June 12, 2026 • 42 mins
Jason Smith and Mike Harmon discuss why Wemby is a dirty player, why Erling Haaland is going to lead Norway far in the World Cup, and the guys are joined by NBA insider Marc Stein to discuss the Knicks.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the best of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Carmen podcast. Be sure to catch us
live every weeknight from ten pm to two am Eastern
seven to eleven pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio. Find
your local station for The Jason Smith Show with Mike
Harmon at Fox Sports Radio dot com, or stream us
live every night on the iHeartRadio app by searching FSR.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
This is the best of The Jason Smith Show with
Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Yes, sour creamy. It depends how because that's usually where
they try to make up with volume because it's a
little cheaper, so the bean layer is usually way too thick,
so it overtakes everything else. We also have a FIFA
World Cup game in progress. Tishert's bett Tysher. Did you
bet this game? Did you bet Korea?
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Yes? I did?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
You did?
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Okay? Very good?
Speaker 4 (00:51):
Why? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (00:52):
Why they're a sleeper in this group? Wown okay because
most people are looking north to the border. I'm not okay,
all right? Hey man, take right there, thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Take We'll give you our big World Cup preview coming
up and a few let's talk about Team USA and
some teams I'll give you my pick to surprise in
the World Cup. Give me now, No, I'm a tease. No, okay,
I'll give you a tease. This team kind of reminds
me of what it was like when Steph Curry played
for Davidson and they made the run all the way
(01:21):
to the Final four, Steph Curry's last year at Davidson. Wow,
that's kind of what I can see this team doing
because of one player, Because of one player, and one
player only, I can see it happening.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
All right, But coming off of Game four, right, and
all the heroics of Game four, now looking ahead to
Game five and beyond in the NBA Finals and Knicks
have a chance to clinch. I just keep thinking of
Rick Buker's words with us last night. It's not a
matter of if, but when the Knicks win the championship,
and that I said, do you ever think you'd never
say that? He goes, Nope, never did, Never thought I'd
(01:54):
ever say that on your show or any other show.
I didn't really even think he'd commit to it, even
last night, especially the way these games have gone. Right again,
it's been madness. But after seeing the video out today,
you know it's another day where here is a questionable
video of Victor Webbin Yama. We go from the pushdown
(02:15):
of Jalen Brunton a couple of days ago that did
not get ruled a flagrant foul. It's like, okay, NBA,
what are we doing? Then you saw the video today
of what happened when Wemby makes a run at Ognunobi,
who is guarding the ball in the perimeter, and and
the big leap and the kick that just lent kick
that was yeah, that lands him right in front of
(02:37):
Ogan and Nobey. It looks like he's kicking right for
his knee, but he lands right in front of Og.
And if Og had moved or if the play had
moved a little bit, like that kick is getting to
OG's knee and who knows what kind of injury that is, Like,
that's a really dangerous play. Now, I'm I'm not going
to sit here and say, oh, Wemby was going after
(02:57):
his acl did Wemby was Wenby may be looking to
make a statement and maybe make a big thud in
front of Wemby, in front of Og, or do something
to maybe get in his head for the rest of
the game. I'm gonna be out here setting picks right, Like,
I can see that, But that's still a really dangerous
play because you don't know what's gonna happen. You don't
know if the ball's gonna dribble, what OG's gonna do. Defensively,
(03:19):
I'm gonna see the guy coming, try to move, and
all of a sudden, now he's got a torn acl
and his knee is ruined. Right, the NBA has a
Wemby problem and they can't ignore it. And the problem
is Wemby plays dirty, right, and for a guy that
they want to be the face of the league, we've
now seen more than enough evidence that Wenby likes to
play dirty. You go all the way back, and I'm
(03:40):
just not talking about the nick. You go back another series.
Wemby plays over the line. Now, I get it, he's
twenty one and he's trying to assert his territory and
teams have to be physical with him. I get that,
But there are these over the line plays that Wemby
commits that the NBA has turned the other eye out,
turn a blind eye to it. But yeah, no, nowhere,
(04:00):
we're not gonna do that. We're not gonna do that.
I can't believe they gave Wemby the flagrant last night
in the middle of the game. But you know, I'm
actually glad they did, because the Knicks outscored him fifty
five twenty five and won the game. But the NBA
has got a Wemby problem because he's a guy that
they have said he's the chosen one. He is the
face of the league. And you see the ratings on television,
highest rated NBA Finals in nearly twenty years. You have
(04:22):
the Knicks, you have Wemby. It's a great formula. But
the NBA can't sit here and continue to protect Wemby
and his dirty play. They're gonna have to come down
and if he commits a flagrant foul, they're gonna have
to never call him on it, right and he's one
flagrant away from being suspended for a game. If I'm
Wenby right now, I feel like I have cart bluntche
you whatever the hell I want to, because you're not
(04:42):
gonna kick me out of a finals game. But the
NBA's got a problem because Wemby is a dirty player,
and there's protecting yourself and there's being physical, and there's
going out of your way for plays. If it was
a case where all the dirtiness with Wemby is coming
from being down low with Arl Anthony Towns. Let's just say,
and there's elbowing and there's pushing and shoving, I would say, well,
(05:04):
you know what, that's physical play, and you call it
however you see it flagrance. But these are now plays now.
The last two this is him going out of his
way to kick really weirdly at Ogianno Noby's ni or
near it or that could have been an injury. This
is this is him shoving Jalen brunsonto the ground. Where
he does that's not a thing that hey, I have
to do this. This is not part of physical play. Underneath,
(05:26):
this is him going out of his way to do
something physical. And you want to go back throughout the
playoffs and look at all the questionable Wenby plays. They're
not I'm tied up with a guy down low. This
is I'm going out of it to make a run
at Alex Caruso, who's standing there, because I don't like
the fact that he's getting in my face. He's guarding
me so low. Like you go back, the NBA has
a Wemby problem and they can't let him continue as
(05:48):
much as they want to be the face of the league,
they can't let this continue. No, it's because you take
the full supercut, and it's generally, at least to my estimation,
a lot of it is retaliate to But it's like
the delayed gratification of all right, wait for now, I'm
gonna do it, as opposed to all right, as you say,
(06:08):
let's go back and forth. You've got those big battles
with Kat for position, or he and Mitchell Robinson getting
after it. Go back to the Minnesota back and forth
with Red right and getting him up in the throat
and everything else. I mean, we've seen the retaliatory side
of it, even yesterday. Right, if he'd gone and taken
(06:30):
an elbow to Alvarado, you could have said, okay, it
makes sense because there were a couple of times where
Alvarado got a little questionable in terms of going at
his knees. You go back to game Game three might
have been an end of game two, but there was
the video of kind of a stumbling Jalen Brunson, who
does the all right, I'm kind of faking like alignment.
(06:51):
I'm faking, I'm blocking down and I give you a
free reign and then I cut back and pop you
to where he gets into Wemby's knee and thigh, to
where I was like, all right, that's that what didn't
look great? Right? Like there's little moments, but then his
retaliations are huge and amplified, and he's coming with a
(07:11):
bunch of force, and now we're we're looking at a
number of these big plays. The Brunson one where he
shoved him, all right, how that's not at least a
fall in the moment still remains one of the dumber
things we've seen in these NBA playoffs, which are full
of bad officiating moments, blunders, omissions, et cetera. But yeah,
(07:32):
this has been the go back to the regular season.
There's a super cut. You got all these playoff moments,
and if nothing else, he's got to be smarter about it,
cuz some teams will enable and employ an enforcer going forward.
You really haven't seen that, right, You get the adjutants.
You mentioned Cruz, so I mentioned Alvarado and found him
(07:55):
like eleven times. But he's but he's getting in at it,
like he's trying to Atabi. He's basically running into his legs. Yeah,
right and kind of diving down low to cut his legs.
It's like, all right, is a dirty no, but you're
a neat and you've now and that's not been called
until the what seventh eighth, eleventh time, Like that's another
(08:16):
thing where an official's got to be like, all right,
he's not really boxing him out at this point, he's
just he's just trying to run into him and create
a problem. And look, that's gonna be the strategy. You've
realized he will retaliate, right. We watched it with Jokic
in their series with Minnesota very early on. Yeah, and
the thing where he's normally pretty even tempered and he
(08:36):
started to lose it. But but wembyshs that plus and
Jokicic has always kind of been a right up to
the line, clean dirty player, Like there's there's lots of
times where I see him he sticks that foot under.
Sure that should be a flake because the NBA seems
to be looking for that. Now you stick your foot
under the landing spot, like Yokicic has done that for
a long time, and he's always been right at the line.
But this is where like, like the league has never
(08:59):
really had to deal with the fact where your most
marketable and biggest player plays dirty and over the line,
right like from from Jordan to Kobe and Lebron and
Duncan and and you've never had a guy that's been, hey,
I'll play this way, but man, am I gonna give
you some dirty highlights that I could earn a flagrant
foul to? Like, I get that. It's new for the NBA,
(09:21):
And that's why they have a problem because so far
it's been we're gonna protect Wemby as much as we can.
Now they put themselves in a corner because now it's
one big, one big play in Game five that has
been a typical Wemby play because look, we know the
guy likes to you know, the guy likes to play dirty. Like,
are they gonna have the guts to say that's a
flagrant and you're done for the next game, like they
(09:43):
sort of have to, or they're gonna lose all credibility
because it's too public. Now everybody sees what Wemby does
away from the ball on these plays. Now it's not
where all this happened and gets lost in the game.
This is now stuff that becomes front and center topics.
