Speaker 1: All right, let's get a drive time Thursday afternoon style,
Speaker 1: about fourteen minutes past the hour of two o'clock. It's
Speaker 1: in April day that feels like April, at least it
Speaker 1: doesn't feel like February. We're approaching fifty degrees. It is
Speaker 1: cloudy here in downtown Salt.
Speaker 2: Lake City, Utah.
Speaker 1: High speed ahead to a little bit of a warmer
Speaker 1: weekend and then a nice springtime week next week.
Speaker 2: So you're almost there.
Speaker 1: If you're waiting for the sunshine like I am, and
Speaker 1: as it is every single day, it's going to have
Speaker 1: you along for the riots.
Speaker 2: Bence check. It's beyond the mic.
Speaker 1: That is Porter Larsen behind the glass today producing the
Speaker 1: program a lot to get to Big Night in pro basketball,
Speaker 1: Big night in the NBA, Big Night in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: says the Warriors and the Lakers are going to play
Speaker 1: a basketball game, and it looks like all of the
Speaker 1: players that are employed to play basketball for both organizations
Speaker 1: are going to play basketball and try to win. Because
Speaker 1: this is like a sneaky big game seating on the
Speaker 1: line as we are high speed ahead to playoff basketball
Speaker 1: in the world of the NBA. Utah Jazz, Well, they
Speaker 1: showed up last night. Technically they were present. They played
Speaker 1: the Houston Rockets. They lost by thirty eight, and it
Speaker 1: really wasn't even that close. So five games left for
Speaker 1: the Jazz as the race to the bottom continues. The
Speaker 1: worst basketball team in Pro basketball plays.
Speaker 2: It's basketball here in Salt Lake.
Speaker 1: The Jazz are the worst team in the NBA, so
Speaker 1: we'll talk a little Jazz basketball, talk a little NBA.
Speaker 1: The Cavs beat the Knicks last night. We talked about
Speaker 1: this prior to the end of the show. The Knicks
Speaker 1: are now to eight against Cleveland and Boston, so the
Speaker 1: Eastern Conference feels like it is a two team race.
Speaker 1: Dallas Mavericks won again last night, so of course that
Speaker 1: prolongs the full time obligation of Alex Jensen landing here
Speaker 1: in Salt Lake to become the seventeenth head coach of
Speaker 1: the Utah men's basketball program. Alex will finish off this
Speaker 1: season with Dallas before he really turns his full time attention.
Speaker 1: Of course, Alex has been on the job and he's
Speaker 1: made a couple of hires, and of course the news
Speaker 1: broke yesterday that Keanu Dawes has withdrawn his name from
Speaker 1: the transfer portal, and we'll play for Utah next year.
Speaker 1: Now today, in case you didn't know, and you probably don't,
Speaker 1: because why would you. Today Mark's the first day of
Speaker 1: a week long dead period in college basketball recruiting. Essentially
Speaker 1: that means you can't have any in person visits, you
Speaker 1: can't have players visit on campus, but you can visit
Speaker 1: with players via zoom. And a report that a young
Speaker 1: man named Terrence Brown, who's a fairly Dickinson transfer, was
Speaker 1: on a zoom call with the Utah coaching staff today.
Speaker 2: So got to hit the ground running.
Speaker 1: As the transfer portal opened a number of weeks ago,
Speaker 1: and we already have heard decisions made by a lot
Speaker 1: of different basketball players about where they're going to play.
Speaker 1: And you know, of course, if you're Alex Jensen, if
Speaker 1: you're the University of Utah, got to try to get
Speaker 1: talent as soon as you possibly can. Latest on the
Speaker 1: transfer portal from Brigham Young. It was announced yesterday that
Speaker 1: Dallen Hall is getting on down haul in the transfer portal.
Speaker 1: Kennon Catchings in the transfer portal, So a lot of
Speaker 1: rumors about who could be joining Kevin Young and BYU
Speaker 1: basketball to replace some of the transfers BYU were, according
Speaker 1: to most people that report on such things, as one
Speaker 1: of the top three NIL payrolls in.
Speaker 2: All of college basketball.
Speaker 1: So I do not imagine attracting talent will be problematic
Speaker 1: for the near future.
Speaker 2: Down to BYU.
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 1: So the latest out of the college basketball side of
Speaker 1: things as we're high speed ahead to the Final Four
Speaker 1: coming up on Saturday. All four number one seeds in
Speaker 1: the Final Four for the second time in tournament history
Speaker 1: and for the first time since two thousand and eight.
Speaker 1: Shout out to our guy Ken Pom. I didn't realize
Speaker 1: this until I was looking at his metrics. Ken Palm
Speaker 1: called the Final four and the Elite Eight. The top
Speaker 1: eight teams in Ken Palm ratings made the Elite Eight,
Speaker 1: and the top four teams in Ken Palm ratings are
Speaker 1: now in the Final Four. So college basketball high speed
Speaker 1: ahead of the Final Four. Rayl Saw welcomes in the
Speaker 1: LA Galaxy on Saturday at two thirty America First Field
Speaker 1: in Sandy Apple TV. You'll have that covered. Go to
Speaker 1: RSL dot com for single game tickets. The Utah Hockey
Speaker 1: Club welcomes in the LA Kings tonight at the Delta
Speaker 1: Center for a seven o'clock drop.
Speaker 2: Of the Puck Wild car Races over.
Speaker 1: It was fun while it lasted, but it's not going
Speaker 1: to be a reality this year. And now the Utah
Speaker 1: Hockey Club finishes off the season and looks dead to
Speaker 1: a very important offseason. Kribill, Armstrong and his staff Gino
Speaker 1: Smith got paid today a couple of year extension with
Speaker 1: the Vegas Raiders, so little NFL offseason stuff. Were only
Speaker 1: three weeks away from the NFL Draft, so we'll do
Speaker 1: some draft stuff on the show. Caleb Loner is in
Speaker 1: Dallas for the Dallas Cowboys Pro Day, so the Cowboys
Speaker 1: looking to former youth Caleb Loaner. So a lot to
Speaker 1: get to on the program today. Alex Soovechkin scored again
Speaker 1: and he's getting closer to a record that once upot
Speaker 1: of time felt unbreakable, the all time goal scoring record
Speaker 1: won Wayne Gretzky. In the world of the NHL, speaking
Speaker 1: the NHL, our first guest right out of the gates
Speaker 1: today is Neil Smith for our weekly conversation to talk
Speaker 1: Punk Talk Hockey, Talk Utah Hockey Club.
Speaker 2: Howard Beck rolls by.
Speaker 1: For some NBA from the Ringer, the TV Voice the
Speaker 1: Utah Jazz, Craig Bowler, Jack as our guest. Later on
Speaker 1: an RSL club legend, key member of the front office,
Speaker 1: my buddy Jason Chris in the four o'clock hour. We're
Speaker 1: gonna have to have an honest conversation about with Jay
Speaker 1: today about whether or not these players are going to
Speaker 1: be signed prior to the primary transfer window closing, which
Speaker 1: is three weeks from today. So Neil Smith, Howard Beck,
Speaker 1: Craig Bowler, Jack, Jason Christ. So we'll do a little
Speaker 1: sports core with our friends from Handy and Handy coming
Speaker 1: up me, Spence, Jackets, all of you the great listeners.
Speaker 1: I do want to give a shout out for all
Speaker 1: the simps that filled out brackets and picked all the
Speaker 1: number one seeds to make the final four, because you're
Speaker 1: probably winning your bracket if you don't really think very deeply.
Speaker 2: And let's welcome in Porter Larson. Happy Thursday, Pal. How
Speaker 2: are you doing I'm doing well.
Speaker 4: How are you, Spencer?
Speaker 1: Are you winning our bracket challenge comfortably?
Speaker 2: Yeah at the moment. And why is that? Who's your
Speaker 2: final four?
Speaker 1: The teams that are in it.
Speaker 4: All the number one seeds, Yeah, the teams that made
Speaker 4: the final four, the teams that I picked to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, all the number one seeds.
Speaker 4: Also, And hey, just to be clear, I'm not only
Speaker 4: up by a few points, but I'll leave that there.
Speaker 1: So wait a second, is there any way anybody can
Speaker 1: catch you? Who do you have winning these games?
Speaker 4: I have Auburn winning the title. Auburn Houston is my
Speaker 4: match of Auburn Houston. If that is the title and
Speaker 4: that is the matchup and Auburn wins, not only will
Speaker 4: I win the employee bracket.
Speaker 2: I believe I win the whole thing.
Speaker 3: So what is it?
Speaker 2: Can you? Are you eligible for the prize? I don't
Speaker 2: think so. Oh that's too bad.
Speaker 4: But yeah, if it goes Houston Auburn with Auburn winning,
Speaker 4: I think I pass up everyone involved. But hey, like
Speaker 4: you said, Ken Palm ratings, if you want to want
Speaker 4: a good bracketology, that's a decent place to look.
Speaker 1: Did you enter a bracket anywhere else outside of work?
Speaker 1: I do have a ESPN bracket.
Speaker 4: It's the same. I just did one bracket everywhere in
Speaker 4: good shape.
Speaker 2: Though.
Speaker 1: You know, all right, Final four coming up on Saturday,
Speaker 1: And as I said yesterday, if it's not going to
Speaker 1: be me, it needed to be somebody from the show.
Speaker 1: So good job keeping our streak alive. I think that's
Speaker 1: six straight years somebody from the show is once.
Speaker 2: Good job.
Speaker 4: And I was gonna say one of those years if
Speaker 4: maybe it was the year before, or maybe your first
Speaker 4: year here. I won it there, So I think you
Speaker 4: and I we got the bragging rights in the afternoon.
Speaker 2: All right, we'll take it. We'll take it.
Speaker 1: So some college basketball of course, Final four, both on
Speaker 1: the men's and the women's side.
Speaker 2: All right, Neil Smith will be our first guest.
Speaker 1: Right out of the gates today, we'll do a little
Speaker 1: hockey Utah, Little Utah Hockey Club before we get to Neil.
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Speaker 5: number one sports talk. Now into the studios of ESPN
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Speaker 1: courtesy of our good friends at Prize Picks. All right, so,
Speaker 1: as I referenced earlier, there's no reason that you would
Speaker 1: know this, but today is the first day of a
Speaker 1: seven day dead period in college basketball recruiting, and essentially
Speaker 1: all that means is you cannot have players on campus.
Speaker 1: There's no in person visits for the next week as
Speaker 1: the college basketball season wraps up, coming up this weekend
Speaker 1: with a Final Four, and then on April the eleventh,
Speaker 1: it will open up once again. So as we sit
Speaker 1: here awaiting word on who else could potentially play for
Speaker 1: Utah basketball, YU Basketball next year. We're probably not going
Speaker 1: to get a lot of news over the next week.
Speaker 1: We still could potentially get some news on the assistant
Speaker 1: coaches and as Alex goes about his business filling his staff.
Speaker 1: I was told by somebody yesterday that the Andre stuff
Speaker 1: continues to simply be talked about. I don't think it's
Speaker 1: as much of a slam dunk surefire higher that we
Speaker 1: thought it was, maybe right out of the gates. No
Speaker 1: information that is tangible and real on that just yet.
Speaker 1: So I think they're still talking, and I think it
Speaker 1: just comes down to Andrea's desire to come back to
Speaker 1: this market and live here and coach for his alma mater,
Speaker 1: as opposed to kind of continuing his own journey. Because
Speaker 1: when you're a head coach in the G League, you know,
Speaker 1: you probably feel like you're one or two breaks away
Speaker 1: from maybe being in the big show.
Speaker 2: And I don't know where Andre's head is at just yet.
Speaker 1: But the one piece of news that did come down
Speaker 1: yesterday is that Kiana Daz has withdrawn his name from
Speaker 1: the transfer portal and he will play for Utah basketball
Speaker 1: next year. Hunter Erickson high speed ed to Hawaii. Shout
Speaker 1: out to Hunter. He's going to spend his grad year
Speaker 1: on the Rock. Good for him, and we await word
Speaker 1: on players like Ezara Sar or Mike shrab Jamps.
Speaker 2: Or Jake Waaleen Mira, little players like that.
Speaker 1: How many of those players Alex wants back is unclear,
Speaker 1: and how many of the players actually want to be
Speaker 1: here also unclear. Ezrasar has children, I believe in the Midwest.
Speaker 1: I think he has a couple of kids he might
Speaker 1: want to get back home there. So that's the latest
Speaker 1: on the college basketball recruiting side of things for Utah.
Speaker 1: On the other side, for BYU, reports are floating out
Speaker 1: there the Richie Saunders is seriously considering coming back to
Speaker 1: play for Kevin Young and Provo next year with an
Speaker 1: NIL offer that is seven figures. So it's interesting to
Speaker 1: consider this if you're Richie, if you're part of his
Speaker 1: support group, I'm sure he's got representation. All these young
Speaker 1: men do at this point family around him. At the
Speaker 1: age of twenty three, I think if you go through
Speaker 1: the pre draft process, and anybody that is even kind
Speaker 1: of a fringe pro prospect should always go through the process,
Speaker 1: because at the very least Brandon Carlson did this two
Speaker 1: years ago, and I can remember when Brandon declared for
Speaker 1: the draft I talked about on air. I'm like, I'm
Speaker 1: not sure if he's an NBA guy, but Brandon might
Speaker 1: as well go talk to as many NBA teams as
Speaker 1: he possibly can, because what you do is you go
Speaker 1: to all these pro days, you go to the combine,
Speaker 1: and you have an opportunity to play in front of
Speaker 1: coaches and in front of scouts, and then they all
Speaker 1: give you feedback, so they'll say to it, Richie, Okay,
Speaker 1: at the age of twenty three, the clock is ticking
Speaker 1: to get to the second contract, which is always the
Speaker 1: goal if you're a pro basketball player. I mean, rookie
Speaker 1: money is good money for normal people, but for pro
Speaker 1: basketball players it is the second, third, and then eventually
Speaker 1: fourth fifth contracts, depending on how long you can stick
Speaker 1: around and you're health cooperating.
Speaker 2: That's when the generational wealth kicks in.
Speaker 1: Richie will get real accurate feedback, yeg Or Demon accurate feedback.
Speaker 1: These BYU players, they are going to kick the tires
Speaker 1: on playing in the pros. If we hear that jeg
Speaker 1: Or Demon and Richie Saunders are coming back to play
Speaker 1: for BYU, simply means they went through the draft process,
Speaker 1: didn't like what they saw and heard. And if you're
Speaker 1: Richie Saunders and the feedback is late second round or
Speaker 1: undrafted and BYU says, come back for one point seven
Speaker 1: million or whatever it is, maybe you take the seven figures,
Speaker 1: you play one more year at college basketball, then you
Speaker 1: enter the draft next year.
Speaker 2: Okay. So it is kind of an interesting spot.
Speaker 1: Kevin Young finds himself in in a way that Alex
Speaker 1: Jensen up here just doesn't where he probably has to
Speaker 1: wait to receive word from Yegor and Richie specifically because
Speaker 1: fus Treori's graduating. Trevinell of course is graduating down Hall
Speaker 1: in the transfer portal, they're losing a couple like I
Speaker 1: think the Isaiah Stewart kids a senior, so they know
Speaker 1: some of the players that are leaving. But I'm sure
Speaker 1: as Kevin Young goes about as big and trying to
Speaker 1: fill out a staff, he's still waiting to hear from
Speaker 1: Richie Saunders and Diego Demmt about what they're going to do.
Speaker 1: And as we talked about yesterday, I have to wonder
Speaker 1: if the Dollen Hall decision is kind of draped in
Speaker 1: information that maybe Yegor demon is coming back, and of
Speaker 1: course he'll be the starting point guard again next year
Speaker 1: and Dallan coming off the bench. Not sure how much
Speaker 1: Dallan made to stay at BYU. He entered the transfer
Speaker 1: portal a year ago. A lot of people thought he
Speaker 1: was just going to go to Lexington and follow Mark Pope.
Speaker 1: But down Hall probably for another couple of years of eligibility.
Speaker 1: Can receive five hundred and six hundred thousand dollars to
Speaker 1: play college basketball, So we'll see where he lands. But again,
Speaker 1: if you're hoping for Utah basketball recruiting news, BYU basketball
Speaker 1: recruiting news, we have entered, as of today, the dead
Speaker 1: period in college basketball recruiting, where no in person visits
Speaker 1: are allowed.
Speaker 2: This is all virtual, it's all zoom.
Speaker 1: And so we kind of a wait word on Alex's
Speaker 1: staff and maybe some other pieces of the puzzle that
Speaker 1: will come together. The Jazz were in Houston last night.
Speaker 1: They got absolutely stomped. They lost by thirty eight, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't that close. The Jazz have five games left.
Speaker 1: They'll be at Indiana coming up tomorrow. We'll do some
Speaker 1: jazz basketball later on, but the Utah hockey club isn't
Speaker 1: action tonight they welcome in the La Kings. Utah Hockey
Speaker 1: Club welcomes in the La Kings tonight, seven o'clock drop
Speaker 1: of the park down at the Delta Center here in
Speaker 1: downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. Our next guest joins us
Speaker 1: on a weekly basis to talk about the world of
Speaker 1: pro hockey.
Speaker 2: Little Utah Hockey Club.
Speaker 1: Neil Smith good enough to give us some time on
Speaker 1: this Thursday afternoon. Neil, Happy Thursday, sir, How are you.
Speaker 6: I'm good. I'm very good. Thanks. Coming down the stretch
Speaker 6: here of the NHL season and looking forward to seeing
Speaker 6: who matches up in the playoffs.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. And we'll get to some big picture
Speaker 1: NHL stuff in a moment. And I don't know if
Speaker 1: it's the pressure of the wild card race essentially being over,
Speaker 1: but ever since they're not officially eliminated, but if we're honest,
Speaker 1: it's not happening. But they've won their last two games
Speaker 1: by a nine score of eight to three at Chicago
Speaker 1: and then Calgary here, and of course Calgary is one
Speaker 1: of the teams they were trying to chase in the standings,
Speaker 1: and we'll see if Calgary can catch Saint Louis who
Speaker 1: just doesn't lose all of a sudden But do you
Speaker 1: think it's kind of just the pressure off this young
Speaker 1: team that's allowed them to win a couple of games
Speaker 1: in a pretty impressive fashion ever since it became pretty
Speaker 1: apparent that they weren't going to make the playoffs.
