Speaker 1: Monday afternoon, thirteen minutes past the hour up two o'clock.
Speaker 2: Beautiful day, beautiful April day.
Speaker 1: It's about sixty six sixty seven degrees, clear and sunny
Speaker 1: here in downtown Salt Lake City, utahter a little bit
Speaker 1: of a cold front closed out last week. We have
Speaker 1: a great week of weather in the forecast. So Happy
Speaker 1: Monday to you. Hope you had a fantastic weekend. Hope
Speaker 1: you had a great weekend and ready to get back
Speaker 1: at it on this Monday afternoon. And as it is
Speaker 1: every single day, it's good to have you along for
Speaker 1: the ride. Spence check, it's behind the mic, Porter Larson
Speaker 1: behind the glass today.
Speaker 2: And since you and I last.
Speaker 1: Spoke, we had a really fun weekend of NBA playoff
Speaker 1: basketball that continues tonight with a double header at Madison
Speaker 1: Square Garden the Pistons in the Knicks. We'll tip off
Speaker 1: at five thirty on Turner Sports. Then your late game
Speaker 1: is the Clippers and the Nuggets. So we'll get to
Speaker 1: some NBA playoff takeaways, we'll get to some of the
Speaker 1: conversations that are kind of going around around the landscape
Speaker 1: for pro basketball. Of course, to Utah Jazz another spring
Speaker 1: with no playoff basketball here in Utah. That makes three
Speaker 1: straight years, and you might want to buckle up and
Speaker 1: hold on for the ride, because I don't think it's
Speaker 1: happening anytime soon. On Friday night, it was the final
Speaker 1: iteration of the play in Tournament, where the Heats send
Speaker 1: Quinn Snyder in, the Atlanta Hawks packing for the off season,
Speaker 1: and then the Memphis Grizzlies, despite a forty piece from
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis, took care of the Dallas Mavericks, which of
Speaker 1: course means Alex Jensen is free to allocate his full
Speaker 1: time job to the University of Utah men's basketball program.
Speaker 1: Transfer portal is open in college Hoops, and it is
Speaker 1: open for another forty eight hours. In the world of
Speaker 1: college football. Speaking of college football, was up at the
Speaker 1: spring game over the weekend at rice Eco Stadium. Fun
Speaker 1: to catch up with some of the coaches, some of
Speaker 1: the administrators, and.
Speaker 2: Some of the players. A lot of former players in the.
Speaker 1: House Britton Covey, Zach Moss, Devin Lloyd and others. So
Speaker 1: fun weekends, fun to taking a little college football. There's
Speaker 1: some transfer portal news on the BYU side of things.
Speaker 1: Not great news for BYU football, as Harrison Taggart and
Speaker 1: Keelan Merrion have announced that they have entered the transfer portal.
Speaker 1: Typically on the Monday after spring football ends for a program,
Speaker 1: you do hear about some players deciding to leave, and
Speaker 1: good news for you fans, we have not heard any
Speaker 1: of that at least so far today. If anything comes down,
Speaker 1: we'll let you know. Talked about this with Sean during
Speaker 1: cross talk. Of course, the coaches will conduct some exit
Speaker 1: interviews as these players will now kind of be left
Speaker 1: to their own accord for a while. Talk to Jason
Speaker 1: Beck and Morgan's Scully coach with on Saturday, and it's
Speaker 1: all about recruiting now for the coaches to take advantage
Speaker 1: of this trunk cad to transfer portal see if they
Speaker 1: can add some talent to the roster. It is NFL
Speaker 1: Draft week, so very exciting week for NFL fans. There's
Speaker 1: not a lot of local buzz, but there's some junior
Speaker 1: tafunuk for Anne reed Brand, Keithy, Caleb Loner, players like
Speaker 1: Tyler Batty kleb Etn and Jacob Robinson from Brigham Young.
Speaker 1: So we'll get you ready for the NFL Draft. We
Speaker 1: have one of my favorite NFL guest today. Still feels
Speaker 1: like the draft begins at two after Tennessee goes.
Speaker 2: Cam Ward at won, but left to see how it goes.
Speaker 2: So a lot to do.
Speaker 1: Another rough weekend for Real Salt Lake after a very fun,
Speaker 1: exciting historic week last week announcing that the Miller family
Speaker 1: has purchased the controlling interest of RSL. They welcomed in Toronto,
Speaker 1: who had not won a match all year, and won
Speaker 1: a match at America First Field in Sandy one.
Speaker 2: Nil your final.
Speaker 1: A very controversial red card handed to Diego Luna, the
Speaker 1: young superstar for RSL.
Speaker 2: I am told inside.
Speaker 1: Sources little birdie que little bird, just the cutest little bird.
Speaker 1: Sometimes he can get grumpy, but he's the best little
Speaker 1: bird that ever existed. They have informed that they are
Speaker 1: going to appeal to the league the red card that
Speaker 1: was handed to Diego Luna. Alex Katranas took the mike
Speaker 1: postgame and was very unhappy because this has been a
Speaker 1: string of bad calls. Now, look, I'm not one to
Speaker 1: utilize the officials as an excuse, because the fact of
Speaker 1: the matter is the play of RSLs not being good enough.
Speaker 1: They do have a striker on the way, I'm told
Speaker 1: he'll be on the ground nother little birdie let me
Speaker 1: know in the next twenty four to forty eight hours.
Speaker 1: It's a little RSL on the program as well, a
Speaker 1: lot to do Monday Afternoon style.
Speaker 2: First guest right out of the gates to.
Speaker 1: Break down all the NBA playoff storylines, and there's a
Speaker 1: myriad of them. As Tom haberstrow right out of the gates,
Speaker 1: he'll join us. We'll do some Utah football basketball, some
Speaker 1: Red Rocks too. It was a rough second and third routine,
Speaker 1: disciplined for the Red Rocks. They finished fourth in Nationals.
Speaker 1: But Josh Furlong, we'll stop by today. We'll get you
Speaker 1: ready for the NFL Draft with Ben Solak, rising star
Speaker 1: front of the show from ESPN, and then Brian Dunseth
Speaker 1: will stop by to talk all things RSL on this
Speaker 1: Monday afternoon. So some football, some basketball, college and pro
Speaker 1: little RSL. Utah Hockey Club and Bill Armstrong addressed the
Speaker 1: media their postseason media availability as the Stanley Cup playoffs
Speaker 1: have but gun and pro hockey. Justin Thomas wins the
Speaker 1: RBC heritage as well at back in the Winter Circle.
Speaker 2: So Tom Habers show Josh for.
Speaker 1: Long, Ben Solak, Bryan don sef Mee, Spence check, it's
Speaker 1: all of you, the great listeners, and that guy Porter
Speaker 1: Larson Monday Afternoon.
Speaker 2: Yo, give me one NBA playoff takeaway.
Speaker 1: I know there's a mirror like OKC is freaking terrifying. Yeah,
Speaker 1: give me one NBA playoff take away from the weekend.
Speaker 3: That that might be the one is that I thought
Speaker 3: the West was wide open because I haven't seen them
Speaker 3: do it yet. Right now, we're one game, min we're
Speaker 3: one game, but Oklahoma City looks like the eighty two games, right.
Speaker 3: Sometimes you sometimes you don't get that. Spence. Let let's
Speaker 3: zoom in here a little bit. I'm a Knicks guy,
Speaker 3: We're a jazz market twenty thirteen, twenty twelve, Knicks Quinn
Speaker 3: Snyder late late Jazz.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 3: They were really really good rosters eighty two games, fifty
Speaker 3: fifty five, close to sixty wins some of those teams.
Speaker 3: But they were never built for the postseason, like physically
Speaker 3: how their roster was put together. They weren't built for
Speaker 3: the postseason. And I wasn't sure about okay see. But
Speaker 3: the one takeaway I think from that is the one
Speaker 3: that obviously stood out to you. Is that they are.
Speaker 3: I think maybe what we think they are, maybe trust
Speaker 3: them on.
Speaker 1: Them so deep man, like everyone on that roster can play,
Speaker 1: including former youth Brandon Carlson. All right, so we'll do
Speaker 1: all the NBA playoff angles and storylines with our buddy
Speaker 1: Tommy Haberstrow on a Monday. But before it gets tom,
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Speaker 1: As the NBA action resumes tonight, All right, just a
Speaker 1: couple quick players off takeaways and we'll do more on
Speaker 1: this with Tom Haberstrow coming up. You know, on the
Speaker 1: Friday before the playoffs, you kind of talk about the predictions,
Speaker 1: what you think the league is going to look like
Speaker 1: who you think is going to advance, and certainly the
Speaker 1: West continues to be much deeper than the East. The
Speaker 1: East has some good young teams that are rising up.
Speaker 1: So just some quick thoughts. On Saturday, we saw the
Speaker 1: Timberwolves going to Los Angeles and just physically pushing around
Speaker 1: the Lakers UH one seventeen to ninety five. And Minnesota.
Speaker 1: Chris Finch is their head coach. He's been around the
Speaker 1: block for a long time. JJ Reddick. This is his
Speaker 1: first go around as a coach in the postseason, and
Speaker 1: when Minnesota is healthy, there's a lot to like about
Speaker 1: that roster. But really, the way they've got about their
Speaker 1: construction is finding a bunch of big, physical wing defenders.
Speaker 2: They can really get.
Speaker 1: Up and cause problems for dominant offensive wings on the
Speaker 1: other side. And of course the Lakers, their bread is
Speaker 1: butter with two of the most exciting players and intelligent
Speaker 1: players this generation, of course, Lebron and then Luke Adancic.
Speaker 1: Luke went for thirty seven, but you know what Minnesota did.
Speaker 1: They essentially allowed Luca to be a scorer and they
Speaker 1: took away his ability as a facilitator.
Speaker 2: He had one assist and that was by design.
Speaker 1: It was almost like they're gonna let Luca do his
Speaker 1: thing and then they're going to try to crowd the
Speaker 1: other players. Lebron looked a little disconnected. I'm not gonna lie,
Speaker 1: which was a little bit surprising. And JJ Reddick talked
Speaker 1: about this post game that the Lakers were just not
Speaker 1: ready for the Minnesota Timberwolves physicality. You know, as a
Speaker 1: Nick fan, I'm not a big Julius Randall guy. But
Speaker 1: Julius is a big, imposing wing, and when he is
Speaker 1: kind of determined to at least give you effort defensively,
Speaker 1: he can change the game. I'm just not a big
Speaker 1: fan of his ball stopping offensive tendencies. You're not going
Speaker 1: to get a Jaden McDaniels eleven to thirteen, three or
Speaker 1: three from three game more often than not, twenty five points,
Speaker 1: nine boards. But he did a really good job on
Speaker 1: Lebron and then Ant made some big shots down the
Speaker 1: stretch twenty two points, nine boards, eight assists. You know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting for Jazz fans Chris Finch sat Rudy Gobert
Speaker 1: for big stretches.
Speaker 2: Where have we seen heard that before? Playoff basketball?
Speaker 1: When the other team goes small, oftentimes it is better
Speaker 1: to sit go Beart so that it's less than the
Speaker 1: Quinn never really latched onto I don't know that he
Speaker 1: ever believed in it, but nas Reed came off the bench.
Speaker 2: It was awesome with twenty three.
Speaker 1: They have got great depth and they're healthy right now,
Speaker 1: and you know, with Luke and Lebron, I would imagine
Speaker 1: the Lakers are going to find their way back into
Speaker 1: the series. And I'm not saying it's over, but that
Speaker 1: was kind of the main takeaway I had from Saturdays
Speaker 1: till the Nuggets had a great comeback against the Clippers,
Speaker 1: and you got to give Russell Westbrook a ton of
Speaker 1: credit with his defense down the stretch, fourth quarter, overtime.
Speaker 1: That's going to be a barn burner. I wouldn't be
Speaker 1: shocked if we went seven. But a great, great game
Speaker 1: one between the Nugs and the Clips went to Denver.
Speaker 1: Now the series that everybody seems to be talking about
Speaker 1: and we are. You referenced, oksee beat Memphis by fifty one. Okay,
Speaker 1: so like I know, John Moran came out after the game,
Speaker 1: so we're not going to play that poorly. Again, I
Speaker 1: don't think this has anything to do with the Grizzlies.
Speaker 1: I think this is all about how historically spent SEC
Speaker 1: Oklahoma City is and has been all year, and they
Speaker 1: probably just don't receive a ton of attention because they
Speaker 1: play in a market that nobody really wants to visit,
Speaker 1: nobody really gives a rip about. But I went to
Speaker 1: the OKC Jazz game, the final Jazz home game of
Speaker 1: the season, and I sat with our guys, Smittye and
Speaker 1: Scott Layden was in town as well, So sat with
Speaker 1: those two and Scotty and Smitty just marveling at the
Speaker 1: depth of OKC and how every player on that roster
Speaker 1: can play high level NBA basketball. I mean, Shay Gilgess,
Speaker 1: Alexander was a wallflower. He didn't do much at all.
Speaker 1: He's their best player by far. He needed thirteen shots
Speaker 1: to score fifteen points and they beat Memphis by fifty
Speaker 1: one points. So, of course OKAC has been historically special
Speaker 1: all year. Probably should have given them a little bit
Speaker 1: more credit entering the postseason. Of course, some of these
Speaker 1: Western Conference teams will have something to say about it.
Speaker 1: But Oklahoma City is the overwhelming favorite to roll out
Speaker 1: of the Western Conference. And if you haven't watched them
Speaker 1: all year, you probably are now intered to just how
Speaker 1: good they are. But the series that everybody seems to
Speaker 1: be talking about is Golden State Houston. So real quick
Speaker 1: here that that was a case. And I talk about
Speaker 1: this all the time, and I do try to bring
Speaker 1: our NBA coverage back to the local scene and through
Speaker 1: the prism of what we can learn about this roster
Speaker 1: construction project that the Jazz are going through right now.
Speaker 1: But I say this every year, and it's not some
Speaker 1: you know, this is not brain surgery, This is not
Speaker 1: rocket science here. But when it comes to playoff basketball
Speaker 1: on the road, that's when superstars remind you who they are.
Speaker 1: Playoff basketball on the road, Okay, young players always played
Speaker 1: better at home and certainly come playoff time when it's
Speaker 1: a half court offensive, slow it down battle and officials
Speaker 1: tend to swallow their whistles. You have to have dudes
Speaker 1: that have been there before. You have to have dudes
Speaker 1: that are not afraid of the moment on the road.
Speaker 1: And I like the Rocket's physicality. I like their size.
Speaker 1: They actually caused Golden State a ton of issues when
Speaker 1: emy Udoaka went with Steven Adams and Alprim Shangun when
Speaker 1: they win big. Golden State struggled and Steph was cold
Speaker 1: to start, but it was like Steph and Jimmy Butler
Speaker 1: were both waiting for their moment in the third quarter
Speaker 1: and the fourth quarter. At the end of the third
Speaker 1: they couldn't hit a shot, but fourth quarter time was
Speaker 1: Steph and Jimmy period. Okay, so there's a lot to
Speaker 1: like about this young rocket squad. I'm and Thompson man.
Speaker 1: For all the conversation about how he was going to
Speaker 1: lock down Steph Curry, that was not the case at all.
Speaker 2: Shan Gun was the only one who really played well.
Speaker 1: Now Van Vliet will not go four of nineteen, two
Speaker 1: of thirteen from three. But when Houston's offense breaks down
Speaker 1: in the half court set, who are they? I have
Speaker 1: no idea because Van Vliet is not a guy that
Speaker 1: can beat you off the dribble.
Speaker 2: He's more of a volume shooter. Jalen Green was over
Speaker 2: his skis.
Speaker 1: I heard a lot of people pick Houston in this
Speaker 1: series in Golden State. To me, at least for one night,
Speaker 1: showed everybody why once again in the playoffs you have
Speaker 1: to have superstars that show up on the road. All Right,
Speaker 1: we'll do more with Tom Harstrow coming up Playoff Style,
Speaker 1: but want to welcome in a very special guest live
Speaker 1: in studio, Tally and Corey from Courtland Roofing.
Speaker 2: Gentlemen, Happy Monday. How are we doing good? How are you?
Speaker 2: I'm good? Thank you for the time.
Speaker 1: Basketball fans at all football fans. What's what's your what's
Speaker 1: your sport of choice?
Speaker 2: All sports? All sports?
Speaker 6: Yep?
Speaker 2: Okay, are we talking utes? Cougars like utes all the way?
Speaker 1: Okay, very nice, Well, nice to meet you guys, Thanks
Speaker 1: for coming in studio. So Tally, I'll start with you.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about your spring special. What would you like
Speaker 1: our listeners to know?
Speaker 3: So with any roof.
Speaker 7: Replacement, we are going to give you a give you
Speaker 7: free seamless gutters on the with that roof replacement.
Speaker 2: So free seamless gutters for the lame and those are
Speaker 2: rain gutters.
Speaker 1: Rain gutters, yes, and and that's a that's a big offer,
Speaker 1: right like free rain gutters.
Speaker 2: What sort of value are we talking about there?
Speaker 3: A couple thousand dollars, a.
Speaker 1: Couple thousand bucks okay, so spring sale. Okay, So Corey,
Speaker 1: we'll move over to you. What do they have to
Speaker 1: do to take advantage of this and actually get the
Speaker 1: free rain gutters.
Speaker 8: Yeah, so they just need to call us by the
Speaker 8: end of the show today schedule and appointment will come
Speaker 8: out do a free inspection of the roof and and
Speaker 8: look at the rain gutters and and if we do
Speaker 8: a full roof replacement for them then yeah they can.
Speaker 8: They'll take advantage of that and get free ring gutters.
Speaker 2: Very nice.
Speaker 1: So Tally, tell me about your company this big picture.
Speaker 1: How long you guys been in operation? What do you
Speaker 1: want our listeners to know.
Speaker 7: We've been in business for twenty years, family owned, locally owned.
Speaker 7: It's really important to us to take care of people.
Speaker 7: And your roof is an important part of your home.
Speaker 7: Basically takes care of all of your assets, for sure.
Speaker 7: It's on the inside.
Speaker 2: Now this time of year.
Speaker 1: Corey will go to you on this this time of
Speaker 1: year as the weather starts to get warm, and this
Speaker 1: is your I'm a layman here, this is your business.
Speaker 1: I would imagine folks are kind of analyzing the damage
Speaker 1: that the winter has done right to try to see
Speaker 1: if this is a good time to get some roof repairs.
Speaker 2: Is that fair to say?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 8: Absolutely, Spring is a big time because we've just gone
Speaker 8: through winter. There has been damage, and we do work
Speaker 8: with a lot of insurance companies, so a lot of
Speaker 8: times people have wind damage or even hill damage and
Speaker 8: we can come out and assess the roof and we
Speaker 8: can let you know if it's worth filing the claim.
Speaker 8: And so we take you through the whole process and
Speaker 8: work directly with the insurance so you don't have to.
Speaker 2: Talk about Tally. The warranty.
Speaker 1: Folks love warranties, and you guys have what you perceive
Speaker 1: to be one of the best warranties in the business.
Speaker 2: Fair to say, Yeah, the.
Speaker 7: Great warranty, labor warranty, the manufacturer warranty. We use Owens
Speaker 7: Corning products. There's a fifty year limited lifetime warranty associated
Speaker 7: with that and we're not going anywhere.
Speaker 2: We'll take it care of you, all right.
Speaker 1: So it's Courtland Roofing my guys, Tally and Coreyan Studio.
Speaker 2: Here's the deal.