The next time. I appreciate you. Just remember to have
silver at that. Uh. And the other is that you're
(10:03):
looking at you got your makeup call, because that's that
thing with Robinson. Was that really a flagrant in the
grand scheme of things? Yeah, but it was. But he
got his but he got his arm up and that's
why they had to give it to Wemby. But he's
got Robinson had his arm up going in, so they
called it okay, great. So when Wemby did it to Cat, okay, okay,
(10:24):
catching him on the chin, okay. But now he's now now,
now look look at this. He is forcing your hand.
And I guarantee, if you're Wenby, you were thinking, I
am bulletproof man. There is no way they're gonna suspend
the best player in the bleeping game. They're not gonna
suspend me for a game. But the NBA has got
to have the guts if he gives you an over
the line play, and I am sure he will because
he does it every game. Well maybe like the Iron Chic,
(10:47):
the late great Iron Sheek taught us. And no, I'm
not gonna say blank this blank that we can but
one of those the Iron sheet absolutely back and forth
with him on Twitter before his passing. We're legendary, but
the idea of sometimes you just need to be humbled
for when Minyama, we joked about it in the moment
right he was doing the point to the head on
(11:08):
Mitchell Robinson and all of that stuff, and then maybe
having that lead evaporate, then having a dope throw an
egg at him might be enough to make him realize,
you know what, You're not quite there just yet. Exit
up about a Fresca exit swallen down The Jason Smith
Show with my best friend Mike Harmon again, Big Problems.
(11:30):
NBA has got a big Wemby problem. Let's see if
they got the guts to fix it. For over forty years,
Tyrock's been uping customers find the right time.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Hey, It's Rob Parker and Kelvin Washington from The Odd
Couple on Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
And in addition to hearing us live week nights from
seven to ten pm Eastern on Fox Sports Radio, we
are excited to announce brand new YouTube channel for the show.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
That's right, you can now watch the Odd Couple live
on YouTube every day.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
All you gotta do search Odd Couple FSR on YouTube
again YouTube, just search Odd Couple FSR. Check us out
on YouTube and subscribe.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
Outline for what could be the cusp of the Knicks
winning the NBA title. And I know right now he's
shaking his head, going, I can't believe we're talking about this.
It's longtime NBA inside a friend of the show, check
him out on substack Twitter at the Steinline. It is
Mark Stein. Mark, what's happening?
Speaker 4 (12:43):
Man?
Speaker 1 (12:43):
How are you.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
Not as good as you?
Speaker 4 (12:46):
But things are good.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
I still feel I'm still shaking. I'm still I still
feel like I'm drunk coming off of last night's game.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
That is obviously not the that is the that is
the circuitest route to a three to one lead, for sure.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
So where are you on that coming off of last night?
What we saw the nixt twenty nine point come back
and where it sits historically, Like, where are you now
twenty four hours after you saw that game and how
it went down?
Speaker 4 (13:18):
I mean, it's hard not to focus on the collapse
aspect of it. Because it's just so devastating for san Antonio.
But the Knicks had a lot to do with it too.
You you know, it's true. I agree with everyone who
says you don't erase a twenty nine point deficit without help,
but that's still a monster deficit to overcome. So I
(13:39):
mean it really, you know, nobody wants that answer that
it's both an amazing comeback and a historic collapse, but
I do think it is both. That's the tip and
and Nobe made to win the game is like, okay,
yes he was. He beat everyone to the spot, beat all,
(14:00):
you know, but that's still just a ridiculously hard tip
skill wise, Like it's it's crazy. The whole state, the
whole thing is crazy.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Yeah, just the strangest set of convergence of circumstance. I mean,
for four straight games roner Edge, how many times have
you started to write something and then just had to
delete it and restart a column or a missive.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
Well, look, in today's NBA, no lead is safe because
of the three point shots. But that isn't exactly what
happened here. Like the Spurs started shooting themselves out of
the game to you know, to start the snowball effect.
(14:45):
It's it's truly like I mean, at halftime, Jason Smith,
did you really think there was any chance your guys
were coming back?
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Oh no, no, I thought I thought, Okay, they'll play
better in the second half. But but this is this is good.
The twenty nine is too much now, I know twenty
nine is not too much. Maybe thirty five is what's
too much them. Maybe fifty is too much, Mark, I
don't know.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
And see that's the thing the Spurs, for all of
their greatness, for all of their championships, they do have
a history of some really really really painful playoff moments.
And I was not there last night, but I was
in the arena for all the others, the Derek Fisher
(15:30):
point for shot, the monfel on, the obviously the Ray
Allen shot, Like I was there for all of those.
But this was like a.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Sustain Nope, I think we're losing Mark Stein there for
a second. Let's go hang on, we'll get you back.
We lost it, we'll get it back. You're back, Mark, No,
we'll get him back. That's fine at the well, get
him back. But yeah, I mean, as you breaking it down,
like the convergence of events and all of the spots.
(16:06):
But go back to the Spurs and their history. It's
the next line on the Wikipedia page. All right, all right,
we got it back. Go ahead, Mark, keep going with
your point.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
Yeah. I hope this is working. Sorry, guys, I don't
know what's wrong. But what I was saying is like
those were all moments, you know, just devastating moments. But
this wasn't like this wasn't a moment. This was a
whole half. I mean, they were up twenty seven and
a half, the league got the league got up to
twenty nine, and it was just like a long nightmare.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
You know, part of it. We talked about this a
few minutes ago, and there's so many things you can
lay down, you know, lay down and talk about. And
we talked look Wenby missing the free throws and Steph
Castle at the end, and Karl Anthony Towns tipping the
ball and Darren Fox's play. But I go back to
the third quarter, Mark, I kind of feel like the
Spurs were just pissed and everything they've gone through the
(16:58):
last few days, and the fans and MSG in the Knicks,
and I felt like in the third quarter they felt
we don't want to just win. We want to win
by one hundred, So we're gonna keep taking these threes.
We're gonna keep doing this because we don't. We're pissed
and we just don't want to beat the Knicks. We
want to absolutely show that we can win by as
many points as we can. And that's what kind of
helped jump start the Knicks comeback, because they kept taking
all those trees thinking they're going to keep making them.
Speaker 4 (17:19):
Yeah, you know this isn't a foulow by monogor no
believe it sends Dirk Navinski to the line late in
the game, or array Allen corner three after a crazy
offensive rebound like this was a sustained unraveling for San Antonio.
But I have to say what I've been thinking about
a lot, and we don't. We haven't heard the full
(17:42):
extent yet. Obviously, nobody does media today the way they
do the finals. Now when you switch cities, everyone travels
today and then tomorrow is when we will all these
guys will all the spurs. You know, key players are
going to have to get up in front of a
podium and take questions about this all over again. But
what I've really been curious about I remember in twenty
(18:03):
thirteen the ray Allen shot, the Spurs were up the Furst,
thought they were closing out a championship on Miami's floor.
They end up losing those finals in seven games. It
was the first time they lost in the finals. But
you remember the next year they came back and just
blitzed the heat and it was the last we saw
(18:24):
the heatles and they got their revenge. And in all
the stuff I wrote about those years, I remember being
told by so many people within the Spurs that maybe
one of Greg Popovic's greatest moments as a coach in
San Antonio was the way he kind of glued the
team back together after the ray Allen shot. Now they
(18:47):
didn't win that Game seven, but it was a very
close Game seven. San Antonio had their chances on the road.
But people told me that pop really did some of
the best coaching of his life to kind of get
that group through that disappointment. And after watching last night,
all I could think of, now, who's gonna glue these
(19:08):
Spurs back together? Because this is such a young team
and Mitch Johnson is a young coach, and obviously Pop
is still involved, and you know he'll have a presence
when they're back in San Antonio. But like, this isn't
the Duncan Genobli Parker Spurs. This is a really young
team and so I just I'm so curious to hear
I hope we get stories of Obviously it was awful
(19:31):
the scenes outside their hotel when the Spurs got back
to the hotel and had to get off the bus.
But I'm talking about when they're back at the hotel
together as a team behind closed doors flying back to
San Antonio today, Like what was that flight? Like who's
trying to get them past this? Because again, the Knicks
comeback historic, but it was a collapse for the Ages.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
And that's where we're at. Mitch Johnson obviously a fantastic
run to this point, but we look at all these
these games where it's like, all right, you've got it,
You've got this figured out, and is do we just
chalk it up to inexperience both his uh and the
average age of the squad. I mean, Wemby's got forty
four minutes yesterday even though they had that massive lead. Like,
(20:14):
there's just a lot of questions to this point for me.
Speaker 4 (20:17):
Yeah, No, they they were coaching mistakes, There were player mistakes,
nerves were a factor. All these things are true. But
then like like even today the last two minute report
comes out, it was like Stefan Castle didn't step out
a bound actually should have been a foul Like that
Does that help? Right?
Speaker 2 (20:36):
No?
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Exactly?
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Like again like they and look, it wouldn't It will
not surprise me if the Spurs can bounce back and
win game five and force the Knicks to finish this
in New York. But it also I don't think would
be terribly surprising if they don't recover because it was
that it was that painful, and like I said, even
tomorrow just doing me when Mitch Johnson and Victor Webbinyama
(21:02):
and I don't know, Fox will take a turn at
the podium, but like, these guys are going to have
to get up there again and talk about it again,
and that's going to be a painful experience.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
NBA insider Mark Stein our guest Jason Smith macrmon live
from the Fox Sports Radio studios. All right, so through
the first four games of this series, now to look
at it from the Knicks perspective, what surprised you the
most about this team first four games, whether it's overall
a player in a game. What surprised you the most
about this team that.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
They were able to win the first couple with Brunson
shooting the ball far below his usual standard. We were
how many I'm sure you guys on the show were
talking about Karl anthonytown playing the best basketball of his life.
