April 10, 2021 • 26 mins
This is Prime Cuts! (4/5 - 4/9) The best moments from The Colin Cowherd Podcast. Colin does a special interview with WWE President and Former CAA Co-Head of Television Nick Khan, who tells an amazing story about how a fight at Kinko's got him into the sports agent business, and where he sees television going in the future (3:00). Blazers Head Coach Terry Stotts joins to talk about coaching Damian Lillard, and some underrated NBA greats (9:30). Joe Person of The Athletic comes on to tell us why the Sam Darnold Trade is a risk worth taking for the Panthers (15:00). And finally, Brian Costello of the New York Post joins to share the pivotal moment in the Darnold-Jets relationship. (19:30).
Make sure you follow Colin and The Volume on Twitter for the latest content and updates and check out FanDuel for the best wagering and daily fantasy action!
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 (00:01):
The volume. Welcome to Prime Cuts with me Colin Coward.
I'll bring you the best of the week this week.
Nick Con special guest, my former agent, now the president
(00:22):
of w w E. It's Brusselmania Week. Some amazing stories
how he got started in the business, the story about
Freddie Roach knocking out a six foot six guy, predicting
the future of TV. Blazer Head coach Terry Stotts joined
the show to talk about Dame Lillard, some overlooked NBA greats.
Joe Person of the Athletic breaks down the Sam Darnold
trade from the Panthers perspective. Brian Castello gives us the
(00:43):
Jets point of view. I've been in broadcasting about thirty years,
and you know, first ten to twelve I didn't have
an agent Dan. I bounced around and had a few
and my career was fine, and I was in local stuff,
local sports, TV radio stuff about thirteen fourteen years. Then
I got a job at ESPN, and at the end
(01:04):
of my ESPN days, I got my last agent, Nick
Con and Nick Cohn worked at CIA, and you know,
he represented guys like Herb Street, a lot of big shots.
There's two or three sports agents in America that represent
most of the big talent, and Nick was one of them.
And so I'm pretty loyal guy. I had an agent,
(01:27):
and you know, my wife and I sat down one
time and she said, I think you need a bigger
presence as an agent, and I said, all right, and
then you meet Nick. And if you've ever met Nick,
you could google him. Nick con He if he showed
up in the Sopranos, like he just he just was
one of the actors, you'd be like, yeah, yeah, he
(01:49):
looks like one of those guys. I'm not saying he
wax people, but I'm saying he gets stuff done and
he's got a presence about him. And so then Nick
and I became very good friends, and he got me
to Fox, and I've leaned on him. That was a
long time ago, seven eight years ago on anything I've
done in business. And then about a year ago he said,
(02:14):
I'm done with the agent thing, and Vince McMahon hired
him to run THEE which is a massive task. Nick
is the first agent I've ever had. Every single question
I ask, and I ask a lot of them, he
is a step ahead, He's two years ahead, three years ahead.
In fact, he had not long ago he was quoted
(02:37):
in a magazine talking about the NFL rights about six
months to nine months out the NFL rights, and he
just nailed it, you know, right down to the dollar figures.
He knew where it was going, what they were paying,
who would get the best deals. And to me, that's
the essence of my friend Nick con Until let's bring
him in. You know you, since i've known you, we
(02:59):
both with love boxing, and you know, listen, I'm on
the treadmill, the daily treadmill, talking about leagues. But I've
told my audience this, and I think I've told you this, Nick.
Nothing beats a fight, nothing beats an event. You had
a relationship with a great Freddie roach and take me
back where did it start? And give me the give
(03:20):
me the journey on that. Oh the way your recollection
of these events is amazing. I think it's one of
I don't know if that it's an underrated thing of
your many great qualities, but it's something you have great recall.
You can sort of remember certain events and what the
scene was like at the event. I don't know, just
a compliment. It's one of the great great traits of you. Anyway,
(03:42):
Freddie Roach. So if you don't know what he looks like,
and I know you do. But if you don't know,
and you're a bully, Freddie sort of looks like your
perfect victim, five ft five, white guy, glasses, Parkinson's disease.
But if you do know who he is, you know
he's a former lightweight contenderant he can knock your block off.
So years ago, when I was a lawyer, I would
go to his boxing gym just as a civilian. Go
(04:04):
work out there, hang out there, and I would tell
me I'm a lawyer. If you ever need anything, let
me know, let me know, let me know. So finally
one day it calls me and he says, hey, I
got into a little bit of a situation at a
King Goes if you remember the King Goes copy shops. Sure,
and I said, I tell me what happened, And he said.
I was standing in line next to a guy who
is six foot six, three hundred pounds, and the six
(04:26):
foot six bully was yelling at the clerk at King Goes.
