(upbeat music)
The Rhyber Solo Show is presented by Traff King's. A show you'll look forward to taking as soon as the game is over. The Knicks and all timer. Last night, up three one in the series,
winning game for the largest comeback
βand B final history, I will break down all my thoughts.β
The plays that you'll remember, the plays that we'll forget. We're gonna do more, Steve Novak, who's in the building last night, play for the next, even ran into Josh Hart this morning.
What did you have to say? So, a ton on one of the all-time games in final history, and we're gearing up for the World Cup, Alexi Wallace on this U.S. men's national teams' chances, that he thinks they need to make it through the group.
And kind of where this sport is in our country, 30 plus years after his 94 team run and life advice. This summer, the Cup is taking over the U.S. and only Traff King's has you covered every step of the way. The Traff King's Sports App is now available
on all 50 states and includes all markets, bringing the game straight to your fingertips wherever you are. From Florida to Texas to California, you're in on the excitement at the speed of sports. Follow every group stage upset, every knockout round thriller,
every stoppage time moment that flips the whole tournament, sweat all the matches you love in real time with a seamless experience built for the world's biggest stage.
No matter where you're watching, you're always connected.
And in the game with one app, new Traff King's customers, sign up to the Code Ryan. It's been five bucks to get 200 rewards within 21 days. That's Code Ryan, RYE and in partnership with Traff King's, the crown is yours.
I'm not quite sure how to introduce what I'm gonna say. Five things, saying I have five things after the last night's game.
βThat will be a game that all of us rememberβ
for the rest of our lives. That is one of the most incredible games I've ever seen. I don't know, I have one on the sit here, rank it, grand emotionally, I'm not super attached to it, but as far as like what actually happened,
the next to complete the greatest comeback and NBA final history, sure, top five, top 10, whatever all sorts of things. Things that we're going to forget that I wish I wouldn't forget.
Things that I've already forgot the next morning, watching the third and fourth quarter's all over again. It's just one of those moments
you're never going to forget if you stayed in it
for the two plus hours for game four. So the next lead, the series, three one after another comeback. So five things. The next now have five 20 points more comebacks in the playoffs, the rest of the NBA combined has four.
Game one against Cleveland down 22 in the fourth quarter they come back, but that was Cleveland. I expected that kind of stuff against Cleveland. The spurs are up 32, 17 in the first quarter. That wasn't the final score of the first quarter,
but when they reached 15 points, a 15 point lead, that was the largest lead in the NBA finals. Up 41, 22, after the first quarter, San Antonio shooting 65% from the floor at the next were 29%, at half time, 76, 49.
The largest lead for a road team in NBA finals history. All culminating in the biggest comeback in the final history going back to the 2008 NBA finals where I was there, Boston against LA. Number two, Brunson and Kat.
So at half time, Kat gets six points. Only two shot attempts, grenadially played,
744, because you get a second personal foul on the challenge
where the spurs challenge the foul in Wimbledon, Yama, where Kat hooked his arm. It was overturned. I felt like I was taking fucking crazy pills last night. He hooks his arm.
The off arm hook thing, and then dragging somebody with you, I don't know why that wouldn't be overturned. And the block was cleaned at the top, and it was actually a really smart challenge even though normally I hate any challenge that early,
because it was gonna get a second foul on Kat and top everything else. I felt like I was disagreeing with legs and RJ. My two guys, I thought I was disagreeing with them all night in the broadcast, and then I went online,
dipped my toes in that world for a little bit, and seemed like so many people thought it was an awful overturned. I did not. Anyway, Kat, only three field goal attempts through three quarters. Granted, we missed a huge chunk of that first quarter.
We got some hot party in there. We're granted it was like, hey, hot party. Wimbledon Yama, shove him. And aside, I counted four times Wimbledon Yama was shoved in the air on lobs.
It's actually brilliant from the next, 'cause you don't get free throws from it. I do wonder, because it's gonna happen when Wimbledon Yama is so much, if it'll be potentially a rule change.
But that's the move, and it's smart by the next to do it. If he is going up for the lob, and you're underneath him, just shove him, because he's not gonna get free throws. There was even a rebounding attempt,
where I couldn't believe he didn't get free throws, and he was shoved in the back, that would be like a fifth time, but it didn't count in the lob category.
βSo that's why Kat doesn't have a lot of shots,β
but then you have Brunson's first quarter, where he's over three in the first quarter, and now you're starting to go like,
What's tomorrow are gonna be like?
They're down 41, 22. Kat foul trouble. And after the game two thing, there's a lot of Kat stuff after game three, you're like, wait a minute,
maybe he's not gonna be final MVP. Brunson, the shooting numbers, the turnovers,
the net rating stuff over three in the first quarter,
like, I don't know, they're gonna come back from down 20, like, probably, so like, they'll probably get back into this game. Now, granted, the half, I didn't think the next were coming back, right?
But down that early, that soon, with Spurs are just hitting everything. But I did all of these thoughts, when you do this job, certainly, which is kind of annoying the way I have to watch sports,
but you're like, what is tomorrow going to be like on the TV shows for Brunson and Kat, based on some of these numbers? And it also is just a reminder to how much the day after commentary is just pointless filler,
just stacking thoughts on top of each other. But then it's, hey, maybe versus definitive statements,
βand unfortunately, the only way that it really worksβ
in the industry is to make all these definitive statements, including kind of like the small guard stuff. Like if Brunson, if they lost this game and Brunson has a bad shooting night, it's just like, you know, this small guard thing,
and here's the thing, nobody would say,
hey, let's get really small, I'm a GM, what are you going to do? I want to get real small in the back court. I won't mind, main guy. I want my number one option to be smaller than everybody else. Nobody would want that.
Nobody would prefer to build out your team that way. But for me personally, and I'm not even saying this because they're up three one now, but even if it were two two and he had a bad night, I'm like, I don't know.
I feel like proof of concept, at least for Brunson, is that having Brunson doesn't make it impossible when you're early in the NBA finals. But that stuff would have crept in. So Brunson scoring 15 points in the second quarter
was probably a huge part of his second half in his closing moments, 'cause he was, you know, at the time, I was like, I look like he's playing for free throws right now. You know, he's gonna have to just take it upon himself.
Oh, geez, keep him in the game with all of his offense, but you're not getting any of them cat bridges had another one of those nights where he ended up getting benched. The bench is doing absolutely nothing, like nothing. I think there was 19 minutes,
I counted a bench minutes in the first quarter, zero points from any one of the next. And then he just goes off, right? The next actually scored 27 points in the second quarter, shot 50% over off from the floor,
but they were getting murdered on the three differential. They were a minus 18 on three point makes in that second quarter. San Antonio, 14 threes in the first half, 54% from the three in the first half, that's a record for most threes and a half
of any NBA finals game. And, you know, you end up having fronts and closed this thing out with shot after shot, including that three against one Medyama, to cut it to one where I think at least
them getting right offensively in that second quarter, led to them having any kind of chance to coming back in this game. All right, so let's get to the second half number three.
So the spurs, the score 76 in the first half, had 30 points in the second half, which is the lowest second half or lowest half of the season,
βwhich I believe the previous lowest 41 points.β
I saw that this morning. I'm not sure if I believe that number. So if that were the case, like, well, at least we know the 30 is real. 30 points in the second half after scoring 76,
they would have needed five quarters playing the way they did in the second half to even match what they scored in the first half. The second half shooting quarter by quarter, 20%, 17%, the third quarter, 21%, 20% from three in the fourth quarter.
So basically 20% for an entire half. Let's look at what they did. In the third quarter, I counted five, three point attempts with 15 or more seconds left on the shot clock. We were, you know you saw it too.
It's like, all right, guys. Like, I know you hit everything and all those shots went in in the first half, but now you're up 30 points. Maybe maybe dilat back a little bit here.
No, and they missed almost all of them. Women Yama took a shot at 10, 50 to go in the third quarter, took another shot at 10, 35 to go. His next field goal attempt was at 230 left in the third quarter. He went eight, 15 without a shot attempt
and it's not because he was fouled because he didn't get to the free third line and it's not because Kornet played in that middle chunk, because women Yama only went to the bench for 58 seconds in the entire second half.
Women Yama was not great last night. However, deciding to play five out again and have them set up all these screens
and never give them a ballback.
I'll never, ever, I'm still pissed off about it. I can't believe they do it. And I know like, hey, look at the shooting and he took 14 shots, he had nine. There's like two possessions where he tips it
βa bunch of times where I think those two possessionsβ
lead to actually six shot attempts for a second half totals. Number four, how would you expect a lineup of Brunson Alvarado and Kat on the back line, although usually he's up around the three-point line
because they have women Yama 30 feet away from the fucking hoop all the time.
How would you expect that group to survive defensively?
Apparently, awesome. So this is something else. There's so many things from this game last night. This is something else. They put OG on Fox.
Alvarado's on Vicell and Brunson's trying to sort of like, I understand you're not going to like run the offense through Vicell to attack Alvarado even though it's like, hey, Alvarado like extended out on ball is in the fight and like they're letting these guys play.
But OG is on Fox and I probably could have made this number higher if I wanted to, but under five minutes to go, I have them attacking OG and an OB of all the options that are out there. And you would still think like, if Kat's back line,
you can't be that worried about it like Kat to me having to move defensively is a much more challenging thing than him being able to just body up against something which we've already covered all this time. But then when be is so far extended like Kat's not even in there.
They're not putting OG on them. They put OG on Fox and then they have Fox attack OG six times under five minutes to go. One of the best defenders in the league
like I was debating putting them first team all defense.
And you're watching this going, what, what do you guys say to each other? And you know, we can sit there and talk about like, hey, they're young, right?
βDid the spurs lose last night because they're young?β
Well, who are they're like two confident guys that were out there? I mean, when be shooting nights in Matthew, Mrs. those two free throws, which is huge, just gonna like there's gonna be some stink on
when be if they don't win this series, which is saying a lot to come back and have to win three straight now between the turnover and game two and the two miss free throws that would have put them up three last night.
Like the shooting numbers again, I think are a little unfair because of those tip and misses.
Castle who doesn't make any shots in the second half,
but his free throws, he was like the one guy he and Harper, I should say two guys that felt like, all right, let me try to get something going here. Now, granted, they're not hitting any three's, but they're at least attacking and in the case of Fox,
a lot of this is settling 'cause he can't get past OG or they're not running any kind of switch at all. I mean, they had one play where they sent it, women, yamma, it's like, okay, it's been way too long, like we need to get him a touch.
