Speaker 1: All right, let's get at drive time Wednesday afternoon, about
Speaker 1: thirteen minutes past the hour of two o'clock. It has
Speaker 1: been chilly and cold and rainy, but the sun is
Speaker 1: about to come out here in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah.
Speaker 1: It is an April Spring Chili day, as we are
Speaker 1: about to turn our calendars to May coming up tomorrow.
Speaker 1: But as it is every single day, it's going to
Speaker 1: have you along for the riot Spence check. It's Beyond
Speaker 1: the Mike, Porter Larsen, Beyond the Glass today, producing the program,
Speaker 1: booking the program, A lot to do, a lot to
Speaker 1: get to jam pack Wednesday show to get you halfway
Speaker 1: through that work week. We will get you one day
Speaker 1: closer to the weekend. We will talk some NBA playoff basketball.
Speaker 1: We'll talk some family members behaving badly, talk some local
Speaker 1: NBA stuff with Utah Jazz. High speed ahead to the
Speaker 1: draft lottery coming up in less than two weeks now.
Speaker 1: Fudnight of NBA basketball last night, Chaotic night of NBA
Speaker 1: basketball last night, but the playoffs continue to rule. We've
Speaker 1: got a doubleheader tonight. Both games should be awesome. Golden
Speaker 1: State is in Houston at the Toyota Center. To take
Speaker 1: on the Houston Rockets. They're going to try to close
Speaker 1: out Houston and that will be a dog fight. It
Speaker 1: will be a rock fight. It will be a physical
Speaker 1: matchup starting at five point thirty on TNT. Then after
Speaker 1: the Warriors and the Rockets complete their game, it'll be
Speaker 1: the Timberwolves and the Lakers from Crypto dot Com Arena
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, California, where the Lakers will try to
Speaker 1: stave off elimination. It is staving season only time of year.
Speaker 1: We talked about staving off elimination, which is what the
Speaker 1: Pistons did last night at Madison Square. Gardener Jalen Brunson
Speaker 1: l had to leave the game with an injury. I
Speaker 1: did come back. So we'll see what the Knicks were
Speaker 1: able to do. Is they go back to the Motor City.
Speaker 1: The Indiana Pacers and Tyrese Haliburton's father John were able
Speaker 1: to eliminate the Milwaukee Bucks in overtime and epic collapse
Speaker 1: from Milwaukee. What's next for Giannis That's a conversation.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Boston Celtics had no problem with the Orlando Magic. They
Speaker 1: curb stomped them in the second half and they vans
Speaker 1: on to the second round. One eighty nine was your
Speaker 1: final score, and we saw vintage Jamal Murray playoff Jamal
Speaker 1: bubble Jamal if you were with forty three points leading
Speaker 1: the Denver Nuggets to a pretty dominating victory over the
Speaker 1: LA Clippers. And now Denver leads that series three to two.
Speaker 1: New York's still up three to two on the Pistons.
Speaker 1: So a lot of NBA basketball in the show today,
Speaker 1: a lot of playoff basketball on the show today. The
Speaker 1: NFL draft, of course, is in the rear view mirror.
Speaker 1: Some new information today about the slide of shad Or Sanders.
Speaker 1: Apparently the Pittsburgh Steelers, according to a Steelers beat rider
Speaker 1: who joined a Rich Eisen today, we're never going to
Speaker 1: take a quarterback that they thought could start this year.
Speaker 1: Still waiting on Aaron Rodgers. Apparently the Pittsburgh Steelers is
Speaker 1: and we've got some Pittsburgh Steelers are is the right
Speaker 1: way to say that. And we have some new landing
Speaker 1: spots for some of our local players that were not drafted,
Speaker 1: some uts and some Cougars finding their way to undrafted
Speaker 1: free agent deals. The college's basket football transfer portal continues
Speaker 1: to remain open. I believe there's five roster spots left
Speaker 1: for Alex Jensen and coach Chilias and the staff at
Speaker 1: Utah to fill out their roster, so we'll give you
Speaker 1: the latest there as far as the current landscape of
Speaker 1: the college basketball situation here in state. RSL takes their
Speaker 1: act on the road once again. It is a road
Speaker 1: heavy portion of the schedule for our local soccer club.
Speaker 1: They're going to be in Vancouver coming up on Saturday
Speaker 1: for a seven to thirty first kick, so we'll get
Speaker 1: to a little soccer on the program today as well.
Speaker 1: The Utah Hockey Club, the headline on ESPN is Mammoth
Speaker 1: Gaff question mark Utah Mama name after leak. The Utah
Speaker 1: Hockey Club apparently allowed their name to leak and now
Speaker 1: they're trying to walk it back. I don't know. It
Speaker 1: feels very reminiscent of leaking some uniforms for the Utah
Speaker 1: Jazz that were not well received before, trying to spin
Speaker 1: that pr Gaff as well. Who's running the show down there?
Speaker 1: Kind of embarrassing. But we may have a name for
Speaker 1: the hockey club and it is certainly not my preference,
Speaker 1: but we'll get to some of that. Some of those
Speaker 1: stories coming up on the show. Downtown Salt Lake City
Speaker 1: is undergoing a massive renovation, and we have some new
Speaker 1: details leaked about the Delta Center renovation. I part of
Speaker 1: me wonders if they leaked that to try to distract
Speaker 1: people from what they did actually leaking the name of
Speaker 1: the hockey club. So we'll get to some of those
Speaker 1: storylines on the program today with a really good guest list.
Speaker 1: We'll start things off today with one of our favorites
Speaker 1: to talk basketball. Do we bring up to Tony Jones
Speaker 1: that he thought you Orge Sanders would be drafted first
Speaker 1: in the NFL draft? Maybe, but mostly we'll talk some
Speaker 1: jazz hoops. We'll talk some Nuggets hoops. We'll do some
Speaker 1: draft today with TJ Trevor Sikima, one of our favorites
Speaker 1: from Pro Football Focus, to recap the NFL draft and
Speaker 1: look ahead to the NFL offseason prior to the start
Speaker 1: of the season. Come fall an hour in studio with
Speaker 1: our guy Chris Comraddi from The Athletic and then Dave Fox. Yes,
Speaker 1: we will let d on the show today after he
Speaker 1: ditched us yesterday. I was on TV with Dave last
Speaker 1: night ten thirty five KM. Why you call it Five
Speaker 1: Questions with Spence. You can find that streaming online at
Speaker 1: KMYU dot com. Tony Jones, Trevor sickham Met, Chris Camaraddie,
Speaker 1: Dave Fox, Me, Spence checkets, all of you the great
Speaker 1: listeners on this Wednesday afternoon and that guy Porter Larson
Speaker 1: on a Wednesday. Whenever a family member of a famous
Speaker 1: person is the story, the story is never good. And
Speaker 1: we've got the Jeff Olbert situation with his kid pranking
Speaker 1: showre Sanders and I, I don't know that I've ever
Speaker 1: seen a press conference where his son had to apologize
Speaker 1: for the behavior of his father as a professional basketball player.
Speaker 1: I thought Tyree s Halliburton handle it well. But just
Speaker 1: clown behavior from his dad last night.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean if if you would have seen like
Speaker 3: a LeVar Ball or Chom Moran, like one of the
Speaker 3: dads who's public a little more public, do that, it
Speaker 3: would be it would be all over the place. So
Speaker 3: you know, Tyrese Haliburton's dad had a extra drink or
Speaker 3: two and probably shouldn't be allowed to sit front row
Speaker 3: for a while for a good while. Probably. Yeah, that's embarrassing.
Speaker 3: You mentioned the stuff with Shador and the Falcons defensive coordinator.
Speaker 3: Maybe a good lesson for those who are around the
Speaker 3: very talented or very successful folk.
Speaker 1: Just just enjoy the ride.
Speaker 3: Don't make yourself the story, don't make yourself the subject,
Speaker 3: because as you mentioned, it's it's very rarely ever a
Speaker 3: good story in that regard.
Speaker 1: And to go at Yannis, you know, like that's the.
Speaker 2: Other like do you want to get your head ripped off?
Speaker 1: Also well head ripped off, but also universally liked and
Speaker 1: respect that. I thought, I thought Jannis handled it so
Speaker 1: well last night.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Jana Sonodakunpo is number one. Yes, a freak of nature.
Speaker 3: He will he could have popped that guy's head off
Speaker 3: like a like a daisy. But he's a sweetheart also,
Speaker 3: so yeah, it's funny that not only do you go
Speaker 3: out on the floor and make an ass of yourself,
Speaker 3: but you do it too, probably like the most well
Speaker 3: liked superstar in today's age, maybe in the NBA in
Speaker 3: a long time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty sill.
Speaker 1: Would you rather fight Yiannis or a gorilla?
Speaker 2: Be honest?
Speaker 1: Okay, fair enough, but you know that that conversation. I
Speaker 1: don't know how it leaked into my algorithm, but now
Speaker 1: it's dominating everything I pull up on social media.
Speaker 3: I didn't really see it much until you mentioned it yesterday,
Speaker 3: and then I went home and it was everywhere. The
Speaker 3: debate about gorillas and fighting and you know you're gonna lose.
Speaker 1: Probably won't do much on that debate today. The LPGA
Speaker 1: Tour is also in our state down at Black Desert
Speaker 1: for the LPGA Championship. So a fun time right now
Speaker 1: here in the state of Utah. First guest on a
Speaker 1: Wednesday will be our buddy Tony Jones. But before we
Speaker 1: get to TJ, courtesy of our good friends at Prize Picks,
Speaker 1: it is time now for your opening tip. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the Drive with Spence.
Speaker 4: Check its on Utah's number one sports talk Now into
Speaker 4: the studios of ESPN seven hundred to set the scene
Speaker 4: for the show. The opening tip of the Drive is
Speaker 4: brought to you by Prize Picks. Use the code ESPN
Speaker 4: seven hundred and run your game with Prize Picks.
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Speaker 1: check out. All right tonight, I'm going over on Lebron
Speaker 1: James twenty six point five points. I'm going under on
Speaker 1: Anthony Edwards forty point five points rebounds and assists. I'm
Speaker 1: going under on Julius Randall nineteen point five points, and
Speaker 1: I will take the over on Luka Doncic thirty eight
Speaker 1: point five points slash assists. I think the Lakers get
Speaker 1: it done tonight. So I'm going over on most of
Speaker 1: the Lakers and under on most of the Timberwolves.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: NBA playoff action last night saw the Detroit Pistons stave
Speaker 1: off elimination at Madison Square Garden. That series has been
Speaker 1: unexpectedly really really fun. They're going to head back to Detroit.
Speaker 1: The Detroit Pistons have not won a home playoff game
Speaker 1: in seventeen years because the Knicks went there and won
Speaker 1: a couple of games in Detroit. And it's funny whenever
Speaker 1: I hear some of these stats dropped about how long
Speaker 1: it's been since some of these teams have had playoff success,
Speaker 1: it is a reminder of how lucky we've been here
Speaker 1: in Salt Lake, about the consistent competitive nature of our
Speaker 1: pro basketball team. Yes, we've never won a championship, and
Speaker 1: if we're honest, we haven't had a team that I
Speaker 1: think has been a serious championship contender since nineteen ninety eight.
Speaker 1: But more often than not, we have had competitive teams
Speaker 1: that advance to the playoffs and offer up some really,
Speaker 1: really fun spring basketball this time of year here in
Speaker 1: Salt Lake. Now it has been three years as the
Speaker 1: Jazz started their decision too. I don't know if you
Speaker 1: believe them. They were breaking it down and now they're
Speaker 1: building it up, which is just dumb. But after the
Speaker 1: Jazz made their decision to move on from a very
Speaker 1: good and still somewhat young, competitive team, it has been
Speaker 1: three years since we've seen playoff basketball. Hopefully it's back
Speaker 1: sooner rather than later. But you know, cities like Washington,
Speaker 1: cities like Detroit, and there are plenty of other examples
Speaker 1: of cities that have truly gone like ten to fifteen
Speaker 1: sometimes more years without a team that is even somewhat
Speaker 1: competitive playing playoff basketball, winning playoff basketball at home. It
Speaker 1: is a reminder of how lucky we've been here and
Speaker 1: another reminder of my hope that we are not in
Speaker 1: the beginning stages of a long ten to fifteen year
Speaker 1: run where we don't have a competitive team here in
Speaker 1: saul Lake, because that is as a basketball fan, that
Speaker 1: is purgatory. Of course, the Celtics had no issue with
Speaker 1: the Magic. I still have not come off my stance
Speaker 1: that Boston is the best team in the league, even
Speaker 1: watching what Cleveland just did just dispatching of the Miami Heat.
Speaker 1: The only thing that would concern me as a Celtic
Speaker 1: fan is right now. Some of the health issues is
Speaker 1: Drew Holliday has had to sit. Tatum is back and
Speaker 1: he was awesome last night, but he had to miss
Speaker 1: a couple of games. Porzingis is always a wild card
Speaker 1: with his health, and even Jalen Brown had to miss
Speaker 1: a game. And Cleveland, of course, dispatching of Miami very
Speaker 1: quickly allowed them to sit there and will allow them
Speaker 1: to sit there players and rest and get ready for
Speaker 1: round two. But no problem for the Celtics last night
Speaker 1: a really really good game in Denver and a reminder
Speaker 1: of what the Nuggets look like when the two man
Speaker 1: game of Jamal Murray and Nicola jokicch looks like you
Speaker 1: did last night. It's so problematic. Now you look at
Speaker 1: Jokicic's stat line and you see four thirteen and only
Speaker 1: thirteen points. He was a maestro last night getting other
Speaker 1: players involved. He had twelve assists, he had ten boards,
Speaker 1: and even when he doesn't score or shoot it well,
Speaker 1: he controls the game. And you could tell that he
Speaker 1: was intentional at getting Jamal looks because Jamal was going
Speaker 1: early seventeen of twenty six, eight to fourteen from three
Speaker 1: forty three points, and when Jamal gets going like that,
Speaker 1: it's a reminder of how tough they could be. Now
Speaker 1: they go back to Los Angeles and this series is
Speaker 1: not over. In fact, I think it's going to go seven.
Speaker 1: Last night was just a kind of a decent Kawhi game.
Speaker 1: He did have twenty and eleven but only took fifteen shots.
Speaker 1: Zubots looked really good, but we saw yet another example.
Speaker 1: And look, we talk often about regardless of what Kawai does,
Speaker 1: the rest of his career will always look back on
Speaker 1: what could have been because of how dominant he's been
Speaker 1: when he's healthy. James Harden can do nothing to change
Speaker 1: the narrative that he is just a shrinking violet when
Speaker 1: it comes to spring basketball. And he did nothing last night.
Speaker 1: And this is a guy who in the past, with
Speaker 1: Houston and other stops, has straight up quit on teams,
Speaker 1: and he looked horrible last night. But most of the
Speaker 1: attention from playoff basketball last night, before we get to
Speaker 1: what could come our way with a really good doubleheader tonight,
Speaker 1: is what happened in Indiana as the Milwaukee Bucks took
Speaker 1: a twenty point lead in the first half behind Giannis
Speaker 1: and Gary Trent, and you feel really bad for Gary
Speaker 1: Trent today because he's taken a lot of heat. He
Speaker 1: did hit four threes in overtime, and they were not
Speaker 1: even in the game without Gary Trent shooting, because it
Speaker 1: really was Yannis and then everybody else. And Yannis thirty points,
Speaker 1: twenty boards, thirteen assists. And this is the stat that's
Speaker 1: blowing me away because a lot of people talking about
Speaker 1: what's next with Jannis and Milwaukee. Over Jannis's last ten
Speaker 1: playoff games, he's averaging thirty two points, sixteen rebounds, and
Speaker 1: six assists. Yet Milwaukee is one in nine in those
Speaker 1: ten games, and they've been ousted in the first round
Speaker 1: of the playoffs for three straight years. Next year, Dame
Speaker 1: Low will probably miss the entire season if he's back,
Speaker 1: and won't be intel spring, and so the conversation turns
Speaker 1: into what's next for Giannisante to Cumbo, Milwaukee had a
Speaker 1: seven point lead with forty seconds left. Teams in the
Speaker 1: history of the NBA Playoffs that are up seven points
Speaker 1: with forty seconds left before last night were one thousand,
Speaker 1: six hundred and nine and zero over sixteen hundred games,
Speaker 1: no one ever lost. They Indiana needed a perfect storm
Speaker 1: with two just atrocious turnovers by Gary Trent Junior, who
Speaker 1: again was shooting lights out, so it's hard to be
Speaker 1: super critical. And then Tyres Halliburton, who ten days ago
Speaker 1: was named the most overrated player in the NBA by
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty of his peers who were contacted
Speaker 1: by the Athletic, just had a dynamite close to a
Speaker 1: great series for him twenty six points nine, as sists
Speaker 1: that last layup he beat Giannis to get to the
Speaker 1: ten and then lay it in. And of course the
Speaker 1: attention today is on the poor be behavior of Tyree
Speaker 1: Halliburton's father, John, who I didn't even know about outside
Speaker 1: of hearing certain things here there. I'd never seen him.
