August 13, 2026 • 38 mins
Jason Smith and Mike Harmon give their Mount Rushmore of athletes who have never won a championship.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to The Jason Smith Show with Mike
Harmon podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weeknight
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 Foxsports Radio
dot com, or stream us live every night on the
iHeartRadio app by searching FSR. You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Greetings,
(00:30):
Welcome in side our three, The Jason Smith Show with
my bes friend Mike Harmon. Our What our three? You sure? Yeah? Okay?
What time do hang on? What time do you think
it is? Alex tie shirt? Nine pm? Okay, what time
do we start the show? No, twelve pm? That is
(00:50):
your time? Twelve pm? Wow? Do you really know how
to tell I don't know you know how to tell time?
That he lives in his own states man. That doesn't matter.
It's two really bad clock miscalculations you made. You're a
bad NFL coach, doesn't know how to do things. Yeah,
I'm pretty sure that if you want to say, it's
twelve something right now, it's not twelve pm. H it's
(01:12):
twelve pm somewhere. It's somewhere. It is Yes, yeah, where? Okay,
how many Let me ask you this, how many hours
difference does it need to be right now from here
to where? It's twelve pm? How many hours? Oh? Wow?
Right right now? It's currently twelve pm in Coordinated Universal time,
which includes parts of Western Africa and the Prime Meridian
(01:34):
area such as Molly, Ghana and the Canary Island. What
about the Anti Meridian? What about the Uncle Meridian and
all the little Meridians, the little Meridians? Uh wait, wait
you think three hours to be twelve pm from where
we are to really? Yeah? Really? Yeah? Then twelve more?
B am? Okay, sure, okay, yeah, you got okay makes sense.
(01:55):
The term mini Meridian can refer to several different products
and local developments depending on the context. Uh like a
mini city development in Meridian, Ohio. In Meridian, Idaho, I
should say, not not the same as Iowa. I accident Ohio. Wow?
We are yeah, we are all over the place. Wait
think we you guys, we need to time out. We're
(02:15):
going to talk it over about geography and time telling. Yes,
so let's go back to the original thing, ty shirt?
What what what? What hour? Do you think this is
the show? Wow? We're about to start three okay, very good,
very good. Oh yeah, yeah yeah, well we're not there yet.
We're not there yet. We haven't started. No, why not
finish too? But we finished that? That was the last hour. Yeah, okay,
(02:40):
I guess this is like spaceballs? When will then be? Now?
Just now? I don't know you were done? When was?
When was then? That? Just missed it, sir, just missed it?
Just went past? Uh so okay, I again, Alex, where
did Okay, so we know, Bree making up words? Went
to cal State Flowton. Where where'd you go to school?
I didn't go to school homestead, homestead, homestead I like that.
(03:00):
I mean homeschool, no homestead, no home, a school on
the stead? You had a school on the stead? Yeah?
You went to school with Steedman Graham, no stead, and
then he came to our school. Okay, all right, very good? Okay,
And you would you were you stayed home instead of
going to school? Uh, that's not what I said. Okay,
you should check out the Whisper podcast where we do
(03:21):
all this and we do it with a whisper. Now
we will we will do the Whisper podcast one day. Well,
let's do it over the course the next couple of days,
we're gonna review Obsession. Yes, that will do all right,
So down Whisper podcast. Now you're gonna set it up
and put it out there and everything. I'll really I'm
an intro outro everything, all right. I like that idea.
I like that. All I gotta do is whisper for
twelve minutes. That's pretty good. I drive myself nuts doing
(03:45):
that for twelve minutes straight, whispering. Whispering is tough. It's hard. Yeah,
the scene is not. Yeah, I don't know. The reason
we're talking about whispering is we were doing a whole
bunch of field of dream stuff's obviously there is the
whisper going on with the game tomorrow night. I wonder
how many takes it was to do that. You know
that if you build it, he will come. Okay, it's
a little bit too guttural, not not enough power behind it.
(04:08):
Can you stand up and do it? If you build it,
he will come. Okay. You know what, We're just gonna
do this whole thing with a Now you said a
little sad and desperate. I mean, I don't know, like
you can kind of go up and down the register.
I mean I can I can do it like Marv
Albert is his pain. Yes, not exactly what ray Kinsella
(04:28):
had in mind. Time Out. Gabby Hoffman, she needs to
stop eating that hot dog. Yeah, now you got the
whole thing with Busfield. He was a jerk in the movie,
but now it's buss Field because he had a couple
of good one liners that now I'm surprised they're still
running the movie. They're not. You know that it's too
it's too classic a movie, yay. And there's lots of things.
(04:51):
I was listening to a countdown, you know, on On
on serious they have all the top five hundred sure, right, okay,
so they do. We'll get to the big basketball conversation
a second. So I was listening to count It was
like the top five hundred summer songs of all time,
or maybe the top of pop songs of all time,
and they count down number four hundred and seventy six.
(05:13):
So we just happened to be listening when it got
down to number one, and it was either summer or poppets.
I forget what it was, and we're like, okay, number
two was I don't even know, right, And all of
a sudden waiting for number one, and you just hear
a voice over and and and you know, somebody's voice
says and the number one song of pop, number one
(05:35):
song of all time was I'll Be Missing You by
P Diddy and blah blah blah. And now let's get
back to the countdown. It's like, oh, they're not even
gonna run that song anymore. So they just went all
the way down to number one and they said, yep,
this is number one song. We're not gonna play it.
Let's go back number five hundred and they started over again. No,
you should have just played every breath you take. Nobody's
had problem with staying no. Let's see, let's see wait
(05:57):
wait wait wait wait wait. Oh well, in season one
of only murders in the Building, there was a time
where Steve Martin thought Sting was the killing. That is true.
You think Sting is killing people in this building Sting
of the police. That is true. Sting was in season one.
It's a long time ago. How about that. I'm actually done.
(06:20):
So look, we are sitting here with two big NBA
stories tonight. The Lakers getting sold for twelve point five
billion dollars in Russell Westbrook retiring from the NBA after
eighteen seasons. And look, we had the fun Mount Rushmore
debate of money last hours. You know me, we never
really do Mount Rushmore stuff, but sometimes it's kind of fun.
(06:44):
We mentioned this in passing Westbrook is the best NBA
player to have never won a ring? Right, You have
lots of guys that played, had big, long careers, didn't
win a ring, guys like Steve Nash. But Russell Westbrook,
when he's accomplished the MVPs the length of his career,
the triple doubles average, the triple double. I feel pretty
(07:06):
safe that Westbrook, we could say, is the best player
to have never won an NBA title, better than Alan Iverson,
better than a lot of There's been lots of great
players who never won a title. What about the Patrick Man? Patrick?
Patrick Ewing was terrific? What about Chuck Didn't didn't Quiet
Chuck was terrific too, Right, Chuck was terrific too. But
Westbrook being a guy, there's another guy we can't name though,
(07:27):
handle the ball as much. Well, Yeah, true, that's you
know that other guy. You know that guy guy in Utah,
not the guy there's the dirty point guard. Yeah, no,
there's the other guy, but there's player. Look, there's plenty
of great all time players in the NBA that have
never won a championship. But I feel pretty good that
Westbrook the career he had, what he's done, what he
(07:49):
did better when you can do something that we haven't
seen in the NBA since the nineteen sixties and the
guy's name begins with Oscar Robertson, yeah, I feel pretty
good about the length of what he did over the
course of his career. Steve Nash who kind of petered
out towards the end of his career. Same thing for
Alan Iverson. Uh, Westbrook, what he did, I feel pretty good.
He's that guy. Just a little sidebar, you know, my
(08:12):
love of the the trading card and memorabilia world. Big
O right at one point business part manager his UH
did some legal work for him. I knew him through
a contact when I was working at Northwestern many many
years ago, and he came out with the book and
the Fundamentals of Basketball whatever. I'll get just signed copy. Now.
Oscar Robertson, very famously for years, would sign only the
(08:34):
Big O. I'm thinking off through a contact. I'm getting
the I'm going to get the full signature. No sign
the big just signed the Big O. It's just an
actual Oh. He didn't even want to write no. No, it
says it was just an Oh. How do you know
that it was him? Trust me, it was him. I
watched him circle the oh. He made the it's a
beautiful signature. He's got one of the best looking signatures
you get every letter. If you get him at a convention,
(08:56):
you get him through some of the trading card things,
through a content, personal contest, big a personal favor. I
got a big O. I just got an oval. All right, great?
Why don't you write because it's Oscar Robertson is a
long name to dse of my life. Do you know
over the course of my life how much time I
would save and just writing the Big O versus Oscar
Robertson a few paths? Uh? So I feel good about
(09:21):
Russell Westbrook. You get to the other sports, sure, best
player in each of the other main sports. Now we're
going all time active, not that we're going all time
so we're going NFL, We're going MLB, We're going NHL, NFL.