Speaker 1: The spring sale gets you free rain gutters and a
Speaker 1: replacement roof. The roof is not free, but the rain
Speaker 1: gutters are free. It is a value of several thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: So get ready for the wet weather by calling our
Speaker 1: experts for a free inspection and take advantage of the
Speaker 1: spring pricing right now. So call the schedule the consultation
Speaker 1: during the show today and you get free rain gutters,
Speaker 1: which is a massive, massive added value for you. And
Speaker 1: here's the number. Call right now at eight oh one
Speaker 1: six one five five five six zero. That's eight o
Speaker 1: one six one five five five six zero quarter.
Speaker 2: Young man.
Speaker 1: It's not often that you directly violate a by law
Speaker 1: of the radio show.
Speaker 2: Do I need to remind you?
Speaker 1: No, it's not It's not often that you violate one
Speaker 1: of the tenants of the show. Need I remind you
Speaker 1: our rule when you decide to go with the greatest
Speaker 1: live act and history of music, Dave Matthews Ben no hits?
Speaker 1: I know, yeah, we we subscribe to the Andy Bernard
Speaker 1: rule about Dave.
Speaker 2: What's going on with you? I know, I know?
Speaker 3: No hits. As you said, it was very last minute.
Speaker 3: It was very last second. I had like three seconds
Speaker 3: to throw a song up. I had to throw a
Speaker 3: Northeast jam band up for you and Tom fair enough.
Speaker 3: I don't know, man, all good? Is this a hit?
Speaker 1: It's the only song they've ever won a Grammy for,
Speaker 1: so it's like the hit but you know what, it's
Speaker 1: all right Monday Afternoon style, NBA Playoff style. Tom Haberstrow
Speaker 1: batting lead off on the show, Tommy Happy money man.
Speaker 2: How are we doing?
Speaker 5: So?
Speaker 6: You prefer him to do number forty one or something?
Speaker 1: There we go, Tom, talk to you know. I love
Speaker 1: when you talked dirty about Dave. Tom, I appreciate that. Yes,
Speaker 1: indeed that would and live preferably obviously not the studio recording.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, I prefer I think number forty one might
Speaker 6: be my favorite lab Jimmy thing or a two step
Speaker 6: I can get with any of those.
Speaker 2: There we go, There we go.
Speaker 1: All right, Tom, I'm gonna ask you the question we
Speaker 1: started the show off with NBA Playoff basketball over the weekend.
Speaker 1: The one major takeaway for you is what if you
Speaker 1: had to kind of hone.
Speaker 2: In on one thing.
Speaker 6: Physicality is back, Spence, Physicality is back. I did this
Speaker 6: study over at the Finder the last couple of days.
Speaker 6: I've been kind of looking at this because I think
Speaker 6: it was during the Lakers game Jay Billis pointed out
Speaker 6: that they hadn't been called for a foul and like
Speaker 6: four minutes into the second quarter, and he was noting it,
Speaker 6: and then I tracked it for all the games. It
Speaker 6: was the fewest few attempts for an opening weekend in
Speaker 6: the NBA Playoffs. Ever, an average of seventeen free throws
Speaker 6: per teen per game is the lowest we've ever seen
Speaker 6: in the playoffs, and it isn't particularly close. Last year
Speaker 6: it was an average about twenty one, and this year
Speaker 6: it's seventeen eighteen right in there. So last year was
Speaker 6: the lowest and now we're about fifteen percent lower than
Speaker 6: the previous low. And so what we're seeing is, you know,
Speaker 6: the physicality that the Warriors are able to play with
Speaker 6: on Jalen Green and with Fred van Vliet and Shane Goon.
Speaker 6: That's the difference. They allowed eighty five points in that game,
Speaker 6: and Imo Udoka said after the Ames, He's like, we
Speaker 6: held the Warriors to ninety five points. That's a win,
Speaker 6: Like normally that is a win. But we couldn't get
Speaker 6: our offense going. And a lot of it is because
Speaker 6: the Warriors were more physical. And what JJ Reddick and
Speaker 6: Lebron James said after they lost the Minnesota Timberrlves is
Speaker 6: we need to be more physical. And the Pistons they
Speaker 6: got run out of that gym at Madison Square Garden
Speaker 6: because they were not playoff tested, they weren't ready to
Speaker 6: play bullyball, and Kate Cunningham shriveled up. And so if
Speaker 6: you go to Tomdfinder dot com you can see historically
Speaker 6: free throw attempts in the playoffs go down, but especially
Speaker 6: so this postseason where teams are not really getting to
Speaker 6: the line at a high rate, and I think it
Speaker 6: has huge implications for this postseason.
Speaker 1: All right, so let's tackle some of these one by one,
Speaker 1: and we'll start out this way with the Western Conference
Speaker 1: stuff before we moved back east. As we continue the conversation,
Speaker 1: so Denver clips, I mean, the West continues to be
Speaker 1: ridiculously deep. There are gonna be some really good teams
Speaker 1: are going home. The Clippers entered the postseason on fire.
Speaker 1: And as I talked to you last week about whenever
Speaker 1: Kauai is healthy for an extended stretch, we all do
Speaker 1: the thing where like, oh, yeah, that's who that dude is.
Speaker 1: And I've always kind of been like, you can have
Speaker 1: Russell Westbrook guy. And I don't think there's anything sustainable
Speaker 1: about what we saw from him Game one, but he
Speaker 1: does have the ability to bring energy that really puts
Speaker 1: him in a category that is very, very small, and
Speaker 1: that's what I've always respected about him. His defense down
Speaker 1: the stretch was great. That was a hell of a
Speaker 1: basketball game. Give me your take Clips Nugs Game one,
Speaker 1: and how do you see that playing out?
Speaker 9: Man?
Speaker 6: I am not a huge Russell Westbrook fan, like I
Speaker 6: have never been. I just think that his stat sheet
Speaker 6: is really impressive and his energy is really impressive. But
Speaker 6: in terms of winning plays, like, I'd rather have a
Speaker 6: lot more players in today's era than Russell Westbrook. I
Speaker 6: think a lot of it is empty calories. And man,
Speaker 6: that performance on Saturday was awesome. Down the stretch, he
Speaker 6: was great. He had a lot of he smoked some layups,
Speaker 6: you know, but he got to every rebound, offensive rebound
Speaker 6: after offensive rebound, deflections, big plays, passes like he made
Speaker 6: so many winning plays down the stretch. And if we
Speaker 6: can get that guy every game, I think the Denver
Speaker 6: Nuggets can win this series. But if we can't get
Speaker 6: that guy, then there's just not enough weapons on Jokic's side.
Speaker 6: I think the Clippers win this series.
Speaker 10: Still.
Speaker 6: I thought that they were gonna win this one handily,
Speaker 6: and then the Nuggets stormed back and they could not
Speaker 6: generate good offense the Clippers and the winning, the energy,
Speaker 6: the winning plays, they were all done by Russell Westbrook
Speaker 6: and the Denver Nuggets, and you know that tilts the scales.
Speaker 6: I mean, I just I never thought we would see
Speaker 6: Russell Westbrook at this age be the high energy guy
Speaker 6: making the right play at the right time. But he did,
Speaker 6: and for that Game one, I was really impressed with
Speaker 6: him down the stretch. Now you're there's good stuff and
Speaker 6: then there's bad. Russ Right, there's the five to seventeen
Speaker 6: shooting where he's taking jumpers where they're begging him to shoot,
Speaker 6: and he has them clutch shots. But I don't think
Speaker 6: that you're gonna be able to rely on that going forward.
Speaker 6: Like you said, it's unexpected to get that kind of
Speaker 6: high performance from Russell Westbrook, and you're gonna need the
Speaker 6: complimentary players Peyton Watson, Porter Junior, Christian Brown. You need
Speaker 6: those guys to show up in Game two or else.
Speaker 6: I think the Clippers are the better team. I think
Speaker 6: Jokic is the best player in this series, but I
Speaker 6: think with James Harden with Zubots, who I think handles
Speaker 6: Jokic as well as anybody, I'm not saying he's a stopper,
Speaker 6: but I think Zoo is as good of a defender
Speaker 6: on Nikola Jokic, and the analytics back that up. I
Speaker 6: think they have a good shot at winning this series,
Speaker 6: a better shot than the Nuggets. But Russell Westbrook, man,
Speaker 6: he had lightning in a bottle for those last couple
Speaker 6: of minutes and he was awesome. I can understand why
Speaker 6: they're so many. Russell Westbrook stands out there because all
Speaker 6: you remember the good ones, and in victories, you remember
Speaker 6: the good ones and you forget all the mistakes and
Speaker 6: all the dumb passes and all the smoked smoke putbacks
Speaker 6: and all that. But when there's more than there are downsides, man,
Speaker 6: Russell Westbrook is awesome to root for it, and that's
Speaker 6: what he was in Game one.
Speaker 1: Not excuse me, I'm not an emotional man, Tommy, but
Speaker 1: I will say somebody who was courtsied for Marcus Camby
Speaker 1: giving Jeff Van Gundy a black eye and Jeff Van
Speaker 1: Gundy holding on for dear life of Alonzo Morning's leg.
Speaker 1: Watching Jeff Wressell with Nikola jokicch for the basketball, it
Speaker 1: made me somewhat emotion. What brought it here to my eye,
Speaker 1: I gotta say, well, you.
Speaker 6: Know what's weird about that is he had a similar
Speaker 6: thing with Matt Ishbia. Do you remember this, Yeah, yep,
Speaker 6: ball goes out of bounds and into the stands and
Speaker 6: it's Matt Ishbia, the owner of the Phoenix Suns, and Ishpia,
Speaker 6: who played as a walk on at Michigan State, was like, nah,
Speaker 6: I'm not giving you the ball back, and Yokich there
Speaker 6: was like an altercation. And then if you remember, Mark Dagnall,
Speaker 6: the coach of OKC, tried to like have this hack
Speaker 6: where they had one of his players I think it
Speaker 6: was I think it was Dylan Jones. He had one
Speaker 6: of his players stand at the scorers table to check
Speaker 6: in and then not check in because they could not
Speaker 6: stand how quickly the referees would give Jokich the ball
Speaker 6: on out of bounds like on made baskets. Yokich would
Speaker 6: get the ball so quickly, and the thunder thought that
Speaker 6: is not right, Like they got to like give the ball.
Speaker 6: He has to pass to the referee and get the
Speaker 6: ball back, and they're not ruling that correctly. So dag
Speaker 6: Nault would send a guy, a bench guy that he
Speaker 6: had no intention of going to the game, but would
Speaker 6: send him to the scorers table because he wanted Jokic
Speaker 6: to not get the ball so quickly out of bounds.
Speaker 6: And then so this is like the third time that
Speaker 6: this has happened. And of course you got Powell, who's
Speaker 6: a Jason Powell, who's the trainer, the head athletic trainer
Speaker 6: for the Clippers forever, and Jeff Van Gunny now getting
Speaker 6: with Yokich. This has become a thing. This has become
Speaker 6: a thing, and it just delights me to know end
Speaker 6: that like the only way to stop or slow down
Speaker 6: Yokic is to just hold on to the ball for
Speaker 6: a nextra beat and then you'll finally get your way.
Speaker 1: You think Jeff gets another head coaching job, Maybe he
Speaker 1: doesn't want one.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: He's done such a great job, and I'm biased, I
Speaker 1: would admit it. But do you think that will be
Speaker 1: There are opens openings and there will be more.
Speaker 2: Do you think Jeff gets a look?
Speaker 6: I think he does. I mean, you look at you know,
Speaker 6: just getting back into the game is half the battle.
Speaker 6: And I think you know he did some Team USA
Speaker 6: for the Select team for a couple of years. I
Speaker 6: think it's getting actually within the NBA circle, I think
Speaker 6: is gonna dramatically improve his chances of getting a job
Speaker 6: rather than trying to hold out for a head coaching gig.
Speaker 6: You know, this is a weird league. Man like JJ
Speaker 6: Reddick went from hosting a podcast to becoming the head
Speaker 6: coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. There is no straight
Speaker 6: line path to becoming a head coach in the NBA.
Speaker 6: And it's just, you know, these owners, I don't think
Speaker 6: they know what they want. And I think there's gonna
Speaker 6: be an owner who wants someone with that name recognition,
Speaker 6: who's a brilliant basketball strategist, who's a guy that has
Speaker 6: been around for decades in the league. And I think
Speaker 6: you're gonna see his name in some circles. Whether they
Speaker 6: hire him or not, I'm not sure what the exact
Speaker 6: right fit is, but you're telling me Sacramento or Memphis
Speaker 6: with the interim coach there, you're telling me that with
Speaker 6: Denver having I think Michael Malone is kind of in
Speaker 6: that Van Gundy tree, So I'm not I'm not totally
Speaker 6: sure they would hire Jeff Van Gundy, but I do
Speaker 6: think that he'll probably get another opportunity at some point
Speaker 6: in the next couple of years.
Speaker 1: You reference JJ Reddick and look, I don't know how
Speaker 1: much the narrative of, hey, this is his first playoff
Speaker 1: series as a head coach, so Game one was kind
Speaker 1: of a bad look for him. They did try to
Speaker 1: go small, almost exclusively, and of course out here in
Speaker 1: Salt Lake City watching Rudy Gobert have to go to
Speaker 1: the bench when the Lakers were going small, you know,
Speaker 1: we all have memories of that, and nas Reed stepped
Speaker 1: in and had a really, really good game. I was
Speaker 1: a little bit surprised that Lebron didn't seem to engage physically,
Speaker 1: because Minnesota, when they're healthy, they've got a ton of
Speaker 1: just big, physical wing defenders. And I'm not a huge
Speaker 1: Julius Randall guy because of course, plenty of years in
Speaker 1: New York where the ball just stalls with him and
Speaker 1: he had seven turnovers, and offensively, you know there are
Speaker 1: always going to be issues. But when he's engaged, he's
Speaker 1: a big, strong dude. So it is Jaden McDaniels, so
Speaker 1: his aunt, and they kind of let Lucas score and
Speaker 1: they were fine with that, but they took away his
Speaker 1: ability to facilitate he i'd one assist. So look, Lebron
Speaker 1: and Luca are both generational, they're both brilliant.
Speaker 2: So I'm not saying this is over.
Speaker 1: But takeaways from te Wolves Lakes Game one, how do
Speaker 1: you think it plays out?
Speaker 6: They need to be better shooting. I mean, when you
Speaker 6: have the Timberwolves get hot, like Julius Randall's not going
Speaker 6: to shoot for a sec from downtown, right, that's not
Speaker 6: going to continue. Jada McDaniels isn't going to shoot three
Speaker 6: to three from downtown. You get basically at twenty one
Speaker 6: points on threes from those two players. That's not replicable.
Speaker 6: But what also is it replicable is you can't have
Speaker 6: basically Luca the only one hitting threes in that game.
Speaker 6: And that's something that the Lakers have to figure out.
Speaker 6: If you're going to go small, you better hit shots
Speaker 6: from downtown. The certainly aren't going to play bully ball
Speaker 6: and just get the guy in the post and just
Speaker 6: score at will inside the paint. They need to figure
Speaker 6: out a way to get the others. I'm talking ruy Ashramura,
Speaker 6: I'm talking Gabe Vincent, these other scorers. I mean, Dorian
Speaker 6: Finney Smith has to be a three point threat. If
Speaker 6: he's going to be out there, because if you're not defending,
Speaker 6: you've got to be able to do something on the
Speaker 6: other end, and they weren't defending. The Timberwolves. Scoring one
Speaker 6: hundred and seventeen points on the surface doesn't seem like
Speaker 6: an egregious defensive game. That game was Neanderthal. That was
Speaker 6: an eighty six possession game. One hundred and seventeen points
Speaker 6: allowed on a eighty six possessions. That's one hundred and
Speaker 6: thirty three defensive rating by the Lakers. If you're gonna
Speaker 6: play DFS, if you're gonna play small, and you're gonna
Speaker 6: go with Ruy and DFS and Luki Lebron and Austin
Speaker 6: Reeves yet better be defending at a high level. But
Speaker 6: they couldn't stop the Timberwolves. And yes, a little bit
Speaker 6: of that with some unsustainably good three point shooting, but
Speaker 6: that is one of the worst defensive outputs that the
Speaker 6: Lebron led team has ever had, one hundred and thirty
Speaker 6: three point defensive rating. They got to be better defensively,
Speaker 6: more locked in, more physical, and that's what you heard
Speaker 6: from JJ Reddick. They got to bring more physicality and
Speaker 6: he's not going to call out Lebron by name and
Speaker 6: Luca by name. But they've got to be better defensively,
Speaker 6: and that is just absolutely putrid defense, one hundred and
Speaker 6: thirty three points every one hundred possions of allowing game one.
Speaker 1: So I went to the Jazz OKC game, mostly because
Speaker 1: it was the final home game of the season for
Speaker 1: the Jazz and just an excuse to go down there.
Speaker 1: And you know, I sat with Richard Smith, forty years
Speaker 1: with the Jazz, and Scottie Laden, who of course was
Speaker 1: the GM here GM in New York, and they were
Speaker 1: just marveling at how every single player on Oklahoma City's
Speaker 1: roster seems to be able to play at a really
Speaker 1: high level. I mean guys that you've never really even
Speaker 1: heard of, Guys that maybe even you know, big time
Speaker 1: NBA fans don't really know all that. Well, look, Shay
Speaker 1: went four to thirteen, had fifteen points, and they beat
Speaker 1: Memphis by fifty one. Like it's pretty it's pretty terrifying, Tom,
Speaker 1: And look, I know you know this, and so do
Speaker 1: I because we watch the league and we cover the league.
Speaker 1: They've been historically great all year with their net and
Speaker 1: we know what they can do on defense and look,
Speaker 1: Memphis is not a world beater, and obviously they're in
Speaker 1: only because they want to play in so I don't
Speaker 1: want to overreact, but that was pretty overwhelming. Watch OKC
Speaker 1: just toy with Memphis game one. What were your takeaways.
Speaker 6: I've been saying this all season, man, you know it,
Speaker 6: I U OKC is gonna run away with this thing,
Speaker 6: and game one Memphis proved at least for one game
Speaker 6: against the eight seed when they had thirty six hours
Speaker 6: before tip off. I'm talking Memphis after they on the
Speaker 6: playing spot that proclamation by me earlier this season and
Speaker 6: say that this OKAC team is something else, that they
Speaker 6: are one of the great ones and they're gonna win
Speaker 6: this thing easily. That looked smart for a night. Now
Speaker 6: I will say this to your point, it's not sexy
Speaker 6: or it's not kind of gonna draw any sort of
Speaker 6: eyeballs to just say they have a lot of high
Speaker 6: IQ players. But what's so interesting about this team is
Speaker 6: they had one finalist for the awards. One finalist. It
Speaker 6: was Shay Gilders Alexander for MVP. He probably will win it,
Speaker 6: but you're talking defense. Sixth Man of the Year, Most
Speaker 6: Improved Coach of the year, none of them have Okac's
Speaker 6: name on it. And this was the team that had
Speaker 6: the largest point differential in NBA history. They blew out
Speaker 6: teams by more than any other team in NBA history
Speaker 6: this year sixty eight wins, fourteen losses. But the way
Speaker 6: they just just destroyed teams was on a level we
Speaker 6: haven't seen. And they are not a team that had
Speaker 6: more than one appearance on the major NBA awards this year,
Speaker 6: And it just goes to show that, like this is
Speaker 6: a team that's the head of the snake is Shay
Speaker 6: Godris Alexander, but they have so many high IQ, high
Speaker 6: performing players like you said, and I'll point out that
Speaker 6: Jalen Williams leads the team in triple doubles this year.
Speaker 6: And it's not that Jalen Williams, right, the other Jalen Williams,
Speaker 6: the one who comes off the bench, the backup center
Speaker 6: who I will remind you wasn't even a first round pick.
Speaker 6: Jalen Williams from Arkansas. This dude has three triple doubles
Speaker 6: this year and he's the team leader in triple doubles,
Speaker 6: not Shay or Jalen, that guy against the Blazers earlier
Speaker 6: this year is covering the game. I was working the
Speaker 6: game and I was like, I think he's gonna get
Speaker 6: a triple double. And this guy is like their tenth
Speaker 6: best player, So like this this team is so deep.