The clerk said something funny to the bully. I Freddie
Roach was standing in line. I laughed. Bully turns to me, says,
what the fuck, are you laughing at I Freddie Roach
said the bully, I'm laughing at what the clerk said
to you. So, according to the third party witnesses, the
six foot six guy backs Freddie up, takes a swing
(04:49):
out him. Freddie ducks under lays the guy out with
one shot. Freddie gets sued. Of course, he had never
been sued before, so the guy found out. At the
time Freddie was training, Mike Tyson was training again named
James lights out Tony and ultimately sued Freddie. I can't
sleep emotional distress. People were driving by my house. So
we got the case settled. I think it was like
(05:09):
a five thousand dollars nuisance fee, you know, just getting
rid of the case. And from there Freddie started introducing
me to all of his fighters who needed legal help,
including a fighter in a two thousand and four world
named Manny Pakia who had not yet broken through. And
it was really Paki out that got me out of
the law, Paquio and Freddie out of the law and
(05:30):
into the sport side of the business. What's the difference
between defending an on air person and defending a boxer.
It's such a different world. It look in boxing tip.
Your best boxers tend to come from the lowest rung
of the socioeconomic ladder, so the rules are different there.
So if you look at Manny Pakia, there was a
(05:52):
time in his professional career. We're on a Friday night
he signed with promoter X the very next day and
took money from promoter X. The very next day signed
with promoter why took more money from that promoter. I
spoke to him and I said, hey, Nanny, I said,
you can't do that, And he said, what do you
mean I can't? I just did, and it sort of
(06:12):
taught me something early in business. There is no can't.
These are rules. Rules and laws are separate things. Go ahead,
what we're gonna say? No, I think that's fascinating. I'd
be like signing with two networks correct, so once and again.
At that time I was twenty nine or thirty years old.
But you hear it and you go through school. Like
one of the things I don't love about school, Colin.
(06:34):
If I can digress for a moment, I think it's great.
Go get an education brought in your mind. But school
is a rule based experience. If your papers do on
a Wednesday, you can't come in on a Thursday and say, hey,
I don't follow your rules, here's my paper, you'll fail
the class. So your entire life you have to follow
the rules to even have a chance to succeed. And
then you get out into business. There's no rules, so
(06:56):
they're laws. We always want to follow the law. We
want no problems there. As you know, there's no rules,
so you can do whatever it is that you want
to do once you know what your risk tolerance is.
Do you believe Amazon or Apple? And again it's almost
a rounding air when you look at their market value,
their valuation, Do you think they'll buy a network because
(07:17):
the network now is not that profitable. I think networks
would tell you, but this NFL deal in five or
six years, these are not highly profitable sports departments or networks.
Do you think an Amazon or an Apple buys one
of these networks? Yes, to me, as crystal clear as
it appears to be in your head. That part of
the setup on these NFL long term deals, and the
(07:39):
NFL wanted long term. But part of the benefit to
the networks is if they were going to sell themselves
now they can sell themselves with at least seven years.
My understanding is the NFL has a unilateral opt out
of all of these agreements seven years into the agreements,
and keep in mind they don't start until a couple
of years from now. That's you're talking about nine to
(08:01):
eleven years from now. Do we believe that these entities
are going to sell? I think so? Even if you
look at Fox. So part of what Rupert said when
he sold the great bulk of what he had built
the Disney was we're not big enough to compete with
what these new enterprises are. So to your point about
(08:23):
the market caps, Disney, Comcast, WarnerMedia market caps of two
hundred and twenty to three hundred billion dollars. So at
that time, Fox said, hey, we're not big enough to compete.
They sold off seventy five percent or so of their assets.
So now with Fox Network, FS one, Fox Business, and
(08:43):
Fox News, how ultimately are you going to compete as
these other behemoths get bigger and bigger and have theme
barks and have satellite companies and cable companies. And yes,
I know WarnerMedia sold direct TV, but they sold direct
TV because there's no broadband with direct TV. So how
do you ltimately get into the future of the business.
If you're prohibited because of your equipment from getting into
(09:04):
the future of the business, which is broadband, you sell it.
So when you look at Viacom CBS, much smaller company.
When you look at Fox, much smaller company. Both phenomenal
companies with phenomenal leadership. But I'm sure there's going to
be a number of phone calls made about possibly acquiring
those entities. We'll see. Well. I love my first guest today,
(09:25):
Terry Stotts, not only because he coaches the Blazers, he
had coached the Bucks in Atlanta before that, but he
played basketball in the Big Twelve and in Europe and
in the CBA. He won a title as an assistant
beating Lebron and the Heat with the MAVs. And it's funny,
having worked in Portland for years, I talk about Terry
actually often because my friends are all diehard Blazer fans,
(09:48):
and it was really special a couple of weeks ago
when Terry won his five hundredth game and he now
joins us. I've said the two players in the NBA
fifteen seconds left I want the ball in their hands
are Stephen Dame, and I've said it multiple times on
my show. There's, as you pointed out, an intuitiveness, a confidence.
The range is just greater than anybody else in the league.
(10:11):
How Terry, how much do you draw the playout with
Dame and how much do you allow him to just
sort of feel it? You know, my job is to
get him the ball. You know, if we if we
call it play at the end of the game, the
most important thing is to get him the ball and
have good spacing, have the right other players on the
(10:31):
floor with him. That allows him to read the situation.
