June 23, 2020 • 45 mins
Jason Smith and Mike Harmon react to the news of what looks like a confirmed MLB season happening. USA Today's Bob Nightengale joins the guys to break down the details of the upcoming MLB season. Bubba Wallace and NASCAR are giving us hope, and Jason breaks down an important element to quarantines within the return of sports. Plus, Jason tells you exactly how the next few years will go for Jamal Adams.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the best of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmen 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 I Heart Radio app by
searching fs R. This is the best of The Jason
(00:23):
Smith Show with Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio. Greetings
and welcome inside The Jason Smith Show with my bast
friend Mike Harmen. Happy Monday. Does we navigate the waters
of maybe a baseball season. Maybe Dak Prescott's rich, but
(00:45):
is he really really rich? Jamal Adams wants out way
till he find out what's actually gonna happen to him.
But Mike Harmon, we may have a baseball season now.
It may not be the baseball season that any of
us wanted and of us thought we were gonna get.
It may not be the season the players want, may
not be the season the owners want, may not be
the season the commissioner wants, may not be the season
the media wants. But we're gonna get this baseball season.
(01:07):
It's like, you're gonna get this piece of chocolate cake. Yeah,
but you kind of look, there's a band aid and
it that came off your finger when you were making it.
Doesn't matter eat the chocolate cake. You'd read around that. Uh,
you'd wolf down that band aid so fast you wouldn't
even know it was there. That actually happened onceince why,
I have no doubt it did. It might have happened
multiple times. You just don't know, you know, no, just
(01:28):
just to start with it because this that's made me
think of it. One time, Um, when we were back
at in Detroit with my wife's family for Christmas. Everybody
makes food, like that's the whole thing or family. Everybody
makes food. They make fudge, they make butterhorn cookies, they
make all kinds of stuff. And uh, Pam's grandmother was
making stuffing once and and she had, you know, cut
her finger at some point. She had a band aid
(01:50):
on her on the top of her finger, at the
top of her pinky finger. And so you know, everybody's
making food and all this stuff. And of course the
stuffing comes out and there's band baked and stuff songs.
There's only one and I was like, I don't know,
I havenna eat the stuffing. I mean, I don't know
what got cooked. Now. We got cooked well enough though
(02:10):
that it would have been sterilized. No, you know, you know,
you're absolutely right. All I do is take it out.
But I'm like, I don't know that eat this stuffing.
I don't know. There's nothing wrong and nothing wrong with it,
did nothing. It was just it was like, I'm not
gonna eat the stuffing, all right. Well, I mean, you
know it's your choice. It was your loss. Uh, you
may have gotten yourself some more muskrat dinner instead, but
(02:31):
I know, I get it. It's it's all good. But yeah,
it's the idea right now of as you followed it
over the course of the day, and going back the
last couple of weeks, all the leaks, all the little
test balloons that came from two or three guys in
Major League Baseball, did everybody else in Major League Baseball
reporting quit? It's like Nightingale passing and that three guys
(02:54):
everybody else just decided I'm done. I'm watching I'm binge
watching something in my basement. At least, that's it. That's it.
That's what listen, we have we got the three of them.
We got John palum Rose, that's all we need. And
we got We actually have Bob Nightingale coming up a
little over an hour from now. He's gonna be on
the show with us, a friend of the show. I
didn't mean to dismiss JP, but just like four hundred
(03:14):
thousand dollars based on based on bets and predictions to me,
and you know, I wanted to let him off the hook.
But here's where we are with the news that came
down late this afternoon, early this evening, as baseball owners
have voted to proceed with the season under the March agreement. Now,
(03:35):
this was the agreement that we thought was coming all along,
that Rob Manford had the power to implement a fifty
to sixty game regular season with the schedule of his choosing.
When the two sides got together in March, the beginning
of the coronavirus outbreak, they ruled it, Okay, we're gonna
come back, and everybody's gonna take less money. Okay, that's fine.
And now obviously that the heart of these negotiations the
(03:55):
past few weeks have been the players felt they gave
up enough money and the owners said, we need more
money from you. This is where we're at. We could
never get past it. Every offer the owners gave to
the players, the players didn't want. Every counter offer the
owners either said no to or didn't even vote on.
So it got to the point over the past twenty
four hours where the players said, you have to give
us this schedule because we want to be able to
(04:17):
go back at you and have legal ramifications to come
after you because you screwed us over in March. We
don't want to have to say okay to expanded playoffs
because it's something you really want. We don't want to
give that up. So let's figure this out. You give
us your your fifty to sixty game schedule, and it's
gonna be pro fully pro rated pay, and we will
come play for this couple of months. Now the owners
(04:40):
have okayed that plan, so now the players are going
to have to okay it as well. Uh. And now
that's going to be the final domino, or the final
hurdle to getting major League Baseball that would ostensibly begin
with spring training in a week. Because what's going on
with the proposal to the players is UH. Two of
the things that Manford needs to know is that one
(05:01):
players can show up in a week for spring training
or summer training, and two they feel safe enough with
the guidelines with the coronavirus, because, oh, by the way,
with all of this going on, the coronavirus has said, hey,
don't forget about me. Don't forget I know deaths are
down and everything, but hey, we're spiking in a lot
of states. We're spiking out, We're spiking all over the place.
People in their twenties and thirties are all getting coronavirus,
(05:22):
So don't forget about us. So now this is gonna
be part of what goes on with Major League Baseball
and the owner. So while Rob Manford is gonna have
this schedule out, we still have to figure out what
the players are going to be okay with. If they
say okay to these two things, we're going to have baseball,
or at least they're gonna try to play baseball. Now,
the two things might come in off of this is
the first one is that I I don't know what
(05:45):
kind of season we're gonna have, and I don't mean
are the fate. Look, look we're gonna love it. Fans
are gonna love it. If they can, if they can
play baseball, we're gonna love seeing it with something we've
never seen a sixty game regular season. How many players
are gonna be on there? How many how many rounds
of laofus who they're gonna be We're gonna get the
designated hitter uh universally this year. Most likely, we're gonna
get a lot of great stuff, and we're gonna be excited.
(06:07):
And I hope we can just blot out the the
the vileness and the venom that is gonna be spewed
back and forth daily between the players and the owners,
because this is not one of those Hey we were
at odds for a long time, but hey, we come
together and here's Tony Clark and Rob Manford shaking hands
and we're ready to go, ready to play. Sorry it
took so long, you know, us baseball players, we we
(06:28):
gotta figure everything out. No, this is one of those
agreements that you're being forced into. So you're gonna see
players complaining about all kinds of stuff when they go
to spring training. When they're playing in the season, they're
gonna be throwing shots at the owners. Owners are gonna
be coming back. Rob Manford's gonna try to keep the
peace and it's not gonna work. Some players are just
gonna walk out. I bet some players are gonna show
up and say, not feeling safe, not doing it, I'm leaving.
(06:49):
You know, We've avery had a couple of MLB uh
NBA players say I'm not gonna go to the bubble
in Orlando for a couple of reasons. But you throw
this kind of animosity with the players and and and
the owners. This is what the season is gonna be.
A gonna be sniping and barking back and forth for
the entire fifty game schedule, the playoffs, and when the
Mets win the World Series, they're gonna be all I'm
complaining about stuff is they're holding up the trophy. So
(07:09):
that's what we're gonna have. It's kind of you're gonna have.
It's a dead sprint right off the jump. So I
mean that's a for fans get excited, uh if, unless
your team just has a terrible two weeks to start thing,
because then you're done and you're already packing it in.
But it adds all sorts of extra motivation to to
(07:31):
try to to make this work. You're gonna have the
I don't think so thinly veiled shots. I mean, we
saw the Trevor Bauer tweet. I mean that's the one
that's making the rounds all over the place right now.
It's absolute death for this industry to keep acting as
it has been. Both sides were driving the bus straight
off a cliff. How is this good for anyone involved?
(07:53):
COVID nineteen already presented a lose, lose, lose situation, and
we've somehow found a way to make it worse incredible,
and then the slap the forehead b g off the
back end of it, because again the CBA is sitting
out there in in short order, right we got and
then the potential for all hell to break loose again
(08:15):
based on how they've operated here we look at the
revenues and this is where the books and ordering all
that information to be passed with full, full uh transparency
more so than ever, to try to make sure they
don't get right back into another stoppage, because that'd be
(08:35):
the death knew, right. Uh, you have this situation, and
I know everybody keeps saying they should do it for
the good of the country and all that stuff. No, no, no,
if you've got leverage, as in your someone who can
do something at the one percent of one percent, right,
I mean we're talking you know, nobody else can go
in and put on the show you do that. Yeah,
(08:56):
you've got leverage, so you want to use it. What
I keep waiting for, We've talked about it a lot, Jason,
is when's the leak of that March agreement. When does
that show up to where we start seeing exactly what
was agreed to in terms of all the the antilator stuff,
because I can't imagine the owners were dumb enough to
sign something saying yeah, we'll pay you flat out, you
(09:17):
know for the games we play, you know the pro
raded and that there were no considerations for all the
other streams of income for the game. I just can't
believe that that was left out. Otherwise you have to
fire every one of those high priced lawyers UH from
the firms that negotiated that, because that's just pour on
(09:37):
every level, right. I mean, you wouldn't do that trade
and baseball cards on the UH on the parking lot
when you were in your your period period off rights
recess and you're going, hey, I'll give you my mark
McGuire for a couple of your Sammy sosas, because I
want the local guy know, uh you you were still
gonna have someone else looking over the deal to make
(09:59):
sure it didn't go around with billions of dollars at steak.
I can't believe it was so blindly and poorly attended
to without without more so, I think we're gonna get
more details out of that before this is done. Buckle up.
This is gonna be something. I mean, it's gonna be
that kind of It's gonna be two months where Rob
Manfred's gonna go. Can we please just get through this
season and finish it? Can we just try to finish
(10:20):
it and go and move everything? You know, the whole
thing is Jason Smith, Mike Carmen, Fox Sports Radio. The
whole thing is that and what you come back to it.
As I said last week, I keep coming back to
the old Nick Packay quote when when, uh, who whose
advantage here? The advantages push? There are no winners here.