Speaker 6: You know, there is a lot of pressure that comes
Speaker 6: off of the players when they know one way or
Speaker 6: the other what's going to happen. And I've seen often
Speaker 6: teams that are eliminated or know they're going to be
Speaker 6: eliminated to play with a lot more ease and play
Speaker 6: a lot more relaxed, So that definitely can happen. But
Speaker 6: I just want to remind you of one thing for
Speaker 6: you and your listeners about the season, because I had
Speaker 6: said at the beginning what I thought would happen, and
Speaker 6: you have to remember that last year the Arizona Coyotes,
Speaker 6: which is this year's TA Hockey club season, and Utah
Speaker 6: currently has eighty with seven games to go. So if
Speaker 6: they get five hundred in those seven games, just to
Speaker 6: throw out a number, if they can go five hundred,
Speaker 6: they'll end the season with eighty seven points. That's a
Speaker 6: ten point jump from what they did last year, and
Speaker 6: I think a pretty darn good improvement of the club
Speaker 6: from a year ago. So if there's a bright, if
Speaker 6: there's light at the end of the tunnel for this
Speaker 6: hockey team, I think that's it. That they made improvements
Speaker 6: and they're continually improving.
Speaker 2: Really good point.
Speaker 1: And also if we include in the dynamic the fact
Speaker 1: that all of these people got a phone call that
Speaker 1: said you live in Salt Lake, now you know, and
Speaker 1: they were able to make the move and not allow
Speaker 1: that to, you know, move the program in the wrong direction.
Speaker 1: And you've been enough to outline how the ownership complications
Speaker 1: in Arizona led to Ryan Smith being able to make
Speaker 1: this happen with the cooperation, of course, of with Gary
Speaker 1: Bettman and the NHL.
Speaker 2: And you know, the commissioner.
Speaker 1: Betman joined our show and said, the first conversation he
Speaker 1: had with Ryan about this was in March, and suddenly
Speaker 1: it was the first week of May and they're here.
Speaker 1: So what does that say about the character of the
Speaker 1: organization that they didn't And I know that there were
Speaker 1: so many positives about the move, But you know, whenever
Speaker 1: we talk about this, and of course this is based
Speaker 1: off my background, I talk a lot about the personal
Speaker 1: angle here where you're moving families and you're moving children,
Speaker 1: and you're relocating, and you're selling a home and you're
Speaker 1: buying a new home.
Speaker 2: It's I know, a.
Speaker 1: Lot of these people make a lot of money, and
Speaker 1: so the complications might fall on deaf ears for normal folk.
Speaker 2: But it doesn't matter how much money you have.
Speaker 1: When you're moving around and you're kind of upsetting the
Speaker 1: apple cart with your family and you're asking people to
Speaker 1: settle into a new community, it can provide complications. So
Speaker 1: what is say to you that even moving into a
Speaker 1: new community, the hockey club was able to continue this
Speaker 1: incremental growth that Bill Armstrong talks about all the time.
Speaker 6: No, I think it's I think it's great. I think
Speaker 6: it's a it's a It says a lot of things
Speaker 6: about the ownership of the club, down to the management
Speaker 6: of the club, down to the character of the players
Speaker 6: of the club, and of course the coaches. But that's
Speaker 6: a big adjustment, and you think people don't often think
Speaker 6: about it. You and I do because we've been through
Speaker 6: it together. But you know, you guy has to move
Speaker 6: if he's got kids, they got to change schools, they
Speaker 6: got to go and make all new friends and you
Speaker 6: know how tough that is on kids that you know,
Speaker 6: they got their friends at school. It's a lot of
Speaker 6: people their their wife is from the city that they
Speaker 6: were in, they met them earlier in their career, perhaps
Speaker 6: in Phoenix or wherever, and now they've got to ask
Speaker 6: them to leave there where they've lived their whole life
Speaker 6: and go to a new place. So it's not just
Speaker 6: the hockey player that it's you know, has to make
Speaker 6: a big adjustments, but it's the family of the hockey
Speaker 6: players that have to make a bigger adjustment because everybody's
Speaker 6: doing what they can do to support dad in his
Speaker 6: hockey career. And it is truly a big adjustment, and
Speaker 6: one that goes unnoticed by the normal fan. All they
Speaker 6: know is that, well, he used to be wearing a
Speaker 6: coyote on the front of his jersey and now he's
Speaker 6: got Utah written down his jersey, and you know that
Speaker 6: kind of thing. But it can be traumatic.
Speaker 1: So I want to put you in Bill Armstrong's seat
Speaker 1: as the roster constructor and the main decision maker. You're
Speaker 1: viewing this, I would imagine as a successful season and
Speaker 1: yet a you know, just another step in the right direction,
Speaker 1: And at what point do you kind of start looking
Speaker 1: ahead to start, you know, considering what decisions you need
Speaker 1: to make to make sure the progress continues the way
Speaker 1: you want it to go.
Speaker 6: I think he's doing it continuously. I'm sure he's doing
Speaker 6: it continuously. So he's evaluating every day and every player
Speaker 6: and who's out there, and he's meeting with pro scouts
Speaker 6: and finding out what their thoughts are about the guys
Speaker 6: that could potentially be free agents or be gotten in
Speaker 6: a deal. That exercise never stops for the GM. They're
Speaker 6: doing that all the time. Now. Obviously, Bill is going
Speaker 6: to focus more on the future now than the present
Speaker 6: because of the fact that the president is sort of decided.
Speaker 6: And I want to say one other thing about the
Speaker 6: present being decided. The only reason it's been this clearly
Speaker 6: decided is because you had a team win ten straight games,
Speaker 6: and that's the sing of those Blues. They played Pittsburgh
Speaker 6: tonight looking for their eleventh straight. They separated themselves from
Speaker 6: the pack by doing that. And if you remember when
Speaker 6: we spoke two three, four weeks ago about Utah and
Speaker 6: their chances to get in I said, if they could
Speaker 6: get on a run, they could do it. And that's
Speaker 6: what Saint Louis did and so and that's what separated
Speaker 6: them from the pac Minnesota has been pretty good all
Speaker 6: year long, and now they've had a lot of injuries,
Speaker 6: so they've slipped back a bit and they're in the
Speaker 6: wild card. But it's not just Utah that couldn't keep
Speaker 6: up with Saint Louis. The Vancouver Canucks won the Pacific
Speaker 6: Division last year and just lost out in Game seven
Speaker 6: in the first round of Edmonton and they're going to
Speaker 6: miss the playoffs. And Calgary, who's had a remarkable season
Speaker 6: from what we expected, it looks like they're going to
Speaker 6: make miss the playoffs. So it's really hard and it
Speaker 6: would be very unfair to think that Utah Hockey Club
Speaker 6: could keep up with a ten and oer record that
Speaker 6: Saint Lewis went on at this critical time in the season.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you about how Saint Louis did this,
Speaker 1: because you know, as a result of my background, they're
Speaker 1: one of the teams that kind of loosely follow and
Speaker 1: for the majority of the season they were looking up
Speaker 1: at not just the Utah Hockey Club, a lot of
Speaker 1: the other the other teams. What what what clicked there?
Speaker 1: Because as you reference ten straight wins. It is the
Speaker 1: longest winning streak in in the NHL by kind of
Speaker 1: a long shot. Dallas has won six straight, but Saint
Speaker 1: Louis with ten straight.
Speaker 2: What what clicked for them?
Speaker 6: Well, I think there's a number of things, but the
Speaker 6: most visible thing is Jordan Bennington. They're start starting goaltender
Speaker 6: who played in the Four Nations for Canada. He was
Speaker 6: a starting goaltender for Canada in the Four Nations tournament.
Speaker 6: Canada won the tournament. Jordan Bennington was the winning goaltender
Speaker 6: of the Four Nations tournament and since then he's been
Speaker 6: eleven and one. He's won eleven and only lost one
Speaker 6: since the Four Nations. So when you've got a goaltender
Speaker 6: standing on his head like that, that's a huge part
Speaker 6: of it. Now you've got to give credit to Jordan
Speaker 6: Cairo and to Jim Montgomery the head coach, and so on,
Speaker 6: and there's a lot of other pieces there, but the
Speaker 6: most visible piece to me is the outstanding play of
Speaker 6: the goaltender Jordan Dinnington. He's playing like he did when
Speaker 6: they won the Stanley Cup a number of years ago.
Speaker 6: So to answer your question, that's what I think it is.
Speaker 1: Dallas, I referenced second in the Central and Winnipeg is
Speaker 1: still the class of that division. They're differentials plus eighty.
Speaker 1: But Dallas has turned it on too. You reference them
Speaker 1: not too long ago as a team to watch out for.
Speaker 1: What's kind of click for them over the past couple
Speaker 1: of weeks.
Speaker 2: Neil.
Speaker 6: Well I thinks is the goaltend. And of course I'm
Speaker 6: always going to start with the goaltender, because without goaltending,
Speaker 6: you're not going to win, so you sort of got
Speaker 6: to go there first. But I think Ottinger has been
Speaker 6: very good for them. They're doing this too without one
Speaker 6: of their very best players, Nero Heaskin and the defenseman
Speaker 6: who's a dynamic force for them, and if they get
Speaker 6: him back for the playoffs, they're going to be even better.
Speaker 6: But I think there's been a number of things. Jason
Speaker 6: Robertson is scoring goals, why at Johnson has been quite
Speaker 6: well developed, and now is putting pucks in all the time.
Speaker 6: They've got a good combination there that are all coming
Speaker 6: together at the same time. And you know, we've said
Speaker 6: all season that Dallas is a good team. They seem
Speaker 6: to be peaking at the right time. I like the
Speaker 6: moves that Jim Nill did it before the deadline when
Speaker 6: he got Granlin and Cci from San Jose. He moved
Speaker 6: early and got those guys, And you know, there's still
Speaker 6: a chance that they could catch Winnipeg. That's not out
Speaker 6: of the realm of possibility. That they're only four points
Speaker 6: behind them, and they have one more game than Winnipeg
Speaker 6: to play, so you know it's not out of the
Speaker 6: realm of possibility they could get there. It's going to
Speaker 6: be really tough for Colorado to catch Dallas. Now there's
Speaker 6: six points back of them, So it looks at this
Speaker 6: point like it'll be Dallas and Colorado in the first round.
Speaker 6: And that's sort of sad Spence because they're both Stanley
Speaker 6: Cup contenders and yet one of them is going to
Speaker 6: be gone in the first round.
Speaker 1: Of course, a ton of attention on Ovechkin's chase to
Speaker 1: break Wayne Gretzky's record, and he's only three goals shy
Speaker 1: of doing that, and I think he's projected to do
Speaker 1: that April twelfth or thirteenth, according to what I was
Speaker 1: reading earlier on the ESPN coverage. But kind of lost
Speaker 1: in Ovechkin's chase is that he's doing it during a
Speaker 1: good run for a team that has a chance to
Speaker 1: make some noise in the East. I mean, oftentimes when
Speaker 1: a player is aging and he's chasing stats, and I'm
Speaker 1: thinking pro basketball, when Koreem broke his record and Lebron
Speaker 1: broke the scoring record during a pretty you know, mediocre
Speaker 1: year for the Lakers. Oftentimes, when a player is aging
Speaker 1: chasing a record like this, he's not playing for a
Speaker 1: team that's contending. And I just kind of wonder what
Speaker 1: your thoughts are on just the fact that Ovechkin is
Speaker 1: close to breaking that record, but he's also doing it
Speaker 1: for a team that's in the midst of a run
Speaker 1: that could put them in contention to hoist the cup.
Speaker 2: What are your thoughts on that dynamic?
Speaker 6: Neal, I think that's a really good point. I remember
Speaker 6: when Wayne was breaking a lot of records back in
Speaker 6: his day with the La Kings. Is when he broke
Speaker 6: most of the records, that's what he got the book,
Speaker 6: the Gordy Howe goal scoring record, and the Kings, you know,
Speaker 6: were not up and contending teams. So I think what
Speaker 6: you're saying, and I want to agree with wholeheartedly, is
Speaker 6: Sovekin's doing this and they haven't taken their eye off
Speaker 6: the ball. The Capitals. They haven't said, well, let's do
Speaker 6: all this for Ov and back off on our defensive responsibilities.
Speaker 6: Let's take every chance we have to get Ov the record.
Speaker 6: They're still playing great hockey now. Last night they got
Speaker 6: creamed by Carolina because they'd played the night before and
Speaker 6: Carolina was right on their game. They lost five to one,
Speaker 6: and guess who got the one goal. Ovechkin, of course.
Speaker 6: So it is remarkable what he's doing at his age
Speaker 6: and how that is helping his team, perhaps when the
Speaker 6: President's Trophy, but certainly be a dominant force in the East.
Speaker 6: And I think that they really want to have this
Speaker 6: record broken at home. I think that you may see
Speaker 6: it work out that he scores that goal against Columbus
Speaker 6: on the twelfth, or maybe against the I'm sorry, I'm
Speaker 6: the thirteenth against Columbus, or that may work out that way,
Speaker 6: or if he can score against Chicago and then at
Speaker 6: the Islanders, he could do it at home against Carolina.
Speaker 6: But I think he's about four games away from doing
Speaker 6: it now, and if I'm right about that, that would
Speaker 6: put him right in line with doing it against Columbus
Speaker 6: either there they played back to back twelfth and thirteenth,
Speaker 6: so it would either be in Columbus or in Washington
Speaker 6: against Columbus. So Mrs Lincoln's, who is the goaltender for Columbus,
Speaker 6: has that to look forward to, like I'm going to
Speaker 6: be the one that's probably going to get beat for
Speaker 6: the record set a goal.
Speaker 1: Well, we've been hyper focused on the wild card race
Speaker 1: out this way in the Western Conference to see if
Speaker 1: the hockey club can get it done. They're straight chaos
Speaker 1: in the East, Neo, isn't there. Looks like Ottawa was
Speaker 1: gonna pull away and grab one of the spots, but
Speaker 1: they've lost a couple in a row. Montreal's differentials minus
Speaker 1: twenty five.
Speaker 2: Yet they're right there.
Speaker 1: But my guys, the Rangers, they've kind of resurrected their
Speaker 1: playoff chances and they're tied with Montreal right now. Montreal
Speaker 1: does have a game in hand. Who do you think
Speaker 1: captures that second wild card? Looks like Ottawa was going
Speaker 1: to grab the first.
Speaker 6: I think because on strength of schedule, you've got to
Speaker 6: go with Montreal only because they only have three more
Speaker 6: games left against teams that are currently in the playoffs,
Speaker 6: and they have five games left against non playoff teams.
Speaker 6: So and if you look at the Rangers schedule, they
Speaker 6: have five against playoff teams and only two against on
Speaker 6: playoff teams, and those two come back to back. So
Speaker 6: and I don't like the way the Rangers are playing.
Speaker 6: When I look at them, I think, with the talent
Speaker 6: they've got on the team, they should be a lot
Speaker 6: better than they are. But their structure doesn't seem to
Speaker 6: be there, and every night something goes wrong for them.
Speaker 6: And even with the stirk and in net, you know,
Speaker 6: they squeak out wins like they did last night over Minnesota,
Speaker 6: but Minnesota got a point there. So I really do
Speaker 6: think that the Montreal Canadians are on a mission to
Speaker 6: make it. I would have if my heart dictated who
Speaker 6: would make it, Spence, I would have had Columbus Blue
Speaker 6: Jackets make it because of what they've been through preseason
Speaker 6: and during the season for that franchise, losing Johnny Gidrou
Speaker 6: and his brother Matthew. But your heart doesn't set the standings.
Speaker 6: But I think it looks to me like the halves
Speaker 6: the Montreal Canadians are going to make that last spot.
Speaker 1: We always talk about this time of year when the
Speaker 1: player are right around the corner about teams that find
Speaker 1: their form at the right time. So I want to
Speaker 1: go back to the Western Conference, and of course Winnipeg
Speaker 1: has been the class all year. We talked Dallas in Colorado,
Speaker 1: there's Vegas, the Kings are in town tonight. But based
Speaker 1: off of what the Blues have done, do you change
Speaker 1: the way that you kind of look at them heading
Speaker 1: into the postseason since they have seen to capture the
Speaker 1: right form at the right time of year.
Speaker 6: You know, they're at plus eighteen. They've really turned their
Speaker 6: season around. I mean that Ken and oh will end
Speaker 6: at some point because they always do no matter who
Speaker 6: the team is. But yeah, could they be a team
Speaker 6: that goes into the playoffs now with nothing to lose
Speaker 6: because nobody expected them to make it? Could they do
Speaker 6: what they did back in twenty nineteen and come in
Speaker 6: and start surprising people? Well, sure, I don't expect that,
Speaker 6: but I think they could do that. I still think
Speaker 6: that the heavyweights are in Winnipeg, Dallas, call Colorado, and Vegas.
Speaker 6: I think then after that, you've got Edmonton in LA
Speaker 6: who looks like they're ready to play a fifth straight
Speaker 6: first round against each other. If you can believe it
Speaker 6: in l A and Edmonton, but it'll it'll all be
Speaker 6: interesting which way it goes. And again out there, you've
Speaker 6: got those five really dynamic teams that have all got
Speaker 6: a shot in the In the East, you've got one division,
Speaker 6: the Atlantic Division, that's got three Stanley Cup contenders Toronto, Tampa, Florida.
Speaker 6: And then you've got in the Metro you've got Washington
Speaker 6: and Carolina. So you've got five in the East, five
Speaker 6: in the West. It's it's not a it's I can't
Speaker 6: say and be honest with you that it's it's anybody's game,
Speaker 6: like it's anybody's Cup. I think there's still favorites out
Speaker 6: of those ten teams I just mentioned, but it's going
Speaker 6: to be a hell of a series, hell of a playoff,
Speaker 6: and you.
