Deshaun Vs. Cleveland, and a Mega-Mailbag With Joe House. Plus, UCLA’s Bob Chesney.

rewatchable coming for you on Monday. We did a poll of 13. A movie that somehow we had not

“done yet, even though we've done almost 450 movies. So that is coming for you on Monday.”

It's an action packed week for me on the Ringer. I'm on Sean Finices, Big Picture Podcast,

doing a movie draft. I am on Way to Second With Jason. It's up to you on this week. On Tuesday,

the fantasy football guys Craig Danny and Dan here could be on this podcast. We're in the or annual my guy fantasy draft. Then Thursday, we have me and south doing NFC over and there's part one. We'll be Thursday live on Netflix. And then Friday live on Netflix. We are doing the second annual Ringer fantasy football draft. Football is here. This will be my last non NFL podcast for a while. Joe House coming out first to do a mailbag. Bob Chesney, new coach of UCLA

for football coming on. We actually went to UCLA. We filmed like a 45-minute eye interview with

“my goal was to get you to like UCLA. And at least like, even if you don't care,”

like kind of secretly hoping when because he has a tall task ahead of him. But I have a lot of belief

he's going to pull it off. So that's the pot. We're into it. Take a break. Pearl Jam and then Joe House mailbag time. This episode is brought to you by PNC Bank. Today sports everyone is constantly trying to outdo each other. Trick formations in field shifts, constant rotation changes. And yet it's proven time and time again. That strong fundamentals are the thing that will lead you to victory in banking is no different. While everyone tries to outdo each other, PNC bank just keeps

going right down the middle with steady, calculated money moves. And the financial wins, they just keep coming. PNC bank brilliantly boring since 1865, brilliantly boring since 1865

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member FDSC. podcast. It is mid-afternoon Pacific time. I just watched the Red Sox sweep the giants. Fennway Park was alive house. Boston was alive. Really the scots in the J.L. Brown trade turned around the Red Sox season and Boston. Fennwise packed. Everybody's happy. The game last night. My dad went. He stayed the whole game with Michael Chuck. They came back. They won in the ninth.

And it's just when you have a good baseball team. Really energizes the city. It's unbelievable. Yeah. I'd like to invite the Red Sox to eat a fat dick because I bet consecutive games against the athletics. What was that two weeks ago? Yeah. Yeah. There's the worst team in baseball. But he was hoping we were doing a couple of bad games. Yeah. Let us are trying to lose. But I will say the 12th one to win the World Series and whatever we have them at to win the

pennant for the Red Sox. I'm a rational economic actor, even though it's just tasteable. I can't figure out the season anymore. They had a guy that won the game last night.

Who came from Potech with a five-year A. I'd never heard of them.

That's possible. The Red Sox diligently. And I'm in an AL keeper league. And I was like, I don't know who this guy is old. Anyone in the game? We have, we have so-guard. We have Mickey Gasper, who's down. His nickname is Mickey Gas, came in. Just started hitting bombs for like eight to eight. See, might be going down this week. Roman Anthony comes back. It's just, it's so funny when you have these baseball seasons when random, no name guys got hot. You just don't understand what's happening

as it's happening. And then all of the sudden you have a chance in the playoffs. Anyway. Enough about the Red Sox. Hard to charm. Yeah. Well, we're going to miss a whole season of it next year. I know. It's like two seasons. We're going to mail back. You say like Coach Bob Chesney is coming up later. This is ostensibly a holy cross. Yeah. Let's go. Why not? And then you're coming out here. You're going to be in the Craig Brewatchable's producer chair for me in house. I've asked for me

south doing AFC overunders and honor. And it's going to be live on Netflix on Thursday. And then

questions, I got a great one from Brett from DC because was talking with somebody about yeah, DC guy was talking to somebody about what are they going to call if the NFL does any tanking for arch manning and the other QBs. What would that be called? And Brett from DC says it should be called arch badness. That's very good. Very good. Because usually we have like the yeah, there's some sort of that one's like a little level beyond the level. I don't know. I like arch badness. I listen to

you in pulsaros. Yeah. You have a part of my own. You know, rev up for this NFL season. And I was like arch for arch. I was doing it. I was working on it. I was spitball. But arch badness is phenomenal.

Arch badness is the leader right now. Okay. Questions. As always, people sent these to BS podcast 33.

I sent you a couple of these because there was a couple like mild prevalence. They didn't send you this one. Came from a lifelong Browns fan named Ryan and Cleveland. He said, uh, I need to know as a fan base ever hated one of its own players as much as Cleveland hates to Sean Watson. He listed some facts, which I bull appointed. He's made roughly 12 million for every game he's played as a Brown, which is 19. Uh, he's made 12 million per touchdown pass also 19. Uh,

he followed Baker Mayfield, shoved them out of the way. Who's the most beloved Browns could be of my lifetime. He says I'm 37. Me the worst trade in recent history to get him gave him the worst contract in NFL history helped the way it's the back end of Nick Cheb's prime. Burned through most the Biles Garrett's prime before we're inter trading them. Uh, meanwhile Watson is several more than 20 civil lawsuits while showing essentially zero public remorse of accountability on top of all

this. He sucks at football. Uh, he, he, he tore his Achilles last year or retore it because apparently even as Achilles had had enough of him playing football. And now he gets booted home preseason games. And yesterday I said it was disrespectful and personal. And he says no shit, Sherlock. Have you ever been in a situation with a hometown athlete where the entire city turned

“on them like this? Because I honestly, we, Boston's had a few where there's been like we really”

turned on Tony Eason. Um, we really turned on Jack Clark who wasn't there that long. Like there's been blips like this. But I can't remember anything like this where it's like completely ruined his ability to play football. Yeah, it would have to be somebody from the redskins and it would have to be redskins/commanders. It would have to be during the Daniel Snyder era for it to

rival anything at the, at this level that the Sean has achieved. I mean, really incredible.

Um, well, like everyone turned Ryan's right. That's the, that's the tackle. Like he's just going back to past and just throwing the ball into the ground to why don't you see her. Yeah, and you can't really boo him individually. Yeah. And really what you're all of the dissatisfaction around him is he just got that check. It was like, thank you. I'm good. And that was, that was really the, you know, hallmark of the Snyder era. A lot of checks given out to guys pass their prime.

Yeah, because there's been a few of these over the years. Like Anthony Rendon when he went to the angels and basically just cash checks for them, decided he didn't like playing baseball anymore. It had some injuries. You lost him and Strasburg from that nuts thing, right? And just paid like a combine half a billion dollars for those two guys that everything in the again. I don't know

“anybody gives those giant baseball contracts at this point with the, well, that's how bad some of them are.”

That's the Boris Scott Boris. Yeah, because, you know, his, his, his magic twos all over the place.

But that was the angels. This is the brand. So I have a one in 64 who have always needed a quarter

back save for that one Baker thing. It falls apart a little when they're like, we got rid of Baker and get him because then Baker bounced around the league for like two years. So I'm a, and Baker was really bad that last Browns year. The more interesting piece to me about this is what he did. Like Todd Bonkins said he was going to announce the starter for week one tomorrow. We're taping this on a Sunday, so on Monday. I can't, sugar was was really good yesterday. Again,

again, somebody's backups and Watson was really awful and got booed the whole time and his body leg of just awful. I can't imagine sugar is not going to be the starting, right? So then what he do with Watson? Do you just make it in the 30 because there's all these cap ramifications. You can't wave on. It's actually worse for them. So what do you do? It's like a staring contest trying to get him to like retire or quit, right? Well, this is the position they were in. You know, the trial

“run here for the preseason was, is there any possibility of salvaging anything on a football field?”

That's it. Yeah. He's doing that. He's in this preseason practices. He's playing these preseason games. Is there any shred of salvageable productive football left? Because they're already are prepared

And it's like if you can give us anything, then it's worth it. By the way, the answer to a place turning that we must include in this is Ben Simmons. Ben Simmons is a sixer. Yeah, Ben Simmons on the sixers. Absolutely. It needs to be included in this conversation. I want to do something to be a guy. That was a little like the Watson thing where it felt like there was some psychological stuff happening as well. Like a pressure or severe confidence loss that

yes, people could, could sense. Yeah, I don't know what they do because I actually think the Browns have some talent. And, you know, they're done. I don't think there are 10 or 11 win teams, but they could be friskier than they were last year. They won 5 games last year. You know, the hard thing to assess with them. And this was the challenge of their

win total when we were sitting and going through it is if they aren't very good as the third

part of the latter, you know, final success game for the Browns. Yes. Because, well, like, oh, should do our, you know, he might be just a career backup guy. Now it's time to just turn it off. And, and, you know, well, I was ready for the college quarterback. I would urge the Browns to go Browns fans to go have basketball here. You have won a title since 64, but you can now claim making the worst NFL trade of all time. People think, are you a walker? No, people think

the cults trading the rights to John L.A. for Mark Hinton and Chris Birmingham and a number of picked now. Like, you have it. This was the worst one ever. So you won. It was such a bad contract by that ownership group that the NFL, the remaining owners openly colluded. Like, there, there was discovery. There was an arbitration about this, you know, a couple of years ago, where the union and the

league ended up settling the arbitration. But like, the record says, we are never going to do a

god damn to Shawn Watson contract again. How are we going to avoid this? Think the plan. The owners are talking to each other. Right. You know, openly, you know, working together to never do that. That, that, that, that, that, that's a shame. That's a shame. That's a shame. Yeah, they changed the league.

“I think they've, they've said a good example for what not to do. People will point to this.”

I think, I think from a Jimmy Haslam standpoint, it can't get worse. Like, this was it. This was rock bottom is all, all-time legacy. And then the really fun part is if Shader is even, I mean, we were talking about with Pellissera, I was talking about how just C plus strad, please. We didn't have a nickname, you see, plus strad. Just be a C plus. Shader can be a C minus. And it would feel like the biggest win of all time, right? Absolutely. For a fifth rounder.

And, you know, the thing that remains with Shader is he is so good in farmland microphone. You know, there's a year yesterday. Yeah. Your boy, your boy Warren Sharp, who's,

not afraid to have some hyperbole and Twitter, was basically making it seem like this was the greatest

sidelight in the history of mankind. So I watched a few minutes. It was fine. He's good. But he's, he's very good with the, with the press. Should do it. So, if you can be any good, who are there,

“who's their first three games against? They have, I think they have, uh, and I get it through.”

God forbid, I was more prepared for the mailback. Well, it's just a different document. Okay. I'm going past Pittsburgh. There's, there's, yeah, there's Cleveland. At Jaguar's at books, home panther's home steward's at jets is the first five. So if I'm should door, like, none of those defenses are scary. Say it for a few stewarders do the thing where their defense looks pretty good in the first month of the season. But, you know, maybe they don't, they then they go

ravens at tightens at stewarders at saints. They don't really play a scary defense to the Texans at home in week 10. So, a lot of time for our own shudder to get his legs. I thought he looked terrible last year, just for the record. Didn't think he really showed anything, but they were starting in bad situation. They have a lot of weapons house. They, they look like they nailed both rookie receivers in the second round. Fainants coming back. I really like Juggkins last year.

Like it's not solid. They're offensive line isn't as good as it was the last couple years, but maybe it'll be okay, but who knows? They, they won that trade, the Biles Garrett trade. I mean,

“when you consider all the permutations of it, I think that they, it's not that the Rams lost it,”

but, you know, they, they did very good in terms of the asset gathering there. So, some silver linings for the Browns, like this is almost over. The team building is very good. Like a electric record is great. Yeah. Yeah. I thought Travis Hunter trade was great. Both of you and I both really like the Biles Garrett trade. So, things are looking up. Maybe that to shine Watson trade is rock bottom. Yeah. My guess is Sanders gets named in the starter tomorrow.

a draft pick would you give up for Tyson Bajit? Oh, wow. Would you have a third form? Is he the third

quarterback now? I don't think he said again for the bears. He is second. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I think I can get up a third friend. I don't think anybody's given up anything. You know,

“every, every team we, we see this every single year, you have to have a super confident”

backup if you're hoping to contend. So, the bears are going to be somebody. Yeah. That's a Bennett action. Yeah. That kind of thing. All right. Next. Now back question from Justin from Westport Connecticut. He's been listening and reading for 20 years. Thank you, Justin. First time writing. Really, there's an important one. Like you. Question. Why couldn't an East contender trade for Browning for the sole purpose of guarding LeBron during key moments in a playoff series,

no way he's looking to embarrass the sun, right? This is really good. That's really good. It's really good. I would have a lot of trouble embarrassing my son in front of a crowd of 20,000 people and then naturally tell by his game and I know you would, too. You know, a team, he would be

“awesome is Cleveland. Right. And I have to tell you, I think they're they're Peyton Watson acquisition”

that that's changed my entire estimation of a Cleveland Cavaliers coming into the season. He's in the who they've been missing for for a couple of years now. Now, maybe I'm a little high on the supply with with Peyton Watson, but I just to give myself a tiny pat on the back. Try to make a compelling case on our worst contract draft with Was in March of 2026 that they paid the wrong dude, that they overpaid for kids around. It wasn't sustainable. They needed the money for Peyton

Watson and they fucked that up. I think Peyton Watson is going to come to the east and really be effective in Cleveland. I know the hard and thing. We're going to talk about James Harden today. He's coming up. Oh, basically, tension is they made a huge mistake with the DeAndre Hunter contract the year and half ago. They were able to sort of get out of that with the shooter trade. Which then they dumped him on Charlotte and got forget the wing they got back. Who's the wing

they got back? Tray man. No, Washington got treatment. Maybe they didn't get anything. Anyway, they're able to dump shooter and then they're able to dump Struus on the Quippers. By the way, Max Struus come on the ringer podcast network. We can do a pod for the season. Okay. Yeah. I've enjoyed his pod appearances. Um, they somehow turned shooter. I guess Hunter into shooter and then Struus

was an expiring into Peyton Watson. Which is pretty good. I like the problem is they then gave James

Harden three years then. $7 million. That's going to be fun. We're not doing that. Do we sit down or do Tray Young James Harden? Those those contracts are going to be fun to discuss. He's made over $500 million now. He screwed up. There was some contract extension he turned down. I think it was at Brooklyn or Philly where he could add this giant max and he's kind of been chasing the

“money ever since, but I think he caught up to the money. He passed this. Who am I to judge?”

