Chris Plank & Aaron Torres Preview the NBA Conference Finals, Debate Who 'America's Team' Is & More!

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Don't listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
You heard that right? The stinking genius is taking a
rare night off. What's going on at how are you?
Aaron Torres?

Speaker 3 (00:11):
Hey?

Speaker 4 (00:12):
Hey, Hey, what's up?

Speaker 3 (00:14):
Chris Plank? What would you give that? Like a six?
I mean I'd give that, well, I don't know what
i'd give it, but there was not enough asking. I
have some PTSD right there from it. Yeah, it was
pretty good. Scare me six, like basically what Arnie Spanner
brings to this show every Sunday night. Okay, wog noo?
Wow are you man? How's how's this Saturday Night show
with old Jason Martin? Well, uh, it's always fun working

(00:37):
with Jay mart I have a feeling that people that
are that listen to this time slot on Saturday night
are going to hear a lot of the same takes
from Torres that they did this time last night. But now, man,
I'm fired up to work, you know you know what,
Cass just say real quick?

Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (00:51):
I was thinking about how many of the stories that
we could potentially hit on that you have a direct
tie to. Obviously the Oklahoma City Thunder you covered Caleb
Williams at Oklahoma. There's another one that's slipping my mind
right now that you have very direct ties to. So
I'm actually, you know, unlike Arnie, I am happy to

(01:12):
be sitting in the passenger seat and learning from Chris Blank.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
I'm living the college football playoff changes right now. I mean,
I'm on the phone, could be going off at any
moment with the reporter ring on that I'm trying to put.
I'm trying to put my big jay journo hat on
and really dive into exactly what people want because I'm
so confused right now. Aaron, and I know you're a
big college football guy. Didn't listen leaning with this. I'm

(01:38):
just bringing it up on something that I'm covering. You
have everyone that's pushing back against automatic bids, which, again,
in fairness, I'm not a big fan of automatic bids.
It's a championship, not an invitational. But they won't really
give you a reason why, or they won't really give
you a true Hey, here's what we want, right. It's
just I feel like everyone's kind of My dad had

(01:59):
a word for it. He would say p footing around it,
but he wouldn't say pee. There was another word. He
kind of just everyone's tap dancing around it right now,
and I don't understand the why behind no one just
coming out and saying, hey, here's what we want, here's
why we want it, and here's how we think it
should be. And yet everyone's playing these games. It's like
phone a friend right now, where everyone's trying to figure
out what they want and what they don't want. When

(02:21):
it comes to college football playoff, I mean, heck, we
can't even come to a consensus if it's sixteen or fourteen.
So I am trying to be a reporter guy on that.
So if anything hits the phone tonight or the email,
I'll be sure to let you know.

Speaker 3 (02:32):
Well, one, are you expecting something after eleven pm Eastern
on a Sunday.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
I don't know when. You never know when there's fuelers
out for information. I just want to know what people
want more than anything else. I don't think we're going
to get anything official about this for months.

Speaker 3 (02:47):
If there's one thing I've learned about college football fans,
it's that they don't know what they want. All I
was told during the twelve or the fourteen era was
that we needed to go to twelve, and then we
went to twelve, and we saw Indiana get moked it
Notre Dame SMU get smoked at Penn State, and then
all of a sudden, it was just it's too much.
Why did we expand so much? So listen, I know

(03:08):
we got a Game seven to get to it. I
don't want to steal the thunder here or may get
a college football segment to lead the show. Oh yeah,
that was good. I didn't even I wasn't even paying
attention to that part. No, but I don't want to
steal your show. But I don't care about the thunder. Okay,
Game seven didn't give us what we wanted. There you go,
so there you you don't have to worry about my thunder.
Nowhere else to give us what we want? A sixteen

(03:30):
team college football playoff? How about that? We don't need
more average to below average teams to determine that they're there?

Speaker 4 (03:37):
Are you know?

Speaker 3 (03:37):
Listen, I think college football is a little bit more
wide open than it was probably five six years ago
in the super team era. But we don't need sixteen
teams to determine that there's really about three to four
of them that can win a title in any given year.
What if ucn's that sixteenth team. What if you listen,
I will be happy as a Yukon fan. I don't

(03:58):
think it's going to make a better product.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
Anyway, who cares about the product at Come on, man,
if your Yukon Huskies can get to the playoffs, well
come on now.

Speaker 3 (04:08):
But that's that's the whole thing. I will be happy
when Yukon walks into uh uh, you know the shoe
and loses fifty six to nothing.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
Everyone get the payday, you get the pay day. Come on, man,
you're looking at this all wrong. Well now you're looking
at this all wrong.

Speaker 3 (04:26):
All I'll say is, you know, basically, there's a perfect
example from last year Indiana. Indiana fans were thrilled to
be there, then they got there and we saw it
wasn't close. So I don't know what I will say
about the college football playoff that I find interesting. What
you said I thought is very a very interesting thing.
Nobody knows what they want. Because when I'm looking at
all these proposals earlier in the week and I see

(04:47):
the ACC gets two automatic bids, the Big Twelve gets
two automatic bids, I thought the biggest winners in this
whole thing were actually the ACC and the Big twelve.
I agree, yeah, And then the reporting comes out that
the ACC is planning Why don't we only get to
automatic bids? I don't know, Cuz ninety five percent of
your league is dog you know what? How about that?

(05:08):
How about Clemson should have get it? I don't know.
I don't know. There's three teams in the ACC that matter.
Sometimes sometimes it's fewer, and so it's a mess, which
is a nice metaphor for everything in college sports. Well,
this is relevant even tonight.

Speaker 5 (05:24):
Now.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
I gotta say my man Shady Sean for twenty apparently
his birthday is April twentieth. He does not like when
we talk to college sports. But here's my point. Game
seven was a dud. Today, it's been over for about
seven hours. We're on to Minnesota for oksee in Minnesota.
The other Game seven was a dud. Toronto did what

(05:45):
Toronto does in Game sevens And I'm sure you guys
don't want me to sit here for three hours tonight
and talk about Liberty just doing something that's never been
done in the history of college softball, which is knock
off a one seat. Imagine a sixteen knocking off of
one right, Imagine UNBC. Who's the other sixteen that knocked
off one? And why Ferley Dickinson. Yeah, fairly Dickinson. That's

(06:06):
just what happened here in the sport of college softball tonight.

Speaker 3 (06:09):
This is a massive, massive story.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
That's developing in college football because the commissioners are meeting today,
and they met today, and they met yesterday, and the
fight over the future is growing and it's a little
bit what's the word I'm looking for, contentious, So we're
not going to get an answer tonight. We might get
a little bit more buzz about which direction it could go.

Speaker 3 (06:33):
Tonight.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
We'll be watching Ross Dellinger and Pete Dammel, And like
I said, I'm trying to be a journalist on this one.
I'll fail miserably airing break but they're meeting right now.
Is no I will not break the story. But it's
going to be fascinating to see how this plays out
over the next few weeks because nobody seems to really
know what they want except the Big ten and the
SEC and they tell you, we want four automatic qualifiers,

(06:55):
we want a sixteen team playoff. We want to go
to our TV partners and make more money. That's what
we want acc and Big twelve and everyone else seems
to be pushing back, but they're not giving us the watch.

Speaker 3 (07:05):
So that's why I'm just perplexing this whole thing. Well,
it is. It is a huge story. And I heard
Gargano and Fitzy talking about it right before we came
on air, and uh, yeah, I mean, if you want
to talk, I mean I got four I got three
hours worth of takes on this college football playoff. But
but yeah, no, it is interesting how quickly it went
from four to twelve, twelve to fourteen, and we bypassed fourteen.

Speaker 2 (07:29):
And got to sixteen. The good news is, well, fourteen's dumb.
Fourteen's dumb. You're just gonna add two more teams. I
think that's dumb because you're just adding two more teams,
what are they gonna be two more two buys?

Speaker 3 (07:39):
And then well does two non buys? Wouldn't the argument
there be sec Big ten champs get a first round
by and that's the rule.

Speaker 2 (07:45):
There we got I guess that would be the only thing, right, yeah,
and then who else can get a buy?

Speaker 5 (07:50):
What?

Speaker 2 (07:50):
Nobody else? I mean, I think, right, that'd be crazy.
Sixteen to me, if you're gonna expand, dude, we were
talking about getting past twelve before we even played the
twelve team playoffs, before we even played a game in
the twelve team playoffs, they're already talking about we got
to get to sixteen. So if TV networks push back
against it, then we might have a little pushback. But

(08:12):
I'm I'm here for it tonight. I'm here for it
tonight if anything breaks. Now, you did say, and you
did bring up the fact that we had a game
seven earlier today, two of them in fact, in hockey
and a basketball But like I said, I'm on in Minnesota.
I'm on OKC in Minnesota. But I'm still having PTSD
after what happened on Friday night. And let's talk a

(08:33):
little bit about Knicks now. It shocks me that Arnie's
not here after his Knicks of advanced to the Eastern
Conference Final.

Speaker 3 (08:40):
That's the only reason they advanced, because they would have
had a game seven today, right, They definitely would have
lost if Arnie was working, they would have lost Game
six in probably game seven. Well, not to interrupt fellas,
but Arnie did text me this morning and he wanted
me to convey a message at the top of the show.
He just wanted me to tell you guys, go New York, Go,
New York Go. That's it. Continue He's also a Dolphins
fan in Arizona Wildcats fan.

Speaker 5 (09:02):
I mean it was perfect Arnie, you know, in perfect
Arnie fashion, I interrupt the show like that.

Speaker 3 (09:06):
So that's well.

Speaker 2 (09:07):
I was gonna say, Arnie's interruption would be asking a
question that he could easily google and then arguing with
you when you google it up for him. That would
be the perfect Arnie. Wait a minute, Wait a minute,
you're telling me we haven't had a college football playoff
before that. That's exactly what it would be. But here's
the thing, I dude, I think we need to we
need to throw some cold water on Knicks fans. You

(09:29):
just won a game to get to the Eastern Conference finals, right,
did you see the celebration.

Speaker 3 (09:34):
We had this debate on our show last night.

Speaker 2 (09:36):
So, like Aaron said, a lot of the same takes
you heard from Saturday night may or may not be
a carbon copy show only my voice over Jason Martin's
go ahead, what do you think too much?

Speaker 6 (09:48):
No?

Speaker 3 (09:49):
I don't. I think this is the most like gen
Z Ring chaser it. Listen you're the guy that just
told me two seconds ago, oh, what if Yukon makes
the college football playoff? That would be amazing, even it
gets smoked by Ohio State by seventy five points in
the playoffs exactly.

Speaker 2 (10:07):
And so for New York Knicks fans, listen, Well, let's
hold on a second. Yukon doesn't have the history of
the New York Knicks, but go ahead.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
Well yeah, I mean, you guns used to winning things,
just not even in football. We've had some nice wins
here over last coma, but no, like with the like,
there are literally people that were old enough to be
at a bar on Monday night on Friday night that
have never seen legally by the way, that have never
seen their team make it this far. And one I

(10:34):
love it to anyone who has ever spent any time
in New York Like there are some you know, band
wagon ish fan bases. We all know who they are,
like Knicks fans are not. Now, are there individuals who
have maybe hopped on the bandwagon in the process, Yeah? Probably,
But the New York is a basketball city. They've supported
that team through thick and thin, and this is the

(10:57):
farthest that they've been since two thou in why two
k and so let them celebrate, let them have their fun.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
To me, now, listen, do I why are you set
the table where this becomes to take every single time?

Speaker 3 (11:12):
Now? I don't think it's I don't think it's to
take every single time.

Speaker 2 (11:16):
Whenever someone celebrates and you're like, man, you're just celebrating
over that. Now, it's like, well, you didn't have a
problem with the Knicks doing it.

Speaker 3 (11:21):
Well, I mean if Ohio State celebrates uh, you know,
winning a first round playoff game, then that's a little
bit different.

Speaker 2 (11:28):
Well, but they're not going to because they know how
to act like they've been there, unlike me.

Speaker 3 (11:32):
Because they have been there, Knicks fans haven't been there.
When the Lakers are actually irrelevant franchise again, maybe you'll
have something to celebrate.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
So, you know, it's like me, you're yelling at me
about this. What are you talking about?

Speaker 5 (11:45):
Me?

Speaker 3 (11:45):
They just want a title five years ago that doesn't count,
Mickey Mouse. No, I'm kidding.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
No, wait, wait, hold on, you live on that belief
that you don't think the title five years ago counted
because of the of the bubble.

Speaker 3 (11:56):
I'm kind of I'm kind of here for to be
honest with you. No, So I've given this stake on
the Lakers championship is it's a legitimate championship. But I've
said this many times, is that in hindsight, it was
a best case scenario for the Lakers where a team
with Anthony Davis and a team with a then thirty
five year old Lebron got two months off before the playoffs,

(12:20):
and then I do think that, you know, being a
veteran team in the bubble did matter, you know, the separation,
the you know, what's it called isolation whatever. But yeah, no,
it's a legitimate championship. But back to the Knicks, back
to the next you have no problem again because I'm
not dying on this hill. I'm willing to be sold on.

Speaker 2 (12:40):
I just think it's a little much when you're climbing billboards,
tearing stuff up in Times Square, you're marching through. I
just to me, it's like, bro, you made it to
the Eastern Conference finals. You didn't make it to the finals.
You made it to the title. I'm listening to Jason
Smith on Friday night before my show. He's telling me
that hold on, Jalen Brunson is the greatest nick ever
ever Aaron Torres. But you're telling me that I should

(13:03):
be okay with this, that we just sit back and say, Okay,
it's been a minute. You guys have your moment, enjoy it.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
Listen.

Speaker 2 (13:08):
As a commentator, this is my this is always my stance.
Is there a commentator and a fan? Are you two
different people?

Speaker 3 (13:16):
And this is what I was gonna say, is I don't.
I don't tell fans how they should like, as long
as you're not threatening players on social media, as long
as you're not threatening wives and children. If an Ohio
State fan want to keep using the same example, if
they want to call for Ryan Day to be fired
even though he has a nine hundred winning percentage because

(13:37):
he can't beat Michigan, I don't have a problem with it.
If you did. Yeah, if you are mad that a
player's transferring again, I don't think you should slide into
the DMS with death threats, but you're allowed to be mad.
And I think the opposite is true as well. Now,
what I will say and what I was gonna say,
the difference between fans and you know, the commentator thing
is that I do think if Jalen Runson was jumping

(14:02):
on the scorers table, and you know we got video
of them at the club at three am that night.
Then I might have been a little bit concerned. That's
a little bit of a odell. You know, taking a
boat trip on a bye week kind of deal, or
Tony Romo going to Cabo with Jessica Simpson kind of deal. Yeah,
players are pretty subdued, Yeah, because they understand there's a

(14:23):
lot more. But to the point about fans acting like
they've been there before, I mean there is a huge
chunk of fans that haven't been there before. And I
would say this, the chunk of fans that have been
there before have a twenty five year track record to
believe that they might not have ever gotten back to
this point. So I thought it was very gen z.

(14:44):
Like I said, ring culture, if you don't win a championship,
nothing else matters. And I think in some instances that
is a fair take to have. Like again, I'll use
the same exact analogy. If Ohio State had lost in
the second round of the playoff after not making the
Big Ten championship after losing to Michigan, then yes, that

(15:05):
is a failure of a season for Ohio State. But
if but it's a successful season for Indiana to go
to the College Football Playoff and lose in the first round.
And so I believe with the New York Knicks, I
have zero problem with their fans celebrating in the manner
that they did for an accomplishment, in an achievement that, frankly,

(15:27):
a large percentage of them have not seen in their lifetime.

