This is unleashed, are you listening?
Can you hear me? This is unleashed are you
listening? Can you hear me with?
Your call Unleashed. Are you listening to hear me?
This is Unleashed. Can you hear me?
What's happening to everybody? BT Unleashed in the house on
this Monday. Hopefully you guys had a great
weekend. Let's get answer.
We got a couple of good things for you today.
Super Bowl stuff or more about the Super Bowl buzz.
We'll we'll get a little deeper into the game as we get a little
deeper in the week here. The Jets starting to hold it on
their OC spot, Little Mix and Lakers and some some LeBron
stuff from last night. I don't know about you.
Like I don't know if if it's that I'm at a different stage in
my life or that the Super Bowl has changed so much that my
interest in the Super Bowl is is this big?
It's minimal and it's minimal for a couple of reasons #1 and I
understand why they have to do it.
They have to do it based on the logistics.
But like the week off, to me, you just, you're in such a role.
You got wild card. We got the end of the regular
season, some meaningful games, whether it's the Steel, those
Ravens and all that stuff, right?
Then you get wild card nuttiness, which I love.
Then you get division around, which is great.
We got a lot of good games too. Then you get obviously
conference championship Sunday and then you get a whole week
off and it's like, and you got almost like get back into it.
And it's hard to like reignite those emotions.
Like you're watching football month after month after month
after month after month. And then all right, we'll just
have the brakes a little bit. Go do some other stuff, You
know, watch some hockey. If you're into hockey, watch
some basketball, little college hoops, pro level, you know, a
little, a little WWE, whatever it might be, go do whatever.
Go skiing and then, Oh yeah, by the way, let's reconvene.
And now let's just get that that ferocious football feeling.
And if it's not a great match up, it's very hard for me to get
that that emotion revved up. I mean, of course I'm rooting
for Sand Arnold that that's a no doubter.
Like go down. Like, if you're a Jets fan, if
you're a Jets fan and you're not rooting or you're rooting
against Sam because you, you like, you're jealous or I, I, I,
I really don't know what to tell you.
I mean, the young man has been every time he's gotten a chance
to take a shot at The Jets and others have done it, obviously
and rightfully so. Absolute train wreck of a
franchise. But anytime Darnold's been asked
about them, he has always comported himself with such
class. So that alone, not to mention
just I think he's a pretty good player.
Not to mention that it was it was more The Jets fault, not
his. I'm definitely rooting for Sam
Darnold, not to mention the opponent here, and that's
obviously the Patriots. But I don't know, like to me
when I think about the Super Bowl, I need some sort of not
that I need it. That's a bit of an
overstatement, but I certainly desire, I certainly prefer some
sort of legacy element involved, like when John Elway was chasing
is going back a million years. But when Elway was first in his
chase chasing his first Super Bowl, obviously trying to
validate that that great career and punctuate that.
And even that's funny though, when John Elway was doing that,
we weren't wrapped up in these day-to-day conversations about
GOAT or legacy or hey, you have no championships.
You got to get as a quarterback, you got to get one.
Otherwise, you can't be, yeah, you can't be one of the best of
all time. Once you get 2 versus 1, you get
a little further separation there.
So it's become much more nuanced.
And a lot of the conversations are pretty interesting, but a
lot of them as well at the same time are redundant.
And it's kind of a rehashing of the old stuff.
At least this Super Bowl doesn't doesn't provide you with that
because Sam Darnold's either going to become a Super Bowl
champion or Drake May is going to become a Super Bowl champion.
Now the feel good story is for me is Darnold, and that's also
personally driven and I can't stand the patriots there.
I I think I dislike the Patriots more than the Red Sox, like I
really do. And I they there's just a lot of
it's rooted jealousy. I admit that, like, you know,
they win all these championships.
They hit the reboot, you know, back-to-back four win seasons
and then they're back at the Super Bowl.
I'm like, my God, can I get a wild card?
Can I sniff ten wins? Can he just give me a bone?
So I admit it's a lot of it's fueled by jealousy.
But the thing about at least from a a bigger picture item
like if you're looking about like the the NFL pantheon and,
and ultimately what could be down the road for somebody like
Drake May versus Sam Darnold. Well, I think it would be more
advantageous to have Drake may win because he's going to
finish, he's going to finish second in the MVP this year.
And if you're, you know, a top three pick, which he was and you
big you, you bag a championship this early in your career, Well,
now you're on a an early trajectory that does make future
conversations and big games and possible Super Bowl appearance
repercussions more applicable to the bigger ticket items like
those legacies. Like if Drake may gets one by
the age of 24, whatever he is 20, I think he's 24.
And you've got Mike Vrabel and you've got that franchise and
you've got a fairly watered down version of the AFC.
Drake may provided the Patriots, and they probably will because
they're a good organization, provided they, you know,
insulate him properly and don't leave him out to dry and at
least give him a chance to win for the next 5-6, seven years.
You know, when I say win, be a consistent playoff team, maybe
one or two wild cards, one or two divisions.
Like now you get to a point like where Drake made before, if he
wins this weekend before he's 30, you know, he might be
knocking on the door with a championship or two or two
championships and another Super Bowl appearance, which obviously
puts him in a very different category at that point.
It's just, you know, I don't know, like the layoff here is a
little unbecoming to me. Like, I'm already I'm already
more excited for St. John's, UConn, Friday night at
the Garden that I am for the Super Bowl.
And then the other element of this and you know, I don't
really know when this happened exactly.
And I'm not here to be, you know, did John Johnny
negativity, you know, or Mr. Downtrodden here.
But all the stuff around the Super Bowl I've just got no
interest for at this point. I mean, you couldn't pay me to
listen to Bad Bunny. Like if I'm in my car and I've
got, you know, a three hour ride and the option is Bad Bunny or
no music or anything and it's decent weather, I'd rather hear
the birds chirp and hear the highway, you know, pavement on
the highways. I'm going 75, whatever I'm doing
then Bad Bunny. I just not into it at all, don't
care. And I, I remember saying this a
while ago and I think it came across as like a like a little
bit of a out of touch statement with the reality of the modern
world, right. But I'm also just not now, I
don't know that he's going to do this.
I I heard he's going to wear a dress.
All right, go knock yourself out, whatever.
But some of these other acts over the years, I mean, they've
been incredibly salacious. And I remember my daughter, my
daughter who's now 9. I don't even want my son seen
that. But, you know, 6-7 years old.
Yeah, you've got this, this risque presentation.
Who the hell needs that? I I mean, listen, you want that
stuff, go find it. There's a million outlets to
find it. Do whatever you want to do
behind closed doors. As long as everybody's
consenting, I don't care. I really don't.
But when you're sitting there with your family and you're
trying to watch the Super Bowl and you got these women, trust
me. I'm not saying to me, I don't
find it attractive. I'm not saying that at all on
some level. But you know, when you have
young girls and even impressionable young boys and
just not down with it, you know, gyrating, like fainting, licking
each other. What what are we doing, man?
This is what the Super Bowl has become and it's a real turn off
to me. So between the length of the
halftime before the not big between that, which just goes on
forever and any flow of the game is lost.
And it's like, OK, Oh, wow, there's that's right.
I'm I'm half, I'm half asleep. I've got 2 beers and I'll fall
asleep here. That's right.
The second-half of the Super Bowl is coming up between the
length and the attention to the other stuff that I just could
not care less about at this point of my life.
I don't even really think I cared about it that much when I
was younger. I really don't like even going
back to like Timberlake and Janet Jackson.
I think I liked it more than but I, I just, I'm looking literally
looking at the clock. I'm like, I, what is the third
quarter start? And there was a point let less
now, but there was a point where when everybody was fixated on
the on the screen, I'm just walking outside going on my
phone saying, all right, what other 8 or 9 bets, prop bets can
I place? I'm looking at lines like I'm,
I'm looking to win some money. I don't quite do that the way
that I used to. So I'm just sitting there bored
out of my frame and then the 7-8 hours, not that I watch it.
So I guess I really shouldn't complain because I do have the
option of watching it or not. But then he got 7 hours of
pregame show. I mean, how much do you need to
get ready for a game? And I'm not talking about the
globalization of football. I get that, all right.
It is a capitalistic society. And if you can make money and by
the way, just about, just about domestically, every area of
revenues been tapped into. So now you got to start bringing
in artists who obviously are appealing to different segments
of the world, which will lead to downloads and views and clicks
and money, The monetization of the sport.
I understand the business engine behind it.
I'm just, I just think the Super Bowl is largely played out.
And I've got the ten of them. I've got the 10 Super Bowls,
maybe even 11. And I was at that would have
been Super Bowl 50. The last time it was at Santa
Clara, I was out there with Tiki doing the national show.
I was doing a lot of TV at that point.
So I was very busy. We had the TV show at night, me
and Tik. We're doing our radio thing in
the in the day and I've enjoyed my like, again, I'm not trying
to be, you know, Joey Downer here.
Every time I would go to the Super Bowl, I, I knew I was
going to work a lot because I was doing TV at night, radio
early. It was a busy juggle.
I loved it and it was, you know, a little bit of a pain in the
ass, like shipping 5 suits out there and all the things that
that's, that's a me issue, not you issue.
I'm just talking about how I used to view the Super Bowl, you
know, a chance to make, you know, make some contacts out
there, do radio Row and and we as at that point, CBS Sports
Radio, like we were always separate from the massive
humanity that is Radio row. I mean, it's just the labyrinth
of muddiness. And quite frankly, the other
thing too is I got older and, and, and deeper in the not so
much an age thing, but deeper into the business.
I very quickly understood that Radio row radio is among the
most mind numbingly dumb and boring and waste of airspace
that you could possibly have. Yeah, let's get on so and so who
won the Super Bowl in 1977? And he's all the year to talk
about joint pain. What I mean, oh, let's welcome
this NFL luminary. He's here to talk about knee
replacement surgery. How are you So And so it's just
it's really now. And we were lucky because we
would get the the stars of the stars and we would say no to a
lot of people. And I remember, you know, last
couple of years, whether it was Brett Favre or or Jim Horribaugh
or Lamar Jackson or Josh Allen or Sean Payton, like me and T
got a Lister. We we got him right, Tim Tebow.
And it was a lot of fun that it was cool, but I don't know, like
if I was just, and I am now just a regular consumer of the games,
I'm not there. So much about the game is
generally just a turn off to me. Now, again, I'm not trying to be
preachy here. If you don't want to, you know,
if you don't agree, that's fine. I'm not trying to interrupt
anybody's joy. I'm just telling you how I
process the Super Bowl now and it just doesn't feel the same
way. And I think this is part of it
as well at DNY Test. I appreciate that, buddy.
Matchups a factor. Bill's lines would hit
different. Yeah.
I mean, you want tell me Bill's lines, you can throw out three
or four other different combinations that might have a
little bit more appeal to me. But and no disrespect to to
Drake may, who again, very well might, you know, win one or two
and get to 3, whatever it might be.
Drake based phenomenal. Drake May is a baller, right?
Drake may the patriots have also had maybe my jet buy is shining
through here, but I don't think so.
I think that this Patriots run has been the easiest of any run
that of any team that's got into a Super Bowl, starting with the
division. I heard God, I would, I would, I
would tell you who I think honestly, I think it may have
been Craig. I heard on the radio, I think it
was at some point last week, I think it was Craig, where every
single game and if I mess up to an extent, a little bit of a
stat, but I'm going to give you the meat of it just to
illuminate how lucky and how easy the Pats had it every game
this year except one or two. And I think it may have just
been one the the Patriots were playing a team that wound up
going to they they fired their coach.
So you play 17 games, I think 15 of them was that.
And then like one or two others was the last place team or
something like that where they didn't fire them.
It's like, you know, and then you get to the playoffs and it's
like, I don't know. And there were some great games
in the playoffs. There really were.
There was also some snoozefest and the Pats played in a couple
of them. So I myself, I get that.
I get that text there. Like I think if it was Josh or
if it was Joe Burrow or if it was Lamar, like part of the
thing about the Super Bowl is that it's become the ultimate
payoff for our evaluation of quarterbacks, which is great.
I really enjoy that. And again, that's why I keep
saying it's the Earl. And I'm trying to be fair to
Drake May, who again is going to finish second in the MVP.
He's a great player, he's accurate, he's a good athlete,
he's a big game player. His stats are through the roof.
He wins, He's a flat out baller and he's not just the guy who's
like a gamer, he's a gamer who's got a lot of talent.
