Aaron Torres and Jason Martin Talk Shop On NBA Finals, Ja Morant, NBA Coaching Carousel and More!

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
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Speaker 2 (00:04):
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oh one point one. Torres inve Vegas. I want in
the Stanley Cup Final. Here to is in the La
Fox Sports Radio studios, Jason Martin and in our Nashville studios.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
Jason.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
What's going on, man? How you doing?

Speaker 4 (01:08):
I'm doing all right, doing better than last week. Last
week I was struggling to speak halfway through the show.
I'm still dealing with a cough, like the pollen is
out of control in my part of the country. But
I'm feeling a little bit better. My braves are about
to play, and it has been kind of a rough
few weeks for us, so really hoping we can.

Speaker 2 (01:25):
Get you more magnet again. Did you move the magni again?

Speaker 4 (01:28):
No, but I am thinking I might need to, like something.
Something has gone awry and injuries. We've lost two key
starters off the rotation. We're bringing dudes up that may
or may not be ready and throwing them in the mix.
It's just, uh, it's it's it's a little treacherous. But look,
it's a long season and it's only June, so I
still feel good about things.

Speaker 3 (01:49):
Still a lot to like about this club.

Speaker 4 (01:50):
But it's not It's not as easy street as it
was about a month ago when it just felt like, man,
this team is just absolutely raking. Not to mention, it
doesn't seem like anybody score on him, but that has
that has since shifted, So that's a thing that's happening.
Tomorrow's Game two in the NBA Finals, As you mentioned,
Stanley Cup about a minute left in the second period,
there there's a lot happening. Of course, there's offseason NFL

(02:13):
news Aaron Rodgers. Still there's still a topic out there
about Aaron Rodgers, like there has to be right.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
Yeah, no, no, A few people are better at at
keeping themselves in the news or whatever than Aaron Rodgers.
And it was funny because as we were kind of
putting the run down together today, I was kind of like,
I just I don't really you know, it's like and
it is I know that like sports radio guys and
girls do this all the time of like comparing everything

(02:40):
to like a relationship, and it's like, yeah, you know,
I had a you know when the Bucks lost, like
it was the worst worst moment since my wife left
me or whatever. Like I don't I can't think of
a good analogy, but like this is kind of the
breakup where it's like okay, like like we get it.
You guys didn't like each other and you both seem
happy without each other, so you don't need to keep

(03:01):
talking about each other. Like it's ironic, right, Like this week,
there was a story that came out that Bill Belichick
texted Tom Brady after the Super Bowl winning Tampa congratulations blah,
blah blah blah blah. But I bring it up because
that was one where Brady and Belichick it just felt
like both sides moved on. Brady was happy, you know,
new guy, new team, new coaching staff, new weapons, and

(03:23):
Belichick kept doing his Belichick thing and it just was
what it was. Whereas with the Aaron Rodgers Green Bay
Packers thing, it's like it just won't end. Like even
when we knew they were broken up, but they weren't
really broken up because he hadn't been traded, but he
said that was the only team that he wanted to
play for, And it's just like, I know, we got
other stuff to talk to. We gotta talk about Game
one and obviously Game two tomorrow night. But like I

(03:46):
get that he is one of the biggest stars in
the biggest sport in our country. But that's just a
story that like I'm just ready to start talking about
Aaron Rodgers with the Jets, Jordan Love with the Packers,
and just I don't need the new updates on something
that I knew it was a bad relationship for like
four years before it actually ever came to fruition. By

(04:06):
the way, in the hockey game on much lighter news.
The Florida Panthers have tied things up at to a
piece under a minute to go in the second period.
They're playing the Vegas Golden Knights ten seconds left in
the second period. There So anyway, Aaron Rodgers, we don't
have to spend the whole show on it, let alone
the entire first segment. But it's like, I get it,
it was bad whatever. I'm just over like hearing the

(04:29):
new leak's story. No, listen to my version of events. No,
it wasn't really my fault. It's like I'm just ready
to move on, just ready to move on.

Speaker 4 (04:35):
Yeah, I guess my attitude. Although they're not perfect comparisons,
it's just kind of you ever see, like the athlete
you hear about him doing something in a game, you
haven't heard his name forever, you forgot he was in
the league, and then like your reaction is like, oh man,
I guy's still in the league.

Speaker 3 (04:50):
That's still a thing.

Speaker 4 (04:51):
I had no idea, Like we had all moved on
and then he was still there. Like That's kind of
how I felt when I saw this story. I was
just like, dude, he's not there anymore. No gives who
gives a crap, Like I am interested in whatever's gonna
happen with the Jets, positive or negative. That's gonna be scintillating.
But y'all didn't like each other like four years ago.
You've been arguing in the restaurant in front of you

(05:14):
know company for like half a decade, Like we've seen this.
We've read the articles. Uh, we've read the articles, about
the articles, about the books, about the articles, like there's
no there's no stone left to unturn here. We know
you guys, you know that was that was something needed
to end a long time before it did. It was like, uh,

(05:35):
Michael Scott and Jan on the office, like we knew
that was a rap, but it's like Michael Scott didn't
know it. Well, who is it here that's keeping this alive?
Like no one cares. Let's just move on.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
Well, let's move on and we can maybe circle back
on that a little bit later. Although again I don't
think there's anything new that necessarily came out of that.
But let's focus on the story of the week in sports,
and that is obviously Game one of the NBA Finals
was Thursday night, and unfortunately, like I think, it kind
of went how a lot of people thought it would
and jump in and correct me if I'm wrong, Jason,

(06:08):
But no, yeah, I was gonna say, you know, Denver
and nine point favorite haven't lost at home in the
entire playoffs. The Heat, of course, coming off that emotional
Game seven win on Memorial Day night against Boston in Boston,
and I think we all kind of thought, Okay, Denver's
on eight nine days arrest here the Heat have to
fly cross country after after an emotional Game seven. I

(06:29):
think that's my biggest takeaway is I like the Nuggets
coming in. I don't necessarily think the series is over
by any stretch, but that kind of sort of just
went how I thought it was going to. And now
the question becomes, obviously, can the Heat steal a game
in Denver tomorrow to even things up? Heading back to my.

Speaker 4 (06:47):
End, yeah, I mean, I mean, you're right, And that's
actually what I told you before the show.

Speaker 3 (06:51):
I said it.

Speaker 4 (06:52):
Kind of took the theme out of much of what
to talks day after that game because it really was
paint numbers. It's exactly what you would have anticipated going
into it, especially with the emotional high of the game
seven win for Miami. The rest for the Denver playing
at home, which look playing in Denver may be the
hardest place to play in the NBA because the you

(07:14):
have to get used to you have to ye have
that too, but you have to get used to being
out of breath. They've gotten used to it. It's why
they always have a good home record. Even when they're
a mediocre team, they usually have one of the best
home records in the league. So you're stepping into that
and oh yeah, they have the best player in the world,
probably at least one of the top three.

Speaker 3 (07:32):
And then he didn't.

Speaker 4 (07:33):
Even have to score to be relevant because he can
let Murray do it. He can let Michael Porter Junior
do it, he can let Bryce Brown do it, he
can lose, he can let all these other guys do that,
and then he still ends up at twenty seven points
at the end of it. I disagree with you on
one point, though, I think the series is over. I
just I looked at that and I said, I mean,

(07:53):
Butler's going to have to do a lot more. You know,
he struggled really over the last two series. But I
just looked at that and it was just there were
there were some things that happened in that game that
I don't think are gonna happen for Miami consistently that
were good for them, Like BAM's not gonna have that
kind of game every night, for example, So you're gonna
have to have somebody else picking up the slack. I

(08:15):
just look at Denver and I saw a team that
was just flat better. Like I think they're two really
good coaches. I think Spulsu is the best coach in
the league, but I think Malone is vastly underrated. But
we saw it and we said Denver's the most complete team.
That's what we talked about Mark Medina a couple of
weeks ago in the program. So we talked about with
Bernie Fratto over and over during this postseason, and it's

(08:36):
still there. Like if they sweep Miami, I wouldn't be
the least bit surprised.

Speaker 2 (08:41):
All right, So I was trying to build some suspense
for the remaining three three hours in fifty minutes that
we're on air here. But I do think it is
kind of a I think it's gonna be tough. I
think it's gonna be tough. Denver is by far the
best team in my opinion, that they faced toughest home
court advantage, like you said, And I do think the
one thing that stands out to me. I do think
the miles are starting to add up on Jimmy Butler's odometer,

(09:05):
because it's interesting I was thinking about this is that.
And it's easy, I think for people game to game,
you kind of forget what the storyline was at this
point a week ago or ten days ago or whatever.
But like part of the reason I vividly remember this,
you and I were lucky enough to be on air
last night last week in this time slot as Game
six ended at the buzzer Derek White with that put back.
But one of the conversations that we were having after

(09:26):
that game was that Jimmy Butler said himself, I can't
play much worse. I feel great about Game seven because
I can't play much worse. So I bring it up
five for twenty one last week in Game six in Miami,
and then six of fourteen in the game last week
in Game one against Denver, And so I think that's
probably what would worry meet now. If you look at
the totality of the Miami Heat, it was just a

(09:49):
bad night overall for a lot of guys, especially their shooters.
Max Strews zero for ten from the field, Caleb Martin,
who de Seger just SAIDs dealing with a little bit
of an injury, one for seven from the field, and
Jimmy Butler six four team. And so I bring that
up because that's what seven of thirty one. If my
math is correct, you know that's not gonna get it done.
But I also do wonder, especially as it pertains to

(10:11):
Jimmy Butler. He was asked to do so much throughout
these playoffs, long series. You know, you take care of
business against Miami, and then you immediately you take care
of business, excuse me, against against the Bucks, but then
you immediately have a grueling series against the Knicks, a
seven game series against the Celtics. And these aren't for
the most part, blowout wins where Denver's had a couple

(10:34):
nights where those guys, those star players are on the
bench early in the fourth quarter and then oh, by
the way, they got eight nine days off before game one.
So I'm just bringing it up to say that was
kind of one of my takeaways is we talked about
Jimmy Butler struggling in Game six last Saturday, and seeing
him struggle again in game one does make me kind
of wonder is he struggling or are is the totality

(10:58):
of everything that he and this team has been has
to do in the playoffs starting to catch up with them.

Speaker 4 (11:02):
Yeah, I think that's fair. I think it could be
dead right about it. As a matter of fact, I
do think when you gave that stat of six to
fourteen in game one, he's got to shoot more than
fourteen times.

Speaker 3 (11:10):
It's just that simple. Like Miami is not.

Speaker 4 (11:13):
They don't have enough weaponry on a consistent basis to
win without him taking much closer to twenty shots. I'd
like to see him at least have like a twenty
one twenty two on the score sheet.

Speaker 3 (11:24):
Like he's got to be aggressive.

Speaker 4 (11:27):
Doesn't mean he needs to take bad shots, doesn't mean
he needs to chuck it up from three, which is
not really his game. Just means, if that means to me,
he's not getting the easy buckets, he's not getting the
transition buckets, he's not as active.

Speaker 3 (11:41):
Around the rim.

Speaker 4 (11:42):
It just means that's not really the Jimmy Butler that
you need right now. He's got to be in full on, aggressive,
fast x nitist mode for them to have a prayer.

Speaker 3 (11:53):
I think in this series, well.

Speaker 2 (11:55):
It'll be interesting. Obviously Game one took place on Thursday,
sadly not as much to react to as we had hoped.
Game two tomorrow night in Denver, and obviously we'll be
talking about it throughout the show. But coming up, I'll
tell you what, Jason, I do want to switch gears
to the team that Miami beat in Game seven on
Monday night. That's the Boston Celtics. We know they're basically

(12:15):
running it back, but is that the right decision. We'll
discuss that next aeron Torris Jason Martin Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 5 (12:23):
Hi, this is Jay Glazer, and you may know me
for the world of football or fighting or even shows
like HBO's Ballers. Well you don't know is for my
entire life, I have lived in something I refer to
as the gray depression anxiety. So now I'm coming out
with a new podcast, Unbreakable, a mental health podcast with
Jay Glazer, where each week, while we talk about mental health,

(12:44):
I hope to describe it, give it words. Listen to
Unbreakable with Jay Glazer on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
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Speaker 2 (13:08):
Welcome back everybody, Fox Sports Radio ERRATORUS Jason Martin. We
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Let me tell you this, Alex Teyshirt the Memory of

(13:30):
an Elephant back there, Alex Tyshert of course remembered that
this was Jason Martin's favorite song, very clearly trying to
get on Jason's good side. Doesn't care about me, which
is kind of weird, but that's fun.

Speaker 3 (13:41):
I'll have a bad side, Torres.

Speaker 2 (13:42):
That's true. So you're saying you do have a bad side. Interesting? Oh,
the plot, the plot thinkings that is Jason Martin's favorite show.
That when we learned it when last time Tyshirt was
on the board. But then here's the crazy part. Alex
Chris Purfett was out that night and then the next
week he played that song unknowingly.

Speaker 4 (14:03):
Sorry, yes, yeah, collaborate and listen Alex.

Speaker 2 (14:07):
Or was he did he really know? Was he really
sitting at home listening to us on his night off?
Remains to be seen.

Speaker 6 (14:14):
I could see him doing that at Chris Prefett. You
never know what's going on with that guy.

Speaker 4 (14:17):
And that's what you should be doing, Chris, you should
be taking notes.

Speaker 2 (14:19):
Brother WHOA tell me? Tell tyshe is the pros pro.
But we we're glad to have Alex tyschert in. Of
course you can hear him on The Odd Couple and
Jason Smith Show with Mike Carmon. Do you still do
Tysher's Tower of Terror?

Speaker 6 (14:34):
So it's trivia, but it is terrifying because I don't
know sports as much. Yes, you will like this because
now we're actually doing a whole new segment and I
know you'll love this one. It's gonna be called plant
based hot takes, So doing this side you love this.
I'm basically gonna present them with the topic and no
matter what I'm debating against either Chris or Rob, they
have to take the other side. Okay, you know fun

(14:55):
that's gonna because I'm gonna say, like Lebron is like
the finals failure of all time for Rob, and he's
gonna have say he loves Lebron.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
You know, that's great. I'm excited.

Speaker 4 (15:03):
That's well, that's yeah, that's got legs.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
Man.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
All Right, I'm saying so really dumb question because I
sort of have it in my head, but not really.
Why do I understand that you are plant based? So
why does it have to be plant based hot takes?
It's a plant guy giving it to you. Okay, all right,
I was thinking if it was like the plant based
uh you know, Whopper of the Week or something, then
then that'd be something a little bit different.

Speaker 6 (15:27):
But yeoh, me and Rob Parker are trying to start
a line of underwear called plant E's, so we'll see
if that can be a sponsor.

Speaker 2 (15:34):
Okay, all right, Well you could hear ty shirt with
Rob and Chris throughout the week Jason and Mike as well.
I'm sure we'll bring you back in at some point.
If I had don't even in, we could have done tyshirts,
trivia tower or whatever, but we'll save it for next time.
So all right, Jason, let's get back to the NBA game.
One is in the books, the Denver Nuggets take care
of the Miami Heat. But of course, part of the

(15:55):
conversation that came into that game, and certainly came out
of Game one, was the fact that Miami was even
there in the first place, in large part because of
what happened on Monday night in Boston. And again, we're
very lucky to do what we do in this time slot.
And listen, you and me were both on the same
page after that game Game six the other night, which

(16:17):
is that essentially after Game six that Derek White put
back incredible victory all of that for Boston. We both
sat here and said, how is that team, the Heat,
gonna get on the road, get on a plane, go
to Boston and win a game seven? And not only
did they win it, I mean it really like wasn't competitive.

(16:38):
I mean they won by nineteen. They were up by
what they were double figures at the half, They're up
by ninth. They went end up winning by nineteen, And
I think it led to an interesting conversation out of
that game, which has since been resolved, which is, what
do you kind of quote unquote do with the Boston
Celtics going forward? Well, we found out that Joe Mizoula
is coming back. Brad Steven has said things that indicate

(17:01):
that he expects to have Jalen Brown back. And so essentially,
this core, which to its credit, did make the NBA
Finals last year, but fell short into Game seven at
home in these Eastern Conference Finals, and oh, by the way,
let's not forget needed to rally from down three to
two in the Eastern Conference semi finals against the Philadelphia

(17:22):
seventy six ers. This core is coming back. So I'll
just set it up for you and you take it here, Jason.
Are the Boston Celtics making the right decision by unless
something strange happens that we're not expecting. It appears as
though this core is going to be brought back.

Speaker 3 (17:38):
So this kind of thing happens.

Speaker 4 (17:40):
And usually some chip falls, like somebody takes the blame,
some big time move gets made you lose in this
situation at home in the way that you did. And
the response from the Celtics organization basically was as of

(18:00):
nobody's fault, we just got beat and that look, there
is some maturity to that response. It's not the usual
way it's played out in sports, but it's actually like
the organization's response is similar to Giannis talking about what
kind of season the Bucks had when they got knocked out,

(18:21):
even though he lost his coach, Boston's gonna keep their
coach who wasn't even the guy that was gonna get
that job, who they didn't think they were gonna have
to make the higher than when they did. They went
for somebody else who went elsewhere, and then they had
to take Missoula, and then it looks like I will
say this, I think the mistake you're making here is
John Brown, because I just don't think he entatum meshed

(18:42):
well together. I think maybe he needs a change of scenery,
but I don't like him being a part of this
team going forward. I think if I'm Brad Stevens, if
I'm somebody within the Celtics organization, I'm still gonna say,
oh yeah, he's definitely gonna be back, because I don't
want to give off the impression anybody else that this
is a distressed asset.

Speaker 3 (19:02):
That we might be able to discount.

Speaker 4 (19:04):
So as long as he's there, I'm going to continue
to say the right things, and then behind closed doors,
I'm probably taking phone calls at the very least so
as not to blow my own leverage and to get
the most that I can for Jalen Brown. I think
that's the bestake somebody. It's not that you have to,
you know, go in there and behead your entire franchise

(19:25):
because you lost a game seven in this way. But
I do think that you look at a couple of
years in a row where you came up short, but
you came close enough to know we got some of
the pieces that we need. But I don't look at
this team and the way that this point. We always said,
and we said this throughout the playoffs. Aaron something just
wasn't right about this team during the postseason and I

(19:46):
picked him to win the championship before the playoffs started,
and even I as Miami was pulling away on Monday night,
it's just like, yep, that this is this is about right?
Like this is it that you had it at home,
You had all the momentum, you got the crazy winning
and you came back and you got throttled. You had
a chance actually to put them out of their misery.
Miami in the first quarter had a chance to go

(20:06):
up fairly big, have the momentum, the crowd was super loud.
You blew that let him get back into the game,
and in the second half they basically took it to you,
and in the.

Speaker 3 (20:14):
Fourth quarter it was a laugher.

Speaker 4 (20:16):
But I don't look at this and just say you
stan Pat and come back with it, because I don't
think that this team is a championship team, because I
don't think one and two on this team.

