WHOOP Podcast - Patrick Mahomes discusses his WHOOP strain, visualizing victory, and why he almost didn't play football.

Episode Date: May 19, 2021

NFL MVP Patrick Mahomes sits down for a wide ranging discussion on strain, recovery, and peak performance.  Patrick shares his WHOOP data with Will Ahmed and they examine just what kind of toll the NFL season takes on the human body.  Patrick also shares how his father's baseball career inspired him to become a professional athlete (3:01), why he almost picked other sports over football (5:21), how visualization and mindset play a key role in his success (10:04), the advice Tom Brady gave him (12:39), his WHOOP data (17:23), building strain throughout the season (21:47), overcoming red recoveries (23:11), and his Super Bowl data (24:48). Plus, Will and Patrick hit on a variety of topics and discuss if they're good for football or bad for football (26:50).Support the showFollow WHOOP: www.whoop.com Trial WHOOP for Free Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

What's up, folks? Welcome to the WOOP podcast. I'm your host, Will Amid, founder and CEO of WOOP, where we are on a mission to unlock human performance. We got a hell of a guest today, the face of the NFL. We're going to give to him in half a second. First, I want to remind you, you can get on WOOP. If you use the code Will Ahmed, W-I-L-L-H-M-E-D, 15% off a W-W-M-M membership, that includes hardware, software analytics, and it's designed to help you improve your health.

Measure sleep, measure recovery, measure strain, just like the world's best athletes and just like everyday consumers who are improving their health. Speaking of world-class athletes, we welcome Patrick Mahomes this week to the WOOP podcast. And we cover a lot of ground on his life, everything about his WOOP data over the course of the NFL season, and really how he manages the mental side. of the game. To my knowledge, this is the first long-form podcast that Patrick Holmes has ever done. At least I couldn't find one in doing research on him. So I found it pretty fascinating. He talks about how his father's 11-year career in Major League Baseball inspired him to become an athlete,

but he himself almost won a completely different direction. He was encouraged to quit football in high school. I don't know how many people even knew that to focus on baseball and basketball. And he says he didn't even know who's going to pursue football professionally until a year before he was drafted. And now five years later, he's the face of the NFL and undeniably one of the best players. We go deep on Patrick's whoop data. So Patrick was wearing a whoop strap 24-7 all season. He's being a big whoop guy along with being a whoop investor. And it's been fascinating to look at his whoop data over the course of an NFL season.

We break all of that down and talk about it. it. You can also find it at whoop.com slash the locker. And I really enjoyed the themes we touched on around mindset. You know, Patrick's had enormous success in a short period of time, but he's also had some tough defeats. We talk about visualization, how it's affected his life and how it's made him a great athlete. And we even discuss his business life and what's next in his career. I think it's a fascinating conversation. You can watch the podcast on YouTube. Without How further ado, here is Patrick Mahomes. All right, Patrick, welcome to the Wooop Podcast.

Yeah, man, I appreciate y'all having me. Now, this is exciting. I've been a big fan of your career to date and everything that you've accomplished. It's amazing. Now, I understand your mother requires that people call you Patrick and not Pat. Is that right? Yeah, it's funny. My dad, she says it's Pat, and I'm Patrick.

And she said that since I was a little kid. So if you want to be my mom's a good side, Patrick's the way to go. I think I've always called you Patrick, so I think I'm on the right track. Now, your father, Pat Mahomes, professional baseball player, 11 years in the MLB. What was it like for you growing up having a professional athlete as a father? You know, it was really cool. I mean, I think now when I look back at it, I have more perspective of how cool it was. At the time, I was just going to the baseball field, shagging fly balls in the outfield,

hitting the cages and everything like that, and just enjoying life. But as I look back now and see all those different people that I met and all the different great athletes that I got to see every single day, it gives me a perspective of how to be a great athlete and how to go out there and make myself better every single day. It seems like there's got to be an advantage in growing up around professional athletes, right? Like in some ways it makes being a pro athlete seem a little bit more accessible. Was that the case for you at all? For sure. I mean, I think that's one part of it is I grew up and I've always envisioned that I was going to be a professional athlete.