$500 million. You can't possibly help to make the finals if he's on your team. People keep giving him money. It's amazing. All right. So, Dysla Brown thing. So, if you're Cleveland, you would go, you trade like a minimum for Brownie. Bring him back. Brownie's on the team. And now he's just kind of lurking as, as almost like a kryptonite situation for LeBron. Put him on there. And LeBron just has to naturally. That's your parent. You naturally have to ease up. Your,

your instinct is always to protect your kids at all times. I think it's a great idea.

Well, let me ask you though. Let's just ponder that for another 10 seconds. Yeah. There are times when I'm playing with my 16 year old where I just want to bust his ass. I want to, I want to, I want to, I want to eat that some people watching that. Yeah, fair enough. Okay. That's right. Yeah, his career. Like, I mean, whatever it's, I guess it's a joke to talk about his career because he could do whatever he wants after he stopped playing professional basketball. He'll do, he'll be good at golf

and he'll be in whatever entertainment realm he wants to be in. They should tell him, let your dad score once and then seem really upset. Like, you're going to break down and then your dad won't be at the custody of the game. This is great. Use the podcast. Something against him. Be kidding. We're upset with it. Okay. Next one. From Paul from Chicago, he says in parentheses, former home

I don't think so, man. How can that happen? What's the one in the country where the Indian

of bears is that they know that happens? The chiefs are really leaving arrowhead, right? They're really leaving the chiefs. I know, but here, the difference with them is nobody can tell the nobody knows can City, Missouri, Kansas, nobody can keep on the states apart. I don't know where they're in now. Very fair. Okay, cities. Okay. Paul says if Fernando Mendoza has an underwhelming NFL career, will there be a Mendoza line named after him for profile? Like, if he hovers around

“six yards per attempt, will we be calling six yards per attempt, the Mendoza line? I think he'll probably”

be better than this, but let's play it out. So I had to go back and deep into my archives. 2009, mailback, DNF in Maryland and Maryland asked, you know how baseball has the Mendoza line? What if we had a friend of foul? I'm partially using Bobby Brister's career, QB rating of 72.3 is the NFL mark at all the thing. So I had a counter. Nobody went, this is just for QB rating. Nobody was lower than 53.9 this decades. That was the 2000s. The ideal mega-suck rating seems to

be right around 63. And I listed guys who did it for a single season who dip below 63. Kellen Clemens, Andrew Walter, Kyle Orton, AJ Feely, Kyle Bullard, Cordell Stewart, David Caron, Joey Harrington, not great. That's a list. So I offer Jack Trudeau as the person. He played

for nine years, lost his first love and starts 42 TDs, 69 picks, 103 sacks, never played in a

“playoff game, 63.3 lifetime. And I said it was the Trudeau line. I have a vague memory of him getting”

upset about this because he was on a radio show and pick a chatsome, whatever. So I liked the Trudeau line. I'd like to keep it. Could we do something with QBR for the Mendoza line? I looked at QBR. What if 50 was the Mendoza line? Think of Mendoza as a better than a 50 QBR. Jalen Hart's was 50.3 last year. Okay. Tyler Schott, Bryce Young, Cousins, Rogers, Rawl, in the 40s. I have a confession. Two of JJ Genome cameras under 40 could that be the Mendoza line, much of a confession.

It's still August. And I have no fucking idea what QBR is measuring as we sit here for. August to death 26. I don't either. I think it would be more reliable. I'll keep it around and go. It will be ready. Football is right around the corner. We are going to be ready for all of it. But like a 50, I don't know what the fuck that means. I don't know either. I think we've got her to the research. Here, I had the answer to it for the Mendoza line. I think Mendoza himself is the

Mendoza line. And each year we just compare other quarterbacks to him, whether they're up and down. So even if Mendoza's like the six quarterback in the league, we'll be like, oh, Josh Allen's above

“the Mendoza line. And he's just a floating line. For the entirety of his career. That's what I'm saying.”

Give him a guess. Yes. Is he better? Is he over the Mendoza line? Because that if Mendoza's bad, that will give us a sense of like, oh, he's at least doing better than Mendoza. And Mendoza is really good. Same thing. Oh, this is great. This is this will help solve a bunch of the challenges. Is this a top 10 quarterback? Is he a top five quarterback? Is he a top 15 quarterback? Well, we have Mendoza. Where is he? Where is he in relation to Mendoza?

He, his interviews are really incredible. I have such high hopes. Like when they get better and there, I'm more nationally TV get then nationally tell that's games. It's going to be tremendous. Love him. So you like the floating Mendoza line, depending on what happened. Okay, and I hope he's awesome. I hope he's a top 10 quarterback. What do we have? Because we need more quarterbacks. I don't want to do quarterbacks. We really need more quarterbacks. Yeah, good quarterbacks.

Ryan McQueenie writes, a long time ago in X was Twitter and fantasy basketball leagues were still

prevalent among friend groups. I would send you my team names and here applies never respond,

never response, not even for Chris came in my pants. That's a team name. He said, okay. What's the guy going to do for a petty laugh right here? Chris came in my pants. I'm positive. We're still playing fantasy basketball. That would have been a team name for you. For sure. I mean, of course. Of course. Not for football. Chris came in my pants. Well, it's too late. It is too late for football because I have that one that I don't feel like I should

share. Yeah, don't share. Inspired by the WMBA. Take that. Take that and whatever direction you want. Dan and Rally said, since the NCA is always talking about expanding March Badness, which is true.

basketball idea. What if we expand the tournament to 1,024 teams? There's to be a 10 round

“tournament. And we include every D1, D2 and D3 team in America. We would still reach the point”

when it narrows down to 64, wherever everyone could have a normal March Badness bracket to fill out.

But you can see some D3 school playing and it'll first round match up against Duke.

I mean, at 3. Why not? What's the difference? Why not? They literally turned the perfect thing. The perfect vehicle into March Badness. Just out of sheer fucking greed. No reason to take her with it. No reason to fuck with it. No reason to make up some bullshit games on a Tuesday. It bullshit games on a Wednesday and Dayton, Ohio, wherever the fuck they do. Play into the place and it's a play plan. Yep. Speaking of e-to-fat dick.

You're out. You have me in dinner. I can tell. I definitely would have you in the hungry showhouse. Good. Adam R. From Indiana. I'm so glad somebody sent this email.

Am I wrong to think it's ridiculous? That not only is Halbert and his first game back,

not a national television. He goes "Princess, fine, whatever." But it's not even at home. It's hard to imagine any other star who let his team to game seven the NBA finals for tearing their fucking Achilles would have their first game back after missing an entire year and then that game would be a New Orleans of all places. Just hoping to shine a spotlight on the continued Pacers disrespect. I wholeheartedly agree. I don't understand why they played it this way and this is a

league that over and over again loves to prioritize. It's 35 and over stars who are all not going to be in the league for much longer. Over something like Tyre Salbert and his first home game in

Indiana, which is on a Tuesday or Wednesday night, like what the fuck house? Yeah. And we will be accused

because I can tell already from the way that we in the ringer basketball community are talking. The Pacers are going to be beloved by many of us. We're all sort of on the idea of the Pacers. What's the word? Even Spockloat was in on them. Yes. He said Croatian watching people jump off

“cliffs and he's still alive. I like the Pacers. I think you're about DuBot's picking roles. This is”

much in clip divers. Getting themselves back to where they were. And you know, I'm still pondering the question that came up on the pod that we did where we were talking through Jalen Brunson. And we together made a case and came into agreement on the idea of him as a top 50 all-time player. Yeah. And Halbert and if they had won that series, we would have to make that same case for him. And he would have beat me in there. But they don't know if it would be tough for me. He definitely

would have been top 75. But his resume already is stronger than Brunson's resume. Like Tyrease has, you know, I think in terms of all star appearances and all NBA teams. But there there was a a very quick aside. I think you did it with compliment. You're going through the last eight NBA. I definitely dare. Yeah. Eight, eight legacy titles. Right. Yeah. And there was a place for Brunson to be recognized. And I'm not recalling it. But Brunson, because that was a likely hurry.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The case the reason I went with Curry was because I thought it vaulted him into a Kobe Jerry West area. Sure. If they hadn't won that title, that's not,

“that's a non-starter. Yep. And I think that's a different sister there.”

All right. We're going to take. Have some good ones left, but we're going to take a quick break. This episode is brought to you by chat. GPT. Imagine you're running a professional sports team. Nice. That would be a dream, man. Imagine the player contract report is due today. Not so nice. You've got performance notes from the coaching staff. You got a salary spreadsheet from your analyst. Three rounds of back and forth emails with the agent. And all that is scattered.

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I wanted to give a promotion. Conspiracy bill is on wait a second with Jason Sepsion and

Tyler Parker this week. Doing his top 12 conspiracy deep dives that he's done in 2006 so far. I was not conspiracy bill was on. Very good. Anyway, Mike Gordon asks, "With all the coverage of what's happening to the makers being sold, what may or may not be happening behind the scenes of Mark Walter?" Does conspiracy bill find it odd? That LeBron got out of there just before the shit hit the fan in Los Angeles is a possibility until that this

organization was on the verge of becoming a complete clusterfuck. First of all, thanks for sending that to good conspiracy bill. We enjoy all conspiracy things at all times. This is just a flat note for me. I don't think they wanted LeBron anymore and I don't really think they wanted them

“since last winter and I think they moved the team away from him. They did not want him to come back.”

It was spun a certain way because LeBron has a lot of media people. He's got an agent who has a podcast on the ringer. There was a way to spin it to make it deserve the result. That's the second best part of all time and deserved all the respect. I don't think they wanted him to come back and you could see it with LeBron this week where he had a team building thing in Slovenia. The entire legacy they were posting photos. It was dinner in Slovenia. I just feel

like it couldn't be LeBron was there. He's too famous. He's too powerful. I think they felt

the tug and pull of that all year last year and I think their intention this entire time was we have to start fresh as great as LeBron is. Thanks for everything and I think LeBron knew it. Nobody wants it. Especially him. He doesn't want to be somewhere where he's not wanted. So I think both sides wanted him to leave. I agree with all of that and they had a little bit of a taste of what that combination of Reeves and Luca and the efficiency that those two

playing together. But I think I take tiny bit of you know a different view. I don't think the leakers are going to be a clusterfuck. The ownership situation and everything. But I think

“that's what we meant. Yeah. Okay. Because I think the team, you know, it's a lot of white guys.”

So you could, you know, maybe point to that. But it's not like it. It's going to be competitive.

They fit right in in Slovenia. This is from, oh, oh, another conspiracy building. This is from Andrew and Kitchener. He wanted to point out the recent Bay Trade deadline. Yanis stays in Milwaukee and then makes his big surprise announcement that he became a shareholder did another gambling company that's not famed or I'm not going to promote them. A strange partnership. And then after months, he was traded to the Miami Heat. But before

and after that happened, the Miami Heat accidentally posted and deleted his scheduled YouTube live stream LeBron James and director of press conference. It caused a big spike. Towshi, the prediction thing. And LeBron and I'm going to fill the, which was I think 9% of the bets. And he says, I'm not saying, but I'm just saying that's an awful lot of money moving a platform. Yanis is a shareholder. And thanks to a team, Yanis plays for it's enough to at least do a

year and a half long investigation and have a lot of guys that training camp have no comment. I can't quite get there with this, but I did enjoy it. It's good. It's pretty good connecting of the dots. But for it to matter, there has to be some evidence of the money. The YouTube thing was extremely suspicious. It was like, oh, I said it up. I didn't realize it was scheduled. It moved the market when that happened. And if you're doing that thinking that

maybe he wasn't going to go there and then bet the other ones. Anyway, I listened. I didn't agree with that one either, but conspiracy Bill enjoys all conspiracy Bill emails. This one's speaking of prediction gambling platforms. John from Maine wants to know if they had been around

“in 1895, what would the odds have been of OJ being guilty in which way would you have bet it?”

I did send this one to you because I wanted to really tell you about this. Yes. I think OJ was probably, I would say minus 2000 after the Bronco chase, maybe even after the board. Would you, what person would have bet the other side of it? So this is what's fascinating about this conversation is that there's no trial that's rivaled it since, right? All of America was watching this on a daily basis. And all of America, the ups and downs of opinion

for those crimes, that that element didn't really change. I think whatever you're going to get off because there's not no bets. Yes. Or look at how bad this prosecution team is doing. Yeah,

crystal card and job of the glove. That's screwed up. Yeah, incredible stuff out of the defense team.

So, so if we had texting and gambling in 1995, the day crystal and screwed up the glove, would we have been out there and just bang into it like doing salvage bets for our OJ bets? Yeah, because I mean, by the time, the verdict was, it was time for them to go do that thing. I think it was less than 50% of America, at least we go back and look at the polling, thought that he was going to be found guilty. Less than 50%. So yeah, the the

dart and that would have been the time to jump in for sure. We really got good numbers.

“Yeah, so that's what it's flip. What do you think it was after the closing statements?”