Speaker 3 (20:26):
I think one.

Speaker 4 (20:27):
I like Tatum, even though he can be inconsistent.

Speaker 3 (20:29):
I still really like him.

Speaker 4 (20:31):
Brown's the one where I'm trying to find something similar
but not identical, and put Brown in a situation where
maybe he can flourish elsewhere, because there's there's something wrong
with the energy surrounding the team and the sense of urgency,
and the way that at times they just look like
a C minus team on the floor, and that most

(20:52):
of the great teams on their worst days they still
look like a B minus and this, this Celtics team
could look positively mediocre.

Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, it's it's tough because, like I think, there are
times where like there's no doubt, you just you got
to blow it up. And I think there's other times
where I think you largely, you know, you largely run
it back. I mean we talked to We've talked about
it for the last few weeks. But like with the
Los Angeles Lakers, I know that Lebron, you know, kind
of did the whole you know, I might be retiring

(21:21):
and this might be it for me, and we all
kind of thought it was maybe a leverage play. And
I bring it up because I said, like, look, the Lakers.
I understand that any season for Lebron James it doesn't
end in a championship is disappointing to him. But best
team in the NBA after the All Star or after
the trade deadline, excuse me, when that corps was together
destroy the defending champs in round two. I think that's

(21:44):
a group that you should largely bring back because I
think they're if they can stay healthy. You're largely just
scratching the surface of what you're capable of.

Speaker 3 (21:52):
Now.

Speaker 2 (21:52):
I understand there's cap restrictions that can you really bring
back Austin Reeves. I'll leave the capologist to figure all
that stuff out. But the point I'm trying to make
is if you can run it back, you should. And
the Celtics, like I don't think it's a definitive. You
gotta blow it up. The end of the road is here.
But I do think you have to consider what else
is out there because I you know, I understand both

(22:13):
those guys are young, but this is what you're six
of that of that duo, I mean eighteen, nineteen, twenty
one two. Yeah, this is your six because Jason Tatum
was drafted in the twenty seventeen drafts. So you're talking
about six years with this group, and I know they're
just now entering their primes. But I'm with you, is
there's something not only from a style of play, but
I do still think there's like a mental toughness component

(22:35):
to them, which I understand they want a game seven
all that stuff. So that's my only thought, Jason, is
you gotta see what's out there. I'm not saying that
you have to blow it up. I think there are
worse things you can do than run it back, but
I think you do have to be smart about what
options are potentially out there, and is there some asset
for Jalen Brown that could potentially make you better or

(22:56):
at the very least different, interesting, etc.

Speaker 3 (22:59):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's it.

Speaker 4 (23:00):
I just think that to me, it just feels like
this is about the ceiling for this team.

Speaker 3 (23:05):
They can be very.

Speaker 4 (23:07):
Boring, like it's just to watch, like you know they're
going to be closed, But do you really see them
winning with this corps at this stage. I think you
could compare this era, even though they've had a lot
of success. You could compare this era of the Celtics
to the Bills. You could compare this era of the
Celtics to maybe the Pittsburgh Steelers over the last like

(23:28):
seven eight years, where you knew they had some talent,
but you also never really thought that's a super Bowl contender,
but you respected them. The difference in those two organizations
and the Celtics is they aren't going through coaches. You
just had two first year guys in a row for
this team, which is not good for a nucleus of

(23:48):
any team to have that kind of turnover at the
head coaching position over and over again. And maybe that's it.
It's just well, if we still kind of like what
Mozilla was doing, we need to give him a little
bit more here. We need to give them a little
little bit more room, give him another year with this
group as opposed to being the Cleveland Browns and Jetising
our coach every year until we find Kevin Stefanski, and

(24:09):
we'll see how long he's able to last there. But
I think there's something about maybe not wanting to be
too rash because a lot of the recent history of
the Celtics has proven that they've made moves too quickly.

Speaker 2 (24:23):
Don't disagree with any of that, and I do think
it'll be interesting to see. It is a long offseason.
Obviously the free agency period could lead to some interesting scenarios,
and obviously that Jalen Brown extension is something to watch
out for as well. Fox Sports radio eron tors Jason
Martin broadcasting live from the tyreck dot com studios. At
the end of your first year, Discover credit cards automatically
double all the cash back you've earned. That's right, everything

(24:45):
you've earned doubled. Seriously see terms of check it out
for yourself at discover dot com. Slash Match coming up
more NBA news and notes, including a couple big coaching moves,
but will either ultimately end up mattering. We'll discuss that
next before we do a toss it over the news
desk steep saga. What's track?

Speaker 7 (25:02):
Hello, gentlemen. A couple of superb plays Hello. In sports
already tonight we had the Aaron Judge catch crashing through
the bullpen gate in right field at Dodgers Stadium. Yankees
beat LA six to three. That was the Fox TV
game tonight for most of the country. And then in
the opener of the Stanley Cup Final at one Seed Vegas,
the Golden Knight's goalie Aiden Hill with a highlight reel save.

(25:24):
Earlier in this game tonight, he was beaten, reached across
the Smiths crease and somehow got the blade of the
stick down in front of the shot. It got the
save early second period to keep the score tied. At
the time, hockey writers are quickly noting that it was
the same end of the ice also in Vegas in
a finals game where Washington's goalie made a very similar

(25:48):
save in that series. This is Stanley Cup Final Game
one in Vegas, and the score tonight is tied two
to two, with the Florida Panthers visiting a wildcard team,
so opening on the road again another eight seed from Miami.
Like the heat this game, with about fifteen minutes to
go in regulation, Panthers had retied the game with a
goal in the final seconds of the second period. Game
two of the series Monday night. NBA Finals Game two

(26:12):
is Sunday evening. Denver beat Miami in the series opener.
Nuggets are undefeated at home in this postseason, nine to zero.
Caleb Martin and Miami mispracticed today due to illness. Heat
guard Tyler Hero is likely a game time decision, trying
to come back from surgery in April on a broken hand.
The Brooklyn Nets are hiring Kevin Ali as an assistant.
Phoenix will reportedly keep top assistant Kevin Young. At the

(26:34):
French Open, Coco Golf won her third round match, as
did number one egas Fiontek. She advanced easily. The Buffalo
Bills gave defensive tackle Ed Oliver a four year extension
worth forty five million dollars guaranteed.

Speaker 2 (26:47):
Rory McElroy is.

Speaker 7 (26:48):
Tied for the lead at the Memorial and FS one
has NASCAR this weekend, the Infinity Race tonight with Cole Custer.
They had the Trucks Race today. They've got the three
hundred from Illinois tomorrow at three point thirty pm Eastern time.
We've got three late games in Major League Baseball Underway
Orioles at Giants scoreless after two. We've got the Padres

(27:09):
Cubs game on FS one right now, scoreless, top of
the second. You are going to the bottom of the
second as I speak you. Darvish has just retired the
Cubs again. Drew Smiley, five and two, is the cub
starting pitcher, and at Arizona, the Diamondbacks, who've won six
in a row, could be alone in first place in
the NL West. After tonight they're hosting the Brave scoreless

(27:29):
top of the second, Atlantis starter Spencer Streider, who's five
and two. The Dodgers were tied for first coming into tonight,
but then got that home loss to the Yankees, where
New York hit four home runs six ' to three
to the final. Aaron Judge with his nineteenth homer. Houston
and Toronto with wins, and Miami beat Oakland twelve to one.
The a's record falls to twelve and forty eight so far.

(27:51):
Luis a Riaz of the Marlins went five for five
five RBIs He's batting three to ninety. Pittsburgh won its
fourth in a row. Texas won again and Philadelphia one
to end a five game losing streak. Boston and Tampa
Bay split a double header. They had rain yesterday and
no game on Friday, already had a double header scheduled

(28:11):
for today. Chance of rain again tomorrow in Boston. The
game they lost from last night will be made up
on Monday. And a final note on the Aaron Judge Homer.
It got there, it got out of there quickly. A
rocket over the low wall down the left field line
at Dodger Stadium tonight. Exit velocity was near one hundred
and fourteen miles an hour off the bat. He's had

(28:33):
near fifty career home runs with that kind of exit velocity.
Number two in the stat cast era of the past decade.
To Guencarlo Stanton, who was activated for this series.

Speaker 2 (28:42):
Back to you, thank you.

Speaker 4 (28:43):
Very much, Taurus. Can I ask you in dissaga question, sure,
has Arnie submitted his resignation yet?

Speaker 2 (28:50):
He's actually working with Arnie tomorrow, So I'm gonna ask
him what was the listen to you, what was the
exact quote that I need to peer pressure him about?

Speaker 3 (28:57):
Well, talk about two games?

Speaker 4 (29:00):
He was he was he was willing to give up
his job if Miami took Boston or that's only the
game six, much less if they won. He said he
would quit his job if the Miami Heat defeated either
Boston or Philadelphia, and last I checked, it's Miami that's
playing in the NBA Finals.

Speaker 3 (29:18):
So I just want to see if somebody's gonna back
up his word.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
Do you think it's possible that the bosses don't still
know that he's working here, Like they just thought.

Speaker 4 (29:27):
He's Milton from office Space.

Speaker 2 (29:29):
Yeah, like they just thought, oh, who does Plank work with?

Speaker 3 (29:31):
Again?

Speaker 2 (29:31):
I can't even you know whatever you know, Plank Plank.
Plank's been hosting solo for a while.

Speaker 7 (29:36):
I would agree with you, but he's so loud. I
think it's just impossible to ignore.

Speaker 2 (29:40):
And his takes are so mediocre that I'm sure the
Boston ultimately hear from them. I mean, okay, his his
takes are so unique. Maybe maybe they're not all media.

Speaker 7 (29:51):
It's Tomorrow night, in the regular Sunday night slot you're
on with Arnie.

Speaker 2 (29:54):
Yeah, I mean, Oklahoma softball never loses, so they're probably
gonna be they have some something.

Speaker 7 (30:00):
He won so much. They don't play till Monday morning,
but it is early morning.

Speaker 2 (30:04):
I wonder if that's I don't know how the schedule broke.

Speaker 7 (30:06):
I'm sure it is, and it's not in Norman, and
it's Oklahoma City hosts the tournaments.

Speaker 2 (30:10):
I thought I think maybe they thought that Plank might
have a game, So whatever, I don't know. I'm in
with Arnie, but I will peer pressure him into But.

Speaker 7 (30:17):
You're right on the always winning. We do bring that
up with Arnie because they've set the NCAA record Oklahoma softball.
It's fifty straight wins, now breaking Arizona's record.

Speaker 2 (30:27):
Real, you know you didn't mention first of all, we
got all sorts of college baseball. Arizona is losing, I believe,
in the least surprising news ever in this time slot.
They're playing Santa Clara. I think they're losing. The reason
I'm paying attention to this college baseball.

Speaker 7 (30:41):
Didn't you u Kon win today?

Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yukon won? How about this? They have to play Florida
in Gainesville in an elimination game tomorrow. But this Clemson
Tennessee game is in the wacky fourteenth inning. By the way,
do you guys have a a.

Speaker 7 (30:56):
Arizona is getting shut out three nothing by Santa Clara
bottom of the fifth.

Speaker 4 (31:00):
It's a traditional three to oh, Like, what the Celtics
were down against the Miami Heat.

Speaker 7 (31:04):
It's the Steve Nash thing all over again, Santa Clara
beating areas.

Speaker 2 (31:07):
Yes, right, that was what I thought of when I
saw that matchup. Do you guys have a guilty pleasure sport?
Because I love college baseball and I think, I mean,
I only love it watching this tournament when there's a
million games on, But I think I love it because
it's like the only sport I can kind of have
on that I don't have to have like a take
on and nobody's gonna ask me about. But I enjoy
the heck out of this tournament every year. And I

(31:28):
was watching this Clemson Tennessee game earlier today, which has
been a really fun.

Speaker 7 (31:32):
Game, still going in the fourteenth falls apparently have just
taken the lead. I would put on the list the
Women's World Cup that Fox is gonna have this summer.
I'll be watching most every game there.

Speaker 3 (31:43):
Jason, I don't know.

Speaker 4 (31:44):
I mean I enjoy college baseball when it gets to
the tournament as well. I don't watch a regular season
college baseball too awful much.

Speaker 3 (31:51):
I mean, I played tennis.

Speaker 4 (31:52):
I lettered in tennis at high school, so I still
watch a lot of tennis as well, And some people
would say golf, but I mean golf. I mean somebody
would Some people would tell me I couldn't say golf.
I should say yeah, because golf is a little bit
too mainstream.

Speaker 3 (32:05):
But I absolutely love golf.

Speaker 7 (32:06):
You know, things have been going very well for South
Florida sports these days. Yeah, you mentioned the Miami Heat
into the NBA Finals, but I think one of.

Speaker 2 (32:15):
You already called it.

Speaker 7 (32:17):
And you've got the Florida Panthers who now have fallen
behind in the Stanley Cup opener at Vegas tonight, and
college baseball it's a top ten team that they have
with the Miami Hurricanes and they are losing to Texas
late tonight.

Speaker 2 (32:32):
Well, and I'll tell you, I know it's not a
South Florida thing, but that Florida Gators team that lost today,
like that, that's the team they're kind of the I'm
not being facetious about it, but like Yukon basketball, like
that was the team that they weren't one seed, but
people said they could win it. Florida, I think was
the second or third seed in the tournament. Wake Force
is the top overall seed, but that was like all

(32:54):
the experts picked to win it was Florida and they
lost today, so they'll be in an elimination game tomorrow.
I know that's not South Florida, but still.

Speaker 7 (33:00):
Yeh, double elimination.

Speaker 2 (33:01):
Love these tournaments absolutely. I'll tell you what. This is
what we'll do. We'll come back and we will continue
the conversation about the coaching stuff in the NBA, because
want to get Jason's opinion on Nick Nurse to the
Philadelphia seventy six ers. The Suns made a splashy hire
by the way, shout out Manti Williams, who is now
the highest paid coach. They made it higher. I mean, well,

(33:25):
you know, and it's an interesting conversation about that.

Speaker 3 (33:27):
Yes it is, and we'll discuss it next.

Speaker 2 (33:29):
Fox Sports Ado.

Speaker 1 (33:32):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live.

Speaker 2 (33:45):
Welcome back, everybody. Fox Sports Radio er Torres Jason Martin
broadcasting live from the tire Raq dot com studios, keeping
the updated on the hockey game in Vegas. Golden Knights
up three to two, about eight minutes left in the
third period against the Florida Panthers, Game one of the
Stanley Cup Finals. De Saga will have you an update

(34:07):
on that, a more extended update at the top of
the hour. But Jason, I do want to get back
to the NBA and so interesting. You know, we don't
really talk like coaching carousel like we talked coaching carousel
with the NFL and college football. I don't remember like
coaching carousel being a topic like that we would normally

(34:28):
talk about this time of year. But with the the
Bucks obviously firing a head coach, the Phoenix Suns firing
Manti Williams, the Philadelphia seventy six Ers firing Doc Rivers,
there is a lot of movement with high profile teams
and high profile coaches. It seems as though you have
a lot on Frank Vogel, so I'll give you the

(34:48):
floor on that one. Frank Vogel recently named the head
coach of the Phoenix Suns. It sounds as though you
are not very impressed.

Speaker 4 (34:55):
Well, I mean, it's not that I don't know that,
it's that I'm not impressed. Frank Vogel is a good
basketball coach. He was very good in Indiana he never
was going to get much of anything other than being
talked about for the wrong reasons as long as he
is with Lebron James for the most part. But I'm
not saying he's not a good coach. I'm just saying,

(35:16):
all right, so you move on for Monti Williams Coach
of the Year. It's won a lot of games for
them over the last few seasons, and you bring in
Frank Vogel, Like it just seems like kind of a
lateral move for your franchise. It's not like Greg Popovich
came available. It's not like Spoilster somehow decided he wanted
out in Miami and he was open. I mean, is

(35:36):
Frank Vogel a name that excites you. I'm not saying
there's anything wrong with it necessary, but do you think
that that is the magic Elickster that's missing? You were
a coach away, so you get rid of Manty and
it's Frank Vogel that's coming in. Like that's my point.
It's not that he's a bad coach, it's that it's
kind of it's not even that it's underwhelming, it's just whelming.

(36:00):
Like it's just you moved from one guy to the next.
But I don't think either one of them necessarily is
the key, Like it's eventually your players have to actually
do what they're supposed to do. I don't, and I
think that MONI maybe he did make some mistakes in
that series, but he also was dealing with guys that
are injured and guys that hadn't had a long chance

(36:20):
to play together because of when they were acquired and
all this other stuff. There were a lot of things
that you could have looked at. I just feel like,
if you were gonna end up with Frank Vogel, you
maybe could have been a little bit more patient with money.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
So I don't disagree with that. And it's funny because
your takeaway is, you know, it's kind of like, you know,
part of it was on just the roster composition and
all that, because that's kind of how I feel about
the the Philadelphia seventy six was hiring Nick Nurse is like,
you know, I was actually on air here on Fox
Sports Radio Memorial Day when that news broke, and of

(36:56):
course when that happens, like you have to have a take,
you have to have an opinion, and I'm like, well, respectfully,
like I don't it's kind of what you were just
saying only with the Sons, but I'm talking about it
with the seventy six ers. It's like it just feels
like you're kind of moving around the deck chairs. Is
I don't really care about if it's Doc Rivers, Nick
Nurse whomever, if Joe l embiid and assuming you get

(37:20):
even get back James Harden, if those guys aren't better
when it matters, I don't know that it really matters
all that much. And so maybe it's a conversation that's
applicable to both these sons and the Philadelphia seventy six ers,
because the Sons again, is Chris Paul gonna be healthy?
Are you going to be able to find other pieces
to compliment Devin Booker and Kevin Durant. It's a great point,

(37:42):
is like, is it really Monty Williams's fault that you
traded literally every expendable piece except for Devin Booker, DeAndre
and Chris Paul to get Kevin Durant and that he
had no depth. I don't think it's the coach's fault.
There was nothing left to you know, nothing left for
him to do. And I think it's kind of the
same for me with Philly is it's just hard for
me to feel like a coaching change matters because your

(38:04):
best players aren't playing their best in the biggest moments.
Speaking of which, by the way, the Vegas Golden Knights
have scored again to go up four to two with
about five five point thirty left in this third period,
about five twenty excuse me left in the third period,
so Vegas making plays in the clutch. But it goes
back to what I was just saying about these games,
Jason is like, it's just hard for me to get

(38:25):
excited about Nick Nurse or even Frank Vogel if the
fundamental issues with the organization aren't changed.

Speaker 3 (38:34):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's right.

Speaker 4 (38:35):
I think all right, So let's just pretend that Nick
Nurse is the one that was coaching during this past
postseason and it wasn't Doc Rivers, because I don't think
Doc Rivers lost that game. I think James Harden hit
a wall, if I mean, and it's not unexpected at
his age. And Joel EMBII did what he's kind of

(38:56):
done in the playoffs, which is be a little bit
wishy washy when it comes to the numbers. And then
in Phoenix if Frank Vote, if Frank Vogel had been
the coach, do you think we would have had a
different result against Denver? I don't. And once you make
a movie, you got to hire somebody, and I don't know,
because you know, you look at who the Bucks hired, Okay.