I mean there there, there, there's nobody. I mean, we
win a little bit as fans because we're gonna get
baseball most likely as long as the players don't say, oh,
(10:42):
there's something else you feel like about this deal we
asked for and then you gave it to us, and
now we still don't like it. Is that both sides
in a pandemic couldn't come together. They decided to use
the pandemic as a literal political baseball to get into
the c b A and what players feel they are
owed and not owed, and and the owners were more
(11:03):
than willing to play along with it. Both sides decided,
we're gonna use this pandemic as a way to kick
start c b A and tell you this is what
we want. This is what we want, this is what
we think we should get, this is what we're ready
to give you. And that that's what's shameful about this
is that every other sport, everybody's got labor issues. Right.
The NFL has labor issues all the time. Players would love,
(11:23):
players love to be in a room alone with Roger
Adell just for five minutes, you know, and go over
some labor negotiations. The same thing happens in the NHL.
Everywhere everywhere there's labor strife, but only in Major League
Baseball does it get to this point. But even in
a pandemic, every other sport figured it out every other sport,
and baseball decided, Nope, we're gonna use this as as
as a reason a shoehorning our way in to make
(11:47):
this about the c b A instead of saying, what
can we do but humanly to get this done? And
it's both sides have done it. They look how many
times we've done shows in the past couple of weeks
where he said, boy, the owners really know what they're
doing today. Boy, this is a great day for the players.
Are what the hell are the players doing today? And boy,
this is a good day for the owners. The bottom
line is in a pandemic when people are dying, we're
trying to figure out safe ways to get to play
(12:08):
baseball and have have sports come back. You're getting this
kind of season where neither side wants it and they're
just pushing their way to it. That's what's really shameful
about this that this is this is how baseball figured out,
This is how we get to a baseball season by
being pushed to it. Well, I don't blame either side though,
you're trying to protect your interests. You know, everybody's saying
(12:28):
the owners should just be okay with taking less money.
Ask all the business owners that can't by laws, haven't
been able to have any money, right they they'd rather
work by some mutant rules that not be allowed to
do it at all. Right, the estimate is that some
sev or eight percent of your restaurants are gonna go under.
(12:49):
For the players, they're risking their health. Not quite to
the level that Blake Snell put it out right in
risking my life. I don't I don't know. I mean,
there's the small, very small percentage chance, as we know,
with more and more data at our disposal. But you're
in a position of leverage to try to make sure
for whatever percentage of the season you're playing that you
(13:10):
can get your own. I can't blame a guy or
a group of guys for holding out to try to
make that happen. Now, you hit a point a couple
of weeks ago where we had all the hey, just
tell us when and where and just be done with it,
all right, So that seemed like it was here comes
man for with a giant fake gavel. Maybe it's squeaks,
maybe it doesn't, I don't know. Whatever it is, all right,
(13:31):
here's my order, and and let's get to work. And
then it took another two weeks of posturing to get
to that, right, I mean, go back to this. It's
what eighty nine days since they signed the temporary agreement
to say, hey, let's get back to work, and then
we're still fighting eighty nine days later. So I I
get it that the frustration of of fans just saying
(13:53):
just play baseball. But I can understand from the business
side of both both just trying to make sure they
get what they want, knowing that it informs next year
and the next ten years, twenty years, thirty. I mean,
why why didn't have to be that way? Though? Well,
why couldn't it just be just like everybody else, Hey,
let's figure it out for this year and then we'll
fig then our labor stuff. We'll we'll get to in
the off season. Why why every other sport did every
(14:15):
other sport figured out Okay, here's we're gonna do for money.
The NBA letting players stay home. It's not that big
a deal with the NBA and NHL or trying to
figure out how to get the rest of their money.
There are Major League season right but major League Baseball
is coming back. They're playing the same number of games
about as as the NBA, they're gonna come back and
play fifty or sixty games on the playoffs. It's two
months and then the playoffs, which is basically what the
(14:37):
NBA is going to do. I mean you you could
have figured that part out and so, okay, it doesn't
need to be about next year, doesn't need about Okay,
what do we do for this year? Let's do this,
this makes sense. Let's let's come together on this. But
there was no coming together because they both decided this
is business and we are it's it's it's just like
going to the mattresses, right, going in the Godfather, that's
what we're going to. The mattresses were when really it's
(14:57):
it's a pandemic. This wasn't the labor negotiation and the
c b A is expiring. This was something that was
completely human and still Baseball couldn't figure it out. No. Sure,
but next year you say, the pandemic, you know, disappears.
We're able to snap our fingers and it's gone. I
know that's not the case, but bear with me for
a minute. Let's go to fantasy land. If that's the
case and everything's back at normal. You don't think they're
(15:21):
using the numbers from this year to try to inform
what goes on next year. That everybody's gonna play nice sandbox. Well,
we're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars, billions of
dollars at stake. They they both want there to be full, right,
both want to be you know, pushing away from that
band aid you know, casserole, that band aid stuffing, feeling
(15:44):
like they've eaten enough like that. How I brought your
band aid stuffing back into the mix. Uh. They want
to because they know the next negotiation, if they gave
anything up, even for next year, the numbers were gonna
be much different, and we're gonna be right back to
the same thing and the same match of everybody fighting
through it all. So I think they went to the mattresses, right,
(16:06):
take it out and let's let's fight. 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 I Heart Radio app Our
two of the program, Welcome inside the Jason Smith Show
with my best friend Mike Harmen. We got Bob Nightingale
(16:27):
coming up in twenty minutes USA Today Baseball Insider with
all the details on what could be the new Major
League Baseball season, and they'll be Commissioner Rob Manford's gonna
put in a sixty game season, just waiting for the
players Tony Clark Player Association to say, Okay, we're good,
and then we could have spring training beginning in like
a week and a half. That's how close we could
(16:49):
beat to it. Um. So we got that coming up
in twenty minutes. But you know, two other big stories
that that have kind of dominated the headlines over the
course of the past seventy hours. And we talked a
few minutes ago about Bubba Wallace, a NASCAR driver who
found a noose in his garage over the weekend and
all the controversy and attention that was on that over
(17:11):
the course of the past couple of days. And to
see NASCAR band together the way they did in support
of of him after this ridiculously racist act that I
can't believe actually happened, when you didn't even have this
is supposed to be people that are just working with NASCAR,
you know, I mean, that's and that's the insane part
(17:32):
of this is that this isn't where somebody could not
that it would have been accepted, of course not. It's
horrendously racist and to have that this person is going
to go to jail and they should go to jail.
Uh well, you're also talking about it. They're affiliated with
the team, right, this is where exactly right, they're affiliated
with the team. Now you're talking about potential suspension or
banishment for team members, sponsors, the whole nine. Ye know.
(17:54):
I mean this really there's a trickle down effect that
could be felt, uh pending the investigation, because now you
got the FBI involved. I mean, this is getting everybody
from the highest order and to investigate exactly what happened here. Yeah,
this wasn't somebody who sounds somehow found a way to
you know, get under a rope and you know left
this there. This is potentially somebody who could be how
(18:15):
did they get in when it's only inside people that
are allowed there. And you know today they had the
race got postponed due to weather and Bubba Wallas did
did very well today but uh, you know he even
got was in the top five for a while and
then he you know, he faded out at the end,
but he still had a pretty decent race. I don't
know how the guy raced at all with what's going
on in the past forty eight hours. Some people can
just block stuff like that out and and and and
(18:36):
go do it and and for him to do that
is amazing. But you know, we talk a lot about
photos that, for some reason, you just know when they're
gonna become iconic and they're gonna be something that's just
different from here's a big celebratory photo of a team
winning a championship or something else. And you know that
the photo of Kauai hitting the jumper last year in
the playoffs, falling out of bounds in Game seven, that's
(18:58):
one of those photos that you you, oh, my god,
I could look at this picture for the rest of
my life. It's so incredibly interesting. And you know, we
had another one of those today. The selfie that Bubba
Wallace took before the race with all the other drivers
with COVID masks on uh with support behind him and
and the the sports standing with Bubba Wallace today was
(19:19):
a very big and and and trending hashtag for a while.
And this photo is so incredibly powerful that here's a
sport that is in the midst of of dealing with
the backlash from the Confederate flag being taken away and
not using the sport anymore. And now you know, there's
still people that want to be able to use it
because they say it still means a lot to them
and they want to fly it outside of NASCAR races.
(19:40):
But to see this picture of Bubba Wallace in front
and everybody else standing with him, standing behind him is
so powerful. The only thing was Richard Petty was looking
you know, he's like kind of turning the other way.
That's the one thing. I'm like, there's the King. There's
look at the King. He's looking at the other way, like,
but he doesn't know when when the picture is being taken.
Obviously he's you know somebody who I have said his
name or something else. I'm like, well, he's turning to
(20:01):
look the other way because you can't miss him. I mean,
you can't miss him right there. But this this picture
is just so incredibly iconic. You can see the wave
of people behind him and all the drivers that saying
this is our way forward. And that's that's part of
the point I made a few minutes ago, is that
this is where we're headed in this country now, and
for a long time. Just because something was allowed, it
(20:24):
doesn't mean it was a good idea. And you know,
you take the Confederate flag, and that falls into it.
Did the Confederate flag mean a lot for people? Sure
it did. I understand that part of it. And the
battles of the South fought. Uh, you know, I I
get that, but in but it's also viewed by many
people as a symbol of racism, of slavery mistreatment, and
(20:45):
I I understand that part of it. And you know,
and and to say, okay, just because the Confederate flag
was allowed for so long doesn't mean it was a
great idea. And should it have been taken care of
a while ago, sure, but they got to it now.
So you know, I I like to say, let's not
celebrate the fact you're incredibly late to the party. Let's
just celebrate that you're here, all right. So you got
to the party and everything you got to the party.
We're good. So here's NASCAR in a very watershed last
(21:08):
few days for them, with with heavy roots in the South,
and here where they are five days later, and and
they're all standing behind the only African American driver saying
we're with you on this, and and and I understand
where the support is. This is, this is what gives
me hope that this is the way the world is headed,
that we're headed away from. Hey, here's some racism that, well,
(21:28):
it's been around for a long time, so we can
just kind of push it to the side. No, we
can't do that anymore. And now we're we're we're attacking
these problems head on. And this is what everybody should
be doing, asking questions, why, why should we why do
we allow this? Okay, let's take a look, and maybe
we don't need the Confederate flag anymore. Uh, here's somebody
who put a noose and Bubba Wallace's garage instead of well,
we gotta do better. I can't believe this. Here's an
(21:48):
incredible moment of solidarity from everybody who's a NASCAR driver.