It's pretty easy. It's pretty easy. When when when the
phrase best player to have never won a Super Bowl
was created for you, and you still are one of
(09:43):
the top five quarterbacks of all time. I'm okay with
Dan Marino still being that. Yeah, but but he twenty
five years he's the best player to never win a Supernow,
but he was hanging out with as Ventura. Yeah, laces
out there. To me, it's Barry Sanders. But again because
because he didn't even get to win like he got, he
didn't get to taste a whole lot of ain't no no, Well,
(10:03):
he turned for the lines, lost. He played for the
which is why he walked away. Yeah, it was so
bad he walked away. So he he gets my bust
up there. I'll give it to Marina because Marino played longer.
You know, Barry Sanders retired very quickly when he was
thirty one years old. As well, dude, you still got time.
I mean, just think about that. With Barry Sanders retirement,
(10:24):
it wasn't like he was near the end. This is
Barry Sanders might have been one of those guys where
he's running for fifteen hundred yards and he's thirty six
years ank him as I decided I'm done, sent him out. Uh.
Major League baseball. It's tough to go between two guys.
But I'll go with the guy whose career I saw
versus a career I didn't see. Uh, So I'll go
Barry Bonds over Ted Williams. I mean Ted Williams, I
(10:47):
mean the thumper and hitting four hundred. I mean, look,
the greatest hitter of all time. Yeah, I guess years
for war service. I didn't see him play, And it's
hard for me to say, oh, he's the best when
I didn't see him. Yeah. No, Bonds is right there
and he look he was. He was just a hair's
breadth away from beating the Angels in two thousand and two.
(11:08):
He would have been the MVP of the World Series,
had a great World Series. But Barry Bonds, even all
the Balco the trouble that he had. I'm okay with
Barry Bonds being there again. You look at the numbers
and Ted Williams, and you hear all the stories about
him and what he was able to do, and and
and and no one's you know, the greatest hitter who
ever lived. And I get all of that, but it's
hard for me to stand up here and say no, no, no,
(11:28):
the guy I never saw play was the best. Really, Yes, no,
I never saw him play, but boy was he good. Well,
you know the other guy that has to be mentioned
here is White Sox Hall of Famer, Ken Griffy junrh Okay,
you have to mention Ken Griffy Junior. You're sure White
Sox say it again? No, White Sox Hall of Famer. No, no, no,
I'll put Ken up there. And maybe if he had
(11:49):
been healthier, made more of a run at bonds. But
I mean, you talk about a guy that owns the
record for most home runs in his career, like the
Red screwed up his legs. He signed with the Reds,
you know, he created the Big Red. He did uh hockey. Honestly,
(12:12):
for me, it was pretty easy because I remember growing
up how good this guy was. Getting to see him
and he was on the Game of the week all
the time, and it was so much fun because you know,
growing up, you know, I got to see the Islanders
and the Rangers and the Devils when they started playing,
but getting to see some of the great players was
always mine because you never got to see them, and
(12:33):
getting to see him and seeing how good he was
and seeing just how he made so many players better
around him. I'm gonna go. Marcel Dion. He was just
that good like he was watching it was it was incredible,
And I feel bad that this is a guy that
was never able to win me. What is he fifth
all time for points in the NHL? Like he was scary.
I remember watching when the Islanders played the Kings, like
(12:55):
my friends who were a little bit older than me,
that that brought me up on hockey. They're like, watch out,
wef we can't control Deon. We're gonna lose this game,
like seven to two. I'm like, oh, come on, man. Yeah,
So I like grew up being scared of Marcel Dion
because he was just that good of a player, you know,
him and simmer and and what was what was a
line they called that, like not the million dollar line,
the Hollywood what did they call the line? It was
(13:15):
him and simmer Ah. I can't think of the line
that had a nickname for them back in the early eighties.
But uh, I will go, I'll go, I'll go. There's
there's my top four. I'll go with Westbrook, Marino, Bonds
and Deal the triple Crown line, Crown Line, Taylor. That's
I couldn't think of it. I'm like it was something
how the triple crown line, That's what it was. Yes,
(13:36):
how about Pavel Burre, Oh you talking about hey for
me to not go the Russian Rocket who was probably
my favorite NHL player when he played, but he didn't
play long enough. He got hurt and he was you know,
by the time he was thirty. He was so unbelievably exciting. Yeah,
I mean he was just you had to know where
(13:56):
he was every second on the ice. But married, you know,
his brother's married to Candae Cameron. So it gets us
into full house and the celebration of noted hockey aficionado
Dave Koolie. All right, Valerie Burray not really close to
the player that popped, not even close. I remember I
was reaching there. I know the other guy I got
(14:17):
to watch a lot, Joe Thornton career played a long time. Yeah,
Thornton was great. And you know the Sharks, you think
they were gonna win at some point when once they
were the best out they were getting over NHL. We
got the coolest entry in hockey though. Yeah, well Sharks,
you're you're an expansion team and you're the Sharks. That's
pretty good. I mean that logo still kicks Assah about
(14:39):
about two Mount Rushmore conversations and one show that we
done hour that's amazing. But did we get an honorable
mention for the guy that doesn't even get to the
playoffs in baseball? Though? In Mike Trout, Oh no, I
mean he had a decade, but you get a decade's
where he was the like it was Thomas Mickey Man like,
(15:00):
oh of that. But you can't use guys now that
aren't done because maybe eventually he says, Okay, I'll accept
the trade to the Phillies, and the Phillies. You can't
do guys that haven't well, especially now that Bryce Harper's broken,
Can they Can they just release him now? I mean
it's hard. I can't say there's other players now who
are incredibly good, Like you want to say, what about
Lamar Jacksonmar Jackson's got half his career left. Yeah, Josh,
(15:22):
these guys are they're ever gonna get over. But I
don't want to be so mean to them and go, yeah,
Josh Allen, but he's only thirty, doesn't matter. He couldn't win.
He's winning. He's gonna put up more stats, but he's
never gonna win. Geno Smith is never gonna no, So
I mean, Gino Smith be lucky if he has his
job after Week four Club Club Club. I sent you
(15:43):
that video and you just like club What did you say?
Week four? Week five, Week five? For week five, Week one,
every other team has a bye playing the Jet. The
Jets come out here though, that that Jets, Browns, Dolphins
battle for the number one pick is going to be
insanely fun fantastic. But don't they they play the rams
(16:07):
of the Chargers this year? Don't they Aren't they here
against the Chargers. I believe they are here. They might
be here for the re I believe they are November
twenty second at the Chargers. Yeah, okay, yeah, just before Thanksgiving. Yeah,
that's where Frostburg gets me on the sideline. Wow, that's
that's really trying to speak something into existing. Hey, Aaron,
(16:29):
how about we throw a hell Mary at the end
of the first half instead of just going a halftime,
not just me coaching from ten feet behind you. Yeah,
Frostburg really needs to get me a sideline passed for
that game. Yeah, but who's that menace that got thrown
Outsten every night seven to eleven you're being taken to
fake jail seven. Give me the FI jail jail with
(16:52):
the guys that were scalping other stuff. Exit out about
a Fresco exit swollen dome. Jason Smith Mike Harmon Live
from the Fox's Radio Studios. Coming up next. Not just
about Russell Westbrook, a sports story that absolutely floored us
when it broke earlier today. That's next Jason and Mike
Fox Sports Radio. Be sure to catch live editions of
(17:13):
The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten
pm Eastern seven pm Pacific. Steve Gott's here.
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(18:09):
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Speaker 1 (18:21):
Fox Sports Radio, The Jason Smith Show with my best
friend Mike Harmon. Well dressed Hobo Dodgers lead the Royals
four to two, top of the eighth inning. Maybe we'll
get to see Edwin Diaz blow us out and make
an appearance here. And I'm sorry, wow, sorry about that.
A little bit of you just get You always have
flashbacks you here, you see the flashy lights. I think
(18:44):
the strobe lights are bad for you in many, many ways.
Just real quick, before you get into this big basketball
story of the Lakers being sold, let me just say
because sometimes I feel like I can be a better
general manager than many people in Major League Baseball. Hey, pirates,
how about you skip Paul Schemes in the rotation and
let his arm rest? Huh? How about you let him
(19:05):
rest for like a couple of week I know you're
trying to make the playoffs and all kinds of stuff,
but his velocity is down like four miles an hour.
You're lucky that he's healthy. How about you rest him,
how about you let him just maybe he's got a
dead arm for a little bit and you just let
him go. Hey, let's see if he snaps and bounces
back for the end of August and into September. But
what do I know, but just keep throwing him out
(19:25):
there and see if he gets hurt. Like I mean,
come on, man, it's not easy. It's funny. It's something
we've been kind of talking about and dancing around for
about a month, right, the velocity when you look at
that opposite when we were talking about Schooll ahead of
the trade deadline, or what you've been watching with Misowski,
where every start it becomes a well, here's new records.
