to do all the time. time and she's just like actually i want a divorce like like for nine years i've been i've been you know had the leash pretty tight and now you now you think this is different that's why i'm asking like how new is this type of situation right i mean i've so rudy had texted one of his buddies was like sometimes i wish i was divorced so i could play more fifa and if your wife read it she'd probably feel sorry for you more though than she yeah i mean like be upset my buddies openly talk about that in front of other significant others. Like, man, we did this wrong.

We could just rent a house, live together in Maine, playing video games, living off the land. I've been married for a month. Married women do it too. Everybody who's married, I don't have to be married to understand this. You fantasize about shit you know is never going to happen. You don't even fantasize as if you're putting it on a pedal like i'm i'm putting it on a pedestal you're not sitting there going oh i i aspire to be this thing i'm daydreaming about it's just the reality of the shit that we think about that sometimes you don't say out loud but um you know i don't know i don't it

sounds like she thinks she's going to be able to tell you you can't do it. The other part that's kind of fucked is like, hey, he's one of the other 10. That's 10 of my other friends. You knew I was planning this trip. You know it's something that's really important to me. I would never tell you you can't go and do something like this. Yes, guys, you're going to drink and gamble. Give me a break. We're playing cards.

I'm not putting the deed down on a fucking game of Pharaoh here. Okay? Yeah, play the same game card. Like, I need this. I need this for, like, I get one or a couple of these a year.

Like, I need this for my annual house. Ah, interesting. Maybe be like, I need a little supportive. Maybe be like, hey, can you be supportive of me? Interesting. Like, you know what? I'll freeze. I'll shun him the whole trip, honey.

I'll send you updates. Will someone indicate my ex-brother-in-law that he's being shunned whatever I mean I hate this shit yeah sorry I just I just really do I think take a stand okay here we go 36 six foot 202 names have been, but there's enough detail that it doesn't matter. Okay. I hope they do listen and hear this, but they aren't regular listeners yet. Okay.

To frame this, I'm the CFO of a small business started by two good friends. Flashback 11 years ago, these two friends, we'll call them Rex and Jimmy. We're going around yard sales. Thank you for getting Rex back into the mix. Buying old video games and selling them online, this blew up incredibly quickly and eBay sent them a dreaded 1099 showing them over 100K in online sales. As previously

mentioned, we are buds. I just got my CPA license and worked at a local accounting firm. So they asked me to do their taxes. It was a nightmare, but we got through it. Flash forward a few months and this thing continues to boom so much that they decided to open a brick and mortar store to sell old video games and consoles. Think GameStop. Yeah,

dude, we're aware. He just reinvented GameStop. GameStop. I miss going into GameStop by the way oh I know I drove by Best Buy the other day and I was like like that was

Circuit City with a fresh 20 in your pocket look out alright so these guys invented GameStop they asked me to do all the accounting work on the side which I'm extremely happy to help out with payroll etc alright three years in they asked me to come on the accounting work on the side, which I'm extremely happy to help out with payroll, et cetera. All right. Three years in, they asked me to come on staff full time as

the CFO. They were up to four stores. By this time, I'd left the accounting firm to be CFO of a medium-sized nonprofit organization, had two children under two, had a pretty decent salary, pretty stable life. It was a risky jump, but I knew these guys and they never settle. I obviously knew the numbers, talked it over with the wife, dad, made the jump. Everyone thought I was crazy, but they just mostly didn't understand it. Old people couldn't wrap their minds around video games being extremely popular and valuable. Look, imagine being the first guys like, yeah, strangers are going to pick your kids up and then bring them to places. Right? So, and look,

the advantage, whenever I've, not that it's happened a lot, but in a couple times where I'd be like, why did you invest in this? Where did you,

I'll hear stories about how like somebody did the books for the business and then realized like these guys are doing it wrong. I'm going to buy it from and then I know what to do because they're better

with the numbers. So it would make sense that if you felt good about the numbers and saw it working out, you knew it would work out. All right. We're up to 10 stores now. Jeez. We're thriving. We dealt with the real estate

market, acquire a few commercial buildings. God, you've given us a lot of info here. Two of which I brought to the table. It was very instrumental in acquiring. One of these properties, a massive 100-year-old four-story, 60,000-square-foot building. First two floors are finished. Commercial tenants, top two floors were vacant and in disrepair. Okay, you've fucking remodeled it. We got it. So they did a $3 million renovation. They've got people in the upstairs.

