Love (& Excuses) in the Air

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Friday edition of the podcast, The Houston Astros Fail and
an apology in a big way. John Morosi, our Major
League Baseball insider, joins us to discuss and Myles Garrett
is going full Jesse small Ya or Juicy small Ya
or Jesse Smallett on us all over again with more
excuses on the day he gets reinstated to the NFL.
I discussed why both of them are very similar and connected,

(00:23):
and we also we'll talk with my guy Lance Taylor
all that more. The OutKick Podcast it begins now. Thanks
for making it such a big success, and I hope
you have a great Valentine's Day as we discussed that
as well, and enjoy the podcast. Out Kick the Coverage
with Clay Travis live every weekday morning from six to
nine a m. E Sterne three to six am Pacific
on Fox Sports Radio. Find your local station for OutKick

(00:46):
the Coverage at Fox Sports Radio dot com, or stream
us live every morning on the I Heart Radio app
by searching fs are you're listening to Fox Sports Radio.
It's Friday. I hope all of you are having a
fantastic start to your near weekend. Thanks bringing out with

(01:09):
us here on out Kick two major stories that happened
that I believe are directly tied together, and I'm gonna
explain why. In both the NFL and Major League Baseball. First,
the owner of the Houston Astros came out and attempted
to discuss the Houston Astros cheating scandal, and it did

(01:31):
not go well. Here is that billionaire owner meeting with
the media, and here's the audio. You know, our opinion is, uh,
you know that this didn't impact the game. Um, we
had a good team. Um, we won the World Series
and we'll leave it at that. Jim, when talking about
the Yankees there, did you say you feel like this

(01:51):
didn't impact the game? And what do you mean by that?
I didn't say it didn't impact the game. You know,
our opinion is, uh, you know that this didn't impact
the game. Science stealing is a distinct advantage for the hitter,
So how is it that doesn't affect competition? So then
what are you guys apologizing for. Um, we're apologizing because

(02:14):
we broke the rules. But isn't science stealing a distinct
advantage for the hitter? So doesn't it automatically impact competition?
It could possibly do that, It could possibly not Okay, guys,
we're gonna wrap up. Thank you, justin thank you. Jim So.
That is the owner of the Astros meeting with the

(02:34):
media as baseball is beginning spring training and the fallout
for the Astros continues. The other story is the NFL
has reinstated Miles Garrett, and what does Myles Garrett immediately do?
He runs the ESPN and he continues to say, oh,
Mason Rudolph called me a bad word, instead of just

(02:55):
accepting his punishment, shutting up and not trying to turn
into the justse small at or juicy small ya as
Dave Chappelle calls him of the NFL. Let me explain
why both of these stories are connected, and I'm gonna
start with Major League Baseball. But the underlying story here
is sports has become like much of the rest of

(03:16):
American society, where adults don't accept responsibility anymore when they
screw up. The Houston Astros owner could have easily come
out and said, you know what, our entire organization failed.
We blew it, we cheated, and I apologize to all

(03:38):
the baseball fans out there who are upset with us.
I can assure you that something like this will never
happen so long as I own the team. I am
mortified and incredibly troubled by the fact that we broke
the rules and we definitely gained a competitive advantage. That's
why we were trying to cheat. And I'm We're not
going to allow this anymore, and we deserve all the

(04:01):
punishments that Major League Baseball gave us, and probably more
to be frank, which is why I fired two of
the individuals who were involved in this incident. Boom, That's
all you have to say, and I can understand it.
I think in a larger context, I'm reading a book
about Babe Ruth right now. Sign Stealing is a part

(04:21):
of Major League Baseball and a part of baseball and
always has been. If you are a young kid and
you grow up like you probably remember your dad or
your grandpa, or your mom or somebody saying hey, when
you get to second base, there's an advantage for the
offense because the base runner can try and steal signs.

(04:41):
And you probably remember noticing that the baseball batter never
turns around and looks down at the catcher as he's
giving a signal, because if he did, does it breaks
the etiquette of the game, and so for generations baseball
players have been trying to gain competitive advantage, and a

(05:02):
part of that is by stealing the signs from the
catcher and the batter. It's why the catcher, catcher and
the picture sorry often have conversations at the mound where
they may adjust the signals when they are base runners
because they're concerned about the pitch being tipped to the batter.
What the Astros did, and I've read quite a bit

(05:24):
about this, The Wall Street Journal has had a lot
of great articles about it. What the Astros did was
bring modern technology to bear in a way that clearly
took sign stealing beyond a competitive endeavor that might happen
in the course of a game if a guy's on
second base or something like that, and took it into

(05:45):
the technological modern age. They had an Excel spreadsheet where
they were watching film and breaking down what people were doing,
what signs they were using in game while the game
was going on, and had a television a television in
the dugout, and they were communicating with players during the

(06:09):
game and having them bang on a trash can to
tip off batters as to what pitches were coming based
on their signs stealing using all modern technology. We don't
know whether they might have even taken in a step
further than that, but that's a clear example of cheating,
and the Astros got caught doing it. And by the way,

(06:32):
the entire team, from the general manager to all of
the staff, to the manager to every player knew exactly
what was going on. So do I think the Houston
Astro's World Series title is tainted? Yes? Do I think
that they deserved more significant penalties than Major League Baseball

(06:52):
has given them so far? Yes? Do I think players
themselves should have been penalized as opposed to getting immute
of the so that they would cooperate in the investigation? Frankly, yes,
I do. I think this was an endemic failure from
the top of the Houston or Astros organization all the
way to the bottom. That's all I need to hear

(07:13):
from the owner. We cheated, we got caught. Trying to
back your way around and make excuses for yourself, it
ain't gonna work. So why can the Houston Astros, with
all of the money that they spend on PR not
just get that right? I say sometimes that I wish
I started my own PR agency, because ultimately public relations

(07:37):
is about telling stories, right, what's the best way that
you can tell a story to your benefit. I'm in
the story business. I would kill it as a PR guy,
and the Houston Astros wouldn't need to pay me millions
of dollars. I would have set down with the owner.
I would have hit him with every question he's gonna get,
and I would have said, ultimately, you need to accept

(07:59):
blame and try to duck it. And that goes for
all your players as well. You guys cheated. You took
sign stealing, which has been going on for generations in baseball,
you wetted it with modern technology, and you took it
during the course of an individual game to a level
that's never existed before. And you did it to game
competitive advantage, and you happen to win a seven game

(08:20):
World Series and win the championship. Probably a decent chance
that you won the championship because of your cheating that
in the when you look at how competitive and how
close that series was, and also when you contemplate the
advantage that they got over the course of the entire season,
you can make a strong argument that the cheating that

(08:43):
the Houston Astros did was why they won the championship.
So I think the Astros have to own it. The
fact that their owner wasn't able to do that is
a huge indictment on him. On top of that, there
is a connection now in the NFL as well. Miles
Garrett was spended for the remainder of the year after
a November incident when he hit Mason Rudolph in the

(09:04):
head with Rudolph's own helmet at the end of the
game between the Browns and the Steelers. That punishment, I
believe was justified. I think the NFL did exactly what
they needed to do in that situation. Miles Garrett, trust me.
Miles Garrett went on ESPN and he immediately blamed Mason
Rudolph for uh he gets reinstated, his first thing is

(09:28):
I'm gonna run to ESPN and I'm gonna blame Mason
Rudolph for a racial slur. Now, Miles Garrett is the
Jossi Smalleett of the NFL, because as soon as he
got severely punished, he came out and he makes up
this racial slur, which there's no evidence for it all,
zero corroborating evidence, no official uh no audio. No, no

(09:50):
other player hears it at all, but somehow, Myles Garrett,
here's a racial slur. Right. Even if that racial slur happens,
I don't care. It doesn't excuse Miles Garrett's behavior. His
suspension should be the exact same. We gotta stop in
this society equating words and actions. Somebody saying something bad

(10:15):
to you does not justify you potentially killing them over it.
People say, well, you're over it when you take a
helmet that weighs as much as a helmet does, and
you're as strong and as grown of a man as
Miles Garrett is, and you swing it at another man's
bare head as hard as you can. If you catch
him the wrong way, you could kill him. That happens

(10:39):
all the time. People get in fights and somebody hit
somebody else, and when somebody falls, they hit their head
the wrong way and they die. This is not uncommon
at all. When you swing something that has that immense
amount of power behind it, you don't control the outcome anymore.
They're something called in the law the thin skulled plane

(11:03):
of rule. If somebody and it's an interesting case. Back
in the day, I'm putting my lawyer hat on here.
But sometimes some people are born with thin skulls uh.
And if you happen to hit someone with a thin
skull in the head, you can kill them even infinitely
more easier than you would a normal person. You're responsible

(11:24):
for the result of your actions, because once you make
that decision to assault and batter someone, you have taken
the danger of those results into your own hands. Myles
Garrett and the owner of the Houston Astros are one
and the same here. They have both done things that
violate the rules of their game. They have an easy

(11:46):
obligation and responsibility in my mind, to just stand up
and say I was wrong, I need to move forward.
I'm going to accept all the responsibility from my wrongdoing. Instead,
they try to make excuses. It's an epidemic in our
society today and frankly, it drives me absolutely insane that
this happens time after time after time. This is a

(12:10):
big deal too. When I think about the Miles Garrett situation,
we over and over and over again. It seems in
this society want to make excuses for people for their behavior,
and a lot of times people say, well, words are
an excuse. What happened to growing up in a generation
where you said sticks and stones may uh may break

(12:32):
my bones, but words will never hurt me. That's what
I grew up with. So I tell my kids now,
you can't allow somebody to own you to such an
extent that they say something and they lead to you
being unable to control your actions as a grown ass man.

(12:52):
I don't believe that Mason Rudolph said anything of a
racial slur to Miles Garrett because there's no corroborating evidence
of it. And I also don't believe it because if
someone making you a victim is the best possible thing
that could happen to you, then I also am incredibly

(13:13):
suspicious of it from the get go. The reason why
I'm calling Myles Garrett the j Smallett of the of
the NFL is because the minute this Jesse Smallllett allegation
came out, and by the way, he's finally been charged
with additional crimes for for making face fake uh allegations,
I was like, wait a minute, this random dude from

(13:35):
Empire that of Donald Trump voters have never even heard
of in their lives, is claiming that on the coldest
night of the year in Chicago, there were two random
dudes in make America Great Again, hats out at two
am or eleven and PM or whatever the heck it
was that minus twenty frigid degree temperature. And they were

(13:59):
waiting for Jesse small Let to go to the subway.
And when he went to the subway, uh, not the
subway like the like the train, but the restaurant. They
waited for him to come out of the subway and
they had a noose and they poured some liquid on
his head and they put a noose around his head
and they said, uh, make America great again. We're Trump supporters,

(14:21):
Jesse Smalllett, We're gonna get you. I was like, what
in the world are you talking about. Do you think
Trump supporters are sitting around watching Empire? You think they
know that Jesse Smalllett, who he is, one, the two,
that he's gay, three, that they care. This is like
the greatest thing that's ever happened to Jesse Smallett's career,
when being a victim is the greatest thing that can

(14:44):
happen to you in a situation. Call me crazy, but
I questioned whether you were actually a victim. Everybody rushes
out to Jesse Smalllett's Carol, this is a hate crime.
We got to investigate this. This is awful, and then
what comes out. Jesse Smalllett was worried about being written
off Empire Show, so he tried to create himself as
a hate crime victim to protect himself and make his

