06/20/2021 – The Jason Martin Show - Fox Sports Radio

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Fox Sports. What's happening. My name is
Jason Martin. This is the Jason Martin Show here on
Fox Sports Radio. I am in the plush confines here
in Nashville, Tennessee, Fox Sports Radio Studios, the crew, Brian Finley,
Bow Benson, Chris Perfett, they're in l A. I'm with

(00:21):
you for the next three hours and glad to be
with you. Blessed beyond measure all reason one. Otherwise, hope
you recognize that you are as well. You can find
me on Twitter at j mart Radio. And if I
sound a little jazz, because I am a little jazz
because sports was kind of fun last night, wasn't it.

(00:42):
But I know we have to break it down from
a bunch of different angles, and there's a whole lot
to get to around the sporting landscape over the next
three hours. So strap in, buckle up, here we go.
Game seven. I'm not going to call that a classic
because I don't know if it was all that well played.
Maybe I'm in the minority, but the second quarter for
the Milwaukee Bucks was one of the most unwatchable on offense,

(01:06):
one of the most unwatchable things that I can remember
in the history of the NBA, I know that covers
a lot of ground, and yeah, you can call it
recency bias, but it was putrid. They won the game, though.
Kevin Durant asked after the game a question that the

(01:28):
person who asked it was just trying to get a
certain answer because it was an obvious let's let's just
brass tacks. It was a dumb question. He's just like, Hey,
you gave it your all. You played fifty three minutes here.
You carried this team on your back throughout this series.
Does that make falling short a little easier to take?

(01:53):
Does it soften the blow? And I think we were
all Kevin duran in that moment when, while wearing a
Brooklyn That's hoodie, he barely even looked up to say
not at all? Who cares nearly have fifty played fifty

(02:15):
three minutes basically played this whole series, had to with
Kyrie out and with Harden a shell of himself because
of his hamstring. Kevin Durant did leave it out, all
out on the floor, and they still lost in Milwaukee
because Milwaukee, actually, especially in this postseason, has been really

(02:40):
lucky in terms of health. I say luck, because who
else can claim the same almost nobody. The Bucks advanced
one fifteen one eleven. The overtime was also uh its
share of not great in terms of shooting, but Anta

(03:02):
Ta Kumpo had forty Durant have forty eight, which is
the most ever scored in a game seven, and it
literally came down to a third of a foot. I
need to look up officially what the width of the
three point line is, because it was the tiptoe of

(03:25):
his shoe in regulation that was the difference between the
two and the three that would have changed the outcome
of the game. That's how close it came. And the
reason it came that close is because of whatever the
hell happened on the endbounds on the other side with
Brook Lopez. But I don't want to be too negative,

(03:47):
because that was why we watch sports, was drama like that.
Did the better team win, maybe the best the better
roster top to bottom did But obviously if the Nets
were healthy, all this tells you is that if Kyrie
is out there, if Harden's out there playing like Harden,
if Kevin Durant had just been what he was, and

(04:10):
you still have Blake Griffin. But then you have Blake
Griffin playing your four role and then you can fill
in the rest. Tend to think the Nets probably beat
the Bucks because what I was thinking while watching a
lot of this was, man, they need to blow this
Bucks team up. And I was all set for that
take after they lost because of the way it was

(04:31):
playing out. But it kept kind of ebbing and flowing.
As bad as that second quarter was from Milwaukee, they
were still in it. It seemed a lot closer than
it should have been considering the amount of jump shot
bricks and some and the free throw situation for where
Janice he was pretty solid in this game. But this

(04:54):
is a problem and it's just it's the big man syndrome.
Very few of them are able to shoot l from
the charity stripe, which again shows you how great Kevin
Durant is as a scorer, because that dude seven ft
but you honest is you know under fift. I think
for the series they're giving him a ten count throughout

(05:17):
Barclay Center because he's been hit with a ten second
violation twice on free throws because he takes forever at
the charity stripe. Now he starts making them and at
that point grand Hill on the TNT telecast says, maybe
they should stop doing that, and I agree. I think
if it stops working, maybe you just back off it.
A little bit. Seemed like Janice was sticking it in

(05:37):
their face more often as a result of all of it.
But his deficiencies are still the same. So that's why
I was sitting here. I was all set for the
take about all right, Buddinhills, what's gone? Is your honest
your number one, not if Middleton's your two, because Middleton's

(05:58):
still not at two. Middleton came up fairly big in
the second half compared to what he was playing in
the first half. I mean, him and Holiday in the
first half might as well not have even been on
the floor. But in the second half Holiday made some
shots down the stretch and Middleton played well on both
ends of the floor in the third and fourth quarters.

(06:19):
And of course he has had explosive games and he's
hit big shots. You will never convince me that he
is a number two in the way that a number
two is expected to play in the NBA. If you
put him on a team where he can be a three,
where you have a true number two and a true
number one, then you've got a champion, because that guy

(06:40):
is a hell of a player. He's just not a
number two in my opinion. He's closer to a two
and a half, and right now you have to be
better than that. That said Charles Barkley after the game, said,
get ready, I told you the Bucks were gonna win
the championship. That's what's going to happen here. Could be right,

(07:02):
but it took everything you, honest had to get to
his forty. It felt like the Bucks had to work
so hard on all these possessions, whereas when Durant was
doing it, he made what was difficult look easy, and
then he just came up about six inches short where

(07:23):
he was standing because he drilled the shot. Then he
went into overtime, and then the shot that he took
at the end, he's not gonna say it was fatigue.
Grant Hill said, it was fatigue. I don't know. I
wish you would have gotten a better shot in that situation,
But if it's Kevin Durant or somebody else with a
little bit better look, I still probably want Durant taking

(07:45):
that shot, even after playing fifty three minutes. It was
a low percentage shot, but Kevin Durant has made nine
figure contracts based on his ability to drill those shots
relative lee consistently. That really is That's the crux of it.

(08:06):
It came down to a shot he made him regulation,
but needed to be a little bit further back. And
then on the flip side, he couldn't make the big
one at the end of overtime when he was guarded
properly off balance after fifty three minutes of action. And
that's why the Bucks actually advance here. So the conference

(08:29):
finals will start on Wednesday, because we have another game
seven Lucky Us tonight in the East between Atlanta and Philadelphia.
Game will discuss here a little bit later. You couldn't
have asked for anything more than Kevin Durant gave you
if you were a Nets fan. James Harten. Actually, I've
got a lot of respect for James Harden out of
this series because he could have packed it in the

(08:54):
game where it looked like he wasn't gonna play, and
he he worked to get himself. He's like, I'm gonna
try it and warm ups and he ends up playing.
He didn't. He had five points in that game. I
think he made one shot and he was over eight
from three, but he was still out there. And then
in Game seven he basically played every minute of the game.
Now he was not himself, he was off on his sreies,

(09:16):
but he actually was playing a little bit of defense.
I came I came away with more respect for James
Harden than I had at any point when he was
in Houston in terms of just the attitude and all
of that. This was the opposite of a quid attitude.
James Harden gave it everything he had. He just didn't
have all that much with that hamstring. Had they had Irving,

(09:37):
I think we probably have a different result here, but
they didn't, and that's the breaks. Unfortunately, because it was
a very top heavy team. Those three guys were the
reason why everybody assumed what this team was going to do,
what they were going to be, how far they were
going to go. If one of them goes down, okay,

(09:59):
you've still got two All Stars on the floor. That's
the advantage here. It gives you the ability to lose
somebody and still be competitive. But can you win a
championship now in the NBA with just two guys. I
don't know if everybody is healthy across the league. But

(10:20):
that's not the case in the NBA right now, because
I don't think the Bucks as they were constructed, we're
going to get through whatever was left, whether it was
if they were somehow to get by Brooklyn. I don't
think they were getting to the championship if everybody was
healthy in the West. But they aren't. The Utah Jazz
aren't playing anymore because Donovan Mitchell, who was still giving

(10:42):
it as all his ankle, he was a game time
decision in the critical game. He played as hard as
he could, He scored a ton of points, just wasn't enough.
Coag goes down and all of a sudden, Paul George
does do enough, and then you get whatever that was
for Man and the eight one points I think it

(11:02):
was that was scored in the second half on Friday
against Utah to knock them out, which is one of
the more amazing things that you'll ever see, the amount
of points that the Jazz scored in the first half,
the twenty six point lead, If I'm not mistaken, I
believe it was, and then that come back. There have

(11:25):
been some storylines in this postseason. Unfortunately, a lot of
them have been who's available and who's not available for
a lot of these teams. You already knew going in
that Denver was gonna be hampered because they didn't have
Murray yet Porter Jr. Was playing better, but we're Yokich
and Porter Jorre gonna get them out of the West,
probably not the jazz. Gobert and Mitchell had to be great.

(11:49):
Conley needed to be healthy, and Conley is another guy that, unfortunately,
throughout his career, has dealt with injuries in crucial times
where he hasn't been a hundred percent scent when they've
needed him most. In Memphis, this was the story. It's
now that's been the story, unfortunately for him in Utah.
I don't like the term injury prone. I don't like

(12:11):
it because I feel like it's just bum luck. I
feel like some people's body just betrays them regardless of
how hard they work, how hard they train, how much
they do right, it doesn't matter. It's the old Dennis
Leary joke come to life. You can work out your
entire life, eat nothing but kale and greens and all

(12:33):
this kind of stuff, and you could be walking across
the street, get hit by a bus with somebody that
smokes ten packs a day behind the wheel. Sometimes luck
does play into it, and in this case really for
the Bucks. They were able to get the Nets not
at full health, but they also got the look that

(12:53):
Kevin Durant just barely was off his spot on the
two that was nearly a three that would have beaten
them because they actually deserved to lose after the inbounds
that had happened five seconds before that. But you do
get an overtime in a game seven, you get a

(13:14):
game that was dramatic and compelling because only one time
really did it look like the Nets maybe we're about
to pull away, because they were up nine I think
it was, and then there was a big three on
the other end from I think it was Pat Connaughton
who Pat Connaughton either made the three or air ball
at the three on Saturday. Did you notice that he
had I think two air balls and he made at
least three that were just perfect, so it was one

(13:37):
or the other. It was kind of Ynice's free throws.
He had two air ball free throws in this game,
and other than that he he shot him pretty well.
There were some odd just odd things, odd tendencies, odd
trends that were throughout this basketball game, but we were

(13:57):
able to sit there and watch something that was pretty compelling.
Brooklyn goes down. But you have to realize watching this
that Kevin Durant is the best basketball player in the world.
No one else can do what he was doing, especially
I mean, everyone knew he was going to have the
ball and he was going to try and score almost

(14:18):
every time. I mean, it's incredible what Janice can do
on his way to the rim and stuff. But the
the mid range game of Kevin Durant, his ability to
step up and shoot the three, his free throw percentage,
his ability to drive the lane, his his ability to
dunk on you and posterize you. Some of the shots
he made one where it looked like he literally shot
it sideways while he was falling backward at a different angle.

(14:41):
It was like he shot it from a ninety degree
angle based on where he was standing. It was unbelievable.
A couple of shots that he made, and there were
a few where he just glided around and hit these
follow ways that they've become so passe because he's so
good at them that you forget that the degree of
difficulty on those shots is like out of a hundred,

(15:05):
like you would be lucky to do that twice. A
good college basketball player will be lucky to do that
twice in their entire career. He's made a living on it,
and he probably did it six or seven times last
night alone, and still the Nets go home and the
Milwaukee Bucks advance. Those are my initial thoughts on the game.