Carl Anthony Towns his first fourth quarter points in this
series were last night. Yeah, he made that corner three.
(21:52):
Like the Knicks. That's the thing about the Knicks is
they're getting it from a lot of different places and
they're just they have a lot of confidence, and let's
face it, they've pulled off comebacks like this before. You know,
they did this to Cleveland in the last round down
twenty two to one, Like they've made a habit of
coming back from twenty plus the last two postseasons. I mean,
(22:17):
they are a very tough and together team.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Mark. One of the things we've talked about a little
bit on air, the Wenby problem, not that you have
to contend with him and try to defend him, but
the aggression. Now you add another flagrant file from him
and a super cut of chippiness starting to really evolve here.
How does the league adjudicate curb that, what could they
(22:42):
do internally or is it just we've seen it on
the big stage a lot, so it's just fresh in
our consciousness.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Well, because of the way the game ended, that's not
really foremost among San Antonio's issues right now. Had San
Antonio carried on with their twenty seven point lead and
won that game like they should have, I think that
would be a dominant storyline today, because, of course, you
had the shove of Jalen Brunson early in Game three,
(23:16):
and the league could have assessed a retroactive flagrant foul
and decided not to, and then Wemby gets a flagrant
in Game four. Had they given the retroactive flagrant in
Game three, he'd now be on four flagrant foul points
and he'd have to be suspended for a game. So
(23:36):
had the Spurs one, I think that actually would have
been one of the loudest talking points in this series.
But the ending and the absolute hole that the Spurs
now find themselves in have kind of overshadowed all that,
and they frankly have larger problems.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
You know, just hearing them talk, Mark, I kind of
feel like when I hear Mitch Johnson talking the Spurs talk.
They do a lot of well, it's not them, it's us.
It's not them, it's us. And at some point I
want to I want to want them to say, don't
you realize that it's forty eight minutes. It's not we
played well for the first thirty minutes, but the last
eight team don't count. Like I feel like that's kind
of where the Spurs are when they're talking about this series.
(24:18):
I'm not really addressing why they're down three to one.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
The three to one lead isn't enough. You need you
need the Spurs.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Mark, we got two days till Game five, Mark, we
need something. We got two days, We got two days.
Speaker 4 (24:37):
He's on, don't don't get don't get greedy. You're doing
you're you're ahead of the game.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Right now. I was gonna say, is is Hurricanes won?
The Mets have actually won a game. Yeah, you got
the Nixon the verge of this.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
What do his Hurricanes? Where did that come from?
Speaker 1 (24:54):
Well? I was I'm a Whaler fan, so like I
got both. My every day is sports stress for me. Mark.
I go from the Knicks to the Rcanes, the Nicks
to the Hurricanes. So yeah, this has been this has
been a last ten days. I didn't I didn't think
I'd ever have to worry about.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
I didn't know.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
I didn't know you were a Whaler's guy. That makes sense, though.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Yeah, it's it's insane. I my teams don't win like
they go like like my entire life, nobody wins anything.
And now I got two teams playing in the finals
at the same time. He's on Twitter at the steinline.
That is at the steinline. Check him out on substack
as well. Mark is always appreciated, my friend. Maybe the
next time we talk, we're talking about the champion Knicks.
(25:31):
We're talking about Game six. Have a great week. Enjoy
the game, my friend.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
Enjoy it. You're enjoy it. You guys enjoy it too.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
We'll talk to I appreciate you, Mark. There goes Mark Stein,
like it's not enough. I was talking more for the
Spurs than I was for I didn't need them to
say great things about the Knicks. But I kind of
feel like, you know a little bit, you want to
understand that. Okay, Hey, it's not just about the leads
that we get to it. There's the rest of the
game too, Like there's the other eighteen minutes that boy
who really struggled with You know what, there's a long
(25:58):
off season once you're a limit and aed and clear
out your locker to say and cause you get to
do the thing. Remember Jim Varney when he was on
and Homer went and the Carnies got over on him. Yeah,
and then Homer got him back at the end, and
then the mantra was we were beaten by the best. Yes,
that's what you want. Until it's over, you're not giving
(26:18):
him any credit. I kind of respect it. Time out
to find out what's trending in the wide world of
sports with someone who's been called the Mitch Johnson. Hey,
a Fox Sports Radio go ahead.
Speaker 5 (26:30):
From Jason Smith, from Mike Carmon and from Alex tie Shirt.
Bringing you renowned global accomplishments from K pop like BTS,
Black Pink and Evo, gaining great foods like kim chi,
Korean barbecue and Korean fried chicken. There's no better way
to start the World Cup off than getting the win
and going into the next group game.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeart Radio.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Wow, hey, very nice, and you hit the post very nice,
love the post, very nice, very nice. I like to
feel like I had a hand in that all these years, knowing,
like hearing that song so often, knowing when you had
to stop talking, thank you, I feel like I had
(27:22):
a hand in that. That was very good, Thank you.
So that was great, that was very good. You've influenced him?
Did you just a time for good? Did you just
AI or chat GPT, like, hey, good things from South
Korea and just read right off there?
Speaker 5 (27:34):
I swear I went to Google and just typed in
famous things from Korea? Okay, very good and right off
the list. Are you sure that all those bands besides
BTS are real? Those ones I've listened to? Yes, okay,
I was in the anime scene that I've listened to. Yeah,
I've listened to all right, very good. You were the
one who talked crap on Lisa, not me.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
No, no, no, no, I'm just I was just asking
a question.
Speaker 5 (27:51):
No, but I played that song that had golden at
a bunch like.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
I know, but it was it was just saying the
word too often over it all? What happens when they score.
Go to Will Withers lovely Day, lovely Day, lovely Day,
eighteen times. You're going after Bill Withers eighteen times Bill Day.
No one, no one, no one, no no, no, yeah no,
I don't like that either.
Speaker 4 (28:12):
No.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
But lovely lovely day, lovely day eighteen times. Every single
time in that song lovely Day, lovely Day, lovely day,
you probably hate a live version of hate jug yeah,
dirty rat lovely day, lovely day. It was too much
of the same words, over and over again. It's again,
it was just too much. I feel like that's a
trigger for something in my brain that's gonna explode when
(28:35):
you say that. I hope not keep playing it over
Scam and Jason, which which camera you looking into?
Speaker 5 (28:42):
You just have to remember when it's something good, you
want more of it. I want more goals. Okay, all right,
that's fine.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Okay. Now, speaking of more goals, I'm gonna give this
to you. You want a Big Bowl prediction for the
United States tomorrow Paraguay first game. And I just every
time I say I keep thinking of the line from
Knives Out, Oh Marta fantastic families from Paraguay. They keep
getting the country wrong. They never get it right, like
martyrs from Paraguay, Brazil, Ecuador, you know, great families from Ecuador.
(29:08):
Right the United States. We talked about them earlier in
the show. Maybe they're the Knicks. Maybe they're just waiting
for the World Cup to start because things have been
haven't been trending great. There's still a big question mark
about this Greatest generation. But I will give you one
guarantee because I've seen it in the World Cup before
(29:29):
and this is kind of the United States. This is
kind of there part of their identity. They want to
get out big right away. They will score at least
once in the first ten minutes of tomorrow's game. They're
at home, they're here, they want to get out big.
We've seen it before now, granted in the Clintsman era
it was hey, Clint Dempsey, you know, they would get
(29:51):
a goal in the first ten minutes. Say we're gonna
sit on this thing. Part, We're gonna try to win
one nothing. They will score at least once, at least
once in the first ten minutes tomorrow against Paraguay. Would
you believe that the over under in this game is
only two and a half goals?
Speaker 3 (30:06):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (30:06):
I'd love the over on this one. I would love
the over on this What's beautiful about this is just
the unknown, right. This is legitimately as close to a
sporting version of Christmas Morning with this squad, because I
really have no idea what to expect, right, new coach,
We've had a couple of friendlies and great and you've
seen some good things. It comes down to, you know,
(30:28):
Captain America, will he finally live up to the tag?
And I know he's rising all the lists, scoring and everything.
When policit scores, good things happen for this squad. We've
seen the record, we've seen the style of play, but
we don't have any of the external nonsense that's gone
on in the past, right, not a lot of fighting
(30:49):
in the media, it seems relatively. I don't know if
that's good or bad. Right, Sometimes you need a little
unrest shake it up, right, right, But this is about
his calm, a preamble to a big tournament as the
US has had in as long as I, you and
I have been doing the show. Yeah, sure, No, Look,
I feel like it's more instead of the nerves about
(31:10):
the controversy and no confidence in the coach and can
he get the guys on the same page, which has
been a mark of the last couple of teams, you know, Burholter,
going back the end of Klinsman, back to Clins right,
that's kind of been what it is for the United States.
Has been okay going in, We feel like we have
young talent, but boy, they don't seem like they're on
the same page. It seems like the coach is doing
(31:30):
one thing. Like Klinsman was US soccer for a little while,
and there was a there was a tiny bit of
time where you felt like, hey, this is gonna work,
and then it didn't. And then Burholter took over and
nobody was happy, and the team didn't look like they
played at their highest level. Uh throughout the course under
Greg Burholter, and and it didn't look like they were
they were they were always as motivated as needed to be.