I thought that was the way I was going to go. And not really having a backup plan. That was how I was going to spend my life. And then at the same time, seeing the great athletes and how hard they work, I think that's where I really learned the most. You see guys Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter hit home runs and make all these plays, but you don't see how they put

three, four hours every single day before a game, just working on the fundamentals. And I think that's what kind of got me to where I'm at, knowing that I have to put in that work if I want to be where I want to be at. I want to be at. Just the consistency and the grind of it, right? And understanding that. Yeah, and I think one thing that always sticks out to me is I remember when I was young, my dad used to make me hit off the T a lot. And whenever I got to like coach pitch and regular kid pitch and stuff like that, I never wanted to hit off the T. Well, then I went to, when he got

on the Rangers, I saw Alex Rodriguez and he's MVP doing all this different stuff. And every single day he's hitting off the T to start off his day, just working on the fundamentals. And that just that really stuck with me forever knowing that you get, no matter how good you, you you always have to work on those base fundamentals if you want to be great and that's you know I've seen that across like every sport that we've worked in just the consistency like that of doing these simple things a lot of golfers too it's really interesting the things they'll do before they even hit a ball it is and uh you don't want to do you don't want to do the little things sometimes you want to just go out there and play and have fun but at the end

of the day those little things are what make you so successful and that's stuff that I work on now every single day now you envisioned becoming a professional athlete at what point did it register that it was going to be football because I understand in high school you almost you almost quit football is that true yeah it was I actually I went on like a little sophomore day or whatever it was at the University of Texas and they had kind of sent me over to play safety and I knew I was going to be a safety or anything like that and so on the ride back home my dad said he's like you should just focus on baseball and basketball because that's the way you're going to go

and I thought about it and I just more than anything I just said I don't want to not be they're playing with all my buddies and when they were in football season. And so I just went out there and tried out a quarterback. And I didn't think I was going to be a professional quarterback until probably after my sophomore year at college. Oh, wow. I actually went in thinking I was going to play football and then I was going to play baseball as well.

And then after three years, I was just going to go play baseball. And then after my sophomore year of college, coach Kingsbury, he came up to me and he was just like, I think if you focus on football for one offseason, that you'll get drafted. And I was like, it sounds good to me, and I focused on it, and the next year I got drafted. It's pretty amazing. I mean, I wonder what happens in your life if you never have that conversation with your coach? You know, it's like it's interesting just the impact that a few moments along the way can have. Yeah, and having people, the right people that can give you that great advice that won't look down upon whatever decision that you do make,

but give you the advice to say, and this is what I think you can take a next step. But this is where I think you can improve and you can really take that in and then go and make your own decision and end up where you're at. So 2017, you get drafted. What did that moment feel like? Also, we're just coming off the NFL draft right now. What did that moment feel like for you? It was awesome. When I entered the draft process, I got like a second or third round grade from the draft advisory board, which is usually pretty accurate.

And so I kind of just told myself these next few months, I'm going to put everything I have. into making my body be in the best shape possible, my conditioning, the way I eat, everything like that, and I worked my tail off, and I was able to get drafted, and the 10th pick overall. And so just to make that climb and to know that all that hard work that I'd put in was paying off, it kind of jumpstarted my career of knowing that that's how I need to work at all times if I want to continue to be successful. Now, were you pissed at nine teams past on you when you didn't think about it? I didn't think about it at all.

I think you look back at stuff like that now and you see stuff like that. But at the time, all I wanted to do was get drafted to a good team and being a good city. And I got lucky enough that the chiefs jumped from 27 to 10. They were already a successful team and they were able to get me. And it was the team that I wanted to go to. And I got drafted at the top 10. And I got to go learn from a great coach. And so the first year you played behind Alex Smith.

He had had great success. You said that it was a good learning experience. for you playing behind him, and then you get your first game at the end of the season. What was that like? What was that moment where you were finally starting an NFL game? I think it was kind of the same as the draft night. I think I learned so much behind Alex where I was just sitting in that room every single day, just taking it as much as possible, preparing like I was going to play,

even though I got to the game and never got to get in the game. But I was preparing and working and do all those different stuff. And then to get that last game and to go out there and have some success, and then be so much better from the preseason to the end of the season and so much more comfortable. It just kind of, the same thing, it told me that all that hard work was paying off. All that stuff that I put in every single day was getting me to where I needed to be at. And I'm thankful for Alex because he was such a good dude and taught me so much

even though he didn't have to. And it helped me be so much better prepared whenever I got in the football game. You strike me as someone who's very focused on the moment. Like you seem like you're a very present person. Is that something you think about, like, you know, really focusing about what you're doing in this moment? Are you conscious of the fact that you're so present? I think I just try not to let any day or moment go to waste. I think that's the biggest thing is I understand that we're not, it's not, you don't get to do some of the stuff that I've been able to do,

