March 16, 2022 • 38 mins
On the Best of The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon, Mike welcomes in Aaron Torres who is in for Jason Smith, and jump right into some NBA action after a busy Tuesday night for Kyrie Irving. The guys stay on the hardwood in the college basketball world and discuss Gonzaga’s standout organizational stability and perennial talent, and more!
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the best of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Carmen podcast. Be sure to catch us
live every weeknight from ten pm to two a m.
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 f s R. This is the best of
(00:22):
the Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio. Hey,
welcome in. It is a fabulous Tuesday. Yeah, that's right.
Tick tick tick. Time is running out on getting those
brackets in the Fox Sports Radio Bracket challenges up. More
details as we roll, and we're obviously watching the first
(00:44):
four always expanded, always exciting teams you've never seen play
on channels that you find for those four days a year.
But we'll do it as we often do here on
Fox Sports Radio, keeping you apprized of all the good,
the bad, ugly in those games, the NBA, all the
free agency noise, all the people here in Los Angeles
(01:05):
that are wringing their hands so much they're getting sore
waiting on Freddie Freeman News, all of that and more.
I'm like Carmon alongside me. Aaron torres in for an
ill Jason Smith, you can send him his best wishes
at how about a fresca? Aaron, it's been a minute.
How you doing, buddy? So I'm doing well. I was
thinking about when you just mentioned finding True TV. What
do you think happens to the people that genuinely enjoy
(01:28):
the programming on True TV for the next five days?
How upset are they? Like eight o'clock Eastern time, the
TV is set, I'm watching True TV, Honey, don't bother me,
and then there's some college basketball on. I'm gonna go
out of a limb and say, based on our sampling
playing True TV or not True TV in the past,
and that should be back tomorrow, assuming h Smith is
(01:48):
up and moving. Otherwise, I'm gonna commandeer it and we're
gonna We're gonna do it. I'm in. But you know,
guessing the types of shows that make it to True TV? Aaron, Uh,
that those are the kind of things that you've set
and you binge watch and they're on a constant loop,
kind of like hey, here's another Criminal Minds or Law
and Order marathon. I think it's the same thing on
True TV. I don't know how much the original programming
(02:10):
is what draws you, except that I can turn it on,
set it, and forget it and walk back in five
hours later, and situationally, it's really what I left when
I walked off to do whatever house project I was
in to start my day. It feels like a lot
of hitting camera shows. And the only reason I know
that is because every year you have True TV on
(02:30):
looking for college basketball, and at some point they stopped
covering college basketball on Saturday or Sunday. Once the Brackett
whittles down and you're like, oh, another another home TV.
What did I just say, another hidden hitting camera show? Yeah, okay,
So they just do this twenty four hours a day,
every single day, three hundred sixty two days a year.
(02:51):
When it's not March better, I'll think about all the
cameras that people now carry. I mean, it's free content.
I guess had a little licensing. Hey can we use
that video that you should out of this guy falling
down at a parking lot? You know that kind of thing,
and and some portion of your audience, look, it's America's
funniest home videos taken to a whole other level. No
dis respect to Alfonso Roberto and the crew that's still
(03:13):
making that show. Going to make you tell about the
late Bob sag It. I got scared there for a second.
Well Bob Saget obviously for a long time. Now, I look,
I I celebrate his entire catalog, but it is still
in introduction and that's kind of news to me. I
didn't I don't know if I knew that. Is it
on True TV? No? No, okay, but honestly, I'm not
sure where it is. I just know that friends of
(03:34):
mine have a little studio that's right next to where that,
so I know that it still exists. That it was
a celebration of Alfonso Ribeia Banks, so we can get
to that. And obviously you bring up Bob Saget. We
we referenced sagged a lot on this show. Is you
know Smith and I fathers of daughters. There's a lot
of full or fuller house that have made the rounds
(03:56):
entourage where you got the other side of Bob's that's
not for your young daughter. No, they don't know that
part of old Uh you know, Danny Tanner just yet,
real quick, I know we gotta get to actual sports stuff.
We got four hours, baby, let's go flex. Okay, So
I grew up on Full House and then I'm not
gonna lie. The wife and I got into Fuller House?
(04:16):
Are your are your kids in the full House? Fuller
House was was a big hit for us. We were
sad that it finished. Did Did they want to then
go back and watch full House? Or were they full House?
They did? That's great? That no, And we've slowly started
grabbing all these other series from when they were younger
and finding the other angles that I used to laugh at.
(04:37):
And now they're old enough to get so the I
car L's and Victorious and look call what it is
Elizabeth Gillies, Victoria Justice and Ariana Grande on Victorious. I
mean that that's a heavy hitting trio right there for
multiple reasons, actresses and singers and performers, and let's face it,
(04:58):
for the base male instinct. As gonna say, as someone
who has no kids, Uh I, Carly is just not
really on my radar. I'm sure it's love, but but
you know, doing radio and and snark being a big
part of it in with me and certainly during your
time with Arnie Spanier, you would appreciate some of the
one liners being fired back and forth at I Car.
(05:18):
Clearly there's an edge in that writer's room, okay, and
on set and look, some bad things happen. So it's
basically it's like working with Arnie where you just make
fun of him. For there's some of that hey hey,
hey at stink and genius one. Pay him your respects.
The man's a damn legend in sports talk radio. But
our business here talking about these sports that are today
(05:40):
and are to come, and all of the permutations of
free agency in the National Football League, you know, trying
to roll that twenty sided dungeons and dragons dice to
figure out where some of those other pieces are gonna fall.
But we go to the NBA and tonight another sixty piece,
and this one by a man who has been polarizing
(06:02):
all season long. Kyrie irving thirty one from the field,
twelve or thirteen from the free throw line to come
up with a plus thirty sixty at forty one at
the half, finishes the night with sixty. That's back to
back nights that we've celebrated sixty point performances. Yesterday, Karl
Anthony Towns on fire had that monster third quarter, he
goes for sixty and a note passed to me by
(06:24):
our executive producer, Justin Frostburg, first back to back sixty
pieces in the NBA since nineteen sixty two. They were
probably both will Chamber about all right, he's won for
a one to get things. Smith would have never gotten that.
He would have referenced some nick that nobody's ever heard of.
You're probably right, Oh, that must have been GAYL good
(06:45):
Rich and Phil Jackson back to back nights. Phil Jackson
might have hit enough guys to a sixty piece with
his elbows. You can watch any video of him back
when he's playing, because I mean he had like and
he's still done. But I mean those long arms and
bony bose and some of them his basketball cards, Like
you think about getting claud with those because he always
had the the arms out. But you see old footage.
(07:08):
He was a monster. Yeah, in terms of how he
played the game much different, but the NBA you can't
play that way anymore. And he had. He carved out
a pretty nice career for himself as more or less
an enforcer and the founder and defender. That's what I
was gonna say is that you know, he basically, as
you said, had a role that no longer exists. I
don't think he had sixty points his entire career. But uh,
(07:30):
defense energy rebounding. You know that doesn't pay the bills
anymore in the NBA. But but anyway, Yeah, so congrats
to uh Karl Anthony Town's Kyrie Irving And listen, I
love dropping a Will Chamberlain every once in a while
and answering a random trivia question that you didn't really
ask me but I answered you. Well, whenever we can
start talking about numbers and Will Chamberlain, I mean, it
gets everybody excited. I'll say this, I know what numbers
(07:51):
you're referencing. If you sit down, I'll say done the math,
haven't you know? I haven't. Um, that's mortifying. And it's
a lot of math too, not very good math. If
you see the one. If you sit down and like, well,
Chamberlain's biography is one of the most incredible books I've
ever read, because people don't realize he was great at
track as a kid, like Olympic quality track. Then he
(08:13):
retired from basketball and took up beach volleyball and at
one point was considered the best beach volleyball player in
the world, like he might be literally the greatest athlete
that's ever been born. But you forgot about the third
third Act, which but he was in the destroy Yeah, well,
I mean, let me he saved the world. Yeah, good stuff.
So but it's also fun. Yeah, and I think the
(08:36):
NBA does this, uh, not quite as well as Major
League Baseball in terms of celebrating the past, but they've
gotten so good at it. Making sure to pay reverence
and homage is all over the place to the the
legends of the past, particularly this all seventy five. Some
folks got upset of being left out. You know what,
maybe you'll be one of the twenty five guys added
to the next one, because it seems what they're doing
(08:58):
the additive process. Here's the fifty, here's the seventy five,
and then move forward. But what's curious a bit about
this though, Aaron, and I ask you, I've long said,
you know, the Nets are just kind of hanging out, right.