And and this photo, I mean, I could look at
it forever. I mean I still look at Richard Petty
look at the other way. Yeah, I think, you know,
I think I got an explanation for him though. I
think he was trying to shuffle off and that it
was only supposed to be the driver's and that Bubba
took the snapshot about I don't know, what do you think,
(22:09):
Richard Petty moving at a pretty good rate of speed
to that level? Uh? Maybe another two seconds, uh and
you have the perfect shot of all the drivers. But
either way it u But but that's what I mean.
I mean, yeah, he's you know, it's just funny that
he's he's not. It's like, but when you take it selfie,
how many times you're taking this selfie? It's like, wait,
we gotta do it again. Why Jim had his eyes closed?
(22:30):
I did not have my eyes skills. You see it
right here. I will do it again. We'll do it again.
But that photo is just so incredibly powerful. It's just
such an it's such a great moment. That's it started
so badly this weekend with oh my god, they're gonna
have a race. I have to answer questions about why
a noose is in is in someone's someone's garage, And
it ends this way on Monday with with hope at
(22:52):
the end of it instead of boy, we're now down
to to fighting the battles that we thought we shouldn't
have to fight anymore. That's a you know, to end
this way is a is a really great way. I'll
tell you yeah. I mean you go through the weekend
and I saw the first notice of it right Father's
Day and running around and and I see it as like,
I can't believe that that can't be right, because the
(23:12):
first I saw of it was something being retweeted of,
you know, the non blue check mark variety. So it's like, okay,
all right, let's ferret this out a little bit more.
And then it started coming up all throughout my timeline.
It's like I forget who it was. I saw the
the list of words that that rolled through the anger, sadness, disappointment, shock,
all of those things you have, all those emotions roll
(23:35):
through you in a matter of seconds, like what the hell? Man? Uh,
where what are we doing here? But you've got a
guy in Bubba Wallace who you know, we all have
had adversity in our lives, right, and big moments where
you had to put your head down and go back
to work. Nothing like this, right, illnesses and family family death,
(24:00):
protracted illnesses. I mean, you've worked through stuff. I've worked
through stuff. Everybody out there can relate to that. For
Bubba Wallace to be able to get in his ride
and be able to block that out. However, he could
to to race as well as he did today and
to see that that uprising of support behind him, to
(24:23):
see the rallying of Nascar, I mean that that's where
you get some of that comforting, right, that the the
knowledge that folks are are moving energies in the right direction.
Like you said with the party analogy, Nascar is late.
NASCAR has some some of its history to answer for. Uh.
And obviously a lot of it would have been rooted
(24:45):
in business. All right, if we do this, what's the
fall off of sponsors, what's the fall off attendance, attracks?
Everything else? You know, it's it's a it's a different
world and it's a different look. See and to see
all the drivers and the past drivers, right, those that
have just retired these last couple of years, and those
have been in the booth for a long time. Uh,
(25:06):
to rally around and Richard Petty seeking him out to
give him that hug track side, I mean, all big
moments for the NASCAR community. Uh. And so you know
they go forward. You know it's uneasy, but they know
they're together. Although we're apart these days, while we're trying
to stay together, trying to be apart trying to do
really good things. We're sharing more and Geico sharing more too,
(25:29):
with the Geico give back a fiftcent credit on car
and motorcycle policies for both current and new customers that
last year full policy term because a Geico dot Com
slash giveback for info and eligibility. So while it ends
that way today for NASCAR, which is really so unexpected
from where we thought that we could at the beginning
of this weekend, Um, we're gonna get baseball. It's gonna
(25:52):
come back in some form, right we get the decision
by Baseball today, we're gonna have, like I said, we're
gonna have Bob Nightingale coming up in a few minutes
to talk about that. And baseball is gonna try to
come back, but obviously there's big coronavirus concerns. The NBA
is trying to come back as well, but now they're
concerned because of all the big spike in coronavirus cases
in Florida, and the NFL and college football have had
(26:15):
to put out statements saying everybody, nobody get together to
work out anymore because young people are getting coronavirus when
they're just working out together. That that can't happen. And
this is what the entirety of sports returning this year
is going to come down to. All right, And I'm
gonna use this story out of women's soccer today, UH
(26:36):
to make my point is that the Orlando Pride NWSL
is trying to come back women's soccer, trying to be
the first team sport to come back next weekend, and
the Orlando Pride had to pull out of it because
six players and four staffers tested positive for coronavirus. And
you know, there are many players former women's national players
(26:57):
on the team. Sydney LaRue forward uh is on the
Orlando project, but our statement saying she's heartbroken she can't
play next weekend. Yahoo is reporting that a lot of
these positive tests stem from the fact that many of
these players and and the staffers were out at a
bar one night, and that is the like, the worst
(27:19):
place to go to try to stay away from coronavirus
is going to a bar. And here you have players
with a season and all kinds of things at stake,
and they decide we're going to go to a bar.
And I can't I can't fathom that decision making. People
being that careless, and you're seeing a spike in in
people in their twenties and thirties. You're seeing spikes in
(27:41):
parts of the country that opened up because they didn't
open up smartly enough. It's not that they couldn't open up,
it's they didn't open up smart enough. Because the only
reason we're getting these spikes now in in more than
twenty five states is because people aren't being careful. Is
because people look at the rest of the country. Look
at the European Union where they're coronavirus caser. We were
right with them, and then their cases went all the
(28:03):
way down and we're still near the top of where
we were. And it's because people aren't making good decisions.
You know, this weekend, I went to Big Bear Lake,
right which is you know, Pam and I decided to
go out of town this weekend. We you know, we
have a place that we stay at in Big Bear.
Let's go up there because the town kind of opened
up a little bit. Let's go up and see and
it's it was amazing to me that maybe thirty percent
(28:25):
of the people were wearing masks and there's people walking
up and down the street in the big main street
in town, very close to each other, not even caring
like I'm like, I know you're all not related. You
know that that you stayed together in the house. It
was amazing that so many people just feel like I'm
done with it, that I'm either getting information off the
internet or the television nor the radio that tells me
(28:47):
it's not that big a deal it is, or I
just feel like I'm done and I don't need to
do it safely anymore. I'm gonna go on if I
get coronavirus, I get coronavirus. Well, yeah, deaths and coronavirus
are going down. That's good. But now we're seeing a spike.
So what's gonna happen. Deaths are gonna go up. I mean,
that's what's gonna We're seeing the spike. Now deaths are
gonna go up. It's because people aren't being smart. You
(29:08):
have and and all sports coming back is gonna come
to is gonna come down to the fact that athletes
in their twenties and thirties have to make good decisions
about not going to a place where they're going to
open up themselves to it. Because while chances are you
may not die, do you want to take a chance.
Do you want to get coronavirus? Are you that comfortable
getting it that I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna be okay.
I mean, we're we're so beholden on on players and
(29:32):
athletes making these decisions. That's what's gonna make sports come
back and sink or swim, because either will come back
because I get it. I get it. What's on the line,
my money, my salary, my life. I gotta be really
smart or you're gonna get players that we're gonna say, Yeah, whatever,
I'm good. I mean, we're we're playing. It's fine. I'm
probably not gonna get it. I'm I'm reading things on
the net. Yeah, I'm gonna be okay. And then what happens,
(29:53):
you wind up getting an outbreak. So, I mean, I
I understand the frustration with it, But the coronavirus isn't
isn't like you or me. It's it's it's a virus.
It doesn't care. It doesn't care that we're done with
it and we've been home for three and a half
months and want to go out. The coronavirus is still there.
It's just about being smart. It's not about staying closed
up it's about when you go out do it smartly.
That's what it is, and that that that's what I
(30:14):
keep seeing, Mike, and that's what's gonna make sports come
back or not come back. Be sure to catch live
editions of The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays
at ten pm Eastern, seven pm Pacific. Joining us now
on the Hotline with all the big news on it
USA Today. Baseball insider extraordinaire friend of the show who
stays up late for us, Bob Nightingale. Bob, I can't
(30:35):
tell you how appreciate I am you stay up late
for us to come on. Thanks so much for doing
it once again. We're just waiting for the players to
figure out. Are they going to agree to Rob Manford's
two tenants, which are, UH, can you get to training
a spring training and time? And will you be okay
with the UH protection orders that we have in place
for COVID nineteen. Do you see any snags at this
(30:55):
point in time from from us having a season and
being able at least try to have a season. No?
Absolutely not. Yeah, definitely a season. I'm going to sign
off on that in the heart heart meat and uh,
we'll see I mean, who knows, maybe there's even a
positive building and thanks twenty four hours to you know,
get actually deal with them for expanding playoffs and all that.
But yeah, there's no hold ups whatsoever. Alright, So when
(31:19):
so don't go ahead, James? So when when this first
came about, Bob, it was not it wasn't the deal
that either side wanted. But now you're saying that maybe
there could even be a deal, like, well, we'll have
this deal now, and maybe there could actually be a better,
bigger deal along the way. Now that they get this
part of it out of the way, well they could
you know, be the players. So they want to expand
(31:40):
the playoffs to chais ruth? I mean so many Fluke's
teams can make the postseason in uh, this year was
just ten teams. Evolved they want to have a chance more.
You have more teams. They have sixteen teams the way
that you know it is now without an agreement. So
a player can make the postseason, win a World Series,
not get a single penny out of it. There's no
(32:01):
World Series share because the World Series share are you know,
receipts from playoff games. If there's no fans that stands,
there's no rey sis. Uh. You know. Also with this
agreement is that there's no you know, they got all
the players gotta heard seven million dollars upfront money. Um
that was paid up before ma. So if you're a
(32:23):
player not making that much money, if you're coured a
minimum sal right, hey you're playing, you already got twenty
five thousand, so you're playing for free the whole year.
So I think MLB want to take care of that.
So right now, guys, guys really would be playing for
absolutely no money at all. They won't get a single check. Bob,
how much is it going to be incumbent on you know,
(32:44):
Tony Clark and the leadership to try to get guys
to play nice sandbox in the dugouts as we get
this thing rolling, Jason's offering up a little bit of
a chaos scenario of we don't feel safe and everything else.
I mean, how imparative imperative is to put on a
good face for the next two months. Oh, it is
for the you know, for the future of the sports
(33:06):
and uh, you know the last thing, you know, because
there's no agreement. So in the agreement, originally it was
like okay, you're gonna have broadcast enhancements everything else now
with without any of that stuff. You know, if a
team officials can say, hey, can you uh put a
microphone on and do this, I'll say, no, there's no
agreement to do that. We don't have to do a thing.