and it's not just everybody gets those opportunities. So if I'm going to be in that moment or having that opportunity, I'm going to embrace it and try to get the most out of it. Even when I'm training or doing stuff like that, I know that I need to get. get this training in and be in this moment because it's going to help me further on down the line and know why I'm doing it and not just here doing it for no reason so it's been it's been cool to be able to enjoy and be in two Super Bowls now win one lose one and just get to see both sides of it now and then hopefully be able to find a way to work my way back and find a way to get to another one how much of your success as a player have you almost

envisioned before it happens you listen to many great athletes talk about visualizing success visualizing holding the trophy, visualizing winning certain awards. Is that part of the way you trained on the mental side? I do for sure. That's big for me. It always has been, even night before games, just sitting and thinking about plays in the game, thinking about stuff that can happen in situations. And then if you watch me before a game, like early,

like three or four hours before the game, I'm just walking the field and just watching and like visualizing the play happening and throwing the ball to Kelsey or Tyreek and then making the plays happen. And then, like you said, visualizing the success, visualizing going out there and winning the championships and winning the Super Bowl and being able to embrace those moments when I'm in them because I've already seen it happen before.

So when you visualize it, are you almost picturing it through your own eyes? Are you seeing yourself in the third person? I actually, I picture it through my own eyes. So it's almost like I'm there and I'm holding the trophy and I'm looking around and seeing all the different people, my loved ones, my friends, my family. and just being there with them in that moment. And then, like I said, then whenever it does happen,

you can really just enjoy it, and you've already seen it happen before, and you're not shocked, you're in the moment. I think about it a lot from a business sense and, you know, picturing the next stage of a business or the next stage of growth. And the way I think about it personally is you're trying to remember your future.

You know, like we just, you know, we did a shoot, and I can remember that perfectly. Can you think about your future with the same clarity? And you strike me as someone who's able to do that, where you can really picture that moment that's about to happen. Yeah, and I think it's been since I was little, too. I mean, I've always envisioned, not necessarily being a football player, but being a professional athlete, having a family, being able to kind of bring my family with me, and then be able to enjoy all these things together. It's happened so far, and I'm going to try to continue to get better and better and try to continue to have success.

So not only helps out me, but it helps out my family as well. Now you have this MVP season in 2018, and you lose the AFC championship game to Brady and the Patriots. Brady talks to you after the game. What was that moment like? What did you guys talk about? Yeah, it's kind of, it's funny. It's the same thing. I mean, you go through the season, and you put in that work, and you go and you win a lot of football games.

No one expects you to be in that situation, and you end up barely losing an AFC championship game to the team that ends up winning the Super Bowl. And for Tom to come and kind of just, it wasn't like he said a lot, a lot to me. He just kind of said, and I appreciate how hard you work. I can tell what type of guy that you are, but how you act and how you handle yourself out there on the field. And I can tell your teammates like you. And he just said, just continue to do that. He goes, continue to do that, and you'll continue to have success. And I think coming from a guy like that who's won seven championships now

and had success everywhere he's been at, and people that play with him always, love them it just shows that you're doing stuff the right way and I mean to have that kind of validation it just continues the work and it continues making you every single day go in and and put in that work because you know that that's what it takes to be at the level that he's at it must have been a validating moment for you even though you were defeated this recognition that someone you know who maybe you're aspiring to track down from a record standpoint you know appreciates what you're doing things highly of you yeah a hundred percent

and he's a guy who's done the right way and he's he's warm a lot a lot every single year and like you said it's that's someone that I'm trying to to get to as my career goes on I'm looking at all the records and things that he has said and I'm trying to get to that point and so it's a it's definitely validating obviously not the time when you lose the football game but when you go to that all season knowing that you've got to if you continue to do this can you put in that work that you can have a chance to get to that level at some point now going into the next season which obviously was an incredible success you guys won the Super Bowl

Were there specific things that you changed about your routine, about your mental preparation going into those playoffs? Yeah, I think I do that every year. I try to find me and Bobby Strupp, my trainer. We try to find different things that I could get better at. For me, the first thing was nutrition coming from college where you're kind of just eating, I mean, I love Chipotle, but eating, like, Chipotle every day, and then, like, trying to find different ways to stay healthy as you possibly can. Now I have a chef and all this different type of stuff. We try to find ways eat healthier and more of my meals.