Speaker 6: Aaron Wiggins. He's kind of this guy that if he
Speaker 6: was on the nets this year, he would have averaged
Speaker 6: twenty five a game. That's how good he is. He's
Speaker 6: already got a forty piece this season, and in ways
Speaker 6: that a lot of good scorers this year haven't had
Speaker 6: a forty burger. The Thunder are great. They play as well, disciplined,
Speaker 6: as smart. They're gonna be this team that because of
Speaker 6: the referees. If this sticks, if the referees reward physicality,
Speaker 6: the Thunder might stand to gain more than anybody. And
Speaker 6: I know people are gonna say, hey, shay goch is
Speaker 6: Alexander a foul merchant. He leads all guards in free
Speaker 6: throws per game. I get it, but you don't realize
Speaker 6: if this Thunder defense, that's already by far the best
Speaker 6: defense in the NBA, if the referees are gonna officiate
Speaker 6: and let things play, dude, it's gonna be It's gonna
Speaker 6: be a bloodbath every single night. Against Thunder lou Dort.
Speaker 6: You could call a foul on lou Dort every single
Speaker 6: time down the floor, case and walls, every time that
Speaker 6: Isaiah Hartenstein, every shake goes of Alexander, the way he
Speaker 6: swipes and and gets into every passing lane. They could
Speaker 6: call a foul on every player on this team every
Speaker 6: time down the floor. They are that physical, there's that menacing.
Speaker 6: They're that brutal to go against. And if the referees
Speaker 6: are going to swallow the wristle their whistle in the postseason, like,
Speaker 6: I don't know how you're gonna score against this team.
Speaker 6: And I feel bad for John Moran and the Memphis
Speaker 6: Grizzlies because I don't think they had a shot. But
Speaker 6: this is a warning. This is a warning. This is
Speaker 6: a This is a warning shot for the rest of
Speaker 6: the league that they took it easy on Memphis and
Speaker 6: they still couldn't score it more than eighty points if
Speaker 6: they tried for the whole game, if they played all
Speaker 6: their guys the whole game, I don't know if Memphis
Speaker 6: would have scored sixty. And so this is a team,
Speaker 6: the Thunder that is if this whistle continues, this is
Speaker 6: gonna go back to nineties basket. We're going to see
Speaker 6: a lot of wins by thirty plus and the other
Speaker 6: team is not going to score more than eighty.
Speaker 1: Which should be good news for a team like the
Speaker 1: Houston Rockets. So let's move over to Golden State Houston
Speaker 1: for a moment here, because I heard a lot of people,
Speaker 1: a lot of people and yes, Charles Barkley, but you know,
Speaker 1: over the years, I've always reminded people that that is
Speaker 1: an entertainment product, and Chuck is the one that guarantees
Speaker 1: everything and oftentimes is wrong, and I love him. Charles
Speaker 1: is great. I will die on that hill, but he's
Speaker 1: not alone. A lot of people thought Houston, with their size,
Speaker 1: their length, their physicality, they would beat Golden State round one.
Speaker 1: Maybe they still will, but you know, for all the
Speaker 1: Aman Thompson is going to have Steph Curry and jail
Speaker 1: conversation yea had Steph had his moments where he struggled.
Speaker 1: I don't know if we can be as reductive as
Speaker 1: saying superstars win games in the playoffs on the road,
Speaker 1: because that's what they do and that's who Steph and
Speaker 1: Jimmy are. When Houston's offense breaks down to the half court, Tom,
Speaker 1: I don't know who they are.
Speaker 2: I really don't.
Speaker 1: I mean, Shangun is awesome, but I don't need another isolation.
Speaker 1: Fred van Vliet dribble it through my leg seven times
Speaker 1: and then chuck up at contested three. Jalen Green didn't
Speaker 1: look ready, Tarry Easton didn't look ready. And again a
Speaker 1: young team with physicality and length. They did find something
Speaker 1: when they went Steven Adams and Shanngun together. And maybe
Speaker 1: they just have to muck it up with their bigs.
Speaker 1: But takeaways. Game one, Golden State Houston, how do you
Speaker 1: think it plays out?
Speaker 6: Yeah, they don't have shooting, they don't have I mean,
Speaker 6: if Fred van Vliet or Jalen Green don't have it going,
Speaker 6: they are gonna have to be in this kind of
Speaker 6: slug fest. And unfortunately, Draymond Green loves playing in the mud.
Speaker 6: You know, this is a guy that loves when it
Speaker 6: gets grimy, when it gets physical. That's where Draymond Green
Speaker 6: wants to play. And that's exactly playing into the Warriors' hands.
Speaker 6: Jimmy Butler, same thing. Like when it comes to just
Speaker 6: muck it up, defensive minded bully ball, I just don't
Speaker 6: think you're gonna win that game against the Warriors. If
Speaker 6: you're gonnat the Warriors, it's by getting stops and getting
Speaker 6: out in transition and scoring in the open court. But
Speaker 6: as soon as it gets into the half court, the
Speaker 6: Houston Rockets are in a very big disadvantage. And Jalen Green,
Speaker 6: I think might be one of the most overrated players
Speaker 6: in the league because I don't think his stuff will
Speaker 6: work in the playoffs. I think in our eighty two
Speaker 6: game regular season he can get you twenty twenty five points.
Speaker 6: But in the postseason, I just say he's too small,
Speaker 6: too too weak in order to really thrive in the postseason.
Speaker 6: And I think his trajectory he isn't at a point
Speaker 6: right now where he can be a winning player in
Speaker 6: the playoffs. It's only one game, but he has a
Speaker 6: lot of bad habits as a score inefficient scorer, and
Speaker 6: I worry that. You know, the Houston Rockets are going
Speaker 6: to be the number two seed and might get swept here.
Speaker 6: I don't think it's going to be a sweep. I
Speaker 6: think the Warriors are a really good team, and I've
Speaker 6: put them on my top tier of title contenders. This week.
Speaker 6: I just put out an article because if the physicality
Speaker 6: is gonna be where it is. They got to muck
Speaker 6: up the game. Dylan Brooks has to figure out a
Speaker 6: way to not only muck it up, but also be
Speaker 6: able to hit a bunch of threes, because if they're
Speaker 6: not gonna get good half court offense from those guys,
Speaker 6: they just don't have a shot. They really don't. And
Speaker 6: you said it like Shane Goon's a good player. But
Speaker 6: in order for this team to be a top tier winning,
Speaker 6: you know, number two seed in the Western Conference and
Speaker 6: being a team that's gonna win at the highest levels,
Speaker 6: they need better offense than what they had yesterday. And
Speaker 6: what I will say is this, the Golden State Warriors
Speaker 6: are great. They are a great team. And still the
Speaker 6: defense is amazing in the half court. The look the
Speaker 6: Rockets half court efficiency the five offensive rating in the
Speaker 6: half court sixty five. That's atrocious. That's in the fourth
Speaker 6: percentile according to Cleaning the Glass dot Com. You can't
Speaker 6: beat the Warriors in the half court. You have to
Speaker 6: get turnovers and you have to play up and down
Speaker 6: in the half court, I mean in the open court.
Speaker 6: There's no way that this is sustainable for the Houston Rockets.
Speaker 6: And I suspect given emy Udoka how he always likes
Speaker 6: to push the envelope. I suspect they're going to come
Speaker 6: out with some extremely hard fouls in game two and
Speaker 6: try to set the tone because they can't win without
Speaker 6: that edge. And I suspect you're going to see a
Speaker 6: very physical Emay Doka squad come in game two.
Speaker 2: Last thing, tom bit of a non sequitor.
Speaker 1: But we'll leend on this because I genuinely am just curious.
Speaker 1: Remember the Great Dumbin Dummer Comedy nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 2: You and I were in high.
Speaker 1: School when when Jim Carrey playing Lloyd Christmas just gently
Speaker 1: put his finger on the mouth of Mary to tell
Speaker 1: her to stop speaking.
Speaker 2: Do you remember that scene?
Speaker 6: Yes?
Speaker 2: Every time.
Speaker 1: Every time Nico Harrison talks, I just want to gently
Speaker 1: walk up and just put my finger over his mouth
Speaker 1: and like, buddy, just please stop?
Speaker 2: What what? What?
Speaker 1: After everything has happened, and after you know, a couple
Speaker 1: of post uh, you know, season media availability uh sessions
Speaker 1: with Nico Harrison, where are you at with that entire
Speaker 1: dynamic and a fan base that appears out for blood
Speaker 1: wanting this dude fired?
Speaker 2: Where are you at with Dallas Now?
Speaker 6: I kind of feel like we're like watching zeep. Yeah,
Speaker 6: you know, like, how can you screwed up this badly?
Speaker 6: Like how can you be surrounding yourself with people there?
Speaker 6: Tim McMahon just had this report today for ESPN. Tim
Speaker 6: McMahon had this report. I didn't realize this, but they
Speaker 6: fired Casey Smith, their longtime head athletic trainer, who says
Speaker 6: close to Dirk Novitsky and Luka Doncic as anybody like
Speaker 6: he is. He is kind of one of the untouchables
Speaker 6: in the organization, the head athletic trainer. He's also like
Speaker 6: leading the trainers Association like he's He's beloved in the
Speaker 6: NBA community. Nico Harrison fired him and then hired someone
Speaker 6: in his place who is not certified, Like how do
Speaker 6: you do that? How do you fire the most beloved
Speaker 6: guy in your organization and replace him with an amateur?
Speaker 6: And the response that that Tim mcmahnon his reporting found
Speaker 6: was well, he he Casey Smith was too negative and
Speaker 6: someone told U Tim McMahon, a team source said, Nico
Speaker 6: Harrison and I'm paraphrasing here wanted a cheerleader and that's
Speaker 6: what he got in this replacement, a yes man. Basically,
Speaker 6: it's like this. This sounds like the office. It sounds
Speaker 6: like a workplace comedy the way that this is gone.
Speaker 6: And I'm with you. I think that the only way
Speaker 6: that this can bring peace to the Dallas Mavericks is
Speaker 6: either the owners sell or the owner's clean house top
Speaker 6: to bottom. I just don't see it any other way.
Speaker 6: It gets worse as the day goes on. So, yeah,
Speaker 6: I'm with you. When Jim Carrey is that is what
Speaker 6: I'm looking I just saw a cliff. I don't know
Speaker 6: if this is if this is really what happened, but
Speaker 6: Yahoo Sports twitter account just shared a video of Nico
Speaker 6: Harrison walking off the podium and getting locked out of
Speaker 6: the facility, like he could not open the door from
Speaker 6: the press conference. He got locked out, and I'm just like,
Speaker 6: this is this is a lampoon. This has gotten to
Speaker 6: be a lampoon a front office. And that's when you
Speaker 6: know you've gotten to a place where you're you're sitting
Speaker 6: here wondering is this are we are we watching like
Speaker 6: a comedy at this point, because it is a comedy
Speaker 6: of errors at this point, and I just I just
Speaker 6: don't see a way out other than to clean house.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's every time he talks. Man, it's awkward and
Speaker 1: it's not getting better. Tom, appreciate the time, buddy. Where
Speaker 1: can people go find your work?
Speaker 6: Tom Thefinder dot com? Also check out the Big Number
Speaker 6: on Yahoo Sports. Every Thursday I riff with Dan Devine
Speaker 6: about a stat that you have to know and we
Speaker 6: discuss it at length every Thursday on Yahoo's Sports. Hey,
Speaker 6: appreciate it, Spence, and next time maybe we'll get some
Speaker 6: number forty one.
Speaker 1: There we go, love it great. Tom Haberstrow joins us
Speaker 1: on a weekly basis. Always appreciate Tom time. The link
Speaker 1: to all of his work is up on his Twitter page.
Speaker 1: It's just his name at Tom Haberstrow. All we're gonna
Speaker 1: switch gears. We're gonna talk to Utah spring football and
Speaker 1: Auburn commit is on his way to play cornerback for
Speaker 1: the Utes.
Speaker 2: We'll do some basketball, some Red Rocks as well.
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Speaker 1: phone right now and dial eight oh one six one
Speaker 1: five five five six zero eight oh one six one
Speaker 1: five five five six zero. You know, I told you
Speaker 1: I almost got emotional watching Jeff Van Gundy wrestle with
Speaker 1: Nikola Jokics for the basketball Well, I almost just got
Speaker 1: emotional during this intro because I'm I'm very proud of you.
Speaker 1: You have redeemed yourself since we were already talking about
Speaker 1: dumb and dummer after the faux pas, you know, first
Speaker 1: bump you you came back strong man.
Speaker 2: So good job.
Speaker 3: It's quite the deep track, uh number forty one.
Speaker 1: I'm all I like it, though, I'm also proud of myself.
Speaker 1: Do you want to know why was that?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 1: You see that uncrustable sandwich? I do, It's unopened.
Speaker 3: You didn't try to push it down last thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: So I went out to speak to our clients who
Speaker 1: are in studio to see how they're enjoying their experience.
Speaker 2: And I came back in.
Speaker 1: I looked at the clock, and I'm hungry indeed, and
Speaker 1: I wanted to eat my incrustable, but I realized Josh
Speaker 1: Furlong was on the phone, so I did not open
Speaker 1: it and tried to, you know, shove it down in
Speaker 1: twenty seconds.
Speaker 2: So I'm proud of you, and I'm proud of me.
Speaker 9: Today.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, we've went, we've We've kept Josh waiting,
Speaker 3: I think long enough.
Speaker 1: Now, Yeah, let's bring him in. Josh Furlong, Happy Monday, buddy.
Speaker 1: How are we doing?
Speaker 6: I'm doing well.
Speaker 4: I mean, you can get you're incrustable if you want.
Speaker 4: I'm not gonna you know, we can take some time.
Speaker 2: You know, Josh, you're a really good radio guest.
Speaker 1: So maybe I'll just ask you a question and then
Speaker 1: you pontificate for like five minutes and I'll just eat
Speaker 1: a sandwich. How about that?
Speaker 6: Good?
Speaker 2: All right? Brother?
Speaker 1: Spring football? I saw you up there. The beer looks phenomenal,
Speaker 1: by the way, and look, you know every year Spring game,
Speaker 1: it's just as you and I have talked about, it's
Speaker 1: kind of an excuse to talk football, is an excuse
Speaker 1: to talk to you. It's but were there anything any
Speaker 1: Josh for long takeaways that you think we're actually real
Speaker 1: that Utah fans would be interested in on this Monday.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean, I think this one was harder than most,
Speaker 4: just simply because they paired it back a ton. I mean,
Speaker 4: it was a perfect opportunity for Kyle Whittingham defense to
Speaker 4: score points. I mean, I think that works. But I
Speaker 4: mean I think there's definitely things to take away. I
Speaker 4: know there's you know, a lot of players that didn't play,
Speaker 4: especially the frontline days. But I think the biggest question
Speaker 4: in my mind was, you know, what does Devin Dampier
Speaker 4: look like? You know, can he run an offense? You
Speaker 4: know in the Big twelve? That kind of stuff? And
Speaker 4: not that we got a bunch of answers from that,
Speaker 4: especially as this team started slow. But I think, you know,
Speaker 4: you've got enough of an understanding of what.
Speaker 6: He can do.
Speaker 4: You can see how he kind of processes information, even
Speaker 4: if it is a vanilla offense, you can kind of
Speaker 4: see how he works.
Speaker 9: And I think you can leave that.
Speaker 4: Feeling optimistic, you know. I mean, I know a lot
Speaker 4: of teams do that coming out of spring, that they
Speaker 4: feel optimistic. But I think just based on where Utah
Speaker 4: was last year and just kind of the down and
Speaker 4: the dumps and everything that the Utah is in. This
Speaker 4: is a great sign of progress, and I think, you know,
Speaker 4: there's there's a lot of opportunities for Utah. But with
Speaker 4: that said, there's still some things that you can to
Speaker 4: work on, and most readily available is wide receiver. Wide
Speaker 4: receiver needs to catch the ball and there's far too
Speaker 4: many drops for a vanilla type offense to to really
Speaker 4: give a lot of fans optimism. But at the same time,
Speaker 4: you know, those things happen. You know, those things can
Speaker 4: be corrected. They're not the worst things in the world.
Speaker 4: But I mean, if you can't get those things to work,
Speaker 4: then it's going to be a trouble. But I think
Speaker 4: just looking at stuff, you know, some of the passes
Speaker 4: that Dan Peer made, especially that one to Zach Williams.
Speaker 4: He made a couple to de Luca Calderella, one being
Speaker 4: a touchdown and he's got great touch on the ball.
Speaker 4: The one to Zach Williams especially, I mean, that was
Speaker 4: perfectly placed. It was a brilliant pass. You know, it
Speaker 4: doesn't matter what kind of defense that that was. You know,
Speaker 4: you were able to see some good things from him.
Speaker 4: Some you know, I left it, you know, filling wanting
Speaker 4: more But at the same time, I think there was
Speaker 4: enough that it kind of what the palette, so to speak,
Speaker 4: and gave Utah fans an idea of what he could be.
Speaker 4: And I think that says a lot for what Utah
Speaker 4: can have is going into the seat of knowing how
Speaker 4: bad it was last year.
Speaker 1: How tall is Devin you were standing next to him
Speaker 1: for an interview. How tall is Devin damp here?
Speaker 4: That's a good question. Five eleven maybe five ten. I
Speaker 4: mean you could push six foot if you have cleats
Speaker 4: on his stuff. But yeah, I mean he's not a
Speaker 4: tall guy by any means.
Speaker 1: I wonder what your confidence level because a lot of
Speaker 1: Devin's damage last year New Mexico was with his legs,
Speaker 1: and you know, the big twelve is going to be
Speaker 1: a step up, and the numbers through the air weren't great,
Speaker 1: you know, the tds and interception ratio with his arm
Speaker 1: weren't great. But with what you've seen so far, and
Speaker 1: with what you have learned in your conversations with his staff,
Speaker 1: how confident are you that he can replicate, replicate, excuse
Speaker 1: me slash improve his production even taking a step up
Speaker 1: in competition.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot of optimism
Speaker 4: about you know, where he can go in terms of
Speaker 4: his completion percentage. You know, I got to see a
Speaker 4: few of that in the spring session where they allowed
Speaker 4: the media in, and then obviously we got the spring game,
Speaker 4: and by all accounts, you know, he was sitting his
Speaker 4: receiver as well, he was seeing the targets.
Speaker 6: Well.
Speaker 4: You know, he did throw one an interception that I remember,
Speaker 4: but I mean it was it was more of a
Speaker 4: defensive play than anything. But I think more than anything,
Speaker 4: based on Kenneth, how this has gone is he has
Speaker 4: a phenomenal offensive line in front of him. And so
Speaker 4: maybe you know, I can't say that I've sat there
Speaker 4: and I've watched all of New Mexico's games and the
Speaker 4: tapes and to see how his passes were gone or
Speaker 4: different things that way, but I think you're going to
Speaker 4: see an offensive line that's going to absolutely help him
Speaker 4: give him the time that he needs, give him exactly
Speaker 4: you know, kind of the space in the needs Utah
Speaker 4: and theory. I mean, you'd have to hope that they
Speaker 4: have a better wide receiver corps than what New Mexico had,
Speaker 4: and so I think just the options alone give him
Speaker 4: the advantage and then you get him the opportunity to
Speaker 4: be in Jason Beck's offense a little bit longer. You know,
Speaker 4: he's got his quarterback coach that's come with him as well.