Speaker 3 (39:14):
Adrian Griffin.

Speaker 4 (39:16):
I don't know whether or not that's gonna work because
I don't know anything about it. I don't know how
I feel about first time head coaches against some redreads
that have had some success. I guess I'm just saying
you're moving on from coaches of the year in some
of these cases, and you're bringing in people that aren't, like,
demonstrably better, and it's just kind of like, all right,
I guess you just want a new face in the room.
When it comes to Nurse, Nurse proved he can win

(39:37):
the championship when he's got Kawhi Leonard and when he
gets to Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson injury in the
NBA Finals, and he actually established a brand and started
wearing his own n N gear during that finals run.
So I was always impressed with that. I like Nick Nurse.
I think coach. I mean, we saw it after the
fact with Siakam and Van Vliet and that crew. But

(39:59):
do I think that he's to take them over the top.
I mean, not if it's those guys, because I've already
said a hard and led team's not gonna win a
championship in my opinion, and Embiid is just too likely
to be hurt for my taste.

Speaker 2 (40:11):
I agree on both. I just it's hard for me
to get excited about either. But I think it again
fundamentally comes back down to how the rosters are built,
and it sets up for a very interesting offseason because
I think it's easy to blame a coach. I think
it's much harder to fix the problems to plague both teams.
Speaking of problems coming up, we will discuss John Morant
Adam Silver Read a lot to say we react next.

(40:34):
Fox Sports Radio Welcome in everybody. Our two erators Jason Martin,
Fox Sports Radio. We are broadcasting live from the tireck
dot Com studios tirerack dot com. We'll help you get
there and unmatched election fast free shipping, free road hazard protection,
over ten thousand recommended installers. Tirerac dot com. The Way
tire buying should be. And I do want to welcome in. Well,

(40:58):
we Jason and I want to welcome in are newest
affiliate in Peoria, Illinois, Peoria Sports Radio one oh one
point one. Welcome them to the Fox Sports Radio family.
There are Chicago White Sox Radio network affiliate and program
director Scott Hecke Thom dropped another network to make the
flip to Fox Sports a big win for them. So

(41:18):
welcome to Fox Sports Radio and the Fox Sports Radio family,
Peoria Sports Radio one oh one point one. Jason, Uh,
interesting because obviously, look, you know, Game one of the
NBA Finals happens the other night, and you know, it
was interesting, It was intriguing. It led to a result
that many, including the two of us, predicted. But the

(41:42):
more interesting thing that came out of Thursday night, more
than the game itself, because the game didn't end up
being very interesting, was actually something that Adam Silver said
before the game. So the story, of course, that we've
all been kind of following U is the unfortunate story
involving John Moran. We know the particular by now, but
the latest twist was about two two and a half

(42:02):
three weeks ago, was caught on a friends Instagram live
brandishing a gun. This, of course after he did the
same thing on his own social media accounts about it
was early March, was suspended for eight games, claims that
he went to therapy, all that good stuff. So we've
been kind of waiting, kind of trying to figure out
what was going on with his situation. Is a punishment

(42:25):
coming down for John Morant. Here's what Adam Silver had
to say before Game.

Speaker 8 (42:28):
One in terms of the timing. We've uncovered a fair
amount of additional information. I think since I was still
asked about the situation, I would say we probably could
have brought it to a head now, but we made
the decision, and I believe the Players Association agrees with

(42:49):
us that it would be unfair to these players and
these teams in the middle of the series to announce
the results of that investigation, and given that we're, of
course in the offseason. He has now been suspended by
the Memphis Grizzlies indefinitely.

Speaker 2 (43:06):
And that was Adam Silver before Game one. Thank you
to the guys in the back forgetting that for us. Jason, listen,
first of all, let me do the whole thing so
that it's clear we understand that based on the information
right now, John Morant has not broken a law. We
understand that, at least the most recent situation. It's during

(43:27):
the off season, as Adam Silver said, didn't even necessarily
break the NBA's Code of conduct, So that has to
be said. But this is the second incident which he's
caught on social media with a gun. The first one,
of course, was during a team trip, which did break
the NBA's Code of conduct. You go through the list
we know about the accusations at a mall, I believe

(43:48):
it's in the Virginia area, and certainly the situation at
his house where he is alleged to have assaulted someone.
So I want to give that all as a caveat
to say it's bad. There's just a lot of bad,
negative press around him. We're going to find out again
if he's broken any actual laws an the NBA Code
of Conduct. But for Adam Silver to then come out

(44:11):
on the night of Game one and acknowledge we're doing
an investigation and we have found even more, Jason, I
know it's a little unfair on our part to speculate,
but Adam Silver doesn't. But Adam Silver said it so
to a degree we have to. I I'm obviously intrigued,
but I'm just fascinated by what's going to be uncovered

(44:32):
and then ultimately what happens to John Morant from there.

Speaker 4 (44:35):
Yeah, I mean what he said is right, Like, you
don't want to take away from the finals with something,
especially if it's going to be really big time news
about you know, one of the guys that you were
hoping was going to be the face of your league
going forward. But of course, as soon as he says it,
it becomes a story of its own. And maybe he

(44:56):
couldn't help but say this, But you almost wish you
don't say anything until the fine are over and then
you can come out and say this. But you're right,
like the fact that they've investigated and they found a
good bit more, and the question is, well, what did
they find?

Speaker 3 (45:08):
Is it bad for jobs? It good for jaw? Well
it seems bad.

Speaker 4 (45:13):
Yeah, But I guess maybe I'm trying to feel optimistic
and just say, well, maybe they've found out that the
timeline on this thing, maybe this wasn't separate, or maybe
this was in the past, or you know, not trying
to get the benefit of the doubt, but it's just
I want to believe that it's not worse.

Speaker 3 (45:28):
Than we've already seen.

Speaker 4 (45:32):
We talked about he said, what's the appropriate punishment and
all this kind of stuff. Well, we didn't find out
what we find out here. But even before we knew
there was more, I said all Star break. I said
he should come back after the All Star break, and
it should actually be kind of a build up to it,
like All Star weekend. This is the last weekend before
John comes back. Jaw's worked really hard. Job's coming back
as a new guy. He's had time away from the game,

(45:55):
he's gone through this rehabilitation process, he's gone through our
disciplinary process whatever like that. But you look at some
of the other things that Adam Silver said. He's talking
about the CBA, and you know, players agree not to
do anything. It's a quote not to do anything materially
detrimental or materially prejudicial to the best interests of their

(46:17):
team of the NBA. That's the thing, Like he said
that this discipline's going to be about the values of
the league. It's not going to be about a crime.
It's going to be a private organization standard is what
he said. That is why, and I agree with them
that you don't have to say anything today because he's
already been suspended in definitely he's not playing basketball right

(46:38):
now anyway, because they're done until the fall in Memphis.
So this wasn't a media that you had to do this.
They're not dragging their heels to try and protect John Moran.
I understand what they're doing here. I actually think they
might actually get this right after getting it woefully wrong,
giving him too much credit for like a three day
rehab stent and then he comes back and we have

(46:59):
all these others after the fact, but to me, before
we found out there was other information. And we'll see
just how much more there is here in a week
or two. But I just don't think you can let
that guy miss or play until the back half of
the season. I think you can do something where it
looks like, you know, we are creating the possibility for

(47:22):
a great redemption story for you Jah, and then you know,
offer him the opportunity to come back and really, hey,
you know, I've actually stepped aside. I've realized I was
going down the wrong pathway. Give him every opportunity to
become a hero, like somebody that has really overcome something
a big time challenge and a big time setback that

(47:44):
most didn't see coming when he entered the NBA. I
think if they come out and say they say he
misses the first ten games of the season, they're gonna
get laughed out of out of the public arena, Like
at this point, you can't do that, Like at this point,
it's got to be something where it is no one
in this league ever does anything like this again.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
So all I would really add to that is, I think,
even without knowing what potential new information is out there,
I think I'm comfortable saying what you said. And by
the way, the hockey game has gone final. Vegas beats
Florida five to two in Game one of the Stanley
Cup Finals. Vegas up one nothing after a five to

(48:26):
two win in Game one to JA. I think there's
probably a lot of people sitting there driving around listening
to us, saying, oh, you know, how can you speculate
on this and how can you do that and how
can you say this without knowing what has been uncovered
and all that, to which I would say, listen, this
is the second incident that we know about that was

(48:49):
on social media. Adam Silver says he has found more.
And then there are two legal matters that are currently
being investigated. And so I have no problem with what
you said, Jason, for a few reasons. Is because one,
you do have to look out for the overall health
of the entire league. I think it's four hundred and

(49:09):
fifty players, thirty players per team, fifteen players. You know,
four hundred forty nine guys have figured out how to
at minimum not show up on everybody's social media with guns.
And you know this isn't a gun conversation. I'm not
saying there's never a circumstance where anyone should ever have
a gun. Whatever the point I'm trying to make, we
know you can't be on social media like like, there

(49:31):
are just four hundred and forty nine guys that at
least on this one particular thing have it figured out,
and they need to be rewarded for that. But I
think the other thing is, and this is gonna sound
kind of weird, encounterintuitive, but for Jaw's own good, I
think you have to suspend him for a significant amount

(49:53):
of time. It's not a punishment. It is a like, dude,
figure it out, because this thing, and it's a cliche,
but it's true. It's gonna end bad in some sort
of way. You're either gonna hurt yourself, You're gonna hurt
somebody near you, or somebody's gonna hurt you. Because in listen,

(50:16):
am I the perfect person to have this conversation? No,
but like I grew up in a great neighborhood. Like,
but you start doing that in the wrong neighborhood, in
front of the wrong people at the wrong time, you're
gonna get yourself in trouble because there's a lot of
people that are going to feel the need for self
defense or whatever, like like, like you understand the path
that I'm going down with this conversation, Jason, is You're
either gonna hurt yourself, You're gonna hurt someone around you,

(50:39):
or somebody is going to see you try to look
cool for social media, take it the wrong way and
hurt you. And so that's why I have no problem
with with anything short of like a year, Like I
don't think you should be suspended for all of twenty
twenty three, twenty twenty four. But if it's thirty games,
if it's fifty games, if it's the All Star Break,
if it's whatever, it's not just a pun. It has

(51:01):
to be a wake up call that something bad is
going to happen if you are not smarter in this situation.

Speaker 4 (51:08):
Jeez, yeah, I look, I think that's well said.

Speaker 3 (51:11):
I would add this.

Speaker 4 (51:12):
I would add a third, and that would be if
I'm Adam Silver, I need everyone to understand that my
league's authority actually exists, because if you look at the
CBA and you look at how the players are able
to manipulate get where they want, like, they have so

(51:34):
much more freedom to do so many more things than
you see. For example, in the NFL, they run the
league in many ways and you get it, they're the
big stars and all of this. But this NBA has
not this. And I always felt like the David Stern
NBA was different. I felt like David Stern there was
a level of gravitas to David Stern where it's just like,

(51:57):
all right, the league. When I hear something about the
league office, take note, Adam Silver, and just the enforcement
mechanisms of the NBA seem fictitious to me. And so
when you saw what happened with Jah the first time,
and the way that they adjudicated it and got them back,
on the floor as soon as possible. That struck me
as very indicative of the way the NBA feels like

(52:20):
it's run.

Speaker 3 (52:21):
Now.

Speaker 4 (52:21):
You cannot continue to give off this impression that the
National Basketball Association and Adam Silver's office and all your
enforcement mechanisms, all your rules and regulations, your standards of conduct,
or just the fact that you have teeth, like that's
got to be a thing, like we have to believe

(52:42):
that there is something serious in that office. And if
you come back with something half hearted this time, in
addition to your excellent point and the other point that
we've made about this situation, the league just looks weak,
It looks toothless, It looks like something that you should
never take seriously. And if I think that, what are

(53:03):
the players in the league that have leverage and money
and power and all that, what do they think in
that scenario? That's that's the whole deal about the good
of the league and the good of John Morant and
all of this. The worst thing that you could do
for somebody in need is ignore them. The second worst
thing that you can do for somebody in need is
subsidize them. And that can be taken in a myriad

(53:25):
of different ways. Certainly, yeah, you can buy something for
somebody who's already on the wrong pathway or whatever, but
you can also kind of it's the whole I'm just
kind of tapping your wrist thing like, no, like the
NBA needs to actually lay the hammer down and take
control of its league.

Speaker 2 (53:44):
I don't disagree on anything. And again, I think, you know,
I tell my wife this all the time, but but
you know, tough love is still love, and I think there, yeah,
there has to be some tough love and it's not again,
and I know I just said it, so I'm not gonna,
you know, belabor the point. But it's not just about punishment.
It's about awareness. It's about you know, like like it's

(54:07):
about making John Morant aware that, like, the behavior isn't acceptable.
But it's also about like, there could be much more
consequences than you missing a few games or you missing
a few paychecks. So it'll be curious to see. I mean, obviously,
the NBA Finals are going to wrap up here in
the next you know, ten weeks to ten weeks, ten
days to two weeks, and so we should it sounds

(54:28):
like by the middle of June get some sort of
resolution on this job Morant situation, and we'll continue to
cover it, and obviously it goes without saying, it'll be
fascinating to see if we find out what the new
information is and certainly what the suspension is. Fox Sports
Radio eron towards Jason Martin, and we are brought to
you by Progressive Insurance. Progressive makes bundling easy and affordable.

(54:49):
Get a multi policy discount by combining your motorcycle, RV, boat,
ATV and more all your protection in one place. Bundle
and save at Progressive dot com. Coming up, well, ask
Mark Medina and Insider about this Ja Morant situation and
much much more. Mark Medina joins us next. There's a
lot to unpack with him. This is Fox Sports Radio.

(55:14):
Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports Radio, Eric Torres, Jason Martin
broadcasting live from the Tireq dot com studios. We are
brought to you by Discover. At the end of your
first year, Discover credit cards automatically double all the cash
back you've earned. That's right, everything you've earned doubled. Seriously
see terms to check it out for yourself at Discover
dot com. Slash match what I want to do now,

(55:35):
go straight to the phones, and we are joined by
our Fox Sports Radio NBA insider Mark Medina. Of course,
you can follow Mark on Twitter at March Underscore Medina. Mark.
First of all, how you enjoying the Saturday night off?
This is probably like your first Saturday off in like
eight months. Probably what are you doing?

Speaker 7 (55:55):
Where are you at hey?

Speaker 9 (55:56):
I mean, look, I did some TV work earlier this apteron,
so I got to have dinner sometime. But you know what,
I'm always here.

Speaker 4 (56:03):
To be busy, so happy to talk groups any time
with it fantastic.

Speaker 2 (56:07):
Well, listen, we're gonna get to game one in a minute.
Jason and I though, right before we brought you on,
we were actually talking about Adam Silver's quotes about John Morant,
not speculating. He said, flat out, you know, our investigation
has uncovered even more. Now to Jason's point, you know,
I think the exact quote was the investigation has uncovered

(56:28):
new information. So to Jason's point, in theory it could
be good, I don't know that it is, and I'm
not asking to speculate on what it might be. But
what was just your overall takeaway about Adam Silver's comments,
Because obviously it sounds as though we are getting a
suspension or some kind of punishment here very soon.

Speaker 9 (56:44):
Yeah, what I took, and I don't think there's a speculation,
but I think that Adam Silver was laying the groundwork
to brace for the fact that whatever punishment John Morant's
perceives this go round, it's going to be significantly more
severe than that eight games mention that he received for
his post, you know, his first sin of the Instagram

(57:05):
Live video charades, and that was an eight game suspension,
and it was also kind of retroactive because he had
already missed games before the formal punishment. But that's what
I think. Now, does that mean season ending suspension? Who knows,
but I am bracing that's going to be a significant
chunk of games. And the reason why he was evasive

(57:27):
about the exact details is that part of the arrangement
with the league and the NBA players Union is that
they didn't want this specific story to overshadow everything going
on with the NBA Finals, with the you know, with
the Nuggets and the Miami Heat, which is understandable, but

(57:47):
if that was the leaning they wanted to follow through,
I was surprised that Adam at least acknowledge, Hey, we
found new things. He could have easily just said, hey,
we're we're still putting everything together. We take it seriously, YadA, YadA, YadA,
and by kind of going down the middle, clearly we're
talking about it and wondering what exactly the suspension or

(58:07):
punishment will be. But yeah, I definitely think it's more significant.

Speaker 4 (58:11):
See, I've kind of I don't know if I've advocated,
but I've lobbied and kind of I feel like mark
All Star break is what I'm looking at for Job.

Speaker 3 (58:19):
Now.

Speaker 4 (58:19):
That may be more than it's gonna be, but that's
what I would do to send the right message and
give an opportunity for All Star Weekend to be Hey,
Joss coming back for the second half of the season.
He's gone through a long process. You have this chance
to create this redemption story for Job that we would
all get behind, especially if it's true, because nobody wants
to see this guy, you know, throw away his future

(58:39):
or anything. But to your point, it was strange to
me that Silver was this specific when he could have
been vague, waited until after the NBA Finals then said Hey,
here's what we found, and then go ahead and tell
us what he's gonna tell us anyway, because we just
led and now I've asked a follow up on John
Morant instead of talking about his NBA Finals, which was
supposed was the reason that we didn't go into more

(59:02):
detail at that press conference.

Speaker 9 (59:04):
Yeah, without a doubt, And I think the bigger thing
about the suspension, what I hope that the NBA winds
up doing, whether it's season long or up through the
All Star break, et cetera, that they strike the right
core that it's not about the public relations for them saying, hey,
now we're being more disciplinarian, because I think the way

(59:25):
the league mishandled the first punishment was this, they both
them and the Grizzlies really cast John Moran in a
light where he was the victim. You know, they played
the oh, he's struggling with mental health issues and we
feel compassionate for him, and look, I don't take those
issues lightly, like those are very serious things, but they
seem to downplay the danger that he put other people in,

(59:49):
as well as the harm that he potentially did with
these allegations with the high school student. And you know,
some of the Pacers team employees, et cetera, and so
with whatever they I hope that it's all addresses the
root problem of getting a punishment that shows the magnitude
of what they find, and so that he feels like

(01:00:11):
he's finally going to be held accountable and that there's
actual time for him to address whatever it is. And
the first time the idea that he saw a counselor
and then all of a sudden a week later he's fine,
just reeked of tone deafness on the seriousness of that
specific issue with mental health, and also just seems to

(01:00:33):
be timed way too perfectly for when the playoffs start.
Now John Morana is back and everything's back to normal
and peaches and cream, and clearly the fact that this
has happened again shows that that's.

Speaker 10 (01:00:44):
Not the case.

Speaker 9 (01:00:46):
So a lot of things unpack, and I'm curious what
the NBA actually finds with all this new information.