Speaker 1: Know, I mean, that's one of the great things about
Speaker 1: this format. And I'm not sure why, and we'll wait
Speaker 1: into this area for a moment. I'm not sure what
Speaker 1: breeds upsets in the Stanley Cup playoffs in a way
Speaker 1: that the NBA doesn't see, but we do oftentimes see upsets,
Speaker 1: and oftentimes home ice advantage doesn't mean the same that
Speaker 1: home court advantage means any any thoughts on that, or
Speaker 1: you know, a new hockey market out here, why the
Speaker 1: Stanley Cup playoffs and professional hockey seem to breed upsets
Speaker 1: more often than pro basketball does.
Speaker 2: Any thoughts on that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, My thoughts are that there is a lot of
Speaker 6: pressure playing at home, and so it has turned from
Speaker 6: not being that much of an advantage anymore to play
Speaker 6: at home. I think because of the pressure. When you're
Speaker 6: on the road, it's you against the world. There's a
Speaker 6: traveling party of thirty people and it's thirty and twenty
Speaker 6: thousand others cheering for the other side. I do think
Speaker 6: that there can be a lot of pressure when the
Speaker 6: expectations are high for your team, and certainly the teams
Speaker 6: that I just mentioned, they've all got very high expectations
Speaker 6: on them. If you take a look at Toronto for example,
Speaker 6: Lenise and you know this Spence, they haven't won the
Speaker 6: Stanley Cup since nineteen sixty seven. So the Leaf fans
Speaker 6: are just propping at the mouth to get them to
Speaker 6: do well in the playoffs and their whole season will
Speaker 6: be judged by the playoffs. And the Florida Panthers want
Speaker 6: to repeat the Washington fans are going to think that
Speaker 6: they've got a Stanley Cup team because they're way up
Speaker 6: in the standings. And we've already talked about these teams
Speaker 6: in the West, where you know Edmonton oiler fans think well,
Speaker 6: why shouldn't we win with Connor McDavid and Leon drysidele
Speaker 6: But to get to your point about upsets, I think
Speaker 6: that it's a pressure things sometimes when those expectations are
Speaker 6: that high, make you squeeze your stick a lot tighter
Speaker 6: and not play as loose as you should. So Winnipeg,
Speaker 6: for example, hasn't been successful in the playoffs. They've been
Speaker 6: successful in the regular season, and they're going to be
Speaker 6: judged by their fans based upon what happens in the playoffs,
Speaker 6: and if they lose in the first round, well that
Speaker 6: six or seven months of regular season hockey will be
Speaker 6: out the window.
Speaker 1: So the Utah Hockey Club has announced that after their
Speaker 1: final regular season home game, which will be April tenth
Speaker 1: VERSUT Nashville, they're going to hand out their postseason awards.
Speaker 1: Fans can vote on it right now, so check that out.
Speaker 1: If they asked you, Neil Smith, the MVP of the
Speaker 1: Utah Hockey Club this season, who would you go with
Speaker 1: Clayton Keller is they're leading.
Speaker 2: He leads them in points kind of by a long shot.
Speaker 1: I know a lot of people close to the club
Speaker 1: would tell you, Serga chef should be an option. And
Speaker 1: when you look at the unsure nature of the goalie situation,
Speaker 1: because Connoring has not had a great year, maybe Vimelka
Speaker 1: is in the mix as well.
Speaker 2: Who do you think the UTA Hockey Club m VP
Speaker 2: is this year?
Speaker 6: Neil, You know, I'm going to go back where I
Speaker 6: was at the beginning of the year because I like
Speaker 6: this kid, Clayton Keller, the Saint Louis native. I mean,
Speaker 6: he's been the captain, He's had a fantastic year. But
Speaker 6: you've got so much growth going on there. I mean
Speaker 6: you've mentioned it. You've got Mamelka, who wasn't it was
Speaker 6: on a contract that was going to expire, gets a
Speaker 6: new contract and has played really well for them and
Speaker 6: has proven that he can handle the reins. This kid
Speaker 6: Dylan Gunter, what a player he is and what a
Speaker 6: shot he's got and able to score goals. He's got
Speaker 6: a fantastic future in front of him. So I guess
Speaker 6: I would go with the captain and say that if
Speaker 6: I had to vote or had to say somebody who
Speaker 6: was their m VP, it would be Clayton Keller because
Speaker 6: he's done a good job in both his roles there.
Speaker 6: But and and you mentioned chev and Sergachev has been
Speaker 6: has been really a great acquisition by Bill Armstrong. And
Speaker 6: when I got to be honest with you, when I
Speaker 6: when they acquired him, I thought, I'm wondering if if
Speaker 6: they're getting damaged goods because you know, he'd had those
Speaker 6: injuries in Tampa, and boy, he has played great for
Speaker 6: them for Utah and has I think set A, you know,
Speaker 6: given them an element that they didn't have in playing
Speaker 6: tough and playing also good offensively. So you know, I
Speaker 6: think any one of those guys would be deserving.
Speaker 1: Before I say you loose, Neil, genuinely curious. You know,
Speaker 1: there's a debate around the NBA right now, and it's
Speaker 1: prevalent here in Salt Lake because the worst team in
Speaker 1: the NBA is the Utah Jazz, and they're not alone
Speaker 1: in their approach. There's about ten teams. If I'm being generous,
Speaker 1: I would say six or seven teams. But if I'm
Speaker 1: being honest, I would say about ten teams in the
Speaker 1: NBA have stopped trying players have been shut down, they
Speaker 1: playing the rest of the year. And the Jazz were
Speaker 1: in Houston last night they got smoked by nearly forty
Speaker 1: And that's kind of status quo. How prevalent, if at all,
Speaker 1: is tanking in the world of pro hockey, Well.
Speaker 6: You know, we have the lottery, and so therefore, even
Speaker 6: if you do tank, it doesn't mean that you're necessarily
Speaker 6: going to end up with not only not the first pick,
Speaker 6: but not even be in the top three. I do
Speaker 6: think I don't think there's anybody in the league that
Speaker 6: tanks here because I think the rebuilders are obvious. I
Speaker 6: think that you know, for example San Jose and Chicago
Speaker 6: or in the middle of a massive rebuild. I think
Speaker 6: that the Ducks are a little bit ahead of them
Speaker 6: in that. And you know they're over in the East.
Speaker 6: You got the Philadelphia Flyers that are in a rebuilding
Speaker 6: stage that they're not. Nobody's going to try to lose
Speaker 6: to get the first pick. It's not like when the
Speaker 6: old days, Mario lemu is going to become available. In
Speaker 6: New Jersey and Pittsburgh were the two candidates to be last,
Speaker 6: and New Jersey tried to win their games and Pittsburgh
Speaker 6: tried to lose theirs and guess who Mary Olemeu became
Speaker 6: iconic with this is the Pittsburgh Penguins. So it doesn't
Speaker 6: happen as much in the NHL. I don't think it
Speaker 6: would do them any good to do that because they
Speaker 6: wouldn't accomplish a lot. I think what you have in
Speaker 6: the league is you have teams that are rebuilding and
Speaker 6: know they're not going to win that season, so they're
Speaker 6: just trying to do whatever they can to build for
Speaker 6: the future.
Speaker 1: All right, Neil, where can everybody go find a podcast?
Speaker 6: It's on every podcast platform and it's NHL Wrap Around
Speaker 6: and we've been having a lot of fun with it
Speaker 6: and it's going to get even more fun in coming
Speaker 6: up in the future. So you get it on Apple
Speaker 6: or Spotify or YouTube or anywhere where you get your
Speaker 6: podcast called NHL Wrapround. Please subscribe, Please give us a hit.
Speaker 6: We need all the numbers we get and we need
Speaker 6: the word to get spread. But we do have listeners
Speaker 6: in Salt Lake City. I've been looking at that. There
Speaker 6: we go, this show. This show is helping us get
Speaker 6: listeners in the Salt Lake City, So I must be
Speaker 6: saying something right.
Speaker 1: Well, we appreciate your presence every week. You've been good
Speaker 1: enough to help us understand this sport. We're all trying
Speaker 1: to get used to Neil, So anything we can do
Speaker 1: for you, we're happy to do that because you do
Speaker 1: so much for us. So thank you for the time
Speaker 1: and have a great weekend.
Speaker 6: Okay, you two, thanks for having me on right.
Speaker 1: Neil Smith stops bat today courtesy reference at IFA Country Stores.
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Speaker 1: means now is the time to start thinking about your
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Speaker 1: the basket begins with the first step on the court.
Speaker 2: That's the ultimate power move. IFA Step one.
Speaker 1: Crabgrass Preventer and lawn food is the first choice to
Speaker 1: give your yard the healthy, thick green look you desire.
Speaker 2: The neighbors will be green with envy.
Speaker 1: Shop IFA online at IFA dot co op, or stop
Speaker 1: by one of their eighteen Utah locations today. The Jazz well,
Speaker 1: they were in huge did last night. Technically they were present.
Speaker 1: It didn't go well, because you know that's the deal.
Speaker 1: Five games left for the Jazz. I would imagine broadcasters
Speaker 1: just like players and coaches in front office staff and
Speaker 1: everybody involved is kind of ready for this season to end.
Speaker 2: That's just my guess. Our next guest covers the.
Speaker 1: NBA for The Ringer, one of my favorite NBA riders
Speaker 1: for a long, long time.
Speaker 2: On a Thursday afternoon, it is Howard Beck.
Speaker 1: Howard, Happy Thursday, sir, How are you well? I wonder
Speaker 1: from your your your perspective and covering this league for
Speaker 1: so long, what it's like for an organization at the
Speaker 1: end of a season like the Jazz are going through
Speaker 1: for the first time in the fifty plus years of
Speaker 1: the Jazz history.
Speaker 2: They've lost more than sixty games.
Speaker 1: They are, by record and by eye test and everything else,
Speaker 1: the worst team in the NBA. And look, losing takes
Speaker 1: a toll on coaches and players in a different way
Speaker 1: than it takes on probably everybody else involved, because they're
Speaker 1: the main actor.
Speaker 2: They're involved, and these guys are competitors.
Speaker 1: But from just an organizational standpoint, what sort of toll
Speaker 1: do you think this takes? Because it just feels like
Speaker 1: everybody I talked to you down there is kind of
Speaker 1: ready for the season to end.
Speaker 7: It definitely takes its toll. And it's interesting because we
Speaker 7: can take the thirty thousand foot view, and obviously much
Speaker 7: easier for me to do so from a distance as
Speaker 7: a national writer covering the league. It's different when you're
Speaker 7: when you're there, if you're a Jazz fan, if you're
Speaker 7: working for the Jazz, if you're even a reporter covering
Speaker 7: the Jazz. I even know this just based on the
Speaker 7: you know, really bad years I covered the Knicks, where
Speaker 7: you know, I have no stake in the outcome, I
Speaker 7: have no emotional investment. But being around a team that
Speaker 7: is mired in you know, that kind of of of
Speaker 7: losing for months on end, it just it just makes
Speaker 7: for a really depressing environment. Right, So it's everybody, like
Speaker 7: the players, you know, the players you definitely feel it from,
Speaker 7: and the coaches you feel it from, but even support staff.
Speaker 7: It just it is just this cloud that hangs over
Speaker 7: an entire organization, and it and underscores why it's so
Speaker 7: tough to do and why it's so inadvisable perhaps to
Speaker 7: do what the Sixers did with the process ten years ago,
Speaker 7: because you do that year after year and you know
Speaker 7: that there's no end in sight. You know, this is
Speaker 7: sports it's supposed to be about. You know, Yeah, there's
Speaker 7: there's highs and lows, but it's supposed to be about
Speaker 7: the joys of the game, and that's all just robbed
Speaker 7: from you when you have a season like this, or
Speaker 7: especially multiple seasons like this. So it there's no question,
Speaker 7: without having talked to anybody there recently, that it's taking
Speaker 7: a toll on everyone involved. I'm just about to get
Speaker 7: out of my car here, so it's give me two seconds.
Speaker 1: Oh you're good. Howard Beck is our guest. The Utah
Speaker 1: Jazz were in Houston last night. They're going to be
Speaker 1: in Indiana coming up that is tomorrow for a Friday Tilts.
Speaker 2: Only five games left for the Jazz. Oh you're good.
Speaker 1: Only five games left for the Jazz. Howard Beck has
Speaker 1: joined us. So since you, uh, since you brought up Philly,
Speaker 1: what do they do? What does this offseason look like
Speaker 1: for the Philadelphia seventy six ers, Because it's not just
Speaker 1: can En beat ever stay healthy?
Speaker 2: It's a lot more than that.
Speaker 7: I think it starts with that though, because if you
Speaker 7: think about, you know, just the whole inflection point of
Speaker 7: this season and of their you know, their trajectory for
Speaker 7: the next few years, everything is just going to be
Speaker 7: about whether or not This next surgery that he's having
Speaker 7: on his knee does what it needs to do, clears
Speaker 7: everything up. If Embiid is even ninety percent of himself
Speaker 7: next season, a lot of other things fall into place
Speaker 7: right Like, yes, there will still be Paul George concerns
Speaker 7: because of his age and injury history. But a healthy,
Speaker 7: thriving Embiid means that Paul George only has to be
Speaker 7: your second or third best player, and not your best,
Speaker 7: which was the role he had to play first for
Speaker 7: parts of this season and not very well. Everybody's back
Speaker 7: in their proper place if Embiid is himself again. So
Speaker 7: there's the glass half full potential for the Sixers. Not
Speaker 7: to be pollyannish about it, but there is a glass
Speaker 7: half full possibility. So Mbi gets the surgery, Embiid returns
Speaker 7: to some semblance of his old dominance. Now you've got
Speaker 7: a player who's, you know, one of the top ten
Speaker 7: in the league. We know what Tyree Max is capable of.
Speaker 7: We know what Paul George, even at the stage of
Speaker 7: his career, is capable of.
Speaker 3: You saw a.
Speaker 7: Really nice debut from Jared McCain, their rookie before he
Speaker 7: got hurt. He was in line for potentially Rookie of
Speaker 7: the Year or certainly wasn't going to be in the
Speaker 7: conversation until he went down. They picked up Quenton Grimes
Speaker 7: from the Mavericks in a trade mid season. Grimes has
Speaker 7: been fantastic for them, So they've got some good role players,
Speaker 7: they've got some good youth, and they've got it looks
Speaker 7: like they're gonna have Now the lottery balls could be
Speaker 7: cruel to them. If the lottery balls knock them out
Speaker 7: of the top six, their pick goes to the thunder.
Speaker 7: But if the Sixers just simply keep their pick after
Speaker 7: the lottery, now they also have a top six pick
Speaker 7: to play with, like maybe that's another really good young player,
Speaker 7: or maybe because they're kind of still in a win
Speaker 7: now mode as long as you have Joel Embiid and
Speaker 7: Paul George, maybe they're flipping that pick for something else,
Speaker 7: for some immediate help. So there's a there's a there's
Speaker 7: a scenario here where the Sixers come out of this
Speaker 7: offseason in potentially good shape. But yes, everything still goes
Speaker 7: back to you. But can Embiid hold up, can he
Speaker 7: stay healthy and can he reclaim his dominance for any
Speaker 7: length of time?
Speaker 1: Do you think there's any thought, because it's kind of
Speaker 1: like the fool me wants thing like. And I know
Speaker 1: there were some conversations about Embiid maybe wanting out of
Speaker 1: Philly last off season, and you know, to your to
Speaker 1: your point, I mean, look, when he is fully healthy,
Speaker 1: he's as close to as impossible to cover as anyone
Speaker 1: not named Nicole Jokic, and so he is that guy.
Speaker 1: Is there a possibility that Philly does their calculation, it's
Speaker 1: like he just he's not going to stay healthy. It's
Speaker 1: time for us to move on. Because if they decided
Speaker 1: to do that, Howard, it just takes it just takes one,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure there would be a lot more than
Speaker 1: one lined up to try to grab Embiid if Philly
Speaker 1: decides to move on from him.
Speaker 7: I've gotten no sense that he wants to leave, and
Speaker 7: I've gotten no sense that the Sixers what would want
Speaker 7: to move on other than the obvious of you know,
Speaker 7: feeling like maybe there's a ticking time bomb there right there.
Speaker 7: But the sense I've gotten from the Sixers, you know,
Speaker 7: in recent months, has been that there's no reason to
Speaker 7: actually believe that this is some sort of chronic you know,
Speaker 7: or even worse an you know, a degrading injury, like
Speaker 7: I don't think it's the kind of thing where they're
Speaker 7: worried that he's never going to be Joel Embiid again.
Speaker 7: I think, you know, whether it's wishful thinking or whether
Speaker 7: it's just based on what their doctors are telling them.
Speaker 7: I think the Sixers still expect that Joel Embiid is
Speaker 7: gonna be pretty close to himself again, So I don't
Speaker 7: think there's any scenario where he's on the move or
Speaker 7: where they're even trying to move him. I also think
Speaker 7: that if you did decide to go that direction, it'd
Speaker 7: be really tough because I think of it in the
Speaker 7: same way I think of Zion, who's obviously much younger.
Speaker 7: But there's certain guys who like the risk reward potential
Speaker 7: makes it really hard to figure out what their value is. Like,
Speaker 7: if you're a team trying to acquire Joel Embiid, given
Speaker 7: the recent injury history, how much are you truly willing
Speaker 7: to give up on the risk that he's not going
Speaker 7: to be himself? And plus, if the Sixers are willing
Speaker 7: to move him, you have all that much more reason
Speaker 7: to think, well, they must want out of the Joel
Speaker 7: and Beat business for a reason. So now you're even
Speaker 7: more cautious. And if you don't want to give up
Speaker 7: that much, well then the Sixers aren't going to want
Speaker 7: to move him, right that You're not moving, you know,
Speaker 7: a player of his caliber, even with the injury history,
Speaker 7: unless you're getting a boatload in return, or at least
Speaker 7: enough in return that makes you think you can, you know,
Speaker 7: kickstart a new future. Now, all that said, what if
Speaker 7: the lottery balls really go their way and they end
Speaker 7: up with Cooper Flag? Is that a reason to keep
Speaker 7: everybody else and say that Cooper Flags now the missing piece.
Speaker 7: Who's going to you know, help Joel and b Paul
Speaker 7: George and Tyres MAXI make a deep run? Or is
Speaker 7: it now we've got our new guy to build around
Speaker 7: and that makes it more palatable to start over and
Speaker 7: maybe try to move Embiid. But again, I don't We're
Speaker 7: We're way ahead of ourselves. I don't think any of
Speaker 7: those things are particularly likely. And I also think that
Speaker 7: given the size of Joel Embiad's contracts, I don't know
Speaker 7: that a lot of teams are going to be willing
Speaker 7: to give up a ton to get him, even if
Speaker 7: he were made available.