And then they end up with him like, when ISO against cat, but his feet are on the three point line. And it's like, you know, those drives just aren't really there for you the way they are in the regular season, which is a bigger women, yamma topic altogether.
So Fox is supposed to be the guy and he puts together five minutes of some of the worst basketball decisions that you're gonna see in a big time moment, all right? Which we'll get to.
βNumber five, what will you remember from this night?β
Let's run through a bunch of these plays. 'Cause like, as a fan base, if you're a spurs fan, I didn't even know why you're listening to this today, I don't know how you could possibly watch a ESPN all day, like go outside, say something nice to an old person,
or yourself, a nice criminal in the middle of the day. Just go for a walk, I can't fathom what it would feel like. But when heart misses that layup, I'm gonna like, are the next gonna come all the way back? And then lose this, like when you just rather get your ass kicked
by 30 points. So let's run through it, all of these plays. There's even more that we could get into, okay? But so many of these things will be forgotten. So we're just gonna keep it in the archives
and have this being a time capsule, when audio time capsule for years. When everybody was just to lead all these pods, like 70 years, probably. All right, so brush and hit's a three to make it 14103 San Antonio.
And it's a three against one, man, y'all. All time, just Sam Cousel type pick once. Fox then turns it over. That leads to heart with the breakout layup, whereas clearly caught in between decisions.
And when he misses that layup with 157 left, I'm like, man. I'm like, they're gonna lose. And it's like, what is heart, imagine if it's two two
βand spurs when a title and heart has missed that layup?β
Like, what is that, like how much does heart's life change? I'm serious. If heart misses that layup, what you did, spurs pull this off, even up the series, when an NBA championship,
Josh Part's life is different forever. I don't think that's an overstatement. He misses that, spurs get the board. OG fouls, women, y'all. On a nice player with Ashley,
getting going towards the hoop and he misses both free throws, which we would have made at 106103. Jalen hits the floater with 122.
That's the next first lead of the game, 105104.
They're first lead of the game with 122 left.
Castle drives baseline steps out of bounds,
βbut at least Castle understood the assignment last night,β
especially with this putrid spurs offense that either doesn't have anyone to settle them down, doesn't listen to their coaches, or the coach can't seem to get the messaging across, that we may have to adjust some things.
And I don't know, move from time to time on offense. I also think heart flopped on that baseline drive, but whatever they got the turnover on that. So then Bronson ends up missing his next shot, which could have been a tie-up.
It was kind of a shock-lock violation because it was an airball, all right? To stay on the, hey, let's attack the best defender in the game right now, that's not women, y'all, but at least on the next side of things for OG.
Fox Isos against him. He misses, heart of all people who's just missed the layup, you would expect him to miss a box out in this huge moment. He misses it because Castle is still at least locked in aggressively.
He beats heart to the offensive board, heart's not even in a play, really. Just completely loses him. And then Castle is set to line. I'm like, is he gonna hit both of these?
Is this guy gonna hit both of these?
I will always think about stuff on Castle.
Is even though the offensive possession could drive me crazy, even though he's good for two absolutely stupid fouls.
βAnd I think he probably fouls like 15, 20 times a gameβ
anyway, but whatever. Him making those two free throws in that moment, looking at Marbury can be viewing all of those dudes, Derek Harper, don't know, not sure, don't think so. And hit those two free throws in that look on his face,
I will always feel a little bit better than Castle after those two free throws than I did say yesterday, afternoon. So then you have another Brunson miss which leads to Fox chasing down the ball
where he has it in his hands with 12 seconds left and he's on the left side of the rim going out of all people, OG and Adobe. And OG and Adobe is maybe the best in the playoffs at this right now,
back pedaling, intransition, on defense,
and still contesting the shot.
It's the worst guy to do it against. That scenario was so much harder than the chase down block, I don't think anybody would necessarily disagree with that. Fox, who I don't know what he was thinking. Was he thinking he had to step and then I'm deer and Fox,
and I'm faster than everybody else, even though he'd played just horrible basketball
βand that one, three that he made for a long stretchβ
to close off this game. Maybe he didn't want to take the free throws, which is certainly something that happens with some of these players, like man, these are gonna be huge free throws,
like let me just go over the rim right now 'cause I don't even want to feel what that's gonna feel like at the free throw line. But it's a disastrous decision. It cannot be argued any other way.
This is not something where there's two sides. There is no debate topic on this Fox layup attempt. He's going at the worst possible guy to go up against. If he just turns left, they're running at least five to seven seconds left,
so that means maybe there's seven to six, five seconds left in the entire game and you're going to the free throw line. It's an all-time mistake. So, the way Hart's layup will be forgotten.
Fox's layup will be remembered. Probably forever is their down three won and it doesn't feel all that good. So, now the next half of the ball, they're inbounding after the foul
to give as used on Alvarado. Five point seven left to inbound. They don't defend the inbounder OG. You don't want to waste women y'all but defending that.
I don't think maybe I could be tucked into it. I don't have a problem with OG over there 'cause he's so far away. They're running bruncin' on the entire opposite side of the core.
They run a screen to bring bruncin' up which actually allows them to switch into women y'all. So, you can even argue that didn't make a ton of sense. And then bruncin' let it fly with four point six left, which I've heard people say it's a great shot
because it gave as team a chance or offense to rebound. Yeah, you think it'd be it missed it and then OG doesn't get the tip. People would've thought that was a great shot.
No fucking way, but I'll allow it. And then OG, who's waving for the basketball as Fox comes to bruncin' to help women y'all against bruncin' which you could say was another mistake by Fox.
But I don't think it was. I think the plan was double bruncin' because what happens when the guy hits a shot and he's a single coverage? Even if it's women y'all me, you're like,
how are you not doubling bruncin'? So, I think that was probably the call and none of my mistake by Fox. I don't even think it was necessarily all that much of a mistake because you probably
would love bruncin' a swing it back to OG and then now OG's in a rush to take some shot or he's not entirely settled. Despite the fact that he's made everything now for what feels like weeks.
But I don't look at that as a mistake by anyone. I don't look at as a mistake by the, I just think it's greatness for Moji to go in, control the ball on enough and just reroute it back in.
It's one of the all-time games.
It is one of the all-time games
βand one of those that I'll never forget where I was.β
- What if you could add an AI assistant to your work without leaving your workflow? Built in a Microsoft Word Excel and Outlook Copilot works for your work. Helping you to do more in the apps you already use.
In Word Copilot helps turn scattered notes into a first draft. I gotta be honest with you. We do the ads. I was like, yeah, I'll check it out.
I'll get to it. I put it off for a little while. It works. I'm honestly ashamed how much it works.
And at first I'd be like, come on.
You know my sentence is better than I do. I talked for a living Copilot and then it's like, hey, that actually sounds better. I'm telling you, get in. - The apps you know go further with Copilot.
Learn more at m365copilot.com/work. Steve Novak joins us and he was in the building. I don't know if he was sitting next to Marber and can be in Patrick Ywing and all those guys. I don't know how the legends seat chart works.
But he's doing pretty imposed game for MSG. He's been a big part of the coverage of the mix. Let's talk about the NBA Finals man. Good to see you. - It's good to see you.
- Yeah, this is quite the morning. Waking up the morning after I just, if I look like I haven't slept, it's because I haven't slept right now. It's just downstairs with Josh Hart getting my coffee
and all my goodness. The things he had to say about OG, he said it in the post game press or two, but man, this city is just, you can feel it.
I mean, everybody's just kind of still buzzing from last night. - Well, maybe we just start there if you ran in a heart this morning. Is there anything that you can share with us? Again, maybe you guys talked about some safety can't share.
But just, I don't know what it would be like. Now, I don't know who would have a harder time sleeping than next to the spurs. But what did you get from Hart today? - Yeah, nothing too serious, you know, it's at the hotel
and you know, playing in New York City's a little bit different where it's such chaos. And obviously when the team had come back in the town, after the two games in San Antonio, it's the team gets parked at a hotel
because you don't go to your homes 'cause just too much chaos, the president was here.
βThere was secret service getting into the building, was chaos.β
It was just a lot and it was gonna be a lot regardless of who was gonna be there.
And so today's like the first day that the guys
actually get to leave the hotel, there were wives and families where I had the hotel as well. But to go sleep in their own bed for a night 'cause now there's two days in between going back to San Antonio. So, you know, I just love that Josh was down there this morning.
Little coffee shop at the hotel. About 25 people packed in about a 20 square foot coffee shop and everyone's just like, "Josh, we're buzzing. "This is amazing. "There's people sitting outside and Josh, you can tell
"with the game you had last night where he missed that layup "and then missed that box out "and he's been just a stud all season and all playoffs "and made so many big plays." But he was feeling like, and he did say,
this morning like, "Oh my God, thank you for Hoji. "I'm so grateful." And you just knew the weight of the guy who makes a bad play in a big moment like that he got saved by Hoji and literally said, "I cleanse you of your non-box out
"and your mislayup and no one will ever care again "because Hoji was a hero."
βAnd I think that's real, I think he's good, he's good.β
- It's 100% real. I mean, I tweeted about it last night 'cause you're going, you're gonna do all of this work you'd be down 29 and then even, you know, some of these moments where a couple minutes into the third quarter
say, "Hey, the spurs are right back at it." You know, under three minutes in, like you think maybe you're gonna get a next seven-old run at the very start of the first half or excuse me for the second half, right?
- Right. - And then it's like, no, we're right back at 30 and so then you do all of this work in their yard. He's in, but you know what's happening there. He's in between a dunk in a layup.
He's worried about it being contested. So at that point, like the backwards out of it and I was feeling for him prior to the result 'cause I'm going, that is going to be one of those things that this season, or this series is even,
like that's gonna be New York City lore and no one's gonna remember this thing in a couple weeks. - Yes, you know, you don't want to even go back and talk about some of the plays in New York, Nick's history that we liked that,
but they all pop right into your mind when you think about just the dramatic, right? The Reggie Choke and the Miss Layups and big series and stuff like that. And because Josh Hart is the guy that he is,
the player that he is, what he's meant to this team, the performances that he's had, the 3.15 rebounds, six assists, four steals games to get wins. And then like you said, to possibly be remembered for a bad play at the end,
where he made an incredible play to be on the break,
to be in a position, to go get that layup and then for it to not go in. It really is, you know, part of the magic and the lore of playing at MSG and in front of fans in New York City is,
you know, the Tyson quote, "the brighter the lights,
The darker the shadows.