Drake May is on his way to a tremendous career.
And maybe in hindsight, you know what, I look back on the Super
Bowl, I will appreciate it more if he does win.
And it's the early punctuation and there's other punctuations
of what ultimately proves to be a Hall of Fame career.
Maybe, maybe it'll hit me different down the road.
Maybe I'll appreciate it more. But I just, you know, if I if
Sam Darnold wasn't on The Jets and I didn't have this affinity
for just a really good, polished, well-intentioned young
man who I'm genuinely happy for, I mean, I'd be looking at at
Sam. Yeah, it'd be a good NFL story.
OK, fine. But I wouldn't be as connected
to it. And I would probably process Sam
Darnold more for what he is. And that's a quarterback who's
been on four teams the last four years, who's playing in the
quarterback who's playing in the Super Bowl, which generally is
not a recipe for massive ratings and massive appeal.
And you know, and then you got to throw the complexities and
this drives me nuts. the Super Bowl watch parties like I am
like I've at least gotten to a point where I've learned how to
function at a I'm I'm pretty social, but I'm also social when
I want to be. My wife knows that, like if I'm
not in the mood, you're not getting social BT Now, when I am
in the mood, there's nobody more fun than social BT.
But like, what my wife has not always understood is that Super
Bowl daddy's working, you know, So when everybody else is
looking at the commercials and which I think are fun, I'm not
here to denounce the commercials.
I actually do enjoy that. Everybody kind of shits on them.
I think that they're fun. And I do kind of enjoy that.
Now, some are stupid and anything with some sort of
political leaning. Either way, I think it's all
base. I think, like, I there's certain
things that really do fundamentally annoy me, but I
enjoy them. But over the years, she's like,
oh, you know, we, we got invited to this party.
You know, you want to go? I'm like begrudgingly, yeah,
hey, I'm going to have so and so and so and so come over to watch
the Super Bowl. So in her mind, she's thinking
it's a fun day, which I get because for the most part, she's
the one with the kids. Especially when I was going into
the city for 13 straight years, doing all the things that that
moms do, the day-to-day rigors of momhood.
Understood. Respect, right?
But her version of Super Bowl Sunday lot different than my
version of Super Bowl Sunday. I got people chirping they don't
know anything about football. And I'm here, especially when I
was doing the National show. I'm sitting there saying I yeah,
yeah, shut up, Shut up. Like, you're droning on about
the dumbest, most meaningless things.
And I'm trying to, I'm trying to, like, construct a show in my
mind the next day, Like, all right, well, how am I going to
attack this with tiki? Oh, third down and seven.
Oh, they call the penalty. Oh, let me hear that.
I don't know if that was a penalty.
Let me hear the commentary. Oh, they're going to the review.
They bring in Sterator. Whomever.
Let me hear what he's saying. Chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp,
chirp. Everybody yapping away, you
know, the wine flowing, the booze flowing and ungodly amount
of food, kids running around yelling.
I got to watch football. I got to understand what I'm
watching. And so I do and what I'm
hearing, which I can't, which is the point.
So I've got a little bit of a different level of frustration
with the Super Bowl, maybe more than some of you like the days
of me going to watch a Super Bowl and hammering back 7 beers
and not remembering what happened.
I, I, I didn't do that. But when I was 23, real.
Well, yeah, I did actually. But I'm talking about like when
I first got in the business, which was really right.
After that, you know, it was kind of lock in time.
So it's upon us. I think the venue's very benign.
I've been out there, as I said, Super Bowl 50, Santa Clara.
I thought Levi, I was living in San Francisco right when they
built the stadium, and I was fortunate I was only there to a
little less than two years. So I was fortunate enough to be
able to watch several games, including a playoff win against
Drew Brees, that Candlestick, which was great for me as
somebody who grew up in the Northeast and you know, you
watch The Jets, you watch the Giants, and then that second
game with like Madden, Summerall, you get the Niners.
You know, you might get some late Raider games when they were
good. And just to really be able to
walk into that stadium and feel Candlestick, it was awesome.
And I'm very happy that I was able to do that.
But the the trek out to Santa Clara, not to mention it's 41
miles from from San Francisco, but it's just like it's kind of
in and Santa Clara is nice, but it just doesn't have any juice.
And I've been to a lot of stadiums that that are that are
somewhat new. And I just think that Levi
stadium is wack at J KB K 1313. What's your favorite Super Bowl
of all time? What is my favorite Super Bowl
Like that's another thing like it's so crazy.
I and I love football. I'm going to try to construct an
answer here. But like, I look at like,
baseball when I was young versus football when I was young and I
could go chat even before I was consuming, like being able to be
old enough to realize what I was watching, you know, like 75.
I mean, I was 1 1/2 years old. But the Red Sox and the Reds in
75. Colton Fisk pushing the ball.
Stay fair, stay fair. 76 like the Big Red Machine squashing
the Yankees, sweeping them for zip.
Then the Yankees going out and getting Reggie, then the Yankees
winning in 77 and 78. And then 79, you had the
Pirates. We are family.
And then you get into the 80s and the Royals were there, a
couple of times in the Phillies were there, and Cal Ripken won
his only championship with the Orioles.
And then you keep getting deeper and deeper.
The Mets in 86. And you know, like I chapter and
verse, I can tell you plays and players and everything, the
Super Bowl is different. I don't know if it was the Roman
numerals that just threw me off as a kid.
I'm like, what? What is it?
What number are we on? Where, who?
I don't know. It was the fact that The Jets
were never in it. I would probably say one that
does jump out to me is just because of the unique
viewership. I remember going to my dad's one
of his really good friends, name is Dale, who who passed on
lawyer who went to Northwestern and my dad and, and I don't
know, I don't know how they became friends.
It was like my dad's certainly not a lawyer and certainly
didn't go to Northwestern, but they became really good friends,
right? And they had a penthouse in
Manhattan and my dad went, you know, they were in there betting
a few bucks. They were definitely betting and
I remember going to this penthouse in Manhattan for the
Broncos, Giants Super Bowl and the Giants trust.
I mean, they mop them and that's when I'm I remember watching
Super Bowls before that, but that was one that jumped out.
I'm not saying it was the best game, but it was certainly
meaningful for me. Matter of fact, I remember, oh,
Jay Rod, do me a favor. Look this up.
I think the year I could be off. 1983 just find the year that the
Eagles played the Raiders. I think it was 83 might be off
but right in that neighborhood. I remember watching the Super
Bowl in my basement with me and my buddy down the street and I
don't even know how we had a few bucks like we were.
He was a year old or so. Maybe he was the. 1980 season
80. Yeah.
No, says Raiders took the Eagles 2710 Yep, Yep, to decide the
champion for the 1980 season, could you do me a.
Favor, can you go? OK, can you go?
So I guess, but I don't think I knew him when I was 6 or 7.
Just go in sequential order. 80, if you can. 80, I'll give you a
minute to look it up. 808182 and 83.
Yeah. What?
I know the Redskins played in
there. I know Miami.
I guess Miami would have been Marino's rookie year.
Do you have that in front of you?
I don't even care when the score.
Whatever. OK, so the Eagles Raiders was
played in 8182. Was 49ers, Bengals, Bengals.
Yep, and then 80. 3 was. Let's see, Was that I would have
been Marino, right? I believe.
So. It's yeah.
Dolphins. The Redskins.
Wow, so it was. Even earlier than I thought.
This makes it even crazier. So I guess the the the Eagles,
Raiders, Super Bowl. I remember being in the
basement. I think my dad had to work and
which sucks, man, and my mom had no interest in the game.
Anyway, I'm in the basement watching, watching the game.
My buddy Mike and we each we each had a few dollars.
I don't know how. And we were we were betting the
dollar like, hey, I'll bet you buck, they run the next play.
I'll bet you dollar that they passed the next play.
And really, maybe I had five singles.
He had five singles. I don't even remember what
monetary denomination actually wound up exchanging hands.
Like if we both had five, then I walk away with 7 versus 3 or 8,
two or nine, one or 645. I had no idea.
You know, I'd probably know that if I knew about reverses back
then and parlays, I would have found a way to bang one in.
But I do remember not really caring that much about because I
didn't really understand football at a very early age,
right? I don't really have the offense
and the defense and the rules. It was so different than
baseball, which to me was very simple to understand.
See the ball, ball, hit the ball, run, catch, throw.
Very few rules. Is it fair?
Is it foul? Are you safe or you out?
Is it a ball? Is it a strike?
I was able to just, maybe it was just me, but I don't think I'm
alone. I was able to process that more
as a young kid, but how about that?
So I guess I would have been 7 and he was 8 and we're sitting
there banging a buck for buck. Hey, a buck, the next pass,
buck, a run here buck. He doesn't get to play more than
5 yards. Oh my God.
So again, I'm not here to preach.
I'm just telling you what I view the Super Bowl to be now.
Now the over commercialization and the kowtowing to people who
don't give a shit about football.
They don't care. And I feel like I've got to
still stand up for the people who do so as the entire day gets
hijacked with music that I don't know and I don't care and I
never will care about. I, I don't, I don't know what to
tell you. Like it just goes on and on and
on and on. Then you've got the weak
interruption again, which I get because there's a logistical
component. You got to get out there.
You want guys to be healthy for the Super Bowl.
I understand it, but like I feel like I haven't watched the
football game in a month and it's only been one week without
football. So that's where I'm at with the
football now, unfortunately. I mean, this is just my luck
now. You got to you got to hire who's
good. You got to hire who's out there
and you've got to make the right decision for the show.
So I wasn't going to let J Rods gross Patriots bias affect me
offering him the job to be the producer for BT Unleashed.
But would you look at this guy, J Rod Pop on the screen.
See, this is the difference. Tell me.
Look at the youthful glow. What's up?
Look at the look how young he is.
By the way, he told me he was out till 3:30 the other night at
the concert. That's been tough.
The weekend. Yeah.
Good. I'm happy.
I know I texted you and asked you about the concert, so I'm
good. I'm glad you had a good time.
Right. But look at this guy.
He's a young pup. He's just getting going.
He's lucky enough to be and and earned it to be involved in
something like this. I know he appreciates it.
I appreciate him. But just look at this guy.
I'm in my early 50s. I've never seen one.
This guy's getting ready to watch another new dynasty with
the Patriots and the, the like, the return of the Patriots.
I'm not going to lie, man, it's turned me off a little bit.
Like I I can respect Rabel and I can respect how they build the
team. I just don't want to watch them
win anymore. I'm I'm not going to pull any
punch. Yeah, I mean.
Come on, I I definitely could see that like because I mean, my
roommate too, he's a he's a big jets fan and like he's saying
the same thing. He's just like, screw the Pats.
Like this is just awful. Hate to see it Got to say from
the people back at home, my family, you know, we're very
happy. Can't wait to see it again.
Going to be fun. So yeah, excited, excited for
the excited for the game this weekend.
We'll see what happens now you're.
You're a music guy and I hope you enjoy it.
You're a music guy. We know you did the BT
Unleashed. We got more songs coming for the
show. You're at the concert the other
night you performed here or now. If you're not a Bad Bunny guy,
then you know I'm not. But you're like the last hope
here. And I know he's wildly famous.
Are you a Bad Bunny fan? You know.
What, Like listen, have I busted down the Bad Bunny a couple
times at a club? Yes. 2. 1000% but it would I
consider myself a Bad Bunny fan. No, I wouldn't say that.
Like when I say I'm like, I wouldn't even say in general,
I'm very excited, like you said, like excited for Super Bowl
halftime shows. I just feel like often, like the
acts, they're kind of basic or just like, you know, Usher,
like, like that's not my generation.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean last.
Year, you know, obviously I enjoyed that was like definitely
for my age group. But yeah, I mean the Bad Bunny
choice, you know, I think globally he's a superstar.
You know, I think even in America he's a star.
I just think audience wise it's it's an interesting choice,
Yeah. I mean.
Audience wise, it's time to go to the bathroom.
It's what it is exactly for me and and.
Pretty much for everyone probably like, you know, it's I
got, you know. Listen, I get it.
Listen, by the way, you don't have to be a big fan to get down
to some music. I mean, if the opportunity
presents itself, you know, and you're at a club and you're
getting after it and you hear a song and everybody's banging
around to the beat, you feel good.
I'm not mad at you for that. And now listen, there's been
some that I've loved here. I love Dre, love, you know, love
when Snoop was out there. Like that's my like the 90s.