(15:06):
career stronger. Now Myles Garrett is trying to justify his actions.
What's the best thing that can happen for him? A racism? Hell, Mary, Now,
let me be honest with you. If I was the
Pittsburgh Steelers and I believe that Mason Rudolph said this,
I would cut him. Not because I believe that words

(15:29):
should lose somebody their job all the time. But if
you were Mason Rudolph and you play in a league
that is se black, and you are yelling racial slurs
at players on the field, you're too dumb to be
my quarterback. I would cut you on the spot, just

(15:50):
for being dumb, and because the quarterback has to be
the leader of the team, and I can't trust you
to be the leader of my team anymore. But there
is zero evidence that this happened at all. If I'm
Mason Rudolph this morning and I'm waking up, I'm thinking
about contacting the Cleveland Police and telling them you want
to reopen the investigation into assault and battery from Miles

(16:12):
Garrett and potentially explore criminal charges there. I'm calling my
lawyers and saying, hey, should we file a defamation claim
against Miles Garrett because he is severely damaging my ability
to make a earning, to to make a living in
the NFL. All of those things I would say are

(16:34):
in play. But again, I think this is directly connected
between Major League Baseball and between the NFL. We have
a failure of the Houston Astros owner to accept responsibility,
and we have a failure of Miles Garrett to accept
responsibility as well. This ain't complicated. When you're wrong, own it,

(16:55):
step up, face the music and say you're gonna get better.
Rarely see it happen. And I think sports should be
leading the charge here as opposed to reflecting what is
all too common in society. Everybody's a victim all the time.
When we come back, Lance Taylor is gonna join us
at the Lance Taylor on Twitter, jock down in Birmingham

(17:18):
will see what he thinks about this and other things.
Also give him credit. He told me last week to
bet on parasite to win the Oscar and I didn't
listen and he was right. This is outkicked the coverage
with Clay Travis. Clay Travis here rolling through the program.
The Lance Taylor now at the Lance Taylor on Twitter

(17:39):
joins us LT, which looks worse the Houston Astros owner
for his ham handed attempt to accept responsibility for the
Astro's cheating scandal, or Miles Garrett for continuing to insist
that the reason why he hit Mason Rudolph was because

(18:00):
of a racial slur, even though there's no corroborating evidence
whatsoever of Rudolph having misbehaved. Both are absurd. But I
am going to go with a multibillionaire in Jim Crane.
And what I just don't understand. You hire a crisis
PR firm, they're supposed to, uh, I mean, all you
gotta do is be brief. I mean, obviously you don't

(18:21):
become a billionaire without having some intelligence and unless yeah,
and he knew what he was going into. Look, and
I mean he admitted guilt. When you get rid of
your when you blow out your general manager and manager, Yeah,
who was one one d plus games three consecutive years
and has been in back to back World series or
two of the last three. I should say it just

(18:43):
it was a you know, I mean, they're admitting guilt
right there, So I just don't understand, completely ridiculous and
just an embarrassment. Do you think it's strange and and
and really also unfair that it appears based on everything
that I've read, and there's been a lot of good articles,
like I was saying about this in the Wall Street Journal,
the entire Houston Astros team, not just the GM, not

(19:03):
just the manager, certainly the staff that supports the team
and everything else. But all the players were cheating and
no players are going to get any punishment for this.
Uh yeah, I mean I don't know what you do though,
I mean, do you stagger the suspensions? I mean, does
everybody get you know, the game immunity to all the
players to participate in the investigation. So that's why, like

(19:27):
they aren't getting any suspensions. But to me, it feels
like there should be a significant penalty here on the
players as well, because a lot of them gained advantage.
And frankly, I mean, I know, like we make fun
of the idea of vacating championships. But I don't believe
the Astros would have won a World Series if they
hadn't been cheating. No. I look, and I'm a Dodger fan,

(19:49):
and I thought we talked about done your show. It
might have been another place that actually discussed this a
couple of weeks ago. But you know, just you know,
a guy that has lived in I had with the
Dodgers since you know, since birth, uh, and a guy
that hasn't any championship since eight And I go back
to two thousand and seventeen, and you know, I don't
think the Dodgers were going to beat the Red Sox

(20:10):
and eighteen you can say, what about the extension of
of Alex Core and what the Red Sox were doing
in the two thousand and eight old series? I thought
they were that good. But you go back to two
thousand and seventeen, that seven game series, there were a
couple of home games that I don't think the Astros
winn against the Dodgers. And you go back and you
look at moments in those games where the Astro's got
big home runs. Um, I agree with you, Clay. You know,

(20:33):
I think the two thousand and seventeen Championship. Was the
Dodgers to win, maybe even the Yankees, who knows. Um,
But I don't think the Houston Astros deserve it. But
if I'm the Astros, if I'm Jim Crane, if I'm
going this route, quay, I don't fire the general manager.
I don't fire the manager. And we just we just deny,
we we play, we play stupid. What do you think
about this Miles Garrett situation? So with the Astros Jim Crane,

(20:54):
and I don't understand why he was so bad either,
uh and uh and again. To me, what connect them
is a failure to accept responsibility in public. Miles Garrett
has been suspended for multiple weeks. The NFL looked into
his Hell Mary racism allegation that he suddenly brought out
when they were investigating what his suspension should be. He
gets suspended, he comes back, and now he's still saying, oh,

(21:17):
Mason Rudolph said a racial slur to me. First of all,
I said on the show to start, and I said
it back then. If Mason Rudolph actually uttered a racial
slur to him, I would cut him for the Pittsburgh
Steelers just because he's too dumb to be my quarterback. Like,
I don't know anything else about him, uh in terms
of his off the field intelligence, but that would be
enough for me to know that he's not smart enough

(21:39):
to be my quarterback because there's a black player rate
in the NFL. Uh and uh and you're just not
smart enough to be the leader of my team. All right,
But there's zero evidence that this occurred, right, zero, No
other player, no official, nobody else heard it at all.
So is it possible that Mason Rudolph insulted Miles Garrett

(22:01):
with a racial slur? Did it so softly that only
Miles Garrett could hear it, by the way, in a
crowded rock of stadium where everybody is screaming at the
end of a game, And yet he said it so
softly that Miles Garrett hurt him perfectly, and nobody else
did right, nobody else on the field did at all.
I suppose that's possible. It doesn't seem very likely, but

(22:24):
there's a small possibility of that happening, right, But even
if it happened, you don't get the right to behave
like Miles Garrett did. I don't even know, Like, maybe
you suspend Mason Rudolph for a couple of games for
word choice, if you could prove that it happened. But
I don't think the Miles Garrett suspension would have been

(22:45):
any different at all. And I think he looks so
much worse other than died in the wool Browns fans
and people who were perpetually triggered out there and obsessed
with racism and are gonna believe every allegation, and who
immediately believed the Jesse Smallett thing like that a tiny
percentage of the overall NFL audience of him. I think

(23:07):
Miles Garrett makes himself look even worse because if he
just said I lost my temper, I've got to be better.
I'm gonna be better going forward, then I think most
people would say, Okay, like that's fine, bring him back.
But as is, I think he makes himself look worse,
just like Jim Crane did. Yeah, I agree with you.
I mean to throw in an allegation out there, I
mean there's got to be some substance to it, and

(23:30):
then Myles Garrett saying he doesn't want to make it racial,
well he made it racial. Yeah. I mean, he's the
guy that brings this up, and I agree with you.
I mean, you know, Clay, if I told you you
could put ten thousand dollars money up, You're only going
to get a twenty five dollar return. But do you
if you knew for a fact, if whether or not
Mason Rudolph said this, I think you would risk your

(23:50):
ten thousand for twenty five. It just seems far fetched
somebody else, insanely stupid of me for Mason to to
for me to believe that Mason Rudolph is that dumb,
and so then to see the way everybody else reacted,
Like if his teammates thought Mason Rudolph was a racist,
which I think you'd probably know. I think it's hard

(24:10):
to hide if you play sports all day, every day
with a majority black team, like he did at Oklahoma
State and like he now does with Pittsburgh Steelers. Do
you think his offensive line would have defended him against
Miles Garrett like they did if they thought in any
way he was racist? Oh, and I also think if
they would have heard something themselves, I think they would
have been in a state of shock, and the reaction,

(24:32):
I don't know, it almost would have been like people
would have been kind of frozen. Yeah. Um, but I
I agree with you. I mean, Miles Garret should have
let this go take some ownership. Look, I completely lost
my mind in a moment. I don't want this to
the fine, uh you know, my entire career because you know,
by all accounts, you know, going into this situation, Miles
Garrett was known as a really good guy. Well that

(24:53):
let's be fair. He's he had been playing on edge
all season for some reason, like he punched a Titans
player to begin the year. On the field, he had
a bunch of borderline late and and and dirty hits.
He just didn't seem like a happy player at all
this year. And I don't know, I felt like he
was playing on edge if you go back and look.
And maybe it was just the pressure of the Cleveland

(25:13):
Brown organization going into the year and they all they
all came. But you know, the unfortunate thing is Miles Garrett, now,
who was a great player, is going to be remembered
at least for now. Now maybe this goes away. Is
the guy that swung a helmet and was suspended for
the majority of the season. And unfortunately for Mason Rudolph,
as you said, it might only be five or ten

(25:34):
of people out there, but they're gonna believe this guy
is a racist and you can't. And this sorry to
cut you off, but this goes to the essence of
why our criminal court and civil court system works as
it does. You can't prove a negative. And what I
mean by that is, if I said to you right now,
Lance Taylor, you are you were drunk when you came

(25:55):
on the radio this morning, there's almost no way for
you to a hundred percent through that that's not true, right,
I mean, it's really really hard because like the number
of people have been around with you all day would
be low, right, And so proving a negative in our
court system, we don't require it. We demand that somebody
who makes an accusation prove that their accusation is true.