And it's like so much can be going so well
βand feel so good, but in a moment, you know,β
it's like it can get the shadows can be dark with one mislayup and so we both know. It ended on a really, really good note and Hart was a huge part of that. And so man, I hope he's enjoying his coffee this morning.
- Let's go back to that first half.
I picked the spurs. I thought they were the better team. I thought the East basically, all of these teams showed me at least, like any concerns we'd had about them was like, "All of these concerns are like magnify now."
And the next run through all these teams, they're up to O as we know and then I just thought it, it just showed so much about San Antonio to go into that building and get that first one. And then it's like, you know, here we go again,
they're up big. Another double digit lead in the first quarter, the first half, we could talk about shooting variance 'cause there's no way that shooting was gonna stay to the level that it was at,
βwe're talking about the 76 points at halftime.β
Did you start to feel like the series that shifted to the point of like the spurs, were maybe gonna pull this whole thing out, not just game four? - You know, I was in the playoffs five times,
played 11 years, I was on nine teams, I was around great coaches, great guys, great teams. And even in this series, to answer your question, I get almost like embarrassed game to game, when I emotionally and psychologically swing so hard,
like you're saying, after even just a half of basketball, like you're saying, the next up to all they come back, you see the spurs respond when we play a much better game, the spurs young group show, okay, this is why they're here, this is who they are.
They get a win, to your point, very impressive at Madison Square Garden, not easy to do. And then in that first half of game four last night, you do start to have those thoughts trickle in, like the next can't move,
they're unable to pass the ball to each other, the defense is so smothering. You know, is this San Antonio team, and they've just found themselves and the series is over because they are the better team,
and they were the better team for that half, they like you said, scored 76 points, and were just dominant. It felt like the win was taken out of the building at the Garden again, which I thought,
for a team to be good enough to do that, and for Wemby at 22, you know, to be kind of getting Mitch to take a cheap shot and be saying like, "Be smart, I'm in your head." I was thinking, "My God, Wemby might actually
"have skipped two full steps and be good enough "to win a championship."
βAnd so I think they showed all those things,β
and it was impressive. And like you said, you picked them because you thought they were the better team, and they were doing these things in the West. What I just cannot get over with this next team is,
while that was going on in the West, and you're watching the OKC San Antonio series, game one, Wemby has 41 points, 24 rebounds, and they find a way to win game seven on the road. You go, oh my God, the West is where the champ has got to be at,
but the next on the other side are really off, play off when after play off when, by margins that are,
like we've never seen before,
and I couldn't figure out if the next were that good, they were winning by so much, winning play off games and road games by so much, or if this young San Antonio team was really the team that skipped a couple steps and as a 20 year old, in the 21 year old,
in the 22 year old, leading the way. And last night's game was, I feel like that all packaged up again. The first half, you got these young guys acting like the vets, getting vets to get flagrant files, playing incredible defense, making threes,
getting in the pain, getting spray in the ball out to each other, just knocking it down and had a ton of swag. And then the second half happened, and they couldn't score the ball, 76 points in the first half and 30 in the second.
And it now feels like me again to go back to the point of just these wild psychological swings that the nicks are the team of destiny, like with the stats, the numbers, you go like, let's just talk about what's happened,
which is, they came back from down 22 against Cleveland. And they won, and game one of that series is over at that point. Now, they came back from down 29 points, down 27 at half against the spurs, who looked like the showtime lakers in the first half.
And, you know, history will tell us, you know, it'll we'll see how this ages, what this really means if the nicks can close this out if the series is over, or if the spurs have more,
but it's just been like such an incredible example
of what basketball and sport can be because my mind was exploding when that comeback was coming to fruition. What did you see from the second half, whether it was the nicks on defense,
the nicks on offense that swung this game? - You know, I feel like I'm doing MSG pre-game post-game.
You know, me and Wally Zerbieker,
and there with Bill Pito and Alan Han, and we're trying to put numbers together. And we're charting, you know, as a technical file here, there was a time out there, you know, what was it that created the swing?
βAnd honestly, all of that, once the game ended,β
it was like I closed my notebook, and it was like, there's nothing here that we've written besides, you know, 76.1/30 second up. - You're obviously, you're shooting on my entire lifestyle
right now, by the end of these notes matter. - No, you're just kidding. I think they would do. But, you know, in that moment, right, it's like you're coming on and it's your job to say,
like, all right, here's what just happened, right?
You realize like if you say like, you know, OGN and OB head, this many points, and, you know, the defense of numbers where this, you're like, you just missed what just happened. You were like, people just paid $100,000 for tickets, and they actually got their money's worth.
That to me, do you know what I mean? - Right, I mean, it's still a staggering number. I mean, just to prove your point, my father's texting me at halftime being like, imagine being one of those people that spent this amount
of money on one of these tickets, and now, like, granted, if you're going out, drop 100 grand on these two, then things have probably worked out for you in your life, and it's not gonna sting as much as it would brew in somebody else's, like, two-year financial window.
But then you just paid to be part of, maybe the greatest night in the history of that building when it comes to basketball. - Yeah, and so I guess, like you're saying now, you go back and you redo NBA drafts, you know,
when you say, like, all right, if you do it again, who would you take one, two, three, four, five? If you could go back and sell tickets for that game, no one, then that was gonna happen. I guarantee they go for more.
I guarantee there's people flying in from Tokyo going, yeah, we got 400,000 for you to sit, you know, a throw, because, like you said, it's like, this is the next, this is Broadway, this is Madison Square Garden, this is, you know,
a team of destiny, it's been 53 years since they won it, and 27 years since they've been in the finals, and so I was sitting last night at the game between Jeremy Lynn and Eddie Curry. And for the record, Eddie Curry is larger than Jeremy Lynn,
I had more room on my right than I did on my left, and Eddie said to me the same thing your dad texted you. He said to me, can you imagine how pissed these people are? Who paid all this money for the tickets? And I said, I said to him, yeah, I do think they're probably
kind of bomb grade now, and isn't it wild
βthat the only way to actually get your money's worthβ
is to feel like that, and for something wild to happen, like it did, and I didn't expect it, sitting there that first half, you know, I was honestly like a little sick, just because it was the second game in a row at home,
where I didn't believe that there was any way a team that the next went into San Antonio and won the way that they did, you take two games as the underdog against a spurs in their house. There's no way that team or anything that does that
can come back home especially the next to Madison Square Garden where it's a pressure cooker in the greatest basketball environment in the world, and lose two games. That was what I thought coming back to New York. But, and Jeremy Lynn said to me at halftime,
we're eating some sushi, and he said to me, I was just on ESPN pregame before this.
He said, there's never been a team in the finals.
There's never been a series in the finals where the road team has won all four of the first four games. The next one, the first two, in the San Antonio, won the third in New York. And we were down 27 at that point,
βand that was honestly it gave me this like inkling of,β
I said to him, so you're saying, the next we're gonna win. And he said, well, it'll be the first time ever. And we carried on, and then we had a chocolate chip cookie, and we walked back out, and I thought back to that,
and I texted him after, like, Jeremy, I cannot believe you said that, and you were right, and it was, I mean, at the time, it just didn't seem like it was more of a joke than it was an actual stat,
'cause it felt like the game was over. - San Antonio's offense, 30 points in the second half. I can't tell if it's because Fox is in a point guard. I'd say, as I said in the open, like we can get into, hey, they're young,
but Harper was the steadiest player, and he's a rookie, and even though Castle didn't make shots in the second half, he just lived at the free throw line, and it felt like he was the one that guy was going to attack.
So we could say, quick, three is in the third quarter. I think the most maddening thing is that the next they're gonna close without Rodo and Brunston in the back core and cat is your backline defender,
which is supposedly always been a thing you could attack.
I thought for years, and honestly, he's not even back, because he's out kind of chasing Wemby, 'cause they set up Wemby so far away from the hoop. Why they would have Fox attack, OGN and OB. I do not get this team, Steve, I do not understand.
It's one thing to be a bad shot here.
This was quick, bad possession.
βI don't know if there's a disconnect between the game plan,β
and they don't listen to Mitch Johnson. I don't know if this Mitch Johnson is not designing enough movement. It seems like out of time out, there's a lot more certainty for what they want to do, and it's usually a better look, and then once it's in the flow of the game,
I totally understand the human nature part of looking up at the score and going, whatever, you're just not gonna play as tough defense, but that is somewhat trotious offensive basketball, not just because it makes and misses, but execution, planning, trying to prioritize
what you're attacking, and under five minutes, I had it that they had six possessions, under five minutes ago in the game, where Fox is attacking OGN. Where arguably I could have to prove a point,
said it was more than six, but I, you know, like, hey, we attack here, but then swing the ball, and it's close off, so does that one really kind of as an attack. I don't wanna say, like, it's an intelligence thing, although it does cross my mind at times.
I just, when the spurs lose this series, this is gonna be one for a long time or make,
I just never understood what they were trying to do
when they were trying to get out of adversity. - Man, I'm telling you, the decisions these coaches have and the gamble to do stuff and the gamble not to, I thought Mitch Johnson did a, he was calling time mouths, he was calling ATOs, and at the same,
everything you're saying in that second half, it's like, I watched it too, where the balls in the iron foxes hands, this is a guy who is there at 28 years old, because he's out there with a bunch of young guys
who are playing pretty big minutes and when we especially play in big minutes. And so, you know, you wonder how intentional
βis it to be putting the ball in the iron foxes hands?β
Because obviously, you can't have, you know, when we bring in the ball at the court, he's your vet, he's kind of your steady. But this is the same team that I would imagine with a pretty similar approach by Mitch Johnson scored 76
in the first half and so like you said,
it's just like, so confusing to try to even imagine. If you're Mitch Johnson and you said, look, whatever you guys were doing in that first half with the game plan they put together, worked with scored 76, I'm now gonna heavily
adjust it, and I'm gonna change it in the second half. You just gotta think you're gonna roll with things. And I do think, it's a, I thought the ball in Wemby's hands when he in game two turned the ball over and then missed the last shot, I thought to myself,
if I was the coach, I think I would know that I wanted to actually put the ball in the iron foxes hands for that last shot to win the game. And the ball wasn't his hands. What they gave it to Wemby to shoot it.