Who do you think was favorite? Who was it? OJ gets off. Our OJ goes to jail. I would have said, OJ gets off was like minus 180. Oh, I think it was cool. You think it was closer to even? Yeah, I do think it was. I thought it was game off after. But part of that also was like right down racial way a lot. Yes, true. Like, you know, so of course. Yeah, that was my invest in that summer. And uh, there wasn't a lot of back and forth dialogue in the trial.

I'll say that. I think the most people were just like, yeah, he did it. So you think it's like minus 140. The only thing that really compares in this was a faster runway, but the 2016 presidential election. Oh, yeah. Which I think Trump was, I don't even know what it was like 25 to 120 to

“let dip. They were even then it went back up and Sal and I had that our famous parlay that we've talked about many times.”

So the paths I was the AFC East where you went on that too? Yeah, I was, of course. The paths with the AFCs with Hillary with the presidency. And we had all these times to hedge and decided not to. But the weekend before the election, Trump was plus 500. So I wonder like if the OJ had a basic one like that. Right. Yeah, right. We ought to side, we couldn't hedge it anyway. Scott B says

after St. James Hard had just reciting with the calves for three years, 97 million. I'm curious.

Do GMs actually watch the games at all? This guy will have earned 500 million as perhaps the greatest resume of all-time crappy performances and then parenthesis. Game 6 rocket spurs 2017, the cherry on top of the poop pie. The cherry on top of the poop pie? Pretty good. That's going to be great for us. Who else would you put on the Rushmore of guys like that? I sent that sticker. Do you have an influence because Hard didn't really stand alone? Well, I don't think he does. And part of this is

“how you kind of frame it. So the first for me is like, okay, who's made the most money in the NBA?”

Right. So that's your first kind of review. And some interesting names around James Hard. Now, nobody, James Harden is now all the way inside the top five. Well, inside of there. Yeah. And LeBron's number one, but, you know, KD, those guys aren't eligible. But if you sit down and look at how much money Chris Paul made over his entire career more than $400 million. And if you look at Chris Paul's playoff resume and give him, you know, he didn't shake that

off for the 2021 finals. Well, he, he, it was a good performance. He took them to the finals, though. They, they made that. And they came down to Devin Booker, getting stripped. And then the

Jewel holiday, Yana Salute, then Yana scores 50 and Game 6. I don't know, Harden never had it.

Now, how did you run like that? Well, I mean, he, he, he Harden doesn't get credit for being on teams. He's played in in five different conference final situations. Harden has. I mean, Chris Paul has two of those. And the teams that Harden was on have a superior postseason record to Chris Paul. He's, he's played in more. I just think of the teammates that if you're comparing those two, only the teammates Harden had. It's just a completely different class. I don't know. Chris Paul's best teammates were David West,

Blake Gray were teammates. They were teammates. Right. Yeah, James Harden. And James Harden was probably Chris Paul's best teammate. The test though was to try and come up with a Mount Rushmore. So yeah, that's a Chris Paul. That's fine. That's all. Harden. That was the way. This is not surprising.

he's going to be north of 500 million when we're all forget. So conference finals in 13 and 14

dragged the aspiration clippers through the conference finals in 21 and that was the best run that he had. Yeah, it's about it. It's where the train gets on nine nine and 12 in in terms of series one. Wow,

“he did some real research for this. Well, you said, this is hard. You have to come up with Dave.”

These are good names. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. This is a good. And then I hate to do it. But Russell Westbrook is in this conversation just because he was one of my men when first. Right. Yeah. He's his playoff game record was 64 and 71 and 135 games two conference finals. Both of them with Oklahoma City and a finals appearance with Oklahoma City and a couple of good

flameouts. And then after they trade KD, he basically never gets even sniffing close. I don't think

he makes round three after that. Did you make it? Was he on Denver? No. He was on Denver the year after after. Yeah. So you would have Paul George Chris Paul Russell Westbrook and then captain of the Mount Rushmore James Harden. He's a George Washington. I like that. You wouldn't have Karl Malone on there. I know the money was in different back then. That's the problem. I'm my gain in criteria. My first one was who's made a button of money over. Yeah. Two seconds. This is a full poop pie.

“That's what that is. Yes. It's a full poop pie. That's pretty good. I really feel bad for Bradley”

Bill. I think he was on pins and needles wondering when you're gonna mention him. Well, he was in the top 15 of all of the money made. He wasn't inside the top 10 of all of the money made, but I don't think he understands what I'll see how to do to get mentioned. There's still time, Bradley Bill. A couple of years left. Ryan Dempsey. He writes. He heard about the KLABOS and jiz room all stars. I think people really enjoyed that. He said, I've not heard the word jiz since the days of

the lunch room at my Catholic all boy's high school in the late 90s. Now in the last couple of weeks, Luke jiz that Nate sheets became an all-time grade below deck boat. I don't know if you watch below deck, but that was the biggest below deck moment of the year after deck can really below deck deck can look did. In fact, jiz on both son Nate sheets. It's a thing that happened. Why didn't you do it? My wife explained it to me. I was happy I did that should.

Then you start throwing jiz in relation to the KLABOS that in the bullsopsies and moves, Australians start sending you any emails about it. And jiz is becoming a regular thing. It's back in the lexicon like they're not. We're happy to help. Welcome back, jiz.

“Can we bring that boner? Oh, it's a boner never left. I think boner left. I don't think people”

say boners the same way that they did when it was. It's in all my text threads with a frequency. But what about boner as a mistake? Like rust. Well I was a rust bro. Come in the boner.

Boner. Yeah, boner was right there for years. Fred Merkel's boner that we always

heard about that grown-up. Fred Merkel had that boner in the world. Well, let's use them. We have the whole NFL. I've been trying to bring boner back. Let's give him a lot of mistakes. Oh, oh, the Sean Watson's boners. J Taylor sent in. He really enjoyed the rustle Westbrook thing. I did with Kirk. I thought I'd miss. I thought it missed the number on what if. And he thinks it impacted two NBA championships. February 2009 forgot about this.

The thunder treated for Tyson Chandler. And then rescinded the trade because they were worried about his toe. They sent out Joe Smith, Chris Wilcox, and the rights to the boner hardened for Tyson Chandler. Because the, the, the, I forget, New Orleans how hornets at that point. We're taking thunders team doc. Dr. failed the fiscal was the same guy who performed the surgery two years earlier. Two years later, Tyson Chandler wins the title with the Dallas Mavericks. Wow.

And then they had to trade Jeff Green for Kendrick Perkins. They just could have had Tyson Chandler and Jeff Green. It's a pretty good what if. I think that might have swung a title. Right? 2012. One of those. Maybe they win. Going back was he really hurt with Chandler for the following season after they said no to the trade. Me and he, he played, played. He was on the maps. He was on the next. So I would say that was, he had a couple good

career. Yeah. Yes. It's a good what if Westbrook had a lot of whiffs. What if David from Iowa, I had that Westbrook stat about usage rate plus a cis percentage and Westbrook had a 99

have a Westbrook that high. He wonder, what was the highest Westbrook? Well, also winning the title.

Oh, okay. Winning the title. And the answer is it's that there wasn't really a high one for

winning the title. It's all the usual suspects. He would have anyway like LeBron. Sure. Jordan. But for guys who played 12 plus playoff games, only four people had a Westbrook over 80. 2021 trade young, 80.2, 2018 LeBron, fucking awesome LeBron season, 81.4. Great. That was when it was just him and just by himself. 2015 LeBron, when everybody got hurt and they made the finals anyway, 82.8. And then the winner, 86.7. 2016 Russell Westbrook. He also regular season

and playoff Westbrook records. That's amazing. So yeah, I'm surprised that Alan Iverson didn't

crack it. That 2001. The assist percentage. She never got a assist like that. When he was scoring

like that, he wasn't getting like sticking the assist. He would not pass the rod. One more respite email from CH who said at Coach basketball a long time. A player's glaring weakness cannot be the most important quality for his position. As a point guard leader of a team decision-making is a very important quality that you're leader, your point guard and your best part must have. Russell Westbrook is walking brain fart with incredible explosiveness and competitive fire. I can't

have him at the point guard position if I want to win a title. That's harsh, but I also don't disagree.

“I don't disagree either. I think that was the Westbrook conundrum, right? We loved all this. This was”

the 90 10. We loved all the stuff he did, but there was that other piece where he just couldn't figure out how to slow himself down in the right time. So there we go. All right, I'm excited for this one. I didn't send this to you. This is from John from Boisio, Idaho. He said it's hard to stay excited about all the cool things sports wasn't it? With all the news about wildly increasing team values, shitty owners, money scandals, athlete gambling, etc. Please give me in the sports world some

reasons for optimism and this current sports climate. I would appreciate a pep talk. Oh, okay. I'm happy to do this. Let's do it. I, I'll start here. The schedule for sports is the best that's ever been. I feel like week after week, week and after weekend, there's stuff going on.

“Even last night, there was a good box and fight last night. The baseball was good. I think the”

WMBA is the best that's ever been. Even in middle August, there's shit to watch. Premier League started this weekend. Tottenham got absolutely smoked. I had to get a transfer guy from Manchester city of United today. One of those anyway. I just feel like there's more going on than we've ever had, right? When we were kids, when our teenagers, I don't remember the schedule being stacked like this. Who was dead? I mean, there was nothing right now. And no, no way to watch all the stuff

either. We can play about the streamers. Yeah, but it was like today the base though Red Sox game. I go to ESPN. It's not on. Like what the fuck? Look around is that I'm peeking. Oh, it's it's the NBC game. And it's that you take that 70 seconds to kind of your clicking on stuff. And then, oh, there it is. Better than it was in 1982. I'll tell you that much. That's right. I can find anything. Like remember, remember, USA started showing NBA in the early 80s. Oh, my god. Like Washington's playing

Atlanta. This is on television. What's happening? Yeah, national cable games. Yeah, national games like games. Right. I remember when USC started USA started showing WWE. ESPN had the Sunday night game. They added in the 1980s. Like these were like several moments for us. Yes. And now the stuff is available. Like you're watching golf today. You could go online and watch any version of it. You can watch Nate's brother and whatever tournament he was in. Like you can do whatever you want.

That's good. True fact. Yeah, that you're right. Good start. Good start.

“I think the players for the most part are more committed to their craft and being good at it”

and staying in shape and being aware of the discourse around them and not kind of

fucking up their own careers than what we grew up with. It would be amazing. You unwittingly

touched on something that will come up in this conversation today. One of the future bailback questions we're going to do. I have a candidate that is, you know, the epitome of what we grew up with.

into when we were like young kids. Like David Thompson, that era. And then, you know, I think

I wrote about this in my book, but the all the guys in the 90s that we loved in college. You know, see what Kenny Anderson, Derek Coleman, these guys that we thought were going to be in our lives in the NBA for 20 years. And, you know, they're careers Christian mightner. We said all these dudes were like, oh, here's the next group. And like 20% of them made it.

“Larry Johnson got hurt. But I think in general, the guys are in better shape and take care of”

themselves and just have more wear with all about what's happening. That's the key. They have more wear with all because the teams are smarter. The teams understand, like I was fortunate enough

in the last handful of years. No, maybe I'm going pretty far back now to visit Memphis with

Bruno and they gave me a tour of their facility and walked through yet all of the rehab stuff that they have, all of the recovery stuff that they have. That's another example. Yeah, all top of the line and the guys are coming off the court from games and immediately going into your cryotherapy, whatever, you know, all of the kinds of of, you know, let's get inflammation. Let's address it right away. Super impressive. And that technology continues to just advance advance advance. And so

for sure, guys are able because what we want more than anything else is to see the stars play the games. Yeah, to be a better player to play. Yes. Another one I go, they interact. Like fantasy, the connection you have with people you went to high school college with and, you know, like we, we've been in the ZFL, my buddy, Gus's pickball that he's had forever. He's to just mail it out and come in the mail. They're like, who won last week? And now we, now we have a website

that we can make picks on. Whatever fantasy league we want to be in, we can do. We can find out what happened to guys on our teams. Well, the, the, the corollary to that is the text threads that accompany the leagues. Yeah, because, you know, the ability to have the, the in real time shit talking where the entire group could see it right away and participate in it. That, that really ups the overall enjoyment of all of it for my, text threads would be another one.

“I would add. There we go. Text threads. I think you're on my most text threads. You're, we're on”

text threads for all different kinds of things with all the different kind of groups people. That's true. That is true. But, but yeah, we have, we have a bunch of fun words. And then, here's another one that doesn't get talked about enough. You know, I was bitching about the stadiums with Derek Thompson and have the billionaires should build their own fucking stadiums, which they shouldn't. You know, it's really nice to have stadiums in arenas.

Remember what we grew up with? Man, fucking terrible arenas. The Patriots football stadium was the worst place in the earth. But, literally, we had nothing good ever happened there.