(26:18):
That's the way the court system works. So if you
accuse somebody of murder, the person doesn't have to prove
that they didn't commit the murder. You have to prove
that they did. The burden of proof is on the accuser.
And I feel like in a lot of stories like
these nowadays, we allowed the burden to be on the
person who is being accused, and we say, hey, prove

(26:40):
that you didn't do this, as opposed to requiring the
person who makes the allegation to prove that they did it. Yeah,
and you know it is. It's a point in time
now where if you want to ruin somebody in the spotlight,
you know, you might not be able to totally take
them down, but you can definitely blimit the rectation with

(27:01):
with just an allegation. Oh that's eltie, I think you thought.
With like interns, um, I was talking to somebody who
does our job as a part of the me too
movement and and he was like, you know what, we
stopped taking female interns. And I said, oh, that's interest.
Like I when I used to do local radio, we

(27:21):
would have a guy and a girl intern every year.
And sometimes they've kind of clamped down on interns in general,
but I was trying to be completely fair, right, we
would bring in a guy, we'd bring in a girl.
We treat him evenly. Um and uh. And I talked
to a guy who's who's doing radio now and he said, yeah,
we stopped doing interns, and we stopped doing girls in particular,
because if you're in a male environment on a radio

(27:43):
show and you have let's say a college girl and
she decides that she wants to say something that you
said off air, or you said something it's inappropriate, Like,
how do you prove that you didn't do it? Like,
nobody cares if a guy comes out and says something.
By and large, they like whatever, it's a dude who's
working with a bunch of other dudes. But you get
the proof is so against you now that if somebody

(28:03):
makes that allegation, how do you prove you didn't do it? Yeah,
and and let's just say, let's just throw a hypothetical
out there. Um, you know you're out with I'll use
myself as an example. I'm out at a a uh
you know, we had a great ratings book. So they've
taken us for a celebratory dinner. Well, I'm at the bar. Um,
maybe she makes an advance to me, this intern, and

(28:27):
I say no, so she feels guilted. Then she goes
in the next day. I've been with a radio station
for twenty years. She makes an allegation. A girl that's
been around as an intern for two or three weeks,
I could get fired And and how do you prove
you didn't do it? That's The challenge in general is
you can't the accusation now. And it's interesting because I

(28:49):
think it's a larger context issue, and I think a
lot of people who are driving into work right now
are kind of nodding, because I don't think we talk
about this enough. We built our civil and criminal justice
system entirely predicated on the rights of the accused, the
idea that the the accused deserves due process, the accused
deserves the right to defend themselves. We set up our
standard of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt because we wanted

(29:11):
to make sure that it's incredibly difficult for a innocent
man to be proven guilty. Doesn't mean that our criminal
justice system is perfect or our civil justice system is perfect,
but just that we have been working on it for
literally thousands of years. We based our our criminal justice
system and civil justice system on British jurisprudence, which goes
back literally thousands of years. We've been working on this

(29:32):
right and now in this modern era where somebody can
make an accusation and it goes viral instantaneously, we have
in many ways flipped the script such that now when
you are accused, you have to prove that you didn't
do something, as opposed to the accuser proving that you
did do something. And that is a seismic shift that

(29:53):
I don't think most people have really recognized as occurred
in our society just in the last several years. And
I think it's gotten word with the prevalence of social media,
with the rise of identity politics, and we can point
to a lot of different cases from a variety of
different perspectives where it has been deployed and I think
oftentimes to the to the detriment of our society. Yeah,

(30:14):
and I think we see it more because of what
we do, because we throw these stories out there, with
all of these allegations, and and once you throw the
story out it is guilty until proven in US. That's right.
And unfortunately I go back to an example like Duke Lacrosse. Yeah,
those guys are guilty forever, and they didn't do anything
at all. They were an innocent I mean, they had

(30:35):
a stripper come over to their house during summer, which
I mean, you know, there's there's nineteen twenty year olds
that will be doing that across America to night. That's right.
College kids all over America will have or they'll either
go to a strip club or they'll have a stripper
come in. And that's all that those guys did and
they ended up getting absolutely I mean that their entire
program got shut down. Yeah, but I mean you're right.

(30:56):
I mean, this is the society we're in right now,
and it's it's it's a sad situation. And by the way,
I think, I think it oftentimes is directly colliding with
sports because the NFL has gotten in this business of
investigating and other sports have followed. But I still say
a guy like Ezekiel Elliott, like I read the entire
case against Ezekiel Elliott, he got suspended six games. I
don't think he did anything and so you know it's

(31:19):
being applied this this you're guilty until you can prove
your innocent. But it's hard to prove that you're innocent
even if you've done absolutely nothing wrong, right, and z
Will Zeke will never get those six games back, and
a lot of people are you know, are gonna believe
that he was guilty of some incredible wrongdoing because the
NFL came in and suspended him. Uh, good stuff is
always LT. By the way, props to you for calling

(31:41):
the Parasite Oscar winning film. Yeah, so how did you
end up doing on locked In last time? I won,
even though because I had two Toy Story four, which
I I watched all those kid movies. I felt like
I was an expert on the kid movies because I've
got the three kids in the house. Um so yet, yeah,
I watched. I thought it was good. But I mean
my big question on Parasite was if it were a

(32:04):
I liked it. I like nineteen seventeen better. But my
big question was if it were an American movie and
it had American actors, would it have won Best Picture? Well?
Maybe not, because I mean, this is the you know,
we want to go Charles Woods Charles Woodson Woodson for
the Heisman because we haven't had a defensive player winn. Yeah.
Um you know, so, hey, do we want a foreign

(32:25):
language film to win this? I don't know. I just
thought it was so creative. Yeah. I thought it was
really well done, and there was just such a turn
at the end, almost a Tarantino like turn. Um. I
just yeah, I mean I thought it was definitely worthy.
I don't know if it was the best I saw.
I kind of lean Once upon a time in Hollywood,
but I liked Hollywood too. Good stuff is always ELP.
You have a good weekend of Man YouTube say this

(32:48):
is outkicked the coverage with Clay Travis Mike at Modesto
on the kick v I P which you got for me?
I'll tell you a class a Dodger a fan. I'm
still pitched. You know. I felt bad for Clayton Kershaw.
He's got the reputation he has and the reality is
he should have a World Series MVP in two thousand seventeen.

(33:12):
He owned him in Game one. Somehow he could sheld
in Game five and now we know why they knew
was what he was, what he was throwing, and then
then he pitched again and Dodgers Stadium didn't get touched.
It's offensive. First of all, the astros this year should
lead the league and hit Spatsman because every team in
the league. Oh, I think there'd be a lot of

(33:33):
pictures angry about about the fact that their pitchers have
been tipped for a year. Absolutely, and every fan base
should boo them and yell cheater every time those guys
come to the plate. Thanks for the call. Uh, have
you got a couple? Yeah, we got a couple of
Let's go to Jose in Fremont's a Dodgers fan, But

(33:56):
I don't think kur Saw his struggles are just because
that's been more in one year. To check this out.
It is different. Though Clayton Kershaw is the m v
P of the two thousand seventeen World Series and the
Dodgers win that title, his career is entirely different. Oh,
without a doubt makes me sick. He's you know, he's

(34:17):
hurting for one that makes you sick. But I don't
think I gotta say you know that a minute ago.
But hey on them the owner of the Astros oh
man that she's on there like the Rick James a
hell characteron where he said something in the mixing, you know,
you go to contradict. And as far as Garrett, I
don't think. I think, I don't think Rudolph said it.
At the same time A thought Claid think that word

(34:38):
is highly sensitive. I'm not saying is right what he did,
But we as not being an African American, will never
understand that magnitude of that word ourselves. Yeah, I gotta
just cut I gotta cut you off here. I gotta
cut you off here. I don't care what anybody says.
As a grown man, you have to be able to
handle people insulting you and not physically assault them period.

(34:59):
I think we got stop treating people differently based on
their background when it comes towards regardless of what you are, black, White, Asian, Hispanic, anything,
you can't allow words to lead you to physical violence.
That's a lesson we have to set across the board.
I think we gotta stop trying to change our standards

(35:20):
and adjust our expected behavior based on individual backgrounds. The
standard is the same for everybody, black, White, Asian, Hispanic, gay, straight,
regardless of your religion, whether you're a Quaker or a Muslim,
If somebody says something mean to you, you can't attack them.
It doesn't matter what it is. One of the problems

(35:43):
with society today is we have stopped enforcing rules across
the board. People are like, well, you know that person
is a transgender, Jewish, uh, Korean? Uh, you know, uh,
the atheist? What ever the hell you want to say,
And so the rule that should apply to them is this, No,

(36:04):
I don't care about any of that. The laws on
the books should have changed anything based on who you are,
your identity, shouldn't matter. The rules are simple. You can't
physically assault somebody because of what they say to you. Period.
We gotta stop making excuses for people open phone lines
eight seven seven nine six three six nine, and sports

(36:27):
have to stop allowing people to make bad excuses. Whether
you're the owner Jim Crane of the Astros or whether
you're Miles Garrett who's playing for the Cleveland Browns. This
is out Kick on Fox Sports Radio. Be sure to
catch live editions of out Kicked the coverage with Clay
Travis weekdays at six am Eastern, three am Pacific. Mason
Rudolph and Miles Garrett. The Story that Will Not End.

(36:49):
Myles Garrett finally reinstated by the NFL. What's the first
thing he does? Runs and talks the ESPN about how
Mason Rudolph was mean to him and called to a
bad word. Let's play both of those audio then I'll
bring in the crew. You guys can react to it
out there. Hope you're having a good Friday. Eight seven seven,
three six nine. Let's start with Jim Crane, whose Astros

(37:12):
I believe cheated their way to a World Series title,
stole a championship frankly from the Dodgers back in may
well have stolen a championship Uh from uh from a
guy who's maybe not gonna get one, Clayton Kershaw and
might have taken away a World Series MVP from him
with their sign stealing. He was asked about it, he

(37:33):
couldn't even keep his story straight for the length of
a press conference. Listen, you know, our opinion is, uh,
had a good team. Um, we won the World Series
didn't impact the game? And what do you mean by that?

(37:55):
I didn't say it didn't impact the game. You know,
our opinion is, uh, you know of that this didn't
impact the game. Science stealing is a distinct advantage for
the hitter, So how is it it doesn't affect competition?
So then what are you guys apologizing for. Um, we're
apologizing because we broke the rules. But isn't science stealing

(38:18):
a distinct advantage for the hitter? So doesn't it automatically
impact competition? It could possibly do that, It could possibly not. Okay, guys,
we're gonna wrap up. Thank you justin thank you Jim,
I mean Jim Crane. What an idiot, What an awful
disaster of a press conference from the Houston Astros. The
guy can't even keep a story straight for like a

(38:40):
ten minute press conference. The only reason you cheat is
to impact the game. If you aren't cheating, and you
aren't impacting the game, you're the worst cheater ever. Like
does take this outside of the world of sports. If
you were playing Udo and you look at the cards

(39:01):
that the UNO player you're playing against has, you are
cheating and you are attempting to impact the game. If
you aren't smart enough to cheat, and you know. The
reason why I'm bringing up Uno, by the way, is
because I'm trying to teach my kids how to play,
and I'm like, no, no, no, you gotta keep your
cards closer to your chest. I can look right over

(39:23):
and know exactly what color cards you've got. I'm never
gonna lose. You gotta think about other people trying to
cheat when you're playing games. It's why you keep your
cards close to the vest. You can't trust people not
to look. The Astros acent cheated and it got them
a championship. Admit it. It's easy. I think it would

(39:44):
be easy to say I'm a hundred percent responsible here,
my organization cheated and explain exactly how it happened, because
I'm fascinated by this. There is a line in which
stealing signs is considered appropriate, and it's been going on
for generations in the history of baseball. If you ever
played baseball, you probably remember somebody pointing out to you, Hey,

(40:08):
when the batter's up and they're given a sign, the
batter is not allowed to turn and look at the
sign that the picture is getting from the catcher, and
if he does, or if he tries to do it,
the picture will hit him. Like there is an ethical line.
But if somebody gets to second base, a lot of
times a second base runner can try and see what

(40:31):
the signals might be and try to tell the batter.
That's a part of the game. It's not a part
of the game to use modern technology two figure out
a way to notify the batter while he's hitting by
banging on trash cans what pitches are coming. The fact

(40:53):
that that occurred is clearly cheating. It's an evolution of
a strategy that has existed for a long time, but
at some point in time. I think if you put
that story in front of most baseball fans, they would say, Okay,
a runner on second, maybe he can try to cue
the batter as to what pitch is coming. That's been expected,

(41:14):
have been happening for years. It's why oftentimes they change
signals when somebody is on second base. But having a
video camera system and a television installed in the dugout
and a beating on the trash can to notify in
real time a batter what pitches are coming. That's not normal,

(41:36):
that's cheating. I think almost everybody out there would agree.
Myles Garrett lost his mind on the football field. He
hit Mason Rudolph in the head with a helmet. There
could have been incredibly severe issues with that. When you
take a helmet, which weighs several pounds, and you are
a grown man and you swing it at another man's