But it's funny, as an East Coast guy, you know, my friends get so
mad at me, like when Biggie was phenomenal, but like I look at
the the West Coast rap of the 90s, like when that stuff was
sitting like doggy style dropped when I was in college and I got
the CDI, got the CD. That was my anthem.
I used to play that before, like before we go out every night,
you know, So I love that stuff. So when those guys were on stage
and obviously Eminem's got some bangers.
He's an old timer, obviously. Like that's great.
It's a little hit or miss, but but I had an idea and thank you
for that, J Rod. I appreciate it, buddy.
I had an idea years ago, right? I remember saying this to Tiki.
I'm like, you know, here's what they should do, and I don't know
why they've never done this, and it's not that freaking hard.
So I proposed to Tiki. I probably said this for the
first time a decade ago, maybe even 11 years ago at this point.
I see, you know, instead of having one, one group or one
artist that may or may not appeal to the mainstream, right?
Why don't you have 4 and why don't you have basically four
different sections of the stadium?
So I'm going to actually draw a very, very loose schematic for
you. All right, let's just say this
is the stadium. Boom, boom, bang, midfield.
There's the end zones. All right, so there we go.
Got a little diagram. So that's the perimeter of the
stadium, that's the field outline.
That's the 50. You got the end zones there,
right? Why not put in each corner,
right where the XS are, right there.
Put in a specific genre where everybody that's watching the
Super Bowl is going to have appeal.
So go to, you know, one. Hey, the nostalgic guy, ladies
and gentlemen, Aerosmith, you know, ladies and gentlemen, Mary
J Blige. You know what, whatever it might
be, and then you have, you know, a current rap or a current R&B,
you get the rock representation for sure.
And then he just bounced around. Now it's not 3 songs of pop, you
know, it's a little bit of a different configuration for the
set. And I understand logistically
that it's a massive, that's why it takes so long, massive
undertaking to have, you know, Katy Perry fly across the sky,
you know, whatever that was on the horse.
I don't remember what she was on.
I get it. And they try to push the
envelope year by year by year. And it does look pretty, could
be wildly cool on TV. But if the music sucks, or at
least if I perceive to be and I'm disinterested in the music,
then guess what I'm doing? I'm either clicking or I'm going
for a walk. So I think if you were to have
equal parts representation, you know it.
And by the way, the nostalgic act doesn't have to be somebody
like Aerosmith. It could be, you know, and I'm
not even a big The Who or you know, one of the early rap I get
Sugar Hill Gang. I don't even know if they're all
alive. I hope they are, but get an
early rap pioneer, just get something that's nostalgic,
right? And then, you know, you, you
level it off with a Little Rock, a little R&B and everybody's
happy. How hard is that?
I mean, I really don't think that that's hard, but I just
just just have 0 interest for this.
Let me get my gun. Why is that not working there?
OK with Drew, unless your team's in the Super Bowl quality is a
let down versus the playoff games leading up yes, Super
Bowls, a social gathering, food, friends, family, cold ones,
commercials, which by the way, you know, food, check friends,
check family, check cold ones, check commercials, check.
I mean 5 for five. Those are 5 things I like.
I just don't necessarily love them all at the same time, but
I'm trying to watch a champion get ground waiting for MLB in
the Masters. Andrew Bay Ridge yes by the way,
how could the Justin Rose play yesterday broke Tigers record.
How about that? I did watch a little golf
yesterday. Good to see Brooks kept the back
off the off the Lib tour. Not that I'm going to get into
golf now, but you mentioned the Masters.
I love the Masters, love the US Open.
We'll do some golf here on the show when it's, you know, when
it's burden. So yeah, I I had no other sport.
Do we have to jump through hoops to crown a champion?
You know, World Series, you know, playoff round, playoff
round play. You know, depending upon wild
card, World Series, four games, five games, six games or seven
games, champion crown. Game off day or game, game, off
day, game. Like if there's a sequence to
it, there's a rhythm to it. Same with the end.
Now the NBA Finals, they do stretch it out a little bit.
And they've done that more and more as the years have gone.
On hockey, it's pretty much on the ice, on the ice, day off on
the ice. It's a continuous run from the
start of the playoffs to the crowning of the champion with
whomever you know, holds up the Stanley Cup.
And they and football's the exact opposite.
And we don't give anything more time than we get football like
we are a lot. I know I am.
I am locked into the NFL training camp.
Like that's not that's not to even obviously mention, you know
how I follow everything, at least with The Jets and the
Giants and the other big stories around the NFL, the bigger ones,
OTAs, and not to mention the hype for the draft.
Like it is a continuous connection to the sport of the
football. And you know, you you get the
training camp and he just praying that none of you guys
get hurt. If you were a Jets fan, he just
pray like, hey, maybe we're going to be competitive this
year. You know, if you have a young
quarterback, let any team now, let's hope we got the right guy.
But there's there's an outward omitting of of emotion that
becomes more and more palpable as the year goes on.
And then it's September and then it's October and then you know
who's real and who's not. And then you get a sense of
who's going to be the MVP or who's in the mix and who's not.
Then you start talking coaches on the hot seat, like the
dialogue. Then you start talking, you
know, which quarterbacks going to go first overall, like we
started doing this year and every year, you know, going back
to the first when Mendoza and Oregon played up and out in
Oregon early in September. So like, it's just really just a
continuous flow. And then not only do you have an
interruption, but now you have it in a in an environment that's
got nothing to do with the with the, with the components of of
what we just watched transpiring.
No home field advantage. The fans.
Yeah. All right, if you got a ton of
money, sure, you can get your way in there.
But of the 80,000, let's just throw the number 80 of the
80,000 fans, right, who are watching in person.
Any given Super Bowl, how many are truly devout fans of the
teams that are watching that, that are playing that day?
How many, I don't know, I can hazard a guess.
Now, I can tell you that it's a lot lower than you know, like if
the Chiefs are playing at Arrowhead and I know the Chiefs
nation travels. I'm not saying that.
And there's a lot of affluent people that are fans of teams
that get to the Super Bowl that find a way to go.
I'm not saying it's all corporate.
I'm not saying it's all sterile, but it's a different type of
juice. It just is the elements
generally. It's benign, it's safe, it's
domed. And, you know, I think there's
something to be said for the sport of football where you are
really you are forced to deal with Mother Nature.
We saw it this year and it all changes.
And I'm just not a fan of that. I'm really just not a fan of
that. So you know that that that's my
take on the Super Bowl. I'll get more to the matchups
and obviously get deeper in the week.
I'll tell you who I think is going to win.
I'm happy for Sam. I'm rooting for Sam.
I think Drake Drake made is great.
I'm incredibly impressed by his his poise and his talent.
You know, Mike Vrabel was the guy that I wanted for The Jets
and then obviously Aaron Glenn was always on my list to be
fair, but might go back and look it up.
Mike Vrabel was the guy that I wanted from day one.
They didn't get him and he's a great coach.
But you know, I do think the one thing before I get to The Jets
OC stuff it a little something on the brunt here.
I think the one thing, and it's a big thing, like it's the thing
that you can't replicate. I don't care if you put Bad
Bunny, Eminem, Aerosmith, Mary J all on one stand.
They they recreate, recreate. We are the world, you know, and
they come up with which will be phenomenal.
I would actually like to see that.
Now that would that I'd stumbled upon an idea.
So how about that you go back to like we are the world, Kenny
Rogers, Michael Jackson, Oh my God, Sting.
I mean, just the the voices in there.
Wow. The I would love to see some
sort of new rendition of all of the artists there.
You know, so get some of the rappers, get Timberlake, get a
couple of old school rock legends that are still alive and
still able to hit the note right.
Put them all on one stage and sing a song.
I mean, how about being creative?
How about doing something like that?
But when there's no juice in terms of a palpable storyline,
and I don't think that there really is, yeah, Pats fans are
fired up. Yeah, Seattle fans are fired up.
Seattle doesn't have a national profile.
They just don't. And I think when you don't have
a national profile or that imprint and the Pats do, but
it's not like the Niners, even though they won more, more more
than anybody or the Steelers or the Packers or a few others.
It's just a little less than unless you've got that Peyton or
that Elway or that, you know, early on Tom Brady that like
carving out this legacy, Marino getting there as a hotshot
rookie and never getting back. I don't know.
I'm trying to be Joey Downer
here. I just I don't love the way this
thing is shaping up. All right, Obviously I get some
of these texts here. J Rod is going to pump them in
whatever looks good. Hold.
Is it BT getting close to telling people to get off his
lawn? Not really, no.
No, I'm not Joe B's definitely turned BT's turned into Joe B.
No, no, I'm not. I just at this point I know what
I want. And if I don't understand the
lyrics and I don't relate to him, I ain't singing them and
I'm not listening to them. So it's not a knock on his
talent. I know he's wildly, like
internationally incredibly famous.
And that's great. It's great for people.
Let's let's bring Elvis back from the dead at Slay under
score Kids. Yeah, No, I'm not trying to dig
up some of the legends just because, oh, it was so much
better back then. I don't even think Elvis is that
good. I really don't talk about some
blasphemous comment here. And you talk about some of the
great musicians of all time and certainly one of those
transcendent, you know, figures and music, you know, Michael
Jackson, Elvis, Madonna, maybe on the on the women's side, a
few others, right. I don't, I don't know that I've
ever willingly put an Elvis song in my whole life on.
I don't, I don't have any of my phone.
If I hear it on the radio, which I don't listen to music on the
radio anymore, I kind of bounce around.
No, I mean, I, I don't need to, as you would say, dig up Elvis
and put them out there. I just need something in
between, you know, you know, if you don't know by now, I'm just
I'm not feeling Bad Bunny, but I don't know what he's going to
sing. I don't care.
I saw and I saw him last night, not that I watched the Grammys
anymore. I couldn't care less about that,
but I did see him, I happened to stumble upon, I was going
through the channels and I did see him.
He's a little bit at the table. He's actually pretty funny.
And, and I thought he said some good things about, you know,
hate versus love and peace versus discord.
And, you know, it's not about aggression, it's not about
anger, It's more about love. And that, by the way, that's
incredibly practical and, and very welcome sentiment.
I mean, I, I think at its core, it's all rooted and good.
I absolutely agree with that. I also, I also don't know the
way the world, not to get too deep here, but the way the world
is now, I, I don't, I don't know if that's if that's enough.
I mean, because the here's the thing, because the people who
are who are espousing the love are already programmed for the
most part to be good and to do good.
It's the people who don't feel love and have hatred and
jealousy and anger that manifests itself in a lot of
different ways. Unfortunately, many tragic, I
don't know, is love going to be able to permeate their heart by
just a musician going out there and saying let's love everybody
or tweet, You know, that's I know.
I mean, it's it's a great sound by knocking them.
It's a great sentiment. I agree with that.
But is it really practical? I don't know, you know, based on
what's going on in the world and has been for a long time,
Probably not, you know, all right, so here's where we are
for The Jets OC position second round.
They got 5 names left. Three, have got experience
called the plays. Two, don't.
Let me just say this, man, I mean no disrespect to Ronald
Curry, Lunda Wells, whatever. You know, they're not getting
the job if it's not Frank Reich, if it's not Darryl Bevel, and if
it's not Greg Roman. And by the way, even if it is
one of those 3, and it's going to be that The Jets are Dumber
and more incompetent than I could ever have imagined.
If the New York Jets go into this season and I'm just I'm
going to make a prediction. And if there's anything that's
less safe, all right, we're probably less accurate.
We're less wise to do is to actually think that you know
what The Jets are thinking in terms of a prediction.
But even The Jets have to know that they have to hire somebody
who's actually done the job before.
Now, if you have a first time DC who's not calling the plays, All
right, Aaron Glenn as an embattled second year coach
who's on the ropes. And if he starts out one and
four, he's probably not making it to Columbus Day and he's
certainly not making it to Halloween, let alone
Thanksgiving. He will be gone early if it's
ugly, right? So with him now calling the
plays out of desperation and a new young kid as the DC whatever
power he's actually has. I I, I don't know if you don't
have an experience to OC, preferably somebody who's been a
former coach like Reich that could assume the burden of what
the hell is going on on game day, then they are just they are
beyond salvation. Like they even the New York Jets
have to understand that this one's a layup.
This is a little you know, when you're playing with your
buddies. And you're playing, you know, a
little a little match on the golf course.
And it's like, you know, this far, I pick it up, man.