Speaker 1: I think I may have asked you this about a
Speaker 1: month ago, and if I remember correctly, the answer was Shay.
Speaker 1: And it just, you know, watching the other night Jokic
Speaker 1: with a sixty point triple double, and every time I
Speaker 1: hone in on him and he has one of those nights,
Speaker 1: I just am seeing there. I'm like, I don't know
Speaker 1: that I've ever seen this in my entire life around
Speaker 1: the NBA. I'm not sure I've ever seen a player
Speaker 1: quite like him. He is unique in every way. Where
Speaker 1: are you at today on the MVP debate between SGA
Speaker 1: and Jokic, Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 7: Everything you just said about Yokich is obviously true. Like
Speaker 7: he's a truly unique figure in NBA history, incredibly dominant,
Speaker 7: and he's having another season that, by any number of
Speaker 7: different standards that you could apply, by any number of
Speaker 7: metrics you could apply, is historic and dominant and incredible.
Speaker 7: But Shay is also having a historic and dominant and
Speaker 7: an incredible season, and he's doing it for a team
Speaker 7: that is still on pace to potentially win seventy and
Speaker 7: if they don't win seventy, it's going to be sixty
Speaker 7: eight or sixty nine. Like the Thunder are going to
Speaker 7: have one of the greatest seasons in NBA history. Obviously,
Speaker 7: only two teams have ever cleared seventy. There aren't even
Speaker 7: that many that have won sixty seven or more. It's
Speaker 7: it's you know, a half dozen or so that matters
Speaker 7: to me. That has always mattered to me as an
Speaker 7: MVP voter, and so yeah, I don't think there's much
Speaker 7: doubt in my mind. I will always reassess everything before
Speaker 7: I actually fill out the ballot. But to me, it's
Speaker 7: been Shae for a bit here and it's still Shay.
Speaker 2: I've got to follow up.
Speaker 1: Since you are a voter, did you receive a sparkling
Speaker 1: package in the mail from our local basketball team encouraging
Speaker 1: to vote for Isaiah Collier as first Team All Rookie.
Speaker 1: It's all we got, Howard, That's all we got out here.
Speaker 7: It was a lighter package than some years. Yeah, I
Speaker 7: did get that. I will say it's going to be
Speaker 7: hard for any team to top. And I always think
Speaker 7: these campaigns are a little goofy and they have no
Speaker 7: bearing on how.
Speaker 3: We've actually vote.
Speaker 7: But it's gonna be hard for anybody to top the
Speaker 7: Washington Wizards, who this year sent me three pints of
Speaker 7: very flavored ice cream, and it's really good ice cream.
Speaker 7: Oh man, I don't I don't even remember what they
Speaker 7: were trying to get me to vote for with that
Speaker 7: ice cream. I just can tell you that the ice
Speaker 7: cream's really good.
Speaker 1: We have the best ice cream in the world.
Speaker 2: We blew it.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess by the time ice cream from
Speaker 1: Utah gets to Brooklyn, it probably would be uh, it
Speaker 1: probably would be melted.
Speaker 3: And look, I don't know if you packed dry ice.
Speaker 7: Oh, so there's a way to do it, apparently.
Speaker 1: Okay, Look if Washington, if the Washington freaking Wizards are
Speaker 1: doing things better than the Utah Jazz, we have an
Speaker 1: issue out here. But look, if you don't have anything here,
Speaker 1: we can punt move on quickly. This rookie class. I mean,
Speaker 1: I love Stefan Castle. I was praying he would fall
Speaker 1: to the Jazz. I loved him in college. You know, Rischache.
Speaker 1: But when you look at what Collier has done, he
Speaker 1: does have a case potentially for least being second team
Speaker 1: All Rookie. I don't know how much you've dug on
Speaker 1: he you know, dug in here, and if you haven't,
Speaker 1: we can move on. But any thoughts on whether or
Speaker 1: not you think he has a shot to make these teams.
Speaker 7: I have not dug in that far. And this is
Speaker 7: this is a tough rookie class in general, which probably
Speaker 7: makes his chances that much higher because in a year
Speaker 7: where there's not a lot of like spectacular rookies, it
Speaker 7: means that people are going to go in a thousand
Speaker 7: different directions, which means the boats will be split spread
Speaker 7: so far that it might not you know, the part
Speaker 7: to entry might be lower. So but I will get
Speaker 7: to that, hopefully by the time we talk again.
Speaker 1: So, as a guy who did you cover the Mellow
Speaker 1: knicks some of those Okay, So you know, I felt like,
Speaker 1: and I don't know if it was just me as
Speaker 1: a Nick fan, you know, my childhood being intertwined to
Speaker 1: that organization. Just appreciating that Mellow took on the New
Speaker 1: York Challenge in a way that most stars seem to
Speaker 1: be either afraid of or they didn't want to work
Speaker 1: for that idiot owner a different topic, but Mello at
Speaker 1: least embraced it, tried to do it, and did it
Speaker 1: at a very high level. Never made it out of
Speaker 1: the second round of the postseason, but for about I
Speaker 1: don't know howard five or so years, I felt like
Speaker 1: he was the best pure individual scorer in the game.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if it's because he came out
Speaker 1: when Lebron did and d Wade did, but it seemed
Speaker 1: like whenever anybody talked about Carmelo Anthony and whether or
Speaker 1: not he was a Hall of Famer, it was intertwined
Speaker 1: in this whole, like he's never won it and he's
Speaker 1: not Lebron, who he was drafted with. I think it's
Speaker 1: a no brainer that he's a Hall of Famer. Of course,
Speaker 1: it's not just the NBA. It's a national championship at Syracuse,
Speaker 1: it's three gold medals with the with the US basketball team.
Speaker 1: But your thoughts now that it's a fisher, the Carmelo
Speaker 1: Anthony is a Hall of Famer.
Speaker 7: Yeah. Also, by the way, really good dude. And he
Speaker 7: was always really good to the media for sure, which
Speaker 7: we all which we all appreciated, and kept his sense
Speaker 7: of humor through good times and bad too, Like you know,
Speaker 7: it was not all, you know, not all fun and
Speaker 7: games with with with the Knis in particular, he's a
Speaker 7: He's been a polarizing player and was in real time
Speaker 7: as well. The Hall of Fame thing is is unquestionable,
Speaker 7: like I don't no one can even I don't know
Speaker 7: how anybody can question that, and you just you just
Speaker 7: said it. People need to remember it's a basketball Hall
Speaker 7: of Fame and not an NBA Hall of Fame, and
Speaker 7: even by NBA Hall of Fame standards, if that were
Speaker 7: a thing, he'd be in, but especially with the Basketball
Speaker 7: Hall of Fame where your college resume matters, and he
Speaker 7: did win a national championship as a freshman where your
Speaker 7: Olympics matter, and he's got multiple gold medals, like all
Speaker 7: of that is baked in, which made him just automatic
Speaker 7: as a player for the Knicks, he was certainly polarizing,
Speaker 7: like they did not have a ton of success, and
Speaker 7: they certainly didn't have the success that they hoped to
Speaker 7: have when they got him and paired him with a
Speaker 7: Mari Statamaier, Maury couldn't stay healthy.
Speaker 3: They brought a Tyson.
Speaker 7: Chandler, you know, but they didn't have the means to
Speaker 7: really fill out that roster, in part because Carmelo forced
Speaker 7: a trade to the next instead of waiting for free agency,
Speaker 7: and in doing so it robbed them of a lot
Speaker 7: of you know, draft capital and trade ships and so,
Speaker 7: like He's even mentioned at one point himself like yeah,
Speaker 7: maybe maybe that that made it tough on them, and
Speaker 7: it made it hard for them to build around me.
Speaker 7: So you know, they had more i think frustrating seasons
Speaker 7: than good ones with him here. They only made the
Speaker 7: second round once. There were a bunch of seasons without
Speaker 7: the playoffs. It felt I think like overall, like like
Speaker 7: like that era was a bit of a bust in
Speaker 7: some ways. And toward the end, Carmela was getting booed
Speaker 7: at times because you know, of the obvious things like this,
Speaker 7: his shot selection at times was questionable, and you know,
Speaker 7: he liked to do a lot of one on one
Speaker 7: and and uh, you know a lot of dribbling, a
Speaker 7: lot of ISO and that style of play was also
Speaker 7: starting to go out of fashion at that time. Like
Speaker 7: his style of play does not really sell well in
Speaker 7: today's NBA. You know, it's kind of a bruiser who's
Speaker 7: going to you know, post up and have the ball
Speaker 7: in his hands a lot in in the post area.
Speaker 7: So still an incredible score, one of the best of
Speaker 7: all time, and you know, the Hall of Fame, Nod
Speaker 7: is absolutely deserving.
Speaker 2: The Knicks fall too.
Speaker 1: I think it's own seven against Cleveland and boss, is
Speaker 1: that an accurate representation on kind of where they exist
Speaker 1: in the ecosystem of the Eastern Conference this year.
Speaker 7: I don't think the record lies. I just I think
Speaker 7: it's not one where it's like, oh, they went two
Speaker 7: and five against these guys, right, Like there's a mixed bag.
Speaker 7: And granted, you know, the more recent losses are tough
Speaker 7: because they've been without Jalen Brunton, who might be coming
Speaker 7: back here soon. But yeah, the record is what it is,
Speaker 7: and like, I think those teams are just demonstrably better
Speaker 7: than the next and demonstrably better than Milwaukee and Detroit,
Speaker 7: Indiana and everybody else.
Speaker 3: In the East.
Speaker 7: So there's a gap. It doesn't mean that the Knicks
Speaker 7: at full strengths might not be able to take four
Speaker 7: of seven from one of those teams. I mean, I
Speaker 7: think they still got a better chance against Cleveland than Boston,
Speaker 7: and they did beat Cleveland this this you know, this
Speaker 7: version of Cleveland. A couple of years ago, the knickt
Speaker 7: smoked them in the first round of the playoffs, and
Speaker 7: I think that that was partially indication where the Cavs
Speaker 7: were at that time, and you know, they're young guys,
Speaker 7: hadn't been in the playoffs before. Mobley and Garland just
Speaker 7: worked deer in headlights in that series, So they're a
Speaker 7: much different team now. Obviously, you know the standings, you know,
Speaker 7: are a test to that. The record attests to that,
Speaker 7: they're they're play attests to that. So yeah, I think
Speaker 7: the Knicks are a distant third in the East, but
Speaker 7: with a puncher's chance, it's they've they've got. They've got
Speaker 7: just enough to make it interesting and and to to
Speaker 7: to make a plausible case. But I don't think what
Speaker 7: we've seen the season in the case that they're that
Speaker 7: they're ready to uh to get through Cleveland and Boston.
Speaker 1: As a man with impeccable musical taste and an incredible
Speaker 1: musical palette, I'm surprised I've never asked you for a
Speaker 1: complete comprehensive breakdown of the musical chops of JD and
Speaker 1: The Straight Shot.
Speaker 7: If you want to, if you want a good laugh,
Speaker 7: I hope it's a good laugh, go on the New
Speaker 7: York Times website or just use Google Google my name,
Speaker 7: UH and Dolan and JD in the Straight Shot, and
Speaker 7: you'll find an absolutely preposterous piece I did at the
Speaker 7: Times way back when, in which I used lyrics from
Speaker 7: his songs on his new album as a means for
Speaker 7: answering questions that he otherwise would not answer since he
Speaker 7: was not meeting with the media. It was kind of
Speaker 7: a Stephen Colbert rip off, where you know, Colbert would
Speaker 7: pretend to have interviewed somebody by using other clips. That's
Speaker 7: what I did, except I used lyrics from JD in
Speaker 7: the straight shot.
Speaker 1: Oh hell yes, Now there's nothing else I want to do,
Speaker 1: and I've got two and a half hours left in
Speaker 1: the show. Hey, before I say you know what, that's
Speaker 1: an excellent idea. I should do that. But before I
Speaker 1: say you loose, I want you to settle a debate
Speaker 1: I was having with a buddy of mine who is
Speaker 1: a Nuggets fan. As I'm watching Jokic, a sixty point
Speaker 1: triple double is so dumb it never happens. And then
Speaker 1: Russell Westbrook was like, Hey, good game, watch this and
Speaker 1: just fumbles it away. Are the Nuggets? Are they in
Speaker 1: danger of Andrew Luckiness? Where the the cults were never
Speaker 1: able to surround Andrew luck with enough talent he got hurt.
Speaker 1: He's like I'm out are the nugg Look, they did
Speaker 1: win a championship and in Denver that's hard to do.
Speaker 1: I'm not taking that away from them. But he is
Speaker 1: so generationally special. Is he being failed by his team?
Speaker 8: Oh boy?
Speaker 7: I don't want to say yes yet. I think we're
Speaker 7: in that zone. I think they're on that trajectory. I
Speaker 7: think if it goes this way for another couple of years,
Speaker 7: we're going to have that conversation in earnest. But I'm
Speaker 7: hesitant only because we're only a couple of years removed
Speaker 7: from their championship. We did just enter this new CBA
Speaker 7: that made it tougher now. I think the Nuggets generally speaking,
Speaker 7: have been kind of a cheaper organization. They don't like
Speaker 7: paying the luxury tax anyway. But you know, they have
Speaker 7: led talent the last couple of summers, and the system
Speaker 7: as it is now makes it hard to replace that talent.
Speaker 7: But but that's the job. Like we can make all
Speaker 7: excuses that we want about the CBA and second aprons
Speaker 7: and all this, but like the job when you have
Speaker 7: a superstar of his caliber generational talent is to do
Speaker 7: everything possible to put them in the best possible position
Speaker 7: to contend for titles, and I don't think you can
Speaker 7: say that the Nuggets are in that position right now.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 7: The West is weird. The thunder are the only you know,
Speaker 7: like they're They're clearly the favorite by a mile, and
Speaker 7: you can't make it a clear cut case for any
Speaker 7: of the teams below them as the number two.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 7: It might be Denver, it might be the Lakers, might
Speaker 7: be it might be the Clippers, it might be the Warriors.
Speaker 7: There's it's just kind of a mishmash, and they're all
Speaker 7: they've all got a case to make. So maybe the
Speaker 7: Nuggets make it, and maybe they make it at least
Speaker 7: at the conference finals. But are they failing Jokics right
Speaker 7: now by not giving him the right kind of supporting
Speaker 7: cast to contend for titles. I think we're The conversation
Speaker 7: is legitimate, and we'll leave it at that for doth.
Speaker 1: Howard, Thank you, my friend, appreciate the time, have a
Speaker 1: great weekend.
Speaker 2: I'll chat soon.
Speaker 7: Thanks, be touch you soon.
Speaker 1: Howard Beck covers the NBA for The Ringer. Spent a
Speaker 1: number of years with The New York Times. He was
Speaker 1: with Sports Illustrated. He has been probably top three NBA
Speaker 1: rider in my opinion for two decades, mostly on Blue
Speaker 1: Sky Now, but you can find the links to his
Speaker 1: work off on his Twitter x I don't know whatever
Speaker 1: they're calling it. Doge website at Howard Beck is where
Speaker 1: you find it. Howard Stops Spot Today brought to you
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Speaker 1: about to get warm next week, and my guess is
Speaker 1: it's probably gonna stay somewhat warm to the point where
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Speaker 2: That's the ultimate power move. IFA Step one.
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Speaker 1: Shopifanline at IFA dot co op or stop by one
Speaker 1: of their eighteen Utah locations today. Five games left for
Speaker 1: your Utah Jazz after the Rockets beat the Jazz last
Speaker 1: night by a lot of points by thirty eight at
Speaker 1: Indiana Tomorrow, at Atlanta on Sunday home against Portland and
Speaker 1: OKC before finishing off at Minnesota Sunday, April the thirteenth.
Speaker 1: Our next guest is the TV voice of the Utah Jazz,
Speaker 1: and I would imagine we find Craig Bowler Jack in Indianapolis, Indiana,
Speaker 1: on this Thursday afternoon.
Speaker 2: Is that correct, sir?
Speaker 3: As it is, we touched down about an hour or
Speaker 3: so ago, then bust in and trying to beat all
Speaker 3: these storms around the Midwest. It's bad. The wind has
Speaker 3: been really bad on all the stops, all the flights
Speaker 3: so far on this road trip. And I guess spring
Speaker 3: will bring that type of weather. But yeah, we got
Speaker 3: on the ground. That's all the counts. And here we
Speaker 3: are waiting for another another game tomorrow night. And as
Speaker 3: you just set an early tip Sunday, late evening or
Speaker 3: late afternoon against the Hawks and then back home before
Speaker 3: we played two and then go up and see Gobert
Speaker 3: and Jingle and Joe and Mike Colling and the Kiel
Speaker 3: Alexander one more time.
Speaker 1: Not going to make some corny analogy between the rough
Speaker 1: weather and the Jazz.
Speaker 2: I will not do that.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to ask you this, Craig, how are
Speaker 1: you man? How are you?
Speaker 2: How are you doing?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm you know what this is. This is a
Speaker 3: challenge I'm not going to cut corners on that spence.
Speaker 3: It is look. I like to win. I like to
Speaker 3: call winning basketball. Who wouldn't. I think most of these
Speaker 3: players want to win, but they also understand and bought
Speaker 3: in on what the task at hand is. And you know,
Speaker 3: that's what my job is too, to still try to
Speaker 3: find some positives. It's hard. We've kind of rinsed and
Speaker 3: repeat on occasion, you know, some of the talking points.
Speaker 3: But each day is different. Man, It's an amazing thing
Speaker 3: on who plays and who doesn't, and who has a
Speaker 3: you know, excellent who's excelled. You know, you had Isaiah Collyer,
Speaker 3: who you know was in the spotlight after passing John
Speaker 3: Stockton's rookie assist record. I like what Isaiah has done.