(33:28):
We'll play our games and go home. So that's that's
a concern too. I'm sure some players will go along
with it and do it, but a lot a lot won't,
just because of our uglie the negotiations were, you know,
And that's the thing, Bobb is that is it when
you compare baseball to the other sports that are trying
to figure things out. And obviously, you know, the coronavirus
is going to be its own entity and that will
(33:49):
tell us what we can and can't do. But the
money aspect of it, you know, the NBA figured out,
the NFL figured it out, and I feel like baseball
kind of used the COVID nineteen pandemic to jump start
it's CBA negotiations, Like both sides sided. Okay, now let's
get what we want, and we're pushing this past this
year into next year and the d H and expanded playoffs,
(34:12):
and I felt like there was a time for for
everybody to just say, Okay, let's just get through this year.
Let's realize we're dealing with a pandemic and if we
want to make it about labor negotiations, that that's not
gonna make anybody look good. No, No, they they had
no season at all. They're just being you know, ugly.
I've said the sport back a couple of decades even now,
(34:33):
you know it's so ugly. But I think that you know,
spurred up a good dinit race people might forget, you know,
but yeah, I mean without uh any talks at all
about the TBA next year, you know you're worried about
how bad it's going to be. I mean, if they
can't get a deal done, you know, knowing what this
country is going through everything else, you know how they
get do it towards more normal conditions. So yeah, it's
(34:55):
a big concern that this has just been the start
of a whole lot of otherness. All right, Bob, who
has to be McGuire? Are so sad of this? Who's
the guy to lead us through? You know what's gonna be?
I think is they even though you know it's giving
like an asterisk. It's somebody works with four. You know,
it's so long because he had a four hunter hitter,
(35:19):
you know, tend Williams. So even though it's a short season, Hey,
now it's possible a lot of guys who hit four
over sixty games. So I think that would I think
that would help it a lot. That would be That
would be the McGuire Sosa. Yeah. And that's the thing is,
I feel like, even though fans get upset, we could
have had baseball longer. Once the games come back and
(35:40):
once we start seeing the game, everybody's gonna be into it.
I don't think there's gonna be asterisks. It's not to
look at it now. I could say, Okay, I could
see where people would think that, But just think in
in in a few weeks, we're gonna have baseball. We're
gonna play sixty games, we're gonna have extra rounds of playoffs,
we're gonna see drama. We're gonna see late season baseball
in October and probably into novem bur And I think
(36:00):
the whole asterisk thing is going to go away pretty easy.
I get where people think it now, but if you
look ahead, I mean, I can't I can't see that happen.
Every sport's gonna have a truncated or some kind of
weird season. No, I'm with you. I mean the UH
let's talk to UH talk of players and gams and managers.
They say, you know what, this season made me more
than any other season, just a fact everything we've gone through,
(36:22):
but the pandemic, the what's going on the country, the
fact you started spring training stopped having no idea would
you start up again? Give you pretty you know, mainly
and physically tough to be a World Series champion. So
I don't think with the least sixty games, I don't
think there will be an asterisk either, and there wasn't.
Askers Dodgers won the any Winter World Series that was
(36:43):
a split season in the Braves went the World Series
and in a short season Grant it was one forty four,
but still short. Uh. So, yeah, I'm with you. I'm
only asterisk I think would be somebody getting poor Hunter,
or somebody you know saying in the r A you know,
under oh five, or somebody to at Otherwise, I don't
think so. Bob. You've been at the forefront of this
(37:04):
report and you're a handful of guys that have really
led the way in terms of keeping us all apprized
of where things are. So thank you for your diligence
and obviously the connections you've made were huge. Did you
ever lose hope and anything you were hearing from people
that that maybe this wasn't gonna happen? You know, I
never did? Yeah, I think I was. I might have
(37:25):
been outlied that all along, let's be a season to
be a season. How are you saying that both sides
and you had to have baseball? Uh? And they can't
go seventeen months without anything? So I didn't, you know,
I didn't think we'd get this ugly and take this long.
I didn't foreseeing that, but I knew they had at
least trying to have a baseball season and or else
they would lost it. Just a ton of fans, Bob.
(37:48):
Is it a big deal for the players that that
Rob Manford decided on a sixty game season over a
fifty game season giving them more money, put more money
in their pockets? Yeah? Huge. The players love that because
the players thought when they turned on the sixty okay,
what happens now? Are they? Uh, we didn't get punished?
Are the mL biggest second, you didn't take sixty or
(38:10):
so that they were they were very very grateful for that.
What happened did though, when you know, just tell us
when and where crowd because it seemed like they were
taking over social media. But then in the end it's
still got to this eleventh hour standoff. Yeah, at least
I think with the MLBS decision on the owner's decision
and play sixty games, you know, at least stop that.
(38:32):
I think. I think when they got ugly for the
players as far as you know, the same thing win
and where, well, you guys just turned on the win
and where. So now at least you know, it's almost
like Major League Baseball came back with the win and
where said, Okay, we'll tell you when I first spring training.
You know where you show up your home cities. Let's
go all right. Lastly, Bob, the two big changes that
(38:53):
we're going forward that were part of the negotiations were
the designated hitter in baseball for the next couple of years,
which are probably then be ratified in the next b A,
and the expanded playoffs. Everybody you've talked to and and
and in your sources there what's going to be the
future of both of those things, both for this year
and beyond well, So the d H will be this
year's UH, still with the help and safety for the calls.
(39:15):
So we will have a universal d H next year
back to old rules. UH. No expanded playoffs in either year.
I don't see that changing next year either, so I
do believe we'll see it. We'll definitely see the next
collective barn agreement. And I think with sixteen teams making
the playoffs, it kind of leads the way that baseball
(39:36):
needs expand by two teams and get the thirty two
so at least half instead of you know, more than
so I think that will change in the future. But
right now, yeah, we'll see d H this year only.
You can follow me on Twitter at b Nightingale, That
is at b Nightingale USA Today MLB columnists and insider
Bob has always thanks so much for staying up late,
(39:58):
but it says we really appreciate it. We'll talk to
you soon, all right, that's good. 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 I heart radio app in the
midst of all the baseball and NBA drama we've had
the past couple of days, and NASCAR as well. Uh,
(40:20):
Jomal Adams won't shut up. He still wants to be
traded The Jets best player, one of the best safeties
in the National Football League, has been unhappy that the
Jets have wanted to sign him to a long term deal.
He wants out. He asked for a trade last week.
He says teams like the Cowboys and the Eagles and
the forty Niners are at the top of his list. Well,
earlier this weekend, a fan recognized Jamal Adams getting into
(40:43):
his car and well, the two of them had the
ensuing back and forth that since went viral on social media.
Hey what's up, bro? How you coming to Dallas? How
you coming to Dallas? Amen? I'm trying okay. Uh, Jamal
Adams still wants to get traded. All right, here's the thing, Mike,
(41:04):
you know how I feel about Jamal Adams. Look, he's
on my team. He's the best player on my team.
He doesn't he doesn't play a position that you can
pay seventeen million dollars a year. Two Okay, a box safety.
You can't give him seventeen million. You can't give him
middle linebacker seventeen million. But the Jets did that for C. J. Mosley. Uh.
As good as he is, he's never gonna be happy.
The guy just wants to get paid, right and when
(41:26):
you when you have that as your sole goal of
getting paid and you don't care where it comes from.
Because he would sign with the Jets tomorrow if they
gave him seventeen million dollars a year, doesn't matter. He
just wants to get paid. I'll tell you how things
are gonna go for Jamal Adams and how his story
is gonna end. You Ready, here's what's can because I've
seen it. Adams eventually is gonna get paid. Likely he
will force a trade from the Jets, try to hold out,
(41:49):
try to figure something out, and the Jets will know that,
all right, we have to move on from him. Uh.
He's gonna be shocked that he's not traded to the
Dallas Cowboys and he's traded to the Jaguars or a
team off the beaten path that's not one of the
seven he wants to go to. Uh. He added the box.
Come on, so that's gonna surprise him when he winds.
(42:10):
I don't want to get traded. I told you the
seven teams, right, I didn't say Jacksonville. I didn't say Arizona.
Wait wait wait wait, I didn't say the Lions. Waa
lo lo loa. But he'll get traded, and you know
what's gonna happen. Suddenly he will get paid because he's
gonna get traded to get paid, and when he gets paid,
his production will plummet, just like Darrell Reevus, just like
(42:32):
every other player who was so overly about the money.
Everybody wants to get paid, and I get that, but
it's easy to see when someone is that much about
getting paid and they get paid, they don't. They don't
do as much, they don't work out as hard, they
don't they don't follow the same things that made them
a star because they just got paid. And he won't
(42:53):
be the same impact player. You will hear stories about
it's a new scheme, it's a different fit. He doesn't
have the same responsibilities he had with the Jets, and
they'll make excuses to why this guy we gave seventeen
million dollars a year two where they're still throwing for
three and fifty yards a game on and said, why
is Jamal Adams helping us? So that's how it's gonna
end for Jamal Adams. Somewhere else where someone's gonna give
(43:15):
him money and go, why do we give this guy
all kinds of money? That's how what's gonna go for him. See,
I think a lot of what comes down to Jamal Adams.
Look at the list that he put out, it's all winners, right,
So I think it's the I'm okay if I'm not
getting paid big money for the moment, as long as
it's an environment where there's a chance. And I think
he's it's the indictment of Adam Gaze and what they've
(43:36):
built there, maybe again against your guy, Sam Donald, even
though I I'm I think there there's good things ahead,
even if it is a no name group of offensive
lineman ahead of him, uh, as well as a bunch
of slot guys running around. I think that will be fun,
uh fun to watch as Robbie Anderson left and decided
he wanted to go to Carolina and got himself a
(43:56):
big paycheck. I think for for Jamal ad it's it's
the unfortunate circumstance of the way the draft works. Man,
you don't get to go to the team you want,
and they control and control your contract. They control your
ability to go and get paid the big money without
causing a ruckus and battling through. And if the Jets
(44:20):
don't want to pay them, you're stuck. If they don't
want to trade you, you're stuck. What are you gonna do?
Sit out for three years? Four years? I mean, you know,
and to where they finally just he probably can't play anymore. No,
I mean you have that. That's the next fight in
the c b A. You want to go down that road,
have at it. I'll bang the drum right there with
you to try to get yourself paid. But in the interim,
(44:43):
trying to play this all out in public, it's just
a bad look. Yeah, he doesn't. He's got he's got
to learn how football works, and he doesn't. He thinks
I could just go on social media, be upset and
force a trade. He's got to get more of the NFL.