(31:53):
And that was always the question going in was just hey,
this is not just are we good enough? This is
more do we have stuff going on off the pitch
and off the field that is really overwhelming us? Now
at least it's been replaced by just nerves of are
we good enough? So I feel like that's a big
step in the right direction. Oh absolutely yeah. I mean
you cancel out the outside noise. We've talked about it
(32:15):
with all these other series with your Nicks and the
Spurs and what they're trying to calm down as they
go back to San Antonio for Game five. But it's
very much that same thing with the US men's national team,
as there's always been the run up and the build
up to try to crown next, which is always a
dangerous thing, especially when nobody's really stepped to the front.
(32:37):
Now again, Polisa is that guy on this squad, but
and has worn it about as well as you can.
But when every big thought piece leading into an event
is all right, is it finally their time? Will it
ever be their time? Like it's the same recycled first
(32:58):
two paragraphs. We change the name, changed the coach, and
then there's a massive indictment on the way soccer is
run and filtered and talent filtered through in the US system. Right,
that's the same thing in every one of these scenarios,
now being the host nation, having a group that it
looks like and again it's all on paper. Right, That's
(33:19):
the beauty and horror of soccer of hockey as we
watch it. Right, it's a funny game. You can dominate
for well, hell, basketball's now become that game too. You
can dominate a team for a vast majority of a
game and it takes one bounce, it takes one throw in.
Oh yeah, I mean we watched this game with Korea.
(33:41):
I was like, all right, you controlled most of the action.
Everything's great. No, there's a throw in where this guy
can get it halfway across the box and you have
no idea what's gonna happen. Like, that's the weird thing
in soccer. Right, goalie makes a decision that leaves him
or her six inches to the left, right or not
to having a clean field of vision on what should
(34:02):
be a stop of ball. Right, we watched a five
hole goal earlier. It's like, how does he? Why did
he not?
Speaker 5 (34:07):
What?
Speaker 1 (34:08):
Yeah? That but that's soccer. Like it's a game of
inches and one mistake and for the US, while everything
lines up to what should be a pretty phenomenal run
and you've got the home field advantage, all of these things,
you have no idea. And I think it's exciting and
terrifying at the same time. Yeah, I mean, it's it is,
and it's exciting, and I feel like there's this quiet
(34:31):
undercurrent of confidence that may be completely wrong, right, Like right, no,
I get that, you know, say, because it's really surprised
me in the last couple of weeks, the positive outlook
that there's been from the soccer media on the United States. Right,
it's really surprised me because I felt like, Okay, we've
(34:52):
seen the team play, We've seen Poachtino picking players. It's
a weird it's a weird lineup, right, It's a weird roster. Uh,
you know, he took he took twenty defenders, and I
think they're gonna play. They're gonna play, you know, a
ten to two system. So it's a weird line.
Speaker 4 (35:08):
Right.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
If they get into some sort of difficulty injury wise
in the middle of the field, that's gonna be difficult
for us. But you know, but I feel like there's
this confidence level under it all that I don't know
where it's coming from. Now. Clearly the talent should be here,
because this should be the Golden generation. Time we've watched
these guys for the past couple of World Cups, the
World Cup cycles rather, and they should be there. This
(35:30):
should be when polistic leads us everywhere. We have a
great draw, right, the absolute draw. We should win the
group and get out, and then that would be a
great matchup in the round of sixteen, and then who
knows where we're at, right, So that's what should be.
We don't win the group, suddenly that round of sixteen
draw is gonna be really, really difficult. But there's this
confidence and I'm trying to say where is it coming from?
(35:51):
Like what is it out there? Because we haven't really
seen this team play, right, Like is that overall confidence?
In poach Tino? Is it overall cup? But he had
to play these two friendlies leading up to the World Cup,
mainly because he's picking such a different roster and they're
playing a little bit of a different way that we've
ever played, and they've not played together. They need this
time to play together, right, So it's weird to say,
(36:12):
why are they playing these friendlies so close? Well, you know, hey,
these other teams are playing the friendlies too, So I'm like,
where is this coming from? Because I'm looking to try
to pinpoint where this confidence is at. But there's so
much of it, and I don't know if it's just
if it's just a misdiagnosis of I just want to
feel positive. I just want to feel like it's our
(36:33):
time because it is in the United States. We are
the host nation. We're gonna get whatever breaks the host
nation normally gets like I don't know where it's from.
But in the end, again, I feel like if I
was this questionable about the Knicks going into the playoffs,
where I said, hey, yes, defensively they're playing better, but
overall they still haven't really meshed. There was the big
(36:56):
part and I said this going in, going after these
deep runs the left last couple of years, maybe they're
just waiting for the playoffs and and veteran teams, teams
that have played together, they're just waiting for the playoffs
and the Knicks that's what they were waiting for to
get to the playoffs, and and for Kat to become
the facilitator. That's what they were waiting for. So I
am gonna open the door to that that maybe this
(37:16):
is just the United States waiting for the for the
actual World Cup to start and they're gonna show us
some stuff. And I get Look, they're in an overmatch bracket,
and that's what you happen when you're the host country,
you get that. And I expect a big result to
Morrogan's Paraguay. I expect for to one something like that
could be the final score where for the most part
the United States plays well but a couple of brain cramps,
because that's clearly what the United States has been over
(37:38):
the last you know, a few games. But I expect
a big outcome tomorrow and the emotion and running out
on this and and to give us some optimism, even
though I struggle to find where it is. It's weird,
I struggle to find I think I'll do this right,
It's all right, let's go. Let's go to the odds.
Let's because we got some numbers to go with it.
To go to the math implied odds eighty eight percent
(37:59):
that they had made. It's from the group cool eighteen
to one that they reached the final forty to one
that they win it. All right, so we got long odds.
I think some of it goes back to just that base,
like two hundred and fiftieth year. We're trying to find
some positivity in this world, right, Look at even people
that kind of hate the Knicks are kind of on
(38:22):
board because they like the guys. At this point. I
don't think anybody hates the next. I think they just
hate Knicks fans. No, no, no, I think they're just
they hate fans the next they love. Everybody loves the
next everybody. No, no, no, the Knicks fans. But the Knicks,
even when they were terrible, when Taylor Swift was at
those games and they were seventeen and sixty sixty five,
they were still part of the national television package, so
(38:44):
you still had to watch them even though they sucked.
So there is a residual hatred. Hey, Thursday night, Great,
I'm gonna watch the gang. Get me started. What's the matchup?
It's the Cavaliers and the Knicks. Damn it, it's the
Knicks a game. But so I think there's some of
it just for the positivity. I think it's all so
the business like approach and at the time, and it's
like kind of curious, right when the final cuts they
(39:06):
got cut by email. There were no hey, come into
the office, let's talk about where your your deficiencies are whatever. No, guys,
just got an email. We're moving on. And and and
the fact that in the past we had so many
three ring circuses, backbiting, family squabbles, lawsuits, whatever else. None
of that's here. It's all just been about the soccer,
(39:29):
which is which is rare, right, So I think it
breeds some positivity, just that we're not fighting all of
these other imaginary windmills and monsters and actually just going
and playing soccer. But again that that's sort of the uh,
the misappropriation of of of confidence is that, well, we're
(39:49):
not talking about an absolute train wreck, just just an
average train wreck. But that's the thing. All right, we
could be over here. We're at least on the right
track at this point, I'll tell you. But I do
expect I expect a big game tomorrow. I expect them
to come out big and and and look again, just
like the Knicks, I'm leaving open that possibility. They're waiting
for the World Cup. This is this is a talented team.
(40:09):
It's our golden generation. They're waiting for this World Cup. Well,
they play a full ninety attacking minutes as opposed to
whatever that was Mexico did earlier today. Well, they did
have a lot of red cards. There were a lot
of red cards in that against the other team wore
red cards and goals in that kid. Yeah, well that's
say two two uh an opponent one of their own weight,
(40:30):
which is just, I mean, just a bad decision. But
like you got the announcers going gold, differential can still matter,
Like why are you guys? They're down two players? Why
are you playing around? Hopefully the US does not do
the same exit about a Fresco exit swollen down The
Jason Smith Show with my best friend Mike Carmon Coming
up next we get back into the NBA Finals. You're
(40:51):
not gonna believe where the latest trolling of the Spurs
collapse came from. Tonight. That's next right here, Jason and
Mike Fox Radio. If you're skilled and manufacturing, your next
job shouldn't be hard to find and it shouldn't slow
your career down. Express Employment professionals connect skilled workers with
contract and full time manufacturing jobs and companies that need
(41:12):
talent right now. Go to expresspros dot com to find
a location near you. Your local Express office understands manufacturing
and works with companies at every level of production. That
means real opportunities for machinists, welders, assemblers, quality control inspectors,
maintenance technicians, production managers and more. When you turn to
Express Employment Professionals for your job search, you're working with
(41:34):
a staffing leader in manufacturing, backed by global resources, with
local teams who know the industry and the employers in
your community. Whether you're looking to build your skills, take
the next step in your career, or find a new
opportunity in manufacturing, Express is ready to help connect you
where you're needed most. The online job search can be
frustrating a black hole of applications. Call your local Express
office to put people back in the hiring process. Visit
(41:56):
expresspros dot com to find your local Express Employment professional's
office today. Hey, that's Expresspros dot com. Expresspros dot com.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific
Thanks for listening to the best of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Carmen podcast. Be sure to catch us
live every weeknight from ten pm to two am Eastern
seven to eleven pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio. Find
your local station for The Jason Smith Show with Mike
Harmon at Fox Sports Radio dot com, or stream us
live every night on the iHeartRadio app by searching FSR.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
This is the best of The Jason Smith Show with
Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Yes, sour creamy. It depends how because that's usually where
they try to make up with volume because it's a
little cheaper, so the bean layer is usually way too thick,
so it overtakes everything else. We also have a FIFA
World Cup game in progress. Tishert's bett Tysher. Did you
bet this game? Did you bet Korea?
