Speaker 1: All right, let's get a drive time Tuesday afternoon, fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes past the hour, two o'clock. Another beautiful day man,
Speaker 1: about fifty two degrees in sunny here in downtown Salt
Speaker 1: Lake City, Utah. And as it is every single day,
Speaker 1: it's gonna have you along for the ride. Spence Check
Speaker 1: it's behind the mike. That's Porter Larsen beyond the glass.
Speaker 2: This program is called The Drive with Spence Checkets.
Speaker 1: We do four hours of radio every single afternoon, and
Speaker 1: it's good to have you along for the ride. All right,
Speaker 1: good guest list today, a lot to get to today.
Speaker 1: Game day for the Utah Hockey Club. They welcome to
Speaker 1: the Chicago Blackhawks. Points at a premium fun conversation with
Speaker 1: Bill Armstrong yesterday, general manager.
Speaker 2: Of the Utah Hockey Club.
Speaker 1: They're back in action tonight, so the push for the
Speaker 1: wild card is on for the hockey club. Utah Jazz
Speaker 1: took an l last night to the Portland Trail Blazers.
Speaker 1: They're gonna be off tonight. They're back in action tomorrow
Speaker 1: taking on Sacramento. Really good game last night from Kyle Philipowski.
Speaker 1: Pretty good game from Bryce sent Siba Keyante tried to
Speaker 1: get them back in and at the end. But it
Speaker 1: was not a great Kyante night after a really good
Speaker 1: Kiante game against the Houston Rockets. But we'll do a
Speaker 1: little jazz basketball on the show today. We'll do a
Speaker 1: little NBA basketball on the show today. All eyes on
Speaker 1: Turner Sport tonight, six o'clock Mountain Time.
Speaker 2: The Lakers and the Mavericks.
Speaker 1: Luka Doncicic taking on his old team in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: We'll get to some storylines surrounding that game. Do some
Speaker 1: big picture NBA as down the stretch we come. And
Speaker 1: I've got to say, as the guy who pretty consistently
Speaker 1: over the past number of well years now has cracked
Speaker 1: on this product to pro basketball where it employs basketball
Speaker 1: players that don't seem to enjoy, you know, playing basketball.
Speaker 1: Over the past few nights, there have been some really
Speaker 1: good games and some high effort situations. As we are
Speaker 1: high speed ahead to spring and the playoff push is
Speaker 1: upon us, so do some NBA on the show today.
Speaker 1: Of course, the news that broke yesterday prior to us
Speaker 1: cracking the mic to come on air Craig Smith out
Speaker 1: as the universe Utah men's basketball coach.
Speaker 2: We'll get to the latest on this, and.
Speaker 1: I've had a couple of conversations over the past twenty
Speaker 1: four hours from folks up on the hill with folks
Speaker 1: up on the Hill and boosters donors reaching out talking
Speaker 1: about what's next for Utah basketball. So we'll get to
Speaker 1: that and the latest with the candidates that most people
Speaker 1: have already talked about. If you missed the Josh Grant
Speaker 1: interview from yesterday, I would highly encourage you to go
Speaker 1: listen to that up on our podcast page, which is
Speaker 1: called The Drive with Spence Check. It's a very honest, salient,
Speaker 1: clear eye opinion on what's happened at the University of
Speaker 1: Utah with the basketball program and what Josh and a
Speaker 1: lot of the alumni are hoping will come next. And
Speaker 1: so that will be a big portion of what we
Speaker 1: do on the program today. The NFL Combine is going
Speaker 1: on the NFL Drafters right around the corner. Some local
Speaker 1: boys involved Salt Lake Tribune with a story yesterday and
Speaker 1: we didn't get to talk about it much. We'll get
Speaker 1: to it today about some nil inconsistencies.
Speaker 2: I guess is how we'll that.
Speaker 1: With BYU football and then we'll do somebo College basketball
Speaker 1: is BYU is high speed ahead of the NCAA tournament.
Speaker 2: It looks like, barring some late season collapse.
Speaker 1: Richie Saunders named the Big twelve Player of the Week
Speaker 1: BYU with a massive win at McHale. So it's kind
Speaker 1: of a quiet night locally outside of the hockey club.
Speaker 1: But tomorrow's packed. Utah is at McHale to take on
Speaker 1: Arizona Sacramentos in town to take on the Jazz and
Speaker 1: BYU back in action as well as they're gonna take
Speaker 1: on Arizona State on the road. BYU in the top
Speaker 1: twenty five for the first time all year. Utah State
Speaker 1: with a tough roady at Boise, so a lot to
Speaker 1: do on the program.
Speaker 2: RSL back in action tomorrow.
Speaker 1: It's the second leg of their CONKYCAFF champions Cup opening
Speaker 1: round matchup against Aridiano. This one is here. It's out
Speaker 1: in Sandy. It shouldn't be right there, but hey, let's
Speaker 1: get a parking lot instead. So it's out in Sandy.
Speaker 1: Head on out RSL dot com to support the lads.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Our first guest right out of the gates Sean Mooney.
Speaker 1: We'll do some Utah basketball right away with Sean, who
Speaker 1: played at the U and now is alongside Ryles for
Speaker 1: the call for U tome nd Hoops. So Sean will
Speaker 1: be our first guest today. NBA Daily Assists was Zach Harper.
Speaker 1: He rolls by on the program as well. And then
Speaker 1: we're gonna bring in Bill Voice himself, Bill Riley on
Speaker 1: the program. We'll get Bill's thoughts on Craig's dismissal and
Speaker 1: what he thinks is next for Utah men's basketball. We'll
Speaker 1: do a little Utah football with Ryle's on the show
Speaker 1: today as well. Roxy Bernstein, one of our favorites, old
Speaker 1: school PAC twelve network guy, now doing a bunch of
Speaker 1: different stuff with the ESPN. We'll do some hockey with
Speaker 1: Roxy and some college basketball with him as well. So
Speaker 1: Sean Mooney, Zach Harper, Bill Riley, Roxy Bernstein. There's a
Speaker 1: couple of potential guests that may stop buy on that
Speaker 1: open three thirty block.
Speaker 2: We'll keep you up to date on that me Spence check.
Speaker 2: It's all of you the great listeners.
Speaker 1: Happy Tuesday, beautiful day outside, and it's going to have
Speaker 1: you along for the ride. And that guy Porter Larson
Speaker 1: rocking the beanie with fifty degrees today.
Speaker 2: It is a little warm feeling.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess I didn't get outside too much before
Speaker 4: I came outside, threw the beanie on, and then yeah,
Speaker 4: ran outside in mid February, and it's an another beautiful
Speaker 4: spring maybe summer.
Speaker 2: Day, Yes it is.
Speaker 1: We were able to avoid the the the mud ponds
Speaker 1: at the park today. Duke, the station mascot, Duke who
Speaker 1: is here today? He cannot say no to a mud
Speaker 1: pond and he's white, yes, so it doesn't. It's not
Speaker 1: a great look. So we were able to avoid that today.
Speaker 1: But a fun day at the park with the dog.
Speaker 1: Hopefully you guys are able to get outside enjoy this
Speaker 1: warm weather. It will not last all that long, all right.
Speaker 1: Sean Mooney our first guest right out of the gates today.
Speaker 1: But before we get to Sean, pry to see if
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Speaker 1: All right, So, you never know in this business when
Speaker 1: a story's going to come down, and you kind of
Speaker 1: throw out the run down and you do the show
Speaker 1: based on the topic and the news of the day today,
Speaker 1: and ultimately the news came down that Craig Smith has
Speaker 1: been relieved of his duties as the head coach for
Speaker 1: the Utah men's basketball team. Craig was in his fourth year.
Speaker 1: We've talked about it. You know, the results. We could
Speaker 1: be reductive and say you didn't win enough, and that's
Speaker 1: certainly part of it. And you know, based off of
Speaker 1: conversations I've had over the past forty eight well, you know,
Speaker 1: twenty four hours or so, now this really was booster driven.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of people and all just say
Speaker 1: this again, if you missed Josh Grant from yesterday, you
Speaker 1: should go listen to that interview. But a lot of
Speaker 1: people in the community that write checks, boosters donors at
Speaker 1: the University of Utah just not pleased with the direction
Speaker 1: of the program. And you juxtaposed it with what's happening
Speaker 1: about forty miles down south.
Speaker 2: You know, on the football side.
Speaker 1: Of things, you could make a very fair case that
Speaker 1: last year was just a moment in time and this
Speaker 1: whole scenario where BYU has risen up to be a
Speaker 1: legitimate Big twelve football contender in Utah last year kind
Speaker 1: of fell backwards. You could make a very fair argument
Speaker 1: that the data indicates that might just be a moment
Speaker 1: right not necessarily the reality you can't do that with
Speaker 1: the basketball programs when you compare the two. And this
Speaker 1: isn't only the only reason that Craig is gone, but
Speaker 1: when you compare the two right now, BYU basketball isn't
Speaker 1: a better spot than Utah and has been, if we're honest,
Speaker 1: in a better spot than Utah has been in a
Speaker 1: little while. Utah has been able to get to some
Speaker 1: head to head wins. But the way that Kevin Young
Speaker 1: has been able to come in and take over that
Speaker 1: program and the way that their collective has been able
Speaker 1: to step up, at least on the basketball side. On
Speaker 1: the football side a different conversation. We'll talk about that later.
Speaker 1: Feel bad for my guy Killani. But on the basketball side,
Speaker 1: it's clear that they're writing big checks.
Speaker 2: It's Ryan Smith, it's Danny Ainge.
Speaker 1: I'm told they have nine seven figure donors and they
Speaker 1: all care about basketball. They paid Kevin a lot of
Speaker 1: money to lead the NBA. The reports are they have
Speaker 1: two seven figure players this year, and Cannon Catchings and
Speaker 1: Yegor Demon and they have the best high school player
Speaker 1: in the country coming to Provo next year. To the
Speaker 1: tune of more than five million dollars for five months
Speaker 1: of basketball. So BYU has something cooking that Utah just
Speaker 1: doesn't on the basketball side, and that doesn't sit well
Speaker 1: with alumni and boosters and people that care about the program.
Speaker 1: And obviously, you know, if you're Mark Carlin, those are
Speaker 1: voices you have to listen to. If you're Taylor Randall,
Speaker 1: those are voices you have to listen to. And I'm
Speaker 1: not saying this is the only reason he's gone. I
Speaker 1: do think it's layered and there are a number of reasons.
Speaker 1: The first reason is lack of results. Craig say it
Speaker 1: himself last year in an interview. This is a bottom line,
Speaker 1: results orientated business and we all know the deal. So
Speaker 1: lack of results, lack of winning, lack of booster support.
Speaker 1: And I'm sure if you're Mark Carlin, you know you're
Speaker 1: probably under a lot.
Speaker 2: Of pressure to make sure you get this higher right.
Speaker 1: You know, we talked about this when Tom Homo announced
Speaker 1: that he was retiring down at BRIGHAMIONG after twenty years.
Speaker 1: As they're ad Broco, Metadal, Dave Rose, Kalone, Satake, Mark Pope,
Speaker 1: Kevin Jung. I mean, that's basically five for five right
Speaker 1: for hires and Marx hires Craig and it didn't work,
Speaker 1: and so it's so for one, he didn't hire Kyle.
Speaker 1: And I think the you know, the succession plan of
Speaker 1: Morgan in place for Kyle was already in place before
Speaker 1: Mark got here.
Speaker 2: So I'm sure Mark's feeling a little bit of heat.
Speaker 1: He's got to get this one right because the one
Speaker 1: higher he's made, and this is the revenue generating sports.
Speaker 1: There are other hires he's made in sports that don't
Speaker 1: generate as much revenue that have been fine, but basketball
Speaker 1: and football is what pay payser bills, and that's ultimately
Speaker 1: how you're judged from Mark seats.
Speaker 2: So we'll see what happens.
Speaker 1: Of course, Alex jen And is the name that everybody's
Speaker 1: honed in on, and as I talked about yesterday and
Speaker 1: we'll talk about with both Sean Mooney and Bill Riley today.
Speaker 1: Five years ago or so, when coach Chriscoviak was let
Speaker 1: go and Alex's name came up, I was adamant that
Speaker 1: he would not even entertain it. But I was adamant
Speaker 1: that he would not entertain it back then because Alex
Speaker 1: was coming off a situation where he was the lead
Speaker 1: assistant for Quinn, Snyder and Quinn and that group had
Speaker 1: about a six to seven year run of big time
Speaker 1: success and they garnered a lot of respect around the
Speaker 1: NBA for their ability to develop talent, namely Gordon Hayward,
Speaker 1: Donovan Mitchell, Rudy Gobert.
Speaker 2: Right, we could keep going, but those are kind of the.
Speaker 1: Roses if if you will, when it comes to that
Speaker 1: iteration of the Jazz and the players they were able
Speaker 1: to develop. Sadly none of them stayed here when they
Speaker 1: had the ability to choose where they wanted to live.
Speaker 1: But Alex was credited with really helping Rudy develop. When
Speaker 1: Rudy came into the league, he could barely run up
Speaker 1: and down the floor. Dennis Lindsay on My show, Jazz
Speaker 1: General Manager said Rudy was treated like a quote circus
Speaker 1: freak at the draft combine.
Speaker 2: Nobody knew what to do with him.
Speaker 1: And of course the bulk of the credit goes to
Speaker 1: go Bear, but Alex was the guy that was working
Speaker 1: with him every day. He went from a Langley baby
Speaker 1: giraffe to a Hall of Famer with the help of
Speaker 1: Alex Jensen. You add on to the fact that they
Speaker 1: want a ton of games, and when you win, you're
Speaker 1: going to lose assistant coaches. And Quinn did with that
Speaker 1: group quite a bit. I could name you a bunch
Speaker 1: of names, but none of them would probably land. You
Speaker 1: probably don't know who they are. But he didn't lose Alex,
Speaker 1: and I thought you would because I thought Alex was
Speaker 1: going to be an NBA head coach. I know he
Speaker 1: interviewed with the Cleveland Cavaliers, I think before they hired Bickerstaff.
Speaker 1: But I'm not sure that Alex has received another interview
Speaker 1: to be an NBA head coach. And so five years later,
Speaker 1: I've changed my tune about what I believed to be
Speaker 1: Alex's interest in this job.
Speaker 2: This is I have not talked to Alex. I've reached
Speaker 2: out to him.
Speaker 1: Alex was perfect for the Jazz because he's very close
Speaker 1: to the chest, close to the vest.
Speaker 2: He doesn't share much. He's a pretty quiet dude.
Speaker 1: So we'll see a lot of people have already leaned
Speaker 1: into this idea of Alex Jensen as your head coach
Speaker 1: and Andre Miller as your assistant. And I'll say this,
Speaker 1: I'm not usually one that says you've got to win
Speaker 1: the press conference, but I think in this situation.
Speaker 2: In scenario you kind of do.
Speaker 1: I think you need to show this community that you're
Speaker 1: willing to spend what you need to spend to keep
Speaker 1: up with that school down south that's spending a lot
Speaker 1: of money to build a powerhouse college basketball program and get.
Speaker 2: In the game. Man.
Speaker 1: And if it's Alex Jensen and Andre Miller, I would
Speaker 1: imagine the ticket reps up on the Hill would receive
Speaker 1: quite a few phone calls right after the press conference.
Speaker 1: And of course the more important thing is how do
Speaker 1: you build a program, But at least for one day.
Speaker 1: If that's the direction, you garner a lot of good
Speaker 1: will in this community, and the buzz would be pretty palpable.
Speaker 2: Do almonds go bad? Do almonds have an expiration date?
Speaker 2: Honestly don't know.
Speaker 5: Do almonds go bad?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Maybe google that.
Speaker 4: I think I'm gonna say yes, But I think you're
Speaker 4: gonna have to like try to or like introduce moisture
Speaker 4: to the to the situation. I think they stay good
Speaker 4: for quite some time.
Speaker 2: Oh right, Yeah, I need to get to the store.
Speaker 1: Nobody gives a rip about this, but I was leaving
Speaker 1: in a rush today.
Speaker 2: Needed a snack.
Speaker 1: I've had this bag of almonds in my drawer for
Speaker 1: at least two years.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's cracked. I'm eating them. So I'm just wondering
Speaker 2: if I'm in trouble.
Speaker 4: I think you're fine, all right, but you know I'm
Speaker 4: not a doctor. I did stay at a holiday in
Speaker 4: last night, though.
Speaker 1: Sean Mooney, we know that Sean is a very proficient
Speaker 1: dancer in basketball. Mind, do you have any knowledge on
Speaker 1: the shelf life of almonds?
Speaker 2: Sean?
Speaker 6: I think you're just fine. I mean, come on, they've
Speaker 6: been around for a centuries, They're going to be around
Speaker 6: for a centuries from here on out. You are nut.
Speaker 3: We know that.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, Sean, that's good. That's good. I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1: Tell you what doesn't have a very long shelf live?
Speaker 1: College basketball coaches?
Speaker 6: What?
Speaker 2: Wow? Did I just make that transition?
Speaker 3: Good? It was? It was good.
Speaker 1: So Jean out know, if you had a chance to
Speaker 1: listen to Josh yesterday on the program, Yeah, goodness, and hey,
Speaker 1: I love it.
Speaker 2: I love the honesty.
Speaker 1: I don't know that I'm completely aligned with him all
Speaker 1: the way, but let you start there. What are your
Speaker 1: thoughts on kind of the salient clear eye analysis Josh
Speaker 1: gave us yesterday?
Speaker 6: Well, First of all, like I love JG. So I
Speaker 6: was an athlete with JG. He obviously is everything you
Speaker 6: said he was Spence. I mean, he's as good a
Speaker 6: player probably as we've had at Utah, really really talented,
Speaker 6: and I love how he's not pulling punches. He's just
Speaker 6: out telling you exactly what he feels. And I think
Speaker 6: like most of what JG had to say was was accurate.
Speaker 6: And the thing I love the most about what Josh
Speaker 6: said yesterday and what I heard the most Spence was
Speaker 6: his passion. Can you hear the passion he has for
Speaker 6: Utah basketball. It's it's that that I think right there
Speaker 6: encapsulates what really drives athletics for so many people, but
Speaker 6: in particular alumni. As far as like the finer points
Speaker 6: of what JG said, the only really only counterpoint that
Speaker 6: I would have to him is like, it's hard to
Speaker 6: go back to our era and put our era into
Speaker 6: this era. I agree that we need a system, that
Speaker 6: we need a system that players want to come play
Speaker 6: for Allah, Kelvin Sampson, Shaka, Smart, Marquette. These these teams
Speaker 6: have eighty seven percent retention. I don't know that you
Speaker 6: have to have roster construction. I don't know that you're
Speaker 6: going to have the same desire to be a role
Speaker 6: player that maybe JG was talking about. And I do
Speaker 6: think role players are very important, obviously, but that's the
Speaker 6: only real counterpoint I would have to JG.
Speaker 1: Just initially, Okay, well said, let me follow up with this,
Speaker 1: And here's where, Honestly, Sean, I'm not really sure where
Speaker 1: to land because I'm not privy to any of these
Speaker 1: conversations about what Josh was was kind of out outlining
Speaker 1: yesterday of alumni trying to contact Craig to get more involved,
Speaker 1: and part of me, if I'm being honest, part of
Speaker 1: me puts myself in Craig's shoes. I'm like, well, I've
Speaker 1: got I've got a program to run, I've got a
Speaker 1: team to coach, you know, and I can't necessarily kowtow
Speaker 1: to every single phone call I get from an alumni
Speaker 1: that wants to tell me how to run my team.