(19:46):
Eventually he's gonna, you know, break the sound barrier all together. Right,
we're talking about land speed in what he's doing. But
for Paul Schemes, Yeah, we've seen that wall and he's
trying to run through it like the kool aid man,
and he's running into it. And he's not getting the
job done. Yeah, I mean I think it's pretty easy.
It's not like he's pitching well, and it's hard to
keep take him out because no, he's getting beat. He's
(20:09):
a five hundred pitchers. He's a jag right way up. Yep.
He can't throw. I mean he's lost like four miles
an hour at least off his fastball. And he sees healthy.
He's out there pitching and everything is okay. But I
think you can give him a little bit of a
rest now, maybe you skip him through their rotation once,
give him a few days to figure things out. And
that's the hard part where where they're still competing for
(20:30):
a wild card berth. So it's just like we're actually
kind of relevant. How do we do this? And you know,
he doesn't want to stop, like he wants to battle through.
And if you're in the pirates, Brash, you're also going, well,
we only have him so long, so we need to
squeeze every start, right, because the goose is the gate
for home dates. Right, you're talking about all of those
(20:51):
ancillary human moneies like we've been talking about with all
these stories. That's a tough decision man. Now speaking of
potential injury. It's a really scary moment that just happened
in the Dodgers Royals game. Again. Dodger's up four to two,
top of the eighth inning, runner at first a foul
pop up. Freddie Freeman doesn't just fall into the dugout
(21:16):
to try to catch this pop up. He doesn't see
where he is. He falls down the steps that are
leading into the locker room. It's like he's there one
second and then he's gone, right, this wasn't I got
to the rail, I went over, I flipped. Guys held me.
He got to the point where he thought he was
gonna make a catch, and he was right at the
steps again, you know the steps that lead straight down,
(21:38):
the concrete steps that lead straight down into the locker room.
He was there one second and gone, shawl of Chavez
ravine was silent. Everybody was standing on edge. Dave Roberts
ran over, but Freeman gets up walking a little gingerly.
He stays in the game for now. So luckily the
Dodgers have dodged a bullet there, because that could have
(21:59):
been in incredibly risky and incredibly damaging for Freeman. Like
that's where that could have been a broken wrist, a
broken elbow, a broken leg, a broken ankle, like he
fell down straight onto the concrete, and it was hard
to see the fall because again he just disappeared. He
disappeared out of sight and just gone like, wow, what happened?
That's what happened to Freddy Freim. Maybe he's part of
(22:20):
the uh you know, ned opened a portal. But there
was a long shot and obviously arm gets cut off
halfway through. Sorry about that, doctor Strange. All right, Like
we're obviously in studio, so we can't hear the play
by play, but as we're watching it, they had a
very long camera angle on Freeman as he's standing at
(22:40):
first base, got holding a runner on and he's got
his arms folded, and if you can read his mind,
like he's not saying anything, like they talk on and off,
but the entire time I'm sitting there going Freddie Freeman saying,
why the hell did I do that? This like in
his mind August and it's the Royals. What am I doing?
It's the middle of August, it's the Royal. I'm an
(23:00):
elder statesman here. I've had to answer questions about my
baseball mortality. And the chase for three thousand hits and
I'm diving into the dugout to get after a file ball.
So again, it looks like Freddie Freeman is okay for now.
Maybe he'll get back to the dugout. That's who's gonna
get Freddie Royal's August what are you doing? What are
(23:21):
we doing here? Twent and four games up? I know
it's been a struggle. Let's make business decisions here that
are good. I ask yourself, is this good for the company?
I ask yourself, right, if there was a mat there,
you could if there was a jump to conclusions, Matt
you could fall on I would say great. But there
was no mat. It was just the concrete. No, that's it. Yeah, absolutely,
a lot of those things. Dave Roberts, that'll be the question. Hey,
(23:43):
let's go to Oral Herscheiser's Walk of Fame star ceremony
and ask him what he felt about that play. So again,
we'll keep you updated on this, But it looks like
Freddie Freeman is okay again. Dodgers lead the Royals right now,
four to two in the top of the eighth inning. Meanwhile,
speaking of the Dodger who could be for sale soon,
the Lakers were sold earlier today in a story that
(24:06):
took everybody by surprise. Josh Kushner, not Jared Kushner, Josh
Kushner and Bob Iiger. Yes, that Bob Iger, the former
Disney executive. You know, we would get emails from him
at ESPN all the time. Oh from the desk of
Bob Iger. Okay, Bob Byger telling us about our fourth
quarter earnings, our fourth quarter losses, what we're doing. Bye bye.
(24:28):
Now Bob Iger and Josh Kushner are buying the Lakers
from Mark Walter, who bought the team nine months ago
for twelve point five billion dollars. Little tangent, when when
you were joined ESPN, did you get one of those
black cards that allowed you to go to the park
all the time. Oh yeah, that was the best part. Well,
that was the best That was. That was the thing
(24:48):
is that I could use it at Disney Lander And
when I got the job doing all night from ESPN,
I got him like I can go all the time.
We would go all the time because I had free
passes year round at Disney. Was fantastic. Yeah, I know,
because this couple of friends of mine, like or colleagues
here that they joined. They're like, the rest of it's great,
the rest of the benefits, but you wait for that
box to show yea, yeah, let me see, let me see,
(25:10):
give it to me. But all that said, yeah, the
Dodgers could have a for sale side. And I'm being
I'm not being completely facetious on this, because why would
Mark Walter sell the Lakers just a year after buying it? Well,
if you did any research into it and looking into
things today, you would know that he is the target
of a major load loan fraud investigation. This stems from
(25:34):
billions of dollars in undisclosed related party transactions between his
insurance companies. So basically, without getting too deep into the
weeds on it, he's under big time investigation for fraud.
The penalty could be in the billions of dollars. So
the guy owns the Dodgers, he owns the Lakers. Got
a liquidate all right, Hey, guess what, Let's liquidate the
I'll keep the Dodgers for now, let's liquidate the Lakers.
(25:56):
So a year after buying the Lakers, it's sold for
twelve point five billion dollars. Well, flip this house for
a two point five billion. Are a flip property, now
that's yeah. I mean, look it's under two years, so
it's gonna be a heavier penalty. They are. They are
the house at the end of the cul de Sac
that has been empty for a while, that was used
as an Airbnb, but now the new owners want to
(26:16):
move on from it. I bought it for a song.
Now I'm gonna flip it. Now it's gonna be twelve
point five billion dollars. Don't have Lebron James to worry
about anymore. Just got got Luca, give him a new,
big contract. Hey, we're all good. Look at the look
at this bank, this brand news property that you could
buy for twelve point five billion, making two point five
billion over what he sold it for. But again remember
(26:39):
the penalties for selling in a year. Just had to liquidate.
Just got gotta be ready for whatever comes up here,
whatever he might. Oh so if you pay those taxes
on the two point five billion, I mean you're still
walking away with what well over a billion? Uh yes,
but you know for those just to complete the circle
all the conspiracy theories when you start talking about investigations,
(27:01):
Yes it is the Kushner family. Yes, the brother of
so some folks wondering political leanings. Well, but I mean
we need to we need to connect the dodge for
those that are unawares because this huge investigation. So perhaps
the walls of reality are crashing down. Shared Kusher's the shadow.
(27:23):
He's the real owner, silent partner, not the real owner.
It's really my brother who's the owner. But we had
to kind of keep that puppet. No, we had to
keep that quiet. Now. Look, let's be on. When I
saw look, Ramona Shelburn broke the story for ESPN today
and it was stunning. When I first woke up and
saw it and saw Lakers sold, I'm like, oh, did
the wait the sale gone through? As something happened with
(27:44):
Genie Busts and continuing on, is is a run? No? No,
this is a completely new story, completely new sale. Here's
Ramona Shellburn ESPN NBA Insider earlier today talking about why
Mark Walter decided to sell the team.
Speaker 3 (27:57):
Now, from October of last year to right now, he
just made two and a half billion dollars on the
Los Angeles Lakers. I don't think he was looking to sell,
but when somebody makes you an offer, you can't refuse.
I think it was a business opportunity you couldn't say no.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
To Yeah, because that's what happened, is that a year
after owning the Lakers, people thought, oh, we got to
go and got to buy this rom I get it,
and I understand all the game that's played with insiders
and information and going. I understand, But no one buys
a sports team to flip it in a year. You
buy the sports team because you want to be in
(28:32):
on a club that has billionaires. Not many other people
are in on. You don't buy, you don't. It's not
like buying a block of property in South Beach and
I'm going to renovate it and turn it into something.
You buy a sports team to own the sports team.