Or like we say in inside the leather or we have an
expression. You could you could tap it in
with your big toe, meaning it's so easy and even even we are
going to miss it. Pick it up.
I'm giving it to you. This is a tapping.
This is a tap in with your toe. This is a pick them up.
This is when you stand with your legs spread and you put the
putter almost behind your back in between your legs and you
knock it in and it goes in every time because it's this far away.
This is the kind of decision that The Jets have here.
If they mess this, they are really beyond hope because there
is nothing else that should permeate their mindset other
than getting somebody in the building that has actually done
the job. And getting somebody in the
building that is equipped to deal with the nonsense and the
losses and the chaos and the anarchy that is inevitably and
invariably going to be on Aaron Glenn's doorstep immediately.
So I like Reich. I don't think he's perfect.
I like Bevel. I don't think he's perfect.
I like Roman. I don't think he's perfect.
I have actually have a sense it's good.
I listen. I think it's going to be Rike or
Roman. I prefer Rike.
I feel like Roman's running style, even though The Jets were
run first team, I think that's a move that like if The Jets would
have gotten Roman 10 years ago, I would have been pumped.
I would have been absolute Jim Harbaugh Guy run scheme wildly
successful, but it just seems like one of these recycled moves
that just has no innovation. But the truth of the matter is
The Jets don't have the luxury of trying to be innovative.
Like you can be a little innovative when you got, you
know, some wins under your belt, when you got one side of the
ball that's on wrap, when you got a quarterback that you
already know is 3 or 4 years in and is already a stud.
Like you can maybe maybe I don't even know if it's fully
advisable, but you could justify it more.
Roll the dice, bring in a guy who is thought to be the boy
wonder, you know, brilliant, innovative, forward thinking,
offensive mind. All right, let's pair him up
with the rest of the veteran staff and let's go to town and
let's win. The Jets can't do that.
The Jets don't have a quarterback.
The Jets don't have a defense. The Jets don't have a passing
game. The Jets don't have a second
wide receiver. I don't know if Breeze Hall will
be back. The Jets really don't have much
except the fact that they've got a pretty good, which is not a
bad starting point, actually better than pretty good.
The Jets have a good offensive line.
And when you hear that and you know that and you do, maybe
that's where Roman makes some more sense.
I, I think I'd, I'd like to know what The Jets philosophy is in
terms of are they going to take a swing with that second first
round pick on a Ty Simpson like which I don't even know.
I like Ty Simpson more than most of you because the Alabama
couldn't run the ball and he was asked to throw the ball.
I think it was 7273% of the time, which was the first or
second biggest disparity in all of college football that think
about Alabama had no running game and this guy was running
for his life. I actually think Simpson is
talented and much more appealing than many of you.
I ain't taking him at 16. I don't know if I could justify
that. But you got to take a
quarterback somewhere and don't you have to have an OC that's
worked with quarterbacks at some point?
I think you do. So that should light itself up
for a pretty easy decision for The Jets.
But again, they're The Jets, so you really don't know.
All right, At Avery Summit, if a head coach is calling the
defensive plays, why bother having ADC?
A head coach should be a general overseer with eyes on every
aspect of the team, not super focused on one area as a play
caller is. I actually think that that's a
very good point. I think that certain people can
certainly do it and history has proven that to be true.
I think with Aaron Glenn, I think it's him asserting himself
and understanding that, hey, if I'm going down, I'm going down
on my watch, I'm going down the way I want to go down.
If I lose this game and I get burned on a on 1/3 and eight
from from midfield, that sets up a game-winning field goal for
the other team with 9 seconds left.
But that's to play that I called.
Well, then I can live with that as a human.
I can live with that as a football person.
I can live with that as a man. I messed up.
I made the wrong call, but at least I did it.
So I'm in control of my own fate.
But I think that that's a, a very, very good point because
when you're so fixated on calling plays, you know what?
What other attention to detail are you missing?
I, I don't know that's why that's why you need somebody
that's done it a lot who's been a coach as a head coach in terms
of delegation, like Reich or or Roman, who's been around the
block and worked with some big names and big talents.
And you know who's going at the very least they're going to run
the ball effectively, remain committed to it, You know, which
would affect down and distance, which should put in play action.
You know, it it could really make his life easier or it could
open up questions like, man, he he hired somebody to be the OC
who used to be a real valued commodity in the NFL.
But like that luster's been stripped away and he's not like
like, right. Frank Reich is not viewed the
way he was 5 five years ago and he let's go for what it is.
He's not neither is Roman, neither is Bevel.
If this five years ago and one of these guys is showing up in
the Floral Park were like, whoa, all right, Frank Rice, Frank
Wright, the head coach five years ago, I would have been to
jump in for joy based on some of the things that I saw with Frank
Wright, right. So I think there's a lot of the
a lot of stuff there that's a little hard to, to dig into now
because I, I don't know exactly what the personnel is going to
look like. They got, I think it was
actually more than I thought. I remember over the weekend I
saw Samini tweeted something. I thought it was going to be
about 7576 million dollars. The Jets are going to probably
have more the neighborhood of 82 to $83 million in free agency
now of money to spend. Now the bad news is, is that The
Jets three highest paid players that they will be paying this
year in terms of dead, dead cap hits no longer on the team.
You know, Aaron Rodgers is 1. Justin Fields is the other.
And why am I forgetting the third?
Either way, those two are definitely on the list here.
So that is not exactly good for a team that's trying to figure
stuff out. But they got a lot of money to
spend. They got a ton of picks.
And at some point, whether it's at 16, whether it's trading back
late in the first round, whether it's next year with one of the
three first round picks, like you got to have somebody in the
building that knows how to work with a quarterback.
So personal. I would probably take my order
would be Reich and then Roman. I know they're series with
Roman. Seems like they're Boomer said
it without, you know, I know Frank's, Frank's boy.
It seems like The Jets are pretty serious with Frank Reich,
which I'd be fine with. But if you don't have the right
people to coach and you don't really have any sort of viable
option behind center, it doesn't matter who the hell you have
coaching. Like it really doesn't.
You know, you got to have players.
That's it. So I'm going to get to the
Knicks here. But like use the Knicks as an
example, you know, the Fizdales, the Hortisex, The Who the hell
else is that coach? My God, pre Tom Thibodeau,
Fisher, Hortisex, Fizdale, I forget, I'm forgetting one.
Either way, were those guys horrendous coaches?
Well, I mean, they were, they weren't good.
But like, if you gave one of those guys Jalen Brunson and
Cat, and I'm not even a big cat fan, but Cat and a couple of
wings who were pretty good. I mean, they're not going to win
23 games. I can promise you that they're
going to be better than they were.
The end of the day, coaching sounds great.
Coaching legends, you know, do you have players how Bill
Belichick do this year at UNC? How did he do?
Did awful. How did he do?
It's terrible. So I I don't get too wrapped up
in in who the coach is, but I do get wrapped up in the process in
determining who the coach will be in terms of what you're
looking for. And at least it seems like The
Jets seems seems like The Jets are in the general neighborhood
of maybe potentially, possibly getting it right in terms at
least as it like a a a theory, like, hey, let's get the guy
who's done it before. Who knows the offense.
Glenn could just worry about the defense.
It sounds good. At least it's congruent with my
mindset. And of course, we'll see how it
goes. All right, good job by the
Knicks last night. So the Knicks are at a very
interesting spot right now. They've won six straight games.
And again, one of the things about, you know, doing the show,
unless it's like a big playoff game, Yanks, Mets, Knicks, I'm
not going to get on the air. I'm not going to get on BT
Unleashed and like rundown box scores and, you know, time out
in the third quarter unless it's like the NFL and it's The Jets
and the Giants during the regular season game.
This is more of a macro conversation about the New York
Knicks here who still have a couple of days to decide if
they're going to make a move for Karl Anthony Towns.
Now, pardon me for Giannis Anthony Kumpo.
Now, Brian Windhorst this morning.
I saw him on on ESPN. Brian said that it just doesn't
seem like the Knicks have any motivation to really jump into
the deep end of the pool and make a real move for Giannis.
Like they're kind of laying out and and I, I get that.
I don't, I don't, I don't meaning I understand it because
there will be so many levels to this trade, recruiting a third
team, maybe recruiting a 14 to get the desired assets to
satisfy Milwaukee and then spin it back around like it's a
complicated process. Really the good thing here.
And I don't think he's going to be a nick.
I would get him. I would do it.
I would pursue that third team and 14.
I do not think Giannis is going to be a nick.
I don't I'm not even sure he's going to be dealt.
But if he is dealt, I do not believe he will be dealt to the
Knicks. That's my opinion.
Now. I kind of felt like that the end
of the week, I would go for him. I would take the swing.
I don't think this group's going to win.
I'm going to remain consistent with that.
It's not a championship team, but at least by winning six
straight games and they played pretty well last night.
Last night was good. Like OG was phenomenal.
Heart was great. Cat had you know, Cat's been
doing a good job on the backboard and and and very, very
good. So maybe that's him attacking
his role with a different mindset.
You know, only took 10 or 11 shots, but he's been more of a
of a presence on the backboard then he had.
Of course, the two fouls early in the first quarter had to take
a seat, but I thought he did a good job again on the
backboards. I thought that Colic had some
good moments. I thought Shamit had some good
moments. So see, now that the Knicks have
won sixth straight versus the losing streak that they were,
you know, embroiled in somewhat recently, at least it gives you
a different mindset. And the word that I'm going to
use is clarity when things are going awry.
I mean, you can apply this to any, any, any facet of life.
Something as simple and as benign as being on the golf
course with your buddies, right, You having a rough start, you
start over thinking everything you like.
Oh God, you know this irons not working today.
So rather than laying up off the tee, even though I probably know
that I should, you know, I've just been kind of I'm just not
getting in the middle of the club face here.
So even though drivers the wrong call and I have a chance to
shoot it out of bounds because it's too short, whatever.
Maybe if I swing 60% instead of 85% or 90, you know, I could
take 2530 yards off the drive and maybe hit it perfectly and
be in position. Like you're overthinking
everything. Like if it and I, I hate hitting
bit irons, I'm not good at it at all.
And I'm the guy who always takes the driver and tries to reach
something that I have no chance to reach or clear something that
I did. I think in my own mind I could
still clear or throttle it down enough where I think I can find
a way to keep it in bound. So you don't listen to me for
golf advice. This is just me painting some
imagery here about the thought process of when things are going
well versus when they're not right.
So to continue the golf analogy, you know, say if it's 100 and
you know, it's obviously different for everybody 210
yards to clear something and you don't really feel right going
with a three wood or a hybrid. So you, you, you keep the and
you you can't clear it like it's dead terrain.
Yeah, guy, you know what? I know that I should use the
five or four or six, whatever it might be, depending upon how far
you hit it. But I'm spraying.
I feel terrible with the five iron today.
You know I'm going for it. Boom.
And then of course, drop 2 hitting three, you get an 8
rounds done because you overthought it, whereas because
you didn't start the round. Well, conversely, if you're
actually playing well and even me as an awful golfer has some
days where I feel like I'm in control and I I have a plan and
I feel good on the range and I'm kind of piping it for me a
little bit. Whereas you don't overthink it.
You just, I was like, oh, I I can't clear that.
All right. Hey, you, you look at a watch,
somebody shoots it, whatever number you want to get.
All right, what's it to clear? Yeah, yeah, All right. 5 iron
boom. You just grab it.
You go and or hybrid, you go. And you don't overthink it.
And because the Knicks have now won sixth straight, they have
more clarity in how they evaluate what they should do and
what they might do. When you're losing 5 in a row
and or four or five or five of six and everybody's banging on
your team and this team's not good enough and I don't think
they are good enough to win a championship.
You you get a little tight, maybe you you see things that
aren't there. You process things differently.
And again, that lack of clarity might propel you or motivate you
to go out and do something that is really not sensible now and
big picture for the franchise. Because in a lot of ways, like,
I can at least understand this philosophy.
While I don't think that this iteration of the Knicks is going
to win the championship, I certainly know that they've got
a chance to represent the Eastern Conference.
I, I, I know that if everybody's healthy, you know, and
everybody's doing their thing. So I'm talking about the
championship, though. I don't think they'll beat the
top two teams out West myself, but you can at least say, well,
all right, we we've we've stabilized their season.
We've got the haters off our back.
And now I'm talking about Leon Rose.
Let let me really evaluate what we should do all right, if this
is really us, this recent version with the six straight
wins, I could justify not getting a third team, getting a
four team, giving up OG give it a mile, give it up Bridges, give
it up this, give it up this, give it up that.