(41:59):
uncovered head, the possibility is there could be severe injury there,
even including death. It's not a crazy idea. If you
have somebody who is as strong as Miles Rudolph and
they swing a helmet at your head, I wouldn't like
the chances that you're gonna be okay. Mason Rudolph, it

(42:20):
appears either has a super strong skull or he caught
against a glancing blow in that brawl. I thought the
NFL got the suspension correct when when Myles Garrett suddenly
realized how severe his suspension was gonna be, he threw
out a racism hell Mary at the NFL's investigation into

(42:41):
this incident. At his appeal, the NFL investigated it, they
said there's no evidence corroborating his allegation at all. None
of the officials on the field, none of the audio,
none of the players, none of them heard Mason Rudolph
say a racial slur. When you have something to gain

(43:01):
by alleging misbehavior by someone else, I'm gonna be honest
with you. I tend to believe you less, just like
with Justse Smalllett. If being a victim of racism helps you,
I'm less likely to believe that you are a victim
of racism. Myles Garrett could be telling the truth. I

(43:25):
think the chances of him telling the truth are low.
But even if he were telling the truth, it doesn't
excuse you from attacking someone. We gotta go back to
the tried and true lessons of most of our youth,
which is sticks and stones may break your bones, but
words will never hurt you. And that needs to be

(43:45):
a rule that's applied evenly. No matter what your identity is,
somebody saying something to you does not give you the
right to physically assault them. We've gotten words and actions
all conflated in this social media air. It's worse for
a lot of people out there two say something bad

(44:07):
on social media than it is to get a d U.
I think about that for a minute. There are a
lot of you out there that would be more likely
to lose your job for saying something inappropriate on Facebook
or Twitter then you are for getting a d U.
I I'm sorry. We've completely broken the words and actions universe.

(44:30):
When we are giving people less penalty for criminal behavior
than they are for what they say on social media,
it's crazy. Here's Myles Garrett. I mean, call me the
N word, and call me a stupid N word. I
don't like, man. I don't say the N word, whether
it's a he r to me personally, just shouldn't be said,

(44:53):
and whether it's known by family, friends, anyone. And I
don't want to use it because I don't want to
find that appropriate around me for anyone to use. Okay,
so I actually agree with a lot of what Myles
Garrett saying there. But you're trying to tell me that
you are in some way mitigating your behavior because somebody

(45:16):
said something mean to you on the football field. I'm sorry.
I'm just not willing to give anybody a pass because
of what somebody says to them. So we have two
different guys in the world of sports, a billionaire Jim Crane,
owner of the Houston Astros, and a multi millionaire Miles Garrett,
number one overall pick defensive end for the Cleveland Browns,

(45:36):
and neither one of them is just willing to accept
responsibility for their actions or the actions of their employees.
And that, to me is all too reflective, unfortunately, of
the society in which we live today, where people just
won't say I did it, I shouldn't have my bad.
Let's move on, because I'll tell you what, I completely

(45:58):
forgive Myles Garrett if he came out and said, you
know what, there's no excuse for my behavior. I shouldn't
have done what I did. I deserve a punishment that
was stupid. I'm gonna be better going forward. I'd be like,
you know what, Myles Garrett, I'll give you a pass,
and so forgiving society. I think most of you out
there would say the same thing. Shouldn't have lost his temper,
shouldn't have behaved the way he did. Got away a

(46:20):
little bit lucky that Mason Rudolph wasn't severely injured given
what he did. But I understand it, and I'm willing
to move on totally. Now. The astros a little bit
different because I don't blame Dodger fans for being upset
about this, but in general, if you own it and
just walk me through the process and you say you look,

(46:40):
we were looking for every competitive advantage we could find.
We know that sign stealing has existed for a long time.
We had a super smart uh member of our staff
that started tracking pitches through Xcel spreadsheets and he figured
out he could determine what the codes were and what
the signals were. And that was fine for scouting purposes,

(47:03):
but then we took it to the next step of
putting a television in the dugout of wiring and making
phone calls and letting people know and hitting garbage cans
and that was unacceptable, and we crossed the line between
diligent preparation for games and research and good old fashioned

(47:23):
scouting and cheating. And for that we bear the responsibility
of the punishments which we've been given. We deserve them,
and I don't have anything to say in our defense. Boom,
It's pretty well said, right. Would have been easy to
accept then if you were the astro or you were
Miles Garrett. Let me bring in the crew. They haven't
had a chance to talk about this yet. Danny g

(47:45):
I'll start with you. What do you think about both
of these situations, the astros and UH and Miles Garrett?
And do you see the connection that I'm making in
which both the billionaire owner and the multi millionaire player
are refusing to accept responsibility for things that they did on? Yeah,
I do. I think a lot of us, at an
early age, especially in our careers, we learned to just

(48:07):
admit when we do something wrong. When I was a
young program director, I was only twenty years old. I
made a lot of mistakes. And there was one time
we talked to him a few days ago. Carl Goldman
was my boss and I missed, Yeah, I missed a deadline.
I was supposed to send this research in and I
mailed it late. When he called me on it, I

(48:28):
made these excuses. I'll never forget that lesson. He told me,
look it, if you just owned up to it, I
would accept your apology, but you making excuses is not
going to cut it. And the next time I screwed
up on that job, I told him, hey, my bad,
I'm gonna do better. That's not gonna happen again. And
he told me, I'm glad you're learning on the job.

(48:50):
That stuck with me my entire adult life that when
you do screw up, just own up to it. Admit it.
You're dead on with this take. Because the Astros made
things a hundred times worse yesterday. I wish they would
have just shut up. I would have rather them not
say anything instead of what they did. Los Angeles is

(49:11):
up in arms. I mean, even the TV morning shows
and the TV afternoon drive shows here, which usually try
to be politically correct and as unbiased as possible, underneath
Altuve and Bregman and the owner of the Astro, they
labeled them as the astros cheating owner, the astros cheating player.

(49:33):
Like that was the description on the TV screen underneath
these guys. That tells you everything you need to know
right there. And yeah, and I love what you said
about teaching your kids, you know, because I was thinking
about playing cards. That's how I think about this too. Okay. Yeah,
sign stealing has been a part of baseball forever, picking

(49:55):
up on pitchers tips and all of that. But using
technology to do this is not. Okay. The Baseball Commissioner
warned all the teams back in specifically about yes, because
of how that Apple watch was in one of the dugouts.
They still did it. Okay, Reading your poker opponents tell
is a part of poker. Using a camera to see

(50:17):
their cards is not. This is not a hard concept
to grasp. Uh, what about you, dub when you hear
both of these stories, which I think are you know,
somewhat interrelated in the way that they both are refusing
to accept responsibility, and I think there'll be a lot
of discussion about both. Uh do you see the connection?
Absolutely both sides, and both these stories are running as

(50:39):
fast and as far away from accepting responsibility as humanly possible.
I'll start with the astros. I mean, that has got
to be the worst apology presser of all time. I mean,
it was really almost jaw dropping listening to the ASTROS
owner yesterday when he was making those comments. He literally
walked back and forth over his own words within seconds
of each other multiple times. It was unbelievable to see.

(51:02):
And it's like, you're sitting here, is like this guy
has made over a billion dollars in his in his life.
I don't know how. I mean, it seems like like
your your mock apology that you just did a couple
of minutes ago was about one thousand times better than
what the anyone from the ASTROS organization put out yesterday.
So I was really just in shock. Whoever their pr people.

(51:23):
I'm yeah, it's just it blows my mind. It really
is mind blowing. And then the Miles Garrett thing is,
I mean, he's already he's already gone down this road
right when when it first happened, So I don't even
understand the logic behind it, and and circling back around
and and saying these things again when I feel like
pretty much everybody has kind of moved on from this story,

(51:45):
and then bam, yesterday he runs to ESPN. He basically
just repeats himself from his first relieve the minute he
gets reinstated to the league, his first thought is, I'm
going to go make an excuse again for what I did,
that the NFL has already shot down once and that
frankly most of the American public has not bought already,

(52:08):
and you're gonna go try it again. Yeah. It just
doesn't even make sense to me that you would even
double back and and and say that excuse another time,
the same excuse you used, you know, months ago. Yeah,
it's crazy to me, And it also again makes both
of these situations worse. When it's better to say nothing
at all, Like if the Astros had just said, hey,
we're gonna rely on the statements that we've made already

(52:30):
from ownership, people would have probably said, hey, you should
have to answer questions. But it would have been much
better for the Astros to be getting criticized for not
saying anything than to have that disastrous performance like Jim
Crane did yesterday. And I think the Miles Garrett thing,
most people felt like, Okay, the punishment's just in some way.
You might have thought he should have gotten a game
or two less, a game or two more, but by

(52:51):
and large, I think the NFL pretty much got it right,
and I think people would have been okay with Myles
Garrett coming back Week one. I certainly was. I went
on and said, hey, I think the NFL got it right.
I'm fine with him coming back. And the first thing
you do is go run to ESPN to wine and
excuse your behavior. I just I don't get it. Eddy.
You've been doing updates a long time. You see a
connection here? Yeah? I think so. And and I mean,

(53:13):
Myles Garrett just got reinstated. He just had a meeting
with the commissioner, and I assume he said all the
right things for them to reinstate him. And then the
next day or maybe the same day, I mean I
I assume they had to record this interview. I mean,
maybe before and they didn't just do it and then
completely turn it around and put it on Sports there.
I don't know, but the next day he's basically bringing

(53:36):
this all out again. I would love to have heard
Roger Goodell's reaction when someone told him, by the way,
there's this interview that's gonna be big news coming out
and people are gonna be talking about, did Myles Garrett
bringing this whole situation up again. Do you guys agree
with me too? And I think this is a big
part of one of the challenges we have is everybody
wants to be treated differently based on their identity now, right,

(54:00):
And I see this happen all the time. Uh. If
you watch television and you watch like somebody come on
as an expert, they oftentimes now want to say their
identity before they give their opinion. Like You'll see it
all the time. Somebody will be like as a Hispanic
transgender atheist, I believe. And my thing is, why do

(54:24):
you need to preface your opinion by telling me your identity?
I don't care about any of that. Your opinion is
either a good one which is supported by facts or
it isn't. What you look like is not going to
dictate whether I believe that you're making a good argument
or not. Why do yeah? Right, this is why justice

(54:48):
is blind in the in the ideal world. Right. If
you think about lady justice like weighing the scales of
justice in an ideal world, she is blind and so
she's sitting there listening to the evidence and trying to
weigh guilt or innocence. But the analogy that I would
make is this is attempting to use something that you
don't control at all as an identity to justify your opinion.

(55:11):
I e. You're trying to put more weight on your
opinion based on your identity. And so this is to
me like back in the day, in like old and
olden times, a somebody who was like an earl or
a king or a uh you know, like whatever title
gentry you were in ancient Europe, people would say and

(55:32):
they still have, like the title if you if you
look up, like Prince William's official title is like, I mean,
it's incredible. It's like the fourth Duke Earl of number
of Northumberland, you know, and all these different titles, and
people used to say that before they would decrease something, right,
the proclamation would be like your King Jeffrey the lionhearted

(55:53):
forties six that you know, like all this long list
of encomiums of incredible accomplishments and idols that you own.
And then it would be like says that you have
to pay taxes right, And all of that title was
the justification to lead you to believe that you needed
to pay taxes right. It seems to me that our
new royalty in this country, and I think it's totally broken.