It is a regular season, just just like the Bucks. Right,
it's a it's a late surge. They were sitting in fifth,
sixth place for a very long time. So you've got
(09:20):
the Bucks, Boston and Brooklyn are the three teams I've
been watching like the other. Stuff's fun and you know,
as a kid from Chicago, the Bulls run this year
has been great. I haven't been able to stay healthy
and once they actually get to the playoffs, curiosity, don't
get me wrong, but expectations. They're not there for me. Right. Likewise, Philadelphia,
we watched some of their some of their greatness, and
(09:42):
people wanted to crown them immediately, and then you see
some of the same old Hey, James Harden can't hit
the broadside of the bar. And go back to last
week's game again at Brooklyn where they just got blown
out of the gym, right and Ben Simmons didn't have
to get off the bench. We'll talk more about him
later because some of the comments from Steve Nash have
me using my eyebrow, going, wait what but that that aside,
(10:04):
you know, just five and five in the in their
last ten and still sitting in the eight seed. But
I got Kevin Durant and I got Kyrie Irving, and
you know the sidelight to all of this is he
went to the locker room. They were fine. Fifty thousand
dollars because you still have this cockamami rule of you
can be there, you can practice with the team, but
you can't play based on these New York rules. And
(10:25):
we'll get into that and how it may affect your
baseball and fantasy baseball squads. Uh and then a little
while as well. But for Kyrie Irving, I mean still
waiting for that other shoe to drop to give him
full access. But on nights when he's available, you see
this kind of destruction. Add Seth Curry to the mix,
who was more or less a throw in to all
(10:46):
of this, but he's still what seventeen a night, and
all of a sudden, I raised my eyebrow, going, well, Brooklyn,
just get get in is really their m O for
the regular season? And then look out if I got
them in a series? Well, and that's it was very
funny you brought up the um Philly game the other
night because you know, Dan Buyer and I were filling
in the following day for Doug Gottlieb, and you know,
(11:08):
Dan kind of brought up the point of you know,
they've re established. Oh you know this is you re
established how good they are? And to me, I've never
doubted how good they are. And you know, obviously it's
not a knock on Dan or anything, but it was
just kind of a conversation that we had, is like,
they're one of those teams, and we've seen it for
years in the NBA. The best teams they really don't
care what seed they are, the three seed, the five seed,
(11:31):
the seven seed, home road whatever. Lebron did this when
he was in Cleveland. Lebron did this when he was
in Miami. The people forget the Golden State Warriors. All
those years they made the NBA Finals. They weren't the
number one seed every single year. Now they were a
bunch of years, including the year they obviously had seventy
three wins. But I just bring it up to say,
this is the NBA um the players have let us
know over the last five, six, seven, eight, ten years
(11:52):
they don't really care about the regular season. That's fine.
They're defined by championships. They're defined by what they do
in the postseason. But at the same time, we shouldn't
be surprised when the Brooklyn Nets go on a two, three, four,
five game losing streak because their best players are not available,
and then oh, by the way when their best players
are available. You remember on a night like tonight, as
you just said, Mike, that that obviously, when Kyrie and
(12:15):
UH and Katie are on the floor together, they're basically unbeatable. Yeah,
it's just that curiosity of an end b a regular season.
And I know there's some fans and and from if
you're on a local level, right if you are following
a team and night tonight you're questioning effort, rotations, player availability, whatever.
I could get that frustration pulling it out nationally, trying
(12:38):
to be more calm and collected. As much as I
liked some hot take nonsense now and again, Aaron, it
is an eight two games and people have to remember
that the wear and tear of a regular season on you.
And I get it, lots of money, first class travel,
all of the help in the locker room, all the
massage therapists and the best you can buy, but the
(13:01):
reality is you're still playing the season. The other thing
is too different teams have different agendas. You brought up
your Chicago Bulls. They're an incredible story, but when your
team is built around guys that have never proven themselves, no,
I know, Demarda Rosen has been around forever, but he's
never proven himself the way that Kevin Durant has, Kyrie
Irving has, Lebron James has, Anthony Davis has whoever, they're
(13:21):
playing for something different in the regular season. In the
Brooklyn Nets. I didn't mean to cut you off, but
to me that it's all motivations, So that that was
gonna be my only other point on Brooklyn is, uh,
you know, you can complain, and you can this, and
you can that. But first of all, it's not every
team that that's just coast into the postseason. But then
on top of that, it's hard to blame the Brooklyn Nets.
When you have a thirty two three thirty four year
(13:41):
old Kevin Durant, if he wants to miss a couple
of nights, it's hard to blame. Kyrie is kind of
a different deal. But the point that I'm trying to
get to is, um, the point that you made earlier, Mike,
is that when the Brooklyn Nets have their two key
guys on the floor, seth Current and even played at night,
by the way, they are going to have as good
of a shot as anybody to to get that. Hilario
Bryant trow. Be sure to catch live editions of The
(14:02):
Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern,
seven pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I
Heart Radio wap Hey. Greetings, Welcome in. Second half of
the show begins. Disco ball still spinning, marching man refusing
to yield. But we are here live and in living
color for the Fox Sports Radio Studios Jason Splitz Show
(14:23):
with Mike Carmen, No Jason Smith. Tonight, Aaron Torres in
his stead talking all things around the great world of sport.
We've got Baker Mayfield with a little bit of drama,
wondering what happens with Deshaun Watson. We got the first
four are completed for tonight, as Indiana takes down Wyoming.
We've got baseball signings and rumor conjecture, speculation. I'm still
(14:47):
wondering if the Padres should go after the three million
dollars for Fernando tot Jr. But that just me. Do
you want to keep getting out a motorcycle? Have at it.
But we'll talk about that and so much more as
we continue the a second half of the show alongside me,
Aaron Torres in for Jason Smith so far towards You're
You're you're feeling good. We've we've had two hours of
(15:09):
of banter. Have I disappointed? You do what you need
to do and cleansing like you would do with Arnie
Spanier by this point, I mean, how do you want
to work this? I have the lad the last two
hours saying mean things about Arnie, So I'm not gonna
do that here. I'm a bigger person. I have grown
throughout this show. But no, I love working with you, man,
Are you kidding? I'm I'm just bummed we haven't worked
together more recently now. It's because Jason and you were
(15:30):
killing it so and we generally don't take a lot
of days off separately, especially separately sometimes, you know, maybe
a Christmas Eve here, maybe a New Year's Day there,
But in general, yeah, no, you know, you know, like
you said earlier, Arnie Spanier and I will occasionally fill
in for you on a holiday evening, but for the
most part, You're right, Yeah, it doesn't seem like you guys,
especially separately, take very much time. I hope Jason's okay,
(15:50):
by the way, Yeah, I know that's it. I mean,
like I I mocked him, and he responded as he
would normally, with just one word, which I can't say.
We comply. We'll take it off air later on, but
whatever is going on, hopefully he's well resting, watching basketball,
True TV, whatever he's got going on, and we'll see
(16:10):
if he's back to play the True TV or not
True TV game tonight, because I got several tweets asking
me earlier, Oh it's bad. Has he like just poured
out his soul about Syracuse basketball yet or is he
just not? We did it. We did it a little
bit because here was the thing over the course of
the year. I mean, we did have Buddy Beheim on
did at night when he wasn't here, when Jason wasn't
(16:32):
He soon was off and he called it. He was
able to call into the show, so we did the interview,
and you know, of course we had to taunt Smith
that he wasn't on the show. He tried to call in,
but he was too late. He missed him by about
no fanboys on this segment. It's his straight journalism, only
big j journalism here. Well, we did have him record
(16:55):
a little note to Jason to sense, so it was
it was a beautiful thing. But yeah, he died a
little with each of the Syracuse losses, and then obviously
the punch to the gut literally the literal, which was
really about his as bad a play as you're coming
up with, I mean, there's a lot of ways to
not be you know, get your revenge in on a guy.
(17:17):
Because in this case, right, it was like to go
in the rewind button. It was literally a jockeying for
position and the guy came in and elbowed him to
try to take his spot. Right, that's it, and the
reaction was I'm going to punch you in the stomach.
There's plenty of ways to get your retaliation that aren't
as obvious and suspendable, and that should have been adjudicated there,
(17:37):
I will agree, even though he was whiny about it
with Coach Beheim and Coach k even said it in
his comments related to it and be him's not being
available buddy that is for the game based on it,
that he should have been thrown out in the moment
they didn't go to the monitor, I don't think because
it wasn't like a reviewable play because that guy sold
the hell out of it. No, he didn't. He got
(17:59):
right up and he didn't complain, and that was the problem.
I saw it live. He he looked like he gave
that look like he was pained like nothing else. I
guess I don't know he because they know he could
have rolled around for another three minutes like he was
a soccer player. Well, that's what I was gonna say,
was that. That was the big thing on the broadcast
was Jay Billis was sitting there saying, well, you know,
they need to go to the monitor. But I only
(18:19):
bring it up because my favorite part of it was
when Jim Beheim goes to the postgame podium and says
something to the effect of, uh, well, it was unintentional
and it only came after the guy the guy him
twice and you can't take that, well, yeah, exactly, And
you can't let a guy push you around if it
was unintentional. What is getting? What is getting? What is
getting elbowed two times before? That have to do with anything? Right?