Speaker 3: He seems to have a focus that I didn't realize
Speaker 3: that he had. And you know, he runs and he's
Speaker 3: damn fast, and if you run with him, you get
Speaker 3: some rewards. But right now it's about youth and minutes
Speaker 3: and how they're going to fare. And now I think
Speaker 3: the attention After talking to Justin Zenech last night on
Speaker 3: the air, I wish he could have stayed longer. But
Speaker 3: you know how you know how timeouts and all that
Speaker 3: stuff goes. Spence, Yeah, I think he's going to join
Speaker 3: us again Sunday in Minnesota. But you know, the focus
Speaker 3: now really is where the lottery selection will be. I
Speaker 3: think the lottery shows coming up on correct me if
Speaker 3: I'm wrong, the twelfth of May, about a month five
Speaker 3: weeks out. I think they will give the Jazz, obviously
Speaker 3: in jazz fans, a direction of what's going down and
Speaker 3: what they will do, and then the rest of it
Speaker 3: plays itself out and in the draft. And I think
Speaker 3: the picks that Danny has in that bucket, they're deep.
Speaker 3: How does he use them? I do not know. Are
Speaker 3: the Jazz a player in the trademarket? Most likely? Will
Speaker 3: they try to bring in one or two pieces? I
Speaker 3: would say, yeah. Do they want to try to work
Speaker 3: next month next year's draft? I would guesstimate that that's
Speaker 3: a real possibility. But again that's beyond my pay scale.
Speaker 3: But you know, it's a tough task to build a
Speaker 3: team through the draft and have to go through the
Speaker 3: process spence of losing to get there. I wish the
Speaker 3: NBA had another way, I really do, and we kind
Speaker 3: of used this time on the road to discuss those,
Speaker 3: you know, possibilities just to again entertain the fans because
Speaker 3: they deserve it, and you know, it's hard, it's hard.
Speaker 3: I think Adam Silber has a real task ahead of
Speaker 3: how he wants to play this out with his new
Speaker 3: television contract and making sure players play when fans come
Speaker 3: to watch their favorite player play and that particular player
Speaker 3: doesn't play. So's I've watched it on the road a
Speaker 3: couple of times this past week, and you know, I
Speaker 3: saw a kid the other night wanted to see one
Speaker 3: of the jazz players and they had traveled in and
Speaker 3: the guy's not there. So it's it's hard to explain
Speaker 3: to him and you show you see the disappointment on
Speaker 3: the young man face. But it's reality of what professional
Speaker 3: sports is right now, and even in even the amateur
Speaker 3: amateur game two spence. You know, that's what the portals
Speaker 3: all about, right I want to go someplace else and
Speaker 3: find a better home. So it's crazy world right now.
Speaker 3: Crazy yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, the incentive structure as far as the
Speaker 1: way that the NBA is set up is mandating that
Speaker 1: the Jazz do what they're doing, right Like that's they're
Speaker 1: doing what they have to do. As it's set up
Speaker 1: with the current incentive structure of pro basketball, and the
Speaker 1: hardest thing in the world is to convince very rich
Speaker 1: people that are making a lot of money that they
Speaker 1: need to do something different because they're going to be like,
Speaker 1: why right, And you reference the NBA TV deal, So
Speaker 1: I think it's a problem. You think it's a problem,
Speaker 1: but I don't know that the NBA thinks it's a problem.
Speaker 1: But I wonder, based off this incentive structure, you know,
Speaker 1: based off of conversations that you have with Xanak and
Speaker 1: Danny whoever else you have access to, if they have
Speaker 1: become resigned to the fact that this is the only
Speaker 1: option they have, because you know, early on first year
Speaker 1: of this, I know we're supposed to say tear down,
Speaker 1: but first year, I'll just say, of the post Quinn Snyder,
Speaker 1: jazz Era Lowry's an All Star, A lot of that
Speaker 1: was because he had some grown ups playing with him,
Speaker 1: namely Mike Conley is his point guard, and I think
Speaker 1: that may have given them a false sense of wait,
Speaker 1: we still have a lot here, and maybe we're Michel
Speaker 1: Bridges or a Paul George or a Drew Holliday or
Speaker 1: Chris stapsportsing us away from kind of being back in
Speaker 1: a competitive space. And you know, now it's a situation
Speaker 1: where there's not a lot there there And I just
Speaker 1: wonder if you feel like they've just become resigned to Okay,
Speaker 1: we weren't able to get any of the big game
Speaker 1: hunting done. We could not get any of these big
Speaker 1: names that we were in the mix for. And so
Speaker 1: does it feel like they're now resigned to this long
Speaker 1: game pain tolerance based off of the you know what
Speaker 1: we're seeing in front of us.
Speaker 3: You know, I think they're in on that, as you
Speaker 3: just outlined perfectly. I think that Justin and Danny, you know,
Speaker 3: tore this team down for that particular reason. You know,
Speaker 3: after a couple of conversations and a couple of interviews
Speaker 3: and stories that are read concerning Donovan this year, you know,
Speaker 3: having quote the window was he thought the window now
Speaker 3: was kind of still open, but you know, the jazz
Speaker 3: or he decided to go elsewhere. I think the twenty
Speaker 3: twenty bubble was really kind of the end of it,
Speaker 3: to be honest with you, I think we saw more issues.
Speaker 3: ESPN did a great timeline of that night in Oklahoma City,
Speaker 3: that big t and I were involved in, and yeah,
Speaker 3: it kind of brought me back to saying, yeah it was.
Speaker 3: It was a hellish night. But there was a lot
Speaker 3: of things prior to that, which I think is where
Speaker 3: we are today. It's been a five year journey, step
Speaker 3: by step by step, I think, from where they were
Speaker 3: the best record in the NBA and the bubble and
Speaker 3: then just a slip slide on the slope and Danny
Speaker 3: came in and said, hey, you didn't like the way
Speaker 3: the guys responded, didn't think that they were competitive. I'm
Speaker 3: just paraphrasing, not totally putting quotations around it, but I
Speaker 3: think you know what I mean is that from his
Speaker 3: sense of where he was as a player and how
Speaker 3: he built Boston, that this team wasn't really connected. So
Speaker 3: let's start again, and that's where we are. They were
Speaker 3: too good for a year or two with Olennock, too good,
Speaker 3: with Mike too good, even you know Simone Fontechio. They
Speaker 3: get a first round to expense back in return, and
Speaker 3: so here we are, and now we're gonna have They're
Speaker 3: going to have to judge on who stays on this
Speaker 3: roster and who does not, who stays in summer league.
Speaker 3: Who do they want to take another look at and
Speaker 3: who do they want to release? As Will Hardy said,
Speaker 3: this is not an easy league and you better have
Speaker 3: some strong you know. Well, let's you know what I
Speaker 3: mean To survive in this league, You've got to be
Speaker 3: a tough guy. And that's where they are. Who's going
Speaker 3: to have the wherewithal to want to work hard to
Speaker 3: improve their game and then have the attitude to actually,
Speaker 3: you know, see it through and be a part of
Speaker 3: what the Jazz want to become. It's a tough journey.
Speaker 3: I think this year is you know, looking around, it's
Speaker 3: worn on a lot of people.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 3: I think I'd raise my hand to say, yeah, COVID
Speaker 3: to the year of COVID. And after COVID, I think
Speaker 3: we called a hundred games you know out the Jumbo
Speaker 3: tront and I thought that was difficult, and this is
Speaker 3: this is different because you're around players and you see
Speaker 3: the emotions and the highs and the lows, and mostly
Speaker 3: have been low. I haven't won a road game since
Speaker 3: January fifth in Orlando. That's a long that's a tough thing.
Speaker 3: Spence for a team to try to continue to be
Speaker 3: motivated and go to practice, go to shoot around and
Speaker 3: still be a professional, especially when you're nineteen, twenty twenty one,
Speaker 3: twenty two years old. Right in the older days, you know,
Speaker 3: you know you we're already twenty two coming out of college,
Speaker 3: and now you're growing up in a totally different way.
Speaker 3: I think that's what's a challenge for Will is to motivate,
Speaker 3: try to motivate or keep some positive vibes going. And
Speaker 3: I'll tell you he's a master of his verbiage. I
Speaker 3: think he still shoots from the cough. He talks about disappointments,
Speaker 3: the highs and lows, and he I think what he
Speaker 3: is hoping that the players listen to what he says
Speaker 3: in postgame comments because there's a lot of truth there
Speaker 3: and a lot of things to ponder and think about.
Speaker 1: So I want to follow up about Will because you know,
Speaker 1: you can't be like for a year like this where
Speaker 1: for the first time in the fifty plus years of
Speaker 1: jazz history, they've lost more than sixty games. There's no
Speaker 1: way Will every single night can be completely honest about
Speaker 1: where he's at in this process.
Speaker 2: He just know he would run out of energy.
Speaker 1: I mean, but my guess is the way he expressed
Speaker 1: himself after the last Houston loss following getting dumb truck
Speaker 1: by Memphis, is more in line with the way he
Speaker 1: actually feels than the way he presents himself every night.
Speaker 2: But I totally get it.
Speaker 1: He has to be measured, He has to try to
Speaker 1: find positives. He has a young locker room where he's
Speaker 1: got to be careful about running down players that are
Speaker 1: being asked to do things that they're not ready to do.
Speaker 2: But you're around him, You're around the team.
Speaker 1: Like, honestly speaking, Craig, what sort of toll do you
Speaker 1: think losing likes like this takes on a guy that
Speaker 1: seems to win as much as Will wants to win.
Speaker 3: Oh, it's look his staff and Will. I am amazed
Speaker 3: at this point in the season that they're still putting
Speaker 3: together shoot a rounds and off day practices, you know.
Speaker 3: But he tells me and I watch practice and shoot
Speaker 3: rounds on the road and at home, not practices, but
Speaker 3: shoot arounds at home that he maintains and he's been
Speaker 3: very consistent. Spence, I can say that straight up, man. Now,
Speaker 3: behind the scenes, I'm not privy for that, but in
Speaker 3: front of us and how he approaches it with his team.
Speaker 3: He switched things up a little bit to try to
Speaker 3: have more fun at shoot around, get away from some
Speaker 3: of the just of the angles. And you know, you know,
Speaker 3: pistol grip, whatever you want to call it. You know
Speaker 3: I'm not you know in his in his verbiage, you
Speaker 3: know of how he calls place. Instead, they'll do five
Speaker 3: on five, they'll do some three on threes. And you know,
Speaker 3: I saw a really competitive practice the other day where
Speaker 3: the guys actually liked to get on the floor and
Speaker 3: play against each other, but not the coaches. So I
Speaker 3: give him credit for trying to keep it keep the
Speaker 3: player's minds intact when a lot of them are drifting.
Speaker 3: And I think that happens again too with the age
Speaker 3: of the NBA announcements, where you just haven't really learned
Speaker 3: how to be a professional. Sure you still got emotions,
Speaker 3: Sure you want to win, and sure you're thinking about
Speaker 3: your future and losing. Let's be honest, no matter what
Speaker 3: business you're in, if your sales are down, or if
Speaker 3: your ratings are down, or if your wins and losses
Speaker 3: don't jive, then that puts added pressure and you're thinking
Speaker 3: about your future. Now, am I going to make this
Speaker 3: squad next year or am I out of the NBA?
Speaker 3: Does someone see worse than what I do? And I
Speaker 3: think will try to give them some directions on how
Speaker 3: you make this journey and still survive it. But do
Speaker 3: they listen. I don't know. And you know, some players
Speaker 3: are going to be gone, Let's just be honest. That's
Speaker 3: just the way it's going to be. And Justin and Dan,
Speaker 3: you're going to pick five or six that they think
Speaker 3: still have the ability to grow and developed during you know,
Speaker 3: you know, a three year window. I would guess. I
Speaker 3: think Walker probably passed the testy year right. Had it
Speaker 3: given up on him after year two, the sophomore slump,
Speaker 3: then you wouldn't see what Walker Kesser has really become.
Speaker 3: Does he need work? Absolutely? Free throw line? You bet
Speaker 3: He's going to be a three point shooter, doubtful. But
Speaker 3: they want to give him an opportunity. So that's what
Speaker 3: I've been watching Spence. It's it's a complicated eighty two
Speaker 3: games that I've never been involved in in the worst
Speaker 3: season of the Utah Jazz. That's fifty one years of basketball,
Speaker 3: mind you, and no Jazz fan is used to having
Speaker 3: sixty one, you know, losses in the column there. But
Speaker 3: it is what it is, and probably things will calm
Speaker 3: themselves down if the Jazz actually win the lottery, Right,
Speaker 3: they've got the same they've got their's. Three teams that
Speaker 3: have a fourteen is a zero point three percent chance
Speaker 3: of grabbing the number one pick. Maybe everyone just kind
Speaker 3: of says, oh, it was worth it. But if that
Speaker 3: pick doesn't go the Jazz way, then you have to
Speaker 3: ask what direction do they go? Right? What direction do
Speaker 3: they go? And that's going to be interesting summer. Once again,
Speaker 3: every summer's interesting, but this one's maybe the most intriguing
Speaker 3: of all.
Speaker 1: Well, the reason I ask about Will is in last night.
Speaker 1: It's only a vacuum, it's only a moment. But we'll
Speaker 1: use last night as an example. Like I'm watching the
Speaker 1: game and sensibah and call your just blow it on
Speaker 1: Like three straight dribble handoffs, like a really simple action
Speaker 1: from Houston led to wide open three point shots on
Speaker 1: three straight possessions for Dylan Brooks, Jalen Green, and I
Speaker 1: think it was Cam Whitmore who nailed one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Cam had checked in right.
Speaker 1: And all they were, Craig, were dribble handoffs and both
Speaker 1: Bryce and Isaiah just like forgot to stick with one
Speaker 1: or the other. And I'm just watching this through the prison,
Speaker 1: like what does their head coach really think? Because it
Speaker 1: feels like Craig every night. If Will wanted to be
Speaker 1: really honest about what he's he could find because my
Speaker 1: guess is Will and his staff are coaching how to
Speaker 1: guard dribble handoffs, Like there's no way these players are
Speaker 1: not learning how to do this. It's like coach Wit
Speaker 1: says all the time, all I ask for my players
Speaker 1: is are you physically capable of doing what we're asking
Speaker 1: you to do? And mentally do you understand the ask?
Speaker 1: And these players the Jazz have are certainly physically capable
Speaker 1: because they're pros.
Speaker 2: But I don't know if it's just lost in translation.
Speaker 2: I don't know if they're young.
Speaker 1: There are so many moments every night where I'm like,
Speaker 1: this looks like a team that's never played together before.
Speaker 1: And I just imagine if Will wanted to every night,
Speaker 1: he probably could blast them in the postgame presser.
Speaker 3: Right. He hasn't, by the way, which I think is
Speaker 3: brilliant on his point because he doesn't want to lose
Speaker 3: one or two guys when they're when a coach will
Speaker 3: bark out someone in the media in a post game
Speaker 3: that's going to cause trouble down the road. But what
Speaker 3: he tries to do is address them as a group
Speaker 3: and not just single out one or two individuals on
Speaker 3: a given night. Spence. You know, again, anybody who's played sports,
Speaker 3: it is do you have the physical capabilities? Right? And
Speaker 3: you just said it. You're in the NBA for a reason.
Speaker 3: You're God given talent, right. The other part of it
Speaker 3: is are you a quick learner? You know they always
Speaker 3: talk about I always got basketball IQ. Where are you
Speaker 3: in the learning process? And a couple of things too
Speaker 3: this year that has come up is how were they trained?
Speaker 3: How are players now trained coming up through team play
Speaker 3: AAU ball and what is the fallout now? Spence, maybe
Speaker 3: we're actually living it, not only the Jazz, but many
Speaker 3: of the coaches around the league I've talked too have
Speaker 3: kind of hinted to the same thing. Youth is one thing,
Speaker 3: but do you come in and leave purely on your
Speaker 3: athleticism and then you get sold to goods that we're
Speaker 3: going to develop him? But I think there's a lot
Speaker 3: of coaches that are concerned overall about where basketball is
Speaker 3: going because the basics of basketball have been bypassed because
Speaker 3: of TV great players who make it look easy Steph Curry. Okay,
Speaker 3: I'm not going to blame him, but that's what he does.
Speaker 3: And those are the highlights you see on a particular network.
Speaker 3: And it started with Michael Jordan actually, in my opinion,
Speaker 3: where that group started to see nothing but the greatness
Speaker 3: of highlights. But you know, oh, by the way, the
Speaker 3: Bulls lost by twelve, you know, but it was about
Speaker 3: the highlight and the entertainment. And now the three ball
Speaker 3: has become such an important piece. I think the Europeans
Speaker 3: are taught at much younger age spens basic skills, how
Speaker 3: to step, how to pivot, how to pass, how to
Speaker 3: rebound with two hands, how to bullet pass it from
Speaker 3: the chest down. And some of this stuff gets lost
Speaker 3: because every young man thinks they have one skill and
Speaker 3: so instead of learning to play the post or learning
Speaker 3: play the two or the three. I know it's positionless
Speaker 3: basketball now, but you still have to have basic skills
Speaker 3: for all those things. And sometimes a kid is picked
Speaker 3: out of a crowd just because he's a little bigger
Speaker 3: than the other and the other guy always goes to
Speaker 3: the point guard right because he's the shortest guy on
Speaker 3: the floor. And you know, they're never really taught the
Speaker 3: true skills of basketball, and I think that's a concern.
Speaker 3: That's me, that's just me. I know, you know, you
Speaker 3: learned it the right way. I had one year in
Speaker 3: high school because I was more football minded. But boy,
Speaker 3: I'd say the basics were pretty simple, you know, dribble pass,
Speaker 3: rebound team. And again, I think strangely has been lost.
Speaker 3: I really do. With the Europeans, I think are way
Speaker 3: ahead of where the US players are, and they've gained
Speaker 3: a lot of ground. I should say they've gained a
Speaker 3: ton of ground. Look at some of the high level,
Speaker 3: elite players in this league and the skill set they have.
Speaker 3: That's that's proof. That's proof of this conversation. In my book,
Speaker 3: I want to move.
Speaker 1: Over now to your just kind of the feel on
Speaker 1: the player side of things, because one of the things
Speaker 1: that I don't understand, and I will admit sometimes I
Speaker 1: read too much into body language and too much into
Speaker 1: I just can't imagine get my head kicked in and
Speaker 1: like laughing and smiling and walking over the bench. So
Speaker 1: I look at the players and I watch the way
Speaker 1: that they're digesting getting their doors blown off every night.