We try to find ways to train my body to be in certain situations where I can make throws from different arm angles in different places. And then mentally, on the mental side of the game, I try to make sure that I was better there. And I think that was the biggest step that I took is I had that full year of kind of just having that inbox, those files of different coverages and defenses that I had seen.

And then going back to that next year where we went and won the Super Bowl, I could kind of pull from that and see, oh, I've seen this look before, and this is what I need to do and do it to combat it. And that was something that I think helped us out a ton as we've made that run in the Super Bowl. Yeah, it's interesting for you. So much of it must be pattern recognition, right, of just seeing the same play, seeing the same players, and recognize them under these super intense moments.

And I imagine if you can visualize those two beforehand, it's almost like you're getting more and more reps without even having to do them. Yeah, exactly. And I think the good thing and the bad thing about being, so successful as offense as we were as we saw a ton of different defenses. A lot of teams threw a lot of different looks at us, a lot of different adjustments. And I think at first it was challenging because you're trying to figure out the ways. But now I've seen so much stuff now that I can pull from that.

And there's been points of game this last year where I've said I've never seen this defense in my first year. And I've already visualized and seen it. And this is what I need to do to have success where I didn't have success that first year with it. That's amazing. So now how long have you been on WOO? I've been on whoop now for probably a year and a half, I think, somewhere in that range. It started off with Bobby, Bobbi's my trainer.

My trainer, he got me on whoop because he was tracking my sleep, my recovery, making sure I'm not going out and not sleeping all night. And so then as of this last year through this last offseason to this off season, I've really focused in on trying to make my recovery score better, figuring out what makes me sleep better, what makes me recover better. and then just tracking my strains and how I can kind of combat that with what I'm eating and stuff like that. What are certain things that you've found help from a bedtime routine standpoint? The first one, I mean, obviously the simplest one is getting more sleep.

I mean, I have more time in bed sleeping. And then we've done different things of taking different magnesium pills and different stuff like that to help me get better deep sleep, better rim sleep. and then until the baby I was trying to cut down my disturbances as much as possible so I was I was trying to find ways that I wasn't waking up more at night making the room a little colder so I can kind of sleep through through stuff like that and then eating earlier and eating a little healthier it usually helps out a little bit so you shared your your whoop data with us with this for this which is totally fascinating so I'll give you some some quick hits so your your average Rem sleep 121 a night and slow-wave sleep 144, that's actually really good, especially for NFL players.

We see normally lower levels than that, so that means you're getting high-quality sleep every night. In general, Mondays were your lowest recovery day. Yeah. So you were averaging like about 45% recovery on Mondays, which makes sense because you're coming off the game on Sunday. Yeah, for sure. I mean, coming off the game on Sunday and then your body just kind of trying to recap, calibrate and get yourself back. From a strain standpoint, your strain was steadily increasing over the course of the season.

So as you started to get into November and December and January, like your average strain was steadily increasing. And it's pretty interesting, this probably won't surprise you, but the more passing attempts that you had, the higher your strain would be. It makes sense, and it makes sense later in the season. Obviously the intensity of the season picks up later in the season. and then like you said the path which I guess you can be running too

but the more passing tempo obviously you're more focused you're trying to make something happen and I scramble something so that probably helps out in the strain a little bit for sure and by the way your strains on game days are high so these are we're talking like over 20 strains so for people listening to don't know what 20 strain is strains out of 21 it's exponentially hard to go up it

and a lot of people who will do like their first marathon for example get around a 20 strain yeah so the fact that you're getting like a 20.5, you had a 20.7 in the Super Bowl. These are really high strains that are hard to recover from. What do you do like right after a game to start that recovery process? So right out to the game, the biggest thing is I usually get a pretty decent, good-sized meal, like right after the game. Even though my adrenaline's pumping, I try to make sure I eat and do stuff like that. I hang out with my family and just kind of just try to relax and try to get to sleep as much

as possible. The only thing good about Mondays is I sleep, I get to sleep in a little bit later. Yeah. We're usually during the season. I'm waking up from 5 to 5.30. Which is early. Yeah, I get to wake up more like 9 or 8 or 9. I usually can't sleep past 8, but 8 or 9. And so that helps out a little bit. And then the next, not even the next day, I try to get in and just move around a little bit and just kind of get my body to kind of flush all that, all that bad stuff out of it. And that's why I can kind of build myself back up as the week goes on. So your average non-game day strain is 13.9. So that's like a hard workout pretty much for people who are listening to this. And then your average game day strain is 19.3.