(56:16):
Is your identity, and people want to argue that based
on that identity they should be treated differently. And my
thing is a society doesn't work if we have different
rules for different people based on what they look like,
or what they worship or anything else. Now I'm not
saying the country has been perfect certainly historically at this,

(56:39):
but the idea that you should be treated differently based
on some sort of identity or characteristics, be at race, sexuality, religion,
ethnicity is crazy to me, absolutely and utterly crazy. But
that's a lot of the arguments that I hear these days.
I think we need the opposite, and this what time Oftentimes.

(56:59):
I think one of why the show does so well
because I think there's a lot of people who are craving, um,
you know, just people being treated evenly. And I think
what upsets people who are my critics by and large
is if you go look at what I say over
the course of my entire career on the radio, which is,
you know, a pretty a lot of words now or

(57:19):
the millions of words that I have written, there is
a consistency to it. I apply pretty evenly the same
rules regardless of wealth, regardless of gender, regardless of religion,
regardless of race, and that upsets people who want to
be treated differently based on those things. Right, Um, there

(57:42):
is a consistency and a legitimacy to it, because I
almost think of myself as trying to write opinions like
a judge wood And if you go to law school
and you study the law at all, you learn that
precedent matters, and so I want my precedence to be consistant.
And I'm always constantly thinking about that, and judges do

(58:04):
the same thing, because you can't adjust the law every
time based on the defendant that's in front of you,
are the particular case that's in front of you, and
very few people are able to do that because it's
hard because you have to think about all the other
opinions you've had before and put them into the same context.
And that's like, for instance, when I went on CNN

(58:25):
and I was jokingly saying like, I believe in the
First Amendment, and boobs like, I'm a First Amendment absolutist
and uh, and I will defend people's right to say
whatever they want to say. Doesn't mean I don't think
there should be consequences sometimes for what you say, But
all of my logic is the same, and so I
want to circle back around. It seems like it's a
crazy thing to say, but it's so eminently reasonable. Our

(58:50):
standards here have to be the same, no matter what, right,
Like you can't allow Myles Garrett to say, oh, somebody
said something really offensive to me, and so that explore
lanes why I attacked him. No, no, no, no. The
standard here is words can't lead to you attacking people.
It doesn't matter what your background is. That's a standard

(59:12):
that should be evenly applied to every person in America,
regardless of their identity or their background. Do you guys
agree with that? Is that a crazy thing to say? No,
not crazy at all. And I bet I'm the only
person on sports talk radio who will say it today. Yeah,
other people are going to be scared to have this
full conversation, right, dub Eddie. Do you guys disagree? I mean, like,

(59:35):
there's gonna be nobody else who will say this, But
like Myles Garrett is trying to excuse himself, I think
the standard that needs to be said by everybody is mom, dad,
whoever you are teaching kids. You can't allow anybody's words
to lead to you physically assaulting them, period, And if
you do, you have to bear the consequences of that behavior,

(59:57):
and you can't excuse that behavior. I saying, oh, somebody
said something mean to me. Like our conflation of words
and actions in society today. The example I gave of
people getting fired because of tweets or Facebook messages and
keeping their jobs when they get d u eyes like,
it's crazy to me that I am in more danger
of losing my job over a tweet that I send

(01:00:18):
than over getting a d U I and a lot
of you would be the same. If you have to
choose do you want your kid to send a inappropriate
tweet or do you want them to drive drunk? Every
single person on the planet listening to us right now
would be like, I'd rather them send an appropriate tweet.
I hope they don't, I hope they don't say something

(01:00:39):
stupid on Facebook. I hope they don't record themselves and
doing something dumb on Snapchat. But if I had to
choose for what my kids were gonna do, I'd choose
them to do something stupid on social media instead of
driving drunk. And I'm just picking driving drunk as an
example because I think everybody out there is like, yeah,
that's something you shouldn't do. Yet, our society oftentimes is

(01:01:02):
punishing people more for social media posts than they are
for actual crimes. Got me fired up. I think we're
gonna talk who do we got next? Do we talk to?
John Morosy here? Yeah? Perfect timing. This is Outkicked the
coverage with Clay Travis, the Outkicks show. Here. I think

(01:01:25):
we've got a couple people who want to weigh in
on calls, and then we're gonna be joined by John Morosi,
our Major League Baseball insider. Good timing to have him
join us right after the Astros press conference yesterday. But first,
let's take a couple of calls. Dob wh should go to? First?
All right, we got Bob in Cleveland. Bob, what you
got for us? Oh my god, I thought I was
listening to the ladies on the view. Uh with just

(01:01:47):
condemning the cheating. Cheating is a prior of sports. I
mean I always learned if you're not cheating, you're not trying. Yeah,
So I think all these guys complaining just whiny little girls,
you know, if they don't pick up the cheating, If
you don't have the skills to pick up the cheating,
do you deserve to lose? I mean, and uh, I'm

(01:02:10):
just just as like man, you guys, Hey, Bob, what
if I, Bob, Bob, what if I put concrete in
my boxing gloves and beat the crap out of somebody
and want to fight? Is that the fault of the
person that I beat up? You can't get away with it? Yeah,
so it's so it'd be whining. It would be whining
if somebody noticed that I had concrete in my boxing gloves. Well,
I think everybody would notice you had concrete. What if

(01:02:33):
I got away with it? That would be whining too,
if I got if I cheated, And what about if
I cork my bat and uh, and then later I
get caught and I've hit a lot of home runs,
And is it whining to say that I corked my
bat and I got caught or put concrete in my gloves. Well,
from the other guys, it would be whiny to a

(01:02:54):
string of examples. No, well that's kind of the point country, Yeah, Bob,
because called in and said it's whining for people to
be upset that somebody cheated and uh and you're saying, like, okay,
so when uh if you found out that uh A
like when Lance Armstrong blood use all the blood doping

(01:03:17):
to win the Tour de France and lied about it
and people found out about it, it was whining for
them to to bring up the fact that Lance arms
A lot of the other writers were doing it too. Okay,
so it's wine. You can bet a lot of the
other writers were doing the same thing. Bob, you have
an i Q of forty six. Thanks for calling No

(01:03:37):
sometimes I want you know sometimes you sit around. Bob
is a great example of this. You ever sit around
and wonder why sometimes the conversation is so dumb. It's
because people like Bob, like Bob just called in, of
people listening right now are like, my god, Bob is

(01:03:57):
the dumbest caller that is called into out in a
long time. Bob thinks he's the smart one. So this
is the thing about society. Super dumb people don't actually
know that they're the super dumb ones. Worse than that,
they think that everybody else is the dumb person. Bob

(01:04:18):
is out there right now, Like I just showed that
Clay Travis from NASCAR Country, How dumb he is he
and all the winers out there talking about the astros cheating.
He thinks he's the smart one. Reality is, he's too
dumb to even know how dumby is. That explains society.
Thanks Bob up. Next, John Morosey's gonna join us. This

(01:04:39):
is OutKick on Fox Sports Radio. This is Outkicked the
coverage with Clay Travis. We bring in now our Major
League Baseball insider John Morosey, J O, N M, O,
R O, S I and Boyd the timing on this
is fantastic Baseball season back and what did you think

(01:05:00):
of the Houston astro's performance yesterday? John Morosy, It seemed
to me like they made the story so much bigger
and so much worse than it already was. Claim my friend,
it was not one of those days to just appreciate
the subtle pop of the glove and the crack of
the bat dream batting practice. Right. It was a little
little more, a little more controversial than that. Uh, you're right,

(01:05:22):
I I. I had a number of issues with the
way that it played out. To me, there was not
enough thought done in advance about at least conveying to
the public a degree of of full accountability and sincerity
about what it transpired. I was impressed by Carlos Correa,

(01:05:46):
who offered at least some detail in terms of timing
and how they did it and and the origins of
of this process, and even took responsibility for not speaking
up more and and really said Carlos Beltron seniority at
the time should not have basically compelled all of us

(01:06:06):
to to stay silent on this. And so I think
Carl's comments were well taken. But in general, the rather
scripted nature of the other apologies and and the lack
of specifics and and most most of all play the
lack of of acknowledging the connection between the cheating and

(01:06:27):
the championship. He just made it really difficult to put
put a lot of credibility and what they were saying
and and from my perspective, opens up continued criticism at
an even higher level during the course of the year
than what would have been the case if the if
the apology had been thorough and authentic from the outset.

(01:06:47):
Here's the question I have, and I think this is
a big one that is starting to happen in a
lot of different sports, for out the hit. Throughout the
history of baseball, teams have tried to steal the signals
of other you know, of catchers to go into pictures right,
especially when there's a runner on second base. Now we
have a modern day technology that is different. Where is

(01:07:07):
the line moved between acceptable gamesmanship and cheating? I think
almost everyone out there listening to us right now would
agree that the Astros were on the side of cheating.
But where is the line? I mean? Is that part
of the challenge here in general? I don't think there's
any doubt again that the Astros were past it. But
is an Excel spreadsheet when you're studying, uh, you know,

(01:07:29):
like the pitching tendencies and everything else, and using that
for scouting, I think it's probably okay? Is it just
within the game itself? Allowing there to be technology in
the dugout other than maybe a phone that allows you
to call the bullpen, you just can't have anything else
and you have to monitor that right and and that, that,
to me, is is what baseball is confronted with. There

(01:07:52):
there is a line. That line is you are not
to use technology to decode in game real time him
sign stealing uh efforts, so that that that is not
what you are allowed to do during baseball. However, if
if you were watching the previous start, let's say and

(01:08:14):
and a veteran player, upon looking at video said, oh
my gosh, I was looking. We got we thrown a
fast boys got his glove up around his ear, and
we're throwing a curve. Boys got his glove around the
letters on his jersey. It's kind of hard to tell
a team to not review video of the previous game

(01:08:37):
and if something jumps out at you that you would
then use that as as a potential advantage in the
next game, that that should be fine. And I think
the also there there have been for the recent years
clay iPads in the dugout that only include historical video
and data and not the data of the current game

(01:08:59):
being played, so that that has also been one elm
which by the way, just not to cut you off,
but is different than let's say the NFL, which has
iPads on the sideline and allows quarterbacks for instance, and
and and players to go on the sideline and look
at what the defenses are doing, right like that is
a technological innovation that football has been okay with And
I don't think most people out there listening right now

(01:09:21):
would say, okay, there's any there's nothing wrong with looking
at you know, all twenty two vision of what the
defense is doing against you during the course of the game.
Football has adjusted in that way. Baseball is saying basically,
we were not even going to allow you to do that. Well,
and I think that the football analog and I'd be
interested in, oklay on, this is what do you ever

(01:09:41):
have teams that that have a camera that are studying
the the sign sequences coming in from the offensive quarter
to the backup quarterback and everybody else over there, and
are then decoding them and in in any way sort
of really I think, yeah, it's a good question. I
think in the NFL they would say that that has
been taken away because the the quarterback hat and the

(01:10:03):
defensive player have the the you know, helmet that has
the audience helmet. So you could usually like somebody's got
the big play sheet and still sometimes they'll hold the
play sheet up over their mouth if you notice, like
a head coach on the sideline. Um. But but in general,
I mean I've wondered, for instance, do they zoom in
on the play sheet, you know, like at some in