(18:41):
He was getting? Even you betrayed yourself in that entire process,
as you explained it. But yes, uh yeah, a lot
of secret Syracuse death for me. Northwestern five hundred team
at times they looked pretty good and then couldn't finish
games all of a sudden, they'd go broke the final
five minutes for Chris Collins. It's like eight seven or eight.
(19:01):
I get it. The problem was they gave him a
huge We don't have to nerd out on college basketball.
We got Baker Mayfield stuff. Uh, but we don't have
to nerd on college basketball. But the problem was they
gave him a big extension, Chris Collins, and now they
got to pay it. And I know that it's a
big ten. They have plenty of money, but that that's
their problem right now. They should just given him a
huge They should not have given him the huge extension.
Well that's the thing though. You tried to say, well,
(19:23):
we're on the come, and to do that, we need
a name. You got to the tournament, right that ever
elusive tournament bid to me for Northwestern is a school
which would be a great example of during the Wild West.
That is name, image likeness. That's the school that needs
to pounce you and I talked about it a little
bit off air. I've certainly brought it up on air before.
(19:46):
But mobilizing your team to help students and their help
and there, well, but to pay them maybe, but even
just to make it all makes sense right, and what
the alumni and connections and all all of that can
do for you, right, Because look, we were first generation
college by brothers and I, so the idea of networking
(20:08):
and and really utilizing the school for all it was
I failed at that. If I were to take one
thing from my Northwestern experience, I didn't take it for
what it was worth because I was too busy trying
to pay for it by hustling every dollar I could
on the weekends and my work study job and everything.
So I didn't walk out with I still walked out
with a massive loan debt, but the point being that
(20:29):
I worked a lot in terms of you know, actual work,
plus trying to do a double major and doing all
these other things that I didn't take the experience for
what it should have been. Northwestern is a place with
the name, with the pedigree that there are a lot
of industries with great ties. And that's the point I'm
trying to make right. Not only is it a top
ten institution, but from a when you start getting into
(20:52):
the sporting landscape, there are many opportunities that if you
sell it right, you can go compete very easily right,
Chicago is an easy place to sell and anybody says,
oh it's too cold, No, no no, you get over and
pretty fast if your well, I don't know in Michigan,
Ohio state. But but but it's the same point Notre Dame. Like,
(21:14):
there's plenty of Midwestern schools that are doing just fine.
And it's not to say Northwestern doesn't from a football perspective. Look,
I've come to be a realist. They're gonna be a
number of players that come into the program that are
quite good. Question is does it all rise up to
the proper level. Does the schedule and everything work together
in your favor during that four to five year period
(21:34):
as that class grows together. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you
still see guys come up and elevate into top tier players. Right.
In one case, you got a guy in rashawns Later
who didn't need to have to play his last year
there and he's already one of the top five players
at his position in the NFL. Well, I was just
gonna say that that speaks to the point we had
on Gonzaga earlier, which is you, as a Northwestern fan,
(21:54):
you kind of accept, okay, like nine and three is
ten and three going to a New Year Day Bowl game,
maybe going to a Rose Bowl when it's a non
playoff game, Like, that's an awesome season and you got
to celebrate that. And so that was I know it's
not an apples to apples, but we were talking a
little bit earlier in the show, and I get people
could go back and download it if they missed it,
but uh, you know, we were talking a little bit
about Gonzaga and I said, I understand that they've been
(22:16):
knocking on the door and they gotta win one at
one point, but it is still kind of an incredible story.
This small Catholic school in Spokane freaking Washington. It has
built itself into a college basketball prop. Yeah, just one
of those when you have continuity. And we talked about
that at all levels, Aaron is you know where you've
got you don't have the the quick firing trigger right
(22:37):
in your organization where you have a coach that may
get to coach through and down year versus great, you're fired.
And we talked about it in the NFL all the time.
You've got a handful of teams that you have as
your models of stability. Pittsburgh, right, Pittsburgh New England. And
obviously it worked out you had quarterbacks that were able
to be there forever. But there are two organizations that
(22:58):
even a down year from Tom and I get it
has only been eight and eight, but it's still the
idea of all right, it's not as good as you've
been and now you've had a couple of those for
some folks, like all right, is the message being lost?
Gone right? That was one of the big things with
the Cleveland Browns all these years was uh gone after
eighteen months, after two years, and most of the time
they did have the wrong guy in place, but organizationally
(23:21):
they were a disaster for Cincinnati. This all came together
brilliantly this year. Is it sustainable? We'll see the a
f C is gonna be difficult to navigate. But to
Gonzaga are going back to Northwestern, you know with Pat
Fitzgerald or what they're trying to do with Chris Collins,
it's still the alright, we we've got to get one
thing in place, fundamentally, figure out what our direction is
(23:42):
and push forward. But football wise, they've leveraged all of
those alumni to get excitable to be around the players
that have graduated to the NFL or into success in
whatever field are still around the program. With the basketball side,
it's a little more sporadic, but doesn't get the same push.
And that's the thing. From an institutional standpoint, it's like
(24:04):
wondering how to best mobilize is n I l wild
West of Hey. Your opportunities are here. You're still in
the Big Ten, You're still on the Big Ten network,
You're still gonna have national games. All of those kind
of things that are selling points to a lot of
the athletes and their families as they flow. So it's
the curiosity of, you know, how do you build it in?
For Gonzaga, certainly, organizational stability is one of the things
(24:28):
you have to celebrate, right and being able to look
in the mirror and know who you are for sure, right,
And that's the thing. Like a Northwestern nine and three
ten and three team, you take it, you may lament
you know, the one that got away, because there's always
that one game. Usually Iowa feel like like every year
Iowa and northwesterns like nine to six is the final school. No.
(24:48):
I appreciate you bringing up the Hawk as because somewhere
Iowa sam are one of our technical producers is laughing
at me with whatever he's doing right now. But to
that point, it's it's the look in the year and
know who you are. And for Gonzaga, you've arrived and
you've been there a long time now, so so that
that's really where I'm at. Whatever term we use, and
(25:09):
it's always been the obligatory blue bloods whatever, you can
push that out, but we we put them in as
a perennial contender at a minimum, and then it's a
question of what can be done from there, and as
we know, it's it's a long arduous journey the n
C Double A tournament. What getting through a regular season
shouldn't be as just brushed away as it does. For
(25:32):
the fact that you have so many factors that do
come into play, because we do it with the NFL,
it's like, well but for this guy getting hurt here,
but for a miscall there same thing, college buckets, You
guys still have to be available and next man up
mentality to coach your way through the conference, through the
conference tournament to get to this point, and then it
(25:53):
becomes the alright, more or less the survivor, outwit, outlast,
out play kind of mantra and mentality. I know, Jeff
Proach seven dollars, I guess probably for saying that, but
just that that kind of mentality of over the next
couple of weeks. I mean, you're tested at every turn.
Gonzaga this is I mean, it's everybody, but no, it's Gonzaga.
(26:13):
And and you're right, man is is there's a balance
between respecting what they've done and realizing that at some
point they have to break through. It is worth noting.
I think coach k what five final fours before he
won his first national championships, So it's not easy, um,
you know, and it is an incredible story. It'll be
interesting though, because the point that you brought up earlier
(26:34):
in the show, you look at those odds markets, they
are an overwhelming favorite and overwhelming favorite, which to me
is a little bit surprising. I don't see a huge
gap between them and everybody else. But maybe this finally
is the year. I mean I mentioned it earlier in
the show, but last year they were really talented, but
they really didn't play defense, and they really were four
(26:55):
guards and Drew Timmy. This year they have the kids
at home. Grant he's a freshman. If you haven't watched
them play yet. He's uh, you know, he could, he
could shoot threes, but he's also rim protector as well,
and I think that's what changes them this year is
they have real rim protection. They have real size down
low and athleticism down low. So maybe this is the
year for Gonzaga. But to your point, I think you're right.
The more that we've talked it through Mike, the more
(27:16):
that I do realize at some point, you gotta keep breaking.
At some point you have to break through. It is
a great story, but he can't keep getting to the
Elite eight Final four National championship game and not eventually
break that door. Down three to one right now, as
your favorites to roll through Arizona at six to one,
Kentucky Kansas, uh, eight to one, nine to one, respectively. Hey,
(27:40):
I'm Doug Gottlie. The podcast is called All Ball. We
usually talk all basketball all the time, but it's more
about the stories about what made these people love their
sport and all the interesting interactions along the way. We
talked to coaches, we talked to players, We tell you stories.
You download it, you listen to it. I think you
like it. Listen to All Ball with Doug Gotlieb on
(28:03):
the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you
get your podcast. Be sure to catch live editions of
The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten
pm Eastern, seven pm Pacific. We're gonna get into Baker
Mayfield and his tweet in about fifteen minutes from now.
We can only go with where we're at now and
do the speculation. That's where we're at. Well, But but
(28:26):
it's that kind of thing. Well, I was gonna say,
I know, like you mentioned Colin cow Heard earlier, especially
with this Baker Mayfield news, He's gonna have a lot
to say tomorrow. I think one of the things that
Colin does well and he said it's one of his
highest rated segments. Where Colin was right, where Colin was wrong,
and our business, there are a lot of people that
refuse to admit that the wrong. I love admitting I'm wrong.