Speaker 1: But look, I also understand Josh's point about the rich
Speaker 1: history and pedigree of this program, and if you're the
Speaker 1: head coach's probably something you should consider at least having
Speaker 1: some people involved to hear their voices. I honestly am
Speaker 1: a bit conflicted on this one, Sean, but I wanted
Speaker 1: to get your thoughts and maybe you have some knowledge
Speaker 1: of alumni reaching out to Craig and Craig not necessarily
Speaker 1: being open to, you know, to those conversations.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I don't have any specific knowledge. Jag definitely,
Speaker 6: Josh definitely spoke as if he did have specific knowledge
Speaker 6: about that. I don't have that knowledge. I do know,
Speaker 6: and you know this. One of my close friends, my
Speaker 6: best man, Tommy Connor, was on a coaching staff at Utah.
Speaker 6: Two coaching staffs, Coach Majerison, coach Criscobiak, and so I
Speaker 6: do know from conversations with Tommy that often alumni reach
Speaker 6: out and sometimes you can talk to them, and sometimes
Speaker 6: maybe their requests or what they want are unreasonable. Like
Speaker 6: a lot of people think they can coach. This has
Speaker 6: nothing to do with what Josh Saner terms of who
Speaker 6: he thinks can coach. I agree, I think Alex Jensen's
Speaker 6: a great choice, along with lots of other candidates. But
Speaker 6: you know, you have to temper yourself and to go
Speaker 6: to Craig's position. To be in Craig's position. Now, I'm
Speaker 6: pretty I feel pretty intimate in this answer. Because I've
Speaker 6: been around Craig. I think Craig did have a lot
Speaker 6: on his plate at Utah. We know that Utah men's
Speaker 6: basketball is a lot just in and of itself. It's
Speaker 6: an entity that we all know and love. I mean,
Speaker 6: I love listening to you talk about your time at
Speaker 6: the Huntsman Center. So I think you have to do
Speaker 6: your best to hear the alumni as far as like
Speaker 6: whether or not there were jobs and all that. I
Speaker 6: really can't speak to that, all.
Speaker 1: Right, So before we get to and we'll talk Alex,
Speaker 1: we'll talk about other candidates, let's discuss Sean, your opinion
Speaker 1: on exactly why this went down when it went down.
Speaker 1: The timing still is a little and I've had some
Speaker 1: conversations that is give me a little bit more clarity,
Speaker 1: But the timing is still a little bit like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, do you let them just finish out the
Speaker 1: season And you know, they're already paying Larry and now
Speaker 1: they're paying Craig.
Speaker 2: They're paying two coaches not to coach the team.
Speaker 1: And you know, and Sean, we can be reductive, and
Speaker 1: I'm sure Craig, who's a honest, straight shooter, what's I
Speaker 1: didn't win enough so we can just lean into results period.
Speaker 1: I've been told that there is a booster element to this.
Speaker 1: People did not love the direction of the program. You
Speaker 1: compare to what BYU's building and how they look right now.
Speaker 2: A lot of people up here are not thrilled with
Speaker 2: the direction. So what's your take on why this went
Speaker 2: down and when it went down?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean I would say that there and Josh
Speaker 6: shit this on the head that I think in his
Speaker 6: what he talked about Last year, the Oregon State loss
Speaker 6: was a tough loss for us, and this year the
Speaker 6: UCF loss was a very tough loss. We had just
Speaker 6: that glimmer of hope. I mean, I was on your
Speaker 6: show saying that we're going to go three and two,
Speaker 6: and I really believe that, you know, and then you
Speaker 6: have that tough loss way of nineteen turnowds. We don't
Speaker 6: play the way we want to play. As far as timing,
Speaker 6: there's probably no good timing. And I want to extend
Speaker 6: courtesy to the staff. We spend a lot of time
Speaker 6: with these coaches, and one of the toughest things is
Speaker 6: the coaches that are on the staff. They don't get fired.
Speaker 6: The head coach gets fired, But the coaches that are
Speaker 6: there are even a tougher predicament now because now Coach
Speaker 6: Smith is gone, Coach Ilot's going to step in, and
Speaker 6: the other coaches are going to do their best to
Speaker 6: pick up for these student athletes who are also dealing
Speaker 6: with confusion. I would say, absolutely, there's no good time.
Speaker 6: This is makes sense in the regard that if you
Speaker 6: look out in the NCAA, I think there are five
Speaker 6: openings at a high level right now, and we know
Speaker 6: that the transfer portal puts all kinds of pressure on
Speaker 6: college basketball from within your program and from without your
Speaker 6: from outside the program. So I would say that even
Speaker 6: though there's no initially good timing, I understand this timing
Speaker 6: as far as shoes involved. I mean, obviously Taylor Randall
Speaker 6: and Mark Harlan are doing their very best. The administration
Speaker 6: is doing their very best to meet a lot of
Speaker 6: people's thoughts about what Utah men's basketball should be, and yeah, Spence,
Speaker 6: you're right, it hasn't been what it should be. I mean,
Speaker 6: the bottom line is we need to make the NCAA Tournament,
Speaker 6: and we need to be a regular in the NCAA Tournament.
Speaker 6: I think that's what we all expect and have grown
Speaker 6: to expect through those that era that Majeri's coached.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm glad you ended your answer with that,
Speaker 1: because there was luck. And I very much like Craig,
Speaker 1: and I do think he's a good coach. I don't
Speaker 1: think this will be the final chapter of his coaching journey.
Speaker 1: He's still very young, He's wanted places he's been prior
Speaker 1: to and I do feel bad for Craig, and I
Speaker 1: feel bad first fan. You know, a nice five million dollars,
Speaker 1: so parachute helps, you know. Yeah, my father wasn't a coach,
Speaker 1: but he was an executive in sports for thirty years.
Speaker 1: We uprooted several times. That's it's hard on a family.
Speaker 1: It's hard on children. So there's a human element to
Speaker 1: this stuff that I don't think we do a very
Speaker 1: good job of acknowledging in our business.
Speaker 2: I wanted to hammer it home.
Speaker 1: But yeah, one of the things Sean that I thought
Speaker 1: of pretty quickly was oh, okay, good, this standard is
Speaker 1: not okay with decision makers up there because it's been
Speaker 1: way too long since we've had to It's twenty sixteen
Speaker 1: was our last tournament team.
Speaker 2: I mean we're coming up on a decade.
Speaker 1: We should have the standard in this city that our
Speaker 1: basketball team either goes to the tournament every year or
Speaker 1: is knocking on the door every year.
Speaker 2: I truly feel that way.
Speaker 3: I absolutely agree with you.
Speaker 6: And to go back to that twenty sixteen, one of
Speaker 6: the interesting thoughts about the end of Larry's coaching career,
Speaker 6: it was the Pac Twelte wasn't as strong as we
Speaker 6: would have hoped it would have been. Right, So they
Speaker 6: end up in the top four four years in a row,
Speaker 6: and I think they only make the tournament one of
Speaker 6: those years. So that's kind of a mix of bad
Speaker 6: luck and being in a league that maybe didn't get
Speaker 6: the same kind of attention. Now, the Big twelve is
Speaker 6: the league where you can make the tournament. You have
Speaker 6: to have the right system in place, the right people
Speaker 6: in place, and certainly bringing former Utah athletes into this
Speaker 6: mix as potential coaches can make a really big difference,
Speaker 6: I mean an amazing difference.
Speaker 2: And we'll get there.
Speaker 1: But before we do, tell me about conversations you've had
Speaker 1: with Josh Eiland. I don't know, Josh. I would imagine
Speaker 1: we'll get him on the show. I know that he
Speaker 1: was a interim head coach prior to a West Virginia.
Speaker 1: I don't really even know what the nature of his
Speaker 1: relationship was with Craig. But what do you know about
Speaker 1: the interim head coach Josh Eiland.
Speaker 6: Yeah, no, quite a bit, right, And so we've had
Speaker 6: the opportunity to spend time with the coaches. He's a
Speaker 6: Kansas kid from a small town family man, really really
Speaker 6: well respected everywhere we go in this league, either the
Speaker 6: rest or the other coaches. I just had a coach
Speaker 6: in our last game at UCF stop me as we're
Speaker 6: walking out and say, hey, make sure you say hi
Speaker 6: to Josh. Josh didn't make the last game because he's sick.
Speaker 6: Coach Ilt didn't make the game. He's a straight shooter.
Speaker 6: You know exactly what you get. He was doing probably
Speaker 6: half of the scouts this year. Typically it would be
Speaker 6: he and JJ, coach Smith's right hand guy. So you're
Speaker 6: getting the coach that knows the league. You're getting to
Speaker 6: coach that is in an unenviable position again two years
Speaker 6: in a row of being an interim head coach and
Speaker 6: potentially not having a job next year.
Speaker 1: Well, and he also coached under Bob Huggins, So you know,
Speaker 1: he probably, as you know, probably probably has a lot
Speaker 1: of a lot of great stories about coaching under Bob.
Speaker 1: So I don't think Josh is a candidate. I don't
Speaker 1: know this. We'll see what he's able to do. So
Speaker 1: before we move into what's next, what do you you know,
Speaker 1: we're all recalibrating now, right, So what do you expect
Speaker 1: on this team moving forward?
Speaker 2: After these players have lost the coach.
Speaker 1: I feel like most of them liked playing for I
Speaker 1: don't have any inside information there.
Speaker 6: Yeah, no, I think it's the craziest thing ever. I mean,
Speaker 6: this is basically all Bill and our sound engineers. Though
Speaker 6: you're guys, though we've been talking about, right, what's gonna
Speaker 6: how's the team going to respond? I mean, I don't
Speaker 6: think the team had any idea this was coming in,
Speaker 6: so I'm sure they're a shot. They flew home after UCF,
Speaker 6: so we're actually in Tucson right now waiting for them.
Speaker 6: They're going to come in to day at five forty five.
Speaker 6: We're all staying at the same hotel. You know, it's
Speaker 6: going to be interesting to see just their body language tomorrow.
Speaker 6: So I think there are two different directions you go.
Speaker 6: You know, you kind of shore up as an athlete
Speaker 6: and you decide what you're made of and uh, and
Speaker 6: you figure some things out for yourself. And if you
Speaker 6: can do that, maybe you can be competitive against Arizona.
Speaker 6: That's the one I'm hoping for. Or you kind of say,
Speaker 6: you know, forget this. Uh, if they don't care about us,
Speaker 6: you know who knows. But I want you to know
Speaker 6: the administration and the people that are in charge, they
Speaker 6: spent their time connecting with these athletes, these student athletes
Speaker 6: and land them know what's going on and where they're going.
Speaker 6: So they know they're cared about.
Speaker 2: Well, that's good, that's good.
Speaker 1: And we'll see how they respond because I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: I certainly I think it would be difficult as a
Speaker 1: young player to lose the guy who you came to
Speaker 1: play for. And maybe a little rally around Coach Eyler
Speaker 1: will have to see. But let's move on to what's next.
Speaker 1: And this is what's always interesting, Sean, because as you know,
Speaker 1: with the ecosystem of college basketball, every year there are
Speaker 1: very very enticing candidates that are coaching at smaller schools
Speaker 1: that have that have had have had a lot of
Speaker 1: success and ultimately if they're able to make the tournament.
Speaker 1: It's one of the things I love about March Madness,
Speaker 1: watching somebody have their live change, lives changed in real time.
Speaker 1: Like you make a little bit of a run, suddenly
Speaker 1: you go from like your Eric Olsen at U see
Speaker 1: San Diego and you make you don't like And I
Speaker 1: could go over the James Right, there's Nico medved to
Speaker 1: Colorado State, There's Eric Henderson at South Dakota State.
Speaker 2: Like you know the list.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about that portion of this pool before
Speaker 1: we get to the names that everybody's already talking about.
Speaker 1: If you're Mark Harlan, even though you're hearing the Alex Jensen's,
Speaker 1: the Johnny Bryants de Andre Millers of the world, do
Speaker 1: you try to go that route to get a more
Speaker 1: conventional hire as it pertains to the macro view of
Speaker 1: college basketball that typically happens that ride of passage, or
Speaker 1: do you not look at that route, because that's essentially
Speaker 1: what you just did with Craig.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, yeah, No, I absolutely think you look at
Speaker 6: that route. I think you look at it all. You
Speaker 6: would be remiss, Spence, if you and I were hiring
Speaker 6: for a job in our business we would try and
Speaker 6: find the absolute best person for that job.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's no.
Speaker 6: Question that a Utah alumni if they can, if they
Speaker 6: can meet the requirements to coach. I mean, that's a
Speaker 6: natural fit for so many people. But there are some
Speaker 6: great coaches out there, and I agree with you. I
Speaker 6: think the greatest thing about college basketball is that story
Speaker 6: of working your way up. That's one of Craig's stories.
Speaker 6: It was a good story, right. I want that for
Speaker 6: whoever comes in next. I mean obviously we you and
Speaker 6: I and the people and the fans out there that care.
Speaker 6: Josh Grant, everyone cares about this program, and we want
Speaker 6: what's best for this program and putting a new system
Speaker 6: in place that is bigger, maybe than what we have
Speaker 6: currently or what we've had since twenty sixteen. A system
Speaker 6: in which you know, U TIH men's basketball has a
Speaker 6: chance to flourish, and the people that are going to
Speaker 6: put money into that are interested in putting money into that.
Speaker 6: I think I heard you talking about that earlier. It's
Speaker 6: a big time deal, but I opened it up to everybody.
Speaker 1: So now let's move over to the names that people
Speaker 1: are excited about. And Sean, I'm not usually a like, hey,
Speaker 1: let's win the press conference. Guy, Like, there's so many
Speaker 1: things that are so important in the long run and
Speaker 1: playing the long game of building a program.
Speaker 2: But I think in this case you might need to
Speaker 2: a little bit.
Speaker 1: And I do think a Jensen as head coach, Andre
Speaker 1: Miller is assistant coach announcement inundates the department, the ticket
Speaker 1: department up there with people interested in actually getting behind
Speaker 1: this group. I just think it's a basketball community that
Speaker 1: has nearly been flatlined for way too long, and so.
Speaker 2: Let's invigorate it a little bit.
Speaker 1: And I do think an Alex Jensen head coach andre
Speaker 1: Miller assistant coach would really excite this basketball community.
Speaker 2: So give me your thoughts on that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean obviously, I told Bill. I mean so
Speaker 6: one of the things that I had when I first
Speaker 6: got this job last year being the voice of the
Speaker 6: youth sidekick was Sloak DeMarlo Slocum and Chris Burgess. I
Speaker 6: both understood slow coach with Tommy and Burge was a
Speaker 6: player from a jurist, There's like this automatic affinity, so
Speaker 6: like I often got my keys from Burge and tried
Speaker 6: to understand what we're doing based on what in Burge
Speaker 6: took the time to help me with that. You know,
Speaker 6: Alex Jensen and Andrew on mean, come on that they
Speaker 6: we all, to Josh's point, we all see basketball through
Speaker 6: coach Majaris, and so to have those two players in
Speaker 6: that era, which we know our fans love, come back
Speaker 6: and start something new, create something new, it'd be fantastic.
Speaker 6: It would be I would understand it in a way,
Speaker 6: Spence that you understand eating almonds are safe for you?
Speaker 1: Well played? Look, I hope they are. We'll find out
Speaker 1: maybe an hour from now. You know what, I haven't
Speaker 1: even what what about Birge? What about Chris Burgess? I mean,
Speaker 1: is that a phone call you make?
Speaker 6: Why not? I mean, and again, like these are solely
Speaker 6: my opinions. I am not, you know, giving you like
Speaker 6: the guy that I think it is. But I'm just
Speaker 6: playing with you. Yeah, heck, yes, you give me a call.
Speaker 6: I mean, Chris Burgess, they're a great coach, he understands. Utah,
Speaker 6: Well he's been there twice.
Speaker 2: Now, Yeah, no, that's right.
Speaker 1: And you know, I don't fault anybody for parlaying success
Speaker 1: into a better contract and a better job, which he's
Speaker 1: done a couple of times and maybe this is a
Speaker 1: part where you take over up here, So.
Speaker 2: Let's move over now.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you about Johnny Johnny Bryan. Josh didn't
Speaker 1: seem to entertain that very much. I like him, I
Speaker 1: always have. He's always been really good to me. When
Speaker 1: I was with the Jazz and he was over there
Speaker 1: as an assistant working with Donovan, I often kind of
Speaker 1: picked his brain about Donovan's process. And Johnny's also credited
Speaker 1: with the evolution and the growth of Gordon Hayward. Now
Speaker 1: he's the associate head coach for a really good team.
Speaker 1: And I feel about Johnny now the way I felt
Speaker 1: about Alex five years ago.
Speaker 2: I just think he's going to get a head coaching
Speaker 2: job in the pros.
Speaker 1: Now Josh leaned into the dynamic of HM being more
Speaker 1: of a developmental coach. Well, that's kind of Alex's gig
Speaker 1: in the pros. Alex was a g League head coach.
Speaker 2: I get it.
Speaker 1: So what are your thoughts on the potential of contacting
Speaker 1: Johnny Brian to see if he'd be interested in coming
Speaker 1: back to his alma mater.
Speaker 6: I mean, absolutely, I understand what Josh is saying. I don't.
Speaker 6: I mean, Johnny Briant's a great development coach, but he's
Speaker 6: an associate head coach in the NBA. I mean, again,
Speaker 6: let's open the list to everybody. I'm not the one
Speaker 6: that has to go through that list, right, You're not
Speaker 6: the one that has to go through that list, but
Speaker 6: there would be no reason not to. And then you
Speaker 6: want to get him in an interview, and you want
Speaker 6: to know what he's all about. I mean, he sounds
Speaker 6: like he could be a good fit. Like I talked
Speaker 6: to Phil Colan, a good friend of mine today who's
Speaker 6: in San Antonio's management, and one of the things that
Speaker 6: Phil Colan told me today was that all these NBA
Speaker 6: teams know exactly what's going on at the collegiate level,
Speaker 6: and this model that we have at the collegiate level
Speaker 6: right now is a model very similar to their model.
Speaker 6: So I mean, yes, of course you want to bring
Speaker 6: Jhnny Bryant, and he's probably going to understand this modern
Speaker 6: model of getting athletes into your program or your system
Speaker 6: as well as anybody.
Speaker 1: All Right, before I set you loose, you know, it's
Speaker 1: just I'll just tell you my opinion. Okay, my opinion
Speaker 1: is watching Utah basketball this year, I feel like Craig
Speaker 1: was entering Jim's with less talent than the other head
Speaker 1: coach most of the time.
Speaker 2: That's my opinion.
Speaker 1: Now, the problem is, this isn't the pros where the
Speaker 1: general manager and the VP of basketball ops are building
Speaker 1: your roster. If you're the head coach, you're responsible for
Speaker 1: the talent on your roster as well. So that also
Speaker 1: comes down on Craig, at least partially. So my question,
Speaker 1: Sean is whoever this coach is?
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 1: So if we played the scenario out a little bit,
Speaker 1: and let's say it's Alex and Mark calls Alex Jensen
Speaker 1: and Alex picks up the phone, I can promise you
Speaker 1: Alex is gonna want to know what shape are we
Speaker 1: in with Nil? What shape are we in with the collective?
Speaker 1: Am I able to keep up with my peers? Can
Speaker 1: we get talent based off of the economics of the
Speaker 1: program right now? The infrastructure around the coach has to
Speaker 1: be as sound as ever in college basketball these days?
Speaker 1: Is the infrastructure at Utah Basketball where it needs to be?
Speaker 3: I agree with you.
Speaker 6: I mean, I think from a talent standpoint, having now
Speaker 6: been all the way to the Big twelve, we have
Speaker 6: talented kids one of our rules, and one of my
Speaker 6: rules through the last twenty five years, is how many
Speaker 6: of those kids could play next level? And if you
Speaker 6: look at some of the teams we're playing, the Big
Speaker 6: twelve is actually not as talented at moving kids to
Speaker 6: the NBA as the PAC twelve was. Last year. I
Speaker 6: think the PAC twelve had nine players and the Big
Speaker 6: twelve had four.