Speaker 2 (01:00:52):
Mark macdeina joining us aeron towards Jason Martin here on
Fox Sports Radio. Mark of course our Fox Sports Radio
NBA insider. Make sure to follow him on Twitter at
my Underscore Medina. Mark. Obviously, you know, let's let's talk
a little game one and I think you can look
at it one of two ways is obviously short turnaround
for Miami off an emotional series win, but also Denver

(01:01:14):
is a phenomenal team that is coming off a sweep
in the Western Conference Finals. I don't want to be hyperbolic,
but but do you feel like the series is over?
Barring something you know, shocking? Do you believe that it
was a blip on the radar because of the travel? Like,
what is your biggest takeaway from Game one? I guess
is probably the best way to put it.

Speaker 9 (01:01:33):
Yeah, I'm with you. I think that fundamentally the serious
outcome as early, I don't want over. I don't want
to say the series is over it's a sweep. I
think that Miami can get one game or maybe even two.
But to your point, I felt like that Game one
takeaway was that the Nuggets are above and beyond better
than the Heat and it's inevitable, barring a significant injury,

(01:01:54):
that they're gonna win the championship. And as much as
I think that Miami can make low hanging fruit adjustments
of some of their role players like Max shrus and,
Duncan Robinson and Cable Martin shooting better, same with Jimmy
Butler and the fact that they're a resilient team. They've
overachieved his night steeds. They don't have answers defensively to

(01:02:15):
stop the nugget because not only did they have Nikola
Jokic posting triple doubles almost every game, they have Jamal
Murray playing an all star level, and they have every
role player that fills every positional need, whether it's another
interior guy like Aaron Gordon or some good two way
players like Contavious Coldwell Pope and Bruce Brown. And then

(01:02:36):
this like really interesting wild card X factor of Michael
Porter Junior being a young prospect that was highly touted
that's finally playing up to his potential because one he's
healthy and who he's you know, figured out how to
master his role. And so with that, yeah, it feels
like Denver's gonna run away with it. But look, I

(01:02:56):
didn't think Miami would even get to this far to
begin with, So I guess you can't technically roll them out.

Speaker 4 (01:03:02):
Mark have you ever or how many guys have you
seen like Jokic. He's so unique to me in that
he doesn't even have to look for his shot to
end up with a triple double. I mean it looked
like he had done nothing offensively, and you get to
the fourth quarter and he ends up with twenty seven points.
That's just that's got to be really, really rare. Most
of these guys are very high utility players that have

(01:03:24):
to have the ball in their hands all the time.
Jokic ends up with eight or nine assists at halftime,
he's just collecting stats, and then he ends up with
high points, a lot of them coming in the fourth quarter,
and his team is running away from it. Like he's
a star that doesn't need to control the basketball all
the time.

Speaker 3 (01:03:39):
How rare is that?

Speaker 9 (01:03:41):
It's very rare, And I think the ironic kind of
contradiction is that the offense certainly runs through Jokic, But
to your point, he doesn't need to have the ball
in his hands a lot or get a lot of shots,
and so you know, he's getting a triple double primarily
because of that, Like he can hit all boxes of Okay,
if you're gonna leave me open, I can get points

(01:04:04):
from you know, three point range, baseline post. If I'm
getting double teamed or play, you know, having a good
defender on me, I can pass and find the open
teammate and it's really illustrated. Something I asked Steve Kerr,
the Warriors coach, last year. I was wondering, okay, like,
is Jokic more dangerous as a score or a passer?

(01:04:26):
And he looked at me facaciously and said both, Like
that's that's the ultimate problem, is that if you try
to prioritize one thing, he's gonna punish you with the other.
But I think most teams have concluded that they'd much
rather have Nakolea Jokic be a score than a passer,
because that just means that there's you know, three four

(01:04:46):
more dominant scorers there. And the ironic part with this
Miami team is that they weren't throwing double teams at them.
They were throwing bam Adebayo and different defenders throwing some
zone and he's still getting other teammates involved. So I
don't think they have the answers. Like they can bam
out of Eyes an all defensive player. He could arguably

(01:05:09):
be an MVP like a Defensive Player of the Year
award type player, and they can man all five positions,
but beyond him, they're just simply undersize. So I frankly
don't know beyond the you know, hoping that he gets
in Vouch trouble and they can be physical with them,
that they can really do anything defensively.

Speaker 2 (01:05:27):
Mark Medina joining US Fox Sports Radio Aeron towards Jason Martin.
Last one for me, Mark the two teams this week,
I thought the Suns with Vogel and the Philadelphia seventy
six ers with Nick Nurse. To me, it's hard to
get excited about either higher because I think both teams

(01:05:48):
are fundamentally flawed as they're currently constructed. Do you feel
like either one, do either one or both? Do you
feel like either one or both moves the needle in
any way?

Speaker 3 (01:05:59):
Or does it?

Speaker 2 (01:06:00):
Does it come down to can Philly keep James Harden
and can they get more out of their stars come
playoff time? And obviously the Suns need to address their
depth issues. Is that the fundamental problem? Or do you
think either or both coaching hires help.

Speaker 9 (01:06:14):
Yeah, Aaron, you hit it right on the head. I
mean the bottom line is NBA teams their success with failures,
most mostly personnel driven, and so as far as the
head coaching hires, I think they both made great hires.
They didn't screw up the coaching process. Let's just put
it that way. Because they're good, they're good coaches, they
have championship experience. It helps with the buy in with

(01:06:36):
star players, et cetera. But I think I think Frank
Vogel was exhibit a here of exactly what you said.
He helps the Lakers win an NBA championship in twenty twenty,
not only because they had Lebron James, Andy Davis, but
he had the personnel to become a very elite defensive team,
and he really masters that side of the floor. You know,

(01:06:57):
two seasons later the team was terrib defensively because they
didn't really have much of a roster. And then he
was let go. And so with the Suns, you know,
it's gonna help, you know, Kevin Durant and Devin Booker
and Chris Paul DeAndre and they're all going to respect him,
but they don't have, you know, the quality defenders that
they need to be an elite defensive team. They have

(01:07:19):
deandreid who can be a good rim protector, and I
think Kevin Durant can be a good defender as well,
even though his obvious value is more on the scoring end.
But they need positional players to make this work, and
same thing with the Sixers. You know, Nick Nurse will
establish I think a good rapport with Joel Embiid even

(01:07:39):
though they had some tumultuous history as opponents, and I
think that James Harden will respect him because of how
he handled things in Toronto. But yeah, they need to
beef up the roster as well, and I think specifically
in the Sixers end, Joel Embiid and James Harden also
have to take accountability. As much as Doc Rivers isn't
blameless for the Game seven playoff elis, they also didn't

(01:08:01):
show up to play in their Game seven against Boston,
So yeah, a lot of personnel things that have to
be addressed before they worry about the right coach or dot.

Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
He is Mark Medina, NBA insider for US at Fox
Sports Radio. Make sure to follow him on Twitter at
Mark g Underscore Medina. Mark. I know I always say it,
but we appreciate the time here, especially on a Saturday,
and we will obviously be talking against soon.

Speaker 9 (01:08:25):
I appreciate you guys as always an error I mean,
quick plug. You gotta follow his website too. He's got
a lot of good MBA one good watch football content.

Speaker 2 (01:08:34):
Yeah, Mark's been doing some great work for me personally,
and he's been crushing all playoffs. I you know, I
appreciate you coming on here, but I appreciate everything you've
done for me as well, Mark, and that's not slowing
down anytime soon either. So thank you, Mark, appreciate it.

Speaker 9 (01:08:48):
Appreciate you. Right back out you guys.

Speaker 2 (01:08:50):
All right? That was Mark Medina. Make sure to follow
him on Twitter at Mark g Underscore. Medina went a
little along with Mark. So let's go straight to the
news desk, Steve to Seger, what is trending well?

Speaker 7 (01:08:59):
Stanley cut. The final opener was in Vegas tonight and
the home team got three goals in the third period,
including an empty net or five to the final over Florida.
Game two of the series is Monday night, NBA Finals
Game two Sunday night. The Brooklyn Nets are hiring Kevin
Ali as an assistant. At the French Open, number six,
Coco Goff won her third round match. Don't forget Nascars

(01:09:19):
on FS one this weekend, including Sunday's three hundred from
Illinois three thirty pm Eastern time. Today's Trucks Race Infinity
Races also on FS one, Cole Custer the winner tonight Infinity.

Speaker 2 (01:09:30):
As for the.

Speaker 7 (01:09:31):
Hockey, by the way, Eric Stahl did score for the
Florida Panthers in defeat about seventeen years after his previous
goal in the final, longest gap between goals in a
final by any player in league history, and at thirty eight,
it was a shorthanded goal, oldest guy in NHL history
to score shorthanded in a Stanley Cup final. Again, Game
two is Monday night, neither franchise has ever won the Cup.

(01:09:53):
Game three isn't until Thursday. In Florida. Three late ballgames
in the Major Leagues. Giants lead three to nothing over
the Orioles bottom of the fifth, the Padres on FS
one have you Darvish on the mound and lead the
Cubs three nothing In the top of the six just
one hit for the Cubbies so far, Fernando Tatist Junior
with his tenth home run. The Cubs place pitcher Justin

(01:10:14):
Steele on the injured list today. The Diamondbacks have won
six in a row, but Atlanta's beating him tonight three
nothing going to the bottom of the fifth inning with
Spencer Stryder on the mound, trying to go to six
and two on the season. If if the home team
can come back and win, Arizona would be alone in
first in the NL West. Because the Dodgers lost at
home tonight to the Yankee six three over La. Yankees

(01:10:37):
hit four home runs. Aaron Judge with his nineteenth wins
for Houston and Cleveland, for Toronto to one at the Mets,
and for Miami, which beat Oakland twelve to one. Luis
Arriaz went five for five. He's batting three ninety the
A's on the road this season five and twenty four.
Texas whip Seattle sixteen to six. Philadelphia four to two

(01:10:58):
winner at Washington fills it into five game losing streak.
Pittsburgh has won four straight, Milwaukee won again, and Boston
split a doubleheader with Tampa Bay.

Speaker 2 (01:11:07):
Back to you, thank you very much, Steve de Seger,
Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday eron Torus Jason Martin
broadcasting live from the Tirec dot Com studios. At the
end of your first year, discover credit cards automatically double
all the cash back you've earned. That's right, everything you've
earned doubled. Seriously see terms and check it out for
yourself at discovered dot com slash match, tell you what, Jason,

(01:11:29):
Let's come back and I want to discuss maybe the
biggest what if. What if in NFL history might be
a little high perperly, we'll explain it next.

Speaker 3 (01:11:40):
I want to know what you're going with on that.

Speaker 2 (01:11:41):
Ooh, stay tuned. Fox Sports Radio, Welcome back, everybody. Fox
Sports Radio Erittords Jason Martin broadcasting live from thee tireq
dot com studios. Busy Saturday night here for June. A
lot of baseball. But Jason, do want to talk a

(01:12:02):
little NFL we You know we've been light on you know,
we've been light on NFL topics these last couple of
weeks again, unless you want to just talk about the
the never ending Aaron Rodgers Packers breakup, which there's a
new twist to every day, even though he left the
organization about three four weeks ago. Uh, but you sent
me a very interesting story that, frankly, could go down

(01:12:27):
as maybe one of the biggest what ifs in recent
NFL history. I think I said NFL history before the break,
but that's how I get just stayed, stayed stay through
the break. So you sent this to me Russell Wilson,
who was last seen in Denver. Not a good year.
You're a Broncos fan, so I don't we don't need
to relive it play by play, but you know he

(01:12:47):
struggled in his u in his new home last year.
Part of it was Nathaniel Hackett. We get all that.
But why I bring it up is because Greg Bishop
in a in an interview in Seattle, Greg Bishop, NFL
insider for spots for Sports Illustrated reference something that had
also previously been referenced by Ian Rappaport, which was that

(01:13:09):
they had both heard through the grapevine that last offseason
the Philadelphia Eagles actually made a real push for Russell Wilson,
but that he preferred Denver. And you talk about the
crazy scenarios that have obviously played out since then, Philadelphia
makes the Super Bowl, Jalen Hurts for a time, becomes
the highest paid quarterback in NFL history. I mean, you

(01:13:31):
just talk about the crazy what if. And that's not
even from the Denver perspective, that's just from the Philly
perspective of how well, you know, sometimes sometimes the best
moves you make are the ones that you don't. And
you talk about how well that has now worked out,
or at least it appears to for Philadelphia, which has
Jalen Hurts. He's set for the future. The rest of
the team is in great shape, while Russell Wilson obviously

(01:13:53):
is in basically career reboot mode right now trying to
get things back on track with Champaigne this year.

Speaker 4 (01:13:59):
Yeah, I mean, it's fast to think about what could
have happened had that gone through no trade clause for Russ.
He said no according to the at least according to
the articles. According to the reporting, if he goes there,
we may not have ever had the Jaywen Hurts season
that we just had. Now the question is, does he
go there and have a similarly bad season, and then,

(01:14:21):
unlike in Denver where you really don't have this option,
in Philly, conceivably you've still got Jaywen Hurts. Is the
possibility that Russ actually gets benched, Like, think about that
storyline for a minute. It goes out in Philadelphia, it
doesn't go well early, and you know, midway through the season,

(01:14:41):
Let's see what we got with jay One. Let's put
him back in there. He you know, he was in
the playoffs last year. If Russ had gotten benched, we
would be thinking even differently about him now. And he
had a bad year and this is either going to
be redemption time or it's gonna be what oh in
terms of his legacy and future and everything else. But

(01:15:02):
he got to pretty much play out the season in
Denver as bad as it all went, you had the
coach fired and everything else. But in Philly, if he
gets benched, we have a completely different argument on our hands.
We have a different storyline, and that would have become
a talking point mid season and Philadelphia be in the
market that it is those fans think about how poorly
that could have gone if Russ had gone there and

(01:15:24):
struggled early on, and then you wonder this, they're gonna
bring in Russ. One of the big reasons they got
Aj Brown is because of his relationship to Jay when Hurts,
So think about that tie in as well, Like him
and Hurts at that wedding, they were throwing football to
each other, AJ was I guess it Hurts tried to
get Aj to come to Alabama.

Speaker 3 (01:15:45):
Like that storyline was out there.

Speaker 4 (01:15:46):
These guys have been friendstance high school and like that's
a big part of the reason why Aj Brown is
playing in Philadelphia. Now, maybe he's not there, or maybe
that whole thing went really awry, This whole thing where
we're talking about how brilliant the Eagles have been in
their rebuilding process and the way that they've acquired talent,
the way they've drafted, the moves that they've made. Think

(01:16:08):
about the domino effect of Russell Wilson having not said no,
if this is all true going to Philadelphia. The situation
with Jalen Hurts. The season we just saw, even the
way he played in the Super Bowl sands one bad play. Basically,
it is one of the great what what ifs in
NFL history. Had they won the Super Bowl, it would

(01:16:29):
have been a no brainer, one of the biggest what
ifs in NFL history. But they were right there, they
almost did, and with I don't think Russell Wilson has
them in the Super Bowl.

Speaker 2 (01:16:40):
I don't think there's any doubt based on what we
saw this past season that he woned. And like I
said before, I tossed it over to you, sometimes the
best moves are the ones that you don't make. And
it's funny I was thinking about that this week with
obviously Bob Meyers, the GM of the Golden State Warriors
resigned or you know, his contract was up or whatever,
but he decided to step away. And you know, everybody's

(01:17:01):
doing these gushing, glowing, you know, stories on him and
memorandums and whatever. And I sat there and said, like,
he had some nice breaks along the way that went
in his favor, besides obviously Kevin Durant, Right, Kevin Durant
goes without saying, but this isn't like a tearound Bob
Meyer segment. But he didn't draft Steph, he didn't draft Clay,

(01:17:22):
didn't draft Draymond. But there was also that moment in
time where there were a lot of people that wanted
him to trade Klay Thompson for Kevin Love and if
you remember, that was like a real thing. And Jerry
West was the one that came out and said, if
you trade this Klay Thompson kid, I'm walking out of
this building and never coming back. And so I'm not

(01:17:42):
saying it would have been Bob Meyer's fault whatever, but
you look at that as like one of those great
moments in history that could have gone a different way
and instead went the way that it did. And now
NBA history has been changed forever. I'm not saying the
Philadelphia Eagles of the Golden State Warriors, but coming off
of his Super Bowl that's super young core. They're gonna

(01:18:02):
be an overwhelming favorite in the NFC this coming season.
I don't know that any of that is happening if
Russell Wilson is there. And then obviously the reverse effect
too of what it meant for Russell Wilson. So again,
I know I just said it, but like sometimes the
moves that you don't make are the ones that change history.
And again we saw it in Golden State. That was

(01:18:23):
just an example. But what could what the Philadelphia Eagles
future over the next ten years could look like is
kind of crazy to think about.

Speaker 4 (01:18:32):
Well, I mean yeah, I mean there's some other good
what ifs as well. I mean, what happens if the
Miami Dolphins find a way to land Drew Brees that
year when Nick Saban is there, and maybe Nick Saban
never leaves, or maybe he's there a lot longer, doesn't
end up at Alabama and what happened at Alabama never
happens at Alabama. Like, there's there's definitely a lot there.

(01:18:56):
I've heard this said, and I try to live by this.
The thief's best is the great The thing that can
keep you from the best thing is the great thing,
because it's hard to leave the great thing. So I
think that that's part of it. Like I mean, if
you get to Russell Wilson, you feel like you're getting
a great situation, but you may have missed the best,

(01:19:16):
the best situations, the one that you fell into last
year that may have set you up for success for
the next decade and given you your franchise player, a
guy that's gonna be beloved there for a very long time.

Speaker 3 (01:19:26):
I believe in Jalen Hurts. There's just there's a lot there, man.

Speaker 4 (01:19:31):
Like that story I saw that in my eyes was
just oh, my goodness, Russ almost ended up in Philadelphia
and then he said no to it and the Eagles
are going to sleep every night and just saying, my gosh,
thank goodness. Oh that's the thing that we prayed that
we wanted, but we didn't know enough to know we
didn't want it.

Speaker 2 (01:19:49):
Don't disagree on anything, and yeah, just one of those
fascinating what ifs. And again I just look at it
from not only the Russell Wilson, like just how much
better set up. They are for the future. Uh with
all those young players and now the young quarterback to
go with it. Fox Sports Radio Ertors Jason Martin broadcasting
live from the Tirec dot Com studios. Coming up, we

(01:20:10):
switched back to the NBA Game two. What can Miami
do to get better? Next? Welcome in Everybody. Hour three.
Fox Sports Radio Ertors Jason Martin broadcasting live from the
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(01:20:30):
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(01:20:52):
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(01:21:14):
two am Eastern Time, been on since ten pm Eastern Time.
And I bring it up, Jason, because we opened the
show by talking Game one of the NBA Finals. The
Denver Nuggets take care of business in a game that
frankly just really wasn't competitive. Like I mean, there's really
no other way to put it. Denver jumped out to
a huge lead. The Heat, to their credit, did make

(01:21:39):
a comeback to make it look a little bit more
competitive than it was an eleven point win. But we
opened the show, Jason, and you were pretty blunt. You said,
I don't really see the pathway for these Miami Heat
to win four out of the next six games and
claim them, you know, claim an NBA championships. So I

(01:21:59):
guess that's what I would say. Is is there anything
like like what makes like what did you see in
Game one or what have you seen in these playoffs
that make you confident that Denver isn't gonna fold like
some other teams have against Miami. And frankly, you know,
we could get to this throughout this opening segment here,
like what does Denver or what does Miami have to
do to make this thing competitive because Denver absolutely dominates

(01:22:22):
Game one.