Speaker 4: You know, I think everything is kind of lending itself
Speaker 4: to him progressing and making that jump. But you know
Speaker 4: it's going to be a completely different ride, you know,
Speaker 4: going against Mountain West defenses versus the Big twelve defenses,
Speaker 4: and it's not that he can't make that jump and
Speaker 4: he's obviously going against Utah's defense on a weekly basis.
Speaker 4: You know, it's it's still TBB right, Like it's real
Speaker 4: leavey for you and I to talk in April and say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 4: everything's going to be better, But you know, we all
Speaker 4: know how this goes that. You know, you can have
Speaker 4: a lot of optimism and have a lot of excitement
Speaker 4: about it, but it has to kind of bear fruit
Speaker 4: in the fall. So I think everything is tracking that way.
Speaker 4: I think, you know, everything is good. It's a clear
Speaker 4: difference in kind of who he is compared to the
Speaker 4: rest of the quarterbacks in that room, and I think
Speaker 4: you know, you have to be optimistic about that and
Speaker 4: know that you know, everything is lending itself that way,
Speaker 4: and even if not, I mean he's able to do enough.
Speaker 4: There's enough assets around him that it's not going to
Speaker 4: be the end of the world.
Speaker 1: After bringing me on wrapped up there spring ball, Harrison,
Speaker 1: Taggert and Keel and Marion announced they're hitting the transfer portal.
Speaker 1: And typically when spring ball is over, that's when you
Speaker 1: get the news who's moving on, who's staying. And I'm
Speaker 1: just wondering, Josh, throughout your conversations with the staff, whether
Speaker 1: or not, you know, if we are planning now for
Speaker 1: potential contributor contributors excuse me, not just fringe guys that
Speaker 1: maybe not even are going to play, But are you
Speaker 1: anticipating in Utah football losing any players over the next
Speaker 1: I think forty eight hours before the window closes.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean there might be a few. I haven't
Speaker 4: heard of any, you know, impact players necessarily, you know,
Speaker 4: Utah has to cut down its roster and so there's
Speaker 4: going to be some of those things where it's either
Speaker 4: natural attrition or it's Utah kind of saying hey, we're
Speaker 4: not going to have a spot for you once this happens. So,
Speaker 4: you know, I wouldn't be surprised if some of that
Speaker 4: would happen. There's always you know, a guy or two
Speaker 4: out there this this level in the world where you know,
Speaker 4: nil is going to come calling, and maybe there's some
Speaker 4: things out there that that attract someone. But I think
Speaker 4: by and large, you know, if you take coach with
Speaker 4: by you know, face value, I think he has a
Speaker 4: good handle of of what's going on, and he seems
Speaker 4: to think it's not going to be too crazy. Based
Speaker 4: on what I've heard. I also agree with him. You know,
Speaker 4: those things change. There's a few players that went into
Speaker 4: the portal and fall that had locked themselves in and
Speaker 4: seems like they were going to be a contributor this year,
Speaker 4: and then they left. So you know, it's crazy. We've
Speaker 4: got till Friday until the portal closes, and so we'll
Speaker 4: see what happens. But I think the core of what
Speaker 4: you've got at Utah is going to be relatively intact.
Speaker 4: It's more of just guys maybe looking for opportunities to
Speaker 4: go elsewhere or try to get more money or whatever
Speaker 4: that may be.
Speaker 6: So we'll see.
Speaker 4: But I don't I don't imagine that we're going to
Speaker 4: get that now that I say that we're going to
Speaker 4: get an influx of people, and you know, we're going
Speaker 4: to look back on this like there and it's given
Speaker 4: mess us up. But no, I think it's I think
Speaker 4: it's not going to be too bad.
Speaker 2: What about additions.
Speaker 1: I read that there's a cornerback on his way from Auburn.
Speaker 1: I know that they had the Micah Hudson kid in
Speaker 1: town as a potential addition as a wide out. So
Speaker 1: any update or inside about potential additions that you talk
Speaker 1: could make prior to the window closing this week?
Speaker 10: Yeah, they did.
Speaker 9: They get the J. C.
Speaker 4: Hart kid from from Marburne that he committed this morning,
Speaker 4: So that's going to add some depth to the cornerback room.
Speaker 4: They'll continue to look for more pieces just to kind
Speaker 4: of have more depth there so that they can get it.
Speaker 4: The Micah Hudson thing was interesting. He actually didn't end
Speaker 4: up visiting. There were some issues that prevented him from coming,
Speaker 4: and it sounds like the predictions are that he's going
Speaker 4: to go back to Texas Tech. So I know there
Speaker 4: was the some coaching staff that we're really interested in
Speaker 4: trying to get him, whether they went down there to
Speaker 4: talk to him or what. You know, that one seems
Speaker 4: like it's probably out of the way. But Utah is
Speaker 4: going to have to go for a you know, a
Speaker 4: high end receiver. They're going to have to put their
Speaker 4: name in there, put the name and a hat for
Speaker 4: a lot of these guys to see what they can do.
Speaker 4: I think there was enough shown from what Utah has
Speaker 4: that they'll be okay this season. But if they could
Speaker 4: find at the very minimum one more that can really
Speaker 4: pair with Zach Williams or kind of be the guy himself,
Speaker 4: I think that would help them. You know, that's going
Speaker 4: to be a big emphasis. Utah has been pretty active
Speaker 4: in the defensive tackle room transfer portal. They've been They've
Speaker 4: been putting out some feelers for a bunch of different
Speaker 4: guys and putting in some offers. So I think you're
Speaker 4: going to be active in kind of those three positions mainly.
Speaker 4: But Kyle said on Saturday, they're not necessarily looking for
Speaker 4: a position necessarily. It's more just trying to find guys
Speaker 4: to improve. So, you know, if there's a guy that
Speaker 4: comes in that's that's you know, a better tight end
Speaker 4: or a better quarterback, you know they're not going to
Speaker 4: find better than Devin Dampier. But if you can find
Speaker 4: somebody to be you know, add more depth or whatever
Speaker 4: that may be. They're gonna they're gonna look at it.
Speaker 4: So those are the primary focus areas. But they're going
Speaker 4: to find anybody that they can that can be contributors,
Speaker 4: you know, whether it be this year or down the
Speaker 4: down the.
Speaker 1: Rum wonder, Josh, if you've heard anything or uncovered anything
Speaker 1: about the future of spring football for Utah the forever
Speaker 1: twenty two game for Utah. A lot of major college
Speaker 1: football programs, among them Nebraska, Texas, USC, Oklahoma others have
Speaker 1: simply canceled their spring games. They have that it's no
Speaker 1: longer a thing around campuses. And some of these campuses,
Speaker 1: like Oklahoma, at their peak, they would get fifty sixty
Speaker 1: thousand people at their spring football game. So a lot
Speaker 1: of programs around the country doing away with spring football.
Speaker 2: Do you know what the plan is for the Utes?
Speaker 6: Ye?
Speaker 4: As of right now, it sounds like Utah is still
Speaker 4: is going to plan on going. I know Kyle, he's
Speaker 4: interested in many different options.
Speaker 9: You know.
Speaker 4: The whole Deon Sanders situation of wanting to play other
Speaker 4: teams or whether it be FCS teams coming in that
Speaker 4: intrigues him and that's something that he'd be open to.
Speaker 4: I think Utah has also kind of put themselves. I
Speaker 4: wouldn't say put them in a box necessarily, but calling
Speaker 4: it the twenty two forever game, Frand has discontinues that.
Speaker 4: You know, I don't want to say it's a bad book,
Speaker 4: but I think, you know, this is something that allows
Speaker 4: people to remember those guys and helps that legacy move on.
Speaker 4: And I think you know they're going to be continued
Speaker 4: to be contrade, excuse me, continually be cre native with
Speaker 4: how they change their spring. You know, the fact you're
Speaker 4: trying to showcase the offense, emptfense and try to do
Speaker 4: different things that way. I think they can keep it
Speaker 4: without giving away too much. I think they've gotten better
Speaker 4: at understanding what they can limit so that you're not
Speaker 4: giving too much for opposing teams to kind of find
Speaker 4: guys through the portal or whatever that may be. But
Speaker 4: as of right now, it doesn't sound like there's any
Speaker 4: intentions to change it. You know, I think the coaching
Speaker 4: staff would prefer to have a closed scrimmage so they
Speaker 4: could actually work through stuff that they want to work
Speaker 4: through and not feel like they have to water it down.
Speaker 4: They're not a big fan of having to water it
Speaker 4: down as well, but that's kind of the nature of
Speaker 4: the sport. So I'm sure it'll go through some evolutions,
Speaker 4: but I don't have.
Speaker 9: Of right now.
Speaker 4: I haven't heard any plans to change kind of the
Speaker 4: current structure of what you touch them.
Speaker 1: One more football question, we'll get a basketball at a
Speaker 1: Red Rocks question, and then we'll set you loose, Josh.
Speaker 1: You know again, it is April, and it's really hard
Speaker 1: to analyze what anything is going to look like come fall.
Speaker 1: And I hate to ask you just kind of like
Speaker 1: an intangible feel good question. But I have heard Coach
Speaker 1: Wit and a couple of coaches I caught up with
Speaker 1: on Saturday all say the same thing, which is the
Speaker 1: energy in the building is better than it has been.
Speaker 1: It's just more positive than it has been. And that
Speaker 1: shouldn't be taken as a knock on anyone. And I
Speaker 1: think we can all understand the stress the past couple
Speaker 1: of years have taken on the program simply because of
Speaker 1: lack of health and ambiguity around player availability, and then
Speaker 1: a really really tough year one in the Big twelve.
Speaker 1: Do you believe them when they say that the energy,
Speaker 1: I guess the kids say the vibes are high. Do
Speaker 1: you believe the coaches when they say that leading into
Speaker 1: the upcoming year two four A into Big twelve play, Yeah.
Speaker 9: Absolutely do.
Speaker 4: I mean just being around them there is a completely
Speaker 4: different fill. I felt like leap into the viewing sessions
Speaker 4: that we had, there was a lot more juice, you know,
Speaker 4: with this team, there was a lot more kind of
Speaker 4: a fall fill where everybody is trying to get better. Immediately,
Speaker 4: it wasn't you know, we've got this down the road.
Speaker 4: Was this matters right now? And so you're getting a
Speaker 4: team that obviously feels like they need to be improved,
Speaker 4: but more or less like they're all having fun. You
Speaker 4: can see it in their faces when you talk to them.
Speaker 4: They're having fun. That's not to mean that they're you know,
Speaker 4: casual and how they approach things, but they're definitely doing
Speaker 4: things in a way that was you know in the
Speaker 4: start contrast to last year. And I think part of
Speaker 4: that is is Utah tried so hard to remain on
Speaker 4: top and so there was a ton of pressure and
Speaker 4: then you kind of started slipping with some things. Guys
Speaker 4: started not feeling like they needed to do certain things
Speaker 4: because they've been there before, right your two time reigning
Speaker 4: packed up champions. You know, maybe we don't need to
Speaker 4: listen to this or try as hard. You know, we
Speaker 4: know we're gonna be pick number one. We've added this depth,
Speaker 4: so that naturally means that we're gonna be there, and
Speaker 4: you kind of start believing your own press. I think
Speaker 4: you kind of starting to see a slip. And so
Speaker 4: I think, you know, all the horrible stuff that happened
Speaker 4: for Utah last year really kind of galvanized this team,
Speaker 4: even though half of this team wasn't even here. I
Speaker 4: think that culture and that mindset of you know, we're
Speaker 4: not gonna let this happen again, and we got to
Speaker 4: be hungry for what we want has really permeated throughout
Speaker 4: the entire team. So I've definitely seen it. The players
Speaker 4: have spoken a bunch about it, the coaches have done it.
Speaker 4: But you're also getting coaches that are different. I mean
Speaker 4: Mark Atuaya, I mean he brings in a whole other
Speaker 4: level of intensity and personality that we just didn't get
Speaker 4: with previous coaching staffs. Right Like, he's out there on
Speaker 4: social media being active, He's trying to showcase kind of
Speaker 4: how the program is. And I think that transcends down
Speaker 4: to the players as well, but they feel like that
Speaker 4: they can beat themselves while still playing at a high
Speaker 4: level for Utah. So, you know, if the vibes are immaculate,
Speaker 4: we'll call it. It's been really good and I think
Speaker 4: things are going well for Utah. And you know, obviously
Speaker 4: we'll have to see what happens when adversity comes. But
Speaker 4: I think right now Utah is in a much healthier
Speaker 4: and better place than they have been in the last
Speaker 4: couple of years.
Speaker 1: The Memphis Grizzlies beat the Dallas Mavericks on Friday night,
Speaker 1: which means Alex Jensen is now free and clear allocate
Speaker 1: all of his time and energy to his job as.
Speaker 2: The head coach for the youth.
Speaker 1: So give us a little bit of an update, Josh. Well,
Speaker 1: then I'll ask you about the Red Rocks for a
Speaker 1: set you loose Jakai Howard fourth transfer portal commit an
Speaker 1: Auburn kid. I believe they still have seven roster spots
Speaker 1: available question Mark, and we're still kind of waiting to
Speaker 1: hear whether or not there are more additions to the staff.
Speaker 1: So now that Alex is on the ground full time,
Speaker 1: let's get an update on Utah men's basketball.
Speaker 2: Where are we at with it?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so there are seven spots that they can do.
Speaker 4: But the reality is is that that's the number that's
Speaker 4: up from from what they've always had. Usually, Utah can
Speaker 4: have thirteen scholarships. With this impending house case, that would
Speaker 4: push it up to fifteen total players. Yeah, you can
Speaker 4: count that they have that with their walk on and stuff.
Speaker 4: But you know this is, you know, they've got the
Speaker 4: bulk of kind of their roster, so to speak, and
Speaker 4: they're they're doing well with the eight players that they have.
Speaker 4: This Jakai Howard kid that just committed from Auburn. Utah
Speaker 4: doing really well with getting those Auburn guys lately in
Speaker 4: both football and basketball. But he can jump out of
Speaker 4: the gym. I mean, he's athletic, he's you know, a
Speaker 4: guy that has tremendous upside. It seems like, you know,
Speaker 4: Utah has really kind of identified a type that they
Speaker 4: want to go after. They want to be able to
Speaker 4: run the ball, you know, high upside, get into guard play,
Speaker 4: and things have gone well there. You know, I don't
Speaker 4: know that anything necessarily changes drastically because Alex Jensen can
Speaker 4: be here more more fully, he entrusted his coaching staff,
Speaker 4: you know, whether that be Rafael Chilius or anybody else,
Speaker 4: to really kind of take the lead in the recruiting front.
Speaker 4: And they've done really well even with him not being
Speaker 4: here full time. So I don't think things drastically change,
Speaker 4: but I think it now helps maybe whether you be
Speaker 4: closing deals or just really having a better understanding of
Speaker 4: kind of where Utah needs to go. But this is
Speaker 4: a team that I think, you know, you're starting to
Speaker 4: see the pieces, You're starting to see things come together.
Speaker 4: They do need some more depth players, and they do
Speaker 4: need some more guys that can kind of sit there,
Speaker 4: but you have to like the eight players that Utah has.
Speaker 4: There's a lot of upside. There's a lot of youths
Speaker 4: still there, that's still some experience that that allows Uta
Speaker 4: to be able to move forward and grow and at
Speaker 4: least make a more competitive jump than maybe in the
Speaker 4: year's past.
Speaker 1: All right, before I said, you lose rough event for
Speaker 1: the Red Rocks after a great start. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: such an incredible streak forty nine straight appearances. But Oklahoma again,
Speaker 1: they've established themselves as the dominant gymnastics program. Utah finishes
Speaker 1: fourth I believe after a really strong start. So how
Speaker 1: did this kind of unravel for the Red Rocks?
Speaker 2: Josh, Yeah, this has been.
Speaker 4: An interesting situation for the Red Rocks because you know,
Speaker 4: the last five years they've been in that last day.
Speaker 4: You know, four of those years they finished in third,
Speaker 4: and they really wanted to be able to finish more
Speaker 4: than third this year. And based on their semi finals
Speaker 4: of getting the top score out of all the teams,
Speaker 4: they were the real likelihood that Utah could get a championship.
Speaker 4: But for whatever reason, you know, they just kind of
Speaker 4: crumbled on on Saturday. And you know, they're not massive things,
Speaker 4: but in gymnastics, all it takes is one little thing
Speaker 4: and then it starts kind of trickling down to others,
Speaker 4: and especially when it's you know, your veteran gymnast, somebody
Speaker 4: like a Grace McCallum who's making mistakes that she traditionally
Speaker 4: doesn't make. It kind of you know, Rocks a lot
Speaker 4: of players or athletes, you know, and where they're they're
Speaker 4: trying to come in there and do what they need
Speaker 4: to and you just saw something you know that you
Speaker 4: don't usually see. I don't know what it is, you know,
Speaker 4: do you need to bring the phage in and kind
Speaker 4: of bring out some purses in the dunky or whatever.
Speaker 5: I mean.
Speaker 4: The fact that they're getting into the top four it
Speaker 4: every year is a remarkable feat, but it's been really
Speaker 4: tough for them to get over the edge and really
Speaker 4: get there. So, you know, I know, this this shock
Speaker 4: to the team. They didn't expect us at all. Carlie
Speaker 4: Dochendorff is a great coach and she's been able to
Speaker 4: do really well with his team, and she truly believes
Speaker 4: that she's in the right spot to be able to
Speaker 4: win a championship. But they've got to find kind of
Speaker 4: that mental edge. Maybe it's finding a way to peak
Speaker 4: at a little different time so that you can get
Speaker 4: there instead of earlier. But you know, it's an unfortunate
Speaker 4: thing for Utah. It's been thirty years since they've won
Speaker 4: their last national championship, and yet they continue to get
Speaker 4: there and they're right in the mix every year. It's
Speaker 4: just you know, at this point, it feels like you're
Speaker 4: always the bridesmaid, never the bride. So one of the
Speaker 4: times they're going to potentially get it, but unfortunately just
Speaker 4: fell up short this year.
Speaker 1: Josh, you're the man, appreciate the time today, have a
Speaker 1: great week, and we'll get you back soon.
Speaker 6: Okay, sounds good.
Speaker 4: Go get that in prestable and they'll be fine.
Speaker 1: Oh my mouth is watering, my man, Josh Furlong today
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Speaker 1: all right, We've got Ben Sollak stopping by to start.
Speaker 2: The four o'clock hour of the program.
Speaker 1: We'll do some NFL Draft with Ben today, one of
Speaker 1: our favorite NFL guests. Some NFL offseason news, the draft
Speaker 1: right around the corner. Love Draft week. Not a ton
Speaker 1: of the local buzz like there typically is. There's the
Speaker 1: Tyler Batty Kid, Caleb Etn, Jacob Robinson from Brigham Young.
Speaker 1: There of course is Junior Tafuna, corenne Reed Well, Brent Keithy,
Speaker 1: Caleb loner is getting a lot of attention, Mackai Bernard.
Speaker 1: Uh So we'll get with Ben and then we'll do
Speaker 1: a little RSL with Ryan duns At. A tough match
Speaker 1: for the for the lads over the weekend. They lost
Speaker 1: to Toronto at home. A red card for Diego Luna
Speaker 1: that has been challenged by the club. They're appealing Diego's
Speaker 1: red cards, so hopefully Diego will be able to play
Speaker 1: in San Diego coming.
Speaker 2: Up this weekend.
Speaker 1: But Porter, wouldn't you consider yourself a bit of an outlaw?
Speaker 1: Is that fair to say?
Speaker 3: I think, uh, I think that's for others to decide.
Speaker 1: Spencer, I mean, you're related to Jesse James we've been
Speaker 1: over this right.
Speaker 2: Oh and the sun Dance Kid.
Speaker 3: Technically they're related through marriage.
Speaker 2: Okay, So you do not consider yourself an outlaw.
Speaker 3: I guess outlaw is just someone who does things that
Speaker 3: are illegal.