(01:10:24):
some way. But I think the answer would be, well,
you can probably tell what plays they're running just by
watching the film itself. But I think in general, in
the wake of this Astro press conference, there's a pretty
consistent feeling that the Astros have not been punished severely.
I would say, according to most Major League Baseball fans.
Do you get that sense as well? A lot of

(01:10:46):
fans want more of a penalty. I I think that
for them in it's in it's interesting play for them.
I really think that the the need and desire for
there to be more more punishment is linked to what
I believe to be a rather incomplete apology. And it
was even said yesterday by Astros owner Jim Crane that that, um, yes,

(01:11:11):
this occurred, but it did not I'm paraphrasing here, it
did not effectively help them win games, and that that
to me is just there's no logic there. Of course,
it helped them, and and there's a penalty here because
it helped them. And it's almost as though the groundswell
of support from fans, I'm sure many of them in

(01:11:33):
Los Angeles, many of them in New York teams that
lost to the Astros in recent playoffs are are saying
are saying correctly that because of the lack of of
of really taking ownership of this in in a full
way and saying, yeah, the title is tainted. Um. I
think that many of those fans are saying that because
the Astros don't seem to quite grasp or at least

(01:11:55):
publicly take ownership of the fact that it's tainted, then
then I think that as part of the reason why
they have they have urged MLB to try to take
away the title in a more objective and punitive manner.
We're talking to John Morosy, major League Baseball insider. I
think also the decision to give immunity to the players

(01:12:17):
strikes a lot of people wrong. This is probably the
last question that I'm gonna be able to get to you.
All these players knew they were cheating going on, and
they're going to escape all censure for it completely. Uh,
That I think strikes a lot of people as unfair. Also,
was it the right decision by Major League Baseball to
give immunity of the players. It was, Clay. It's It's
a hard thing for me to say, but I believe

(01:12:39):
it was for them to be able to at least
arrive at a conclusion as to what transpired, to get
full information and think without immunity, it would have been
a very incomplete investigation that did not yield enough specifics
to to really arrive at a fair conclusion and and
and fair punishment for those involved. I do think that,

(01:13:01):
And this is one of my other issues about what
we said yesterday um Astrosuner Jim Crane saying this was
not a failure of the players, who was a failure
of their leaders, and and yes, in that in that
case Jeff Luno and A James were suspended and and dismissed.
But the players are are the best in the world
of what they do. They have played baseball their whole lives,

(01:13:22):
and more than anything else they have, they should have
a pretty good idea of what's right and wrong. And
and that that to me is one of the other
issues here is is that not giving the players themselves
enough agency over their own culture, and and that that
needs to be I think addressed for the sport going forward.
What kind of culture do you want to have as
a sport and as individual thirty teams and and how

(01:13:45):
do the rules support and the and the practices support
your belief on players and their own agency about what's
right and wrong. Candidly that that this that should not
be a nuanced discussion. So I understand Clay why they
were given immunity. I would have I'm in a perfect
world be could you have seen discipline for the players, Yes,
but I understand here why that was not the case.

(01:14:07):
And I think overall the commissioner did did a pretty
good job. Sean Morosey, I'm OutKick on Fox Sports Radio.
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Fox sports
Radio dot com and within the I Heart Radio app.
Search f s R to listen live. Encourage you to
go download the podcast. Make sure you don't miss anything.

(01:14:29):
January was the biggest podcast month ever for the show.
I hope the name will be true in February, even
though it's a short month, and even though I'm out
next week, I'm headed down to Mexico with my family.
Uh and so I'm excited to get away for a
little bit, first break since football season really started. So
we're gonna get down there for a little bit. But

(01:14:49):
in the meantime, we've got two different stories that we
are tracking to start off your Friday. The Houston Astros
finally met the media and it did not go l
and Miles Garrett finally gets reinstated. And what's the first
thing he does. He runs to ESPN to complain about
Mason Rudolph and explain why he decided to assault Mason

(01:15:12):
Rudolph with his helmet. There was a racial slur according
to Miles Garrett, which is a story that has already
been told as an attempt a racism. Hell, Mary, as
it were to limit Myles Garrett's suspension in the first place,
will unpack both of these We will open up your
phones here on the show eight seven, seven, three six

(01:15:33):
nine No guests for the final hour will break down
both these stories and have some fun with you. By
the way, it's Valentine's Day for all you knuckleheads out
there are starting off your day. You're like, oh no, yeah,
it's Valentine's Day, February. Your girl, your wife, your side chick,
they're all gonna expect something. If you're a woman, pretty

(01:15:54):
much can get away. We're just sleeping with your man.
We'll be honest with you you don't have to get
him any kind of present. If you're a man, doesn't work,
you gotta get a present. So if it's Valentine's Day
and you still haven't done anything, you blew it. Good
luck trying to get into a restaurant tonight, your knucklehead,
it's Friday. You're gonna see dudes all over America today,

(01:16:15):
all over America with that angry girl with him walking
in a restaurant trying to get a table. I'm telling y'all,
you know what's gonna this is actually be a good
television show. I'd like to watch it. Guys in their
car driving all over the place. Didn't even get me
a reservation at Applebee's. You can't even get me an

(01:16:35):
Applebee's on Valentine's Day. That's what's gonna be happening. You're
telling me that you love me and you can't even
get us a table at Chili's. I you expect for
me to want to spend the rest of my life
with you, and you can't even get me in a

(01:16:55):
Longhorn steakhouse on Valentine's Day. I'll want to bloom an
onion and outback steakhouse is too full. Because your dumbass
couldn't actually make a reservation anywhere. I'm not even asking
for you to get a reservation at a non chain restaurant.
I'm just asking you to have at least thought ahead

(01:17:17):
to the point where we can actually get in a restaurant,
because it's Friday and it's Valentine's Day, and if you're
trying to get into a restaurant, it ain't happening. So
all the dudes out there that made reservations that are
actually sitting at the table with their girl. When you
walk in with your girl and you're like, hey, you
got any availability table for two? No? No, they don't. Hey, baby, month,

(01:17:42):
if we sit at the bar, you got any places
at the bar? Can we go sit at the corner
of the bar. Maybe we've got some dude in between us.
We're gonna get some drinks. I mean, maybe that guy
will move. Hey, can you scoot over there? All some
of y'all are laughing right now, but this is gonna
be a lot of a large percentage of the out
Kick audience. It's gonna be walking into outback steakhouse like,

(01:18:03):
hey man, can we get that bloomen onion? Do you
mind if we stand here, baby, man, Look, I mean
there's room at the end of this bar. I'm sorry
I didn't get a table, but we can stand here.
I mean, I got you a blooming onion. I don't
know what else you want. There's a lot of men
gonna be trying to make that argument tonight. There's a lot.
There's a huge percentage of men. And if you work
at a restaurant, you know what I'm talking about. Two

(01:18:25):
you got that side. I look from the girl at
the counter. It's always the girl at the counter, who's
in charge of the tables. Yeah, Hey, what's the weight?
Four hours and thirty minutes. Four hours and thirty minutes
at the Olive Garden. Yeah, four hours and thirty minutes
at the Olive Garden tonight. Because every man who cares
about his woman actually made a reservation and your dumbass didn't.

(01:18:49):
That's what's gonna happen. Did you have a reservation, Danny
g tonight didn't need one. Pro tip. This is one
of the knights to stay away from the restaurants. I
told the girl i'm dating, I'm gonna cook. Oh that
is a vet move o, g move. There's gonna be
going out, by the way, should have given the step earlier.

(01:19:09):
Candles on the table. Good move, Another good move. Go
out February, baby, I love you so much. I want
to celebrate Valentine's the day before Valentine's Boom. That's a
good move too. It's not gonna be as crowded. We'll
have more space, be a better restaurant, better atmosphere. It's
like trying to go out on New Year's Eve. It

(01:19:30):
never goes well. Always over planned, under deliver. That's what
happens on New Year's Eve. Valentine, same thing. Do you
have a girl? Not for the moment. And by the way,
this reminded me, we're almost upon the one year anniversary
of me showing up here drunk. That was the day
after Valentine's Day last year. What did you do on
Valentine's Day last year? I went to a pres game

(01:19:50):
with one of my buddies and got absolutely wasted. And
so you just stayed up all night and then showed
in still drunk? Or did you go to bed wake
up still drunk? No? I I went down to Printer's
alley and next thing I knew it was four in
the morning. So I came into work. That's very good.
We run a tight ship here obviously, unlike the Astros
and Miles Garrett. I'm I'm willing to, you know, be

(01:20:11):
honest with my mistakes. And Eddie, what are you doing
for Valentine's? We are going out to dinner to our
favorite Mexican restaurant. We're going at three o'clock. Are you
really yeah? Oh that's such a fantastic food. So do
you have a reservation at three o'clock? No? But I
I really don't think it will. What percentage of our audience,
our dudes right now who were just laughing nervously because

(01:20:33):
they realized they haven't made a reservation yet, Like, you know,
this happens right Like they're gonna be so many guys
out there in the car with their girls driving around
the multiple places asking how long the weight is on
Valentine's to try to get in Clay, I was inside
a Target in Los Angeles yesterday afternoon. I did my
shopping on Amazon Prime a couple of weeks ago. But

(01:20:54):
I just needed a couple of, you know, small additions
to what I'm giving my girl. But you should have
saw the guys walking around the aisles that had already
been torn through like a week ago. Nothing, I swear,
nothing left on the shelf except remnants of old Reese's
pieces packages that were opened and so someone just tossed

(01:21:14):
it on the shelf. It looked like a war zone.
In the two aisles for Valentine's Day gifts, there were
guys milling around scratching their heads. I could tell they
were like the Valentine's Walking dead. Yeah, they had anxiety
all over their face. They know they're gonna be dudes
today who are like, Hey, what's that code again? You've
been It happens every year. What's that? What's that rose code?

(01:21:36):
You got for me? That one flowers? I did it
for two weeks. I told you, for two weeks. All
you had to do was go put in the code
out kick and you could have had this stuff taking care.
Hey man, you know the shipping is really expensive. Yeah,
if you get shipping the day before or the day of,
it's really expensive. Go figure. I just I would watch
a reality show about angry women in the passenger seat

(01:22:00):
men drive around on Valentine's Day to try to get
into restaurants because they didn't make a reservation. It's even
worse because it's Friday, because it's a weekend Valentine's Day,
which means, you know, everybody goes out on Friday and
Saturday anyway, So the odds of you just being able
to walk into a restaurant and sit down at the table,
there are a lot of dude sweating right now. They're like,
oh no, oh no. So so you're not taking responsibility

(01:22:23):
for your Valentine's Day failings either, But at least you're
not the owner of the of the Houston Astros. My boy,
Jim Crane, he's a billionaire. Maybe you should have paid
somebody a little bit of money to give him some
advice not to sound like an idiot, because, bro, he
sounded like an idiot. Here he is when you here's
a pro tip when you contradict yourself within a couple

(01:22:45):
of minutes in like, I don't even know how in
his head he wasn't like, oh, just don't say the
opposite of what you just said. Can we pause this?
Because I want to just point out exactly when he said,
can you pause it? Middleway through, Danny g here's Jim Rain,
the owner of the Astros. He's going out to talk
to the media. It's time to accept responsibility for what

(01:23:05):
happened with Houston. Here he goes, you know our opinion is, uh,
had a good team. Um we won the World Series
didn't impact the game? And what do you mean by bath?
I didn't say it didn't impact the game. You just