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Yes? I did?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
You did?
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Okay? Very good?
Speaker 4 (00:51):
Why? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (00:52):
Why they're a sleeper in this group? Wown okay because
most people are looking north to the border. I'm not okay,
all right? Hey man, take right there, thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Take We'll give you our big World Cup preview coming
up and a few let's talk about Team USA and
some teams I'll give you my pick to surprise in
the World Cup. Give me now, No, I'm a tease. No, okay,
I'll give you a tease. This team kind of reminds
me of what it was like when Steph Curry played
for Davidson and they made the run all the way
(01:21):
to the Final four, Steph Curry's last year at Davidson. Wow,
that's kind of what I can see this team doing
because of one player, Because of one player, and one
player only, I can see it happening.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
All right, But coming off of Game four, right, and
all the heroics of Game four, now looking ahead to
Game five and beyond in the NBA Finals and Knicks
have a chance to clinch. I just keep thinking of
Rick Buker's words with us last night. It's not a
matter of if, but when the Knicks win the championship,
and that I said, do you ever think you'd never
say that? He goes, Nope, never did, Never thought I'd
(01:54):
ever say that on your show or any other show.
I didn't really even think he'd commit to it, even
last night, especially the way these games have gone. Right again,
it's been madness. But after seeing the video out today,
you know it's another day where here is a questionable
video of Victor Webbin Yama. We go from the pushdown
(02:15):
of Jalen Brunton a couple of days ago that did
not get ruled a flagrant foul. It's like, okay, NBA,
what are we doing? Then you saw the video today
of what happened when Wemby makes a run at Ognunobi,
who is guarding the ball in the perimeter, and and
the big leap and the kick that just lent kick
that was yeah, that lands him right in front of
(02:37):
Ogan and Nobey. It looks like he's kicking right for
his knee, but he lands right in front of Og.
And if Og had moved or if the play had
moved a little bit, like that kick is getting to
OG's knee and who knows what kind of injury that is, Like,
that's a really dangerous play. Now, I'm I'm not going
to sit here and say, oh, Wemby was going after
(02:57):
his acl did Wemby was Wenby may be looking to
make a statement and maybe make a big thud in
front of Wemby, in front of Og, or do something
to maybe get in his head for the rest of
the game. I'm gonna be out here setting picks right, Like,
I can see that, But that's still a really dangerous
play because you don't know what's gonna happen. You don't
know if the ball's gonna dribble, what OG's gonna do. Defensively,
(03:19):
I'm gonna see the guy coming, try to move, and
all of a sudden, now he's got a torn acl
and his knee is ruined. Right, the NBA has a
Wemby problem and they can't ignore it. And the problem
is Wemby plays dirty, right, and for a guy that
they want to be the face of the league, we've
now seen more than enough evidence that Wenby likes to
play dirty. You go all the way back, and I'm
(03:40):
just not talking about the nick. You go back another series.
Wemby plays over the line. Now, I get it, he's
twenty one and he's trying to assert his territory and
teams have to be physical with him. I get that,
But there are these over the line plays that Wemby
commits that the NBA has turned the other eye out,
turn a blind eye to it. But yeah, no, nowhere,
(04:00):
we're not gonna do that. We're not gonna do that.
I can't believe they gave Wemby the flagrant last night
in the middle of the game. But you know, I'm
actually glad they did, because the Knicks outscored him fifty
five twenty five and won the game. But the NBA
has got a Wemby problem because he's a guy that
they have said he's the chosen one. He is the
face of the league. And you see the ratings on television,
highest rated NBA Finals in nearly twenty years. You have
(04:22):
the Knicks, you have Wemby. It's a great formula. But
the NBA can't sit here and continue to protect Wemby
and his dirty play. They're gonna have to come down
and if he commits a flagrant foul, they're gonna have
to never call him on it, right and he's one
flagrant away from being suspended for a game. If I'm
Wenby right now, I feel like I have cart bluntche
you whatever the hell I want to, because you're not
(04:42):
gonna kick me out of a finals game. But the
NBA's got a problem because Wemby is a dirty player,
and there's protecting yourself and there's being physical, and there's
going out of your way for plays. If it was
a case where all the dirtiness with Wemby is coming
from being down low with Arl Anthony Towns. Let's just say,
and there's elbowing and there's pushing and shoving, I would say, well,
(05:04):
you know what, that's physical play, and you call it
however you see it flagrance. But these are now plays now.
The last two this is him going out of his
way to kick really weirdly at Ogianno Noby's ni or
near it or that could have been an injury. This
is this is him shoving Jalen brunsonto the ground. Where
he does that's not a thing that hey, I have
to do this. This is not part of physical play. Underneath,
(05:26):
this is him going out of his way to do
something physical. And you want to go back throughout the
playoffs and look at all the questionable Wenby plays. They're
not I'm tied up with a guy down low. This
is I'm going out of it to make a run
at Alex Caruso, who's standing there, because I don't like
the fact that he's getting in my face. He's guarding
me so low. Like you go back, the NBA has
a Wemby problem and they can't let him continue as
(05:48):
much as they want to be the face of the league,
they can't let this continue. No, it's because you take
the full supercut, and it's generally, at least to my estimation,
a lot of it is retaliate to But it's like
the delayed gratification of all right, wait for now, I'm
gonna do it, as opposed to all right, as you say,
(06:08):
let's go back and forth. You've got those big battles
with Kat for position, or he and Mitchell Robinson getting
after it. Go back to the Minnesota back and forth
with Red right and getting him up in the throat
and everything else. I mean, we've seen the retaliatory side
of it, even yesterday. Right, if he'd gone and taken
(06:30):
an elbow to Alvarado, you could have said, okay, it
makes sense because there were a couple of times where
Alvarado got a little questionable in terms of going at
his knees. You go back to game Game three might
have been an end of game two, but there was
the video of kind of a stumbling Jalen Brunson, who
does the all right, I'm kind of faking like alignment.
(06:51):
I'm faking, I'm blocking down and I give you a
free reign and then I cut back and pop you
to where he gets into Wemby's knee and thigh, to
where I was like, all right, that's that what didn't
look great? Right? Like there's little moments, but then his
retaliations are huge and amplified, and he's coming with a
(07:11):
bunch of force, and now we're we're looking at a
number of these big plays. The Brunson one where he
shoved him, all right, how that's not at least a
fall in the moment still remains one of the dumber
things we've seen in these NBA playoffs, which are full
of bad officiating moments, blunders, omissions, et cetera. But yeah,
(07:32):
this has been the go back to the regular season.
There's a super cut. You got all these playoff moments,
and if nothing else, he's got to be smarter about it,
cuz some teams will enable and employ an enforcer going forward.
You really haven't seen that, right, You get the adjutants.
You mentioned Cruz, so I mentioned Alvarado and found him
(07:55):
like eleven times. But he's but he's getting in at it,
like he's trying to Atabi. He's basically running into his legs. Yeah,
right and kind of diving down low to cut his legs.
It's like, all right, is a dirty no, but you're
a neat and you've now and that's not been called
until the what seventh eighth, eleventh time, Like that's another
(08:16):
thing where an official's got to be like, all right,
he's not really boxing him out at this point, he's
just he's just trying to run into him and create
a problem. And look, that's gonna be the strategy. You've
realized he will retaliate, right. We watched it with Jokic
in their series with Minnesota very early on. Yeah, and
the thing where he's normally pretty even tempered and he
(08:36):
started to lose it. But but wembyshs that plus and
Jokicic has always kind of been a right up to
the line, clean dirty player, Like there's there's lots of
times where I see him he sticks that foot under.
Sure that should be a flake because the NBA seems
to be looking for that. Now you stick your foot
under the landing spot, like Yokicic has done that for
a long time, and he's always been right at the line.
But this is where like, like the league has never
(08:59):
really had to deal with the fact where your most
marketable and biggest player plays dirty and over the line,
right like from from Jordan to Kobe and Lebron and
Duncan and and you've never had a guy that's been, hey,
I'll play this way, but man, am I gonna give
you some dirty highlights that I could earn a flagrant
foul to? Like, I get that. It's new for the NBA,
(09:21):
And that's why they have a problem because so far
it's been we're gonna protect Wemby as much as we can.
Now they put themselves in a corner because now it's
one big, one big play in Game five that has
been a typical Wemby play because look, we know the
guy likes to you know, the guy likes to play dirty. Like,
are they gonna have the guts to say that's a
flagrant and you're done for the next game, like they
(09:43):
sort of have to, or they're gonna lose all credibility
because it's too public. Now everybody sees what Wemby does
away from the ball on these plays. Now it's not
where all this happened and gets lost in the game.
This is now stuff that becomes front and center topics.
The next time. I appreciate you. Just remember to have
silver at that. Uh. And the other is that you're
(10:03):
looking at you got your makeup call, because that's that
thing with Robinson. Was that really a flagrant in the
grand scheme of things? Yeah, but it was. But he
got his but he got his arm up and that's
why they had to give it to Wemby. But he's
got Robinson had his arm up going in, so they
called it okay, great. So when Wemby did it to Cat, okay, okay,
(10:24):
catching him on the chin, okay. But now he's now now,
now look look at this. He is forcing your hand.