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 Harmen 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 I Heart Radio app by
searching fs R. This is the best of The Jason
(00:23):
Smith Show with Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio. Greetings
and welcome inside The Jason Smith Show with my bast
friend Mike Harmen. Happy Monday. Does we navigate the waters
of maybe a baseball season. Maybe Dak Prescott's rich, but
(00:45):
is he really really rich? Jamal Adams wants out way
till he find out what's actually gonna happen to him.
But Mike Harmon, we may have a baseball season now.
It may not be the baseball season that any of
us wanted and of us thought we were gonna get.
It may not be the season the players want, may
not be the season the owners want, may not be
the season the commissioner wants, may not be the season
the media wants. But we're gonna get this baseball season.
(01:07):
It's like, you're gonna get this piece of chocolate cake. Yeah,
but you kind of look, there's a band aid and
it that came off your finger when you were making it.
Doesn't matter eat the chocolate cake. You'd read around that. Uh,
you'd wolf down that band aid so fast you wouldn't
even know it was there. That actually happened onceince why,
I have no doubt it did. It might have happened
multiple times. You just don't know, you know, no, just
(01:28):
just to start with it because this that's made me
think of it. One time, Um, when we were back
at in Detroit with my wife's family for Christmas. Everybody
makes food, like that's the whole thing or family. Everybody
makes food. They make fudge, they make butterhorn cookies, they
make all kinds of stuff. And uh, Pam's grandmother was
making stuffing once and and she had, you know, cut
her finger at some point. She had a band aid
(01:50):
on her on the top of her finger, at the
top of her pinky finger. And so you know, everybody's
making food and all this stuff. And of course the
stuffing comes out and there's band baked and stuff songs.
There's only one and I was like, I don't know,
I havenna eat the stuffing. I mean, I don't know
what got cooked. Now. We got cooked well enough though
(02:10):
that it would have been sterilized. No, you know, you know,
you're absolutely right. All I do is take it out.
But I'm like, I don't know that eat this stuffing.
I don't know. There's nothing wrong and nothing wrong with it,
did nothing. It was just it was like, I'm not
gonna eat the stuffing, all right. Well, I mean, you
know it's your choice. It was your loss. Uh, you
may have gotten yourself some more muskrat dinner instead, but
(02:31):
I know, I get it. It's it's all good. But yeah,
it's the idea right now of as you followed it
over the course of the day, and going back the
last couple of weeks, all the leaks, all the little
test balloons that came from two or three guys in
Major League Baseball, did everybody else in Major League Baseball
reporting quit? It's like Nightingale passing and that three guys
(02:54):
everybody else just decided I'm done. I'm watching I'm binge
watching something in my basement. At least, that's it. That's it.
That's what listen, we have we got the three of them.
We got John palum Rose, that's all we need. And
we got We actually have Bob Nightingale coming up a
little over an hour from now. He's gonna be on
the show with us, a friend of the show. I
didn't mean to dismiss JP, but just like four hundred
(03:14):
thousand dollars based on based on bets and predictions to me,
and you know, I wanted to let him off the hook.
But here's where we are with the news that came
down late this afternoon, early this evening, as baseball owners
have voted to proceed with the season under the March agreement. Now,
(03:35):
this was the agreement that we thought was coming all along,
that Rob Manford had the power to implement a fifty
to sixty game regular season with the schedule of his choosing.
When the two sides got together in March, the beginning
of the coronavirus outbreak, they ruled it, Okay, we're gonna
come back, and everybody's gonna take less money. Okay, that's fine.
And now obviously that the heart of these negotiations the
(03:55):
past few weeks have been the players felt they gave
up enough money and the owners said, we need more
money from you. This is where we're at. We could
never get past it. Every offer the owners gave to
the players, the players didn't want. Every counter offer the
owners either said no to or didn't even vote on.
So it got to the point over the past twenty
four hours where the players said, you have to give
us this schedule because we want to be able to
(04:17):
go back at you and have legal ramifications to come
after you because you screwed us over in March. We
don't want to have to say okay to expanded playoffs
because it's something you really want. We don't want to
give that up. So let's figure this out. You give
us your your fifty to sixty game schedule, and it's
gonna be pro fully pro rated pay, and we will
come play for this couple of months. Now the owners
(04:40):
have okayed that plan, so now the players are going
to have to okay it as well. Uh. And now
that's going to be the final domino, or the final
hurdle to getting major League Baseball that would ostensibly begin
with spring training in a week. Because what's going on
with the proposal to the players is UH. Two of
the things that Manford needs to know is that one
(05:01):
players can show up in a week for spring training
or summer training, and two they feel safe enough with
the guidelines with the coronavirus, because, oh, by the way,
with all of this going on, the coronavirus has said, hey,
don't forget about me. Don't forget I know deaths are
down and everything, but hey, we're spiking in a lot
of states. We're spiking out, We're spiking all over the place.
People in their twenties and thirties are all getting coronavirus,
(05:22):
So don't forget about us. So now this is gonna
be part of what goes on with Major League Baseball
and the owner. So while Rob Manford is gonna have
this schedule out, we still have to figure out what
the players are going to be okay with. If they
say okay to these two things, we're going to have baseball,
or at least they're gonna try to play baseball. Now,
the two things might come in off of this is
the first one is that I I don't know what
(05:45):
kind of season we're gonna have, and I don't mean
are the fate. Look, look we're gonna love it. Fans
are gonna love it. If they can, if they can
play baseball, we're gonna love seeing it with something we've
never seen a sixty game regular season. How many players
are gonna be on there? How many how many rounds
of laofus who they're gonna be We're gonna get the
designated hitter uh universally this year. Most likely, we're gonna
get a lot of great stuff, and we're gonna be excited.
(06:07):
And I hope we can just blot out the the
the vileness and the venom that is gonna be spewed
back and forth daily between the players and the owners,
because this is not one of those Hey we were
at odds for a long time, but hey, we come
together and here's Tony Clark and Rob Manford shaking hands
and we're ready to go, ready to play. Sorry it
took so long, you know, us baseball players, we we
(06:28):
gotta figure everything out. No, this is one of those
agreements that you're being forced into. So you're gonna see
players complaining about all kinds of stuff when they go
to spring training. When they're playing in the season, they're
gonna be throwing shots at the owners. Owners are gonna
be coming back. Rob Manford's gonna try to keep the
peace and it's not gonna work. Some players are just
gonna walk out. I bet some players are gonna show
up and say, not feeling safe, not doing it, I'm leaving.
(06:49):
You know, We've avery had a couple of MLB uh
NBA players say I'm not gonna go to the bubble
in Orlando for a couple of reasons. But you throw
this kind of animosity with the players and and and
the owners. This is what the season is gonna be.
A gonna be sniping and barking back and forth for
the entire fifty game schedule, the playoffs, and when the
Mets win the World Series, they're gonna be all I'm
complaining about stuff is they're holding up the trophy. So
(07:09):
that's what we're gonna have. It's kind of you're gonna have.
It's a dead sprint right off the jump. So I
mean that's a for fans get excited, uh if, unless
your team just has a terrible two weeks to start thing,
because then you're done and you're already packing it in.
But it adds all sorts of extra motivation to to
(07:31):
try to to make this work. You're gonna have the
I don't think so thinly veiled shots. I mean, we
saw the Trevor Bauer tweet. I mean that's the one
that's making the rounds all over the place right now.
It's absolute death for this industry to keep acting as
it has been. Both sides were driving the bus straight
off a cliff. How is this good for anyone involved?
(07:53):
COVID nineteen already presented a lose, lose, lose situation, and
we've somehow found a way to make it worse incredible,
and then the slap the forehead b g off the
back end of it, because again the CBA is sitting
out there in in short order, right we got and
then the potential for all hell to break loose again
(08:15):
based on how they've operated here we look at the
revenues and this is where the books and ordering all
that information to be passed with full, full uh transparency
more so than ever, to try to make sure they
don't get right back into another stoppage, because that'd be
(08:35):
the death knew, right. Uh, you have this situation, and
I know everybody keeps saying they should do it for
the good of the country and all that stuff. No, no, no,
if you've got leverage, as in your someone who can
do something at the one percent of one percent, right,
I mean we're talking you know, nobody else can go
in and put on the show you do that. Yeah,
(08:56):
you've got leverage, so you want to use it. What
I keep waiting for, We've talked about it a lot, Jason,
is when's the leak of that March agreement. When does
that show up to where we start seeing exactly what
was agreed to in terms of all the the antilator stuff,
because I can't imagine the owners were dumb enough to
sign something saying yeah, we'll pay you flat out, you
(09:17):
know for the games we play, you know the pro
raded and that there were no considerations for all the
other streams of income for the game. I just can't
believe that that was left out. Otherwise you have to
fire every one of those high priced lawyers UH from
the firms that negotiated that, because that's just pour on
(09:37):
every level, right. I mean, you wouldn't do that trade
and baseball cards on the UH on the parking lot
when you were in your your period period off rights
recess and you're going, hey, I'll give you my mark
McGuire for a couple of your Sammy sosas, because I
want the local guy know, uh you you were still
gonna have someone else looking over the deal to make
(09:59):
sure it didn't go around with billions of dollars at steak.
I can't believe it was so blindly and poorly attended
to without without more so, I think we're gonna get
more details out of that before this is done. Buckle up.
This is gonna be something. I mean, it's gonna be
that kind of It's gonna be two months where Rob
Manfred's gonna go. Can we please just get through this
season and finish it? Can we just try to finish
(10:20):
it and go and move everything? You know, the whole
thing is Jason Smith, Mike Carmen, Fox Sports Radio. The
whole thing is that and what you come back to it.
As I said last week, I keep coming back to
the old Nick Packay quote when when, uh, who whose
advantage here? The advantages push? There are no winners here.
I mean there there, there, there's nobody. I mean, we
win a little bit as fans because we're gonna get
baseball most likely as long as the players don't say, oh,
(10:42):
there's something else you feel like about this deal we
asked for and then you gave it to us, and
now we still don't like it. Is that both sides
in a pandemic couldn't come together. They decided to use
the pandemic as a literal political baseball to get into
the c b A and what players feel they are
owed and not owed, and and the owners were more
(11:03):
than willing to play along with it. Both sides decided,
we're gonna use this pandemic as a way to kick
start c b A and tell you this is what
we want. This is what we want, this is what
we think we should get, this is what we're ready
to give you. And that that's what's shameful about this
is that every other sport, everybody's got labor issues. Right.