Speaker 2 (15:30):
So that's what airon the Analyst thinks. Airon the Fan
feels the same way. Yeah, no, I'll give you. I'll
give you another perfect example. Is he mentioned me being
a Yukon guy.

Speaker 3 (15:42):
I have a Yukon baseball jersey sitting in my closet
for the day that Yukon goes to the College World
Series because they've lost in the Soupers twice the last
three years, I believe, once to Oklahoma.

Speaker 2 (15:54):
Maybe now you Oklahoma in the regions last. Yeah, that's right,
came here in one, that's right.

Speaker 3 (16:00):
But if we get to Oklahoma, or if we get
to Omaha, that would be a successful season even if
you don't win the championship, because Yukon isn't built to
beat Arkansas on LSU in Texas and Tennessee and whoever
else is good in college baseball. It's a different standard
for the Yukon women's team or the Yukon men's team
or whatever. And so I feel like for Knicks fans, now,

(16:22):
you want to get to a point where you're not
celebrating Eastern Conference championships, And maybe in two to three
years they get to that point. But for the first
time in twenty five years to do something, I think
you absolutely should celebrate it and absolutely enjoy every second.

Speaker 2 (16:38):
Now you don't know it, nah, I'm just saying it's
only a trip to the Eastern Conference finals.

Speaker 3 (16:42):
You know. It's just they've been there before. It's happened before.
I even want a title. Now, if you go to
the they had never been there as a franchise, it
would be okay, I think so, yeah, I think you disagree.
I mean they've essentially I mean, their star player I
don't even think was born. Maybe he was, but do
you mean the greatest Nick ever? Listen, that was a

(17:04):
Jason Smith take to that didn't come out of Torres' mouth, Okay,
And I'm not enough of a Nix's story to know
I'd probably put you know, Walt Frazier somebody like that.

Speaker 2 (17:13):
Patrick Ewan for sure, that's it. Say yeah, maybe so
many won back to back tables. But like I said,
I'm like you, I'm not going to tell people how
to celebrate.

Speaker 3 (17:21):
I don't care.

Speaker 2 (17:21):
I thought it was a little over the top, but
you know what, go for it.

Speaker 1 (17:24):
It be you.

Speaker 2 (17:26):
But it is only a trip to the final. So
now our Eastern Conference Finals. So now does this mean
that they didn't accomplish what they wanted to accomplish if
they get knocked out by the Pacers or with the
celebration the way that it was, does that lead you
to believe, Hey, they're just happy they got here.

Speaker 3 (17:41):
That's where I'm in. Other words, you celebrate like that.

Speaker 2 (17:44):
It's like, okay, well you can't be mad if you
get knocked out of the Eastern Conference Finals. That's kind
of how my mind works. Like I said, be you
do what you want. But man, that was that was
something else. I mean, I don't know. I was living
on the scanner. I was doing the Friday night show.
We'd go to commercial break. I'm on the scanner. It's
getting arrested like crazy.

Speaker 3 (18:01):
I love it. I'm here for you or not till
two am. Right, Yes, I.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
Was on from one am to four am on Friday,
so you probably got some good stuff. Oh it was amazing.
It was absolutely amazing what was going on. But I
just I guess the bottom line more than anything else,
I do agree with you be you. But now if
you're gonna come in here, if they get knocked out
by the Pacers, I kind of set the standard that
this was worth celebrating, so hey, let's go.

Speaker 3 (18:28):
Then you'll hear, hey, we're ready for next year. Right?

Speaker 2 (18:30):
Oh, this was the building year for next year, isn't
that That's what happened. If the Thunder get beat by
the t Wolves or vice versa. Right, if Minnesota beats
okay See or OKAC beats Minnesota, that team that loses
is gonna say, oh, you know, we're heading off, We're
ready for next season. That's when we're really building towards. Right,
That's what every single fan of a team does when
they lose.

Speaker 3 (18:48):
I guess if I can make a quick analogy, and
I kind of already made this analogy, you are You
are the analogy, ky, I know, I know, I didn't
even realize that I was the you know, I'm like,
I don't even know, but I'll give you I'll give
you what I believe to be a perfect analogy. Patrick
Beverley jumps on the scorers table after the t Wolves
win a play in game in what twenty twenty two?

(19:12):
Oh yeah, nobody's jumping on scorers tables. Listen, the Timberwolves
went into Crypto dot com arena and won a game
one an opening round series, and acted like they should
win an opening round series. So I think the standard
changes with the continued success. And so, as I said

(19:33):
a second ago, you hope that this isn't the peak,
not only for this year, but bigger picture, and you
hope that a year from now it's not a big
deal to get to the Eastern Conference finals and that
the standard is raised. But I'm with you as a fans,
celebrate how you want to celebrate. I actually had no
problem with it, so do you. Yeah, I'm sure there'll
be people. Do you need to calm down a little

(19:55):
bit when it comes to destroying property? Yeah, that's saved
for a championship.

Speaker 2 (19:59):
People, Come on, you gotta win a title when you
start burning couches, But enjoy it. Because I don't know
what to make of the pacers, which I think we'll
try to find out as the show goes on tonight.
That's Aaron Torres. I'm Chris Plank. Arnie Spanier is out.
We're coming to you live from the Fox Sports Radio studios.
And when we come back, it was a busy week
in the NFL for news. It was a busy week

(20:20):
in the NFL for signings, and we get a little
bit more details on one of those big signings. We'll
talk about next on Fox Sports Radio. I don't want
to circle back to college football in a bit with you, Aaron.
It's Aaron Torres, I'm Chris plankare on Fox Sports Radio.
But for now, let's touch a little bit on the
NBA before the Saga's update, and then we'll get to
all these NFL notes. We went back on fan reaction

(20:43):
with the Nicks. Both feel the same way. Be you right,
go crazy, do your don't damage property, but be you
do your things, celebrate. Just wonder now if you've set
yourself up for all right, Well we just got beat
by the Pacers, but it's okay. We made the Eastern
Conference Finals. I don't think anyone's thinking that way right now.
Making the way that Oklahoma City responded today, fell behind
early got in a I guess you could say, in

(21:06):
a little bit of a tough spot. Aaron Gordon's playing
on one leg and they're not attacking him. Then all
of a sudden something clicked with three minutes ago in
the first half and they ended up winning by like
one hundred and six points today. Pretty impressive performance. What
stood out to you from OKAC making a game seven
game very very uninteresting?

Speaker 3 (21:24):
Yeah, I mean, first of all, you know, it is
funny how often, and I'm not trying to be like
negative about this, but how often we look forward to
a big game seven and how a lot of times
just frankly doesn't deliver up each What's up? Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Speaker 2 (21:38):
No.

Speaker 3 (21:38):
So all I'd really say, Plank is you know, listen,
I'm not trying to sit here and say that I
have all the answers and I get everything right. Everybody
in this business gets stuff wrong unless you ask Ernie Spaniard.
But that's another conversation. When I you know, when you
hear Aaron Gordon isn't going to be at one hundred percent,
and you know you kind of go back through this

(22:00):
series and again, you live in Oklahoma, so you you
probably even followed it more closely than I did. But
Oklahoma City basically blows Game one. They're in control for
basically all but like the last two or three minutes
there's the game for what was a Game three. That's
the overtime game that they kind of were in control of,
and then once overtime started, Denver just took over. And

(22:24):
they're at home and Aaron Gordon's hurt. Like I'd like
to sit here and say that that, you know whatever,
but I kind of sat on our show last night,
I said, I like Oklahoma City. I get the championship stuff.
Jokic is, you know, in my opinion, the best basketball
player on planet Earth right now. But as we saw today,
there's only so much that he can do, and you know,

(22:45):
and there's only so much that the Nuggets can do
when he isn't on the court. And so, like I said,
I did I have a twenty eight point margin. I
think it was actually more than that. I'm trying to
do the math in my head of a thirty three
point margin yeah victory. Yeah, I can't say I had
a thirty three point margin of victory, thirty two, whatever
it was, But I did think Oklahoma City was going
to win because of how most of the series has

(23:08):
had played out to that point, plus the Aaron Gordon
news coming into Game seven.

Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, I was in shock early whenever I saw some
of the early scores because I was following along. I
was working some softball today and I was getting to
the VR. But then when I saw they were down ten, well,
immediately I'm like, well, what in the hell? How how
can you be down ten to a Denver Nuggets team
that doesn't have Aaron Gordon. But then you kind of

(23:33):
saw a switch flip because Jalen Williams had been terrible
in this series on the road, but he took this
game over in the first half. In the second quarter,
he went eight for eleven and that meant he had
more field goals and he managed in each of games one, two, four, five,
and six in one quarter in the second quarter today,

(23:54):
And that's just crazy to think about because he's such
an integral part of the thunder attack. I forced some
turnovers in a nice job. He was the difference for him,
and you're you're more of an X and O guy
than I will ever be in my life. But how
in the world is six foot five Alex Crusoe able
to guard Yokitch at all, like, and I know anytime
Nicola would get into the into the paint, they would

(24:16):
double team him and Denver couldn't hit a shot down
the stretch to save their lives. But I was, I
was kind of impressed with a head banded, ballded dude
Alex Caruso today and the defensive job he did against
Yo Kitsch that was wild.

Speaker 3 (24:29):
You're giving me way too much credit because I am
certainly the farthest thing from an ex's and O's guy.
But uh yeah, I mean his his whole career continues
to kind of blow me away. I mean, I'll tell
you a little story that's you know, inside baseball for
you and I, but you obviously are very familiar with
with tech SAgs radio and uh I remember years ago

(24:50):
going on with the then host Gabe Boch before the
draft and he was like, oh, you know, you think
this Caruso kid can make it? And his career actually
ended in the West Regional in Anaheim, where the Oklahoma
Sooners advanced out of the sweet sixth or out of
the Sweet sixteen a e Lite eight to go to
the Final four. Buddy Hill. Yeah, so I was at

(25:11):
Alex Caruso's last college basketball game, and I did not
see an NBA player that night, And sometimes I still
don't see an NBA player. But the dude just has
found his role. Yeah, plays hard, and you know, I'm
you know, listen, I'm not one to ever not acknowledge
when I'm wrong, and his entire career continues to kind

(25:31):
of unfold. But I think, to me, the big thing
is just when Jokich was off the court, they just
they they they don't have enough help around him. I
know he said some stuff after the game, and okay,
see just comes at you in waves. There's so many
young guys out on that team that could beat you,
and that kind of came to fruition today.

Speaker 2 (25:48):
Yeah, they even kind of whittled it down to an
eight man rotation for a while today, which was wild. Okay,
enough on that. Nobody wants to talk about a thirty
seven point win in a game seven. But we can
start looking ahead, which will do coming out up here
in moments. But first we got to get you caught
up on everything that's going on in the world of sports.

Speaker 3 (26:04):
What's going on? Steve de Seger, Hello to both of you.

Speaker 4 (26:07):
Gentlemen, and I did just run across a great trivia question.
You know, with our final four set for the NBA playoffs,
the question is are there any guys left in this
NBA postseason that already have a ring on their resume?
It's going to be Oklahoma City hosting Minnesota on Tuesday
to start the Western Conference Finals, and the East Finals

(26:28):
start Wednesday with Indiana at New York. Anybody on any
of those teams?

Speaker 3 (26:32):
Yes, Alex Caruso.

Speaker 4 (26:33):
Alex Caruso of the Lakers won a title in Telly,
and he doesn't think that's a real ring.

Speaker 3 (26:39):
Don't tell airon that.

Speaker 4 (26:40):
Amazingly, J Tucker right, the answer to the question involved
six people, including PJ Tucker. A few years ago Toronto
had Passcal Siakam and og Onarobi past Keal the year
before the Lakers so twenty nineteen, Dante de Vincenzo in
twenty twenty one, and a couple of years ago Nver
had Thomas Bryant, who's still in the playoffs. So six actually,

(27:04):
wow on the list, and I must mention in Arnie's absence,
of course, there is somebody from the Arizona Athletic Department
about to lose that. The Wildcats are trailing seven to
three in a softball super regional at home in Tucson
against Ole Miss.

Speaker 2 (27:21):
They didn't force the if necessary game, but they're in
big trumble.

Speaker 4 (27:25):
Yeah, ask A and M how they went. Old Miss
is up seven to three in the bottom of the
fourth inning. The winners this weekend go to the best
of three softball super Regionals next weekend. And there is
no bigger story than what you referenced earlier, Liberty for
crying out loud one twice at number one Texas A
and M, including tonight to eliminate the Aggies. Yes, A

(27:46):
one seed is out in the regionals. They've had this
seating for twenty years. This has never happened. Meanwhile, I
believe it's number two Oklahoma correct.

Speaker 2 (27:56):
Two seed, so really not good enough to get the one.
That's Texas. Good news for them, they're getting their SEC
championship trophy in the mail for the tournament that got
rained out.

Speaker 4 (28:06):
Texas that coming sure look good this weekend, by the way,
and ranked in the top ten. It'll be Oklahoma against
Alabama next weekend, best of three, Texas against Clemson, and
a best of three next weekend. And UCLA against South
Carolina Top ten matchup next weekend. But Liberty against will
find out whom. Maybe Stanford Stanford's holding on seven to

(28:27):
five at Oregon, bo.

Speaker 3 (28:28):
It'll be two upsets there, Steve.

Speaker 4 (28:30):
It was already, wasn't it Oregon? It was a lopsided
game where they slaughtered Stanford earlier this weekend.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
Those those two teams have swapped beaten the snot out
of each other.

Speaker 4 (28:39):
Yeah, And isn't it usually the same picture most games?
I mean, it's not like a five man rotation.

Speaker 3 (28:46):
This is women's.

Speaker 4 (28:47):
Softball for Grand outloud. So okay, Oklahoma City advances. You
mentioned the thunder at a home game for Game seven
and eliminated Denver to and the NBA Playoffs second round
today one twenty five to ninety three, Shape Gildas Alexander
thirty five points, and it will be ok C advancing.
Even though they trailed by eleven early, they did lead

(29:08):
by twenty three just after halftime when it was seventy
one to forty eight. In the WNBA wins for Washington
and for Minnesota, which won at LA eighty nine seventy five.
Kelsey Plumb now with LA did have eighteen points. There
was a Game seven tonight in the NHL playoffs, and
it has happened again. The Toronto Maple Leafs have lost
seven straight Game sevens over the last couple of decades.

(29:31):
Lost at home six to one to Florida tonight as
the Panthers took a three to zero lead with three
straight goals in the second period in about six minutes.
Scotty Scheffler won the PGA Championship by five strokes. Brison
Deshambo tide for second place in Charlotte. NASCAR's All Star
Race was tonight, won by Christopher Bell. Having quite a season,
he takes on the million dollar first prize. Joey Logano

(29:54):
finished second congratulations. FS one's final Cup Series event of
the season, by the way, was this evening. Fox TV
will have the Indy five hundred next Sunday. Fox has
all the IndyCar races this year and the guy who
earned the poll today is the first Indy five hundred
rookie since nineteen eighty three to take the poll. Robert
Schwarzman from Israel will be starting in the lead. Carlos

(30:16):
Alcarez took the Italian Open. That's a French Open tune
up on the clay courtse The French Open begins next Sunday.
Baseball's game at Yankee Stadium tonight went to the New
York Yanks over the New York Mets eight to two
with six runs in the bottom of the eighth Cody
Bellinger with a grand slam. Seattle completed a three game
sweep of the Padres. The Angels completed a three game
sweep of the Dodgers. Narrow wins for Arizona and San Francisco,

(30:39):
and the Minnesota Twins had won thirteen straight but lost
today five too at Milwaukee.