Great. We had the governor of our state come to our building to tour it to see the big project that we were doing. It was a huge deal because he never comes to our small town and he's coming to visit us three goofs at the beginning of the tour i got relegated to handing out pamphlets at the door and totally got passed over any introduction at the tail end of the tour rex finally realizes i haven't gotten to officially meet the governor and shake his hand and he says oh, oh, I want to introduce you to our CFO. Then he looks up and sees one of our tenants, who's a barber, is in the shop, stops mid-sentence

before my name is uttered and says, would you mind if I introduced you to our tenant? I totally got shafted and was left standing there dumbfounded. A couple of weeks ago, we hit the 10-year anniversary of opening the first brick and mortar store. It was a big deal to us. We did several things to commemorate the occasion. One of those things was a video Rex and Jimmy created with pictures, clips. Here we go.

I know where this is going. And notable moments from the last 10 years and posted it on our social media pages. Guess who's notably missing? Your boy. I make no appearance. Some things you should know about me. It's fair to say I am reserved and don't seek attention. Well, mission accomplished.

I do things behind the scenes, do the dirty work, do everything that is asked of me. Don't ask for anything. Just let my work speak for itself. And the three of us are like brothers, even though they are the owners. And I understand that carries a different way. I'm involved in all decision making and all day-to-day operations. Having said all that, it's obviously eating at me that I didn't make the video. And I don't know if that's petty of me or if I'm completely justified. It's a stupid video. To top that,

there hasn't been one word mentioned about my absence in the two weeks since the video was launched. There've been a couple people outside of work that have seen the video and noticed my absence and mentioned it to me. I know for, God, they made an effort to get other people in the video for fear they'd be butthurt if they were left out. But here I am, number three on the org chart with the only two owners above me, butthurt and left out. I was there before the beginning. I've been involved every one of those 10 years and with full-time service for seven of the 10, what in the world should I do? These are the types of things that guys, if any other employee would bring this issue to the table, they'd be swatted back.

They don't take those things well. But if anyone should be able to approach them with this issue and just air it out, I should have enough goodwill stored up to ease the tension. But would that forever change the dynamic of our relationship? I don't know what to do. I'm vital to the operation. I'm starting to feel invisible when things get public. Again, I'm not the type that needs or seeks public attention.

It sounds like you need some attention. But it's also nice to be acknowledged and recognized and get your fair share of attention when the moment arises. Instead, I just get totally left out of everything and it seems to be happening more frequently. I don't think it's intentional. Anyway, what should I do? All right. Okay. Here's the first question I'd ask.

So you got a bunch of stores now. How much stuff do you think you're going to be in? Like the governor showed up, you got blown off. Sounds unfortunate. You weren't in the video. Okay. What's the other stuff you're going to be left out of? Potentially nothing, right?

Like what's the next big reveal? Is it going to be another place where you cut a ribbon or ceremonial shovel in the ground? Are you not going to be in that picture? Remember this. Owners will always think about the fact that they started it. Even if you've been the number three guy from the very beginning, they don't look at you as an equal to them. They don't. And if you started the company

and it was your idea and you were first money in, whoever was after you will forever be after you. And I know some people say, oh, that's not the way I do it. That's not it. Okay, cool. Okay, cool. You're, you know, congrats to you

for thinking about everybody's feelings. But in the real world, all my experiences are like you can do a million things, but if you're not the number one, you know, you're never really going to be seen as an equal to that person, despite how important it is. It seems all the work that you've done for these guys. All right. The other problem with this, well, there's a couple of things. You admitted yourself, you're kind of reserved. So it sounds like these guys

might be taking you for granted a little bit, right? You're the CPA. You're the guy that hangs in the back that you've never been forward facing. So even though you would like just some acknowledgement, which is totally realistic. I don't think that's being petty. I think it's being very honest. And I think it's cool

that you can work yourself through these thoughts. Since you've gotten none, it's probably why you've gotten none. The third part is, and I can speak from experience here, right when I was making my

decision to leave ESPN and it was a Wednesday. So on like a Monday I went in, it was after the show, we threw some numbers around, I was like, you know, I just don't think it's working out. And they were like, we're not going to pay you more. And I was like you know I just don't think it's working out and they were like we're not going to pay you more

and I was like yeah no I get it I was like I think I'm out and then that Wednesday there was like an all hands talent meeting they'd have these once maybe every couple years it wasn't even annually where if you were on TV at ESPN you had to be at this meeting and

everybody files in it It's kind of cool because you're catching up with people that you wouldn't see if you don't see on the road, if you don't cover the same sports. But everybody's in this room together. And Skipper got up there and told us to see Star Wars like 500 times. And then they played a promotional video of all the talent on the air. And there was like a certain level that you had to be at to be in this video. Right. And I was sitting there and the video started and you're like, okay, there's Van Pelt and there's Stephen A and there's Greeny. And, you know, I was like, okay. And then like the next wave of people came through and I was like, all right. I was like,