The NFL has labor issues all the time. Players would love,
(11:23):
players love to be in a room alone with Roger
Adell just for five minutes, you know, and go over
some labor negotiations. The same thing happens in the NHL.
Everywhere everywhere there's labor strife, but only in Major League
Baseball does it get to this point. But even in
a pandemic, every other sport figured it out every other sport,
and baseball decided, Nope, we're gonna use this as as
as a reason a shoehorning our way in to make
(11:47):
this about the c b A instead of saying, what
can we do but humanly to get this done? And
it's both sides have done it. They look how many
times we've done shows in the past couple of weeks
where he said, boy, the owners really know what they're
doing today. Boy, this is a great day for the players.
Are what the hell are the players doing today? And boy,
this is a good day for the owners. The bottom
line is in a pandemic when people are dying, we're
trying to figure out safe ways to get to play
(12:08):
baseball and have have sports come back. You're getting this
kind of season where neither side wants it and they're
just pushing their way to it. That's what's really shameful
about this that this is this is how baseball figured out,
This is how we get to a baseball season by
being pushed to it. Well, I don't blame either side though,
you're trying to protect your interests. You know, everybody's saying
(12:28):
the owners should just be okay with taking less money.
Ask all the business owners that can't by laws, haven't
been able to have any money, right they they'd rather
work by some mutant rules that not be allowed to
do it at all. Right, the estimate is that some
sev or eight percent of your restaurants are gonna go under.
(12:49):
For the players, they're risking their health. Not quite to
the level that Blake Snell put it out right in
risking my life. I don't I don't know. I mean,
there's the small, very small percentage chance, as we know,
with more and more data at our disposal. But you're
in a position of leverage to try to make sure
for whatever percentage of the season you're playing that you
(13:10):
can get your own. I can't blame a guy or
a group of guys for holding out to try to
make that happen. Now, you hit a point a couple
of weeks ago where we had all the hey, just
tell us when and where and just be done with it,
all right, So that seemed like it was here comes
man for with a giant fake gavel. Maybe it's squeaks,
maybe it doesn't, I don't know. Whatever it is, all right,
(13:31):
here's my order, and and let's get to work. And
then it took another two weeks of posturing to get
to that, right, I mean, go back to this. It's
what eighty nine days since they signed the temporary agreement
to say, hey, let's get back to work, and then
we're still fighting eighty nine days later. So I I
get it that the frustration of of fans just saying
(13:53):
just play baseball. But I can understand from the business
side of both both just trying to make sure they
get what they want, knowing that it informs next year
and the next ten years, twenty years, thirty. I mean,
why why didn't have to be that way? Though? Well,
why couldn't it just be just like everybody else, Hey,
let's figure it out for this year and then we'll
fig then our labor stuff. We'll we'll get to in
the off season. Why why every other sport did every
(14:15):
other sport figured out Okay, here's we're gonna do for money.
The NBA letting players stay home. It's not that big
a deal with the NBA and NHL or trying to
figure out how to get the rest of their money.
There are Major League season right but major League Baseball
is coming back. They're playing the same number of games
about as as the NBA, they're gonna come back and
play fifty or sixty games on the playoffs. It's two
months and then the playoffs, which is basically what the
(14:37):
NBA is going to do. I mean you you could
have figured that part out and so, okay, it doesn't
need to be about next year, doesn't need about Okay,
what do we do for this year? Let's do this,
this makes sense. Let's let's come together on this. But
there was no coming together because they both decided this
is business and we are it's it's it's just like
going to the mattresses, right, going in the Godfather, that's
what we're going to. The mattresses were when really it's
(14:57):
it's a pandemic. This wasn't the labor negotiation and the
c b A is expiring. This was something that was
completely human and still Baseball couldn't figure it out. No. Sure,
but next year you say, the pandemic, you know, disappears.
We're able to snap our fingers and it's gone. I
know that's not the case, but bear with me for
a minute. Let's go to fantasy land. If that's the
case and everything's back at normal. You don't think they're
(15:21):
using the numbers from this year to try to inform
what goes on next year. That everybody's gonna play nice sandbox. Well,
we're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars, billions of
dollars at stake. They they both want there to be full, right,
both want to be you know, pushing away from that
band aid you know, casserole, that band aid stuffing, feeling
(15:44):
like they've eaten enough like that. How I brought your
band aid stuffing back into the mix. Uh. They want
to because they know the next negotiation, if they gave
anything up, even for next year, the numbers were gonna
be much different, and we're gonna be right back to
the same thing and the same match of everybody fighting
through it all. So I think they went to the mattresses, right,
(16:06):
take it out and let's let's fight. 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 I Heart Radio app Our
two of the program, Welcome inside the Jason Smith Show
with my best friend Mike Harmen. We got Bob Nightingale
(16:27):
coming up in twenty minutes USA Today Baseball Insider with
all the details on what could be the new Major
League Baseball season, and they'll be Commissioner Rob Manford's gonna
put in a sixty game season, just waiting for the
players Tony Clark Player Association to say, Okay, we're good,
and then we could have spring training beginning in like
a week and a half. That's how close we could
(16:49):
beat to it. Um. So we got that coming up
in twenty minutes. But you know, two other big stories
that that have kind of dominated the headlines over the
course of the past seventy hours. And we talked a
few minutes ago about Bubba Wallace, a NASCAR driver who
found a noose in his garage over the weekend and
all the controversy and attention that was on that over
(17:11):
the course of the past couple of days. And to
see NASCAR band together the way they did in support
of of him after this ridiculously racist act that I
can't believe actually happened, when you didn't even have this
is supposed to be people that are just working with NASCAR,
you know, I mean, that's and that's the insane part
(17:32):
of this is that this isn't where somebody could not
that it would have been accepted, of course not. It's
horrendously racist and to have that this person is going
to go to jail and they should go to jail.
Uh well, you're also talking about it. They're affiliated with
the team, right, this is where exactly right, they're affiliated
with the team. Now you're talking about potential suspension or
banishment for team members, sponsors, the whole nine. Ye know.
(17:54):
I mean this really there's a trickle down effect that
could be felt, uh pending the investigation, because now you
got the FBI involved. I mean, this is getting everybody
from the highest order and to investigate exactly what happened here. Yeah,
this wasn't somebody who sounds somehow found a way to
you know, get under a rope and you know left
this there. This is potentially somebody who could be how
(18:15):
did they get in when it's only inside people that
are allowed there. And you know today they had the
race got postponed due to weather and Bubba Wallas did
did very well today but uh, you know he even
got was in the top five for a while and
then he you know, he faded out at the end,
but he still had a pretty decent race. I don't
know how the guy raced at all with what's going
on in the past forty eight hours. Some people can
just block stuff like that out and and and and
(18:36):
go do it and and for him to do that
is amazing. But you know, we talk a lot about
photos that, for some reason, you just know when they're
gonna become iconic and they're gonna be something that's just
different from here's a big celebratory photo of a team
winning a championship or something else. And you know that
the photo of Kauai hitting the jumper last year in
the playoffs, falling out of bounds in Game seven, that's
(18:58):
one of those photos that you you, oh, my god,
I could look at this picture for the rest of
my life. It's so incredibly interesting. And you know, we
had another one of those today. The selfie that Bubba
Wallace took before the race with all the other drivers
with COVID masks on uh with support behind him and
and the the sports standing with Bubba Wallace today was
(19:19):
a very big and and and trending hashtag for a while.
And this photo is so incredibly powerful that here's a
sport that is in the midst of of dealing with
the backlash from the Confederate flag being taken away and
not using the sport anymore. And now you know, there's
still people that want to be able to use it
because they say it still means a lot to them
and they want to fly it outside of NASCAR races.
(19:40):
But to see this picture of Bubba Wallace in front
and everybody else standing with him, standing behind him is
so powerful. The only thing was Richard Petty was looking
you know, he's like kind of turning the other way.
That's the one thing. I'm like, there's the King. There's
look at the King. He's looking at the other way, like,
but he doesn't know when when the picture is being taken.
Obviously he's you know somebody who I have said his
name or something else. I'm like, well, he's turning to
(20:01):
look the other way because you can't miss him. I mean,
you can't miss him right there. But this this picture
is just so incredibly iconic. You can see the wave
of people behind him and all the drivers that saying
this is our way forward. And that's that's part of
the point I made a few minutes ago, is that
this is where we're headed in this country now, and
for a long time. Just because something was allowed, it
(20:24):
doesn't mean it was a good idea. And you know,
you take the Confederate flag, and that falls into it.
Did the Confederate flag mean a lot for people? Sure
it did. I understand that part of it. And the
battles of the South fought. Uh, you know, I I
get that, but in but it's also viewed by many
people as a symbol of racism, of slavery mistreatment, and
(20:45):
I I understand that part of it. And you know,
and and to say, okay, just because the Confederate flag
was allowed for so long doesn't mean it was a
great idea. And should it have been taken care of
a while ago, sure, but they got to it now.
So you know, I I like to say, let's not
celebrate the fact you're incredibly late to the party. Let's
just celebrate that you're here, all right. So you got
to the party and everything you got to the party.
We're good. So here's NASCAR in a very watershed last
(21:08):
few days for them, with with heavy roots in the South,
and here where they are five days later, and and
they're all standing behind the only African American driver saying
we're with you on this, and and and I understand
where the support is. This is, this is what gives
me hope that this is the way the world is headed,
that we're headed away from. Hey, here's some racism that, well,
(21:28):
it's been around for a long time, so we can
just kind of push it to the side. No, we
can't do that anymore. And now we're we're we're attacking
these problems head on. And this is what everybody should
be doing, asking questions, why, why should we why do
we allow this? Okay, let's take a look, and maybe
we don't need the Confederate flag anymore. Uh, here's somebody
who put a noose and Bubba Wallace's garage instead of well,
we gotta do better. I can't believe this. Here's an
(21:48):
incredible moment of solidarity from everybody who's a NASCAR driver.
And and this photo, I mean, I could look at
it forever. I mean I still look at Richard Petty
look at the other way. Yeah, I think, you know,
I think I got an explanation for him though. I
think he was trying to shuffle off and that it
was only supposed to be the driver's and that Bubba
took the snapshot about I don't know, what do you think,
(22:09):
Richard Petty moving at a pretty good rate of speed
to that level? Uh? Maybe another two seconds, uh and
you have the perfect shot of all the drivers. But
either way it u But but that's what I mean.