Speaker 3: But the Big twelve has a lot of really good.
Speaker 6: College basketball players, which we need. Alex Jensen, Johnny Bryant,
Speaker 6: my goodness, my brain just stopped. Andrew Miller. I mean,
Speaker 6: these guys are going to have a connection to money
Speaker 6: and the potential of creating a larger annail budget that
Speaker 6: possibly another cook coming from a smaller school would not.
Speaker 6: So that can make a big difference and that may
Speaker 6: be a big part of what the decision is for
Speaker 6: the administration.
Speaker 1: All right, John, last thing, you know, Michaeale Arizona. That's
Speaker 1: the first game that the kench Eiler has to deal
Speaker 1: with here in Arizona's going to be grumpy after getting
Speaker 1: got by breaking me on.
Speaker 2: So tell me what you're expecting tomorrow night.
Speaker 1: Is the Utes invade a really tough place to play
Speaker 1: in college basketball.
Speaker 3: Yes, Spence, and listen.
Speaker 6: If you haven't been down here, I'm I'm We're gonna
Speaker 6: get you a ticket. You need to come down and
Speaker 6: watch a game here. It's a great place to watch
Speaker 6: a game. Here's what I'm expecting. If our energy is
Speaker 6: good and we can defend them in transition. This team
Speaker 6: is scary in transition. If we cannot give up transition
Speaker 6: buckets and we can have the kind of rebounding energy
Speaker 6: that we've had, it could be I mean, listen, Arizona's
Speaker 6: better than we are, okay, but it could be something
Speaker 6: that we compete and who knows, maybe the Utah School
Speaker 6: shock them twice. Maybe Tony Padi is a referend tomorrow.
Speaker 2: So very nice, very nice, all right, Sean, Well, I
Speaker 2: appreciate it. Man, have a great call. Thanks for the time.
Speaker 2: Say travels.
Speaker 6: Thanks brother.
Speaker 2: How good day, Sean Mooney. I'll be on the call
Speaker 2: with Bill Riley.
Speaker 1: The Utes invade Michale tomorrow to get Arizona team, who's
Speaker 1: going to be very grumpy after what happened against BYU.
Speaker 1: Speaking of Bill Riley, sets your alarm four o'clock today.
Speaker 1: Riles will stop by the voice of the Utes. After that,
Speaker 1: it's roxy Bernstein. But after a quick break, we'll do
Speaker 1: some MBA with Zach Harper Sean Mooney. Brought to you
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Speaker 5: I'm trying to bring you up.
Speaker 2: It's not working. Well, you're not gonna bring me down.
Speaker 1: NBA Daily Assist Zach Harper, Tuesday afternoon. I'm bragging about
Speaker 1: fifty two degrees in sunny? What's it like where you're at?
Speaker 3: I had to turn the air conditioner on because it's
Speaker 3: played eighty All.
Speaker 1: Right, never mind? Uh? Are you in La proper?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: Where's home for you?
Speaker 3: I'm in I'm in Sherman Oaks. I'm in the valley.
Speaker 2: Oh, hipster just over the hill? Yeah, okay, right on, man,
Speaker 2: it's not hipster. I'm poor.
Speaker 3: I'm the money to live out.
Speaker 2: Where's the uh is it? Silver Lake? Where do all
Speaker 2: the hipsters live?
Speaker 7: Silver Lake?
Speaker 3: Little Rock? Locally, he's like all that. Yeah, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 3: I refuse to live east.
Speaker 1: That happened, all right, fair enough, fair enough, all right, Zach.
Speaker 1: There's a game in Los Angeles tonight. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you've heard about it.
Speaker 2: I think where I'm at with it is Lucas saves
Speaker 2: the whole, like try to drop fifty form when he's
Speaker 2: in Dallas? What do you what do you think tonight?
Speaker 3: Looks like, Yeah, he's only like really played one good game, right,
Speaker 3: He's only I think played three games total, but he's
Speaker 3: only played one good game. He's looked rough in the
Speaker 3: in the other ones, and so like, I don't think
Speaker 3: this is one for him. Like, I know he played
Speaker 3: really well against Denver, but I don't know that you
Speaker 3: expect a rhythm and a chemistry with his teammates that
Speaker 3: kind of allows him to just go out there and
Speaker 3: drop fifty. I do think it makes more sense. I
Speaker 3: think when they when are they in Dallas, like April
Speaker 3: ninth or something like that, I think that's when it
Speaker 3: makes sense to like make your statement now if I think,
Speaker 3: I think if he's got a cook and today, if
Speaker 3: he's feeling good, if he's hitting shots early, yeah, his
Speaker 3: teammates are gonna feed him, He's gonna light him up.
Speaker 3: But I do think you're too early in the process
Speaker 3: of getting back from the calf injury and too early
Speaker 3: in the process of building what you need with your
Speaker 3: Laker teammates. If you're Luca like you, you can't be
Speaker 3: in this like I'm gonna absolutely dominate this game no
Speaker 3: matter what.
Speaker 2: What is your way?
Speaker 1: Too early takeaway on what you think this thing can
Speaker 1: look like this season? I mean, the interesting thing is
Speaker 1: the jazz song twice right away, and it didn't look
Speaker 1: great in either game. I think Luca dropped thirty two
Speaker 1: against Denver, and so we do have one. We do
Speaker 1: have one good game from Luca. I still believe there
Speaker 1: their lack of just even decent big men on paper,
Speaker 1: let alone in execution, is gonna cost them. But you know,
Speaker 1: with these two, it's certainly gonna look really, really good
Speaker 1: at times. But so far, what do you think and
Speaker 1: what are you expecting just the rest of the way
Speaker 1: this year with Lebron and Luca together.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I think there's gonna be times where
Speaker 3: it looks really good offensively, right, and there will be
Speaker 3: times where the defense does look fine. But I think
Speaker 3: it's gonna be more smoking mirrors than than actually something
Speaker 3: that works in the playoffs, because I mean, when's the
Speaker 3: last time you found out a team signed Alex lenn
Speaker 3: and you're like, oh, that's really good for them, right,
Speaker 3: because that's where they're big man situation, Like Jackson Hayes
Speaker 3: is terrible, right, I'd get it. He can go catch
Speaker 3: a lob, he can run the floor, he's athletic, he's
Speaker 3: terrible defensively, and someone that they can't even rely to
Speaker 3: have out there twenty twenty five minutes a game. And
Speaker 3: so they're still playing pretty small. You know, they had
Speaker 3: an interesting scheme against against Jokic and trying to make
Speaker 3: sure he didn't get any shots off, and it worked
Speaker 3: that night. So I think random Knights in the regular
Speaker 3: season they're gonna look fine, but you get to a
Speaker 3: playoff scenario, it's gonna be very matchup dependent, as is
Speaker 3: the case with a decent amount of teams in the West,
Speaker 3: but it's gonna be very matchup dependent. I think like
Speaker 3: I could see a pathway where they get the right matchups,
Speaker 3: they're healthy, they get into the conference finals. I think
Speaker 3: like there is a chance of that, but most likely
Speaker 3: this is at best a second round and out team.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's kind of where I've landed. And you know, matchups, injuries,
Speaker 1: you never know. It could have come playoff time. But
Speaker 1: I mean, look, man, when they were here, Walker Lowry
Speaker 1: and John Collins got whatever they wanted, Like, they had
Speaker 1: no pushback for the Jazz front line. If they're struggling
Speaker 1: with the Jazz front line, they're gonna struggle with other
Speaker 1: front lines.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean it was like that was the thing.
Speaker 3: Is the first game Luca didn't play well, and you're like, yeah,
Speaker 3: but the Lakers one because it's the Jazz, right, And
Speaker 3: then they went to Utah and I was like, oh no,
Speaker 3: this none of this looks good. It was to the
Speaker 3: point where I didn't even start watching the game at first.
Speaker 3: I turned it on because I looked at the score
Speaker 3: and the Jazz were up a significant amount. I looked
Speaker 3: at the score, Jazz are up, and then I was like, oh, well,
Speaker 3: I guess Luca didn't play tonight, and it's like, nope,
Speaker 3: he's playing, Lebron's playing. This is just bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, no, it was really bad.
Speaker 1: Let me let me get one jazz topic in here,
Speaker 1: because I do think there's one one thing rotationally that
Speaker 1: Will's done that actually is real. I mean mostly this
Speaker 1: is rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.
Speaker 2: We all know that.
Speaker 1: So like, ultimately, whether Kyle Philipowski is starting when Walker
Speaker 1: is hurt is not okay, great, and Kyle actually played
Speaker 1: pretty well against the Blazers. But we have seen Keyonte
Speaker 1: now kind of embrace this role off the bench, and
Speaker 1: we've seen Isaiah Collier as a starting point guard. He's
Speaker 1: about to break John Stockton's record for assis as a rookie. Now,
Speaker 1: John played behind Ricky Green, so it's not like he
Speaker 1: was starting and getting you know, getting a bunch. But
Speaker 1: this is something that I think could manifest itself as
Speaker 1: meaningful as opposed to all the other meaningless conversations we
Speaker 1: try to have about a team that's unserious about winning.
Speaker 1: So Isaiah Collier as the starting point guard, what has
Speaker 1: he's shown you and Keyonte, now that he's embraced this role,
Speaker 1: coming off the bench, looks a little bit more comfortable
Speaker 1: as opposed to them relying on Kyante to be the
Speaker 1: main initiator and decision maker.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean kind of what we were talking about with
Speaker 3: Kiante for a little bit is the same. I field
Speaker 3: about like the shots mostly look good, don't really go
Speaker 3: in right, But I like his size. I do think
Speaker 3: it's important to note that this was like one of
Speaker 3: the top prospects in his in his class, uh in
Speaker 3: high school, and then he went to USC where apparently
Speaker 3: they're just trying to destroy anyone's pro prospects the last
Speaker 3: couple of years because it just doesn't look good. And
Speaker 3: so I do think he I don't think he had
Speaker 3: the proper development last year. Getting into the mix, getting comfortable,
Speaker 3: getting up to speed has taken a little bit of time.
Speaker 3: But I like what he's what he's shown for the
Speaker 3: most part. I think his decision making for the positions
Speaker 3: he's put in pretty good and and his skill set
Speaker 3: is pretty good. I love I mean, look it was
Speaker 3: it was a little flurry last night. I love the
Speaker 3: way they were just like, you know, trying to extend
Speaker 3: the game, and Kiante was just fearless taking those shots
Speaker 3: at the end of the game, right, I mean, I
Speaker 3: think that was I think that's kind of the role
Speaker 3: I like for Kiante. I just don't think about it,
Speaker 3: like if you're going to come off the bench and
Speaker 3: be you know, kind of that super sub I do
Speaker 3: want him just kind of letting it fly. I do
Speaker 3: want him just pushing the temple. I do want him
Speaker 3: being a little chaotic, because that's that's kind of what
Speaker 3: you need in your guards off the bench of when
Speaker 3: you're a bad team, Like you just need someone to
Speaker 3: change the energy and make something happen.
Speaker 1: I am going to reach and stretch to try to
Speaker 1: make a topic out of potentially nothing. But I have
Speaker 1: seen kJ Martin play well in NBA games before, and
Speaker 1: he is he got a start for the Jazz and
Speaker 1: he's kind of the one tangible piece the Jazz received
Speaker 1: when they were the condu. It's all these deals going
Speaker 1: down and he's still young and he can I mean,
Speaker 1: he can fly.
Speaker 2: Man, He's a really good athlete. You've seen him play.
Speaker 1: Do you think there's a chance that they bring kJ
Speaker 1: Martin in with the opportunity to look at him and
Speaker 1: he might be around for more than a minute?
Speaker 3: Absolutely? Like he's I think for years A mean, al
Speaker 3: has and I have been like, why isn't Justin holiday
Speaker 3: rich right, Like, why isn't he getting like these big
Speaker 3: deals because we've watched him he's like he's this really
Speaker 3: nice three and D guy, shoots the ball well, doesn't
Speaker 3: really make mistakes. But he's ever like really had, you know,
Speaker 3: or been given that extended opportunity to be a role
Speaker 3: player consistently on a good team, And I've just been
Speaker 3: amazed that he hasn't found his way into that and
Speaker 3: then found his way into a big contract because of it.
Speaker 3: I'm starting to wonder, I kJ Martin's going to be
Speaker 3: that next Justin Holiday for me, and not that he's
Speaker 3: the shooter that Holiday is, but I just think like
Speaker 3: he's got so much defensive impact potentially with his athleticism
Speaker 3: and how he plays. I think he's such a threat
Speaker 3: running the floor, obviously getting up and down at the rim.
Speaker 3: If he can just be a consistent corner three point shooter,
Speaker 3: I think that's a super valuable role player. Like I'm
Speaker 3: a big kJ Martin fan. I was a little surprised
Speaker 3: that he didn't get a chance with Philly as much,
Speaker 3: although they're you know, they've been a mess, I know,
Speaker 3: but I just thought that everywhere he's gone, whether it's
Speaker 3: been the clippershether it's in Philly, doesn't matter. Like I
Speaker 3: just think that that's a guy you can mold into
Speaker 3: a really good role player.
Speaker 1: So after the news broke about women Yama, I was
Speaker 1: bosh right. My first thought was Chris bosh And you know,
Speaker 1: all the information we receive, uh, and we talked to
Speaker 1: Habershaw about this yesterday seems to indicate the Spurs are
Speaker 1: confident that this is just a little bit of a blitz.
Speaker 1: And you know, with stuff like this, I'm not going
Speaker 1: to be the media guy that looked at web MD
Speaker 1: and he's gonna break down what a blood cloud means.
Speaker 1: But you gotta shut him down and make sure he's
Speaker 1: on blood dinners and then ultimately a full recovery. My
Speaker 1: question is, does San Antonio lose the final twenty five
Speaker 1: games in Draft Cooper Flag?
Speaker 3: They should?
Speaker 2: They will?
Speaker 3: I mean they might. We're to be in a race
Speaker 3: of Philadelphia, but yeah, like they should. I mean, this
Speaker 3: is you know this it's not exactly nineteen ninety seven
Speaker 3: all over again, but you know, you could see see
Speaker 3: some similarities there. You know that you like, it's a
Speaker 3: different timeline and everything, but you know there's once Wendy
Speaker 3: went down, like I was kind of wit you. I was,
Speaker 3: I'm like, all right, as long as he's okay, great.
Speaker 3: It doesn't seem like his you know, long term career
Speaker 3: is going to be effect did amazing. All right, so
Speaker 3: go get one of these guys, like that's the whole thing.
Speaker 3: Like Steph Castle looks like a player that got you know,
Speaker 3: good wings with Vasel and Kelvin Johnson. Obviously, picking up
Speaker 3: Darren Fox is big, Like, all right, go get another
Speaker 3: one of those guys. And if you have Cooper Flag
Speaker 3: or Ace Bailey or one of these dudes next to Wemby,
Speaker 3: that's super enticing. And then you know the terrible thing
Speaker 3: is you know the report about about Pop and you
Speaker 3: know it never and once we found out it was
Speaker 3: a mild stroke, Like I don't care if the word
Speaker 3: mild is in there. He's seventy six, Like it just never.
Speaker 3: I never was like, yeah, he definitely should come back
Speaker 3: to coaching. To me, I was like, just go take
Speaker 3: care of yourself and live the great rest of your
Speaker 3: life and be with your family and everything, and maybe
Speaker 3: be a consultant in the organization. But I mean, if
Speaker 3: you have it's already going to be the most enticing
Speaker 3: coaching position in sports. If you added another piece to that,
Speaker 3: I mean, my god, like you'd have everyone coming for that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, not to be insensitive if they drive Cooper flag popably,
Speaker 1: like just wheel me out there.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm coaching the team, right.
Speaker 1: You know, people will be in line to coach that
Speaker 1: team if they're able to grab him. Can you imagine
Speaker 1: the reaction from the league and the Salt Lake City
Speaker 1: because look, man, I feel like it's our time. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go goonies on you. I feel like we've
Speaker 1: earned it all right. Every time we've been in the lottery,
Speaker 1: We've never moved up, never won a championship, haven't had
Speaker 1: a championship contending team here since ninety eight up. For honest,
Speaker 1: if there's one team that's earned the number one pick
Speaker 1: Zach a White power forward, it's the Utah Jazz.
Speaker 3: Absolutely. I mean, like I've been in these, you know,
Speaker 3: group chats with people are like where we know, where
Speaker 3: should Cooper go? Where should the NBA want Cooper to go?
Speaker 3: And I get it, like you could want him to
Speaker 3: go to San Antonio. You could want him to go
Speaker 3: to you know, New Orleans. I guess so that seems
Speaker 3: like a disaster. You could want him to save one
Speaker 3: of these bad franchises. Who's just kind of meandering all
Speaker 3: the time, like a Charlotte or a Washington or whatever.
Speaker 3: Get him to Brooklyn to help bump up the rest
Speaker 3: of that New York market. All those things are great,
Speaker 3: it's not gonna it's not gonna be a better story
Speaker 3: than putting on him on the Utah Jazz. It's not
Speaker 3: like we can call it what it is, like a
Speaker 3: star white Power Forward on the Jazz that is going
Speaker 3: to move ratings and numbers and jerseys and tickets and
Speaker 3: all that stuff.
Speaker 1: I want to cater to the audience here for a second.
Speaker 1: Let's put our let's put our thinking caps on. Let's
Speaker 1: get into our imagination space and picture an opening lineup
Speaker 1: next year of Walker Keshler at Center Lowry Marketing at
Speaker 1: Power Forward, Cooper Flag at Small Forward. Then they make
Speaker 1: a deal for Grady Dick at the two and TJ
Speaker 1: McConnell at the one. I mean, come on, box office,
Speaker 1: we have just fixed the Utah Jazz.
Speaker 3: Look. Everyone made fun of David Kahn when it was
Speaker 3: like Kevin Love and Pekovich and Loup Bridden Now and
Speaker 3: Alexi spid and Andre Kiirlenko. Everyone made fun of David Kahan.
Speaker 3: But I bet they'll love Danny Inge and love Justin
Speaker 3: Zannik if they figured this out.
Speaker 2: No doubt.
Speaker 1: Jimmiferdat out of retirement coming off bench and we are
Speaker 1: dialed in, man, do you think.
Speaker 3: Do you think? Do you think he can he can
Speaker 3: get away from from nothing right now to get a
Speaker 3: job with NBA.
Speaker 2: Isn't he doing three on three?
Speaker 3: Does that is that year round? I don't thought that
Speaker 3: was once every four years? Does a half court over there?
Speaker 3: Go go represent ive?
Speaker 1: I don't know what Jimmer is doing these days. I
Speaker 1: know he lives in Colorado. I mean, he made enough
Speaker 1: money and maybe he's just yelling.
Speaker 3: He's not in the Big Three right and he's not
Speaker 3: playing in China anymore.
Speaker 2: I don't think so. By the way, have you watched
Speaker 2: What's that?
Speaker 1: I just saw it on the DVR because my DVR
Speaker 1: is like every time I turn it on and it's
Speaker 1: like you seem to like sports or here's a sport
Speaker 1: feel it's like one on one.
Speaker 2: It's a one on one tournament. Have you watched any
Speaker 2: of this?
Speaker 3: No? No, I'm at a point in my life I
Speaker 3: watch NBA or w NBA basketball. That's what I watch.
Speaker 3: I don't even have time for college anymore.
Speaker 2: All right, you're not watching any shows, but you gotta
Speaker 2: watch movies for the pod, right.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I watched movies. I mean, look, I've almost
Speaker 3: bringed whatever episodes of Love Is Blind or here like. Look,
Speaker 3: I'm doing other things. I just I can't. That's stuff
Speaker 3: where I can turn my brain off, right right. This
Speaker 3: is like if I'm gonna have to pay attention to
Speaker 3: another basketball league, I can't do that.