Speaker 1: He has a reputation of really standing up for a son,
Speaker 1: which is great, but he has a reputation of being
Speaker 1: a little bit off the cuff, being a guy that
Speaker 1: has a difficult time containing himself. And I'll just say this,
Speaker 1: if that was you, if you're listening to program, if
Speaker 1: that was you last night, mister John Doe listening to
Speaker 1: this radio show, and you had a front row seat,
Speaker 1: and you're a Pacers fan, and after the game the
Speaker 1: Pacers win and you go confront Giannis like that, you
Speaker 1: would be banned from NBA arenas for the rest of
Speaker 1: your life. And I think the league needs They're not
Speaker 1: going to ban John Halliburton for the rest of his life,
Speaker 1: but I think the league needs to come down on
Speaker 1: Tyresee's father for what he did last night. I don't
Speaker 1: know what that looks like. Maybe just tell him he's
Speaker 1: got to sit in the friends and family room, the
Speaker 1: green room, and the arenas you can know longer sit courtside.
Speaker 1: It wasn't just what he did. It wasn't the timing
Speaker 1: of it, because if you look at the replay, and
Speaker 1: by the way, if you watch Inside the NBA on
Speaker 1: TNT last night, I don't know what the hell Shaq
Speaker 1: was thinking. Now that's kind of an evergreen sentence because
Speaker 1: Shaq is a legend, but at times he says things
Speaker 1: that are so idiotic and dumb it makes you wonder
Speaker 1: if he's just doing it for the sake of argument.
Speaker 1: I thought Chuck nailed it last night. I thought Kenny
Speaker 1: Smith nailed it last night. I thought Shaq was up
Speaker 1: in the night. This was all on John Halliburton. None
Speaker 1: of this should be at the feed of Giannis Sante Tocumbo,
Speaker 1: who is an unbelievable talent, one of the best players
Speaker 1: we've ever seen, a former NBA champ, a former MVP,
Speaker 1: and I have no issue with what Giannis did, and
Speaker 1: the fact that John Halliburton did that to Yannis, to me,
Speaker 1: even makes it worse. One of the classiest players, and
Speaker 1: Giannis's postgame comments could not have been more mature and better.
Speaker 1: So that's kind of the big takeaway. Family members behaving poorly,
Speaker 1: And as I said earlier, whenever the story is about
Speaker 1: the family member of the famous person, it's never a
Speaker 1: positive thing. Lebron James famously had to tell his mom, Gloria,
Speaker 1: to stop chirping at other players, to the point where
Speaker 1: she stopped sitting courtside. Jeff Olbrick his son, defensive coordinator
Speaker 1: who has been fined, the Falcons defensive coordinator who has
Speaker 1: been fined. Whenever the story is about the family member
Speaker 1: of the famous one, it's never a good thing. Doubleheader
Speaker 1: of NBA Playoff action tonight, and I am juice for
Speaker 1: both these games. Closeout games always the hardest, more often
Speaker 1: than not, unless you're the Celtics playing the Magic We
Speaker 1: Got Warriors, Rockets, TNT and then Timberwolves Lakers. So two
Speaker 1: good games tonight. Let's break it down with one of
Speaker 1: the best, one of our favorites, Tony Jones on a
Speaker 1: Wednesday afternoon. TJ. Happy Wednesday, buddy, how are we doing?
Speaker 5: Happy Wednesday?
Speaker 1: How are you good?
Speaker 5: Man?
Speaker 1: I'm good? So just give me the Tony Jones take
Speaker 1: on the John Halliburton Giannis Ante Tocoombo altercation last night.
Speaker 5: It was completely unacceptable in you know, a long story short,
Speaker 5: John Hollibarton's Burton shouldn't be allowed into another aren for
Speaker 5: the remainder of the playoffs. So you know this is
Speaker 5: that was a serious breach. You know, uh, you can't
Speaker 5: do what he did. I mean, he basically went up
Speaker 5: to Gianni's cursed him out, you know, called them all
Speaker 5: sorts of names. You know, I went face to face
Speaker 5: with him. I mean that that's just Jianna's showed Giannice
Speaker 5: is a better man than I would than I am,
Speaker 5: because I would have knocked his block off, and Jannis
Speaker 5: had every right to knock his block off, and he
Speaker 5: showed a level of emotional maturity that I think that, uh,
Speaker 5: that all of us can take a lesson from. And
Speaker 5: you know, it's good that Tyrese went into the press
Speaker 5: conference and owned it and rebuke what his father did.
Speaker 5: And you know, I think the NBA should come down hard,
Speaker 5: and I think that, you know, they should set an
Speaker 5: example of the father and not let him into another
Speaker 5: arena until until next season. And you know, this is basically,
Speaker 5: you know, this is basically a player going into the
Speaker 5: stands just reversed. You know, it was you know, it
Speaker 5: was just something that that just should not happen, can happen,
Speaker 5: and should never happen again.
Speaker 1: You know, Tony good stuff there. I actually would not
Speaker 1: be opposed to the league doing something even a little
Speaker 1: bit more harsh, because let's call this how it is.
Speaker 1: If if that was a fan last night, if that
Speaker 1: was who if whoever's listening to the show right now,
Speaker 1: if that was you, if you had a front row
Speaker 1: seat and you're a Pacers fan, and the Pacers win
Speaker 1: the game, and a fan did that to Giannis, he
Speaker 1: would be banned for life right now. I don't I'm
Speaker 1: not saying anything that anything that harsh should happen, but
Speaker 1: it's almost in a way you expect better behavior from
Speaker 1: family members of players. So I agree with you that
Speaker 1: the league has to do something. But what do you
Speaker 1: think about even coming down a little a little bit
Speaker 1: harder than keeping him out of arenas for the rest
Speaker 1: of the postseason.
Speaker 5: I mean, you can keep him. I wouldn't be opposed
Speaker 5: to keep him out of arenas for a full calendar year. Yeah,
Speaker 5: And I think that was I think it was best.
Speaker 5: And that's the thing, you know, I saw a lot
Speaker 5: of that, Like, you know, if that was a fan,
Speaker 5: if that was a fan joh Halbert was is a fan.
Speaker 5: He doesn't work for the Pacers, he doesn't work for
Speaker 5: the NBA. He is a fan who happens to be
Speaker 5: a father of.
Speaker 1: The player.
Speaker 5: And and you know, I don't see any other you know,
Speaker 5: parents or you know, coming out coming onto the floor
Speaker 5: and doing something like that. And you know, and as
Speaker 5: a parent, you know, you have to set an example,
Speaker 5: and you know, and you know, he's too old to
Speaker 5: do what he did, Like he's too old to be
Speaker 5: doing stuff like that. Like you expect that, you know,
Speaker 5: if something like that were to happen with a family member,
Speaker 5: you expect that with a brother or something like that,
Speaker 5: or a cousin or somebody like that, somebody who's you know,
Speaker 5: in his twenties. You know, this man is way too
Speaker 5: old to be doing what he did that. You know,
Speaker 5: it just really really unacceptable.
Speaker 1: And I also to him one more thing here, I
Speaker 1: feel like he took away the moment from his kid.
Speaker 1: Feel I feel like he you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Like ten days ago, you guys at the Athletic released
Speaker 1: a survey of one hundred and fifty players, and his
Speaker 1: peers identified him as the most overrated player in pro basketball.
Speaker 1: And I can't imagine what that did. Like, I'm sure
Speaker 1: that really bummed him out. And that final game winning
Speaker 1: layoup TJ he beat Giannis for the lay up, and
Speaker 1: you know, he he essentially leads his team to a
Speaker 1: first round playoff victory. Like I felt like the actions
Speaker 1: from his father kind of took away the shine of
Speaker 1: the moment for his kid.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Absolutely, because Tyres Holiverson should have been able to
Speaker 5: go up to that press conference and talk about his
Speaker 5: heroics in the last you know, forty seconds in overtime
Speaker 5: and also in the last minute of regulation. Instead, he
Speaker 5: had to answer those questions, and that was unfair to him. Uh,
Speaker 5: patently unfair to him. It was unfair, to be honest,
Speaker 5: that he had to address uh that he had to
Speaker 5: address that, that he had to be put in a
Speaker 5: position to where he had to compose himself enough to
Speaker 5: where he would be able to to to address that
Speaker 5: with the elequence and the grace that he did address that,
Speaker 5: and it just took away from from you know, the
Speaker 5: entire not the narrative of the game, but you know
Speaker 5: the conversation of the game, which is, you know, the
Speaker 5: Indiana Pacers came back from seven down in the last
Speaker 5: forty seconds of overtime to win a game. You know,
Speaker 5: we should be talking about that. We should be talking
Speaker 5: about the two turnovers by Gary Trent Jr. We should
Speaker 5: be talking about you know, Doc Rivers kind of looking
Speaker 5: helpless on the sidelines. We should be talking about Giannie's future,
Speaker 5: anything else other than Tyrese Holliburton's father, And.
Speaker 1: We will do that now. Tony Well said, so let's
Speaker 1: talk about what you think is next for Gianni's Actually,
Speaker 1: you know what, before we get there, let's do a
Speaker 1: little dame you know, because there's always this debate that
Speaker 1: goes on in state, like who's the best in state
Speaker 1: college player that is playing in the NBA, And usually
Speaker 1: that digresses into BYU vers Utah and it's clearly Damien
Speaker 1: and it has been for a long time a local legend.
Speaker 1: I can remember Randy Ray coming on my radio show
Speaker 1: and Dame was a sophomore and telling both me and Gordon,
Speaker 1: you guys have to get up here and see this kid.
Speaker 1: And one of my regrets is that I did not
Speaker 1: do that enough. I think I saw Dame play here
Speaker 1: two or three times, and I don't know if this
Speaker 1: is the end, but he's turning thirty five this offseason,
Speaker 1: and that is not an injury that is easy to
Speaker 1: come back from, even if you're twenty two. So what
Speaker 1: are your thoughts about this unfortunate situation that may end
Speaker 1: Damian Lillard's career? How do you think this plays out?
Speaker 5: Do you know the one? So there were two tweets
Speaker 5: that I sent out around twenty twelve and twenty thirteen
Speaker 5: that got me everything but a Child of God by
Speaker 5: every BYU fan on Twitter. And I'm gonna tell you
Speaker 5: the two tweets. Can you guess what the two tweets are?
Speaker 1: I'm gonna guess they had something to do with him
Speaker 1: being better than for that or something like that.
Speaker 5: Okay, So the one tweet was I covered when I
Speaker 5: was remember I was covering Utah State, so this was
Speaker 5: twenty eleven. Actually this is twenty eleven, and and I
Speaker 5: covered Utah State against Weaver State and Damian Lillard just
Speaker 5: went absolutely nothing. Utah State won the game, but Damian
Speaker 5: Lillard was was absolutely ridiculous. And I tweeted that night
Speaker 5: I said, Damian Lillard is the best NBA prospect in
Speaker 5: the state of Utah. And this was Jimmers senior year
Speaker 5: and that did not go overwhelmed at all. So that
Speaker 5: was one tweet, and the second tweet was is uh
Speaker 5: and I'm super proud of this one. The second tweek
Speaker 5: was I said, uh after the state tournament and I
Speaker 5: had the twenty twelve or twenty thirteen, I don't know,
Speaker 5: after the state tournament, the high school state tournament, I
Speaker 5: said that Sam Merrill was the best UH senior point
Speaker 5: guard in the state of Utah. And that was TJ
Speaker 5: Hall this year when he was a high four star kid.
Speaker 5: He was like a top forty kid nationally. And they
Speaker 5: had both, you know, Sam and signed with Utah State
Speaker 5: and TJ signed with BYU, and both of those tweets
Speaker 5: and ended up aging really well. And both of those
Speaker 5: tweets got me in a lot of hot water with
Speaker 5: with the BYU fan base. Uh so b yu. I
Speaker 5: love you guys. You know, Agent Davans was going to
Speaker 5: be number one, number two pick in the draft, So
Speaker 5: we're even getting to Dame. I don't think his career
Speaker 5: is over, h I one believe that he's coming back.
Speaker 5: I one hundred believe that we have seen the last
Speaker 5: of him as an All Star, all NBA level player.
Speaker 5: You know, the there are a lot of comparisons going
Speaker 5: around to to Kevin Durant's Achilles injury, you know, but
Speaker 5: the difference is Damian Lillard six for two and Kevin
Speaker 5: Durant uh is seven foot and you know Damian Lillard's
Speaker 5: you know, really dependent on you know, his urse, his
Speaker 5: explosion off the dribble, his first step, you know, getting
Speaker 5: separation for you know, his his ability to score at
Speaker 5: all three levels. I I one hundred percent believe that
Speaker 5: he's going to come back. So I don't think he's
Speaker 5: going to retire. I don't think that, you know, we've
Speaker 5: seen the last of him. What I'm hoping is that
Speaker 5: when he does come back, he finds himself in a
Speaker 5: position where he can win a championship. You know, as
Speaker 5: a veteran guard, who can you know, as a veteran guard,
Speaker 5: who's you know, able to provide some clutch and timely scoring.
Speaker 5: I don't think that he's going to ever be the
Speaker 5: guy that he was before the Achilles because that's just
Speaker 5: too hard for you know, a thirty five year old,
Speaker 5: you know, small guard who's dependent on who's dependent on
Speaker 5: the first step to to really uh to to really
Speaker 5: deal with and come back and play at the same level.
Speaker 5: But you know, his career as an All NBA guy, uh,
Speaker 5: his career as an All Star guy. You know, he's
Speaker 5: he's was this sensational and he's one of the best
Speaker 5: offensive under the rim uh players of our era. And
Speaker 5: you know he's he's you know, done everything the right way.
Speaker 5: He's conducted himself, you know, professionally, nothing but professionally on
Speaker 5: and off the floor. You know, I wish nothing but
Speaker 5: the best for him. And you know, like I said,
Speaker 5: I'm sure that we'll see him back in an NBA
Speaker 5: uniform in about a year.
Speaker 1: I hope you're right, and I hope it looks okay.
Speaker 1: I hope it's not one of those things where like
Speaker 1: after ewing his hurt his achilles and came back and
Speaker 1: played for the Sonics, and it's like, who is that player?
Speaker 1: You know, I don't want to watch Dame look anything
Speaker 1: other than what we're accustomed to seeing him look like.
Speaker 1: But it does lend Tony a conversation about what's next
Speaker 1: for Giannis and Milwaukee. You know, ultimately, if you're Yiannis.
Speaker 1: I referenced this earlier. Last ten playoff games for Giannis,
Speaker 1: he's averaging thirty two, sixteen and six, but they're one
Speaker 1: in nine and they've lost in the first round three
Speaker 1: straight years. So look, let's be clear. Milwaukee is not
Speaker 1: trading him unless Jannis comes to them and says, okay,
Speaker 1: I gave you everything, and look here, here's the deal.
Speaker 1: When you are when you when you want a championship. Okay,
Speaker 1: the Lebron thing is perfect here. When Lebron left Cleveland
Speaker 1: the first time for Miami, they were burning his jersey.
Speaker 1: When he left the second time for la it was
Speaker 1: love because he won a title for the city. So
Speaker 1: Jannis can actually leave Milwaukee if he wants to with
Speaker 1: his head held high. Do you think that's going to happen?
Speaker 1: And if so, how do you think that trade goes down.
Speaker 5: You know, it's it's really interesting because if you're if
Speaker 5: you're Milwaukee, you're gonna want you know, you're gonna want
Speaker 5: a Yannis level deal, and you're gonna want you know,
Speaker 5: you're gonna want real assets. So you know, Houston's got
Speaker 5: real assets, Oklahoma City's got real assets. The Utah Jazz
Speaker 5: never real assets. I don't think that giannest is going
Speaker 5: to go to Milwaukee's front office and say, hey, trade
Speaker 5: me to the Utah Jazz. You know, but you know
Speaker 5: people are throwing out you know, Golden State Warriors, the
Speaker 5: Los Angeles Lakers, you know, those teams don't have any
Speaker 5: assets to get honest, you know, unless Milwaukee's taking the trade,
Speaker 5: you know, for twenty five or thirty cents on the dollars.
Speaker 5: So you know, if Joannis goes to if Jannie goes
Speaker 5: to you know, his front office and he says, hey,
Speaker 5: you know, please trade me, then you know, the the
Speaker 5: the the ultimate you know landing side is probably Houston
Speaker 5: or you know, Oklahoma City. But if I'm Oklahoma City,
Speaker 5: I don't know that I want to trade for you honest,
Speaker 5: like I just you know, I think that they are
Speaker 5: a NBA title contend there right now. I don't think
Speaker 5: they need another piece, and I think that with the
Speaker 5: assets that they have, they're set up to be a
Speaker 5: title contender for years for years to come. The one
Speaker 5: Eastern conference place where I would say is really interesting.
Speaker 5: I think it's Philadelphia because I think they have, you know,
Speaker 5: Paul George's salary. Let's assume that they keep their pick
Speaker 5: right now, they have they have this year's pick, and
Speaker 5: you know they also have they have a young guy
Speaker 5: that's already there and Jared McCain that you know, they
Speaker 5: could possibly put into a trade. And they have the
Speaker 5: Los Angeles Clippers twenty twenty eight unprotected first round pick,
Speaker 5: so you know, the the sixers could potentially actually put together.