The entire time, the first 30 years of my life until the, the Tuckeral snow game, the

Tom Brady game. That was like the first happy moment in the history of that stadium. But, you know, when you think about obstructed views and just 25% of the seats, just being the shitiest seats possible, like that's gotten better. It's more expensive. It mentally better. The food

“dire important for you. The, the, the, the capital centers, what I grew up with for the, for the”

bullets and, and the caps. And, you know, in the 70s, you could smoke. This thing was subterranean. You would come in and there would be a giant cloud of smoke in the sky. In the sky, in the sky, you're a cloud of smoke. You couldn't even still be smokey for the entire third quarter. Okay, it's like shooting off fireworks inside the fucking, you know, in close dome. The other thing is like speaking of, you know, recognizing the impact of of those stadiums on the players. We went

to three rivers to see a pirate's game for our buddy chips wedding. Yeah. I couldn't believe how fucking terrible that place was for baseball. Oh, yeah. I couldn't believe they played football in there either. I've been to some awful baseball stadiums and all of them, like, when we went to Camden, yes, where, where we saw the inside the park home run, where the guy got knocked out by the throws, just went home for the inside the park run. Oh, I can't remember where's the same

place. Yeah. And, Jacko said, that's the most unbelievable thing. I've seen all weekend. And then somebody who was with was like, there's a whole story that I won't tell because it was obscene. That was the famous story for us. But yeah. But we were at Camden and we were like,

Camden was. And now there's probably 15 stadiums better than Camden. Better. Yeah. All of the baseball

“stadiums that were coming this way nicer now. I mean, some of them are sterile. Like, I think”

old the Yankee Stadium versus the new one. I don't think it's a concert. The old one was just better. But yeah. And there's some good ones too. So those are some good things. Those are all good things. I'm from podcasts too. I think podcasts have been really fun for learning more and not having to be so trapped to kind of the generic network or local sports radio. Just you can kind of pick what you want, whatever you care about. You know, I'm not coming in fully prepared. So I don't have

the full litany of this. But I really, I feel like we've been really treated to a slew of very good playoff slash, you know, championship outcomes across like exciting stuff. Yeah. Yes. Because there's a lot of unexpected shit happening. Nobody had in the Anna playing Miami. But for the National Championship in college football last year. And that happened. And that was fucking awesome. And you know, what we got with the spurs the nicks. Nobody at the beginning of last basketball season had the spurs

and the nicks as the combatants. And then that was incredible outcome wise. And we're having this

flip over in football where immediately, you know, there are no dynasties in football. The chiefs go six and, you know, 11. And it's the Patriots and the Seahawks in the in the goddamn Super Bowl. Right. And the next year that can change. It's going to change. Yeah. I mean, we're sitting here. It's definitely going to be two different teams in my opinion. Yeah. Sports is great. And by the way, with these owners. I know I've done a lot of podcast content about it. It's not great.

That you have teams. You have guys or companies or investors buying teams solely as assets. Right. Like I look at like we we hung out with Ryan Smith the year ago at the masters. Yeah. Somebody who bought the jazz. And then really wanted to like build in Utah and understood the fanbase. And then bought that to blow smoke up Ryan Smith's football. But the team. We really want to be part of the community and want to grow Utah. The responsibility. Yeah. Through the teams.

And we either had terrible owners. And we've certainly both have had terrible owners. You have had bad moments. I've had bad moments. Sniders and good example. Peter Angela, so I had, I just quit the Orioles because you had some horrible ones. I did too. Snider at least was a Redskins fan. When you did that, he was just terrible at owning the team. And he was an unlikable guy. My point is that's the part that worries me as if people are buying these teams. But don't

give a shit about them. And it's basically how can I flip this later? That part's scary.

But we've had bad owners our whole lives. It's true. Go back to the 70s and 80s stand.

“Owners have always been bad. It's like you remember the good ones. You know.”

So anyway, Mike and Ridgewood Queens wants to say about Denzel Boston who I've been raving about in the Cleveland camp. He said, you know how the equalizer franchise stars Denzel Washington and the set in Boston? Well, his name is basically the movie. Why isn't Denzel Boston's nickname the equalizer? Okay. So there's been three equalizers. They've all been set in Boston. Starring Denzel. I don't. I accept this. The sky should be named the equalizer. How do we get this

going? My most successful nickname pushever was PG13. I singlehandly started that. Okay. Maybe we can start the equalizer. It's good. I want them to be good. Yeah. The thing that's got to hold it back is if they're they're bouncing dirt balls. Five yards in front of them. Right. Doors or overthrow or buy? I even worse if it's over his head and he's jumping up the getting nailed. Yes.

Jim and South Pasadena, I never knew this. So it's just one of the craziest emails I've gotten.

Do you think it's a big enough deal that the Giants and Dodgers right now are tied all time in the robbery. They each have 1,294 wins with 17 ties. They are dead even. They've a place that's 1890

“and they play what 17 games a year and they're exactly that even. How is anything more insane than this?”

That's nothing more insane. How is that possible? They played almost 2600 games and they're dead even.

said. Yeah. Some nerds came out. Some nerds came out and so I thought that's actually totally conceivable that that would happen. But I still think it was pretty great. The Dodgers and Giants tied. Terry P had a two-part question. Did Seattle beat in the Patriots this year less than the

joint in the Zaz and Patriots had from the Malcolm Butler Super Bowl victory. The answer is

fuck no and that's in all caps. Then he has. Then he has are the Seahawks the first NFL teams since

“the O1 Patriots have no haters. It's a more interesting one. Good one. Who does it like the Seahawks?”

Right. I guess like the United States. You'd have to have a team that played them or you or rivals with them. You'd have to come up with something even like at the Mike McDonald's that hasn't arrived and been a dick. Like there isn't a note not where the rivalry between McDonald and Shanhan and McVey. Man, it's pretty good. Yeah. Everyone. Yeah. Everyone can say don't have a fan. Legion of Boom had an identity and everybody wanted them to shut the fuck up. And sure. Yeah,

Sherman talked a lot of shit. He talked to Braini at that time. People are like, is this guy? Yeah. Yeah. This one. Seahawks don't they just kind of keep coming up. Everybody loves the city of Seattle. Donald is a, you know, a very likable reclamation project at a left field story.

“By the way, I think we're doing a Seattle Portland swing for live shows. Oh, do tell it's happening.”

I don't know if you wanted. I know. Yeah. You might have to come along. I'm on my hands up. Great food in those cities. Yeah. Great food cities. I think we're into a rewatchable. Just that way. And that is one of the important. But yeah, we have the dates. Elizabeth Fairman. Oh, she's honest with you. Yeah. She's probably the single most beloved ringer employee. Yeah, deserve it. Anyway, I think I think we're doing a Pacific Northwest swing in.

It's speaking of the Pacific Northwest from Andrew in New York. I know you already have a distaste for Tom Dundin. But were you aware he's also responsible for the growth of your least favorite sport pickleball? He's the majority owner of the major league pickleball. As a whole thing about it. This is true. El Chipo is a number of pickleball invested mixed perfect sense. See, I'm I'm I'm torn here because I'm boys with a guy. Oh,

it's been a champion now of of just the expanding popularity of it. And I I've never I've touched a

paddle for it one time ever. I won't do it because I'm not like popping into Achilles, right, not playing golf for six months because I played fucking fix. You're a bunch of back and forth. I'm not doing that. I'm not doing it. But I'm just saying I recognize it's it's broad popularity, the demographic that that it you know it's seeking. And I like the idea of the tiny intimate little stadiums they're doing and everything. I get it. I get it. That's all. I'll leave it with that.

That was that for me. That was to say like that. Aaron Reich wrote in with his son Zikil. He said he's been listening the podcast with my kids. They're ten and seven. Sorry for all the F bombs in this pod. Oh, sorry. I ask a question. What would it be? He thought for a little bit. I asked, do you think a healthy Jason Tatum would have

“led the Celtics to the same regular season record if you switched him with Jaylin Brown last season?”

Phenomenal. Phenomenal question. It's interesting that nobody's ever asked me this one and I've never

really thought about it before. I think they would have been around the same. I think that's one of the great things about what Jaylin did last year was he was able to basically match the production of somebody who just made four straight, first two more on BAs. But yes, I think I think they would have had the same record. Maybe even I whiff better because of the rebounding. Well, I'm agreeing because the true architects, the person that deserves credit for this is Missoula. They played a certain

way, a certain approach, and they took no night off. No. They were going hard from jump first tip back in October 2025. I haven't told you this, but you knew it was going to happen. I've kind of talked myself into the Paul George train. Oh, this is so good. It's 23rd. It took uh, took over 50 days. It happened this week. Yeah. I was going to tell you. I'm going to have so much fun this basketball season. Yeah, it happened. The problem is when guys are missing games, we're going to be able to say,

Yeah, I've talked myself until I knew I would. You knew I would. I didn't, I honestly,

50 days was a long time, but now I've talked myself into it. I had to. What else am I going to get? I'm going to move away. You're going to roots for the Celtics this upcoming season,

“and they have a chip on their shoulder. And you know, they, okay, who's the laughing stock now?”

It's Paul George, the defensive stopper out on the wings and all the rest of it. Paul George, I know what's coming. Run Harper, bail a shireman. We can replace Jalen with bulk. Yeah. All kinds of looks. Paul George, much better fit with Jason Tate of. Good catch three points, shooter. Not going to care about an alpha dog situation in your turn, my turn, because he's he's in his mid 30s. He's ready to be a supporting guy. The basic question is the chemistry of this team is Jason Tate

plus this mid Robinson plus Paul George with the, with the guys that got a year older. Right. Can they play those away that was a little wants them to play? That's that question. That Brad Stevens had this show that only so thick bands watch. It's like a YouTube show.

And he had some quote, narrower, who's basically like we had basically said,

I felt like we had taken this group as far as it could go. What he meant was these two guys, I think we had taken as far as it could go. And it was time to figure out a new version of this.

“And that's why they did it. And you get one year at a Paul George. And then he's an”

inspiring next year. And you have all these picks and maybe you can flip them into something, the admit. That particular proposition, I remain immensely skeptical of. I meet it. I just as wide took 50 days to 54 days. How about this? Why don't you just see, let them play together with with Mitch Robinson. And let's see what the team is capable of. Let's see that. Because those two fucking guys won an NBA championship together.

And you knew that you were going to have Mitch Robinson. Mitch Robinson's been in your plans. I don't know if it's a normal. I also tell hundreds and great about this. But I had to talk yourself into things. You're in a long car ride. And then there's two hours to go. And you kind of give into the car ride. And like there's two hours to go. Let's let's just it's going to. That's the same thing. I had it. It was going to be a rowering through it.

Yeah, powering through the stuff. And guess what, when I when I figured out how to just find the shirt in my head, it was like when we would drive to Vegas and you would see the Arbys. Oh. Yeah. I'm just need. We weren't probably one of the title this year. We needed to reset the team. Get under. Inspiring next year. Built the team around Tatum. Let's try. Let's try it. Let's take them years. Let's chat from

Tatum years. Chat from Fresno said, I sent me this one. We've all seen the guy that isn't good at a sport. But he's tripped head to toe in the best of parallel and shoes for that given sport. What about sports and parallel items that you can only buy if you meet a certain skill level, like special ping hats for people that are scratch golfers, different tennis shirts or headbands for tennis players, above and four or five, etc. You see somebody in a certain

hat or shoes. You immediately know they're good. So there's a slight parallel with this with the masters. I know. I knew you're going to go with it. It's a different stores and then birthments has like some special swag. But then if you get into the clubhouse store that only the members in, right, there's really special hats and stuff there, right? So there's

like tears. What do you think of this idea? I love it. I have no notes. The problem is it creates,

I mean, what's going to stop me from buying one of these things? Like it. Oh, your body has a ping hat. Yeah. The person earned it, but I'm going to fucking buy it from them because it's

“the coolest one. And I want to be, you know, the guy walking around. Yeah, that's what he did”

in the park in promotora of excellence. Yes. The same way that we use, I'm not going to say out loud the way the techniques that are out there. I'm sure people can figure them out. But you can get some great stuff out of, I got scared. I'm just talking about like massage techniques and that yet. Oh, yeah. You got to pro shop. There's ways to sort of get our body back. Chris Chen has has some, says some great strategies. You see, he's used over the years.

He gets a putter every year out of the way. So there have to be some sort of boner system. Almost like when you get your own master's jacket. Like Jeff Yang, we know a couple people on Master's jackets. Jeff Yang has. Heidi, you were off. You, you, you have that. You have that on. The master's jacket, you wouldn't let like, oh, house, hit bar, my master's jacket. So maybe these hats are like, maybe they're like $1,200 hats. Good. I like this. I

There's something there. Something there. It should be like, it should be awarded from the P.J. Tour or the, or the country, what you win the country, whatever you get it. Yeah. Okay. That from Fresno. Good job. Cody Larson basically wants to know if Mao's Garrett is a you ain't there. He can't hit. He checks every box. Okay. Let me hear it. Super star.

They never wanted anything with them. Everybody's written off the team of that. That's basically

the you ain't there in a nutshell. Okay. The problem is it's the Browns and they're quarterbacks to Sean Watson or should go our Sanders. And they, they've had a lot of substitute. There were a lot of years of real saw. Can keep my eye on the you ain't there for that. Okay. All right. Luke from North Carolina said the Hornets have acquired around 20 second round picks up the next few

“years. I think that's pretty close to accurate. My question is, if you offer all 20 picks,”

who is the best player you could acquire for 20 second round picks? But I think this one or no. You did. And I'll have to confess. I didn't get around in the research. This remains the one of the, the the most confounding elements of the way that the business of basketball is conducted to be team. Team valuing. Yeah. Second round picks where you and I could give a shit. Right.

We would just trade off. We would have, we would never have second round picks. But here take

'em. I have a one in 10 chants after 32. It clearly, it's, it is a lubricant in the machine. It is. It greases all of these deals. All of these deals slide right in. Very nice. Okay. They can make things work to, to some kind of satisfaction because we constantly see these second round picks added in as as a sweeteners and elements or something about the way the collective bargaining agreement works or something about the way the cap works that these, these second round picks,

there's something there. So I couldn't get Jalen Durin for 20 second round picks.