But you know, I try not to stand in the
way of greatness. Honestly. It's uh, you let great players
do great things. And like I said, call it time out.
A lot of times we don't call it time out
if he already has the ball because they'll do everything
in their in their power to deny him the ball. So,
(10:55):
you know, it's one of those situations I learned, and
that's one of the things we've learned together is early
on in the first two or three years, he said,
I need to take that shot. I need to take
that shot. And so that's how I think, that's how
it's evolved. And obviously he's come through But you know
it's sometimes I get criticized for saying, well, you know,
(11:17):
all he does is get Dame in the ball. Well, yeah,
that's that's my job. It's getting him the ball. It's
not a bad you know what, Hike get to Tom Brady,
He'll take care of the rest. Who's a player that
would surprise me if I said, Terry hard to prepare for,
difficult to match up with throughout your career. It could
be a George Gervin or Bernard King, just somebody that
(11:38):
jumps out. It's maybe not the face of the league,
wildly underappreciated. You know, the name that comes to me
and they're you're right, there are a lot of guys
like that. But the name that comes to me is
Alex English. Oh God, I knew it. I knew it.
I mean those teams in Denver, and I wasn't in
the NBA, but I mean you had kikey Van and
(12:00):
Alex English and Doug Mo coaching them and they just
they moved, they passed, they cut. I can't that team
would have so much success in today's game because of
how they move and pass. They would score, they would
score a bunch. But Alex Alex was one of my
assistants in Atlanta, but he might be one of the
(12:21):
more underappreciated Hall of Fame players out there. You know,
it's so funny. I am literally laughing. I have referenced
him before. I said, if you're twenty thirty years old,
because he wasn't a dunker. He was kind of read thin,
shot the ball above his head. And not all the
games Terry were on TV, so I would read the
Seattle Times box score. He dropped like thirty two every
(12:42):
other night, and you're like, who is he? Who's Alex?
You know? There was another player that was a different
kind of player named Walter Davis for the Suns, right,
another incredibly KG player that just never got his due
because back then the games weren't on television. So the
Paul falls, the Alex English is. By the way, Kekey
(13:03):
Vandaway is another guy that dropped, Oh exactly exactly. I
mean you talk about a fundamental player who could shoot
pass cut screen. You know, he basically what every player
is doing now with the step back. That's what Keiki
almost invented, the step back. I mean, his footwork was
was outstanding, and like I said, you put Keki and
(13:26):
Alex English together on the same team with that style
of play, it was it would be hard to guard.
And like, you're right, I didn't get a chance to
see him that much. You know, I'd see clips and
but it's not like today where you could just sit
on watch Alex English every night. You know those hot
takes you post on social media, Well now you can
win up to five thousand dollars when you put those
(13:49):
takes to the test on FanDuel. It's a new game
called over Under and it's absolutely free to play on FanDuel.
Here's how it works. Fan Duel will set lines on
things like total points or three pointers made during every
NBA on TNT broadcast. All you have to do is
pick over or under for every problem. Your picks could
win you a share of five thousand dollars during every contest.
(14:13):
Fan Duels the exclusive home for Overunder, and it's available
in all fifty states, so you can play from anywhere.
All you have to do is go to FanDuel dot com,
slash over under and sign up now. If you have
not done so already, you create a new FanDuel account
if you don't already have one. It takes less than
two minutes to sign up. Then put your takes to
(14:35):
the test during every NBA on TNT broadcast at FanDuel
dot com slash over under. They could be worth up
to five thousand dollars. Age and location restrictions apply seefanduel
dot com for terms in condition. So let's bring in
Joe Person, eight years the Charlotte Observer. Now he's at
(14:59):
the athletic covering the Panthers and he joins us. First
of all, Joe, this feels like a significant upgrade for
Sam Darnold. Whereas the Panther's offensive line isn't dominant, there
are some nice pieces. Robbie Anderson is a burner that
(15:19):
Sam's worked for, Christian McCaffrey's a star, and Joe Brady
and Matt Rule seem more than competent on the offensive
side calling and designing plays. So, from your perspective covering
the Panthers, does Darnold seem like something you need? You know?
I think it's I think it's a risk worth taking.
(15:40):
I mean that this does feel like an organization that's
been spinning his wheels at the quarterback position, and you
know that they made the decision that they wanted to
move on from cam Newton. They thought that the health
was a big concern, and I think matt Rule wanted
a fresh start, a fresh quarterback. So they go with
Teddy Bridgewater. Probably paid Teddy Bridgewater too much money for
(16:02):
a guy that was looking in New Orleans like a
good competent backup quarterback. Yes, but but it didn't work out,
I mean, and so what are you gonna do? They
tried to go down a number of other quarterback roads.