(01:23:27):
hold on, Yeah you did. You literally said it didn't
impact the game, and then you said you didn't say it.
I don't know who Jim Crane is married to, but
I bet his wife has won four billion consecutive arguments
with him whatever they have argued about since he's married,
assuming he's married, she has won every argument they've ever had.
Because he's like, no, I didn't say that. Yeah, you

(01:23:50):
just said it. You just said it in front of
all the media, and we can all go back and
immediately hear you say, we start that again. Like literally,
you can't even avoid contradicting yourself directly, like you hung
yourself out to dry. Here here's Jim Crane, billionaire owner

(01:24:12):
of the Houston Astros, who has had months to prepare
for these questions, which are in no way surprising, right,
no way surprised. This is why I think I should
start a PR firm. I could make millions of dollars
a year to talk to billionaires like Jim Crane and
just tell him what to say. And one of the

(01:24:32):
number one rules is don't say the opposite of what
you just said. Here's Jim Crane, billionaire talking about the Astros.
You know our opinion is, uh, you know that this
didn't impact the game. Um, we had a good team.
Um we won the World Series and we'll leaven at that. Jim,
when talking about the Yankees there, did you say you

(01:24:53):
feel like this didn't impact the game? And what do
you mean by that? I didn't say it didn't impact
the Jim facile. Jim is gonna be standing in line
to night with this girl at the at the at
the Olive Garden for four and a half hours. Oh,
he's inside a target, Jim right now? Is it? He
is like he may own a bunch of targets, but
he didn't even think to get some chocolates. I mean,

(01:25:16):
I sometimes question, how can you be a billionaire and
be that dumb. Maybe he inherited it. I don't know.
Maybe Jim Crane's a big fan of the show. And
if he is, Jim Clay Travis PR, I'll give it
to you for free. I'm not even kidding about this.
There are a lot of people in media names that
you would know. When they find themselves and messes. They

(01:25:36):
call me and they're like, hey, Clay, how should I
handle this? Like, here's what I did, Here's what I
love this stuff. It's like plotting a plotting a war campaign.
Are you like, Okay, here's what the media is gonna say.
Here's how you spin it. They're gonna do X, you
do Y, and it leads to Z. It's like playing
four dimensional chess. I love it. I would love to
be NPR. And I will tell you right now that

(01:25:58):
whoever the astros aide for PR, they should be fired
and maybe drawn and quartered and lit on fire, literally
lit on fire, not just fired. They should be drawn
and quartered like mel Gibson and Brave Heart, one arm,
other arm, leg horses going in different directions, all at
the same time, and then whatever's left of him should
be burned, maybe in the center of the outfield, just

(01:26:20):
don't put it on video, and don't beg on any
trash cans while it's going on. So the astros are idiots,
all right. All you needed to say is this, Like
I'm reading a great book about Babe Ruth right now
and his era and how he became the first global
sports superstar, but certainly American superstar. How he made basically
superstart impossible in the world of sports fascinating. And even

(01:26:43):
when you read about like nineteen twenties baseball, everybody's always
been trying to find an edge in baseball, and sign
stealing has been a part of baseball for as long
as it's existed. And the idea that it batter is
not gonna turn and look, and if he does, the
pictures have to throw at him, you know, like all
these unwritten rules of baseball. If Jim Crane had just

(01:27:06):
sat there and said, you know what, we wanted to
win so desperately we went beyond what's acceptable when it
comes to stealing signs, doing it with video, putting a
television in the dugout, banging on trash cans to notify
batters as to what pitches were coming, that was a

(01:27:28):
bridge too far. We cheated that definitely helped us win
the World Series. If uh, if I could go back
in time, I would make us not do that. Even
if that's potentially a lie, you can at least say it,
and we deserve all the punishments that Major League Baseball
is gonna give us. And I don't really have anything
else to add other than that. But that's why I

(01:27:49):
fired the manager. It's why I fired the GM. I
think you have to hold leaders accountable when situations like
these arise. Cheating was endemic. It ran through the entirety
of our organization, and it's unacceptable and it won't happen
again on my watch. I don't know if I believe him,
but that's all he had to say. Clay, do you
think he was advised in any way not to completely

(01:28:11):
come clean because it would potentially open himself up to
the lawsuits of any kind? But when you're a billionaire,
I don't see what you care about lawsuits. If you
are a billionaire, you can always afford lawyers, and already
Major League Baseball has released their findings in this situation,

(01:28:32):
so I don't really understand what he could say which
would place him in further legal Jeopardy. It's a good question,
but I'm putting my lawyer hat on here, and I
don't even understand from a PR perspective, what additional ramifications
could have come from him saying saying exactly what I
just said. And I don't think people would have been happy.

(01:28:52):
There's like people in social media who are Dodger and
Yankee fans are gonna be like, Okay, we get it.
You just really wanted to win and you happen to cheat.
It happens like No, I don't think people would have
taken it and been happy with it, but at least
it would have been an acknowledgement of responsibility and not
have been blatant, bold faced lies like what we got

(01:29:14):
from him instead. And that's what's particularly frustrating, I think
to your average baseball fan, and just to your average
sports fan in general, when you screw up, and particularly
when you're caught screwing up, own it, come out, look
us directly in the eye and say I blew it.

(01:29:34):
And I think people, even if they're angry, they will
accept that a lot more than they will this dissembling,
this disinformation. Frankly, this blatant wise and the immediate contradictions
of yourself like we saw from him. It's frankly just
insulting and all too often very common in the world
of sports as well. This is outkicked the coverage with

(01:29:57):
Clay Travis Valentine's Day music. This is a Leah you said, yeah,
one of her classics. R I p Aaliyah. This is
at your bed. She died in the Bahamas, right yeah,
they overloaded the airplane. They were on a video shoot.
Horrible And that was our Kelly's wife. Right well, back

(01:30:18):
in the day they secretly married, but when she died,
they weren't together, like fourteen years old when they got married.
I think, you know, I'm starting to think this R.
Kelly guy, he might have some skeletons in his closet.
Just I don't know. Maybe it's just me, but I'm
starting to think this guy might have some things that
he's not necessarily proud of. I think he might think

(01:30:43):
he might be a bit shady. So you're saying we
should close the show with an R. Kelly slow jam,
and I think I don't want to be trapped in
a closet. I just want to say that welcome back.
I go out kick Studios. All right, I was making
fun of Jim Crane and his awful press conference. I
gotta say, Myles Garrett, like, I want to like you.
Seems like fairly smart guy. When he was at Texas

(01:31:05):
A and M he liked to talk about how much
he like dinosaurs. I'm like anybody who plays football and
has an interesting hobby other than talking about football. I like,
so Myles Garrett like he wants to be a paleontologist.
He's like Ross from Friends. I'm like, okay, I kind
of like this super smart guy. Scored highly on the
on the Wonderli Test, and I get that. This entire

(01:31:28):
last football season, it seemed like he was playing angry.
First game of the season, he punches a Titans player,
should have gotten kicked out of the game. He injures
a couple of different quarterbacks with borderline pretty dirty hits. Right,
just seemed like he was playing on the edge all year.

(01:31:49):
And then he loses his mind and hits Miles Uh sorry,
uh Mason Rudolph in the head with the helmet, and
I thought the suspension was justified. And after the game,
Amy came out and he said, you know what, it
was dumb of me, he didn't make excuses, and I
was like, you know what, I'm willing to give you
a pass if you just do something dumb and then

(01:32:10):
admit that you probably shouldn't have done it right, because
nobody's perfect, and especially when passion is involved like football.
Even though he was potentially very lucky that Mason Rudolph
wasn't severely hurt. Because when you take a helmet with
what it weighs several pounds, and you're as strong as
Miles Garrett is and you swing that as hard as

(01:32:33):
you can at somebody's head, you could kill them. People
out there like what are you talking now? You could
easily kill somebody if you swing a helmet at their
head as hard as you can, and you hit them
at the wrong angle and the way they fall, they
hit their head again, Like that's not unheard of. I
don't know what percentage of the time if you swing
a helmet as hard as you could and you're as
strong as Myles Garrett Is that you would kill somebody.

(01:32:56):
But it wouldn't it wouldn't be insanely uncommon. And or
you could give him a concussion. You could certainly severely
fracture their skull like there could be all sorts of
major issues that could come from that move. So it
was dumb. He deserved his penalty and he has served
his suspension, and I'd be fine for him playing Week one,
and I wouldn't be like, oh my god, I can't

(01:33:16):
believe this guys back out on the football field. I
think the NFL got it right with justice. But then
Myles Garrett, right before the suspensions came down, he tried
to throw a racism hell Mary. He went all Jesse
Smalllett or juicy small yea in the words of Dave
Chappelle on us and tried to become a racism victim
when being a racism victim is a hundred percent to

(01:33:38):
his benefit. And I would say this in general, anytime
somebody becomes a victim and in a hundred percent benefits them,
I automatically questioned whether they're likely to be telling the truth.
And so people were like, we're upset with me. Back
when the Jesse Smalllett thing happened, They're like, Clay, how
come you don't believe this guy? And I'm like, well,
hold on, you're telling me that on the coldest night

(01:34:00):
of the year in Chicago, that there were two random
Donald Trump supporters out in Chicago and their mock Maga
hats make American Great Again hats, and they're out late night,
just hanging out on the street corner. It's like minus
twenty degrees and Jesse Smalett happens to walk to the
Subway restaurant to get himself a subway and when he

(01:34:25):
walks out, these Donald Trump supporters rush over to Jesse
Smalllett and they pour some stuff on his head. And
by the way, these these Donald Trump supporters have been
walking around with a noose in the minus twenty degree weather,
just standing out on street corners with a noose for
a while. And they rush up and they put the

(01:34:46):
noose around Jesse Smallette's head and they're like, this is
Maga country. You know, you're a gay black dude. We
hate you. And then that's it. I was like, that
sounds really strange to me, And for I was like, just,
first of all, what are the odds that hardcore Donald
Trump supporters are watching Empire? Like let's just start right there, like,

(01:35:09):
let's just break it down on its most basic level.
When you think about the show Empire, are you like, man,
they turn off Fox News and they can't wait to
watch this story about a black musical family on Fox,
Like that overlap is huge. My man was watching Tucker
Carlson and he's like, oh man, I gotta turn this

(01:35:30):
off right now. I was gonna watch Laura Ingram tonight,
but instead I gotta watch Empire. I don't think that
overlap is very big, right, Like that the hardcore Donald
Trump supporter and the Empire viewer. Like if you were
doing a Venn diagram, there's like three people in that
Venn diagram to begin with. I don't want to stereotype,

(01:35:52):
but I think the number of people who are hardcore
Donald Trump supporters and also hardcore Empire fans is low.
And he even if you were that person, do you
really think you care so much about Jesse Smallett that
you know about his sexuality? Like you're like, oh, this
dude is gay, Like I can't believe that, and is

(01:36:13):
it really that controversial? So I just didn't buy it.
I'm like, this is the like I would never talk
about Jesse small at at all. The greatest thing that
could ever happened to him is for him to be
a victim of a racist attack, because then everybody talks
about him, and he becomes a star, and he becomes
a victim and he can play the victim card. Like

(01:36:36):
this just doesn't add up for me. It also doesn't
add up for me that Miles Garrett is called the
racial slur by Mason Rudolph. Myles Garrett behaved the worst
in his professional career when he hit Mason Rudolph in

(01:36:58):
the head with the helmet, And you expect for me
to believe that Mason Rudolph, who plays a majority black
sport and has played a majority black sport for a
long time at Oklahoma State and now at the Pittsburgh Steelers,
is so incredibly dumb that he called a black player

(01:37:21):
a racial slur on the field, Because if he did that,
his career is over and his name is ruined forever.
If he did that, he would be so dumb that
if I'm Mike Tomlin and the Pittsburgh Steelers, I'm like,
I don't care how talented this guy is. He's not
smart enough to be my quarterback. Sometimes people make decisions

(01:37:45):
and it's so dumb, even if it's not football related.
I'm like, yeah, I can't invest big money in this guy,
Like Jamis Winston has done a lot of really dumb things,
even leaving aside the rape charge, where I'm like, I
quite should this guy whether he's smart enough to be
my leader? Right? Like the eat the W thing? Remember

(01:38:07):
that eat the W video? Jamimes like We're gonna eat
the W and all his teammates like, what are you
talking about? And you watch it? And then and then
like the steel and the krab legs and the getting
up on this on the counter in the at the
at Florida State and screaming about a sexual act after
you've narrowly escaped being charged with rape. How about being

(01:38:29):
in an uber and groping the uber driver? Like those
are just all so dumb things that I wouldn't want
him to be the leader of my team. Mason Rudolph
doing a racial slur would be the same thing. It's
just so dumb that I questioned his leadership ability. But
there's also no corroborating evidence that had happened. Think about

(01:38:51):
the chances that Mason Rudolph, in a loud football stadium
with referees with Mike's everywhere, with players everywhere, utters a
racial slur, but the only person who hears it is
Miles Garrett. There is otherwise no corroborating evidence to substantiate

(01:39:13):
that claim at all. What are the chances that you
would believe it when the story one benefits Miles Garrett
and is arguably the best possible thing that someone could
say to him for him to try to justify his actions.