Speaker 1: And I was actually told this by somebody over there,
Speaker 1: and it tracks with what I'm seeing. Like the one
Speaker 1: player that really feels like this sucks is Walker, And
Speaker 1: I was told by somebody that's over there, like Walker's
Speaker 1: the one that takes this really hard.
Speaker 2: Does that track with kind of what you've noticed.
Speaker 3: No, he loves to win, man, He's competitive. He has
Speaker 3: put a lot of work in. I think all these
Speaker 3: players are struggling right now just to say, Okay, I
Speaker 3: get it, this is my job. But Spence, i'd be disappointed.
Speaker 3: I can't speak for Danny and Justin, but I would
Speaker 3: guess that they want their guys to be competitive. They
Speaker 3: want this has to hurt. If it didn't, then get out.
Speaker 3: But it's a tough balance, isn't it. I mean it
Speaker 3: has to be. I'd go nuts, because you're taught in
Speaker 3: sport that the work you put in, the blood, sweat
Speaker 3: and tears that you go through with teammates, whether it's
Speaker 3: on the bench, in the weight room, on the floor,
Speaker 3: in the huddle, on the football field, whatever sport you choose, baseball, soccer,
Speaker 3: whatever it may be, everyone's got a story about you
Speaker 3: sacrifice because you're part of the team, but you also
Speaker 3: have to individually sacrifice because you're working out, you're breaking
Speaker 3: the body down and building a back up. Yeah, Walk
Speaker 3: wants to win, man, he works at it as much
Speaker 3: as anybody, and it does bug him not to play
Speaker 3: and to lose. Right now, the team is at a
Speaker 3: point that I think, you know again, you got five
Speaker 3: less spence and it's going to be a good thing
Speaker 3: for this team. Just to take a breath and get away,
Speaker 3: work on a few things, stay in shape, and then
Speaker 3: come back for summer league and we'll get a better
Speaker 3: picture of what direction the Jats is going to go
Speaker 3: and with whom right still don't know who's going to
Speaker 3: be a part of this this continued process and how
Speaker 3: how the draft lottery is going to turn out in
Speaker 3: five weeks time. But now I'm with you. I see
Speaker 3: a lot of guys who have hopes to be great
Speaker 3: in this league, and this is not fun. This is
Speaker 3: not a fun time right now. And there I think
Speaker 3: Will and the rest we're hoping that many of them
Speaker 3: would would learn the game better, become better because of it.
Speaker 3: Because of the minutes and not having John Collins on
Speaker 3: the floor, lowry market and sex and smissed his share
Speaker 3: at Games two and not put the heavy hitters in JC,
Speaker 3: you know, and let the young guys take. Probably since
Speaker 3: the All Star Breaker, probably ninety percent of the minutes
Speaker 3: are played by about nine guys. And are they going
Speaker 3: to be better than they were when they started the season, Well,
Speaker 3: you better hope so. If not, they're going to probably
Speaker 3: be moved. And that's going to be the true story
Speaker 3: when the season comes to an end, and those decisions
Speaker 3: belong solely with Justin and Danny, and yes, Will Hardy
Speaker 3: does have a voice in that group.
Speaker 1: All right, Bowler, before I say you loose, we'll end
Speaker 1: on a positive. Because you referenced Isaiah call. You're breaking
Speaker 1: John Stockton's rookie assist record ten more last night beings
Speaker 1: four to twenty nine, and by my calculation, he's only
Speaker 1: fifteen thousand, three hundred and seventy eight away from John's
Speaker 1: career record.
Speaker 3: Oh I needed that laugh.
Speaker 2: That's good man, And I'm not knocking on Isaiah.
Speaker 1: I mean, ultimately, John played eighteen minutes a night as
Speaker 1: a rookie. He played behind somebody named Ricky Green. He
Speaker 1: only had five starts. But when you look at this
Speaker 1: rookie class. I really love this Stefon Castle kid. I
Speaker 1: was actually hoping he would fall to the Jazz, but
Speaker 1: Zachary Reschache, Alex sarkleil Ware has played.
Speaker 2: Well as of eight.
Speaker 1: Jalen Wells and the Jazz have started this campaign to
Speaker 1: encourage media members, including Howard Beck, our guest Last Hour,
Speaker 1: to offer up a vote for Isaiah to make first
Speaker 1: team All Rookie. I don't know that he can make
Speaker 1: first team All Rookie. He feels more of a lock
Speaker 1: for second team. But is there a shot? You think
Speaker 1: that maybe, based off of the way Isaiah's kind of
Speaker 1: responded to this challenge, that he could be or Rookie.
Speaker 1: He's the only candidate the Jazz had for a postseason award.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think there's a shot. You know, with six
Speaker 3: point two assists a game and some of the publicity
Speaker 3: that came with the name John Stockton. And you make
Speaker 3: a great point, John didn't start for three years. That
Speaker 3: was a Jerry Sloan way. You have to earn it,
Speaker 3: you know, That's what happened with d Will in the
Speaker 3: early days of his career as a rookie. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm starting coach, you picked me here, I'm gonna know,
Speaker 3: got to wit your turn. And that's what happened to
Speaker 3: Stockton behind Ricky, and so I think again, sometimes people
Speaker 3: think that that record means it means a lot to Isaiah.
Speaker 3: He put his eyes on it and he said, I'm
Speaker 3: going after it. But but John didn't, like you said,
Speaker 3: his starts weren't there, his minutes weren't there. And Isaiah
Speaker 3: has taken advantage of his opportunity right to actually own
Speaker 3: that record now because of the time he's been on
Speaker 3: the floor, unlike John. But I think he's got a shot.
Speaker 3: It's because I think his speed, his attitude. I think
Speaker 3: he's I think with teams around the league. When I
Speaker 3: talked to broadcasters, there seems to be a really intrigue
Speaker 3: about him. Taken late twenty ninth, had the relationship with
Speaker 3: Bronnie you know, at USC and he always comes back
Speaker 3: to say, no, Bronni played with me, I didn't play
Speaker 3: with him. You know. I like that because he's trying
Speaker 3: to take a you know, his take his own credibility
Speaker 3: to himself that he didn't write the Tales of one
Speaker 3: Bronnie James. But I think he's got a shot. I think.
Speaker 3: I think he's become a more of a liability for
Speaker 3: teams to slow him down. They put more ball pressure
Speaker 3: on him, you know, at half court, at the top
Speaker 3: of the three point line. They seem to really try
Speaker 3: to engage him. But man, that first step he'll blow
Speaker 3: by a lot a lot of guys. And I think
Speaker 3: teams are beginning to realize and appreciate just how good
Speaker 3: he is developing in a very short period of time.
Speaker 3: So yes, I think he's got a real shot. Is
Speaker 3: it going to be you know, well, surprise me if
Speaker 3: he's a second team er. No, but I think he's
Speaker 3: got a shot at it. But you know, I thought,
Speaker 3: you know, Oscar sibwe may be the G League MVP,
Speaker 3: and he didn't win that. So that guy had a
Speaker 3: tremendous year, by the way, and he's a great guy.
Speaker 3: I'm anxious to see if the Jets have plans for
Speaker 3: him to All.
Speaker 1: Right, baller, well, enjoy the Windy City, have a good
Speaker 1: call tomorrow and enjoy Atlanta. And yeah, man, five games left,
Speaker 1: so get to that finish line. Thanks for the time, sir.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we're trying to sprint down the finish line, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 3: five to go, and it's good talking to your pelf.
Speaker 1: See you soon, all right, The great Craig Bowler Jack
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Speaker 1: run your game all season long. You're gonna do a
Speaker 1: little sports court today with our friends from Handy and
Speaker 1: Handy coming a bit coming up in a bit, we'll
Speaker 1: launching the five o'clock out of the program on this
Speaker 1: up Thursday afternoon, little chili, little rainy outside here in
Speaker 1: downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. RSL welcomes in the LA
Speaker 1: Galaxy Saturday at two thirty. Forecast is okay, should be
Speaker 1: all right on Saturday, a little early afternoon kick. And
Speaker 1: our next guest is a club legend, and if I'm honest,
Speaker 1: he's a life legend. Okay, so let's welcome him in.
Speaker 1: Jason Christ Thursday afternoon, Jason, how are you, sir?
Speaker 8: I'm great, spence, even better when you give me such
Speaker 8: nice compliments like that. To start off with, well, I just.
Speaker 1: Want people to accurately remember exactly who you are.
Speaker 2: You are a legend, Jason. You understand that.
Speaker 8: Yes, perhaps, But maybe even more understandable is the fact
Speaker 8: it was a long, long time ago. And I guess
Speaker 8: that's why we're concerned if people will remember it or not.
Speaker 1: It was not a long it wasn't that long ago.
Speaker 1: I mean you were the coach of a team that
Speaker 1: won a title in two thousand and nine. You had
Speaker 1: a good Conka cafroon. It wasn't that long ago, Jason,
Speaker 1: give yourself some credit, please.
Speaker 8: I don't know since I just keep feeling older and older.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know you're going to roll your eyes, but
Speaker 1: I'm with you at this point as I continue to agent, what's.
Speaker 2: The us the favorite?
Speaker 1: What's what's the one goal that you scored throughout your
Speaker 1: career when you're laying in bed at night you remember
Speaker 1: that one?
Speaker 2: Is there one that comes to mind?
Speaker 8: That's a tough question. And the truth is I have
Speaker 8: a very very bad memory, so I have oftentimes people
Speaker 8: bring up things that happened in a game or instances
Speaker 8: and I said, you remember that, and I, frankly, I'm like, no,
Speaker 8: I don't. And it maybe it comes across the wrong
Speaker 8: way A lot of times. I don't know what that is.
Speaker 8: Maybe I got hit in the head too many times
Speaker 8: with the ball or something. But if you had to
Speaker 8: make me pull one, I'll pull u. The hundredth goal
Speaker 8: actually at Rice Cycle Stadium. It was obviously a special
Speaker 8: one of momentous occasion because it was the hundreds, but
Speaker 8: it was also a pretty darn good goal left the
Speaker 8: volley from outside the box that was laid down to
Speaker 8: me by Chris Brown. So yeah, i'd say, abou.
Speaker 2: Shout out to Chris Brown. I remember that goal.
Speaker 1: Is that the only good memory you have about playing
Speaker 1: soccer at Rice Cycle Stadium?
Speaker 8: Be honest, I think yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, no, I understand that was a rough time for
Speaker 1: all of us, but hey, we live and learn and
Speaker 1: we move on, all right, Jason, We got to start
Speaker 1: with the progress. We had Pablo on a couple of
Speaker 1: days ago, and last week Pablo hopped on and said
Speaker 1: he was told they were about four days away from
Speaker 1: potentially two different signings to add a little talent to
Speaker 1: the attack. And I hate to break it to you,
Speaker 1: here's my soccer analysis. We need to add a little
Speaker 1: talent to the attack with this club right now.
Speaker 2: So just give us the update.
Speaker 1: Man, I don't want to puld your feet to the fire,
Speaker 1: but our self fans wondering if these players are going
Speaker 1: to be signed.
Speaker 8: Wait, did you say that he said we would four
Speaker 8: days ago or a week ago? We were supposed to
Speaker 8: have it and four days later we didn't.
Speaker 1: Which is it a week ago it was four days away,
Speaker 1: and then a couple days ago have tapped out and said,
Speaker 1: I'm not really sure where we're at at this point.
Speaker 8: I think that speaks to how volatile these situations are
Speaker 8: for us as a club. I think you know we
Speaker 8: have it is not for a lack of trying, Spence.
Speaker 8: I think all of us have been talking about it.
Speaker 8: None of us have been lying. We are very intent
Speaker 8: on adding a player or two in this window. We
Speaker 8: have gone so far as to make offers. Some of
Speaker 8: those have been rebuffed, some of those are still negotiations.
Speaker 8: I feel quite confident that there will be additions. I
Speaker 8: just can't be that confident on exactly how fast it
Speaker 8: will happen.
Speaker 1: So I know you have to be careful here. So
Speaker 1: I want to be careful how I phrased the question.
Speaker 1: And certainly I would never ask you or anybody else
Speaker 1: to talk about a scenario involving people that literally sign
Speaker 1: their paychecks. But they're clearly have been reports out there
Speaker 1: that we're in the middle of another ownership transition. Is
Speaker 1: it fair to say that that situation may be delaying
Speaker 1: the potential of adding pieces to this puzzle.
Speaker 8: No, I don't think that that's really been a consideration,
Speaker 8: to be honest, We've had direction from really the moment
Speaker 8: that we found out that Elias Manuel wasn't going to
Speaker 8: be joining us. Even before that, you know, our direction
Speaker 8: we were going to add another striker on top of him.
Speaker 8: So the idea was to come into the season with
Speaker 8: three strikers, one that would be the main guy, Elias
Speaker 8: as a secondary figure to replace Anderson Julio, and then
Speaker 8: we were adding a third young player, which we all
Speaker 8: liked in rspol And so when we lost Elias, I
Speaker 8: think that really sent us into a tailspin and kind
Speaker 8: of thought made us think about whether we needed to
Speaker 8: change that idea and go with more of one man
Speaker 8: and then two younger ones. And so that's the direction
Speaker 8: we've been taking since then. The change in ownership that
Speaker 8: is imminent really hasn't had any conflicting opinion or conflicting
Speaker 8: ideas as to that, So absolutely not, I would say
Speaker 8: that that's not relevant to the situation. Suation.
Speaker 1: The natural dumb guy follow up is what's the hold up?
Speaker 1: I know these things are complicated, and believe me, I've
Speaker 1: I've been a part of the scenario where feeling like
Speaker 1: something was close and then visa this paperwork that player
Speaker 1: change on mind that, so I know there are complications.
Speaker 1: But what would you say to the fan base as
Speaker 1: far as what the hold up is?
Speaker 8: I would say it this way. Have you ever bought
Speaker 8: a car?
Speaker 2: I have, I have, yes.
Speaker 8: Yeah, And you went to the dealership and you said, Okay,
Speaker 8: I've got a budget in mind here that I need
Speaker 8: to stay within, and you negotiate and you make an offer,
Speaker 8: and oftentimes sometimes the answer is yes. They sail and
Speaker 8: goes to the manager, and the manager comes back with
Speaker 8: the salesman and says yes. But many times he says no,
Speaker 8: or many times it's a no as of right now,
Speaker 8: and then there's a negotiation. So I think the thing
Speaker 8: that probably people need to understand is that we do
Speaker 8: not have a blank checkbook here. We are not the
Speaker 8: LA Galaxy, we are not into Miami, we are not
Speaker 8: the clubs. We operate within a budget and we have
Speaker 8: to we have to make budgetary decisions. So I think
Speaker 8: that does tend to make things a little more difficult,
Speaker 8: and and I think that has been the major delay.
Speaker 8: The other piece of it is that sometimes you can
Speaker 8: go down the road with a player that that you're
Speaker 8: really high on and you may find out that that
Speaker 8: player actually doesn't want to come to m LS. So
Speaker 8: you know, there's there's just so many things that go
Speaker 8: into these these decisions that make it complicated. It is
Speaker 8: not because we are just sitting on our hands and
Speaker 8: not trying to move forward or nervous about making decisions.
Speaker 8: It's it's none of those things. It's just we have
Speaker 8: to we have to get everything aligned and we have
Speaker 8: to be within a budget.
Speaker 1: I'll ask another dumb guy follow up. You've played eight
Speaker 1: games in total, You've scored six goals. Do you feel
Speaker 1: urgency to get this done?
Speaker 8: Does the urgency go up? Is that what your question was?
Speaker 8: Sorry I broke up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean like like it's it feels like
Speaker 1: it's getting late early. It's not just lack of results,
Speaker 1: it's really lack of quality chances and finishing.
Speaker 2: I mean it's clear.
Speaker 1: Uh you know, Pablo, this week I asked them about Saturday.
Speaker 1: Any outlined the potential of playing like a false nine
Speaker 1: maybe and I'm like, well, that's tough because you know
Speaker 1: that means you're not really thrilled with the nines you have.
Speaker 2: There disposed at your disposal?
Speaker 1: Is the is the front office approaching these negotiations with
Speaker 1: urgency because you're leaving a lot of points on the table.
Speaker 8: Jay. You know, Spence, there was a very good GM
Speaker 8: who one time told me that you should not do harm.
Speaker 8: So you should not out a player out of urgency
Speaker 8: or out of out of the feeling like we have
Speaker 8: to win this game on the weekend, because oftentimes when
Speaker 8: you do that, you make more decisions, and so we
Speaker 8: have to make a smarter decision that's going to be
Speaker 8: for the good of this club for a long period
Speaker 8: of time. And I think that that that's how we're
Speaker 8: behaving right now. We certainly aren't going to be pushing
Speaker 8: into any urgent situation. I would not want us to
Speaker 8: add a player that I don't think is going to
Speaker 8: be a major difference maker, because you only get to
Speaker 8: add these types of players. You can only have three
Speaker 8: of them on your own, and for us, we can
Speaker 8: only have two because of the roster model we've chosen.
Speaker 8: So we do not want to get this decision wrong.
Speaker 8: We would hate to make a decision out of angst
Speaker 8: or urgency and then six months from now say, actually,
Speaker 8: this player isn't good enough. And by the way, we
Speaker 8: can't just replace them. So we have to be diligent
Speaker 8: in our process.
Speaker 1: In quotations you don't want to add harm credited to
Speaker 1: Steve Pastorino two thousand and five. Okay, moving on, all right,
Speaker 1: so let's just focus on what has happened so far
Speaker 1: and the players that are at Pablo's disposal.
Speaker 2: What would you most?
Speaker 1: Okay, So, if we removed what I perceived to be
Speaker 1: a clear lack of quality at the striker position, what
Speaker 1: else goes into this anemic offensive attack that has bred
Speaker 1: six goals in eight games.