“No. I don't think so. Could I get herb Jones? See, now we're talking. Yeah. I think it's like herb”

Jones. Right. Like that, that's, that's a great. We got to do, I'm going to do some some some research as the MVC. I think it's the herb Jones level. It's like great. That's a great call. Could I get Nas read for 20 second round picks? I don't know. It's going to have 40 second round picks at point. Is Alex Rosso? Yeah. That's Corusa where 20 second round picks. This stage of is where he is and the kind of the injury risk. It's down there, baby. And everybody knows, you know, Oklahoma City

speaking of, of trafficers of second round picks. Could Washington get 20 second round picks for Anthony Davis. I don't know what to do with them. For what? By the way, I'm glad I brought this up. What the fuck was Dallas doing the last nine months? The last nine months. What do you mean? They basically gave Anthony Davis a way last year for reasons that remain unclear. And then he immediately had more value on Washington. Right? What did you just keep them? They just bought

out play Thompson to save nine million bucks. Why don't you keep them as an expiring? Maybe your team's going to be a little better than you thought. Maybe you could package him in a deal instead now he's just a nine million dollar sunk. Oh, congrats. You saved nine million dollars. Your team's tripled since you bought it. Well, I don't understand these teams at all. This is like, but this Dallas team, which goes, I mean, the original sin of the lucatrade, but every element of what they've done

since. And I'll never forgive the fucking league for giving them Cooper flag. They could

fuck off, continue to fuck off for that. I'll never forgive it. Peter from shit, we're almost done. Peter from Chicago said, you and House, we're talking about how the new Vegas expansion team, which by the way, I know for a fact is in the 9's. Okay. 9, it's in the 9 billion range for Vegas team. And just we were talking about they shouldn't be named the odds. And Peter said it got me thinking in the WMBA they have a new expansion team in Philadelphia. They've yet to come up with a

“team name. They want to use fan support as input using your platform. I think this would be the”

greatest time to market the idea for them to be named the Philadelphia 70's sisters. They're a president. They're a president to this day in my life. There are multiple places where I have the sole sisters. S.O.L. S.I.S.T.A.H.S, which was my Emmy mascot for the Miami WNBA franchise that does not exist any longer. The sole sisters look, I'm into this, but let me fill it up with

up to 70's sisters. Good, be open. All right. Martin from Estonia asks, "Who are my all-time

drive them to the airport, Celtics top five?" Estonia. Hi, Martin. Thank you. This comes from Kyrie's last year with the Celtics, which did not go well, and then I was joking constantly about

“how I wanted to drive them to the airport to make sure he got on the plane, and then I think we”

made a social video of me driving Kyrie to the airport. By the way, Kyrie, I'm glad he's figured out. I like this stage of Kyrie. I'm glad he's set up for sure, but he was not at fun. Were you wearing your seatbelt on that ride? I definitely was not. No. So I asked you for your five bullets. I'm going to give you, you go first, and I'm going to be my five-self exact. Okay, so this was tough, because I do there are sympathy cases in here, and then something that I have absolutely no

sympathy for whatsoever. Top of the list because of recent CBIAS. I was going to say Kalku's

mom because his bags were always packed over the last two years. Yeah, I was in Washington,

but I don't really have animosity towards him. He tried and then the circumstances changed and

“whatever, for a man. Jordan Poole is a whole another kind of deal. Like after, and really it's not”

Jordan Poole's fault. It is the organization that as the rebuild was arrived upon. They put this dude. They gave him a microphone and let him say welcome everybody to this day. They put him front in center as a guy that was like a kind of leader thing and it blew my fucking mind. So Jordan didn't they give him the end of the jumbo try and interest? Where it's like this. He used the last guy. Yes, all that stuff. Yes. Crazy business. Just insane business. Speaking of crazy business

insane business and I do have sympathy for this guy, John Hotplate Williams by the end of his five

years here. Now the story is that he was dealing with an enormous amount of stress and the way that he was handling that stress was eating it. And I understand that. He was an early case. Well, you just like to eat without the stress. Yeah, both. I'll eat the stress. But they put him. That guy had paycheck skipped by both Washington and the clippers where he went because he could not get the weight thing. Yeah. By the end of his five years here. You mentioned some of your team. Yeah.

Can we quickly add John Hotplate Williams? Yes. This was Peter Vessie. He was a really influential NBA writer for the post for years. And we loved reading his hoop to shore. But his two best nicknames ever. He called Joe Barricharrel. Joe Barricharrel. And then there was a John Hotrod Williams who was on Tulane and the Cavaliers. Yes. And Peter Vessie called the other John Williams. John Hotplate Williams to separate them. And it was just like chef's case then added. Yeah. All right. So Hotplates on

there. Yeah. And then some guys from this era in the in the sort of 2000s Andre Blotch. Yeah, if you even say Andre Blotch, I was going to not even know if I knew you anymore. He was, again,

“if you wanted to be slightly sympathetic, he was he did get shot. Right. I think Washington got”

shot in a carjacking effort. But then he got arrested a couple times. There was some solicitation kind of stuff going on. You entered a famous thing. And he was there's some famous clips of him going for triple doubles in all the wrong ways. Yeah. So by the time, you know, he was that jacer. Yeah. That's right. These two guys I put together because they were both traded together and their most famous moment in Washington was was attempting the, I mean, I'm not going to use that word.

The colossally stupid cinnamon challenge. Nick. Yeah. Nicky. Yeah. Nicky. Jesus. I didn't know. Jalen had it from 2008 to 2012. Yeah. Two big dummies here in Washington with just an incredibly outside like their their connection to reality. So that those guys together, I was happy. And now this one I got to proceed carefully because I don't want to be any repercussions that that might be visited upon me. But I'm going to whisper it. Javar is pretty dead to where.

Yeah. You got to be careful because, you know, he had connections. So his Brad Beale not on the airport list. I mean, he's pretty good for you guys at that point. Yeah. And he'll be, you know, he's still at the top of all of the record. I thought for sure. Sorry. So he's going to make your list. No. He didn't do anything wrong. He just showed up and just put the new upper hand. Yeah. But that's, that's what Washington does. That's what they did. I don't, I don't, I don't bear him any

genuine threat of gunplay in a locker room. I thought for sure, you were also, who is the shooter

“you had in the mid 2010s that you overpaid. No. It was like a six foot eight. There was three point”

shoot. Where one God damn was it, uh, or silently so those like one of those type of guys. You, you paid one of those guys. I mean, it sounds right. I could easily go back and pull up. Now I'm going to have to, but what's it? Yeah, I'm going to need it and make it for you. Nah, because again, okay. All right. I'm going to give you my, I did by the decade. I did one per decade, 1970s, Sidney Wicks. It was really him and Curtis wrote together, but the

red are back his dumbest move ever. The Paul Silas leave, wooden pay Paul Silas, who was the

heart and soul of two title teams, Paul Saltegrund. Won't pay him and then try to replace them with

Sidney Wicks and Curtis Rowe. Curtis Rowe had the famous quote or something like, there aren't any W's and Ells in paycheck, something like that. He was not not a popular Celtic, very weak was worse down and was just a losing player, his whole career with good stats, but kind of peaks when Calvin Murphy punched him out in a rocket Celtic game. Calvin Murphy was five, nine. It's Sidney

“Wicks was six times and ended up getting a, I think a broken or bloody nose, everyone hated him. So that's”

one. Rick Roby in the 80s. He was nice, Greg, great guy, backup center. One of the most frustrating Celtic, he would just come in, he'd bowl somebody over, he'd be moving on a charge, he'd go over the back on somebody and then he would like have a nice lefty hook, but he was just incredibly frustrating. Yeah. And was so delighted when we traded him for Dennis Johnson. I wanted to drive him to the airport just to make sure he got on. Todd day in the 90s. Oh, wow. The most selfish

player I've ever watched. It was the mid 90s when I, when my dad would always give me the tickets.

He had the fleet center record for a while because he was just, I mean, he was at the ball as if he had the ball over half court. It was going up. He was one of those guys. And you could just watch and suck the life out of everybody else. He was a good college part too. He was really good. I love that Arkansas team. Mark Blunt in the 2000s. Sure. I get it. When we paid him a big contract, I wrote an entire piece using a film of Louise analogy of Harvey Katel at the ending running

toward the cliff as they drove off it because I hated the country. I couldn't, he's suckered them in. He did the Jerome James. He had like six good weeks, suckered them in. And then eventually we dumped him. I'm going to sew to somehow. So he's for the 2000s and then Kyrie in the, uh, in the 2010s. So we're only halfway through the 2020s. Seems like a nice guy, but Nicole the Vustowitch in the lead right now for the airport. I didn't, I didn't hope. I hope he got in the plane.

Well, he, I mean, how long was he in Boston? He wasn't there long enough to, you know,

“was him in heaven for any air that are the two leaders for the 2020s right now?”

Yeah, Evan 49 came in and he was the big 2021. He was like our big trade, trade deadline score off the bench and he went like three for a hundred in the playoffs. Okay. Uh, last question from Parker from Utah. Finding out Joe has played water polo was not on my 2026 bingo card. I wasn't as shocked as when I found out Luke was traded to the Mavericks, but I was definitely more shocked than when I found out Tyler dirt. It was really the narrator of Fight Club the

whole time. I don't have a question. Spoiler. Yeah. I don't know. Can we spoil that movie or no? No, that's fine. Um, I think it's okay. I think we have to show the photo. Oh, God. I'm still working. I haven't been to my parents together up into the attic yet. Well, you sent me the photo. I did. I went that. This is the team. Who did you send it to? What do you mean? Now I can't find the photo. I sent it to you. Just you.

Only you. It was just to me. Me to you. I didn't send it around to any of our threads. Oh, I found it. Okay. It's just a group of young men. All right. Here we go. Invading suits to Joe has water polo photo. There it is. Joe has his in the back. Oh, my guys. Oh, my. Dale, you guys. Shout out. Nice. He had a hair and skinny body. And there we go. Yeah. There you go. The Joe has water polo photo exists. So you're going to try to find some more

for us. I feel like there's some action shots that are out there. Like his, you know, with the water splash, you know, you're up, you're caught the ball. You know, there's going to be a doctor high school.

I played on the college of the Holy Cross team. You never talked about it. None of us said any

idea. It was all about five times a week. I mean, I somehow never knew you're in the water polo team till you were a junior. We were in the Nescaklique. And we played like baits and Colby

“and Trinity. I can't remember all everybody. You played all four years at Holy Cross. I did.”

I missed. So my number one activity at Holy Cross was a radio station by far my faith thing. And every year, there was a great college, the college music journal C.M.J. posted a weekend down in New York. And the radio station would send people down. I was invited. And I couldn't go any of those years. I chose to go to the water polo tournament because that's when the championships were every year up at baits where it's fucking freezing cold. Even time. That's the worst ride from

the cross to the base. It's like four hours. They let us take a van. The college will only cross, let us, you know, we had a van. We got a Holy Cross van. Guess how many cases of beer were. Oh my god. I mean, it worked out. It was fun. I enjoyed it. But Holy cow. Yeah.

There you go. Joe has this water polo crew. Amazing stuff. I'm going to see you this week.

You've come in. Thanks for the mail back with me. Thanks for your money. Do you understand in the questions? Yeah, a couple of dinners. Thanks. Everybody said the questions. We're going to take a break and come back with the guy who briefly resurrected our Holy Cross football program. And now I'm trying to do the same. You said, Bob Chesney is next right after this. All right. I have not cared about college football. So I was in college at

Holy Cross. Holy Cross. You coach two Bob Chesney. But yeah, we were really good once upon a time. Really good. And I grew up in Massachusetts in New England. Yeah, they didn't really have the food for a couple of years. Yeah. But we just wasn't like going and being in Michigan or,

you know, where you've just Texas where you fall in love with. So I never related team. And now in

my mid 50s, I have a team. You see what football has you got here. Welcome. Welcome to the team. Thank you. Thank you. I'm your unofficial booster. I love it. Talk me through everything. Like so you're at James Madison last year. Yeah. You're in the playoffs. And now eight months later you're here. You're in LA. Yeah. And you're in the

“N. I. L. Yeah. Like what's the single hardest thing about doing this? Well, I think that you”

hit the nail and they had the timing of it was just that was the hardest part about it. Because, you know, you don't want to be, you want to be solely focused. You don't want any distractions in your team. As you feel like you got a good team and you're doing something pretty special, which we felt like we had to jam you. And you know, you go week after week and then your name starts popping up in something and and somewhere else and you're, you know, you're taking a Zoom or a

couple of Zoom during a by week and you're trying to fit it in and, you know, you definitely have interest in places, but at the same point in time, you know that you can't mess up the product that you're, you know, and that journey that you're currently sharing with that team. So it was well, they know too, right? They know about your life. They know indirectly. They know indirectly. And they see stuff out. There's some true, some not, you know, so ultimately to them, I said,

come ask me anything. I'll tell you the truth. I don't want you to ever feel like, you know, I'm not being honest with you. And there's sort of a business side to this. But whatever we're talking about is talking about next year. Yeah, not the journey we're on. So, you know, it ultimately went in through, you know, there's a couple of home visits and things of that nature that that occurred. And I really started to just see what, you know, UCLA was all about. And you start talking to

some of the guys that were on the search committee and you start, you know, talking to Martin, you start feeling like man, they want this thing back on track. And you felt the energy from them. And I felt like it was a, you know, a young crew, but there's, you know, Adam Peters, who's the GM of the commanders, right? Yeah. There's Bob Myers, who did, you know, work magic, obviously with, you know, the Golden State. And then there's Casey. And then Doc Roberts is calling

me on the side. And like every piece of it, I was like, man, these are some like high level, you know, people that have won at the highest level in money in the sports, right, in the sports world. Not just, hey, they are CEO or some of us that doesn't know what the team dynamics are. And I was just so intrigued by that that it really made me think, you know, more and more about it. And then eventually we make the decision, you know, it goes public and after it goes public,

we're still in the championship weekend, right? So we're still trying to play this championship game.