They lost out on Matthew Stafford to the Rams. They
(16:24):
were very involved, to the point that that Houston would
answer their phone calls or not into Shaun Watson, and
then that legal situation closed that door on them. And uh,
I think in Darnald Scott Fitter or the new GM
in Charlotte saw a guy that he thought was at
least better than the guys in this draft not named
(16:49):
Trevor Lawrence at Zach Wilson. And rather than rather than
take a chance on a guy in let's say, Trey
Lance that maybe they didn't that they thought might work,
They're gonna take a guy. They take a chance on
a guy the same kind of thing. Maybe it works,
maybe it doesn't. But it's kind of more of a
rental than you know, a five year rookie d What
(17:13):
do we know? What did you learn Joe about Matt Rule,
his style? What is Darnold walking into You only have
a year, so but you can ascertain certain things over
sixteen games? What did you like? What has a college
coach coming to the league would concern you? So, I
mean he is I mean, he definitely brings that college
(17:36):
sort of mentality to it. Like the thing that I'll
never forget from from that first Matt Rule training camp,
which was weird because of COVID and right, but they're
they're having basically an interest squad scrimmage in Bank of
America's state, in an empty Bank of America's stadium. Just
(17:56):
the fact that they're having an interest squad scrimmage kind
of like a spring game type thing. But he's doing that,
and at halftime, you know, or whatever the halftime break was,
he had the starting offense doing win sprints because he
did not like what he saw from them from from
an effort standpoint. So I mean that there is that feel.
(18:18):
I was impressed with Matt Rule. I thought that he
had a good feel for a situational football game management
type of stuff. I mean, it didn't didn't necessarily always
pan out as they went over eight uh with with
the opportunity to win or tie the game late late
in games. But um yeah, I think he's going to
(18:42):
be a success in this league. But but it is,
it just seems like they've been kind of patching holes,
you know, like sticking a finger in the whole one
year at quarterback and then another one springs out, springs
up the very next year. So we'll see. I mean,
this is uh, you know, as well as anyone that
(19:04):
that position. You don't get it right, you may not
ever be the success that as a head coach that
that folks think you will be. So let's bring in
Brian Costello, Jets beat reporter for the New York Post,
works for w fa N. Nobody's is tied in to
the Jets and their current dysfunction, as Brian Costello Hopefully
(19:25):
it's headed eventually in the right direction. I know, And
I like Joe Douglas the GM let's hope. So listen,
Darnald worked with fifty six different offensive teammates, none of
them a pro bowler, none of them. I mean, you know.
I mean compare that to Baker Mayfield, who has the
number one graded offensive line on Pro Football Focus. Two
(19:45):
great backs, Jarvis landry O b J. I mean compare
that to almost any quarterback was there. I mean, obviously
Sam didn't have a ton to work with with your sourcing, though,
did you hear things the gay side? Were there frustrations
with Darnold? Because I heard one out of college he
was under coached at USC, which has been in sort
(20:07):
of this malaise for years, that he wasn't great on
the white board in the draft rooms. Initially that's why
Baker got drafted, that he'd just been under coached, and
Baker had Lincoln Riley, who's brilliant. When did you start,
you know, because people talk and chirp, and gays wants
to protect his legacy in his job. When did you
start hearing some maybe misgivings or doubts about Darnald a
(20:30):
little bit in Gasee's first year. I thought that, you know,
the Ghost game was kind of a pivotal moment. Everyone
remembers that game, right the week before Sam had come
back from Mono. They beat the Cowboys. Yeah, and Sam
throws and ninetyr touchdown to Robbie Anderson and they stunned
the Cowboys. Right, this is Dak Prescott and the Cowboys.
(20:51):
So everything is riding high. And then they have Monday
Night against New England and he can't do anything. He
looked lost out there. And yeah, he says he gets
a don camera. I'm seeing ghosts And I thought that
kind of explained it. Sam. Someone said this to me
a while ago, and I think it's right there. Sam
is more Brett Farve than he is Peyton Manning. He's
(21:11):
not a guy who's going to be reading the defense
and picking everything apart he can run around and make plays.
You know, he's not far He doesn't have five's skill level.
He doesn't have five's arm. But that's what he's good at.
He's gonna just run around and making things happen. Schoolyard ball,
he's not good and like read one to read two,
read three to read four, he's not good at that.
(21:31):
And so that's what you know. The Jets thought bringing
in the Shanahan system with Mike Lafloora, that might help
Sam if they kept him. And we'll see if Joe
Brady can do that with him. You know, I just
like in Gasee's gaze, the system is complicated. It's the
pay manning system from Denver So and Adam did not
want to dumb it down that much, so to speak.
So I think it just didn't wasn't a good mix there.
(21:54):
You know, I've heard the same things that That's exactly
what I've heard, is that Sam is best being in
tuitive and just making plays. And by the way, that
was so popular in the seventies, eighties, nineties, it's less
popular now. The big ben the kind of remedial audible system,
make it up as you go. It just doesn't play.
(22:16):
It's more of an Aaron Rodgers, Tom Brady you know,
own the line of scrimmage pre snap Drew Brees League.