Speaker 2: No, I'm with you. I'm with you there.
Speaker 1: But we are fixing the Utah Jazz one good white
Speaker 1: player at a time, so we'll have to see if
Speaker 1: it goes down.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Do you take anything from Minnesota's come back last night?
Speaker 1: I mean, Oka see rested chet and they lost Hartenstein
Speaker 1: in the second quarter, but Minnesota was able to come
Speaker 1: back from twenty four down, which does not happen very often.
Speaker 2: Did that do anything for you?
Speaker 1: Either tell you about Okac at all or maybe Minnesota
Speaker 1: playing a bit better.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think we're seeing a lot recently of Minnesota.
Speaker 3: Just like, hey, when Julius Randall's not out there, it
Speaker 3: looks a lot better, right, Like, it looks a lot better.
Speaker 3: And so like you know, Nazrita is headed for a
Speaker 3: big payday and and I think, you know, I think
Speaker 3: Minnesota is in a pretty good place, especially considering them
Speaker 3: and had really much recently. Like I think they're in
Speaker 3: a pretty good place. But for OKC, Look, I have
Speaker 3: concerns about a team that never is tested, right, Like
Speaker 3: they're zero to four games decided by one possession, which
Speaker 3: is whatever. They blow out almost every I want to say,
Speaker 3: like thirty seven of their forty six wins are double
Speaker 3: digit wins, Like they're not in close games. And as
Speaker 3: good as they are and they are historic and they're
Speaker 3: historically dominant, this is still a very young, playoff inexperienced
Speaker 3: team and they didn't play in a way against Dallas
Speaker 3: in the second round last year they made me think like, oh,
Speaker 3: they're right on the cusp, like they kind of choked
Speaker 3: that series away. And so when they get into those
Speaker 3: type moments, they're still very unproven and I don't think
Speaker 3: it's just a lock that they make it to the
Speaker 3: conference final. So this is still a team that has
Speaker 3: to prove themselves in the postseason, and little moments like
Speaker 3: last night you can just brush them off as like, hey,
Speaker 3: it's a back to back for both teams and it
Speaker 3: was fluky and yeah, sure all that stuff can be
Speaker 3: and probably is true, but we got to see them
Speaker 3: win some tight games here. Like it feels a little
Speaker 3: bit like the Milwaukee Bucks before they got Drew Holliday,
Speaker 3: where they were just blowing teams out all the time.
Speaker 3: Then they got to the postseason, it was like, Ooh,
Speaker 3: they don't really know what to do here.
Speaker 1: If you were putting a sizeable amount of money on
Speaker 1: who comes out of the West, like for me, I
Speaker 1: think I think I bet on Denver right now, even
Speaker 1: though okay, see, by every metric is the best team
Speaker 1: in the conference. Playoffs are different, and every time I
Speaker 1: hone in on Jokic, I'm like, yep, he's still the dude.
Speaker 1: And if they can knock down shots because he provides
Speaker 1: good looks almost every possession, I still think that you
Speaker 1: have to look at them as even though the Vegas
Speaker 1: favorite is not Denver, it is okay, seeing the metrics
Speaker 1: favorite Oklahoma City in a seven game series, I might
Speaker 1: roll with jokis where are you at?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would also put my money on Denver, And look,
Speaker 3: I get like, during that what was it, eight or
Speaker 3: nine game win streak, whatever it was, people were like, oh,
Speaker 3: it's a soft schedule for sure, but this has gone
Speaker 3: beyond that win streak, Like, this is a team that
Speaker 3: has been pretty dominant since I think it was I
Speaker 3: think on my date right, I think it was December seventh,
Speaker 3: was when Yokiics dropped a career high fifty six and
Speaker 3: they lost to the Wizards and they dropped to like
Speaker 3: eleven and ten. Since then, they've been the third best
Speaker 3: team in the NBA in terms of record. I think
Speaker 3: they've been the third or fourth best team in terms
Speaker 3: of net rating. Like this Nuggets team has figured it out.
Speaker 3: They've got to be healthy. They don't have a margin
Speaker 3: of air for if their health isn't you know, close
Speaker 3: to one hundred percent when when they get to the postseason.
Speaker 3: But if they're healthy, like, I'll take them over anybody
Speaker 3: in the list.
Speaker 1: I didn't anticipate doing any Pistons talk today, but they've
Speaker 1: won seventh straight. And what I try to do here
Speaker 1: with the Jazz for our listeners is look at teams
Speaker 1: that not too long ago were in the spot and
Speaker 1: Detroit is kind of one of them. Orlando's another one.
Speaker 1: But you know, Caid Pollo, they've got stars that we
Speaker 1: don't have here, But what do you make of what
Speaker 1: has been a pretty impressive turnaround. They've won seven straight,
Speaker 1: eight of their last ten. As far as what they're
Speaker 1: doing in Detroit that might be working.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, look, they were one of the worst
Speaker 3: teams I've ever seen last year. Yep, and I during
Speaker 3: pretty much the entirety of that season. But once we
Speaker 3: got through halfway through that that you know, twenty eight game,
Speaker 3: losing the streak, I kind of had this feeling like,
Speaker 3: I don't really think Monty Williams is given us all here,
Speaker 3: and wouldn't it be great to get fired with seventy
Speaker 3: million dollars left on your contract? Right? Like it just
Speaker 3: kind of seemed like he knew what to do in
Speaker 3: terms of what his long term best case scenario was.
Speaker 3: And all right, they added some veterans like Molik Beasley
Speaker 3: who didn't pan out in Milwaukee. You know, he came
Speaker 3: in and he has been phenomenal. Like he's on pace
Speaker 3: to have like one of the six or seventh best
Speaker 3: three point shooting seasons ever, and so he's been great.
Speaker 3: Tobias Harris came in and he's been pretty solid. But
Speaker 3: for the most part, this is a lot of what
Speaker 3: we saw last year in terms of the group, and JB.
Speaker 3: Bickerstaff is just a really good coach. I didn't think
Speaker 3: he should get fired in Cleveland. It ended up working
Speaker 3: out for them, but I didn't think the process was good.
Speaker 3: I thought he did a great job, and he's doing
Speaker 3: a great job now. I think that's the problem. If
Speaker 3: you're looking at the Jazz and you're saying, well, how
Speaker 3: can we do that? The problem is one you don't
Speaker 3: have a kid Cunningham right, who's who's taken a leap
Speaker 3: and been very good. But two Will Hardy's a good coach.
Speaker 3: He's out here looking like he wants to get fired
Speaker 3: every night. And so that turnaround for the Pistons I
Speaker 3: think was more coaching in culture than it was. It
Speaker 3: was development. And and with the Jazz like they've got
Speaker 3: a good coach, so I don't I don't think that
Speaker 3: they would necessarily fall into that pattern.
Speaker 2: I agree, man, I think he's an elite coach. I
Speaker 2: really do.
Speaker 1: I just wonder if the Jazz don't get any lottery
Speaker 1: luck and if they if they don't, like if the
Speaker 1: Jazz this year fall to like the fifth pick or
Speaker 1: the sixth pick or whatever, missed out, miss out on
Speaker 1: the top three or four dudes, same thing next year,
Speaker 1: and then his contract expires. What does he do if
Speaker 1: we're sitting here two years from now, none of this
Speaker 1: luck comes our way. They're not able to execute any
Speaker 1: trades for anything substantial, and it's it's five full years
Speaker 1: of Will doing the best he can to maximize the
Speaker 1: talent that he gets, but he's not receiving the talent
Speaker 1: that allows him to compete night in and night out.
Speaker 1: Like they love him and they want him here forever,
Speaker 1: and I get it, But what does Will do if
Speaker 1: his contract expires and we're still kind of spinning our wheels?
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I haven't heard anything like about his frustrations
Speaker 3: or anything like. I think he seems pretty happy there.
Speaker 3: I think he likes the organization. I think he wants
Speaker 3: to build long term. He seems like that kind of guy.
Speaker 3: So if I'm his agent, I would be like, well,
Speaker 3: it hasn't really worked out in terms of getting him
Speaker 3: the players he wants, so he's gonna need a lot
Speaker 3: of money to stay right, Like, I think it just
Speaker 3: comes down to that. I don't think unless there's just
Speaker 3: an offer where he's blown away and it's a perfect
Speaker 3: scenario that he can't pass up. I wouldn't anticipate him
Speaker 3: getting out of Utah. I would anticipate him cashing in
Speaker 3: on that opportunity because you are you do then kind
Speaker 3: of have the jazz at a disadvantage in terms of negotiations.
Speaker 3: But I do think it does just it feels like
Speaker 3: one of those situations where he is the law term
Speaker 3: solution on both ends of that equation.
Speaker 2: I agree with that.
Speaker 1: But the interesting thing is, you know, with the way
Speaker 1: these guys are wired like and money makes everything taste
Speaker 1: a little bit better. I'm not saying it doesn't, but
Speaker 1: when it comes to simply wins and losses, if you
Speaker 1: don't feel like you can compete in the job that
Speaker 1: you have because you're not giving the you know, you're
Speaker 1: not giving the things that you need to have what
Speaker 1: your peers have across the landscape of the league, will
Speaker 1: just strikes me as the type of guy that And
Speaker 1: this is all hypothetical because I mean this is two
Speaker 1: years away, but I do think you know, I feel,
Speaker 1: and I have felt for a while. You know, they
Speaker 1: found marketing that's a real piece, and they've got the
Speaker 1: head coach that's a real piece. I almost have question
Speaker 1: marks about everything else. Maybe Walker's playing himself into the conversation.
Speaker 1: I just have to wonder if Will's looking at his
Speaker 1: win loss on his resume, his record, and he's saying,
Speaker 1: this is not going to look good for me historically speaking, Yes,
Speaker 1: money would be nice, But these guys are wired to win,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just, I mean, you're right. I just I
Speaker 3: also think they're wired with a love of ego that
Speaker 3: and I don't even mean that in a pejorative way,
Speaker 3: but like they're wired in terms of ego of like,
Speaker 3: oh yeah, we'll figure it out here, right Like they're
Speaker 3: not They're not out of talent, Like there is talent.
Speaker 3: There's more potential on that roster than anything really tangible.
Speaker 3: But I would anticipate because of how good Danny and
Speaker 3: Justin are at their jobs, and I would imagine the
Speaker 3: communication process is pretty is pretty stable there between front
Speaker 3: office and sidelines. I just I don't think he's gonna
Speaker 3: have any questions about what the plan is and how
Speaker 3: they try to execute it. Now, they may have the
Speaker 3: bad luck of the lottery and all this stuff, right
Speaker 3: like that, there's nothing you can really do about that.
Speaker 3: But I just look. And I don't know the guy
Speaker 3: at all, but I just don't. I don't think he's
Speaker 3: someone who'd be like, ooh, I'm worried about you know
Speaker 3: what my record is long term? Like I don't think
Speaker 3: Brett Brown was thinking that way when he was in Philly, right.
Speaker 3: I think it was an opportunity and he liked coaching
Speaker 3: there and it didn't work out and they got rich
Speaker 3: of him. But I don't think he sweated that because
Speaker 3: I think I think guys like that are are looking
Speaker 3: at those situations and saying, when we turn it around,
Speaker 3: all that stuff's gonna be irrelevant.
Speaker 2: Speaking of Philly, what what what do you do?
Speaker 1: I mean like they got und you got they got
Speaker 1: undressed by the the bulls hung one on them.
Speaker 2: What are they lost? Eight straight? Like like what how
Speaker 2: do they? How do they get out of this?
Speaker 3: Okay? Surgery? So you give you give Joel embiid surgery
Speaker 3: tomorrow and you say, hey, we'll see in September, Like, well,
Speaker 3: you're gonna rehab, you're gonna get in great shape, You're
Speaker 3: gonna get the rest you need, You're gonna get the
Speaker 3: rehab you need for this knee surgery. And and you
Speaker 3: just shoot for for next season and maybe even bring
Speaker 3: them along slowly into the start of next season. Like
Speaker 3: the awards, the sixty five game rule, all that stuff
Speaker 3: is irrelevant. Getting into the playing tournament now is irrelevant.
Speaker 3: Even if you get healthy by April, you're not gonna
Speaker 3: do anything. That team's not good enough. And I never
Speaker 3: bought them as contenders. I didn't think they beat this obviously,
Speaker 3: But like this is all about, you have a very
Speaker 3: small window moving forward with a lot of money owed
Speaker 3: to dwell Embiid and a lot of money owed to
Speaker 3: Paul George, and a lot of money owed to Tyrus Maxi.
Speaker 3: And unless you are going to make a major shift
Speaker 3: in altering that roster, which I don't think they're even
Speaker 3: really all that capable of doing if they wanted to,
Speaker 3: you have to. You know, it's kind of like the
Speaker 3: Clippers conversation the last few years. You got to just
Speaker 3: find a way to set yourself up to catching lightning
Speaker 3: in a bottle with this group, or you start letting
Speaker 3: guys walk. But that's not gonna happen anytime soon with
Speaker 3: the way the contracts are structured. So get embead surgery
Speaker 3: now and hope that that's what fixes the problem for
Speaker 3: them and fixes the problem for his knee, because there
Speaker 3: is no there's no like, mister Miaghi, We're gonna, you know,
Speaker 3: rub this thing in the playoffs and it's gonna magically
Speaker 3: heal and we're gonna march to a championship. There's no
Speaker 3: Disney movie here. There's no incredible like film noir that
Speaker 3: happens like this is going to be bad if you
Speaker 3: don't go this pass, and even if you do go
Speaker 3: this path, it might still be bad. You have terrible
Speaker 3: luck with this, But there is there's no magical cure
Speaker 3: that isn't surgery and rest for Joel embiid.
Speaker 2: Did you watch Cobra Kai.
Speaker 3: I watched like three seasons of it, and it just
Speaker 3: even for me, it got too ridiculous.
Speaker 1: Oh I thought it would be right down your alley.
Speaker 1: It is horrifically awesome.
Speaker 3: The first season is right up right up until the end.
Speaker 1: Man that they somehow someway find a way to be
Speaker 1: horrifically awesome until the very end.
Speaker 2: I'm surprised you didn't finish it.
Speaker 3: I mean, I got to the point I've had people like, oh,
Speaker 3: you gotta finish it, and I am a completionist on
Speaker 3: some level, So there's part of me that wants to.
Speaker 3: But I mean, we had like karate gangs in the
Speaker 3: valley in la that's where the story goes. Keep the
Speaker 3: bloods and the crips. But karate Dojo's what are we talking? Like?
Speaker 3: What am I watching?
Speaker 1: You're missing out on Daniel Laruzo being kidnapped and put
Speaker 1: into a cage with snakes and he escapes by picking
Speaker 1: the lock.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I heard, I heard Terry Silver comes back, which
Speaker 3: I do like that because Karate Kid three is super underrated.
Speaker 3: But like one, I've had this. I've had this take
Speaker 3: for a long time. Nobody is with me on it,
Speaker 3: but it is. It is a fact. The Jaden Smith
Speaker 3: Karate Kid is better than the original. Oh stop it
Speaker 3: and guess what. Jaden Smith, as terrible as he is,
Speaker 3: is a better actor than Ralph Macchio. Go watch Cobra
Speaker 3: Kay and tell me Ralph Macchio is any kind of
Speaker 3: decent actor. He's terrible.
Speaker 2: I'm not here to stand up for Macchio's actor shot doing.
Speaker 3: No, that's what you're doing.
Speaker 1: I'm not, but I will not stand for the slander
Speaker 1: of the original Karate Kid, which was a gem of
Speaker 1: a movie.
Speaker 3: No offense to the amazing Pat mur either rip. Give
Speaker 3: me Jackie Chan all day.
Speaker 2: Okay, Jackie Chan.
Speaker 3: Whoever played Daniel's mother in the first one, Give me
Speaker 3: Taraji p Henson all day?
Speaker 2: Okay, Okay, that's fine.
Speaker 1: The tough part about Cobra Kai for me, like Larusso's
Speaker 1: daughter would get her ass kicked against a five year
Speaker 1: old like she is not you know, like you know,
Speaker 1: like and they try. She's like the baddest female karate
Speaker 1: fighter on the planet, Like you know, she couldn't fight
Speaker 1: a way out of a wet paper bag. But it
Speaker 1: is unbelievably entertaining, horrifically until the end.
Speaker 2: You need to finish it, man.
Speaker 3: I don't. I don't know if I have that in me.
Speaker 3: How alseome I I mean, I'm just gonna I would
Speaker 3: That's the problem, is I fire? I like turn Netflix on.
Speaker 3: I mean, I either have a new terrible season of
Speaker 3: Love Is Blind that I can't stop watching, or just
Speaker 3: go to like Seinfelder, I think you should leave and
Speaker 3: just would rather watch those again.
Speaker 1: Okay, fair enough, fair enough, there's not enough time to
Speaker 1: watch all the things.
Speaker 2: I get it all right, Before I set you loose?
Speaker 1: Are you buying any of this Golden State Warrior reborn again,
Speaker 1: hype that they could be a problem come playoff time
Speaker 1: after the Butler deal, and they've won three straight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean they won. They won three straight. I
Speaker 3: think are five and one with Butler in the lineup.
Speaker 3: I'm not I'm not not buying it. I'm actually writing
Speaker 3: about this for for the newsletter tomorrow. It's a free
Speaker 3: newsletter's called the Bounce Get at the Athletic dot com
Speaker 3: slash abouts one of a few things we do for free.
Speaker 3: I'm I'm I'm trying to figure out if I buy
Speaker 3: it and everything like, Look, it's coming out of Draymond's mouth,
Speaker 3: so a huge silo of salt comes with it. But
Speaker 3: the way he's presenting it in this article that that
Speaker 3: Marcus Thompson and Sam Amic wrote I think two days
Speaker 3: ago on the on the Athletic. The way he's presenting it,
Speaker 3: I kind of get it. I get the logic, and
Speaker 3: I do think a big part of it is you
Speaker 3: could see throughout this season they did not believe that
Speaker 3: they were the better team in a lot of these games,
Speaker 3: and with their offensive struggles, it was just rough with
Speaker 3: Jimmy there, he does bring that that gravitas. He does
Speaker 3: bring that confidence, and I get it. People are sick
Speaker 3: of the heat, They're sick of Jimmy Butler. This man
Speaker 3: does these things. If any scenario was gonna be like
Speaker 3: Rashid Wallace going to the Pistons in two thousand and four,
Speaker 3: it would be Jimmy Butler going to the Warriors.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's one of those dudes. There's no argument there,
Speaker 1: And I just cannot believe. At least admit you were
Speaker 1: emotional when Miggy Miguel Diaz was paralyzed and learned to
Speaker 1: walk again and came back and won the fight.
Speaker 2: At least admit you were emotional for that?
Speaker 3: Is that science?
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, no, dude.
Speaker 1: It's one of the things about that series that's so amazing,
Speaker 1: the audacity they have to do those things that are
Speaker 1: so unrealistic. You know, he's basically dead, and then he'd
Speaker 1: learned how to walk again. Suddenly he's winning karate fights again.
Speaker 3: It's see, children are psychopath.
Speaker 1: Yes they are, Yes they are. Now there's no doubt.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, if you finish it, let me know.
Speaker 1: It doesn't sound like you will, but nonetheless act Thanks.
Speaker 2: For the time, brother, appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Zach Harper from the Athletic appreciate his time. He's brought
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Speaker 1: appointment today. Can highly recommend the yacht rock documentary on HBO.
Speaker 5: Max yacht Rock Documentary.