But if you're trying to win championships for the next 20 years with Wemby, then Wemby has to get that shot. You live with the results, got a good chance of making it. And he's gotta go through whatever happens. And it feels like him missing that shot
in game two and turning the ball over on the possession before. And then last night, having the first half where he's in the next head and talking trash to Mitch Robinson, and then disappearing, it just, it feels like what was supposed to happen
for a team led by a 2021 and 22 year old guys. And so I, on the other side, kind of look over at Mike Brown. And I think to myself, like you said, there were line ups out there. And first of all, I can't explain how you have Darren Fox going
at OGN and Obi, who's been basically the reincarnate. I don't know what. - He's blind with a little less handle. I mean, it is ridiculous what OG is turned into now during these playoffs.
Even if you were the biggest OG fan, I don't know that you expected this. I mean, he's, he's even, even in game three, you know, it was, it was off the charts for him, but it's forgotten in the loss.
- Off the charts because he's always been a defender.
He's always been a rebounder. He's always been in the right spots and high. You'd great, but now the shot making. I mean, he's hitting step back through his, and I don't mean like one or two.
It's the whole playoffs. When you're as big a dude as he is, and you're playing that foot step and back and knocking down threes from 25 feet away. Like he was, he did it in game three when the next loss
and I thought to myself, what a great, what an awful 28 point game, it's so in vain. He had this incredible shot late to make it, to even give the next a chance again. I thought, stop making shots.
Like this game is kind of over, we're going to need you lit. And now I look back and I go like, this is just who he is right now. He's in that rhythm. He can't miss, I mean, he's having one of the best playoff
friends of any player in history at this point if we consider what happened last night. But I was going to say too, I do want to give Coach Brown credit to have a line up out there
βthat at times, I think back to the Atlanta series,β
the first round, where there was some line-ups he was trying and there were people saying,
"Look, he's playing these line-ups
"that have never played together all regular season long."
And now Coach Brown thinks it's the right time to be experimenting and trying this and trying that in the plus-minus with that group was bad. But now you fast forward. And you go, like you said, the nicks just closed
that miraculous comeback in large part because he was willing to go with Solhan out there and have ported out of necessity because Towns got two quick ones in the first 10 seconds. But at the same time, you have Jose Elvarado out there
closing the game because he's bringing a spark. He's unpredictable. The spurs, guards do a great job of putting their body on you. And not letting you move. And Jose is slimy.
You can't get your hands on him. He's in the paint and he's creating something.
βAnd so I think a lot of coaches would have neverβ
put him out there because he hadn't played big consistent minutes at that point and left him in. And so I think that was a big, big piece of what happened as far as the spark that allowed the comeback to happen was Elvarado.
I can't believe it. I mean, of all the scenarios you would lay out in front of me and be like, and Jose, all the rotors are going to have a monster force quarter on that one lap. I just think they were so accustomed to him not
taking these shots. And it's almost like guys got turned styled by themselves. Like when we get turned around and all of a sudden, Elvarado's like, well, I'm just right here. I guess I'll do this.
I want to get the OG's tip and the defensive adjustment on that imbalance and everything. But before I do that, we have to spend some time on Bronson because there was a version of events,
especially after the first quarter, which I mentioned.
It's like, hey, man, where are we going to go? And you could look at the net rating stuff. And it was pretty damning. You could look at the shoot. And you could look at the turnovers.
Like there was a way, if you wanted to go on TV and sit across a Saturday else, you would have some very nice statistical evidence to say, like, hey, Bronson's is not really the guy. It was funny.
And I shared this in the open a bit. And I'll share it with you, is that I feel like the small guard thing, again, it's no one goes, let's do this. Let's have a small guard. But if they were to lose last night's game, Bronson
continues to struggle shooting, maybe it's the turnovers, maybe the net number grows even worse, you could be like, hey, this is why the small guard thing doesn't work. And it's like, look, I think it kind of proved that at least in Bronson's case, it works when you're in the NBA finals.
βAnd that it doesn't mean that you have to win it,β
even though, again, no one would say, like, by design, let's make sure we have a small player at this position.
But I thought that second quarter was huge for him
to just kind of get into some kind of offensive rhythm. I know the spurs, or I think smart about what they're doing defensively like trying to mix it up with him a little bit. We know that they're probably going to try to yank champagne out in some of those late possessions because that's the one
that Bronson gets aroused for. I mean, he gets so excited when he's in the game, that it's a pretty clear, like, it's champagne season, whenever Bronson's out there with him. So they're going to yank him.
But is there something that you can share with us? It's like a better understanding of just being around this guy all the time. And why I think it matters, the ability to take and make some of these ridiculous shots in the biggest moments
and kind of what it does to the other four guys, even if the shooting numbers and net numbers don't look as good as maybe you would expect from him. Yeah, and I have to, I just candidly say, like, I haven't seen a player like him.
βI mean, I think about Steph Curry and his shot makingβ
and his off-the-ball movement. And we all know how great and miraculous that is when you watch him and especially during those championship Bronson, you go, like, can someone explain, like, what factor he has, like, did you work more?
Does he have more confidence? Like, how does he shoot the ball from different spots in different ways all the time and make it? And I, you know, look, I've led the league in three point percentage shooting on a top 10,
three point shooter of all time. I can't really explain the way Steph, you know, makes his, you know what I mean? Like, he's a guy who I thought I shot more shots than everyone and I thought I worked harder than everybody.
And he has something that I can't really relate to 'cause he's making them from, you know, with the usher in the hallway before every single game. And when I watch Jalen, like you said, it's like for him to be almost like more than a three-level score.
It's like he can score at the rim. Does a great job of finishing, even over guys like Wemby, which I just think when you watch it happening, you think every time. Wemby's seven four with a Na'd foot wingspan, I'm like,
Jose's not going to be able to shoot a jumper over and if he does, he won't make it. Jalen's not going to be able to get in the paint with Wemby in front of him and be able to get it over and much less make it.
And to your point, like I can't really explain how he can score at the rim. He can be great in the mid-range. He can use his footwork pivot game and get those bump, bump, has he fouls.
And also banged down the clutch three that he did. Again, over Wemby. It really is like he's a guy that my game wasn't like. So I truly can't relate the responsibility
You have to run a team to also be the go-to score.
Also turn it off sometimes and understand,
βyou have the responsibility of making sureβ
cat is going, OG's going, McAll's going, every other guy, out there on the court. And then in a moment, in the fourth quarter, understand, look the balls back in your hands and go ahead again.
And so I realized I maybe am giving context, but also none at all, because I really don't know how to relate to it. And part of it is your question about him being a small guard. Because if he was a co-worker, he was KD.
He was LeBron, you'd say, man, he overpowers and he can see over the top.
And he's just such an incredible hybrid big at six foot,
eight, nine, 10. Well, that's not who J. LeBronson is. And this is the first time we're seeing a guy his size, I think, do. And if he continues to get one more win,
especially do what no one has done before. And his demeanor after the games is 100% Kobe, right. He studied Kobe, he'd love Kobe. You hear Kobe Bryant when he does his press conference. He was so like, calm and humble.
After last night's game, it allows the rest of us who are cheering for the next to win this, to jump around and be giddy and have a good time because you just know like, well, that's the guy who's responsible for whatever happens next.
He's so locked in and I don't think it's a show.
βI think he's that focused, I think he's that kind of leaderβ
and all the other guys on the court. When he has the ball, have confidence that he's gonna make the shot, make the right play. And emotionally, lead as well. And so I mean, he is becoming more and more
of just an icon and a small guard hero that we haven't really ever maybe seen. - I'm so glad you reminded me of the 104, 103, 3 against 1B, because I mean, there's so many things that happen in the last few minutes and that three,
they're down for Al Rado, it just made the lay up. And that three and you know, he's getting isolated. So let's go to the in-bounds because on that play, we're looking at it and it's, I think 5.7 left, it was funny
'cause I'm like, okay, so no one's on the in-bounder and I actually say like, well, he's so far away depending on which side they run this, like this isn't gonna be a late or you con thing where the balls to that side and now late
or makes the cut-in, which haunts anyone that hated Duke growing up. I respect Duke now though, I like John Shire a lot. So I've grown, it took me, maybe 35 years. But on that in-bounds, I'm like,
"Ah, it's not that big of a deal." And then again, like, what would you wanna do? You'd want to double-bruncin, you'd wanna send two to Bruncin on that. Bruncin gets isolated against a guard.
The first thing all of us are saying
if Bruncin makes a shot is like, "How are you not doubling Bruncin?" And not only do they double-bruncin because fucks shades to his side, they get wind beyond Bruncin in a switch, bringing him up.
So then the spurs are probably thinking, like, this is even better. Even though Bruncin had just hit that one against him, that's not gonna be fun. And Bruncin doesn't even hesitate.
He rips it at four point six left, which, if OG doesn't tip it, there's probably a decent conversation, like, is that a little bit earlier? But then on the other side of it, you're like, well, how free did you expect Bruncin to get?
From Wemby, that might have just been a little more in rhythm. And the inbound was got a little messy too, 'cause he's dancing around half-court. So all of these things are happening. At that point, like, I'm like,
βhey, I think the spurs are fine with all of this.β
If it had gone in slow motion. And OG's waving for the ball, because FOX comes to Bruncin side. And I don't have a criticism really of San Antonio, not defending the imbounders on that.
I think everything that happened was everything they've wanted. And it's just that OG is at a completely different level. And the absurdity of that tip to control the ball, full sprint, he's actually kind of like, off on his angle on that tip.
It's gonna go down. And when they pull this off, 'cause now I just don't know how San Antonio would have to mental capacity to come back from this. I mean, it may go down as the biggest shot
in the history of the next. - I mean, look, when I'm at the garden, and they play the LJ 4.8 every single time I'm there, I said to the guys last night, Serbia, and Pito and Elana, I said fellas,
if you don't think we just watched another LJ, that we're not gonna see that play for the rest of our lives. It's gonna get played on the jumbo tron for the rest of history. It's the finals.
Like you said, it was about to be two to two and now it's three to one.
And he's had a run that's incredible.
That game was not, but I wanna back up just a second
To before OG and Anobis taking the ball out of bounds.
And he throws it like you said,
it felt almost like a turn over to Jalen, a half-court. Good, god, I was like, what about the block, OG had on Deer and Fox, where if Deer and Fox triple's the ball out there, seven seconds left, and he goes to the line,
and he's got free throws. Instead, Deer and Fox tries to take it in for a layup, which I don't think is crazy, especially what it appeared. He, you know, the room he thought he had, and OG pins it on the glass,
and gets the block to allow for the next to have the ball, in that situation. Or where Jose Alvarado had dribbled up, it looked like it might have been over and back, but the basketball was still on that side of the half-court,
and his feet were on the other side, so it wasn't over and back time out. Now it's next ball, OG takes it out, throws it to Jalen.