Speaker 2 (30:44):
Back to you, thanks Steve so of the kind of
fringe events guys, Aaron tours in for Arnie Spaniel, Chris Playing,
Steve Seger, Ool crewe Ian, Roddy's here, Mary Max here,
and all the editors behind the scenes will get the
sound coming up in just a bit of kind of
the non mainstream sports that get a little time this week.
College softball, college baseball. I know you're in college baseball.

(31:06):
Have you started your interest in college baseball yet?

Speaker 1 (31:08):
Erin?

Speaker 3 (31:08):
Or is it next week? You know? I was sitting
around the house. I think it was last Friday. The
wife was busy doing something. I may have flipped on
the old SEC network to watch little old Mississippi State.
No big deal. There you go Highway to Hoover. We're
getting there. We're there. Next week.

Speaker 2 (31:26):
You got Indie racing, you got NASCAR and the Coke
six hundred, if that's still what they call it. Usually
we get like a boxing match. But I don't think
we really have one schedule this week and any those four,
which one really kind of piques your interest? Is it
the Indy five hundred or you just kind of sit
out this week and Chill I.

Speaker 3 (31:46):
Would say definitely. I would say definitely. College baseball, although
I will say disager mentioned I'm not a huge tennis guy,
but at some point in my life I want to
get to rolling Garo Steve.

Speaker 2 (31:58):
I will tell you something though, if you get on
the ESPN app right now, I don't know how often
you guys use it the never whenever you watch it,
whenever you watch you don't watch TV on the ESPN app.

Speaker 3 (32:08):
I was making it up.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
Really Okay, Well, I have to use it because I
have an Xbox. I have the very first I have
like Xbox negative five, so on their app right now
there's eighty eight. There's eight hundred different channels where you
can watch some sort of tennis right now. As far
as the NCAA teen tennis is concerned, I've never seen anything.
There's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven,

(32:31):
twelve channels where you can watch live nca tennis.

Speaker 4 (32:34):
I think ESPN plus is actually one of those enablers
for the tennis gambling scandals of the past.

Speaker 1 (32:39):
Oh I like that.

Speaker 5 (32:40):
I was gonna say, isn't there some class action lawsuit
going on with ESPN Plus or something? Really, I don't
want to be misinforming people right now.

Speaker 2 (32:47):
Hey, dude, was gonna if it's ESPN slander, we're here
for yeah. So Torres says, French open disager. Which one
are your?

Speaker 3 (32:55):
Every year? Though?

Speaker 4 (32:56):
Even if I never want to watch another IndyCar race
during year in previous years, to me, it's like watching
the Kentucky Derby or the World Cup Final.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
Absolutely, what about you, Ian Roddy, any of those do
anything for you?

Speaker 3 (33:07):
This week?

Speaker 5 (33:09):
I'm bigger into like Formula one and stuff. So there
was the Grand Prix earlier today that kind of peaked
my interest a little bit.

Speaker 2 (33:15):
But I'm in next I'm in in Memorial Day weekend.
We're talking about next week on the big weekends for racing.

Speaker 4 (33:21):
For Nevers baseball, you're saying it's one of these one
off events so to speak.

Speaker 3 (33:26):
Well, you know that is fair to Sega.

Speaker 2 (33:28):
That's a good point because baseball is supposed to be
starting to take center stage here, right.

Speaker 4 (33:35):
They purposely had rivalry matchups all weekend this weekend like
Yankees Mets tonight.

Speaker 3 (33:41):
You know what, you know what a sport I enjoy most,
You know, Memorial Day weekend. Count how many beverages I
can put down at the barbecue.

Speaker 4 (33:50):
Mata about the lacrosse playoffs always, yeah.

Speaker 3 (33:52):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (33:53):
You got the lacrosse final four into the championship on Monday.

Speaker 3 (33:57):
As someone who grew up in Connecticut, that's like the
unofficial it's it's warm out, summer's here. Yeah, I got
my I got my feet, maybe a little botchy or
batman or something in the backyard. That's my sport of
choice on Memorial Day weekend.

Speaker 2 (34:10):
All right, So Roddy's is probably the Monaco Grand Prix, right,
is that Farian?

Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (34:17):
De Seger and I are more I guess you could
say Indy five. Of course, I'm all in on softball,
and Aaron's getting us a little tennis here, all right.

Speaker 3 (34:25):
I like it. I'm here for it.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
We've got you covered in all the non mainstream sports
with what we'll be counting down to this coming Memorial
Day weekend. All right, when we come back, I've got
a counter to your minimalist idea for the postseason in
college football, and I got a counter off the tweets
to the show tonight.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
We'll dive to that next right here on Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 2 (34:48):
I got some good tweets coming, and it's the best
way to stay in touch with the program. Aaron is
at Aaron Underscore Tours. It's erin with two a's. I'm
at playing show. Everybody make it easy tweets Sports Radio
Mark Wright is aren'ie still drunk? I think the Knicks
fans think they won the NBA title the other night.

Speaker 3 (35:06):
No, I think they know. Just celebrate how you want.

Speaker 2 (35:09):
I just think you set yourself up for a little
disappointment if that's your big party. After the thunder pulled
away in the third quarter today, I bet Mike the
lepre Kahn broke into song That's for my man Eddie
Nature Boy, have you dealt with the Mike the Leprekahn
call yet, Aaron Torres.

Speaker 3 (35:27):
No, we don't generally open up the phone lines on
our show, Budd that's a good call, that's a good call.
But I'm open. I'm open to it if you want
to open No.

Speaker 2 (35:35):
No, no, no no. We're good and we're good. We're
goodther say Ben Mallers. Coming up next for saving Saved
by Friday night show one four Am.

Speaker 3 (35:41):
Send her time. We'll do there.

Speaker 2 (35:43):
But here's the text tweet I wanted to get to.
This is from Mustang Media because I'm I am a
sixteen team playoff guy. If we're gonna go there, I'm
fine with twelve. Honestly, I'm fine with twelve and the
four buys no problem with it. Sixteen is what I
want if we're going to go that direction. My saying
Mania Rights couldn't be more right. I'm happy the Ponies

(36:05):
got in, but getting smoked by Penn State was no bueno.
I'll still take all the hype and exposure because we
got the most coverage we've had since the Pony Express.

Speaker 3 (36:14):
In al days.

Speaker 2 (36:16):
So here's my question that I would say from that
if cause you don't want you don't want to see
go to sixteen because you don't want to see more
mid games. And I agree with you, we get bad games.
Then do you just want teams in and bowl games?
Is that where you you're good with, like more a
Citrus Bowl and a Liberty Bowl and a Memorial Bull
or whatever bowls out there?

Speaker 3 (36:35):
Is that where you would rather those teams go. I
already know what your pushback is going to be when
I say this, but I have no pushback. I'm an
open book. Well, what I was going to say is that,
you know, I think one of the things that made
college football so unique was that teams that really, you know,
we used the regular season to determine who is actually

(36:58):
capable of winning a championship, and then we got a
playoff largely featuring those teams. And so to me, all
I'll really say is, yeah, am I gonna watch every
college football playoff game? Not just because it's my job,
but because I genuinely enjoy college football? Of course, sure,
I just think that two things are two things happen

(37:19):
the further you expand the playoff is that one you
are gonna get vastly inferior teams in and even in
the Mighty SEC this year, we saw that there was
a you know, the third, fourth, fifth team. I mean,
look at what Alabama did when they made their bowl
game and got embarrassed by Michigan, let alone, I hate

(37:40):
to say it, losing to Oklahoma, losing a vag for them. Yeah. So,
but I think the other thing that does not get
talked about enough is it also totally devalues the regular season.
And I'm sorry, I get the whole argument there's more
games that matter. It's like, yeah, but you know, I
don't know, like everyone know there's more games that matter.

(38:01):
It's like, are there really though, Like, are we really watching?
You know, were you really watching Indiana Purdue in the
last week of the regular season last year because I
had playoff stakes? No, you were not. I'm sorry, you
just weren't.

Speaker 2 (38:15):
Don't lie to me, especially when it was like thirty
five zip after the first quarter.

Speaker 3 (38:19):
Well yeah, tune in for the first quarter either, So
I just you know, I just think it does.

Speaker 2 (38:24):
I did just so we're just so we're fair because
there was nothing else on. It was one of those Yeah,
I guess I'll watch this for a little bit.

Speaker 3 (38:32):
So I get I guess it just depends on what
you're looking for out of your college football viewing experience.
Is that, yes, I enjoy the games, Yes I will
watch them when they're on. I your anti playoff expansion
because I'm anti dilution of the regular I'm more anti
dilution of the regular season, which is what happens the

(38:54):
more you expand the playoff. I'll say this much too.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
I think you really implode the regular season if you
give automatic bids, if you get to four in the
SEC four and the Big Ten, and two in both
the ACC and the Big twelve. Now, if I'm the
ACC and the Big twelve, and this is where we're
going and that's what I have in front of me,
I'm all about it. But I do think it hurts
the regular season a lot even more if we get

(39:19):
to those four automatic bids. Absolutely, And I also wonder,
I mean, can you imagine a conference championship game, Aaron
where the one and two seeds.

Speaker 3 (39:27):
Aren't playing and it's like a playing game. So stupid.
I mean, I get it, but it's stupid, and especially
by the way, four automatic bids.

Speaker 2 (39:34):
But there's gonna be at large bids too, so you
can get as many as five or six from a conference. Yeah,
so it's like, if you lose that game, it still
might not matter. So it's just we don't have enough
time for this.

Speaker 3 (39:45):
Rent. But I would say that Ohio State winning the
national championship last year, depending on how you feel about
an expanded playoff, was either the best or worst thing.
I think it was the worst because it basically proved
that basically there's no real game that matters in the
regular season. We could discuss it over our two an
hour three. I know we're short on time here. No, no, no,
we don't have to.

Speaker 2 (40:02):
I just I that's a good counter Like listen, I
think it's devaluing the regular season the more teams you
added the playoffs, and I think it will continue to
the value the regular season. But they're gonna chase the money.
That's what everyone in college sports needs. Right now. It's
Fox Sports Radio, stick Gram.

Speaker 1 (40:18):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (40:21):
This is on vacation at Did you happen to hear
what Arnie's plan was. He's not even on his trip yet,
he's not even gone.

Speaker 3 (40:31):
He's going with his wife.

Speaker 2 (40:32):
Uh, what do you say, Costa Rica or the Minican
Republic or.

Speaker 3 (40:36):
Someone like that. Dominican Republic. He said, Dominican Republic. Thank you.
They haven't even left yet.

Speaker 2 (40:40):
He's taken the show off tonight because he has to
get up early tomorrow morning.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
Does that seem kind of soft? Yeah? Yeah, I'd say
so what time? I mean, what time does it? What
time is? I think what he's saying like four A.
I guess four am. But you're on vacation. You're gonna
sleep on a flight.

Speaker 2 (40:58):
And the Knicks just clinched a spot out of the
Eastern Conference Finals. For goodness sakes, they can be heer
to celebrate a little disappointed. But the man never really
takes any time off because, I mean, from what he
has nothing else to do except for this show on
Sunday nights and his feelings. And then number two, I
just I think he would probably drive Beth crazy if

(41:18):
he didn't have this outlet here on Fox Sports Radio.
But it's like a precursor to his vacation to not
do the show tonight.

Speaker 3 (41:26):
I'm about to take that, aren't you the guy that
told me you don't like taking vacations.

Speaker 2 (41:31):
I do not like Well, first of all, I've got
three kids, man, so I don't want to be around
them anymore than I have to. And then number two,
we usually drive everywhere, so I'm stuck with him in
the car with me, and I have the kind of
wife whom I love. But if I put an AirPod
in to start listening to one of our podcasts or
listening to Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app, I

(41:52):
immediately get what are you doing?

Speaker 3 (41:54):
What are you doing?

Speaker 2 (41:54):
I'm like, I was gonna listen to the show why
don't you talk to me? So my non sports radio time,
Aaron's kind of hell to be honest with you, okay, which, Oh,
by the way, I am taking a vacation here in
like late June, so I've got to like mentally prepare
myself for that.

Speaker 3 (42:10):
Now, that's how bad things are. I will say too.
You also travel a lot for your work. How many
weeks a year are you on the road between softball
and football?

Speaker 2 (42:18):
Oh, I mean, you think about it, probably I'd say
not quite half, pretty close to it.

Speaker 3 (42:24):
Yeah, you know that's fair. I'm traveling a lot, So
that's that's very defensible because I don't travel nearly as much,
and so I literally live for the two to three
weeks a year that I can just get I travel some.
I was actually on the road doing something this past week.
But like I when I go away, but I also
like when I go away, like I, are you completely
unplugged one hundred percent? Yes, and look at you. And

(42:46):
I've had to learn how to do that. I also,
you know, you know how our business is plank, Like
you know, especially as a guy who mostly covers college sports. Now,
I will say, like with the basketball portal, that takes
us pretty deep into the spring. But it's like you
get a pretty nice window where there's not gonna be
much going on. Yeah, except for of course last year
when I was in Cabo and Dan Hurley decided an

(43:08):
interview for the Lakers job. But but no, so I
kind of have it whittled down to a very few
select weeks that I know it's pretty safe. But yes,
I do, and I really do. Like I'll leave my
phone in the room. Like my wife is somebody that
like she just likes being on her phone and just
you know, doing whatever. And I guess it's just because
of our business. I'm on my phone so much that

(43:30):
like I'll leave the phone in the room. And what
I have found is that you know, when I'm usually traveling,
which is June July. It is amazing how little you
miss on Twitter and social media and in the world
of sports when you leave your phone for six or
eight hours. Just a lot of arguing mostly time. It is.

Speaker 2 (43:48):
Yeah, people fighting, people fighting is all it is, or
me trying to fight with so much. But I will
say just in defensive, Arnie, and to your point, I
have grown to the point where I'm enjoying. I found
a few places that I like to go and I
enjoy getting to go there.

Speaker 3 (44:04):
So that's we're going to one of those places that
can you share.

Speaker 2 (44:07):
And I can't believe I have to admit this because
you know, I can't stand the Broncos, but I love Colorado.
I love love Colorado now and so we're going there,
and that map gets me a little bit fired up.
So we'll excuse Arnie tonight. The saga's loving it because
he's able to get in a disager. You're able to
get an update off without getting interrupted, Sagra.

Speaker 3 (44:26):
Scott got back from a big old vacation himself, so
that's why he's got his little glow going on right now.

Speaker 2 (44:31):
Yeah, and he's got a vacation from a vacation because
he's on vacation, and then he doesn't have to deal
with Arnie tonight, So you've got to be in heabit now.

Speaker 4 (44:37):
It's really the listeners that are on vacation tonight. Welcome.