Speaker 1: You know, turn me on to it was come, it
Speaker 1: was c K. Bill Simmons produced it. And uh, I'm
Speaker 1: not a huge like yacht rock guy. What was that
Speaker 1: funny that Bill Simmons producing?
Speaker 3: Its?
Speaker 4: Just it for some reason, Bill Simmons producing a yacht
Speaker 4: rock commercial or or yacht rock documentary.
Speaker 5: Just it's interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, his company, Like say what you want about Bill Simmons,
Speaker 1: he finds a way to create content people like. I know,
Speaker 1: people don't love like his personal approach or podcast, but
Speaker 1: in our industry, Bill Simmons is kind of like a pioneer.
Speaker 5: He's he's content king.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and look as far as his personal like podcast delivery,
Speaker 1: I'm not a huge Bill guy, but you gotta respect like, well,
Speaker 1: you're not a Celtics fan. True, it's fine. And Rosillo,
Speaker 1: Ryan Rosillo used to be a friend of the show.
Speaker 1: We rarely get him on anymore. I mean he still
Speaker 1: does a good job on his portion of it, but
Speaker 1: the Simmons stuff sometimes can be tough to digest. But
Speaker 1: as far as his ability to kind of see around
Speaker 1: corners with with projects, I mean, no hate on this end, man.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's there's a zero to argue with or complain
Speaker 4: about there. Like the NBA, he'll just say, hey, look
Speaker 4: at the look at the results, look at the pocketbook.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the bottom line.
Speaker 1: And you know, like it'd be one thing too uh
Speaker 1: to be Bill Simmons and kind of get in your
Speaker 1: feelings about people not being a fan. But then I
Speaker 1: think he just goes to his mansion in Manhattan Beach
Speaker 1: and records a podcast and he's doing just fine.
Speaker 5: Yeah, he knows what he's doing there. There is.
Speaker 4: Kind of a old guard way of sports media where
Speaker 4: even if you are a fan, that's not part of
Speaker 4: your coverage, right, And I think that Bill is okay
Speaker 4: kind of blurring those lines and there's no like, there's
Speaker 4: no guilt there and he doesn't pretend to not be that.
Speaker 4: So yeah, yeah, you have to respect it. And he's
Speaker 4: clearly clearly made a lane and more more than a lane.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: He produced de Andre the Giant documentary, which was awesome.
Speaker 1: He is one of the masterminds of ESPN's thirty for thirty. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, he was one of the guys that kind
Speaker 1: of created that. He's one of Emmy's peeble I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, but this, this yacht rock documentary was interesting
Speaker 1: because I've never really understood the origin of it. I
Speaker 1: never really understood like which bands are yacht rock which
Speaker 1: are not? And uh, you know, it definitely definitely reminded
Speaker 1: me growing up in the back of my dad's car
Speaker 1: because apparently most of the music he liked was certainly
Speaker 1: yacht rock. Anyway, nobody gives a rip about that. Did
Speaker 1: you watch Cobra Kai you have Netflix?
Speaker 5: Did you watch Obra Rock Tied a new one?
Speaker 2: Well, it's it's a series.
Speaker 5: Oh that's right. I haven't seen it then, though.
Speaker 1: So are you old enough to remember Karate Kid any
Speaker 1: of that stuff?
Speaker 5: A little bit? I've I've definitely seen the original Karate Kid,
Speaker 5: but I was I was a tyke.
Speaker 1: All right, we haven't heard from you porter, excuse me.
Speaker 1: We're gonna get to this BYU story in a moment.
Speaker 1: We didn't get a chance to talk about it yesterday
Speaker 1: because the Craig story, uh was kind of all over
Speaker 1: the place, and I honestly am not sure where I
Speaker 1: land on this. I kind of changed my mind, and
Speaker 1: I think it's dependent on the situation. I thought Josh
Speaker 1: Grant yesterday, you know some very clear eyed, salient points.
Speaker 1: Clearly had some things you wanted to get off his chest,
Speaker 1: which makes for great radio. I don't think I'm aligned
Speaker 1: with him on every single thing, but I'm also not
Speaker 1: privy to these conversations, and I do think at times
Speaker 1: we operate with blinders on in this market because it's
Speaker 1: a very unique place to be and it's important to
Speaker 1: understand the landscape of what Salt Lake City and what
Speaker 1: Utah is and how to kind of operate around some
Speaker 1: of the oddities.
Speaker 2: That don't exist in other places.
Speaker 1: And if you don't know how to do that, it's
Speaker 1: probably a difficult place to live. S talking to Shan
Speaker 1: about this during crosstalk, But I think at times we
Speaker 1: get blinded.
Speaker 2: Certainly on the college side of things. The Jazz are different.
Speaker 1: It's a pro basketball team, RSL Pro Soccer team. You
Speaker 1: don't really need to operate around the complications of the
Speaker 1: community as much because you're more insulated if you're.
Speaker 2: In a pro situation.
Speaker 1: But we always kind of do this thing where as
Speaker 1: soon as a job comes open, it's got to be
Speaker 1: a Utah guy, it's got to be a BYU guy.
Speaker 1: BYU is different because it's more unique, I'll just say
Speaker 1: that than the University of Utah's as the standards and
Speaker 1: stipulations that you have to be able to uphold and
Speaker 1: live up to if you want to work at that
Speaker 1: institution more often than not, right, so I understand, like,
Speaker 1: for instance, when the ad job comes open, their president.
Speaker 1: BYU's president's you know, leads with he's got to love
Speaker 1: Jesus leave what leads with religiosity As far as the
Speaker 1: dynamics that you have to follow if you want to
Speaker 1: be the athletic director of BYU. It's not the same
Speaker 1: way at Utah. But instantly after the Craig news comes down, porter,
Speaker 1: you know the names. It's Alex, it's Alex Jensen, it's
Speaker 1: Andrea Miller, it's Johnny Bryant. Of all the names you've heard, Well,
Speaker 1: two parts I want to get your take on this.
Speaker 1: Do you think it has to be somebody with local
Speaker 1: ties and alumni with the institution, And is there a
Speaker 1: name or a couple of names that you've leaned into as.
Speaker 2: Far as who you think should get the gig.
Speaker 4: You know, I don't think it has to be someone
Speaker 4: with that connection, right. And obviously you mentioned the fact
Speaker 4: that this may be kind of a booster driven as
Speaker 4: far as the timing and the way that this all
Speaker 4: went down, maybe that leads to they're already being some
Speaker 4: of those names you mentioned, Alex Jensen, Johnny Bryant, Andre Miller.
Speaker 4: Maybe those are the guys that those boosters specifically want
Speaker 4: to be on that list. But I do think you
Speaker 4: have to expand your search beyond that. I just I
Speaker 4: don't believe in limiting your net two players that played
Speaker 4: for you, right, guys that played basketball for you. Is
Speaker 4: that's just limiting your program two options that could be
Speaker 4: really good fits and could work with those alumni. Now
Speaker 4: I am more open in today's landscape of college sports
Speaker 4: to the former player thing than I was two three
Speaker 4: years ago. We've seen what Dion's done. It's not that situation,
Speaker 4: but there is a more professional element in college sports now,
Speaker 4: and I think that once some of the dust is settled,
Speaker 4: that will only be more true. And for that reason,
Speaker 4: I do think that there is maybe more of an
Speaker 4: openness from me on a former player having a guy
Speaker 4: in that position that you can really build a brand around,
Speaker 4: a recruiting brand and like public facing image for your
Speaker 4: program that has a face like that, right, That was
Speaker 4: something that Craig Smith struggled with. I think he's a
Speaker 4: really good basketball coach. X's and o's give me Craig
Speaker 4: Smith in those ninety four feet and with that time
Speaker 4: on the clock. He's phenomenal in that regard. So that's
Speaker 4: where this story gets complicated. And man, you got to
Speaker 4: find the right balance between wanting the guy that there's
Speaker 4: nostalgia there because he did so much for your program,
Speaker 4: and then wanting to make the right decision for the
Speaker 4: future of your program. I think there can be middle ground,
Speaker 4: and hey, maybe it is the same guy, but I
Speaker 4: don't think you should limit your net to that. Now
Speaker 4: You've already limited it, limited your net because you're currently
Speaker 4: paying Larry Christoviac, Craig Smith, and now Josh Eilert to
Speaker 4: be your head coaches. That's currently happening as of February
Speaker 4: of twenty twenty five, and that puts Utah in an
Speaker 4: interesting position. And you know, I don't have a calculator,
Speaker 4: nor would I know what to do with it if
Speaker 4: if I was asked those questions. But I got to
Speaker 4: think that that's part of this equation as well. The
Speaker 4: fact that Utah is now paying three different coaches to
Speaker 4: be their head coach can't help them in a search
Speaker 4: for the next guy.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's it's interesting how the sport of
Speaker 1: college basketball and the ecosystem of college basketball has changed
Speaker 1: in a way where once upon a time, whenever we
Speaker 1: would have these conversations about whether or not a pro
Speaker 1: coach wouldever look to go back to college, you talked
Speaker 1: about how, you know, do you want to change and
Speaker 1: trade your lifestyle? Do you want to trade in the
Speaker 1: NBA lifestyle where you're flying charters all the time and
Speaker 1: standing in the nicest hotels in the country all the
Speaker 1: time to fly into Kansas and I have to Topeka
Speaker 1: in a rental card to scout a player, A go
Speaker 1: to Mont Pillier, Idaho, and a rental card to scout
Speaker 1: a player. The game has changed where so much of
Speaker 1: this stuff is done remotely and the travel is a
Speaker 1: lot better than it used to be. It's still a
Speaker 1: little bit of a downgrade in lifestyle, but it's not
Speaker 1: as much of a day in and day out grind
Speaker 1: as it was prior to the change of the landscape
Speaker 1: of the sport. And the change in the landscape of
Speaker 1: the sport hasn't been something that everybody's excited about, because
Speaker 1: when money permeates its way into anything as the main motivation,
Speaker 1: it changes, certainly entertainment products and sport products.
Speaker 2: I think that's one of the issues with the NBA
Speaker 2: right now.
Speaker 1: It does feel like it's leaned into operating like a
Speaker 1: Fortune five hundred company that just wants to provide value
Speaker 1: for shareholders as opposed to caring about the consumer. And
Speaker 1: I know people are a little afraid about that with
Speaker 1: college athletics, but it is what it is.
Speaker 2: And it's changed.
Speaker 1: It will continue to lean into this because there's so
Speaker 1: much money to be made and that's just the deal
Speaker 1: when you live in a capitalist society, love it or
Speaker 1: hate it. We don't know how much of a downgrade
Speaker 1: and lifestyle would be for an Alex Jensen to go
Speaker 1: from one of the lead assistants in Dallas to be
Speaker 1: the head coach at the University of Utah. But I'll
Speaker 1: say this before we get to this BYU stuff. The
Speaker 1: thought of having Andre Miller on your bench and walking
Speaker 1: inother gyms, that's instant credibility.
Speaker 4: That's really cool, Right, And if let's just for instance,
Speaker 4: say that's the higher you make, you can then go
Speaker 4: and let Andre be the face of your program and
Speaker 4: delegate the menial stuff, the ted stuff that really does
Speaker 4: require a lot from a head basketball coach. And you
Speaker 4: have a GM of sorts. Right, we're seeing different positions
Speaker 4: that are are you coming to the forefront of college sports?
Speaker 4: And that's probably gonna be part of the equation when
Speaker 4: you make a higher. Right, if you hire a guy
Speaker 4: like Andre Miller, he's gonna be the face of your program.
Speaker 4: He's gonna be the guy that is working with those
Speaker 4: players day in and day out. You're probably gonna have
Speaker 4: someone else it is on the recruiting trail, three hundred
Speaker 4: and sixty five days a year working that part of
Speaker 4: the program. And yeah, that's that's just how we're going
Speaker 4: to have to approach this. This new landscape is as
Speaker 4: long as it looks like it does.
Speaker 2: If Mark Harland called you and asked you to be
Speaker 2: the head coach, would you try it?
Speaker 6: Hell?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you just go, you just go do it?
Speaker 5: Why not?
Speaker 2: No? I mean I like it, but you might be
Speaker 2: mad with a little pushback.
Speaker 4: Oh, I'm going to get fired within. Like, let's be clear,
Speaker 4: if I was the head of anything that would be
Speaker 4: a ship that is. And not to say I'm not
Speaker 4: confident in myself. I'm just talking about, like as far
Speaker 4: as constructing like a culture and organization, a whole team.
Speaker 5: I'm not the guy to look too.
Speaker 2: There, don't you? Don't you produce the show and book
Speaker 2: guests on the show.
Speaker 5: It's one radio show, though, Spencer.
Speaker 1: Aren't you in charge partly of building the culture of
Speaker 1: the Drive with Spence Jackets money?
Speaker 5: No, that's you, my friend.
Speaker 1: Oh No, I mean, I mean I'm but I'm not
Speaker 1: doing all the lifting. You got to help me out
Speaker 1: a little bit.
Speaker 4: I fill out timesheet and make sure you know we
Speaker 4: have a guest this hour, this hour, this hour.
Speaker 2: You're the culture builder. That's a lot of pressure, right,
Speaker 2: But that's why they pay you the big bucks. Oh,
Speaker 2: they pay me some bucks. Okay, they pay me bucks
Speaker 2: to pay some bills. Which is nice in this business.
Speaker 2: I'm just glad that you would say.
Speaker 5: Yes, Oh, no doubt about it. I Spence.
Speaker 4: I used to landscape and do electric electrical for a living, so.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I'll take that child.
Speaker 1: As long as we're not making a living with our hands,
Speaker 1: we're doing okay. But I don't know that that call
Speaker 1: is coming. But I'm glad that you would take Mark,
Speaker 1: take on the challenge. You do have my number.
Speaker 2: Mark, hit us out, Mark, and I know you're listening.
Speaker 6: Mark.
Speaker 1: If you're sicking me criticizing you for four hours every day,
Speaker 1: make me your basketball coach and I'll stop.
Speaker 2: I promise.
Speaker 5: There you go. All right, Josh Grant.
Speaker 1: Josh, my man, Josh Grant, all right, before we catch
Speaker 1: a break. Didn't get a chance to do much of
Speaker 1: this yesterday, but Kevin Reynolds saw Lake Tribune the trip
Speaker 1: did some good reporting about BYU football players. They're claiming
Speaker 1: that their nil collective was cut. The pay was cut
Speaker 1: before their season last year, which of course was awesome.
Speaker 1: They were eleven and two and smoke to Colorado and
Speaker 1: the Alamo Bowl, and they're a really good team. Caliney
Speaker 1: did a hell of a job. So I view this story.
Speaker 1: Now I would I would just send you to the
Speaker 1: Trip okay, because I'm not going to sit here and
Speaker 1: unpack the entire thing for you.
Speaker 2: But sl trip dot com.
Speaker 1: They quote Isaiah Bagna, who was a defensive end and
Speaker 1: then Crew Wakely. Crew Wakely left that program with an
Speaker 1: axe to grind man, there's no doubt, and they talk
Speaker 1: about a meeting that was held at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the season someone named Min Kim.
Speaker 2: I do not know who this person is.
Speaker 1: He is the leader of the Royal Blue Collective, or
Speaker 1: one of them, and he is the CEO of a
Speaker 1: company down south called Neutra cost.
Speaker 2: I'm sure that's above board.
Speaker 1: And I guess he held the meeting and said, quote,
Speaker 1: according to Isaiah Bagney said quote, I'm not here to
Speaker 1: pay your renter bills. I'm not here for any of that.
Speaker 1: You guys are entitled greedy asking me for money, and
Speaker 1: then announced there would be changes to the collective because
Speaker 1: the team went five seven the year prior to and
Speaker 1: missed a Bowl game for the first time since twenty seventeen.
Speaker 1: According to both these players, the collective was cutting everybody's pay.
Speaker 1: Starters would be slashed by more than fifty percent. Most
Speaker 1: walk ons that would get nothing. Contracts would be signed
Speaker 1: in the coming days if the players wanted any cash
Speaker 1: at all. They were forced to agree to the new terms,
Speaker 1: and according to Bagna, this Kim Fellas said, quote, I'm
Speaker 1: here to win, and you guys didn't win last year.
Speaker 1: And so apparently, according to Crew Weakly, this gentleman went
Speaker 1: at Chase Roberts.
Speaker 2: He was mad that Chase.
Speaker 1: Entered his own individual NIL deal, which is weird to me.
Speaker 1: With desret at first Credit Union, which is a competitor
Speaker 1: of a donor for the Royal Blue Collective mountin America
Speaker 1: Credit Union, and they go on to talk about the
Speaker 1: contracts that were signed. Apparently there were what is called
Speaker 1: a non compete, which my understanding.
Speaker 2: By the way, the letter of the laws, those are.
Speaker 1: Now illegal, But you weren't supposed to go outside of
Speaker 1: the collective to get your own NIL deals. That feels
Speaker 1: a little unfair to me, and that also feels ignoring
Speaker 1: like the spirit and the letter of what NIL is
Speaker 1: supposed to provide these young men and women their ability
Speaker 1: to simply go out and profit off of who they are.
Speaker 1: It's the same economic rights that you and I have
Speaker 1: had our entire life. So ultimately where I landed after
Speaker 1: reading this story and kind of marinating on the topic
Speaker 1: a little bit. This is just a and this is
Speaker 1: not just a BYU thing. There are stories of collectives
Speaker 1: across the country just trying to understand the right way
Speaker 1: to go about business. Now this feels like this, this
Speaker 1: Kim character might might be, you know, feeling himself a
Speaker 1: little bit as far as the way he kind of
Speaker 1: handled the entire thing and some of the things he
Speaker 1: said to these players. Kim did not respond to a
Speaker 1: request for a comment of the story, but it goes
Speaker 1: on to talk about and it gets into detail.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: Prior to the five and seven season, the team was
Speaker 1: broken into tiers. Top tiers players made five thousand dollars
Speaker 1: a month, second tier players two thousand dollars a month.
Speaker 1: The third tier was five hundred to one thousand dollars
Speaker 1: a month, and very few players made over five grand a.
Speaker 2: Month, but a few actually did.
Speaker 1: According to Bagna quote, over eighty percent of the defensive
Speaker 1: starters were cut. The starters were down to one thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: some of them were even on eight hundred bucks. And ultimately,
Speaker 1: the other takeaway I had here is a hell what
Speaker 1: a hell of a job from coloone Satake and his
Speaker 1: staff and Jay Hill and I got a rod to
Speaker 1: have an eleven to two season and go to the
Speaker 1: Alamo Bowl and smoke Colorado and finish in the top
Speaker 1: fifteen with a roster of players that apparently were really
Speaker 1: upset about the way this was handled. And you know,
Speaker 1: there are two sides to every story, Okay, So that's
Speaker 1: what it comes down to. And this is just another
Speaker 1: example of the university just trying to figure it out,
Speaker 1: trying to figure out a landscape without a lot of
Speaker 1: guard rails and rules, and until the guardrails and rules
Speaker 1: are signed and hopefully that's done this year with a
Speaker 1: house versus the NCAA settlement, and we're moving into a
Speaker 1: situation where things are actually outlined and you know what
Speaker 1: you're supposed to do, as opposed to figuring it out yourself.
Speaker 2: Stuff like this would go away.
Speaker 1: So you kind of feel bad for the players, but
Speaker 1: you understand on the other side the collector trying to
Speaker 1: figure it out, and ultimately a coaching staff that was
Speaker 1: able to rally these guys for a hell of a year.
Speaker 1: Man one of the best of PYU football seasons. They've
Speaker 1: ever had quite frankly, Well, all right, so you're just
Speaker 1: gonna rub it in, So you're gonna use the one
Speaker 1: example of a band I like when I was sixteen
Speaker 1: that has an age.
Speaker 2: Well, that's what you're doing here.