I loved that Jalen shot it early, like you said,
because it's exactly like you said, if you have one behind you, I would just say as a shooter, as a guy who's trying to make a shot late, all you want is space.
You don't care where you're at. If it's eight feet away, if you're 35, 40 feet away, you want to clean luck. You're going to give yourself a chance, 'cause you get into Wendy's body, especially for Jalen.
It's going to look more like castles shot at the end when it got, you know, tipped, it's going to be him just hitting a body and throwing a ball up and you're not really giving it a chance. So I, and it almost went in.
Let's be an intro, or two, it was dead online, Jalen shot. And so I loved it. Not only from the perspective of a gave him a good chance, it was a smart shot, because he had went beyond him and recognized it.
But also, like, what happened allowed for the opportunity of it to be tipped, tipped, something to happen. And as we know, OG flying in like you described and just, you know, I think, Serbia, when we were in a studio yelled,
OG from heaven and then Monica McNut were doing post games said, you know, something else about the hand of God. You know, it was really like just from above,
βit seemed like where did he come from and how did he do it?β
Even if you do get that rebound, you know, how do you make it? And so I mean, it was magic how it came together. But I, I love the, the possibility of what Jalen did
was with making it and giving a second opportunity
to make something happen all time or man, all time or oh my goodness. Hey, thanks so much, man, and enjoy game five. I don't know how we're ever going to be lucky enough to see something like we saw last night again in the series. Yeah, I was fun.
There's still some series to play. The San Antonio team is shown. They, they got some fight and they're, they're good, but boy, boy, it feels like the next season special after last night, so I appreciate it.
Great, great, great being out with you. What if you can add an AI assistant to your work without leaving your work flow, built in a Microsoft Word XL and outlook, copilot works where you work, helping you do more in the apps you already use.
In XL, it generates insights from your data. XL, you got a little budget. You get some money's in, money's out. You want to keep track of it. You want to be a grownup.
βAre you trying to prepare your account a little bit better?β
I used to just write it down on a legal pad. Not anymore, because with copilot and Excel, look out world. The apps you know go further with copilot. Learn more at m365copilot.com/work.
World Cup, gear and up for it. I know a lot of our listeners check out sorruti's pod with bar stool to get a little deeper in the app, but we're excited about the games and joining us now at U.S. Men's National Team, legend and, of course,
part of Fox's coverage of the World Cup. Alexie Wallace, good morning, good to see you. Good morning, good morning. We live in interesting times, and we're barreling down the pike towards this world cup.
So hopefully, everybody is ready. And, you know, whether we're ready or not, it's gonna happen. (laughing) Okay, well, did you learn anything from the friendly against Germany that gives you any insight in this team?
- Yeah, I mean, I thought, you know, the kids nowadays call it Bibles. I thought the last two games, the win against Senegal, and then the, it was a loss to to want to Germany, but I thought they actually played really well
in large portions of the game created a lot of chances. 10 corner kicks or something like that.
βSo I think this window and these friendlies,β
the vibes were very positive. And keep in mind that I think that they needed that. Internally, I think they needed it. And externally, in the way that we were looking at this team to kind of go in with a much more positive view of this team,
you know, now as we're recording this, a couple days away from the paragliding. - If you look at it, and again, you know, my understanding is pretty seasonal with the sport, but not making the field eight years ago,
and this kind of roster reset with a lot of younger players. And it felt like it was building towards 26. Do you feel like, now you know, a lot of this is gonna be results based, like, hey, the plan worked, it didn't work based
on how far they advanced, but just from this team,
From the roster construction of it,
do you look at that reset as a positive going into this field? - I do keep in mind that, you know, four years ago in 22,
the US was the second youngest team in Qatar at the World Cup.
βAnd so I think there was always a plan to kind of bloodβ
this young generation and then to have that come to fruition, this World Cup. Now it's not all of those players, and they all don't hit, but I think there's a lot of players that have grown up as players and have grown up as men, you know,
sometimes, you know, there were teenagers at times that we were kind of throwing out there on the field. And now they are seasoned to professionals. They are hopefully more mature in the way that they approach the game, and they know what a World Cup is.
So yeah, I think there is kind of proof of concept, if you will and what we are seeing here, but to your point, you know, the whistle's going to blow. Everything that's happened over the last couple of years, yeah, we can talk about it and it gives us context,
but really the only thing that is team and Mauricio Puchitino, the head coach of this team are going to be judged on is what happens at the World Cup. - Where is this team now, internationally, in comparison to say, you're run 30 years ago?
β- Yeah, if you would ask me, you know, back in the 1900s,β
back a long time ago, back in the previous century, what it would look like in the summer of 26, 32 years later, and 32 years on from the 94 World Cup, I would have said, oh yeah, we're challenging for a World Cup.
And I know progress isn't always linear
and you go up and down and sometimes you take steps back in order to go forward, and there's been plenty of that. So in my 1999 brain, I would be kind of disappointed that this is where we are, but I'm also, you know, was a moron 20 something year old back in back then,
and I have a little bit more understanding of, you know, the way this process works, I am bullish about this team. I try not to grump you old man too much, but I will say that this is a team in a generation
that's been given absolutely everything from a very young age. And so with that comes and should come higher expectations. And I'm, believe me, I'm incredibly happy and proud of that, but we should expect more from that. And when it comes, you know, the resources
and the coaching and the pathways and the opportunities, but we created that and that's something that we wanted to do, but now it has to pay off. This is not yet an elite team. So they're going to need a little bit of magic
to do something magical this World Cup, but there's nothing better than a World Cup and it's a simple one thing, that's a home World Cup, and there is some magic and hopefully they can harness that. - Yeah, when you go back to '94 in your run,
you know, I was obviously like you a lot younger and it wasn't a sport I was super dialed into, and then it was kind of this thing that brought us all together. I was like, what's going on? - Like, we're good.
- What's happening? And you know, you had all these big personalities, you included, which, you know, it's kind of proven like proof of concept because so many were still involved in the media
from that team for such a long time ago. What was it like to actually get attention in a country that really probably wasn't paying any attention or was even all that aware of who you guys were? - I mean, it was everything, you know,
the soccer culture back then, it was kind of a wild west or a wasteland, but and a lot of soccer culture was kind of underground
and niche, and for the first time that summer,
the sport and a lot of us in the sport were elevated to a level where there was credibility and more importantly, there was respect, and so that was fun. And it's kind of like a band, right, you know,
you follow a band and you're one of three people that's watching in them and a dingy club and then it kind of gets big. And you have to really guard against, you know, being gatekeeping and, you know,
pretentious about, about in this case, it would be soccer.
βAnd so I think what happened in the summer of '94β
is not only were we elevated, but we welcomed everybody in and the last thing in the world that we want from a soccer perspective to have the sport feel exclusionary and people feel unwelcome and believe me,
I'll raise my hand, the soccer folks out there, they can be very precious at different times. And they can make it difficult for people to come in. But I think in '94 we did a good job of opening up and bringing people into that tent and many of them stayed
and I think again this summer we have to make sure that we are inviting people in and many will come in. Some will stay, some will go, but man, when you get infected in the best possible sense of an infection, it's really hard to get rid of it.
- You said something just a moment ago too, where it's like, okay, and I think you are being fair about this, maybe it's our similarity in age here, but it's just, this generation is beginning to everything. For us soccer, I could see how maybe a younger generation
Would be like, well, it's not our fault that in '94
that you weren't as supportive as much, but in these are just facts. Like that '94 run has led to this becoming more of a priority. And yet the results aren't necessarily there. And you're somebody who I think just, you tell it like it is. If you see it, you're going to say it
and that you're not going to have some sort of like relationship or you feel like I have to defend US men's soccer at every single turn because I'm a former member of the team. And that role for you, I feel like you're completely comfortable with it and yet others become uncomfortable
βbecause of the commentary, which may be the best wayβ
to describe the relationship. - Yeah, I mean, I've been doing this a long time and I have a pretty thick skin and I came in with a pretty thick skin and a lot of this stuff comes with the territory.
And I always looked at it as, if soccer is ever going to be taken
seriously and put at the same level of other sports, it has to, from media perspective, be treated in the same way. I don't criticize just to criticize. I believe that I do it in a fair way.
But I was telling something the other day, over the course of my career, I've had parents, moms and dads and sisters and grandparents and boyfriends and girlfriends, everybody at one point come up and scream and yell at me and stuff like that.
And they have to kind of vent for something that I have set. But the question I get most often is, do you believe everything you say? And I can unequivocally say, absolutely.
It doesn't mean I can't put myself into other people's shoes and I can't, in the tradition of debate, take a side and try to argue that side. But I don't know a whole lot about, for example, football, I know your viewers and listeners
know a whole lot more than I do about it. But I know what I'm being talked down to and I can sus it out. The audience can sus out if you're not being credible and you're not being honest with them.
And soccer is a beautiful game, but it's also very simple game. People will get it.
So I never want to dumb it down in the way
that I'm talking about it. And hopefully, I'm talking about it in a way that people can see parallels and connections
βwith other sports because that's leads to better quality, I think,β
but I also think it leads to better credibility. I am very down in expansion in college football. I do not like any of the conference for realignment. I don't like when we add more playoff games in any sport to be honest to you.
And then once it was explained to me, relate to you, see what they're doing, what does this mean now for group play with the expansion of what it means or doesn't mean now to make it through your group? Yeah, so I think the idea is, well, the idea in terms of the problems
that are going to arise is that you're going to have less quality within the group stage, and that the group stage is kind of just going to become a theta complete, and the teams are always going to go through, and there's going to be less competition. I understand, I don't want to diluted version
of the world cup or any tournament for that matter. But I also recognize that, look, I'm talking to you today because of the summer of '94 and the power of a world cup. I lived with the power of a world cup can do to an individual.
I also saw what it can do to a country and culture. But I also don't want to stand in the way. And I don't think this is about everybody gets a trophy or something like that, not by any stretch of the imagination. But I do think that this is a world cup.
βThere is a representation of the world that I think has to happen.β
And giving countries and cultures the opportunity, it can fundamentally change the trajectory of the sport in some of those countries. And not in a charitable type of way. But I remember a couple of World Cups ago, Panama,
went to their first World Cup.
And we have this wonderful moment in soccer, and a lot of sports where you can kind of pan down the players during the national anthem. And I'll ever forget watching the Panamanian players and tears streaming down their face. Not because they were going to kick a ball or win any games.