(15:26):
I do want to get deeper into that out of
bounds play and some of the other things that I noticed,
and will do that when we come back. You can
tweet me, by the way, at j Mart Radio. Were
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(15:48):
Learn more at discover dot com. Slash yes Nielson Report
limitations apply again. Tweet me at j MAR Radio. The
telephone number we haven't done this a while is eight
seven seven ninety nine on Fox. That's nine on six
six nine. I'll be glad to chat with you as
well more on Game seven last night, and we'll start
to talk about Game seven tonight when we come back.

(16:09):
I'm Jason Martin, and this is Fox Sports Radio. Fox
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(16:30):
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(16:59):
Welcome back Jason Martin show here on Fox Sports Radio.
My name is Jason Martin. UM in Nashville, Tennessee. Home
on Twitter at j MAR Radio. We're talking Game seven.
A good bit of Game seven from last night on eleven.
The Bucks over the nets, so that sends Brooklyn, well,

(17:21):
dun sent them home and sends them back home from
where they were. They were in Brooklyn. They lost at home.
Milwaukee advances to play the winner of Atlanta and Philadelphia.
That game we played tonight on T and T. I
believe um the out of bounce. Listen the out of bounds.

(17:42):
Towards the end of this game, I think they were
like seven seconds left. They weren't gonna be able to
hold it. They had like two point one on the
clock on the shot clock day, meaning the Bucks. The
ball gets inbounded to Brookly Lopez in the corner. Brooko
Opez holds onto it like you don't know what to do.

(18:02):
He kind of like looks around a little bit, and
then he passes it out to the right elbow beyond
the three point line, and the shot clock expires. At
this point, the Bucks are up one O nine, one
of seven. And after that's where Durant goes and hits
the two that was nearly a three that would have

(18:24):
changed the tenor of the of this entire last twenty
five minutes of radio, to say the least. And I'm
watching this, and I'm old enough now that I don't
talk to the screen very often, like it does happen,
but not as often. I'll talk to my wife. We'll
be talking about the sporting event that we're watching, or

(18:44):
whatever it is that we're watching. But it's kind of
like you're in a room and you're watching an episode
of the Office or Seinfeldt or something like that. If
it's just you hanging out, are you laughing out loud?
Or do you just register that that was funny and
then move on it. I kind of have hit that
phase of my life where it's number two. I don't
usually just laugh out loud at stuff. I mean, at

(19:09):
jokes in front of other people. With other people, yeah,
you laugh, But like, am I laughing at TV shows
when it's just me? No, me and the wife, Okay,
yeah we might laugh, So I don't. I don't scream
at the television when it comes to sports either all
that often. But when I saw this, I was like,
what the hell are you doing? And I imagine that

(19:32):
not only was I not alone, at least three quarters
of the people that were watching that broadcast on t
NT we're doing some version of what I was doing.
If you happen to be a Bucks fan, it was
probably much more explicit. Dudes make a whole lot of
money to coach, to prepare, to draft guys, to sign guys,

(20:02):
they make money to play, and a lot of them
make really good decisions. And maybe it's just because when
you see a bad one, it's so easy to spot.
But when something gets executed like this, I'm just like,
all right, whose head needs to be on the chopping

(20:22):
block here? Does everyone associated with this inbounds play need
to be fired? Like right now? I'm not the guy
that generally wants to call for people's job, but I'm
just like they. Okay. So, so Chris Middleton goes on
TC after the game and he's talking to the crew. Everybody.
They do their usual deal where Earning out the question
and then Shock, then Charles and Kenny and then dudes out.

(20:45):
So Middleton's talking and I think it was Shack asked
him the question. He goes, did you think brook Lopez
new this situation at the end of regulation and knew
that he needed to shoot the ball quick? And Middleton says,
we we thought he knew what we sure thought he knew? Huh?

(21:14):
All right, So if that's true, who's responsible for making
sure that the guys on the floor understand, Hey, guys,
when we get out of this, because we called a
time out here, right, so we can make sure that
we get this out of bounds play perfect. We do
have one of the best players in the world, especially
a dude that had caught an inbounds play from the
from the opposite baseline but basically the exact same play

(21:35):
in the fourth quarter and dunked it with one hand
and an alley You bought the inbound. Hey, guys, we
got two point one seconds left on the shot clock.
We've got to make sure that we get something off.
Maybe we get a rebound, if nothing else, we can't.
We gotta make sure the shot clock doesn't expire. That's
the one thing we can't do. All right, two point
one seconds break? Are you telling? And that didn't happen?

(22:02):
Remember the j R. Smith play with Lebron years ago
that led to the meme game one Cleveland Golden State.
This was as like, was there a coaching error? There
was there a coaching male practice there? Who's responsible for
brook Lopez? No, when there's two point one seconds left

(22:24):
on the shot clock? First off, I would say brook Lopez, Like,
I've never played in the NBA, but I imagine I
would always be cognizant of what was happening on the
scoreboard and on the shot clock and on the game clock.
Those are those are those are pieces of information I'm
not sure that I should be without at any point,

(22:46):
at any time in any game. And I know they
won the game. And why am I talking about it?
I'm talking about this because it's just mind boggling. It
irritated me watching an aptitude of this level because brook
Lopez a pro. Do you know that brook Lopez is
the all time leading score in the history of the

(23:07):
Nets franchise? How about that storyline knocking them out of
game seven? We're in the other uniform, but boy, he
tried to put a Net uniform on at the end
of regulation. He tried to give them one more shining
moment in a Brooklyn in the Brooklyn Union. But if

(23:28):
Brooke doesn't know, okay, then who becomes the next line
of defense? Like if you ever see and you've seen
this before, like movies or products or something like that
hits the market and he just like, how did that
get past focus testing? How did that get past the
first line of critics? How did that How did that

(23:50):
make it to market? How did that get past the
assembly line? How did that get past the idea stage?
If somebody suggested that you're just like, you know what, No,
we're not gonna do that. Why didn't that have been
before this awful thing happened. There have to be layers
to save people from themselves. We were thinking about this.

(24:13):
So we're looking for a nanny right now, and it's
a it's an ordeal. You gotta make sure somebody you trust.
The money has to be right, but the money is
quite high, especially in the city I happen to live
in in Nashville, because everyone wants to live here, so
everyone needs childcare as well. We're looking for a nanny

(24:36):
and our job and and I even said this to
my wife last night, was just like, here's the deal.
A nanny's role is to is to take things off
the plate of the parent, to make the parent a
little more comfortable, to do a few things to help
the baby get onto a routine, that kind of thing.

(24:58):
A radio producer one, you know, I've I've served in
that role. And now I have what I believe to
be a fantastic group in Los Angeles to work for
me and work with me here at Fox two or
three of them. Actually the whole crew might actually be
smarter than me. But that's a that's an issue for
a different day. And then my producer that I worked

(25:21):
with on a daily basis in Nashville is as talented
as anybody I've ever been around in the business. What's
a producer's job? That guy actually said it to me
this way. He said, my job is to make you comfortable,
to make the host comfortable, to save you from yourself.
To see things first, it's like a catcher. Okay, I

(25:42):
see the tendency of the batter, so I'm gonna throw
you up. Yeah, I see what's coming from the deal.
But it's me and the picture, right, We're gonna make
the decision as to what the next pitch is gonna be.
I'm gonna make the picture as comfortable as I can.
I'm gonna give him, I'm gonna give him the target
where he wants it. Our communication is gonna be too,
is liking. Everything's gonna be to make him more comfortable.

(26:05):
So what's the job of a coach. It has to
be to make the players comfortable. They're already stressed enough.
Their egos. Every misshot. Knowing how many people saw it,
especially something like Janice the free throw line and what
he's going through and all of that. They don't need

(26:26):
the added pressure. They need common sense to be taken
care of for them. They don't need to have to
make those decisions every time, not when there is opportune
time to remind them of the situation. And at first
I was just like, well, Brook Lopez may have just
had a brain for it, and this just happened and
he knew exactly what was going on, And that may

(26:46):
actually be the case. But Middleton saying in the postgame interview,
we we thought he knew the situation, good lord, like
somebody and it was not bootolser than one of his assistants.
Needs to make him comfortable, make him more comfortable by

(27:07):
making sure that his job is covered. Also, there's always
a second layer, there's always a third layer. But somehow
that product got to market and it led to almost
the end of the Bucks season after forty eight hard
minutes of basketball, or I guess you would say forty
seven minutes and fifty three seconds of hard basketball. Honestly,

(27:33):
if if this were a balled on life situation, Durant
would have been three inches further back and that would
have been the three. Because the Bucks deserved to lose
because of that The storyline was written as what was
that out of bounds play that then gave Durant the
shot on the other end because the shot clock viola

(27:56):
should stop the clock that we're able to set up
take that thing from half court. The only thing, the
only thing that happened was Durant wasn't quite far enough
back to turn that into a catastrophe. They survive it,
and we won't think about it again after tonight because
the Bucks ended up winning the game in overtime. That's

(28:22):
that's the difference between being a goat for a long
time or a scapegoat for a long time, or people
just moving on to the next round. I know, I
just spent a good bit of time on it because
I don't think it's gonna get talked about all that much.
But it was the number one thing that I thought
about after the game was good lord, the luckiest guy
in the building is Brook Lopez. And there cannot be

(28:47):
that kind of disconnect at the end of a basketball
game between a smart player and a coaching staff making
a lot of money to be intelligent. That's the kind
of thing that can't happen. Grant Hill, you and said
them on the broadcast. He goes you that that can't happen, Amen,
Like I thought I said that too. It was just say,
how how does that happen? It's just a reminder, you know,

(29:12):
you might get star struck when you're around an athlete
or whatever because they're somebody you've just grown up watching.
You so appreciate what they've done. You've getting gotten so
much entertainment. But they do put on shoes the same
way you do. They went to school when they were
kids just like you did. They did some of the
same dumb stuff that you did. Like, there's not that

(29:32):
much that separates you and them except the lifestyle created
by the money that they're ridiculous talent brought them. And
it was in that moment where it's just like, I
promise you I could have done what Brook Lopez done.
In fact, I would have gotten that shot off. Now
it probably would have been blocked into the tenth row,
but I would have known the situation. It was at

(29:52):
that moment that I thought, hey, you know what, I'm
actually smarter than that dude. In this moment, I would
have been better for them in uniform. Then the former
All Star that is in the corner that let that
shot clock run out. I don't want my shot clock
to run out. So let's go to Brian Finlay and
catch up on the latest, including obviously the Bucks advancing. Yeah,
let's start there and I'll try to take the shot

(30:15):
and make the shot if it comes down to me.
In the final moments, the Bucks flushed down the nets
one one eleven in overtime. In Game seven to strut
into the Eastern Conference Finals. Janic saident to Kompo, excelling
with forty points, thirteen rebounds and five assists. Kevin Durant
exploding for forty eight points. He hit that long two
to four sot as Jason was mentioning, but then he

(30:37):
airbawled a potential game winner in the extra session. Durant
went over six from the floor in overtime. After the game,
Milwaukee's Chris Middleton said, quote, they in Brooklyn made a
couple of plays where you think that they were going
to win the game, but we just stayed with it.
We were down a majority of the game and late
in the fourth quarter, but we stayed resilient. We made

(30:59):
plays down the stretch. Close quote Chris Paul and Kwhi.
Leonard will not dress for Sunday's Game one of the
Western Conference Finals between the Clippers and Sons. Paul is
sidelined because of a COVID nineteen related matter and Leonard
is dealing with a knee issue. Russell Henley Louis Use
Stays and then Mackenzie Hughes share the lead at Golf's
US Open at Tory Pines in San Diego. All three

(31:21):
are at five under overall heading into Sunday's final round.
Bryce and to Shambo stands two shots off the pace,
as does Rory McElroy. On the ice, the Islanders flogged
the Lightning three to two, even their Stanley Cup Semifinals
at two games. On the Diamond, the diamond Backs free
fall to a sixteenth straight loss after stumbling to the

(31:42):
Dodgers nine to three l a picture. Walker Bueller had
his no hitter taken away in the eighth inning after
Arizona finally mustered up a hit, Showhyotani hits a home
run as the Angels contort the Tigers eight to three,
and the Padres upstage the red seven to five. But
some bad news for San Diego as Fernando Tatis Jr.