Speaker 4: I know that was the theme that we were we
Speaker 4: were talking about. I actually kind of liked Blues Traveling.
Speaker 4: I know they they got some interesting sound, some corny
Speaker 4: stuff in there as well.
Speaker 5: What's the is it?
Speaker 2: Kingpin to the movie Collen Brothers. Excellent movie.
Speaker 5: That may be part of it. But yeah, actually I
Speaker 5: actually kind of.
Speaker 1: Like well Forward Tour nineteen ninety four, Dave Matthews Band,
Speaker 1: Fish Alman Brothers, they were all there, and Blues Traveler
Speaker 1: was the headlining.
Speaker 2: Now that's how big they were in nineteen ninety.
Speaker 5: I would have spent a lot of money to be
Speaker 5: at that show.
Speaker 1: It was a good show man, all right. Time for
Speaker 1: the voice. You know what that means? Bill Riley Tuesday Afternoon,
Speaker 1: Ryle's Happy Tuesday, sir?
Speaker 2: How are you get you blue?
Speaker 7: A couple of Blues Traveler stories?
Speaker 2: Please do?
Speaker 7: I paid three dollars in college at the Bottleneck and
Speaker 7: Lawrence to see Blues Traveler, and then also in nineteen
Speaker 7: ninety nineteen nineteen ninety five, Blues Traveler was the headline
Speaker 7: band at the Lakewood Amphitheater at Atlanta, and Dave Matthews
Speaker 7: opened for Blues Traveler in Atlanta.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, that's how big they were. Man, that's how
Speaker 2: big they were. They were massive.
Speaker 1: Porter posed a question to me earlier last week, which is,
Speaker 1: how has my music in the nineties aged to this day?
Speaker 2: What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 7: Uh, it's funny you say this. When I was flying
Speaker 7: to Orlando the other day, I had kind of a
Speaker 7: nineties hits channel on. I was listening a little Big
Speaker 7: Head Todd in The Monsters I had. I had the
Speaker 7: gin Blossoms radio going, Hey, I will I will stand
Speaker 7: on the gin Blossoms Mountain and die on top of
Speaker 7: the JiTT They had some bangers in the nineties. I
Speaker 7: like Big Head Todd the Monsters. I think the nineties
Speaker 7: has aged. Okay, maybe not the greatest music decade, but
Speaker 7: I'm still on board with it.
Speaker 6: How about you?
Speaker 1: I'm on board. I just love that you just use
Speaker 1: the term bangers Ryle's. I appreciate that. I mean, at
Speaker 1: least at least you didn't say that It slaps. That's
Speaker 1: the other thing that kid The kids say.
Speaker 3: Right, yeah, something like that.
Speaker 7: But I think the nineties it's been okay, I think
Speaker 7: it's aged. Okay, but you know, I'm old, as you've
Speaker 7: said for you know, twenty years. I'm old.
Speaker 2: I've apologized.
Speaker 1: Okay, I've seen the errors of my ways because you're
Speaker 1: not that much older than I am. All right, but
Speaker 1: it was a fun bid back in the Bill and
Speaker 1: Spence days. Now that I'm aging, I feel.
Speaker 7: Bad, Bill, but we still love Shep like he's a
Speaker 7: little brother.
Speaker 2: Right, even though he's older.
Speaker 1: All right, Let's move over now, obviously to the news
Speaker 1: that broke prior to the show yesterday, about an hour
Speaker 1: before we started the show. Excuse me, I get the
Speaker 1: alert that Craig has been really of his duties. So
Speaker 1: the timing is interesting, and you know, talking to some people,
Speaker 1: I'm sure you have as well about why exactly this
Speaker 1: went down when it went down, Bill, So what was
Speaker 1: your reaction when you heard the news and why do
Speaker 1: you think they decided to do it?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 7: I was caught off guard, Spence. I was somewhere over
Speaker 7: West Texas, flying from Orlando to Tucson, and I had
Speaker 7: my WiFi on and I was doing some work and
Speaker 7: I just scrolled the old Twitter machine to check headlines,
Speaker 7: and I saw Jeff Goodman's story pop up, and then
Speaker 7: my phone began to be explode, you know, thirty three
Speaker 7: thousand feet. I was surprised by it. I mean, I
Speaker 7: was just the timing of it caught me off guard.
Speaker 7: I don't know that you're ever fully expecting that something
Speaker 7: like that in season, But you know, I think you know,
Speaker 7: to your other the other part of the question, I
Speaker 7: think it was just probably the full body of four
Speaker 7: years of work and maybe the overall trajectory of the
Speaker 7: program would be my guess, and maybe a little maybe
Speaker 7: not as much consistency as they would have maybe liked
Speaker 7: to would be my guess on why the move was made.
Speaker 1: So ultimately, there's always a personal side to these things.
Speaker 1: There's always an element of how this affects people that
Speaker 1: I think we tend to ignore in the media because
Speaker 1: our job is to cover the story. But look, you know,
Speaker 1: my father wasn't a coach, but he was an executive
Speaker 1: and we uprooted multiple times throughout his career.
Speaker 2: And that's just the deal.
Speaker 1: You get into this industry and you take these jobs
Speaker 1: oftentimes knowing that you're going to be fired.
Speaker 2: You're hired to fire to get fired.
Speaker 1: There are very very few coaches, executives, or even players
Speaker 1: that have a super long run in one spot.
Speaker 2: It's just a transient existence.
Speaker 1: And I think Craig's a really good man, and I
Speaker 1: do think, you know, when it comes to his ability
Speaker 1: to drop game plans.
Speaker 2: I think he did a good job this year.
Speaker 1: My opinion is the talent on this roster, but you
Speaker 1: know it wasn't necessarily up to par. They were picked
Speaker 1: to finish last, and I actually thought he did a
Speaker 1: good job coaching up roster that was a little bit
Speaker 1: voyden talent at times juxtaposed to who they were playing against.
Speaker 1: So you have a front row to all these games,
Speaker 1: all these seats. What do you have to say about
Speaker 1: the job he did just as a coach.
Speaker 7: But to your point, first and foremost, Craig Smith, for
Speaker 7: the three and a half almost four years I've worked
Speaker 7: with him, has been awesome to me, the same way
Speaker 7: Larry Christoviac was before that. So you'll hear no Craig
Speaker 7: Smith slander from me at all. He is a great guy,
Speaker 7: excellent human being, And to your point, too. I think
Speaker 7: he's a good basketball coach as well. Yeah, did they
Speaker 7: outperform with their preseason expected at least to this point
Speaker 7: what their preseason expectations were. Yes, because when you're picked sixteenth,
Speaker 7: there's nowhere to go but up. But kind of going
Speaker 7: back to what where we were before that, I think
Speaker 7: it's just kind of the overall big picture trajectory and
Speaker 7: you know the fact that the program hasn't been an
Speaker 7: NCAA tournament program in almost ten seasons, nine seasons this year,
Speaker 7: unless they make some sort of miraculous run you know
Speaker 7: in Kansas City, it's likely to be another year without
Speaker 7: the NCAA. And I think, you know, Mark Harlan and
Speaker 7: probably Taylor Randall above him, because you don't make moves
Speaker 7: like this without, you know, alerting your boss, who's the
Speaker 7: boss of everything. I think they're both big basketball guys,
Speaker 7: and I think the men's basketball is important to them
Speaker 7: and what's going on at the you and I think
Speaker 7: that they probably looked at the big picture trajectory and
Speaker 7: maybe said it just wasn't good enough.
Speaker 1: So tell me about Josh Eilert, my man's about to
Speaker 1: coach at michale I mean goodness, gracious, dude, like, and
Speaker 1: you know it's going to be a grumpy Arizona group
Speaker 1: based off of what happened with them against BYU. So
Speaker 1: tell us about this interim head coach and what are
Speaker 1: you expecting tomorrow night in a really, really tough place
Speaker 1: to play.
Speaker 7: Well, the good news for Utah is Josh Eilert's been
Speaker 7: in this position before because he was the interim head
Speaker 7: coach last year at West Virginia, so he had to
Speaker 7: make the rounds in the Big twelve last year when
Speaker 7: Bob Huggins was let go at West Virginia and he
Speaker 7: rode the title of interim head coach much of the
Speaker 7: year last year. He's well liked by the guys. The
Speaker 7: team likes him a lot. He knows the league. He's
Speaker 7: been part of most of the game plans this year
Speaker 7: and the scouts this year. So I think you know,
Speaker 7: it's it's never optimal to have to name somebody an
Speaker 7: interim head coach inside a season after a move like
Speaker 7: this has made. But if anybody's up for the task
Speaker 7: and can do it, it's Josh because he was in
Speaker 7: the same position at West Virginia year ago. But to
Speaker 7: your point, too, Arizona is going to be an angry
Speaker 7: bunch after what happened to them on Saturday against BYU
Speaker 7: down here in Tucson. So you know, it's been a
Speaker 7: tough week, certainly, but it's not going to get any
Speaker 7: easier tomorrow night on the court at McHale, for sure.
Speaker 2: Do you have a feel, all, Bill?
Speaker 1: And we had Sean on earlier any referenced the players
Speaker 1: were going to fly in, so maybe you haven't had
Speaker 1: a chance to kick the tires. But you know, I
Speaker 1: would imagine that a lot of these young men, and
Speaker 1: I don't know this because there are people pontificating on
Speaker 1: the possibility of did you make this decision right now
Speaker 1: based off of some players that may be unhappy that
Speaker 1: you want back next year. But my guest would be
Speaker 1: most of these guys are bummed out that they just
Speaker 1: lost their head coach.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's different than in the pros.
Speaker 1: You know that your coach is hired to be fired,
Speaker 1: and you don't sign necessarily only play for a coach.
Speaker 1: In college, you know, when you're recruited, your parents are
Speaker 1: trusting this person to take care of you, and you sign,
Speaker 1: oftentimes to play for the guy that recruited you, So
Speaker 1: any context or idea of how these players have reacted
Speaker 1: to what has to be tough news for at least
Speaker 1: some of them.
Speaker 7: No, I haven't seen them yet, kind of like Sean,
Speaker 7: we're both down here in Tucson. They're scheduled to arrive
Speaker 7: a little bit later on this afternoon, so I'll have
Speaker 7: a better feel tonight and tomorrow when i'm shoot around
Speaker 7: and around them a little. But to your point, I
Speaker 7: think you're probably right. I think there's probably a little
Speaker 7: bit of surprise and some shock and probably a little disappointment,
Speaker 7: because you know, when you come to play at a school,
Speaker 7: no matter what the school is, whether it's Duke or
Speaker 7: Kansas or Yukon or Utah, you're you're you know you're
Speaker 7: you're coming to go to the school. Sure, but you're
Speaker 7: coming because you've committed to a coach and a staff.
Speaker 7: So I'm sure those guys were a little caught off
Speaker 7: and and a little bit a little bit disappointed.
Speaker 3: By what happened.
Speaker 7: But you know, now now you rally up and see
Speaker 7: what you can do, and you know, if your competitors,
Speaker 7: you want to go out there, no matter who's coaching you, and.
Speaker 3: See what you can do against Arizona.
Speaker 7: So, like I said, I don't have a feel for
Speaker 7: where those guys are right now, but probably will later
Speaker 7: today or tomorrow.
Speaker 1: I know a lot of these decisions are made above
Speaker 1: your pay grade, and if there's anything you just want
Speaker 1: to straight punt on, please let me know. But do
Speaker 1: you think Josh has a chance to coach his way
Speaker 1: into this job?
Speaker 3: I don't that that.
Speaker 7: I don't know, uh, just because like you said, it's
Speaker 7: above my pay grade, and I don't know what kind
Speaker 7: of conversations they may have had with Josh, so I can't.
Speaker 7: I just I don't feel comfortable in my position just
Speaker 7: not knowing and again having been kind of out of
Speaker 7: the pocket down here in Orlando, or Orlando, Orlando and Tucson.
Speaker 7: Make a comment on the coaching, you know, kind of
Speaker 7: the direction where they're going to go. You know, there's
Speaker 7: been a lot of names thrown around out there, and
Speaker 7: you know, if you read there, you know you can
Speaker 7: probably make cases for a lot of that stuff. But
Speaker 7: I just I don't have a feel for it, so
Speaker 7: I don't feel real comfortable talking about it.
Speaker 2: Did you attend the Magic Kingdom and did you wear
Speaker 2: Mickey ears?
Speaker 6: Well?
Speaker 7: No, I did not, And I think you and I
Speaker 7: have had this conversation about adults who go to Disney
Speaker 7: parks by themselves.
Speaker 3: It's very odd and off putting.
Speaker 1: There's so many things I want to say right now,
Speaker 1: but yes, you and I are on the same page.
Speaker 2: And look, let's just stick here for a moment.
Speaker 1: It's strictly budgetary, okay, Like the amount of mony that
Speaker 1: you're spending to do this. You could go to Hawaii,
Speaker 1: you could go to Europe. Like, why is it saving
Speaker 1: the cash to ride? You know, it's a small world
Speaker 1: for the seventy fifth time. It doesn't make sense to me.
Speaker 6: It makes no.
Speaker 7: I mean I took my kids when they were younger.
Speaker 7: We had a good time, but that's what you kind
Speaker 7: of take one for the team when you're a parent
Speaker 7: and you get that experience and then you move on.
Speaker 7: So I did not visit Epcot or the Magic Kingdom
Speaker 7: when in Orlando, nor did I visit the old Magic
Speaker 7: Home either. What's what I don't even know what it's
Speaker 7: called these days.
Speaker 3: It used to be, I guess it.
Speaker 7: Was like it was one of those MLMs that was
Speaker 7: big in the nineties.
Speaker 3: They had the name of the arena.
Speaker 7: But we were way at UCF's West sixty By the way,
Speaker 7: sixty thousand studentssow at UCS. It's the second biggest campus
Speaker 7: in the country.
Speaker 1: Wow, I did not know that, all right. Moving from
Speaker 1: one Josh to another, Josh, I don't know. Did you
Speaker 1: have a chance to listen to Josh Grant on the
Speaker 1: show yesterday?
Speaker 7: I didn't. I was flying when he was on, but
Speaker 7: I heard I heard he was.
Speaker 3: He was.
Speaker 7: He was quite passionate in his in his desire for
Speaker 7: what he was looking for.
Speaker 1: In the next day, coach, Yes, he was very salient,
Speaker 1: he was very clear eyed, he was very direct and
Speaker 1: even said that he was very excited that the news
Speaker 1: came down when it did. And it leads to a
Speaker 1: conversation Bill just philosophically, because ultimately, you know, when it
Speaker 1: comes to historically speaking, the way that college coaches the
Speaker 1: profession works. And one of the things I love about
Speaker 1: March Madness is seeing a coach that coaches a smaller
Speaker 1: school into the NCAA tournament, winning a game or two,
Speaker 1: and his life changes immediately, and the life of his
Speaker 1: family changes immediately because he gets this great opportunity to
Speaker 1: triple quadruple his salary and take over a bigger program.
Speaker 1: And there there's a group of options right now, coaches
Speaker 1: that are coaching at quote unquote smaller school that have
Speaker 1: done a great job that seems to indicate that they
Speaker 1: are next in line to get an opportunity like coaching
Speaker 1: in the Big twelve at the University of Utah. Now,
Speaker 1: the names on that list are not necessarily names that
Speaker 1: people around here are probably all that familiar with. You're
Speaker 1: talking about UC San Diego, Eric Olson, You're talking about
Speaker 1: Nico Medvet at Colorado State, Eric Henderson South Dakota State,
Speaker 1: Leon Rice at Boise, UC Irvine, Russell Turner. And this
Speaker 1: is a list that's put together by Jeff Borzello, who
Speaker 1: covers college basketball for ESPN.
Speaker 2: So that's one route for Mark to take.
Speaker 1: Now you could argue that he just took that route
Speaker 1: with Craig being at Utah State after South Dakota State
Speaker 1: and then rising up the ranks. And then the other
Speaker 1: route is the route people around here talking about, and
Speaker 1: that essentially is Alex Jensen as the head coach. Potentially
Speaker 1: Andre Miller is coaching the G League as an assistant,
Speaker 1: or Johnny Bryant, who's an associate head coach for a
Speaker 1: really good basketball team in the pros with the Cleveland Cavalier.
Speaker 1: So just thirty thousand foot viewpoint, what's the voices take
Speaker 1: on just kind of the direction you think this thing
Speaker 1: will go?
Speaker 7: Again, back to what I was saying before, I'm not sure.
Speaker 7: But what you have to look at when you're making
Speaker 7: this decision now is I don't think either path spence
Speaker 7: is a bad path to take, because as you said,
Speaker 7: there's good options on both of those paths. But what
Speaker 7: you have to look at, especially in particular with Utah
Speaker 7: right now, is who's going to be able to come
Speaker 7: in and, you know, get kind of jumpstart the program
Speaker 7: and get it back to where the expectation is. In
Speaker 7: the expectation and I think Mark said this in his
Speaker 7: release yesterday, was to compete in a regular basis in
Speaker 7: the NCAA tournament, to compete at a high level in
Speaker 7: the Big twelve, turn in the Big Twelve Conference. You know,
Speaker 7: who's the guy that gives you the best chance to
Speaker 7: do that? At the same time, you know Utah, you know,
Speaker 7: the interest in Utah men's basketball has been down a
Speaker 7: little bit, So who's somebody could come in and connect
Speaker 7: with the fan base a little bit. And then the
Speaker 7: third component is who's somebody that in today's day and age,
Speaker 7: can work in the nil world and you know, whatever
Speaker 7: that budget happens to be, work within those parameters and
Speaker 7: make it work to your program's best, you know, best ability.
Speaker 7: And again, there might be guys at that at that
Speaker 7: Mountain West you know, big West West Coast conference level
Speaker 7: that could do it. There might be guys that haven't
Speaker 7: had that college experience. But you've got to find the guy.
Speaker 7: And also, can you build a staff because in today's
Speaker 7: day and age, you have to have the head coach.
Speaker 3: We know this.
Speaker 7: It's not like when Rick was here. You know, football
Speaker 7: and all these sports. The head coaches are CEOs now.
Speaker 7: So you've got to find a guy who you think
Speaker 7: can also build a staff and surround himself with good
Speaker 7: people because the job of a head coach is so
Speaker 7: much more intricate and complicated now. You're more of a CEO.
Speaker 7: You're still coaching, but you have lots of other duties now,
Speaker 7: So who's the guy that.
Speaker 3: Could best do that?
Speaker 7: And that's what you know, Mark and his search committee's
Speaker 7: challenge is going to be.
Speaker 1: I do think and I talked about this with Sean earlier.
Speaker 1: I am not a you gotta win the press conference guy,
Speaker 1: Like watch Nick Sirianni's opening presser for the Eagles and
Speaker 1: you're like, dude, can even can he string a sentence together?
Speaker 2: They just want a Super Bowl.
Speaker 1: All that matters is the long game at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, and then somebody coming in here that
Speaker 1: can recapture past glory in his own way in the
Speaker 1: modern day and age of college basketball, because there's no
Speaker 1: going back.
Speaker 2: You've got to look to the future.
Speaker 1: And even invoking the name of Rick mcjeris is unfair
Speaker 1: because that was a tremendous run.
Speaker 2: But it shouldn't just.
Speaker 1: Scare people away from having that standard around here. This
Speaker 1: is a proud basketball state, it's a proud basketball market.
Speaker 1: And while my initial reaction was sadness for Craig and
Speaker 1: his family, because I know what that's like, my secondary
Speaker 1: reaction was, Okay, somebody up there finally said this is
Speaker 1: not good enough, okay, and we need to change our
Speaker 1: standards for what our basketball team is. There's no reason
Speaker 1: that you can't be both a basketball and a football school.