You don't buy the Lakers that I'm gonna sell it
in a year unless you need money for some particular
reason that could be coming up very very soon. I mean,
(28:53):
you don't have to cross a lot of t's and
got a lot of eyes, sit here and go and
follow the money and go right here and here and
wait for watergate phone calls like that, Redford and New
and Dustin Hoffwer when the phone was keep ringing and
ringing and ringing and ringing. I saw one of those
on Gilmore Girls yesterday at a reasone, So I mean,
let's get it that. Let's understand that. You know the
reason the Lakers are sold less than a year. It's
(29:16):
not quite Oh hey, guess what. I was at dinner
one night and these guys walked up to me and said,
would you take twelve and a half billion dollars with Lakers?
I said yeah, and the check cleared.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
No, I don't think anybody's gonna really buy it, because
that's the selling point, right, what Ramona had to say there,
plus these it came together in seventy two hours. Yes, okay,
you might have gotten the finally two hours the final
notice of hey, the blank's about to hit the fan,
killing the blank yourselves at home kids, But it's it's
just that idea of yeah, it came to like the
(29:46):
school deal. Yeah, they didn't talk to anybody or listen.
They all went to voicemail, like Lebron James in his
quest to find his next team. It's all insane. Some
of the dismissiveness of this, like no, no, no. The The
other part of the story is the juice here meteor part.
It's also a story that puts the Bamber case in
the background for a while longer. Yeah, no one's gonna
(30:10):
with a twelve point five billion dollar story. No one's
gonna care about one hundred billion dollar tree planting, So
who cares about the no show job whatever? Hey, hey,
he lost I lost money. No one's buying that. I mean,
no one's buying it all okay, but I mean it.
If this is the case, right that, where here's a
big investigation in the billions of dollars, I'm selling the Lakers.
(30:33):
If I ever wanted to buy the Dodgers, I'm making
a phone call because you never know, I'm getting my
team together ever, know, right, if I've had an investment
team looking around, whether it's baseball or in this case,
now you got the NBA, where this is a group
that's no longer buying for the Las Vegas ownership at
any point, so that's back in play. But if you've
got a group that's been kind of waiting for one
(30:56):
of these franchises to come up, yeah, right, now, you'd
be on the own going all right, what's liquid? What
do we have? Make sure all your disclosures we were
vetted for Team X, we may have an opportunity again
because you have no idea how big this is. But
it certainly was twelve point five billion dollars big. Yeah,
I mean, look, and to be quite honest, this is
(31:17):
how business goes when a deal can be put together
fast when you want to. But the fact that we
had not heard anything about this, wait, all of a sudden,
I'm getting a phone call out of the blue to sell.
I mean because even the even people who didn't have
any idea about what's going on with this are going
to say, Okay, this is not how it's done. Because
the other part is folks started to dismiss it going well,
I mean, you know he has had health issues. Okay,
(31:41):
so are all any and everything that he owns up.
I don't think he's doing the day to day He's
not out, you know, as part of the launch crew.
And I'm not I'm not taking anything from his health
because he did have a stroke that was well chronicled,
et cetera. So but to say that that's the reason
that he's selling like day to day operations, Man, he's
(32:03):
not pushing pencils. He's not doing that on a daily basis.
He's got a team and an infrastructure that they built
that they're borrowing from the Dodgers organization. So yeah, this
is completely related, in my humble opinion, to the sort
of damicles hanging over here as related to the investigation.
(32:24):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific. Westbrook retired, But did he really? Could he
come out and play again later? Not for a team
light the Wizards or the Sacramento Kings. I mean later
(32:46):
on after the break when there's contenders who have a
need come off the bench instant offense, and he kept
the Knicks to win back to back. You'd gone thirty
three seconds ish before he got the Nixon really not
a lot of Knicks talk tonight. I was really surprised.
(33:06):
I really, I really thought, as I, Hey, hey, that's
defending champion two times. That's defending that's back to back
NBA and Texas State champion, New York Knicks. Okay, I
get here, you you know what. I I'm not gonna
go watch Nick's highlights tonight, but when I get off air,
I watched Nix highlights every day dark side. Oh wow,
(33:33):
Kevin Ellen's a couple of really big two bits that
come out. So I'm jacked. All right, all right, come
on now, let's go. So Russell Westbrook retires and I
kind of, you know, summed it up with you know,
freestyling to skater boys. That was pretty good, but uh,
retiring today? Look at Hall of Fame career. You know
you've heard all the plauts about them all day. He said,
(33:55):
I'm going out on my own terms. You know it's over.
Put out a video narrated by Mike will Be Okay,
the offers he had to play were from the Kings
and the Wizards. Didn't want to do that going out
on his own terms. All right, I get it. I
like that we have a disclosure that those are the
two teams. Yeah, just asked. I said, no, he still
(34:16):
played pretty well last year. Now, is he someone that
can play thirty five minutes a game. No, but coming
off the bench and still at what six triple doubles
last year? Is he really retiring or is he retiring
leaving the door open seeing a guy like boy Jose
Alvarado could not play at all, and all of a sudden,
look at him. He's he's on the court. Winning a
(34:37):
championship there for the Knicks. Uh, I'm not closing the
door on that, because I can easily see after the
All Star break a team with a need, their backup
point guard is injured or they get you know, one
of their rotation guys off the bench is hurt, and
Westbrook can come in and still provide that instant offense
(34:59):
that I will go play with a contender after this
for one more year and see if it works. Magio,
I still have enough left in the tank. He still
I want to go out of my own terms, so
I'm retiring. But the door is open where if a contender,
whether it is the Knicks or the Nuggets again who
say hey, come on back, you know the thunder whoever
(35:19):
it might be the Celtics. Something happens, there's a trade,
there's a need, there's an injury. I one hundred percent
can see him coming back and playing after the All
Star break and maybe being another guy that you can
add on after the deadline that becomes this this late uh,
this late edition that could be that. I can see
that happening, because to go try to play with a
(35:41):
contender to win with enough time to to get back
into the flow and be able to run the offense
one hundred percent. I can see that now if the
if the phone call doesn't come, then the door closes.
But I can see why right now contenders are saying, yeah, Russ,
we're kind of all filled up right now. We're good.
We're going forward here. Yes, you're thirty seven, you do.
But we feel pretty good where we're at right now.
(36:02):
I get contender saying, we're all right, but things change
in a few months. Right, this is August when you're
talking about February. So when it comes to it, and
only for a contender not where Hey, here's a team.
Maybe we can make a run at the eighth seed
or maybe get out of the playing round into the
sixth seed. No, I don't think Russell Westbo's coming back
for that, but a big time contender that has a chance,
I can see. Yeah, a lot of wait and see.
(36:24):
I mean, there's no reason to rush into and force
a marriage. Now if you've got a rotation that you
believe in some young guys, you want to give some run.
Because Russell Westbrook also isn't coming for free, right, I mean,
that's the other part, with the number of years he's
in the league. You're talking about having to move some
contracts around and make that work, playing time, ball handling,
(36:45):
all of that. It's like, all right, let's see what
we've got. There's no rush and for him, again, if
those are the two teams that we're knocking on his
door to come be a regular guy, whether they thought
he could sell tickets, put asses in seats, or just
make them interesting ladder, Uh, probably the best option of
the three. That that there's just no point for him,
(37:06):
right and that and that's a credit to the player
and kind of backs what my feeling has been all along.
He's like, this guy loves basketball, wants people to respect basketball.
Has he had some quizzical moments, absolutely, but you're not
just gonna play for the sake of playing. And I
respect the hell out of that. So I agree with you.
(37:27):
I don't think that the last six years. He's played
with six teams in the last seven years, but he's
accepted his fate. Yeah, and now you have the opportunity
to pick and choose and say, all right, I'll wait
for the right opportunity when someone needs me. If it
doesn't come, it doesn't come, and that that's you're okay.
With that, you play in the booth like he'll show
up on one of the studio shows. Oh what should
(37:47):
be done? Hey mae, maybe I'll wind up doing that.
He'd be fun. I mean, Draymond's not done yet. He's
still playing basketball, so Russell could put the headset on. Yeah. Well,
I mean there's that too, So yeah, no, is the
door closed? No, I can I can see this happening
after the All Star break or maybe even after the
new year, depending on Hey, we have a really rough
need because our six man of point guard got hurt
(38:10):
coming off the bench. We need you now. Okay, I
can see it even now then, but maybe by the
end of the year. So he's playing, he still has
a lot left in the tank when he gets to
the playoffs. Exit out about a Fresco exit swollen down
The Jason Smith Show with my best friend Mike Harmon.
Coming up next, we get back into the biggest NBA
story of the day, and way do we tell you
(38:32):
who's to deserve the biggest congratulatory phone call of the
day after the Lakers got sold. It's not who you
think that's next. Jason and Mike Box
Thanks for listening to The Jason Smith Show with Mike
Harmon podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weeknight
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 Foxsports Radio
dot com, or stream us live every night on the
iHeartRadio app by searching FSR. You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Greetings,
(00:30):
Welcome in side our three, The Jason Smith Show with
my bes friend Mike Harmon. Our What our three? You sure? Yeah? Okay?