And I guarantee, if you're Wenby, you were thinking, I
am bulletproof man. There is no way they're gonna suspend
the best player in the bleeping game. They're not gonna
suspend me for a game. But the NBA has got
to have the guts if he gives you an over
the line play, and I am sure he will because
he does it every game. Well maybe like the Iron Chic,
(10:47):
the late great Iron Sheek taught us. And no, I'm
not gonna say blank this blank that we can but
one of those the Iron sheet absolutely back and forth
with him on Twitter before his passing. We're legendary, but
the idea of sometimes you just need to be humbled
for when Minyama, we joked about it in the moment
right he was doing the point to the head on
(11:08):
Mitchell Robinson and all of that stuff, and then maybe
having that lead evaporate, then having a dope throw an
egg at him might be enough to make him realize,
you know what, You're not quite there just yet. Exit
up about a Fresca exit swallen down The Jason Smith
Show with my best friend Mike Harmon again, Big Problems.
(11:30):
NBA has got a big Wemby problem. Let's see if
they got the guts to fix it. For over forty years,
Tyrock's been uping customers find the right time.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Hey, It's Rob Parker and Kelvin Washington from The Odd
Couple on Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
And in addition to hearing us live week nights from
seven to ten pm Eastern on Fox Sports Radio, we
are excited to announce brand new YouTube channel for the show.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
That's right, you can now watch the Odd Couple live
on YouTube every day.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
All you gotta do search Odd Couple FSR on YouTube
again YouTube, just search Odd Couple FSR. Check us out
on YouTube and subscribe.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
Outline for what could be the cusp of the Knicks
winning the NBA title. And I know right now he's
shaking his head, going, I can't believe we're talking about this.
It's longtime NBA inside a friend of the show, check
him out on substack Twitter at the Steinline. It is
Mark Stein. Mark, what's happening?
Speaker 4 (12:43):
Man?
Speaker 1 (12:43):
How are you.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
Not as good as you?
Speaker 4 (12:46):
But things are good.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
I still feel I'm still shaking. I'm still I still
feel like I'm drunk coming off of last night's game.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
That is obviously not the that is the that is
the circuitest route to a three to one lead, for sure.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
So where are you on that coming off of last night?
What we saw the nixt twenty nine point come back
and where it sits historically, Like, where are you now
twenty four hours after you saw that game and how
it went down?
Speaker 4 (13:18):
I mean, it's hard not to focus on the collapse
aspect of it. Because it's just so devastating for san Antonio.
But the Knicks had a lot to do with it too.
You you know, it's true. I agree with everyone who
says you don't erase a twenty nine point deficit without help,
but that's still a monster deficit to overcome. So I
(13:39):
mean it really, you know, nobody wants that answer that
it's both an amazing comeback and a historic collapse, but
I do think it is both. That's the tip and
and Nobe made to win the game is like, okay,
yes he was. He beat everyone to the spot, beat all,
(14:00):
you know, but that's still just a ridiculously hard tip
skill wise, Like it's it's crazy. The whole state, the
whole thing is crazy.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Yeah, just the strangest set of convergence of circumstance. I mean,
for four straight games roner Edge, how many times have
you started to write something and then just had to
delete it and restart a column or a missive.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
Well, look, in today's NBA, no lead is safe because
of the three point shots. But that isn't exactly what
happened here. Like the Spurs started shooting themselves out of
the game to you know, to start the snowball effect.
(14:45):
It's it's truly like I mean, at halftime, Jason Smith,
did you really think there was any chance your guys
were coming back?
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Oh no, no, I thought I thought, Okay, they'll play
better in the second half. But but this is this is good.
The twenty nine is too much now, I know twenty
nine is not too much. Maybe thirty five is what's
too much them. Maybe fifty is too much, Mark, I
don't know.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
And see that's the thing the Spurs, for all of
their greatness, for all of their championships, they do have
a history of some really really really painful playoff moments.
And I was not there last night, but I was
in the arena for all the others, the Derek Fisher
(15:30):
point for shot, the monfel on, the obviously the Ray
Allen shot, Like I was there for all of those.
But this was like a.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Sustain Nope, I think we're losing Mark Stein there for
a second. Let's go hang on, we'll get you back.
We lost it, we'll get it back. You're back, Mark, No,
we'll get him back. That's fine at the well, get
him back. But yeah, I mean, as you breaking it down,
like the convergence of events and all of the spots.
(16:06):
But go back to the Spurs and their history. It's
the next line on the Wikipedia page. All right, all right,
we got it back. Go ahead, Mark, keep going with
your point.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
Yeah. I hope this is working. Sorry, guys, I don't
know what's wrong. But what I was saying is like
those were all moments, you know, just devastating moments. But
this wasn't like this wasn't a moment. This was a
whole half. I mean, they were up twenty seven and
a half, the league got the league got up to
twenty nine, and it was just like a long nightmare.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
You know, part of it. We talked about this a
few minutes ago, and there's so many things you can
lay down, you know, lay down and talk about. And
we talked look Wenby missing the free throws and Steph
Castle at the end, and Karl Anthony Towns tipping the
ball and Darren Fox's play. But I go back to
the third quarter, Mark, I kind of feel like the
Spurs were just pissed and everything they've gone through the
(16:58):
last few days, and the fans and MSG in the Knicks,
and I felt like in the third quarter they felt
we don't want to just win. We want to win
by one hundred, So we're gonna keep taking these threes.
We're gonna keep doing this because we don't. We're pissed
and we just don't want to beat the Knicks. We
want to absolutely show that we can win by as
many points as we can. And that's what kind of
helped jump start the Knicks comeback, because they kept taking
all those trees thinking they're going to keep making them.
Speaker 4 (17:19):
Yeah, you know this isn't a foulow by monogor no
believe it sends Dirk Navinski to the line late in
the game, or array Allen corner three after a crazy
offensive rebound like this was a sustained unraveling for San Antonio.
But I have to say what I've been thinking about
a lot, and we don't. We haven't heard the full
(17:42):
extent yet. Obviously, nobody does media today the way they
do the finals. Now when you switch cities, everyone travels
today and then tomorrow is when we will all these
guys will all the spurs. You know, key players are
going to have to get up in front of a
podium and take questions about this all over again. But
what I've really been curious about I remember in twenty
(18:03):
thirteen the ray Allen shot, the Spurs were up the Furst,
thought they were closing out a championship on Miami's floor.
They end up losing those finals in seven games. It
was the first time they lost in the finals. But
you remember the next year they came back and just
blitzed the heat and it was the last we saw
(18:24):
the heatles and they got their revenge. And in all
the stuff I wrote about those years, I remember being
told by so many people within the Spurs that maybe
one of Greg Popovic's greatest moments as a coach in
San Antonio was the way he kind of glued the
team back together after the ray Allen shot. Now they
(18:47):
didn't win that Game seven, but it was a very
close Game seven. San Antonio had their chances on the road.
But people told me that pop really did some of
the best coaching of his life to kind of get
that group through that disappointment. And after watching last night,
all I could think of, now, who's gonna glue these
(19:08):
Spurs back together? Because this is such a young team
and Mitch Johnson is a young coach, and obviously Pop
is still involved, and you know he'll have a presence
when they're back in San Antonio. But like, this isn't
the Duncan Genobli Parker Spurs. This is a really young
team and so I just I'm so curious to hear
I hope we get stories of Obviously it was awful
(19:31):
the scenes outside their hotel when the Spurs got back
to the hotel and had to get off the bus.
But I'm talking about when they're back at the hotel
together as a team behind closed doors flying back to
San Antonio today, Like what was that flight? Like who's
trying to get them past this? Because again, the Knicks
comeback historic, but it was a collapse for the Ages.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
And that's where we're at. Mitch Johnson obviously a fantastic
run to this point, but we look at all these
these games where it's like, all right, you've got it,
You've got this figured out, and is do we just
chalk it up to inexperience both his uh and the
average age of the squad. I mean, Wemby's got forty
four minutes yesterday even though they had that massive lead. Like,
(20:14):
there's just a lot of questions to this point for me.
Speaker 4 (20:17):
Yeah, No, they they were coaching mistakes, There were player mistakes,
nerves were a factor. All these things are true. But
then like like even today the last two minute report
comes out, it was like Stefan Castle didn't step out
a bound actually should have been a foul Like that
Does that help? Right?
Speaker 2 (20:36):
No?
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Exactly?
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Like again like they and look, it wouldn't It will
not surprise me if the Spurs can bounce back and
win game five and force the Knicks to finish this
in New York. But it also I don't think would
be terribly surprising if they don't recover because it was
that it was that painful, and like I said, even
tomorrow just doing me when Mitch Johnson and Victor Webbinyama
(21:02):
and I don't know, Fox will take a turn at
the podium, but like, these guys are going to have
to get up there again and talk about it again,
and that's going to be a painful experience.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
NBA insider Mark Stein our guest Jason Smith macrmon live
from the Fox Sports Radio studios. All right, so through
the first four games of this series, now to look
at it from the Knicks perspective, what surprised you the
most about this team first four games, whether it's overall
a player in a game. What surprised you the most
about this team that.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
They were able to win the first couple with Brunson
shooting the ball far below his usual standard. We were
how many I'm sure you guys on the show were
talking about Karl anthonytown playing the best basketball of his life.