Speaker 2: So maybe, oh well, okay. And I like to.
Speaker 3: Speed, I like to park illegally. I like to defy
Speaker 3: parking publicly, defy parking police.
Speaker 1: Okay, so Porter is a bit of an outlaw. We
Speaker 1: do have a new client on the show. They're They're
Speaker 1: They're called Outlawed. Is still an excited to welcome in
Speaker 1: the welcome them in a new partner on the s
Speaker 1: ESPN Sports Network. It's Outlawed Distillery, a homegrown grain to glass,
Speaker 1: nitty gritty whiskey, vodka, rum, and moonshine. Wow, moonshine, moonshine
Speaker 1: Distiller out of Monday, Huh Moonshine Distillery right here in
Speaker 1: Salt Lake County. Outlaw Distillery, Utah grown with so much
Speaker 1: history here of cowboys.
Speaker 2: Outlaws, mining, and more.
Speaker 1: Outlaw has everything on the spirit spectrum for their spiced rum,
Speaker 1: vanilla bean rum, Outlaw coffee, rum, honeybourbon, barrel proof whiskey, vodka, moonshine.
Speaker 1: They have it all, and they're embracing the Outlaw name
Speaker 1: by being rebellious and making some very unique spirits that
Speaker 1: aren't being seen or created by any other distilleries in Utah.
Speaker 2: Passionate group, we're happy to have them on board.
Speaker 1: So if you want to try their spirits, you can
Speaker 1: either find their bottles in the local liquor store or
Speaker 1: you can book a tasting, and that's the best thing
Speaker 1: to do, So tell them that I sent you. It's
Speaker 1: about an hour and a half and you get to
Speaker 1: try all their spirits and you get to keep a
Speaker 1: shot glass as a souvenir. So get your tour and
Speaker 1: tasting booked at outlawdistillery dot com today. They opened in
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen as the fourth distillery in the state of Utah.
Speaker 1: Deeply rooted in Utah history and tradition, even the name
Speaker 1: Outlaws inspired by legendary characters such as that Guy's distant
Speaker 1: relative Butch Cassidy born in Beaver, Utah, and the Outlaw Trails,
Speaker 1: which serves as a primary transportation route for many of
Speaker 1: the notorious Wild West Outlaws. The vision for Outlaw Distillery
Speaker 1: is clear and help show the world that some of
Speaker 1: the best spirits can come from one of the least
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Speaker 1: friends at Outlaw Distillery get your tour and tasting booked
Speaker 1: at Outlawdistillery dot com today.
Speaker 2: Tell him, I cens you.
Speaker 1: They're gonna hook you up with a shot glass and
Speaker 1: we are going to send somebody, one lucky listener to
Speaker 1: play little golf, a free round of golf to Glenmore.
Speaker 2: So it's our Festival of Tease giveaway.
Speaker 1: We are doing it every day this spring, sending you
Speaker 1: to a different golf course every single day. So we'll
Speaker 1: send you to Glenmore today at eight seven seven three
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Speaker 2: Text in you know what? Text in your favorite Outlaw?
Speaker 1: There we go of all time? Who's your favorite outlaw
Speaker 1: of all time? Is it Billy the Kid? Porter's this?
Speaker 1: You're related to Billy the Kid too?
Speaker 2: Or No? I don't think so.
Speaker 1: Is it Billy the Kid? Is it Butch Cassidy? Is
Speaker 1: it Jesse James? I don't know that I know any
Speaker 1: other Outlaws?
Speaker 2: Do you? Come on?
Speaker 3: Harvey Logan, the.
Speaker 2: Great Harvey Logan never gets any love.
Speaker 3: Kid Curry, Kid Curry flat Nose Curry his cousin.
Speaker 1: You're making that up eight seven seven three five three
Speaker 1: zero seven hundred text and your favorite aut porters going
Speaker 1: to send you to play golf at Glenmore. So we'll
Speaker 1: do a little draft with Ben Solak, will do a
Speaker 1: little RSL with Brian Dunseeth. So when it comes to
Speaker 1: the local prospects, you know, it is interesting up at
Speaker 1: the spring game on Saturday. Our guy Britton Covey in
Speaker 1: the house, our guy Zach Moss in the house, Devin
Speaker 1: Lloyd among others. And of course when those three are present,
Speaker 1: it makes you remember often times Utah football, you know,
Speaker 1: entering draft week seems to have a little bit more
Speaker 1: buzz than this group.
Speaker 2: Now, Junior Tafuna.
Speaker 1: When you look at some of the draft grades, Porter, Junior,
Speaker 1: coren A Brandt and Caleb.
Speaker 2: And Makai Bernard in the mix as well.
Speaker 1: But most of the youths this year have like six
Speaker 1: seven round draft grades. What do you make of the
Speaker 1: potential for you know, Utah football players maybe potentially hearing
Speaker 1: their name called than the draft, or you think most
Speaker 1: of these guys are undrafted free agents?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean you're gonna see I would say mostly
Speaker 3: undrafted free agents. I do think that Junior Tafuna gets
Speaker 3: his name called kind of mid draft mid draft range.
Speaker 3: Karennie Reid and Keithy I think have a opportunity to
Speaker 3: get drafted as well. There's a there's I think a
Speaker 3: couple fits for bran Keithy where if he's available at
Speaker 3: a certain time, a certain team will pick him. He
Speaker 3: may not be very high up on like the overall
Speaker 3: tight end board specifically because of his injuries and whatnot.
Speaker 3: But if you'll remember going into what would have been
Speaker 3: two seasons ago when we thought bran Keithy might play,
Speaker 3: he was the NCAA Division One leader at the tight
Speaker 3: end position in every receiving stat category before he came back,
Speaker 3: before he tried to come back from that knee injury,
Speaker 3: So they kind of know what he's capable of. They
Speaker 3: want to see if you can still do it, because Spence,
Speaker 3: it has been two years now. On the bran Keithy's side,
Speaker 3: if he performs well and looks good in all of
Speaker 3: their workouts, I think he has an opportunity to get drafted.
Speaker 3: Same goes with with karnnie Reid, maybe amid to late
Speaker 3: round pick from there, Dori and singer Mackay Bernard some
Speaker 3: of the other guys you mentioned. They may get some
Speaker 3: undrafted free agent or mini camp calls, but I don't
Speaker 3: necessarily think they'll they'll hear their name on Sunday, unless again,
Speaker 3: there's a super specific fit that that really liked them
Speaker 3: going through the process.
Speaker 2: Britain Covey free agents.
Speaker 1: I will allow Britain Covey to reveal his plans when.
Speaker 2: The time is right. And Zach has one more year
Speaker 2: with Cincinnati.
Speaker 3: Yeah, obviously, both those guys going through a really tough
Speaker 3: year trying to stay healthy, both of them dealing with
Speaker 3: actually somewhat similar situations as far as the nagging injury goes.
Speaker 3: So that's number one with their offseason this year, and
Speaker 3: then number two is is, yeah, figuring out what comes
Speaker 3: next for for each of those guys. But Zach is
Speaker 3: a is under contract with the Bengals. He got a
Speaker 3: multi year deal into uh into last offseason, which is
Speaker 3: huge getting into the the the NFL. Uh uh, the
Speaker 3: NFL's four year when you get paid after your career.
Speaker 1: What's the word, I'm I'm blanking looking for the NFL
Speaker 1: pench tension.
Speaker 3: He's uh, he's locked and loaded down.
Speaker 2: You gotta get it, man.
Speaker 1: I always, uh, I always feel bad for a guy
Speaker 1: Britton Johnson, not Britain Covey, because Britton Johnson was just
Speaker 1: like a couple of months away from getting an NBA
Speaker 1: pension and unfortunately, uh, you know, but made good money
Speaker 1: overseas and.
Speaker 2: There are stories like that.
Speaker 10: You know.
Speaker 1: It's one of the more under talked about because I
Speaker 1: don't think fans give a rip to have pension talk
Speaker 1: on sports soccer radio.
Speaker 2: But that's uh, I mean, that's a life changing thing.
Speaker 1: If you can play long enough, if you're ten years
Speaker 1: long enough where suddenly you're paid the rest of life
Speaker 1: has stipend every month to live.
Speaker 2: It's one of the benefits.
Speaker 1: Utah football did land a commit for their twenty twenty
Speaker 1: six class.
Speaker 2: Preston Pitts is his name.
Speaker 1: The Utes had a bunch of commits, or I should
Speaker 1: say a bunch of prospects in town over the weekend
Speaker 1: for that spring game. And the good news about this Monday,
Speaker 1: and we'll have to see how the week plays out
Speaker 1: because the transfer portal is open in college football throughout
Speaker 1: the course of the week, and usually what has happened
Speaker 1: ever since the transfer portal became a reality of this
Speaker 1: sport is that when programs end their spring session, players
Speaker 1: know exactly what sort of hand they've been dealt, whether
Speaker 1: or not they're going to play, whether or not they
Speaker 1: have received a better offer from different schools. And BYU
Speaker 1: wraps up their spring ball and they hear pretty quickly
Speaker 1: that Harrison Taggart, an Oregon transfer as a linebacker, had
Speaker 1: a really good year for Jay Hill's defense last year,
Speaker 1: is getting gone. He's in the transfer portal, as is
Speaker 1: Keelan Marion, who is a dynamic wide receiver and a
Speaker 1: kick returner as well. So some bad news for BYU today,
Speaker 1: But nothing on the Utah front, which is really good news. Now,
Speaker 1: nothing yet, Okay, So coach with Morgan Scalley, Jason Beck,
Speaker 1: they're going to have their exit interviews as the players
Speaker 1: will kind of be on their own for a little
Speaker 1: bit when it comes to springball ending and you know,
Speaker 1: kind of the things that the coaching staff is asking
Speaker 1: of them. And then after the exit interviews, potentially we'll
Speaker 1: hear something. But no news in that direction today for
Speaker 1: Utah football, which is really really good. Cooper Flag has
Speaker 1: declared for the NBA Draft. I don't know that anybody
Speaker 1: is surprised about that. Of course, the NBA playoffs roll
Speaker 1: on tonight with a couple of games double header. You're
Speaker 1: going to see the Nicks and the Pistons at MSG,
Speaker 1: and then it is the Nuggets and the Clippers. So
Speaker 1: the next day that is interesting for Jazz fans will
Speaker 1: be made the twelfth, when we find out the lottery
Speaker 1: order and whether or not that fourteen percent chance for
Speaker 1: the Utah Jazz will bring them the number one overall
Speaker 1: pick and hopefully Cooper flag they cannot fall in further
Speaker 1: than five, they will have a top five pick, and
Speaker 1: the Jazz as a result of I'm sure nobody was
Speaker 1: paying attention to this, and I don't blame you. The
Speaker 1: NBA draft tiebreaker was today and the Jazz learned the
Speaker 1: fate of their two second round picks. So the Jazz
Speaker 1: second round pick this year, which is thirty first, goes
Speaker 1: to Minnesota, and that's part of the goat Bear deal.
Speaker 1: So aw's of right now, the Jazz will have the
Speaker 1: forty third overall pick in the second round and the
Speaker 1: fifty third overall pick in the second round, So those
Speaker 1: are second rounders, you know. In the second round, it's
Speaker 1: hit or miss. Of course, we have had some good
Speaker 1: second round picks around here, namely Paul Millsap, the best
Speaker 1: player in pro basketball.
Speaker 2: Nicolea.
Speaker 1: Jokic was the second round pick as well, So we
Speaker 1: know the fate for the Jazz in the second round.
Speaker 1: Now we wait for me the twelve to find out
Speaker 1: what their lottery selection is going to be. And don't forget,
Speaker 1: we're gonna have great draft coverage for you guys that night, myself,
Speaker 1: Bill Riley, Gordy Chase, and Richard Smith.
Speaker 2: And there's a chance we're going to be out and
Speaker 2: about on location.
Speaker 1: So if you want to watch the Utah Jazz draft,
Speaker 1: hopefully the next superstar for the market, stay tuned for
Speaker 1: more information the NFL Draft week. We are your home
Speaker 1: at the NFL Draft here in the markets.
Speaker 2: Not a ton of.
Speaker 1: Local buzz, little local buzz though, But let's bring in
Speaker 1: our next guest, one of my favorites to top football
Speaker 1: with on a Monday afternoon, the rising star himself, young
Speaker 1: man Benjamin Solac.
Speaker 2: Ben, Happy Monday, sir, How are you.
Speaker 9: Well you Ben?
Speaker 2: I'm good? So what's this week going to look like
Speaker 2: for you?
Speaker 1: I would imagine that you are hitting it hard yeah, yeah.
Speaker 9: But it's pretty much anybody who might have a chance
Speaker 9: to go decently earlier, just kind of right casting into
Speaker 9: the into the dark and hoping you find one more guy.
Speaker 9: And then Thursday and Friday I'll be on for ESPN
Speaker 9: on the on the Digital show, on the YouTube show.
Speaker 9: So yeah, so the goals and everybody who goes in
Speaker 9: the first three rounds, we'll see how far I get.
Speaker 2: How how much of a sure thing is cam warded?
Speaker 9: One sure thing in terms of willing it happened, is
Speaker 9: a good pick.
Speaker 1: So I'll just ask you both, okay, so like you
Speaker 1: never know what the smoke screen stuff, is that going
Speaker 1: to be the pick at one?
Speaker 2: And if so, what's your opinion on it?
Speaker 9: Yeah, I think it's definitely worth it. One not much
Speaker 9: reason to the times to be playing a game there,
Speaker 9: and they didn't really add a quarterback and croagency and
Speaker 9: so it'd be a foolish bait and switch because they'd
Speaker 9: have no where to throw the ball in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 9: I think it's a good pick. I think certainly if
Speaker 9: cam word we're out in last year's draft classes. Remember
Speaker 9: he declared for last year's class and then rescinded a
Speaker 9: declaration got the nil money transferred to Miami. If you're
Speaker 9: ound last year's class, he would not have gone one,
Speaker 9: he would not have gone two. It would not have
Speaker 9: gone to break right. I don't think there's a prospect
Speaker 9: of the caliber of Jane Daniels, drake Man, Caleb Williams
Speaker 9: from last year's draft. With that said, quarterback in the
Speaker 9: draft is kind of like a weirdly binary thing. You're
Speaker 9: either like good enough to be a very early pick,
Speaker 9: or you're not right. You're either like a top five
Speaker 9: guy or somewhere in the second round. You know, we
Speaker 9: kind of don't have oh, you know, the twentieth best
Speaker 9: player of the twenty fourth best player being a quarterback.
Speaker 9: You either worth that early pick and you're getting that
Speaker 9: rookie contract, or you aren't. Mccathon Wardy certainly is. I
Speaker 9: think he would have gone around the Pennix McCarthy knicks
Speaker 9: range last season had he come out improved a lot
Speaker 9: in Miami. Has a very pro arm, makes a lot
Speaker 9: of high difficulty throws. He's got a good amount of
Speaker 9: knucklehead in him. Make some dumb mistakes, but that's not
Speaker 9: an uncommon thing for coming out of a rookie quarterback
Speaker 9: coming into the NFL, and coaches know how to work
Speaker 9: around that. So I expect me to be a good proble.
Speaker 9: I'd like to pick some the science is.
Speaker 2: There intrigued at too.
Speaker 1: I've had a number of draft guests that say, the
Speaker 1: draft really begins at two after ward? Is off the
Speaker 1: board of one or is it Travis Hunter? What do
Speaker 1: you think happens in Cleveland?
Speaker 9: Yeah, at this point, I would be stunned if it's
Speaker 9: not Hunter, And I think it's pretty clear that they
Speaker 9: prefer him. To add Dual Carter. I think it's pretty
Speaker 9: clear that they're willing to take him over any of
Speaker 9: the other quarterbacks in this draft. And so Hunter, to
Speaker 9: me is the expectation. I think teams will call and
Speaker 9: continue to call about number two overall, number three overall,
Speaker 9: just because those aren't quarterback picks and they might want
Speaker 9: to be repositioning and getting one of Travis Hunter Abdul Carter.
Speaker 9: Those two guys are kind of the only two, you know,
Speaker 9: elite prospects, blue chip prospects adjective you want in this
Speaker 9: year's draft, and so you'll continue to hear trade buzz
Speaker 9: potentially over the next couple of days. That always kind
Speaker 9: of happens as we get close to Thursday. But I
Speaker 9: think if the Browns say't make.
Speaker 1: The fake, they're going to stay at take hunor does
Speaker 1: that dual Carter then land with the Giants. I mean
Speaker 1: they were out in our not market, but our time
Speaker 1: zone watching Shootoor Sanders work out last week.
Speaker 2: But what happens at three, I.
Speaker 9: Would expect it to be a bull Carter. It's not
Speaker 9: the most perfect fit you ever solved, just because they
Speaker 9: have Brian Burns in the building, they have Taveon Thibodeaux
Speaker 9: in the building. They have bigger needs than the defensive
Speaker 9: line in general. But with that said, like I said,
Speaker 9: I think it's pretty much a top two player class, right.
Speaker 9: We talked about just ranking it without ranking the QUARTERBACKSS
Speaker 9: Travis Hunton. Just have Dull Carter. The Dants are gonna
Speaker 9: have the position and get one of those two players,
Speaker 9: and then you have a great problem to solve, which
Speaker 9: is how do we get all of our good pass
Speaker 9: rushes off the field. You know, that's a nice problem
Speaker 9: to have. Taveon Thibodeau was a first round pick for
Speaker 9: them in twenty two out of Oregon. Coming out on
Speaker 9: this fIF year option has not been picked up yet,
Speaker 9: so he's still a tradeable asset as well, even though
Speaker 9: the team wants to say, hey, we have a lot
Speaker 9: more snaps for your young pass rusher, will come take
Speaker 9: him off your hands. And so I expected to be
Speaker 9: Carter and then yeah, they if they played Carter Thibodeau
Speaker 9: and burns all of them for twenty twenty five, trust me,
Speaker 9: it's not gonna feel like, oh no, we makes it
Speaker 9: the pake. It's gonna feel like, wow, we've got a
Speaker 9: deep stable of passers here that'll help you win games early.
Speaker 9: It will certainly help you win games late in the
Speaker 9: season as well.
Speaker 1: Since I mentioned shador, I swear every guest I've had
Speaker 1: on a top draft is giving me a different answer.
Speaker 1: So what's the Ben Solac take? Where do you think
Speaker 1: should or Sanders Lands?
Speaker 9: I think he's going to be drafted somewhere in the
Speaker 9: back half of round one. I think it's gonna be
Speaker 9: taken somewhere in the Teddy Pickett, Teddy Bridgewater, Lamar Jackson,
Speaker 9: Johnny Manzel range right that. Hey, you know, we've kind
Speaker 9: of like you a little bit more as maybe an
Speaker 9: early day two guy, but we want the fifthyear option,
Speaker 9: so we're going to trade up to go get you.
Speaker 9: That to me is fair on shred door Sanders. I
Speaker 9: think in the beginning of the draft process, when we
Speaker 9: started talking about him and people said, oh, he's next
Speaker 9: to camp Ward, he's going to be in contention quarterback one,
Speaker 9: I thought that was too lofty. And now as we
Speaker 9: get excuse me, as we get closer enough day one
Speaker 9: and day two here people say, oh, maybe Jackson Dart
Speaker 9: is QB two, Maybe Tyler Shuck is QB two, maybe
Speaker 9: Javen Milroe's QB two. To me, that's too far. Depends
Speaker 9: on too far the other direction. I think Sanders is
Speaker 9: clearly the best, the next best in that bunch, But
Speaker 9: I think Dart, I think Milroe. I think Sanders all
Speaker 9: the chance to go late day one, early day two,
Speaker 9: and I think you'll see if none of the Steelers
Speaker 9: there twenty taking shud door Sanders, and I think you'll
Speaker 9: see one of the Browns Giants of Saints trading up
Speaker 9: from that early second round to go get him at
Speaker 9: the end a round one.