You know, Brian, you've talked about this in your stories
with a post and I'm sure you haven't the fan
that it wasn't a given maybe six weeks ago to
move off Darnold, that Sala liked him. What I mean,
(22:37):
did it come down to, essentially Zach Wilson gives us
four straight years of a rookie contract. I think that
was a big part of it, you know, I think
it was just the timing was off with Sam Colin
because I was, like, I've said to people, there's a
lot of people who said, oh, they kept Sam. There's
a lot of Jets fans trade the number two pick,
get a million picks and build around him. So I'm like,
(22:57):
all right, let's play this out. What's the best case
scenario for the twenty and twenty one Jets? Right? They
still have holes? Who were their starting cornerbacks? You don't
you probably don't know who their starting cornerbacks are right
right now? It's Bryce Hall and Bless Austin. They do work.
They don't have a running back. You know, they signed
Tevin Coleman, He's not a lead running back. They still
have questions at receiver. So play this out. Let's say
(23:18):
they keep Sam and he has, you know, a decent year,
twenty touchdowns, eight interceptions, and the Jets win six or
seven games. Because that's about the ceiling for this team
right now. Then what do you do Colin? Do you
give him a contract extension off that year? Like, I
don't know, I wouldn't pay someone off of that year.
I haven't seen enough. So that's to me and Joe
Douglas's mind, It's like, you know, it's just not enough
(23:42):
time to evaluate him. In a year, he's not gonna
show you enough where you're gonna give him this long
contract extension. You can start over with Zach Wilson and
start over with the rookie contract. And I think they
really liked Wilson. They fell in love with him watching
the film, and then they kind of they guy. Finally
got to see him on that pro day and he
basically answered all the questions on that reaffirmed what they
saw on tape, and that's when they said, all right, Carolina,
(24:04):
let's go, let's talk um overall. How are the Jets
viewed and treated in your eyes by the city's media.
I think rough. I think it's it's been rough because
they've lost for the last ten years. You know, they
haven't made the playoffs now since twenty and ten, and
they've had a lot of called Jetsy type stories. Gino
(24:24):
Smith gets punched in the face, Sam Donald gets monoonucleosis.
They bring in Tebow and you know they don't use them. Um,
you know, there's just a lot of crazy stories. Colin.
I mean, the gays press conference, there's just just they
there was a plane flying over practice, that said fire
John Issick. So it's there's a lot. You know, there's
(24:44):
been a lot. So yeah, I don't I don't think
it's been unfair. I think um, I think they get criticized.
And you know the thing about New York media, and
I like asking guys who've been in other markets, and
there's just more of us. It's just a little bit
louder here than other places because there's more of us,
and and the back page is sort of a different animal.
You don't have that in every town. You know, the
(25:05):
back page can be rough on guys. Page six doesn't
exist everywhere. Like I'm the Jets beat writer, right, Colin.
You know how many conversations I've had to have with
quarterbacks about them appearing on page six and explained to them, yes,
that's the New York Post, but that's not me. I
like Mark Sanchez, we had a picture of him on
(25:25):
the front page eating breakfast with Ava Longoria. That doesn't
happen in Green Bay, Colin, Right, And so like I
had to go face Mark the next day and be
like sorry, you know, and you know, Sam Dorn rented
a limousine and brought up had a big party after
one game and it was in page six and I said, Sam,
I'm sorry. You know, so that kind of stuff doesn't
happen anywhere, but I think, you know, I think Chicago,
(25:48):
South Florida. I think there's you know, there's markets where
they people get covered just as tough as here, but
it's just a lot more here. M h. That wraps
it up for the week. We're heading into another big
week here at The Volume. Make sure to subscribe and
(26:10):
follow us at the Volume Sports on Twitter and Instagram.
The Volume
The volume. Welcome to Prime Cuts with me Colin Coward.
I'll bring you the best of the week this week.
Nick Con special guest, my former agent, now the president
(00:22):
of w w E. It's Brusselmania Week. Some amazing stories
how he got started in the business, the story about
Freddie Roach knocking out a six foot six guy, predicting
the future of TV. Blazer Head coach Terry Stotts joined
the show to talk about Dame Lillard, some overlooked NBA greats.
Joe Person of the Athletic breaks down the Sam Darnold
trade from the Panthers perspective. Brian Castello gives us the
(00:43):
Jets point of view. I've been in broadcasting about thirty years,
and you know, first ten to twelve I didn't have
an agent Dan. I bounced around and had a few
and my career was fine, and I was in local stuff,
local sports, TV radio stuff about thirteen fourteen years. Then
I got a job at ESPN, and at the end
(01:04):
of my ESPN days, I got my last agent, Nick
Con and Nick Cohn worked at CIA, and you know,
he represented guys like Herb Street, a lot of big shots.
There's two or three sports agents in America that represent
most of the big talent, and Nick was one of them.