But as you got into the playoffs, it was consistently over 20. So that's like really, really high strain. One thing that's interesting is looking at your heart rate during games. You have your heart rate jack during the quarters. So like first half, second half. But you actually do a very good job having your heart rate drop during halftime. What are you doing during halftime? I think I'm pretty good at just kind of relaxing and just I'm getting so much info. We'll look at the tablets and look at looks that we got during the first half

versus what we think we're getting the second half. I'll listen to what the coaches say. But I think the biggest thing is I'm just relaxed. You're trying to be mindful. I just get back, kind of rest, take in everything that they're telling me, and then kind of rebuild myself back up going into that second half. And I think I even do that pretty good on the sideline. If you ever look at me on the sideline, I'm pretty just calm, just sitting there,

obviously taking all the info in that we're getting from the coaches. But at the same time, knowing that I'm going to have to go back out there and the intensity we'll have to pick up. Yeah, you've got a great calm way about you on the sidelines, actually. I've noticed that. And I bet it rubs off on your teammates, too, because when they see you go down two touchdowns or go down a touchdown, and then the leader's just super calm and then can turn on that fire.

I think that's terrific. Yeah, I think it's that mindset of just all you can control is that next play. Like no matter what happened if it was a good play the last play or a bad player, what the score is, all you can control is that next play that you're having. And I've always had that mindset of no matter what happened, just focus on that next play. So this is an interesting graph. So this is your strain as it builds over the course of the season. So you can see like September and October, it's lower.

and then all of a sudden, you're like over the course of the season, I mean, those are big peaks. And these are your two bye weeks. The two by weeks have these huge drops in strade. That is hilarious, the by weeks. I mean, it does make so much sense. I mean, obviously, every game is important, but September and October, you're trying to fill in it out,

you're filling out what you are as a team. And then as you get to November and December and obviously January or February, your intensity picks up because you're trying to win these football games. The other one that I found pretty interesting, is you had a 91% recovery when you torched the poor jets, 35 to 9. 91% recovery. You went 31 for 42, 416 yards, 5 TDs, which is the season high. 144 pass rating.

Now, when you wake up in the morning, will you look at the recovery the day of the game and think about it a little bit? I do, and then Bobby texts me every single day before and tells me how about recovery score. But I do, it's like the first thing I wake up, try to wait for it to kind of get the info in, process the info in, and I try to get the look at it, because I want to know how I'm feeling, how my body's feeling, where I'm at, and usually

if I'm feeling pretty relaxed, it's usually a pretty good score. Now, if you see, like, so there you had a 91% recovery. You also, you had at one point this season a 16% recover, 18% recovery against the Bills in the AFC championship game. That means I wasn't sleeping well at night. I was definitely thinking about everything and too much visualizing before the before and too much adrenaline pumping. So when you see that in the morning, what do you do so that that doesn't bother you? How do you think about it in the context of winning?

Yeah, well, the good thing about that one is it was a later game. So I could kind of, I went and got breakfast, and then I went back and just kind of laid there for a little bit and just kind of let my body relax. Usually when they're earlier games, you want to have a good recovery score for sure. But if you have a later game, you can kind of get back down, lay down, kind of let your body relax, let your mind relax, and kind of get it off the football game just a little bit and kind of focus in on just kind of getting your body in the best possible place.

I love that. I mean, I've heard some folks say, like, oh, I'm not sure if I want to look at it because it might affect my psyche, but I think the more advanced way to think about it is I'll know the information, and it's not going to change my mindset for winning, but I'm going to use that information to treat my body appropriately leading up to the game.

Yeah, you have to. I mean, your body, I mean, you can do so much with your mind, obviously, but your body, at the end of the day, if it's in prime shape, you can go out there and be the best you can possibly be at, at whatever you're doing. So I always check mine and just try to make sure I know where I'm at physically and then mentally where I need to prepare myself, if I need to do stuff a little bit extra on the mental side or I'm able to let my body kind of do what it needs to do physically. So 56% recovery for the Super Bowl, that's pretty solid. I mean, maybe you'd want to have been green, but I doubt that affected your performance? No, it was, obviously, I wish I played a little bit better this Super Bowl. But, no, it was, I was ready to go for sure. I mean, I was ready to play.