And then have it a team where it's literally Giannis and
Brunson and a bunch of scraps and hoping that you win and
hoping that Giannis's Achilles does not blow up, which
terrifies me because he's had two calf issues this year and he
also had one in the 2024 playoffs where it was a real
problem for him. And that's generally A
precursor. Not always, I talked about this
on Friday, but generally A precursor to something much more
devastating. And that would be the shredding
of the Achilles tendon when it rolls up and you're out for a
year. You know what I mean?
Ask Durant. Ask, ask all these guys.
Bird ruptured his Achilles. You know, it's, it's brutal,
especially for a guy who's built on quick twitch and bounce and
athleticism. So well, I would still do it
because I if I don't think that this team could win a
championship and I don't right, then why wouldn't I do it?
I would do it. But I've also operated through
clarity and with clarity the entire season because from day
one, going back to when I was on the fan after the first win of
the season and going in, I remember saying teams not a
championship team because I'm not a cat believer.
I'm not a cat hater. I know it seems that way.
I just think what he does not do well is going to devastate the
team. When you're playing against a
great team in the Eastern Conference Finals or the NBA
Finals with a great roster, star players and a great coach and a
winning culture, I don't see Kat being that guy.
So because I believe that and in my mind, I know that because
I've he's been around 10 years now, I'm doing it.
But I know it's not necessarily the most prudent thing to do
because you're giving everything up and he's bringing some entry
baggage here as well. Knicks may have a better chance
this season adding a minor piece than a major piece mid season.
I would agree with that. I don't know what that is.
You know, I'd like to get, I'd like to get a defensive guard
out there. Obviously, you know, Drew
Holiday, he's been mentioned big, you know, big game chops,
big shots, good defender, helps out Jalen Brunson alleviates the
pressure because he could bring the ball up a little bit.
He can work off each other. You can't quite hunt the guards
the way they do with Brunson in the half court.
Every time somebody plays the Knicks, they're like, all right,
we're attacking Brunson, we're attacking Cat.
We're going right up Brunson, getting downhill and going
through him because he's not strong.
We're going around them because he's not fast and because the
Knicks will know that and we'll have to compensate for that once
they do. Now, the subset of the initial
attack is we get after Carl Anthony Towns in space and we go
by him or we go through him because as we saw, he couldn't
even post up Russell Westbrook, who's 63.
And while he gets some rebounds and he, you know, he's obviously
a talented player. He's not a real physical force
even though he's big. So there's just a lot here with
the Knicks. And I think it's fascinating to
see what they're going to do. And it's this week, man.
It is this week. It's Thursday, 3:00 PM.
And I would say that at the end of the day, I give you a couple
of predictions here. I just gave you one with The
Jets. I think it's going to be Reich
or Roman. I do think that they'll kind of
get it right with that experienced voice there.
I do not think the Knicks will get Giannis.
That's one prediction. I don't think they'll incredibly
feel like they'll try incredibly aggressively to get him.
And for some reason, I actually don't think he's going to be
dealt. And if he is, he's not, it's not
going to be to the Garden, Miami, whatever.
I I think the prudent thing for Milwaukee is to get to the
offseason and understand that you're not going anywhere this
year. Your top superstars, not
healthy, one of the best players in the NBA or healthy or happy
obviously wants out. Eventually you're going to have
to acquiesce. But I don't know that you do it
under this force pressure and like the spectacle that is now
like the Giannis watch. I just don't know if you
maximize the return. So I don't think he's going to
be a Nick. I don't.
All right, let me get this at J KB K13.
I know it's a hypothetical, but you think the team would have
been better this year if they kept Randall and Devo?
I I don't know that's come up. Are we being Sally's that that
conversation quite a bit. I love Viv Vincenzo, love them.
I've got great respect for Randall.
They weren't going to win a championship with Julius Randall
either, you know now, if you had a situation where you were
playing, let's say, let's say, see a lot of this too goes back
to the inability to really trust Mitchell Robinson health wise,
not from a basketball point of view.
If you had like, do I think that this group could win a
championship? You have Jalen at the one you've
got. I mean, at that point you can't
even put Bridges at the 2. Whatever.
But I'm just going to do it for now.
Bridges at the two, OG at the three, Randall at the four.
And then Mitchell Robinson obviously wore Hartenstein.
But you know, there were there were limitations that they can
only offer him $60 million. But although it looks like the
Thunder might trade him, bring him back, I take him in a RP.
I love him, right? So to me, that's a starting 5
that would be better or have more of a chance to win a
championship than the starting 5 right now.
Now you still have OG there, you have Bridges at the two
Brunson's doing his thing and then you got, you know, Randall
who's going to alleviate some of the scoring pressure and it's
not a good defensive player, but he's not as bad as Brunson or
cat. And then instead of having cat
at the five, you got Mitchell Robinson, But he just he's not
physically reliable and that really does change and prevent
the Knicks from maybe doing things that I think from a
basketball sensibility. They know they should do.
Like if if if I'm I mean, I've been pointing out cats
deficiency since the moment they got them.
You don't think that they know that.
Of course they do. They're not dumb, but because
Mitchell Robinson is a 0 on offense and is a a is is not
reliable physically. You know, you, you can't
structure A-Team around him where we're going to just roll
with him as one of our main horses and go from there.
If you could. It's a totally different
discussion, but that's part of the reason why they they brought
in Cat, even though Cats not a perfect player at Rob Russell
3023. Am I the only one who thinks
Peyton's an asshole for firing his OC, disrespecting Bo Nicks?
I mean, I don't know. Not exactly taking the poll
about Sean Payton. I think that Sean Payton is.
I think Sean Payton's what you want in the coach.
He's unapologetic, he's fiery, he's brilliant, and he's a
winner. Now, some of those other traits,
yeah. I mean, a lot of people who are
great at something they do project that.
Inability maybe to relate to everybody in the room.
And I'm not saying I respect that, but I think you just come
to understand that that that's kind of the way it is with
somebody who's great at especially a coach, you know,
who's in charge of the whole building.
You know, I, I like Sean Payne. I think he's great for football.
I really do, even with suspension aside, whatever all
the stuff that's happened, guys, you know, PE DS cheating.
I mean, come on, We're going to start being in the the virtue of
the moral, the police morale, the morality police now with
Sean Payton. I mean, I'm I'm not going to do
I really never have. I got a funny Sean Payton story
for you, though. Maybe this is part of the reason
why I like him. And even if he didn't do this
for me and for tiki, then I think that I'd still speak very
highly because I think he's a great guy.
I wish he was coaching the chats.
Why? What else do I have to say?
Like if that's not the ultimate compliment or endorsement, I
don't know what else to say. So he had he was with the Saints
early with the Saints, I forget the exact.
Well, maybe not that early, but we were doing the national show
and Tiki was with Sean, with the Giants, as many of you know, and
he had his number and Sean's a crazy and, and Tiki would always
tell him he's like, man, he's such a dude bro.
He would just come in and drop, you know, 9F bombs and just the
whole locker room love them and just a guy's guy, you know, go
out, have a steak, have a couple of scotches, let it RIP like a
guy that even though he was a coach, just let it flow.
Now when you're the head coach, it's got to be a little
different. But as a positional coach, as he
was with Tiki, the like the dudes loved them, the whole team
loved them, right? And he had committed to come on
the show and do with the national show.
We'd get a lot of coaches and you know, a lot of prominent
national figures. We just did.
That was great. And Sean Payton was booked to
come on the game on the show. And I guess we had booked it, I
don't know, like a month or so ago, and I guess Sean maybe 3
weeks out. And I think Sean forgot that he
was scheduled to do it. Now we're polite.
Listen, it's not the worst thing.
I mean, if Sean Payton doesn't show up, it's not like we can't
do a show. If you're structuring your show
around the guest, you have no show.
But let's just get that out there.
You're not a very good host if you can't do the show because of
guest bags. Like you got to be able to vamp,
but you got to be able to pivot and you got to be able to talk,
right? So, I mean, I wanted to talk to
him because there was some real good things to talk about, but I
wasn't overly concerned. Anyway, Long story short, he's
texting with him and Sean was like, oh, you know, I, I, I
forgot, but I know I committed. They had a game.
It was a preseason game. Sean Payton called us from the
tunnel of the Silverdome, not the Silverdome of the the
Superdome. Silverdome was WrestleMania 3 of
the Superdome and actually did the interview for a good 15
minutes on the air while he's in his coaches gear, when he's in
the tunnel on his on a cell phone.
So I thought it was a pretty stand up move.
So I'm a Sean Payton guy. I know he rubs people the wrong
way. I get it.
I think once you're on your on his bad side, it's it's a rough
thing, but I think he's a great coach.
I really do. I think too.
So talking about the Knicks, it's been a big week here with
with Giannis and the trade deadline.
Maybe they just get, you know, somebody for the margin, some
sort of ancillary piece where a little defender, you know,
preferably in in the back court next to Brunson, maybe an extra
shooter, whatever. Again, I don't think Giannis is
coming. But you know what I can't take?
And they use the word glazing, right?
Glazing, I mean, just the way people glaze them.
Ron. I just, I really, I can't stand
it. I mean, last night, Reggie
Miller and, and Reggie's one of these guys.
Like even as a Knick guy, I don't hate Reggie because I
think Reggie's incredibly entertaining.
But Reggie's got to get over himself.
First of all, the nonsense of owning the Knicks.
And dude, the Knicks beat you more than you beat the Knicks.
Can somebody please get the memo to Reggie Miller when he gets on
TV and he's got the suit, he's all Natalie attired and all
buttoned up and looking good, which he does.
You know, he talks like he was 27 and six against the Knicks at
the Garden. Dude, you lost more to the
Knicks then you beat them. And he's like, he is
misremembered or recreated this narrative in his mind based on
one or two moments. Like, I mean, all right, Reggie
was Reggie was good. I mean, really good.
And Reggie was a villain that we love to hate.
And Reggie made New York, Indiana, that rivalry basically
like Nick's Bulls, Nick's Heat. But Riley, like it was
ridiculous and I missed that stuff like the rivalries are
kind of gone now for a lot of reasons that I I won't get into
now. I don't want to get sidetracked
here, but hey, come on, Reg enough.
I mean, LeBron James throws down an alley, you dunk last night.
You see him falling all over Mike Tirico.
Oh, whoa, give me a break, dude. You call it a game.
You know, I don't need you to be yes, that was a very nice move
by LeBron as the Knicks. You know, you don't have to be
so objective where you sound boring, like it's a 1939
broadcast of the of the World Series.
But hey, jeez, can you have a spec, a speck of objectivity?
Enough with the Reggie Miller stuff.
I'm just getting tired of it, man.
And then and and even Mike Tirico, who I think is a good
broadcaster, he's polished. Yeah.
He's getting a little corny as he's getting old.
He really is. Like, there was a point where
Mike Tirico was the best, like, in terms of, you know, no
frills, no nonsense. No, you know, no, no kissing up.
Like, he's just now he's one of these guys where he just thinks
he's so funny and so cool. You're not you're a geek.
I mean, really, I I say that affectionately, like Mike
Tirico's a geek. I mean, Mike Tirico, what are
you? Come on, come on, dude.
Like, I don't know. The way he presents himself now,
even with the interviews with Jordan.
I I'm just I am a fan. But I I guess when you heard it,
when, when you hit a certain level of fame, I think too many
people, they just take it that next step too far.
And now you're a little preachy and the delivery is not as
appealing. Like I like young, hungry, up
and coming Mike Tirico, who I thought was buttoned up and
awesome and he's still a very talented guy.
But I say this because last night this was just stupid,
right? So last night there is a
situation where I hope there was a foul or whatever.
What? There was a late whistle, all
right, that negatively impacted the Knicks and Tracy Morgan,
who's great. So Tracy Morgan's always
courtside and he's right next to Tirico.
He's literally. So it's like Tracy Morgan here.
And then the NBC booth, right? So you got Tirico next to him,
then you get Reggie, then you got Purdue's.
Whatever. Yeah.
Stats guys, and Tirico is on the broadcast turning to Tracy
Morgan. He's like Morgan.
He's like, what do you think about that, Tracy?
Well, first of all, Tracy Morgan's not miked up #1 and for
somebody who's been doing broadcasting for 30 years, I
would think that Mike Tirico would understand.