(32:03):
Their Star came out of the game dealing with that
injury to his shoulder reaggravated it, and we're still trying
to figure out how long he could miss or what
the diagnosis is. Let's get back to a man who
is dominating in Nashville and on Fox Sports Radio. It's
Jason Martin Finley. What were you thinking on that out

(32:23):
of bounce play. The fact that there was miscommunication, no,
the fact, I don't know what it was, the fact
that broke Loope Brook lopezs apparently didn't realize there was
two seconds left on the shot clock and the Bucks
almost lost the game because of that. That mistake. You know,
it's indescribable, But guys just brain fart. And I was

(32:44):
at a high school basketball game before I came in,
and I you see it all the time at the
high school level. Even coaches are screaming to their players.
But it's an indescribable thing. Jason, you can't really explain it.
It's just you. Your mind goes dumb, your brain goes blank.
And I don't really have a way to describe it
because I don't think the player themselves can describe it.

(33:05):
It's just something that happens, and there's really no excuse. Well,
if you look at his face, it was like he
didn't even realize, like he barely knew he was on
a basketball court when they looked at him. I had
never in my life thought, dude, you look more like
Bullshannon from Night Chord in this moment than you ever
have in your life. And now I've ruined brook Lopez

(33:27):
for you forever. If you're listening to me right now
on Fox Sports Radio as Finley has to uh, for
the next two hours, of course we'll catch up with
him again. Uh. Look up Bullshannon from Night Court Richard Mole,
and then look up Brook Lopez, and you tell me.
I'm not sure that they're different people, especially now with
the hair difference in everything else, but in that moment,

(33:48):
I'm pretty much. I feel resolute that Richard Mole could
have handled that scenario better than Brook Lopez did for
the Bucks near the end of that game, And like
I said, if if Karma had anything to do with
it at all, Kevin Durant would have then made the
three instead of the two. But it was close. It

(34:12):
was three inches. I think Barkley joked, if he just
wore a half size sneaker smaller. Then the Nets are advancing,
but the last the Bucks get it done. Now they
go to the conference finals and it's wide open for him,
and I still look at him and say, I don't
think that's a championship team for very much longer. If

(34:32):
I'm if I'm Jnest, I don't know how I feel
about it. If I'm boden Holzer, I'm certainly not really
sure about my job. Even though the thought was it
was this game where he was coaching for his job.
I don't know if he gets into the five, if
he's into the finals now, okay, conference finals against the
Philadelphia team where I we I asked last week, would

(34:54):
you want Benn Simmons on your team? I didn't realize
it's gonna be that bad a week for Ben Simmons
after I said that. But we're gonna talk more about
Ben Simmons as a result. But I mean, you look
at that Sixers team of the way that they've played,
and then Trey Young and what he's doing with Atlanta
is awesome, but that's not a great roster, like the
Bucks don't have an excuse to get to the NBA finals.

(35:19):
And then you get there, all right, Chris Paul's gonna
miss Game one for Phoenix. Kauai is out at least
for now, He's not even traveling to start the series
for the Clippers. The Bucks should win it this year,
but I still, like I said, I look at that team,
and I say long term, I don't know, because Drew
Holiday didn't feel like he was worth the money. I know, Yes,

(35:39):
he made a couple of big shots late, and that's
what you paid him to do. I mean, I would
pay him to have um made some consistent shots, not
almost been a detriment on the floor the way that
he was throughout a lot of this series. I'm just
not as sure about the Bucks. But I'm not surprised
at all now if they were to go ahead and

(36:02):
win the championship, like of course, of course, even with
their deficiencies and some holes in there in there game
and their team that could definitely be exploited, getting past
the nets is huge. It took everything that they had,
and I think it took Kyrie getting hurt and hardened

(36:24):
being hampered, but they got it done despite Kevin Durant
having a historic night in a Game seven, just off
a two to a three. We have a completely different
last forty three minutes, except I'm still doing the brook
Lopez take. In fact, it's even more vociferous than it
was just now. When we come back, I'll try again

(36:46):
to realize that we have a certain amount of time
before the top of the hour, so I need to
make sure I get a shot off, unlike brook Lopez,
who was saved last night by about three inches of
Kevin Durant shoe and then fatigue after fifty three. It
to Kevin Durant that kept him from making a big
bucket at the end of overtime and the Buck's advance.
So we'll forget about this because this could have been

(37:09):
j R. Smith's two point oh and instead it's okay,
oh that that Yeah, it did happen, but they won
the game. Saved is what I'm telling you. Will be
right back. I'm Jason Martin, and this is Fox Sports Radio.
Well played, Chris, give the man a raise. I try
night Court Dame for brook Lopez, A K. Richard, maul

(37:30):
A k Hey, Bullshannon. It's a beautiful thing. Also eighties
television things. We can do a full hour on it.
Maybe we should be better than talking about that inbounds playing.
I can tell you that. Yeah, keep it going. It's
a beautiful thing, not a beautiful thing. I got nothing

(37:55):
against Nick, right, I know he works for Fox. I
just gotta say he put a tweet out and said
the best thing the Nets could do this offseason is
the thing they won't do, which just tell Steve Nash thanks,
he did an admirable job and he'll be a great
assistant coach on new Nets head coach Rick Carlisle's staff.
And then he writes Nash is their biggest weakness. No, Nick,
injuries of the biggest weakness. You may not you Maybe

(38:19):
Nash is not the second coming of Red hour Bach.
Maybe he's running Mike d'antoni's offensive system. But he was
the first year of coach that probably wasn't there at
any point to be a great coach. He was there
to manage egos, to manage personalities, and as a likable guy,

(38:41):
seemed like he handled that pretty well. You can say
he was a weakness. You can't say he was the
biggest weakness, even if you didn't like him. I'm saying
there's some people that are saying, how was Harris still
in the game, How was he playing that big a minutes.
We was the best catching shoot guy in the NBA
last year or this past season, and I think in
Game one he shot in Game two he shot high

(39:03):
forties from three. He was just off late in the series.
Who were you gonna put in for him? You want
to give speedy class in a bunch more minutes. Nash
was not necessarily in a spot where he was pulling
a bunch of great bodies off the bench. Could he
have pulled some bigger dudes out there to grab some rebounds, yes,

(39:26):
But they're also I see people dogging Nash for not
finding a way to get Kevin Durant a break. Do
you think Kevin Durant just kind of said, na, coach,
I'm gonna go ahead and go because he knew what
we all knew, which is he had to be in there.
Maybe there are some things that well, I'm sure there

(39:48):
are things that Nash could have done better, but it
was his first year. There are a lot of guys
that have gotten better. Like we're starting to see how
good Tylu is right now. It was hard for him
to get credit for anything that he used to do.
He has the same thing. Eric Spoilster's a hell of
a coach too, but it was hard to see it.
Nash will probably get better, But I must disagree with

(40:13):
our colleague Nick right when he says Nash is their
biggest weakness. No, Kyrie Irving's ankle and James Harden's hamstring
were the biggest weakness for the Nets. I thought it
was a bit of a flawed premise in terms of
that team in the first place, just because there's one
basketball But those three guys seem to be they They

(40:35):
exceeded my expectations for what they were gonna be as teammates.
And again I came out of this series with more
respect for Hardened because he played as hard as he could.
He didn't he didn't play decoy. He just wasn't himself
with that hamstring issue. And we already knew what Durant was.
So if you want to dog out Nash now, I

(40:55):
mean you can, but you can't get away with saying
he's their biggest weakness, because I still think many of
us think this series is a totally different one if
Kyrie actually plays and Hardness hamstrings. Okay, so okay, maybe
not the greatest coach in the n b A, but
I'm gonna take the injuries in terms of the nets
biggest weakness. What's happening? I remember two of the program

(41:20):
Jason Martin Show here on Fox Sports Radio. I'm in Nashville, Tennessee,
and the FSR studio is glad to be with you.
The crew, I'm glad to be with them. Bo Benson,
Brian Finley, Christoper Fett. Put them in any order. They're fantastic.
You can put me forth in that list. I'm on
Twitter at j mart Radio. We're brought to you by Discover.
Discover matches. All the cash back you earn on your

(41:41):
credit card at the end of your first year. That's amazing.
Discovers accepted now places in the US to take credit
cards to learn more. Discover dot com slash Yes. Neilson
Report limitations apply. This from Mark Stein to New York Times.
Just saw this sweet pop up about ten minutes ago
or so. Still still ring at the Game seven box
score and still struggling to process it. Five of the

(42:04):
ten starters tonight played at least fifty minutes. That meaning
Game seven last night. Five dudes played at least fifty
minutes in an NBA game. More ridiculous than that I
saw this stat when I was looking through the box scores.
There was only one guy between these two teams, one

(42:29):
that scored off the bench. One for the nets Green
Claxton Shammont didn't scored all on Compa. The brother didn't score,
Forbes didn't score. Pat Connaughton is the only one. Remember
I told you it was either airball or he drilled it. Yep.

(42:50):
He made three threes any airball the other two that
he took, and he was the only guy that wasn't
a starter in this game to score out of a
overtime games seven game. You want to talk about shortening
the bench, that's wild man. Harden played fifty three. Durant

(43:14):
played fifty three Brown, who at times looked good. It
seemed like every time he did something good, he then
did something bad. Once he made it. He he had
like two or three of these tear drop rebounds where
he would just the ball would end up in his
hands and he would just kind of floated over. It
was almost like the old Tony Parker shot. He had

(43:36):
three or four of those in this game, and then
at least once or twice after he had bad turnovers,
and once he was after he had scored on one end,
he immediately missed a pass from Durant on the other,
and Durant was barking at him as they were coming
back down the floor because he was irate it the turnover.