Speaker 5: They could potentially actually put together a package that is
Speaker 5: that is at least worth you know, opening the conversation
Speaker 5: or opening the door, opening all the lines of communication
Speaker 5: with Milwaukee.
Speaker 1: All right, since you referenced the Jazz, as you know, online,
Speaker 1: a lot of jazz fans are talking about the potential
Speaker 1: of the Jazz getting involved if Giannis does ask out
Speaker 1: of Milwaukee. The issue, well, there are several issues. I
Speaker 1: don't know that the Jazz are looking to do the
Speaker 1: whole big game hunting thing this offseason. It feels like
Speaker 1: they've really leaned into a long game play. So that's
Speaker 1: one look. If Yannis wants to come to Utah, the
Speaker 1: Jazz will be interested. I'm not saying that they wouldn't be.
Speaker 1: I just don't know that that's a play that they're
Speaker 1: going to try to make, because I think they're gonna
Speaker 1: long game it and we'll see if they get Cooper
Speaker 1: flag at one. But I guess I guess. The way
Speaker 1: I'll ask you is whether it's Giannis or anyone else
Speaker 1: that could be available. There are a lot of teams
Speaker 1: that have real issues because they have high pay rolls
Speaker 1: and they're not good. Phoenix is one of them. Rumors
Speaker 1: about Durant being dealt, So whether a Jonas or Durant
Speaker 1: or anyone else, you think the Jazz are going to
Speaker 1: try to make a play to get involved with some
Speaker 1: of these big name guys that will be moved.
Speaker 5: Well, I don't think it makes sense for the Jazz
Speaker 5: to do any of that unless they get Cooper flags.
Speaker 5: Because if they get Cooper flag, I think he's good
Speaker 5: enough that he's going to roll out of bed into
Speaker 5: the NBA and he's going to average fifteen to five
Speaker 5: and flave you know, instantly as a rookie and instantly
Speaker 5: be a high level starter. But he's the only guy
Speaker 5: in the draft that that's gonna instantly going to be
Speaker 5: a high level guy like that. So, you know, if
Speaker 5: you're the Jazz, let's say you get Cooper Flaggs, you
Speaker 5: can offer you know, a lot of Jazz fans have
Speaker 5: lamented the fact that, you know, the Jazz haven't been
Speaker 5: able to trade John Collins or Jordan Clarkson as of yet.
Speaker 5: Well guess what. Now they're tradable salary and they're all
Speaker 5: they're both going into the last years of their contract,
Speaker 5: which means they can offer Milwaukee one of the biggest
Speaker 5: things that Milwaukee really needs right now. They can offer Milwaukee,
Speaker 5: you know, relief from their books. Give them John Collins,
Speaker 5: you give them Jordan Clarkson. And do you they have
Speaker 5: eleven tradeable first round picks? Uh? And you give them
Speaker 5: five or six of those. And then you know, the
Speaker 5: question is if you're Milwaukee, Okay, do we want a
Speaker 5: tangible young guy to come back and Milwaukee The answer
Speaker 5: is probably yes, because if Milwaukee deals with Houston, they're
Speaker 5: gonna ask rom and Thompson if if Milwaukee deals with
Speaker 5: Oklahoma City, they're going to ask for one of those
Speaker 5: young guys, you know. So then the question is, you know,
Speaker 5: how does Milwaukee feel about Keyante George or Isaiah Collier
Speaker 5: or Coles Otowski. And I don't know the answer to that,
Speaker 5: But the Jazz can for sure get their foot in
Speaker 5: the door by offering tradables, by offering salary and salary relief,
Speaker 5: and offering a bunch of picks because Milwaukee does not
Speaker 5: have a lot of picks, does not have any picks
Speaker 5: at all, you know, So you know it'll be interesting.
Speaker 5: But you know, if the Jazz don't get Cooper Flagg,
Speaker 5: it doesn't just doesn't make sense because if they don't
Speaker 5: get Cooper Flag, they probably just need to just go
Speaker 5: ahead and tank next year and try to get one
Speaker 5: of one of the three big guys in the twenty
Speaker 5: twenty six draft. But if they do get Cooper Flag,
Speaker 5: then I think that that accelerates their timeline a little
Speaker 5: bit and they can go and they can try to
Speaker 5: make moves to where they can try to be competitive
Speaker 5: right away.
Speaker 1: All right, a couple more things on last night before
Speaker 1: we get a thought on time, then I'll set you loose.
Speaker 1: And I hate to ask you about the Knicks kind
Speaker 1: of letting it go there with the Pistons. They'll be
Speaker 1: me Tony. Come on, man, it's sports sock Radio. We
Speaker 1: all know where your heart lies. And look they're still
Speaker 1: up three to two. Detroit does don't want a playoff
Speaker 1: game at home in almost twenty years. Jalen gets hurt.
Speaker 1: I don't know, man, Sometimes Kat just shrinks in big moments.
Speaker 1: That's not new. But a thought on last night, and
Speaker 1: do you think the Knicks get it done in Detroit?
Speaker 1: Are we looking at a game seven at MSG?
Speaker 5: My thoughts are that that was a really blown opportunity.
Speaker 5: You know, I watched that game, you know, on the
Speaker 5: edge of my seat, and you know, you just have
Speaker 5: to close that game out right, Like you know, you
Speaker 5: got a gift from the NBA in Detroit. And I
Speaker 5: don't like to admit this, but we got a gift
Speaker 5: in game four, and you know, and we should have
Speaker 5: lost the game four, like we we should be playing
Speaker 5: for our season tomorrow. That's that's that's the real sobering
Speaker 5: reality of it. Like we could easily be playing for
Speaker 5: our season tomorrow. And you know, I think we just
Speaker 5: got to go in there and put together a really
Speaker 5: complete basketball game on both ends of the floor. But
Speaker 5: you know, jamb Brunson is beat really beat beat up.
Speaker 5: The Pistons took a lot of have taken a lot
Speaker 5: of skin off of the Knicks, whether the Knicks win
Speaker 5: this series or not. And you know, they they've really
Speaker 5: beaten you know, jialing Up. You know Karling Anthony Towns
Speaker 5: has had to go through, you know, a lot on
Speaker 5: the interior on both ends of the floor. On the
Speaker 5: Pistons are big, and they're physical, and I think they
Speaker 5: have the best player on the series in k Cunningham.
Speaker 5: And you know, I think that we're capable of going
Speaker 5: into Little Feasas Arena and winning tomorrow. I think we're
Speaker 5: fully capable of that. But at the same time, I'm
Speaker 5: just not going to be surprised that this if we're
Speaker 5: looking at a Game seven on Saturday.
Speaker 1: And honestly, I wouldn't mind that because I like watching
Speaker 1: Game sevens at MSG. Even though both of our poultses
Speaker 1: are the sky high and we may have to have
Speaker 1: blood removed because our heart rate will be through the roof,
Speaker 1: but we'll see how it plays out matches fund as
Speaker 1: spring basketball in New York, all right, wasn't too long
Speaker 1: ago that most everybody was off of Denver. The Clips
Speaker 1: were up two to one. We saw a little bubble
Speaker 1: Jamal last night, town, didn't we We saw a little
Speaker 1: playoff Jamal Murray. Takeaways from the Nuggets win last night,
Speaker 1: a couple of takeaways.
Speaker 5: Number one, you saw, you know, playoff Jamal Murray. That
Speaker 5: was a special display of shot making. And he really
Speaker 5: had a bounce on his step, and you know, he
Speaker 5: had it really going, you know, off the dribble, and
Speaker 5: you know he the shot making was just absolutely insane.
Speaker 5: You know, there are times where you know, Jamal murray
Speaker 5: shot making is just, you know, something to behold. I
Speaker 5: remember the Lakers series in twenty twenty three in the
Speaker 5: Western Conference Finals. You know, his display of shot making
Speaker 5: is his ability to raise his game not only in
Speaker 5: that series, but the Phoenix series where he was the
Speaker 5: second best player in the series in a series that
Speaker 5: feature Kevin Durant and Devin Booker, and both Durant and
Speaker 5: Booker were really, really, really good. You know, it's it's
Speaker 5: when when he plays like that and you have Nicola Jokis.
Speaker 5: Denver is just really tough to be So, you know,
Speaker 5: that's one takeaway to the second takeaway, which is really
Speaker 5: shocking to me. David Adaman's out coaching Tyleru and some
Speaker 5: of the the the adjustments that he's made. I'll give
Speaker 5: you one right now. In the first three games, you know,
Speaker 5: Nikola Jokis operated you know, a lot in the middle
Speaker 5: of the floor, which is you know, conventionally you want
Speaker 5: your best player in the middle of the floor to
Speaker 5: where he can drive right, he can drive left, he
Speaker 5: can you know, kind of survey the floor, you know,
Speaker 5: kind of you know, Denver puts Jokids kind of in
Speaker 5: a lot of Dirk Novitsky situations where you know, styline extended.
Speaker 5: You know, he can move right and he can move left. Well,
Speaker 5: you know, the Clippers were doubling him so fiercely and
Speaker 5: so hard in the middle of the floor, and they
Speaker 5: were they had turned were able to turn your kitch
Speaker 5: over with a lot of blind double blind side double teams,
Speaker 5: and you know, it was a problem. It was kind
Speaker 5: of mucking up Denver's offense. It was kind of throwing
Speaker 5: Denver's offense off kilter. Denver relies on a lot of timing,
Speaker 5: a lot of d h o's, a lot of dribble handoffs,
Speaker 5: a lot of pick and rolls. Uh. It was thrown
Speaker 5: off the timing of the offense. And you know, that's
Speaker 5: one of the reasons why the Clippers really looked like
Speaker 5: they were in control of the first three games of
Speaker 5: the series, well in games four, in Games five, David
Speaker 5: Adaman has done a couple of things with Jokic. Number one,
Speaker 5: he's had him operating on the sides of the floor
Speaker 5: to where so that means, h if the Clippers are
Speaker 5: sending double teams, it's alleviated the double team pressures because
Speaker 5: if he's on one side of the floor or the
Speaker 5: other as opposed to the middle of the floor, you
Speaker 5: can only send one double teams from one angle. And
Speaker 5: Yolkic could see and there weren't There haven't been any
Speaker 5: blindside double teams that have been able to turn them over.
Speaker 5: And you know, once he sees the double teams, you
Speaker 5: cook because then he can just he's like a supercomputer.
Speaker 5: He can just kind of pick you apart, you know,
Speaker 5: with with his reads. So that was one thing, and
Speaker 5: the other thing, Uh, he's gotten the cola Yolkicic on
Speaker 5: the move. He's gotten the col Yolkic on the move
Speaker 5: a lot more in the last two games. You know,
Speaker 5: so he's you know, gotten cut into the basket, He's
Speaker 5: gotten them actually coming off of down screens. He's running
Speaker 5: ato plays for him, and it's it's made Jokic's a
Speaker 5: lot harder to tag uh for you know, the Los
Speaker 5: Angeles Clippers defense, it's made him uh, it's made him
Speaker 5: a lot more difficult uh to keep uh. It's made
Speaker 5: it's made it a lot more difficult for them to
Speaker 5: keep taps on him and to know the where he's
Speaker 5: going to be at a given time with any offense.
Speaker 5: You know. So those you know, adjustments have really swayed
Speaker 5: the series. And you know, once you you know, put
Speaker 5: Jokics in positions where he's going to be able to succeed.
Speaker 5: He's the best player in the world. He's going to
Speaker 5: succeed and he's going to you know, figure out a
Speaker 5: way to to to uh uh put his impact on
Speaker 5: the game. So, you know, I think David Adaman has
Speaker 5: made some really, really really great adjustments in this series
Speaker 5: that have turned the series back from the back from
Speaker 5: Los Angeles to.
Speaker 1: Denver, tj good stuff today, man, appreciate the time and
Speaker 1: you'd be good and travel safe and well. Chatzoon, no problem.
Speaker 5: Appreciate you, my guy.
Speaker 1: Tony Jones covers the NBA for the athletic at t
Speaker 1: Jones on the NBA is where you find them. Stops
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Speaker 1: unline at IFA dot co Op. I should have known.
Speaker 1: I should have known when I left it open for
Speaker 1: ck there was a potential of getting weird. Spin doctors. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: all right, nineties one hit Wonders is where we went
Speaker 1: with today? What year was this?
Speaker 2: I gotta say ninety three, ninety four ish that check
Speaker 2: me on this.
Speaker 1: Let's see spin Doctors. What's the name of the song?
Speaker 2: Two princes princes, then they had another one little miss
Speaker 2: camp be wrong.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, only you would have this knowledge. Mom
Speaker 1: had the cassette played in the Volvo nineteen ninety one.
Speaker 1: Oh man, I'm off. Okay, that's still pretty good. Uh
Speaker 1: can we be honest? Horrible band?
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's why they were one hit wonder fair enough?
Speaker 1: Chris Comrodnie live in studio. Hello, Christopher, how are you
Speaker 1: good man?
Speaker 2: How are you?
Speaker 1: I'm good, I'm good. So let's get the Shador Sanders
Speaker 1: stuff out of the way. As really the only local
Speaker 1: media member that has experienced covering Colorado Dion and Shador.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you this. Do you think Dion did
Speaker 1: him a little bit of a disservice throughout the course
Speaker 1: of this process, because you hear a lot of like, well,
Speaker 1: like his dad, he sandbagged a bunch of interviews, and
Speaker 1: like his dad, he wanted to choose where he wanted
Speaker 1: to play. Dion could have sandbagged every interview possible. He's
Speaker 1: the best cornerback potential you've ever seen play. Chador is
Speaker 1: just simply not that talent. Do you think he maybe
Speaker 1: was done a bit of a disservice by his father.
Speaker 2: He was done a disservice by his father and basically
Speaker 2: the entire ecosystem of the NFL draft, because if we're
Speaker 2: being honest, the folks who are tasked with pontificating on
Speaker 2: such things in the months and years prior ash your
Speaker 2: door at the top as a top ten picks. So
Speaker 2: my question is, was the lead up to the combine,
Speaker 2: the interviews, skipping the combine, opting to maybe throw it
Speaker 2: pro day, and then throwing a pro day. Did all
Speaker 2: of that stuff suddenly sour team so much to the
Speaker 2: point that it cost him to slip four rounds.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: And to me, like I told one of my bosses, like,
Speaker 2: beyond the prank call, beyond where he ended up. I
Speaker 2: think this is a learning lesson for basically everybody who's
Speaker 2: involved in stuff like this to take a step back
Speaker 2: and figure out what went wrong and why did it
Speaker 2: go wrong because we've never seen this before. I mean,
Speaker 2: like the closest analogy we have, honestly is Rogers was
Speaker 2: it was Aaron sliding when Alex Smith went one and
Speaker 2: still a first rounder, still a first rounder and obviously
Speaker 2: went to the ideal spot when a Super Bowl is
Speaker 2: going to be a first ballot Hall of Famer, but
Speaker 2: I don't. I can't remember ever having a prospect in
Speaker 2: the most important position in football, let alone sports slide
Speaker 2: at the level that Shador Sanders slid to. And I
Speaker 2: think we will have think pieces. I think we will
Speaker 2: have reports coming out in the coming days. I mean
Speaker 2: Diana Rossini, who works with me at the Athletic Now
Speaker 2: reported this week that you know, a lot of it
Speaker 2: came down to the interviews, came down to the fact
Speaker 2: that he didn't want to participate at the combine. And again,
Speaker 2: my question is going to be for a while now
Speaker 2: until we get it answered, and you'll only get an
Speaker 2: answered through sources, league sources, through people who will speak
Speaker 2: on condition of anonymity, because a lot of these folks, remember,
Speaker 2: most people in the world of sports kind of live
Speaker 2: in semi fear of Deon Sanders. You do not want
Speaker 2: to get on the wrong side of Dion because of
Speaker 2: the cultural and media sway that he has. But again,
Speaker 2: how did this happen? How did this kid go from
Speaker 2: being like maybe where the Steelers going to take him
Speaker 2: at twenty one as recently as a month ago, to
Speaker 2: going in the fifth round to the Browns after they
Speaker 2: had selected Dylan Gabriel the third round. It's a fascinating
Speaker 2: story and I'm really interested to see what comes out
Speaker 2: in the coming weeks and months.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and your point about the conversation, I mean, there
Speaker 1: was a point last year mid season where Vegas had
Speaker 1: pretty good odds for Shador to be a finalist for
Speaker 1: the Heisman Trophy and be the number one overall pick.
Speaker 1: So it wasn't just people throwing stuff against the wall
Speaker 1: the hope it would stick, like you could get odds
Speaker 1: on Shoudor going number one mid season last year there
Speaker 1: was the Saints at nine, who need a quarterback. To
Speaker 1: your point of this Dealers at twenty one. I do
Speaker 1: often find the chasm between NFL talent evaluators, NBA talent evaluators,
Speaker 1: and media talent evaluators interesting because how much of the
Speaker 1: media talent evaluating is also draped in I want this
Speaker 1: to be a great story, Like we sit down and
Speaker 1: watch mel Kuiper lose his mind for three days because
Speaker 1: he thought should Or should be the number one overall pick.