Speaker 1: Ask Auburn, ask Alabama. I mean, they're Florida. We could
Speaker 1: keep going, and for too long this has been kind
Speaker 1: of branded. No, you're a football school. Now you can
Speaker 1: be both, Bill, don't you think. I mean, it's not
Speaker 1: an unreasonable expectation.
Speaker 7: You should that should be the goal. Can absolutely be
Speaker 7: both of those things. And again, the standard is different today,
Speaker 7: but it's not different. Meaning your standard should always be
Speaker 7: to compete at the highest level. To be in the
Speaker 7: school like Utah with the resources it has and the
Speaker 7: support and the tradition that has, shouldn't be going nine
Speaker 7: and ten years without being in an NCAA tournament. And
Speaker 7: I think that's what Mark and the powers to be
Speaker 7: at the.
Speaker 3: You have said.
Speaker 7: You know, they want to do everything they can do
Speaker 7: to reset that standard, to get it back and make
Speaker 7: sure basketball is a top priority. Yeah, football is the
Speaker 7: big dog on every campus.
Speaker 3: It is.
Speaker 7: We know that from a financial standpoint. But you just
Speaker 7: rep of three or four schools that are succeeding at
Speaker 7: a very high level in both and yes, you can
Speaker 7: absolutely do that. That's what the expectations should be. And
Speaker 7: I don't you know when fans don't you should want
Speaker 7: to have the standard that was in the Majeris era.
Speaker 7: That's fine, Just don't think that the best style of
Speaker 7: basketball and the way it was back then is coming
Speaker 7: back because the game in collegiate athletics has changed over
Speaker 7: the last twenty five years, but the standard really shouldn't.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I agree with you, So back to the whole, Like,
Speaker 1: I don't really think you have to win the press
Speaker 1: conference all the time. I do think in this case,
Speaker 1: this basketball community could use a little injection of life,
Speaker 1: and I do think an Alex Jensen Andre Miller Ben.
Speaker 1: I mean, imagine walking into a gym with Andrea as
Speaker 1: your assistant coach, Like, that's instant credibility, that's instant respect.
Speaker 1: And I would imagine if that's the direction, and we
Speaker 1: won't know for a little while, phones would ring off
Speaker 1: the hook up there at the basketball office for season
Speaker 1: ticket deposits. So what are your thoughts on just kind
Speaker 1: of that dynamic, interjecting some juice based off of names
Speaker 1: that we're familiar with around here. If that's the direction,
Speaker 1: what do you think the effect would be on the community.
Speaker 7: Well, I think if that were the case, that people
Speaker 7: would would just they would love it again. That would
Speaker 7: be a connection back to the bygone days. But it's
Speaker 7: people that they you know that they've they've known for
Speaker 7: a long time. And again that's that's another component of
Speaker 7: all this fans. It's not just you know, it's not
Speaker 7: just it's re engaging your fans and making your fans
Speaker 7: excited to come to the John M. Huntsman Center again,
Speaker 7: excited to talk about Utah basketball again.
Speaker 3: You know, the program has not been in the dumps.
Speaker 3: It hasn't.
Speaker 7: It's been solid, but it hasn't been to the standard
Speaker 7: where where fans and and folks that run the department
Speaker 7: want it to be. But if you had that kind
Speaker 7: of connection to a bygone era, I think it just
Speaker 7: it's kind of the cherry on top if you will
Speaker 7: and really would re engage a lot of fans.
Speaker 1: I've got one football question for you, but before we
Speaker 1: get there, find basketball question. How much of this I
Speaker 1: don't know, rising juggernaut, I guess I'll say that they're
Speaker 1: building down in Provo. At least that seems to be
Speaker 1: the case, with the number one player in the country
Speaker 1: there next year, to seven figure players on Kevin's roster
Speaker 1: this year, and then a massive economic investment on the
Speaker 1: bench with not just a former pro as your head coach,
Speaker 1: but pro assistant coaches strength and conditioning, nutrition is how
Speaker 1: much of what they're building down at BYU do you
Speaker 1: think motivated folks up here to say, Okay, we've got
Speaker 1: to start making sure that we can at least compete
Speaker 1: and keep up with what they're doing down south.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Again, not being in those meetings, I don't know that,
Speaker 7: But what I do know is you never want to
Speaker 7: fall behind your rival. You never want your perception to
Speaker 7: be that you're behind your rival. So to whatever extent
Speaker 7: that would be, I don't know, but you always if
Speaker 7: your rival is doing something, you want to be able
Speaker 7: to keep up or do better. So I think I
Speaker 7: don't know if that was a factor in any of this,
Speaker 7: but yeah, nobody wants to look forty miles down the
Speaker 7: road or one hundred miles down the road wherever your
Speaker 7: arrival happens to be and see that they're thriving and
Speaker 7: you're you know, you're struggling.
Speaker 1: All right, before I set you loose. Brankeithy Karene Reed
Speaker 1: junior TOFUNA, currently at the NFL Scout Scouting Combine as
Speaker 1: the guy that called all their games. Got to know him.
Speaker 1: What kind of pros do you think these youths are
Speaker 1: going to be well.
Speaker 7: The chief thing is interesting just because the health, I mean,
Speaker 7: how healthy is he don't I don't know what his
Speaker 7: draft stock is going to be only because but again
Speaker 7: the combine and then the individual workouts can certainly help.
Speaker 7: I think Karenni Read and Junior Tafuna are going to
Speaker 7: be pros. I mean, I think Karenni is going to
Speaker 7: be one of those guys. If he's not a starting linebacker,
Speaker 7: he's going to be a guy that's in a linebacker rotation,
Speaker 7: play special teams. And I think Junior could be the
Speaker 7: same thing along the defensive line.
Speaker 3: I think both those.
Speaker 7: Guys are our pro players, probably have a five to
Speaker 7: seven to eight year career. And with Tiethy, it's just
Speaker 7: hard to predict because of the injury situation. But we
Speaker 7: know Brand's athleticism and his ability at the position, and
Speaker 7: he's not a traditional tight end. He's not that inline
Speaker 7: blocking guy. But he's a guy that's really good in
Speaker 7: the open field. He's got really good hands, and I
Speaker 7: think he'll be on somebody's roster if he stays healthy.
Speaker 1: All right, Ryles, Well, thanks for the time man, Safe Travels.
Speaker 1: Safe Travels have a great call.
Speaker 2: Tomorrow night. Tomorrow night. Thanks buddy, Thanks man, all right,
Speaker 2: special thanks.
Speaker 1: To Bill Bill Riiley, Voice of the Utes Top five
Speaker 1: live in Tucson, Utahs at Michale tomorrow without their head
Speaker 1: coach Greg Smith.
Speaker 2: Of course, let go so appreciate Bill.
Speaker 1: Stopping by Sean Mooney, Zach Harper, but time now one
Speaker 1: of my favorites. Roxy Bernstein, my buddy from the PAC
Speaker 1: twelve network on the show on a Tuesday, ranking a
Speaker 1: top five Counting Crows song question Mark.
Speaker 8: Oh, absolutely top five. I would say, you know, it's
Speaker 8: since live that might be my favorite song they play live.
Speaker 1: Well, it's actually what I was gonna say live. It's
Speaker 1: hard to beat that song live for sure.
Speaker 8: Yes, that that song live, just the way they have
Speaker 8: tuned it over the years.
Speaker 6: It.
Speaker 8: Really resonates and it waits a ball. Look, everybody loves
Speaker 8: mister Jones. Like it's funny. I've had these discussions with
Speaker 8: Adam over the years, like when you get to his level, right,
Speaker 8: when you have number one type hits and songs, everybody
Speaker 8: knows when he plays the show, there's probably five songs
Speaker 8: you have to play, right, Like for them it's mister Jones.
Speaker 8: I think it's rain King maybe hanging around long December.
Speaker 8: It's funny Adam doesn't necessarily see it the way I do.
Speaker 6: But are you agree with me? Like when you go to.
Speaker 8: See a band like that, there's like there's staples that
Speaker 8: have to be in the catalog for that night. Wouldn't
Speaker 8: you say absolutely?
Speaker 1: I just love that you call him Adam, like we're
Speaker 1: just having a conversation about your friend named Adam. For
Speaker 1: our listeners, it's Adam Durretz. He's the lead singer of
Speaker 1: Counting Crows. He's one of Rocksy's best friends.
Speaker 8: And you know when he's putting the set list together
Speaker 8: like before a show, because they they change it every night.
Speaker 8: It's not the same show. Like there are certain songs
Speaker 8: they'll play on each tour that they're ready to play,
Speaker 8: and there's some songs that aren't in the bag if
Speaker 8: you will, like you know, like a golf bag analogy there.
Speaker 8: But out of the songs that they have for that
Speaker 8: particular tour that they've either been working on at sound check,
Speaker 8: I've learned my place spence over the years because sometimes
Speaker 8: if I ask for a song, he's not going to
Speaker 8: play it just because he can piss me off. So
Speaker 8: and so we've learned over the years that we just
Speaker 8: kind of okay, all right, and not chime in, you know,
Speaker 8: not even show any emotion if he says he's going
Speaker 8: to play a song that we really want to hear
Speaker 8: in that particular night. At some point though, there's a
Speaker 8: few our buddies. We've told him we want to design
Speaker 8: one set list before you retire. We have to have one,
Speaker 8: and he says, we'll see so, which probably means no.
Speaker 1: That's cool though, I mean, because you know, obviously a
Speaker 1: child of the nineties, man, I love the Crows. It
Speaker 1: was a long December for Craig Smith, and he won't
Speaker 1: be hanging around anymore.
Speaker 8: Nice there you go, good good segue, good.
Speaker 1: Tie, and you know, ultimately I'm gutted for a good
Speaker 1: man for you first and foremost. And I know you
Speaker 1: got to know him, but your reaction when you heard
Speaker 1: the Craig Smith had been relieved of his duties around.
Speaker 8: Here, disappointed for him, because, like you, I have an
Speaker 8: affinity for Craig. I think he's first off, he's just
Speaker 8: a terrific dude. He's a fun guy to talk to, to
Speaker 8: be around. I mean, I'll just get like a random
Speaker 8: text from Craig, like I'm doing some game and he'll
Speaker 8: just text me like because he's watching, and like I've
Speaker 8: hit him up on certain places where I go, like,
Speaker 8: for example, his connection to the Dakotas right now, I
Speaker 8: was going out there for NCAA hockey tournament and I
Speaker 8: hit him up and he was like searching for a
Speaker 8: couple of places to send me to. So I had
Speaker 8: a pretty good connection with him that goes back to
Speaker 8: his days at Utah State, and it really is. I'm
Speaker 8: sad for him. I'm disappointed for him because I do
Speaker 8: think he's a heck of a coach. I really do
Speaker 8: think Craig is a good coach. I understand the move
Speaker 8: from Utah's perspective. I'm not saying I agree with it,
Speaker 8: which Mark Harland felt he needed to do, but just
Speaker 8: the first thing that comes to mind sense is by
Speaker 8: disappointment for Craig.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, one hundred percent.
Speaker 1: And there's a personal element to these stories that I
Speaker 1: don't think we do a good enough job of covering
Speaker 1: in the media because we're so like, all right, what's
Speaker 1: next and what went wrong? Like he's a good man
Speaker 1: with a good family and a five million dollar parachute helps,
Speaker 1: but it's hard when you lose a gig that that
Speaker 1: you care about, and I know how much you cared
Speaker 1: about it. So when it comes to what could be
Speaker 1: next for this program, Roxy's it's interesting you're familiar with
Speaker 1: our market and I kind of go back and forth
Speaker 1: with the dynamic here because there are a lot of
Speaker 1: people that simply just jump to we need a former ute,
Speaker 1: We need somebody who's familiar with the program. We need
Speaker 1: somebody who's familiar with the challenges and the oddities. Honestly speaking,
Speaker 1: that this market poses that don't really exist in many
Speaker 1: other places. As much as I love it here, I
Speaker 1: know that there are things that you have to traverse
Speaker 1: that can be a little bit complex. Do you think
Speaker 1: it has to be a Utah guy or do you
Speaker 1: think Mark Harlan goes the way of trying to find
Speaker 1: one of these young candidates at a smaller school that's
Speaker 1: done a really good job, or maybe somebody has been
Speaker 1: out of the game. Like, what's your take on what
Speaker 1: could be next around here?
Speaker 8: At certain places, I do believe you need that connection.
Speaker 8: I don't think Utah is one of those places that
Speaker 8: I think Utah has had enough success in tradition and
Speaker 8: up history that they can bring in somebody from the
Speaker 8: outside if you will. And look a lot of times,
Speaker 8: if you hire a coach that doesn't have that connection
Speaker 8: to a specific program, you hire an assistant on your
Speaker 8: staff that fits and understands the landscape, like for example,
Speaker 8: Mila Moderate cal Right, there are so many hoops and
Speaker 8: so much political red tape you have to deal with
Speaker 8: at a place like cal that you have to have
Speaker 8: an understanding of what you're up against. And I think
Speaker 8: the same can be said for a place like Stanford.
Speaker 8: Utah is not in that same boat. To me, I
Speaker 8: think Utah is a place where you can bring in
Speaker 8: somebody that doesn't necessarily have that connection because of the
Speaker 8: tradition and the success that this program has had in
Speaker 8: the past. And you look up in the rafters and
Speaker 8: you see the likes of you know, a Keith Van
Speaker 8: Horn's name up there, Andrew Bogan, Andre Miller, all these
Speaker 8: great players that have come through, and like, for example,
Speaker 8: you know, Rick Majeris came through and had a lot
Speaker 8: of success. I don't believe that for me, that wouldn't
Speaker 8: be a prerequisite as far as who the next coach
Speaker 8: of the University of Utah men's hoops team should.
Speaker 1: Be I do think and I have said, and I
Speaker 1: haven't necessarily always been on this train, only because I
Speaker 1: am well aware of when guys have an opportunity to
Speaker 1: live that NBA lifestyle, they don't necessarily want to go
Speaker 1: back to the college days. It's not all tried and true.
Speaker 1: Calipari Patino BYU hired Kevin Young. But you know there's
Speaker 1: some former utes in pro basketball right now that are
Speaker 1: very respected and highly thought of. And I want to
Speaker 1: ask you about Alex Jensen, who's a lead assistant for Jason
Speaker 1: Kidd in Dallas, and Alex was Quinn Snyder's lead assistant
Speaker 1: here in Salt Lake. He worked for Will Hardy for
Speaker 1: one year and essentially that was just like he's under
Speaker 1: contract and they liked him, so you can hang around Will.
Speaker 1: I don't think everyone's going to have him on his staff.
Speaker 1: But five years ago, when Mark decided to fire Larry Kroskoviak,
Speaker 1: the name Alex Jensen surfaced, and I said on air,
Speaker 1: I don't think he takes it because I thought at
Speaker 1: the time he was going to parlay his tenure with
Speaker 1: the Jazz into a head coaching opportunity in the pros
Speaker 1: that has never come, and so five years later, I
Speaker 1: think Alex might be more inclined to answer the phone
Speaker 1: that he was, you know, not too long ago. What
Speaker 1: are your thoughts on Alex Jensen as a potential candidate
Speaker 1: to replace.
Speaker 8: Drag Well, I'm familiar with him to an extent, But
Speaker 8: one thing I do know is Jason Kidd thinks the
Speaker 8: world of him, because, as you know, I went to
Speaker 8: college with Jason. I'm still friendly with him, and I've
Speaker 8: asked him about, you know, guys on his staff for example,
Speaker 8: and he raves about him, says he's a phenomenal coach,
Speaker 8: just a great person to have on the staff and
Speaker 8: be around on a daily basis. And that's a ringing
Speaker 8: endorsement from somebody like Jason kitt And as you look
Speaker 8: at the landscape now, it's ever changing landscape spence of
Speaker 8: college athletics. We're just seeing more and more pro people
Speaker 8: have a connection and maybe looking to get into the
Speaker 8: college game. And whether it's for example, on the football side,
Speaker 8: with guys like Andrew Luck and Ron Rivera that are
Speaker 8: going back and they're not coaching, but they're going to be
Speaker 8: around the game. But with this NIL and roster management
Speaker 8: we're seeing these days and free agency that is taking
Speaker 8: the college basketball land landscape by storm, it could possibly
Speaker 8: help having somebody with that pro experience. And look, Kevin
Speaker 8: Young down at BYU not only is having success this year,
Speaker 8: but let's face it, there's a lot of money right
Speaker 8: with BYU basketball and to be able to acquire the
Speaker 8: talent that they have and the great freshman for example,
Speaker 8: demon and catchings they have this year, it took a
Speaker 8: lot of money to get those guys. And next year
Speaker 8: with de Bantha comes in, it's a huge amount of
Speaker 8: money that he's getting paid to go to BYU. That's
Speaker 8: the landscape you're operating in now, and you have to
Speaker 8: find those resources. You have to find the revenue. And
Speaker 8: I know fran Frascilla put out a tweet, you know,
Speaker 8: my colleague at ESPN about the commitment that Utah financially
Speaker 8: needs to make. And I'm not exactly sure where their
Speaker 8: NIL is, but my guess, just just knowing where some
Speaker 8: of the league is that they're probably in the bottom
Speaker 8: third as far as money they're having their NIL collective
Speaker 8: for basketball. Does that change? I think that when you
Speaker 8: look at the scenario you have to explore the entire
Speaker 8: landscape of where Utah basketball is at right now, do
Speaker 8: you make this move with Craig Smith that shows me
Speaker 8: that you're committed to winning. Well, there's more ways to
Speaker 8: show than just making a move like this that you
Speaker 8: committed to having success with your basketball program.
Speaker 1: Roxy Bernstein calls Adam Durretz Adam and Jason Kidd Jason
Speaker 1: just so you know, do you do?
Speaker 2: You?
Speaker 3: Do you?
Speaker 2: Jason and Adam have like a text threat, Roxy.
Speaker 8: They're on separate text threads that I have And by
Speaker 8: the way, I actually call them j Kid usually.
Speaker 2: Now, now there we go.
Speaker 1: Give me the what's what's the mount rushmore of your
Speaker 1: most famous friends?
Speaker 6: Oh?
Speaker 8: I mean those are the top of the chain right there.
Speaker 8: I mean, certainly, Adam, are you familiar with the actor
Speaker 8: Eric Dane?
Speaker 2: I know who Eric Dane is.
Speaker 3: Yes, Eric and I.
Speaker 8: Grew up together and we're still very close. In fact,
Speaker 8: we are fantasy football partners on our league that all
Speaker 8: our buddies.
Speaker 3: Grew up with.
Speaker 2: Wow. Very impressive.
Speaker 8: Yeah, that's another one.
Speaker 2: Very impressive. What do you tell me what you're expecting?
Speaker 1: So, Josh Eiler, it's the interim head coach and they're
Speaker 1: at McHale tomorrow and they're going to play an Arizona
Speaker 1: team that's probably a little bit grumpy. So Utah's first
Speaker 1: game without Craig is a McHale against Arizona. How do
Speaker 1: you think these young men respond? They've got to be gutted.
Speaker 1: You know, you sign on the dobted line to play
Speaker 1: for a coach. Your parents trust the coach to take
Speaker 1: care of the son. We know the deal. So how
Speaker 1: do you think they're going to respond? What are you
Speaker 1: expecting the McHale tomorrow night?
Speaker 8: First off, Arizona's going to be a little grumpy.
Speaker 2: Yes, that might.
Speaker 8: Be the understatement of the year because the way they
Speaker 8: lost that game to be Ui the other night. They're
Speaker 8: going to be extremely ticked off hitting into this matchup.
Speaker 6: But I'm not sure.