Speaker 2 (44:42):
That's right, it's their God to heaven here this evening,
all right, I want to hear I want to hit
a couple of tweets before we get to some NFL
talk at Aaron Underscore Torres, I'm at playing show at
Fox Sports Radio. Here's mister Nobody talking about college football,
which just ended up being a big topic because Aaron
and I don't get hang out that often and we
both love college football and college basketball. Mister Nobody, rights,

(45:03):
the goal is chasing the money and giving otherwise media
mediocre coaches and out.

Speaker 3 (45:09):
So yes, they want the expanded playoffs. You're right.

Speaker 2 (45:12):
The regular season gets watered down. College basketball regular season
gets ignored because of the sixty eight teams in a tournament.
I would also add this, I think unless you're a
college basketball die hard Air and you're a college basketball diehard,
I think you're one of the best follows in the
country and one of the best listens when it comes
to college basketball.

Speaker 3 (45:31):
But the twelve team.

Speaker 2 (45:32):
Playoff this year did kind of slow down that quick
turn to college basketball for some people, right, And I
think that that hurts college basketball more than just the
sixty eight team watering it down, right.

Speaker 3 (45:49):
Or No, I honestly, I'll be real, I actually did
not feel that way. I felt like.

Speaker 2 (45:55):
You didn't think that the expanded playoffs slowed people getting
into college.

Speaker 3 (45:59):
Basketball this year? I didn't know, And I'll tell you why.
It's because I actually think that the college football season
is going way too far into January. What I tended
to see this year was that I think that people
that love college football were really into college football untill

(46:20):
about the second week of January, and I think that
overlapped with one the excitement of the playoff to their
teams are still adding guys in the portal blah blah
blah blah blah. And then what I tended to see was, Yeah,
if you're an Ohio State fan, you're living and dying
every single day. But like if you're an Auburn fan
or you're a whatever fan, I don't think that you

(46:43):
were like invested in the new cycle. Now again, you
watch the games. But the other thing I would say too,
I just think I don't think it hurt college basketball.
I actually thought it kind of hurt college football. I
just think it went too late. Like I look at
myself as a big college football fan. But we got to
the middle of January and I remember I forget what game,

(47:03):
what round it was, but it was like the weekend
going into that Bill's Ravens Divisional round game, and all
that week that was what I was consuming. Lamar versus Josh,
Josh versus Lamar MVP this dah da da da, And
it was like, oh, but the college football season is
still going on, but now it's so far into the
calendar that like I actually I thought it was hurt

(47:26):
a little bit by how late it went into the calendar.
That you know, again just my opinion.

Speaker 2 (47:30):
Well, I live in a college sports market, and I'll
absolutely say that. You know, we didn't have a great
Our basketball team started out undefeated in non conference play,
and you couldn't beg people to go to games because
they were invested in the college football portal. And we
couldn't get a call on basketball because they were talking
about you know who you adding. So this might be
kind of unique. And I don't know if most college

(47:52):
football cities are like that, college football places where you
had teams in the playoffs, maybe so, But I felt like,
at least in my world, it absolutely load people getting
into college basketball. But if you're an Auburn and you're good,
if you're in places where you're good, absolutely would make
sense that you're moving on rather quickly. They've got to
figure out how to fight this battle with the NFL.
Back agree, because that's that's where your biggest fight is.

(48:14):
You are now December twentieth and nineteenth and twentieth is
first round the playoffs, and you also have a banger
of a doubleheader from the NFL on that weekend. Trying
to Ian, I think you probably have it off the
top of your head. You got like Eagles Commanders and
I want to say maybe Steelers Ravens that weekend, right,
And so those two games are on the twentieth, and

(48:38):
that's the second day of the first round.

Speaker 3 (48:40):
Of the playoffs.

Speaker 2 (48:41):
We can sit here in debate whether or not it's
hurting the regular season, or whether or not it's hurting
fans jumping into college basketball or not. But what we
know for certain you're not going to win a battle
Aaron with the NFL.

Speaker 3 (48:53):
Yeah, man, I'm sorry, Plank, go ahead. Yeah, I was just
to say, that's just not gonna happen.

Speaker 2 (48:57):
You know.

Speaker 3 (48:57):
My thought is, and I've heard Joe Klatz say this,
is that he thinks college football should end on New
Year's Day. I don't know how realistic that is. I
know there's this just move up the season. It's like, well,
August is a tough time. It's really hot. And again
I'm not a parent, so I don't know, and I'm
not trying to, you know, make jokes, but like you know,

(49:17):
you said you had three small kids.

Speaker 2 (49:18):
I mean they're probably well, no, they're not small anymore.
I have one small two that are much think they're
much cooler than me.

Speaker 3 (49:25):
Well, all I was gonna say was, you know, school
doesn't start until sometimes the middle of August, end of August,
so I think it's a little harder to just, oh,
just start in the beginning of August. I don't think
it works that way. But I am in favor of
and this isn't gonna happen. You already referenced it. I say,
get rid of the conference championship. Game weekend. I don't
like this notion of play ins to the playoff you

(49:48):
know whatever. You know, the the layout, but basically the
top teams wouldn't even play whatever. I say, just get
rid of that weekend start. They maybe have one week
off to end the regular season, just to get everybody's
bodies refreshed, and then just start that puppy, you know,
second week of December and try to be done by
January tenth. Because again, I know you, like you said,

(50:10):
you take you know, you're in Norman, you take calls.
I just think the deeper you get into January, the
more investment people have into the NFL playoffs. And to
your point, the NFL isn't giving up any ground. And
you know, they've kind of owned that mid to late
December window on Saturdays, on Thursdays, all of that, and

(50:32):
so they're not giving up any of that. And so
I think that plays a role in all this too.
You know, I gotta cut here.

Speaker 2 (50:37):
I was trying to I got a new computer this week,
and it's it's like, not my computer, but it's does
that make any sense?

Speaker 3 (50:44):
Company's computer? There?

Speaker 2 (50:45):
You go, like Aaron Torre's enterprises, right, I need to
get Chris Plank Enterprises and get it going. But I
got a great cut on that because you're talking about
you're talking about the NFL saying, hey, we're not going
to give up any ground. I thought it was interesting
this week because the schedule was released the National Football League,
and everyone had their opinions about the schedule, release videos

(51:05):
and things of that nature. But the one thing that
stood out to me was that December twentieth date as
a college football fan, and listen to what Mike North.
He's not our Mike North up in Chicago, but the
Mike North who's the executive EP of scheduling for the NFL.
And you think that they're gonna have some grace for
the NFL or for college football going forward.

Speaker 3 (51:26):
Listen to this found this way.

Speaker 6 (51:27):
We work around them in our schedule all the time.
All their CFT bowl games and playoff games are in
our buildings in Dallas and Atlanta and Miami and all
these places. We work around them. Sometimes we move start
times for Monday Night football to avoid the Rose Bowl.

Speaker 7 (51:42):
Like.

Speaker 6 (51:42):
We work with them very closely. We are cooperative, we
are friends. It's not that we're competing with college football.
That third Saturday in December. That's an NFL day. We've
played on the third Saturday in December thirty seven of
the last forty years. As the college has expanded this
CFP playoffs and decided they needed more windows and more

(52:03):
weeks to play their games, they really almost didn't have
a choice but to come into one of our days.

Speaker 3 (52:07):
Yeah. So there you go.

Speaker 2 (52:08):
There's your fight, and you're not gonna win it. You're
not gonna win it.

Speaker 1 (52:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (52:13):
So your only option, I think is gonna be aaron
is to move things up because you're now getting into
windows where the NFL is like, hey, we're playing here.
We're not gonna move for you. We already move enough,
So best of luck. You're just kind of stuck here
with this.

Speaker 3 (52:28):
So that is a great sound. I had not heard
it before. Here's the other thing, Plank, that I was
thinking about that I know, you know, as somebody who
knows this space as well as you do. My other
thought was, when people say, you know, college football has
to sit down with the NFL and figure this out,
who is Roger Goodell supposed to call exactly easy to
talk to, is it? Bill Hancock, the commissioner of the CFP,

(52:50):
is it Greg Sanche, who we know is the most
Bill Did you say Bill Hancock? Do did you say
we retired? Oh retired? Okay, yes, I thought you said
that's I thought you said something else that was a
signal of the end of something very much alive, very
much alive, might be a major league Yeah aad, Yeah,
we'll cross him off the list then. So yeah, so,

(53:12):
like you know, and I think it speaks to one.
First of all, I understand, like everything in college sports,
we took too long to get here, and now it's
scramble mode, full speed ahead. So I do understand that
some of this is on previous leaders, previous administrations, previous whatever.
But now we're going so full speed ahead. And again,

(53:33):
you know, to your point from a minute ago, we
never even took time to figure out if this twelve
team playoff is going to work before we immediately go
to what we assume will be sixteen, and you don't
think about all of the problems that are coming with it.
And so but I think one of the biggest problems
that college sports has, which again as an insider like yourself,
you know, is that there's not even anybody for we're like,

(53:55):
like say, Roger Goodell said, listen, we want to work
with you. We want to figure this out.

Speaker 2 (53:58):
Who is Roder Godell supposed to call four or five
different people exactly?

Speaker 3 (54:03):
And that's part of the problem here is there's just
we love it. It's the best, but it is also
just the absolute worst in certain instances. And this is
a perfect example of.

Speaker 2 (54:13):
Nick Saban was part of this committee, coalition whatever the
term is that they had talked about putting together. He
and Cody Campbell. Cody's the big money guy at Texas Tech.
And what was the first thing that Nick Saban said
whenever he had the opportunity to speak publicly about it,
He's like, well, I don't even know if we.

Speaker 3 (54:31):
Really need a coalition or committee or whatever.

Speaker 2 (54:33):
He's like, I want to be part of that because
he doesn't want to sit through all the bs you
got to go through. Someone's just got to be a
commission of football and accept that it's different than every
other sport. By the way, quickly, before we get to
our buddy, Todd Furman and guys, keep the tweets coming.
We'll get to tons of them through the show tonight.
I'm curious, are you an expansionist when it comes to
the NCAAA tournament or I'm sorry anti expansion when it

(54:55):
comes to the NCAA tournament.

Speaker 3 (54:56):
Are you happy where it is now?

Speaker 2 (54:57):
Or with the growing numbers of teams at play Division
one basketball, d you say, hey, this tournament and it's
the ability to include more teams has to grow as well.

Speaker 3 (55:07):
I am a billion percent in favor of keeping it
exactly where it is. Me too, there was no there.
There has probably never been a team that has a
legitimate gripe in a sixty eighteen era about being left out.
And you know, you look at this year. It was
like nobody at North Carolina and they found a way.
Texas of course was the fourteenth SEC team, And you know,

(55:34):
and I also think you know one to the point
that you brought up a second ago. I love college basketball.
I follow it because the sport's been good to me
and it allows me to do what I do. But
I also understand that really there is no interest until
the middle to the end of February. It's just the
reality there just isn't. So that's part of it. The Again,

(55:56):
it's the same as I said with the college football Playoff,
the more you expand it the more it continues to
dilute the regular season. And then also I just think,
you know, and this is something that again, this is
the conversation we just had about the college football playoff.
The symmetry of Okay, you get a couple opening days there,
you know, Thursday, Tuesday, Wednesday, you play the the I

(56:18):
call them the first four. They call it the first four.
I just call them playing games because that's what they are.
You know, you start messing with the symmetry of having
that four day extravaganza Thursday to Sunday, where now you're
playing games all day Tuesday Wednesday, you lose what makes
the tournament the tournament and what kind of makes it
this unofficial holiday where people take time off, they go

(56:41):
travel to Vegas, they go travel to the sportsbook near
their house. And yeah, I just I mean, listen, you
can have too much of something. I mean this notion
that oh yeah, you can never have too much of
a good thing. Okay, yeah, yeah, eat ice cream for
three meals a day, and see what your doctor tells
you after a couple months. You know.

Speaker 2 (56:59):
So it's just I agree, Yeah, I like it where
it is right now. Aaron one hundred percent.

Speaker 3 (57:04):
We ask you this as an Oklahoma fan before they
went on their little run towards the end of the year.
Were you clamoring for more Oklahoma basketball when they were
on like an eleven game losing streak in the SEC
and they were right on the bubble the whole time? Nah? Exactly.

Speaker 2 (57:18):
But I do love me some Porter Moosers, so I
wanted him to be able to keep this job, and
thankfully he did. When we come back, or Man, Todd Furman,
we'll throw some of the college football playoff conversations in
front of him, but we got NBA Eastern and Western
Conference final matchups to preview. We'll start diving all in
next right here on Fox Sports Radio with Aaron Torres

(57:40):
in for Arnie Spaniard. Tonight, I'm Chris Plank the SEGA
coming up with an update in about ten minutes from now.
We're abrought to be joined by our buddy, Todd Furman
the Bet the Board podcast. All right, Todd, so okay,
see moves on in an absolutely dominating Oh we don't
have him yet.

Speaker 3 (57:56):
I'm sorry, my bad, my bad. I just assumed.

Speaker 2 (57:58):
You know what happens when you assume in this you
make an ass out of you and me. So Todd
Ferman coming up here in just mere moments minus three
point fifty five for the thunder in this series, t
Wolves plus two to eighty five. That number surprised you
at all. Is how big of a favorite OKC is
over Minnesota?

Speaker 3 (58:16):
Yeah, it does as a matter of fact, And I
understand the concept of where Minnesota was seeded coming into
the series, but you know, very baseline, you know, casual
analysis that Todd will probably rip apart when he comes on. No,
like I get that, you know, the seating was whatever.
But this is also a team that played in the

(58:36):
Western Conference Finals last year. I think they're actually a
better version of themselves because listen, I think Karl Anthony
Towns is a talented player, and I understand why they
tried to pair them with Rudy Gobert, but go bear
with kind of that nase reed kind of more of
a I guess Karl Anthony Towns is a stretch guy too,
but I don't know, I think it works. And so yes,

(58:57):
to answer your question directly, I actually am a little
bit surprised where the odds are right now in that series.

Speaker 2 (59:03):
There he is, without an further ado Todd Furman, what
do you think you surprised to see that number minus
three fifty five for the thunder being as big a
favorites as they are over Minnesota in this series.

Speaker 7 (59:14):
I'm not just knowing how the thunder of Power rated
all season long. And to Aaron's point, I caught the
tail end of your guys discussion there. Look, there's a
reason that the Nuggets end up losing that series but
go five and two against the spread. So it's a
distinct possibility that oddsmakers are currently overvaluing Oklahoma City, not
just from a game to game standpoint, but also in
the big picture for a series. So I understand why

(59:36):
the number is what it is. Would I be running
into the window to back OKC and Lake, you know,
three dollars and fifty cents to make a dollar? Absolutely not.
I'd be much more inclined to make a compelling case
for the Timberwolves, thinking that some of their scarts issue
could push them across the finish line in the Western
Conference Final.

Speaker 3 (59:51):
This might be a dumb question, Todd, but you know,
sometimes when you get a huge brand, the Lakers, Notre Dame,
Michigan football, whatever, they become a very public side. Are
the Knicks a public side or have they been so
bad for so long that people have been afraid and all?
That's kind of it's a serious question, But what do
you make are they super public just because of how
big the brand is?

Speaker 7 (01:00:12):
Well, first things first, this is a Sunday night segment
that usually Arnie is in your chair errand so there's
no such thing as a dumb question when Arnie isn't there,
So you're automatically resolved of any question you fire.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):
It's not really a compliment to me as much as
it is an insult to Arnie. But anyway, that's okay,
continue with the kind of how.