Speaker 1: Is that mel Kiper really analyzing should Or as a talent?
Speaker 1: Or is that mel Kuiper the actor on television also
Speaker 1: wanting the story. Right, there's a gap between the two.
Speaker 1: You're taught when you're evaluating talent, if you're working for
Speaker 1: a team, you're taught to remove emotion. Now, do you
Speaker 1: have to analyze everything that surrounds the player?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 1: But can he play simple? Bottom line? But on the
Speaker 1: media side of things, how much of this talent evaluation
Speaker 1: is draped in the narrative that they want you to
Speaker 1: click on their stuff and watch their TV show?
Speaker 2: Right, Well, it's a business and of its self, and
Speaker 2: the sport has owned the off season like unlike any
Speaker 2: other professional sport. We have really like worldwide because the
Speaker 2: international soccer window can get exciting, but the summer transfer window,
Speaker 2: as you know, the most important transfer window, is only
Speaker 2: like three weeks long, and you don't have you'll have
Speaker 2: some monumental movement like in bab Beta Real Madrid that
Speaker 2: comes along once and once a blue moon. You can
Speaker 2: make an argument that people are more tantalized by the
Speaker 2: off season and the draft than they are by the
Speaker 2: season for a lot of teams, because in the NFL,
Speaker 2: a lot of teams are bad for a long time
Speaker 2: and all you have to sell them is hope and
Speaker 2: what did we learn from Ted Lasso?
Speaker 1: It kills you?
Speaker 2: Hope that kills you?
Speaker 1: So Porter loved that show? Is that Porter show hated it?
Speaker 2: I know. My point is is it is a It
Speaker 2: is an ecosystem in of itself, the NFL draft, and
Speaker 2: a lot of people have figured out a cultivated a
Speaker 2: way to market themselves as pseudo experts. Selfishly, I'm going
Speaker 2: to lean and rock with my guy Dane Brugler, who
Speaker 2: you've had on the show many times, who knows the
Speaker 2: stuff because he isn't one of those guys. He is
Speaker 2: kind of the the guy behind the curtains for a
Speaker 2: long time. It's like I'll show up in October November,
Speaker 2: and I'll and I'll start to give you guys, you know,
Speaker 2: some feedback on who I think is good. But the
Speaker 2: internet's a fickle place, man, And you can you can
Speaker 2: create a fabricated existence for yourself and and project yourself
Speaker 2: as an expert when you're really not. And you can
Speaker 2: be a fan of things. But unfortunately, in this world,
Speaker 2: somebody might find something hyperbolic and be like, oh, this
Speaker 2: person said it. Oh, let me check out their online
Speaker 2: io on x Oh they're a draft expert. Okay, let's
Speaker 2: spin this and let's aggregate it and then send it
Speaker 2: into the universe, and then it takes on a life
Speaker 2: of its own. And this happens often, but in the
Speaker 2: NFL draft it happens at an alarmingly high rate.
Speaker 1: Porter brought this up, and I think it's spot on.
Speaker 1: And let's see Dane had Schador going twenty one. Yep,
Speaker 1: the Giants trading back in. But I think as far
Speaker 1: as his overall big board, he was like forty three
Speaker 1: or something. So Dane actually was closer than most of
Speaker 1: the other analysts, certainly the mel Kuipers of the world.
Speaker 1: But I don't know if there's another event or anything
Speaker 1: on the sporting calendar that's covered by more liars and
Speaker 1: charlatans than the NFL draft. No Porter brought it up.
Speaker 1: It's one hundred percent correct, because people realize you could
Speaker 1: be Joe Schmoe that knows nothing about what you're doing,
Speaker 1: and you create a mock and it finds its way
Speaker 1: into an algorithm. People are going to click on mock
Speaker 1: drafts no matter what, and it always makes it hard
Speaker 1: to understand where the real information is coming from. And honestly,
Speaker 1: you're also getting smoke screens and misdirections from teams.
Speaker 2: That's the most undersold part of this. And talk about that, well,
Speaker 2: you know you've been in the front office rooms before, right, And.
Speaker 1: That's also what makes it complicated, because what you want
Speaker 1: to do when you're in a front office is you
Speaker 1: use your media contacts to send out messages via the
Speaker 1: media that will throw other teams off your sense and
Speaker 1: will make other teams believe that you're actually looking at
Speaker 1: players that you have no desire to select, and you
Speaker 1: want to throw media, you know, you want to throw
Speaker 1: the media messaging out there so teams actually stay away
Speaker 1: from the guy that you like or think that you
Speaker 1: like somebody that you don't. And therefore it makes our
Speaker 1: job analyzing this stuff beyond microphones or beyond computers, writing
Speaker 1: about it really hard to do. And that's why you
Speaker 1: can look at every single mock. Everybody gets it wrong
Speaker 1: every single year, so it makes it hard to really
Speaker 1: understand what's real and what isn't. But you made multi
Speaker 1: trips down to Boulder to cover Colorado and Dion and
Speaker 1: Shador and I told this anecdote Monday after the draft
Speaker 1: where when we were down well it was Vegas Big
Speaker 1: twelve media Day this year is in Dallas. When we
Speaker 1: were in Vegas for Big twelve Media Day, we're on
Speaker 1: radio row. We're interviewing players and coaches, Kenny Dillingham. You know,
Speaker 1: you go down the list, and it was a pretty
Speaker 1: docile environment. Intel boom. You look over, double doors open.
Speaker 1: Six cameras are following Shador and Shiloh and Dion as
Speaker 1: they walk in, and suddenly the circus is in town.
Speaker 1: And if you're running a front office, if you're a
Speaker 1: general manager, you don't want the circus in town for
Speaker 1: somebody you perceived to be as a backup quarterback. Like
Speaker 1: all things being equal, unless you're a generational talent, unless
Speaker 1: you're Peyton, unless you're Andrew Luck, and there are no
Speaker 1: questions about who you could be as a quarterback, all
Speaker 1: of your variables really need to be in place. And
Speaker 1: it seemed like a lot of the variables surrounding Shador
Speaker 1: were question marks that were never fully answered.
Speaker 2: Well, he existed in a biodome of he existed a
Speaker 2: biodome great movie, by the way, right, so we could
Speaker 2: go there. He existed in this reality that was cultivated
Speaker 2: from the get go, having always been coached by his dad,
Speaker 2: Hall of famer, you know, bombastic human being knows that
Speaker 2: like like a plus genius and messaging. But to your point, yes,
Speaker 2: like what this was was this was the ultimate reminder
Speaker 2: that the NFL has the zerost time for bs. I
Speaker 2: wish I could have said it like it would have
Speaker 2: been a good one.
Speaker 1: It would have been a good one to land right there. Yeah.
Speaker 2: They just do not suffer fools. And I'm not saying
Speaker 2: Shadoor is a fool. I'm just saying like they do
Speaker 2: not have time for the pomp and circumstance, like you
Speaker 2: are expected to get in line and adhere and granted there.
Speaker 2: You know, there have been some characters over the years,
Speaker 2: but like think about recently, like who who came into
Speaker 2: the league with a lot of kind of fanfare but
Speaker 2: a lot of questions Like Johnny manziineal is a great one,
Speaker 2: perfect one? Yeah, yep, And you know, you know, different
Speaker 2: set of circumstances, different set of issues. But like what
Speaker 2: would be really fascinating would be go into a multiverse
Speaker 2: and be like if Shador doesn't play for Dion, if
Speaker 2: Shador goes to play at Oregon State, or does he
Speaker 2: go play at you know, Texas Tech or a different school.
Speaker 2: Does this conversation change because he's a he is a
Speaker 2: You can't say he's not a good quarterback. He's a
Speaker 2: good quarterback. But the line of delineation that I found
Speaker 2: fascinating after his fall is so many people were like,
Speaker 2: you shouldn't be surprised by Dion Sanders slide, or should
Speaker 2: or Sanders slide?
Speaker 1: Look at the tape.
Speaker 2: If that's the argument, then why were we projecting him
Speaker 2: as a first round pick all along. I understand that
Speaker 2: he had a circumstance where he played for his dad,
Speaker 2: who obviously prioritized the offense around him to make him
Speaker 2: look good, but they failed to recruit offensive lineman two
Speaker 2: years in a row. He was running for his life.
Speaker 2: He was the most sacked quarterback in college football the
Speaker 2: last two years. He held the ball way too long,
Speaker 2: but he could make some throws. I'm absolutely one hundred
Speaker 2: percent confident by saying this, like, if should or gets
Speaker 2: a shot, like he will not look terrible. There's a
Speaker 2: chance he might not pan out, but he's not going
Speaker 2: to be the least prepared quarterback in the history of
Speaker 2: the NFL. But he was brought in in a system
Speaker 2: that catered to his every need both on the field
Speaker 2: and off the field. When I was at Colorado's pro
Speaker 2: day last year or fall camp media day, sorry, Dion
Speaker 2: spoke and then the other two people that got on
Speaker 2: the dais were.
Speaker 1: Who Travis and not Travis?
Speaker 2: Oh? Wow? Shador and Shiloh Oh come on, jeez, that
Speaker 2: doesn't surprise you. I mean, and again going back to
Speaker 2: the biodome, the ecosystem. I've used that word a lot today.
Speaker 2: It's fun when you when you're brought up this way
Speaker 2: in like kind of just the the prince who was promised.
Speaker 2: Once you get to the NFL, all that stuff goes
Speaker 2: out the window. And one thing that I'm really interested
Speaker 2: in is like Deon knows this. He lived that life,
Speaker 2: but he didn't lift that life at the level list
Speaker 2: Shador's gonna have to because he's playing quarterback, right, which
Speaker 2: is a position that takes on a life of its own.
Speaker 2: It's so much more pressure than cornerback. Dion could could
Speaker 2: you know, go one on one with Chris Carter or
Speaker 2: Andre Risen or Jerry Rice. But like Shador, if he's
Speaker 2: going to get a shot, like he's gonna have to
Speaker 2: go up against the Baltimore Ravens defense, and the Steelers
Speaker 2: defense by himself. This is a totally different ballgame. I
Speaker 2: don't think we're ever going to see something like this again,
Speaker 2: which is why I think the draft coverage was so intense.
Speaker 2: It was burning white hot on this issue. But it
Speaker 2: was very tiresome and it and it turned into I
Speaker 2: guess you could say good TV for for the folks
Speaker 2: at NFL Network in ESPN because everybody was waiting at
Speaker 2: baited breath for where'shi door gonna go? But you can
Speaker 2: make an argument that the entire weekend was hijacked by this.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 1: Andrew Marshawn from your outlet from the Athletic wrote a
Speaker 1: great piece on the Melo Kuiper meltdown because I'll be honest,
Speaker 1: watching Melo meltdown was fun. It was good television. I mean,
Speaker 1: even though it did it kind of distracted from what
Speaker 1: we were actually doing. Good Bad Moon Rising pull the
Speaker 1: original Bad Moon Rising Andre Rising?
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 1: Was he the one who was a left eye who
Speaker 1: burned the house down?
Speaker 2: Yea rest and peace?
Speaker 1: Rest in peace, Left Eye? Best poly Shor movie.
Speaker 2: Oh I'm gonna I'm gonna zag on you. You're not
Speaker 2: gonna be ready for this. I'm not in Sino Man.
Speaker 1: In Sino Man, is I'm gonna go Son in law?
Speaker 2: Sun in Law is his best leading role in the
Speaker 2: army now underrated. Okay, but if I want to watch
Speaker 2: one polyshore movie, it's going to be in Sino Man.
Speaker 1: Okay, here's the question. Chris Camraddie's favorite polyshore movie texted
Speaker 1: in right now to eight seven seven three five three
Speaker 1: zero seven hundred, and you will win one round of
Speaker 1: golf to Davis Park, the best polyshore movie according to Ck.
Speaker 1: Because that's what we do on the show eight seven
Speaker 1: seven three five three zero seven hundred. It is the
Speaker 1: festival of a tease. Every day this spring we are
Speaker 1: giving away one round of golf to the best courses
Speaker 1: in the state. Listen to The Down and Dirty with
Speaker 1: Scott Mitchell, The Sean O'Connell Show, and then this little
Speaker 1: old radio show. The drive was Spence checkets from two
Speaker 1: to six for your chance to win each day from
Speaker 1: ESPN seven hundred the Utah Golf Association. All right, a
Speaker 1: couple more draft things before you catch a break. Is
Speaker 1: it an indictment at all that Caleb Lohner was the
Speaker 1: only you drafted and no BYU players are drafted or
Speaker 1: is this just a moment in time that it's a
Speaker 1: great quest?
Speaker 2: And I was talking with this about this with Porter
Speaker 2: while you were on your last segment. What are the
Speaker 2: odds that the only dude between both schools, both rivals,
Speaker 2: who is drafted is a former basketball player that played
Speaker 2: basketball at both of those schools.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm gonna go the logical route and say
Speaker 2: it's lightning in a bottle. But you're looking at back
Speaker 2: to back years now where Utah didn't have much NFL talent.
Speaker 2: BYU's different because a lot of their guys either transferred
Speaker 2: in the portal or stayed. I mean most of their
Speaker 2: guys stayed, honestly, But I don't know, like off the
Speaker 2: top of my head, who would have gone really all
Speaker 2: that much higher than Caleb even at.
Speaker 1: BYU, Like I thought Junior would be drafted.
Speaker 2: Tifuna, Yeah, yeah, I mean he he came. It all
Speaker 2: depends on who you play with, man. Junior played with
Speaker 2: a lot better talent his early years at the U
Speaker 2: than his later years. And when you play with better players,
Speaker 2: they're going you're going to look better because they're going
Speaker 2: to make you look better. Yeah. I don't know if
Speaker 2: if Chase would have been I mean he probably would
Speaker 2: have maybe six to seven rounds, six seventh round. But like,
Speaker 2: other than that, it's a really fascinating team to if
Speaker 2: you really think about it, because like they were so good,
Speaker 2: but they don't have because the Eten kid didn't get drafted.
Speaker 1: No he didn't.
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's I think, i'll say lightning in a
Speaker 2: bottle moment. But for Utah, there was a time where
Speaker 2: it was like every year you're kind of relied upon
Speaker 2: to have a top three round pick. Now next year
Speaker 2: it'll be different because Spencer Fano is likely a top
Speaker 2: ten pick. But there was a time during Utah's you
Speaker 2: know PAC twelve run, before the demise of the conference,
Speaker 2: where you were looking at four or five guys going
Speaker 2: from you know, rounds two to six every single year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of them landed. I thought Baddy would
Speaker 1: be drafted. I thought Tyler Batty was gonna get drafted.
Speaker 1: A lot of them landed on their feet. Conra O'Toole
Speaker 1: got one of the richest like undrafted deals with Seattle.
Speaker 1: I think he got like three hundred K guaranteed with
Speaker 1: a signing bonus. But yeah, it's just always interested to consider,
Speaker 1: I guess we should shout out Jalen Royals, who was
Speaker 1: draft from the fourth round by the Chiefs. Fano is
Speaker 1: a top ten pick. Is that what we're hearing?
Speaker 2: My guy Dan Brugler has him as a top ten.
Speaker 1: Really okay, very nice? Well, hopefully it is just a
Speaker 1: moment in time. All right, we'll catch a quick break.
Speaker 1: Cek is live in studio for another big segment. We
Speaker 1: also are going to bring in Dave Fox today, who
Speaker 1: has two Pelotons and two Emmys. Do you have a
Speaker 1: peloton or an Emmy? Do you have either?
Speaker 2: I definitely don't have an Emmy. I have an old
Speaker 2: used exercise bike hand me down from Aaron Falk.
Speaker 1: You have a hand me down exercise buck from Falk.
Speaker 1: Oh that rules erin if you're listening. Get back about
Speaker 1: Tea Times coming up this weekend in honor of Andre
Speaker 1: bad Moon Rising and of course Cameron Rising. By the way,
Speaker 1: have you heard anything about our guy Cam Last thing
Speaker 1: I heard he was out of Utah Royals game.
Speaker 2: It is Mike on but yeah, that was the last
Speaker 2: time I saw Cam publicly? Was I think he went
Speaker 2: with a a former Utah and BYU players porter.
Speaker 1: Have you heard anything about the future of one young
Speaker 1: Cameron Rising.
Speaker 2: No, I think that's kind of the question right now.
Speaker 3: Last I just to be clear, last I talked to
Speaker 3: Cam was in January, so at that point he wasn't
Speaker 3: necessarily training for an NFL team, So I don't necessarily
Speaker 3: know what the next move is for one Cam Rising.
Speaker 1: I honestly thought he'd make like three hundred grand and
Speaker 1: go play quarterback for like Sacramento State or something.
Speaker 2: Well, they just got Jayden Rashada.
Speaker 1: It was just a hypothetical. I'm just saying, not that
Speaker 1: school per se. But didn't you think that maybe you
Speaker 1: go play another year of college football?