(43:57):
And Jeff Green, who of course has played with Durant
in the past, he was in there for a bit,
but he didn't do very much in this thirteen minutes.
So again, Harden and Durant both played all fifty three.
Brown played fifty two, Middleton played fifty two, Jannis played
fifty and then you had Joe Harris played forty seven,

(44:20):
Drew Holiday played brook Lopez Paid played forty six. Like
good gracious mix in a bench. There were some other
guys as you could have seen potentially that could have
helped in this game, but no dice on that. I
don't know why Onto compos brother needs to be in there,

(44:42):
but apparently he does. I mean I asked that, or
I say, I don't know why, but I kind of
answered it when I said Onto Skumpo's brother, at least
I'm pretty sure. So those are some stats, right here's
some other stats. Ben Simmons at the free throw line
right now is doing some things that you just have

(45:11):
to say last week, I didn't realize I was gonna
be this prophetic when I said, would you want Ben
Simmons on your team? Based on how he has to
be motivated towards offense. He's shooting thirty two from the

(45:35):
free throw line in the playoffs, only I think Ben
Wallace is worse, and he's actually what's funny is Ben
Wallace is a guy I was going to compare him
to and didn't even realize this stat until I went
to look it up during the last break. But I
was thinking about Ben Wallace early because I'm like Cospet's

(45:57):
basically what you have with Ben Simmons. You have a
guy that does a whole lot of things right, but
he is almost it's almost like offense would make him sick,
so he just can't do it. He's never been good
at the free throw line, but right now, I mean,
you want to talk about bad, this is bad. And

(46:23):
now he's afraid to take them so he's not driving,
which is the one thing he can do is make
layups and get to the rack, and he doesn't want
to do that because why wouldn't you foul him? I mean,
they asked that question to Steve Nash on T and
T when he talked after the first quarter or whatever
it was, or it may have actually been it was

(46:46):
in the fourth quarter. They talked to him, right, it's
the fourth quarter was starting and he's and they asked,
you know, are you gonna employ pretty much a hack
a shack on your honest and he said, well, we
do have that option available. But Janest was actually shooting
free throws pretty well. But in Game five, I think
it was, Simmons went four for fourteen from the line

(47:10):
in the playoffs. And this is prior to Game six,
he had missed forty five free throws forty five. The
entire Hawks team has only missed thirty five, the Sons
have only missed twenty nine, and the Nets that only
missed twenty two. Entering last night's game, Simmons, if he's

(47:37):
not getting to the rim, if he's not aggressive because
he's afraid of going to the foul line, if he's
actually gun shy, then my goodness, you've got a big
problem if you're Doc Rivers. And at this point, and
I actually heard Barkley mentioned this last night, why has

(47:58):
this been allowed to go on for so long? And
this goes back to the former coaching staff, because how
was this happening? Why were you not forcing him to

(48:20):
shoot more often and and putting him in this situation
like Brett Brown was there and you were like, oh,
you know, he's doing a pretty good job. This is
how Barkley said, and I think this is actually worthy, imenious.
This is what he said last night on T and T.
He's just like, whoever the coaches, if I was the coach,

(48:41):
when we're in practice and Ben Simmons gives up, gives
up a jump shot, doesn't take when he's supposed to take.
I stopped practice right there and we go back and
re re redo that play, and I annoy him so
much with that that he actually just starts shooting the
ball because he should not be this far into his
career and be this guy you think, maybe he's only

(49:08):
been in the league for a couple of years, but dude,
he's been in the league for a while. Like this
is now, this is a problem. This is not you're
getting to where is it even fixable anymore. It doesn't
mean he was ever going to become a great shooter,
but was he going to become a little more confident
his confidence is shot. Dude. He was taken in twenty

(49:31):
sixteen as a topic in the draft. Now he's only
twenty four years old because he was so young when
he came into the league. But this is five seasons
in and he's afraid to shoot the ball, and he's
afraid to drive the ball because he might get fouled,
and goes to the free throw line where he makes

(49:53):
like one out of three and a half. What do
you supposed to do with this? I know you see
it and you see value because of what he can
do defensively, how he handles the ball, his vision, his
size at six eleven, to be able to handle the

(50:15):
ball the way he does, like you put him on
the right roster. It's it's so easy to get enamored
with it, but can you help him offensively or is
he going to be that big of a problem. They're
having to find guys to sort of fill in the

(50:37):
gaps around Ben Simmons on the offensive end of the floor.
Game seven between the Hawks and the Sixers is big
for a lot of guys, but it's the most important
sporting night on the floor of Ben Simmons's career. He

(51:02):
has the opportunity to shut people up. And really, I
don't know if he's as worried about people as he
is whatever voices are in his mind that have destroyed
his confidence. There were always the rumors that maybe he
was the asan kid here, he was Jason Kidd without
the jay, you know, as they called a Mason Kidd.

(51:23):
But Ben Simmons is way worse offensive player than Jason
Kidd was thirty two from the free throw line. Tyrese
Maxie is a way that they're trying to to compensate

(51:43):
for the deficiencies to Ben Simmons on the basketball floor
because he's willing to do what he has to do,
and he was solid on defense against Trey Young. So
when Simmons ends up in foul trouble, they're able to
put him back in there, and Maxie actually does all right.

(52:04):
He played thirty minutes Simmons only played. He had sixteen points,
and he pressured Trey Young to the point where if
you google Ben Simmons, two or three of the top
news stories are opinion pieces asking the questions, should Tyrese

(52:25):
Maxie start Game seven? I just wonder what's going through
Ben simmons head right now. Last week, it was sort
of no, I wouldn't want that guy on my team
because it seems like you have to motivate him to
shoot the ball. I didn't realize it was as bad
as it actually has been because this past week has
been even more illuminating to the things that I was

(52:46):
seeing that are now being confirmed. We're all seeing it
right before our eyes. We know what himbid can be
when he's healthy and you you have seen flashes of
Ben Simmons going full on aggressive towards the rack, but
that was a couple of years ago. We haven't seen
that in a while. So what is he going to

(53:08):
give you in Game seven? If you had to put
money on one of these teams, who has the killer
instinct in this series? The answers Trey Young, Max. He
is gonna have to do an unbelievable job. Everybody's have
to do a good job because Trey Young is gonna
go out there and try to get forty five. I mean,

(53:31):
we can predict the game at the end of the show.
But the guy that I I'm most would be this
is gonna be very clunky, But I would most be
least surprised to see dominate this game would betray. The
one I would be most surprised to see dominate this

(53:52):
game would be Ben Simmons. And if he goes up
and he steps up and he makes free throws at
the clip that Janice did last night, maybe avoiding the
air balls. I like the second air ball where grand
Hills just like he's just tired. He's fatigue, no, no grant.
He he had one of those earlier in the game too.
He's just really bad at free throw shooting. They'll be

(54:16):
spurts where he's good, but it won't be consistent probably
throughout his career. That was the shock thing. You know,
Shock made him when he had to, is what he
always said. He would go through stretches where he would
seemingly make everyone, but then he would go like a
month and a half where you probably couldn't remember a
free throw that he made. Ben Simmons is always probably

(54:36):
going to be an inconsistent offensive player, but I need
him to be consistently aggressive. If I'm a Sixers fan,
if I'm Doc Rivers, if I'm Joe l Embiid or
anybody else wearing a Sixers jersey tonight, I need Ben
Simmons to be aggressive if he misses, he misses, but
I want him to get his confidence back. Maybe he'll

(54:59):
see one go through the net and that will help
him out. Right now, he's helping nobody out, and I'm
sure it's tough on him, Like nobody. Nobody wants to
be a topic because of this, not when you know
how talented you are in so many other ways. But

(55:21):
as I have said many times about many different things,
it's always the negative that sticks with you. It's not
the positive. A million of you could send me very
kind messages and one could say something negative, and the
only thing I'm gonna remember is a negative thing. Every
single time. Ben Simmons knows how athletic he is, he

(55:41):
understands how gifted he is, he knows about his vision,
He hears all those compliments. You can't ever get enough compliments,
but that one piece of criticism can dog you out
and bum you out. And I I feel a little
bit sorry for Ben Simmons because I don't think this
is how he wants to play. But once it gets

(56:03):
in your mind, it can be a significant problem. And
it's actually happened with the Sixers twice. Remember Marquel Foltz.
A couple of these top picks haven't worked out. It
seems like there was a trust the process and boy,
the Sixers are gonna dominate the East. And now it's
maybe the Spurs are gonna acquire Ben Simmons and try
to save his career. But this game tonight, Trey Young's

(56:29):
will have a whole lot of highlight tennis career. Joe
Embi's gonna have a whole lot of highlight tennis career.
This game, to me, the narrative of this game, it's
the most important night of Ben simmons career, just to
try and stop the bleeding. I'm Jason Martin and this

(56:49):
is Fox Sports Radio looking it up officially now twenty
four of seventy one from the free throw line is
Ben Simmons. This postseason of seventy one not on the
floor with the season on the line for the Sixers

(57:10):
just tells you what's going on here and it probably
shows that. I mean, dude, they they had a rookie
in who was a late first round or not not
cock of the walk material in terms of coming out

(57:30):
of the draft, a name that you knew instead of
the trust the process guy where they have a hundred
and seventy seven million dollars per y'allhoo Sports committed to
through two thousand and twenty four season on the line,
that guy is not on the floor. And then I

(57:51):
tell you twenty four seventy one from the free throw line.
You're like, Okay, I get it, he's shooting now that
that that actually helped his free throw percentage now to
a robust thirty three point eight through six games. You
tell me who has a bigger task in front of them,

(58:15):
a more important night in front of them. Then Ben
Simmons does tonight for Philadelphia. I mean, I could wait,
but I know there won't be an answer. And like
I said, I feel for him because I know it's
between the years. He's probably never he was. I mean,

(58:37):
he was flawed as an offensive player from the jump,
but when he was explosive, he didn't have to shoot
well because he was able to get to the rack.
I mean, Janice doesn't shoot well, but he can do
these crazy spin moves and he it's almost like he
glides in air at will, and he ends up with

(58:58):
forty points. Anyway, I mean, if Simmons could just get
you twenty, you'd feel all right. But I think he's
averaging maybe thirteen for the season in a league where
you have to score, that's just not enough. What was
the knock on the Bucks was the Bucks average like
a hundred and twenty points in a regular season, and
somehow the Nets and their vaunted defense held him under

(59:20):
a hundred. They were averaging like nine two for the
first half of this series. I think it got up
to a hundred now, and of course they've won the series. Yes,
you do have to play defense, and Ben Simmons is
exquisited doing that. But you've got to score in this league.
You just do because if you don't, some dude with
the last name of Man is gonna go crazy and

(59:41):
the Clippers are gonna score over eighty in the second
half and send you home even when you do score
seventy two in the first half. You can't have a
guy like that, with that much money committed to him,
where he can't score, or where he is reticent to try,
where he's fearful and gun shy. And I'm afraid that's

(01:00:03):
kind of where we are with Ben Simmons. So I
can't wait to see Game seven, just to watch number
twenty five and see what it is that he comes
to the yard with what he comes to the floor with,
whether or not he presses or if he's just aggressive,
and he says, screw it. If they found me, they

(01:00:25):
found me. I'll do what I can at the line.
If it's bad, dude, it's not gonna get worse than
it is right now. That's the good news. You might
as well just start shooting him. You're already shooting thirty
like it's historically bad today, So how much worse they're
gonna get. We're already talking about how bad your free
throw shooting is, so you might as well just keep

(01:00:46):
on shooting him. At least let them value get him
into fault like I would just drive every single time
because they're gonna hack you every time. Go ahead and
foul them all out. Let that become you do, because
you can't continue to be that level of albatross. Albatross

(01:01:13):
an interesting word, and it's kind of a segue. The
Aaron Rodgers situation continues to be an albatross around the
green Bay Packers. You're seeing the president of the team
come out and say it's divided the fan base. I've
seen a lot of reporters in Green Bay saying the
fans have turned on Aaron Rodgers. I think there are

(01:01:38):
a couple of different stories happening right now in sports
that are all based on the same central, overarching theme,
and that is players are testing the limits of their power.
They're testing the limits of their leverage to find out
whether or not they can control their destiny a bit

(01:02:00):
more than they ever had before. And they are following
the NBA model in the NFL, where the players association
is not as strong, where it's a lot more splintered
and fractured, and where the deal is nowhere near as
favorable to the players as it is in the NBA.