Speaker 7 (01:00:29):
All of it works. But no, when you mentioned public teams,
the Knicks really aren't one of those public, high profile
teams that are going to have a premium attach to them,
likes the Cowboys or the Lakers. For just the reason
that you outlined, it's been a franchise that has been
mired in mediocrity and that's probably the best way to
put it over the last twenty to twenty five years
that when you're looking at this Knicks team from top

(01:00:50):
to bottom, it's all a question about how you try
and assess the value of the win against the Boston Celtics.
Did that have more to do with the Knicks and
injured Jason Tatum late order to have more to do
with the Boston Celtics really struggling again. The Indiana Pacers
have been an undervalued commodity, not just this postseason, but
last year. I think a lot of people forget that
they really pushed Boston a lot more than what that

(01:01:12):
series score line suggested in the Eastern Conference Finals. So
as the number continues to climb a little bit, I
think the Pacers are a relatively difficult matchup, knowing that
they can do a number of different things. They have
a deeper bench than the Knicks, who probably utilize a
seven to eight man rotation. And it wouldn't shock me
at all if we were talking about Indiana going back
to their building four game three, this series notdded up

(01:01:33):
at one apiece, with them having snatched home court advantage
away from a next team that really hasn't played its
best basketball at MSG this postseason.

Speaker 2 (01:01:39):
Todd, I feel like you, more than anyone else that
comes on Fox Sports Radio, can talk some hockey and
talking intelligently, and I don't know maybe give Maple Leave
fans some advice on how they should feel tonight, how
should they handle this because that was the definition of
a gut punch man.

Speaker 7 (01:01:56):
Well, they say the sign of insanity is doing the
same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
That has kind of been the mantra of this May
Police franchise going back to twenty eighteen twenty nineteen when
they put together their quote unquote Core four that now
has a grand total of two series victories on their resumes.
Yet we're going to try and use that same nickname

(01:02:18):
to put them on the pedestal of the Yankees, who
had five World Series championships for their Core four. So
I think what you're going to see this year in
Toronto or this offseason, I should say I would be
surprised that Brandon Shanahan is back as the general manager
of all things Toronto May Beliefs. I think Brad Tree
Living has a very difficult job on his hands. But
in my opinion, Mitch Martiner played his final game as

(01:02:38):
a member of the Toronto May belief If I was
in that seat, I'd be looking to try and shop
Austin Matthews aggressively and see if a team in a
bigger market might want to overpay, and I'd look to
build around William Melander, Matthew and I, who I think
are the faith and future of this organization. Because you
mentioned a gut punch, I'll call that a gutless effort
in game seven. On the heels of a gutless effort

(01:02:59):
in game five, you can't get beat even by a
defending Stanley Cup champion by a combined score of twelve
to two, and two of your most pivotal games of
the season after you built a little bit of momentum
after to nothing win in Sunrise in game six.

Speaker 3 (01:03:10):
As a person who whose uncle was a Hartford Whaler
season ticket holder, I've never forgiven Brendan Shanahan for demanding trade.
So take that Brandan Shanahan. Todd Herlin says, you're out.

Speaker 7 (01:03:21):
Hey, look I mean Aaron, I have a Ron Francis
replica jersey that sits in my closet. I will still
make the cake to this very day that the Hartford
Whaler's logo is one of the best in sports. Now,
I do think it's a little bit blasphemous. At the
Carolina Hurricane, oh my goodness to don The Hartford Whaler's
logo is part of the IP rights, but that's a
different discussion for a very different day.

Speaker 3 (01:03:42):
I will say this, It has nothing to do with
this segment, but I went to a Los Angeles Rams
game in December of last year wore a Hartford Whaler's
hat and got more compliments on that hat than pretty
much any piece of paraphernalia that I've ever worn. So
I appreciate you.

Speaker 7 (01:03:59):
I respect it. I respect it more than I could
put in a word.

Speaker 3 (01:04:02):
Real quick, is there do you think there's any value
four teams left in the chase for the Cup two
seed versus the three seed in the East and West?
Or are we at the point now in the playoffs
where there's probably not much value on.

Speaker 7 (01:04:14):
Anybody, Not so much in the futures market. But I
do think it's interesting because when we look at the
dynamic for the final four in the NBA, you have
three franchises that have never won an NBA championship and
playing I'm saying it the right way because I don't
count anything the Sonics won before moving to Oklahoma City
on that ledger, So three teams that haven't won and
the Knicks. We may as well go back thirty seven

(01:04:34):
generations since Arnie was twenty five year old, way back
in the seventies to find the Knicks championship. Meanwhile, in
the NHL, we have the exact same four teams that
we're here a season ago, and I think we could
see a little bit of a role reversal, more so
in the Eastern Conference than in the West. I mean,
I know, Carolina was blank four nothing, and Ron Britdenmore
has never won a conference final game while he's been

(01:04:55):
the bench boss for Carolina. But this team feels a
bit different. And I think you saw a little bit
off fatigue in Florida's game, not necessarily tonight, of course,
but for some stretches. I think Carolina finds a way
to exact a measure revenge and they get out of
the Eastern Conference. And the Oilers were my pick before
the playoffs started, so I'm not jumping off that bandwagon.
It feels like all of that scar tissue accumulation for

(01:05:16):
the Oilers battling back last year against the Panthers, just
to come up short in Game seven will be what
propels Connor McDavid and Leon Dryside across the finish line.
So Edmonton might pick to win the Cup, but I
would not be betting them in the future's market. I
don't think there's enough.

Speaker 2 (01:05:28):
Upside Aaron talking about the Rams gives us the ability
to segue smoothly to some football talk.

Speaker 3 (01:05:35):
Can you they catch your eye on Wednesday's schedule release.

Speaker 7 (01:05:39):
I think it's always fascinating to see which teams the
league wants to showcase on some of the biggest stages.
And while I'm not going to quite say it's apples
to apples, the Washington Commanders heading into this year feel
very similar to this stage that the league tried to
put the Houston Texans on a season ago as a
sophomore quarterback, So it's a little bit of buyer beware.
Sometimes it's a much different Dynams to go from being

(01:06:01):
the hunter to the hunted. And we'll see if Jade
Daniels and this Commander's team are up for the task.
I'll even go one step further, guys and kind of
put them on upset alert Week one. Wouldn't shock me
if the Giants, whether it's Russell Wilson or Jamis Winston
under center, find a way to beat the Commanders outright
of the seven point dog. The Lions schedule looks to
be a little bit difficult on paper, but they do
have a rest advantage that I think will pay dividends.

(01:06:23):
I believe it's five teams that they'll play on short
weeks coming off of Monday Night football, so we'll see
how a new offensive and defensive coordinator fare there, and
one team that I think was dealt a very fourtuitous
hand after having one of the more difficult schedules. I'm
not buying them in the market, but the forty nine
ers should be thrilled with the way their schedule shakes out,
and we'll see if the newly minted two hundred and

(01:06:43):
fifty plus million dollar man in brock Purty can get
the forty nine ers back to the top of the
NFC West and into the postseason.

Speaker 3 (01:06:49):
Two part question on college football, No, it's probably a
little early to do like the serious deep dives, because
you know, this portal thing just keeps rosters and fluck
so late into the spring. But the two part questions
is pretty straightforward. Is one, do you find it less
interesting to bet national championship futures because there's these additional

(01:07:12):
rounds of the playoff, and frankly in Ohio State or
Texas is just better built to do it than most
other teams. But then the second part is again knowing
that it's early. Are there any say, conference championship lines
or maybe a line to make the college football Playoff
that has caught your eye early?

Speaker 7 (01:07:28):
It's definitely a different dynamic when you're looking at the
national championship futures now than what it would have been
in the four team playoff or of course the BCS
era because one loss, two losses, or in some cases
three losses not a death now. So sometimes you can
benefit by waiting to try and see how the market
could overreact to one data point. And a team that
I know is getting an awful lot of buzz early on,

(01:07:49):
and rightfully so is Clemson. We've seen their oddso in
the national title bet down from thirty to one into
the mid teens. If they were to lose their season opener,
there's a chance that that number drifts out into the
low twenty and you'll be able to come back in
over the top. One team that did take some money
at real long shot prices, where the Michigan Wolverines. Their
schedule looks good, and if Bryce Underweld or mikey Keeam

(01:08:09):
give them a little bit more stability at quarterback, you
can understand why there's some optimism. But oddsmakers aren't dummies
by any stretch of the imagination, and there's a reason
why I'd say, depending on the book, anywhere from eight
to ten to twelve teams all priced at twenty to
one or shorter, and they're all some of the perennial
blue bloods that are up there. The team is most
likely to have an inside track. So you kind of

(01:08:30):
have to see when the betting market decides it wants
to overreact to an early season result, that's not going
to be indicative of how these teams are going to
look now in terms of some of the conference stuff
that's out there. Now, you know one of the leagues
that I think will be the most compelling, not the
SEC or the Big Ten. I think the Big twelve,
yet again, has a ton of parody. When you go
through this league, and you can make a case, at

(01:08:51):
least right now for five to six different teams, you
get a player like Devin dan Pierre that comes in
to give Utah a little bit more pop at the
quarterback position. BUYU maintains Cotton new but great under the
radar quarterbacks as far as national media is concerned. Not
for you guys to follow the sport in what Sam
Levit can do at ASU or what we're going to
get Sawyer Robertson at Baylor. So interesting conference. That is

(01:09:12):
the one that's going to fascinate me the most. And
the team I want to dig into a little bit
more tho it will be the Houston Cougars. I think
they get an upgrade with Connor Wegman at quarterback, and
I've always loved Willie Fritz at every step of the way.
Just not sure that roster is built to try and
be a little bit of a Cinderella. There at a
price tag around forty to one. Just yet.

Speaker 3 (01:09:28):
Yeah, great, great, great stuff. Hey Tom, have an awesome
week man.

Speaker 2 (01:09:31):
Everybody check out the Bet the Board podcast and I'm
sure Arnie you'll have a wild bet for you coming
up next Saturday, our Sunday.

Speaker 3 (01:09:38):
Excuse me?

Speaker 7 (01:09:38):
Yeah, yeah, one thing before I go, Chris, I got
to flip it back to Houstince. You are the college
softball guru. How do I contextualize Liberty knocking off Texas
A and M and punching their ticket to the super regionals.

Speaker 2 (01:09:49):
By it's like a sixteen beating one in the NCAA tournament.
It's very similar to that. Now it's different because you
have well, I guess it's really not and they had
to do twice. They had to do three times. That
had to beat him three times. Man, that's insane. So yeah,
that's how I would say it. It's like your BC
beating Purdue. It's like who did Farley Dickinson beat Aaron who?

Speaker 7 (01:10:11):
Who was the FDU over Purdue? And u NBC over
UVa's That's.

Speaker 3 (01:10:16):
Why I had to be Texas A and M on
the other side though, right, that was what I was
thinking when when you mentioned it earlier, Plank, I was like,
of course it was Texas A and M that was
on the other side of that, so gad to be.

Speaker 2 (01:10:27):
Yeah, it's it's wild, man, this is gonna be crazy.
It's gonna be fun super Regional. Can I start betting
on it yet or do we have odds on this
will be to the Teletworld Series.

Speaker 7 (01:10:33):
Did not shop around aggressively to see if there were numbers.
Typically we don't get odds on the women's side until
we get to Oklahoma City, but maybe with the super
regionals with more expansive menus. Now, but you know, Plank,
you have to take full advantage of mister Torres their
ride shotgun with you because we know he is a
college baseball guy. True, but I'm sure he's already been
studying the brackets before they get released. So we know

(01:10:54):
who's gonna make the field of sixty four with a
chance to get to Omahawk.

Speaker 3 (01:10:57):
Well, Yukon's won like twenty three of twenty five in
our somehow, not in the field right now, but anyway,
I'll take that up with Kendall Rodgers another time, even
though he has no idea who I am. But that's there.
You go, Thanks Todd. We'll talk to you next week.

Speaker 7 (01:11:09):
A pleasure.

Speaker 2 (01:11:10):
It's always a good show. We can get a D
one baseball shout out? Yeah, all right, Steve de Sager,
speaking of shoutouts, is in the house? Run a little late, sorry, Steve.
We got to get caught up on everything in the
world of sports.

Speaker 3 (01:11:20):
What's going on?

Speaker 4 (01:11:21):
You mentioned the Liberty Game, and yes, more than once
had to win at the number one team in the country.
This hadn't happened in the twenty years of this seeding
in softball that the one seed nationally is out in
the regionals. But Texas A and M was beaten and
we were waiting to see who Liberty will be facing
in the best of three super regions.

Speaker 3 (01:11:41):
Going on. My gosh, Oregon has.

Speaker 4 (01:11:42):
Tied it seven to seven against Stanford. They're in the
seventh inning. But the other late game with Arnie's Arizona Wildcats. Yeah,
it's over Wildcats at home.

Speaker 2 (01:11:52):
Oh, they lost when they were hosting a regional Holly
Smokes Arizona.

Speaker 4 (01:11:57):
Arizona with a very proud soft tradition. This is an
incredibly rare event for them losing at home in Tucson.
Ole Miss advances to face Arkansas on a best of
three super regional next weekend. We mentioned earlier number two
Oklahoma against Alabama next weekend and a best of three.
And by the way, we do have the NBA's Conference

(01:12:18):
finals starting this week. Oklahoma City will be there, clearly
the one seed from the regular season with a sixty
eight and fourteen record. But the note from Associated Press
is in the NBA playoffs these past six years Most
of the teams that have been making the conference finals
were not one or two seeds, whereas the previous six
years usually it was always a one or two seed

(01:12:42):
making the NBA Conference Finals. It's Oklahoma City hosting Minnesota
to start the Western Conference Finals on Tuesday. Ok see
a one to twenty five ninety three winner at home
today in a Game seven to eliminate Denver. Thirty five
points for Shay Gilgis Alexander In the NHL Playoffs, a
Game seven at two Toronto went to Florida six to
one over the Leafs. The Maple Leafs have lost seven

(01:13:04):
straight game sevens. Scottie Scheffler won the PGA Championship by
five strokes NASCAR's All Star Race tonight to Christopher Bell.
Fox TV will have the Indy five hundred next Sunday.
Robert Schwartzman ere in the poll today, the first Indy
five hundred rookies since nineteen eighty three to win the poll.
He is from Israel. Fox has all the IndyCar races
this year, including the one on the Streets of Detroit.

(01:13:26):
The next weekend after the five hundred, Carlos Alcarez took
the Italian Open sweeping number one. Yonick Sitter of Italy
Center just back on the tour, but he's now been
beaten by Alcarez four straight times. The French Open starts
next Sunday. In Major League Soccer, Orlando beat slumping Miami
three to nothing, and the LA Galaxy scored late to
tie LAFC two to two. Guys, we have the UFL going.

(01:13:49):
The Spring Football League's regular season ends in two weeks.
On Fox TV, DC is six and two. It won
thirty three thirty over Arlington. Apparently that was an exciting finish,
but the last two minutes of the game could not
be seen on ABC because they switched to the basketball
pregame show instead. Congratulations Saturday, Michigan now six and two

(01:14:10):
one at Houston. The quarterback Danny Eetling from LSU and
Purdue through three touchdown passes. Saint Louis had paid attendance
of thirty thousand. Yesterday, Saint Louis six and two won
twenty nine twenty eight over Birmingham with a late touchdown.
Quarterback Max Duggan from TCU had a couple of touchdown runs.
And Sunday Night baseball's game had the Yankees eight to
two winners against the Mets thanks to six runs in

(01:14:33):
the bottom of the eighth, Cody Bellinger hit a late
grand slam. He went three for three six RBIs. Meanwhile,
the Mets offense went three for thirty and struck out
eleven times.