What time do hang on? What time do you think
it is? Alex tie shirt? Nine pm? Okay, what time
do we start the show? No, twelve pm? That is
(00:50):
your time? Twelve pm? Wow? Do you really know how
to tell I don't know you know how to tell time?
That he lives in his own states man. That doesn't matter.
It's two really bad clock miscalculations you made. You're a
bad NFL coach, doesn't know how to do things. Yeah,
I'm pretty sure that if you want to say, it's
twelve something right now, it's not twelve pm. H it's
(01:12):
twelve pm somewhere. It's somewhere. It is Yes, yeah, where? Okay,
how many Let me ask you this, how many hours
difference does it need to be right now from here
to where? It's twelve pm? How many hours? Oh? Wow?
Right right now? It's currently twelve pm in Coordinated Universal time,
which includes parts of Western Africa and the Prime Meridian
(01:34):
area such as Molly, Ghana and the Canary Island. What
about the Anti Meridian? What about the Uncle Meridian and
all the little Meridians, the little Meridians? Uh wait, wait
you think three hours to be twelve pm from where
we are to really? Yeah? Really? Yeah? Then twelve more?
B am? Okay, sure, okay, yeah, you got okay makes sense.
(01:55):
The term mini Meridian can refer to several different products
and local developments depending on the context. Uh like a
mini city development in Meridian, Ohio. In Meridian, Idaho, I
should say, not not the same as Iowa. I accident Ohio. Wow?
We are yeah, we are all over the place. Wait
think we you guys, we need to time out. We're
(02:15):
going to talk it over about geography and time telling. Yes,
so let's go back to the original thing, ty shirt?
What what what? What hour? Do you think this is
the show? Wow? We're about to start three okay, very good,
very good. Oh yeah, yeah yeah, well we're not there yet.
We're not there yet. We haven't started. No, why not
finish too? But we finished that? That was the last hour. Yeah, okay,
(02:40):
I guess this is like spaceballs? When will then be? Now?
Just now? I don't know you were done? When was?
When was then? That? Just missed it, sir, just missed it?
Just went past? Uh so okay, I again, Alex, where
did Okay, so we know, Bree making up words? Went
to cal State Flowton. Where where'd you go to school?
I didn't go to school homestead, homestead, homestead I like that.
(03:00):
I mean homeschool, no homestead, no home, a school on
the stead? You had a school on the stead? Yeah?
You went to school with Steedman Graham, no stead, and
then he came to our school. Okay, all right, very good? Okay,
And you would you were you stayed home instead of
going to school? Uh, that's not what I said. Okay,
you should check out the Whisper podcast where we do
(03:21):
all this and we do it with a whisper. Now
we will we will do the Whisper podcast one day. Well,
let's do it over the course the next couple of days,
we're gonna review Obsession. Yes, that will do all right,
So down Whisper podcast. Now you're gonna set it up
and put it out there and everything. I'll really I'm
an intro outro everything, all right. I like that idea.
I like that. All I gotta do is whisper for
twelve minutes. That's pretty good. I drive myself nuts doing
(03:45):
that for twelve minutes straight, whispering. Whispering is tough. It's hard. Yeah,
the scene is not. Yeah, I don't know. The reason
we're talking about whispering is we were doing a whole
bunch of field of dream stuff's obviously there is the
whisper going on with the game tomorrow night. I wonder
how many takes it was to do that. You know
that if you build it, he will come. Okay, it's
a little bit too guttural, not not enough power behind it.
(04:08):
Can you stand up and do it? If you build it,
he will come. Okay. You know what, We're just gonna
do this whole thing with a Now you said a
little sad and desperate. I mean, I don't know, like
you can kind of go up and down the register.
I mean I can I can do it like Marv
Albert is his pain. Yes, not exactly what ray Kinsella
(04:28):
had in mind. Time Out. Gabby Hoffman, she needs to
stop eating that hot dog. Yeah, now you got the
whole thing with Busfield. He was a jerk in the movie,
but now it's buss Field because he had a couple
of good one liners that now I'm surprised they're still
running the movie. They're not. You know that it's too
it's too classic a movie, yay. And there's lots of things.
(04:51):
I was listening to a countdown, you know, on On
on serious they have all the top five hundred sure, right, okay,
so they do. We'll get to the big basketball conversation
a second. So I was listening to count It was
like the top five hundred summer songs of all time,
or maybe the top of pop songs of all time,
and they count down number four hundred and seventy six.
(05:13):
So we just happened to be listening when it got
down to number one, and it was either summer or poppets.
I forget what it was, and we're like, okay, number
two was I don't even know, right, And all of
a sudden waiting for number one, and you just hear
a voice over and and and you know, somebody's voice
says and the number one song of pop, number one
(05:35):
song of all time was I'll Be Missing You by
P Diddy and blah blah blah. And now let's get
back to the countdown. It's like, oh, they're not even
gonna run that song anymore. So they just went all
the way down to number one and they said, yep,
this is number one song. We're not gonna play it.
Let's go back number five hundred and they started over again. No,
you should have just played every breath you take. Nobody's
had problem with staying no. Let's see, let's see wait
(05:57):
wait wait wait wait wait. Oh well, in season one
of only murders in the Building, there was a time
where Steve Martin thought Sting was the killing. That is true.
You think Sting is killing people in this building Sting
of the police. That is true. Sting was in season one.
It's a long time ago. How about that. I'm actually done.
(06:20):
So look, we are sitting here with two big NBA
stories tonight. The Lakers getting sold for twelve point five
billion dollars in Russell Westbrook retiring from the NBA after
eighteen seasons. And look, we had the fun Mount Rushmore
debate of money last hours. You know me, we never
really do Mount Rushmore stuff, but sometimes it's kind of fun.
(06:44):
We mentioned this in passing Westbrook is the best NBA
player to have never won a ring? Right, You have
lots of guys that played, had big, long careers, didn't
win a ring, guys like Steve Nash. But Russell Westbrook,
when he's accomplished the MVPs the length of his career,
the triple doubles average, the triple double. I feel pretty
(07:06):
safe that Westbrook, we could say, is the best player
to have never won an NBA title, better than Alan Iverson,
better than a lot of There's been lots of great
players who never won a title. What about the Patrick Man? Patrick?
Patrick Ewing was terrific? What about Chuck Didn't didn't Quiet
Chuck was terrific too, Right, Chuck was terrific too. But
Westbrook being a guy, there's another guy we can't name though,
(07:27):
handle the ball as much. Well, Yeah, true, that's you
know that other guy. You know that guy guy in Utah,
not the guy there's the dirty point guard. Yeah, no,
there's the other guy, but there's player. Look, there's plenty
of great all time players in the NBA that have
never won a championship. But I feel pretty good that
Westbrook the career he had, what he's done, what he
(07:49):
did better when you can do something that we haven't
seen in the NBA since the nineteen sixties and the
guy's name begins with Oscar Robertson, yeah, I feel pretty
good about the length of what he did over the
course of his career. Steve Nash who kind of petered
out towards the end of his career. Same thing for
Alan Iverson. Uh, Westbrook, what he did, I feel pretty good.
He's that guy. Just a little sidebar, you know, my
(08:12):
love of the the trading card and memorabilia world. Big
O right at one point business part manager his UH
did some legal work for him. I knew him through
a contact when I was working at Northwestern many many
years ago, and he came out with the book and
the Fundamentals of Basketball whatever. I'll get just signed copy. Now.
Oscar Robertson, very famously for years, would sign only the
(08:34):
Big O. I'm thinking off through a contact. I'm getting
the I'm going to get the full signature. No sign
the big just signed the Big O. It's just an
actual Oh. He didn't even want to write no. No, it
says it was just an Oh. How do you know
that it was him? Trust me, it was him. I
watched him circle the oh. He made the it's a
beautiful signature. He's got one of the best looking signatures
you get every letter. If you get him at a convention,
(08:56):
you get him through some of the trading card things,
through a content, personal contest, big a personal favor. I
got a big O. I just got an oval. All right, great?
Why don't you write because it's Oscar Robertson is a
long name to dse of my life. Do you know
over the course of my life how much time I
would save and just writing the Big O versus Oscar
Robertson a few paths? Uh? So I feel good about
(09:21):
Russell Westbrook. You get to the other sports, sure, best
player in each of the other main sports. Now we're
going all time active, not that we're going all time
so we're going NFL, We're going MLB, We're going NHL, NFL.
It's pretty easy. It's pretty easy. When when when the
phrase best player to have never won a Super Bowl
was created for you, and you still are one of
(09:43):
the top five quarterbacks of all time. I'm okay with
Dan Marino still being that. Yeah, but but he twenty
five years he's the best player to never win a Supernow,
but he was hanging out with as Ventura. Yeah, laces
out there. To me, it's Barry Sanders. But again because
because he didn't even get to win like he got, he
didn't get to taste a whole lot of ain't no no, Well,
(10:03):
he turned for the lines, lost. He played for the
which is why he walked away. Yeah, it was so
bad he walked away. So he he gets my bust
up there. I'll give it to Marina because Marino played longer.