I mean, yeah, he's you know, it's just funny that
he's he's not. It's like, but when you take it selfie,
how many times you're taking this selfie? It's like, wait,
we gotta do it again. Why Jim had his eyes closed?
(22:30):
I did not have my eyes skills. You see it
right here. I will do it again. We'll do it again.
But that photo is just so incredibly powerful. It's just
such an it's such a great moment. That's it started
so badly this weekend with oh my god, they're gonna
have a race. I have to answer questions about why
a noose is in is in someone's someone's garage, And
it ends this way on Monday with with hope at
(22:52):
the end of it instead of boy, we're now down
to to fighting the battles that we thought we shouldn't
have to fight anymore. That's a you know, to end
this way is a is a really great way. I'll
tell you yeah. I mean you go through the weekend
and I saw the first notice of it right Father's
Day and running around and and I see it as like,
I can't believe that that can't be right, because the
(23:12):
first I saw of it was something being retweeted of,
you know, the non blue check mark variety. So it's like, okay,
all right, let's ferret this out a little bit more.
And then it started coming up all throughout my timeline.
It's like I forget who it was. I saw the
the list of words that that rolled through the anger, sadness, disappointment, shock,
all of those things you have, all those emotions roll
(23:35):
through you in a matter of seconds, like what the hell? Man? Uh,
where what are we doing here? But you've got a
guy in Bubba Wallace who you know, we all have
had adversity in our lives, right, and big moments where
you had to put your head down and go back
to work. Nothing like this, right, illnesses and family family death,
(24:00):
protracted illnesses. I mean, you've worked through stuff. I've worked
through stuff. Everybody out there can relate to that. For
Bubba Wallace to be able to get in his ride
and be able to block that out. However, he could
to to race as well as he did today and
to see that that uprising of support behind him, to
(24:23):
see the rallying of Nascar, I mean that that's where
you get some of that comforting, right, that the the
knowledge that folks are are moving energies in the right direction.
Like you said with the party analogy, Nascar is late.
NASCAR has some some of its history to answer for. Uh.
And obviously a lot of it would have been rooted
(24:45):
in business. All right, if we do this, what's the
fall off of sponsors, what's the fall off attendance, attracks?
Everything else? You know, it's it's a it's a different
world and it's a different look. See and to see
all the drivers and the past drivers, right, those that
have just retired these last couple of years, and those
have been in the booth for a long time. Uh,
(25:06):
to rally around and Richard Petty seeking him out to
give him that hug track side, I mean, all big
moments for the NASCAR community. Uh. And so you know
they go forward. You know it's uneasy, but they know
they're together. Although we're apart these days, while we're trying
to stay together, trying to be apart trying to do
really good things. We're sharing more and Geico sharing more too,
(25:29):
with the Geico give back a fiftcent credit on car
and motorcycle policies for both current and new customers that
last year full policy term because a Geico dot Com
slash giveback for info and eligibility. So while it ends
that way today for NASCAR, which is really so unexpected
from where we thought that we could at the beginning
of this weekend, Um, we're gonna get baseball. It's gonna
(25:52):
come back in some form, right we get the decision
by Baseball today, we're gonna have, like I said, we're
gonna have Bob Nightingale coming up in a few minutes
to talk about that. And baseball is gonna try to
come back, but obviously there's big coronavirus concerns. The NBA
is trying to come back as well, but now they're
concerned because of all the big spike in coronavirus cases
in Florida, and the NFL and college football have had
(26:15):
to put out statements saying everybody, nobody get together to
work out anymore because young people are getting coronavirus when
they're just working out together. That that can't happen. And
this is what the entirety of sports returning this year
is going to come down to. All right, And I'm
gonna use this story out of women's soccer today, UH
(26:36):
to make my point is that the Orlando Pride NWSL
is trying to come back women's soccer, trying to be
the first team sport to come back next weekend, and
the Orlando Pride had to pull out of it because
six players and four staffers tested positive for coronavirus. And
you know, there are many players former women's national players
(26:57):
on the team. Sydney LaRue forward uh is on the
Orlando project, but our statement saying she's heartbroken she can't
play next weekend. Yahoo is reporting that a lot of
these positive tests stem from the fact that many of
these players and and the staffers were out at a
bar one night, and that is the like, the worst
(27:19):
place to go to try to stay away from coronavirus
is going to a bar. And here you have players
with a season and all kinds of things at stake,
and they decide we're going to go to a bar.
And I can't I can't fathom that decision making. People
being that careless, and you're seeing a spike in in
people in their twenties and thirties. You're seeing spikes in
(27:41):
parts of the country that opened up because they didn't
open up smartly enough. It's not that they couldn't open up,
it's they didn't open up smart enough. Because the only
reason we're getting these spikes now in in more than
twenty five states is because people aren't being careful. Is
because people look at the rest of the country. Look
at the European Union where they're coronavirus caser. We were
right with them, and then their cases went all the
(28:03):
way down and we're still near the top of where
we were. And it's because people aren't making good decisions.
You know, this weekend, I went to Big Bear Lake,
right which is you know, Pam and I decided to
go out of town this weekend. We you know, we
have a place that we stay at in Big Bear.
Let's go up there because the town kind of opened
up a little bit. Let's go up and see and
it's it was amazing to me that maybe thirty percent
(28:25):
of the people were wearing masks and there's people walking
up and down the street in the big main street
in town, very close to each other, not even caring
like I'm like, I know you're all not related. You
know that that you stayed together in the house. It
was amazing that so many people just feel like I'm
done with it, that I'm either getting information off the
internet or the television nor the radio that tells me
(28:47):
it's not that big a deal it is, or I
just feel like I'm done and I don't need to
do it safely anymore. I'm gonna go on if I
get coronavirus, I get coronavirus. Well, yeah, deaths and coronavirus
are going down. That's good. But now we're seeing a spike.
So what's gonna happen. Deaths are gonna go up. I mean,
that's what's gonna We're seeing the spike. Now deaths are
gonna go up. It's because people aren't being smart. You
(29:08):
have and and all sports coming back is gonna come
to is gonna come down to the fact that athletes
in their twenties and thirties have to make good decisions
about not going to a place where they're going to
open up themselves to it. Because while chances are you
may not die, do you want to take a chance.
Do you want to get coronavirus? Are you that comfortable
getting it that I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna be okay.
I mean, we're we're so beholden on on players and
(29:32):
athletes making these decisions. That's what's gonna make sports come
back and sink or swim, because either will come back
because I get it. I get it. What's on the line,
my money, my salary, my life. I gotta be really
smart or you're gonna get players that we're gonna say, Yeah, whatever,
I'm good. I mean, we're we're playing. It's fine. I'm
probably not gonna get it. I'm I'm reading things on
the net. Yeah, I'm gonna be okay. And then what happens,
(29:53):
you wind up getting an outbreak. So, I mean, I
I understand the frustration with it, But the coronavirus isn't
isn't like you or me. It's it's it's a virus.
It doesn't care. It doesn't care that we're done with
it and we've been home for three and a half
months and want to go out. The coronavirus is still there.
It's just about being smart. It's not about staying closed
up it's about when you go out do it smartly.
That's what it is, and that that that's what I
(30:14):
keep seeing, Mike, and that's what's gonna make sports come
back or not come back. Be sure to catch live
editions of The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays
at ten pm Eastern, seven pm Pacific. Joining us now
on the Hotline with all the big news on it
USA Today. Baseball insider extraordinaire friend of the show who
stays up late for us, Bob Nightingale. Bob, I can't
(30:35):
tell you how appreciate I am you stay up late
for us to come on. Thanks so much for doing
it once again. We're just waiting for the players to
figure out. Are they going to agree to Rob Manford's
two tenants, which are, UH, can you get to training
a spring training and time? And will you be okay
with the UH protection orders that we have in place
for COVID nineteen. Do you see any snags at this
(30:55):
point in time from from us having a season and
being able at least try to have a season. No?
Absolutely not. Yeah, definitely a season. I'm going to sign
off on that in the heart heart meat and uh,
we'll see I mean, who knows, maybe there's even a
positive building and thanks twenty four hours to you know,
get actually deal with them for expanding playoffs and all that.
But yeah, there's no hold ups whatsoever. Alright, So when
(31:19):
so don't go ahead, James? So when when this first
came about, Bob, it was not it wasn't the deal
that either side wanted. But now you're saying that maybe
there could even be a deal, like, well, we'll have
this deal now, and maybe there could actually be a better,
bigger deal along the way. Now that they get this
part of it out of the way, well they could
you know, be the players. So they want to expand
(31:40):
the playoffs to chais ruth? I mean so many Fluke's
teams can make the postseason in uh, this year was
just ten teams. Evolved they want to have a chance more.
You have more teams. They have sixteen teams the way
that you know it is now without an agreement. So
a player can make the postseason, win a World Series,
not get a single penny out of it. There's no
(32:01):
World Series share because the World Series share are you know,
receipts from playoff games. If there's no fans that stands,
there's no rey sis. Uh. You know. Also with this
agreement is that there's no you know, they got all
the players gotta heard seven million dollars upfront money. Um
that was paid up before ma. So if you're a
(32:23):
player not making that much money, if you're coured a
minimum sal right, hey you're playing, you already got twenty
five thousand, so you're playing for free the whole year.
So I think MLB want to take care of that.
So right now, guys, guys really would be playing for
absolutely no money at all. They won't get a single check. Bob,
how much is it going to be incumbent on you know,
(32:44):
Tony Clark and the leadership to try to get guys
to play nice sandbox in the dugouts as we get
this thing rolling, Jason's offering up a little bit of
a chaos scenario of we don't feel safe and everything else.
I mean, how imparative imperative is to put on a
good face for the next two months. Oh, it is
for the you know, for the future of the sports
(33:06):
and uh, you know the last thing, you know, because
there's no agreement. So in the agreement, originally it was
like okay, you're gonna have broadcast enhancements everything else now
with without any of that stuff. You know, if a
team officials can say, hey, can you uh put a
microphone on and do this, I'll say, no, there's no
agreement to do that. We don't have to do a thing.