Speaker 8: You never know what you're going to get, right. It's
Speaker 8: easier to assess where a professional team is that after
Speaker 8: a move like this, whether it's a major league team
Speaker 8: that fires a manager mid season or an NBA team
Speaker 8: that makes the move like this, and they usually come
Speaker 8: out and respond because they take it personally and the
Speaker 8: connection that they have to Craig Smith. You wonder how
Speaker 8: it's resonating in the locker room right that do they
Speaker 8: feel they let Craig Smith down. It's certainly an emotional
Speaker 8: charge group right now. And you can't blame These are
Speaker 8: eighteen to twenty two, twenty three year old kids, and
Speaker 8: they're going to feel some empathy for Craig. They're going
Speaker 8: to be upset, and probably some of them are looking
Speaker 8: in the mirror wondering what could I have done better
Speaker 8: that could have kept Craig here? And so I would
Speaker 8: expect a team that's going to be emotionally charged. They're
Speaker 8: going to come out and ready to go tomorrow night.
Speaker 8: I fully expect that it's a good group of kids,
Speaker 8: and I think they'll try to play honestly for Craig
Speaker 8: tomorrow night, that they know they let him down, and
Speaker 8: in this way they can turn the page and help
Speaker 8: honor their coach by going out there with a high
Speaker 8: level performance against a terrific team in Arizona.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well said.
Speaker 1: And in order to be fair to Craig Roxy, I've
Speaker 1: asked all my guests this week this question, I'm going
Speaker 1: to ask you the same question. And I don't want
Speaker 1: this to come across as callus and I'm not trying
Speaker 1: to knock on the group, but you referenced where's the nil,
Speaker 1: where's the collective? What's the deal with that? We don't
Speaker 1: fully know? Catchings and demon reportedly or seven figure kids
Speaker 1: down at Brigham Young and aj Debants is getting more
Speaker 1: than five million dollars to play five months of basketball.
Speaker 1: So we know they've got a ticking down there. But
Speaker 1: whether it's nil, and sadly this also does fall partly
Speaker 1: on Craig. This team was picked to finish sixteenth in
Speaker 1: the conference for a reason. There's just not a ton
Speaker 1: of top shelf talent on that roster. And I actually
Speaker 1: think there's an argument to be made that Craig did
Speaker 1: a good job coaching a group that didn't necessarily have
Speaker 1: the raw talent that some of the other teams had
Speaker 1: to a situation where they did overshoot expectations based on
Speaker 1: the preseason poll. But as a guy that calls a
Speaker 1: lot of these games, how would you articulate what you
Speaker 1: believe the talent level is on this roster this year?
Speaker 8: The talent level is, just like you said, near the
Speaker 8: bottom of the Big twelve, and there is a reason
Speaker 8: why they were picked in that position. For example, they
Speaker 8: don't have a dynamic point guard that can set people up.
Speaker 8: It was an offense that was able to score points
Speaker 8: because of ball movement and connectivity. Yes, Gate Madson was
Speaker 8: the guy they were looking to to hit the big shot,
Speaker 8: but it wasn't. They didn't have that dynamic playmaker that
Speaker 8: they've had in the past. So that I think Craig
Speaker 8: came up with a good system that gave them chances
Speaker 8: for success. But at the same time, I get it
Speaker 8: when you're assessing your program, when you're Mark Harlan, you're
Speaker 8: the administration the University of Utah, you take a whole
Speaker 8: broad scope of it and you want the talent level better.
Speaker 8: There's good players in the program. I think Ezrasar is
Speaker 8: a really nice player, loss and lovering. I think and
Speaker 8: be a really good player and it can really control
Speaker 8: a game of times from inside. But it just didn't
Speaker 8: seem there was the broad talent with his program. It's
Speaker 8: funny is I've also talked to some NBA people about
Speaker 8: Jake Wallen and there is a lot of feeling amongst
Speaker 8: the NBA people that he's got a chance, maybe in
Speaker 8: a year or two, to be on the radar as
Speaker 8: far as the NBA team, So, but it's different kind
Speaker 8: of talent that they have with this group. But it
Speaker 8: just from when you look across the board of the
Speaker 8: Big twelve, I just don't see the high level talent
Speaker 8: that Baylor has, that Houston has, that Texas Tech has that.
Speaker 8: And I think this is a down Kansas team, but
Speaker 8: they still have a lot of high level talent, and
Speaker 8: same with teams like Kansas State for example. So I
Speaker 8: think unfortunately when you examine the program as a whole,
Speaker 8: I think that that's what the administration came back to.
Speaker 1: So you've got BYUASU. Let's move over to BYU be
Speaker 1: down at Ashue tomorrow and back to back wins over
Speaker 1: ranked teams. First time that's happened. I think it's thirty
Speaker 1: seven years. They've won four straight. If you kind of
Speaker 1: expand back, they've won eight of their last ten. And
Speaker 1: when they make shots, they are a problem. And they
Speaker 1: are the type of team that is built. Should they
Speaker 1: find fire at the right time, which they're finding right now,
Speaker 1: they're the type of team they can go to the
Speaker 1: NCAA tournament and do something. I'm not saying this is
Speaker 1: a Final four team, but with the ability to make shots,
Speaker 1: when they are knocking down shots, when they're limiting turnovers,
Speaker 1: and when they're just hanging on the glass. They don't
Speaker 1: necessarily have to rebound teams because offensively they're so dynamic.
Speaker 2: It feels like, you.
Speaker 1: Know, Demon's their best pro prospect, but Richie's probably their
Speaker 1: best college player. And I've been tremendously impressed to see
Speaker 1: them settle in the way they have because it didn't
Speaker 1: look great early on, and Kevin's never done this before,
Speaker 1: so you have talent on paper. If it doesn't work early,
Speaker 1: people are gonna wonder if you can coach well. The
Speaker 1: late returns as well, I should say the returns as
Speaker 1: of late are that you know, this is a team
Speaker 1: that looks to be dialed in, ready to roll down
Speaker 1: the red to the stretch of the season. What's your
Speaker 1: take on where we find ourselves right now with Brigham.
Speaker 8: Young, they seem to be peaking at the right time,
Speaker 8: and that's what you want come latter part of February
Speaker 8: and into March, is you're playing.
Speaker 7: Your best basketball, and they are, and.
Speaker 8: This team I think has gotten better and better in
Speaker 8: the crazy team spens, you don't see teams that have
Speaker 8: eleven man rotations at this time of the year, but
Speaker 8: BYU does and they all do something to help the team,
Speaker 8: and I think that's helped the chemistry with that group
Speaker 8: and getting used to a new coach in Kevin Young,
Speaker 8: tweaking the system a little bit where they shoot a
Speaker 8: lot of threes. You mentioned Richie Saunders, but he's not alone,
Speaker 8: and he's made some moves along the way, like inserting
Speaker 8: Trevinell into the starting lineup. I think was a nice
Speaker 8: move for them to help space the floor and getting
Speaker 8: fu Seni Tria to accept the role in Dollen Hall
Speaker 8: coming off the bench because those guys have been starters
Speaker 8: and it's a credit to them. It's a credit to
Speaker 8: that locker room that they're able to embrace what Kevin
Speaker 8: Young is doing and they're catching teams to the right time.
Speaker 8: Time they caught Kansas the right time. Kansas was really
Speaker 8: after losing the game to Utah and they seemed a
Speaker 8: little bit dysfunctional at the time, to be honest with you.
Speaker 8: They got to get right game against Oklahoma State on Saturday.
Speaker 8: Then they bounced back and won a tough one at
Speaker 8: Colorado last night. But they're catching teams at the right time,
Speaker 8: and I think They're catching Arizona State tomorrow night. Potentially
Speaker 8: at the right time, considering some of the injuries that
Speaker 8: ASU has. Jayden Quainton's got hurt in his last game.
Speaker 8: They're outstanding freshman. We're not sure if his status tomorrow night.
Speaker 8: And they just kicked BJ Freeman off the team, who
Speaker 8: was their leading scorer. Yet they went out and won
Speaker 8: without them. So that's it's going to be interesting to
Speaker 8: see this matchup tomorrow night. And Arizona State has not
Speaker 8: played well at home. They've been a better road team
Speaker 8: for whatever reason.
Speaker 2: Who do you think the second best team of the
Speaker 2: conference is?
Speaker 7: Who is the second best?
Speaker 8: I'm still gonna lean toward Arizona I know, even they
Speaker 8: they lost last night. Houston, to me has separated themselves
Speaker 8: and I do really like Iowa State, let me tell
Speaker 8: you right there. But there's something about this Arizona team.
Speaker 8: I'm anxious to see how they were covered tomorrow night
Speaker 8: against Utah after the way they had a real, real
Speaker 8: tough loss against EYU the other night.
Speaker 2: Can I ask you a couple of hockey questions before
Speaker 2: I set you loose? Yeah, all right, let's move over.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's move over to the four Nations face off.
Speaker 1: You know, one of one of our weekly hockey guests
Speaker 1: is Neil Smith, who was the you know, the general
Speaker 1: manager of the Rangers and a high level scout for
Speaker 1: the Red Wings and built some of the best rosters
Speaker 1: that we saw in the nineties. And we had Bill
Speaker 1: Armstrong on yesterday, and you know, it was funny with Neil.
Speaker 1: He said prior to the start of the tournament, I
Speaker 1: asked him we had him on the week that week,
Speaker 1: and I said, Okay, we got a little bit of
Speaker 1: a break with a hockey club and we've got four
Speaker 1: Nations coming up? What do you think? And He's like,
Speaker 1: I'm out on it. I'm not like excited for it
Speaker 1: at all. And then of course we had him on
Speaker 1: last week and to his credit, he ate the appropriate crow.
Speaker 1: You know, Roxy, It's kind of a lesson, man like,
Speaker 1: sometimes the best things in life just completely catch you
Speaker 1: off guard. And I was so wildly entertained, and as
Speaker 1: a NBA guy who was disgusted with a product that
Speaker 1: employees basketball players that don't seem to like to play
Speaker 1: basketball as of late, I loved watching the Four Nations.
Speaker 1: So give me your take on that tournament, and what
Speaker 1: do you think it does for pro hockey domestically.
Speaker 8: Aside from the three fights and nine seconds in the
Speaker 8: first US Canada game, it was still tremendous theater, yep
Speaker 8: and unbelievable hockey, and just the reacts to the players
Speaker 8: that were playing and the speed of these games. That
Speaker 8: was the thing that really jumped out to me is
Speaker 8: the quickness, and it's showing you that the game is
Speaker 8: about speed. Now, yes, okay, the Kachuck brothers floud and
Speaker 8: so did JT. Miller, but they also have a lot
Speaker 8: of speed and talent, and it was evident and I
Speaker 8: think it's only a precursor to how good the Olympics
Speaker 8: could be.
Speaker 6: Now.
Speaker 8: I don't think that we'll see a situation like we
Speaker 8: had with these fights, especially in the Olympics, but it
Speaker 8: does make for great hockey to watch, and I think
Speaker 8: we were treated to the best in the world, the best,
Speaker 8: and it was evident that it meant something. That it
Speaker 8: wasn't just lip service. Oh we're gonna go there and compete,
Speaker 8: We're gonna play hard. It was clear that it meant
Speaker 8: the world and national pride was on display and they
Speaker 8: wanted to win desperately for their countries and the only
Speaker 8: thing that would have made it a little bit more intriguing.
Speaker 8: Can you imagine if Matthew could Chuck had flought Sam Bennett.
Speaker 8: He made the Florida like right off the opening face off.
Speaker 8: If that wouldn't signify how much it meant, I don't
Speaker 8: know what else would.
Speaker 1: And I loved the back and forth where the Canadian,
Speaker 1: you know, the Hagen kid was like, we do it
Speaker 1: for the flag, they do it for the cameras. It's like,
Speaker 1: you know, like the whole thing was awesome. Let me
Speaker 1: ask you about our local hockey club and I'll set
Speaker 1: you loose. You know, they're about where I think most
Speaker 1: people thought they would be, but with the chance to
Speaker 1: maybe catch either Vancouver or the Abs for a wildcard spot.
Speaker 1: They got Vancouver the other night they beat him, so
Speaker 1: a nice little four point swing. Chicago's in town tonight,
Speaker 1: twenty three, twenty four games left on the show bill.
Speaker 1: Armstrong yesterday said it's twenty four game sevens like points
Speaker 1: are at a premium. I think we got a shot
Speaker 1: to maybe see a little playoff hockey in Salt Lake
Speaker 1: this year.
Speaker 8: There's a chance. Yeah, I wouldn't rule them out. And
Speaker 8: they've recovered from some of the injuries that they have
Speaker 8: dealt with, certainly on the back end this year, with
Speaker 8: missing Sean Dursey example, until recently for the entire season
Speaker 8: and Marino being out for an extended period of time.
Speaker 8: They got to get hot and the margin Frere and
Speaker 8: Bill Armstrong is exactly right. They have to treat every
Speaker 8: night like it's a game seven. And after they dropped
Speaker 8: the game to La on Saturday, bouncing back with a
Speaker 8: good win against Vancouver. And the other thing that was
Speaker 8: key about the win against Vancouver spence it wasn't an
Speaker 8: overtime or shootout win. It was in regulation. So a
Speaker 8: team you're chasing Vancouver, they didn't get a point. And
Speaker 8: in these matchups when you're playing Calgary, these teams you're chasing,
Speaker 8: you're battling with, they can't be three point games. You
Speaker 8: got to win it in regulation to make sure that
Speaker 8: the other team is not keeping pace with you, because
Speaker 8: if you're trying to catch them your points behind, well,
Speaker 8: yes you gain a point on them, but you're not
Speaker 8: really doing the job. And that's the way they have
Speaker 8: to step into it, and they have to take advantage
Speaker 8: of the schedule. The Blackhawks are a team that they
Speaker 8: need to handle that they need to put any doubt
Speaker 8: away early in this game, and that's the way they
Speaker 8: need to approach it and they have to be in
Speaker 8: that mentality and somehow if they can sneak in. These
Speaker 8: are the teams that are dangerous come to Sanley Cup playoffs.
Speaker 8: We've seen eight seeds before in the NHL come from
Speaker 8: way back and win because they're in playoff mode already,
Speaker 8: and that could be an advantage for them should they
Speaker 8: be able to get to the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Speaker 1: Roxy, you are the man, my friend. I appreciate the time.
Speaker 1: Safe Travels. Have a great call tomorrow night.
Speaker 8: Okay, thanks bets any time.
Speaker 1: But Roxy Bernstein one of the best, one of the
Speaker 1: nicest guys in this business, a business devoid of kindness.
Speaker 1: Roxy is one of those guys at Roxy Bernstein is
Speaker 1: where you find them on social media. I'll be on
Speaker 1: the call tomorrow night for byuasut.
Speaker 8: Do you have any.
Speaker 1: Like for real famous friends? Roxy Bernstein rolls on the show.
Speaker 1: He calls Adam Durretz, Adam Jason Kidd, j Kidd, do
Speaker 1: you have any like uber famous friends?
Speaker 2: Any anything stand out?
Speaker 4: I will not like mention the sports guys that I've
Speaker 4: gotten close with, right, Like Britain is genuinely one of
Speaker 4: my closer friends away from football. I would have to
Speaker 4: like the only real close connections I have in that
Speaker 4: regard are I've talked to you about some of the
Speaker 4: country music folk, right. Culter Wall is a connection that
Speaker 4: I made a long time ago. I've known him since
Speaker 4: he was and I was like nineteen twenty years old.
Speaker 1: You need to let me know next time he's in town,
Speaker 1: because you've won me over. I want to go see
Speaker 1: him perform.
Speaker 4: That is his manager is the guy that is my
Speaker 4: actual connection, right, it's through him, but I've known him
Speaker 4: for a long time, as well as some of that
Speaker 4: kind of circle of underground country, non radio country, if
Speaker 4: you will. That's probably it. Right, We've talked about the
Speaker 4: country stuff. I've had run ins with many A listers
Speaker 4: and whatnot, but none of them are my friends, especially vjsing.
Speaker 2: I need what's the deal with that dude? Like he
Speaker 2: has such a bad he's really a jerk, right, he
Speaker 2: has such a bad reputation.
Speaker 4: And I've dealt with golfers and very wealthy people who
Speaker 4: expect a certain level of service, right and try to
Speaker 4: provide that, but it didn't seem to matter what you did.
Speaker 4: You could have, like, I could have shined that guy's
Speaker 4: shoes with my tongue, and I feel like he would
Speaker 4: have been like, now you miss a spot.
Speaker 2: But you know, I'm glad you didn't do that. Each
Speaker 2: of all, I'm glad you didn't do that. I imagine
Speaker 2: you ran into some entitled folk up there. Yeah.
Speaker 1: My goal is to have a friend as famous as
Speaker 1: Adam Dirretz that I can just call Adam, just referring
Speaker 1: him as Adam.
Speaker 5: Adam and j Kidd hanging out on a weekend.
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Speaker 2: Luka doncic over under forty five point five points.
Speaker 4: If you would have set forty, I'd go over, But
Speaker 4: I'm going to go under with the forty five.
Speaker 1: I think he'll wait to just try to score like
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty until they're actually in Dallas, right,
Speaker 1: because that the scene when Luca is back in Dallas
Speaker 1: is going to be really fascinating because he's gonna have
Speaker 1: a lot of fans in that arena that have his
Speaker 1: back right over the MAVs. So I'm picturing him like
Speaker 1: hitting a bunch of step back threes in Dallas. And
Speaker 1: like Niko is probably not even at the game tonight,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that he goes full throttle.
Speaker 4: Luca, You're you're gonna get like Jimmer and Utah vibes
Speaker 4: where for some reason the team and the have wrong
Speaker 4: colors is cheering for the white guy shooting from forty
Speaker 4: feet beyond the three point line. Yep, yeah, it's gonna
Speaker 4: be weird. It's going to be weird. The the one
Speaker 4: that comes to mind is like Russell Westbrook, because that
Speaker 4: was it seemed personal between him and Kevin Durant. This
Speaker 4: seems personal between Dallas and Luka Doncic and maybe personal
Speaker 4: even though we don't really know why right behind the scenes,
Speaker 4: stuff that we're not necessarily privy to. But yeah, man,
Speaker 4: this is This is one of the more anticipated player
Speaker 4: versus former teams that I can really remember.
Speaker 2: So some good NBA hoops on tonight.
Speaker 1: It's out of a quiet night locally, tomorrow we're smacked,
Speaker 1: jam packed locally with a bunch of action. Hockey Club
Speaker 1: is taking on Chicago tonight, so a big game for them.
Speaker 1: Every game down the stretch is big for the Utah
Speaker 1: Hockey Club. Jazz will be an action against the Kings.
Speaker 1: The Utes are at McHale to take on Arizona RS
Speaker 1: valid action against Aridiano tomorrow, so little soccer as well.
Speaker 2: All right, Port, let's get out of here. What comes
Speaker 2: our way On a Wednesday edition of the show.
Speaker 4: On a Wednesday edition of The Drive, we'll cover all
Speaker 4: of our bases. Halfway through the work week, halfway closer
Speaker 4: to the weekend. Chris com Ronnie stops by for an
Speaker 4: entire hour, as does Richard Smith. We're gonna we're gonna
Speaker 4: have some in studio stuff with those guys tomorrow. Josh
Speaker 4: Furlong joins us for the latest in the University of
Speaker 4: Utah men's basketball coaching search and of course on a
Speaker 4: game day as they visit the McHale Center, and uh
Speaker 4: Neil Smith for behind the Glass. We'll go from there.
Speaker 4: But yeah, busy, busy show on a Wednesday, including a
Speaker 4: couple of in studio guests.
Speaker 2: There you go.
Speaker 1: Special thank you today to Sean Mooney, Zach Harper, Bill Riley,
Speaker 1: and Roxy Burns for the sound you made miss from
Speaker 1: the show today. Website's an option. It's ESPN seven hundred
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Speaker 1: excuse me toatch you out on a Wednesday drive as
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