Speaker 8: Well, some of it has to do with just creating
Speaker 8: the chances, right, So the player that you're talking about
Speaker 8: that you would like us to add is the finisher
Speaker 8: of chances. And then if you step back and say, all,
Speaker 8: in fact, we haven't created enough chances, well, then we've
Speaker 8: got a different problem. And so I think that the
Speaker 8: problem that we have isn't just about one player. I
Speaker 8: think the problem that we've had is a little bit
Speaker 8: of lack of consistency, a little bit of lack of
Speaker 8: performance by a couple of individual players over those number
Speaker 8: of games. I think some of the some of it
Speaker 8: comes down to the fact that we had Champions Cup
Speaker 8: and we rotated the team. I think some of it
Speaker 8: comes down to getting an ejection early in a game.
Speaker 8: In the very next game, you're really not in a
Speaker 8: soccer game. You're more just in a in a war,
Speaker 8: as we were at Minnesota. So I think that we're
Speaker 8: just being a little bit a little bit anxious right
Speaker 8: now about things. You know, we've only played six games.
Speaker 8: There's there's still time in front of us. I think
Speaker 8: also that if we all as supporters and family members
Speaker 8: of the club start to talk about, you know, these
Speaker 8: new players coming in, we forget that that that we
Speaker 8: need to be focused on the players that are here
Speaker 8: since focused on making sure that the players are here
Speaker 8: are playing their best. And so I think there needs
Speaker 8: to be a little bit more of a siege mentality here.
Speaker 8: And this is something that your father taught me, that
Speaker 8: that the players and the coaching staff needs to be
Speaker 8: operating from the perspective that there is no more help
Speaker 8: coming over that wall, and that we have to as
Speaker 8: a group and as a team, we have to band
Speaker 8: together to make this thing work. If we're constantly looking
Speaker 8: for the next player and for the next help, and
Speaker 8: we are going to be focused on doing what we
Speaker 8: need to do to perform at our optimal level.
Speaker 2: Okay, fine, I'll fall in line.
Speaker 1: I hate interviewing people that have worked for my dad
Speaker 1: because you bring that up and now I'm just going
Speaker 1: to my room and I'm grounded for a week. Okay, fine, Jason,
Speaker 1: we'll focus on the group that is here. Okay, we'll
Speaker 1: have a siege mentality goodness, PTSD what what? I Ki'd
Speaker 1: obviously love love you pops?
Speaker 8: What?
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 1: So the players that are here, what have you liked
Speaker 1: if we let's w let's wax positive for a moment.
Speaker 1: What are some of the things that have stood out
Speaker 1: that are positive?
Speaker 6: You know?
Speaker 8: I think a couple of games ago Houston, we had
Speaker 8: a performance by a striker that I felt like was
Speaker 8: a very very high level performance in that game. And
Speaker 8: we had a performance from two attacking midfielders that both
Speaker 8: scored goals in the game. And we had a performance
Speaker 8: and for many of those minutes where we did actually
Speaker 8: create a very high number of goal scoring chances, we
Speaker 8: didn't take them all. If we had, we would have
Speaker 8: won that game, for one. But that's There have been performances,
Speaker 8: There have been players showing what they're capable of, and
Speaker 8: when they do, I think we have a high level team.
Speaker 8: What we haven't had I don't think is real consistency
Speaker 8: through that. So you know, have the players played well
Speaker 8: and then the next game played better and I like
Speaker 8: I went back to I think some of that comes
Speaker 8: through the fact that we were having to or the
Speaker 8: decision was made to rotate so many players and lineups,
Speaker 8: complete lineups through kN KAKAFT Champions Cup, so there just
Speaker 8: has not been any sort of rhythm or flow amongst
Speaker 8: the best starting eleven to really kind of establish how
Speaker 8: we want to play and who we want to be.
Speaker 8: I would also say that I think in many of
Speaker 8: the games we have been making tactical adjustments very early
Speaker 8: on or even going into the game that were skidding
Speaker 8: away from a little bit about the identity and the
Speaker 8: game model that we formulated last year.
Speaker 1: So you referenced early earlier. It's not just the finishing
Speaker 1: of the chances. It is the chances that are created,
Speaker 1: and on paper, it feels like, you know, with Diogo
Speaker 1: and Diego, you have two very dynamic chance creators. I
Speaker 1: want to go individually with both of them, and I
Speaker 1: want to talk about Diogo because on paper he is
Speaker 1: your designated player. Are you getting what you need from
Speaker 1: that silo based off of the paycheck he's receiving.
Speaker 8: Would say that at the beginning of the season, I
Speaker 8: felt like he was sended in a really, really good direction.
Speaker 8: I felt like three games ago, like I said, at Houston,
Speaker 8: he scored a goal. He then had a chance he
Speaker 8: probably should have scored. Diego scored a goal. We were
Speaker 8: getting to the final third very very well, and I
Speaker 8: felt like he was really starting to perform at the
Speaker 8: level that we had wanted him to. And then we
Speaker 8: had in the twenty fifth minute a silly ejection at
Speaker 8: home to Dallas, and then we went to Minnesota in
Speaker 8: the frozen tundra and hurricane that was supposed to be
Speaker 8: a soccer game, and those types of players are almost
Speaker 8: never going to have really effective games in those types
Speaker 8: of conditions. So for me, the pot I would go
Speaker 8: back and just say, I think we're we were moving
Speaker 8: in a really positive direction, and I'm going to Holt
Speaker 8: that that's just roll right into things on Saturday, and
Speaker 8: then he continues to move in a positive direction because
Speaker 8: I think it's in there Diego.
Speaker 1: You know, Pablo himself on the program has implied like
Speaker 1: this is kind of his show. You know, he kind
Speaker 1: of gets the keys to the Lamborghini and let's go.
Speaker 1: And you know he's had some national team call ups
Speaker 1: and to start the season he was wearing that mask
Speaker 1: because of the broken nose, and look, there's still so
Speaker 1: much quality. He's one of those players, like a hobber.
Speaker 1: When they get on the ball, you just get excited.
Speaker 1: You kind of sit up and perk up and watch
Speaker 1: a little bit in a way that you don't prior
Speaker 1: to him receiving possession.
Speaker 2: Are you getting what you need this year from Diego Luna?
Speaker 8: I would say half of the games we have and
Speaker 8: half of the games we have not, and that is
Speaker 8: to no fault of Diego's. But I do think that
Speaker 8: the fact that he was without soccer for a month
Speaker 8: because of the broken nose that he took with the
Speaker 8: national team in January that set him back. Then you
Speaker 8: had a player out there wearing a mask who admittedly
Speaker 8: afterwards said I literally can't see. So a player that
Speaker 8: plays in this position that needs to have a three
Speaker 8: hundred and sixty degree perspective all the time that you're
Speaker 8: asking a lot. So I think that affected his performances.
Speaker 8: Then when he moves the mask. I thought he had
Speaker 8: a couple of outstanding games and so again it's a
Speaker 8: player for me that we know the potential, we know
Speaker 8: the capabilities, it's just a matter of him starting to
Speaker 8: put those performances together back to back to back.
Speaker 1: Same question about Mark Zouke, who you know during the
Speaker 1: summer window last year, after you guys brought them on board,
Speaker 1: it didn't take very long to see like, all right,
Speaker 1: there's something there. Okay, there's some juice there with this kid.
Speaker 1: Are you getting what you need from him?
Speaker 8: Again? I think, same exact answer. So now I think
Speaker 8: we're coming up to the answers to some of our
Speaker 8: questions about why we're not creating enough goal spun chances
Speaker 8: or why perhaps we haven't scored enough goals. Because these
Speaker 8: players that are in these positions that are supposed to
Speaker 8: be lifting us and creating attacking, attacking chances and scoring
Speaker 8: goals as well, by the way, we need goals out
Speaker 8: of these three positions, their performances have been a little
Speaker 8: bit inconsistent and a little bit spotty. And there's a
Speaker 8: lot of reasons for that. We don't just keep the
Speaker 8: blame on the players and say, well that's not good enough.
Speaker 8: No need to look at the reasons. We need to
Speaker 8: work with those players. We need to coax them. We
Speaker 8: need to bring their performances up. We need to draw
Speaker 8: all the consistency out of them. We need to give
Speaker 8: them some confidence. This this isn't just about them, and
Speaker 8: then we all walk away. We identify the problems and
Speaker 8: then we try to we try to address solutions.
Speaker 1: Could keep going down the list, but I'll just ask you.
Speaker 1: Are you getting what you need from anybody on the
Speaker 1: team right now?
Speaker 8: Yes? We are. In fact, I think we have one
Speaker 8: elite performer in the team and his name is Rafa
Speaker 8: cabral Ye.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, I think I think he's been dying to bite kid.
Speaker 1: Help me understand. And it could be just me being
Speaker 1: unfamiliar with this uh Sam Junco kid, But there's there
Speaker 1: there's a lot to like about Alex in my opinion,
Speaker 1: Alex Katrontas, I was unaware that we were going to
Speaker 1: be kind of in a battle in that position. It
Speaker 1: felt like Katronos had locked it in. Can you help
Speaker 1: me understand that?
Speaker 8: Yeah? And again, I think this goes straight to what
Speaker 8: I said earlier. I think some of the issues we're
Speaker 8: having is because the beginning of our season was so
Speaker 8: tumultuous and tumultuous. I mean, what I mean exactly is
Speaker 8: we had four games in two weeks. Like nobody starts
Speaker 8: the soccer season that way. You just can't from a
Speaker 8: physical perspective, you can't build the fitness, the base fitness
Speaker 8: level to ask your players to play four games in
Speaker 8: two weeks in the very first two two weeks in
Speaker 8: the season. So the decision was made, Okay, we're going
Speaker 8: to rotate whole sale. So it was like, well, here's
Speaker 8: one eleven is going to play the Conker CAF, here's
Speaker 8: the other level is the other eleven that's going to
Speaker 8: play the MLS season. And so you know, part of
Speaker 8: that decision to have two left backs was because last
Speaker 8: year we felt like what we ask from a physical
Speaker 8: perspective of that position is borderline in humane. So we
Speaker 8: have to have we have to have multiple players to
Speaker 8: use in that spot. I still think that we have
Speaker 8: to have multiple players to use in that spot every
Speaker 8: single game because of what we asked. I'm not sure
Speaker 8: there's a human being, or not too many anyways, that
Speaker 8: are capable of performing at a high level when you're
Speaker 8: asked to sprint up and down the field for ninety
Speaker 8: minutes and you have to be on the highest line
Speaker 8: in the attack and on the lowest line in defense.
Speaker 8: So we brought in another player in fam to help
Speaker 8: us alleviate some of that and compete with Alex. And
Speaker 8: so I think that competition is one that is, you know,
Speaker 8: it's pretty obviously open right now. The coaches have looked
Speaker 8: at both players for a lot of minutes, and I'm
Speaker 8: not sure that either player has really put their best
Speaker 8: foot forward and said and essentially said to the coaches,
Speaker 8: You're not going to get a choice because I'm going
Speaker 8: to own this position, all.
Speaker 1: Right, final one here, because I will ask you about
Speaker 1: I'll say the two nines on the roster with respect
Speaker 1: to the brave kid who came in as a sub
Speaker 1: Piole got the red against Dallas out against Minnesota. Forrester
Speaker 1: has been more or less the first choice nine, more
Speaker 1: or less. But those are your two preferred nines as
Speaker 1: of now. What do you see from them that at
Speaker 1: least if you hope that they can maybe play better
Speaker 1: as we step forward, You know, I.
Speaker 8: Think I would I would want to go back just
Speaker 8: a little bit here, Spence and say that that it's
Speaker 8: it's not everybody's opinion that that and certainly I bet
Speaker 8: you if you asked Hisses Breer, he'd tell you he
Speaker 8: is a nine. He has some some capabilities to play
Speaker 8: like a ten as well, but in college he played
Speaker 8: majority as a nine, and so I see I see
Speaker 8: qualities in him. Not not from a physical perspective, because
Speaker 8: he's not a tall guy and he's not a super
Speaker 8: fast guy, but he is a guy that's really good
Speaker 8: around the goal, and he is a guy that's really
Speaker 8: good with his hold up play, and on top of that,
Speaker 8: he's really good at combining with other players around him.
Speaker 8: I think he has similar characteristics to what I I
Speaker 8: used to play as a striker, so he's a little
Speaker 8: bit different, but I wouldn't I wouldn't qualify him as
Speaker 8: a as a false nine in the way that Lionel
Speaker 8: Messi has been asked to play that position. So I
Speaker 8: see three three three players there. I think all of
Speaker 8: them have had moments where you're like, oh, this looks
Speaker 8: really good, and then all of them have had moments
Speaker 8: like Wow, this looks really bad. And that's just part
Speaker 8: of being young players. So you know, we have to
Speaker 8: again appreciate who we are here. We are a club
Speaker 8: that develops players. We are not a club that goes
Speaker 8: out and signs ten million dollars forwards. We're a club
Speaker 8: that goes out and signs players and turns them into
Speaker 8: ten million dollars forwards. So are feel like he's the
Speaker 8: one I was referencing against Houston. I thought he was
Speaker 8: fantastic for you know, the seventy minutes that he played
Speaker 8: and they subp them out for Forrester. But I thought
Speaker 8: he really didn't put us so wrong. He was doing
Speaker 8: everything that we asked off are nine. He just hadn't
Speaker 8: had a goal in the game, but he had a
Speaker 8: couple of chances.
Speaker 1: Do you get nervous when you see me walk into
Speaker 1: the one hundred lions dinner? Do? I?
Speaker 8: No, absolutely not.
Speaker 1: You make things Sonner, Okay, I felt like you were
Speaker 1: mad at me after I peppered youth questions. But look
Speaker 1: know what, okay, what good to hear? Good to hear man,
Speaker 1: Thank you for the time. We'll be pulling for your Saturday,
Speaker 1: and yeah, well chat soon.
Speaker 8: Thanks check appreciate it. Guys, take all right.
Speaker 1: RSL in action On Saturday, they welcome in the LA Galaxy,
Speaker 1: who won MLS couple year ago. The Galaxy are off
Speaker 1: to the worst start in the history of their organization.
Speaker 1: They have zero wins, which quick math tells me is
Speaker 1: not good, four losses, two draws. They have not won
Speaker 1: yet this year, so hopefully oursel can get back to
Speaker 1: their winning ways. Coming up Saturday with a two thirty
Speaker 1: KICKARSL dot com is where you go for single game
Speaker 1: and season tickets. A little rain a little earlier here
Speaker 1: in downtown Salt Lake City.
Speaker 2: Talk pretty chilly outside.
Speaker 1: It's about forty forty one degrees as we make our
Speaker 1: way towards the weekend. But as it is every single day,
Speaker 1: it's good to have you guys along for the ride.
Speaker 2: My name is Spence check Its.
Speaker 1: The name of this program is The Drive with Spence
Speaker 1: Checkets on ESPN seven hundred and ninety two NFM. We
Speaker 1: are proud to be part of Utah's ESPN Radio network.
Speaker 1: We've had a very busy show today. About an hour
Speaker 1: left in the program today and then we'll break into
Speaker 1: a little Grizzlies hockey.
Speaker 2: Excuse jeuse me, Grizzlies basketball, Grizzly heat.
Speaker 1: Tonight fun night in the NBA, we actually have a
Speaker 1: game that matters between two good teams that actually are
Speaker 1: employing basketball players that want to play basketball.
Speaker 2: The Warriors and the Lakers tonight.
Speaker 1: Both those two teams trying to jockey to stay in
Speaker 1: that top six and therefore avoid the play in tournament.
Speaker 1: The Jazz were smoked last night by the Houston Rockets.
Speaker 1: They are going to be an action tomorrow against the
Speaker 1: Indiana Pacers. Craig Bowler, Jack from the Road, will stop
Speaker 1: by today to give us all the latest on the
Speaker 1: Utah Jazz is. They're jockeying with the Washington Wizards for
Speaker 1: the worst record in the NBA for the right to
Speaker 1: get the number one overall pick and then hopefully draft
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag. The five o'clock out of the program today
Speaker 1: is brought to you by IFA Country Stores. It's going
Speaker 1: to get a warm outside at some point. If you're
Speaker 1: new to our fine market, this is kind of the deal.
Speaker 1: You never know when it comes to March and spring weather,
Speaker 1: and sometimes May and April and June, you never know. Okay,
Speaker 1: So it'll get warm. Time now to start thinking about
Speaker 1: your lawn to take care of it. So when he
Speaker 1: drive to the basket begins with the first step on
Speaker 1: the cord. That's the ultimate power move. IFA Step one
Speaker 1: Crabgrass preventer and Lown Food is the first choice to
Speaker 1: give your yard the healthy, thick green look you desire.
Speaker 1: The neighbors will be green with NV shop ifan line
Speaker 1: at IFA dot co op or stop by one of
Speaker 1: their eighteen Utah locations. Started things off with Neil Smith
Speaker 1: today to kind of preview tonight's Utah Hockey Club game.
Speaker 1: There is one local team in action tonight, that is
Speaker 1: the Utah Hockey Club. They welcome in the La Kings
Speaker 1: for a seven o'clock drop of the puck here at
Speaker 1: the Delta Center in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. The
Speaker 1: Kings are a really good team hockey club. They won
Speaker 1: a couple of straight games, but they're not going to
Speaker 1: make the wild card this year. We talked about this
Speaker 1: couple weeks ago, even when they were three four points
Speaker 1: back of the final wildcard spot, before the Saint Louis
Speaker 1: Blues just took off. Lose have won ten straight games,
Speaker 1: they have run their differential to plus eighteen, and right
Speaker 1: now the hockey club nine points beyond both the Blues
Speaker 1: and the Wild looks like the Blues in the Wild
Speaker 1: are going to be the two wildcard teams. The Flames
Speaker 1: do have two games in hand. Hockey Club Club beat
Speaker 1: the Flames the other night. Flames are seven points beyond
Speaker 1: both the Blues and the wild so it looks like
Speaker 1: they're going to run away with it. The La Kings
Speaker 1: right now are second in the Pacific. They are five
Speaker 1: points behind the Vegas Golden Knights. The Golden Knights have
Speaker 1: locked in a playoff spot, the Jets and the Stars.