And so I'm pretty loyal guy. I had an agent,
(01:27):
and you know, my wife and I sat down one
time and she said, I think you need a bigger
presence as an agent, and I said, all right, and
then you meet Nick. And if you've ever met Nick,
you could google him. Nick con He if he showed
up in the Sopranos, like he just he just was
one of the actors, you'd be like, yeah, yeah, he
(01:49):
looks like one of those guys. I'm not saying he
wax people, but I'm saying he gets stuff done and
he's got a presence about him. And so then Nick
and I became very good friends, and he got me
to Fox, and I've leaned on him. That was a
long time ago, seven eight years ago on anything I've
done in business. And then about a year ago he said,
(02:14):
I'm done with the agent thing, and Vince McMahon hired
him to run THEE which is a massive task. Nick
is the first agent I've ever had. Every single question
I ask, and I ask a lot of them, he
is a step ahead, He's two years ahead, three years ahead.
In fact, he had not long ago he was quoted
(02:37):
in a magazine talking about the NFL rights about six
months to nine months out the NFL rights, and he
just nailed it, you know, right down to the dollar figures.
He knew where it was going, what they were paying,
who would get the best deals. And to me, that's
the essence of my friend Nick con Until let's bring
him in. You know you, since i've known you, we
(02:59):
both with love boxing, and you know, listen, I'm on
the treadmill, the daily treadmill, talking about leagues. But I've
told my audience this, and I think I've told you this, Nick.
Nothing beats a fight, nothing beats an event. You had
a relationship with a great Freddie roach and take me
back where did it start? And give me the give
(03:20):
me the journey on that. Oh the way your recollection
of these events is amazing. I think it's one of
I don't know if that it's an underrated thing of
your many great qualities, but it's something you have great recall.
You can sort of remember certain events and what the
scene was like at the event. I don't know, just
a compliment. It's one of the great great traits of you. Anyway,
(03:42):
Freddie Roach. So if you don't know what he looks like,
and I know you do. But if you don't know,
and you're a bully, Freddie sort of looks like your
perfect victim, five ft five, white guy, glasses, Parkinson's disease.
But if you do know who he is, you know
he's a former lightweight contenderant he can knock your block off.
So years ago, when I was a lawyer, I would
go to his boxing gym just as a civilian. Go
(04:04):
work out there, hang out there, and I would tell
me I'm a lawyer. If you ever need anything, let
me know, let me know, let me know. So finally
one day it calls me and he says, hey, I
got into a little bit of a situation at a
King Goes if you remember the King Goes copy shops. Sure,
and I said, I tell me what happened, And he said.
I was standing in line next to a guy who
is six foot six, three hundred pounds, and the six
(04:26):
foot six bully was yelling at the clerk at King Goes.
The clerk said something funny to the bully. I Freddie
Roach was standing in line. I laughed. Bully turns to me, says,
what the fuck, are you laughing at I Freddie Roach
said the bully, I'm laughing at what the clerk said
to you. So, according to the third party witnesses, the
six foot six guy backs Freddie up, takes a swing
(04:49):
out him. Freddie ducks under lays the guy out with
one shot. Freddie gets sued. Of course, he had never
been sued before, so the guy found out. At the
time Freddie was training, Mike Tyson was training again named
James lights out Tony and ultimately sued Freddie. I can't
sleep emotional distress. People were driving by my house. So
we got the case settled. I think it was like
(05:09):
a five thousand dollars nuisance fee, you know, just getting
rid of the case. And from there Freddie started introducing
me to all of his fighters who needed legal help,
including a fighter in a two thousand and four world
named Manny Pakia who had not yet broken through. And
it was really Paki out that got me out of
the law, Paquio and Freddie out of the law and
(05:30):
into the sport side of the business. What's the difference
between defending an on air person and defending a boxer.
It's such a different world. It look in boxing tip.
Your best boxers tend to come from the lowest rung
of the socioeconomic ladder, so the rules are different there.
So if you look at Manny Pakia, there was a
(05:52):
time in his professional career. We're on a Friday night
he signed with promoter X the very next day and
took money from promoter X. The very next day signed
with promoter why took more money from that promoter. I
spoke to him and I said, hey, Nanny, I said,
you can't do that, And he said, what do you
mean I can't? I just did, and it sort of
(06:12):
taught me something early in business. There is no can't.
These are rules. Rules and laws are separate things. Go ahead,
what we're gonna say? No, I think that's fascinating. I'd
be like signing with two networks correct, so once and again.
At that time I was twenty nine or thirty years old.
But you hear it and you go through school. Like
one of the things I don't love about school, Colin.
(06:34):
If I can digress for a moment, I think it's great.
Go get an education brought in your mind. But school
is a rule based experience. If your papers do on
a Wednesday, you can't come in on a Thursday and say, hey,
I don't follow your rules, here's my paper, you'll fail
the class. So your entire life you have to follow
the rules to even have a chance to succeed. And
then you get out into business. There's no rules, so
(06:56):
they're laws. We always want to follow the law. We
want no problems there. As you know, there's no rules,
so you can do whatever it is that you want
to do once you know what your risk tolerance is.