Speaker 2: Maybe? But man, I mean we've talked about the sad nauseam,
Speaker 2: but the amount of serious injury back to back to back,
Speaker 2: it was a lot. Yeah, and I would imagine that
Speaker 2: the mental component is as hard, if not harder, than
Speaker 2: the physical part.
Speaker 1: At this point. Do you think there was any conversation
Speaker 1: at all about him coming back to Utah?
Speaker 2: I guess would be.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: It felt like it was just one of those things like, hey,
Speaker 1: this has been great, give you a hug, go on
Speaker 1: your way, right.
Speaker 2: Well, there's still guaranteed that Cam wants to still play,
Speaker 2: That's what I mean. No, for sure, Yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: my guess would I mean, I don't know. I don't
Speaker 2: even want to guess. But we have to prepare for
Speaker 2: and of the eventuality that football will not work out
Speaker 2: for a lot of people. And you know, Cam reached
Speaker 2: some incredible heights, but like I said, to go through
Speaker 2: the amount of injuries that he'd went through in his career,
Speaker 2: just a Utah alone is a lot.
Speaker 1: Do you think the time of college football college basketball
Speaker 1: programs building their programs with athletes and players that we
Speaker 1: all get to know over the course of two, three,
Speaker 1: four five years is just completely done. Because when you
Speaker 1: look at the history, well, and this isn't just a
Speaker 1: Utah thing, but if we're you're going to use our
Speaker 1: local example as the home of the you it's family
Speaker 1: on three the basketball program, you know, the teams that
Speaker 1: were the best and the teams that everyone remembers, Van Horn,
Speaker 1: britt Andre three four year guys. The best football teams
Speaker 1: we had were guys that stayed here two three four years.
Speaker 1: They were upper classmen.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's not just success, but it's also
Speaker 1: this thing in the community where hey, Britain's a senior
Speaker 1: or Cameron's cam raising is like, Okay, they're coming back.
Speaker 1: Do you think those days are over?
Speaker 2: Nor your guy at Yukon's coming back for a senior year?
Speaker 2: That yeah, I mean the guy who was a lottery
Speaker 2: pick projection just a couple of years ago. I guess
Speaker 2: he likes Dan Hurley a lot.
Speaker 1: Also getting paid a little money, so played.
Speaker 2: A little getting paid a little money. I mean, one
Speaker 2: thing I will say about in a little bit of
Speaker 2: a caveat on. You know the the PAC twelve title
Speaker 2: teams is like a lot of those teams were transfers.
Speaker 2: Cam was a transfer.
Speaker 1: S J.
Speaker 2: Quinn Jackson was a transfer. Yeah, a lot of guys
Speaker 2: who were part of that team didn't necessarily start out
Speaker 2: as utes. I think college basketball still has a chance
Speaker 2: because the roster size is small enough you can afford
Speaker 2: to pay a decent amount of ni OL money to
Speaker 2: players who want to stay and make money rather than
Speaker 2: risking rolling the dice and going to the NBA. And
Speaker 2: depending on where you go to school, the house settlement
Speaker 2: could benefit basketball players like pretty well yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: like I would imagine the house settlement will help Yukon
Speaker 2: basketball more than it will UCUN football.
Speaker 1: Well, and Richie Saunders announces he's coming back, and the
Speaker 1: reports are that's a seven figure deal. How about BYU basketball,
Speaker 1: if all the reports are true, paying between thirteen and
Speaker 1: fifteen million dollars for their roster next year.
Speaker 2: Is that true? Well, I mean I was told, I
Speaker 2: was told, I was told that BYU doesn't prioritize.
Speaker 1: Well, well, they also out love, and out develop and
Speaker 1: outserve everybody. Okay, yes, indeed we know all of that.
Speaker 1: But Jeff Goodman is the one. The report of the
Speaker 1: Baylor kid is getting three mil aj deband to seven
Speaker 1: mil for five months of basketball. That's ten. Richie gets
Speaker 1: seven figures. There's stills on campus shout out, you got
Speaker 1: to go. You gotta go down to campus. You gotta
Speaker 1: get some some swigs with aj I'll go. I'll crush
Speaker 1: some Uh what what's the cookie company? Crumble, Crumble or chip?
Speaker 1: I'll crush.
Speaker 2: It's not a bad idea, it's a remote.
Speaker 1: It's an excellent idea. I wish I would have thought
Speaker 1: of it. Zach Wilson bought a bunch of chips, I
Speaker 1: think with his New York Jets money. But yes, I
Speaker 1: mean all of the lovely ancillary BYU. We love everybody,
Speaker 1: out serve everybody. Things aside, if you just do the
Speaker 1: math based off the reports thirteen to fifteen minutes, it makes.
Speaker 2: Sense just because it's so it's so front loaded or
Speaker 2: you know, top loaded, with with AJ getting that much money,
Speaker 2: you're probably never gonna pay that again to another, you know,
Speaker 2: number one crew in the country unless your guy, Kevin
Speaker 2: k why my guy, my guy, unless he manages to
Speaker 2: strike gold twice and keeps this thing rolling. But I mean,
Speaker 2: even if you take AJ out of the equation, then
Speaker 2: you're saying you're paying seven to eight million dollars for
Speaker 2: the rest of the roster. That still makes sense and
Speaker 2: and and probably is necessary in a conference like the
Speaker 2: Big twelve.
Speaker 1: See, that's the thing. And that's why I don't get
Speaker 1: the Steve Bannon muddy the waters, flood the zone with
Speaker 1: misinformation and then the deflection about what's really going on.
Speaker 1: I don't understand why the culture just can't embrace and
Speaker 1: be honest and authentic about what's really happening. And the
Speaker 1: reason I don't get it is that it's not a
Speaker 1: bad thing. To your point, if you want to keep up,
Speaker 1: it's what you have to do like Utah should be
Speaker 1: so lucky to be paying this roster thirteen to fifteen mil.
Speaker 1: And they're good, Like BYU is going to be a
Speaker 1: top five team next year, and it's because they have
Speaker 1: deep pockets. It's not because they outlove everybody. Just stop
Speaker 1: saying things like that.
Speaker 2: Is BYU a final fourteen? It could be is is
Speaker 2: I don't I'm coming in. I'm coming on the drive
Speaker 2: with zero aj debonsa tape? Are you are you? Is?
Speaker 5: Like?
Speaker 2: Is he the surefire number one the following year?
Speaker 1: He's awesome?
Speaker 5: Like?
Speaker 2: Is he is he as guaranteed the number one pick
Speaker 2: in the twenty sixth draft, as Cooper Flag was for
Speaker 2: the twenty five.
Speaker 1: No, because there's another kid in that draft that's thought
Speaker 1: to be on his level. Okay, but everything I've seen
Speaker 1: on tape, because you know me, grind, grind on the tape.
Speaker 2: Give me, give me your cump, give me your spence check.
Speaker 1: He's He's a Lebron type wing. He's a Durant type wing.
Speaker 1: He is a Kawhi type wing. He is all of
Speaker 1: six 't eighty six y nine. He's got a big
Speaker 1: body and even at his age, he doesn't need to
Speaker 1: fill out much. I mean usually when we see seventeen
Speaker 1: eighteen year old great players, it's like they got to
Speaker 1: put on ten to fifteen pounds. Aj is big, he's strong,
Speaker 1: he can handle it, he can shoot it. He finishes
Speaker 1: on the break, he finishes with force, and he guards
Speaker 1: three or four positions. He's awesome. Can he shoot He
Speaker 1: can shoot it. There's nothing he can't do. The only
Speaker 1: thing he has to improve on is incrementally on everything
Speaker 1: that he he's already awesome at, and then learn how
Speaker 1: to play against men in the NBA. But no, he's
Speaker 1: surefire like BYU fans are gonna love him. He's awesome,
Speaker 1: He's all that.
Speaker 2: So you think he'll be able to handle the pressure
Speaker 2: of playing Utah twice a year?
Speaker 1: Fair question? I mean I think the pressure of the
Speaker 1: Huntsman Center might get to him. But no, I mean
Speaker 1: it's he's worth every penny they're paying him. I just
Speaker 1: don't understand why people can't say it out loud, like
Speaker 1: what are you hiding? What are you trying to deflect from?
Speaker 1: Is it like an embarrassment, like they don't want to
Speaker 1: admit that they're outbidding everybody. I just don't understand the
Speaker 1: dynamic at all.
Speaker 2: I think you. I don't know if it's an embarrassment.
Speaker 2: I just think you lean in long enough to an
Speaker 2: approach to things that maybe you feel like you're portraying
Speaker 2: all the legwork that you've done up until this point.
Speaker 2: But I agree wholeheartedly. I mean Kirk Bowles, who is
Speaker 2: a Austin based calumnist who's covered University of Texas for
Speaker 2: a long time. He is not the Houston Chronicle. He
Speaker 2: reported today from several sources that he anticipates Texas spending
Speaker 2: as much as forty million dollars on their football team
Speaker 2: this year.
Speaker 1: And it's what you gotta do, yep, you know. And
Speaker 1: all of the pearl clutching right about not wanting to
Speaker 1: admit this is what's happening. You should lean into it.
Speaker 1: One caveat that I think is important to make, and
Speaker 1: maybe this is the sensitivities of the culture of Brigham Young,
Speaker 1: is that maybe there's an idea that the church up
Speaker 1: here on South Templar whatever is writing the checks, and
Speaker 1: we should be very clear that's not happen. Right. These
Speaker 1: are Crimson or Royal Blue or whatever the current nil
Speaker 1: stuff is down there. These are wealthy donors that donate
Speaker 1: to the collective that are paying the bills. The checks
Speaker 1: aren't coming from the church. Maybe that's what people are
Speaker 1: sensitive about.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know. I guess any school, not Utah,
Speaker 2: any school would be lucky to have that amount of
Speaker 2: money at their disposal to build a basketball program, and
Speaker 2: a competitive one at that.
Speaker 1: Is b YU currently paying more for their basketball team
Speaker 1: than RSL is paying for their soccer team.
Speaker 2: Are we counting transfer fees? Yes, ooh, probably that's wild
Speaker 2: to consider.
Speaker 1: I wanted to get this because we talked about it
Speaker 1: off air, one more football thing before we kind of
Speaker 1: move on, because one of the conversations that you hear
Speaker 1: post draft are NFL gms and executives turned off at
Speaker 1: the way Shaudor handled the process. And there simply is
Speaker 1: no other league or any other that has this. Kissed
Speaker 1: the ring, protect the shield field kind of like you know,
Speaker 1: quite like football. Would you agree with that, like the
Speaker 1: NFL protect the shield, kiss the ring. There is this
Speaker 1: like cultish feel around football, and if you don't handle yourself, well,
Speaker 1: nobody's bigger than the shield in the NFL, like nobody is.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and there's a reason why it took and
Speaker 2: this is a very dark turn, but it's the reality.
Speaker 2: If there's a reason why it took so many tragedies
Speaker 2: in the world of CTE, why it took a movie
Speaker 2: like Concussion, Why it took something as severe as deaths
Speaker 2: of former former players for anybody to even remotely challenge
Speaker 2: the league. Right, And there's lots of guys who are
Speaker 2: still afraid to talk about it because they're afraid of
Speaker 2: being shunned or being excommunicated, or being viewed as the
Speaker 2: type of person that doesn't respect or you know, have
Speaker 2: this devout loyalty to the quote unquote shield. It's it's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: What is it about football that breeds the religious man?
Speaker 2: We don't have enough time for that.
Speaker 1: Oh we do, we do. But there's something different even
Speaker 1: about fandom.
Speaker 2: Man, And it's man in it's man in the arena.
Speaker 2: It is our modern day Gladiator. And I'm and I'm
Speaker 2: throwing out all the cliche bs. This is not stuff
Speaker 2: I believe, but this is stuff that some people believe.
Speaker 2: Most of it is living vicariously through athletes and people
Speaker 2: that they'll we know will never be able to be
Speaker 2: fast enough or strong enough, or good enough or talented enough.
Speaker 2: And it's a great question because you can make an
Speaker 2: argument that it's leveled up significantly even in the last
Speaker 2: like twenty five years. I don't, I'm sure. And this
Speaker 2: comes along with the advent of the Internet and social
Speaker 2: media and the explosion of media rights and basically being
Speaker 2: able to watch every game. But why do you have
Speaker 2: to spend five hundred dollars on NFL network red zone?
Speaker 1: Red zone? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Like, and people pay it like it's not even a
Speaker 2: second thought. For sure. I gotta watch my Jack, I
Speaker 2: gotta watch the Jaguars, I gotta watch the Carolina Panthers.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: There's something even about fandom where you see people visit
Speaker 1: their favorite NFL arena for the first time and openly weep,
Speaker 1: or go to the Rose Bowl for the first time
Speaker 1: and openly cry. And then there's the whole media race
Speaker 1: to prove who's the horniest for football when fall comes,
Speaker 1: which is just like.
Speaker 2: It'sooky, man, it is it is. It is odd. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean that sounds like a story I should explore that.
Speaker 1: Our football guys is uncomfortable. Yeah, you're right in there.
Speaker 2: I was just saying it's me.
Speaker 1: Oh, I know, I'm most ready for Porter.
Speaker 2: Goes to Jerry World and he's just like ready to
Speaker 2: take out a s.
Speaker 1: Orders a card carrying member of the Church of Football
Speaker 1: on Saturdays and Sundays. And look, I love football. I've
Speaker 1: always my whole life, I've loved football. But whenever anything
Speaker 1: starts to feel coltish, I tend to go the other way.
Speaker 1: I'm like, Okay, that's a little weird because still at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, we are talking about children's
Speaker 1: game in college played by mostly children. Yeah, that is
Speaker 1: consumed by people that make it their entire identity, and
Speaker 1: when the season ends, it's like they're lost. They're wandering
Speaker 1: in this abyss. They don't know what to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, little story teas for you, which has been a while.
Speaker 1: What finally because you don't tweet them out anymore.
Speaker 2: I spent a day with Dan Mullen in Vegas last
Speaker 2: week nice and we talked about this, okay, and what
Speaker 2: we're going to talk about it more next week after
Speaker 2: the piece comes out. I think its supposed to come
Speaker 2: out on Monday. But Dan was was very transparent and
Speaker 2: honest about the grind and the drain of the reality
Speaker 2: of football and college football and the sec and how
Speaker 2: beneficial it was for him to be away from it
Speaker 2: and enjoy it. Like I mean, obviously, if you're good
Speaker 2: at TV, it's fun. Dan was good at TV. He
Speaker 2: was Yeah, and he probably could have been on ESPN
Speaker 2: for another twenty years and been good. He told me
Speaker 2: that as much when I was in Vegas. But it
Speaker 2: is fascinating to get the perspective from guys who get
Speaker 2: a break from it and then get back into it
Speaker 2: because they're they're basically challenging themselves again again to try
Speaker 2: to not let what happened the first time happen again.
Speaker 1: I'm interested to hear his thoughts and read what you
Speaker 1: have to say, because nobody can live up to the
Speaker 1: pressure of being a deity. If you're a football player
Speaker 1: and a football coach and these fans in your community
Speaker 1: treat you like you like you walk on water, that
Speaker 1: has to be exhausting to deal with day in and
Speaker 1: day out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think Dan Dan had a quote where he
Speaker 2: was like, in the sec if you win, people will
Speaker 2: be eh, good job, But if you lose, it's like
Speaker 2: you walked in the front door and kick their dog.
Speaker 1: For sure. For sure, you know there's there's a little
Speaker 1: bit of that with what happened with Utah football year ago.
Speaker 1: You know, coach Waite has spoiled this community so much
Speaker 1: the one down year, I.
Speaker 2: Mean, victim of your own circumstances. Success, Yeah, and you'd
Speaker 2: rather take that tense times out of ten, because if
Speaker 2: you don't have success, you don't have the job in
Speaker 2: the first place anymore, for sure. But perspective is important, man.
Speaker 2: It's important in fandom, it's important in everyday life. And
Speaker 2: I want to believe people are smart enough to understand
Speaker 2: where fandom fits and how a potential kid in the
Speaker 2: transfer portal may or may not affect a season, or
Speaker 2: how you know, a recruit who has Utah on their
Speaker 2: top five may or may not affect the longevity of
Speaker 2: the program. But I don't know, man, this is a
Speaker 2: reality check episode, if we really I mean, that's what
Speaker 2: we got to do.
Speaker 1: For sure.
Speaker 2: We got to get we got to get Spencer Hall on,
Speaker 2: we got to get some sports psychologists on, and we
Speaker 2: really got to get into the nitty gritty well.
Speaker 1: And the other interesting dynamic is, just like other religious elements,
Speaker 1: the more you can convince people that what you are
Speaker 1: selling them is paramount to their very existence, the quicker
Speaker 1: they're going to pull out their checkbook and say where
Speaker 1: do I sign? And that's the lifeblood of college football programs.
Speaker 1: The donors, your season ticket holders, people in your community
Speaker 1: that preach at the Oak Duke. Calm down. My dog
Speaker 1: has a humping habit which we're working on. If you
Speaker 1: want to see my dog hump Chris on YouTube, go
Speaker 1: ahead and sign on.