Speaker 1: Winnipeg Jets and the Dallas Stars have also locked in
Speaker 1: playoff spots. Were the real chaos now exists in the
Speaker 1: East with the wildcard race. There, the Rangers are tied
Speaker 1: with the Canadians at seventy nine points. Both those two
Speaker 1: teams are five points beyond the Ottawa Senators. The Columbia
Speaker 1: Blue Jackets are two points beyond both the Rangers and
Speaker 1: the Canadians. In the West, it seems like everything is
Speaker 1: pretty much settled in Hockey Club did announce that after
Speaker 1: their final home game of the regular season, as there's
Speaker 1: only a handful of games left, they will handle out
Speaker 1: their team awards. The final home game is going to
Speaker 1: be Thursday, April the tenth. Nashville is in town, so
Speaker 1: something to look forward to if you're a Utah hockey
Speaker 1: club fan. But if you're going to the game tonight,
Speaker 1: be safe and enjoy it, as only a handful of
Speaker 1: games left before our first season as a hockey market
Speaker 1: will be behind us. So that's kind of the main
Speaker 1: local storyline today. We also brought in Howard back for
Speaker 1: a little NBA basketball again. Kind of a big night tonight,
Speaker 1: certainly on TNT where they will have Memphis Miami first.
Speaker 2: You're going to hear that on our radio station.
Speaker 1: Then the late night game will be Golden State and
Speaker 1: the Lakers, and it is kind of a sneaky big game.
Speaker 1: We only have five or six games left in the
Speaker 1: NBA as the playoff chases behind us. As far as
Speaker 1: the college basketball storylines, we discussed this a little bit earlier,
Speaker 1: starting today. It's what it is what is known as
Speaker 1: a dead period in college recruiting. On the basketball side,
Speaker 1: it simply means there are no visits allowed in person,
Speaker 1: no on campus visits. The University of Utah found out
Speaker 1: yesterday that Keanu DAEs has removed his name from the
Speaker 1: transfer portal and he will come back and play basketball
Speaker 1: for Alex Jensen, Raphael Chileus, Wes Wilcox. But because it
Speaker 1: is a dead period right now, we probably won't hear
Speaker 1: a ton of news now. Terrence Brown is a transfer
Speaker 1: from Fairleigh Dickinson. He was a twenty point per game
Speaker 1: score a year ago for FDU, and there's a report
Speaker 1: out there that he met with the Utah coaching staff
Speaker 1: today via zoom. Okay, so we are still waiting word.
Speaker 1: We only know that Hunter Erickson is going to spend
Speaker 1: his final year in college in Hawaii as he should.
Speaker 1: Good for him, and then Keanu DAEs is coming back
Speaker 1: to play for Alex and his staff.
Speaker 2: No news on.
Speaker 1: Players like Jake Walleen or Miro Little or any of
Speaker 1: the other players that have put their names in the
Speaker 1: transfer portal.
Speaker 2: Ezrasar is another name to watch for.
Speaker 1: You think a lot of people believe that as is
Speaker 1: a guy that AJ should look at to bring back
Speaker 1: to play for the Utes next year, But no official
Speaker 1: word just yet. Of course, if anything our way, we
Speaker 1: will bring it to you Prior to signing off air
Speaker 1: at seven o'clock tonight, BYU found out yesterday that Dallan
Speaker 1: Hall has entered the transfer portal, joining Kennon Catchings.
Speaker 2: So we'll have to wait to see where Dallen ends up.
Speaker 1: I think Dallen leaves BYU as a player that should
Speaker 1: be looked at as a real legend in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, a key coog for two NCAA tournament teams,
Speaker 1: one of the first choice players off the bench for
Speaker 1: Kevin Young for a team that went to the Sweet sixteen,
Speaker 1: something that BYU has only done I think three times
Speaker 1: in their history. BYU of course holds the unfortunate honor
Speaker 1: of making the NCAA Tournament more times than any team
Speaker 1: without advancing to the Final four. With aj Debanza in
Speaker 1: the fold, with his Xavion Stanton kid from Vegas in
Speaker 1: the fold, and the potential to bring back a bulk
Speaker 1: of their roster, I think BYU could start pre season
Speaker 1: top ten, top fifteen thereabouts. There are a lot of
Speaker 1: conversations about negotiations, and that's what's happening now. These are
Speaker 1: negotiations when it comes to trying to get these young
Speaker 1: players come back and play for you, and BYU apparently
Speaker 1: is prepared to pay Richie Sonders seven figures to come
Speaker 1: back and play for them, which makes sense. Richie Sonders
Speaker 1: played like a player that could start for some of
Speaker 1: the elite teams in all of college basketball, and against Alabama,
Speaker 1: he was like the only one that looked like he belonged.
Speaker 1: And against some of the other teams at BYU faced
Speaker 1: this year where they had elite strength and athleticism, Richie
Speaker 1: was kind of the guy who shined. So what does
Speaker 1: it mean for Richie Saunders, who at the age of
Speaker 1: twenty three might be very ready to come back, or
Speaker 1: excuse me, it might be very ready to get his
Speaker 1: NBA experience started because the timeline. I mean, look, remember
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag, this prospect who everybody is going all in
Speaker 1: on to try to lose games in order to draft.
Speaker 1: Cooper reclassified he turned eighteen, like three and a half
Speaker 1: months ago. He should be a senior in high school.
Speaker 1: And the deal is, if you're a college basketball player
Speaker 1: with the NBA interest, you want to get the clock
Speaker 1: ticking as soon as you possibly can on simply your
Speaker 1: contracts so you can get to your first max deal
Speaker 1: as soon as possible.
Speaker 2: And I just have to wonder if Richie.
Speaker 1: Saunders at the age of twenty three, is eager to
Speaker 1: get that thing going, if he does get the feedback
Speaker 1: during the pre draft process, and my guess is Richie
Speaker 1: will go through the process just like Diegor Demon will
Speaker 1: just like Brandon Carlson from the Utes did a couple
Speaker 1: of years ago before deciding to come back. You go
Speaker 1: through this draft process and you have the opportunity to
Speaker 1: get invaluable feedback from pro scouts, pro coaches, pro general managers,
Speaker 1: NBA front office people that will tell you exactly what
Speaker 1: they think about your chances of being a pro and
Speaker 1: they'll let you know whether or not you have a
Speaker 1: chance to be drafted in the first round or even
Speaker 1: if you're drafting the second round. But if Richie Saunders
Speaker 1: goes throughout the pre draft process and the feedback is
Speaker 1: your late second rounder undrafted, he could make more money
Speaker 1: staying at BYU as opposed to leaving and trying his
Speaker 1: hand at the pros. Conversations about whether players like Dawson Baker,
Speaker 1: Mihailo Boskovich, that kid apparently is getting some nil interest.
Speaker 1: Yegor Demon I think is probably gone. That's just my
Speaker 1: gut because unlike Richie, Yegor is a first round lock,
Speaker 1: and he might be a lottery lock depending on the
Speaker 1: max you're looking at. Early on in the season, he
Speaker 1: was struggling to make his threes and his outside shot
Speaker 1: didn't look great, and he really cowered away from pressure
Speaker 1: from teams like Iowa State or teams like Houston. I
Speaker 1: think that affected his stock a little bit. Yegor at
Speaker 1: this point, at the age of nineteen, is certainly a
Speaker 1: prospect that you draft as a project, a player that
Speaker 1: might play for you in three, four, five years BYU
Speaker 1: will lose Trevin Nell, Mowatt mag as well as Fos
Speaker 1: Treori and Trey Stewart. Those are the players that are graduating.
Speaker 1: But what does it mean for a player like Kaba Keta.
Speaker 1: Will KBA come back? Looks like he's probably got the
Speaker 1: inside track to start for them at center. Canon Catchings
Speaker 1: is rumored to be looking at North Carolina, and with
Speaker 1: aj Debansa coming into the fold and the potential of
Speaker 1: Richie Saunders coming back, this could be a case where
Speaker 1: there just simply was not enough minutes for Cannon Catchings,
Speaker 1: who has pro basketball potential and.
Speaker 2: A desire to play in the NBA.
Speaker 1: But as far as the college basketball recruiting news, it's
Speaker 1: going to be quiet for a little bit at least,
Speaker 1: that's my guest as a result of this quote unquote
Speaker 1: dead period where you cannot have players on campus for
Speaker 1: in person visits right now, it's all zoom calls, it's
Speaker 1: all you know, virtual meetings, and we'll see if AJ
Speaker 1: and his staff announce any players from the transfer portal
Speaker 1: signing to play for the Utes. Of course, we'll be
Speaker 1: tracking that interesting peace today from Jeremy Wu on ESPN
Speaker 1: dot com. So, if you've listened to the show in
Speaker 1: the past, first of all, thank you for that. Continue
Speaker 1: to do that. We need your support, We like your support.
Speaker 1: We appreciate your support. I don't love the player comp thing.
Speaker 1: I don't love comparing the play in college to a
Speaker 1: player that plays in the pros or used to play
Speaker 1: in the pros. I just think it gives I think
Speaker 1: it gives the fan base unrealistic expectations. If you're expecting
Speaker 1: a prospect to be a generational player right away, reminds
Speaker 1: you that there are very few eighteen year olds like
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag, who is eighteen, who look like they belong
Speaker 1: right away.
Speaker 2: In fact, the list is very short. It's the unicorns.
Speaker 1: It's guys like Lebron Garnett, who Tom Haberstrow has compared
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag to had a good rookie season at the
Speaker 1: age of eighteen, but didn't burst on the scene as
Speaker 1: the ticket, as the KG that we all became to know,
Speaker 1: we all kind of came to know and love as
Speaker 1: an NBA player. So Jeremy went throughout his business of
Speaker 1: talking to NBA scouts about who Cooper Flag reminds them of.
Speaker 1: And as a Jazz fan, I continue to say, if
Speaker 1: you want to know why the Jazz are doing what
Speaker 1: they're doing, it's the right thing to do with the
Speaker 1: infrastructure of what pro basketball offers, with the incentive structure
Speaker 1: that the NBA is built. If you're the Utah Jazz,
Speaker 1: you should have done this two years ago. But it's
Speaker 1: better late than never. And I just think they've become
Speaker 1: resigned to the fact that whether it's the modern day
Speaker 1: and age of the NBA or simply what the NBA
Speaker 1: is and has always been, if you're going to build
Speaker 1: this thing, there is not a magic bullet. There's no
Speaker 1: big game hunting. My guess is Danny Ainge will never
Speaker 1: utter that phrase again. After they said we're going big
Speaker 1: game hunting and then two months later signed Drew Vubanks. Right,
Speaker 1: there are rumors that for whatever reason, people down there
Speaker 1: thought that they could trade for mckel Bridges and sign
Speaker 1: Paul George. I don't know what level of delusion that was,
Speaker 1: but they clearly have been resigned to this reality that
Speaker 1: in the infrastructure of the NBA and with the way
Speaker 1: that the league is set up, this might be their
Speaker 1: only chance possible. And I will say this if May
Speaker 1: twelfth comes and goes and we're all watching the lottery
Speaker 1: and the Jazz do win the thing for the first
Speaker 1: time in jazz history. The Jazz have never had the
Speaker 1: Lady Luck shot upon them, They've never had the ping
Speaker 1: pong balls bounce their way. And if they do, I
Speaker 1: will say that this has all been worth it, even
Speaker 1: though it sucks. They're doing the right thing. It's just
Speaker 1: really hard. So the comps that Jeremy goes over and
Speaker 1: I'll encourage you to go to ESPN dot com to
Speaker 1: read it if you want to learn more about Cooper
Speaker 1: flag Kawhi Leonard is one that we've heard quite a bit.
Speaker 2: He talks about lamar Odom.
Speaker 1: Now before you roll your eyes, lamar Odom coming out
Speaker 1: of high school and college was thought to be generational.
Speaker 1: He just had some off court issues. They never really
Speaker 1: fully allowed him to live up to his potential. But
Speaker 1: he did have a good NBA career. I had never
Speaker 1: heard the Jason Tatum comp, which I kind of like.
Speaker 1: And Jason Tatum, of course a Boston Celtic who was
Speaker 1: drafted by Danny Ainge. There's a Scottie Pippin' comp out there.
Speaker 1: The one that I don't love is Andre Andre Kierlinko.
Speaker 1: It feels like those are scouts that are looking at
Speaker 1: measurables and measurements and just like, yeah, he's white, he
Speaker 1: must be playing like Andre Kerlinko. Andre was a really
Speaker 1: good player, an excellent player. But if you're drafting somebody
Speaker 1: number one overall, you just want to make sure that
Speaker 1: it's a better situation than drafting the next Andrea Karlko.
Speaker 1: I'll due respect to Aka, who is a good player
Speaker 1: here for a long time. So ESPN dot com is
Speaker 1: where you find it. Good story by Jeremy Wu on
Speaker 1: the pro comps for Cooper Flag. You know I'm okay,
Speaker 1: Porter If a day in April feels like April, I
Speaker 1: just don't need a day in April feeling like December
Speaker 1: or February.
Speaker 4: And it also kind of throws you for a loop
Speaker 4: when you don't know what it's gonna look like when
Speaker 4: you wake up and then two hours later it's sunny.
Speaker 4: You go for a walk in the morning and it's
Speaker 4: like nice seventy degrees, and then you're you know, you're
Speaker 4: up for a little walk, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 4: it's a blizzard that is springing Utah. So I guess
Speaker 4: if you're not used to it, you haven't been here real.
Speaker 1: Jan Brownstein, who kind of is in charge of the
Speaker 1: golf portion of the radio station, has brought in our
Speaker 1: list of golf courses. We are going to be giving
Speaker 1: away rounds two starting on April the seventh. And all
Speaker 1: it does today is depressed me because I look at
Speaker 1: that list. I'm like, I want to play there. I
Speaker 1: want to play there. I want I'm ready to get
Speaker 1: out and play.
Speaker 4: You're close, You're you're getting very close to that time. Obviously,
Speaker 4: some of those courses are open, some of them are
Speaker 4: ready for play, but I bet all of them will
Speaker 4: be here in the next couple of weeks.
Speaker 2: Well, we'll have to see. It's the Valero Texas Open
Speaker 2: right now.
Speaker 1: It's the final tune up before the Masters Augusta coming
Speaker 1: up next week. Tony is in a good position at
Speaker 1: the Valero. He's got a good year, so hopefully Tony
Speaker 1: can show well at Augusta. Did you ever watch the
Speaker 1: McDonald's All American Game growing up?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I watched it pretty pretty intently.
Speaker 2: I would say, I want to say.
Speaker 4: Up until I was out of high school. I guess
Speaker 4: it kind of kind of plays into you're really into
Speaker 4: the mc donald's All American Game when you're you know,
Speaker 4: thirteen fourteen and there's au ball going around, you're doing
Speaker 4: the circuit stuff. That's kind of when I was mainly
Speaker 4: into it. But I still check it out depending on
Speaker 4: who's there. If there's a prospect like a Zion Williamson,
Speaker 4: If there's a prospect like a Cooper Flag, for sure,
Speaker 4: I'll check it out.
Speaker 2: If if not, yeah we'll see.
Speaker 1: Aj Debants is seventeen points five boards to assist to
Speaker 1: lead the West to a one oh five ninety two
Speaker 1: win over the East.
Speaker 2: It was at Barclays. Seems good.
Speaker 1: I always wanted to play in it. I used to
Speaker 1: watch it when I was a kid. I'm like, oh man,
Speaker 1: that would be so fun. Britton Johnson. The McDonald's game
Speaker 1: that Britain played in was stacked. It was like Tracy
Speaker 1: McGrady lamar odom I don't know how many Utahns have
Speaker 1: played in the I think Frank Jackson played in it?
Speaker 8: You did?
Speaker 2: I think Britain did Frank Jackson? Is it? Aj Debants
Speaker 2: is not a Utah. We can't count him as a Utah.
Speaker 2: He's not.
Speaker 4: But he played prep ball here and if that is
Speaker 4: what your you know, what your litmus is, then in
Speaker 4: some form he is. Now how he got here and
Speaker 4: you know the workings behind that story. You know again,
Speaker 4: money is doing a lot when it comes to the
Speaker 4: sports world, the college sports world, and now even the
Speaker 4: high school sports world.
Speaker 1: So is he a Uton?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 4: No, but he played high school basketball in Utah.
Speaker 1: That's something, claiming aj de Band says. A Uton is
Speaker 1: like the golfers are like, Hey, Utah's Mike Weir like,
Speaker 1: and he's not from East lives here, but he's from Canada.
Speaker 1: There's a flag next to his name that's Canadian. Yeah,
Speaker 1: our fifty first state. How the tariffs with Canada right now? Dude,
Speaker 1: let's not let's not do that.
Speaker 4: I was watching my four O one K today.
Speaker 1: Not great, Bob, great, but hey, no, there's no hay,
Speaker 1: there's no way to spin this positively. No matter what
Speaker 1: the propaganda is you see on Fox News. All right,
Speaker 1: let's say night. We've got the Grizzlies in the heat
Speaker 1: coming up. It's a big one between the Lakers and
Speaker 1: the Warriors. Two good teams that might have players that
Speaker 1: are employed to play basketball show up to play basketball
Speaker 1: and try to win. I know it's wild, all right, Porter,
Speaker 1: what comes our way? Let's get our weekend started out
Speaker 1: the right way and hopefully a day that has a
Speaker 1: little more sunshine than today.
Speaker 2: What comes away? On a Friday show.
Speaker 4: On a Friday edition of The Drive, Zach Harper comes
Speaker 4: your way for the NBA Daily Assists. We'll chat with
Speaker 4: Paul Pugmyer. Of course, one week out from Augusta Thorton,
Speaker 4: Nystrom drops by talking some NFL draft, a little offseason football,
Speaker 4: and the Goat Adam Miklic joins the program on a Friday.
Speaker 1: He is the goat, I'll be clear about that. And
Speaker 1: by the way, a little Bertie is telling me that
Speaker 1: Paul pug Meyer is on his way to Augusta National
Speaker 1: Golf Club next week to enjoy a little Masters.
Speaker 2: So we'll do that with Paul on a Friday.
Speaker 1: Get your weekend started out the right way and join
Speaker 1: us for a Friday Driving Well, say good night for
Speaker 1: a Thursday edition of the show special thank you today,
Speaker 1: Neil Smith, Howard Beck, Craig Bowlerjack and Jason Christ for
Speaker 1: the sound that you may have missed from the radio
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Speaker 1: helps hees porter. I'm Spence saying, and I enjoy your
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