You know, Barry Sanders retired very quickly when he was
thirty one years old. As well, dude, you still got time.
I mean, just think about that. With Barry Sanders retirement,
(10:24):
it wasn't like he was near the end. This is
Barry Sanders might have been one of those guys where
he's running for fifteen hundred yards and he's thirty six
years ank him as I decided I'm done, sent him out. Uh.
Major League baseball. It's tough to go between two guys.
But I'll go with the guy whose career I saw
versus a career I didn't see. Uh, So I'll go
Barry Bonds over Ted Williams. I mean Ted Williams, I
(10:47):
mean the thumper and hitting four hundred. I mean, look,
the greatest hitter of all time. Yeah, I guess years
for war service. I didn't see him play, And it's
hard for me to say, oh, he's the best when
I didn't see him. Yeah. No, Bonds is right there
and he look he was. He was just a hair's
breadth away from beating the Angels in two thousand and two.
(11:08):
He would have been the MVP of the World Series,
had a great World Series. But Barry Bonds, even all
the Balco the trouble that he had. I'm okay with
Barry Bonds being there again. You look at the numbers
and Ted Williams, and you hear all the stories about
him and what he was able to do, and and
and and no one's you know, the greatest hitter who
ever lived. And I get all of that, but it's
hard for me to stand up here and say no, no, no,
(11:28):
the guy I never saw play was the best. Really, Yes, no,
I never saw him play, but boy was he good. Well,
you know the other guy that has to be mentioned
here is White Sox Hall of Famer, Ken Griffy junrh Okay,
you have to mention Ken Griffy Junior. You're sure White
Sox say it again? No, White Sox Hall of Famer. No, no, no,
I'll put Ken up there. And maybe if he had
(11:49):
been healthier, made more of a run at bonds. But
I mean, you talk about a guy that owns the
record for most home runs in his career, like the
Red screwed up his legs. He signed with the Reds,
you know, he created the Big Red. He did uh hockey. Honestly,
(12:12):
for me, it was pretty easy because I remember growing
up how good this guy was. Getting to see him
and he was on the Game of the week all
the time, and it was so much fun because you know,
growing up, you know, I got to see the Islanders
and the Rangers and the Devils when they started playing,
but getting to see some of the great players was
always mine because you never got to see them, and
(12:33):
getting to see him and seeing how good he was
and seeing just how he made so many players better
around him. I'm gonna go. Marcel Dion. He was just
that good like he was watching it was it was incredible,
And I feel bad that this is a guy that
was never able to win me. What is he fifth
all time for points in the NHL? Like he was scary.
I remember watching when the Islanders played the Kings, like
(12:55):
my friends who were a little bit older than me,
that that brought me up on hockey. They're like, watch out,
wef we can't control Deon. We're gonna lose this game,
like seven to two. I'm like, oh, come on, man. Yeah,
So I like grew up being scared of Marcel Dion
because he was just that good of a player, you know,
him and simmer and and what was what was a
line they called that, like not the million dollar line,
the Hollywood what did they call the line? It was
(13:15):
him and simmer Ah. I can't think of the line
that had a nickname for them back in the early eighties.
But uh, I will go, I'll go, I'll go. There's
there's my top four. I'll go with Westbrook, Marino, Bonds
and Deal the triple Crown line, Crown Line, Taylor. That's
I couldn't think of it. I'm like it was something
how the triple crown line, That's what it was. Yes,
(13:36):
how about Pavel Burre, Oh you talking about hey for
me to not go the Russian Rocket who was probably
my favorite NHL player when he played, but he didn't
play long enough. He got hurt and he was you know,
by the time he was thirty. He was so unbelievably exciting. Yeah,
I mean he was just you had to know where
(13:56):
he was every second on the ice. But married, you know,
his brother's married to Candae Cameron. So it gets us
into full house and the celebration of noted hockey aficionado
Dave Koolie. All right, Valerie Burray not really close to
the player that popped, not even close. I remember I
was reaching there. I know the other guy I got
(14:17):
to watch a lot, Joe Thornton career played a long time. Yeah,
Thornton was great. And you know the Sharks, you think
they were gonna win at some point when once they
were the best out they were getting over NHL. We
got the coolest entry in hockey though. Yeah, well Sharks,
you're you're an expansion team and you're the Sharks. That's
pretty good. I mean that logo still kicks Assah about
(14:39):
about two Mount Rushmore conversations and one show that we
done hour that's amazing. But did we get an honorable
mention for the guy that doesn't even get to the
playoffs in baseball? Though? In Mike Trout, Oh no, I
mean he had a decade, but you get a decade's
where he was the like it was Thomas Mickey Man like,
(15:00):
oh of that. But you can't use guys now that
aren't done because maybe eventually he says, Okay, I'll accept
the trade to the Phillies, and the Phillies. You can't
do guys that haven't well, especially now that Bryce Harper's broken,
Can they Can they just release him now? I mean
it's hard. I can't say there's other players now who
are incredibly good, Like you want to say, what about
Lamar Jacksonmar Jackson's got half his career left. Yeah, Josh,
(15:22):
these guys are they're ever gonna get over. But I
don't want to be so mean to them and go, yeah,
Josh Allen, but he's only thirty, doesn't matter. He couldn't win.
He's winning. He's gonna put up more stats, but he's
never gonna win. Geno Smith is never gonna no, So
I mean, Gino Smith be lucky if he has his
job after Week four Club Club Club. I sent you
(15:43):
that video and you just like club What did you say?
Week four? Week five, Week five? For week five, Week one,
every other team has a bye playing the Jet. The
Jets come out here though, that that Jets, Browns, Dolphins
battle for the number one pick is going to be
insanely fun fantastic. But don't they they play the rams
(16:07):
of the Chargers this year? Don't they Aren't they here
against the Chargers. I believe they are here. They might
be here for the re I believe they are November
twenty second at the Chargers. Yeah, okay, yeah, just before Thanksgiving. Yeah,
that's where Frostburg gets me on the sideline. Wow, that's
that's really trying to speak something into existing. Hey, Aaron,
(16:29):
how about we throw a hell Mary at the end
of the first half instead of just going a halftime,
not just me coaching from ten feet behind you. Yeah,
Frostburg really needs to get me a sideline passed for
that game. Yeah, but who's that menace that got thrown
Outsten every night seven to eleven you're being taken to
fake jail seven. Give me the FI jail jail with
(16:52):
the guys that were scalping other stuff. Exit out about
a Fresco exit swollen dome. Jason Smith Mike Harmon Live
from the Fox's Radio Studios. Coming up next. Not just
about Russell Westbrook, a sports story that absolutely floored us
when it broke earlier today. That's next Jason and Mike
Fox Sports Radio. Be sure to catch live editions of
(17:13):
The Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten
pm Eastern seven pm Pacific. Steve Gott's here.
Speaker 2 (17:22):
I have a podcast empire. It continues to grow, and
I have brought it here to iHeart. I'm also doing
a live radio show from three to five pm Eastern.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Because my wife wanted to kick me out of the house.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
It's called ste Gotson Company Live, which is available in
podcast form right when the show finishes every single day.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
Some of the biggest names in sports. A lot of
phone calls, I love you guys a show it's one
of my favorites.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
A lot of interact shit guys not taking themselves too seriously.
Those are just some of the things that you could
expect from Stu Gottson Company and Steve Gotson Company Live.
So listen to stew Gottson Company Life. I've ed our
original podcast. Please subscribe, rate and review Steve Gottson Company
and God Bless Football. Taylor's livelihood depends on it. You
(18:09):
do it today and you can check all of those
out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast or wherever you
get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Fox Sports Radio, The Jason Smith Show with my best
friend Mike Harmon. Well dressed Hobo Dodgers lead the Royals
four to two, top of the eighth inning. Maybe we'll
get to see Edwin Diaz blow us out and make
an appearance here. And I'm sorry, wow, sorry about that.
A little bit of you just get You always have
flashbacks you here, you see the flashy lights. I think
(18:44):
the strobe lights are bad for you in many, many ways.
Just real quick, before you get into this big basketball
story of the Lakers being sold, let me just say
because sometimes I feel like I can be a better
general manager than many people in Major League Baseball. Hey, pirates,
how about you skip Paul Schemes in the rotation and
let his arm rest? Huh? How about you let him
(19:05):
rest for like a couple of week I know you're
trying to make the playoffs and all kinds of stuff,
but his velocity is down like four miles an hour.