Carl Anthony Towns his first fourth quarter points in this
series were last night. Yeah, he made that corner three.
(21:52):
Like the Knicks. That's the thing about the Knicks is
they're getting it from a lot of different places and
they're just they have a lot of confidence, and let's
face it, they've pulled off comebacks like this before. You know,
they did this to Cleveland in the last round down
twenty two to one, Like they've made a habit of
coming back from twenty plus the last two postseasons. I mean,
(22:17):
they are a very tough and together team.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Mark. One of the things we've talked about a little
bit on air, the Wenby problem, not that you have
to contend with him and try to defend him, but
the aggression. Now you add another flagrant file from him
and a super cut of chippiness starting to really evolve here.
How does the league adjudicate curb that, what could they
(22:42):
do internally or is it just we've seen it on
the big stage a lot, so it's just fresh in
our consciousness.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Well, because of the way the game ended, that's not
really foremost among San Antonio's issues right now. Had San
Antonio carried on with their twenty seven point lead and
won that game like they should have, I think that
would be a dominant storyline today, because, of course, you
had the shove of Jalen Brunson early in Game three,
(23:16):
and the league could have assessed a retroactive flagrant foul
and decided not to, and then Wemby gets a flagrant
in Game four. Had they given the retroactive flagrant in
Game three, he'd now be on four flagrant foul points
and he'd have to be suspended for a game. So
(23:36):
had the Spurs one, I think that actually would have
been one of the loudest talking points in this series.
But the ending and the absolute hole that the Spurs
now find themselves in have kind of overshadowed all that,
and they frankly have larger problems.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
You know, just hearing them talk, Mark, I kind of
feel like when I hear Mitch Johnson talking the Spurs talk.
They do a lot of well, it's not them, it's us.
It's not them, it's us. And at some point I
want to I want to want them to say, don't
you realize that it's forty eight minutes. It's not we
played well for the first thirty minutes, but the last
eight team don't count. Like I feel like that's kind
of where the Spurs are when they're talking about this series.
(24:18):
I'm not really addressing why they're down three to one.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
The three to one lead isn't enough. You need you
need the Spurs.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Mark, we got two days till Game five, Mark, we
need something. We got two days, We got two days.
Speaker 4 (24:37):
He's on, don't don't get don't get greedy. You're doing
you're you're ahead of the game.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Right now. I was gonna say, is is Hurricanes won?
The Mets have actually won a game. Yeah, you got
the Nixon the verge of this.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
What do his Hurricanes? Where did that come from?
Speaker 1 (24:54):
Well? I was I'm a Whaler fan, so like I
got both. My every day is sports stress for me. Mark.
I go from the Knicks to the Rcanes, the Nicks
to the Hurricanes. So yeah, this has been this has
been a last ten days. I didn't I didn't think
I'd ever have to worry about.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
I didn't know.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
I didn't know you were a Whaler's guy. That makes sense, though.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Yeah, it's it's insane. I my teams don't win like
they go like like my entire life, nobody wins anything.
And now I got two teams playing in the finals
at the same time. He's on Twitter at the steinline.
That is at the steinline. Check him out on substack
as well. Mark is always appreciated, my friend. Maybe the
next time we talk, we're talking about the champion Knicks.
(25:31):
We're talking about Game six. Have a great week. Enjoy
the game, my friend.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
Enjoy it. You're enjoy it. You guys enjoy it too.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
We'll talk to I appreciate you, Mark. There goes Mark Stein,
like it's not enough. I was talking more for the
Spurs than I was for I didn't need them to
say great things about the Knicks. But I kind of
feel like, you know a little bit, you want to
understand that. Okay, Hey, it's not just about the leads
that we get to it. There's the rest of the
game too, Like there's the other eighteen minutes that boy
who really struggled with You know what, there's a long
(25:58):
off season once you're a limit and aed and clear
out your locker to say and cause you get to
do the thing. Remember Jim Varney when he was on
and Homer went and the Carnies got over on him. Yeah,
and then Homer got him back at the end, and
then the mantra was we were beaten by the best. Yes,
that's what you want. Until it's over, you're not giving
(26:18):
him any credit. I kind of respect it. Time out
to find out what's trending in the wide world of
sports with someone who's been called the Mitch Johnson. Hey,
a Fox Sports Radio go ahead.
Speaker 5 (26:30):
From Jason Smith, from Mike Carmon and from Alex tie Shirt.
Bringing you renowned global accomplishments from K pop like BTS,
Black Pink and Evo, gaining great foods like kim chi,
Korean barbecue and Korean fried chicken. There's no better way
to start the World Cup off than getting the win
and going into the next group game.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeart Radio.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Wow, hey, very nice, and you hit the post very nice,
love the post, very nice, very nice. I like to
feel like I had a hand in that all these years, knowing,
like hearing that song so often, knowing when you had
to stop talking, thank you, I feel like I had
(27:22):
a hand in that. That was very good, Thank you.
So that was great, that was very good. You've influenced him?
Did you just a time for good? Did you just
AI or chat GPT, like, hey, good things from South
Korea and just read right off there?
Speaker 5 (27:34):
I swear I went to Google and just typed in
famous things from Korea? Okay, very good and right off
the list. Are you sure that all those bands besides
BTS are real? Those ones I've listened to? Yes, okay,
I was in the anime scene that I've listened to. Yeah,
I've listened to all right, very good. You were the
one who talked crap on Lisa, not me.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
No, no, no, no, I'm just I was just asking
a question.
Speaker 5 (27:51):
No, but I played that song that had golden at
a bunch like.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
I know, but it was it was just saying the
word too often over it all? What happens when they score.
Go to Will Withers lovely Day, lovely Day, lovely Day,
eighteen times. You're going after Bill Withers eighteen times Bill Day.
No one, no one, no one, no no, no, yeah no,
I don't like that either.
Speaker 4 (28:12):
No.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
But lovely lovely day, lovely day eighteen times. Every single
time in that song lovely Day, lovely Day, lovely day,
you probably hate a live version of hate jug yeah,
dirty rat lovely day, lovely day. It was too much
of the same words, over and over again. It's again,
it was just too much. I feel like that's a
trigger for something in my brain that's gonna explode when
(28:35):
you say that. I hope not keep playing it over
Scam and Jason, which which camera you looking into?
Speaker 5 (28:42):
You just have to remember when it's something good, you
want more of it. I want more goals. Okay, all right,
that's fine.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Okay. Now, speaking of more goals, I'm gonna give this
to you. You want a Big Bowl prediction for the
United States tomorrow Paraguay first game. And I just every
time I say I keep thinking of the line from
Knives Out, Oh Marta fantastic families from Paraguay. They keep
getting the country wrong. They never get it right, like
martyrs from Paraguay, Brazil, Ecuador, you know, great families from Ecuador.
(29:08):
Right the United States. We talked about them earlier in
the show. Maybe they're the Knicks. Maybe they're just waiting
for the World Cup to start because things have been
haven't been trending great. There's still a big question mark
about this Greatest generation. But I will give you one
guarantee because I've seen it in the World Cup before
(29:29):
and this is kind of the United States. This is
kind of there part of their identity. They want to
get out big right away. They will score at least
once in the first ten minutes of tomorrow's game. They're
at home, they're here, they want to get out big.
We've seen it before now, granted in the Clintsman era
it was hey, Clint Dempsey, you know, they would get
(29:51):
a goal in the first ten minutes. Say we're gonna
sit on this thing. Part, We're gonna try to win
one nothing. They will score at least once, at least
once in the first ten minutes tomorrow against Paraguay. Would
you believe that the over under in this game is
only two and a half goals?
Speaker 3 (30:06):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (30:06):
I'd love the over on this one. I would love
the over on this What's beautiful about this is just
the unknown, right. This is legitimately as close to a
sporting version of Christmas Morning with this squad, because I
really have no idea what to expect, right, new coach,
We've had a couple of friendlies and great and you've
seen some good things. It comes down to, you know,
(30:28):
Captain America, will he finally live up to the tag?
And I know he's rising all the lists, scoring and everything.
When policit scores, good things happen for this squad. We've
seen the record, we've seen the style of play, but
we don't have any of the external nonsense that's gone
on in the past, right, not a lot of fighting
(30:49):
in the media, it seems relatively. I don't know if
that's good or bad. Right, Sometimes you need a little
unrest shake it up, right, right, But this is about
his calm, a preamble to a big tournament as the
US has had in as long as I, you and
I have been doing the show. Yeah, sure, No, Look,
I feel like it's more instead of the nerves about
(31:10):
the controversy and no confidence in the coach and can
he get the guys on the same page, which has
been a mark of the last couple of teams, you know, Burholter,
going back the end of Klinsman, back to Clins right,
that's kind of been what it is for the United States.
Has been okay going in, We feel like we have
young talent, but boy, they don't seem like they're on
the same page. It seems like the coach is doing
(31:30):
one thing. Like Klinsman was US soccer for a little while,
and there was a there was a tiny bit of
time where you felt like, hey, this is gonna work,
and then it didn't. And then Burholter took over and
nobody was happy, and the team didn't look like they
played at their highest level. Uh throughout the course under
Greg Burholter, and and it didn't look like they were
they were they were always as motivated as needed to be.