Speaker 3 (01:14:43):
Back to you, thanks Steve Hey.

Speaker 2 (01:14:45):
A reminder you need to check out the Fox Sports
Radio YouTube channel. Tons of great videos from many of
our Fox Sports Radio shows. Just search Fox Sports Radio
on YouTube and you'll see a bunch whole bunch of
video highlights from our programs and be sure to subscribe
so you always have to access to our Fox Sports
Radio videos on YouTube. Oh we got live action, I

(01:15:05):
completely I'm digging around. I've got Sports Center on, I've
got the CBS. Do you ever watch the CBS Sports HQ.
It's pretty good. It's just not like a NonStop news
show on old school ESPN News right.

Speaker 3 (01:15:18):
Yes, just NonStop and I love it.

Speaker 2 (01:15:21):
Top of the seventh inning, Oregon and Stanford tied at
seven and a chance to host a super regional potentially
on the line. Here, So good stuff in my beloved
sport of college softball. If you need some live action
during the show tonight, all right, Mord Seger when we
come back plus airon Torres and I have not really
dug into anything NFL related. We got schedule thoughts, we've

(01:15:43):
got new playoff seating thoughts, and we've got pretty getting
paid to dive into coming up right here on Fox
Sports Radio. All right, we are back on the clock.
I think kind of to erin Toys, I'm Chris Plank
Arnie out tonight.

Speaker 3 (01:16:01):
Steve Seger, what is what is Jason Martin's the Steve Cast?
What does he call this?

Speaker 4 (01:16:09):
To segment?

Speaker 2 (01:16:10):
He says, segment? Yes, I was Steve Cast. I just
made that up off the top of my head.

Speaker 4 (01:16:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:16:16):
Our Sunday Night version very much.

Speaker 4 (01:16:18):
An ultimate cast yact.

Speaker 3 (01:16:21):
That what you got.

Speaker 4 (01:16:22):
It's only on the OCHO now that the Denver Nuggets
have been eliminated. AP reports that Russell Westbrook's rating for
this series against Oklahoma City he was he was a
minus ninety two on the court for the series, which
would be the worst for any player this decade in
a playoff series.

Speaker 3 (01:16:39):
And then you've got the.

Speaker 4 (01:16:40):
Toronto Maple Leafs. My goodness, what a history. I know
they'll be very proud and say, look at all the
Stanley Cups we've won. Can we just talk about our lifetimes?
Because the leaf just for the last twenty years, they've
been in a Game seven in the playoffs seven times.
They've now lost their last seven game sevens in a
row at home six to one to Florida tonight, So

(01:17:03):
the Panthers go to a conference final, and for a
team to get beaten at home by at least five
goals more than once in a single playoff series had
only happened once since nineteen forty six in the NHL postseason,
but that's what happened in this second round best of
seven to the Leafs as they're eliminated by Florida. The

(01:17:25):
Toronto Maple Leafs have made the playoffs nine straight seasons,
but they have failed to reach a conference final or
let's say, the NHL Final Four, in any of these
So that's the second longest streak of its kind in
the history of the NHL postseason. The record belongs to
the Saint Louis Blues, who through two thousand made the
playoffs fourteen straight years but didn't make a single conference

(01:17:48):
final in that whole run. The Maple Leafs haven't been
in a Stanley Cup final since nineteen sixty seven. We're
getting close to sixty years since they've done so, so
I know they can say, hey, hey, we're number two
all time in Stanley Cup victories. We won the Cup
thirteen times in our long and proud history. It is
a long and proud history. But the last time they

(01:18:10):
were even in the Stanley Cup final, there were only
six teams in the league. If you look at the
standings for nineteen sixty seven, six teams in the league
top four made the playoffs. Toronto was third place out
of six.

Speaker 3 (01:18:23):
It's like Indiana basketball. They're like, we got nine championships.
It's like, yeah, eight of them came before World War One.
It was like Michigan football until recent years.

Speaker 4 (01:18:32):
Colleague. You know in nineteen oh one we were okay, let.

Speaker 3 (01:18:36):
Me talking about fielding Yost. I got a good fielding
Yost story for you. Today it's coming with cowboys.

Speaker 4 (01:18:41):
Yeah, yeah, like cowboys in most of our lifetimes. Well,
not happy with tonight's NASCAR All Star Race with Joey Legato.
This is the guy who dominated the All Star Race
last year at the short track, led literally almost every
lap last year and he led twenty of lapse tonight,
a race high one hundred and thirty nine compared to
twenty eight laps led for the winner, Christopher Bell. There

(01:19:04):
was a new thing with this year's race.

Speaker 3 (01:19:06):
There was a.

Speaker 4 (01:19:07):
Promoter's caution late in the race, while Legano held a
comfortable lead. They pause things, slow the action, bunch the field.
This was introduced by the Speedway Motorsports CEO, and as
Legano said afterwards after finishing second and losing his lead late,
I am ticked off right now. Dang it, we had

(01:19:27):
the fastest car. You get to pause. I'm trying to
choose my words correctly on the caution situation. I got
bit by it. So I am one frustrated dot dot dot.
I am all about no gimmicks with the caution. I'm
all about that. I'm just me and that CEO not
see an eye to eye right now. Okay, I gotta

(01:19:49):
have a word with him.

Speaker 3 (01:19:51):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:19:52):
So the man who took the million dollar first prize,
Christopher Bell. Apparently NASCAR does not list the rest of
the prize money to the other drivers. They just divided
among the rest of the field. Safe to say, Legano
did not win anything close to a million bucks.

Speaker 2 (01:20:06):
To good stuff, Sager. I was not aware of that.
I totally missed that in the race tonight. Hey, by
the way, this race is too strong out. One guy's
dominating too much. Guess what, throw the caution out. Let's
make it fun. Oh my goodness, what a wild decision
to make. All right, got a ton of NFL stuff
to throw in front of Torres. Next on Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:20:29):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (01:20:33):
We're rolling Arnie's out Aaron's and we're having fun conversations.
What an awesome moment for my beloved sport is softball.
Oregon beat Stanford on a walk off, three run home
run and the Oregon Ducks will be the final team
to punch their ticket to the Super Regionals.

Speaker 3 (01:20:52):
Pretty cool, I know.

Speaker 2 (01:20:53):
I listen, this is only knowing most of you couldn't
care less about college softball. I don't need I don't
need Darryl's smart me tweet. You're all too cool for
women's sports unless it's Caitlan Clark. But it was a
cool moment, man. So now we're set for the super Regionals.
Congratch the Oregon Ducks, and I'll continue to do my
best to uh to politic for more coverage of this sport,

(01:21:14):
but we'll see how it goes.

Speaker 3 (01:21:15):
I agree with really quick. No, I agree, And first
of all, anybody who's complaining, listen, it's a two screen world.
We all have short attention spans. You had live sports
on at one am Eastern time on that That's right,
that's right. That's one of the things that really kind
of got me into the college baseball stuff. Was there.
You know I always usually do like a Vegas trip

(01:21:36):
kind of late May early June, and you just be
sitting in the sports book at you know, nine o'clock
at night, just kind of chilling with a with a
cold one, and it'd be like Oregon State, Uh, you know,
Coastal Carolina. You're like, I can always I get bet
on this. It's ten o'clock Pacific. It's the only because

(01:21:56):
you know, by by June all the NBA is done.
You know, you might get a finals game, but that
that that puppy on the West coast is going to
end by you know, eight o'clock. And it's like, oh,
it's ten thirty and I can just bet on this
Oregon State baseball game. Sign me up. So they stormed
the field.

Speaker 2 (01:22:12):
I think there are some other athletes that were there,
maybe some football players, and they kind of stormed the
field and celebrated with the Ducks.

Speaker 3 (01:22:18):
And Chris Blank, I got to ask you a question,
go ahead. I mean, they're storming the field for a
regional game that only advances them to the super regionals?
Are are regionals a big deal? There? Are Oregon basketball?
Are Oregon softball fans overreacting? Have they set the bar
too low? Chris Plank?

Speaker 2 (01:22:37):
Yes, okay, you only celebrate whenever you want a title.
They're acting like they haven't been there before, act like
you've been there. But they're running around just having a
blast right now for people fun.

Speaker 3 (01:22:50):
See. Plank and I had this debate about Aaron York Knicks.

Speaker 2 (01:22:54):
Aaron is allowing the Knicks to celebrate the Eastern Conference
Finals birth like they won the title, and I think
they got a little carried away.

Speaker 3 (01:23:01):
But defense it was the fans not the players. As
I said, there was no Jalen Brunson jumping on a
scores table, so which would have been hilarious. It would have,
but he didn't do it. That would have been a
little bit, a little bit extra.

Speaker 2 (01:23:13):
Hows the kids say you only you only dog pile
when you win a championship. You only storm the field
when you win a title. But listen, I guess we
gotta I guess we got to bend the knee every
now and then to a different take here there.

Speaker 5 (01:23:26):
Well, I love that iconic clip of Patrick Beverly with
tears in his eyes.

Speaker 3 (01:23:31):
Oh my gosh. And they won the first round of
the playoffs. So hilarious.

Speaker 2 (01:23:34):
Man, I just drop an F bomb after f bomb,
just just absolutely hilarious. So congrats to the Oregon Ducks
and so on a night when we get our super
Regional set. In softball, we also have the NBA's Eastern
and Western Conference Finals. Are you are you leaning either
way yet on the East side, because I kind of
think the Eastern con. I think both series have a

(01:23:55):
chance to go seven. I think the thunder are gonna win.
Kind of leaning towards the Nick right now, to be
honest with you.

Speaker 3 (01:24:01):
So yeah, with the East you know, I know that
Indiana has been overlooked these entire playoffs. Tyrees Halibert and
always the most overrated player in the league. Oh maybe
he's not actually whatever pole that was. But with the Knicks,
like I know, it's cliche, but I just think there's
something about this specific group and Jalen Brunson. I'll say

(01:24:25):
this man, even as a guy who loves college basketball
watched him win two championships at Villanova, Like I, I
did not know that he had this gear to his
game where it's like every single time they need a
big play in the clutch, he comes through. I will say,
you know, the Boston series was a little bit weird
because obviously Game one, Game two before the Tatum injury

(01:24:46):
was mostly just about three point shooting and lack thereof.
And I do think Indiana poses some interesting defensive uh problems,
But no, I I like, I actually do like the
Knicks to win. I think it's an incredible story. I
think they're an incredible team with incredible chemistry. I do
think they end up winning. I think they're I think
they're in good shape too.

Speaker 2 (01:25:06):
I think we're gonna have I hope we're gonna have
a fun final four because as it stands are I
guess you would say these people get mad if you
use the college phrase.

Speaker 3 (01:25:15):
In the NBA.

Speaker 2 (01:25:15):
Sorry, but if you have good Eastern Conference in Western
Conference finals, because so far, like our Game sevens have
kind of stunk the series. I thought the Thunder Nugget series.
I know Arnie would be mad because there was only
one buzzer beater. He would tell you that it stinks,
But you take away games two and seven, and that
was an awesome series. Game two the Thunder one by

(01:25:37):
forty five. Tonight they went by like thirty seven. But
to me, I thought that was a fun series.

Speaker 3 (01:25:43):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:25:43):
The Knicks Celtics series, to me was really hard to
figure out because the Knicks lost two games by twenty
and in two of their wins they had to come
back from twenty and then they won a game by
like one hundred and fifty points and in game six
the other night. So I don't know if was that
a good series or no.

Speaker 3 (01:26:04):
Yeah, It's funny because sometimes you see the opposite, right
as you have like a buzzer beater in an NCAA
tournament game, and it's like, oh, it's an all time classic,
and it's like, actually it was terrible. It just had
an incredible ending, And I thought Oklahoma City Denver was
kind of the opposite, was that it was an incredible
series that just I think Denver just flat out ran

(01:26:24):
out of gas. By the end of that series and
maybe more specifically Nikolea Yokic ran out of gas. But no,
I thought that was one of the more entertaining series
that I've watched in a long time. And I think,
because it's hard to say, it's like Oka C's coming
out party. They of course, you know, were in the
second round last year against Dallas, but I think that
was an important series for them as a franchise. You know,

(01:26:46):
it was funny knowing I was working with you today.
You know, I don't know how much of the airwaves
they take up with you and Norman Monday through Friday,
but I was kind of curious of like, if they
did lose, is it something where you have to consider
trading one of these core piece is getting some veteran guys.
That's not a question that we have to answer tonight, obviously,
and maybe we won't have to answer it period. But

(01:27:06):
I just thought it was a cool series. I thought
it was a fun series, you know Jokic. I know,
the Denver stuff was weird, just with fiery Mike Malone
a week before the playoffs, but I thought Jokic established
himself as the best player in the world and even
in some of the law. You know, early in the
series he struggled a little bit, but as the series
went on, even in some of those losses, he was

(01:27:27):
just incredible. So now I've enjoyed these NBA playoffs so far,
and I'm with you, is I don't think that any
of the four teams advancing would surprise me. I am
sort of leaning Nicks and I'm probably I'm probably leaning
Minnesota in the West. I'm not I don't feel great
about it. I don't feel great about it. Man, I'm

(01:27:48):
gonna tell you right now, I don't feel great about it.
Everyone talks about depth this time of year, and I'm like,
h you know, everyone's kind of tired of this time
of year.

Speaker 2 (01:27:57):
Is how much does depth truly matter? And then when
when push came to shove for the thunder until they
got up by about twenty they were sticking to an
eight man rotation. So I worry about I worry about Gobert,
I worry about having someone to shut down Randall. There,
I'm with you. I think this has a potential to
be electric. And it all boils down to whether or

(01:28:18):
not Anthony Edwards decides he wants to take over games
because yes, I think he can. What is did you
think he was going to be this good when you
saw him at Georgia?

Speaker 3 (01:28:29):
No? Not at all. Medium, No, not at all. I'll
say this though, that last point that you brought up,
it's a point that me and j Mart have hammered
home on our Saturday show where you look at the
stat line at the end of these games and you're like, oh,
Anthony Edwards was awesome. But you know, first of all,
the closeout game. You know, I was texting with j

(01:28:50):
Mart after it against the Lakers because you know there
was some you know, first take topic or whatever, Oh
is it Anthony Edwards League, and it's like, well, he
was the fourth most important player on the court the
night they beat the Lakers to clinch the series. But
you know, me and J Mart were on for one
of the Lakers games. But then, certainly I think it

(01:29:11):
was Game four of the Timberwolves Timberwolves Warrior series where
you know, Steph was out and it was like Minnesota
just never really hit that throttle, and it's like you
got you got Golden State on the ropes without a
future Hall of Famer and and Anthony Edwards again, it's

(01:29:34):
weird because you look at the final stat lines and
you say, oh, he played these great games, but it's
like it just feels like he coasts and it feels
like he's happy to settle for threes. And you know,
I don't want to do the whole like cliche, like
it's the Jordan killer instinct, but it's like there are
times that it's like a little too casual out.