Speaker 1: We'll just follow up with your opinion on who Sor
Speaker 1: Sanders is as an NFL quarterback.
Speaker 9: I think he can be a acceptable starter for you, right,
Speaker 9: I've heard, I've heard him compared to Geno Smith. I
Speaker 9: don't think that's picture perfect. I think Geno a little
Speaker 9: bit bigger, a little bit more physical, like the pocket
Speaker 9: a little bit more and just in general a little
Speaker 9: bit more accurate in the downshill throws than Sanders is.
Speaker 9: I think Tua is a little bit better of the comparison. Now,
Speaker 9: Sanders much better creating the two as much better scrambler.
Speaker 9: He's a little bit like tool with a jet pack
Speaker 9: right two on caffeine, like he could do stuff when
Speaker 9: he moves, you know. But in general, that that quick release,
Speaker 9: that ability to throw his anticipation over the middle of
Speaker 9: the field. Maybe not the best vertical ball thrower because
Speaker 9: your arm kind of dies on you a little bit,
Speaker 9: but that ability to work your to twenty yards, be
Speaker 9: highly accurate throwers and antsicipation and give your receivers constantly
Speaker 9: chances to make plays on the football in the tight areas.
Speaker 9: I think I think he can be in that range
Speaker 9: of a quarterback. And again, you don't really want to
Speaker 9: draft that top ten. You want a higher feeling. But
Speaker 9: if you feel like you're a good offense and you
Speaker 9: have good weapons, and you can plug each other rookie
Speaker 9: contract quarterback, you could do worse than the should or Sanders.
Speaker 1: Jackson Dark played his high school football out in our state,
Speaker 1: and it's been fun to kind of watch him make
Speaker 1: his way throughout his career as a collegians. I'll ask
Speaker 1: you kind of the same question, your opinion on who
Speaker 1: he is as a pro. And you referenced a couple
Speaker 1: of landing spots, what's the most likely spot for Jackson Dark?
Speaker 9: Yeah, Jackson darts got that whip like release right. That
Speaker 9: release is a very very fast Aaron Rodgers while making
Speaker 9: him a very good RPO quarterback. He he doesn't need
Speaker 9: to be connected to the ground to zip that ball
Speaker 9: in there, can throw from some weird platforms, and then
Speaker 9: he's a cost son of a gunman. He is tough
Speaker 9: as nails. If he needs to hang in the pocket
Speaker 9: for an extra half second, take a big shot together,
Speaker 9: let a receiver get open, he will do it every
Speaker 9: single time. So he's a highly competitive player. He has
Speaker 9: them some translatable skills in that ole Miss offense. You
Speaker 9: did not see NFL pros. You did not see NFL
Speaker 9: processing right, Some of that is Dark. Some of that
Speaker 9: is the nature of the offense. So there's a lot
Speaker 9: of projection involved. When we thought about taking Jackson Dart
Speaker 9: from the college level to the NFL level through a
Speaker 9: lot of vertical routes that were wide open, right, it
Speaker 9: was one of the highest quarterbacks in terms of rate
Speaker 9: of targets wide open down the field. College had an
Speaker 9: all of last season. And again, if you can get
Speaker 9: a lot tighter in the NFL, the margins are going
Speaker 9: to get a lot thinner, So can me Dart as
Speaker 9: a project quarterback. Dar's a sort of guy that I
Speaker 9: want to draft and then maybe start in year two
Speaker 9: after he's had a year to activate himself to an
Speaker 9: NFL playbook, long NFL play calls, NFL routes, so on
Speaker 9: and so forth. I think the Saints that I've clearly
Speaker 9: been a little bit more interested in Dart over the
Speaker 9: other teams, and also makes sense for Dart because they
Speaker 9: can play Derek Carr for another year if he's healthy,
Speaker 9: they can play Spencer Rattler, who played for them a
Speaker 9: lot last season, for another year and bring Dart along slowly.
Speaker 9: That Kellen Moore offense a lot of quick throws, a
Speaker 9: lot of RPOs. That's where you want Jackson Dart to be,
Speaker 9: and so to me, projects player most of the player
Speaker 9: that i'd like to take on day two. But if
Speaker 9: he goes that Drew lock range right forty three overall
Speaker 9: early second round pick, that's kind of the quarterback tax
Speaker 9: right there.
Speaker 1: In ten years, Shodor Sanders Jackson Dart, who will have
Speaker 1: had a better career.
Speaker 9: I would bet on Sanders, but I would personally not
Speaker 9: like to make a bet, you know there at all.
Speaker 9: I think when we start talking about these quarterbacks who
Speaker 9: go later than the top ten, destination is destiny, right,
Speaker 9: Asking that again in two weeks, when I know which
Speaker 9: team each one went to, I'll give you a much
Speaker 9: more confident answer because I'll like the offensive infrastructure, I'll
Speaker 9: like the coaching staff, the opportunity for development, right, kind
Speaker 9: of like, hey, you already know if a quarterback is
Speaker 9: drafted by the Jets, that guy going good. Sorry, sence,
Speaker 9: but like that's just kind of the nature of them,
Speaker 9: of destination being destinied. So right now, I don't feel
Speaker 9: great about making a pick on either one. But if
Speaker 9: you tell me, hey, you know, one of these guys
Speaker 9: gets drafted to be the developmental quarterback in Los Angeles
Speaker 9: with the Rams by Matthew Stafford. Yeah, I'm gonna take
Speaker 9: him to be the guy who's going to develop nicely.
Speaker 9: He's got the right bedrock around him to grow.
Speaker 1: Now you're born is well taken. If destination is destiny,
Speaker 1: the Jets are destitute.
Speaker 2: I know that.
Speaker 1: But since you brought it up, what do they do
Speaker 1: at seven? What do you think they do?
Speaker 9: So? I think if if armand Membu the right taskle
Speaker 9: out of Missouri excuse me, remains on the board, and
Speaker 9: to me, that's the best marriage of need, a team
Speaker 9: fit overall prospect value, that'd be the player that I
Speaker 9: would circle for. Then you remember Aaron Glenn and Danner
Speaker 9: Engstron and they're both coming from Detroit. What was the
Speaker 9: first thing Detroit did when Dan Campbell got there, Brad
Speaker 9: Holmes got there? Take a tackle, Penny Sewell, we're are
Speaker 9: building this thing from the trenches. So to me, that
Speaker 9: that would be my expectation. Now Membo is becoming a
Speaker 9: hotter and a hotter name for the Raiders at six,
Speaker 9: and I'll tell you if the board falls with Mason
Speaker 9: Graham off the board at five to the Jaguars, Membo
Speaker 9: off the board at six to the Raiders and then
Speaker 9: presumably Will Campbell as well, the left half of als.
Speaker 9: You go in to the Patriots at four. That board
Speaker 9: sucks for the Jets. That's a really, really, really tough draw.
Speaker 9: You start talking about taking a tight end top ten
Speaker 9: Tyler Warren or Colston Loveland Man, that is lofty for
Speaker 9: a tight ending. So talking about the rest of the
Speaker 9: corner class, Will Johnson and j. D. Baron, and those
Speaker 9: are not guys who are traditionally top ten picks. This
Speaker 9: class is not very top heavy. It does not have
Speaker 9: a lot of elite talents. So some of these teams
Speaker 9: in the back of the top ten are going to
Speaker 9: just be dealt really tough boards because there's gonna be
Speaker 9: players who usually go like fifteen o'verrow and that's it.
Speaker 9: And you can see that happening to the Jets. And
Speaker 9: so I like Membo the right tack ont of Missouri
Speaker 9: for them. If he's not there, I would expect effort
Speaker 9: on a trade back because I just don't think the
Speaker 9: board is gonna come nicely to him.
Speaker 2: We finally heard from Aaron Rodgers, and thank God for that.
Speaker 1: I wonder Ben, how you digest did the story they
Speaker 1: Aaron told about his meeting with Aaron Glenn, and does
Speaker 1: that shed any insight any light on the approach that
Speaker 1: Aaron Glenn is going to take as the head coach
Speaker 1: of the Jets.
Speaker 9: All I know, Aaron Rodgers complained about having a fly
Speaker 9: to New York on his own dime and then getting stiffed.
Speaker 9: Aaron Rodgers also made like forty five million dollars last year.
Speaker 9: I mean it just it falls on such deaf ear
Speaker 9: to me. I to be completely frank, I could not
Speaker 9: believe that we were doing it again as a football
Speaker 9: media in a football consuming public. Aaron Rodgers merges from
Speaker 9: the silence to go on the Patmack of the show
Speaker 9: and everybody live tweeting what he says. I couldn't give
Speaker 9: two hoots. Aren't we done with this?
Speaker 11: Since he has he has not played well, he has
Speaker 11: not shown an interest in doing what is necessary for
Speaker 11: the team that he quarterbacks to play well, and he's
Speaker 11: now refusing to participate in free agency in like a
Speaker 11: normal way, which I understand because, like you know, takes.
Speaker 9: Power of the player's hands. I want to be control
Speaker 9: my own destiny. That's great, go do it over there.
Speaker 9: Don't then hop on on your curated television show and
Speaker 9: complain about how people are talking about you. You're the
Speaker 9: one who's doing differently. Of course people are going to
Speaker 9: report on it. What do you think this works? So,
Speaker 9: like you know, Rogers for the Steelers, Rogers retiring, I
Speaker 9: don't know and did did did Glenn stiff him in
Speaker 9: the approach? In the free agency conversation all I want
Speaker 9: to come back, maybe, but I can't pull Aaron Glenn
Speaker 9: for that. I don't know how anybody in the league
Speaker 9: has patients for Aaron Rodgers in twenty twenty five. So
Speaker 9: to me, you know wherever he ends up before he
Speaker 9: ends up Harbor long he plays, however long he plays.
Speaker 9: And I'm sure kill Hill inform us of that in
Speaker 9: his own due time.
Speaker 2: Well said.
Speaker 1: And I won't even ask a follow up because I
Speaker 1: think he handled everything I wanted to ask you there.
Speaker 2: Which is which is totally fine.
Speaker 1: I do want to go back to Travis Hunter, though,
Speaker 1: because Andrew Berry, the Browns general manager at the combine
Speaker 1: and said that they view him as quote a receiver
Speaker 1: primarily first, whether it's Cleveland or another team. Are we
Speaker 1: going to see Travis Hunter play legitimate like big time
Speaker 1: snaps on both sides of the ball.
Speaker 9: I think you will see it happen in at least
Speaker 9: a few games, because I think that the team that
Speaker 9: drafts Travis Hunter will want to entertain the idea and
Speaker 9: support the idea in the way that like you know,
Speaker 9: when you when your ten year old starts doing card magic,
Speaker 9: you're like, yeah, go for it, dude, Like you know,
Speaker 9: this is probably not going to become anything, and like
Speaker 9: this is a little bit awkward and weird, but like,
Speaker 9: you know, kind of we want, you know, we want
Speaker 9: to be a positive force for you. Right, So Travis
Speaker 9: Hunter comes into the league. He's a total rookie. He says,
Speaker 9: I can do something that hasn't been done in twenty
Speaker 9: five thirty years. All right, man, go for it, and
Speaker 9: like you're gonna give him some snaps a receiver, give
Speaker 9: him some snaps a corner, and then you're gonna leave
Speaker 9: with him in three weeks and say, hey, listen, you know,
Speaker 9: like we've got GPS tracking data says you know, you're
Speaker 9: not moving as fast in the fourth quarter as you
Speaker 9: do otherwise, We're going to try to bring your corner
Speaker 9: steps down. You try to reach a middle ground with him,
Speaker 9: he's very clearly committed to at least giving it an effort,
Speaker 9: and I think you have to. You're going to draft
Speaker 9: the player, you want to keep him mentally engaged, you
Speaker 9: have to at least entertain that effort to some degree. Now,
Speaker 9: the Brown saying they think him as a receiver, to
Speaker 9: me is very it's a smart way to go about it,
Speaker 9: because it's much harder to be a full time receiver
Speaker 9: and move light at corner then it is to be
Speaker 9: a full time corner and moonlight at receiver. Because if
Speaker 9: you want to play fifteen fast at receiver, I can
Speaker 9: just on the sideline tell you, hey, you know we're
Speaker 9: at third and seven. We're calling this you're running this route.
Speaker 9: Quarterback in the in the in the pocket, in the huddle.
Speaker 10: Excuse me.
Speaker 9: You can tell you hey, remember it's an eighteen yard dig.
Speaker 9: You know. It's easy to kind of plug and chug
Speaker 9: you there. At receiver at corner, Well, you got to
Speaker 9: know what happens if they motion. You got to know
Speaker 9: what happens if they walk out under center play action,
Speaker 9: was they they move it this way three by one.
Speaker 9: There's so much more that can happen on any given play.
Speaker 9: So if you want a guy to become one position
Speaker 9: full time and you kind of want to discourage him
Speaker 9: from doing the second position. I would put him full
Speaker 9: time at receiver and then have him experience some of
Speaker 9: the challenges of trying to moonlight at corner as opposed
Speaker 9: to flip flop of it. So I think you're going to
Speaker 9: see Travis Hunter end up being a full time receiver
Speaker 9: for the Browns end of his rookie contract, second year whatever.
Speaker 9: But I think they'll they'll take.
Speaker 6: The tires on.
Speaker 9: I'll see what he looks like as a two way player.
Speaker 2: Who's throwing on the ball, who's going to be undershenter
Speaker 2: in Cleveland.
Speaker 9: If they draft Hunter, I would love them to draft
Speaker 9: standers because this is, in my opinion, under talked about
Speaker 9: in the process. The connection between Shador Sanders and Travis
Speaker 9: Hunter for collegiate players is very impressive. Right, These guys
Speaker 9: have been throwing, pitching, and casting each other for four seasons.
Speaker 9: Jackson State, Jacksonville State, excuse me, into Colorado. You know
Speaker 9: we've seen top ten picks a quarterback, sort of top
Speaker 9: ten picksure receiver. We watched Tua sort of Jayleen Waddell
Speaker 9: and and Vaque Smiths. It looked nothing like this, right,
Speaker 9: Caleb Williams are not killables seeing Rome do their our
Speaker 9: teammates now, they aren't previously, but we've seen these combos
Speaker 9: and in terms of the way they had just roused
Speaker 9: from the fly, the way that Shador throws to him
Speaker 9: back shoulder, the way that he trust him in contested situations,
Speaker 9: like they have a very good relationship. So to me,
Speaker 9: if the Browns get Hunter at wide receiver, it would
Speaker 9: move Sanders up my draft board for them. And so
Speaker 9: I like Sanders as a Browns quarterback. They also seem
Speaker 9: like they're interested in shuck as well. The Louisville kid.
Speaker 9: I would expect those of the two names I look
Speaker 9: at for Cleveland.
Speaker 1: I will not ask you if Aaron Rodgers will play
Speaker 1: for the Steelers, but I will ask you what their
Speaker 1: situation is under center and how they kind of solve
Speaker 1: this issue. If it's not going to be Aaron, who's
Speaker 1: going to be the quarterback for the Steelers.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I think that they absolutely have to take a
Speaker 9: quarterback with one of their first two picks. Remember no
Speaker 9: second round pick because of the dk met cap trades.
Speaker 9: They have their pick at twenty and then they have
Speaker 9: a mid third round or if you don't think the
Speaker 9: guy in the first round, I think it's pretty much
Speaker 9: non negotiable. You have to see the guy on day two.
Speaker 9: I think that they are taking a long, hard look
Speaker 9: at Sanders because I think a month ago they didn't
Speaker 9: think Sanders was going to get to them a twenty.
Speaker 9: Now it looks like that's a lot more likely. So
Speaker 9: to me, I think Sanders is something that they're zeroing
Speaker 9: in on. I'm not confident if they like him or
Speaker 9: dislike them out of the direction, but I think they're
Speaker 9: doing that legwork now and I think that they've you
Speaker 9: seen them engaging Jackson Dark and you see them engage
Speaker 9: with Jaln Milrowe as well out of Alabama. Those, I
Speaker 9: think are the three names that I would if someone's
Speaker 9: going to sneak in around one they're in the back half,
Speaker 9: those are the three that I would circle. So I
Speaker 9: think it's going to be a rookie. I think, honestly,
Speaker 9: it's going to be a first round pick at rookie,
Speaker 9: and it's going to be one of those three names.
Speaker 9: If it's not that pick at twenty in they passed.
Speaker 9: Then on day two they got to get active, and
Speaker 9: they got to be willing to trade free for Peck
Speaker 9: still getting you cannot walk in the next season with
Speaker 9: just Mason Rudolph and hoping that you get Aaron Rodgers.
Speaker 9: That seems like an awful team building planned to me.
Speaker 1: Urban Meyer did a zoom call with one of our
Speaker 1: local TV stations and Utah State plays their football just
Speaker 1: off the road in Logan, so he had a front
Speaker 1: row seat to watch Ashton Genty all year and Urban was,
Speaker 1: i'll say effusive with his praise for Ashton Genty out
Speaker 1: of Boise State. What's the Ben Solac take on his
Speaker 1: pro potential and where do you think he's drafted.
Speaker 9: Ashton Jenny's an excellent, excellent prospect. I don't think he's
Speaker 9: at the level that Take One Barkley was when he
Speaker 9: came out of Penn State Ezekiel Elliot when he came
Speaker 9: out of Ohio State. Those two players went two and four, respectively.
Speaker 9: But in this draft class, he's certainly one of the
Speaker 9: three four best players in the class and you expect
Speaker 9: him to go top ten. This is everything you want
Speaker 9: in a bag of chips in terms of a running
Speaker 9: back prospect. He's going to do a really good job
Speaker 9: of the NFL turning pnutration plays into two yard games,
Speaker 9: turning two yard games into five yard games five or
Speaker 9: games in a ten yard game. You're going to do
Speaker 9: exactly you want an early drafted running back to do.
Speaker 9: Be going to take a high, high number of volume,
Speaker 9: a lot of snaps, be able to catch the football,
Speaker 9: carry it twenty twenty four times a game, and deliver
Speaker 9: consistent running and then explosive plays as well in the
Speaker 9: open space. So is everything that you want. He's probably
Speaker 9: not going to be the fastest running back in the league,
Speaker 9: but besides that, it's all gravy. So my expectation is
Speaker 9: six to the Raiders, five to the Jaguars, ten to
Speaker 9: the Bears. I would be stunned if he gets outside
Speaker 9: of the top ten, and I'm honestly if he gets
Speaker 9: past six with the Raiders and he's available seven, eight,
Speaker 9: and nine. Would not be surprised to see a team
Speaker 9: trying to tree up in front of the Bears to
Speaker 9: go get the guy, because he'll be viewed then as
Speaker 9: a blue ship player who's falling. Cowboys at twelve want
Speaker 9: to go move up get their future. Zekal Elliott would
Speaker 9: not bother me at all.
Speaker 1: With the remaining a few minutes, Ben I have you,
Speaker 1: I will ask you about a couple of teams locally
Speaker 1: that are of interest. And since my producer is a
Speaker 1: lifelong suffering Dallas Cowboys fan, I believe they have ten
Speaker 1: or eleven picks if I remember correct. So what do
Speaker 1: you think Dallas needs to come away with as far
Speaker 1: as when the draft is complete?
Speaker 2: How do you think they handle their business?
Speaker 9: Yeah? Ten picks of the Cowboys. Six of the ten
Speaker 9: are Round five and later, which to me indicates the
Speaker 9: team that's going to be willing to trade up, that
Speaker 9: is going to be willing to sell some of those
Speaker 9: picks to make moves. Now that they've been most paired
Speaker 9: to wide receivers right, namely Matthew Golden out of Texas,
Speaker 9: been a little bit of Tetero McMillan out of Arizona,
Speaker 9: but I think Golden is chalking out for them as
Speaker 9: wide receiver one. So wide receiver is a big need
Speaker 9: for them. Three down running back is clearly a need, right.