You're lucky that he's healthy. How about you rest him,
how about you let him just maybe he's got a
dead arm for a little bit and you just let
him go. Hey, let's see if he snaps and bounces
back for the end of August and into September. But
what do I know, but just keep throwing him out
(19:25):
there and see if he gets hurt. Like I mean,
come on, man, it's not easy. It's funny. It's something
we've been kind of talking about and dancing around for
about a month, right, the velocity when you look at
that opposite when we were talking about Schooll ahead of
the trade deadline, or what you've been watching with Misowski,
where every start it becomes a well, here's new records.
(19:46):
Eventually he's gonna, you know, break the sound barrier all together. Right,
we're talking about land speed in what he's doing. But
for Paul Schemes, Yeah, we've seen that wall and he's
trying to run through it like the kool aid man,
and he's running into it. And he's not getting the
job done. Yeah, I mean I think it's pretty easy.
It's not like he's pitching well, and it's hard to
keep take him out because no, he's getting beat. He's
(20:09):
a five hundred pitchers. He's a jag right way up. Yep.
He can't throw. I mean he's lost like four miles
an hour at least off his fastball. And he sees healthy.
He's out there pitching and everything is okay. But I
think you can give him a little bit of a
rest now, maybe you skip him through their rotation once,
give him a few days to figure things out. And
that's the hard part where where they're still competing for
(20:30):
a wild card berth. So it's just like we're actually
kind of relevant. How do we do this? And you know,
he doesn't want to stop, like he wants to battle through.
And if you're in the pirates, Brash, you're also going, well,
we only have him so long, so we need to
squeeze every start, right, because the goose is the gate
for home dates. Right, you're talking about all of those
(20:51):
ancillary human moneies like we've been talking about with all
these stories. That's a tough decision man. Now speaking of
potential injury. It's a really scary moment that just happened
in the Dodgers Royals game. Again. Dodger's up four to two,
top of the eighth inning, runner at first a foul
pop up. Freddie Freeman doesn't just fall into the dugout
(21:16):
to try to catch this pop up. He doesn't see
where he is. He falls down the steps that are
leading into the locker room. It's like he's there one
second and then he's gone, right, this wasn't I got
to the rail, I went over, I flipped. Guys held me.
He got to the point where he thought he was
gonna make a catch, and he was right at the
steps again, you know the steps that lead straight down,
(21:38):
the concrete steps that lead straight down into the locker room.
He was there one second and gone, shawl of Chavez
ravine was silent. Everybody was standing on edge. Dave Roberts
ran over, but Freeman gets up walking a little gingerly.
He stays in the game for now. So luckily the
Dodgers have dodged a bullet there, because that could have
(21:59):
been in incredibly risky and incredibly damaging for Freeman. Like
that's where that could have been a broken wrist, a
broken elbow, a broken leg, a broken ankle, like he
fell down straight onto the concrete, and it was hard
to see the fall because again he just disappeared. He
disappeared out of sight and just gone like, wow, what happened?
That's what happened to Freddy Freim. Maybe he's part of
(22:20):
the uh you know, ned opened a portal. But there
was a long shot and obviously arm gets cut off
halfway through. Sorry about that, doctor Strange. All right, Like
we're obviously in studio, so we can't hear the play
by play, but as we're watching it, they had a
very long camera angle on Freeman as he's standing at
(22:40):
first base, got holding a runner on and he's got
his arms folded, and if you can read his mind,
like he's not saying anything, like they talk on and off,
but the entire time I'm sitting there going Freddie Freeman saying,
why the hell did I do that? This like in
his mind August and it's the Royals. What am I doing?
It's the middle of August, it's the Royal. I'm an
(23:00):
elder statesman here. I've had to answer questions about my
baseball mortality. And the chase for three thousand hits and
I'm diving into the dugout to get after a file ball.
So again, it looks like Freddie Freeman is okay for now.
Maybe he'll get back to the dugout. That's who's gonna
get Freddie Royal's August what are you doing? What are
(23:21):
we doing here? Twent and four games up? I know
it's been a struggle. Let's make business decisions here that
are good. I ask yourself, is this good for the company?
I ask yourself, right, if there was a mat there,
you could if there was a jump to conclusions, Matt
you could fall on I would say great. But there
was no mat. It was just the concrete. No, that's it. Yeah, absolutely,
a lot of those things. Dave Roberts, that'll be the question. Hey,
(23:43):
let's go to Oral Herscheiser's Walk of Fame star ceremony
and ask him what he felt about that play. So again,
we'll keep you updated on this, But it looks like
Freddie Freeman is okay again. Dodgers lead the Royals right now,
four to two in the top of the eighth inning. Meanwhile,
speaking of the Dodger who could be for sale soon,
the Lakers were sold earlier today in a story that
(24:06):
took everybody by surprise. Josh Kushner, not Jared Kushner, Josh
Kushner and Bob Iiger. Yes, that Bob Iger, the former
Disney executive. You know, we would get emails from him
at ESPN all the time. Oh from the desk of
Bob Iger. Okay, Bob Byger telling us about our fourth
quarter earnings, our fourth quarter losses, what we're doing. Bye bye.
(24:28):
Now Bob Iger and Josh Kushner are buying the Lakers
from Mark Walter, who bought the team nine months ago
for twelve point five billion dollars. Little tangent, when when
you were joined ESPN, did you get one of those
black cards that allowed you to go to the park
all the time. Oh yeah, that was the best part. Well,
that was the best That was. That was the thing
(24:48):
is that I could use it at Disney Lander And
when I got the job doing all night from ESPN,
I got him like I can go all the time.
We would go all the time because I had free
passes year round at Disney. Was fantastic. Yeah, I know,
because this couple of friends of mine, like or colleagues
here that they joined. They're like, the rest of it's great,
the rest of the benefits, but you wait for that
box to show yea, yeah, let me see, let me see,
(25:10):
give it to me. But all that said, yeah, the
Dodgers could have a for sale side. And I'm being
I'm not being completely facetious on this, because why would
Mark Walter sell the Lakers just a year after buying it? Well,
if you did any research into it and looking into
things today, you would know that he is the target
of a major load loan fraud investigation. This stems from
(25:34):
billions of dollars in undisclosed related party transactions between his
insurance companies. So basically, without getting too deep into the
weeds on it, he's under big time investigation for fraud.
The penalty could be in the billions of dollars. So
the guy owns the Dodgers, he owns the Lakers. Got
a liquidate all right, Hey, guess what, Let's liquidate the
I'll keep the Dodgers for now, let's liquidate the Lakers.
(25:56):
So a year after buying the Lakers, it's sold for
twelve point five billion dollars. Well, flip this house for
a two point five billion. Are a flip property, now
that's yeah. I mean, look it's under two years, so
it's gonna be a heavier penalty. They are. They are
the house at the end of the cul de Sac
that has been empty for a while, that was used
as an Airbnb, but now the new owners want to
(26:16):
move on from it. I bought it for a song.
Now I'm gonna flip it. Now it's gonna be twelve
point five billion dollars. Don't have Lebron James to worry
about anymore. Just got got Luca, give him a new,
big contract. Hey, we're all good. Look at the look
at this bank, this brand news property that you could
buy for twelve point five billion, making two point five
billion over what he sold it for. But again remember
(26:39):
the penalties for selling in a year. Just had to liquidate.
Just got gotta be ready for whatever comes up here,
whatever he might. Oh so if you pay those taxes
on the two point five billion, I mean you're still
walking away with what well over a billion? Uh yes,
but you know for those just to complete the circle
all the conspiracy theories when you start talking about investigations,
(27:01):
Yes it is the Kushner family. Yes, the brother of
so some folks wondering political leanings. Well, but I mean
we need to we need to connect the dodge for
those that are unawares because this huge investigation. So perhaps
the walls of reality are crashing down. Shared Kusher's the shadow.
(27:23):
He's the real owner, silent partner, not the real owner.
It's really my brother who's the owner. But we had
to kind of keep that puppet. No, we had to
keep that quiet. Now. Look, let's be on. When I
saw look, Ramona Shelburn broke the story for ESPN today
and it was stunning. When I first woke up and
saw it and saw Lakers sold, I'm like, oh, did
the wait the sale gone through? As something happened with
(27:44):
Genie Busts and continuing on, is is a run? No? No,
this is a completely new story, completely new sale. Here's
Ramona Shellburn ESPN NBA Insider earlier today talking about why
Mark Walter decided to sell the team.
Speaker 3 (27:57):
Now, from October of last year to right now, he
just made two and a half billion dollars on the
Los Angeles Lakers. I don't think he was looking to sell,
but when somebody makes you an offer, you can't refuse.
I think it was a business opportunity you couldn't say no.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
To Yeah, because that's what happened, is that a year
after owning the Lakers, people thought, oh, we got to
go and got to buy this rom I get it,
and I understand all the game that's played with insiders
and information and going. I understand, But no one buys
a sports team to flip it in a year. You
buy the sports team because you want to be in
(28:32):
on a club that has billionaires. Not many other people
are in on. You don't buy, you don't. It's not
like buying a block of property in South Beach and
I'm going to renovate it and turn it into something.