And by the way, they didn't win games there. But in that moment, it meant everything to them because they were representing their country and the pride and the joy that they felt in that moment on the global stage.
I mean, that was moving, that was something. And so there's a Olympic element to what the World Cup is. It's different than club. It's not necessarily all of the best teams in the world. It's a collection of teams from all over the different parts
of the world. Let's talk about the parody of the US group here, because, based on everything I've read here, it feels like there's not necessarily that one team that's so daunting.
But yet, it feels like kind of anybody can take anyone else out. So how do you see the group? I think you're letting them off the hook. Look, this US team, I just talked about all the opportunities and the advantages that they have had.
And again, I feel like a parent. And I tell my kids all the time. You don't have to apologize for what you have, OK?
You damn well better respect it and you better use it.
And that's what I feel like when I'm talking to this team. We should expect more from this team this summer. Going to a World Cup from mainstream, done that plenty of times. Getting out of group, done that plenty of times. Winning the group, we've been doing that.
Hell, back in 2002, we were a handball away, arguably from going to a semi final. So when I look at this group and I compare and contrast with other groups that we've had, I don't want to call it easy, because don't get me wrong.
These guys could screw this up, OK? But I will take this group any day of the week.
βThis is a group that you should expect your U.S. team to win.β
And by the way, when they win that group, they are going to go to this round of 32. This new round of 32, at which point they will be playing a team that they're better than.
Now, that is something that we've never had in a knockout game
at a World Cup, the U.S. playing a team where we are favorite, where we are looked at as a better team. And then we're back to the round of 16 and moving on from there. So I look at this group, obviously, the United States Paraguay in Australia and Turkey.
Yeah, I expect this U.S. team to win this group. And to gain that advantage of winning the group, where you can then get to play one of the best third place teams and a team that you're better than. OK, I like that.
We're locked in here. How many teams would you put in the tier one group of all of these teams if this country won a World Cup? This is not a surprise. Sure.
So keep in mind, only eight countries in history have ever won a World Cup, and that even includes Uruguay, and that was decades and decades ago. So there is a really kind of elite group. Your safe money, and this World Cup is on France and Spain.
I would put Argentina in there, except the last team to repeat. Keep in mind, Argentina won the last World Cup. The last team to repeat was in 58 and 62 when Brazil did it. And so history is against them, even with Messi,
even in his own backyard and his new neighborhood here in the US. I wouldn't put it past them, but again, history is against them. But they are one of the elite three, if you will, right under that, then you're getting into your Portugal's. It kills me to say this, but England--
It's just $1,000,000, because of the history. Oh, dude, listen, I mean, there's a lot of things that are going to happen this summer, all right? But one thing I cannot abide is England. Coming to our shores on our 250th birthday.
What I feel is the greatest country in the world. And having England win a World Cup, you think the English are insufferable now. Can you imagine if that happened?
The problem is, this is a really good England team.
And so I would put them in that second tier right there. I do think this World Cup's going to be kind to South American teams. The climate, there's going to be a lot of talk this summer about the weather.
βPeople whining and complaining about the weather, all right?β
Newsflash, it's hot in the summer, but by the way, we also have indoor games here for indoor venues that are happening here. So teams like Columbia, teams like Ecuador, I think that they're going to do well. Obviously, I mentioned Georgia, China, and Brazil.
And then you also have Portugal, which is a really good team. And Chris Gianno, Ronaldo, trying to equal messy with the World Cup, and he's 40, whatever. And it's a question. I'm sure all sports deal with questions like these when you have an older legend
with that sometimes sucks all the energy and the oxygen out of the room,
but is undeniably good and has an incredible amount of power,
almost a power imbalance. And is he better at not starting? And if he is, is he okay with not starting? And that whole dynamic that's going to play out with Ronaldo. Yeah, you know what, I really liked the way you saw it.
Because I haven't had a lot of animosity towards England lately. You know, maybe I get done with a book and I go, you know, stamp act, you know, what's kind of fucked up.
βAnd now I think you have me charged up, and like we can't let that happen.β
One thing that I've noticed already, too, is with the travel. And I've traveled a bunch of places. I'm sure I don't have the resume that you have internationally. But I feel like I have a good sense of different corners of the world. Maybe a suburban venue, three star hotels,
isn't what you were looking for when you're an international star. But at the same time, like I can't imagine giving this country a hard time over some of the venues and logistics as opposed to some of the other settings for the World Cup. Like, I don't know if this is an anti-American thing, which I can certainly understand.
And in some places, even I'm like, hey, that might be a little justified. But some of the complaints early on, and again, people like to complain. It's kind of the default setting. This isn't even close to being as challenging as some other places that opposed to this event.
Yeah, I mean, look, if you want to find something to complain about this summer,
You will find it, okay?
It's a million different things. A lot of it, like you said, is going to be steeped in, you know, the derangement of America and the way we are viewed. You know, at times, raise our hand, pompous, arrogant, whatever, American exceptionalism, all that kind of stuff.
And so a lot of it is through that lens, okay?
βBut I think a lot of it is just kind of looking for something to be a grieved at.β
And if it's not there, either making it up or elevating something that doesn't deserve.
There's plenty, I think, to be critical of, if that's something that you want to do.
And some of it absolutely fairly right now, when it comes to our infrastructure, one of the reasons why one of the reasons why FIFA wanted to do it here is the existing infrastructure. I mean, we are turn key when it comes to doing, you know, these big events. Obviously, they're going to make a tremendous amount of money. And I just, not warn people, but just, I'd add, it's not going to be 1994.
It can't, and it shouldn't be 1994. But it can be something different, and it can still have that legacy. I think once the ball gets kicked, a lot of this other noise that's going on around, the tournament is going to go away, and I think people are going to enjoy what happens. But again, this is on our watch.
And this is a advertisement to the world, you know, just to take it back a little bit. I love the fact that I cannot think of another administration where there has been more soccer emanating from the White House and from the Oval Office. And regardless of your political affiliation, you're having the president of the United States be invested in a world cup.
That's a good thing. All right? Because again, it's happening on his watch. He understands soft power, probably better than anybody.
βI think he's going to go down as the soccer president.β
But it behooves us, and he recognizes that it's a reflection on him to make sure that this goes well. And it's not going to go perfect. There are going to be ups and downs throughout some, you know, over a month long type of tournament.
So there's a lot of stuff still to happen here. But I'm still bullish about what's going to happen, both on and off the field for this. So if we take it back to like some of those elite teams, is there a team that you say, okay, US advances, like this is actually a elite team that they match up well with. So let's do that one first and then on the other side of a team, it's like, hey, no
chance against them. Yeah. I mean, I think that France, for example, could bring three teams to this world cup and all three of them can compete. So that's, you know, the amount of quality and the depth of talent that they have.
You know, we're going to need, when we're coming up against, like I said, you know, the France's and the Spain's and the Argentina's, you know, even the, you know, the Brazil's, this is not a great Brazil team, nor is this a great German team. But this is Brazil in Germany. And actually what scares me is low expectations for a Brazil for a Germany, that could be,
that could be dangerous and they get on a roll. People ask me about, you know, dark horses and stuff. Well, you know, we've seen Morocco rise, a lot of people are talking about Norway, you know,
I mentioned, you know, Netherlands a team that's never won the World Cup, by the way,
teams like Portugal and Netherlands as great as they are. They've also never won the World Cup, so it's very, very difficult. You know, we can have on that day a spectacular performance and play with these guys and even beat these guys, but, you know, if you're playing them 10 times, you're probably going to lose, you know, six or seven times.
What are we great at? Like, what do you look at with this team or you go, okay, this is something that maybe wasn't there 30 years ago? So the irony is, we've almost thrown the baby out with the basket with this particular team and that I'm really excited and positive about the attack, the chances that we create.
I mean, the other day against Germany, we had something like 10 corners. We were creating, not just, just, chances, but good chances, attacking chances. I am concerned about the defense. They seem susceptible to not just letting in goals, but letting in unnecessary goals. Look, if a team plays an incredible pass or something like that, okay, that's fine.
We can go and look and say everything should have been on this, but, you know, their day against Germany, a couple minutes into the game, they let a set piece goal, that's just marking. And that's just organization, if we get beaten by a team that's playing through us, okay, I can understand that.
Also goalkeeping.
βI think plenty of your viewers, even if you're not into soccer, you will recognizeβ
it over years, we've had very good goalkeeping, so one thing that we have done, we've had world class goalkeepers, you can start with Tony Meal and Brad Friedle and Casey Keller and Tim Howard, obviously, you know, one of the great performances in World Cup history from Tim Howard.
So goalkeeping has always been something that we have figured out.
I'm not sure about the goalkeeping right now.
I do think that it's going to be Matt Frees, well, by the way, I think will be the first
Harvard man to start in a World Cup.
βIf he starts here on Friday, but he's made the saves that he should make.β
We need to see him make a save that he shouldn't make and therefore keep this team in a game or save a win, so you save three points or save a point here and there. And I'm not sure if he can do that, so he's going to have to step up his game here at the World Cup. Great use of Harvard, man.
Hey, let us know where everybody can watch the World Cup coverage because I know you guys are loaded up in Fox. Sure. Fox, as you mentioned, there are 104 games and 70 plus of those are going to be on big Fox.
We're making sure that everybody, and anybody who has a television out there can find it will have also digital content, my state of the union, which will be every single day live, giving you a review and a preview just at a nice little 20 minute bit of what you saw.
So I recognize that everybody can't watch every hour, I hope they do, but they can't watch
every hour and you can dip in and out as we go along. And we'll introduce you to the teams, we'll introduce you to the players, we'll tell you what's going on, all of the drama, both on and off the field that inevitably is going to happen. We'll talk about that, so I'll finish it with this.
I do things when it comes to this World Cup opportunity. We talk a lot about the opportunity to bring people into the tent, but also responsibility. We feel a responsibility at Fox to make sure that this is bigger and better than anything that we've done, so that all those people that do come into the tent, they feel welcome.
βAnd I think we've done a good job in the past, but we're just ramping up to a wholeβ
other level, because again, it's on our watch in our country. We want to make sure that we give the best possible picture, and like I said, advertisement to the world. I can't wait. I know the same goes for you and all the guys who say, "I just don't inform me."
I will.
Thanks for the time today.
Awesome. Thank you. But if you can add an AI system to your work without leaving your work flow, build on a Microsoft Word, Excel, and Outlook, Copilot Works where you work, helping you do more in the apps you already use.