Do you believe Amazon or Apple? And again it's almost
a rounding air when you look at their market value,
their valuation, Do you think they'll buy a network because
(07:17):
the network now is not that profitable. I think networks
would tell you, but this NFL deal in five or
six years, these are not highly profitable sports departments or networks.
Do you think an Amazon or an Apple buys one
of these networks? Yes, to me, as crystal clear as
it appears to be in your head. That part of
the setup on these NFL long term deals, and the
(07:39):
NFL wanted long term. But part of the benefit to
the networks is if they were going to sell themselves
now they can sell themselves with at least seven years.
My understanding is the NFL has a unilateral opt out
of all of these agreements seven years into the agreements,
and keep in mind they don't start until a couple
of years from now. That's you're talking about nine to
(08:01):
eleven years from now. Do we believe that these entities
are going to sell? I think so? Even if you
look at Fox. So part of what Rupert said when
he sold the great bulk of what he had built
the Disney was we're not big enough to compete with
what these new enterprises are. So to your point about
(08:23):
the market caps, Disney, Comcast, WarnerMedia market caps of two
hundred and twenty to three hundred billion dollars. So at
that time, Fox said, hey, we're not big enough to compete.
They sold off seventy five percent or so of their assets.
So now with Fox Network, FS one, Fox Business, and
(08:43):
Fox News, how ultimately are you going to compete as
these other behemoths get bigger and bigger and have theme
barks and have satellite companies and cable companies. And yes,
I know WarnerMedia sold direct TV, but they sold direct
TV because there's no broadband with direct TV. So how
do you ltimately get into the future of the business.
If you're prohibited because of your equipment from getting into
(09:04):
the future of the business, which is broadband, you sell it.
So when you look at Viacom CBS, much smaller company.
When you look at Fox, much smaller company. Both phenomenal
companies with phenomenal leadership. But I'm sure there's going to
be a number of phone calls made about possibly acquiring
those entities. We'll see. Well. I love my first guest today,
(09:25):
Terry Stotts, not only because he coaches the Blazers, he
had coached the Bucks in Atlanta before that, but he
played basketball in the Big Twelve and in Europe and
in the CBA. He won a title as an assistant
beating Lebron and the Heat with the MAVs. And it's funny,
having worked in Portland for years, I talk about Terry
actually often because my friends are all diehard Blazer fans,
(09:48):
and it was really special a couple of weeks ago
when Terry won his five hundredth game and he now
joins us. I've said the two players in the NBA
fifteen seconds left I want the ball in their hands
are Stephen Dame, and I've said it multiple times on
my show. There's, as you pointed out, an intuitiveness, a confidence.
The range is just greater than anybody else in the league.
(10:11):
How Terry, how much do you draw the playout with
Dame and how much do you allow him to just
sort of feel it? You know, my job is to
get him the ball. You know, if we if we
call it play at the end of the game, the
most important thing is to get him the ball and
have good spacing, have the right other players on the
(10:31):
floor with him. That allows him to read the situation.
But you know, I try not to stand in the
way of greatness. Honestly. It's uh, you let great players
do great things. And like I said, call it time out.
A lot of times we don't call it time out
if he already has the ball because they'll do everything
in their in their power to deny him the ball. So,
(10:55):
you know, it's one of those situations I learned, and
that's one of the things we've learned together is early
on in the first two or three years, he said,
I need to take that shot. I need to take
that shot. And so that's how I think, that's how
it's evolved. And obviously he's come through But you know
it's sometimes I get criticized for saying, well, you know,
(11:17):
all he does is get Dame in the ball. Well, yeah,
that's that's my job. It's getting him the ball. It's
not a bad you know what, Hike get to Tom Brady,
He'll take care of the rest. Who's a player that
would surprise me if I said, Terry hard to prepare for,
difficult to match up with throughout your career. It could
be a George Gervin or Bernard King, just somebody that
(11:38):
jumps out. It's maybe not the face of the league,
wildly underappreciated. You know, the name that comes to me
and they're you're right, there are a lot of guys
like that. But the name that comes to me is
Alex English. Oh God, I knew it. I knew it.
I mean those teams in Denver, and I wasn't in
the NBA, but I mean you had kikey Van and
(12:00):
Alex English and Doug Mo coaching them and they just
they moved, they passed, they cut. I can't that team
would have so much success in today's game because of
how they move and pass. They would score, they would
score a bunch. But Alex Alex was one of my
assistants in Atlanta, but he might be one of the
(12:21):
more underappreciated Hall of Fame players out there. You know,
it's so funny. I am literally laughing. I have referenced
him before. I said, if you're twenty thirty years old,
because he wasn't a dunker. He was kind of read thin,
shot the ball above his head. And not all the
games Terry were on TV, so I would read the
Seattle Times box score. He dropped like thirty two every
(12:42):
other night, and you're like, who is he? Who's Alex?