Speaker 4 (01:22:24):
Yeah, I think it goes back to our guests from
last hour. If you missed him, I should always catch
Mark Madeena when he's on with us our Fox Sports
NBA insider. He said, to my question about Jokic and
how unique he is as a player in terms of
not needing to end up or not to have the
ball consistently and shoot the ball consistently to be effective.

(01:22:45):
He ends up with a triple double where maybe he's
not even gonna have double figures midway through the third
quarter and you look up, he's got twenty seven points
to lead his team because of what he did in
the fourth.

Speaker 3 (01:22:54):
But it's his.

Speaker 4 (01:22:54):
Assists and the way he moves the basketball around and
finds the open guy, and just his basketball IQ and
everything like that. Like he said, bam Adebayo is a
potential defensive of the year kind of player. But he
couldn't like there's nothing you can do because Jokicic is
so multifaceted, because he possesses so many different ways to

(01:23:15):
beat you, and he's so hard to play against, he said.
When he asked Steve Kerry the question about you know,
is he more dangerous as a scorer as or as
a passer? And courage response was both, which makes sense.
I don't know what you're supposed to do to stop
him if you're Miami. Especially Miami, they just don't seem
particularly well equipped to deal with this. And the biggest

(01:23:38):
problem is there are a fleet of guys on that
Denver team that Jokic can get the ball to who
can make shots, and he's given them the ball where
they want to shoot, and they all seem to be
hot at the right time. I mean, Murray is absolutely
on fire. Michael Porter Junior is really playing well in
these playoffs. KCP has made some big shots in all

(01:23:59):
the series so far. Brown is making plays he's gon't
get paid in the offseason. And then you've got Aaron Gordon. Now,
Gordon's not gonna give you the kind of game every
night that he gave you in Game one, Like he's
frustratingly inconsistent. But when he's on, they really do feel
like they're unbeatable. You're right, like, pretty much from the jump,
this dish didn't feel like a basketball game. Credit the

(01:24:22):
Heat for not getting beat by forty and fighting back
to get it, you know, near single digits, but I
don't ever think they quite got there once it really
blew up in the second half. But the reason I
watched it and felt this way, and I've watched it
through the playoffs, is just the Nuggets are better than everybody.
They're more complete than everybody. They're deeper than everybody where
it matters, like they don't. It's not like fifteen deep,

(01:24:45):
but nobody's going fifteen deep in the NBA Finals. You
need a rotation of about six to eight guys max,
and they all need to be able to contribute, and
they are. And the problem for Miami is Miami's a
very hot and cold team. Offensively, Struce has not shot
the ball well, especially in the last two rounds, and
Game one he was awful. Caleb Martin's banged up and

(01:25:05):
you need everything you can get from him right now.
Butler just didn't seem to be as aggressive as he
needed to be in Game one, and maybe you credit
the Nuggets for making it difficult on him, and just
he wasn't able to be aggressive, and bam, he gave
you a really nice game overall in Game one, and
I'm not sure he's capable of doing that maybe one
more time in this series against what the Nuggets are

(01:25:27):
gonna bring. So I just don't look at the matchup
and think there is a real pathway that makes sense,
Like it's basketball and there's plenty of opportunity for them.
I just think the Nuggets are better. And sometimes it's
obvious very quickly. And I think that's why I said,
if this turns out to be a sweep, I wouldn't
beat the least bit surprised.

Speaker 2 (01:25:47):
Yeah, And it goes back to what I said in
our one when we were actually talking about the Celtics
about you know, is there a next move for them?
But it's why I think, like the like the Lakers.
I don't think it's panic time for the Lakers because
I just think the Nuggets are that good. And you know,
sometimes you catch a team at the right time peaking,
everybody's healthy, everybody's operating at the highest level. That's what

(01:26:08):
the Lakers got a last round, and it's what the
Heat have got in this round as well. And what
I would say is, and I know it's obvious, but
but sometimes you just got to watch games and stuff
sticks out that might not otherwise, And Like, what strikes
me that's so obvious and interesting about Denver is exactly

(01:26:29):
what you just said, Jason is like most teams, if
they have an NBA, an NBA MVP caliber player, if
that dude like that, dude's got to be the best
guy on the floor, getting the most points, doing this,
doing that, right. Like we've talked a lot this show
in the last couple of weeks about Joel Embiid and
the Philadelphia seventy six ers. They fired Doc Rivers, they

(01:26:50):
bring in Nick Nurse, But if Joel Embiid isn't operating
at a higher level in big games, none of it
is going to matter. Well, Nikola Jokich to a point
that you brought up with Mark Medina, that's a guy
that he can finish the game with four points and
have the biggest impact on the game of any guy
on the court. And so that's where I think it
gets complicated, is you know we've now watched this is

(01:27:13):
now the fourth round of the NBA playoffs, and Darvinham
elite defensive coach, Anthony Davis elite defender. You know, you
go on down the list. Monti Williams is a good coach,
you know, blanking on the guy's name, Eric Spolster. I
don't know why. I was just blanking on that. He's
obviously an elite coach and there's just no way to

(01:27:33):
stop Jokic. And so that, to me, that's where my concern,
that's where my concern comes in. And that's where I'm
with you in that I'm not telling people don't watch
the games and don't don't do whatever. I just think
the pathway is so, so so tough because I don't know, like,
I don't know if there really is a quote unquote

(01:27:54):
way to stop Jokic in the same way that Steve Kerr,
you know you mentioned Mark Madina asked Steve Kerr, what's
tougher to defend the passing or the scoring? He said both.
And that's what would concern me is if I'm Miami,
is this guy is operating at such a high level.
But most importantly, Jason, he can beat you in so
many different ways. And that's why I just don't know

(01:28:16):
what the blueprint is because if you hold him to two,
he might have fourteen assists like he did the other night.
If he goes off for thirty, then obviously that's disadvantageous
as well. So I'm beating around the bush here, I'm
going around in circles. But that's just what stands out
to me about that team is just their star player
can beat you in so many ways, and there's not
one way to shut down that team in general.

Speaker 4 (01:28:38):
Yeah, and the offense still flows through him, but he's
not gonna take every shot, but if he could, he's
gonna make probably enough of them to beat you on
a regular basis anyway. That's why I feel like he's
so unique and why he's so special and why you
know he's done what he's done for this Denver team.
You look at Luca for example, in Dallas, Lucas, I'm

(01:29:02):
pretty sure most of the time he'll get you forty,
he'll get you close to forty or thirty five because
he's gonna take that many shots. But that's about it, right, Like,
I mean, that's kind of that's what he's going to
have to do to keep them close for them to
win games. Most of the time, he's gonna have to
have the ball an insane amount of time, just like
James Harden and Houston for example, Like just a guy

(01:29:23):
that just the usage rate was off the charts when
you look at Jokic. Jokic had seven field goal attempts
in the first three quarters in an NBA Finals game
where the you know, two time raining defending MVP prior
to this year when Embiid won it.

Speaker 3 (01:29:39):
This is a guy that he didn't even try to
look for a shot, but.

Speaker 4 (01:29:41):
His statistical value in all the other categories was so
ridiculous that it didn't matter, and everybody was hot because
he's finding them all. You're not standing around watching somebody
play hero ball who then eventually you either get a
rebound and score or maybe once in a blue moon,
he jumps in the air and there's no to go
with the ball and he ends up passing it over

(01:30:01):
to you. That's happened in a lot of these franchise
and it's definitely happened with a lot of these NBA
superstars and Jokic his game is so different that every
it's not a surprise to me, Aaron, that a lot
of these secondary players seem to be pretty hot shooting
the basketball because Jokic is gonna find you, and you

(01:30:21):
trust it he is. Every time he gets the ball.
You don't assume he's going to the rack.

Speaker 3 (01:30:25):
He might.

Speaker 4 (01:30:25):
If he does and he gets fouled, he's probably gonna
make the free throw because he's better at that than
a lot of guys his size as well. But he's
an exquisite passer at his size, and his vision is
just insane. And so you look at Porter Junior and
some of these guys, they're getting opportunity after opportunity after opportunity,
and I think Malone has given some of these guys

(01:30:46):
the green light and say, hey, yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:30:47):
Man, shoot it up.

Speaker 4 (01:30:48):
We'll find out who's hot, and then it's gonna be
a heat check from that point on. If it's Murray,
get out of the way, twenty seven will.

Speaker 3 (01:30:55):
Take it home.

Speaker 4 (01:30:56):
And if it's you know, Katavious Colwell Pope I think
had twenty one in one of the games against the
Lakers in the first half. Stuff like that, Like it
doesn't always have to beat Damian Lillard going for sixty
the way it isn't in Portland for them to have
to win. Jokicic can do it in so many different ways.
That's why I just to pick your poison approach just
ain't gonna work, because I don't think Miami has the

(01:31:18):
answer to solve this offense flowing through Jokics the way
that it does.

Speaker 2 (01:31:23):
Let me ask you a dumb question because I already
think I know what the answer is because you kind
of referenced it earlier. But there's obviously we've all watched
sports our whole lives. Anybody listening probably has as well.
It's why we do what we do. It's why everybody
listening is listening. And there is an adage in sports
that the series doesn't really start until the home team
loses a game. And so I guess what I'm trying

(01:31:45):
to ask is Denver hasn't lost in home all playoffs.
They had an eight to nine day break between games,
whereas Miami played on Monday night, then immediately had to
fly across country and was playing less than seventy two
hours later. Is there any scenario in your opinion where
obviously Denver's awesome. So this isn't a discredit Denver, but

(01:32:06):
that maybe, just maybe it was a perfect storm for Denver,
and not even necessarily that like something crazy is gonna
happen tomorrow, but get Miami home, get them with that
home crowd, get Denver away from the altitude, and that
maybe Miami can at the very least win Game three
and kind of make this a series going forward.

Speaker 4 (01:32:25):
I mean, certainly it's possible you'll have a better chance
at home. But let me just say this, if you
go down too oh to this Nuggets team, you're picking
anybody in the NBA to take four or.

Speaker 3 (01:32:35):
Five from that group.

Speaker 2 (01:32:36):
I'm not you gotta win.

Speaker 4 (01:32:38):
That's why, like, it shouldn't be a must win for
the road team to win one of the first two
games at home. But I just think this Nuggets team
is so stacked, so consistent, and so just it just
gels in so many different ways that the idea of
beating them eighty percent of the time after losing two,

(01:33:01):
I just don't see it like that. That's why I
just I feel like this could easily be a sweep.
Maybe it's a five game series. Maybe you do get
game three and it ends up being a four to
one series. I just I have a hard time believing
that Miami's gonna go home and get that kind of
momentum against this Nuggets team. It just they've had to
play a lot, they have had emotional highs and lows. Obviously,

(01:33:24):
with a three to zero to then have to go
win a game seven. You mentioned the mileage on Butler's
tires maybe finally catching up to him, and him feeling,
you know, maybe maybe his best basketball this season has
already happened. It just doesn't look right right now for Miami.
I just this Nuggets team feels like it's just this
is stanos Man, this is inevitable at this point, and

(01:33:47):
they're gonna be a deserving champion.

Speaker 2 (01:33:50):
Yeah. I want, and you know one, it's for what
we do. I don't want a boring finals. I don't
want a finals where everybody kind of knows the outcome.
But I'm with you. I just the pathway for Miami
to win four of the next six, needing to win
at least one in Denver, when Denver hasn't lost there

(01:34:11):
in the entire playoffs. I just I don't know that
I see it. And I hope I'm wrong, and I
hope it gets interesting, and I hope we get seven games,
and I hope it's awesome. But I do worry a
little bit about that possibility. Fox Sports Radio ertors Jason Martin.
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(01:34:31):
your protection one place, bundle and save at Progressive dot Com.
Coming up, it was the big story in college football
this week. It's changed coming to the SEC. We discussed
that next Fox Sports Radio Welcome Back, everybody, Fox Sports

(01:34:53):
Radio ertors Jason Martin broadcasting live from the Tireck dot
Com studios, and we are brought to you by Discover.
At the end of your first year, Discover credit cards
automatically double all the cash back you've earned. That's right,
everything you earned doubled. Seriously see terms of check it
out for yourself at Discover dot com slash match. So, Jason,

(01:35:16):
we talk a lot of college football on this show
in general. Obviously being on Saturday nights at ten pm Eastern,
it's basically a good chunk of every show from about
mid August straight through pretty much mid January, just because
of the time slot we're in and the things that
we're reacting to. And there were actually quite a few
news items pertaining to the future of college football this

(01:35:39):
week that that feel relevant. The first one I want
to talk about came from SEC Spring meetings down in Destin, Florida.
If people don't know, all the schools, by the way
this year, including Texas and Oklahoma, their administrators get together,
their school presidents get together, their coaches get together and
just kind of talk talk through the issues that are

(01:35:59):
going on in the league. Right now. I bring it
up because the big topic this week was the future
of SEC football schedules. Right now, the SEC has eight
league games, in other words, eight SEC games. Meanwhile, the
Big Ten, the Big twelve, and the Pac twelve all
have nine. So the conversation was do you eventually go

(01:36:20):
to nine? And at least for right now, Jason, the
SEC is going to stick to eight. And the last
note I want I want to share before I get
it to you is that, remember we are going to
an expanded college football Playoff after this coming season. So
it's not as though like if we didn't have the
expanded playoff and there were only four teams that made

(01:36:40):
that playoff. I could understand the SEC saying let's stick
with eight because our league is tough, you never know,
and we're not going to add an extra game. But
with a twelve team playoff where we assume a minimum
of three SEC teams is probably gonna make it every year.
I don't really get why you want to do it now.
To be clear, last thing I promise is that based

(01:37:01):
on everything that was reported, this is not final as
in forever, but at least for twenty twenty four, they're
going to stick with eight league games. Do you have
any strong thoughts about that, Jason, I.

Speaker 4 (01:37:11):
Mean it's a bad look optically, right, because it feels
like the SEC is trying to make sure that not
only do they have three, but they also have more
teams to get Bowl eligible, because it's easier to get
six wins if you're not, you know, having to go
through the riggers of an SEC schedule. But then there's
some nuance here that needs to be discussed. One you

(01:37:32):
can tell Sankie wants nine, or certainly that's the perception.
I think he's gonna get nine, but it might take
till twenty twenty five. I think one of the things
that we've seen in the reporting is these schools would
like ESPN to pony up more money with Oklahoma and
Texas coming in, and then they would be more you

(01:37:53):
know towards a nine game and all that they would
like to get richer out of this if they could.
But then there's the argument you have this save an argument,
which is I don't think it's fair that we have
to play meaning Alabama, we have to play LSU, Auburn
and Tennessee.

Speaker 3 (01:38:07):
Is our three every.

Speaker 4 (01:38:09):
Year games with everything else being rotated around when there's
gonna be other schools that don't have, you know, schools
that difficult. But unfortunately for Alabama's argument, there their rivalries
which are super important to college football, especially in the SEC.

Speaker 2 (01:38:24):
Can I jump in though? Yeah, go ahead, Like I
understand that Tennessee is on an uptick, but are those
rivalries like really that hard? Like, you know, you think
about who everybody else could end up with, Like Texas
is almost gonna certainly have to play Texas, A and
M and Oklahoma. Uh, you know, I don't know. Auburn's

(01:38:44):
always gonna play Georgia and Alabama if you have three
league rivals Like that was the part that tripped me up.
Is relatively speaking, if you go through like the last
twenty years, LSU all burn in Tennessee as annual rivals,
isn't a terrible draw. LSU is always gonna be good.
But Auburn has been. There's been a lot of peaks
and valleys with that program, and there have been mostly

(01:39:05):
values with Tennessee. That was the part that kind of
made me laugh. Is like, on the scale of the
three toughest teams that you could draw, that doesn't feel
that tough to me. It really doesn't.

Speaker 4 (01:39:16):
Well, I mean, you can make that argument, but if
you're looking at Saban now, he's not arguing that we've
had to play Tennessee when they were being coached by
Jeremy Pruitt and you know people in the past, Derek
Dooley and things like that. He's saying this hypel team
that's probably gonna be here for a while, that team,
this LSU team with Brian Kelly, that team, and Auburn

(01:39:39):
whatever their future is going to be. You know, that's
one that you're not gonna get out of, obviously because
it's the Iron Bowl and everything else. But that thing's
often competitive when it has no business being competitive. And
that means on Auburn side, at least in recent memory.
I'm not discrediting your point. I'm just looking at from
the Alabama perspective. So you have that, and then you
have the argument of some of the schools that wanted eight.

(01:40:02):
Where you look at Kentucky arguing we got to play
Louisville out.

Speaker 3 (01:40:05):
Of conference every year, that's a tough game.

Speaker 4 (01:40:07):
South Carolina saying we've got to play Clemson every year
out of conference.

Speaker 3 (01:40:10):
That's a tough game.

Speaker 4 (01:40:11):
So you have a few schools to have those in
state rivalries that are difficult asks for them. Florida's got
to play Florida State, you know, every year, things like that.
So that's been one of the arguments out there as well.
It's still not a great look for the SEC, but
I think it's just a matter of time, situation, and
it's gonna be easy because yeah, it's gonna be easy
to pile on the SEC right now because it always

(01:40:33):
is because they're the big dog. So you're gonna try
and use this to do whatever you can to butchers
your own conference.

Speaker 3 (01:40:39):
Here's the other thing about the SEC and.

Speaker 4 (01:40:41):
Everything that's happening right here, all the ink that's being spilled,
the virtual ink online, the ink in you know, newspapers, magazines, whatever.
Let me tell you what it apps, what it means
when it comes down to it, when it comes to
the playoff, and when it comes to national championships in
college football, Bucus, it means nothing and knows that say
whatever you want, We're just gonna keep winning championships. Have

(01:41:03):
you looked at.

Speaker 2 (01:41:04):
George's twenty twenty three schedule.

Speaker 3 (01:41:07):
It's pathetic.

Speaker 2 (01:41:08):
You look at George's twenty twenty three roster, but keep
going get out on no.

Speaker 4 (01:41:11):
Well, I mean that's to say. I mean, I'm pretty
much done with the point. It's just the SEC shrugging
their shoulders and saying, so what tough, Like, who's gonna
tell them they have.

Speaker 3 (01:41:20):
To do anything? They're making their own rules. I do
think they will go to nine.