“And I did not want to be a distraction. And I remember when it popped, I told the team on the”

field first. I said, look, something's going to come out later today, because guys text me that they got this story and we're going to go with it. I said, so I just want you to know what they're talking about again is next year. Now, I said that. And I was like, how do I, like, what's it exercise that I could do to prove to them that I am still solely focused on this? And it's funny,

So I end up, you know, holding up my phone in the next morning team meeting and I've, you know, 400 or whatever it is, text messages. And I said, this at 400 text message on her took a screenshot of it, actually. And I said, I'm not answering to single one of these. I said, these are all about next year. I said, we're still, I said, so you guys need to do the same. And it was cool because by the end of the

week, I showed him was like 1,200. And I never, I just kept growing. And I was holding true to my

word that I'm not interested in talking about this stuff for next year. I'm interested in finishing this with a conference championship hosting it at home. And then maybe making the playoffs. And then fortunately enough, we made the playoffs. Had a little bit of time off. I got to come out here, do a press conference meet the team and figure some things out about the late Elantear. And then, you know, that was really it. It started to develop a staff and put together, you know,

our GM role ultimately, because recruiting was going to be the first thing we had to do. Didn't talk to a single kid at JMU about, hey, you're coming with me. I wanted that to stay pure and be about, you know, that team that year. And I didn't want to talk to them about any of those things, so the season was over. So they only happens in sports movies. I'm taking you. It'll take a new man. It happens because then it was funny because then we waited because I also

was, you know, just trying to be respectful of the relationship with JMU and I didn't want to technically tamper with any of these guys. So we were going to call them until the portal opened. And then when the portal opened, we start calling them, they're like, where were you? Like,

“I've been talking to coaches this entire time. And I think you guys were interested. We're like,”

though, we're trying to play by the rules here and do it the right way. And, you know, then obviously a chunk of them came with us, a couple of days. But, you know, I think that what's here with us, we're really proud of. And I think helps that the culture of this program. And it's been really good. But the thing that saved me, as a long ass answer to, by the way, right? But I'm along for the right. Yeah, the thing that saved me was probably the fact that this

is three hours back. Right. So I look at like Stein who went over to Kentucky from here on the West Coast. So you get done with your day at 10 o'clock. You know, it's one in the morning on the East Coast. So he's got to find time during the day and take away from what he's doing, you know, at Oregon. I'd take anything away from Jamie. I got to give the day 10 11 o'clock at night, get on the phone with no GM candidates and start figuring those things out. And you sell three hours at the

end of the day, you know, that you wouldn't normally have. I'm sure your wife was delighted. Yeah, she, I was in the basement, she even though I was. So she's got to see you, you know, it's very,

“pretty much pretty much. So that's how it all kind of went down. But it was good because I got to stay”

true to the mission we were on and not take anything away or dilute that in any way. And at the same point in time, do a little extra work. It was harder on me, but really just me, not on any videos.

I mean, that's always for decades. Been one of the worst things about college sports.

Yeah. When a guy that's there is going to leave. And he could go one of two ways. Like you can go in a limbo and compare the team apart. Yeah, we're, yep. You know, you keep everyone focused. So you put a lot of thought into that. A lot of thought into it. And I think the way we did it, I was trying to hold off from anything going public till after the championship game. It just didn't work out that way. Once media gets it, they get it. And it's kind of the end of it.

I had it for like a month. I just sat on it. That's right. And you should have. And I appreciate it. But those are the things that, you know, we're, and then it came down to if we're in a playoffs. Yeah. You know, I am coaching in this game. And that had to be part of this conversation with any school I was talking to is, you know, for an Ebola game. I'm probably coaching in that game. Like I'm not going to not going to like leave this team. I just, it wasn't going to be an option for me to

go forward with any other team if they didn't respect that. So, and I knew what put us at a little bit of a disadvantage in the recruiting class. I knew our portal class had to, you know,

“then carry a lot of the weight. But is what it is. Like for me, I think, you know, the loyalty to that”

place that supported me so much. And you know, and, and had our back, I felt like I had to, know, really do the same. So, yeah, and you know, you're, you say, like, it's a great school from the West Coast, just still going to get some, yes, some kids. Correct. So, the, the Jamie thing ultimately, like, it played out pretty well. Yeah, made the playoffs. Nobody was expecting that. Yeah. You lose, they didn't come here. Yes. You take over, when the last time I talked to you,

when we was with a bunch of people and you were explaining, I think it was in this spring. I can't remember, it was like March April, somewhere in there. You're explaining how different it is now

to try to get people. Yeah. And dealing with not only you paying players, which is never really

happened. Yes, above the table before. Correct. But you're also dealing with, like, weird representatives, people that don't have the credentials to really negotiate. Correct. People that don't understand, you give your word to somebody. And then you just, oh, you're good. Me that. I'm going to go here. Then right. So what, what is this word like? Because from afar, it seems like a nightmare. Yeah, I mean, it's close to a nightmare. I think that, you know, you look at the NFL and the cool thing

about the NFL is that you have contracts, there's tampering rules, there's all the things that come with it. There's in complete. Then it opens up the hiring cycle. And everybody, free agency happens,

That's not the case here. You know, obviously, it won't be the case here for some time. I think

“till 2031, I think the national championship game is already scheduled at the time of the year that it is,”

which is starting this, you know, this next school year. Right. So you're still playing through the Christmas break. You're playing, you know, into the next semester. And now guys are going to transfer out or transfer in or figure it out. So I think those teams that are, you know, in the playoff hunt, that's all hard. That's probably a really hard juggle. Because you got to have official visits during the middle of, you know, preparing for the first round or second or third round of the playoffs.

And it's, you're making job interviews. But it's like one year job interviews exactly right. So that's the stuff that's different. And then, you know, you find a kid. We love you. You know, you love us. It's great. Everything's going good. But shoot. Can you just, I love it. I'm going to definitely come visit. And I was saying, but just, can you talk to my agent real quick? You know, and then the agent gets involved. And when the agent gets involved, you know, he goes a whole different

direction. Sometimes in the visit never happens or it does. And you got to promise money up front,

sometimes with a kid you never even met or at least promise a ballpark. So you're just walking around

“cash. You just have hundreds on you. Just want to know who you have to grace up. Yeah. That's right.”

So that's what it feels like. So it's really one of those things that, uh, any of you I know the market and a market seemed to escalate, you know, significantly this past year. How do you keep track of the market when there's like over a hundred teams looking for a left tackle, and really the truth is the market might be the market. It might be set for you. But then there's one other school that's extremely desperate and has money and just raises, you know, your value all the

sentence and eBay auction out of nowhere. And just a big spike in it. And now you got to figure out is that worth it or not for us. And you just have to do a really good job of understanding your own budget, understanding your position, allotment and allocation of what you're trying to do. And then

you just got to try to stand by. Never wanted to do this now. You just want to like coach, coach 11

guys on each side and go. So that's the interesting part is that no, but I name one coach that got into it to be a GM and to understand this. You know, have the portal open for a bunch of years. You know, not too long ago, run a budget, raise money. I mean, that was always a little bit part of it. But then now you're doing all of that. And I realized that J.M.U. when I was the one talking all the agents, you know, and we get on a phone call, you know, and it would start and then there'd be a, you know,

a re-bottle that would come back, you know, minutes later, then we'd have to go back to that it was like four or five six phone calls with every guy until you could even get near a number and get like what are you doing? That was at the point of this same. This is really hard work. So, you know, obviously having a GM and a system GM and a recruiting department, you know, is necessity at this stage of the game. But then the thing that that I really don't like about it is that as soon as

you put an agent in contact with a GM, it's all business. And it's not about what's the best fit. Where should he be? What's his playing time like? Does he gel well with the coaches? Is the culture going to fit him? You know, is he going to be happy there? Does he like they are all those, those things go out the window. And that agent, all he cares about is the the highest number he could get for the kitty can throw him in the shittiest situation and he's still happy because he got paid.

And that's the thing, that sounds in sports media too, but it doesn't, yeah, there's some good agents that don't do that. And it will be like, this is not worth the extra money for you to go to this place. This is, and the guys that I think were the NFL guys that are truly credentialed and absolutely know the value of going to a good program or a program that fits their player. There's a long game to be played. And I think a lot of them, it's really hard to, to, you know, give up a lot

of money on the front end. But man, there's a chance if you do it right to make a whole lot for a whole lot longer. And here, not only with football, but the connections and the education, you know, this is, I would say to our guys all the time, like this is your life, this is your football playing life. Yeah. Right. What's happening from here to here? And are you preparing yourself in that small window of football life for the rest of it? And here's a place where you could do it both,

“you know, do both. And I think that's, you know, that's what I'm most proud of. We're not just football,”

you know, we're helping, you know, mold these young men into becoming great employees and employers and husbands and fathers and all those things. And that's what you get at a place, you know, with this type of, you know, education and people around you. Yeah, like in the, this would be like in the NBA of Kauai was a free agent and his uncle was asking for under the table stuff from multiple teams. Yes. Oh, wait. That happened. Yeah. And here's the number I gave you and the shop that

went around. Oh, wait. Did I say that? Hey, how about can you give me more of that? You talk about bringing people into a program. Yeah. But this is 2026. And everybody seems like they're here for a year and then all this side after. Whereas like probably when you got in a football coach and you're like Sunday, I'll coach and college. Yeah. I'll build a program. I'll get somebody from high school. It'll be with me for four years unless something horrible happens and transfers. Yes.

But now it's like you're just, it's transactional and it's one year of peace. So how do you have a culture when everything's one year? Yeah. So it's interesting that you say that because let's go back to a Holy Cross, right? I was ever since years. Yeah. We had, I think, two transfers. And both of these kids got in on their own over like, hey, we just, we're transferring. We got in, because you

into. Oh, thanks for pumping. I'm pulling this. Thank you so many smart people. Really appreciate that. So that is really, you know, then you go to JMU. Right. So I go from six years and two transfers and six years. No NIL. No work, but you're working partial scholarship. So it's kind of like NIL. And you've got to value people and break up these scholarships and do what you've got to do. They earn more. You give them more, all the things that come with it. But they were there.

Those kids stayed because that degree mattered to them. They really wanted to stay. They wanted to graduate and they wanted those connections in the mentorship that came from that place, which is second to none. Then you go over to JMU. 67 new transfers. We brought in at your 67. I went from two in six years to all of a sudden, 67. Like, imagine what that's like, I don't know about the portal. I don't know about NIL. I don't know about any of these things in our whole budget. It's like

“$250,000 when I get there. Right. And that's what we're trying to, so we couldn't take anybody”

based on money. They had to come because they loved the place. They saw the value of the idea. And they liked everything that it worked. And then at the end, the final piece of it, they

all these majority of those 67 kids we took came and said, I'm in. They never asked about the money.

And then later you'd have a conversation, I'm, hey, here's what we're thinking. They're big, great. I'm good. I said, I'm coming there. That's why I want to be. It would be some of those other guys that showed up with a number. You know, agents weren't as prevalent back then. You know, the kids mostly represent themselves. But they showed up with a number that they wanted. You'd sit there with them and you'd be like, this is not going to work. This is only about

the money for you. And it wasn't possible for us to buy kids at that time. Because really, if we acquired them with money, we're going to have to motivate them with more money. And we have to retain them with even more money. Well, then you have the starting, sitting thing that, too. Like, you got this guy we paid this much. Right. Exactly. That's all start. Yeah. That's when he checks out if he's not starting. That's right.

That's right. And then you saw the spring portal too. So that's the spring portal window that happened in there. So 67 new guys next year went down a little bit. Our budget went up to,

“I think, four or four 50 or something like that. You know, so that's what we walked in that”

Oregon game with a roster of about 400,000. So you made the playoffs with a 450 K NIO budget?

Yes. And you're competing against, yeah, like 30, 40 million. Then some of these schools are spending.

Probably more. Pretty impressive. Probably more. Yeah. Probably more. So again, it was the kid, the right kids. The right kids that had a chip on their shoulder and wanted to go do things that, you know, nobody thought they could do and were maybe passed over, whatever it might be. Those are the guys that work in our program. Is this system better or was the old system better? What, meaning what? Which is like, is the system we have now? Is this the right system or

it's a better system than what we had? What is it? Oh, I think that players need to be paid. I think I can not imagine, I could not imagine back in a day looking up in the stands and seeing everybody wearing your jersey and you got zero dollars for that. That's what the people stole of all the sports for you potentially getting an injured. That's right. That's right. So I think it was so extreme. You could have a work study job. You could have any job if you were

on scholarship. Like that was so limiting and extreme and everybody was making money on these kids. Yeah. Right. So then it's the way the world works. Right. You over-correct. So then you over-correct it's like, no, you could have all the money you want. And you could have NIL, not pay for play, but then it becomes pay for play based in the guys of NIL. And all those things happen. And I think there's somewhere in the middle, when you look at the NFL model, you know,

we're slowly working, you know, towards a, you know, triple 18 for the NFL. Right. And we are. We are the feeder program for the NFL. I think that, you know, agents that are actually

certified can only take a certain percent. Some guys are taking 15, 20, 25 percent from these guys.

Right. You shouldn't be able to do that. You know, if you can't... Well, they're not governing any of it.

“But if you're, if you're tampering, you should be automatically barred from being able to represent”

anybody again. Just all the things that come with it, you know, like the NFL has is what we really, you know, need to institute a more multi-year contracts, you know, that kids can eat. It's going to say, could you make it? You can't transfer for two years. And that goes for coaches. Yeah. And I think you just get into the Santai Trust things. And are they employees and all the stuff that comes with it? There's so many, every move has a, you know, equal and opposite reaction.