Speaker 2 (01:29:51):
There, Yes, and you worry about it, And you know what,
I would say the same thing about Shae. I would
say the same thing about Shay Gil just Alexander. But
you know, the fight that I have to fight a
lot with Sga is the foubating conversation. We were fighting
about it on Friday night. I feel like it's all
the NBA. I get it that Shay is a little

(01:30:12):
bit more prone to get away with it and get
a few more calls. But do I have a defense
to that or do I just have to wear it
that it's going to be a criticism that he's got
a little of that James Harden and him where.

Speaker 3 (01:30:26):
He's a bit of a foulbator and he has a
lot of success from the line.

Speaker 2 (01:30:29):
Because I feel like it's a fight regardless of how
hard I fight it, regardless of all the facts that
all throw out there about well, well actually here's the
free throws and here's the number. Oh about he's avoubator.
I can't win that fight, it seems with people. Well,
you can't win any fight on social media with true.

Speaker 3 (01:30:46):
So that's a great point. Yeah, So I wouldn't worry
too much about that. Listen. I think it's a pseudo
fair criticism, but I would say that that's something that's
pervasive in all of basketball right now, is you know
I you know, obviously as somebody who even watches obviously
less NBA than than college. I mean, even during that

(01:31:07):
Final four National championship run with Florida, you know, Walter
Clayton's kicking his foot out to try to pick up
the file. I remember there was I remember there's a
huge play in the Texas Tech Elite eight game, and
you know there may have been. It was a survivor
pool that I was heavily invested in. But I'm screaming,
and my wife and sister in law were in the
room like what what what? What what? And I'm like, look,

(01:31:28):
he tried to draw the file and they didn't see it,
and I replayed it and you could see it on replay.
But I only bring it up because that was the
final four most outstanding player in the NBA. You know,
whether it's it's fall baiting, you know, with the pump
fakes or with the ripthroughs, or with the kicking the
foot out. So I understand those that are frustrated with Shay.
I would counter by saying, it's basically the whole league,

(01:31:51):
if we're being perfectly honest.

Speaker 2 (01:31:53):
Yeah, I could not agree more. All Right, it's Aaron Torres,
I'm Chris Plank. Arnie's out tonight. He'll be back next Sunday,
getting ready for a big to the Dominican Republic instead
of being on vacation. Tonight's rest before the vacation. So
that saved you from a lot of the New York
Knicks talk. But what we haven't got into yet is
the NFL, the schedule release, the potential rule change, and

(01:32:14):
brock Perty's contract. We can do that all next, but
I want to hit one thing on the schedule release
that stood out to me. And you're gonna get the
cowboys crammed down your throat a lot when it comes
to the talking points when it comes to debate, ready,
when it comes to our shows, I feel like a
lot of people will kind of fall back on Dallas
Cowboys talk because it gets reaction.

Speaker 3 (01:32:36):
They're all over the schedule.

Speaker 2 (01:32:37):
Right, I mean, they've got the Fox a team on
most of their games.

Speaker 3 (01:32:40):
But I found this interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:32:41):
This was a quote from Michael Molville of Fox said,
our four to twenty five games, and that's for the
East Coasters. What Aaron, You're in the Pacific time zone.
So what is that three two one, that evening game?
Right that I'm sorry, early afternoon game.

Speaker 3 (01:32:56):
Correct.

Speaker 2 (01:32:57):
Our four to twenty five games, only three of them
were Cowboys games. In other years we've gone looking for
five or six Dallas games at four to twenty five.
What we wanted for this year was more AFC, more Philly,
but also more Detroit and a little more Washington to

(01:33:19):
try to capitalize on the Jane Daniels story. I think
we have a better mix of teams than we've had
in the past. Sometimes we've had we've heard exasperation from
fans that the Fox for twenty five game is always
the Cowboys. It's still gonna be the Cowboys sometimes this year,
but you'll see a little bit more variety in terms
of the top teams in our four to twenty five window.

(01:33:41):
I don't know why, because they still got the maximum
amount of primetime games. They still said that what the
top team of Brady and Kevin Burkhart is going to
do most of their games.

Speaker 3 (01:33:51):
That kind of caught me interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:33:52):
I mean, is is Jerry's fumbling of the bag starting
to hurt the Cowboys a little bit when it comes
to even the national media enamored nature with the Star.
I kind of felt like this was one of those
signs that it's kind of fading a bit and Fox
doesn't believe they're gonna be a championship caliber team.

Speaker 3 (01:34:10):
Yeah. I find that very interesting. And you know it's funny.
My nephew is a huge Cowboys fan. He's younger than me.
He doesn't even remember the the Troy Aikman, Mike Lrvin,
you know, Emmett years and I remember sitting with him
last year I was visiting Connecticut whatever. I only bring
it up because I said to him, I was like, oh,
you know, oh Cowboys, what do you think? And they

(01:34:32):
were bad? And he just said to me, he's like Aaron,
He's like until Jerry's gone. It just it doesn't matter,
like we're just we're stuck in this rut of Dak
and Jerry Dak and Jerry Dak and Jerry. And it
really struck me. And I think everyone is kind of
figuring out, yes, the brand is huge, and yes, if
you and I were to talk Cowboys versus Jaguars or

(01:34:54):
Cowboys versus Titans, it's obviously gonna do a bigger number.
But I I think we're at the point where it's
hard to like, it's hard to talk them like you
talk about them because they're the Cowboys, not because anybody
actually thinks that they can make any noise. And I
think for most of the last decade or so, really,

(01:35:18):
since Dak's been there or whatever, you could at least
at this time of the year kind of talk yourself
into Okay, well if this happens and the division stinks
and Washington and the Giants think whatever. I don't think
you can do that this year. And I had not
heard those Michael Molverhill comments, but I find them very
interesting because that kind of just reflects how I kind
of feel like the public is starting to get about

(01:35:41):
the Cowboys, and it kind of confirms it. Do you know.

Speaker 2 (01:35:44):
I was going through this list. You mentioned it because
you said about ten years of Dak Prescott. In my mind,
I was like, it hasn't been that long, has it.
You realize his first year as a starting quarterback was
twenty sixteen, so you're right on. This is gonna be
his tenth full season as a Dallas Boys starting quarterback
and he's only his rookie season. Let's see here, he's

(01:36:07):
only played a full season once in the last five seasons,
like he's been injured. I mean, that's crazy, and it
was in twenty twenty three, and I don't know, man,
Tony Romo had a good run. I kind of feel
like the biggest mistake they've made is they've they've not
done a good job in evaluating the quarterback position. I mean,
some of these names are wild. When you look at

(01:36:28):
the Dallas Cowboys starters post Troy, I mean, now that's
going back almost, you know, twenty five years now, so
we don't have to go that deep to talk about
their misery.

Speaker 3 (01:36:37):
But I don't like this. I saw that this week.

Speaker 2 (01:36:41):
I didn't notice it when the schedule came out, right
because I didn't really pay too much attention to start
times or anything of that nature. I was too busy
deciding what was funny and who tried too hard in
their schedule release videos. But maybe we're finally kind of
getting the clue that we're getting a little bit of
Cowboys fatigue because you can only cram a back team
down people's throat so long, right, yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:37:02):
One hundred percent. You know, let me jump in on that,
uh on that quarterback point. And I know we're gonna
talk about Brock Party sometime in the next few Yeah,
But like, I do think it's interesting that there have
now been two times where the Cowboys could have looked
themselves in the mirror and realistically had the tough conversation

(01:37:25):
with Dak Prescott that the forty nine ers had with
brock Party at some point in the last couple of months,
which is, you're really good, we know how valuable you
are to this organization, but that doesn't mean that you
should be the highest paid player in the league. And
you being the highest paid player in the league is
going to handicap us from putting a really good team

(01:37:47):
around you. You know, it's funny you joke about aren't
he never taking vacations. I remember when I used to
host with them on Saturday. This was in the lead
up to Dak's first big contract. I remember I was,
he was out and I was hosting solo, and it
was during the first big contract for Dak, and I said,

(01:38:08):
you can't pay him top dollar because he needs help
around him. And so they not only do that, but
they then, of course last offseason, make him the highest
paid player in the league. And I think when you
want to start to talk about the Cowboys problems, you
have a quarterback that's probably somewhere between I don't know,
the eighth and fifteenth best quarterback paid as the best quarterback,

(01:38:29):
you can't put a team around him, and I think
that's where it all starts. But I think the broader
picture is exactly what you just said is. I think
people are starting to realize it's the Cowboys. But to
the exact point in the exact quote you made, you
can't put a bad team on air week after week
after week and expect people to keep showing up just
because it's the Cowboys.

Speaker 2 (01:38:50):
I always this has been I would be terrible as
a general manager, or maybe not even I kind of
think i'd be okay, as a general manager, as capologist,
I'd be terrible. Because Dak Prescott his cap number this
year for the Cowboys of this is, according to over
the Cap, fifty point five million dollars fifty point five

(01:39:15):
And when you look at quarterbacks in general, that's obviously
up or end, but it's still it's kind of the
going rate. But you have I feel like quarterbacks anymore
if they're smart. I mean, listen, I don't know about you, dude.
I don't think I could even imagine spending fifty million
dollars in my lifetime. It's like generational wealth. I think

(01:39:36):
everything could.

Speaker 3 (01:39:36):
Be taken care of. I know, get what you're worth.

Speaker 2 (01:39:40):
But it's almost as if quarterbacks you gotta chill out, qbs,
because the percentage of the cap that you're at right
now is really hamstringing your team, especially when you're at
the level of Dak Prescott, is right, I mean this,
You're not a superstar. You're not gonna be able to
carry a team. You're not Patrick Mahomes, and even Patrick
Mahomes is taking a team friendly deal right now. And
I don't want mess with anyone's money erin, but it's

(01:40:02):
almost if you're a quarterback. You got to accept who
you are and what you can and can't do. Yeah,
I think we're finally starting to get to the point
where that there's a little bit of self awareness to that.
And I only bring it up we'll talk rock party.

Speaker 3 (01:40:16):
But also last offseason to a got you know, generational
wealth money, but it wasn't like top five in the
league money, and so you know there are still crazy
numbers being handed out. Joe Burrow got a huge extension,
justin Herbert, Trevor Lawrence whatever. I do think there is
some level of self awareness, but it clearly hasn't happened

(01:40:37):
with the Cowboys. And by the way, to your point one,
you never questioned anybody's money. If somebody wants to pay you,
that that's one thing. The other thing is part of
this is Jerry Jones's ego is listen, you know, I'm
only reading what everybody else is reporting. But I think
he gets a little bit of a high off of
making Dak the highest paid player in the history of
the league, whether it's the best thing for his organization

(01:41:00):
or not. So one, you'd love your quarterback to have
some self awareness and say, hey, yeah, I could make
whatever the highest number is and be the highest paid
player in the history of league. Well, guess what, that'll
go away the next time somebody else signs a big contract.
Or I can take like you said, I could take
the hometown discount of only fifty million dollars, still have

(01:41:22):
my family set up for the rest of my life,
and put my team in a much better position. So
I think some of it's on Jerry, but I'm with
you as I think guys have to have a self
awareness and a cap league of the hindrance that having
a contract that big can have on roster building going forward.
We got break. That's Aaron Torres. I'm Chris Plank.

Speaker 2 (01:41:41):
A reminder you can catch the show in podcast form
as soon as we wrap up here on Fox Sports Radio.
If you missed any of it, check it out. Search
Fox Sports Radio wherever you get your podcast, and be
sure to follow and rate and review the podcast. Leave
a five star rating, say something nice about Arnie or
in this case, Aaron and I. Tonight it's Fox Sports
Radio wherever you get your podcast, and you'll see tonight's

(01:42:02):
show right after we get off the air. We're talking
Brock Party next on Fox Sports Radio with already out
at Aaron Torres is in Fox Sports Sunday, Ben Mallard
coming up here in about thirty minutes from now.

Speaker 3 (01:42:16):
Final Steve the SEGA update in moments.

Speaker 2 (01:42:20):
I didn't have a problem with it, especially whenever I
saw the numbers. Do you have an issue with the
forty nine ers paying brock Purty. I mean, they don't
really have a lot of other options right now, But
any issues with it.

Speaker 3 (01:42:31):
No, Because again I think context matters. I think you know, again,
you see two hundred and sixty five million and you
assume it's this insane contract, and then you actually break
it all down. The fifty three million dollar a year
average ties for seventh at the position in the NFL.
The one hundred and eighty one million in guarantees is

(01:42:51):
ranked eighth, and so so yeah, I mean if he
signed the Dak Prescott extension when he you know, is
guy much like Dak Prescott that needs a lot of
help around him, that I would have said the forty
nine ers overpaid. But when you're talking about a guy
that took a lot of money, clearly life changing money,

(01:43:13):
but also had the wherewithal to not try to hold
out for top dollar. I think it it's hard to
say something's team friendly we're talking about fifty three million
a year, but I think it makes sense for both sides,
you know.

Speaker 2 (01:43:27):
And it was wild because Mike Florio over at Pro
Football Talk had an article that basically laid out, it's
not even really fifty million dollars a year, you know,
it's kind of and again, I know we're I don't
like doing this, but I think it's what more like
forty six forty seven because it's a completely new deal

(01:43:48):
that he has signed, so it tears up the previous
contract and gives him a whole new deal. So it's
even a little bit more And I hate to even
use the term team friendly, but it's not a Dak
Prescott deal, right, the kind of deal that's going to
weigh down the entire team. The no trade clause that
broke tonight was fascinating of it, of everything that kind
of came out of this, right, And it was fascinating

(01:44:10):
because everyone was freaked out about it, and Aaron I am.
I thought everyone that got a big deal like that
had a no trade clause in it. So that's showing
my stupidity.

Speaker 3 (01:44:18):
Maybe a little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:44:19):
But It's becoming more and more common with high end
quarterback deals, and it I don't think it's really that
shocking as it typically was whenever you have a guy
get a deal like this and have a no trade clause. Yeah,
you said it to me right before the show, and
I think I had.

Speaker 3 (01:44:34):
I don't think I had the exact same response as you,
of like this is this a big deal? Does this matter?
And the counter to it as well is who is
the last quarterback that's been really good on a really
good team that hasn't demanded a trade that got traded. Yeah,
these aren't like NBA guys that just get traded every

(01:44:55):
every offseason. There's two or three superstars that ends up
getting traded, Like maybe there's a super obvious name, and
there are guys like Deshaun Watson who demanded a trade.
But I don't remember Aaron Rodgers getting traded in his prime.
I don't remember Ben Roethlisberger, Eli Manning, Patrick Mahomes I
believe is still with the team that drafted him. Same

(01:45:16):
with Josh Allen, same with Lamar Jackson. So I saw
people kind of making a big deal about this, and
I'm like, do really good quarterbacks on really good teams
that are meeting expectations get traded regularly, and I just
missed that, Like, is that a thing that happens that
I'm not aware of? I was laughing.

Speaker 2 (01:45:32):
I was listening to the Fellas at a Sunday night
show tonight, a little extra Fellas this weekend, and I
think it was either Jason or Ant that said, well,
and of course if they want to trade him after
a year or two, And I'm like, why would you
give him a four year deal if you want to
trade him after two years? You know, it just doesn't happen.
It's it's not reality. But you're also right, it's not

(01:45:52):
the NBA where dudes are constantly saying, trade me right now,
where I want to go somewhere else, just a couple
of years into a deal. Here's the numbers I was
looking for. It's not a five year extension that kicks
income twenty twenty six. His remaining contract gets torn up.
This is according to Pro Football Talk, and replaced with
the six year, two hundred and seventy nine point three
four to six million dollar contract, which makes it a

(01:46:14):
per year average from signing a forty five point zero
five to seven mil. So I mean even that number, right,
you're like, okay, all right, which sounds crazy to say, oh,
I'm going to the forty five million dollar deal, but
that's the world we live in.