I think being in it the year before prepared me a little bit more. That first year, you get out there and you're just everywhere because there's so much going on. but having that experience definitely prepared me to be in that game and I can tell about the recovery score I guess Yeah, now you've gotten really involved in the business world. It seems like in the last 12, 18 months You're an investor in whoop. You've invested in other businesses How's that side of things for you and sort of growing into being a successful businessman? Yeah, I think the biggest thing I've always done is I have done and I will continue to do is just I kind of invest in things that I'm passionate

about and things that I think help me every single day. So like you said, whoop, I check my whoop every single day. I check my whoop scores. I look at the recovery. I look at the strain. I look at all the different analytics that it has to help prepare my body to be in the best possible shape. There's other ones like hyperice and there's ones like biostil and there's all the

different stuff that I use and that I love using. I invest in that because I know that I care about and I believe in it. And that's something that I'll continue to do because I don't want to put my time more than my money, my time into something that I don't really care about. I don't want to be stuff that I care about and that I believe in. Yeah, I respect that. In a way, it seems like the smartest investment strategy for you, too, because if you use the products and you like them,

then there's an authentic sort of story behind it. Yeah, exactly. And then I'm not, when I'm telling people about it, it's not like I'm just making stuff up. It's from an authentic place. It's literally exactly what I do every single day, and it's what I use. And it's the stuff that I drink or whatever it is.

Now, let's play a quick game. This is the rapid fire. We're going to play good for football, bad for football, okay? So I'll say something, and then you tell me whether you think it's good for football or bad for football. All right. So we'll start with a softball. What do you think of a 43-year-old winning the Super Bowl? It's good for football.

It's good for me. It's a good sign, right? You can play for a long time. I've played a long time. Yeah, no, for sure. All right, what do you think of the difficulty of onside kicks? It's good for football. I believe that, like, if you're at an onside kick, you better,

it's a low chance that you can get it because you're in a desperate situation. So you feel like you shouldn't be able to come back that easily? No, I mean, obviously, if I was on the other side of the equation, I might like it. But I feel like if you put yourself in that situation, you shouldn't have a higher chance of coming back. All right, here's a fun one. Penalties for excessive celebration. I think it's bad for football.

I think the fans want to see people celebrate and people. I understand if they're really taunting someone, but if you're celebrating with your teammates and doing all the different type of stuff like that, I think it's fine. I think so too. Some of the more memorable moments in football have been in these crazy celebrations.

You look back at all the time, like T.O. with the Pop-Worn and like Joe Horn with the cell phone, like that stuff's iconic and that stuff that people love to see. Okay, what do you think of the playoff seedings? so right now you can have teams that have lower records oh yeah i know you're saying um another way to think about it is you just take you take the top of the teams or whatever

i think it's good for football because if you like well at least for us yeah the first thing we talk about is win the afc west that's the first thing it's not about win the afc west win the afc win the super bowl and so uh i i mean i think it's good for football what do you think of 17 games season uh it's going to be tough on that recovery it's going to definitely be, I'll just say it's going to be a definitely a change. It's a lot of games on a body. I mean, you got to think about all the guys that already get injured the late part of the season. I think it's going to be bad for the players, but it might be, it'll be good for the money. So, I mean, wherever you rank that. Okay, how about coaches' challenges? It's good for

football. You think so? Yeah, there's just some calls. I mean, everyone's human. How do you know when a split second if it's in or out of bounds. So my perspective coming from a technology point of view is that at this point there should be like an artificial intelligence layer of software just sitting on top of instant replay that could get every play right. I've always I've always thought about the old I feel like the chip in the ball is that it's got to happen at some point where you like if you cross a line it just tells you touchdown. Totally and so part of me thinks that the coaching coaches challenges and things like that are less about getting it right and more about the drama of like, oh, should they challenge or not challenge, oh, we've got to go to

a commercial break. But it also is like the whole human error thing. It's kind of like baseball balls and strikes. Like it's just part of the game. Like if you, if you, like the biggest thing to me is when they get in the pile and like by the go line, there's literally no way you can tell if he's in the end zone or not. And like you said, it's just whatever they call it. Yeah, totally chipping the ball and more I think is to replay software.

But I'm sure it'll happen soon enough. I think the sports in pretty good hands with you with you at the helm, Patrick. This has been a real pleasure, man. I appreciate you, man. Always, man. Yeah, for sure. All right, thanks for coming on. Thanks to Patrick for coming on the Whoop podcast.

We're wishing him lots of green recoveries this upcoming NFL season. Reminder, you can use the code Will Ahmed, W-I-L-L-A-H-M-E-D to get 15% off a W-W-M-M membership. You can follow us at W-W-O-W-A-M-M-N on social media. Stay healthy, folks. the green.