Speaker 2: Let's get to ten. Let's get to ten viewers.
Speaker 1: But the more you can convince people that the altar
Speaker 1: with which they are worshiping is actually a real thing
Speaker 1: that benefits their life, the more that they're going to donate,
Speaker 1: the more money you have, and therefore the more you
Speaker 1: can keep up.
Speaker 2: And in a way, the present day model of college
Speaker 2: athletics benefits universities at that level way more than it
Speaker 2: ever has. Sure, yeah, because you can go into these
Speaker 2: meetings with boosters and folks that potentially can get out
Speaker 2: their checkbook and be like, you can make a difference, right,
Speaker 2: you can help us land so on and so forth.
Speaker 2: And if we get this guy, our fortunes are changed forever,
Speaker 2: and you.
Speaker 1: Will be known as the person that helped us do this,
Speaker 1: and therefore you will be a member in the community
Speaker 1: where other community members look at you as the the
Speaker 1: shining bright north Star. Yeah, and that that that creates
Speaker 1: an identity that people the crave. You want to be
Speaker 1: the season ticket older, the booster that wrote the check
Speaker 1: that had led Devin dan Pier to sign here. Then
Speaker 1: suddenly you're a hero amongst your community that is worshiping
Speaker 1: at the altar of Utah football. But no other sport
Speaker 1: has this. Maybe European soccer, but no other sport really
Speaker 1: has this feel where people would It feels like they
Speaker 1: would dive for the team they cheer for.
Speaker 2: Oh it's yeah, soccer for sure, not just soccer worldwide.
Speaker 1: Good good segue Oka, right, last few minutes we have here.
Speaker 2: So wait, did you get Did you go to the game?
Speaker 1: Oh, the vibes were high. So I was San Diego.
Speaker 2: Tell me about because they played at San Diego State.
Speaker 1: Stadium, San Diego State Stadium.
Speaker 2: How it like? Did it look Okay? It did?
Speaker 1: It looked better than I was expecting it look at
Speaker 1: San Diego. So it's gorgeous no matter what. But mountains
Speaker 1: in the backdrop are beautiful. I don't know that that's
Speaker 1: sustainable long term, but you know, I guess according to
Speaker 1: what I was told the turf takes a lot of
Speaker 1: abuse and beating through out the course of the year,
Speaker 1: but the conditions look great. The crowd was pretty good. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it was a football stadium, they were kind of scattered,
Speaker 1: but I would say all in there was probably eighteen
Speaker 1: nineteen thousand people there or out of the course of
Speaker 1: the stadium. But the lads get all three diego with
Speaker 1: the brace your guy. We saw our guy, big Willie
Speaker 1: Goles come on as a sub, sat next to Johnny
Speaker 1: Russell for a little portion of the game. My man's intense.
Speaker 1: He's got a great beard. But vibes are good.
Speaker 4: Man.
Speaker 1: Three points on the road. Here we are with the lads.
Speaker 1: All right, here we go.
Speaker 2: I know, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: Tried, you just got me.
Speaker 2: Is there anybody else on this roster that can level
Speaker 2: up to the level that Diego Luna can level up to? Oh?
Speaker 1: Because if question if Arsenala is going, Mecca was really good.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, I guess I should quantify it by saying,
Speaker 2: like in the attacking third, is there anybody that's a problem, Well,
Speaker 2: what about big Willy Goals had had a pretty good
Speaker 2: chance he did put it. I think, I mean it's
Speaker 2: probably a field goal, it's probably an extra point it, Yeah,
Speaker 2: he got ensolved it or what. I don't think you
Speaker 2: can rely on those types of performances every single week
Speaker 2: from a guy. Like there's one guy in the world
Speaker 2: that you can do do that with in his name's
Speaker 2: Lionel Messi, and even at thirty seven, he's still doing
Speaker 2: it in this league. But other than that, it's just
Speaker 2: not realistic. And who knows, maybe Agata's addition changes things.
Speaker 2: I am fascinated to see what the what the attack
Speaker 2: looks like when he's that number nine. But Harsales problem
Speaker 2: now is not in the attack and a third like
Speaker 2: they're down like three or four center backs and like
Speaker 2: that vera collision, dude, Yeah, like wow, like that was
Speaker 2: some scary like straight gone like you could immediately tell
Speaker 2: when the other team comes over and like freaks out.
Speaker 2: That's when you, like I think of when I think
Speaker 2: of Gordon Hayward's broken foot, like I don't think of
Speaker 2: everybody else. I think of what Lebron did. Ye you
Speaker 2: know what I mean? Because it when it resonates with
Speaker 2: the opponent on the level, that's like visceral. That's when
Speaker 2: you know it's bad. I don't. I don't know what
Speaker 2: his availability will be that for this week because it
Speaker 2: was so Yeah, I would assume that he should probably
Speaker 2: be held out because he was knocked out cold, but
Speaker 2: Glad was hurt somebody Kobe Kobe Henry. Kobe Henry's been
Speaker 2: hurt for like a month now. I guess Quinton was
Speaker 2: having some cramping issues or something like. And now you
Speaker 2: have to go to Vancouver. Who plays tonight plays Miami
Speaker 2: tonight in the in the conker caf Semis. So maybe
Speaker 2: you get those guys tired on the you know, second
Speaker 2: leg of their two game week in Vancouver, but you're
Speaker 2: still going to play the best team in the West,
Speaker 2: maybe the best team in the conference, on the road
Speaker 2: in a place where historically you haven't been very good.
Speaker 1: What's realistic to expect? I mean, Johnny Russell in his
Speaker 1: prime was really good for SKC's thirty five. He's been
Speaker 1: without a club for seven months. I was told by
Speaker 1: my guy, my guy Pops that he was impressed with
Speaker 1: his initial conditioning. He's not as far behind as they thought.
Speaker 1: I don't know if he's available this Saturday. Thirty five
Speaker 1: years old, right, So what's reasonable to expect from from
Speaker 1: Johnny Russell.
Speaker 2: On the field or off the field, well both if
Speaker 2: you like. On the field, I would say that left
Speaker 2: footed gold dangerous player late in games, probably shouldn't be
Speaker 2: starting because you have younger wingers. I mean even a
Speaker 2: kid like Xavier Gozo who are in the start in
Speaker 2: San Diego, Like, these are guys you need to bring along. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And I think you know the segue to why I
Speaker 2: ask for off the field is like you need guys
Speaker 2: like Johnny Russell who've scored sixty goals in this league
Speaker 2: or whatever to kind of teach a lot of these
Speaker 2: young guys the ropes and you know, give them advice
Speaker 2: on how to handle things and how to go at
Speaker 2: certain defenders on the field, Like I would yes that
Speaker 2: Johnny Russell could still stand over a free kick and
Speaker 2: hit it with his left foot and peg it pretty well,
Speaker 2: But I don't know if he's going to be in
Speaker 2: for a seventy minute work shift where he's busting his
Speaker 2: ass up and down the line the way Pablo wants
Speaker 2: his wingers to play well.
Speaker 1: And your point, Diego is clearly head and shoulders above
Speaker 1: everybody else and kind of has to make miracles happen
Speaker 1: every game if they're gonna have a chance to compete,
Speaker 1: and the summer window will open. But by the time
Speaker 1: it closes, there's just not a lot of time. Nine
Speaker 1: games left, all right. One more thing here. The headline
Speaker 1: on ESPN dot com is Mammoth gaff question mark Utah
Speaker 1: Mama name after leak. So we have a situation where
Speaker 1: the hockey club changed their social handles, but it was
Speaker 1: not supposed to be for public consumption to Utah Mammoth.
Speaker 1: This is the same operation that leaked the Jazz yellow
Speaker 1: jerseys too early and then try to walk it back
Speaker 1: to say, wait, Purple's back to this isn't bad?
Speaker 2: Like what's People just need to be on the same page.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm of the opinion that it should just
Speaker 2: be Utah Hockey Club. I feel the same an imperpetuity forever,
Speaker 2: and I will I will drive this steak into everyone's heart.
Speaker 2: We are a state known for fossils, but we're they're dinosaurs, right,
Speaker 2: Come on, man, Like the entire eastern Utah is known
Speaker 2: for just a bleep ton of dinosaur fossils. Mammoth, what
Speaker 2: are we doing? Yeah, I will say, I'm sure it's
Speaker 2: very difficult to have and a perfect syncd out roll
Speaker 2: out in terms of moving things over bing bong bing bong.
Speaker 2: One who's weird enough to notice that stuff at like
Speaker 2: eleven pm? Come on, guys, go to sleep, you know,
Speaker 2: watch some you know, righteous Jempstones or something. But yeah,
Speaker 2: it's it's not great to me. The bigger misstep is
Speaker 2: the name as opposed to the the canned rollout.
Speaker 1: I would agree, but both of them are embarrassing. But
Speaker 1: I guess maybe is back. Chris, Great to see you,
Speaker 1: enjoy mo Apple'll see you next week. Right, It's Chris
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Speaker 1: and online at IFA dot co Op. Belly Lakers try
Speaker 1: to stave off elimination tonight, as do the Houston Rockets.
Speaker 1: The NBA playoffs roll along with two really good games
Speaker 1: tonight after a bunch of great action last night. I
Speaker 1: was on television last night at ten thirty five on KMYU,
Speaker 1: also streaming on kutv dot com. We call it five
Speaker 1: Questions with Spence, even though last night was eight Questions
Speaker 1: with Spence. I needed more time to be filled. And
Speaker 1: Dave Fox joins us live in studio after ditching us yesterday. Hello, Dave.
Speaker 1: Oh sorry, we had a little station sports meeting yesterday.
Speaker 6: But thank you for pivoting and allowing me to come
Speaker 6: into This is rare because normally I'm here and then
Speaker 6: you come there and right, but it's just the opposite.
Speaker 1: So now I can steal all your material. No, all good,
Speaker 1: But last night was fun. Thanks for having me. Of course,
Speaker 1: my guy Timmy writing the questions as he does all
Speaker 1: the time. He is just great. He is the best.
Speaker 1: He is the best. All right, Where to start? Where
Speaker 1: to start? Where to start? Today? NBA playoffs. I've been fun.
Speaker 1: But for the third straight year, there's no playoff basketball
Speaker 1: in Salt Lake City, Utah. And you know I was
Speaker 1: thinking about this because they referenced the Detroit Pistons have
Speaker 1: not won a home playoff game in seventeen years. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: we're pretty spoiled. Yeah, how many you know, how many
Speaker 1: spring basketball exciting events that we've had over the years,
Speaker 1: even though it's been three years. You know, it's important
Speaker 1: to remind jazz fans that markets go through this. We
Speaker 1: just don't go through it very often. Well, and if
Speaker 1: you talk about the grand history, Detroit had some pretty
Speaker 1: good years too.
Speaker 6: That's just for a long time. Yeah, yeah, this has
Speaker 6: been a really really long time. And I mean I
Speaker 6: can go all the way back to ninety seven, ninety eight.
Speaker 6: How much fun was that. It was just phenomenal to
Speaker 6: be a part of that. But you're right just to
Speaker 6: be involved, to say you're a playoff team, to not
Speaker 6: be stuck in the lottery in a bad position, it
Speaker 6: means a lot. It just granted, a lot of teams
Speaker 6: go to the playoffs, I get it, but still, if
Speaker 6: you're a playoff team, you're a playoff team, and that
Speaker 6: says something. It's funny because I was looking at the
Speaker 6: NHL lotteries is I think it's been announced as Monday,
Speaker 6: and the odds on Utah getting a number picker zero.
Speaker 6: They can't happen because they're so far down the lottery.
Speaker 6: So that's when you're kind of stuck in purgatory. That's
Speaker 6: not really where you want to be. So at least
Speaker 6: this year, Spence, the Jazz are in the best position
Speaker 6: they've been in in quite some time in terms of
Speaker 6: the hope for getting a lottery a number one pick.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fourteen percent chance. Unfortunately, speaking of Detroit and knock
Speaker 1: on Wood, last year, the Pistons had the worst record
Speaker 1: in pro bat skpball and they fell to five, which
Speaker 1: is the Jazz floor. They cannot fall past five. We
Speaker 1: have recent precedent though of it happening, so unfortunately that
Speaker 1: is not the play. Because if Cooper Flag is jazz
Speaker 1: Man next year, a couple of things. First of all,
Speaker 1: then we can start understanding exactly the direction the Jazz
Speaker 1: are going to take, because people ask me all the
Speaker 1: time what are they gonna do, and I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: I don't know, and I probably will not even have
Speaker 1: an idea until after we know where they're drafting. But
Speaker 1: if they draft one, and if they get Cooper Flag,
Speaker 1: then we have more of an idea of what they're
Speaker 1: going to do coming up. And also we will no
Speaker 1: longer be NBA purgatory like NBA National. People will start
Speaker 1: paying attention to the Jazz again because nobody has done
Speaker 1: that at all this year.
Speaker 6: Well, and they get Flag and then they add Giannis,
Speaker 6: and then you're talking about look at you.
Speaker 2: So it's on now.
Speaker 1: I have to believe that. First of all, Milwaukee will
Speaker 1: not trade him. The only way it happens is if
Speaker 1: Yannis says that's enough, Okay, he would have to ask
Speaker 1: for it. I read this this morning blew me away.
Speaker 1: So the past ten playoff games for Milwaukee, Giannis is
Speaker 1: averaging thirty two points, sixteen rebounds, and six assists, and
Speaker 1: they're one and nine in those ten games, and it's
Speaker 1: their third straight year they've lost in the first round.
Speaker 1: So it's it's a little bit like so when Lebron
Speaker 1: left Cleveland the first time for Miami, they burned his jersey.
Speaker 1: He came back to Cleveland, won a championship, left for
Speaker 1: Los Angeles and they celebrated it because he got them
Speaker 1: their championship. Jannis won a title in Milwaukee's, so he
Speaker 1: can kind of do the thing where it's like, look,
Speaker 1: I gave you everything. I had won year title, but
Speaker 1: now it's time for me to move on the question
Speaker 1: is how much of that will be his decision as
Speaker 1: far as where the landing spot is, because Milwaukee's not
Speaker 1: going to trade him, and I'm sorry, Giannice is not
Speaker 1: going to be like, hey, they've got great snow in Utah,
Speaker 1: so to Salt Lake. I guess he's not not a
Speaker 1: hockey guy up there.
Speaker 6: So that's a really good point. And it's getting back
Speaker 6: to what you said about Lebron. Like you said, he
Speaker 6: has the title. I think that changes your mindset to
Speaker 6: a degree. You never stop the pursuit of getting titles,
Speaker 6: but at least he has one. You look over the
Speaker 6: careers have stocked on them alone. They were fantastic. Never
Speaker 6: got a title, but they wanted it. In that grant
Speaker 6: free agency and demanding trades wasn't quite as prevalent as
Speaker 6: it was back then. But uh, it went bad quickly
Speaker 6: when and I don't mean bad, but I mean once
Speaker 6: though they had those two runs, then it was like
Speaker 6: off off the cliff. Few years later, Carl's in LA
Speaker 6: and John retires. I don't know how patient Jannis will
Speaker 6: continue to be.
Speaker 1: Maybe he really loves Milwaukee he's got his title, and
Speaker 1: he says, well, I just I'll ride this out. But
Speaker 1: that team, that team does not And I think you'll
Speaker 1: agree with me here. That organization isn't even close to
Speaker 1: being title connectors, especially with the problems now that they
Speaker 1: have with Damian Loward.
Speaker 6: I think they put a lot into that basket. And
Speaker 6: who knows what his situation is going to be. That's
Speaker 6: a tough injury to come back from at his age.
Speaker 6: So yeah, well we'll see what kind of paya Jannis has.
Speaker 6: But we would welcome him here with open arms in
Speaker 6: our wonderful community. Take him up do some snowboarding if
Speaker 6: he would prefer. I'm happy to take him up to
Speaker 6: Alta and put the boards on and you know, do
Speaker 6: some surfing in the summer whatever. NBA players are not
Speaker 6: allowed to do that, well they can, they're not allowed.
Speaker 2: To do that.
Speaker 6: Yet Malone got to drive around around Harley all the time.
Speaker 6: Well he wasn't supposed to, but he did, but he did.
Speaker 6: You know, it was Carl Malone.
Speaker 1: But no, I mean, look, even with Dame, we saw
Speaker 1: where their ceiling is and at times it looks pretty good,
Speaker 1: but they're not close to competing with Dames, so they're
Speaker 1: miles away without him. Game won't be on the floor
Speaker 1: next year until probably the spring, if at all. But
Speaker 1: he's under contract for two more years at about one
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty million, a lot of money. So Milwaukee's
Speaker 1: in trouble and Phoenix is in trouble. There will be
Speaker 1: teams that will be moving on from star players. Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant will be traded, Giannis will be traded. I just
Speaker 1: think the Jazz have probably three years too late, but
Speaker 1: they finally have accepted their fate and they're going to
Speaker 1: play this long game thing. I don't think like I
Speaker 1: don't know that Danny Inge will ever utter the phrase
Speaker 1: big game hunting again. I just think they've leaned into
Speaker 1: this long term play and we'll see if they get
Speaker 1: Cooper and then they go from there.