When you ask somebody a question in the crowd who's not miked up,
we're not going to hear the answer when we're watching at
home on TV. So like #1 it was, it was like
sloppy and, and that, you know, and I understand that because
that does happen where like if I'm doing a show and I'm out in
a public setting and I've done a million of these, right?
And I don't mean like a BTN Sal event that's actually on the
air, which was great by the way. I'm talking about like, if I'm
doing a show in front of a live audience, whether it's a Super
Bowl show, whether it's a million remotes over the years
at bars and restaurants, what you get is right.
And imagine yourself doing the show and there's say 500 people,
1000 people in front of you. And you know, you, you can hear
people yelling stuff. And it's hard as as a young
broadcaster, not to like, want to respond to him.
But if you do, you're not having a, you're having a conversation
that's not being transmitted on the air, which by the way, is
what you're getting paid for. So Mike Tirico's going on and
belaboring it. And I'm getting, and then he's
like, oh, what's the problem? Like he's trying to talk for
Tracy. I'm like, like, that's not
funny. It's it's not really hitting the
mark. And then he's like, oh, you
know, I'm sorry. Get a little distracted here,
dude. You got distracted because
you're the one who started talking to Tracy Morgan.
Tracy didn't start talking to you.
Now, if you want to, if you want to have some fun and you want to
slap a pair of headsets on Tracy Morgan and you want to have him
do 30 seconds of commentary, it's not the NBA Finals.
That's fine. That's funny.
I love Morgan. He's great.
He's funny, he's cool. He's a big Nick guy.
Let's go. At least he might balance out
the booth. Get a little Nick, you know, a
little Nick Love on that broadcast outside of the the
Bootlick and Reggie Miller. I mean, Reggie, you'd think that
Reggie. You would think that Reggie was
Michael Jordan. Dude, you wrote like, come on.
Enough So I don't know, man, I, I, I'm watching the game and I'm
like, how does Mike Tirico, who's done this for a gazillion
years at the highest level and very well, how does he not
understand that's not the biggest deal?
I'm not saying it is, but how does he not understand that
whatever you're asking Tracy and whatever Tracy's saying, we
don't know what he's saying like and it just it wasn't for it
just kept going on and on. Reggie.
Oh, whoa, what a dunk by LeBron. Big deal.
Everybody kisses Lebron's ass. I can't wait until LeBron James
is gone. I just can't wait.
I'm so over. I've said this a million times.
I am so over LeBron. I don't care about LeBron.
I don't want to watch LeBron anymore.
And then there, and I don't even know if they did it.
There was this. I, they better not have.
I don't think they did. There was this little
undercurrent of, oh, should the Knicks have a then should the
Knicks have a, a montage for LeBron James before the game,
just in case it's his final game at the Garden?
You had your mind. I could care less about LeBron
James's final game at the Garden.
You know why? I'm going to tell you why?
Because LeBron James, when he was at that point the best
player in the world, he no longer is.
He's still really good. And what he's doing is amazing.
I'm not trying to dump all over the guys. 4041.
He's getting up and down the court like he's 30 when he wants
to run and he doesn't play defense anymore.
But when he wants to play hard, he's still really good, right?
And you know, behind Jordan, behind, behind Kareem, you know,
he's one of the top 345 players of all times, not the GOAT, but
he's one of them, right? So I get it and I respected the
accomplishments. But why I don't like if the
Knicks and if they did it, somebody hit me up on the
messages. And if they do do it, say he
says during the summer, hey, this year coming up as my last
year, if they present the montage to LeBron James, the
Knicks are pathetic. Like that is just the height of
weakness here. And I'm going to tell you why.
Because when we were drowning and it was Isaiah and it was
Eddie Curry and it was mistake. After that Stevie Francis broken
down and an old broken down, You know, no disrespect, but Tracy
McGrady, Jaylen Rose, all the thing, they were Knicks, You
know, in case you forgot, like I didn't stop watching the Knicks
when they were trash. I I watched them.
You know, all the coaches recycle 23 wins, you know, never
getting lucky in the draft and, you know, never getting one of
those ping pong balls to fold our way.
All those years, many well a couple of those years, LeBron
James had a chance to come and want the Garden.
And you know why he didn't come and want the garden?
Cuz he didn't have the stones to do it because he knows deep down
that he's not that guy. He knows deep down he won't say
it cuz everything he espouses all.
Look at the stats or look at me. Yeah, I'm the best.
OK, OK. Now Jordan didn't need to go out
there and recruit Bosh and Wade. He just made Pippen better.
He just made Horace Grant better.
He made Steve Kerr and Trent Tucker and all the other
shooters that Craig Hodges. He made them better.
Why? Because he's better than you,
because he's Jordan all right. And the way it went with LeBron
where at those at those points of inflection, like he's got to
get a championship or then the way he's you know, it's it was a
different discussion. He decided during which is his
right. I don't begrudge him for it.
I'm just not going to reward him with a stupid montage.
He never once had the balls to come to the Garden, say, all
right, let's go New York, let's go Knicks get on my if I'm
Superman, if I'm the GOAT, get on my shoulders and let's fix
this thing. Let's win in New York.
And then now I I want to be I'm getting a little worked up here.
LeBron always gets me worked up. I'm just so over them.
You know what I officially lost LeBron.
This is a little side piece. I just I just getting all him
mess around that, you know, when when he was in the bubble right
now. There's going to be
controversial for some and I'm and I'm not trying to be
polarizing for no reason. Don't be a fake intellect.
All right, And I like there's nothing worse than somebody who
thinks that they're worldly and I'm not talking about anybody
now and intelligent. And then they try to weigh in on
something and they are lost, whether it's foreign policy or,
you know, takes on the economy or whatever.
I mean, like, not even sports stuff, like you think you're a
person of the intellect and then somebody calls you on it and you
can't spit back 1 regurgitated answer.
And I'm talking about when LeBron was in the bubble and he
was holding the autobiography of Malcolm X, which is an
incredibly important book. And he walks in and he's
holding, it's a prop. He used that.
He used that important moment of history right as a prop.
Think about when that was, that was during COVID, that was at
the height of I know there's been other moments and moments
that have been been inflamed over time, but, and it's still
kind of like that now a little bit unfortunately, but for sure
politically. But during COVID, it was at, I
mean, it was at an apex that I, I had not really seen in my
lifetime only because I was too young to understand like the
end. And you know, it's not a
Republican, Democrat thing at all, but at the end of the
Carter administration with the hostages and Iran, and when you
have mortgage rates 20% and you had the, the recession and you
have people waiting on line to get gas.
Like, I mean, I, I, I, I didn't really hear my parents talk
about that because they were just focused on putting food on
the table. But I'm sure if I was an adult,
I would have really understood what was going on rather than
catching up later on in life. But if somebody asked me about
that, I can at least give you a snapshot of what happened when I
was five years old. They asked LeBron what, what's
the book about? They couldn't say anything.
I mean that that was so embarrassing and that told me so
much about LeBron. Let me ask you this.
If Kobe Bryant, rest in peace, Kobe.
If Kobe Bryant comes in to a press conference within a
Malcolm Malcolm X autobiography or something that is incredibly
important to somebody to him, and he's asked about it, Kobe
would have given you a dissertation.
Kobe would have A-Z. Here's why I love it.
Here's what I agree with. Here's what I disagree with.
Here's what he was saying. Here's what we need to fix here.
Here's where we are as a society.
LeBron couldn't even string together a sentence.
He was a good man. You know, a lot of the same
problems of Flick today. No, no shit.
No kidding. And we, we know that.
Yeah. We're trying to fix stuff.
We know, and it would have been very interesting to hear your
thoughts on the actual book that you're carrying around like
some, you know, some intellect. I'm not saying you're dumb.
Don't, don't hijack this segment.
This is going to be all over social media, I'm sure.
Don't hijack this. But if you're going to come with
something, don't come with a prop.
Come with a purpose, you know, So I've just that's that was the
last point where I'm like, you know what, I'm just enough of
this guy. Then the self glorification and
then, you know, never wanting to never having the stones to come
to the Knicks, right? That's fine.
That's your decision. But I'm not going to glorify you
on some some massive Jumbotron for a guy who never wanted the
heat at the Garden because you didn't have the shoulders to
bear it. I don't need that.
And you didn't have the shoulders to bear it to win a
championship without your boys, you know, which is another
reason why you're not the GOAT. You can't shine Jordan's shoes.
You can't. And Oh yeah, by the way, I think
Kareem is number 26 championships, 6 MVPS, all that
stuff, right? Most points before LeBron broke
it based on longevity, taking more shots, 3 point shots.
Games changed. Kareem was better.
It was MJ, Kareem then maybe, maybe, maybe LeBron James.
Maybe you could also have a Wilt conversation or a Bill Russell
conversation or a Magic or a Bird cop.
There's others, right? But at least Lil Alcindor at
that point he was, that was still his name one in Milwaukee.
I won with Oscar Robertson, but it's not like him and Oscar got
together and go Oscar. Let's pair up.
He was in Milwaukee, drafted by the Bucks out of UCLA, wins
championship. Then he goes to the Lakers and
it's trade and then the Lakers draft Magic.
So it's not like he went out and Magic was a five time All Star,
first team, all NBA, your Magic. Listen, let's get together.
We both need a championship. So like the championship hunt
has really altered how I perceive some of these players.
LeBron to me comes across as a phony.
LeBron to me too often has weighed into very, very hot
topic, very sensitive issues a little bit early.
And he was wrong on some stuff. Not everything.
But LeBron, I'm just not a LeBron James fan.
I respect the way he plays the game.
I respect the way he takes care of his body.
I respect the accomplishments. But a video montage board for
LeBron James? Get the hell out of here.
Yeah, you could do that when he goes back to Cleveland like the
other night, or say, if he finishes up next year back in
Miami and he goes back to Staples Center or he goes to
Miami, that's fine. You want to do it for a team
that he played for, the Knicks, the Garden, Get lost.
Not interested. Not interested at all, please,
you know, And now, and I didn't, I didn't read it.
I want to be fair, a gentleman who I've got a lot of respect
for it. I do have to read this.
That's why I've got to weigh my comments.
Not because I'm afraid or reticent to give you my opinion.
I would imagine by now I don't, you know, that I don't really
hold back on much. I just couldn't read it because
I don't have the, I don't subscribe to it.
So Ian O'Connor, I think he's a great journalist.
He's a true journalist. He's not a, he's not an
arsonist, he's not a race baiter.
He's not a hater. He's a practical journalist,
right, who I think does great work.
And I'm saying that even though we went to Mariston, you know, I
did as well. I'm not saying that because he's
a fellow fellow Marist man. Ian was there about 10 years
before me. I've only met him a couple of
times. We've talked a few times via
text. Wouldn't consider him a friend
because I don't know him on that level.
Never broke bread with him. Anyway, I just want to set the
stage there. Ian had a tweet this morning to
a link that he wrote on The Athletic for an article about
why the Knicks should be open to bringing him or why LeBron
should finish his career at the Garden.
What I I couldn't fundamentally oppose that as I just as you
heard for the last 5 minutes anymore, I'm incapable of of
really pushing back on that more unless I just start cursing and
ranting unnecessarily, which I'm not going to do and just come
across as a complete raving lunatic.
I've chronicled why I'm not a LeBron James fan.
I don't need to go overboard and just start taking shots.
No, I don't need LeBron James the Garden at all.
So with all due respect to somebody who is very good at his
job and is very a respectful, great journalistic integrity,
very smart, very talented, very accomplished.
I don't agree at all. Now, I can't say I don't agree
with what? Like I can't be more specific
because the I don't have the contents of the article because
I don't subscribe to the Athletic, right.
But that caught me for a little curveball today.
And then you know enough, Ben Stiller's tweets are getting on
my last nerve too. I mean, Ben Stiller, he tweets
about LeBron last night. Where is it?
I mean, this guy, I mean, you want to talk, but dude, I mean,
come on, man. He says yeah.
Always exciting to see King James play in person and hear
the Garden appreciation. This will not be forever and we
will miss him. No, we won't.
I won't miss him at all. Speak for yourself, Ben.
Speak for yourself. And by the way, I think that I
speak for more people than you when it comes to the Knicks.
Because I think I've got a better read on the Knicks.
If you listen to Ben Stiller, it's Mr. Happiness.
Oh, the Knicks have lost five straight, but I still think
we're going to be good. I I mean Ben Stiller and and
it's OK to slant optimistically, but don't speak for us when you
say we now you're saying us. So say you, you're going to miss
LeBron James. I would respect that.