(01:02:21):
At least, You've got the Aaron Rodgers situation before everything
else went down. You had the Deshaun Watson situation. You
had the Russell Wilson situation, which you're gonna have again
because this was the prelude to him leaving Seattle after

(01:02:43):
this year. I believe you've got the vaccine stuff that's
going on, the Cole Beasley being the latest example of it,
but Montes Sweat and others that are challenging and saying
things that are deemed unpopular. There's just a lot of

(01:03:06):
this happening right now in sports, guys are testing the
limits of their leverage. The newest example is Zion Williamson
his family saying they would like him to play for
another team. Almost never when a professional athletes family speaks

(01:03:26):
and it's released publicly, very rarely at least, is that
a good thing for the athlete or does it connote
a good story or a positive story? I should say
good story is different. Good could be entertaining, but not positive.
Do you think that they said this out of nowhere?

(01:03:49):
I don't know who the family members are. Some family
members is what I saw in the report. They're saying, hey,
you know they haven't done enough around Zion Williamson. And
I'm thinking to myself, you didn't play him very much
when you did get him back from injury. Then you
were really low managing him Steven Strassburg kind of ways

(01:04:14):
where you would put him in, he would go crazy,
then you would take him out for the last seven
minutes because he hit his minute restriction while he was
on fire, and then you would lose the game. Because
I did multiple shows last year where I'm like, all right,
just shut him down for the season. Why are you
playing him at all, if you're not playing him in
those final minutes. Yeah, yeah, j Mark. But he could

(01:04:34):
get hurt, right, he could get hurt in the second quarter. Two?
Why do you have a minute's limit on him? Is
he more likely to get hurt if he plays twenty
six minutes instead of nineteen? That was my argument then,
and then this past year he did have a good year.
I mean, Brandon Ingram is a good player, a Lonzo's whatever.

(01:04:58):
Was the coach a good higher obviously not standing Van
Gundy's out, always thought he was better as an analyst
of basketball than he ever has been as a coach.
So I'm not surprised that didn't work out. But it's
a little bit soon, don't you think to start having

(01:05:19):
this conversation. And again you wonder, I mean, did this
come up at the dinner table when Zion started talking?
And then the family took it somewhere else because certainly
they'd like see him in New York just as one example.
There are actually two examples this week in the NBA
alone of potential leverage place Luca Dodge, who's the other one?

(01:05:43):
There's a max on the table. Is he gonna take it?
Is Rick Carlyle's exit a function of a rift between
head coach and superstar. Maybe Luca wasn't playing Rick carl
Lyle's Brandon ball. The comparisons of Luca too Dark are

(01:06:08):
certainly always going to be there. But lucas kind of
a different player. He's also a little bit more of
a he shows the youth, He's a little bit more immature.
He can be a bit of a hothead here and
there on the floor, mixes it up a bit. Dirk
was more of an elder statesman very early on the

(01:06:29):
way he played, at least the way I saw it.
So if there's a clash, is that why Carlyle is out?
Is it just he is eyeing going to Milwaukee after
Putinholzer's let Go? Or is there something else there? We
are living in a sea change in sports where athletes

(01:06:52):
are at least interested to find out how far their
name and take them. And I don't mean in terms
of getting to the Hall of Fame? I mean can
I get out of a market I don't want to
be in? Can I force more money or more concessions?

(01:07:13):
Can I get people that I don't want out of
an organization? Can I go against the rules of an organization.
All of this, and we talked about when Zion was
drafted and then before you know, the talk when he

(01:07:33):
when the Pelicans won the lottery. What if Zion doesn't
want to play in New Orleans, Well he has to write,
that's the arrangement, and it was well, that's implied, that's assumed,
that's only the arrangement until enough Zion Williamson's say, I'm
not gonna go where you tell me. I'll go where

(01:07:56):
I want. You can set rules, but are there athletes
powerful enough to be above them? We're seeing that in
the NFL, and we're seeing in the NBA. How is
the Aaron Rodgers thing gonna work out? I don't know.

(01:08:16):
The more you see, the more you hear, the less
green Bay seems likely. But then the next day he's
definitely staying in Green Bay. Same people will say the
same thing two days in a row, and then they'll
say the opposite thing for the next three days. Eventually

(01:08:37):
we'll find out. But he's definitely out there trying to
show the leverage. He's even trying to show leverage in
what hell. I'm loving that, you know, I'm hanging out
with Miles teller and my fiance and we're doing all
this kind of stuff and all this cool stuff. He's
he's just sticking it to everybody while he's skipping camp.

(01:09:00):
All of that. Russell Wilson's back down because it's a
longer play for Russell Wilson. And he did. Look, he
did get a coordinator he wanted. He got Brian Schottenheimer
out of there. And what did Broden shot Brian Schottenheimer
then go do? He went to Jacksonville as the offensive
coordinator and said the single dumbest thing that came out
of anyone's mouth this week in sports, and that was, oh, yeah, well,

(01:09:23):
we don't know who's gonna be the starting quarterback this fall.
I mean, look, it's an open competition. Yeah, sure it is. Brother,
we're all I know Trevor Lawrence is competing for the
quarterback spot in Jacksonville because it's not setting stone that
he's going to be the guy. Yeah, good call on
that one. Stuff like that doesn't need to be said.

(01:09:47):
I don't know what the question was that led to it,
But don't say things where you know your audience is smart.
Don't gaslight us. We're full lee aware. It's Trevor Lawrence's job.
He was taking number one overall, and the head coach
I think took the job specifically because they were number

(01:10:11):
one and they knew who the quarterback was going to be.
And here's Brian Schottenheimer. Oh look, we can't commit to
Trevor Lawrence as a starter unless he loses a leg
or is physically unable to perform. He will be starting
in Jacksonville. And Schottenheimer during the break, I'm gonna have

(01:10:35):
to pull out some new proxy and sodium or some
ibuprofen to take it to get over this. And Bullshannon
and his inbounds play at the end of the Nets
Bucks game. Luckily his team won. Brian Schottenheimer's is gonna
endure some losses before they start winning. But I do

(01:10:56):
think they're gonna be better this year. But don't don't
don't cas light me, don't gaslight this audience. Don't gas
like people that watch sports, everybody thinks they're smarter than
they are. But I promise you we're not wrong when
we say Trevor Lawrence is gonna be the starting quarterback
in Jacksonville. Promise you that we're gonna be accurate on
that let's go to Brian Finley and catch up on

(01:11:18):
the latest and what's trending, what's going on being hey, Jason.
Kevin Durant was inches away from sending the Nets into
the Eastern Conference Finals yesterday. He hit a foot on
the three point line two pointer at the end of regulation.
It ended up being an equalizer, not a game winner,
and the Bucks end up winning against the Nets one fifteen,
one eleven in overtime in a Game seven to be

(01:11:40):
the ones that go to the Eastern Conference Finals. Janice
Antenta Coompo grooving with forty points, thirteen rebounds, and five assists.
Kevin Durant threw up an air bowl at the end
of ot He went over six in the extra session,
and after the game, Steve Nash processed the nets unforeseen
playoff shortcomings. When p g gave us, you know, Kevin's

(01:12:04):
just I don't know what more Kevin could do is
just out of this world. And you can say that
for all our guys at a different part of the
season gave us something and just really really proud of
the group and and I heard for them more than anything.
Chris Paul and Kwile Leonard will not take the chord
in today's game one of the Western Conference Finals between
the Clippers and Sons, Paul is dealing with an issue

(01:12:25):
related to COVID nineteen and Leonard is still nursing that
knee issue. Russell Henley, Louis Eustasan, and Mackenzie Hugh share
the lead at Golf's US Open. All are at five
under overall heading into Sunday's final round. Bryson de Shambo
is in striking distance two shots off the face, as
is Rory McRoy on the ice. The Islanders outlast the

(01:12:48):
Lightning three too, as their Stanley Cup semifinal series is
all square at two. The Diamondbacks drooped to a sixteenth
straight loss after going down to the Dodgers nine to three.
Walker b Laer had his no hitter axed in the
eighth inning. Showyo Tani hits a home run as the
Angels melee the Tigers eight to three. The Mariners show

(01:13:08):
up the Rays six to five, and Tendon nings JP
Crawford not only did he poke a grand slam, he
scored the game winning run in the tenth thinning. Now
to a man who can hit for the cycle, it's
Jason Martin. Fanley, What do you do with Ben Simmons?
What do you do with Ben Simmons. Well, this is
obviously a mental issue with him, and I would hope

(01:13:33):
that he could console the sports psychologists, and I know
that's something that perhaps has gone through his mind and
maybe he's doing that. But there have been some very
high profile stories where from a mental perspective, a key
athlete has been underperforming but has then been able to
right their wrongs and get back to what they're supposed

(01:13:56):
to be as far as what they're making their potential.
But I'm seeing it look more and more likely Jason
that he is on his way to another team. I've
heard this talked about. How about him with the Portland Trailblazers.
I would love to see that because they could use
some depth in their front court and some explosion around

(01:14:17):
the rim, and then if you have c J. McCollum
and Damian Lillard, you might have a team that could
compete for a conference final. Well, I mean maybe if
he could shoot the basketball and not be afraid. I mean,
the good news is he's twenty four, he's not forty four,
so he's got time here. I mean, I think the
psychologist thing is interesting. Um, I mean twenty four years old.