I think it's funny, like we just get out here
and we talk about sports. Hey, I thought Baker Mayfield
(28:46):
was gonna be, uh, you know, a superstar, and I
was dead wrong on that. So I could go on
and on down the list. So yeah, I got no
problem raising my hand. None, none of us. Like one
of the lords things that came back in the celebration
of the life of Scott Hall right yesterday. We gave
it a couple of minutes at the end of the show.
But certainly I I blogged on and on my find
(29:07):
your Wins, like my radio persona comes from the amalgam
of guys. I listened to broadcasters in Chicago and professional
wrestlers that were coming at the microphone, and that was
one of those guys. But one of the things he
talked about was like nobody's perfect, and the last guy
that was perfect, they hung up right, going, going and
make it is is Jesus reference. You can be offended
(29:27):
by it, but it's the truth. Everybody's got their faults
and makes mistakes and error, and in certainly in sports radio,
if I get a pick wrong, is that the who
cares right? Nobody's keeping score right? So the you know,
sometimes Smith will do the I told you, so, I'm like,
nobody remembers what you said, or if they do, they're
gonna remember that and they're not gonna move on anyway.
(29:50):
Notice where all the retractions going a newspaper were buried
in the middle next to the auto ads. It's true, man.
You know in Tuesday's issue we didn't think nobody nobody, man, no, no,
But it's one thing that I think people in our
business could do better. And I do think it's it's
a fun part of the business and being like, wow, man,
I've really whipped on that. It is what it is,
(30:10):
but um, I think more people should do it. No,
and that's certainly uh won't wear it as it were.
I did get a note from our buddy Todd Ferman.
I wanted to tie this up right here because obviously
people are starting to look in the futures market for
the NBA based on kind of what they're seeing with
Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving will get to Brooklyn in
a moment. But for for Todd and and this was
(30:32):
kind of where we stood right in in the quick analysis. Uh.
For those that missed it, you've got from the Westgate
super Book looking Jake Hornegie talking about odds shifting and
money coming in on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers ahead of
Tom Brady's announcement on Sunday afternoon. So a couple of
(30:53):
large bets obviously moving odds and even when the odds moved,
you still had more money placed. And so in this case,
and I think you and I both both got to
the same equation. One how are you proving things? The
other is sometimes you have imperfect information and markets right,
(31:14):
and maybe someone gets one past. And that's kind of
where Todd's coming at at Todd Firm, and I'm sure
he'll address this in full. Is the the idea that
someone got got to a good number before anything was official? Sure,
and that's life, right, that's going to happen. That's why
people look at every sports book to see if there's
(31:35):
discrepancies and maybe where odds have been taken down, but
not fully across the board. Yet, as information gets disseminated
and people try to figure out a situation, and there
are sometimes where the markets allow you to take advantage,
and this would appear to be one where you had
a gap, and that that that's just the most fascinating
(31:55):
part about all this to me is where does where
is the line drawn? Because obvious see if it If
it is, and we use this example earlier, but if
it is Calvin Ridley from his from an account with
his name on it, attached to all his personal info.
That's a lot easier than somebody hearing something that's here
and something that's here in something that maybe useful information
(32:17):
in a bet like this. So so yeah, no, to
just finish that, I think the big thing with it
is you had a window with the legal tampering, which
is still oxymoronic and stupid a term, but the league
year starting tomorrow, there was a finite window where a
decision was probably going to be made. Yeah, exactly, great
(32:37):
where he's not going to go into full free agency
with the Buccaneers or wherever, if he was going to
force his hands somewhere without them having information where he
was going to be that he was playing. So yes,
someone probably looked at it and said, well, I've got
a little bit of money to burn, and maybe maybe
it's more defarious that we're making out to be. But
I'm putting it at at face value, going all right,
(32:58):
I'm getting those kind of odds with Tampa and I
based on the year he had right touchdowns and passing yardage.
And but for Tristan Worth's talking about again, Gonzaga and
all these other teams and n C double a buckets,
a turned ankle here or whatever. If Tristan Worths plays
that game against the ring. Is it a different game,
I would say it is, as opposed to. My god,
(33:20):
they're getting no help on the right side of this.
So he looks at that, you're gonna get your wide
receivers back. They added uh from Atlanta Russell gauge today. Gronkowski,
you know, will sign up at some point for one
more run. You'll fix the running back situation. Yeah, you
get a little bit of turnover at your offensive line,
(33:41):
but Jensen comes back, your anchor at center. You're in
pretty good shape. You gotta change out a couple of
aging pass rushers or decide, you know, whether you bring
them back on one year deals and they want to
make one more run with Brady or not. But the
timeline and the sand in the hourglass was shrinking before
the new league year, So it makes sense that if
(34:01):
Brady was gonna make a decision, this is where it
was gonna come, not three months. Hence absolutely And oh,
by the way, you know, we talked about it earlier.
But the Russell Wilson trade, the there's so many factors that, um,
you know, I don't think it's I wrong. I don't
think it's coincidence that that if Brady was already thinking
about the possibility of potentially coming back, the Russell Wilson
(34:25):
trade probably helps. And then it falls in line with
all of those other things that you said. So so
you know, it's just it's just an interesting conversation of
we And I'm somebody that was very frustrated with the
Calvin Ridley thing. But I do wonder where that line
in the sand is of again, what is completely inappropriate
(34:46):
And again to your point, if it's a player, if
it's a team official, that's a lot different than somebody
who may just be talking to these people because they're
in the business. Again, so fascinating and I think that
to me, the layers behind that are so interesting. Well,
think about what we just had and we'll get to
the Brooklyn nets and Ben Simmons coming up in a
couple of minutes. Because I like where this this flow
(35:08):
is because we're talking about a lot of dollars, a
lot of sense people putting, you know, a couple of
bucks here and there on games and building fantasy squads,
daily fantasy whatever else. How many people in bars around
Indianapolis two weeks ago. I had nothing to do with
a team. They weren't a team official, they weren't an agent,
they weren't a player. You don't tell me. Guys weren't
(35:29):
getting a little loose with their tongues as the night
were on. And if you were just sitting there sipping
your scotchy scotch, guy may have very easily heard a
couple of things to let you lean on some information
and where dominoes might fall. Yeah, and and it's it's
you know, we we've talked about you and I were
talking a little bit about it in the break, but
you and myself working in sports. When you're at a
(35:50):
bar and you're having a drink with with your significant other,
friend or whatever, and people here that you work in sports,
that you know, they just start asking you. So could
have been, oh, you work for the Carolina Panthers, and
and maybe it was this is all hypothetical, but you know,
you're at a bar and the guy that Carolina Panthers
is just like, yeah, man, we we don't know what
(36:11):
to do. And listen, let's be honest. I mean, we
all know Brady's coming back at some point, right, And
so again, it's just it's a fascinating conversation of where
does it go from speculation, innuendo, maybe some forward thinking
to your point about the league year two. Okay, this
guy had information that no one else had access to.
(36:32):
This guy or girl had access to information that nobody
else had access to, and he needs to be punished accordingly. Yeah,
educated guesses versus perfect information. We're always trying to figure
out where that line is. And maybe they give it
a look. See may maybe they try to do the
the quick. All right, let's cover our asses, uh for
for lack of a better term, to make sure that
(36:52):
there wasn't something to furious. But as we talked about
last hour and and todd in is is mentioned to
me here at Ferman, it seems like you just had
an opportunity where the odds were in your favor going
all hunger games here, that you had an opportunity to
get really good odds that Brady would decide he was
(37:14):
coming back. And if I knew they were out that far,
I'd be honest with you in the as we all
may may lay a couple of dollars here and there.
I mean, at those odds with what the NFC is
laying out, well, there's a pretty good wager or at
least on the surface, it looks like a pretty good bet.
Well and not only that, but and that's exactly right,
is and for you, you you might have been in Vegas
(37:34):
and you might have thrown out a hundred bucks for
somebody else, thirty thou dollars might not be that big
of a deal as as crazy as it's, no, that's
absolutely right because people are lamenting so tyed Brady just
really quickly. There was a football auction this weekend that
went off at over five thousand dollars. That was the
last Brady touchdown. So now there was a lot of
(37:54):
question of well does this guy pay because they don't
get invoice till the Monday weekend. So since it's no
longer technically the last and it could be, and it
still could be, not likely, but but everybody assumes he
gets the opening day, fires a touchdown and and that
ball is rendered mood, that's still several months. I would
(38:15):
argue the guy should have to pay because as of
right now it's the last touchdown. There's no guarantee that
he's still healthy and available. Hell, we just had Pete
Alonzo with a four rollover of his car as he
was getting ready to go to spring training. He's there
and he's up and he's moving. But for the grace
of God. But the idea that you know, the assumption
(38:36):
is he's gonna go and tack on more tds. Who
knows you have no idea, So that guy should pay
every damn dime of it, you hear me. I'll blog
that out a little bit later on, but we'll get
into the Brooklyn nets. Ben Simmons, what do you do
Thanks for listening to the best of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Carmen podcast. Be sure to catch us
live every weeknight from ten pm to two a m.