(33:28):
We'll play our games and go home. So that's that's
a concern too. I'm sure some players will go along
with it and do it, but a lot a lot won't,
just because of our uglie the negotiations were, you know,
And that's the thing, Bobb is that is it when
you compare baseball to the other sports that are trying
to figure things out. And obviously, you know, the coronavirus
is going to be its own entity and that will
(33:49):
tell us what we can and can't do. But the
money aspect of it, you know, the NBA figured out,
the NFL figured it out, and I feel like baseball
kind of used the COVID nineteen pandemic to jump start
it's CBA negotiations, Like both sides sided. Okay, now let's
get what we want, and we're pushing this past this
year into next year and the d H and expanded playoffs,
(34:12):
and I felt like there was a time for for
everybody to just say, Okay, let's just get through this year.
Let's realize we're dealing with a pandemic and if we
want to make it about labor negotiations, that that's not
gonna make anybody look good. No, No, they they had
no season at all. They're just being you know, ugly.
I've said the sport back a couple of decades even now,
(34:33):
you know it's so ugly. But I think that you know,
spurred up a good dinit race people might forget, you know,
but yeah, I mean without uh any talks at all
about the TBA next year, you know you're worried about
how bad it's going to be. I mean, if they
can't get a deal done, you know, knowing what this
country is going through everything else, you know how they
get do it towards more normal conditions. So yeah, it's
(34:55):
a big concern that this has just been the start
of a whole lot of otherness. All right, Bob, who
has to be McGuire? Are so sad of this? Who's
the guy to lead us through? You know what's gonna be?
I think is they even though you know it's giving
like an asterisk. It's somebody works with four. You know,
it's so long because he had a four hunter hitter,
(35:19):
you know, tend Williams. So even though it's a short season, Hey,
now it's possible a lot of guys who hit four
over sixty games. So I think that would I think
that would help it a lot. That would be That
would be the McGuire Sosa. Yeah. And that's the thing is,
I feel like, even though fans get upset, we could
have had baseball longer. Once the games come back and
(35:40):
once we start seeing the game, everybody's gonna be into it.
I don't think there's gonna be asterisks. It's not to
look at it now. I could say, Okay, I could
see where people would think that, But just think in
in in a few weeks, we're gonna have baseball. We're
gonna play sixty games, we're gonna have extra rounds of playoffs,
we're gonna see drama. We're gonna see late season baseball
in October and probably into novem bur And I think
(36:00):
the whole asterisk thing is going to go away pretty easy.
I get where people think it now, but if you
look ahead, I mean, I can't I can't see that happen.
Every sport's gonna have a truncated or some kind of
weird season. No, I'm with you. I mean the UH
let's talk to UH talk of players and gams and managers.
They say, you know what, this season made me more
than any other season, just a fact everything we've gone through,
(36:22):
but the pandemic, the what's going on the country, the
fact you started spring training stopped having no idea would
you start up again? Give you pretty you know, mainly
and physically tough to be a World Series champion. So
I don't think with the least sixty games, I don't
think there will be an asterisk either, and there wasn't.
Askers Dodgers won the any Winter World Series that was
(36:43):
a split season in the Braves went the World Series
and in a short season Grant it was one forty four,
but still short. Uh. So, yeah, I'm with you. I'm
only asterisk I think would be somebody getting poor Hunter,
or somebody you know saying in the r A you know,
under oh five, or somebody to at Otherwise, I don't
think so. Bob. You've been at the forefront of this
(37:04):
report and you're a handful of guys that have really
led the way in terms of keeping us all apprized
of where things are. So thank you for your diligence
and obviously the connections you've made were huge. Did you
ever lose hope and anything you were hearing from people
that that maybe this wasn't gonna happen? You know, I
never did? Yeah, I think I was. I might have
(37:25):
been outlied that all along, let's be a season to
be a season. How are you saying that both sides
and you had to have baseball? Uh? And they can't
go seventeen months without anything? So I didn't, you know,
I didn't think we'd get this ugly and take this long.
I didn't foreseeing that, but I knew they had at
least trying to have a baseball season and or else
they would lost it. Just a ton of fans, Bob.
(37:48):
Is it a big deal for the players that that
Rob Manford decided on a sixty game season over a
fifty game season giving them more money, put more money
in their pockets? Yeah? Huge. The players love that because
the players thought when they turned on the sixty okay,
what happens now? Are they? Uh, we didn't get punished?
Are the mL biggest second, you didn't take sixty or
(38:10):
so that they were they were very very grateful for that.
What happened did though, when you know, just tell us
when and where crowd because it seemed like they were
taking over social media. But then in the end it's
still got to this eleventh hour standoff. Yeah, at least
I think with the MLBS decision on the owner's decision
and play sixty games, you know, at least stop that.
(38:32):
I think. I think when they got ugly for the
players as far as you know, the same thing win
and where, well, you guys just turned on the win
and where. So now at least you know, it's almost
like Major League Baseball came back with the win and
where said, Okay, we'll tell you when I first spring training.
You know where you show up your home cities. Let's
go all right. Lastly, Bob, the two big changes that
(38:53):
we're going forward that were part of the negotiations were
the designated hitter in baseball for the next couple of years,
which are probably then be ratified in the next b A,
and the expanded playoffs. Everybody you've talked to and and
and in your sources there what's going to be the
future of both of those things, both for this year
and beyond well, So the d H will be this
year's UH, still with the help and safety for the calls.
(39:15):
So we will have a universal d H next year
back to old rules. UH. No expanded playoffs in either year.
I don't see that changing next year either, so I
do believe we'll see it. We'll definitely see the next
collective barn agreement. And I think with sixteen teams making
the playoffs, it kind of leads the way that baseball
(39:36):
needs expand by two teams and get the thirty two
so at least half instead of you know, more than
so I think that will change in the future. But
right now, yeah, we'll see d H this year only.
You can follow me on Twitter at b Nightingale, That
is at b Nightingale USA Today MLB columnists and insider
Bob has always thanks so much for staying up late,
(39:58):
but it says we really appreciate it. We'll talk to
you soon, all right, that's good. 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 I heart radio app in the
midst of all the baseball and NBA drama we've had
the past couple of days, and NASCAR as well. Uh,
(40:20):
Jomal Adams won't shut up. He still wants to be
traded The Jets best player, one of the best safeties
in the National Football League, has been unhappy that the
Jets have wanted to sign him to a long term deal.
He wants out. He asked for a trade last week.
He says teams like the Cowboys and the Eagles and
the forty Niners are at the top of his list. Well,
earlier this weekend, a fan recognized Jamal Adams getting into
(40:43):
his car and well, the two of them had the
ensuing back and forth that since went viral on social media.
Hey what's up, bro? How you coming to Dallas? How
you coming to Dallas? Amen? I'm trying okay. Uh, Jamal
Adams still wants to get traded. All right, here's the thing, Mike,
(41:04):
you know how I feel about Jamal Adams. Look, he's
on my team. He's the best player on my team.
He doesn't he doesn't play a position that you can
pay seventeen million dollars a year. Two Okay, a box safety.
You can't give him seventeen million. You can't give him
middle linebacker seventeen million. But the Jets did that for C. J. Mosley. Uh.
As good as he is, he's never gonna be happy.
The guy just wants to get paid, right and when
(41:26):
you when you have that as your sole goal of
getting paid and you don't care where it comes from.
Because he would sign with the Jets tomorrow if they
gave him seventeen million dollars a year, doesn't matter. He
just wants to get paid. I'll tell you how things
are gonna go for Jamal Adams and how his story
is gonna end. You Ready, here's what's can because I've
seen it. Adams eventually is gonna get paid. Likely he
will force a trade from the Jets, try to hold out,
(41:49):
try to figure something out, and the Jets will know that,
all right, we have to move on from him. Uh.
He's gonna be shocked that he's not traded to the
Dallas Cowboys and he's traded to the Jaguars or a
team off the beaten path that's not one of the
seven he wants to go to. Uh. He added the box.
Come on, so that's gonna surprise him when he winds.
(42:10):
I don't want to get traded. I told you the
seven teams, right, I didn't say Jacksonville. I didn't say Arizona.
Wait wait wait wait, I didn't say the Lions. Waa
lo lo loa. But he'll get traded, and you know
what's gonna happen. Suddenly he will get paid because he's
gonna get traded to get paid, and when he gets paid,
his production will plummet, just like Darrell Reevus, just like
(42:32):
every other player who was so overly about the money.
Everybody wants to get paid, and I get that, but
it's easy to see when someone is that much about
getting paid and they get paid, they don't. They don't
do as much, they don't work out as hard, they
don't they don't follow the same things that made them
a star because they just got paid. And he won't
(42:53):
be the same impact player. You will hear stories about
it's a new scheme, it's a different fit. He doesn't
have the same responsibilities he had with the Jets, and
they'll make excuses to why this guy we gave seventeen
million dollars a year two where they're still throwing for
three and fifty yards a game on and said, why
is Jamal Adams helping us? So that's how it's gonna
end for Jamal Adams. Somewhere else where someone's gonna give
(43:15):
him money and go, why do we give this guy
all kinds of money? That's how what's gonna go for him. See,
I think a lot of what comes down to Jamal Adams.
Look at the list that he put out, it's all winners, right,
So I think it's the I'm okay if I'm not
getting paid big money for the moment, as long as
it's an environment where there's a chance. And I think
he's it's the indictment of Adam Gaze and what they've
(43:36):
built there, maybe again against your guy, Sam Donald, even
though I I'm I think there there's good things ahead,
even if it is a no name group of offensive
lineman ahead of him, uh, as well as a bunch
of slot guys running around. I think that will be fun,
uh fun to watch as Robbie Anderson left and decided
he wanted to go to Carolina and got himself a
(43:56):
big paycheck. I think for for Jamal ad it's it's
the unfortunate circumstance of the way the draft works. Man,
you don't get to go to the team you want,
and they control and control your contract. They control your
ability to go and get paid the big money without
causing a ruckus and battling through. And if the Jets
(44:20):
don't want to pay them, you're stuck. If they don't
want to trade you, you're stuck. What are you gonna do?
Sit out for three years? Four years? I mean, you know,
and to where they finally just he probably can't play anymore. No,
I mean you have that. That's the next fight in
the c b A. You want to go down that road,
have at it. I'll bang the drum right there with
you to try to get yourself paid. But in the interim,
(44:43):
trying to play this all out in public, it's just
a bad look. Yeah, he doesn't. He's got he's got
to learn how football works, and he doesn't. He thinks
I could just go on social media, be upset and
force a trade. He's got to get more of the NFL.
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific
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Jason Smith
Mike Harmon
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