You buy a sports team to own the sports team.
You don't buy the Lakers that I'm gonna sell it
in a year unless you need money for some particular
reason that could be coming up very very soon. I mean,
(28:53):
you don't have to cross a lot of t's and
got a lot of eyes, sit here and go and
follow the money and go right here and here and
wait for watergate phone calls like that, Redford and New
and Dustin Hoffwer when the phone was keep ringing and
ringing and ringing and ringing. I saw one of those
on Gilmore Girls yesterday at a reasone, So I mean,
let's get it that. Let's understand that. You know the
reason the Lakers are sold less than a year. It's
(29:16):
not quite Oh hey, guess what. I was at dinner
one night and these guys walked up to me and said,
would you take twelve and a half billion dollars with Lakers?
I said yeah, and the check cleared.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
No, I don't think anybody's gonna really buy it, because
that's the selling point, right, what Ramona had to say there,
plus these it came together in seventy two hours. Yes, okay,
you might have gotten the finally two hours the final
notice of hey, the blank's about to hit the fan,
killing the blank yourselves at home kids, But it's it's
just that idea of yeah, it came to like the
(29:46):
school deal. Yeah, they didn't talk to anybody or listen.
They all went to voicemail, like Lebron James in his
quest to find his next team. It's all insane. Some
of the dismissiveness of this, like no, no, no. The The
other part of the story is the juice here meteor part.
It's also a story that puts the Bamber case in
the background for a while longer. Yeah, no one's gonna
(30:10):
with a twelve point five billion dollar story. No one's
gonna care about one hundred billion dollar tree planting, So
who cares about the no show job whatever? Hey, hey,
he lost I lost money. No one's buying that. I mean,
no one's buying it all okay, but I mean it.
If this is the case, right that, where here's a
big investigation in the billions of dollars, I'm selling the Lakers.
(30:33):
If I ever wanted to buy the Dodgers, I'm making
a phone call because you never know, I'm getting my
team together ever, know, right, if I've had an investment
team looking around, whether it's baseball or in this case,
now you got the NBA, where this is a group
that's no longer buying for the Las Vegas ownership at
any point, so that's back in play. But if you've
got a group that's been kind of waiting for one
(30:56):
of these franchises to come up, yeah, right, now, you'd
be on the own going all right, what's liquid? What
do we have? Make sure all your disclosures we were
vetted for Team X, we may have an opportunity again
because you have no idea how big this is. But
it certainly was twelve point five billion dollars big. Yeah,
I mean, look, and to be quite honest, this is
(31:17):
how business goes when a deal can be put together
fast when you want to. But the fact that we
had not heard anything about this, wait, all of a sudden,
I'm getting a phone call out of the blue to sell.
I mean because even the even people who didn't have
any idea about what's going on with this are going
to say, Okay, this is not how it's done. Because
the other part is folks started to dismiss it going well,
I mean, you know he has had health issues. Okay,
(31:41):
so are all any and everything that he owns up.
I don't think he's doing the day to day He's
not out, you know, as part of the launch crew.
And I'm not I'm not taking anything from his health
because he did have a stroke that was well chronicled,
et cetera. So but to say that that's the reason
that he's selling like day to day operations, Man, he's
(32:03):
not pushing pencils. He's not doing that on a daily basis.
He's got a team and an infrastructure that they built
that they're borrowing from the Dodgers organization. So yeah, this
is completely related, in my humble opinion, to the sort
of damicles hanging over here as related to the investigation.
(32:24):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific. Westbrook retired, But did he really? Could he
come out and play again later? Not for a team
light the Wizards or the Sacramento Kings. I mean later
(32:46):
on after the break when there's contenders who have a
need come off the bench instant offense, and he kept
the Knicks to win back to back. You'd gone thirty
three seconds ish before he got the Nixon really not
a lot of Knicks talk tonight. I was really surprised.
(33:06):
I really, I really thought, as I, Hey, hey, that's
defending champion two times. That's defending that's back to back
NBA and Texas State champion, New York Knicks. Okay, I
get here, you you know what. I I'm not gonna
go watch Nick's highlights tonight, but when I get off air,
I watched Nix highlights every day dark side. Oh wow,
(33:33):
Kevin Ellen's a couple of really big two bits that
come out. So I'm jacked. All right, all right, come
on now, let's go. So Russell Westbrook retires and I
kind of, you know, summed it up with you know,
freestyling to skater boys. That was pretty good, but uh,
retiring today? Look at Hall of Fame career. You know
you've heard all the plauts about them all day. He said,
(33:55):
I'm going out on my own terms. You know it's over.
Put out a video narrated by Mike will Be Okay,
the offers he had to play were from the Kings
and the Wizards. Didn't want to do that going out
on his own terms. All right, I get it. I
like that we have a disclosure that those are the
two teams. Yeah, just asked. I said, no, he still
(34:16):
played pretty well last year. Now, is he someone that
can play thirty five minutes a game. No, but coming
off the bench and still at what six triple doubles
last year? Is he really retiring or is he retiring
leaving the door open seeing a guy like boy Jose
Alvarado could not play at all, and all of a sudden,
look at him. He's he's on the court. Winning a
(34:37):
championship there for the Knicks. Uh, I'm not closing the
door on that, because I can easily see after the
All Star break a team with a need, their backup
point guard is injured or they get you know, one
of their rotation guys off the bench is hurt, and
Westbrook can come in and still provide that instant offense
(34:59):
that I will go play with a contender after this
for one more year and see if it works. Magio,
I still have enough left in the tank. He still
I want to go out of my own terms, so
I'm retiring. But the door is open where if a contender,
whether it is the Knicks or the Nuggets again who
say hey, come on back, you know the thunder whoever
(35:19):
it might be the Celtics. Something happens, there's a trade,
there's a need, there's an injury. I one hundred percent
can see him coming back and playing after the All
Star break and maybe being another guy that you can
add on after the deadline that becomes this this late uh,
this late edition that could be that. I can see
that happening, because to go try to play with a
(35:41):
contender to win with enough time to to get back
into the flow and be able to run the offense
one hundred percent. I can see that now if the
if the phone call doesn't come, then the door closes.
But I can see why right now contenders are saying, yeah, Russ,
we're kind of all filled up right now. We're good.
We're going forward here. Yes, you're thirty seven, you do.
But we feel pretty good where we're at right now.
(36:02):
I get contender saying, we're all right, but things change
in a few months. Right, this is August when you're
talking about February. So when it comes to it, and
only for a contender not where Hey, here's a team.
Maybe we can make a run at the eighth seed
or maybe get out of the playing round into the
sixth seed. No, I don't think Russell Westbo's coming back
for that, but a big time contender that has a chance,
I can see. Yeah, a lot of wait and see.
(36:24):
I mean, there's no reason to rush into and force
a marriage. Now if you've got a rotation that you
believe in some young guys, you want to give some run.
Because Russell Westbrook also isn't coming for free, right, I mean,
that's the other part, with the number of years he's
in the league. You're talking about having to move some
contracts around and make that work, playing time, ball handling,
(36:45):
all of that. It's like, all right, let's see what
we've got. There's no rush and for him, again, if
those are the two teams that we're knocking on his
door to come be a regular guy, whether they thought
he could sell tickets, put asses in seats, or just
make them interesting ladder, Uh, probably the best option of
the three. That that there's just no point for him,
(37:06):
right and that and that's a credit to the player
and kind of backs what my feeling has been all along.
He's like, this guy loves basketball, wants people to respect basketball.
Has he had some quizzical moments, absolutely, but you're not
just gonna play for the sake of playing. And I
respect the hell out of that. So I agree with you.
(37:27):
I don't think that the last six years. He's played
with six teams in the last seven years, but he's
accepted his fate. Yeah, and now you have the opportunity
to pick and choose and say, all right, I'll wait
for the right opportunity when someone needs me. If it
doesn't come, it doesn't come, and that that's you're okay.
With that, you play in the booth like he'll show
up on one of the studio shows. Oh what should
(37:47):
be done? Hey mae, maybe I'll wind up doing that.
He'd be fun. I mean, Draymond's not done yet. He's
still playing basketball, so Russell could put the headset on. Yeah. Well,
I mean there's that too, So yeah, no, is the
door closed? No, I can I can see this happening
after the All Star break or maybe even after the
new year, depending on Hey, we have a really rough
need because our six man of point guard got hurt
(38:10):
coming off the bench. We need you now. Okay, I
can see it even now then, but maybe by the
end of the year. So he's playing, he still has
a lot left in the tank when he gets to
the playoffs. Exit out about a Fresco exit swollen down
The Jason Smith Show with my best friend Mike Harmon.
Coming up next, we get back into the biggest NBA
story of the day, and way do we tell you
(38:32):
who's to deserve the biggest congratulatory phone call of the
day after the Lakers got sold. It's not who you
think that's next. Jason and Mike Box
Hosts And Creators
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Mike Harmon
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