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 f s R. This is the best of
(00:22):
the Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon on Fox Sports Radio. Hey,
welcome in. It is a fabulous Tuesday. Yeah, that's right.
Tick tick tick. Time is running out on getting those
brackets in the Fox Sports Radio Bracket challenges up. More
details as we roll, and we're obviously watching the first
(00:44):
four always expanded, always exciting teams you've never seen play
on channels that you find for those four days a year.
But we'll do it as we often do here on
Fox Sports Radio, keeping you apprized of all the good,
the bad, ugly in those games, the NBA, all the
free agency noise, all the people here in Los Angeles
(01:05):
that are wringing their hands so much they're getting sore
waiting on Freddie Freeman News, all of that and more.
I'm like Carmon alongside me. Aaron torres in for an
ill Jason Smith, you can send him his best wishes
at how about a fresca? Aaron, it's been a minute.
How you doing, buddy? So I'm doing well. I was
thinking about when you just mentioned finding True TV. What
do you think happens to the people that genuinely enjoy
(01:28):
the programming on True TV for the next five days?
How upset are they? Like eight o'clock Eastern time, the
TV is set, I'm watching True TV, Honey, don't bother me,
and then there's some college basketball on. I'm gonna go
out of a limb and say, based on our sampling
playing True TV or not True TV in the past,
and that should be back tomorrow, assuming h Smith is
(01:48):
up and moving. Otherwise, I'm gonna commandeer it and we're
gonna We're gonna do it. I'm in. But you know,
guessing the types of shows that make it to True TV? Aaron, Uh,
that those are the kind of things that you've set
and you binge watch and they're on a constant loop,
kind of like hey, here's another Criminal Minds or Law
and Order marathon. I think it's the same thing on
True TV. I don't know how much the original programming
(02:10):
is what draws you, except that I can turn it on,
set it, and forget it and walk back in five
hours later, and situationally, it's really what I left when
I walked off to do whatever house project I was
in to start my day. It feels like a lot
of hitting camera shows. And the only reason I know
that is because every year you have True TV on
(02:30):
looking for college basketball, and at some point they stopped
covering college basketball on Saturday or Sunday. Once the Brackett
whittles down and you're like, oh, another another home TV.
What did I just say, another hidden hitting camera show? Yeah, okay,
So they just do this twenty four hours a day,
every single day, three hundred sixty two days a year.
(02:51):
When it's not March better, I'll think about all the
cameras that people now carry. I mean, it's free content.
I guess had a little licensing. Hey can we use
that video that you should out of this guy falling
down at a parking lot? You know that kind of thing,
and and some portion of your audience, look, it's America's
funniest home videos taken to a whole other level. No
dis respect to Alfonso Roberto and the crew that's still
(03:13):
making that show. Going to make you tell about the
late Bob sag It. I got scared there for a second.
Well Bob Saget obviously for a long time. Now, I look,
I I celebrate his entire catalog, but it is still
in introduction and that's kind of news to me. I
didn't I don't know if I knew that. Is it
on True TV? No? No, okay, but honestly, I'm not
sure where it is. I just know that friends of
(03:34):
mine have a little studio that's right next to where that,
so I know that it still exists. That it was
a celebration of Alfonso Ribeia Banks, so we can get
to that. And obviously you bring up Bob Saget. We
we referenced sagged a lot on this show. Is you
know Smith and I fathers of daughters. There's a lot
of full or fuller house that have made the rounds
(03:56):
entourage where you got the other side of Bob's that's
not for your young daughter. No, they don't know that
part of old Uh you know, Danny Tanner just yet,
real quick, I know we gotta get to actual sports stuff.
We got four hours, baby, let's go flex. Okay, So
I grew up on Full House and then I'm not
gonna lie. The wife and I got into Fuller House?
(04:16):
Are your are your kids in the full House? Fuller
House was was a big hit for us. We were
sad that it finished. Did Did they want to then
go back and watch full House? Or were they full House?
They did? That's great? That no, And we've slowly started
grabbing all these other series from when they were younger
and finding the other angles that I used to laugh at.
(04:37):
And now they're old enough to get so the I
car L's and Victorious and look call what it is
Elizabeth Gillies, Victoria Justice and Ariana Grande on Victorious. I
mean that that's a heavy hitting trio right there for
multiple reasons, actresses and singers and performers, and let's face it,
(04:58):
for the base male instinct. As gonna say, as someone
who has no kids, Uh I, Carly is just not
really on my radar. I'm sure it's love, but but
you know, doing radio and and snark being a big
part of it in with me and certainly during your
time with Arnie Spanier, you would appreciate some of the
one liners being fired back and forth at I Car.
(05:18):
Clearly there's an edge in that writer's room, okay, and
on set and look, some bad things happen. So it's
basically it's like working with Arnie where you just make
fun of him. For there's some of that hey hey,
hey at stink and genius one. Pay him your respects.
The man's a damn legend in sports talk radio. But
our business here talking about these sports that are today
(05:40):
and are to come, and all of the permutations of
free agency in the National Football League, you know, trying
to roll that twenty sided dungeons and dragons dice to
figure out where some of those other pieces are gonna fall.
But we go to the NBA and tonight another sixty piece,
and this one by a man who has been polarizing
(06:02):
all season long. Kyrie irving thirty one from the field,
twelve or thirteen from the free throw line to come
up with a plus thirty sixty at forty one at
the half, finishes the night with sixty. That's back to
back nights that we've celebrated sixty point performances. Yesterday, Karl
Anthony Towns on fire had that monster third quarter, he
goes for sixty and a note passed to me by
(06:24):
our executive producer, Justin Frostburg, first back to back sixty
pieces in the NBA since nineteen sixty two. They were
probably both will Chamber about all right, he's won for
a one to get things. Smith would have never gotten that.
He would have referenced some nick that nobody's ever heard of.
You're probably right, Oh, that must have been GAYL good
(06:45):
Rich and Phil Jackson back to back nights. Phil Jackson
might have hit enough guys to a sixty piece with
his elbows. You can watch any video of him back
when he's playing, because I mean he had like and
he's still done. But I mean those long arms and
bony bose and some of them his basketball cards, Like
you think about getting claud with those because he always
had the the arms out. But you see old footage.
(07:08):
He was a monster. Yeah, in terms of how he
played the game much different, but the NBA you can't
play that way anymore. And he had. He carved out
a pretty nice career for himself as more or less
an enforcer and the founder and defender. That's what I
was gonna say is that you know, he basically, as
you said, had a role that no longer exists. I
don't think he had sixty points his entire career. But uh,
(07:30):
defense energy rebounding. You know that doesn't pay the bills
anymore in the NBA. But but anyway, Yeah, so congrats
to uh Karl Anthony Town's Kyrie Irving And listen, I
love dropping a Will Chamberlain every once in a while
and answering a random trivia question that you didn't really
ask me but I answered you. Well, whenever we can
start talking about numbers and Will Chamberlain, I mean, it
gets everybody excited. I'll say this, I know what numbers
(07:51):
you're referencing. If you sit down, I'll say done the math,
haven't you know? I haven't. Um, that's mortifying. And it's
a lot of math too, not very good math. If
you see the one. If you sit down and like, well,
Chamberlain's biography is one of the most incredible books I've
ever read, because people don't realize he was great at
track as a kid, like Olympic quality track. Then he
(08:13):
retired from basketball and took up beach volleyball and at
one point was considered the best beach volleyball player in
the world, like he might be literally the greatest athlete
that's ever been born. But you forgot about the third
third Act, which but he was in the destroy Yeah, well,
I mean, let me he saved the world. Yeah, good stuff.
So but it's also fun. Yeah, and I think the
(08:36):
NBA does this, uh, not quite as well as Major
League Baseball in terms of celebrating the past, but they've
gotten so good at it. Making sure to pay reverence
and homage is all over the place to the the
legends of the past, particularly this all seventy five. Some
folks got upset of being left out. You know what,
maybe you'll be one of the twenty five guys added
to the next one, because it seems what they're doing
(08:58):
the additive process. Here's the fifty, here's the seventy five,
and then move forward. But what's curious a bit about
this though, Aaron, and I ask you, I've long said,
you know, the Nets are just kind of hanging out, right.