Right. And then that, you know, then it's just what road do we really want to go down, you know, when it comes down to it? And I think every, every, that's hard because every school, every, every conference feels differently about things and you're trying to get, you know, a unanimous decisions and they're just impossible to find. Yeah. And then everybody's jumping conferences. That also does it hard to find. Right. All right. So going backwards,

you started at assumption. That's right. You're there forever. And you're a junior university in division three road road island. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then assumption, and then which put you in Worcester, which is put us in Worcester. Yep. And assumption. So Worcester has Holy Cross Clark WPI, Worcester, the polytac. Yep. So state. Yeah. And Nicole's backer punches like eight of them in there. Yeah. Yeah. And you're just, at some point, you start killing

it as assumption. Yeah. And then Holy Cross hires you. And at that point, we've all given up on Holy

scholarships. Yeah. And we've talked about this. But when I was there, it was right as it was transitioning.

It was big sports school. Could have potentially was the first one asked him in the

Big East. No doubt. And a lot of the people that were there were like jocks and high school athletes. Yes. And that was such a big part of the school. And we watched it kind of get nudged out as we're there. Yeah. And then we just kind of all gave up on it. Yeah. And then you brought it back. Yeah. And you're winning. And you have this great season. And then you stayed for an extra season. Yeah.

“Which I think we were all like, oh, he's at here. He's gone. Yeah. So why'd you stay there to be honest with”

you? Like, I didn't, if I was still there, I'd be happy. Right. Right. That place was very special. My, my, my daughter just turned 16 on Monday. Right. So she, that's all she knew. She had three years in Newport, Rhode Island. Yeah. But my middle daughter and then my son was born and was certain we were there for 11 years in that team. Yeah. And when you're, I remember being an assumption.

And I went over to a game, a holy cross game. And remember sitting up top. We parked in the baseball

field and tailgated. Then we went and set up top because we played a Friday night game at assumption. And they ended up beating New Hampshire. Who was like number 15 in the country or 10 in the country at that time. And I was like, oh, man, this is a cool place. Like, look at this stadium. Look at these people. Like how cool is this natural grass field, the history and that field that names up above on the, you know, the, um, in the ring of honor in the stadium. And you're like,

damn, yeah, some day this would be really cool. You know, and it just happened that that was didn't get the call. The final, that was the next year. So I don't think they wanted me. I think

“they wanted a lot of other people. And I think eventually it for, you know, to me. And, and I remember”

it's like everywhere I go. And when I first became a D3 head coach, it was like, ah, you don't know

how to, you've never been a head coach. You can't do this. And we, we won. And then I went to D2

there. Well, now this is scholarship football. I'll never forget a referee. And I know his name. And I won't say it publicly. But we were at, we were at Bentley. And I remember this is an awful call. He knew it was an awful call. And I was, I'm pretty good. He's like, the same D3 football anymore. Son, something like that. He said to me. And I was like, okay. All right. And that's how I was received. When I got there, which is fine. Yeah. And then very quickly, we were able to, you know, just

become a top five team in the country. Then went to Holy Cross, same thing. You don't know, this is now full scholarship, right? Not only is a full scholarship, you talk about this academic index thing. That's like the Ivy League. You're going to have to recruit nationally. You've never done any of those things. There's no way you could win here. And we were able to win there. And then I went to J.M.U. And it's the same thing. But wait, go back. So you, you wanted a huge, huge way.

Yeah, everybody's like, oh, he's getting poached. Yeah. Yeah. So then, so why'd you stay? Yeah, yeah. That was the question, huh? Yeah. Yeah. Well, you think you didn't know all this, but the reason what, no, I've seen it because of just the history I had in that town. I love that town. There's just some, you know, blue collar, tough people that love football that I got a chance to, you know, everybody knew who you were. It was just one of these, can you have done finished business to

those businesses? What you felt like the South Dakota thing was probably the thing that really drove you more than anything is that we got to get these guys, right? And we went out and played them in the COVID year and they got us pretty good. And then we came back and we had that next year where, you know, I look at it all and there's a fourth quarter call that, you know, I just did the worst luck that season. Yeah. And if I just make this one call, I feel like we got, we're

we're winning that football game, you know, and we end up, you know, flying back on a plane and it didn't work out. We knew guys were graduating, but we knew we'd still have a good, a good class coming back. And there were some really young guys in there that I knew we're going to play with some freshmen, but I felt like we had them and the ones coming in were going to be good ones. Just happened then we lost the corner, then we lost the other corner, then we lost the backup

up to one of the years. And then it just, it kind of puts you in a spot where you're playing with really young guys, you know. And then at the end of that year, really, you know, I stayed because I still believed in it. I felt like we could do it. I felt like we're, I'm not walking away from this yet. Like I wanted to win a national championship. But then I'll remember after that next year,

“all the kids, I'll never forget, like sit in my office, looking out in the lobby, one kid came in.”

And I remember, you know, he said to me, coach, I'm on a quarter of a scholarship. Like I need at least a half or three quarters or full. Like my, you know, what we can't do this anymore is a family. Yeah. And I was like, how many catches did you have this year? And it started crying. He's like, one, I was like, you can't come ask me for more scholarship money. I said, if you need financial aid, we should go talk to the financial aid office. I said, but we can't do more. And then I looked

out in the hallway and I saw like eight kids out there. As like, so I stood up. I said, you, you all here for the same reason. And yeah, so we'll have a team meeting. So we went to a team meeting. And I realized very quickly that that had turned because of the portal. And because of the ability for them to watch all the other guys going places and getting paid and getting scholarships and promises and all these things. And I was like, this is going to be hard to sustain if we don't

find a grad program or if we don't open the door more to transfers. And that wasn't, we weren't built out. So you're not getting transferred, but then you also can't keep Jen. Correct.

And that was it. Yeah. And it wasn't it initially like it took a while. You know, and I remember, you know, there's, you know, I remember my wife watching like the, you know, these people like track flights of where the AD's driving and flying to and they're flying to. And, you know,

“I did my interview. They came to my house. Everything I'm like, boy, that was great. I think we killed it.”

And then it was like, maybe three, four or five days later. And I was out at the Campbell trophy near Campbell Award ceremony. It was called in the Belagio. And I remember coming back on the, on the plane before I was in the airport. I just, I called my agent like, let's not do this. I'm just going to stay at Holy Cross. I said, this doesn't, these guys don't call me back. They don't see it the way I see it this ain't going to work. And he, as soon as I hung up with him, this search

from called me. Right. So what, I didn't even talk to, he didn't even talk to him. He said, hey, they want to talk to you. You know, can you get on the phone with the president and everybody's and while I'm in short of it, I was flying back. It was midnight. I put on a shirt and die and sat in my kitchen and accepted the job to Jamie. I mean, the big mistake was Syracuse. Yeah. What they were thinking. Yeah. I thought I was going to go. I like right there. Yeah. It, this all worked out personally.

One of the things you talked about the last time I saw you when you were explaining to some of

“the people behind the program about how you come in and how you have to change the culture.”

And you were talking about people just competing every day on anything. And I thought it was so fascinating. I just want you to explain it. Like, just explain it the way you explain, like, just how you your mindset of day after day after day. I want everybody pitted against each other

in some way. Yeah. So I think you always wonder where you stand on a team. You always wonder.

And you just never get this feedback. I was talking actually was in the book The Cubs Way, if you've seen the book The Cubs Way. And it was talking about a mad and what he and Theo did with this team. And he was talking about, you know, in the minor leagues, they'd cut a guy and never really tell him why. And then he'd see him years later and he'd be like, man, it was just you weren't doing this or that. And he's like, he had a sort of a profile moment where the guy was like,

why didn't you tell me that when I was there? I would have worked on that. And now I felt like that was, I was like, you know what, that's what this thing has to be. And this started way before, but that's just sort of solidified the idea of it. Just constant feedback, constant feedback. Am I winning? Am I losing? Am I getting better? And I don't need to compare myself to other people. I need to compare myself to myself a day ago. That's ultimately what we're trying to do here

on a day-to-day basis. But if you don't put them in situations to succeed and fail,

“then I think they're guessing. And to me, why say it all the time, the leading causes success is”

well-managed failure. Well-managed failure. Any successful thing you did in your life, you're probably failed at it first or a couple times at it first. And it's just, you're going to learn that lesson. It's got to try to cut a little bit. And then you get into the part of the leading cause of failure is mismanaged success. So they both, you're successful, but do I forget about the why I got there? Right. And now am I feeling like I've arrived? I'm entitled to this now and what does that do?

And you're going to watch yourself fail pretty quickly. So to me, the other side of this was,

I'll never forget playing Southern Columbia was the name of the team. They were all black uniforms

at home. Their field was down. And you had to walk down this like no laptop road from the locker room. And you were wearing white because you were the away team. And you heard them come down the thing. And you could just, their cleats hit the ground different than your cleats hit the ground. Right. And then when they walked on that field like they looked different. They played different. They felt different. And to them, they didn't think anything of it. Right. To us, it felt like

this energy and there was like a hurricane. You know, but they were just in the eye of the hurricane. It was good. They were good. But for us, you're like, how do I, I want to break through that thing. And it's not that easy to do. I think that's no different to me in your personal journey on success and confidence. I don't think that you could have any success if you don't have confidence. And confidence is just a belief initially, right. But then you have this confidence, right.

You could then start to have success. And then with a little bit of success, might create a little more confidence, which might create a little more success, which might create a little more confidence. And that's right. Now you start spinning, you know, like in this little vortex, like I said, and you're in the eye to hurricane. Everybody's looking at you like, holy shit. This guy's got it figured out, man. He is unstoppable.

That to me is what you're trying to create. But you can't build confidence if you don't give them moments to succeed and have these micro successes over and over and over again every single day. And these failures, these failures so that they could get better and learn and become something

that may be they weren't a day ago. So that's ultimately what this whole thing is built on.

We're not just competing for the hell of it and to keep score and embarrass people or doing it to have these micro successes, which we'll bring. But you're doing stuff like everybody's split. No weightlifting group. Everything. Five different things. Explain some of that. Yeah. Yeah. So we come in in the winter and we'll go through a couple of

they didn't know yet to give them a couple of weeks with each other. And then we'll pull the fastest, you know, the number one fastest, one through five and then number one strongest, one through five.

All right. So the fastest guy will go with a fifth strongest guy. The second fast we'll go with the

fourth strongest guy and it'll work this way that way. And then they become the team. So we were B-R-U-I-N, right. So we're the Bruins. Right. So as we went through that, they draft the whole team, which is now kind of cool. Because we publicized now. It's a competitive draft results. Of course, it's picked last. Who was picked first? All the things that come with that. And then their team is set to compete every single day. So we go out on that field and their station set up five

different stations. Might be sled pushes ropes, tug of war, whatever it is. But before you go to bed, that night, you get a, the email comes out or the text comes out. And it's like bill against Bob, the entire day. So you're like, oh shit. Right. So now, so now I'm measuring myself against you for the next day. That's right. And really what you're doing too is it's teaching how to prepare. Like if I know it's going to be a hard day, probably going to go to bed a little bit earlier,

probably going to hydrate a little different. I'm going to figure out what I got to do to be at Pete performance. Because I know I'm going against you. But then there's other moments where

“I think this will be an easy one. I don't need to really worry about it. But all of that score gets”

kept, gets publicized, and the team wins based on it. So how many days before people were like, I get, I get what's going on. Yeah. I think it happens pretty quick. Yeah. I think it happens really quick. For the most, you know, fierce competitors. Yeah. And we break our, like in my mind, our competitors, right, you have guys that just survive and they're just getting through it. And then you got these other guys that are competitors that will be pushed and push, like not push

other people, but be pushed, but you got to kind of outside motivate them. Then you got these dominant competitors. These guys don't need any pushing. They will win all the time. But then you got the other one, the ultimate competitor. And this is a guy that is the dominant competitor, but brings other people with him. Right. And there's a big difference in our, I love Tom Brady going to Tampa Bay. Right. The one, the example I love too is don't floaty playing for the, what's the stampede for

all those years, right? And winning great cup after great cup of any gets traded to the Allowets, the worst team in all of Canadian and wins there. The one guy goes in there and does that. So that, that's a dominant competitor. Right. Or the ultimate competitor. Right. And then you have the dominant competitor. He can do it, but he's not bringing other people. Then you have the competitor that's got to be outside, you know, motivated and they have the survivor that's just watching the clock and

trying to get through the day. And they start to fall into these buckets. And they start to understand, you know, who they are. We define that for them. So they could self identify and then eventually correct whatever they got to correct. So, you know, that stuff starts happening right away. And you see who kind of rises to the top. You know, I mean, basketball is probably the best, one of the things I love about basketball is you're measuring these guys by stats and all these

different things. But the guys who actually won had that extra quality, like we need to talk about the ultimate competitor that bring everybody up. And that's like Bill Russell and Duncan and Bird Magic 100% where you either either caught up to them or they got ready. Yeah, you're not, you're not, like taking a day off with Michael Jordan and that's not going to happen.