I wonder if I'm going to be in this. And I was like all right i was like i wonder if i'm gonna be in this and i was like you're not gonna do this you just fucking quit 48 hours ago and then will kane and i were sitting next to each other and will's in it and he nudges me and then there was a couple people where i was like oh okay like yeah i'm not in this and then will looks he's like you weren't in it and i was like i know i know i wasn't in it and every fucking person in that room is keeping track of who's in it and who isn't and most of the people in that room no offense you didn't deserve to be on the video. Okay. I, in my head, I'm going like, if things worked out here better and I hadn't quit 48 hours ago,

like maybe I'm in, I should be in the video. I should be in the video. Especially if that guy's in it. Right. 15. Yeah. There's a couple of people like,

well, if that person's on it, then I should be in it. Right. Come on. Right. Okay. All right.

I'm above that 15 hours a week live. And Will goes, if you hadn't quit, you think you'd be in the video? And I was like, one of the reasons I'm quitting is I knew I wouldn't be in that video. And we start dying lap. You know what would have been a terrible look? Let's say I hadn't quit and still had like, I had a year left on the deal. Imagine if like there was no change in the lineup and that was you know that was why i ended up leaving because the steven a part of it

but if i had gone into the principal's office that next morning was like hey not a big deal but totally don't care it just yeah totally don't care i haven't been thinking about it all night and like was actually going to grab a smoothie even before I came over here. But like, just a little disappointed I wasn't in the video. You know, like, my Golic Junior was in it. And I've been here longer. But not a big deal but not a big deal. Not a big deal.

Not mad. Yeah. Not mad. Not mad, but just, you know, just food for thought maybe for next year's video. Something like that.

Something like that. Like, did you not have footage? I mean, fuck, they had one time where I think it was Snoop Dogg was in studio of Van Pelt and I, and they do like the famous mural of all the pictures. Not only did they, they cropped me out of the picture. Oh, you got cropped.

He was in studio with our radio show, and they cropped me out of the picture. And I saw that by the makeup room, and I was like, you're fucking kidding me. So here's the point. I felt whatever the version of it is for me that I felt, I know what you feel. But you almost lose even worse by saying, how come I wasn't in the video? And no offense, but that was at ESPN where the whole point is to be in videos. And this is a video game store. It's likely they take you for granted it's likely their

personality is such that they don't think you want any of these things the governor thing it sounds like it's just a mistake but again is somebody that can start stacking chips of disrespect for a fucking living which unfortunately is one of my things you know but you only gave us like two unless there's more like are you going to be missing out on all these things in the future

so um i mean you could say something to one of them but they're probably going to talk shit about you when you leave okay do you believe our accountant was mad? Because whatever. And like, look, they introduced the barber to the governor because he's a tenant paying money. And barbers are cool. Kyle loves barbers. Normally barbers are cool.

Thoughts? Yeah, I mean, I don't know if they think of you as like the money nerd in the back or not. They might, right? They might. I don't know what kind of dudes they are, but it also kind of sounds like the guy who didn't join any clubs in high school and wasn't on any teams and then is looking at the collage of pictures in the back of the book and the yearbook.

And it's like, well, where am I? It's like, well, I don't think you really did anything outside of going to class. And, you know, there aren't people taking photos of the classrooms. There's people taking, you know, photos of the fucking chess club and the AV club and the football team. And so like, if you're not doing anything notable, maybe you're not like, you know, notable camera wise, then maybe you're not, you're not going to be in these certain things. And, and like you said, you're like, this stuff is kind of silly when you say it out loud that I'm, you know, that I'm upset about it. You already know it's uncool. And then as soon as you say it, you're going to feel even more uncool. And probably you're not going to like that. You have said it, even though it's a feeling

that you have inside, you know, if you're like, if you zoom out and you get a, not emotion about it, about it, you just, it would sound like what Ryan just said was just like, oh, cool. You weren't in the picture, man. You know? So even though, you know, you feel it in your stomach and maybe you're upset about it. Once you say it, you know what I mean? They're going to, you weren't in the picture, man. So even though you feel it in your stomach and maybe you're upset about it, once you say it, you've now said it. So I would not say it. I mean, what you could do is just be like, hey, man, I've been here for a while. We've been expanding. I just want to kind of get more in the mix. I don't know if we're dinners or something or if there's something. I just feel like I just had sort of an epiphany. I just feel like, you know, I want to be more, more facing or outward facing or whatever. Like you could do something like that. Definitely don't bring up this, you know,