It is a regular season, just just like the Bucks. Right,
it's a it's a late surge. They were sitting in fifth,
sixth place for a very long time. So you've got
(09:20):
the Bucks, Boston and Brooklyn are the three teams I've
been watching like the other. Stuff's fun and you know,
as a kid from Chicago, the Bulls run this year
has been great. I haven't been able to stay healthy
and once they actually get to the playoffs, curiosity, don't
get me wrong, but expectations. They're not there for me. Right. Likewise, Philadelphia,
we watched some of their some of their greatness, and
(09:42):
people wanted to crown them immediately, and then you see
some of the same old Hey, James Harden can't hit
the broadside of the bar. And go back to last
week's game again at Brooklyn where they just got blown
out of the gym, right and Ben Simmons didn't have
to get off the bench. We'll talk more about him
later because some of the comments from Steve Nash have
me using my eyebrow, going, wait what but that that aside,
(10:04):
you know, just five and five in the in their
last ten and still sitting in the eight seed. But
I got Kevin Durant and I got Kyrie Irving, and
you know the sidelight to all of this is he
went to the locker room. They were fine. Fifty thousand
dollars because you still have this cockamami rule of you
can be there, you can practice with the team, but
you can't play based on these New York rules. And
(10:25):
we'll get into that and how it may affect your
baseball and fantasy baseball squads. Uh and then a little
while as well. But for Kyrie Irving, I mean still
waiting for that other shoe to drop to give him
full access. But on nights when he's available, you see
this kind of destruction. Add Seth Curry to the mix,
who was more or less a throw in to all
(10:46):
of this, but he's still what seventeen a night, and
all of a sudden, I raised my eyebrow, going, well, Brooklyn,
just get get in is really their m O for
the regular season? And then look out if I got
them in a series? Well, and that's it was very
funny you brought up the um Philly game the other
night because you know, Dan Buyer and I were filling
in the following day for Doug Gottlieb, and you know,
(11:08):
Dan kind of brought up the point of you know,
they've re established. Oh you know this is you re
established how good they are? And to me, I've never
doubted how good they are. And you know, obviously it's
not a knock on Dan or anything, but it was
just kind of a conversation that we had, is like,
they're one of those teams, and we've seen it for
years in the NBA. The best teams they really don't
care what seed they are, the three seed, the five seed,
(11:31):
the seven seed, home road whatever. Lebron did this when
he was in Cleveland. Lebron did this when he was
in Miami. The people forget the Golden State Warriors. All
those years they made the NBA Finals. They weren't the
number one seed every single year. Now they were a
bunch of years, including the year they obviously had seventy
three wins. But I just bring it up to say,
this is the NBA um the players have let us
know over the last five, six, seven, eight, ten years
(11:52):
they don't really care about the regular season. That's fine.
They're defined by championships. They're defined by what they do
in the postseason. But at the same time, we shouldn't
be surprised when the Brooklyn Nets go on a two, three, four,
five game losing streak because their best players are not available,
and then oh, by the way when their best players
are available. You remember on a night like tonight, as
you just said, Mike, that that obviously, when Kyrie and
(12:15):
UH and Katie are on the floor together, they're basically unbeatable. Yeah,
it's just that curiosity of an end b a regular season.
And I know there's some fans and and from if
you're on a local level, right if you are following
a team and night tonight you're questioning effort, rotations, player availability, whatever.
I could get that frustration pulling it out nationally, trying
(12:38):
to be more calm and collected. As much as I
liked some hot take nonsense now and again, Aaron, it
is an eight two games and people have to remember
that the wear and tear of a regular season on you.
And I get it, lots of money, first class travel,
all of the help in the locker room, all the
massage therapists and the best you can buy, but the
(13:01):
reality is you're still playing the season. The other thing
is too different teams have different agendas. You brought up
your Chicago Bulls. They're an incredible story, but when your
team is built around guys that have never proven themselves, no,
I know, Demarda Rosen has been around forever, but he's
never proven himself the way that Kevin Durant has, Kyrie
Irving has, Lebron James has, Anthony Davis has whoever, they're
(13:21):
playing for something different in the regular season. In the
Brooklyn Nets. I didn't mean to cut you off, but
to me that it's all motivations, So that that was
gonna be my only other point on Brooklyn is, uh,
you know, you can complain, and you can this, and
you can that. But first of all, it's not every
team that that's just coast into the postseason. But then
on top of that, it's hard to blame the Brooklyn Nets.
When you have a thirty two three thirty four year
(13:41):
old Kevin Durant, if he wants to miss a couple
of nights, it's hard to blame. Kyrie is kind of
a different deal. But the point that I'm trying to
get to is, um, the point that you made earlier, Mike,
is that when the Brooklyn Nets have their two key
guys on the floor, seth Current and even played at night,
by the way, they are going to have as good
of a shot as anybody to to get that. Hilario
Bryant trow. Be sure to catch live editions of The
(14:02):
Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern,
seven pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I
Heart Radio wap Hey. Greetings, Welcome in. Second half of
the show begins. Disco ball still spinning, marching man refusing
to yield. But we are here live and in living
color for the Fox Sports Radio Studios Jason Splitz Show
(14:23):
with Mike Carmen, No Jason Smith. Tonight, Aaron Torres in
his stead talking all things around the great world of sport.
We've got Baker Mayfield with a little bit of drama,
wondering what happens with Deshaun Watson. We got the first
four are completed for tonight, as Indiana takes down Wyoming.
We've got baseball signings and rumor conjecture, speculation. I'm still
(14:47):
wondering if the Padres should go after the three million
dollars for Fernando tot Jr. But that just me. Do
you want to keep getting out a motorcycle? Have at it.
But we'll talk about that and so much more as
we continue the a second half of the show alongside me,
Aaron Torres in for Jason Smith so far towards You're
You're you're feeling good. We've we've had two hours of
(15:09):
of banter. Have I disappointed? You do what you need
to do and cleansing like you would do with Arnie
Spanier by this point, I mean, how do you want
to work this? I have the lad the last two
hours saying mean things about Arnie, So I'm not gonna
do that here. I'm a bigger person. I have grown
throughout this show. But no, I love working with you, man,
Are you kidding? I'm I'm just bummed we haven't worked
together more recently now. It's because Jason and you were
(15:30):
killing it so and we generally don't take a lot
of days off separately, especially separately sometimes, you know, maybe
a Christmas Eve here, maybe a New Year's Day there,
But in general, yeah, no, you know, you know, like
you said earlier, Arnie Spanier and I will occasionally fill
in for you on a holiday evening, but for the
most part, You're right, Yeah, it doesn't seem like you guys,
especially separately, take very much time. I hope Jason's okay,
(15:50):
by the way, Yeah, I know that's it. I mean,
like I I mocked him, and he responded as he
would normally, with just one word, which I can't say.
We comply. We'll take it off air later on, but
whatever is going on, hopefully he's well resting, watching basketball,
True TV, whatever he's got going on, and we'll see
(16:10):
if he's back to play the True TV or not
True TV game tonight, because I got several tweets asking
me earlier, Oh it's bad. Has he like just poured
out his soul about Syracuse basketball yet or is he
just not? We did it. We did it a little
bit because here was the thing over the course of
the year. I mean, we did have Buddy Beheim on
did at night when he wasn't here, when Jason wasn't
(16:32):
He soon was off and he called it. He was
able to call into the show, so we did the interview,
and you know, of course we had to taunt Smith
that he wasn't on the show. He tried to call in,
but he was too late. He missed him by about
no fanboys on this segment. It's his straight journalism, only
big j journalism here. Well, we did have him record
(16:55):
a little note to Jason to sense, so it was
it was a beautiful thing. But yeah, he died a
little with each of the Syracuse losses, and then obviously
the punch to the gut literally the literal, which was
really about his as bad a play as you're coming
up with, I mean, there's a lot of ways to
not be you know, get your revenge in on a guy.
(17:17):
Because in this case, right, it was like to go
in the rewind button. It was literally a jockeying for
position and the guy came in and elbowed him to
try to take his spot. Right, that's it, and the
reaction was I'm going to punch you in the stomach.
There's plenty of ways to get your retaliation that aren't
as obvious and suspendable, and that should have been adjudicated there,
(17:37):
I will agree, even though he was whiny about it
with Coach Beheim and Coach k even said it in
his comments related to it and be him's not being
available buddy that is for the game based on it,
that he should have been thrown out in the moment
they didn't go to the monitor, I don't think because
it wasn't like a reviewable play because that guy sold
the hell out of it. No, he didn't. He got
(17:59):
right up and he didn't complain, and that was the problem.
I saw it live. He he looked like he gave
that look like he was pained like nothing else. I
guess I don't know he because they know he could
have rolled around for another three minutes like he was
a soccer player. Well, that's what I was gonna say,
was that. That was the big thing on the broadcast
was Jay Billis was sitting there saying, well, you know,
they need to go to the monitor. But I only
(18:19):
bring it up because my favorite part of it was
when Jim Beheim goes to the postgame podium and says
something to the effect of, uh, well, it was unintentional
and it only came after the guy the guy him
twice and you can't take that, well, yeah, exactly, And
you can't let a guy push you around if it
was unintentional. What is getting? What is getting? What is
getting elbowed two times before? That have to do with anything? Right?
(18:41):
He was getting? Even you betrayed yourself in that entire process,
as you explained it. But yes, uh yeah, a lot
of secret Syracuse death for me. Northwestern five hundred team
at times they looked pretty good and then couldn't finish
games all of a sudden, they'd go broke the final
five minutes for Chris Collins. It's like eight seven or eight.