I and Bob, of course, when I saw what he tweeted because he used
the word we and he's now speaking for most of us, if not
many of us. And I put I had a sub tweeted
and I wrote back, speak for yourself.
Not going to miss him at all. The Garden's going to miss him.
Why I'm not going to miss him. He never wanted the Knicks.
He had multiple chances. What am I going to miss, miss
LeBron James? No, no way.
You know what I remember too, and I don't, I don't know if
just, well, I mean, I know the world's different.
I'm not trying to make this bigger than than it is, but I
know the world is very different.
I do understand that for sure. But I remember when I was young,
if I had to guess, the year, 80, whatever, 88 ish, whatever year
maybe J Rod, do me a favor, look up.
Can you please do me a favor, buddy?
Can you look up what year Doctor Jay retired and what year Kareem
Abdul Jabbar retired, please? Thanks, buddy.
And then just pop in. Let me know when you got him in,
but I'll set it up now. I remember when Kareem came in
for his last game at the Garden. That was like obviously Patrick
was on the team. Gerald Wilkins, Mark Jackson,
88, I don't know, just 87, whatever it was something like
that. I remember the Knicks gave them
a really nice rocking chair. And he's also from New York.
He's one of us. Doctor J.
Retired in 88 and then Kareem retired in 89.
OK, so. I was in the neighborhood, so
Doctor J was 88, and that was obviously Ewing and those guys,
89 the next year. And I remember both of those
gentlemen got a, a really nice parting gift from the garden, as
they should. And you've seen that with, you
know, Jeter got that, Mariano got that.
You kind of go to certain stadiums, they give you
something symbolic of like that city, you know, like Mariano
maybe got a surfboard from the Angels out West or some cool
stuff like that. It's a chance to really
celebrate a luminary of the sport.
And it's happened many times and I don't know, maybe hit me
because I was younger. I don't know.
And I just remember, like Doctor J and Kareem seemed so old at
that point, unlike LeBron, who still physically looks like he's
3233, you know, dresses different, dresses younger,
different, you know, different swag, all that stuff.
But there was a reverence with Kareem and there was a reverence
with Doctor J. And I feel like with LeBron, and
he's not the only one, this guy is there.
There's like it's, it's divisive.
And I, I know some of the reasons why it is divisive, but
I just don't think that New York Knicks fans have any real
interest in showering LeBron James with his adulation in this
affection. Because you didn't do a damn
thing for us. You didn't.
And it's something you know, I, I don't know, I, I just, I, I
really, I don't get it. I don't get it at will, at will
or Willa Verde 664. I would not will I had the show
on in my office and my Co worker Vanessa said man this guy really
hates LeBron. Very funny moment here.
I told her to subscribe Attaboy will Vanessa if you still no, I
don't hate him. I'm just at first I don't hate
anybody like unless you are a dark, you know, criminal without
remorse, that's not even my job to judge you.
That's obviously that's God's so, but I don't hate anybody.
There's certain people I don't want to be around.
There's certain people, you know, I just, I don't really
connect with. There's certain people I dislike
and I just don't even really well, there's parts of me that
do this. I I do dislike some things
LeBron has done, but hates the wrong word.
I just don't feel LeBron the way some do.
Like the glorification of LeBron James is something that's never
going to come out of my mouth. It's not happening.
It it happened at one point, you know, where I would happily
engage in the GOAT conversation, you know, halfway through his
career. I mean, look at this guy.
Geez, look at this transformative figure, this big,
fast, explosive athlete who could do everything on the
basketball court, a prototype for the all around game.
But like Steph has become the prototype for shooters and how
he's in how he's impacted the game.
You know, I've I've always give given LeBron his due as a
basketball player. But even when giving him his due
as a basketball player, you got to understand this is the same
player who willingly passed up shots in big spots for reasons
off the court or whatever. You know, he had some issues
with coaching or there was a story going around that I'm not
going to get into because I don't know if it's true.
And I'm not trying to be disrespectful, but there was a
lack of engagement. And you know, that Celtic
series, what I'm talking about a lack of engagement with LeBron
where he just stopped shooting. You think Michael Jordan's doing
that a big game, do you? No, I know Kobe's not doing
that. I know Kobe's humping shot after
shot after shot. You know, so it's not hate,
Vanessa and I love now we see if that were at a very interesting
point. Think about this guy and guys
and gals when you when when BT Unleashed started, it wasn't and
that was right before Christmas. It was not being streamed in
offices. You know, you're like us, my
guy. Be hopefully my guy BT I'm going
to support him. I'm going to follow him.
I like his takes, I like his style, I like his energy, like
those core BT fans. And I love you guys, You know
that. And you follow me.
No matter you'd follow me to the end of the earth.
If I'm going to do a radio show wherever or some sort of
content, you're going to find me.
You're going to seek me out because you enjoy what I do.
And that's so awesome to me, so meaningful, right?
But now what's happening now? We got BT Unleashed being
streamed in offices where you got the Co workers popping in,
the Co workers now weighing in with comments.
All this guy, he really hates LeBron.
I don't hate LeBron, Vanessa. I'm just telling you why I don't
want to honor him at the gardens.
Big difference, big difference. But how about that, J Rod?
We're getting some streamage now.
We are now getting streamage in. Audiences, come on.
Throwing it up in the break room.
Let's go. Yeah, dude.
I love it. So the water coolers, you know,
it used to be back in the day, one of the things that they
would that the radio people and many of them had zero ID what
they were talking about. Like most, there were a few good
ones. I'm not going to name the ones
who I'm not going to be that guy, but there were some radio
people who like they were on the air for a minute, but they just
weren't good, right? They just had no vibe, no flow,
no presents. They were like reading news and
they were doing a show like they were reading news and it it's
not like I'm not trying to hate on them.
It's just this. Then they eventually moved into
like a role. ESPN had a lot of these.
I will say that ESPN had a lot of these people where and some
good ones for sure, But a couple who would come in and they come
in from Bristol and they'd say this is the way you need to do
an interview. And then you know, this is the
way you need to structure this and this.
I'm like, all right, come on, can I just open the mic and do
men be me, do the show? We're not here to, you know,
like let's go at the but but they would always say, and I
agree with this, they would say you want to be able to do stuff
that becomes water cooler topics like when you get you know what
I mean? Now a lot of people work from
home. Maybe it's not quite as
applicable in the early 2000s or mid 2000s or even a little bit
beyond that. Hey, did you hear what BT and
and Stephen A and BT said at the water, like at the water cooler?
Did you hear what those guys were saying about the Knicks?
What about Isaiah or about, you know, a rod or about Jeter or
about, you know, David Wright? That's water cooler stuff back
back then and maybe it's not quite the same, but we get a
little BT unleashed water cooler action.
I mean, we're going to be living large problem.
Yes, Sir. Yeah, very hype.
What does that? Say, did I read that one?
I did. No, I did not.
Let's pop that guy up. I got it.
All right. Oh, you see, that happens when I
go to pop it up, right? When I go to pop it up And
you're popping it up at the same time to get that, like, tennis
match, right? OK, so we got to figure that
out. So Jesus, Navarro, 4135.
Jesus, what's happening, buddy? 100% agree with your LeBron
take. Take the the MJ versus LeBron
stuff is generational debate, my son and I go at it almost every
day. Yeah, I mean, and thank you for
that. Jesus.
There's something to be said for carrying the torch for your guy.
I understand that. Like Mike Francesa carries the
torch for Mickey Mantle and you know Mickey Mantle and and
always has and always will. When I get it, I respect it.
Mickey Mantle, the numbers, the presents, the contribution of
the contributions, the World Series championships.
His place in the game is rarefied and revered enough
where it's not out of place for Mike to defend his guy from his
generation and make him whatever he makes him out to be.
Which is why when younger people defend LeBron in the context of
the GOAT, I don't even begrudge them because they're reacting to
something that they have watched and it's more intimate and
they're more familiar. And, you know, even though it's
not like when I would see a highlight of Bill Russell or Bob
Cousy dribbling with his head down or old Oscar Robertson or
Jerry West footage, it was grainy, sometimes black and
white. And I'd sit there and I'd say,
come on, how is this guy one of the best man?
Like when my dad would tell me, I get it.
There's those territorial parameters, those those, those
lanes that we generally gravitate to and defend, those
that we saw. But Michael Jordan was so
different, so different and so much better for so many reasons
that to me, it's indisputable. But I get it.
You know, each generation wants to defend their guy, and I'm not
mad at that. Jordan's mental fortitude with
Lebron's unmatched physical gifts would have combined on
that. Now that's a good point for the
undisputed GOAT, bar none, LeBron psyche.
LeBron psyche with Jordan's physical attributes would have
been Lance Stephenson. LeBron psyche with that is a
very interesting way to frame it.
I don't entirely agree. I mean, you know, and Lance
Stephenson was good, but I so I know what you mean by that.
Lance Stephenson was almost a poor man's LeBron.
That's not a knock. He could do everything, just not
at the level that LeBron could. He could defend, he could score,
he can handle. Yeah.
I mean, Lebron's psyche is completely different than
Jordan's. Nobody had Jordan's psyche.
It's a psychopath. I mean, God forbid he loses a
Nassau on the golf course, he's he's going to be hunting you
down to get a rematch. I mean, that guy's professional
and will and competitive motor unparalleled.
I'll, I'll give you another one. Nice.
Somebody who I think, and I love the guy and I've interviewed him
and he's awesome. One of the.
I think he's one of the best human beings around.
I'm talking about Shaq. I love Shaq, although Shaq still
owes me money from a bet that we made about the Cowboys.
Long story, not a lot of money, not at all.
I wish it was a lot, but I've got great love for Shaq.
But the knock on Shaq contrast Shaq and Kobe.
You know, Kobe would come in and was a killer and if you weren't
ready to practice, if you were hungover or if you were £10 out
of shape and if you couldn't run and if you didn't have your
stuff together, you had a problem with Kobe and Kobe would
voice it. And if it had to get physical,
it would. Whereas with Shaq, you know, you
could make the case that if Shaq had just a little bit more, like
a little bit, not the full Mamba mentality or the MJ psyche, I
think you might be able to make a case that Shaq may have gone
down as the greatest player in the history of all time.
But really, I mean, I feel like Shaq left a couple of
championships on the table. I feel like Shaq left a couple
of personal awards on the table because he wasn't in the best of
shape and because he wasn't necessarily motivated to be
great. Now Shaq lived his best life and
it's worked out well. And again, Shaq, you talk about
trying to do good in the world. I mean, Shaq is out there buying
moms and, you know, single moms computers for their kids.
And, you know, really, I think he straddles is why I respect
him tremendous. I think he straddles a great
line of being fair and being honest.
Like he's talked about some of the, you know, inconsistencies
and some of the issues that are wrong in the world, right.
But he's also quick to defend law enforcement when it when it
when it's applicable. Like he's not a guy that just
jumps in and, you know, weighs in on something that is very,
you know, dangerous if you don't have your facts together.
He generally does and he and he generally is on the side of
humanity and what's right. Like if you're, I, I know I'm
getting a little preachy here, but it's important.
That's how much I love Shaq. Like if you're a police officer
and you do something wrong, you got to pay period.
There's nothing else. There's no other conversation to
have. But if you are doing your job
and something happens, then you've got to understand that's
within the context of of the job description.
If you color outside the lines, you go to jail.
I mean, that's, that's what I believe.
And Shaq, whose dad was a military man and has great
affinity for law enforcement, but also some of the
inconsistencies in the world, whether it's education or
certain things that that do plague minorities.
I think he's a great voice. I think he's just a real
balanced, amazing voice. So I love the guy.
I one of my favorite people in the world.
I wish there were more Shaq's. The world would be better.
But I also think when it came to being a basketball player, he
was half in, you know, like he wasn't motivated to be the even
though he says like, and I believe this part, like when he
played Patrick and David Robinson and you know, those big
guys from his era, Hakeem, he was on a mission to show he was
better. But what about the other 70
games? Was he always in?
You know, what was he doing the night before?
How late was he out? How hungover was he?
How out of shape was he even though he was a beast?
I mean, you know, he didn't have Kobe's all in mentality.
And if he did, I, I think you might you truly might have the
greatest of all time. So the mentality is the
mentality. And I don't even knock LeBron
for not having a Kobe mentality or or Michael mentality.