Speaker 6: If I can circle back to yesterday's show, and I
Speaker 6: listened to your show every day, so your NBA guess not.
Speaker 6: Dave mcmanimum Tim McMahon, and he brought up an interesting
Speaker 6: point in the same subject in that no, there's no
Speaker 6: chance Kevin Durant's coming here, but the Jazz could be
Speaker 6: a facilitator in a deal that involves Durant somewhere. They
Speaker 6: already have been with Phoenix once before, and you know,
Speaker 6: you kind of got into the whole. You know, is
Speaker 6: there another year of tanking? And I think you both
Speaker 6: kind of agreed that if you get Cooper Flag, you
Speaker 6: don't necessarily have to go into a full year of tanking,
Speaker 6: if I heard that correctly. But the temptation to try
Speaker 6: to add Dabansa.
Speaker 1: Is great.
Speaker 6: But Spence one are the odds on getting the number
Speaker 6: one picked two years in a ruw it?
Speaker 1: It doesn't happen much. And you know, I do, I
Speaker 1: do think there is a chance that if Cooper Flagg
Speaker 1: is here in Salt Lake City, the Jazz decide, and
Speaker 1: may have already decided that their timeline starts. Now that's
Speaker 1: what I think, and their timeline starts with Cooper Flag.
Speaker 1: And look the draft class next year, and you know,
Speaker 1: people analyze the draft day to day for a living
Speaker 1: in a way that I don't. But the draft class
Speaker 1: next year is thought to be every bit as good
Speaker 1: as the draft class this year. And so we love you, Lowry,
Speaker 1: but you're about to turn twenty eight. And even a
Speaker 1: guy like Walker Kestler's agent a little bit, which sounds
Speaker 1: hilarious to say, but if you get Cooper flag at eighteen,
Speaker 1: and I remind everybody every time I bring up Cooper Flagg,
Speaker 1: he turned eighteen three and a half months ago. He
Speaker 1: reclassified and should have been a senior in high school.
Speaker 1: So it's like Trevin Nell is what twenty seven like?
Speaker 1: You know, so he is not some season college basketball player.
Speaker 1: He should have been a senior in high school this year.
Speaker 1: He's a young eighteen. So there is part of me
Speaker 1: to believe the Jazz have already done their calculation and
Speaker 1: they're saying, if we get Cooper, our project starts now
Speaker 1: with him.
Speaker 2: But I don't know.
Speaker 1: About dismissing Kesser yet, He's not that much older. I'm
Speaker 1: just saying I don't think anybody would be safe if
Speaker 1: they get Cooper flex probably and Lowry right is even more.
Speaker 6: And then you go down the line guys like Jordan
Speaker 6: Clarkson done, John Collins. You know, maybe they would have
Speaker 6: traded Jordan if they could by now. Yeah, well no,
Speaker 6: it may not be. It may be part of the
Speaker 6: facilitation of Kevin Durant. We'll see where that all goes.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what's beneficial now with both Clarkson and Collins.
Speaker 1: Is now that we enter the final year of their contracts.
Speaker 1: So if another general man out here you say, okay
Speaker 1: that that money does expire. Instead of trading for John
Speaker 1: Collins last year, gms are saying, I don't want to
Speaker 1: trade for John Collins because I'm paying him twenty six
Speaker 1: million dollars next year. But now this year you're saying, okay,
Speaker 1: that comes off the books. It's expiring, so we'll make
Speaker 1: that deal.
Speaker 6: So forget about big game hunting and think more about
Speaker 6: the we use the word again, the facilitating things. They could,
Speaker 6: in a roundabout way benefit the Jazz because they have
Speaker 6: a lot.
Speaker 1: Of other assets to deal with. Hey, did you call
Speaker 1: any of Jack's and darts high school football games? Several? So,
Speaker 1: so he turns out to be QB two in the
Speaker 1: NFL draft process, which I think is pretty interesting. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, starts at USC, goes goes to Miss Brian Dayball,
Speaker 1: who was Josh Allen's offensive coordinator in Buffalo, trades back
Speaker 1: into the first round to take Jackson.
Speaker 6: What sort of NFL player do you think he's gonna be.
Speaker 6: I think he's going to be a really good one.
Speaker 6: When I the games I still remember his first game.
Speaker 6: I think we called one of his first games at
Speaker 6: Corner Canyon. And remember he played three years at Roy
Speaker 6: and we actually called a few of his games there.
Speaker 6: But he wasn't showcase there the way he was at
Speaker 6: Corner Canyon. You know, Eric Carrig just turns out the
Speaker 6: quarterbacks there. And the two things that caught me one
Speaker 6: he was incredibly accurate with his passing. But when he
Speaker 6: took off and ran, I mean he ran like a
Speaker 6: running back here.
Speaker 1: A kid that's built really well too, a.
Speaker 6: Big, strong kid, and just a great kid. Beyond that,
Speaker 6: it's just a lot of fun to watch. I love
Speaker 6: him in the NFL. And I think you talk about
Speaker 6: the Giants, Sorry about the Jets.
Speaker 1: Do you mean to bring what are you doing? No
Speaker 1: one's asking you about the Jests, Dave cross Town. Uh.
Speaker 6: They added Skataboo, So I'm thinking four or five. And
Speaker 6: I'm not a you know me and my Cowboys guy.
Speaker 6: I like the Giants. I don't like anyone else in
Speaker 6: the NFCS, but I think there might be a nice
Speaker 6: little foundation there, and that's a team that traditionally loves
Speaker 6: those fans will eat up a running back like Scataboo,
Speaker 6: you know, a strong kid and Dart. I just think
Speaker 6: four or five years from now, that's going to be
Speaker 6: a heck of a tandem in that in that city.
Speaker 1: Do you think Jackson in fact Porter get on the microphone, Oh,
Speaker 1: Jackson Dart NFL prospect juxtaposed to Zach Wilson.
Speaker 3: Good question, And it's interesting you mentioned the Corner Canyon thing.
Speaker 3: They've now put out two first round quarterbacks in a
Speaker 3: time span that I'm not sure many colleges around the
Speaker 3: country have. Yeah, I think that Jackson is he has
Speaker 3: a lot more of like the refined stuff that that
Speaker 3: Zach had. Clearly a great arm, he could sling it.
Speaker 3: But but Jackson seems to really know playbooks well. He
Speaker 3: seems to know pre snap stuff really well, a lot
Speaker 3: of the stuff that I actually think Zach struggled with.
Speaker 3: It was the reason, although he was great at BYU,
Speaker 3: was not a great prospect. Jackson seems to have a
Speaker 3: little bit more of that pocket presence pre snap stuff.
Speaker 1: I think it more experienced to played for Lane Tiffin.
Speaker 1: But but I'll circle back to what you said too
Speaker 1: about the coaching. That's a big part of it.
Speaker 6: So Zach goes into a coaching situation where you got
Speaker 6: a head coach who's the defensive guy. In fact, he's
Speaker 6: back with the Niners, right, he's the defensive coach.
Speaker 1: Again.
Speaker 6: I just think it was a bad situation. And again
Speaker 6: I don't mean to fall back on the Jets.
Speaker 1: But they're terrible. Yes they are, and I can census.
Speaker 6: And they brought him in and he had to play. Well,
Speaker 6: that's not the case with Jackson Dark because they had
Speaker 6: mister unlimited. Don't play it, don't play it, Russell Wilson,
Speaker 6: mister unlimited. Right, have you ever heard have you ever
Speaker 6: heard the Russell Wilson mister unlimited? You don't want to
Speaker 6: It'll ruin your day, don't but don't play that.
Speaker 1: Jameis Winston.
Speaker 6: They have both of them, so they read who knows
Speaker 6: what they're gonna do with him, But he's gonna have
Speaker 6: plenty of time to learn if they so choose to
Speaker 6: do that.
Speaker 1: And I just think it's a great situation for him.
Speaker 6: And may I have a hard time saying all this
Speaker 6: because I'm not a Giants fan in any way, but
Speaker 6: I'm probably gonna become one just because of Jackson Dart.
Speaker 1: Help me understand what they've got cooking at Corner Canyon.
Speaker 1: Why have they been able to turn these kids out
Speaker 1: like that? Well, Eric, first of all, has a great system.
Speaker 1: Now this isn't just sticking a quarterback behind the center, right.
Speaker 1: The one thing that people don't talk that much about.
Speaker 1: He always has a great line, a great offensive line.
Speaker 1: Jackson powers or Powers Jackson is another great kid who's
Speaker 1: with the Raiders right now. Yeah, Fee now coming up,
Speaker 1: he's going to be a sensational well in some respects
Speaker 1: he's not directly, but their their family. He always builds
Speaker 1: a great line and he has a decent defense to
Speaker 1: go along with it. And you know how much that
Speaker 1: can mean to a quarterback if you're not on the
Speaker 1: field the whole time. So Eric's just.
Speaker 6: Built a machine out there. They're gonna be good. They've
Speaker 6: got a quarterback this year Auga who's going to be
Speaker 6: a senior. Watch out for him. He's going to be
Speaker 6: really he committed to a college. Uh, he's still out there. Cool,
Speaker 6: but he's only going into his senior year, so heavily recruited.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 6: And it's it's funny because what Eric has built as
Speaker 6: Corner Canyon at Corner Canyon has forced the other teams
Speaker 6: in that region. And I'm talking about like Lehigh and
Speaker 6: Skyridge and Loan Peak to up their game. And now
Speaker 6: you've got this. It's we always me and a Lemon.
Speaker 6: Frank always called the sec of high school football in Utah.
Speaker 1: But do not say Frank Stam on this radio show.
Speaker 1: You an a Lemma and the other three. You can
Speaker 1: say that adultcea no no no, and bald weird dude.
Speaker 1: You can put that bald weird dude. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: And in fact, this year, I've already got our schedule done.
Speaker 6: We're gonna do a lot of games out of that
Speaker 6: involved those four teams because they're just so good. But
Speaker 6: that's what Eric has built there, and it's it's just
Speaker 6: going to continue.
Speaker 1: They're really good.
Speaker 6: He's got a quarterback you probably don't even remember, Devin Brown.
Speaker 6: He's on Ohio State's roster right now from a couple
Speaker 6: of years ago.
Speaker 1: So good. He's got he's got to going on there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just, uh, it's impressive. Let me ask
Speaker 1: you this. Did Jackson transfer from Roy to Corner Canyon
Speaker 1: to play for Eric? Was likely exactly right.
Speaker 6: He played three years at Roy going into his senior year,
Speaker 6: and he had the blessing of the roy coaches. Fred
Speaker 6: Fernandas was the head coach, and he knew he had
Speaker 6: something special, but he didn't really have the offense or
Speaker 6: the team to really exploit that.
Speaker 1: And he goes to Corner Canyon and Spence.
Speaker 6: Within weeks he's getting offers from all over the place,
Speaker 6: and of course he landed at USC and if they
Speaker 6: had not had a coaching change, Actually, I mean, what
Speaker 6: do you expect that that's going to happen when new
Speaker 6: coach comes in, he brings his quarterback with him. He
Speaker 6: was pretty good and he's with the Bears now. But
Speaker 6: he he he instantly was being recruited everywhere. Best move
Speaker 6: he ever made. I'm not sure where he'd be at
Speaker 6: now if he had not made that move to Corner Canyon.
Speaker 2: Was there?
Speaker 1: I mean, this is a silly question. I'm sure Utah
Speaker 1: would have liked Jackson Dart to play for them. Like,
Speaker 1: what was there any conference? Did he just simply want
Speaker 1: to go to SC?
Speaker 6: I couldn't tell you this inner workings other than Cam
Speaker 6: Rising was there at the time and made it a
Speaker 6: little bit of a he was young that the ttle
Speaker 6: kid too, well, what he came and went in a hurry.
Speaker 1: I mean, was there. He's still playing somewhere. I think
Speaker 1: he truly was there, not much of a need.
Speaker 6: I think that was the issue because the same issue
Speaker 6: with Zach Wilson if you go all the way back,
Speaker 6: remember Zach originally committed to Boise State and then made
Speaker 6: the move to BYU, which turned out great for him.
Speaker 6: But they end up with Isaac Wilson, and you know,
Speaker 6: we'll see where that goes. But I've you know, you look,
Speaker 6: I mean, hindsight's twenty twenty O could look at Obviously,
Speaker 6: if the youth could do it over again, they would
Speaker 6: have loved to have Jackson Darty. He was great in
Speaker 6: Mississippi and that's and the rest is history. Now he's
Speaker 6: off to the NFL and we'll see how that goes.
Speaker 1: Is it any sort of an indictment or concern that
Speaker 1: Caleb Loner was the only ute drafted and there were
Speaker 1: zero BYU players drafted. Yeah, BYU team had had a
Speaker 1: really good season in the Big twelve.
Speaker 6: No NFL guys and no other ute NFL guess that's
Speaker 6: what I'm saying. And that was one of my five
Speaker 6: questions for you yesterday. Because I thought the same one
Speaker 6: of your eight questions, sorry, one of my eight questions.
Speaker 1: Eight questions. Suspension just doesn't have the same rings, so
Speaker 1: I just hide him in there. But I thought the
Speaker 1: exact same thing.
Speaker 6: In fact, I had to read over the draft and
Speaker 6: draft by school two or three times Saturday afternoon to
Speaker 6: make sure I was reading this correctly, because in a way,
Speaker 6: there's a there's a bit of comedy to it. But
Speaker 6: on the other side of it, good for Caleb, and
Speaker 6: you've mentioned some of the other tight ends that have
Speaker 6: gone through this. It's it's a great story for him.
Speaker 6: He didn't get overly used on Utah's offense last year,
Speaker 6: but he had a couple. He had the touchdown at
Speaker 6: Utah State and had a few other big catches and
Speaker 6: you will see what he can do in the NFL.
Speaker 6: I don't know what his blocking acumen is, but for
Speaker 6: a pass catching tight end, I think it's great. But yeah,
Speaker 6: when you when you look back at the draft, and boy,
Speaker 6: the NFL draft is eternity.
Speaker 5: We know that.
Speaker 6: And that's the only kid that was drafted between BYU
Speaker 6: and Utah. Jalen Royals course for Utah, stay good for him,
Speaker 6: goes to a great suation with the Chiefs. But that's
Speaker 6: the only kid out of those two schools. Is it's
Speaker 6: I think it's less an indictment on Caleb.
Speaker 1: I have no issue with that.
Speaker 6: Good for him, and more of what where are all
Speaker 6: these other, you know, kids that we thought were going
Speaker 6: to get drafted? But you brought up a great point
Speaker 6: yesterday when we were talking about Shadurra Sanders. The media's
Speaker 6: perspective of draft projections in the NFL's perspective of draft
Speaker 6: projections are two completely different things.
Speaker 1: And we learned that, didn't we. Yeah. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you're a talent evaluator for a team, you're taught to
Speaker 1: remove emotion. Can the kid play? You know? And on
Speaker 1: the media side, certainly for a network like ESPN, who's
Speaker 1: a partner with the NFL and has the NFL Draft,
Speaker 1: their one motivation is to get you to watch their
Speaker 1: TV show exactly, So how do we do that? We
Speaker 1: create a narrative around should Ur Sanders and we have
Speaker 1: mel Kuiper lose his mind every five minutes about how
Speaker 1: he made God and look, I honestly don't know if
Speaker 1: that is mel Kiper being sincere as a draft analyst
Speaker 1: or as a TV character. I really don't know, because
Speaker 1: he seemed to be playing it up to the camera,
Speaker 1: like every five minutes, let's go back to Mel and
Speaker 1: he's freaking out. Looks like his hair is going to
Speaker 1: fall outs. Did he did he really think should or
Speaker 1: Sanders should have been the number one player drafted? Or
Speaker 1: is he playing up to the audience so you turn
Speaker 1: on ESPN.
Speaker 6: Well maybe it's a little bit of both. But think
Speaker 6: about this. He had him high on his board and
Speaker 6: he doesn't want to be wrong. It's you know, it's
Speaker 6: funny thing I always think about when you look at
Speaker 6: replays in the NFL and the NBA. These officials don't
Speaker 6: want to have to overturn a call because if they do,
Speaker 6: they admit they're wrong.
Speaker 1: They're wrong.
Speaker 6: But that's what replay has created. Well, maybe it's the
Speaker 6: same situation with with Mel.
Speaker 1: He doesn't want he has to defend, and he over
Speaker 1: defended himself his projections of the draft. When this kid
Speaker 1: who he had highly projected, I think he had him
Speaker 1: as the second quarterback.
Speaker 6: He thought he should be right, so he had him
Speaker 6: QB one and he drops fifth. Obviously he's gonna raise
Speaker 6: a big stink over it. And boy, I think you
Speaker 6: you hit on it too. There was a little bit
Speaker 6: of theater with that because how many times did they
Speaker 6: go to mel I thought he was going to come
Speaker 6: to blows. At one point, who was he fighting with?