that you're not in the video. And, and I would, I would leave that whole thing alone. Nobody even remembers that shit. I can guarantee. Um, nobody remembers that you didn't get to shake his hand when you were in line. Um, but yeah, you could just be like, you know, I just want to, I've just been like reinventing my, you know, my work life or whatever. It's sort of like when Cerruti became my manager, he was just like, Hey, you know, I noticed that you don't really hang out with a lot of people here. Like maybe you should try to do that. And I, and I have, and I actually did do that. I'm not having showed up in any more photos on the company website or anything, but, uh, I've noticed a difference. I have noticed a difference. So you could just say that I've had a bit of an epiphany or a change in course,

and I just want to get kind of more in the mix, man. You could just say that. Maybe that's enough. Definitely don't bring up that you're feeling slighted, though. I just kind of think, unfortunately... I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Can I follow up on something you said there? No, go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah.

Suri, you pitched to Kyle that maybe he could be a little bit more social with his coworkers? Well, no, this is what happened. You know, I think one of the early... I mean, I think you're cool with me sharing this, Kyle, but one of the early conversations we had was just, you know, like,

there are a lot of people that had left the ringer, right? And a lot of them were Kyle's friends. They didn't add any, you know? Yeah, and he was just you know like there are a lot of people that had left the ringer right and a lot of them were kyle's friends and they didn't add any you know yeah and he was just kind of it's like tommy alter kind of but you're like mark titus tate frazier jim coming in cutting him and it was just sort of like right tate is back uh but you know that was i wasn't counting on that so i was just like yeah i had like five guys and five felt good. And then there was none. He was like, hey, so I noticed you didn't add any guys. What are you thinking? I've reaped some benefits.

I feel like I'm not talking to strangers now at work, but I don't know. Yeah. It is what it is. I remember you were like, yeah, there's some new people here that I think I like. He's like, I like Waz. Waz is a cool dude. I'd hang out with Waz. I'm like, yeah, I don't just talk to him.

I talk to these people. It's fine. I'm not trying to be a guidance counselor here, but sometimes it's hard to make friends. A little bit. I think we got Kyle on the right track. Wait, wait. The dynamic of now Cerruti being Kyle's manager, which I'm not sure the listeners truly understand,

that you were like, maybe you could say hi to some of the people. I don't think it was like that, though, Kyle. You had expressed to me that you felt a little isolated. Oh, you know what it was?

I was like, hey, Kyle, you need to be more of a team player. It wasn't like me trying to be big manager. Was there a party that you felt a little isolated. Oh, you know what it was? I was like, hey, Kyle, you need to be more of a team player. It wasn't like me trying to be big manager. Was there a party that you weren't invited to? No, no, it wasn't that at all. I never went to any of those drinks when they're like, hey, we're all going to this brewery down the street from the fucking office.

And I'd be like, yeah, I'm definitely not going to that. Wow, that was a hard sell. But Frolic is up this way. So if you want to, if you're coming back to Hollywood. But it was just like, you know what it is?

We have these new Spotify's got this pretty in-depth like development thing at the end of the year. And there's like four categories. And by the time you get to the fourth category, it's like, oh God, I'm just really going to say all this stuff again. But the last one is like behavior. And it wasn't like,

and it's not like, oh, have you been behaving yourself? It was just like, how do you act? And I was just like, I was just like, you know, not really. We've hired a bunch of new people in the last couple of years plus COVID. And I don't really think I know anybody. And I think I'm actually all right with that.

He was like, well, maybe you should change that. I love that it's a take home. How are you behaving? Like as if anybody be like, I've been a dick. Yeah. You know, I've taken stock know i've taken stock i've taken stock yeah and i could do better 2024 i will not be a i i love philip seymour hoffman and along came polly when she asked about the career and i know i i some version of it and

he's like everything's going incredibly well they're going incredibly well like i just i just can't imagine kyle the behavior question going like honestly i've been great i've i like i like everything i've done like not wearing shorts in the office anymore you know really tighten it up uh I I love I love now we're not really answering I think we answered it to however we're going to answer it but I'm just telling like you think your startup there's some feelings hurt get 400 fucking egomaniacs in a room keeping track of who's in something and who isn't and again I'm admitting my own guilt with it, but I was able to process it a little differently because I was like,

it's like somebody right before the video started. It was God's plan, you know? Yeah, right. Because right before the video started too, like a pretty high up guy came to me and was like, hey, just so you know, we're all getting seated. He's like, just so you know, like our whole thing is not a bluff.