(01:14:40):
I just want to see it go the right way
for him. Um. Right now, he's definitely in his head.
Game seven is gonna be absolutely huge, I think for
his development. If it goes to the off season and
he's had another bad one, that's gonna be tough to
get out of his mind. Also, there was this tweet
that was quote retweet it by our greatest team producer here,

(01:15:02):
Rob g and it was of Ben Simmons. I believe
it was before Game five, and it was a video
of him. It was like a short thirty second clip
on Twitter of Ben Simmons taking routine warm up shots
before the game and they were like ten footers and
he was sort of I don't think he was completely focused,

(01:15:22):
but he kept throwing up a brick after another brick
and these were like eight footers that they were like
little floaters. He kept missing them and yeah, it doesn't count,
but it just looked like he really, Jason is just
lost in his mind right now, and he had nothing
going for him even in warmups, and that sort of

(01:15:42):
warm up is not translating or how you prepare a
warm up is is certainly not the way you want
that to translate when you actually are playing in a game. No,
I would agree Roy McAvoy tin Cup material right now
for Ben Simmons. But Game seven is definitely gonna be fascinating.
We'll pick it at the end of the show, all right,

(01:16:02):
then we'll get Finley back in the third hour. Also, yeah,
I mean I was thinking about that Trailblazer's idea. I
don't know what their money situation is. I would say
it's time for c. J. McCollum to be on another
roster as well. Uh, maybe if you were to add
a third guy. But I don't think Simmons is going
to be the answer to the problem there. I'm not

(01:16:23):
sure who's like what where is he going to be
the answer? First thing, Portland's gonna get the right coach.
You would think Doc Rivers is a kind of coach
that could have done the things to help his game.
I mean, he's dealt with offensively challenged players in the past,
and he's dealt with, you know, some head cases in
the past as well, so maybe he could have found this,

(01:16:46):
but it doesn't look like he's been able to get
through to Simmons. We're talking about Steve Nash earlier and
whatever job that that he did or didn't do with
the Nets Rivers is a hell of a coach in
my eyes. I've always liked him, but he it feels
like he should have been able to get through to Simmons,
and it doesn't look like that's connected as at all,

(01:17:07):
which makes me think, even with the money that's committed
and and all of that, Simmons being in another uniform
next year, it's likely. I just don't know if it
is Portland's when we come back. Derek Carr continues to
say things that make it very difficult to understand him.
I'll explain next. I'm Jason Martin and this is Fox

(01:17:28):
Sports Radio. Welcome back Jason Martin. With you here from Nashville, Tennessee.
Jason Martin Show, Fox Sports Radio. Glad to be with you.
Happy Father's Day to all the dad's, including my dad,
who you know once i'm his age. I'm hoping that
my own children will have his good opinion of me

(01:17:51):
as I do with him, no question about that. Derek Carr,
I was hosting with Jeff Schwartz. I was hosting in
the Mornings on Fox few years ago, and we talked
about Derek Carr coming off of Hard Knocks, and Jeff

(01:18:14):
wasn't a big fan of Derek's and I kind of
asked him why, and he goes, what did you see
him on hard Knocks? And I said yeah, And of
course everything was about a b But Derek Carr was
doing some interesting stuff, right, some stuff he was saying,
the way he was acting, and Jeff used to use
this word to describe him. He said, j Mart, he's

(01:18:38):
a gooper. And I asked him to describe and explain
what gooper meant. But we all kind of know, right like,
whatever your definition of goober is, it's probably in the vicinity.
And we're not talking about chocolate cover pe nuts here.

(01:18:59):
But Derek Card this week, in the midst of I
guess the media availability, for no apparent reason, said yeah,
if I'm not a raider, I'll retire. And I understand

(01:19:28):
part of the sentiment. And I know Hunter Renfro has
come out and said that, you know, he really liked
Derek Carr saying this, and the sentiment is one thing,

(01:19:49):
but he's saying he's gonna retire if he's not a raider.
He's like, oh, I'm I'm silver and black till I die.
I'd rather quit than play for another franchise. Okay, great,
but here's the thing that's not really under your control.
And I'm still pretty sure Jon Gruden is not a
big fan of yours. We're not a huge fan at least.

(01:20:10):
I thought you had a pretty good year last year.
But it's saying stuff like this, It's just like, yeah,
you're a googer. This isn't how you say it. All
you have to say is I am dyed in the wool,
silver and black. You cut me open, it's gonna bleed
silver and black. I hope I'm lucky enough to play
for this franchise for the rest of my career. I
truly do. I don't want to be anywhere else. What

(01:20:35):
I just said would have been fine, but I'd rather
quit than play for another franchise. You're gonna get called
on that because you're not going unless you actually do retire,
you will play for somebody else. Probably chances are at
some point in your career. Ultimately, what you say isn't
just gonna come back to haunt you forever. This was

(01:20:56):
just stupid. I thought it was just like, all right, yeah,
that's a Google wish thing to say. Again, Jeff's right, Yeah,
you're you're kind of a goober, because what what are
you talking about here? Exactly? As far as I know,
you're not on the trade block? Ian Rappaport, I even
think reported that they told you you're not on the
trade block. But I'd rather retire then play for somebody else. Huh.

(01:21:21):
Let's see how that's working in a year or two
when they are going to actually or when they draft
your replacement. How you feel about that, because as far
as I know, you can play football, but you might
not be able to play for the Raiders your whole career.
So why say that out loud? What's happening? I remember
three of the program Jason Martin here with you from Nashville,
Tennessee on this Father's Day, which means US Open Sunday.

(01:21:45):
Decided about that Between the basketball, you've got twenty players
within five shots to the lead entering the final round
at Tory Pines. Hopefully that means some fireworks. Problem is
being within five shots of the lead of at the
it feels like a lot more because you're probably not
going to go very low with the open because of
the difficulty of the course. But at the same time,

(01:22:06):
somebody else might go awfully high that's above you or
that's ahead of you in the leaderboard, and you can
find your way closer to the top just by holding par,
just by finishing. Even so, we'll see whether or not
Henley and and those guys are still at the top
at the end. We've seen fireworks in the final round
and Tory Pines before still my favorite Open ever leading

(01:22:27):
to the eight teen whole playoff with Tiger and Rocco
Media on the Monday, and that was a tournament looked
like Lee Westwood had a really good chance to win
and he kind of fell apart. So it can happen
at the Open. Watch my favorite event and sports. That
and the Master's both really right up there near the
top of my sporting list. Actually, they probably are one
and two, along with the NFL and high end college

(01:22:49):
football bucks nets. Just to recap again, one f one
eleven bucks. Get the I'B done. Kevin Durant couldn't have
done more, but he didn't care. When he was asked
about it after the game, He's like, Oh, yeah, does
this soften the blow that you did all that you

(01:23:11):
could and really carried this team on your back. And
he said, not at all. Who cares? Dumb question. But
that's actually a pretty good response in terms of that's
what you want in a newspaper, because that's what I
would put as a headline, who cares? Nets Star? Kevin
Durant says this after scoring forty eight points in a loss.

(01:23:33):
Nobody's ever scored more in a game seven situation. Then
Durant did right there, and it's still wasn't enough. But
let me show you how great Kevin Durant is. Kevin
Durant had maybe a quarter of James Harden even though
he played every minute of this game. James Harden is
just not James Harden right now with a hamstring, and

(01:23:54):
he played without Kyrie Irving, and he still took this
thing to overtime against a former league MVP, and I
don't mean former like it was ten years ago, against
Johanna Santa Takompo in the Bucks, who have dominated the
last three regular seasons really in the NBA. This year

(01:24:17):
they stepped back a little bit. But that's how good
Durant is that he almost overcame the other two guys
not either being there or being who they are supposed
to be, but ultimately not quite enough. Janice gave you forty.
I'm still worried about Janice long term being the number

(01:24:39):
one player on a championship team this year. It might
happen because the injuries and the way things have played out,
the Bucks really should win it. Now you think about
this afternoon in game one, you Serve thinly say at
the top of the hour in the update, Chris Paul's
out of game one, Kawhi Leonards out of game one.

(01:25:00):
The Kauaii thing is going to be interesting to kind
of monitor to see how healthy he can be. What
we're looking at here. Originally they were like, we're we're
trying to figure out is this is this going to
be an a c L or whatever, And the feeling was, well,
I mean, if he's got an a c L, we
already know that. But he's out indefinitely, not traveling to Phoenix,

(01:25:27):
but we still don't know exactly how serious is he
gonna be able to come back? When is he gonna
be able to come back? But not just those two teams.
Philadelphia's injury is just Ben Simmons on the free throw line.

(01:25:50):
The East, those two teams to me just I mean
either Atlanta or Philadelphia. I don't think they match up
all that world to beat Milwaukee. And then the teams
in the West are just they're not what they could be. Now.
If Kauai is back in their full strength, then maybe
it's the Clippers to lose. I don't know. But Janice

(01:26:10):
gave you forty and actually made free throws, and he
made him in the face of a Brooklyn crowd who
kept chanting the ten count because he's been hit twice
with you know, delays for like a ten second violation
on the free throw line. So they're doing that and
he's draining him in their face and they keep channing.
It's like, and Grant Hill made this points like maybe

(01:26:32):
stop channing because he seems to be doing better while
you're channing. But they never gave it up. But he
he made more than he missed, even though he did
have two air balls, which they took credit for. I
think you saw a lot in this game. I think
you saw the greatness of Kevin Durant, the unstoppable nature

(01:26:53):
of Janice inside when he's on the run and he's
got a path to the bucket. If you could say,
in front of him and make him have to turn around.
From mid range, you got a pretty good shot. Because
he's still he's still very mediocre from that distance. I
think you saw heart out of James Harden because he tried.

(01:27:18):
He's hurt, but he tried to play some defense at times.
He was doing whatever he could do. He just he
obviously didn't have what he needed on the shot, but
the offense just wasn't there. Even though he actually scored
a good many points, he still didn't shoot the ball
well at all. I mean, he was five of seventeen

(01:27:43):
and two of twelve from three. He had twenty two points.
But he had twenty two points on seventeen shots, and
he was ten of ten from the free throw line,
So he scored twelve points on seventeen shots outside of
the you throw a line. Kevin Durant had forty. He

(01:28:03):
had to take a lot of shots to get there.
But who else is gonna do it? Again? Crazy stat here,
But there was only one guy come by on these
two teams that came off the bench that scored points,
and that was Pat Connington, who hit three threes out
of the five that he took, and the other two
that he took were both air balls. It was that

(01:28:25):
kind of night. So again you saw how great Janice
can be, and you also saw what limits him. You
saw the greatness of Kevin Durant, so good that he
almost overcame all the injuries that were dogging the nets.

(01:28:46):
I think you saw that Chris Middleton, yet again, is
not a true number two. He's a number three. That's miscast.
He's much closer to a Chris Bosh than a Duane Wade.
But he's a great player and if he's allowed to
be a three someday that could be a championship team.

(01:29:07):
If he's called upon to be the two consistently, I
fear that you're gonna come up short. He did not
have a good first half. He had a much better
second half. Now he was playing good defense, but that's
what he does. And Drew Holiday, who you paid a
lot of money for and to hold onto, showed up

(01:29:30):
in the fourth quarter and maybe that's all that you
need to to make that worthwhile. But that investment hasn't
looked all that good at times during this series, especially
in the last few games. So it was good that
he did have that fourth quarter because he was struggling mightily.
It wasn't a great night for him. He was five

(01:29:51):
of twenty three shooting and two of nine from three.
You're gonna need more than that. But I think you
just saw in general that it just came down to
the healthier team. The Bucks were a healthy team and

(01:30:14):
still needed over time to beat that extraterrestrial mutant, Kevin Durant,
who in the loss to me proved he's the best
player in the world. And I said Kauai was a
couple of years ago, and I still think Kauai is

(01:30:35):
the other guy on that list that I would probably
put on that list. But Durant's attitude on the floor,
like I watched Kauai and Kauai and the off and
on nature, his personality is just kind of hard to measure.
I think the killer instinct exists for both of them.
And I'll take the one you don't take. But what

(01:30:58):
Durant did in the loss against the Bucks, what he
did playing every minute, playing fifty three minutes, scoring forty
eight points, winning the game. Basically, he was just three
the four inches too close and his foot was on
the line on the three that would have won the game.

(01:31:20):
I think It's fair to call him the best player
in the world right now and maybe for the last
you could have argued for the last three to five years,
along with Lebron and a very selective a few others
that you could put in a discussion, and then it
just becomes subjective to you what you favor in a player.