Speaker 9: Javonte Williams and Miles Sanders the only additions to a
Speaker 9: really empty room at this time. Now, it's a good
Speaker 9: class for three down running backs. They don't need to
Speaker 9: go there round one to go get that player. I
Speaker 9: would say Day two is probably what they're hoping to target,
Speaker 9: and then corner is in need. You know, you have
Speaker 9: a good player in Trayvon DAGs and a good player
Speaker 9: in Deron Bland. Gigs come back from a pretty major injury.
Speaker 9: Drown Bland is entering our contract. Your depth got tested
Speaker 9: in a real bad way last season. They struggled a
Speaker 9: lot to cover and they're ever consistent. Nickel corner Jordan
Speaker 9: Lewis is now Jacksonville Jaguar would be a free agent pick.
Speaker 9: So to me, I've got three corner positions that by
Speaker 9: twenty twenty six I might not feel good about any
Speaker 9: of them. So I would also expect decently early pick
Speaker 9: on the corner board. Again, I don't think it's gonna
Speaker 9: be around one. I think it's going to be a receiver.
Speaker 9: But day two, it's a very good class for corners.
Speaker 9: On Day two, a lot of developmental guys. But excite
Speaker 9: the Cowboys to go there.
Speaker 1: Niners have eleven picks, as you point out of your piece,
Speaker 1: it's a big draft for them. Of course, they have
Speaker 1: to pay their QB, so they've got a lot of holes.
Speaker 1: How do you think San Fran handles this week?
Speaker 9: They've just lost so many snaps on the defensive line.
Speaker 9: And now with you know, Drey Greenlaw and Tellano Whufanga
Speaker 9: are both gone to Denver, Trivarius Ward to the corner
Speaker 9: is left for Indianapolis. They are just bleeding snaps on
Speaker 9: the defensive side of the ball. To me, I'm using
Speaker 9: all eleven picks, not all eleven, but a lot of
Speaker 9: my eleven picks and taking that shotgun approach. Right, I
Speaker 9: want to make a lot of selections and just pour
Speaker 9: those resources onto the defensive side of the ball. I
Speaker 9: want to be able to add multiple pass rushers to
Speaker 9: support Nick Mosa, right, I want to be able to
Speaker 9: get up developments a linebacker behind Fred Warner, a guy
Speaker 9: who takes them outside corner. Snaps it to al Bernardo
Speaker 9: Green like, you need to inundate the roster the defensive
Speaker 9: side with you, because the way you survive Rockberdy Contract
Speaker 9: Part two is by being cheaping up on defense to
Speaker 9: then spend the money on offense. So that to me
Speaker 9: has to be the approach.
Speaker 1: Last one, Ben, I'll set you loose after this. I
Speaker 1: know you're busy, but there there's reason for optimism in
Speaker 1: Denver for the first time and quite some time after
Speaker 1: the rookie season of bonicks. And they they've got twenty
Speaker 1: in round one, they've got let's see seven overall picks.
Speaker 1: From what I'm reading here, how do you think Denver
Speaker 1: handles this week before it sets you loose?
Speaker 9: So Denver's and the Rumored is one of the only
Speaker 9: teams that's kind of interesting and willing and trading up,
Speaker 9: which I think is I think it's sharp. I think
Speaker 9: it's gonna be an easy year to trade up because
Speaker 9: everybody else wants to trade down, so I think that
Speaker 9: the price is gonna be pretty cheap. They should be
Speaker 9: adding splash players on offense. Right, they did a really
Speaker 9: nice job scraping it together and Sean Payton finding clever
Speaker 9: ways to work around, you know, Marvin Nimms Junior and
Speaker 9: Gavanti Williams and Julie mcgloughlin and Adam Troutman and Lucas Kroll. Right,
Speaker 9: they have like just like bodies. Little Jeordan Humphrey just
Speaker 9: did Cortlandt, who was kind of a tenth pole the
Speaker 9: whole offensive operation. And other than that, they were just
Speaker 9: kind of scrounging it together so you have depth. Now
Speaker 9: it's time to have impactful players. Let's that guys who
Speaker 9: cause problems. Right in free agency, they kicked the tires
Speaker 9: and the wide receivers. There was a very bad receiver class,
Speaker 9: and then Evan Ingram was their addition at tight end.
Speaker 9: Two year contract. It's not that big of a financial
Speaker 9: commitment and Ingram is not the playmaker that he used
Speaker 9: to be. So to me, I'm looking at Omarion Hanson,
Speaker 9: the running back out of North Carolina, both the top
Speaker 9: tight ends, Tyler Warren out of Penn State Coastal Lovelant
Speaker 9: of Michigan, and then at the top receivers as well,
Speaker 9: matcw Goldan out of Texas and teder Roe mcmillo of Arizona.
Speaker 9: I'm saying, listen, if I need a trade out, all
Speaker 9: trade up. I want an impactful, three down, scary guy guy.
Speaker 9: When I go to play January football, playoff football, the
Speaker 9: opposing defense has to worry about this dude. I compare
Speaker 9: him with Courtland Sun. Become that much more dangerous on
Speaker 9: offense and make a big move, make a big splash,
Speaker 9: go attack it that those offensive knee positions that'd be
Speaker 9: a plan for Denver.
Speaker 1: Ben, you are the man, great stuff. Excited to follow
Speaker 1: your work this week and be good man, keep it up.
Speaker 9: Okay, thank you, take care.
Speaker 2: I had the great Ben Solac over DESPN.
Speaker 1: That guy has been coming on our show for a
Speaker 1: long long time.
Speaker 2: Ever since he was just a kid in this business.
Speaker 1: It's been really fun to watch his stock row and
Speaker 1: he does great work. There aren't a lot of well,
Speaker 1: there isn't a lot, I should say local buzz with
Speaker 1: the players available in the draft. You know Utah with
Speaker 1: Junior Tifuna, Karene Reid Brand, Keithy Byu with Tyler Battie,
Speaker 1: kayleb Btn and Jacob Robinson. I've got a mock pulled
Speaker 1: up right now and I don't see any local players
Speaker 1: off this mock board until one ninety nine where kayleb
Speaker 1: Btn is.
Speaker 2: Off the board for the Chargers. So we are your
Speaker 2: home of the NFL Draft in the market. Don't forget.
Speaker 1: It's such a great event and it's a great time
Speaker 1: to be hopeful if you're an NFL fan. Junior Tafuna
Speaker 1: off at two forty eight to the New England Patriots,
Speaker 1: so that to be a sixth round. I believe RSL
Speaker 1: is in San Diego, coming up on Saturday. After another
Speaker 1: loss over the weekend, Always a pleasure to catch up
Speaker 1: with our next guest, RSL original, the Legend himself, Brian
Speaker 1: dun Seth. Monday Afternoon, Donny, Happy Monday, buddy.
Speaker 2: How are we doing.
Speaker 10: I'm doing well. It's good to see that the word
Speaker 10: legend isn't being used as descriptively as possible. I mean,
Speaker 10: you calling me a legend. I don't think I checked
Speaker 10: any of those boxes.
Speaker 2: Man, lies, you are lying on the program.
Speaker 1: My question, Donny, is when somebody, when somebody says, do
Speaker 1: you when Don Garber says okay, Brian dun Seth, who
Speaker 1: scored the first goal in RSL history, do you correct
Speaker 1: them or do you just let it go?
Speaker 10: I can tell you the christ.
Speaker 2: So I knew it. I knew it. I knew it.
Speaker 10: He was so sensitive. No listen, Hi. I told Jason.
Speaker 10: I was like, do you realize how many times I've
Speaker 10: corrected people over these last twenty years? That you scored
Speaker 10: the first goal, I scored the first home goal.
Speaker 6: It was what did you do it today?
Speaker 10: And I was like, you know what. I was just
Speaker 10: going to enjoy a super surreal moment of hosting, you know,
Speaker 10: the Miller group coming in and the commissioner looking over
Speaker 10: at me and saying that, and all like the heads
Speaker 10: at the same time. It was like a movie and
Speaker 10: like the all of the people's face has just turned
Speaker 10: towards me, and Garber's looking at me, and I was
Speaker 10: just like, yeah, this is this is a movie. This
Speaker 10: is a surreal moment. But yeah, cool. Nonetheless, I ended
Speaker 10: up ben milling him later for the shout out.
Speaker 2: I thought it. I thought it was great. I thought
Speaker 2: it was great.
Speaker 1: And look the snapshot of you planting the flag and
Speaker 1: Rice Ecles never gets old, man, every time I see
Speaker 1: that clip of Clint sending in the cross and You're
Speaker 1: getting your head on it and planning the flag. I mean,
Speaker 1: it really was a moment that signaled the arrival of
Speaker 1: this club. And now we're twenty plus years later, which
Speaker 1: is wild that you and I have been doing this
Speaker 1: for as long as we have.
Speaker 2: But let's start with.
Speaker 1: Some of the positive vibes and positive news before we
Speaker 1: get to the tough stuff. And I just wonder how
Speaker 1: you digested the new cycle last week, where the Miller
Speaker 1: family has taken over the controlling stake of ownership of
Speaker 1: RSL and the Royals.
Speaker 2: What do you think this means for the group?
Speaker 10: Yeah, listen, I think a lot of us, none of
Speaker 10: us were naive and recognizing that Ryan Smith's attention was
Speaker 10: a little bit different following the acquisition the Utah Hockey
Speaker 10: Club and we hadn't really seen him tweeting about it
Speaker 10: or talking about We all saw Laker Utah Royals for
Speaker 10: the better part of the year. So when I heard
Speaker 10: the whispers a couple of months ago about the Miller's scale,
Speaker 10: Miller and the company itself interested in the acquisition of
Speaker 10: Real Salt Lake, it checked a lot of boxes. You know,
Speaker 10: I go back to the time when you know your
Speaker 10: dad was able to start Real Salt Lake, and when
Speaker 10: Dave's paying five million dollars and we're seeing the expansion
Speaker 10: fee coming around three fifty to four hundred. Now you
Speaker 10: know there's a lot of money left on the table.
Speaker 10: And to see kind of the momentum ship from the
Speaker 10: sale under Deloy Hanson into David Blitzer and Ryan Smith
Speaker 10: and now for David Blitzer to kind of step back
Speaker 10: still have a lot of the sport being controlled to
Speaker 10: soccer control. But similar to his investment, whether he talked
Speaker 10: about Crystal Palace, you talked about Augsburg, you know, you
Speaker 10: talk about in Major League Baseball, NFL, NBA. You know,
Speaker 10: a part of him really does enjoy being a minority
Speaker 10: owner and allowing kind of and I'm of the firm
Speaker 10: belief that having a local owner with primary ownership is
Speaker 10: important because there's something and that's that's not to disparage
Speaker 10: anything that David Blitzer and his group has done, because
Speaker 10: it has been extraordinary since the sale and Deloye walking away.
Speaker 10: He's done a great job and a lot of great things,
Speaker 10: and the infrastructure in the atmosphere, even he upgrades to
Speaker 10: the stadium. But I do think there's something special about
Speaker 10: having people that understand the market, understand what this city wants,
Speaker 10: and you know, having someone that's fully invested in this
Speaker 10: team is going to be or these teams are going
Speaker 10: to be important because it's not just real sal Lake
Speaker 10: and Utah Royals. It's also real monarchs. It's also the academy,
Speaker 10: you know, it's the infrastructure of the training facility, all
Speaker 10: of those things. So I think it's and as they
Speaker 10: continue to bet in, my hope is sooner rather than
Speaker 10: later we'll see an influx of funds and investments that
Speaker 10: continue the development of the nuclear arms spending in Major
Speaker 10: League soccer, and as I said to you, I think
Speaker 10: a couple of years ago, I think his expansion slows down.
Speaker 10: We're going to see multi billion dollar owners continuing to
Speaker 10: invest in clubs already owned by multi billion dollar owners.
Speaker 1: I wonder, Donny, if you've been able to garner an
Speaker 1: insight or in your conversations, if you understand how the
Speaker 1: dynamic will work.
Speaker 2: Between the Blitzer Group and the Miller group.
Speaker 1: Is it is the line of delineation as clear as
Speaker 1: the Miller's handling the business side and Blitzer handling the
Speaker 1: soccer side, or is it a little bit more convoluted
Speaker 1: than that.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I'd assume it's a bit more convoluted. But what
Speaker 10: I would say is that because of the Blitzer sporting
Speaker 10: network specific to soccer has already been in play. There
Speaker 10: is a benefit for the Millers to slowly figure out
Speaker 10: ways how to sorry about my son's game, and they're
Speaker 10: they're good now leading to.
Speaker 2: Know against the city.
Speaker 10: No, I think what it does is it allows the
Speaker 10: Millers to kind of bet in and understand from the
Speaker 10: business side what's happening, but then also having great education
Speaker 10: of what the soccer side is. You know, I am
Speaker 10: of the firm belief that I don't think it would
Speaker 10: be in any way, shape or form a bad thing
Speaker 10: for someone like Dave, you know, date check Its to
Speaker 10: come in and somehow be involved and then allow the
Speaker 10: soccer people to make soccer decisions similar to the success
Speaker 10: that we saw back in two thousand and nine through
Speaker 10: twenty twelve, you know, specific to hiring Guard, hiring Jason,
Speaker 10: hiring Robin, and building out that roster and allowing just
Speaker 10: the soccer to speak for itself, and then you know,
Speaker 10: if there's failures, there's consequence. But yeah, I think we're
Speaker 10: going to see an evolution over the next couple of
Speaker 10: years of what that looks like. You know, I am
Speaker 10: not of the belief having not been in the conversations
Speaker 10: and being in the room to understand completely what this
Speaker 10: all looks like. But in the short term, I think
Speaker 10: there's enough of a of an educated personnel in charge
Speaker 10: right now to allow you know this this quote unquote
Speaker 10: handover of power in real time.
Speaker 1: One more thing, and then we'll move over to some
Speaker 1: results and some additions that are on the way. And
Speaker 1: hopefully more that we don't know about on the way
Speaker 1: as well. But what has been you know, as the
Speaker 1: kids would say, vibes are high, and you know, the
Speaker 1: start of the season has been great, but your your
Speaker 1: connections at the club with both RSL and the Royals,
Speaker 1: does it feel like this ownership transition is being met
Speaker 1: with a ton of optimism?
Speaker 10: Yeah, I think it is, I really do. I mean,
Speaker 10: there's no one that's come out publicly and said anything different.
Speaker 10: There's nobody that has mentioned to me and either my
Speaker 10: hosting opportunities or being around the trainings that it speaks
Speaker 10: to anything different. But again, I think you know this
Speaker 10: and I know this. We're not naive. I mean we're dumb,
Speaker 10: We're not naive. I think we've seen the transfer of
Speaker 10: power from different organizations and clubs and different sporting ventures
Speaker 10: that you know, there's always going to be a little
Speaker 10: bit of havoc, a little bit helter skelter, a little
Speaker 10: bit of confusion because ultimately we're looking at the variation
Speaker 10: of responsibility. So that's all fine and dandy, but there
Speaker 10: is going to be you know, there's there's going to
Speaker 10: be some time for everyone to kind of figure out
Speaker 10: who ultimately is in charge, who's making the decisions, and
Speaker 10: then you know the responsibility of failure is going to
Speaker 10: be in there as well.
Speaker 1: All right, now, we have to talk about the current
Speaker 1: form of the club, which, if we're hotist, is not good.
Speaker 1: So three wins, six losses, eight goals scored, fourteen a
Speaker 1: loud minus six. The goals allowed category is kind of
Speaker 1: inflated by two really bad performances. But my first question,
Speaker 1: in this kind of non secuitar direction that we've gone to,
Speaker 1: what is fair to say about the calls that have
Speaker 1: gone against the club over the past three or four weeks.
Speaker 10: You go back to the FC Dallas Challenge for Peel,
Speaker 10: and anybody that has played at a high enough level
Speaker 10: will tell you that that was a player protecting himself
Speaker 10: in a moment in which Patrickson Delgado was about to
Speaker 10: do him and by doing him, I mean might gonna
Speaker 10: put his foot through his ankle. And I think he
Speaker 10: recognized in that moment he needed to protect himself, and
Speaker 10: I think there was a gray area of a conversation
Speaker 10: that should have been involved. That doesn't just have to
Speaker 10: be that, hey, this is violent conduct, this endangers the
Speaker 10: safety of the opponent. No, this is a guy saying, like,
Speaker 10: you know you're not going to kick me right now,
Speaker 10: I'm going to protect myself. The Daniel Lovett's forearm shiver
Speaker 10: elbow to the face of Marchuk should have been a red.
Speaker 10: I'm not surprised based on the referees' personality and history
Speaker 10: that maybe his arrogance in the moment wasn't open to
Speaker 10: the idea of having someone in a booth in the Dallas,
Speaker 10: Texas area send him over to the monitor to overturn
Speaker 10: his call. Love It should have seen a yellow card
Speaker 10: right after that for a second yellow challenge at a
Speaker 10: bare minimum. And then finally they're amongst my constituents that
Speaker 10: call games. So this isn't coming from a real Salt
Speaker 10: Lake Homer or for my love for Diego Luna. There's
Speaker 10: not a pundit in the world that would look at
Speaker 10: Diego Luna untangling his leg from Petrosso wrapping him up
Speaker 10: and think that in any way, shape or form, that's
Speaker 10: violent conduct and Spence. I texted our good friend Trey
Speaker 10: Fitzgerald immediately as I was sitting in the Delta Lounge
Speaker 10: in Seattle, flying home from calling the Seattle National Game,
Speaker 10: and I said Hey, just let me know when the
Speaker 10: appeal comes through that Diego is going to be available
Speaker 10: for next weekend down in San Diego, because that was
Speaker 10: one of the when you have Drew Fisher's var sending
Speaker 10: you to the monitor with his experience, one of the
Speaker 10: most respected managers in this league, for this. Now it's
Speaker 10: three nilo for this not to be downgraded. For Sergei
Speaker 10: demian Chuk to go over to the monitor, have to
Speaker 10: look at it from four different for you know, maybe
Speaker 10: what two minutes from multiple different angles in any way,
Speaker 10: shape or form to think that that is violent con
Speaker 10: for a player to untangle his leg from a player
Speaker 10: on the ground, it's just lunacy. It's crazy. To me.
Speaker 10: I don't understand it. And the problem that I have
Speaker 10: with this is also double jeopardy since because RSL was
Speaker 10: a better team and that listen, they lost the game, right,
Speaker 10: they gave up the goal.
Speaker 9: They deserve to lose a game.
Speaker 10: That being said, they played down to man for the
Speaker 10: better part of thirty minutes. They were the better team.
Speaker 10: They should have scored multiple goals, they should have come back,
Speaker 10: and now you lose the player in real time, arguably
Speaker 10: one of the most dynamic number ten playmakers not named
Speaker 10: Lino Messi. In Major League soccer, you don't have them
Speaker 10: for the better part of thirty minutes. You're playing a
Speaker 10: man down. You don't get the points on the day.
Speaker 10: And now my hope is that we hear the announcement
Speaker 10: that he's got oh shy almost just for dang, and
Speaker 10: then we get the announcement that he's going to be
Speaker 10: allowed to play next weekend. I feel like that's incoming. Yeah,
Speaker 10: it's just tough. It's a bitter pill to swallow, and
Speaker 10: all of the small things that are going wrong, a
Speaker 10: lot of it a real So they need to figure out.