Speaker 4 (01:41:25):
I think it'll happen probably shortly after Oklahoma and Texas
come into the conference. We'll see what gets stipulated and
how they set it up. But I just don't think
they feel like there's any urgency here because what do
they have to prove to anybody else? People can run
their mouth all they want. They just keep winning titles.

Speaker 2 (01:41:44):
It'll be interesting, and yeah, this is one I think
it's a fun conversation. It is hard for me to
get fired up on this only because it does feel
as though this is a placeholder. And you know, I
think the thing that people forget too about this, and
then we'll talk to Sagre. But like, I think the
thing that people forget about this is that like a

(01:42:05):
lot of stuff changed in a short amount of time
in college football. Like remember Texas and Oklahoma they commit
in twenty twenty one to come. They weren't supposed to
come till twenty twenty five. Now they're coming. In twenty
twenty four, the College Football Playoff was pushed through, Like like,
I think the thought was, I forget the exact year,
but I think the contract ended in twenty twenty six,

(01:42:26):
and the thought was, Okay, after twenty twenty six, we're
gonna reevaluate. And it was the school president's last year
around Labor Day that just said, no, we're doing this
twelfth team thing, and you guys got to go figure
it out right now. And so I just bring it
up to very simply say that a lot has changed,
and I really have no fundamental issue with the SEC
taking a year or two to say, hey, let's SE's

(01:42:47):
into this. We got another you know, one hundred years
with Texas and Oklahoma part of what we do. Let's
not rush into it, but they better get there, though,
I mean, they better get there because it looks weak.
And like I said, if you're doing it in a
scenario where we have a twelve team college football playoff,
where two three of your teams every year gonna have
a chance to could be for a championship, there's no

(01:43:07):
excuse not to add the extra game. Fox Sports Radio
Aeron Tors, Jason Martin coming up. I want to discuss
the other big news out of college sports, and it
is big. It's certainly interesting. We'll discuss that next. Before
we do, though, let's toss it over the news desk,
Steve de Seger, what is trending?

Speaker 7 (01:43:24):
We will get to hockey in a moment, but there
are three late night ball games, including the Braves in action.
Ronald Acunya has hit home run at Arizona, estimated to
go four hundred and sixty four feet.

Speaker 3 (01:43:35):
Did you see it, Steve?

Speaker 7 (01:43:36):
I am looking at the video as we speak.

Speaker 3 (01:43:39):
I watched it.

Speaker 10 (01:43:39):
I watched.

Speaker 3 (01:43:40):
I barely could talk.

Speaker 4 (01:43:41):
I was in the middle of a comment. I was
just like, oh my lord.

Speaker 7 (01:43:46):
The beat writer for MLB Mark Bowmen, Longtime with Atlanta, says,
this is Acunya's third home run of at least four
hundred and sixty feet already this year, and no other
player entered today with more than one. Wow, that was
a long one Braves five, Diamondbacks two, top of the
eighth inning. This would end Arizona's six game winning streak,

(01:44:08):
and it would be good news for the Dodgers because
they'd stay in a tie for first in the n
West with Arizona. Dodgers had essentially a minor league pitcher
going tonight. In the Big Fox TV game against the Yankees,
Yanks had four home runs Aaron Judge with his nineteenth
New York sixt' three to the final in La Garrett
Cole seven, and oh the win. The loss to Michael Grove,
who allowed two of the homers gave up four runs

(01:44:29):
in five innings. Grove of La did actually lower his
ERA to eight point one four tonight. As for the
other games in progress on FS, one great start in
San Diego for you, Darvish Padreser, shutting out the Cubs
three to nothing in the bottom of the HS two
hits for the Cubbies. Darvish went seven scoreless innings with
nine strikeouts, and at San Francisco, bottom of the eighth

(01:44:50):
Giants lead Baltimore four to nothing. Cleveland got a four
to two win at Minnesota. Victories for Houston and Toronto
and Miami sent Oakland to another loss, twelve to one.
Kansas City lost again, Colorado went in and beat him
six to four. Philadelphia ended a five game losing streak.
Pittsburgh won its fourth in a row, Texas sixteen to

(01:45:10):
six over Seattle. And an update from San Diego. Fernando
Tatist Junior is just hit a three run homer his
second long ball tonight. He has eleven home runs. The
Padre lead now six nothing over the Cubs in the
bottom of the eighth Stanley Cup Final opener was in
Vegas Golden Knights five to two over Florida with three
goals in the third period. Game two is Monday night.

(01:45:31):
NBA Finals. Game two is Sunday night. Brooklyn Nets are
hiring Kevin Ali as an assistant. At the French Open,
number six Coco Golf won her third round match and
number one Egas Fiantic advanced easily. Golf also won her
doubles match. Defending Wimbledon champ Elena Rebakina withdrew before her
third rounder due to illness. The Buffalo Bills gave defensive

(01:45:51):
tackle Ed Oliver a four year extension. Rory McElroy has
tied for the lead at the memorial. Victor Hovelin is
in a group one shot back and did just see
Churchill Downs. After this weekend will suspend its current meet
after twelve horse fatalities there in the past month. Their
final month of race days will be held in Henderson,
Kentucky instead, about two hours west.

Speaker 2 (01:46:11):
Back to you, thank you very much, Steve de Seger,
Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday, Aaron Torres, Jason Martin
broadcasting live from the Tireraq dot Com studio. So there
was outside of the SEC there. You know, it's interesting, right,
like the SEC, because it's the SEC. It's Nick Say,
but it's Kirby Smart, it's Greg Sankee, it's LSU, it's Florida,

(01:46:32):
it's it's Georgia, it's whatever. They're gonna get the meat
of the headlines. But the more interesting stuff I actually
thought was in the Big Twelve this week, which also
held conference meetings and where brett Ormark, their commissioner, actually
shared some pretty interesting information about kind of their their
vision and their goals. And so you know, there are

(01:46:56):
a conference that they've been very aggressive, and I think
early on the thought process was not only are they
going to target expansion, but they're really looking to add
the bulk of the Pac twelve, specifically those four corner schools,
which are Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado, and Utah. Why bring
it up is and obviously it's a story that I'm

(01:47:17):
following closely because Miama Mater Yukon has been linked to
the Big Twelve. But if you pay close attention, it
appears as though not only does it appear the Big
Twelve actually seems to be prioritizing basketball schools in this
round of realignment, not only Yukon, but Gonzaga, San Diego
State and Brett Ormark on the record talked about it

(01:47:40):
yesterday like there was a media availability, and he said,
we do see the upside in basketball moving forward. We
think it's undervalued. There's a chance for us to double
down as the number one basketball conference in America. Football
is the driver, and we all know that we're exploring
all options and all considerations at this point in time.
So Jayson, again, obviously Miama mat involved. So I have

(01:48:00):
a lot of thoughts. But when you hear that the
Big Twelve I think is really taking a different approach
than maybe I'm not exactly gonna say, it's like maybe
anybody has ever taken, at least at the power conference level,
is since realignment really kind of ramped up ten twelve
years ago. I think it's fascinating. I got a lot
of thoughts, but curious to here what you have to say.

Speaker 3 (01:48:20):
I think it's brilliant.

Speaker 4 (01:48:22):
And the reason why is because there's no move that
you can make that's gonna make you the SEC in
college football. There's no move out there that's gonna make
you the Big Ten in college football. Once Oklahoma and
Texas leave, you're bringing in some nice schools. And I'm
not saying that you can't do anything. I'm saying that
you can go own a sport or that's your idea.

(01:48:43):
I mean, I grew up on Tobacco Road, so I
know what it's like to be in a basketball rich area.
Now it was different then, no question about it.

Speaker 3 (01:48:52):
But the ACC we didn't really care that.

Speaker 4 (01:48:55):
Much about college football like in the areas I grew
up with. It was college basketball season twenty four to seven,
three sixty five that we were talking about we were
selling out high school basketball games more than we were
high school football games to watch all of those things.
You look at the Big Twelve, You look at the
schools that they already have right now, even the ones
that they're acquiring. You have some basketball rich schools coming in.

(01:49:18):
If you did bring in Gazaga as a basketball only member,
if you brought in Yukon, if you looked at it
from that perspective, you're trying to create this top flight
basketball conference and you can own that sport because you're
not going to own college football either way. Like, so
he's thinking outside the box and saying, let's go find
a piece of this and we can really, you know,

(01:49:41):
make our bones here. This might be the way that
we survive is to go own another part of the
landscape that's not being touched. Like I'll make a quick argument, Yeah,
very important one. But like I look at some of
the successes on the political side, in editorial content and
particul some that we may know very well that we

(01:50:03):
may have worked for at a time or two. But
you look at I looked at it from a.

Speaker 3 (01:50:08):
Business plan perspective.

Speaker 4 (01:50:09):
If the perception is almost the entire media is all
on one side of the political aisle. If I'm just
a pure businessman, if I'm trying to survive and thrive
and feed my family and all this, irrespective of my beliefs,
how deeply held they are or whatever. I'm looking at
it from a purely business perspective, I can just go

(01:50:30):
be a part of that pie. Or I can go
the completely opposite side, where there's almost nothing there, and
I can control fifty to sixty percent of that pie,
and almost all of the audience is going to flock
to me that's looking for that content. So I can
go and try to swim with the sharks where there's
where it's already oversaturated and where I'm way behind, or

(01:50:51):
I can go a completely different route and try to
succeed there. So I like this idea. I think it
makes a lot of business sense. It's smart, and it's compelling.

Speaker 2 (01:51:02):
So I'm intrigued and interested in And that's why i
wanted to kind of set you up on it, because
again Mi Alma Mater, being involved, I've paid extra close
attention to it. And you know, first of all, some
of you have asked me privately publicly whatever I wish
you kind could stay in the Big East forever. I
also understand that to run an athletic department at the
highest level, and it's not just football, because I think

(01:51:25):
from the U Cut perspective, Oh, they tried to do
the football thing one time and they left the Big
East once. Well, it's like, no, the Biggest kind of
kicked them out because they had a football team and
the Biggest wasn't gonna basically sponsor football. But I bring
it up because I'm obviously paying close attention to this,
and so I actually think your line of thinking is

(01:51:45):
in line with their line of thinking, and I am
with you that it is brilliant. Is that, first of all,
it is a bigger piece of like like two things. One,
as you said, there is no school that you can
get outside of note of which isn't company of the
Big twelve. There's no school that you can get that
is going to elevate the football product that much. Now,

(01:52:08):
a Utah's good, Whoever's good, Washington's good, whatever, Oregon's good,
but you're not gonna get those huge brands who replace
Texas in Oklahoma. But a few things stand out. One,
I do think we've gotten to the point where basketball
is a little bit underserved. And even if it's only
the NCAA tournament, we're talking about like an eight hundred

(01:52:28):
million dollars a year. That's like what the that's what
the TV money is. So there's that part of it.
And then two and somebody kind of put this bug
in my ear over the course of the last week
or so, is that listen At some point, probably if
you're reading the tea leaves, the ACC probably isn't gonna
survive and it might be a while whatever. But if

(01:52:49):
the Big Ten gets the four to five teams that
they want and the SEC gets the four five teams
that they want, then you're at twenty twenty four teams each.
So probably you know, forty to forty eight teams between
the two conferences. At that point in theory, they could
break off in all sports, not just football. They could
break off in all sports and do their own thing.

(01:53:10):
And so what somebody kind of pointed out to me
this week is the one thing that you said is
that you're never gonna be the SEC or even the
Big ten in football. And that's okay. By the way,
you had a team that played for a championship last year,
so you're not nobody, but two, if you position yourself
as the elite basketball conference with Kansas, with maybe a Yukon,

(01:53:31):
with maybe a Gonzaga, with maybe an Arizona. If that
it's one of the Pac twelve schools that you target,
then if in eight or ten years or whenever, the
SEC and the Big Ten try to break away completely,
they can't run a real basketball tournament without you, And
now you have to be included. You might not be
the it might not be the Big Three, it might

(01:53:51):
be the Big two and a half, but you're at
least included in that conversation, Jason, So, I know we
gotta get to break I know we gotta get to Disagrea.
But that is the thinking real quick before we get
out of here. Anything else to add to.

Speaker 3 (01:54:02):
That, No, man, I think that's really well said.

Speaker 4 (01:54:04):
That. That last point's really smart too, just and I
hadn't even thought about it from that perspective, It's like, Yeah,
you can't run a tournament without Kansas, Gonzaga, UKN Like
what are you doing? Like that that you may survive
because they have to have you involved on the basketball side.
If nothing else that, I just think this is a
very very intriguing thought from the Big twelve, and it's

(01:54:26):
one that looks like, hey, we're gonna find a way
to survive, and if we got to do it this way, that's.

Speaker 3 (01:54:31):
What we'll do.

Speaker 2 (01:54:32):
Don't disagree, And yeah, I think I think it's fascinating
to think about. And for people who say, oh, they
would never break up the NCAA tournament, well just remember
Greg Sanki already last year was trying to push, hey,
do we really need automatic bits to the NCAA tournament
or should we just pick the sixty eight best. He's
already trying to finagle away to eliminate automatic bits. Give

(01:54:55):
him another eight ten years to continue to build that
power and continue build up the SEC. I have no
doubt he will continue to try to do that. We'll
see if he has success. Fox Sports Radio Eritors Jason
Martin coming up. We are going to toss it over
to the Saga. He's got his extended update. Always love
catching up with the Sager. Bottom half of the nine
o'clock hour, We'll be back Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back, everybody.

(01:55:20):
Fox Sports Radio er Torris Jason Martin, broadcasting live from
the Tireck dot Com Studios. Just had a thriller. By
the way, in college baseball, Stanford had the bases loaded
down three with a chance to win the game. Flyout
A and M wins enough for me to saga, please
take it away with my friend.

Speaker 7 (01:55:41):
We may be mentioning that sport again.

Speaker 2 (01:55:43):
In just a moment.

Speaker 7 (01:55:44):
We did mention Ronald Acunya in the incredible season he's
already having for the Braves. He had a home run
estimated it's four hundred and sixty four feet that cleared
the outfield seats at Arizona. The great researcher Sarah Langs
had an item by the way, if you're unfamiliar with
the name, she was honored on the field before Mets
game this weekend with her battle against als. She is

(01:56:06):
still working, and she tweets tonight that Acunya, now in
his career, has ten home runs of at least four
hundred and sixty eet so.

Speaker 3 (01:56:15):
Fad especially when you look at like his size.

Speaker 4 (01:56:18):
It's not like he's Pee Alonzo or somebody like that
like that, he shouldn't be able to do this.

Speaker 3 (01:56:22):
It's so awesome.

Speaker 7 (01:56:23):
And tonight he hit his twelfth homer and stole his
twenty fourth.

Speaker 2 (01:56:27):
Base of the season already.

Speaker 7 (01:56:29):
So the Braves up five to two at Arizona, bottom
of the ninth, ready to end the six game winning
streak of the Diamondback. Speaking of streaks at Triple A
in the Angel System, at Salt Lake City tonight, Michael
Stefanik singled in the first inning. He extends the franchise
record on bay streak to fifty eight fifty eight straight
games he's gotten aboard without failing. This is a five

(01:56:52):
foot eight middle infielder who's batting about three twenty at
Triple A this year in the Angel System, and he's
from a small college in southern California, Westmont, a school
that just last night won the Small College World Series
in the NAIA. I know this because my nephew had
two RBIs in the six and of course I'm a

(01:57:13):
proud uncle. He also in the semifinal had the go
ahead two run single and in the quarterfinal the go
ahead two run homers. So it was quite a magical
week for him, final days of his college career.

Speaker 4 (01:57:24):
He went out like l Way.

Speaker 7 (01:57:26):
As for the college baseball it's it's been a great
weekend already and we're just starting the NCAA tournament. Santa
Clara has eliminated Arizona. The Wildcats are done. I believe
aight assists for Steve Nash and nine to three the final. Wow,
now it's a Monday night. Also, are you on with
Arnie h I believe so yah okay, sol Im yes, yes,

(01:57:49):
and tomorrow and Monday but tomorrow money okay. If we
look forward to this in this slot the next two nights,
I'm sure this may or may not come up.

Speaker 2 (01:57:57):
Lead the show with it tomorrow?

Speaker 4 (01:57:58):
Why not?

Speaker 7 (01:57:59):
Oregon one at Vanderbilt tonight eight seven. Texas won at Miami.
I saw this today, Dallas Baptist eliminating Oklahoma State and
the score was eighteen to four. They may as well
have had the mascot pitching at the end. Southern Miss
eliminated Auburn, Texas Tech won at number two Florida today
and the wild Game Tennessee winning in fourteen innings at

(01:58:22):
Clemson six to five. Vegas with a comeback win to
open the Stanley Cup Final tonight. They have overcome a
deficit to win this postseason nine times. Last year, Colorado
did so ten times. On the way to the Cup.
We have NBA coaching news plenty of it. Phoenix is
gonna keep its top assistant Kevin Young. ESPN says he

(01:58:43):
stays and will now earn a league high two million
dollars or so to stay.

Speaker 2 (01:58:48):
Frank Vogel won eighth of money Williams salary.

Speaker 7 (01:58:51):
Yeah, Frank Vogel's contract not quite that, so it is
notable what he stays to be on the same bench
with Vogel, who's the new Son's head coach. Monty Williams
was let go by Phoenix, now in Detroit for historic riches,
but he will not be taking Young, who was a
finalist for the Sun's job. The Brooklyn Nets are hiring
Kevin Ali as an assistant. He was up for the
Pistons head coaching job. Oli, of course, coach the University

(01:59:14):
of Connecticut to the NCAAA crown almost a decade ago.
Now he'll work for Nets coach Jack Vaughn. Both are
from southern California. Former Trailblazers head coach Terry Stotts is
finalizing a deal to be an assistant in Milwaukee. According
to ESPN, too be on the staff of new coach
Adrian Griffin, and New Orleans has added James Brego to
the coaching staff from Charlotte. The Pelicans retained assistant Jaron Collins,

(01:59:38):
who was a finalist in Detroit. And by the way,
the next Julius Randall had ankle surgery. Should be ready
for fall camp. Game two of the NBA Finals Sunday night.

Speaker 2 (01:59:47):
Thank you very much, Steve to say you appreciate all
those updates. Fox Sports Radio Aeron Tors Jason Martin broadcasting
live from the tyreck dot com studios here with the
saga coming up. It's the story of baseball. We'll discuss it.
A's to Vegas. Not so fast, my friend, Fox sportsty
Welcome in everybody, hour four. Fox Sports Radio Aaron Torris

(02:00:09):
Jason Martin broadcasting live from the tirec dot com studios.
Tirerec dot com. We'll help you get there and unmatched
election fast, free shipping, Free road has a protection in
over ten thousand recommended installers. Tirerack dot com the way
tire buying should be. Also, we want to welcome in
our new newest affiliate in Peoria, Illinois, Peoria Sports Radio

(02:00:34):
one oh one point one. Welcome to the Fox Sports
Radio family. There, Chicago White Sox Radio Network affiliate and
program director Scott Heckethom dropped another network to make the
flip to Fox Sports a big win for them. So
welcome to the Fox Sports Radio family. Peoria Sports Radio
one oh one point one, Jason por Sports Radio one

(02:00:58):
on one point one is where you can listen to
Chicago White Sox their AL wuldn't really call them rivals,
but another team in the AL. I guess what I'm
trying to get to is this on Peoria one to
one point one. Will they be listening to Chicago White
Sox games against the Las Vegas A's in the coming months.