(19:01):
I get it. The problem was they gave him a
huge We don't have to nerd out on college basketball.
We got Baker Mayfield stuff. Uh, but we don't have
to nerd on college basketball. But the problem was they
gave him a big extension, Chris Collins, and now they
got to pay it. And I know that it's a
big ten. They have plenty of money, but that that's
their problem right now. They should just given him a
huge They should not have given him the huge extension.
Well that's the thing though. You tried to say, well,
(19:23):
we're on the come, and to do that, we need
a name. You got to the tournament, right that ever
elusive tournament bid to me for Northwestern is a school
which would be a great example of during the Wild West.
That is name, image likeness. That's the school that needs
to pounce you and I talked about it a little
bit off air. I've certainly brought it up on air before.
(19:46):
But mobilizing your team to help students and their help
and there, well, but to pay them maybe, but even
just to make it all makes sense right, and what
the alumni and connections and all all of that can
do for you, right, Because look, we were first generation
college by brothers and I, so the idea of networking
(20:08):
and and really utilizing the school for all it was
I failed at that. If I were to take one
thing from my Northwestern experience, I didn't take it for
what it was worth because I was too busy trying
to pay for it by hustling every dollar I could
on the weekends and my work study job and everything.
So I didn't walk out with I still walked out
with a massive loan debt, but the point being that
(20:29):
I worked a lot in terms of you know, actual work,
plus trying to do a double major and doing all
these other things that I didn't take the experience for
what it should have been. Northwestern is a place with
the name, with the pedigree that there are a lot
of industries with great ties. And that's the point I'm
trying to make right. Not only is it a top
ten institution, but from a when you start getting into
(20:52):
the sporting landscape, there are many opportunities that if you
sell it right, you can go compete very easily right,
Chicago is an easy place to sell and anybody says,
oh it's too cold, No, no no, you get over and
pretty fast if your well, I don't know in Michigan,
Ohio state. But but but it's the same point Notre Dame. Like,
(21:14):
there's plenty of Midwestern schools that are doing just fine.
And it's not to say Northwestern doesn't from a football perspective. Look,
I've come to be a realist. They're gonna be a
number of players that come into the program that are
quite good. Question is does it all rise up to
the proper level. Does the schedule and everything work together
in your favor during that four to five year period
(21:34):
as that class grows together. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you
still see guys come up and elevate into top tier players. Right.
In one case, you got a guy in rashawns Later
who didn't need to have to play his last year
there and he's already one of the top five players
at his position in the NFL. Well, I was just
gonna say that that speaks to the point we had
on Gonzaga earlier, which is you, as a Northwestern fan,
(21:54):
you kind of accept, okay, like nine and three is
ten and three going to a New Year Day Bowl game,
maybe going to a Rose Bowl when it's a non
playoff game, Like, that's an awesome season and you got
to celebrate that. And so that was I know it's
not an apples to apples, but we were talking a
little bit earlier in the show, and I get people
could go back and download it if they missed it,
but uh, you know, we were talking a little bit
about Gonzaga and I said, I understand that they've been
(22:16):
knocking on the door and they gotta win one at
one point, but it is still kind of an incredible story.
This small Catholic school in Spokane freaking Washington. It has
built itself into a college basketball prop. Yeah, just one
of those when you have continuity. And we talked about
that at all levels, Aaron is you know where you've
got you don't have the the quick firing trigger right
(22:37):
in your organization where you have a coach that may
get to coach through and down year versus great, you're fired.
And we talked about it in the NFL all the time.
You've got a handful of teams that you have as
your models of stability. Pittsburgh, right, Pittsburgh New England. And
obviously it worked out you had quarterbacks that were able
to be there forever. But there are two organizations that
(22:58):
even a down year from Tom and I get it
has only been eight and eight, but it's still the
idea of all right, it's not as good as you've
been and now you've had a couple of those for
some folks, like all right, is the message being lost?
Gone right? That was one of the big things with
the Cleveland Browns all these years was uh gone after
eighteen months, after two years, and most of the time
they did have the wrong guy in place, but organizationally
(23:21):
they were a disaster for Cincinnati. This all came together
brilliantly this year. Is it sustainable? We'll see the a
f C is gonna be difficult to navigate. But to
Gonzaga are going back to Northwestern, you know with Pat
Fitzgerald or what they're trying to do with Chris Collins,
it's still the alright, we we've got to get one
thing in place, fundamentally, figure out what our direction is
(23:42):
and push forward. But football wise, they've leveraged all of
those alumni to get excitable to be around the players
that have graduated to the NFL or into success in
whatever field are still around the program. With the basketball side,
it's a little more sporadic, but doesn't get the same push.
And that's the thing. From an institutional standpoint, it's like
(24:04):
wondering how to best mobilize is n I l wild
West of Hey. Your opportunities are here. You're still in
the Big Ten, You're still on the Big Ten network,
You're still gonna have national games. All of those kind
of things that are selling points to a lot of
the athletes and their families as they flow. So it's
the curiosity of, you know, how do you build it in?
For Gonzaga, certainly, organizational stability is one of the things
(24:28):
you have to celebrate, right and being able to look
in the mirror and know who you are for sure, right,
And that's the thing. Like a Northwestern nine and three
ten and three team, you take it, you may lament
you know, the one that got away, because there's always
that one game. Usually Iowa feel like like every year
Iowa and northwesterns like nine to six is the final school. No.
(24:48):
I appreciate you bringing up the Hawk as because somewhere
Iowa sam are one of our technical producers is laughing
at me with whatever he's doing right now. But to
that point, it's it's the look in the year and
know who you are. And for Gonzaga, you've arrived and
you've been there a long time now, so so that
that's really where I'm at. Whatever term we use, and
(25:09):
it's always been the obligatory blue bloods whatever, you can
push that out, but we we put them in as
a perennial contender at a minimum, and then it's a
question of what can be done from there, and as
we know, it's it's a long arduous journey the n
C Double A tournament. What getting through a regular season
shouldn't be as just brushed away as it does. For
(25:32):
the fact that you have so many factors that do
come into play, because we do it with the NFL,
it's like, well but for this guy getting hurt here,
but for a miscall there same thing, college buckets, You
guys still have to be available and next man up
mentality to coach your way through the conference, through the
conference tournament to get to this point, and then it
(25:53):
becomes the alright, more or less the survivor, outwit, outlast,
out play kind of mantra and mentality. I know, Jeff
Proach seven dollars, I guess probably for saying that, but
just that that kind of mentality of over the next
couple of weeks. I mean, you're tested at every turn.
Gonzaga this is I mean, it's everybody, but no, it's Gonzaga.
(26:13):
And and you're right, man is is there's a balance
between respecting what they've done and realizing that at some
point they have to break through. It is worth noting.
I think coach k what five final fours before he
won his first national championships, So it's not easy, um,
you know, and it is an incredible story. It'll be
interesting though, because the point that you brought up earlier
(26:34):
in the show, you look at those odds markets, they
are an overwhelming favorite and overwhelming favorite, which to me
is a little bit surprising. I don't see a huge
gap between them and everybody else. But maybe this finally
is the year. I mean I mentioned it earlier in
the show, but last year they were really talented, but
they really didn't play defense, and they really were four
(26:55):
guards and Drew Timmy. This year they have the kids
at home. Grant he's a freshman. If you haven't watched
them play yet. He's uh, you know, he could, he
could shoot threes, but he's also rim protector as well,
and I think that's what changes them this year is
they have real rim protection. They have real size down
low and athleticism down low. So maybe this is the
year for Gonzaga. But to your point, I think you're right.
The more that we've talked it through Mike, the more
(27:16):
that I do realize at some point, you gotta keep breaking.
At some point you have to break through. It is
a great story, but he can't keep getting to the
Elite eight Final four National championship game and not eventually
break that door. Down three to one right now, as
your favorites to roll through Arizona at six to one,
Kentucky Kansas, uh, eight to one, nine to one, respectively. Hey,
(27:40):
I'm Doug Gottlie. The podcast is called All Ball. We
usually talk all basketball all the time, but it's more
about the stories about what made these people love their
sport and all the interesting interactions along the way. We
talked to coaches, we talked to players, We tell you stories.
You download it, you listen to it. I think you
like it. Listen to All Ball with Doug Gotlieb on
(28:03):
the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you
get your podcast. Be sure to catch live editions of
The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten
pm Eastern, seven pm Pacific. We're gonna get into Baker
Mayfield and his tweet in about fifteen minutes from now.
We can only go with where we're at now and
do the speculation. That's where we're at. Well, But but
(28:26):
it's that kind of thing. Well, I was gonna say,
I know, like you mentioned Colin cow Heard earlier, especially
with this Baker Mayfield news, He's gonna have a lot
to say tomorrow. I think one of the things that
Colin does well and he said it's one of his
highest rated segments. Where Colin was right, where Colin was wrong,
and our business, there are a lot of people that
refuse to admit that the wrong. I love admitting I'm wrong.