Speaker 10: I'm looking for leadership. Who's responsible in terms of pulling
Speaker 10: everybody up by the shorts. Who's the guy theoretically that's
Speaker 10: willing to punch somebody to change the and manufacture the
Speaker 10: momentum because right now this team needs something. They've played well,
Speaker 10: but they're not playing well enough, if that makes sense
Speaker 10: to UH to be where they need to be in
Speaker 10: the nuclear arms race of the Western Conference playoff.
Speaker 1: Ers, Little Bertie Que Little Bertie, my source at RSL
Speaker 1: inform me earlier that the red card has been appealed
Speaker 1: based off of your knowledge of the interworkings of MLS.
Speaker 2: What are the chances that it gets rescinded.
Speaker 10: I could see it being with the with the with
Speaker 10: the three person I don't know which we're calling it, uh,
Speaker 10: the three person panel, if you will. I don't think
Speaker 10: there's anybody that looks at that and says that that's
Speaker 10: a violent conduct worthy red card. I think it is
Speaker 10: a three mil in favor of that appeal going through
Speaker 10: and Diego Luna's red card being rescinded and him being
Speaker 10: reinstated for availability in San Diego. And again this is
Speaker 10: me coming from an analyst perspective. I could not believe
Speaker 10: what I was watching in real time.
Speaker 1: I know you alluded to and maybe the answer to
Speaker 1: my question is what you already said as far as
Speaker 1: the arrogance of the official, But watching the red card
Speaker 1: in real time, you couldn't really tell because Diego was
Speaker 1: standing over him, and it's like, all right, well, did
Speaker 1: he do something farious on him?
Speaker 10: I thought he must have, you know, I'm watching it.
Speaker 10: I thought he must have stepped on him. Yes, he
Speaker 10: must have stopped on him, right, really should the angle
Speaker 10: from behind and he pulls his leg out and then
Speaker 10: he kind of like leans in like what are you doing?
Speaker 10: It was more of that, not like diego, listen, diego.
Speaker 10: We're all young, dumb, naive at moments like you're talking
Speaker 10: to a guy that almost cost the United States a
Speaker 10: spot in the Olympics because I saw blood red and
Speaker 10: I reacted And it was just in that split second,
Speaker 10: like my Southern California upbringing, like I just I saw red.
Speaker 10: Myth This wasn't that. This was like what, like why
Speaker 10: are you wrapping up my leg? Like let go? Like
Speaker 10: that's what that was to me, right.
Speaker 1: But but my point was in real time, it's like, okay,
Speaker 1: well that looked like it could be something aggressive. Then
Speaker 1: you see the replay and there's nothing there. So my question,
Speaker 1: Donny is how do you watch that replay and come
Speaker 1: to the conclusion that it needed to be read like
Speaker 1: what is that just arrogance?
Speaker 2: Like how do you do that?
Speaker 10: I don't know. I mean, I think maybe maybe the
Speaker 10: more easier conversation is maybe that's why he's not one
Speaker 10: of the consistent reps at the highest level when it
Speaker 10: comes to All Stars playoffs, MLS Cup finals. You know,
Speaker 10: we've got we've got some great referees in pro in
Speaker 10: Major League soccer. I was actually having a conversation with
Speaker 10: one of the referees that Max Rados and I ran
Speaker 10: into while we're up in Seattle. There's some really fantastic referees,
Speaker 10: but as the evolution of the game goes on, we
Speaker 10: forget that some of the best referees are aging out,
Speaker 10: so we're gonna get some younger referees that have worked
Speaker 10: their way through and have deserved opportunities. But again, the
Speaker 10: pace of the game, the speed of play, the decision making,
Speaker 10: and then the influx of you know, you have ego,
Speaker 10: you have arrogance, you have experience, you know, the idea
Speaker 10: of var and the intervention of technology is fantastic. But
Speaker 10: at the same time, there's still a human error and
Speaker 10: a lot of these guys you could show them one
Speaker 10: play and you could say red or no, and half
Speaker 10: the room will stay red, half the room will say yellow.
Speaker 10: So there's still an element of human error involved. And
Speaker 10: for me, the game in Nashville and the game against Toronto,
Speaker 10: those were both I don't know if it's arrogainst lack
Speaker 10: of experience, or just maybe self belief in the call,
Speaker 10: but you know, two mistakes that I think should have
Speaker 10: gone in a different direction.
Speaker 2: All right, Doddie, it's getting late early.
Speaker 1: You know, this is a slog this is a marathon,
Speaker 1: this is not a sprint. MLS schedule is intense, and
Speaker 1: you know, I've seen some of the best clubs that
Speaker 1: we've had here get off the horrible starts and some
Speaker 1: of the worst clas we've you know, like good stars
Speaker 1: can lead to bad seasons, bad starts can lead to
Speaker 1: good seasons. It's a roller coaster ride. But through nine
Speaker 1: matches they're eleventh. Ty was Saint Louis on nine points.
Speaker 1: I'll ask you this before we get to some potential editions.
Speaker 1: What have you seen that you've liked? What are they
Speaker 1: doing well as of now, even though the start has
Speaker 1: not been great.
Speaker 10: Oh, you're talking specific to rilsa Lake, correct. Yeah. I
Speaker 10: think Diego Luna playing in the number ten position has
Speaker 10: the pure playmaker with Diego Gonzalveez on the left, has
Speaker 10: afforded both the players the ability to shine. It takes
Speaker 10: maybe pressure off the Yogo to be quote unquote one
Speaker 10: of the number ten's, and allows Diego to kind of
Speaker 10: find the game because he's a guy that can absolutely
Speaker 10: kind of sniff out opportunities. I still think of Mecca
Speaker 10: and Ojeeda are really really strong in their partnership. Pelacios
Speaker 10: hasn't shown nothing. Plasco hasn't shown the consistency or performance
Speaker 10: or the the recognizing and critical moments of where he
Speaker 10: needs to be. That may be just a rhythm thing
Speaker 10: or a lack thereof. Haa Haafa has been fantastic in
Speaker 10: goal Cabral. I think he's a fantastic addition. But to
Speaker 10: be quite honest, I think there's more questions than answers.
Speaker 10: I don't know who the best number nine is. I
Speaker 10: really don't know what the true level of Dominic Marchuk is.
Speaker 10: I see glimpses, but I don't see any consistency. The
Speaker 10: right back spot is wide open for opportunity. When Kobe
Speaker 10: Henry's available, I think he easily competes for one of
Speaker 10: the starting spots. And whether you're talk about Junka or
Speaker 10: Katrantis at left back, that turned into more of a
Speaker 10: competition than I ever expected to be so based on
Speaker 10: the lack of results and the losses, take away all
Speaker 10: the conversations about referees and monumental moments going against we
Speaker 10: also alate, I still think there's more questions than answers.
Speaker 10: I think he probably have competitive wise, roster for roster,
Speaker 10: spot for spot. One of the deepest, if not the
Speaker 10: deepest team for Real Salt Lake we've ever seen built.
Speaker 10: But they certainly aren't close to having their difference makers
Speaker 10: even from what we saw last year. This is a
Speaker 10: completely different group than we saw in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 10: And I'm waiting for waiting. I'm waiting for the vocal leaders.
Speaker 10: I'm waiting for the guys to kind of step up
Speaker 10: from a physical standpoint, no nonsense me versus you, I'm
Speaker 10: going to destroy you. And then the technical side of guys,
Speaker 10: they can put away chances because every and I don't
Speaker 10: know about you, but every time I watch Real Salt Lake,
Speaker 10: I feel like they they're generating three to four fantastic
Speaker 10: goal scoring moments. And the game against Nashville is a
Speaker 10: perfect example where Mark took before he scores. He should
Speaker 10: have had two or three more, Peel should have had one.
Speaker 10: This team needs to be more clinical and maybe a
Speaker 10: part of this quote unquote lack of investment was a
Speaker 10: byproduct of this ownership turnover. But they got to get
Speaker 10: back on track and by Wednesday, you know, that's the
Speaker 10: close of this first window. Hopefully they they can find
Speaker 10: the right guy that makes the most sense.
Speaker 2: For this team, and that's where we'll go next.
Speaker 1: Before I set you loose so you can get back
Speaker 1: to your boys game, Fabricio Romano, who breaks a lot
Speaker 1: of worldwide soccer news, reports that RSL has agreed in
Speaker 1: principle to sign Robert Bozanic, ki striker who has been
Speaker 1: in Portugal.
Speaker 2: I'm donnie.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to tell you I've been grinding on
Speaker 1: Portuguese you know Portuguese soccer tape. I don't know much
Speaker 1: about him, but tell us about this new striker. I'm
Speaker 1: told this should be on the ground of the next
Speaker 1: twenty four hours or so.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I won't pretend to know what his level is.
Speaker 10: I'm aware of him. I know that the conversations have
Speaker 10: been going on for quite some time. I'm confused as
Speaker 10: to why it's taken this long, similar to Diogo Consalvez acquisition,
Speaker 10: when you were able to get Chico Rongo done so soon. Remember,
Speaker 10: the Blitzer group owns either outright or a big part
Speaker 10: of Esterill in portsg so they will be very familiar
Speaker 10: with this player. I know he's a national team player.
Speaker 10: If you look statistically, he's not outrageous in terms of
Speaker 10: scoring goals. I think he's only got a handful of
Speaker 10: goals over the course of the season. Hopefully he's impactful enough.
Speaker 10: It's given him plenty of time to bet in over
Speaker 10: the course of the season, considering we're only nine matchdays in.
Speaker 10: But the question is how much of a different profile
Speaker 10: does he have compared to the two strikers three strikers
Speaker 10: if you include his speeta as well. We'll see, But
Speaker 10: sooner rather than later, let's see what he's made of.
Speaker 10: Get him on the field and hopefully in terms of fitness, sharpness,
Speaker 10: game you know, the game awareness, he's coming in and
Speaker 10: can immediate least step onto the field and you know,
Speaker 10: make an immediate impact. The team certainly needs somebody that
Speaker 10: can finish off some of the great chances that they've
Speaker 10: created so far in the first nine matches.
Speaker 2: Last thing, and I'll set you lose. Are you aware
Speaker 2: of it?
Speaker 1: Any other impending acquisitions additions to the group before the
Speaker 1: window closes on Wednesday?
Speaker 10: No, that's the only one. Oh uh, maybe let's put
Speaker 10: it that way. Maybe there's I've heard some whispers and
Speaker 10: if it does come to fruition. I think it would.
Speaker 9: It would.
Speaker 10: It would certainly help the team in positions that are
Speaker 10: necessary for competition for the starting spot. But yeah, I
Speaker 10: mean the other part of this is, you know, real
Speaker 10: Salt Lake has a certain amount of money available as
Speaker 10: they continue to evolve and make these moves. I'm looking
Speaker 10: at the summer transfer window of how aggressive can they be,
Speaker 10: especially with you know, the Miller's coming in. That's a
Speaker 10: big part of this equation that I think is going
Speaker 10: to be an unknown for all of us is to
Speaker 10: try to understand the true nature of financially what this
Speaker 10: roster is going to look like. Because weekend we are
Speaker 10: you know every month or so that we talk every
Speaker 10: couple of weeks spence where we're constantly watching and trying
Speaker 10: to figure out a way to negotiate what is this
Speaker 10: nuclear arms spending in Major League soccer? Because if you're
Speaker 10: really going to go out and spend money and find
Speaker 10: like the Latte lost in Atlanta or the Kevin Dankees
Speaker 10: in Cincinnati. And I know this is going to sound
Speaker 10: crazy that your your one hits though misses, you're gonna
Speaker 10: be with him at twelve to fifteen million dollar rage
Speaker 10: at this point, so things are significantly different. That's why
Speaker 10: I think having billionaire investors alongside billionaire owners are incredibly
Speaker 10: important for the evolution major lege soccer because you just
Speaker 10: can't afford to sit still anymore.
Speaker 1: Donny, good stuff. We'll let you get back to the game.
Speaker 1: And I appreciate the time, but it'd be good.
Speaker 10: Okay, Yes, Skyline four zero winners over park City up here,
Speaker 10: so a big, big result there. O.
Speaker 1: My god, Bri, I've done seth RSL legend RSL back
Speaker 1: at action against San Diego coming up this weekend. Hopefully
Speaker 1: Diego Luna will be on the pitch. They have appealed
Speaker 1: the red card. We'll see if it's send it before
Speaker 1: we catch a break. My guys, Tally and Corey Liven
Speaker 1: studio from Courtland Roofing on a Monday afternoon. All right, Corey,
Speaker 1: we will start with you. I know we've talked about this,
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Speaker 1: if if there's a listener right now that knows they
Speaker 1: have a minor roof issue, why is it important to
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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question.
Speaker 8: And to start off, if we do do a repair
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Speaker 8: needs to be done. If there is a repair that
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Speaker 1: Tally, we haven't talked about this, but you offer discount
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Speaker 2: Talk about that program you guys have.
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Speaker 1: So very cool, Very cool, Corey. Let's talk about the process.
Speaker 1: Listener gives you a call today. What happens next?
Speaker 8: Yeah, So first step is we want to schedule a
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Speaker 8: at the roof, assess the damage or just assess the
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Speaker 1: Tally, peace of mind is important when people are getting
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Speaker 7: Absolutely, we use mo Owens Corning products, phenomenal brand with
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Speaker 1: Very nice, Corey, You guys are in studio because you're
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Speaker 8: Yeah, So for today only, we are offering free rain
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Speaker 2: It's not a big deal.
Speaker 1: Did you google search Dave Matthews band, Deep tracks. I
Speaker 1: want you to be honest, you did, didn't you? Maybe
Speaker 1: this is this is this is a deep track.
Speaker 3: I would say it's a deep track, a deep track
Speaker 3: off one of their lesser listen to albums.
Speaker 1: Nonetheless, yeah, it's uh, you know, I think Dave was
Speaker 1: going through some stuff. I think my guy was going
Speaker 1: through rough time in the early two thousands and so
Speaker 1: the song were we all? Well sure, I mean two
Speaker 1: thousand and one, you know, rough year for a few reasons. Uh,
Speaker 1: the song every Day did come off the album every Day,
Speaker 1: which is one of his hits in a great song live,
Speaker 1: but so right, deep track off an album not a
Speaker 1: lot of people know about.
Speaker 3: I cried a lot and one I was a small,
Speaker 3: small child.
Speaker 1: Well, there was a lot of reasons to cry in
Speaker 1: two thousand and one. Maybe we don't need to get
Speaker 1: into that.
Speaker 2: How old? How old were you in two thousand and one?
Speaker 10: Seven?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 3: Six?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Six or seven?
Speaker 2: Okay? Fair enough? So Little Dave Dan the program, all right.
Speaker 1: NBA Playoffs double header tonight, NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs four
Speaker 1: games tonight.
Speaker 2: So it's a fun time of year. Of course.
Speaker 1: Stanley Cup Playoffs are a ton of fun if you
Speaker 1: are new to golf, if you are new to hockey,
Speaker 1: they do not have Stanley Cup playoffs in golf, but
Speaker 1: they do have the RBC herotage Justin Thomas back in
Speaker 1: the winner circle. But if you are new to hockey
Speaker 1: in the market, I would encourage you to check out
Speaker 1: some of this action. It is intense, like the overtime
Speaker 1: games in Stanley Cup playoffs are wildly intense. And I
Speaker 1: gotta say the early returns of NBA basketball in the
Speaker 1: postseason has been a lot of fun. It sounds silly,
Speaker 1: but when basketball players actually care about playing.
Speaker 2: Basketball, the sport is really cool. So there you go.
Speaker 1: Fun stuff today with the Utah football spring game over
Speaker 1: the weekend, the transfer portal open in both college and
Speaker 1: I should say both college basketball and college football. We
Speaker 1: are expecting and getting some information on the house first
Speaker 1: NCAA settlement that will provide a little bit of clarity
Speaker 1: on what college football administrators kind of have their disposal
Speaker 1: to try to build out programs.
Speaker 2: So a lot going on.
Speaker 1: RSL is expected to welcome in their new striker, Robert Bosinika,
Speaker 1: over the next forty eight hours and hopefully he'll be
Speaker 1: able to alleviate some of the issues that have been
Speaker 1: plaguing the club, and they just cannot score goals. And
Speaker 1: if you're not a soccer fan, here's a little soccer analysis.
Speaker 1: If you can't score goals, you're not going to win games. Boom,
Speaker 1: there you go. So ours will be back in action
Speaker 1: coming up on Saturday against San Diego. So we do
Speaker 1: have a little soccer that we'll discuss on the program too.
Speaker 1: Of course, the ownership transition complete last week as the
Speaker 1: Miller family have taken over the controlling ownership interests of
Speaker 1: Rayastal Lake and the Utah Royals as well. NFL Draft week,
Speaker 1: of course, the local prospects will be tracking them. Really
Speaker 1: for the Utes, I think the highest rate of prospect
Speaker 1: is junior Junior Tafuna Karen Karena Reid is still trying
Speaker 1: to get healthy. Bran Keith, you once upon a time,
Speaker 1: was thought to be the better NFL tight end prospect
Speaker 1: before uh before Dalton kind of took over, Daldon Kincaid,
Speaker 1: Caleb Loner getting some intrigue, McKay Bernard on the b
Speaker 1: YU side of things, Tyler Batty, Klee, Btn and Jacob
Speaker 1: Robinson are the names to watch out for. But it
Speaker 1: is a fun week as far as the NFL Draft goes,
Speaker 1: going home to watch watch our knicks.
Speaker 3: Yeah right, that's uh, that's top of mind. Today was
Speaker 3: a little I wouldn't say distracted, that would be a disservice,
Speaker 3: a disrespect to my family. Uh, but busy with Easter
Speaker 3: stuff over the weekend, so kind of I played catch
Speaker 3: up on a lot of the hoops. Uh, you know, weeknight,
Speaker 3: gonna settle in and watch good show rsl Utes, Jazz,
Speaker 3: We talked Outlaws, we talked Dave Matthews band. So very
Speaker 3: full Monday. Yeah, I'm happy about it.
Speaker 2: Very full Monday.
Speaker 1: Indeed, all right, before we get out of here, we're
Speaker 1: gonna do a little best of and then it's time
Speaker 1: for the Clippers and the Nuggets. You can listen to
Speaker 1: a game on the radio station Porter What Comes Our
Speaker 1: Way on a Tuesday edition of the program.
Speaker 3: On a Tuesday edition of The Drive, Tony Jones stops
Speaker 3: by to talk to some jazz NBA action. Of course,
Speaker 3: he'll be covering the Nuggets throughout their postseason run. Tim
Speaker 3: McMahon talking to MBA on the Daily Assist a whole
Speaker 3: hour with Richard Smitty Smith. So we're diving deep into
Speaker 3: the NBA Playoffs tomorrow to start the show, and then
Speaker 3: catch up with John Kimball for some RSL to finish
Speaker 3: the show. A busy week for them in their own right.
Speaker 1: All right, some good stuff and of course we will
Speaker 1: get you ready for the NFL Draft on Thursday, Green Bay,
Speaker 1: lambeau Field, so stay tuned for that. Well, say good
Speaker 1: night special thank you today to Tom haberstro to Josh Furlong,
Speaker 1: Ben Solak and Brian dun Seth for any of this
Speaker 1: sound you missed today. Website is ESPN seven hundred sports
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Speaker 1: in our space every afternoon for four hours, check out
Speaker 1: our podcast page.
Speaker 2: It is called The Drive with Spence. Check its.
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Speaker 2: Reporter.
Speaker 1: I'm Spence, Sega night and enjoy your Monday evening. Hope
Speaker 1: you had a great Easter weekend. We'll talk to you
Speaker 1: on a Tuesday edition of the program, and as always,
Speaker 1: you can find it right here on ESPN seven hundred
Speaker 1: ninety TWOEFM. We are proud to be part of Utah's
Speaker 1: ESPN Radio network.