(02:01:18):
And here's the deal. By the way, Bernie Fraddle is
gonna join us in twenty minutes. He is gonna have
incredible insight into the behind the scenes of what is
actually going on in Vegas. But what Bernie has told
us for weeks now is that while you know there's
headlines and there's this, and there's that, is that behind
the scenes there isn't as much of an appetite for

(02:01:40):
Major League Baseball in Vegas as maybe many people think. Again,
Bernie is gonna have all the details and we cannot
wait to hear from them, But just reading reports, there's
a Nevada state assembly woman named Danielle Monroe Moreno, who
seems to be really pushing against this. My guess is
for all the reasons that Bernie has said. They just

(02:02:02):
built a new basketball arena, They built the new football
stadium with public funding. And you need the football stadium
to be able to host Super Bowls like Vegas will
host next year, to host Final Fours, to have a
Taylor Swift concert like they did over the last couple
of weeks. But a thirty thousand seat baseball stadium on
the Strip feels like a luxury, and it seems as
though they're having trouble getting public support behind it. Finally,

(02:02:25):
I would add really quick, and I know this is
just a small sample size, but I think you know this.
But but my mom, I love her, just celebrated her
birthday on Thursday. She is she has a winter home
in Vegas, and even just talking with her this week
is she said, like, you know, she hangs out with
all sorts of people in the community, and it doesn't
feel as though there is a real want for baseball

(02:02:47):
in Vegas. So we go in a lot of different
directions here, Jason, We've talked about this a lot, But
this feels like they're getting a lot more pushback than
I think maybe they anticipated, and I don't think it happen,
will it not. Bernie'll give us the percentages here in
fifteen minutes, But I just don't feel like this is
nearly as much of a slam dunk as it felt
like maybe two three weeks ago, at least publicly.

Speaker 4 (02:03:09):
It certainly was being reported like it was already done.
I know, and to his credit, no shock here. Bernie
has been very kind of He hasn't been skeptical, but
he's been much more realistic in saying, hey, there's still
a lot of hurdles that need to be overcome in
order to make this thing happen. Let's calm down, let's

(02:03:30):
slow down. We don't need to get into fifth gear here.
We're gonna end up with the speeding ticket if we're
not careful. And the more that we have learned, and
you just laid it out very well, the less likely
and less less effective. It feels like it would be
as well. Like to your point about your mom and
happy birthday to her, I just don't since there's this

(02:03:55):
giant fervor for baseball there, and I think The weird
thing about it is if you're going to move the
a move them somewhere that really wants a team, move
them to a market that's going to support a team
that and we've talked about this before that you know,
a lot of the things that we're going to start see,
I believe, are stadiums that are going to be built

(02:04:15):
for an experience as opposed to five hundred thousand seats
because things have changed. People want amenities, they want different things,
so you don't necessarily have to have a fifty thousand
seat building or something like that. You can put this
in the right place and you can, you know, really
make a brand new community in Vegas. I just feel

(02:04:36):
like baseball becomes an afterthought. They've got the Raiders, they've
got the Golden Knights right now playing in the Stanley Cup.
They've still got UNLV, Like they have a lot, and
that's not to even mention everything that's not sports related
that's going on there.

Speaker 3 (02:04:51):
Of course, they have all the boxing, have.

Speaker 4 (02:04:53):
MMA, they got AWNWWE coming there multiple times a year,
Like you have all of these things that are there competing,
and baseball just seems like it would just kind of
come there and it would be like, all right, yeah,
Vegas has got baseball, but it wouldn't matter in the
grand scheme. And you're not getting the Yankees, you're not
getting the Dodgers. You're not getting one of those kind
of franchises either. You're getting a twelve win as team

(02:05:14):
right now.

Speaker 3 (02:05:14):
So obviously the fervor is.

Speaker 4 (02:05:16):
Gonna be even lower, maybe than it would be if
you're getting a franchise that was rolling. But you're very
likely never going to have that happen anywhere. Because franchise
is rolling, it's probably being supported, and the idea that
they're going to leave under those circumstances is much more,
you know, it's much more dire, it's much more unlikely.
So I just look at it, and I can't wait

(02:05:36):
to hear what Bernie's got and what he wants to
say tonight about this whole situation. But I am now
increasingly of the belief that this ain't happening.

Speaker 2 (02:05:46):
So a couple things here and one we can get
them into all the nuance here in a minute. But
like something that I keep coming back to is, first
of all, I get it's major League Baseball, and there's
only thirty of these things these only thirty of these
teams and thirty of these opportunities really for lack of
a better term, but I keep going back to if

(02:06:10):
you have seen the way the A's have been run
over the past X number of years, and it's been
a while now, they've had good years where they've overachieved
relative to the payroll and the perceived talent. But I mean,
they're by far the worst team in Major League Baseball

(02:06:31):
this year. And I think that's part of it, right,
is like this isn't the NFL where you can go
from war. First of all, it's just not the NFL
in terms of fan interist whatever, blah blah blah, but
NFL worse to first, you know, every every NFL team
has something like there's just something interesting about every NFL
team major League Baseball, ain't that? And so to expect

(02:06:54):
like Vegas to be like like to expect Vegas just
the commune to be excited and to embrace this team
that they have no affiliation with. The Golden Knights came there,
Golden Knights too, one game one of the Stanley Cup
Finals day. By the way, they came there. They weren't
somewhere else before that was the city's team from the beginning.
So it's one thing to have a team move there.

(02:07:15):
It's another thing to have a team that is actively
trying to lose in their current spot, has not been
even trying to put a competitive field on the team,
a competitive team on the field, and you're supposed to
be excited about one just bringing them in, but then
two using public funding to build a stadium. Like I

(02:07:37):
just I don't want to oversell, but I don't want
to undersell this point either. As to your point, if
the A's were h you know, forty games above five
hundred and trending towards whatever, maybe they're not even in
a position to move or in a need to move.
But that is part of it. On top of all
the other stuff that we've talked about, the things to
do in Vegas. A summer sport, you're asking traveling fans

(02:07:59):
to commit to three or four straight knights at the ballpark.
That's what I keep coming back to. If I lived
in Vegas, if I was a taxpayer, and they're saying, oh,
by the way, we need to we need to tax
you more to build this stadium to bring in this
team that isn't even trying to win. I don't know,
It's just something doesn't feel right. And I'm so glad
we have Bernie on in the next segment to contextualize

(02:08:20):
all this. But something just doesn't feel right. And I
can understand consternation concern from the lawmakers and the citizens
of Las Vegas.

Speaker 4 (02:08:28):
Yeah, I mean I just look kinded and just objectively,
you say, does Vegas kneed baseball?

Speaker 3 (02:08:35):
And I think the answer is no.

Speaker 4 (02:08:37):
I mean, you think about when New Orleans got the
Hornets for a little while, and you saw how they
rallied around that team and made them home, and they
were like, hey, we want to give you a team.
We want to find a way even though we're gonna
send the Hornets back x y Z, we want to
help you guys out. And you look at something like
even though it's gonna upset Seattle fans, Oklahoma City have

(02:09:00):
anything else. And so one of the great environments in
the NBA is Oklahoma City. It's loud city for a reason,
like it's it's it's amazing, And you look at that,
Is that going to be that way in Vegas? No,
Like you want to if you want to move the a's,
you want to move the A's or any franchise to
a place where they're going to be supported, beloved, all

(02:09:21):
of this, and you're telling a bunch of people that
I don't think felt the need for baseball to begin with.
Oh yeah, by the way, we also want you to
pay for it. It's like, heck, no, Like, if you
want to bring baseball here, you'll pay for it, and
then if I want to go see it and support it,
then I will. But don't ask me to pay higher
property taxes or higher taxes to help you build a

(02:09:41):
stadium for something I didn't necessarily feel like I was
missing to begin with. There are communities that would love this,
embrace it, bring it in and it would be huge.
They'd celebrate it. Vegas, Nah, man like this, this would
be a blip on the radar, I feel like.

Speaker 2 (02:09:57):
And it's a point that Bernie's brought up many times.
Is the idea that you know, Salt Lake City, Portland, Nashville,
you know, they have a baseball committee where they're trying
to rally interest and rally whatever. And I'm with you,
and I think it goes to the point that I
just made. But then also the ones that we've talked
about which is the one that I keep coming back

(02:10:18):
to is to ask. You know, first of all, and
maybe I'm wrong on this, I think the idea of
trying to relocate any team or put any team in
any city with the hope that visiting fans are gonna
be the ones who do a large bulk of the
supporting like one, I just think that's fundamentally like not

(02:10:40):
a smart decision. But then on top of that, I
keep going back to you mentioned New Orleans. You mentioned
the Hornets when they first got there. That's one game
a week on a Tuesday, and then maybe you get
a Saturday or a Friday, and then the following Monday.
Baseball to ask fans to come into town three nights.
It was funny. I was talking to a buddy about

(02:11:02):
this day, Like, I have buddies who are die hard
baseball fans.

Speaker 10 (02:11:05):
You know.

Speaker 2 (02:11:06):
A year ago I went to a bachelor party in
Vegas with some of the biggest baseball people that you
would ever meet. But even my buddies, like when they
go to Vegas, your buddies, whoever friends whatever. Yeah, even
if your team's in town, you want to go, but
for a game, you want to gamble you want to
eat out, you want to stay at the pool, especially

(02:11:26):
during the summertime when the weather's nights. Like that's the
part that comes back to me. It's one thing if
you're the Golden Knights and you're hoping, Hey, the Edmonton
Oilers are in town and we think they're gonna bring
a pretty big crew and they're gonna spend money, and
that's gonna be great. That's fine. That's one night that
you're asking of them. And if the Golden Knights are
playing Edmonton on a Friday night, that still gives them
Thursday and Saturday and maybe Sunday to do what they

(02:11:48):
want outside of the hockey arena. But if you're the
Oakland A's and the Seattle Mariners are coming into town
and you expect Mariners fans to pack a park three
nights in a row when they're on vacation, I don't know,
it's just it just it hasn't even happened yet, and
just the whole concept feels fundamentally flawed to me.

Speaker 4 (02:12:05):
Jason, Yeah, I mean I think there's there's another thing
I think about, is like, how many day games are
you gonna try to play?

Speaker 3 (02:12:13):
None?

Speaker 4 (02:12:15):
Like, if you're not playing to night, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (02:12:16):
How you're getting anybody there at all.

Speaker 4 (02:12:18):
To the point about the pool and all that kind
of stuff, maybe you can attract a little bit more
of that after dark, at least, I mean the gambling crowd. Now,
there's still plenty to do obviously at night in Sin City,
but I feel like day games would be up abject
disasters there. And again, this is not sixteen regulars seventeen
regular season games, I guess now in the NFL, it's
not even an eighty two game hockey season or NBA season.

Speaker 3 (02:12:41):
This is a bunch of home games.

Speaker 4 (02:12:43):
This is eighty some home games like eighty that you've
got to sell your team goes on the road. You know,
I maybe I sit home and I watch a few
innings of Vegas Baseball, if I'm at all a sports
fan and I've got the time or whatever. But it
just doesn't seem like there's no not a need for it.
And if there's not a need for it, then moving
it there it just seems like a move that doesn't

(02:13:05):
need to happen.

Speaker 2 (02:13:06):
Well, there's not a need for it, and increasingly it
feels like there might not be a want for it.
But thankfully. That is what we have Bernie Fratto for.
He's gonna join us next to discuss at all. Before
we get there, though, I want to mention we're brought
to you by Discover Insurance. Progressive Insurance excuse. Progressive makes
bundling easy and affordable. Get a multi policy discount by
combining your motorcycle, RV, boat, ATV and more all your

(02:13:27):
protection oneplace, bundle and save at Progressive dot Com. Coming up,
we will go out to Vegas. We will bring in
Bernie Fratto and he will give you the insight on
everything going on with the a's Is it real? Is
it not? Fact from fiction? Nobody better Bernie Fraddo.

Speaker 3 (02:13:44):
Next.

Speaker 2 (02:13:44):
Fox Sports Radio, Welcome back, everybody. Fox Sports Radio eritoris
Jason Martin, broadcasting live from the Tireck dot Com studios.
We are brought to you by Discover. At the end

(02:14:05):
of your first year, Discover credit cards automatically double all
the cash back you've earned. That's right, everything you earned doubled.
Seriously see terms of checking out for yourself at Discover
dot com. Slash match. With that said, ooh good save.
As we do every week, We're gonna head out to

(02:14:28):
Las Vegas. Bernie Fratdo of the Bernie Frado Show joins us,
and here's the million dollar question, Bernie, when we throw
out to Vegas in a year or two or five,
are we gonna be throwing out to Bernie Frado wearing
a Las Vegas as hat or is that just totally
in the can We just spent ten minutes talking about it,
but we we can't really have any conversation about anything

(02:14:50):
Vegas related without getting your inside, Bernie, what do we
need to know about the ongoing Vegas a situation?

Speaker 10 (02:14:58):
It's funny you mentioned five five years because for what
it's worth, even if the bill is passed by the legislature,
it's merely a first step. You've got to get the
stadium construction aspect of it solved. They've got to negotiate
a stadium authority lease. They got to get a community
benefits agreement. That's going to extend this by another twelve months.

(02:15:20):
So now the deadline date or check that that's not
the correct word. Now the prospective date is twenty twenty eight.
It's been backed up a year. So this past week
they finally did introduce Bill five oh nine. The clock
is taking there's no vote yet to the best of
my knowledge. June fifth, Monday, the legislative session adjourns. But

(02:15:41):
now the bill's being heard in various committees like the
Senate Revenue Committee and the Senate Finance Committee. You've got
lawmakers weighing in, lobbyists weighing in members of the public,
and the rhetoric has been pretty brutal. It's been very contentious,
it's been very hotly debated, and we really don't have

(02:16:04):
enough time to even scratch the service. But let me
lead with what I think is the most notable aspect
of this, and that has to do with the National
Education Association Southern Nevada Chapter. A lady by the name
of Vicki Kradell pointed out to the committee that currently
Nevada ranks forty eighth among fifty states in public school funding.

(02:16:25):
There are teacher shortages, educational program shortages, and she went
on to say, and she wasn't being funny, that Nevada
was the only state in the country to receive three
f's in education funding in a matrix they call making
the Grade for the year twenty twenty two. And that's
a report released I believe by the Education Law Center

(02:16:46):
to a federal agency, and then she went on to
create a punchline. She says, quote, when we have the
money to fund billionaires to bring teams to Las Vegas,
but we can fund education, I would say we have
a problem. We're getting f's because Nevada wants the a's. Yeah,
there's your rim shot. But she was being deadly serious.

(02:17:09):
So this is very hotly contested, and I don't see
any way they're going to have a vote by Monday
unless there's some back deal, door deals going on. So
it looks like this is headed to a special session.
And I'll land where I've been landing all along, because
politics makes for strange bedfellows. It's a fifty to fifty deal.

Speaker 4 (02:17:28):
So you said, hotly contested, hotly debated. Just walking around
Vegas or listening to actual residents, not folks that are
just there, how much is this actually moving the needle?
How much is this actually being talked about? I don't
mean like officially, I mean unofficially. How much is this
actually mattering?

Speaker 10 (02:17:50):
Not a lot. It's very casually talked about because we've
got other things right, like the Golden Knights, etc. And
the Raiders are worried about Jimmy Garoppolo all that kind
of stuff. So not really a lot, Jason. And there
have been straw, non scientific polls done, people keeping records,
and I heard something Friday that really blew me away
that there's there was and I can't speak intelligently asked

(02:18:13):
to the data, but it was seventy nine percent against
in a public poll.

Speaker 2 (02:18:17):
Burn. Let's switch gears to some other stuff. First of all,
you kind of mentioned it in passing, but you know,
Jimmy g the whole situation with the Raiders Tom Brady,
obviously we know about his ownership opportunities and all that stuff.
I assume that you think that Tom Brady is not
going to be the next starting bar back.

Speaker 10 (02:18:35):
There no, no, no, no, no, no, okay.

Speaker 2 (02:18:38):
That was all I have for you.

Speaker 10 (02:18:39):
Well, I didn't mean to cut you off there, a
big fellow. Look, Tom Brady will probably get a one
percent ownership of stake in the Raiders, which will be
somewhere between forty and sixty million, depending on the valuation.
And this is not unusual for athletes to do this.
He treated like an annuity. He hangs on to it
ten years from now. The Raiders are worth twelve billion dollars.
He turned sixty million into one hundred and twenty million.

(02:19:01):
That's all. Brady has zero interest in playing quarterback for
the Raiders. I'll be shocked if he suits up this
year for the Raiders. He's not preparing for that now.
He's got other things going on. They got the worst
offensive line in football or an absolute dumpster fire, and
Brady would only play And I only give it a
two percent chance for any team if they thought they
could win a championship this year. And the over under

(02:19:22):
on the Raiders win total is seven and a half,
and believe me, sharp people are pounding the under. So
Brady is not going to play football for the Raiders
this year.

Speaker 4 (02:19:30):
Do you feel like that percentage chance of Brady playing
football is better or worse than the chances for the
Miami Heat to come back to Denver Nuggets.

Speaker 10 (02:19:41):
Yeah. I think actually in Miami you have a much
better chance, and currently Denver is minus nine hundred. But
you know, it's interesting they talk about heat culture and
it's a real thing. I made a couple of calls
down there and I said, so, what's the temperature in
the room, And they say, hey, we'll be there Sunday night. Okay,
Max and Duncan Robinson were one from fourteen behind the Ark.

(02:20:04):
Caleb Mark was only one for seven, but the Heat
only shot two free throws. Jimmy Butler was a little
hesitant by the time the fourth quarter rolled around. They
shot fifty percent from the floor. And oh, by the way,
the Heat only turned the ball over eight times on Thursday,
so they took care of the ball, so they believe
in their heart. I mean, it's kind of like Monty

(02:20:24):
Python when they chop off the guy's arm and he
says that it's a mere scratch, you know, and they
chop off out of arm and he says, yeah, don't
worry about it, man, and it's just flesh. Room chops
off both his legs and we'll call it a draw.
The heater eternally optimistic. I mean, I really respect what
they've done. The problem there is I don't know how
they defend Nicolay Okay, regardless of whether he's got the ball,

(02:20:45):
doesn't have the ball, he's in the low posts, the
high posts, he's making a pass, he's driving the rim.
You know. Bam Adebayo had a real issue, right So
the long and the short of it is Miami may
score more, but I don't know how they can stop Denver.
Having said that, let's see what happened happens. You know
how I felt about Denver all along.