I think it's funny, like we just get out here
and we talk about sports. Hey, I thought Baker Mayfield
(28:46):
was gonna be, uh, you know, a superstar, and I
was dead wrong on that. So I could go on
and on down the list. So yeah, I got no
problem raising my hand. None, none of us. Like one
of the lords things that came back in the celebration
of the life of Scott Hall right yesterday. We gave
it a couple of minutes at the end of the show.
But certainly I I blogged on and on my find
(29:07):
your Wins, like my radio persona comes from the amalgam
of guys. I listened to broadcasters in Chicago and professional
wrestlers that were coming at the microphone, and that was
one of those guys. But one of the things he
talked about was like nobody's perfect, and the last guy
that was perfect, they hung up right, going, going and
make it is is Jesus reference. You can be offended
(29:27):
by it, but it's the truth. Everybody's got their faults
and makes mistakes and error, and in certainly in sports radio,
if I get a pick wrong, is that the who
cares right? Nobody's keeping score right? So the you know,
sometimes Smith will do the I told you, so, I'm like,
nobody remembers what you said, or if they do, they're
gonna remember that and they're not gonna move on anyway.
(29:50):
Notice where all the retractions going a newspaper were buried
in the middle next to the auto ads. It's true, man.
You know in Tuesday's issue we didn't think nobody nobody, man, no, no,
But it's one thing that I think people in our
business could do better. And I do think it's it's
a fun part of the business and being like, wow, man,
I've really whipped on that. It is what it is,
(30:10):
but um, I think more people should do it. No,
and that's certainly uh won't wear it as it were.
I did get a note from our buddy Todd Ferman.
I wanted to tie this up right here because obviously
people are starting to look in the futures market for
the NBA based on kind of what they're seeing with
Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving will get to Brooklyn in
a moment. But for for Todd and and this was
(30:32):
kind of where we stood right in in the quick analysis. Uh.
For those that missed it, you've got from the Westgate
super Book looking Jake Hornegie talking about odds shifting and
money coming in on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers ahead of
Tom Brady's announcement on Sunday afternoon. So a couple of
(30:53):
large bets obviously moving odds and even when the odds moved,
you still had more money placed. And so in this case,
and I think you and I both both got to
the same equation. One how are you proving things? The
other is sometimes you have imperfect information and markets right,
(31:14):
and maybe someone gets one past. And that's kind of
where Todd's coming at at Todd Firm, and I'm sure
he'll address this in full. Is the the idea that
someone got got to a good number before anything was official? Sure,
and that's life, right, that's going to happen. That's why
people look at every sports book to see if there's
(31:35):
discrepancies and maybe where odds have been taken down, but
not fully across the board. Yet, as information gets disseminated
and people try to figure out a situation, and there
are sometimes where the markets allow you to take advantage,
and this would appear to be one where you had
a gap, and that that that's just the most fascinating
(31:55):
part about all this to me is where does where
is the line drawn? Because obvious see if it If
it is, and we use this example earlier, but if
it is Calvin Ridley from his from an account with
his name on it, attached to all his personal info.
That's a lot easier than somebody hearing something that's here
and something that's here in something that maybe useful information
(32:17):
in a bet like this. So so yeah, no, to
just finish that, I think the big thing with it
is you had a window with the legal tampering, which
is still oxymoronic and stupid a term, but the league
year starting tomorrow, there was a finite window where a
decision was probably going to be made. Yeah, exactly, great
(32:37):
where he's not going to go into full free agency
with the Buccaneers or wherever, if he was going to
force his hands somewhere without them having information where he
was going to be that he was playing. So yes,
someone probably looked at it and said, well, I've got
a little bit of money to burn, and maybe maybe
it's more defarious that we're making out to be. But
I'm putting it at at face value, going all right,
(32:58):
I'm getting those kind of odds with Tampa and I
based on the year he had right touchdowns and passing yardage.
And but for Tristan Worth's talking about again, Gonzaga and
all these other teams and n C double a buckets,
a turned ankle here or whatever. If Tristan Worths plays
that game against the ring. Is it a different game,
I would say it is, as opposed to. My god,
(33:20):
they're getting no help on the right side of this.
So he looks at that, you're gonna get your wide
receivers back. They added uh from Atlanta Russell gauge today. Gronkowski,
you know, will sign up at some point for one
more run. You'll fix the running back situation. Yeah, you
get a little bit of turnover at your offensive line,
(33:41):
but Jensen comes back, your anchor at center. You're in
pretty good shape. You gotta change out a couple of
aging pass rushers or decide, you know, whether you bring
them back on one year deals and they want to
make one more run with Brady or not. But the
timeline and the sand in the hourglass was shrinking before
the new league year, So it makes sense that if
(34:01):
Brady was gonna make a decision, this is where it
was gonna come, not three months. Hence absolutely And oh,
by the way, you know, we talked about it earlier.
But the Russell Wilson trade, the there's so many factors that, um,
you know, I don't think it's I wrong. I don't
think it's coincidence that that if Brady was already thinking
about the possibility of potentially coming back, the Russell Wilson
(34:25):
trade probably helps. And then it falls in line with
all of those other things that you said. So so
you know, it's just it's just an interesting conversation of
we And I'm somebody that was very frustrated with the
Calvin Ridley thing. But I do wonder where that line
in the sand is of again, what is completely inappropriate
(34:46):
And again to your point, if it's a player, if
it's a team official, that's a lot different than somebody
who may just be talking to these people because they're
in the business. Again, so fascinating and I think that
to me, the layers behind that are so interesting. Well,
think about what we just had and we'll get to
the Brooklyn nets and Ben Simmons coming up in a
couple of minutes. Because I like where this this flow
(35:08):
is because we're talking about a lot of dollars, a
lot of sense people putting, you know, a couple of
bucks here and there on games and building fantasy squads,
daily fantasy whatever else. How many people in bars around
Indianapolis two weeks ago. I had nothing to do with
a team. They weren't a team official, they weren't an agent,
they weren't a player. You don't tell me. Guys weren't
(35:29):
getting a little loose with their tongues as the night
were on. And if you were just sitting there sipping
your scotchy scotch, guy may have very easily heard a
couple of things to let you lean on some information
and where dominoes might fall. Yeah, and and it's it's
you know, we we've talked about you and I were
talking a little bit about it in the break, but
you and myself working in sports. When you're at a
(35:50):
bar and you're having a drink with with your significant other,
friend or whatever, and people here that you work in sports,
that you know, they just start asking you. So could
have been, oh, you work for the Carolina Panthers, and
and maybe it was this is all hypothetical, but you know,
you're at a bar and the guy that Carolina Panthers
is just like, yeah, man, we we don't know what
(36:11):
to do. And listen, let's be honest. I mean, we
all know Brady's coming back at some point, right, And
so again, it's just it's a fascinating conversation of where
does it go from speculation, innuendo, maybe some forward thinking
to your point about the league year two. Okay, this
guy had information that no one else had access to.
(36:32):
This guy or girl had access to information that nobody
else had access to, and he needs to be punished accordingly. Yeah,
educated guesses versus perfect information. We're always trying to figure
out where that line is. And maybe they give it
a look. See may maybe they try to do the
the quick. All right, let's cover our asses, uh for
for lack of a better term, to make sure that
(36:52):
there wasn't something to furious. But as we talked about
last hour and and todd in is is mentioned to
me here at Ferman, it seems like you just had
an opportunity where the odds were in your favor going
all hunger games here, that you had an opportunity to
get really good odds that Brady would decide he was
(37:14):
coming back. And if I knew they were out that far,
I'd be honest with you in the as we all
may may lay a couple of dollars here and there.
I mean, at those odds with what the NFC is
laying out, well, there's a pretty good wager or at
least on the surface, it looks like a pretty good bet.
Well and not only that, but and that's exactly right,
is and for you, you you might have been in Vegas
(37:34):
and you might have thrown out a hundred bucks for
somebody else, thirty thou dollars might not be that big
of a deal as as crazy as it's, no, that's
absolutely right because people are lamenting so tyed Brady just
really quickly. There was a football auction this weekend that
went off at over five thousand dollars. That was the
last Brady touchdown. So now there was a lot of
(37:54):
question of well does this guy pay because they don't
get invoice till the Monday weekend. So since it's no
longer technically the last and it could be, and it
still could be, not likely, but but everybody assumes he
gets the opening day, fires a touchdown and and that
ball is rendered mood, that's still several months. I would
(38:15):
argue the guy should have to pay because as of
right now it's the last touchdown. There's no guarantee that
he's still healthy and available. Hell, we just had Pete
Alonzo with a four rollover of his car as he
was getting ready to go to spring training. He's there
and he's up and he's moving. But for the grace
of God. But the idea that you know, the assumption
(38:36):
is he's gonna go and tack on more tds. Who
knows you have no idea, So that guy should pay
every damn dime of it, you hear me. I'll blog
that out a little bit later on, but we'll get
into the Brooklyn nets. Ben Simmons, what do you do
Hosts And Creators
Jason Smith
Mike Harmon