In Outlook, it cuts through the noise to get you up to speed faster. It works. Anytime I'm right in email right now, I can't wait to see what it says. I'm like that is better than what I came up with. It is more efficient.
That is the right word. Why are you making up words or solo? The apps you know go further with GoPilot, learn more at m365CoPilot.com/were. Do you want details? 5.
I drive a Ferrari. 355 Cabriole. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South fork. I have every toy you can possibly imagine.
I'm best of all kids. I am liquid. So now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Very good advice, live advice [email protected].
We've got Kyle, we've got Serruti and we have feedback. Great. I'll follow up to the Bredo Incident of Game 1 with a 2020-6 MBA finals. So we had a few questions about the Bredo Incident which I described. I'm not going to get into greater detail again.
Guy checking in, Matt, says well after hearing the recap of the Bredo Incident, it really sounds like Serruti 100% did not have Ryan's back. Honestly, kind of confirms what people don't like about his personality. If you're sitting next to your buddy at a ball game and he has a confrontation with someone, there's almost no way you're unaware of every detail unless you're actively trying
not to be. I don't buy Serruti's. I was pretty dialed into the game, explanation at all. No offense to O Serruti, but I will say this though. If Kyle had been there, he absolutely would have had Ryan's back.
Not only would he remember every detail of the interaction, I'd bet money he would have been served himself into the situation in real time too. Just say in, love the show. All right, man, you know, I got a couple of messages about this too and it's like, people
βread so much into this thing and being like this, this just says everything you need toβ
do about Serruti. I don't really want me to do a man. I was churpee at what point in my life. I'm not really churpee anymore. I feel like I've learned my lessons.
I'm a reformed churper. I genuinely didn't see the incident happen. I got a guy, old guy next to me, spurspan. He was chatting me up. I think Ryan, you could be there to attest to this, although maybe you can't because you were kind of preoccupied.
But busy. Which is fine. I didn't see the incident. I didn't really know what was going on. There's dude standing in front of us, stuff's getting spilled everywhere.
I, I don't know what you want me to do, man. I guess I can't be a winner in this situation. So yeah, I don't know, maybe. I'm definitely this is I would have guy because I hate when guys like if I was there. And also, I got a little churpee on a work trip and we all went to Ole Miss and I like
Was like, oh dude, I definitely could have embarrassed those guys when we wer...
out van had like gave us those LSU, like tiger bands and the Ole Miss guys were churping and I got a little like even van was like, what would it work trip.
βSo I was like, I'm not sure that I would actually, I think we're on a work trip.β
That was the fun there, so considering that was still kind of a work trip, I'm not sure exactly what I would have done, but you know, I'm back in now. What does this guy want me to do? What does he want me to do?
Like first off, we are, I don't know, it's a guy with his family.
I don't think the, I don't think the accusation of me would be, I don't have Ryan's back. If anybody, everybody thinks I just agree with Ryan all the time too. So like here, we can't, like what, I can't, I can't do it. But a lot of the main culture right over there, like all right, dude, like get off a Reddit, chill out, like live your life.
Touch grass. Do something else, touch grass. Yeah, Mike, good. It's like, do you think if Ryan actually actively fought the guy, I'd be like, I don't know, man, I can't, you know, there's nothing I could do.
We were wearing our freaking, our landiers, our credentials were honest, like people, you know, I don't, I do, what, I can't win the situation, who knows. Hmm, hmm, they can't be so happy right now. Oh, man. Big cat would be so happy because he loves the fucking pussy.
And big kiss. And he's. Yeah, right. That's an alias. Is that a short name?
Yeah. What is this real name? Here's the thing.
I was there as everybody knows.
It wasn't really that loud, long. There was nothing boisterous about it whatsoever. It happened in almost no one was paying attention to what was happening. The final game. Yeah, because I was looking around being like, is it, it was, the back and forth was so
quick. And it wasn't really even, you want to say a scale of one to ten, it was like a four. There was no, like no one raised their voice. Like he was kind of, you know, going, they can watch the game, but no one is going to hear them.
No one is going to say what he's like, turn around, pay attention, mind your business, mind your business.
βSaying that it wasn't like, so performative that everybody was like, oh, what's going on?β
It was like a four-house. Right. Yeah. And, and Cerudi was on the other side of it. These guys were behind me until the right, Cerudi was to my left.
Cerudi had this old guy that was talking to us here off. This is entirely unfair. Has nothing. Whatever you think of like Cerudi's personality, not having his back all the same stuff. There was no window to have my back because no one stood up, no, it didn't get really
loud. It didn't go that long. I sat there mad for way too long, which is my own issue. Okay. And Cerudi was like, yeah, yeah, Cerudi's like, what's going on?
And then I explained it to further evidence to Cerudi's position here, Cerudi was like, what is going on? And it was, because it was so minimal. I'd also say, like, no offense to Kyle, there's all sorts of scenarios where Kyle would have my back.
And I know Kyle would have my back no matter what. There's also a lot of scenarios where he's not super dialed in what the fuck is going on either. Okay, hold on.
βI think I know what you're trying to say here.β
That was a work day. That was a work day. I probably wouldn't have been in there with beers, right? We were working that night, you know, and we did have to work. We did have to work.
We did have to work. And I was actually, you wouldn't have had beers. Flying across the country and then getting my car out of Newark and then driving up two hours of the Hudson Valley to get started on working. So I wasn't having beers that day anyway.
But I didn't even mean it as I thought there was exactly what you meant. No, that's not what I was talking about. But I'm saying there's like a good time version of you that would just be excited to be at the game and you're cheering on the nicks. This was about where you actually going to pay attention to something you didn't notice
and not the NBA finals on in front of you. Dude, I'm telling you, everyone in the section, nobody knew what was even going on. It wasn't that big. The stealth burrito. So I told the story, somebody spilled an entire pink hurricane glass and no one cared.
Not a single person care. It just, it things were happening. Things were happening. Yeah.
It's, it's, you know, those, those media land you'd scare me because when I first went to
Summer Lake, I was like, it was my first like media sort of thing and I was just getting kicked out of places in front of people that were important. And so I've been on my, I guess you could say best behavior since then. But I think back to that first Thomas and Mac introduction there and it's just like, man, what a, what a rough way to start your media trips.
So I'm, I'm usually on my best behavior. The media land you'd really change me, I think. Hi, here you are, all right, let's get into a quick basketball one while we're on the topic. Am I the dick?
Form shooting at the gym. What's up? We're still a pod. Before I get into the question, I have to tell you about my invention. My friends and I came up with who extend our basketball careers in our 40s, walking basket
ball. That's exactly what it sounds like. Two on two, three on three. No running allowed. Walking only.
Jump shots are fine. Spurning is a foul. It's definitely a just foul view by the group.
We're checking tape.
Yeah, it's honestly incredible Adam Silver should be looking into it.
Hardens like I've been playing that. What are you talking about? Yeah. Anyway, here's the issue.
βI lived at a lifetime in the Northeast because of my work schedule.β
I'm usually, they're late morning or early afternoon when the gym isn't crowded. Before I left, I'll usually shoot around for 10, 15 minutes, nothing serious. Some pull ups if you drive, get a little cardio in. Later, the college kids are home for the summer, most are normal, but there's a new type of guy that's shown up.
And I blame Instagram trainers for this. Every court now has at least one kid standing directly into the basket, taking one foot jump shots for 20 minutes straight. 20 minutes. Here's my issue.
If you're standing under the rim, nobody else can really use that who. You can't shoot jumpers without worrying about hitting the guy. I've watched people walk onto a court realize what's happening and immediately leave.
There's one repeat offender.
We'll call him Blondie, think we know what this guy looks like. One day, there are two guys playing one on one side of the gym, so I grabbed the other hoop. I'm shooting around doing my thing, working on my walking basketball game because my buddies Jake and Sean have been talking a lot of trash lately.
You're working on your walking basketball game by yourself. It's like me doing bucket golf by myself. It's been paying off, by the way. Putting the work. Yeah.
This is worse. Yeah. What's your bothering other people now? Yeah. I guess we're going to get Sean and Sean's resume.
He was a D1 walk on, but we still taking the series two out of three, so I'm not sure where all the confidence is coming from. All right. A few minutes in Blondie walks onto my side and immediately starts form shooting directly into the basket, not rebounding for me, not alternating, just setting up camp under the rim.
I pull my headphones off and say, hey man, just you know, I'm doing some cardio. I'll be shooting from outside and taking pull-ups.
βHe looks at me like I just explained taxes to him and goes, okay, bro, did he say, bro?β
Then immediately goes back to standing under the basket.
So I start shooting, first three, almost take his head off.
He gives me what the fuck look. I give him the Jordan shrug, got up more shots and they land uncomfortably close and eventually he kicks the ball, clears it me and leaves. So my question is, am I the asshole here? I respect getting shots up, I respect trying to improve, but if somebody's already using
a hoop, is it acceptable to basically make the core unusable for everyone else because you're doing Instagram form shooting two feet from the rim? Or did I actually, or excuse me, did I accidentally? Become the villain in somebody else's life and vice email. If you did good, that guy sucks.
What are you doing? That sucks. Yeah, there's nothing else to say. That guy, you, you want to be the villain in that guy's life. So yeah, no one has to suck.
You succeeded for the day. So I would, I honestly be proud of this guy. Yeah, I was trying to tell everyone just 30 footers, half-court, danger shots. I might hit him on purpose, just to like, I mean, sorry, people over, because it's just this idea now that you're supposed to sit there and you get to take up and
retire. That's just not the way it work. Everybody took shots. If there wasn't enough balls, you grab rebounds, although I do think it's a little weird when you're at a gym and you have your own ball and somebody's like, hey, you
know, it's like, well, I didn't, I didn't want to make a friend today. I was just trying to get a little sweat, but yeah, no one, no one is on this blondie guy's side. So you're in the clear. Kyle, I'm sorry.
I was trying to think of a story and nothing's coming to mind, but I know that I've been a part of this. Like, enjoying when somebody breaking the social norms is getting messed with by people doing the right thing, just by virtue of them doing the right thing. I'm trying to think that like, it's, you're using the hoop the way it's supposed to
be used. He is not really. And like, there's no law that says he can't, but he's having a bad time because of it. And I like, it's, it's like a, it's like a delicious dessert. It's awesome.
I'm trying to think of what happened. I can't. I've know I've been a part of it. Or it's like, wow, that dude's really just going to do that. Well, we'll just keep doing what we're supposed to do.