Speaker 2 (02:21:02):
Well, And I was gonna ask you Burne. You know
you always say you know the sports and the theater
and everything, and you know it's it's the most unpredictable thing.
It's and you say it all the time. It's it's
why you can't write Hollywood scripts for that that that
can match many of the things that we see. So
with that said, do you give not not just for tomorrow,
but for the series? Do you give the Heat any chance?

(02:21:25):
And if so, like what needs to change? Because you
just acknowledged Nicole Yokich is basically impossible to stop. So
what what has to happen for the Heat to make
this thing competitive and make it a series?

Speaker 10 (02:21:36):
Not that I have the power to speak this into existence,
but I would say, if the Cola wakes up tomorrow
with malaria, sure they got a shot. I think Miami
will win a game. They'll they'll be competitive. This is
they run into a much better team, just like the
Lakers did nine days off. Look, they didn't even miss
a beat. So do I expect Miami to win in
Denver Sunday?

Speaker 3 (02:21:57):
No?

Speaker 10 (02:21:57):
Do I expect them to be more competitive? I do
get down to Miami. They'll win a game in Miami, maybe,
to doubt it, probably one, and that'll be about it.
They just ran into the better team. There's no crime
in that. Look, this team was trailing Chicago by three
in the play in game eight weeks ago, whenever the
heck it was, and then you know they were written
off for dead then. So the fact that they are

(02:22:18):
in the NBA Finals, I think it is quite an accomplishment.

Speaker 4 (02:22:20):
So you also had tipped us off. You are a
historian and you are the master of the unique. So
tell us about the Stanley Cup trophy. I know you
have some fun stuff.

Speaker 10 (02:22:32):
Yeah, it's part of my blessed life. Covered three red
wing Stanley Cup champion teams and one that lost in
the finals to New Jersey in ninety five. The Stanley
Cup is one of a kind. It's indescribable. It's in
town now, it's making the rounds. It's one hundred and
thirty one years old. It's two artifact thirty four pounds.
It's almost thirty six inches tall. And again we could

(02:22:55):
spend probably four hours giving you Stanley Cup stories. But
here's some fun interesting artifacts that you might you know
you share the water cooler on Monday. There have actually
been three babies baptized in the Stanley cop After the
Colorado Abs beat Florida in nineteen ninety six, he had
a defenseman named Silvan le Fay. He had his baby,

(02:23:17):
his daughter Christen, and then the Red Wings had a
Thomas Holmstron. He had a kid in two thousand and eight.
The Stanley Cup has been all over the world, but
this one takes the cake for me. To boost morale
for Canadian American troops during the Middle East, back during
the war in Afghanistan, they actually flew the cup in

(02:23:37):
so the Canadians could see it and it fired him
up and it hung out with the Canadian troops in
Afghanistan back twenty years ago. By the way, if you
decide to take the cup swimming in a pool, which
Mario Lemieue did, he wanted to see after the Penguins
in nineteen ninety two won the Stanley Cup, he wanted
to see if the cup would float. It does not float.

(02:23:57):
It's sunk to the bottom of the pool like a rock.
So they got that going for you. And interestingly enough,
the Cup's only been lost once, and it's only been
there's only been one attempt to steal it once, and
both have to do with the Montreal Canadians, who, by
the way, little trivia, you know all the names in
the Cup. The Montreal Canadians appear in the Cup twenty

(02:24:19):
four times, more than any other any other team. But
in the nineteen sixties, the Montreal Canadians were driving the
Cup across Canada for some sort of event and the
car broke down and they had to change a tire
and to get the tire out they had to put
the Stanley Cup on the side of the road. They
drove away, and an hour later they realized, hey, my god,

(02:24:41):
we forgot the cup. And they turned around and it'd
been snowing, but sure enough, when they got back to
where they were, was covered in snow, but it was
safe and sound. And then this one, to me, is
an absolute beauty. Somewhere in the mid sixties at the
old Chicago Stadium in Chicago, the Cup was on display
as part of some function and walked in, grabbed it

(02:25:03):
turned around, starts walking out the door, and a cop says,
where do you think you're going, buddy? He says, I'm
taking the cup back to Montreal where it belongs. The
cops thought it was so funny he didn't even arrest
him and they got the cup back. So that's like
ten percent of all the crazy cup stories out there.
I mean, people eat meals out of it, they drink
booze out of it, they take it to strip clubs,
They do all kinds of crazy things you can never imagine.

(02:25:25):
And I tell you, once you've been around it, which
you've ever seen it, if you ever have a chance,
there is some sort of aura around the Stanley Cup.
One hundred and thirty one years old. It is the
greatest trophy in all sports.

Speaker 2 (02:25:37):
I'm one of those that was lucky enough to be
around it many years ago.

Speaker 4 (02:25:40):
There you going nice, Oh great, so you guys don't
have need you agree it?

Speaker 3 (02:25:46):
Yeah, oh yeah, that's awesome.

Speaker 2 (02:25:47):
Yeah. It's uh, you know how they say like people
have like a you know, they're like like, oh so
and so stops the room when they walk in. It's
like the cup like it's like you know, it's like
if Tom Brady walked in a room like this. Can
you the second appears, all anybody wants to do is
take a picture with it. So Bertie Fratto of the
Bernie Fratto Show, you can listen to him at the

(02:26:08):
top of the hour again, he'll be taking up until
six am Eastern Time. Also, make sure to follow Bernie
on Twitter at Bernie Fratto. Bertie. We appreciate the time,
the insight and we will be listening at the top
of the hour.

Speaker 10 (02:26:19):
Thank you, Bernie, joy your weekend, guys. Thanks so much.

Speaker 2 (02:26:22):
That is Bernie Fratto of the Bernie Fratto Show. He
will be following us at the top of the hour
final time today. Do want to toss it over the
news desk Steve Seger? What is trending?

Speaker 7 (02:26:31):
And if you've seen the Indy five hundred trophy which
they gave out last weekend of the holiday, the winner
there gets his face on the trophy. Yeah, it's astounding.
You were talking about the Oakland A's and I know
long term it's not just are they bad this season
when you're talking a move, it's what the future will be.
But they're giving you nothing in the area of good

(02:26:52):
news with this season. They not only lost twelve to
one at Miami today, aser twelve and forty eight for
the season. They've been outscored by over two hundred runs
already this year. That's one of the top ten worst
run differentials at this point of a season ever, and
the other bad teams on the list with them are

(02:27:12):
all from the eighteen hundreds.

Speaker 4 (02:27:16):
Braves lost two to them early this week.

Speaker 7 (02:27:18):
Yeah, exactly. We did make a comment on that a
couple of nights ago on the show. It's just out
of nowhere. On the positive side of things, killing opponents,
the Texas Rangers sixteen six winners against Seattle. Texas scored
it at least ten runs in a game fifteen times
already this season, a near record for this point and

(02:27:39):
it speaking a lot of runs. You guys mentioned Number
one Wake Forest in college baseball, they are leading the
late game fifteen to six against Maryland. Later reminder FS
one as NASCAR this weekend including Sundays three hundred from
Illinois three thirty pm Eastern time. Stanley Cup Final was
in Vegas. The opener tonight went to the home team
five to two over Florida with three goals in the

(02:28:00):
third period. Game two is Monday night. Neither franchise has
ever won the Cup. Florida had won eight straight on
the road this postseason till tonight. NBA Finals Game two
is Sunday night. Denver beat Miami in the series opener,
the Nuggets at home nine to zero. In these playoffs,
Caleb Martin did not shoot well last game, and for Miami,
he missed practice today due to illness. Max Struce oh

(02:28:21):
of ten shooting from the floor last game. How soon
can Tyler Hero get back?

Speaker 4 (02:28:26):
The heat guard.

Speaker 7 (02:28:26):
Likely a game time decision for tomorrow, trying to come
back from surgery at April on a broken hand. He
was hurt in the first half of the first game
of the first round. This year, They've been missing his
outside shooting and twenty points per game season before he
was named the league sixth Man of the Year. So
it's looking like Hero could return Sunday or Wednesday. But

(02:28:47):
the Denver Nuggets have won seven games in a row overall,
and in Nuggets history, every time they've led a series
two games to none, they've won that series seven times total,
including every round this postseason. At the French Open, Number six,
Coco Goff won her third round match Novak Djokovic play
his fourth rounder tomorrow. The Buffalo Bills gave defensive tackle

(02:29:08):
at Oliver a four year extension. The Vikings are expected
to cut running back Dalvin Cook at some point if
they can't arrange a trade. Now he was born in Miami.
His brother plays for Buffalo. We'll see where he goes.
Did you see the Chicago Bears yesterday said their property
in Arlington Heights is not their sole focus for a
new stadium site now tax issues. Rory McElroy has tied
for the lead at the Memorial three late ballgames in

(02:29:30):
the Major League San Diego and you. Darvis shut out
the Cubs six nothing. Darvish with nine strikeouts in his
seven innings of work. The Cub's offense went two for
twenty nine. Fernando Tatist Junior hit two home runs. Atlanta
winner at Arizona.

Speaker 3 (02:29:44):
Five to two.

Speaker 7 (02:29:44):
That ends the Diamondbacks six game winning streak. Ronald Okunya
with a long homer his twelfth. Spencer Streyder six and
two got the win. Diamondbacks still tied for first in
the NS with the Dodgers, who lost at home to
the Yankees six ' three. Garrett Cole seven and oh
got the win for New York. Mark Yanks at four
home runs. Aaron Judge, with his nineteenth Dodgers with runners
in scoring position, went one for eleven. Giants shot out

(02:30:08):
Baltimore for nothing. Alex Cobb now five and two. He
had seven strikeouts in seven and two thirds. Cleveland won
at Minnesota four to two, beating Sonny Gray, who had
been four to Zho Toronto a two to one winner
at the Mets Vladimir Gerrero junior RBI double top of
the ninth Mets record thirty and twenty nine. Houston got
a grand slam from Alex Bregman and four walks from

(02:30:29):
him and a win over the Angels nine to six.
Sho hey Otani four for five in the loss. In
the Miami win against Oakland twelve to one, the Marlins,
Luis Arias went five for five five RBIs. He's batting
three ninety. By the way, you know, you can't sell
enough tickets when the A's are in town and it's Miami.
Of course, that's one of the great draws in all
the National League attendants last night was eight thousand. It

(02:30:50):
was ten thousand tonight. Just for the record, Phillies won
to end a five game losing streak. Pirates won their
fourth in a row Milwaukee one to keep pace Colorado
and the whiteside wins. I don't know if you saw
the White Sox ending in a two to one win
and ten against Detroit. All the runs came on wild pitches,
including the game winner, which was a fastball that missed

(02:31:11):
the catcher and went off the umpire's face. Bask Boston
split a doubleheader with Tampa Bay. Last night's game was
rained out. There chance or rain again tomorrow.

Speaker 2 (02:31:21):
Back to you, Thank you very much, Steve de Sager,
Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday aeron Torris Jason Martin
broadcasting live from the tyreck dot Com studios to Saga.
I'll see you tomorrow with Arnie Spanier and Monday, Yes,
and Monday and Disaga will be in of course all
afternoon and early evening here on the network. Tell you
what coming up. We will preview the big game tomorrow,

(02:31:43):
Game two of the NBA Finals. What do the Heat
have to do to steal a game in Denver? We
discussed that next Fox Sports Welcome back everybody, Fox Sports
Radio eron Torris Jason Martin, broadcasting live from the Tyres
dot Com studios one more time. By the way, I
do want to welcome in our new affiliate in Peoria, Illinois,

(02:32:05):
Peoria Sports Radio one hundred point one. Welcome to the
Fox Sports Radio family. They're a Chicago White Sox radio
affiliate and program director Scott Heckethom dropped another network to
make the flip to Fox Sports a big win for them.
Welcome to the Fox Sports Radio, Peoria Sports Radio one
on one point one. By the way, if you're new

(02:32:26):
to the show, Torres and Martin, tweet us at Aaron
Underscore Tours on Twitter at j mart Radio Jason. Let's
get to it. We open the show talking Game one
of the NBA Finals, and you know, you kind of
didn't beat around the bush. You said, I, I don't
really see the scenario in which I really don't see

(02:32:49):
the scenario in which the Denver Nuggets can win this series.
So obviously that probably means that you're not feeling great
about Miami going into Denver, a place that no visiting
team has won this entire postseason. What has to happen
tomorrow for this thing to at least be competitive, let
alone for Miami to actually steal a game in Denver

(02:33:09):
tomorrow night.

Speaker 4 (02:33:11):
I mean they got to shoot well. I mean Bernie
said it and I mentioned it earlier. Struce can't go
out there and start the game zero for six and
not be able to contribute.

Speaker 3 (02:33:20):
Duncan Robinson can't shoot that poorly.

Speaker 4 (02:33:24):
Caleb Martin needs to get over the illness that kept
him out of practice on Saturday, and he's gonna have
to be there. If you get Tyler Hero back, all
the better, but obviously you're not gonna rush that, so
that's a game time decision. Maybe they know he can play,
or maybe they realize maybe we'll have him back for
the first game in Miami and that'll give us a
little bit of a boost there if we're down oh two,

(02:33:44):
maybe that's.

Speaker 3 (02:33:44):
What gets us to two to one. I don't know,
but the big thing for me is that Jimmy Butler's
got to be aggressive.

Speaker 4 (02:33:52):
Six or fourteen is just not a stat line that's
good enough in this playoff final. He's got to be
taken closer to twenty shots, or maybe even twenty to
twenty two shots, especially if the other guys are not
able to score. That means he's got to be aggressive,
means he's got to be going to the rack, going
for rebounds, probably getting to the free throw line, and

(02:34:13):
his body may be banged up.

Speaker 3 (02:34:15):
And he's played a whole lot of minutes.

Speaker 4 (02:34:16):
He's had to this Miami team, you know, having to
come through the play in round before they even got
to play against Milwaukee, and they've dealt with Boston, they
dealt with a good, pretty good Knicks team. You know,
this has been a challenge. It's been a long road
for them. And the Nuggets have been sitting there and
we didn't I don't know that we mentioned this at all,
but Nuggets sat there for like, you know, a week,

(02:34:37):
watching Miami in Boston, and so they're just fresh as
a daisy compared to Miami at this point. So I
think they've got to shoot the basketball better, which is
not exactly rocket science in terms of analysis, but and
I think that they've got to just kind of hope
that the role players for Denver just are off like Jokic.

(02:35:00):
Let's give Jokic thirty, but let's make sure Jamal Murray
stays in the fifteen range, and let's make sure some
of these other guys don't get hot.

Speaker 3 (02:35:06):
I mean Murray.

Speaker 4 (02:35:07):
I'm not calling him a role player, but you can't
let him go out there and get you twenty six
and Jokic get you thirty and expected that that's going
to be enough to probably win if you're Miami. So
I think you just want to try and contain Jokic
a little bit, keep some of those passing lanes a
little bit more challenging. Maybe you get a couple of
extra turnovers, but I think it's Jimmy Butler's aggression and
being able to make some threes. That's probably your recipe.

Speaker 2 (02:35:32):
It goes without saying. I mean those key guys, Kayla Martin,
Jimmy Butler and Max Strews have to be better really quick.
I mentioned this earlier. Jimmy Butler. We were on air
during Game six of the Eastern Conference Finals last week
when Jimmy Butler goes five of twenty one from the
field and then in the most recent game he goes

(02:35:52):
six of fourteen. As you just said, do you think
it's just, hey, these are the playoffs, great coaching, great scheming,
especially as you get more tape, or do you believe
that that maybe he is wearing down because I look
at at everything that he's been asked to do dating
back to the start of these playoffs, and remember they

(02:36:13):
were playing game single elimination games. I look at what
he's been asked to do, and this guy, you know, listen,
I love him, and I love his story, and I
hope that it's somehow, you know. I hope he ends
his career with the championship at some point. But he
is thirty three going on thirty four years old, and
I think that's my worry is that we've talked about

(02:36:33):
this throughout the playoffs, is that every team Jokic has
his Jamal Murray, Jason Tatum as his Jalen Brown, Devin
Booker has his Kevin Durant, Lebron James is Anthony Davis
on and on the best teams that have made the
deepest runs, they really have two guys that can take
over a game when needed. And the Miami Heat, I
guess they've had moments with Caleb Martin and stuff, but

(02:36:54):
it's still Jimmy Butler's team, and Jimmy Butler's really got
to be playing in an elite level for them to
have elite level success. Do you think it's just scheming
and coaching and opposition, or do you think he's finally
starting to wind down at this time of the playoffs.

Speaker 4 (02:37:08):
I mean, I imagine the answer, as most people would think,
is some degree of both. The question is how much
of a percentage is the wear down factor and how
much of a percentage is scheming. I just think that
I think if he's worn down at all, maybe that's
keeping him from being aggressive. Maybe he's trying to be
a little bit conscious of that. But I do think

(02:37:31):
I expect an aggressive Jimmy Butler, for better or worse.
I expect that he is gonna be looking for it
early and often. And I don't know if Tyler hero plays,
but you mentioned to Sagre mentioning that's twenty points a
game they haven't had since the first game of the playoffs.
They need him. I don't know that they're gonna get

(02:37:51):
him yet. Maybe they'll get him in game three. But Butler,
I expect he's gonna play with his hair on fire.
Now that may still not be enough, but that's really
the only shot. And I will bet you Spolstra has
told him that it's like, hey man, we rise or
die by you right now, Like it's it's gonna be
up to you, and if he is aggressive early, maybe

(02:38:12):
that creates a little bit more space, a little bit
more opportunities and takes a bit of the pressure off
some of those other guys, and maybe they start making
some of those shots. I don't think they will shoot
as poorly in game two as in Game one, but
I still right now I see the Nuggets sweeper and
Nuggets in five, so they're gonna have to show me.

(02:38:33):
If they win in Denver, this thing gets a little
bit more interesting real fast. If they don't, then you're
looking at having to win four out of five to
win the championship. If you're Miami against that Nuggets team
and Yokichi Murray, and I just don't see that universe
really quick.

Speaker 2 (02:38:48):
Game two, you have Nuggets winning. Yes, okay, I do
as well.

Speaker 10 (02:38:53):
I have.

Speaker 2 (02:38:53):
I think I'm gonna go Nuggets in five. I'm with you.
I don't really need to repeat anything because it has
been repeated throout the sh show. I just think it's
a bad matchup. But I think Denver's that good. I
think that we can like because they're the Nuggets. Because
Jokic is so understated, I think, you know, it's easy
to underestimate how good this team is. By the way,
one score still going on. Wake Force the number one

(02:39:16):
seed of the college baseball Tournament, up twenty one to six.
In the eighth inning, there was a weather delay in
Winston Salem. Shout out to everybody staying there till the end.
But with that said, we do have to get out
of here. Want to thank the crew, Alex Tisher on
the board, Patrick Steve De Seger, Freir Torus, Jason Martin
as well. Thank you for listening. Make sure to download
the podcast available after the show. This is Fox Sports Radio.

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