I knock him for being I, I think a little bit too full of himself
and taking himself a little bit too seriously and thinking he's
above the game. Like Michael Jordan never once
thought that. And if anybody had a license to
think that, it was him, even Kobe.
Kobe never thought that. And it's a more modern example.
That's why I say even Kobe. Where's LeBron?
It's all about LeBron. And it has really always rubbed
me the wrong way. And I'm going to tell you, you
know, I don't know why. I mean, why are you going to
hide that Shaq was the most dominant senator of all time at
Charlie F6675? Yeah, Well, I mean, I'd like to
have seen Will. I mean, Will going against, you
know, smaller guys in the NBAI don't.
I don't know. That was different.
It was a different league, so you can't really even compare
it. But are you telling me, Charlie,
and, And maybe you are, and if you are, I'd probably push back
a little bit that Shaq was more physically dominant in his era
than Wilt was in his. I don't know if I could buy
that. You know, I don't know that I, I
feel that I didn't, I didn't see will.
I know all the records. I know his place in NBA lore.
I don't know. I I most dominant center of all
time in terms of sheer brute force, I probably agree with
you. And he was a great player.
And Shaq is a top 12 to 15 greatest player of all time.
But when you leave some stuff on the table, you got to take a hit
on the back end. And you know, Bill Russell as a
center was a better winner. Was he better all like a, I want
to say a better teammate that's kind of getting into a lane?
I can't really I don't I don't know if that's true, but better
winner, that's provable, right? So check for Bill Russell
physically dominant. The numbers would say that Wilt
was. I think that's a check in Wilt's
category, right? You know, best all around.
I think it's Hakeem Olajuwon to me as the greatest all around
center shooting defense, won a couple of championships.
So that's your opinion. I get that.
I would push back a little bit. It's close, but you know, at
nice putt get ready for that golf season.
If Grant Hill didn't get hurt early, we'd be talking about a
different GOAT. No, we wouldn't be.
There's no way we'd be talking about Grant.
Grant Hill is the greatest player of all time.
Stop and Grant Hill was a beast. But I can't start doing the next
10 minutes on players that if they didn't get hurt, they would
be the GOAT. I'd say it was mainly about
LeBron, but because you put the question out there, I mean, I'll
address it quickly. Grant Hill was Grant Hill was
like a little bit of like a Tracy McGrady, like, you know,
just an all the round. It just did a good handle.
Can be a better defender than T Mac.
You know, like Penny like that, that Unicorn that did it all.
And obviously the foot injury when he was hobbling through the
playoffs with Detroit. Then he bounced around.
Yeah. Grant Hill's place, his lore in
the NBA and the like amongst the the NBA greats will be a little
bit different than it is. But Grant, I mean, he wouldn't,
he's not going to be the GOAT. But Grant, I just saw Grant.
I was, I was on the same plane as Grant 2 weekends ago coming
back from St. John's game.
His plane got snowed out and St. John's said, hey, come on our
charter and then you know, get back to New York or where you
going to go? He was going to Boston to do a
Celtics game. I love Grant, talk to him a
little bit, gentlemen. I've had him on the show before.
Awesome player, one of the great college players of all time.
Winner class act, but let's not get nuts here come on, let's not
just start throwing stuff out there that if he doesn't get
hurt he's the goat. That's that's a little bit much
for me all right, I think we got everything I had to get out
today here. Let me just look at some of
these texts and see if there's anything else that I want to
want to address This is an interesting one.
This jumps out quick at pity right.
Kobe's not a top five player only one MVP have to have more
than three to qualify Well, I mean that's your opinion.
There's no rule that says you must have three.
First of all, the Steve Nash got 2.
Who's better, Steve Nash or Kobe?
And by the way, this one of the ones that Kobe did not get that
Steve Nash did that will be another MVP for Kobe.
Kobe also played a different era with some some dogs.
You know, it's different era when he was coming up.
So that's part of it. You know, I'm going to do a
special show and some other content that'll be a little bit
more Evergreen this month where I'll record it rather than going
live. Like actually I've got a couple
things here. We're let me just find the
notebook where I've got some of those topics line.
Is that it? Yeah.
All right, so a couple of things.
And this will play into like, you know, top, top NBA players
of all time. My old I'm going to do my old
time Yankee lineup. I'm going to do my old time
Knicks starting five Mets lineup as well.
My old time biggie starting five.
I'm going to do the Mount Rushmore of New York athletes in
my lifetime. Top five WWE talkers, top 10
sports posters, top 10 college football venues I've attended
top five sneakers. So I've got some stuff like
that. So you know, invariably I'm
going to have to do an all time NBA list, which is always fun.
I can tell you right now whether it's in a week and a month.
It doesn't matter what I do it M JS1 Lebron's two and to me, you
know, Kobe, I do think and I I say this with incredible
respect. There's no other way to say it.
I, I love Kobe and I and I was genuinely sad.
I mean, really sad when he was killed for his for somebody's
daughter, for I, I loved Kobe, loved him, sad for his wife, sad
for his, I mean said anytime somebody loses their life.
But Kobe really hit me. I was that was a rough 1.
And that's how much I loved him. And Kobe to me is not my top
five, but he's not there because he didn't win more MVPS.
And that's why guys like the voting, right?
That's why this stuff matters and that's why I tend to make a
big stink like when some dope doesn't vote for Bill Belichick
or at least 11 dopes don't vote for Bill Belichick to be a first
time first ballot NFL Hall of Famer as a head coach, you know,
give me a break. Or some idiot doesn't vote for
Jeter or, you know, somebody gets snubbed for an All Star
game. And I don't really care about
the old certainly football. I mean Shidor Sanders is playing
the pro the hell out of here. But like at least baseball and
the NBA to a lesser extent, that does resonate still like and I
do think. It's a bit of a scoreboard.
So if somebody gets snubbed a few times, you know, being say a
four time All Star versus an 8 time All Star, perceptually that
stuff matters. But no, Kobe Bryant is not in my
top five. I I've got a really dig because
when I do this, I pay homage to everybody.
So it's just I'm not a prisoner of the moment.
So you know, I'm going to look at Oscar Robertson, going to
look at obviously Wilt and some of those names from back in the
day, the early great players. Is Kobe top 10?
It's it's in the neighborhood. But if I'm starting A-Team and,
and here's the irony, I don't know if Kobe's in my top ten.
If he is, he's at the back end. But if I'm starting A-Team
tomorrow and I've got access to LeBron or Kobe, I'm taking Kobe
yet. So Lebron's obviously in my top
ten. He's going to be in my top five,
but it's a different evaluation. So either way, we'll do some of
that cool content, some Evergreen stuff here.
Let's see what else did. A couple people saying it's a
lack of humility with LeBron. I would agree.
That's really the first thing that that really rubbed me the
wrong way. Talk about the Decision.
Yeah. And that's just because the the
Knicks got burned and it was a whole dog and pony show the way
he presented that I didn't like it.
I'm always down for a little baseball question.
Let me pop this in at the Rhino 30 BT why do the Yankees think
Cole is going to be vintage Cole, the 35 coming off Tommy
John? He's going to have to rediscover
his control and he'll be on an 80 pitch count.
Well, I I think that that's fair to start.
Ryan, number one, you know, there's enough evidence that
Tommy John surgery is incredibly effective Now when you're older,
OK, a little different. I think that the Gerrit Cole
that we see early and by the way, Aaron Boone, I know Aaron
went to Tampa today because we texted him last night.
Me and Sal wanted to take him to dinner.
You don't want to take him to a nice steak dinner, a little
wine, a little celebration, me, Sam and Boonie for what he did
for us with the BT and Sal live show.
And I didn't think he'd quite be going this quick.
And and I know he because he went to a St.
John's game two years ago. I got him some good tickets and
I wanted to see if he wanted to go again.
So he he's in Tampa now. He was leaving today, so I know
he's very curious to get eyes on Garrett Cole pertaining to the
question. But I think that what you see
for the first month out of Garrett Cole, it doesn't really
matter. You know, I think that's one of
the reasons why I'm really excited about the prospects of
this Yankee rotation because once he, you know, learns to
trust his body again and gets the whole complement of off
speed stuff and see it's fast, but I think the first thing
that's going to be there is to be low.
You know, I'm not worried about that.
He's going to be 959697 maybe on a hot day.
He's going to get it back up to 98, which he'll occasionally
touch. He's going to learn how to, you
know, pitch again and again. Learning to trust your body at
that level is a very real thing. But I think that Garrett Cole's
going to be terrific. I don't know if he's going to be
terrific right away. Matter of fact, I don't think
that he will be. But I think Garrett Cole's going
to be top of the rotation. You know, Max Freed, Garrett
Cole, Camp Schlittler, you know, Rodon, whether it's a heal,
whether it's a Warren, whatever it might be.
Some of those young kids like I think the Mets were, the Yankees
rotation is going to be absolutely great.
It just not going to be good or great in April and May when
everybody's getting healthy and everybody's getting right.
And the worries about Garrett Cole.
I really don't. But it's always good to end on a
baseball conversation because baseball is coming.
They just said booty's down in Tampa.
I would imagine Mendy's maybe he went down yesterday.
Maybe he's going down today as well.
So now the stories start to trickle in and even if it's not
incredibly juicy, but you know, so and so you get this a lot
about reporting, you know, best shape of his career or this
young player, this where he explodes.
We'll get those Dominguez stories and Spencer Jones and
Benj for the Mets. Like we'll get all that.
And a lot of it really doesn't always equate to real tangible
stuff. But it's is a little juice to
kind of bridge the gap in February into March.
Before you know it, baseball is here.
And you know that I can't wait for baseball on BT Unleashed.
And I know that you guys are pumped for baseball.
So hey, I appreciate you guys. Make sure you like it.
Make sure you subscribe to show to the show, spread the word out
there, crank it up in the office, let everybody know what
BT Unleashed is all about. And as I've told you, you know,
many times, the likes and the subscriptions here and the
comments and the traction, that is all one big digital imprint
that really positions BT Unleashed more favorably within
the YouTube algorithm. And once that happens, you going
to see, you know, the views, which are pretty good as they
are, go up and up and up. Then obviously with the
monetization of the channel, I could do more and more and more.
So, you know, don't just think that it's a little thumb that
doesn't do anything like the comments.
And I also respond to a lot. So it's a good way to interact
with me. But the comments and all that
other stuff really does matter in how YouTube views a show and
the prospects and the strength and the upward, you know,
trajectory of a show. So that stuff matters.
All right, I don't want to beg, but I mean that that stuff does
the more you do support you BT that's how you support me.
Support me by liking, subscribing, commenting, getting
the word out there and all that other good stuff.
One other thing that I will get. I know that Fox said I can do
it. There's just some copyright
things that I've got to be aware of.
I don't want to get in trouble with YouTube.
I want to do this the right way, but I will take a last night's
hopefully. So hopefully some of you guys
saw that on Fox News last night with with Brian Kilmeade about
youth sports and the professor from Florida about, you know,
just the cost of the general direction of youth sports,
Something I'm incredibly involved in, very passionate
about, something I speak about very often.
It's something I hold very close to my heart.
And it was great to get invited there.
I had a great time. I appreciate them having me on.
And I know the producer, my guy Joe said that I will be able to
post the segment to my unleashed page.
I just got to make sure that trademark copyrights were good
there. And then once that, if you guys
missed it last night, it will be up I would say within the next
day or so. So if you did watch last night,
thank you. If you did like did subscribe,
thank you. Get the word out there.
Have an awesome Monday. Hopefully Jets name their OC at
some point the next day or so as we get, you know, built up
deeper in the week, more Super Bowl stuff, more Knicks stuff,
trade deadline Thursday, Yanks and Mets getting ready to go to
spring training. So it is a good time of the
year. St.
John's, UConn, Friday night, Biggie's Tournament, March
Madness, NCAA stuff around the bend.
So it's about to start popping. Then it gets us into the
Masters. So I think we're kind of through
the early stages of what generally is a fairly benign
time in sports and you know, we're stronger on the other end.
So can't wait, man. Can't wait for all that good
stuff that I just referenced coming up.
Have a great Monday catch tomorrow at 10.
J Rod catch you. Good job with this.
He's going to post everything. So bounce around the page if
you're new, old segments, old shows, old topics, jump in now
kind of, you know, if there's a different take that you missed
and you kind of knew, I promise you it's somewhere embedded on
the BT Unleashed page. So have a great Monday catch,
you guys. Tomorrow at 10.
Be well, everybody.