And I love that it's not working out for him. So this was like a perfect scenario of that. And I look for that. Not an exact scenario, but like if you see a guy just like weaving it out of traffic, and then like, yeah, miles down the road, you see the red and blue lights and you're just like,
hell yeah. Right. Or he's just totally now he's walks in between some 18 wheelers and you're like, I'm just going to, I stayed in my middle lane and I'll see you later, buddy. I like stuff like that.
Yeah, I mean, this has happened a lot and it sucks, you know, because normally, like, the way it used to work is if there was an open gym and granted, if you have like, the sideline hoops, you know, if somebody's working at like one of the main two and then there's four sideline ones, like, you normally be like, okay, well, those two guys have those and that's fine.
But like, most of the time, especially when you're younger and guys are getting shots up,
βand nobody's actually playing, one guy doesn't just get the hoop, okay?β
If there's a chance that it's six hoops and six guys, you know, you figure it out. But there's also going to be some overlap in there, too, with the guy that's on the main one with the two sides. Everybody knows what I'm talking about, but I've noticed, certainly, more so over the last few years, that we show up, like, guys get the baseline tripod set up, and then
he's fucking doing like hard dribble drives against nobody and then pulling off the corner. And I get hard, I don't care if kids are in the car. Well, I get hard to be like, all right, now I'm going to get some shots up, because I cannot
Wait for you to tell me that an ace, bro, hey, bro, I'm filming.
Yeah, I got a camera here, you know, you know, now we're filming itself.
Yeah, because just, like, this is not the way it works, man, like you want to tell me that you're only going to be on the squat rack for eight minutes and you want to get some form footage, go ahead, I can come back. That's not what this is. This is not your squat rack for 30 minutes.
Now, there is an abuse of public places that just takes place now in all walks of life, parks, whatever, like the people that just like, you know, in the middle of like, I've seen it, like coming out of a arena with people just like stand there and everyone's supposed to walk around them in their camera and it's like, I hope that person gets knocked in their ass.
Again, we're just letting fly here. It's first man probably. These people, you're, I don't know, it's like, again, it's totally different thing for somebody just like jumping the trevy fountain for like content.
βYou're like, you guys, like, what is going on here?β
So, any time. So, when you was a citizen, not just in the Italian. No, exactly. Yeah, just me as a fan of history, I don't care about it, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, the back right.
Um, I just like, these, there's social norms that have just like, we've relaxed on them for whatever reason. And whenever you put someone in their place, like, we, it's like the, it's like the life equipment, just like stuff in somebody locker, like he just need to show them, like, shut up, shut up.
This is not allowed. Like, you're not allowed to do this. You really should read some serity feedback before we do everyone at least is fucking rolling. But I'm bad.
Yeah, maybe you want to piss off when I just, because then I just don't care and like, I don't know. I mean, my own head. Well, though, we started off. Yeah, you know, stop.
It totally was. But this was awesome. Look at this. The name is Matt. Do you want to follow up and send you?
Yeah. Please do. I need a link. You can, we got an F that guy out of serity. Hi.
Anyway. Is it okay to lie to my wife? You guys will take the lead on this one. Love the show. I travel a lot for work.
I feel like I've been listening forever all the way back to the SPP days. It's great. Listen, when I'm on the road. I feel like if you're going to do the, the columning thing, you've got to, you've got to just
βyou have the baggy, long t-shirt under the jersey too, because that's like kind of a key componentβ
to be going to help you. I love Colittal, I mean, just, no gym stats constantly ride the merry-go-round of working out to lose 10, 15 pounds and eating and drinking poorly to get it back. All right. So here's my question.
Essentially, I would like to know if I'm an insane human being for doing this and we're like a caught in this lie. Getting the point in married 13 years, happily married, with only one issue, my wife is very stubborn. I would like to hire someone to put a patio in our backyard, pavilion, fireplace, bar, TV,
the whole nine. I have two young kids, so it would be great to have a place for me to hang out without having to leave the house. It would get a ton of use. So here lies the dilemma.
My parents are successful and I've made, I've always been very generous with their money.
My dad has always said, you either get it now or when I die, I vote now. That's kind of a sick way to look at it. Yeah. How about the dads? How about a dad like that?
That's all right. So anyway, he's always offered to help with vacations, et cetera. Just never would pay a bill for me like mortgage car payment. My wife has an issue with accepting his money and it creates our one point of contention. He agreed to pay for the pavilion for us.
It's going to cost 117k. What? I loved it. Yeah. I loved it this guy.
I did get the money. Go get one from somebody's backyard right now, buy it off. Five golf. A hose. I can do that right now.
I'm coming back. I'm coming back off there.
My wife, which I love about her, never likes getting favors and is very stubborn.
She says that it's way too much money and we can't do it or accept this offer to help. I just understand because if the rules are reversed, I would say thank you very much to her parents. But I, this is when I started working behind the scenes in a shady fashion. I asked the landscape or to draft a fake proposal showing the patio costing only 62k
to get it done. My wife finally agreed to let my parent. So she said yes to 62,000, but not 117. And they start on Monday. Well, you're in.
Oh, you're in. Wow. This guy did all. This guy did it. Now will I get caught in this lie?
I feel a little guilty, but I am getting what I want and she has no idea what the general cost of landscaping projects could be anyway, just really curious if you think I'm way out of balance, you're pulling a stunt like this. Thanks for your input and keep up the great work. Couple questions, right?
Do you work from home? Is there ever going to be a time when somebody's like, excuse me, Miss, like, I just need to approve this or like, is there going to be any reason where she's going to have to do some paperwork or you're going to be like out at the office where she's going to have
βto do some sort of administrative things on this, where she's going to get a peak?β
I would say normally this is a big problem, but because it's not your money, like because this is a lot of money to lie about, but because it's not your money, I think that's sort of negates it. I'm with Serity, I say this is okay, but is there going to be a way where they're going to need to like, you know, you're not going to be around to kind of be the go between here
She's going to actually get a little bit more info than you're expecting?
That's the only thing I'm worried about.
I think you'll be all right. They're obviously like your dad and your family needs to be in on it too, so they need to know that don't bring up that, you know, hey, if they're over there, they're like, yeah, that's the big advantage. You know, it's got everyone's got to be touching a beam going 117 for this.
Yeah, it's got to be your tight, but this is, because you're right, like I think you're, I think you are one right to be okay with taking the money and two, it's going to make everyone kind of better and the whole backyard is going to be awesome, like your wife, I think is going to be weird, not want this. Like, what do you not want us to put this in or pay for it or something?
Okay, so that's odd. So I know, I think this is a white lie that's totally fine, but it's got to be airtight. So everyone's got to know and then, you know, go from there, but there's, I don't know what other way would you, like, it's not like her, her, her friends are likely talking about the prices of like landscaping in the back.
I think when would this even come up?
βI wonder if you must not, it would be that much.β
Yeah, and we're meant. So yeah. And you put in papers once, that's where he was going with this, or he's like, hey, I want to do it ourselves. And I definitely don't do it yourself.
I've done that. It's not fun.
All the time, why is this one always sinking? Yeah, digging, leveling the sand, the gravel, that's
leveling. I wonder if I like to, I didn't buy the motorized one. I was doing like the freaking hand pat one. I was like, yeah, I was just, I was just, I was just, I was just, I was just, I was just, I was like, here you know. Yeah. Yeah. He came over with his pre-just points. Like, this doesn't look super level. I wonder if it was 60 grand was like, I don't feel totally bought because I'm like 120 or whatever she said. It was like, so we're just never going to go to my parents' house for Thanksgiving. Damn.
Like, I wonder if there was like a threshold or she is like 60s acceptable. They don't, they don't owe me at 60. It feels like California's sober was like, oh, he's here, but he's drinking more. Like, oh, that's, you know, okay. Yeah, man, everybody's got through different paths and all that kind of stuff. We just weren't too much part of everything here. Right. He's on mushrooms every day, micro doses.
He's got the solids. Yeah. What the fuck was that? What the fuck was that? It doesn't count.
Mushrooms all day at golf. Mushrooms at soccer practice. Mushrooms, mushrooms, mushrooms. Like that. He's doing great. It's good for him. She completely destroys her whole principal case on this where she's okay with 60k and not 117k.
βAnd honestly, like a lot of this stuff is really stupid.β
If your dad had a hard attack next week, then she's like, okay, we can build the gazebo. Right. I mean, that's that's stupid. That's like the arguments you can have with your wife though, unfortunately. Oh, it's just that. Maybe he can say it. Yeah, exactly. I think she ruins her case by going, it's okay if he gives 60 grand a build the gazebo.
I totally agree. I would just to just to play like slightly double the advocate on her side. It is kind of annoying, though, sometimes when you have family members that are a little possessive over like who gives what?
And if she feels like, like, we always have to do stuff with them because they're doing all these things for us.
That does kind of suck for her half of the family. Like you come out in that positive office in this situation. But we're sticking to their equally itinerary, right? We're going to the trevy fountain when they want to go to the trevy fountain. Right. So that can be annoying, but I do think it's still worth it.
Yeah, I mean, you worried about the dad coming over. Yeah, we're just going on, like, walls out there again. Or if they just like hold over your head like, hey, like, oh, you're not coming over Christmas this year. Like, well, we did, you know, we didn't just want to see my parents this year. Sure, sure, sure.
You know, you're going to choose them. That does happen and that does so. Yeah, that's true. But I think you're in the clear.
βYeah, I don't know. What's the worst? What's the worst is going to happen?β
Just make sure you're there for all the meetings. Maybe just, maybe just set up weekly checkups with this guy. So he doesn't have to go above your head. That'll do it for the show today. Congrats to the nicks for one of the all timers.
Thanks to Kyle. Thanks to Seru. Thanks to Tom. Thanks to it. It's Kevin with a state and he's off, right?
Not today now. Yeah. Nice to do this credits thing because of the Spotify thing. So if everybody hears probably like, why the fuck's it even do that? But that's why I do it.
Because I want them to know, I really want a Tom to know I cared tonight. The nice gesture. That'll, yeah, that'll do it for the show. So we are going to be back on Sunday. Correct after game five.
And we could be talking about a new, I have no idea. Wouldn't it be crazy if the spurs, like mentally show the results, the same way they did game three. And then get this to three two and then all the pressures on to York. Could that happen? Could that happen?
Are the spurs in fact the better team? So I was thinking at half time last night. Not so much after the game. That'll do it for the show. That was a fun one.
Riders on the show. Part of the sports. Two.