(01:31:41):
Is it you honest? Is it James Harden, is it
Lebron James all of that kind of stuff. Is it Kauai?
But Durant proved his greatness in the loss. This is
one of the greatest performances I've seen from him because
this was a day where all the shots that he took,

(01:32:01):
he's a guy that you want taking those shots, even
though again he missed a lot. He took thirty six
shots in this game, and he made less than half
of them. Nine rebounds, six assists. Blake Griffin had a
good series, a couple of really nice games, and in
this game he's seventeen and eleven. I actually think that

(01:32:23):
that turned out to be a pretty pretty good acquisition.
They didn't pay very much for him. It seems like
the consistus was all of a sudden, he was done,
but he was playing in an awful place in terms
of that team, in that organization and what they're trying
to do there. Just nothing happened. Now he joins this

(01:32:45):
team where he's actually really the four, even though he
was the three in this series because Kyrie went out there,
meaning the third best player. I'm not saying the four
is in the power forward, small forward, that kind of deal.
But Blake Griffin played well and showed he's still got
something left. I mean, giving you seventeen and eleven in

(01:33:07):
that game you needed him. He was seven of twelve
from the field, three of six from Three's not like
he took a ton of shots and missed a ton
of shots. He played well. They needed a little bit
more and he fouled out of the game. But this
was a game that if you want to look at

(01:33:27):
a stat, that's because it's so close, it's hard. I
haven't really I didn't mentioned this stat in the first
hour when we were talking about this because because of
the way the game played out and how close it was,
it's hard to say this is why you lost. But
the Nets shot thirty from three. They were twelve of
thirty nine from three in this game, and the Bucks

(01:33:50):
shot forty two they shot forty one point seven. To
be exact, they were fifteen and thirty six. Neither one
of us like super impressive in terms of just fifteen
and thirty six and sound good for three is usually
gonna win twelve or thirty nine. You can see worse,

(01:34:11):
but usually you want better than that. And maybe the
biggest problem there was that James Harden was two of twelve.
He just he just couldn't hit anything. If it wasn't
at the free throw line, he wasn't gonna make very much.
So when you look at Durant, who was four of
eleven from three, which isn't up to par for him either,
but he was taking a lot of just he was

(01:34:33):
doing everything he could. That means they combined to shoot
being hardened and Durant from three six three, that's gonna
cause you trouble free throw line for the nets. You
look at the bucks, they shot sixty seven that they

(01:34:53):
left some out there, but pretty much it was just
your honest holiday missed one. Middleton made all three of
his low has made his two, and Janice was a
to fourteen and for him, considering, he's the reason that
the percentage was that low. But that's still above his average.
I mean, he's like a forty seven percent free throw shooter,

(01:35:17):
and that's well above I know that's a low bar,
but you take small victories when you have to. If
he makes a few less of those, we're never in
overtime to start with, and we don't win the game.
In terms of the bucks, he was a plus six
on the floor with his forty points. But I do
think the eight of fourteen from the line for Anto

(01:35:39):
Tookumpo is a good sign. The problem is it's just
a streaky thing. He'll go out in Game one of
the Eastern Conference Finals here in a few days and
he'll make two of two of eight or something like that,
or maybe more. Maybe he'll make more because he'll have
more attempts than that, because the way he plays, he's
gonna get to the line a pretty good bit. The

(01:36:02):
one problem with him getting to align his man it
takes so long it destroys the flow. And the one
other take away from this game, before we get to
the breath, referees stopping to check out of bounds to
see possessions, all of them like there seemed like there
were so many reviews in the last couple of minutes

(01:36:22):
of this game, it's just like there is no flow
to the proceedings. Yet again, in a critical moment at
the end of the playoff game, there were some foul
calls that I didn't like both ways throughout this game.
But the incessant replay, this is not what replay was
invented to do. Was just over and over again, challenge

(01:36:43):
every out of bounds. It's the same thing as going
back and finding out somebody missed a tag by a
millionth of an inch, which we would never have seen
in real time. But because we can go back and
turn this thing one one now, we can go frame
by frame. If that's not what replay was designed to do,

(01:37:07):
I just need to flow with the game back. I
sound like Jeff Van Gundy here, but I'm okay with that.
The last few minutes of regulation, in particular, we're very
frustrating to watch because the officials took and if you're
gonna do these reviews and if coaches are gonna challenge
here and there, you've gotta be efficient. I know you
gotta get it right if you do that. But usually

(01:37:29):
we see a replay two or three times, we know
what happened. They're gonna watch the thing fifty times anyway.
It's just like, can we get back to the game.
These things are long enough, and these guys are getting
ice cold, We're potentially getting ice cold. I want the
thing to be decided on the floor in a flow
that feels like a game, not this disjointed, staccato mess,

(01:37:50):
which also which happens way too often for my taste
in the NBA. So that's my final takeaway. But congrats
to the Bucks and to the Milwaukee fans out there.
You're in the East in conference finals. You'll meet up
with the winner of Game seven. We will pick that
game at the end of this program. But that's uh,
at least you got a Game seven went to Overtime's

(01:38:11):
first time that's happened in a while. Um, I want
to say it was two thousand and six as a
matter of fact, was what I heard. So it's been
a while and at least it gave us some drama,
even if it wasn't well played through all fifty three minutes.
I'll take that game every day of the week. If
you give it to me, we'll be right back. I'm
Jason Martin and this is Fox Sports Radio. What's happened

(01:38:32):
and welcome back. I'm Jason Martin. This is Fox Sports
Radio Jason Martin Show. I'm on Twitter at j mart Radio.
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(01:38:54):
and save hundreds with local rebates Tankless made Simple dot Com.
So I know, I talked about Levian Bell last week
and I said, um, basically said, what an idiot. It
is not the smartest thing to come out and say
what he said about Andy Reid, and I didn't think
about the implications of it past, just sounding diva ish

(01:39:19):
and just sour grapes because it didn't go the way
you thought it was gonna go. Because you went and
tried to get a championship by joining a team that
absolutely didn't need you, that had drafted Clyde Edwards Hilaire
at your position in the first round and then brought
you in for depth at best, and you still think

(01:39:40):
it's Pittsburgh and it's not. And it's the guy who
had his jewelry stolen twice by his girlfriend. My my
co host here and Nashville had mentioned that to me
earlier this week. I had forgotten about that, not once
but twice. But maybe even better as Levian Bell's apologies
aash An apology where he said, you know, I meant

(01:40:05):
what I said and I don't take any of it back,
but I'm sorry you knew about it. It's like, dude,
you're you're not sorry at all, Like you're not sorry
about the words you said. You're not sorry you did it.
You just maybe I could have made that private, but

(01:40:27):
you didn't actually apologize for so, so don't apologize for
just stick with it. But the ramifications of this Andy
Reid's reach his friendships is relationships are deep in the
National Football League, like all of his coaching tree hires,

(01:40:50):
the respect level for Andy Reid and how many people
get along. Like the thing about Levian that was so
surprising about it was just no one ever says anything
negative about Andy. He's like the nicest guy, right, like
you hear that story all the time. So the problem
with what levy On did more than just you can

(01:41:11):
see that regardless of coach and just say all right,
that's not a guy we want on our roster, is
you have gone after someone that everybody likes and that
a whole heck of a lot of them know very well.
That might make it difficult for you to find a

(01:41:33):
new home. I'm not going to predict that he's done,
but he's inching real close to not being picked up
because what production are you gonna get that comes along

(01:41:53):
with the Levy On show. I don't know the answer
to that question, because the production in New York wasn't there,
and you had two touchdowns with the Chiefs, Like, we're
not talking about you being the m v P of
the league or the best running back in the league

(01:42:15):
like may have been arguable four or five years ago
in Pittsburgh. We're talking about whatever this Levian bell is.
And if you boil it down to the guy that
they suited up but did not use in the Super Bowl,
even when they had the depth issues that would have
put you in there, they still put other guys in there.

(01:42:40):
I feel like Andy Reid would have played him if
Levian had given him the best chance to win, and
yet they didn't. So what does that say? Either there
is some kind of a spite issue here from coach

(01:43:02):
to player or the players skills have receeded to a
large degree. Speaking of skills, three quarterbacks this year to
keep an eye on, because three quarterbacks are the next

(01:43:25):
ones in line to either get paid or not get paid.
Two of them I think probably no brainers in terms
of they will. Even if you don't agree that they should.
I would say, Josh Allen, you take him off the
maybe pile. He's definitely getting his money. He's going north
of forty million. Lamar Jackson, he's going north to forty million.

(01:43:49):
And then the third guys, Baker Mayfield. It's gonna be
time for the Browns to decide are we committing long
term to Baker Mayfield? And at what value are we
committing to him? And the Browns are an interesting case
because here we go again. Two years ago, everybody was

(01:44:12):
back in Cleveland, Oh, they're gonna be so good, and
there were a few of us and I'll pat myself
on the back here that said, there's too many new
pieces here and one of them is a coach that
I'm not sure should be a coach. And it went
not just badly, it went very badly for Cleveland. And

(01:44:33):
then last year they bring in Stefanski. Everyone was off
the bandwagon and they make the playoffs. There are teams,
there are franchises and organizations in sports that perform better
without the weight of expectation. There are some that rise

(01:44:54):
to the challenge of expectation, and then there are some
that go to the opposite direction. Cleveland now has expectations again,
because if you look at all of these analytics numbers,
and these preseason top thirty two rankings and all the
stuff that every website is doing right now to generate
content during the off season, they all have Cleveland as

(01:45:18):
either the second or the third best team in the
a f C. Most of them do, so. I guess
a couple might have Tennessee mentioned, maybe one or two
have Baltimore mentioned, But generally Kansas City, Buffalo, Cleveland are
the three you see the most at the top where
it's usually Kansas City, and then you a little bit
of a step down you get to Buffalo and Cleveland,

(01:45:38):
and maybe Cleveland's kind of closer to the Tennessee's the
Buffalo the Indies. But here we go again expectations and
guess who's coming back Odell He was there two years ago. Also,
how are they going to perform under expectation now? And

(01:46:01):
what is the quarterback going to do three guys like, yeah,
you've got a lot of younger guys where the money
isn't the issue just yet. That justin Herbert's, the Joe Burrows,
even the rookies certainly from this year. But I'm talking
about the guys over the last year or two that

(01:46:21):
have been in this league. Kyler Murray, some of these guys,
and some of them. You know that Bill will come
to pretty soon. But is Baker going to get paid?
Is he gonna get paid by the Browns? And what's
the number going to be the problem for Cleveland is

(01:46:43):
we're hitting the spot where their rookies are going to
need new contracts. Fifth year options have to be decided upon,
and then the Miles Garretts of the world are gonna
want their money. The top guys are gonna want their money.
The window for championships often in that sport reside in

(01:47:07):
maximizing rookie contracts for quarterbacks first and for first round
draft picks in general. Just being able to maximize these
guys before you get to the second contract where the
agent can really actually make something happen, like, yeah, there's

(01:47:27):
a rookie rookie pay scale and all of this, so
you're able to do some things, but then you can
get yourself into big trouble because if all those players
are as good as you hope they are, if you're
a great draft, then that means you're gonna have to
pay out a lot of money at some point to
a lot of guys, and then you have to start
making decisions, well, who gets cut, who do we value most?

(01:47:49):
And for the Browns, they have drafted well and they've
had a lot of draft picks, so the bill is
going to come do sooner rather than or so where
does the quarterback fit in? Looking for the Browns, they
didn't have to make that decision this past year, specifically
because with the cat being down, it wouldn't have been
a good It would have been a good problem for them.