Speaker 6: I can't remember. He was fighting with Reese Das. It
Speaker 6: was Reyese Davis.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when he started yelling about how the NFL gets
Speaker 1: a wrong a quarterback and Reese of course wants to
Speaker 1: protect the shields, he said, stop yelling at the NFL please.
Speaker 1: So it was really good. It was really good. But
Speaker 1: that's the point Dave like, as a media member, Okay,
Speaker 1: if you're a media member and you're quote analyzing the draft,
Speaker 1: your whole motivation is to get the most amount of
Speaker 1: people to click on your stuff or watch your show.
Speaker 1: It unless you're trying to impress the NFL team because
Speaker 1: you want a job, and there are several media slubs
Speaker 1: that believe they should be working for NFL teams or whatever.
Speaker 1: But you always have to remember, as a consumer, the
Speaker 1: motivation for TV networks is one thing and one thing.
Speaker 1: Only turn on the TV and keep it on the
Speaker 1: TV on our station as long as possible. You know this,
Speaker 1: That's how you say advertise well, Steven A.
Speaker 6: Smith did the same thing though, of course very that's
Speaker 6: very horror show. Yeah, then that's that's his stick for
Speaker 6: you know in h twenty point eight, by the way,
Speaker 6: running for president, which you've stopped it, so that is
Speaker 6: stick you and I don't argue.
Speaker 1: Enough on them on my TV show. But do you
Speaker 1: want to argue more? We can argue more.
Speaker 6: All that, I'm pretty much a softie and I have it.
Speaker 6: I have this weird tendency to almost agree with just
Speaker 6: about everything you say. Well, I just don't do combative radio.
Speaker 1: I don't think well, and I could be wrong, because
Speaker 1: maybe if I was more like Steven A. Smith, I
Speaker 1: could sign one hundred million dollar contract. But I don't
Speaker 1: think people turn on the radio to escape from their
Speaker 1: day to listen to two people yell at each other. Don't.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm wrong, but that was entertaining, no doubt about it.
Speaker 1: That It's just funny stuff. So Caleb, only local player
Speaker 1: besides Jalen drafted, but only you. No BYU players drafted.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna flip the script on you as far as
Speaker 1: what you asked me last night, and I'll just stick
Speaker 1: with the Utah perspective. We saw spring football, we saw
Speaker 1: Devin Dan Pierre play a lot. We saw a lot
Speaker 1: of hitting. We saw a lot of live hitting. I
Speaker 1: mean I was down there on the sidelines. Well, of course,
Speaker 1: don't touch the quarterback, but I was kind of taken back.
Speaker 1: And I talked to Morgan about this after the spring game, like,
Speaker 1: you guys were hitting, and He's like, yeah, we needed,
Speaker 1: we need some live action. What gives you the most
Speaker 1: confidence the year two in the Big twelve for Utah
Speaker 1: football will be better. Okay, A couple of things.
Speaker 6: First of all, and you and I were talking about
Speaker 6: before the spring game, we we didn't even think we
Speaker 6: would see some of these.
Speaker 1: Guys all that much.
Speaker 6: And I wouldn't blame Cotton. I wouldn't see the past
Speaker 6: couple of years geez. But and I'm going to go
Speaker 6: back to when I was on your show and I
Speaker 6: did disagree with you. I said, no, I think they're
Speaker 6: going to play him a lot because they need to
Speaker 6: see him.
Speaker 1: So thank you. I decided to own horn. That's good
Speaker 1: to give yourself To circle back and answer your question.
Speaker 1: A couple of things.
Speaker 6: First of all, seeing him for the first time in person,
Speaker 6: I thought Devin was smaller, shorter, and thinner, and you know,
Speaker 6: it's kind of he's a small dude because Isaac next
Speaker 6: to him look pretty big. But the way the ball
Speaker 6: placement I thought was really exceptional. There were a couple
Speaker 6: of passes, a couple of corner routes, a couple of
Speaker 6: sideline routes where he put that ball on the money.
Speaker 6: That's one thing I appreciate about too. He already seemed
Speaker 6: to have a great command of the huddle and the team.
Speaker 6: Three for as being as small as he is when
Speaker 6: you see him in person, he really got around well.
Speaker 6: He now granted that they can't go full bore, and
Speaker 6: you know, we're gonna see what happens in the in
Speaker 6: the fall when he's not wearing a yellow vest.
Speaker 1: But overall, I thought that I don't know how much.
Speaker 6: We really saw, and I don't think we saw a
Speaker 6: lot Spence, you know what I mean, because they're not
Speaker 6: going to show it in the spring game. But I
Speaker 6: think it gives the ute fans some hope for what
Speaker 6: this team might be able to do this year.
Speaker 1: And we'll see.
Speaker 6: The main thing they got to just stay healthy. We
Speaker 6: learned that last year. That's a big part of it.
Speaker 6: And some of the main players like Barton didn't play.
Speaker 6: But I'm telling you what, he looks big. He looks
Speaker 6: like a stud. I mean, he's one of these guys
Speaker 6: that's gonna be able to play, you know, defensive line
Speaker 6: if he needs to, moving up from that kind of
Speaker 6: a Micah Parsons kind of position, you know, linebacker and that. So,
Speaker 6: you know, if I'm a youth fan, I'm pretty excited
Speaker 6: about this offense in the direction it's going. I can't
Speaker 6: wait to see it when they could really open it
Speaker 6: up and and you know they're not. It's not as
Speaker 6: vanilla as it might have been. Having said that, it
Speaker 6: was kind of a you know, there was some wide
Speaker 6: open plays.
Speaker 1: It was fun to watch. Really was little concerned about
Speaker 1: who who Devin's going to throw the ball to. So
Speaker 1: Zach Williams lands at USC. According to our friends at
Speaker 1: two four to seven Sports, Utahs hosting a wide receiver
Speaker 1: transfer named Tobias Merriweather who's in town from cal Uh
Speaker 1: the number sixteen available player in the two four to
Speaker 1: seven portal rankings. They've got ad wide receiver to Dave. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we talked about it himself.
Speaker 5: Yeah he is.
Speaker 6: But I will say this, there were a couple of
Speaker 6: nice catches made. Now, Zach Williams, there's now a usc
Speaker 6: good point. There were a couple of drops early, and
Speaker 6: Kyle mentioned that. In fact, in the first quarter there
Speaker 6: were a few of them and the ball was being
Speaker 6: put right on the spot. So it's weird, though, Spence,
Speaker 6: because it was like wide receiver has been an issue
Speaker 6: like year after year after year, and they always seem
Speaker 6: to have plenty of tight ends.
Speaker 1: But we'll see where that goes. Yeah, I think we'll
Speaker 1: always wonder what Dorian could have done last year if
Speaker 1: Cam was healthy. Right, I mean, there's been some talent
Speaker 1: like Tim Patrick's an awsome NFL wide receiver device Vaile.
Speaker 1: There's been some talent there, but you got to have
Speaker 1: a healthy quarterback that can capitalize on it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and Patrick had that broken leg rough time here
Speaker 6: at Utah. But and I remember when he did that,
Speaker 6: I thought, well that this is gonna be a rough
Speaker 6: comeback for him. And he ends up, like you said,
Speaker 6: having a really nice career still playing. He got paid
Speaker 6: by Detroit.
Speaker 1: All right, before we say you loose, you had a
Speaker 1: very You have a very special guest on Talking Sports
Speaker 1: tonight by my count Utah Men's basketball roster right now
Speaker 1: has five roster spots left. Yeah, and I believe. So
Speaker 1: you had a chance to sit with Alex Jensen tell
Speaker 1: us about it.
Speaker 2: Came in today.
Speaker 1: It was a lot of fun.
Speaker 6: Spent about twenty twenty five minutes with him, and you
Speaker 6: know how talking sports work, we get maybe eight or
Speaker 6: nine outes. So we're gonna run it in two parts
Speaker 6: because it was great tonight. The first part we talk
Speaker 6: a lot about Alex, his family, the move they just
Speaker 6: went through coming back to Utah. You know, his wife
Speaker 6: was in the performing arts on Broadway. That kind of great,
Speaker 6: great lady. It's funny because he was I was asking
Speaker 6: about so she's, you know, Broadway girl, performing arts, your
Speaker 6: sports basketball? Which direction are the kids headed? And he
Speaker 6: said his two daughters already are headed to basketball?
Speaker 1: Really, so yes, don't they only have girls? Three girls?
Speaker 1: Well the third is.
Speaker 6: Only three years old, so she hasn't made that call yet, right,
Speaker 6: So his wife's you know, she's not overly, I mean
Speaker 6: she's not. They're they're fully supportive of what their kids do.
Speaker 6: She's still waiting to see if she gets her dancer.
Speaker 1: We'll see. But we talk a lot about about that.
Speaker 6: And then on Sunday night, I'm gonna run part two
Speaker 6: and we talk a little bit more about basketball. I
Speaker 6: thought one of the interesting things he brought up, and
Speaker 6: you see this with all programs now they're going to
Speaker 6: the GMS, And he said it was really important for
Speaker 6: him to get a GM that is not a coach,
Speaker 6: literally is a GM.
Speaker 1: And that's that's what he managed to fine. And that's
Speaker 1: that's where we're at.
Speaker 6: In college because he because he's like, he deals with
Speaker 6: all the money and I deal with all the players.
Speaker 1: Could you imagine that phrase five years ago? You know
Speaker 1: you'd be on probation. I was disappointed that Alex didn't
Speaker 1: contact me about the vacant GM job. But what are
Speaker 1: you gonna do?
Speaker 6: He asked me about that. I told him that you're
Speaker 6: happy where you're at. Okay, fair enough. I just try
Speaker 6: to start my own role. Dave ye heyat great to see, Okay,
Speaker 6: see a great day Fox. Tune into Talking Sports tonight
Speaker 6: you'll hear an interview with Alex Jensen.
Speaker 1: This is clearly your favorite nineties one hit wonder every time,
Speaker 1: every time we do this little musical situation on the show,
Speaker 1: this is what you land on to close out. I
Speaker 1: feel like every single time.
Speaker 2: You you might be right, you might be right.
Speaker 3: It's definitely up there as far as one hit wonders go,
Speaker 3: and it really is a one hit wonder.
Speaker 2: I don't know if I can name another one of
Speaker 2: their songs.
Speaker 1: Oh, no way, how bizarre by what's who is this?
Speaker 1: I don't even know omc omc. Yeah, there's no way that.
Speaker 1: I don't think they have another song. But anyway, all right,
Speaker 1: fun out of NBA playoffs, couple of playoff basketball games,
Speaker 1: we got three playoff hockey games. When had my yearly physical? Today?
Speaker 1: There we go bring it up because of public service announcement.
Speaker 1: As someone who wants upon a time had early detection
Speaker 1: literally save his life. I would encourage you to get
Speaker 1: out there and once a year, contact your doctor, go
Speaker 1: get blood work done. You are still a young No no, no,
Speaker 1: you're still a young so it's not as vital for you.
Speaker 1: But when's the last time he had a physical young man?
Speaker 3: That's kind of why I was I was saying that
Speaker 3: I am, how do you put this, not a man
Speaker 3: of Western medicine as much as I should be.
Speaker 1: Probably Okay, so you're doing ayahuasca once a year to
Speaker 1: make sure that your mentals are okay, Like what exactly
Speaker 1: does that entail?
Speaker 3: I don't do ayahuasca. I haven't gone down like the
Speaker 3: full the full branch. I just like it takes a
Speaker 3: lot for me to go into a hospital, into a doctor.
Speaker 3: I need to get better at that. I do know,
Speaker 3: you know tests, as you mentioned, the preventative stuff. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm just really bad at it. Unless I literally am
Speaker 3: like bleeding out of my head.
Speaker 2: I just I go elsewhere.
Speaker 1: Just go once a year and get some blood taken
Speaker 1: and look at the levels and see how you're doing.
Speaker 1: That's all it is.
Speaker 3: I actually have reached out to start that process, just
Speaker 3: a blood test, just make sure everything's in line.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I need to work on that.
Speaker 1: So I am not a pearl clutch as it pertains
Speaker 1: to other people's relationships, because it's none of my business.
Speaker 1: This build Ballichick relationship situation is a little bit how bizarre,
Speaker 1: may I say it?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Apt song for the segment.
Speaker 3: Here's what I'll say. I'm usually with you like your
Speaker 3: relationship is your relationship whatever. But when you're a Hall
Speaker 3: of fame head coach who is seventy four.
Speaker 1: Or more seventy four and she is you know, he's
Speaker 1: seventy three, she's twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, so that's part of the thing here. You're again,
Speaker 3: you're a Hall of fame head coach who just took
Speaker 3: a job at the college level, and you're now dating
Speaker 3: a college aged woman. You're also a professional head coach
Speaker 3: who is with the New England Patriots. There is a
Speaker 3: history with the New England Patriots and some like I
Speaker 3: would say, odd stuff with like flights and models and
Speaker 3: all the above.
Speaker 2: Right, So, yes, I'm with you.
Speaker 3: Not usually want to wade into the waters of someone
Speaker 3: else's relationship, but in this circumstance, you at least have to,
Speaker 3: I don't know, assess it a little bit, wonder a
Speaker 3: little bit, because it is.
Speaker 1: It is interesting if Bill Belichick is seventy three and
Speaker 1: is dating a twenty four year old, what's socially acceptable
Speaker 1: for a forty seven year old man to date as
Speaker 1: far as the age goes. There's the question for you
Speaker 1: seventy three, Wow, just go the other way. Yeah, Hey,
Speaker 1: I'm not judging. Like I said, I'm not a pear
Speaker 1: clutcher when I oh, he's so young, So okay, whatever,
Speaker 1: do your thing. Life is hard enough find somebody that
Speaker 1: fulfills you and makes you happy. I'm like, but the
Speaker 1: whole thing about her like being c seed on his
Speaker 1: emails and the CBS cutting off interviews Sunday Morning Interview
Speaker 1: where she's like dictating the question Like that stuff is
Speaker 1: weird for a guy that, historically speaking, has been so
Speaker 1: controlling about his own communication and narratives.
Speaker 3: That's where it becomes like, Okay, we have to dive
Speaker 3: into we have to see what's going on here, because
Speaker 3: Bill Belichick is historically known in the NFL as like
Speaker 3: the most powerful guy around. Yeah, Robert Kraft is part
Speaker 3: of it, but it was always seen as like Bill
Speaker 3: Belichick's way or the highway.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: You talk to players who who had him as a coach,
Speaker 3: You talked to people who worked for Bill Belichick. It
Speaker 3: is a guy who suffers no fools and kind of
Speaker 3: looks like a fool now. And it's a little interesting
Speaker 3: because here's the deal. I don't care how in love
Speaker 3: you are or or whatever. The circumstance is to allow
Speaker 3: someone else, even your significant other, to like dictate the
Speaker 3: words you're saying or the answers to questions you're having,
Speaker 3: that's weird. If you're just like an accountant who has
Speaker 3: a a weird marriage for Bill Belichick who just took
Speaker 3: a job at North Carolina. Yeah, it's something we're going
Speaker 3: to talk about.
Speaker 1: Hopefully those two crazy kids make it work.
Speaker 3: I think I I I think they will be Porter,
Speaker 3: You don't want you want to hear some crazy I
Speaker 3: want to. I got odds on like shout out to
Speaker 3: our got Jimmy Shapiro. Odds on like Bill Belichick's relationship,
Speaker 3: like will Bill Belichick be the UNC coach or will
Speaker 3: he be fired first? Or will he and Jordan break
Speaker 3: up before he gets fired? Or will Jordan end up
Speaker 3: dating a UNC player? Like? Those were real odds that
Speaker 3: I received in a in an email from a booking site.
Speaker 2: So that's where we're at.
Speaker 1: Porter. Bottom line, My Angelou said it best choose love
Speaker 1: one more time and always one more.
Speaker 2: Time, always one more time.
Speaker 1: Write that down, May Angelou. Let's get out of here.
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Speaker 1: All right, Porter, what comes our way? On a Thursday
Speaker 1: edition of the program.
Speaker 3: On a Thursday edition of The Drive, spence our week
Speaker 3: of reaction to the NFL draft.
Speaker 2: Of course, we.
Speaker 3: Will continue to talk NBA playoffs. Bill Riley stops by
Speaker 3: the program. Aaron Falk stops by the program. I even
Speaker 3: got Aaron to come in studio, no way, So even
Speaker 3: though he's not texting you back, you will see him.
Speaker 1: Tomorrow, Okay, all right, because I need to know if
Speaker 1: he's playing golf this weekend.
Speaker 3: Pablo Mastrueni joins the program as well, and we'll go
Speaker 3: from there on a Thursday.
Speaker 1: All right, So join us for a Thursday Drive and
Speaker 1: join some playoff hoops tonight and some playoff hockey as well.
Speaker 1: Will Saga and I and the special thank you to
Speaker 1: Tony Jones, to Travis Sikama at A, Chris Com, Ronnie
Speaker 1: and Dave Fox for the sound you made miss from
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Speaker 1: can find that right here on ESPN seven hundred