Speaker 3 (01:46:27):
With quarterback contracts, right, that's where we live. Yeah, one
hundred percent and yeah, and I think bigger picture. The
other thing too, is, I know you were talking about
the fellas and you know, the whatever, but the contract
kind of lines up. It feels like it's it's heavy
the first couple of years, and it kind of lines

(01:46:47):
up with what this window will be where you know,
as McCaffrey ages out, as Trent Williams age is out,
you can kind of figure out if brock Party is
your future. And listen, I just think everything about it
makes sense, from the amount of money to the time
frame to everything in between. And now we'll see you know.

(01:47:07):
And by the way, like I get the whole notion
of brock Party did not look the same when a
lot of guys were injured last year. Doesn't every quarterback
need help by like quarterback does?

Speaker 1 (01:47:20):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:47:20):
Like I remember Patrick Mahomes without a star wide receiver
and no oh line in the Super Bowl, And I
don't think it went well. Jalen Hurts is really good.
He was a lot better with Sakwan Barkley. So yes, yes,
Brock party needs help. I get it. I get that.
You know, if you were lining up guys for a
backyard football game, he wouldn't be the first or second pick,

(01:47:42):
if you could take Josh Allen or Mahomes or Lamar
or whoever. But I think a lot of the narratives
about him are nonsense. And again, I just think a
lot of this makes sense as far as I'm concerned.

Speaker 2 (01:47:53):
That's Aaron torys I'm Chris Plank. Arnie's out, But the
saga is in. So let's get our final update of
the night with the Man, the Myth, the left and
Steve you saga, what's going on?

Speaker 3 (01:48:01):
Steve?

Speaker 4 (01:48:01):
Hello again, gentlemen. And we had it first tonight because
with Toronto olt, Winnipeg had already been out, et cetera. Apparently,
according to stats inc these Stanley Cup playoffs this year,
it marks the first time that the teams with the
four best records in the league were all eliminated in
the same round, and in fact, it's the first time
in the history of the four major sports that your

(01:48:23):
four best records in your league were all eliminated in
the same round. Toronto had a Game seven at home.
You can probably guess how that went, six to one.
Florida is the final to end the second round, Panthers
scored three straight goals in the second period in about
six minutes for a three to zo lead. The Leafs
have now lost seven straight game sevens. Florida goes to

(01:48:43):
the East Final against Carolina starting Tuesday in Raleigh. And
by the way, this is the sixth straight season that
a hockey team from Florida has made it to the
final four Panthers three years in a row and before that,
the Lightning three years in a row. In the NBA Playoffs,
ending the second round a Game seven win at home
for Oklahoma City, eliminating Denver, won twenty five to ninety three.

(01:49:05):
Shake Gilgis Alexander thirty five points. Jalen Williams had twenty
four and he had seven assists just one turnover. Okse
trailed by eleven early but led by twenty three just
after halftime when it was seventy one to forty eight.
Aaron Gordon did play with the strain hamstring, had eleven
rebounds in defeat Nikola Jokic twenty points. Nuggets from three

(01:49:25):
point range ten for forty five today, and they committed
twenty two turnovers. Oklahoma City hosts Minnesota to start the
Western Conference Finals on Tuesday. Two WNBA games. Washington won
at Connecticut USC's Keiki Erie Fen rookie into the pros
Now seventeen points, fourteen rebounds. Minnesota won at La although

(01:49:45):
Now with la Kelsey Plumb scored eighteen points. Scotty Scheffler
won the PGA Championship by five strokes. Bryce and De
Shambo tied for second place in Charlotte. John Rahm was
tied for the lead during the final round but fell
to a tie for eighth. On his final three holes today,
he had a bogie and then two double bogies. Scheffler
is ranked number one in the world for two straight
years now. This is his first PGA Championship, his third

(01:50:08):
major title. Heast won the Masters twice. This is his
sixth year on tour. It's his fifteenth tournament victory already.
Rory McElroy tied for forty seventh, his lowest seventy two
hole finish in four years in majors and McElroy declined
all four days to speak to the media.

Speaker 3 (01:50:26):
Is that is that a bigger story than we're making
it out to be, Steve.

Speaker 4 (01:50:29):
It should be a bigger story. I know, he said before,
I don't know anything to you. Colin Morikawa quite famously
said I don't know you anything. Others on tour have said,
you know, I wish we had more availabilities for the media,
because that's how we relate to the fans. We're a
professional product here. Scheffler earns over three point four million dollars,
by the way, for this victory today. A tie for

(01:50:51):
second was worth about one point four million each. Meanwhile,
the NASCAR win for Christopher Bell gets him a million
dollar first prize at the All Star Joey Logano finished second.
FS one's final Cup Series event of the season was tonight.
Fox TV will have the Indy five hundred next Sunday
at Upset. In college softball, tonight, Liberty eliminated number one

(01:51:12):
Texas A and M in a regional. Also, Oregon walked
off to advance to face Liberty next weekend. Carlos Alcarez
took the Italian Open final. The French Open starts next Sunday.
The Sunday Night ballgame went to the Yankees eight two
over the Mets with six runs bottom of the eighth
Cody Bellinger a grand slam. The angel swept a three
game series at Dodger Stadium, winning six to four today.

(01:51:33):
The Dodgers did activate Tommy Edmond and to make room
cut veteran Chris Taylor. As for the starting pitching, it
just hasn't been there for la Tony Gonsolin not a
decision today, but in four innings he allowed four runs
with five walks. Seattle swept a three game series at
San Diego, winning six to one today. The Padres scored
just one run in each of the three games this weekend.

(01:51:55):
San Francisco with two runs bottom of the eighth beat
the A's three to two. The Athletics have lost five
in a row. The starter for the Giants was Justin Verlander,
four innings, five walks. Arizona won nothing over Colorado, eleven
strikeouts for Merril Kelly, who got the win. Seven innings
of work. The Rockies on the road three and twenty
two so far this year. The Twins had won thirteenth straight,

(01:52:18):
but lost at Milwaukee five two today Houston was a
four to three winner at Texas. The Rangers starter Jack
Lder no decision yet a no hitter in the seventh,
led three to nothing. Houston takes it from Raveldez the win.
Josh Haters eleventh save. Philadelphia won nothing over the Pirates,
beating Paul Skens, who had nine strikeouts in eight innings,
but he's now three and five for Pittsburgh despite a

(01:52:39):
good ERA for the Phillies, Notable Jordan Romano got the save.
Reliever Jose Alvarez was suspended eighty games for a performance enhancer.
Atlanta won ten to four at Boston. Brave star pitcher
Spencer Strider could return Tuesday after his hamstring injury. The
Orioles yesterday fired their manager. They keep losing. The team

(01:53:00):
is now fifteen and thirty. They've lost six in a row.
Lost in home ten to four to Washington. In fact,
today's loser, Zach Efflin, allowed four home runs and was
down eight to nothing. Yesterday's loser, Kyle Gibson, was designated
for assignment. He gave up six runs in the first
on Saturday to make his record zero and three with
an ERA of sixteen point seven eight, and he's out

(01:53:21):
of a job, yes, and Detroit's record is thirty one
and sixteen after winning at Toronto today three to two.

Speaker 3 (01:53:27):
Back to you, thanks, Steve, have an awesome week.

Speaker 4 (01:53:29):
Man.

Speaker 2 (01:53:30):
Uh you know, Aaron, you mentioned something we were sharing
a few notes right before this show started, and you said,
last night you and our buddy Jason Martin were having
a conversation involving one Cooper Flag. What's been the big
debate on Cooper Flag? I mean, I kind of feel
like that he's ended up in a pretty good spot
right in Dallas, or now, well, he ended up in

(01:53:54):
a great spot in Dallas.

Speaker 3 (01:53:55):
I mean, I think the big debate is that the
team that randomly traded a player entering his prime in
a in a trade that no one can still explain
to me three months later, how that guy, how that
team ended up with the number one pick. That seems
to be a big conversation.

Speaker 2 (01:54:14):
Okay, I didn't know if there was something with Cooper
Flag that I was missing out on, because you would
think that he's got to be happy that he's a
Dallas maverick. Right with all the other options out there,
Washington Wizards probably don't want to go there. New Orleans Pelicans.
Sure as hell don't want to go there with the
way things are going. But you end up in Dallas,
could sports market decent team around you got a chance

(01:54:36):
to win pretty quick. I think it's pretty good. But
I'm here for all the conspiracy theory talk. Are you
a Frozen Envelope believer?

Speaker 3 (01:54:45):
I'm a believer, and I can break it down maybe
after the break, that there are like seven to eight
instances of one player landing in one very specific spot
being either good for the league or hypothetically a nice
payback for a favor done to the league that have

(01:55:07):
happened not only forget forty years since the Frozen Envelope.
I could come up with five or six that feel
very convenient in like the last ten to twelve years.
So that's what I'm a believer in Christmas, I'm here
for it right back. She heard this segment last night,
So conspiracy theory talk, I'm here for it.

Speaker 2 (01:55:27):
I'm such a believer in this conspiracy that it's got
me down a rabbit hole where now. I honestly, I
believe the Goodell burned the Spygate tapes because he thought
there was too much evidence on there of intense cheating.
I've bought into the Soviet Union and the officiating in
that NBA. I'm sorry, in that Olympic game. I'm in

(01:55:49):
on all conspiracies. Now, after this one, let's learn it
up next as we put a rapid This edition of
Arnie and Playing with Aaron Torre is.

Speaker 3 (01:55:56):
In right here on Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 2 (01:56:00):
Grace Tonight from Mary mac Ian, Roddy our producers of course,
Steve dis Sega on updates, Aaron Torris sitting in, and
the millions and millions of editors behind the scenes chopping
up the audio that I just did not play tonight.
Oh my gosh, terrible job on my part, Aaron, terrible
job on my part.

Speaker 3 (01:56:20):
But we survived. We made it without Arnie.

Speaker 2 (01:56:22):
You think you'll be okay knowing the show didn't go
off the rails and truly implode without him. Is he
gonna be okay? Or do we need to do something
terrible here at the end to make him feel better?

Speaker 3 (01:56:31):
I mean we can let maybe, like Aaron, do a
crappy pick or something.

Speaker 2 (01:56:35):
Yeah, do you have a crappy pick for this week?

Speaker 3 (01:56:39):
No, nothing's immediately coming to mind. First of all, I'll
say this, I appreciate you not immediately dismissing the fact
that I think there could be a conspiracy theory with
the lottery, because it's like there's a lot of high fullutin.
You know you said earlier, I'm here for it. You're
a big jake tonight trying to break this sixteen team
college football. Yeah, nothing happened.

Speaker 2 (01:57:00):
By the way, we can get start times for super
regional games next week yet, So I think everyone's in bed.

Speaker 3 (01:57:06):
Can I tell you that insider life, it's not you know,
Pete Damil sitting up waiting for a text right now.

Speaker 2 (01:57:12):
Yeah, I think I quitted about halfway through the show
when no one replied to a text. I'm like, I
ain't staying up for this. Go to bed after this program.
Exactly what times your show?

Speaker 7 (01:57:21):
Uh?

Speaker 3 (01:57:21):
What times your show?

Speaker 5 (01:57:22):
Uh? In?

Speaker 3 (01:57:22):
Oh, we got plenty of time.

Speaker 2 (01:57:23):
I got till ninety But I got kids that'll wake
my ass up here in about six hours.

Speaker 3 (01:57:27):
So only one of them is young.

Speaker 2 (01:57:28):
You told me well, eleven and sixteen, So I mean
I got eleven, sixteen, and I think the twenty one
year old's still alive. I haven't heard from him in
about two weeks. I'll just assume he is west point right.
That's right, that's incredible, right coming down the home stretch
Finals week.

Speaker 3 (01:57:42):
Wow, this is last year.

Speaker 2 (01:57:44):
I don't know how nice of Junior. He got one
more year. Ok, one more season if you will. But
I think I'm with you on the conspiracy theory, dude,
I think I'm with you. And now, now, how far
back are you going? You said you don't want to
go all the way all the way back to the
Patrick Ewing, you know, like wait with the Bulls and
Derrick Rose and lebroning up in Cleveland and O three

(01:58:04):
is this is what we're talking about.

Speaker 3 (01:58:06):
Here's what I came up with, just off the top
of my head. So you have Cooper flag being, trade
being or excuse me, the Dallas Mavericks winning the draft
lottery one percent, yes, less than two percent, one point
eight percent. Uh, just months after they trade a star
entering his prime off of an NBA Finals appearance to

(01:58:28):
the big glamour franchise in the NBA. So you have that.
You have twenty nineteen, the New Orleans Pelicans trade Anthony
Davis to the Lakers. Another star to UH to UH
to Los Angeles. Oh, by the way, they get Zion
that year didn't work out, but Zion was a pretty

(01:58:49):
big deal. Twenty fourteen, maybe this is a little bit
of a stretch, but there were rumors Lebron James is
coming back to Cleveland.

Speaker 7 (01:58:57):
Oh.

Speaker 3 (01:58:57):
They just so happened to get the number one pick.
Two years before that New Orleans again, right after they
traded Chris Paul in this case to the Clippers get
the number one pick. And then twenty eleven, that was
obviously the first lottery that the Cavs were eligible for
in the post Lebron era, they happen to get the
number one pick in the Kyrie sweepstakes. So again, you know,

(01:59:18):
and that doesn't include Derek Rose, as you said, drafted
by the hometown. Yeah, making them back a bit for that. Yeah,
and Lebron obviously, you know, everybody can put two and two.
I'm just saying it's a lot of coincidences of teams
doing the League of favor, happening to get the number
one pick.

Speaker 2 (01:59:34):
Shortly thereafter one of teams are like knocking on their
doors like, Hey, what do we need to do to
get this Dallas deal?

Speaker 3 (01:59:40):
What can we do?

Speaker 2 (01:59:41):
What can what can make it possible for us to
end up getting me quote unquote frozen envelope. And I
did laugh when everyone said, well, if you think this
is fixed, then you believe that this firm that verifies
it all. And there's like just laundry list of issues
that this firm had with the legalities.

Speaker 3 (01:59:56):
And the other ding. People are like, why would they
do it for Dallas? And it's like, oh, because Dallas.
You have to go back to Dallas training Luca to
the freaking Lakers in a trade that makes zero sense.

Speaker 2 (02:00:07):
And by the way, Dallas a pretty awesome media market.
I mean it really truly is. You got the Cowboys,
got the Rangers, you got national championship games college football.
It's a big time deal. Aaron always love hanging out
with you, man, have a great week. I know you'll
be busy with fill ins and stuff. Make sure you
follow them for all the fun getting into his main
season of life, college baseball.

Speaker 3 (02:00:25):
At Aaron Underscore Tours.

Speaker 2 (02:00:26):
Big Ben mahlor is coming up next for Mary, for
Ian for Desaga. For Aaron, I'm Chris Blank. We'll see
you back here next Sunday night, same bat time, same
bat channel on Fox Sports Radio.

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Dateline NBC

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Chris Plank & Aaron Torres Preview the NBA Conference Finals, Debate Who 'America's Team' Is & More!