(01:48:12):
The money is about to go up twenty million or
or a little bit more next year, there are at
least estimates out there. Then two or three years, when
the full television money comes through, the salary cap might
be two fifty million dollars, which is sixty five million
more than it is this year. So maybe the problem

(01:48:34):
is limited to some extent, but to what extent that
really is? The biggest question is can the Browns play
with expectations, and specifically Kim Baker. Mayfield turned this second
year into the end of the discussion as to whether
or not he's a long term starter in the NFL,

(01:48:56):
and that really may come down mostly to what Kevin
sta Fanski can pull off. But I am intrigued by
those three quarterbacks this year, Lamar, Josh Allen, and Baker
all three probable playoff teams, even though I've said my
ht take at least for right now, is I think

(01:49:16):
Baltimore is going to be a team that misses the
playoffs this year, and I think Greg Roman will be
somewhere else next year. I think for Lamar, he it
would be better if he was not there this year,
but it looks like they're gonna roll with that again.
But Baker and the Browns the most important things, just
because two years ago the expectations were there. I said, yeah,

(01:49:39):
I'm gonna need to see that. First, I wasn't alone,
there were some others, and then we saw what that
was and it was bad. And then last year everybody
was down on him. Okay, yeah, yeah, I mean, we
like Stefanski, but come on, nobody was picking him to
win a division, all of that, and then they came
out and they were very good. And now they have
the expectations again, and I don't know if it's as

(01:50:00):
hype as it was two years ago when they're on
the front of ESPN, in the ESPN the magazine and
Baker Mayfield's doing g Q spreads and all this other stuff.
But the expectations are back to a spot where we're
expecting the NFL media, the NFL public is expecting the
Browns to win double digit games and to make it
to the playoffs. Is there anything more frightening than an

(01:50:21):
expectation that the Cleveland Browns are gonna win eleven games?
I know there's seventeen. That's why I'm not saying tent
seventeen games now. So the Browns are gonna go eleven
and six and win the division. Brown's gonna go twelve
and five and win the division. Is there anything that
you hear or that you're you're kind of sensing might
be the case more? But every time you hear somebody

(01:50:42):
say it out loud, you're just like, I, I I
need to get away from this. It's like you get
hives all of a sudden. It's just a stressor. Also
a stressor is Brian Finley. Let's go down one more
time and get the latest b Yeah, Jason, the Bucks
emasculate the ones in reagonable Nets one emasculated them be

(01:51:03):
they beat them by four and overtime. It's not that
you look at the differential in points, but it's the
fact that the Nets were deemed to be the second coming.
They were the team that had been crowned NBA champs
before the season started, or as soon as they got
the Big three together, and then it didn't go as
far as they thought it was going to go, nor

(01:51:26):
all of the NBA media elite who are buddy buddy
with the Nets. It all just kind of imploded. Well,
I don't know that was a pretty strong verb, considering
it took overtime and Kevin Durant having too big a
feat to be behind the three point line to get
it done. I see where you're coming from. But the

(01:51:46):
fact is everybody looked at the Nets as the team
that this was championship or bust, and the fact that
they didn't get there and fell short is sort of
where it comes from. But yeah, I totally see what
you're saying okay. One one eleven was the final in
overtime in Game seven, too book reservations for the Eastern
Conference Finals. Milwaukee advances. Janice Identikompo forty points, thirteen rebounds

(01:52:11):
and five assists. Kevin Durant forty eight points. James Started
had a hamstring issue, he still played all fifty three
minutes possible in this contest, managed twenty two points, and
afterwards Durant had a message to the media. He said,
stop making this story out to be about the Nets
blowing it and focus more on the Bucks advancing. We
gotta get credit to the Milwaukee Bucks. They're great, great

(01:52:34):
team who got a good chance to win a championship.
Stories should be about them and how will they played
this series? How will they play all all year. We
got good looks there over time. We just didn't knock
them down. But respect to Milwaukee Bucks and how they prepare,
how they challenge this all series and made adjustment saw series. Um,
we got to respect for the ball club. Durant got

(01:52:54):
good looks, but he went over six in ot including
an airball from long range at the end of the
extra session. Chris Paul and Kwile Leonard will not play
in Sunday's Game one of the Western Conference Finals between
the Clippers and Sons, which will take place later today.
Paul Sideline because of a COVID nineteen related matter, and
Leonard is still weathering through a knee issue. Russell Henley,

(01:53:17):
Louis Eustacean and Mackenzie Hues are the three at top
the leader board at Golf's US Open with one round
to go, all are at five under overall. Bryson n
Shambo was two shots off the pace, and ditto Ferrory McElroy.
The Islanders get the win against the Lightning three to
two to even their Stanley Cup Semifinals at two games
and just a couple mentions. In baseball, the Diamondbacks loses

(01:53:41):
sixteen straight contest after falling to the Dodgers nine to three.
Walker Bueler had his no hitter broken up and the
eighth inning show Hey Otani hits a home run as
the Angels kick aside the Tigers eight to three and
the Padres overcome the Red seven to five. But Fernando
Tatis Jr. Was pulled from this game after he re

(01:54:03):
aggravated his shoulder injury. So we'll continue to monitor what
could be the diachnosis on that's certainly a big part
of the padres and what they do. And I can't wait, Jason,
as they sent it back to you to see Paul
George once again explode onto the scene and have a
huge game later today. I know your Clippers guys. How

(01:54:23):
far are the Clippers going in this particular series? Do
you want to say that I could even see them?
Here's the thing, what do we know about Chris Paul exactly? Yeah.
But don't you think, Jason, that we might be saying
to ourselves. You remember that game where Drew Bledsoe was

(01:54:44):
injured and Tom Brady took over. We might be saying
that about Terrence Man one day. Gosh, I just realized,
how I just realized how early slash late it is
when you just said Terence Man. Bryan Finley just said,
the Clippers don't need Kawhi Leonard. Let's uh just make

(01:55:05):
sure that's set ye, make sure that's say bo. Let's
do that. Thirty nine points for Terence Man. It was
one game, though, Finley. But Paul George seems so much
more comfortable when he is the guy I feel like
at times when he has to cater to others, He
limits himself, and he just doesn't look as comfortable. He
looked the best version of Paul George we have ever

(01:55:26):
seen him in a Clipper uniform, which suggests to me,
if you can get thirty plus points from Terence Man,
you can get Reggie Jackson going off. You've got something
brewing here in the Western Conference finals. Yeah. So I
was talking about teams playing without expectations and talking about
the Browns. I was talking about that at like five
minutes ago. Paul George is a guy that thrives on

(01:55:47):
low expectations. You know, when you think he's just gonna
go ahead and pack it in, that's when he goes
and gives you forty. But when you when you're like, oh,
he's about to go off and give us forty five,
that's when he goes four a fifteen from the you,
that becomes your problem. I would say, I don't think
you can win a championship if Kauai is hurt long term. Yeah,

(01:56:08):
I mean generally I could see where you're going with that.
But yeah, again, it hinges upon what how long is
Chris Paul going to be out? And if it's a
couple of games. Who knows it makes a big It
makes a big difference if Chris Paul is not there.
I don't think they can beat the Clippers. It's an
inept offense. Look, we saw what Devin Booker can do,

(01:56:29):
but as far as guiding a team like Chris Paul,
not even close. No, no, Um. But I would hesitate
to buy my Terrence Man fat head just yet. Finly Well,
I came into the Fox Sports Radio studios tonight with
my Adam Morrison Charlotte Bobcat number twenty three Replica Jersey on.
So maybe I'll just get a Terrence Man jersey next,

(01:56:52):
Like I said I would, I would hold off all right. Yeah,
that's that's Finley, who's now pricing Terrence Man jerseys. If
you wait long enough, somebody that's already made that mistake
will then be able to sell you one on eBay
for like twenty bucks. We'll be right back. I'm Jason
Martin and this is Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back, finishing
up here at j mart It's Jason Martin Show. You know,

(01:57:15):
I'm Fox Sports Radio. I'm on Twitter at j mart Radio.
Discover matches all the cash back you earn on your
credit card at the end of your first year. It's
amazing because Discoverers accepted now nine percent of places in
the US to take credit cards. To learn more at
discover dot com slash yes Nelson Report limitations apply. A
couple of games today, obviously Big Ones, first game of

(01:57:39):
the Western Conference Finals, Clippers at Suns. No Cris Paul,
Kawhi Leonard did not travel, So you've got two stars out.
What is Phoenix when it's Devin Booker and DeAndre Ayton
sans Chris Paul. We know what the Clippers have done.
Tyler has coached very effectively, and you're seeing what kind
of coach he's capable of being. Any app sinse of

(01:58:00):
Kawhi Leonard. You're also seeing Paul George play a couple
of solid games in a row. Just makes you start thinking, now, wait,
is playoff p actually a thing? I refused to go there.
But Phoenix without Chris. But Chris Paul is such a
leader and has been the culture shift for them in
many ways. I find it hard to believe that they

(01:58:23):
win without him. But no Kauai means I'm either betting
on Paul George or Terrence Man to go have a
great game, or I'm betting on Devin Booker at home
and eighton to just do enough. Gosh, I don't know
that one's tough. I'll take the Clippers, but I don't
feel great about it. Atlanta and Philadelphia is a big one.
That's the game seven, the second game seven and as

(01:58:46):
many nights. Aren't we lucky as basketball fans? What Ben
Simmons shows up? What Tobias Harris shows up. Tobias Harris
was abysmal in Game five and then came back and
played pretty well in Game six. You're gonna need the
game six, Tobias Harris, the one that was making shots

(01:59:09):
and had a solid plus minus rating. You're gonna need
that guy if you're Philadelphia. Atlanta needs a great game
from Capella. And it all comes down to Trey. Trey
Young has the killer in him now. He has been
slowed down at least by bigger defenders and more physical

(01:59:34):
defenders at times in this series. And when Philadelphia has
been successful, it's because they bodied up Trey Young and
made him shoot over height. They're still gonna have that height,
so they're gonna have the ability to do that again.
The question is do you believe in Trey Young at
his age to do here what he did to Madison

(01:59:54):
Square Garden. Can he shut them down and shut them up?
How many points is he gonna need in this game
to win? Philadelphia has the better roster. We don't know yet.
I don't think whether or not Bogdanovitch can go. They

(02:00:18):
certainly could use him in Beads day to day, but
he's always day to day. Trey Young's gotta have it,
feels like to me, Trey Young's gotta have thirty five
to forty and be efficient, not forty on forty five shots,

(02:00:41):
but if it. But he needs to shoot as many
times as they can get him the basketball in this
series because it's gonna go as he goes. I don't
believe Ben Simmons is gonna have a great offensive game tonight.
But Trey Young's average in twenty five in the series
in Beads averaging. I need Tray to give me thirty
five a night to win the game. I think the

(02:01:02):
storyline on Monday in the n b A is gonna
be again Trey Young taking another step. I think the
Sixers have a better roster. I think they've got the
game at home and I'm riding with Atlanta because I
just there's something about Trey Young right now. I think
that next rounds when it's gonna be too much for him,

(02:01:23):
because he's still very, very young. I just think he's
gonna go off. I think he's gonna have one of
those kind of nights similar to Durant last night, but
he'll get it done a lot of threes. I just
anticipate a wild, wild game seven. We're all lucky we
get that, plus a wide open US open enjoy the

(02:01:44):
sports will recap it all next week Fox Sports Sunday
coming up next, Go Nowhere. I'm Jason Martin

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