“Yeah. And he ain't taking a day off. Yeah. Right. So send you packed. That's right. So that's what”

you're looking for. And that's hard to find. You know, you don't have a ton of those on any team. Well, so when you show up or you're like, who's by, yeah, who are many, yeah, you don't have a couple of these guys looking. And you're here. You hear people talking and you see people that have clout, why do they have the clout of a popular or are they looking at the competitor? That's the question. And that's what you're trying to kind of sit through and figure out. And every day we

film it all, we watch it all, we we grade it all. Like that's all part of the process. Yeah, that's, I don't know why more people don't think this way. Because even like my daughter's

first club soccer coach, you step these Friday games and it would be like these three and three

games and it would be, you know, you keep going and then the winner would win and some of the parents were like, oh, this is bad. Like my kid, my kid getting up on a bad team, they lost. It's like that's not why he's doing this. He's trying to figure out week after week, who were the two kids that always end up in the finals that it doesn't matter who's on their team. He's trying to teach

“them certain habits. But that's, that's right. You know, it's interesting. And that's why I think”

it's just honest with us. They got to be vulnerable. The score pops up and they suck that day and got to eat it in front of the team and they got to live with it in front of the team. And that's all just part of it. So is there a moment when you feel, obviously it's like you're rowing and everybody's rowing in different directions where you kind of, there's this one day or one moment or you were like, oh, we're on the same boat now. I can see it. And those moments, I have screen shots

of them. Like I'll never, you know, I'll never forget it assumption the first time like the, the

centers in his stance pointing at like this linebacker that's fake blitzing, who's pointing back at him. And then over there's some kid talking shit to the quarterback from the third level. Then the other kids coming up. And you just see this thing. You're like, oh, this is like, it's how this is if they love this, they love this game. Their buddies, they're talking tons of shit. They are

Right. So when did that happen here? You know, I think it's a more recent thing. You know, I think today was really a step that I felt different. Yeah, like I felt because I was coming. Yeah, probably we thought you were out there. So I told them all they have to practice. So it's up there. It's not true. That's right. No, but today felt like it today felt like I mean,

the offense is always going to be a little bit behind the defense, right? Because defense just gets

her run around with their hair on fire and make plays. And then the offense eventually catches up. And today felt competitive as hell out there. I felt like they were having fun. And we could just stay out there and practice. I brought him up. And then we called it, you know, like they thought practice is over and we went into an overtime period. So we did the overtime ones, you know, however we did it. And then after, you know, we brought him up again. And they're like double over

time. Like they didn't want to leave that field today. And to me, that's a good sign. Like they could, we could stay out there for three more hours. And they would have loved every minute of it. Can you talk about your quarterback without going into coach speak? Yeah, I can. Okay. Yeah,

“I sure can. I, I think, you know, first I, I empathize with what he went through last year. It was”

so long to be up to this point in time in his collegiate life. You know, he was the villain in college football for a minute there, right? And he's so far from that. Like he is an unbelievable young man from an unbelievable family. Cares a lot about his all of his eight, I believe siblings has a mother and father at home who love him and support him to no end and, you know, a brother on the team. And it's pretty awesome to watch this guy, you know, just go out here and compete every day.

He's one of them, too. That'll be, you know, hands under, you know, ready to snap the ball and talk it some shit to somebody else out there. You know, that he's a fierce fierce competitor and a really, you know, unbelievable person that has the attention of this team. Can you have a quarterback that's not a fierce competitor? It depends on what happens. I think it depends on what's around him. I would say any names, but there's NFL guys at one Super Bowl that had unbelievable

defenses, unbelievable returners in the special teams game, you know, and really ran the ball and all they want to do is try to put it on fourth down and that turn it over and the defense managers will

“take care of us. You can do that. But it's a lot harder to do that way and you have to be really”

buttoned up and dominant on the other sides. When it's pretty even in a league like we play in we're probably teams will be talent more talented than us. It's sort of positions in certain moments of the year. You know, you need a guy, like you need a guy, like you need a guy. Because he's the one every time I tell everybody that you're gonna win at least eight games. They're like, oh, and then then I want to put the quarterback and I'm like, well, he's definitely talented, right? Yes. And,

you know, you have all these transfers that's the other thing people can't figure out. Yeah. What do you have? How many transfers do you have? I think we'd 54. I think we had it up with. I mean, did you think you were gonna end up with? Oh, man. I don't. Did you think it was going to be like over 50? Like, did you have any idea? You know, so this was the interesting part. We showed

up here on the third of January. Yeah. And that's when I think the portal opened on the third.

So the portal opened on the third and later that day we had 17 kids come and visit on the third. Got? So think about it. Now we're in school because we're on the quarter system. Yeah. So the semester started. So the whole team's in here and as the whole team's sitting in this room, you're looking like, all right, I got to grab a meeting with this kid and a grab a meeting with that kid. I got to figure out if they're staying, but you don't have time to really do that a lot

because of the fact that you're bringing in 17 other kids and you're parading them around, well, your team's lifting in the weight room. You know, doing what they're doing in this guy might not be staying. Thank you so much. And then the agents are calling and everything else is happening. And eventually, like, we can't, yeah, we're not going to get to his number. He could go. He can go. He can go. Some of you are interested in how you do this and also have a family. Yeah, yeah. Well,

my family wasn't here. So I was living in that hotel right there. Yeah. And then that hotel for 60 days. Yeah. And it was what it was. You don't want your family here at the beginning because you're

never going to see him anyway. Yeah. And I think it just was, it's part of it. So that was ultimately

you know, bringing together an entire team and coaches, by the way. Then now you're going into an official visit. You met these guys. We had some of them three days ago. You don't really know them. And you're trying to speak the same language through these official visits and figure it all out. Yeah. You know, next thing you know, there you have it. But the number grew when kids laughed or saw how many kids were coming by. Eventually, I remember having to go to the weight room and say to our

current team, like, look, stop it. Like, stop having your agents call, stop worrying about who we're bringing in. We're going to get to 105 guys on this team. Right. I don't care where you go. You're not going somewhere where there's not seven or eight running backs. Right. Going somewhere there's not 20 some offence alignment. You're not going somewhere where there's not 10 safety's

“and eight corners. You're not going like that's what all these rosters are built. So you can go somewhere.”

But no, if you go somewhere, I was probably bringing someone else to. You're not going to go somewhere and be the only running back on the team. So relax. If you like it here, if you value this education, if you like what you see so far from all of us, just stay. If you don't leave, and that was ultimately, you know, what we just had to eventually get to, and then the good and bad of the quarter system is that the kid visits on the third school start

later in that window, we would tell them if you're coming out here and you like it, just, you know, the pack of bag, you got to fly somewhere. So they have to fly back to their aunt's house somewhere in Arizona or wherever and then come back because they couldn't really stay there to fly out and come back. So we had that set up for guys, like to be able to understand that, you know, you got to move in quick to school started. Then the quarter ended, you know, wherever it ended and guys were

still in the portal, that allowed us to bring a couple of guys in before spring will start it. So it's almost like we had two windows, you know, as I'm fortunate, because most of the time I've been at places where school starts on January 27th. So the portal opened on the third, you have all that time to build your team. Right. We start school on the third, the same day the portal opens. Like that's kind of a, you know, I don't want to say you inherited like a losing culture,

but it wasn't going great here. Yeah. And it's like you've got to basically pour disinfecting all over the place and try to reinvigorate stuff and change, yeah, make it an optimistic situation

“and then pessimistic one. That's right. And I think that's what it's been for a little while,”

like if it's going to go wrong, you know, it's probably going to happen here. It's going to go wrong here with with with us. And I think coming in and I think being on the outside, looking in,

you didn't really see the power of this UCLA, you know, degree university. I said it a million times.

There's first round draft picks in Olympic gold medalists walking around in the athletic department. And then there's future CEOs and lawyers and doctors and everybody else walking around this campus at a regular students. Like you have a chance to breathe some pretty rare air as you walk around here and we're one good football team away from being arguably the most dominant athletic department in the country. We want three national championships this year and eight conference

championships. I don't know if we might already be the most dominant, but if you don't have a good football team, it's hard to say that you are that. So, you know, that's what we're charged with. And that's what we're excited to do. But you're right. The biggest way to win is first stop losing. Stop doing the things that the losing teams do. And I think that is, which is being unprepared

during the week being undecciplined, not really worrying about yourself first, right? Not putting

“the team first. Do I get credit over the team? All that's done. And that's what breaks team's”

apart. Yeah, I think we are keep identifying it. He only mentioned these three guys in the post games speech. I had seven Newyards where I should. We just got to keep talking about the team, the team, the team, ultimately is what this entire thing, you know, has to be built on and everybody's got to understand that. And then in the end, for us, we'll treat them and how they treat the team. And if they treat the team well, they'll get it back, you know, well, if they don't, they won't.

And I think that's life though, right? Like you get whatever you give, you know, if you're again, kind of a shitty person, you're probably going to have, they're probably going to be shitty. Being a few, everybody is like, they don't like me and they're, they're this and they're that, well, it's probably what you are to them. But it's kind of the way the world I believe works. So our guys understand that and keep fighting that fight. Speaking of shitty, people don't

realize you're abject catered for USC, that you really concealed that. Now, I'm just trying to get a trouble. But you see, USC is your big rival though. Yes. Yes. I'm ready for it to come back. Yeah. I don't feel like it's ever fully been cooking. Yeah. The entire time I looked there, since 2002, it was like, this is because the USC, all of those, everybody who went there, all the alumni, they'll hate UCLA and vice versa. Yeah. And yet, we don't really get a

chance to battle that much. Yeah, that's healthy, I guess, right? Yeah, we got to change it. It's underrated rather than, because people think about like Duke UNC and, you know, it's just in general, like for the schools, but I don't think people realize there's a lot of animosity to get them to battle. You know, we got to get it back. It's got to be a lot more competitive, you know, we got to set the mean about Lincoln Riley and stuff. I enjoyed meeting them,

it seems like a great guy. Why do you think you got underestimated over and over again with these

“coaching searches? I think that you got to, it's going to be, it's easy, it's lazy to do,”

right? And lazy to say is, hey, he never coach there, that's easy, right? Like it's a very easy thing

for anybody to say. And I think for me, again, from D3 to D2 to FCS, he wrote it, yeah, but that's right. And I think that's, always what it's going to be, till you, till you prove it. So I don't, there's not a minute that I worry about, you know, what anybody on the outside says, because I've lived it so many times over, you know, to me it's not a lot of winning the last 10 years. Yeah, it's not about any of that. It's about what do we believe in this room for

good about everybody else, right? And I'd say the other thing that I try to make sure our guys know is that you don't, don't read the good, right? Because then if you read the good right now, because we're great right now, right? We have played a game like everybody loves us, it's unbelievable, it's phenomenal, undefeated like it is all what it is. It's when, you know, the tough times show up, you know, you're not going to want to hear what they have to say on the outside.

And those that were your biggest supporter sometimes become your biggest opposition. And for me, I want to know that we're doing it right in this room. Yeah, that's true. This is like the perfect time right now. Yes. It's like you're on the second date with somebody you might

movies and get some nice things right here. Perfect. Right. That's perfect. What's the number one thing

“you're getting from UCLA fans when people meet you and they talk to you. What did they say?”

Hey, they have energy man. They got energy. They got some juice right now. Like, they're desperate. They are, I don't feel desperate. I feel hope. And I feel like gratitude. And I feel like excitement, you know, I feel like there's a belief. And what is, well, you got to believe it long before you ever see it, right? And it takes all of them and that there's a village of people that we need to support this and they're doing an unbelievable job. But we've had an event on the over there at the hotel.

And I think last year there was a hundred people that was close to 400, you know, in this donor data that we had the other day. And just, you know, the energy they got for this, the excitement they have for this, you know, this time around they feel like it's going to be different. And it will be, well, it's like Lewis Cage has done helped us with PR at the ringer and me personally for you. I haven't seen him in 10 years and then he showed up today for this. Yeah. And I just thought that

he's locked in, he's UCLA fan. That was vitally. It was great to finally meet on person again.

And see him talk to him. When's the first game? It's September 5th. Are you playing? Cal. That cal. I think I'm going to the Michigan game. Yeah, do it. Yeah, do it. That's good. I got a lot of girl soccer this, this is my daughter's last season. So I have a pack schedule, but I'm coming to at least two. I'm coming to a couple of home games too.

“Yeah, this is my new team. Yes, you have to. You have to support it. This is, I have a lot of”

stake here. You have to do it for me. I know you do. We will, we will do that. And we have, we expect a lot from

you too, though. Yeah, you got to tell me what else you expect. Yeah. I'm happy to be like, I'm trying to

think of like the positive adult in the sports in the college sports movie. I don't want to be like the JT wash, blue chips character. Yes, it just comes in the screams that you know. No, no, no. We'll talk about what we'll just be hard of that. Let's talk about a little bit more. I want to be like the guy in Hoosiers. It's just in the stands room for everybody. Just like positive and happy. That's you. Yeah, not sure. I'm not the drunk that fit your person. Yeah, just let him be the happy guy. All right. Good luck. I'm glad

you're here. Yeah, man. Thanks for thanks for hopefully turning around. You're so helpful, Bob. Yeah. Well,

“thanks for being here. And honestly, thanks from the beginning. You know, I remember talking to Casey”

about the whole thing and you said you had a conversation with you and then you sent me the list. Yeah. They had some preliminary list and I'm like, where's Chesney? I was going. Yeah. Right. And then you just kept winning. You like, right? Well, it won't be here without you brother. So I appreciate it. Well, you'd be here either way. But I was happy to play a small, small, tiny part. I appreciate it. Good luck this is. Thanks, man. I should. All right. That's it for the podcast.

Thanks the house. Thanks to Bob Chesney and everybody you see a way for helping out. Thanks to Gahau and Eduardo as well. Thanks to Jesse, who somehow joined the pod today, even though the Dodgers are in semi-free fall. Glad he was here. I'm going to be back on this speed on Tuesday, fantasy time, fantasy football. We're doing it. The big preview is going to be on Tuesday and rewatchables Monday and Paul 13. So see you later in the week.

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