I was like, yeah, no, no. I was like, I'm not bluffing either. And he was like just so you know like our whole thing is not a bluff i was like yeah no no i was like i'm not bluffing either and he was like okay he's like we're not this is it like we're not coming back to the table we're not gonna have you go like i had second thoughts i go i am aware and i also am not going to be coming back to you and he was like okay okay then they're like all right cut rossillo out of fucking quick call yeah i was never i was never in that video ever i'm not gonna be at the year after that either so um but the people keeping track of like there'd be some people that keep track of like how many pictures of them there were in the hallway to like certain studios and it's very weird yeah but it's also not weird it's very weird

but it's also the most predictable thing ever and it's like i don't know in a weird way so look at it that way at least there's not 400 of you dude uh maybe you could just start kicking ass start kicking ass and then tell them you want to leave and then they go what do you thought you were happy here benefits salary competitive all salary, competitive, all that stuff. You snubbed me when the governor was here for the barber. I was going to say, that sounds kind of like the origin story of a villain. Yeah, and you just drop the mic.

He just spins off his own video game company. You stand up and go, mic drop. Sometimes you got to get in pictures too. I'm never like a take picture guy and my camera roll in my phone is usually like pictures of where I parked my car. So I don't forget or like pictures of a receipt, you know, I'm not like, I'm not taking pictures around. So then, so then when it, when it comes out, you know, when like pictures of a

thing comes out, there's like a picture that I'm in by accident and I'm usually looking fucking ridiculous or like, you know, there's like all those ones of me at Sundance where I'm like, I look hammered or something like that. It's like, cause I didn't, I didn't make the effort to get in other pictures. So people are sometimes only left with none or very little pictures. So, um, you know, when there's, when the cameras are out, if you, if you want to be, if it's important for you to be in photos and maybe you just got to, you know, smush into that group there for, for the, uh, for the picture. This is like not somewhat related, not a perfect fit, but it kind of reminds me of like, speaking of high school.

Uh, so there was like a senior video that like, that, like there was a commission to make a senior video, right. It was supposed to like tell the story of the class and like, you know, incorporate as many people as possible, like best dates, all this stuff. And they showed it at like one, you know, one of the, like the possible, best dates, all this stuff. And they showed it at one of the last, the night thing, one of the banquets that we had or whatever at the end of the year. And the three guys that made it basically just made a video.

It was like they had just gotten a hold of Premiere and they essentially just made a video of them fighting with lightsabers all around the school. And that was the video. And it was honestly awesome. So like nobody that, nothing and nobody that was supposed to be in this video was in it was honestly awesome. So, like, nobody that, nothing and nobody that was supposed to be in this video was in it, because there was just these three dudes

just basically doing a lightsaber battle throughout different parts of the school. So sometimes when, you know, when people get cut out of videos, it's actually kind of awesome. I respected it. It was an entire snub. The whole school was equally snubbed. The whole school got snubbed, and honestly, the teachers were kind of mad. They were like, seriously, this is what happened? I thought it was an entire snub. The whole school was equally. The whole school got snubbed. And honestly, like the teachers were kind of mad. They're like,

seriously, like this is what happened. I thought it was hilarious. To close here. So Rudy, do you have to on your checklist of to do items? Do you have to tell me to be more social? Uh,

has it ever been brought up? I think you're a contractor, but I don't think you're the same. I definitely don't. Cause you're, I mean, you kind of are, you,

you do go out like you like to like when people are in town like you want people to have a good time you want to go out to dinner like i don't think it's like i think you got a boat because you want to hang out with more people right i would assume like you just want to invite people on the boat so i don't i don't actually think it's a huge problem for you sometimes i think i mean i i know this that you just you use sometimes like i think the oh i gotta grind tape as just like an excuse to not hang out. And I know that I respect that, but I do think you actually do like and want to hang out with people.

I love having your group together or guys that, you know, it doesn't have to be like, oh, gee, best friends. But it's kind of funny later in life when you find yourself like aligned with somebody that you just, and you're like, all right, perfect. I love those nights, those things. like i actually do love all that stuff yeah you just like it on your terms yeah right i just the days of hey it's friday those have been over for a long long time all right kyle i have some golf clubs for you you gotta come pick them up or i don't have them up the plan was i I have to bring them up.

The plan was I would always just bring them up to Frolic Room, but that's not happening now that I have guests at my house. But all right, that is it. We'll be back full schedule next week as well. So thank you. Thanks to Saruti. Thanks to Kyle, Ryan, and our solo podcast. We're going to respond. I'm just a little podcast from your spot. you