(31:53):
And that was always the question going in was just hey,
this is not just are we good enough? This is
more do we have stuff going on off the pitch
and off the field that is really overwhelming us? Now
at least it's been replaced by just nerves of are
we good enough? So I feel like that's a big
step in the right direction. Oh absolutely yeah. I mean
you cancel out the outside noise. We've talked about it
(32:15):
with all these other series with your Nicks and the
Spurs and what they're trying to calm down as they
go back to San Antonio for Game five. But it's
very much that same thing with the US men's national team,
as there's always been the run up and the build
up to try to crown next, which is always a
dangerous thing, especially when nobody's really stepped to the front.
(32:37):
Now again, Polisa is that guy on this squad, but
and has worn it about as well as you can.
But when every big thought piece leading into an event
is all right, is it finally their time? Will it
ever be their time? Like it's the same recycled first
(32:58):
two paragraphs. We change the name, changed the coach, and
then there's a massive indictment on the way soccer is
run and filtered and talent filtered through in the US system. Right,
that's the same thing in every one of these scenarios,
now being the host nation, having a group that it
looks like and again it's all on paper. Right, That's
(33:19):
the beauty and horror of soccer of hockey as we
watch it. Right, it's a funny game. You can dominate
for well, hell, basketball's now become that game too. You
can dominate a team for a vast majority of a
game and it takes one bounce, it takes one throw in.
Oh yeah, I mean we watched this game with Korea.
(33:41):
I was like, all right, you controlled most of the action.
Everything's great. No, there's a throw in where this guy
can get it halfway across the box and you have
no idea what's gonna happen. Like, that's the weird thing
in soccer. Right, goalie makes a decision that leaves him
or her six inches to the left, right or not
to having a clean field of vision on what should
(34:02):
be a stop of ball. Right, we watched a five
hole goal earlier. It's like, how does he? Why did
he not?
Speaker 5 (34:07):
What?
Speaker 1 (34:08):
Yeah? That but that's soccer. Like it's a game of
inches and one mistake and for the US, while everything
lines up to what should be a pretty phenomenal run
and you've got the home field advantage, all of these things,
you have no idea. And I think it's exciting and
terrifying at the same time. Yeah, I mean, it's it is,
and it's exciting, and I feel like there's this quiet
(34:31):
undercurrent of confidence that may be completely wrong, right, Like right, no,
I get that, you know, say, because it's really surprised
me in the last couple of weeks, the positive outlook
that there's been from the soccer media on the United States. Right,
it's really surprised me because I felt like, Okay, we've
(34:52):
seen the team play, We've seen Poachtino picking players. It's
a weird it's a weird lineup, right, It's a weird roster. Uh,
you know, he took he took twenty defenders, and I
think they're gonna play. They're gonna play, you know, a
ten to two system. So it's a weird line.
Speaker 4 (35:08):
Right.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
If they get into some sort of difficulty injury wise
in the middle of the field, that's gonna be difficult
for us. But you know, but I feel like there's
this confidence level under it all that I don't know
where it's coming from. Now. Clearly the talent should be here,
because this should be the Golden generation. Time we've watched
these guys for the past couple of World Cups, the
World Cup cycles rather, and they should be there. This
(35:30):
should be when polistic leads us everywhere. We have a
great draw, right, the absolute draw. We should win the
group and get out, and then that would be a
great matchup in the round of sixteen, and then who
knows where we're at, right, So that's what should be.
We don't win the group, suddenly that round of sixteen
draw is gonna be really, really difficult. But there's this
confidence and I'm trying to say where is it coming from?
(35:51):
Like what is it out there? Because we haven't really
seen this team play, right, Like is that overall confidence?
In poach Tino? Is it overall cup? But he had
to play these two friendlies leading up to the World Cup,
mainly because he's picking such a different roster and they're
playing a little bit of a different way that we've
ever played, and they've not played together. They need this
time to play together, right, So it's weird to say,
(36:12):
why are they playing these friendlies so close? Well, you know, hey,
these other teams are playing the friendlies too, So I'm like,
where is this coming from? Because I'm looking to try
to pinpoint where this confidence is at. But there's so
much of it, and I don't know if it's just
if it's just a misdiagnosis of I just want to
feel positive. I just want to feel like it's our
(36:33):
time because it is in the United States. We are
the host nation. We're gonna get whatever breaks the host
nation normally gets like I don't know where it's from.
But in the end, again, I feel like if I
was this questionable about the Knicks going into the playoffs,
where I said, hey, yes, defensively they're playing better, but
overall they still haven't really meshed. There was the big
(36:56):
part and I said this going in, going after these
deep runs the left last couple of years, maybe they're
just waiting for the playoffs and and veteran teams, teams
that have played together, they're just waiting for the playoffs
and the Knicks that's what they were waiting for to
get to the playoffs, and and for Kat to become
the facilitator. That's what they were waiting for. So I
am gonna open the door to that that maybe this
(37:16):
is just the United States waiting for the for the
actual World Cup to start and they're gonna show us
some stuff. And I get Look, they're in an overmatch bracket,
and that's what you happen when you're the host country,
you get that. And I expect a big result to
Morrogan's Paraguay. I expect for to one something like that
could be the final score where for the most part
the United States plays well but a couple of brain cramps,
because that's clearly what the United States has been over
(37:38):
the last you know, a few games. But I expect
a big outcome tomorrow and the emotion and running out
on this and and to give us some optimism, even
though I struggle to find where it is. It's weird,
I struggle to find I think I'll do this right,
It's all right, let's go. Let's go to the odds.
Let's because we got some numbers to go with it.
To go to the math implied odds eighty eight percent
(37:59):
that they had made. It's from the group cool eighteen
to one that they reached the final forty to one
that they win it. All right, so we got long odds.
I think some of it goes back to just that base,
like two hundred and fiftieth year. We're trying to find
some positivity in this world, right, Look at even people
that kind of hate the Knicks are kind of on
(38:22):
board because they like the guys. At this point. I
don't think anybody hates the next. I think they just
hate Knicks fans. No, no, no, I think they're just
they hate fans the next they love. Everybody loves the
next everybody. No, no, no, the Knicks fans. But the Knicks,
even when they were terrible, when Taylor Swift was at
those games and they were seventeen and sixty sixty five,
they were still part of the national television package, so
(38:44):
you still had to watch them even though they sucked.
So there is a residual hatred. Hey, Thursday night, Great,
I'm gonna watch the gang. Get me started. What's the matchup?
It's the Cavaliers and the Knicks. Damn it, it's the
Knicks a game. But so I think there's some of
it just for the positivity. I think it's all so
the business like approach and at the time, and it's
like kind of curious, right when the final cuts they
(39:06):
got cut by email. There were no hey, come into
the office, let's talk about where your your deficiencies are whatever. No, guys,
just got an email. We're moving on. And and and
the fact that in the past we had so many
three ring circuses, backbiting, family squabbles, lawsuits, whatever else. None
of that's here. It's all just been about the soccer,
(39:29):
which is which is rare, right, So I think it
breeds some positivity, just that we're not fighting all of
these other imaginary windmills and monsters and actually just going
and playing soccer. But again that that's sort of the uh,
the misappropriation of of of confidence is that, well, we're
(39:49):
not talking about an absolute train wreck, just just an
average train wreck. But that's the thing. All right, we
could be over here. We're at least on the right
track at this point, I'll tell you. But I do
expect I expect a big game tomorrow. I expect them
to come out big and and and look again, just
like the Knicks, I'm leaving open that possibility. They're waiting
for the World Cup. This is this is a talented team.
(40:09):
It's our golden generation. They're waiting for this World Cup. Well,
they play a full ninety attacking minutes as opposed to
whatever that was Mexico did earlier today. Well, they did
have a lot of red cards. There were a lot
of red cards in that against the other team wore
red cards and goals in that kid. Yeah, well that's
say two two uh an opponent one of their own weight,
(40:30):
which is just, I mean, just a bad decision. But
like you got the announcers going gold, differential can still matter,
Like why are you guys? They're down two players? Why
are you playing around? Hopefully the US does not do
the same exit about a Fresco exit swollen down The
Jason Smith Show with my best friend Mike Carmon Coming
up next we get back into the NBA Finals. You're
(40:51):
not gonna believe where the latest trolling of the Spurs
collapse came from. Tonight. That's next right here, Jason and
Mike Fox Radio. If you're skilled and manufacturing, your next
job shouldn't be hard to find and it shouldn't slow
your career down. Express Employment professionals connect skilled workers with
contract and full time manufacturing jobs and companies that need
(41:12):
talent right now. Go to expresspros dot com to find
a location near you. Your local Express office understands manufacturing
and works with companies at every level of production. That
means real opportunities for machinists, welders, assemblers, quality control inspectors,
maintenance technicians, production managers and more. When you turn to
Express Employment Professionals for your job search, you're working with
(41:34):
a staffing leader in manufacturing, backed by global resources, with
local teams who know the industry and the employers in
your community. Whether you're looking to build your skills, take
the next step in your career, or find a new
opportunity in manufacturing, Express is ready to help connect you
where you're needed most. The online job search can be
frustrating a black hole of applications. Call your local Express
office to put people back in the hiring process. Visit
(41:56):
expresspros dot com to find your local Express Employment professional's
office today. Hey, that's Expresspros dot com. Expresspros dot com.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific
Hosts And Creators
Jason Smith
Mike Harmon
Popular Podcasts
Hey Jonas!
Hey Jonas! The official Jonas Brothers podcast. Hosted by Kevin, Joe, and Nick Jonas. It’s the Jonas Brothers you know... musicians, actors, and well, yes, brothers. Now, they’re sharing another side of themselves in the playful, intimate, and irreverent way only they can. Spend time with the Jonas Brothers here and stay a little bit longer for deep conversations like never before.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com