(01:39:34):
If you're trying to assess who is telling the truth
and who is lying, I would suggest to you that
most often times, the person who is telling the lie
benefits the most from the lie. So I'm not inclined
to believe Myles Garrett. But even if Myles Garrett is

(01:39:56):
telling the truth, here is my big thing. His behavior
is still completely unjustifiable. And here is where it ties
into me with the Astros. If Myles Garrett just comes
out and says, you know what, I lost my mind.
I did something really dumb. I wish I hadn't done that.
I'm gonna forgive him. I think most of you would
as well. If the Astros say it, people are angry.

(01:40:19):
I don't blame me. If you're a Yankees fan or
you're a Dodgers fan, I think Clayton Kershaw probably wants
to strangle to death every member of the Houston Astros
because they probably cost him a World Series MVP and
maybe the only World Series that he would ever win.
I understand why he would be furious, but at least
if you admit it, there's no obfuscation, there's no hiding.

(01:40:41):
You are coming out in the light of day and
telling us exactly what happened. We buith Myles Garrett and
the Houston Astros. We're not getting that right now, and
so I don't believe the Astros. I don't believe Myles Garrett.
Open phone lines eight six nine. I'm Clay Travis. All right,
we'll finish up with some calls for the week. I've
heard that we've got a lot of people who want

(01:41:01):
to talk about Valentine's Day, the Astros and UH and
also Miles Garrett. So dub, I'll let you hit a
couple of them here right now before we go to break.
Who makes the most sense to start with. Let's start
off with Valentine's Day. We got Jamie in Pennsylvania. Jamie
a boy or a girl? Jamie, what you got for me?
I'm a guy? Yeah, never know what that name tough break.

(01:41:24):
It's like a boy named Sue. Well, her name Kim,
so that goes both plays. Yeah, all right, what you
got for me? We don't celebrate Valentine's Day? And I
know I can use a lot of justifications here, and
a lot of people are gonna say that's just, uh,
you know, a cheap move on my part. I convinced
her that, hey, baby, I love you every day. I

(01:41:46):
don't need a special day. But that's how we roll.
The way I'm gonna defend it is with a sports movie, uh,
Finding forrest Or. You ever see that movie? Yeah, that's
the chess movie, right, No, that's the the Sean Connery.
He plays a recluse rider he wanted to pull up, sir,

(01:42:08):
and then he's yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah right yeah.
But the the young black basketball player is trying to
impress a girl and he approaches Sean Connery and says,
you know, what what should I do? And Sean goes
an unexpected gifts at an unexpected time and that's good. Yeah, well,

(01:42:30):
I mean you know it's true though, I mean they
expect it today, you know, And so if you do something,
you know, on a random day, you know, kind of
even more it's good advice out there. You can take
her out to Chili's on a random Tuesday instead of
on Valentine's Day. Ladies, never know when you're gonna get

(01:42:52):
the Fahita dish for free. Who's up next? We got
Mike in New York. My what you got? So my
opinion on the uh, the Miles good thing? I think
he took the wrong and going so did the Astros,
just like you're saying, like the mile is good. Just

(01:43:15):
he tried to rip my helmet off. I got really
angry and then he came at me again. I swung
the helmet. I was wrong, move on to Ben Cool.
And if the Astros would have just said, hey, we cheated,
we got penalized. We're moving on from the situation, much
like the Patriots or something, just hey we did it,
We're sorry, Boom, work down with that and let it be.

(01:43:38):
I think they would be in a better situation too. Yeah.
I mean again, this is why Clay Travis pr would
make insane amounts of money, because I know what the
public wants, and ultimately you have to figure out how
to give the public what they want. When you end
up in the center of controversy, a conclusion that justifies
their attention who's up next? Are we got Sean and

(01:44:03):
Charlotte Sean, what you got for me? It's commenting on
the Astros. And don't forget this is the same owners,
same franchise that mess the whole I guess, allegations with
the front office member that made inappropriate comments to a
member of the media, and they don't know how to
handle these kind of situations. Um, yeah, you know what.

(01:44:23):
That's interesting. Uh, there are It's a good point. There
are previous issues of not being able to handle some
of these incidents. Just dumb. I mean, it's just poor
decision making. I think from both Jim Crane, the owner
on down with the Astros and with Myles Garrett. All right,
we'll take a few more your calls, will close out
the show next. Uh, this is OutKick. Appreciate you spending
your Friday morning with us on Fox Sports Radio. This

(01:44:46):
is Outkicked the coverage with Clay Traffics. We got only
a few more minutes. We've got a bunch of you
still want to weigh in, so be fast with me.
I'll finish off the week with your calls. Who got
dub we got bitten in Nashville? What you got for
me man, Hey, good um, how was a lifetime in

(01:45:07):
Franklin last night? And somebody was talking about Gallantine's Day?
So it was the perfect time to pick up girls
because they go out in single conglomerates as a perfect
time to take a girl home. Have you ever heard
of Gallantine's Day? Well, I think there's a yeah, thanks
to the call, there's definitely a lot of girls who
go outside because they don't have a They don't have

(01:45:28):
a date on Valentine's Day. So if you're a single man,
maybe you can take advantage of that. But I think
also there's a well, I don't know, yes, in general,
let me keep moving. Who's up next? Robert in New York?
Robert in New York? What you got for me? Yeah, Clay,
I think it might just be possible where he's put
himself in a situation where he can't take that comment back.

(01:45:48):
He kind of used that excuse that a racial slur
was used as a way to try to left any
impact of his actions from us, the fans, from you,
the media, and more importantly from the NFL as a
way to jump right then, thanks, thanks for called, but
then you don't have to do a sit down interview
with the ESPN. That's my point. Like, he's already made

(01:46:09):
that allegation. It's been refuted by the NFL. They said
there's no evidence to support it. It's been denied by
Mason Rudolph, and every other player who was on the
field has said they didn't hear anything. So if that's
all the case, you've made that allegation, it's been refuted largely,
why do you need to re make the allegation again

(01:46:29):
in a sit down interview. So I'm talking about Myles Garrett, like,
just move on, and it's a really bad decision. Like
I don't know who advises these owners these players. Again,
that's why I think I could kill it with Clay
Travis pr who's up next? Victor in l A victor?
What you got? So I just want to say that
with the Chenese scandal and everything as a yankeear as
a Dodger, especially Kate Christah, this is a very moral question,

(01:46:53):
the difficult question. What do you take away from this?
What do you do from this point forward? Like tea
or something. What do you take away? What's the best
way do you for you to this? And thank you
so much? Yeah, I think Major League Baseball just has
to start policing in an aggressive way the use of
technology and the dugouts. And I think that's the biggest

(01:47:13):
issue that you can take away from this is that
you can't have televisions, can't have cell phones, can't have
Apple watches, you can't have anything other probably from a
technological perspective, in the course of the game, other than
a phone to allow you to communicate with the dugout.
And I think you have to police that from both
player and coach perspective. Who's up next, a Obie? What

(01:47:35):
you got for me? Ma? Man? Morning? And today? I
appreciate that same um um in terms of mild Garrett
now understanding that I'm like justifying anything you said. But
if if that conversation was suppos to be inconfidence, does
the NFL have any fault for making that public? Well,
we don't know. You're talking about in the initial appeal process. Correct.

(01:47:58):
In other words, supposedly he's said that wasn't supposed to
go public, and the somehow the NFL somehow went public. Right,
But my my assumption is, yeah, it's a good call.
My assumption is anytime something goes public like that, who
benefits Certainly Mason Rudolph didn't benefit. Certainly the NFL didn't benefit.
So it seems to me that that was something that

(01:48:20):
went public from somebody associated with Miles Garrett in an
effort to lessen the punishment four Miles Garrett, because nobody
else benefits at all from that allegation going public. Right,
If you're trying to track down, like why a story
is out there and it involves multiple parties, usually the
person who benefits the most is typically responsible for a

(01:48:42):
getting out there. Not always, but usually, And that's what
I would say there. I think Myles Garrett's camp leaked it.
Who's up next? Alright, last one here? We got Tim
and Fort Lauderdale. Tim gotta be fast for me? What
you got Valentine's Day? Fifty six years old with the
same woman thirty years this holidays for all the young
folks dating engaged, you know, they they're they're sweetheart. My

(01:49:05):
wife and I got just as frustrated trying to go
out to dinner on Valentine's Day, the old switch rooney
on the menus, trying to get in a restaurant. We
do it the weekend before the weekend after I don't
I don't love her anymore on Valentine's I don't love
her any less on Valentine's It's uh, just my sweetheart
every day. And coincidentally, I tell everybody I out kicked

(01:49:26):
my coverage when I got her. Good for you, I
hope everybody out there is out kicking their coverage on
Valentine's Day. But if you are a guy and you
don't have a restaurant reservation right now, you might need
to try a hell, Mary, you might need to throw
out an idea. Baby, we're going away next week. You
better play in a vacation in a hurry. You better.
I didn't want to do anything to get us too

(01:49:47):
complicated on Valentine's We're going away for next weekend. I
already took care of it all, and you better take
care of it all today. That's a hell Mary, might
work for you, might not, But that's a play that
could potentially wor did you tell your wife you're gonna
take her on vacation next week? Next week, we're leaving tomorrow,
going to Mexico. Happy Valentine's, Baby, You, me and the

(01:50:08):
three kids were going down to the We're going down
to the Caribbean. Your vacation is her gift. That's right.
We're going out to a movie with the kids tonight,
all five of us. Well, let's be honest. Living with
me is its own Valentine's every single day. I am
glad you're Havis. This is Outkicked the coverage. I appreciate
all of you for hanging out with us. Download the podcast,
don't miss anything. I'll be back after a week off.
I'm headed to Mexico. This is OutKick on Fox Sports Radio.

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