You know? There was another player that was a different
kind of player named Walter Davis for the Suns, right,
another incredibly KG player that just never got his due
because back then the games weren't on television. So the
Paul falls, the Alex English is. By the way, Kekey
(13:03):
Vandaway is another guy that dropped, Oh exactly exactly. I
mean you talk about a fundamental player who could shoot
pass cut screen. You know, he basically what every player
is doing now with the step back. That's what Keiki
almost invented, the step back. I mean, his footwork was
was outstanding, and like I said, you put Keki and
(13:26):
Alex English together on the same team with that style
of play, it was it would be hard to guard.
And like, you're right, I didn't get a chance to
see him that much. You know, I'd see clips and
but it's not like today where you could just sit
on watch Alex English every night. You know those hot
takes you post on social media, Well now you can
win up to five thousand dollars when you put those
(13:49):
takes to the test on FanDuel. It's a new game
called over Under and it's absolutely free to play on FanDuel.
Here's how it works. Fan Duel will set lines on
things like total points or three pointers made during every
NBA on TNT broadcast. All you have to do is
pick over or under for every problem. Your picks could
win you a share of five thousand dollars during every contest.
(14:13):
Fan Duels the exclusive home for Overunder, and it's available
in all fifty states, so you can play from anywhere.
All you have to do is go to FanDuel dot com,
slash over under and sign up now. If you have
not done so already, you create a new FanDuel account
if you don't already have one. It takes less than
two minutes to sign up. Then put your takes to
(14:35):
the test during every NBA on TNT broadcast at FanDuel
dot com slash over under. They could be worth up
to five thousand dollars. Age and location restrictions apply seefanduel
dot com for terms in condition. So let's bring in
Joe Person, eight years the Charlotte Observer. Now he's at
(14:59):
the athletic covering the Panthers and he joins us. First
of all, Joe, this feels like a significant upgrade for
Sam Darnold. Whereas the Panther's offensive line isn't dominant, there
are some nice pieces. Robbie Anderson is a burner that
(15:19):
Sam's worked for, Christian McCaffrey's a star, and Joe Brady
and Matt Rule seem more than competent on the offensive
side calling and designing plays. So, from your perspective covering
the Panthers, does Darnold seem like something you need? You know?
I think it's I think it's a risk worth taking.
(15:40):
I mean that this does feel like an organization that's
been spinning his wheels at the quarterback position, and you
know that they made the decision that they wanted to
move on from cam Newton. They thought that the health
was a big concern, and I think matt Rule wanted
a fresh start, a fresh quarterback. So they go with
Teddy Bridgewater. Probably paid Teddy Bridgewater too much money for
(16:02):
a guy that was looking in New Orleans like a
good competent backup quarterback. Yes, but but it didn't work out,
I mean, and so what are you gonna do? They
tried to go down a number of other quarterback roads.
They lost out on Matthew Stafford to the Rams. They
(16:24):
were very involved, to the point that that Houston would
answer their phone calls or not into Shaun Watson, and
then that legal situation closed that door on them. And uh,
I think in Darnald Scott Fitter or the new GM
in Charlotte saw a guy that he thought was at
least better than the guys in this draft not named
(16:49):
Trevor Lawrence at Zach Wilson. And rather than rather than
take a chance on a guy in let's say, Trey
Lance that maybe they didn't that they thought might work,
They're gonna take a guy. They take a chance on
a guy the same kind of thing. Maybe it works,
maybe it doesn't. But it's kind of more of a
rental than you know, a five year rookie d What
(17:13):
do we know? What did you learn Joe about Matt Rule,
his style? What is Darnold walking into You only have
a year, so but you can ascertain certain things over
sixteen games? What did you like? What has a college
coach coming to the league would concern you? So, I
mean he is I mean, he definitely brings that college
(17:36):
sort of mentality to it. Like the thing that I'll
never forget from from that first Matt Rule training camp,
which was weird because of COVID and right, but they're
they're having basically an interest squad scrimmage in Bank of
America's state, in an empty Bank of America's stadium. Just
(17:56):
the fact that they're having an interest squad scrimmage kind
of like a spring game type thing. But he's doing that,
and at halftime, you know, or whatever the halftime break was,
he had the starting offense doing win sprints because he
did not like what he saw from them from from
an effort standpoint. So I mean that there is that feel.
(18:18):
I was impressed with Matt Rule. I thought that he
had a good feel for a situational football game management
type of stuff. I mean, it didn't didn't necessarily always
pan out as they went over eight uh with with
the opportunity to win or tie the game late late
in games. But um yeah, I think he's going to
(18:42):
be a success in this league. But but it is,
it just seems like they've been kind of patching holes,
you know, like sticking a finger in the whole one
year at quarterback and then another one springs out, springs
up the very next year. So we'll see. I mean,
this is uh, you know, as well as anyone that
(19:04):
that position. You don't get it right, you may not
ever be the success that as a head coach that
that folks think you will be. So let's bring in
Brian Costello, Jets beat reporter for the New York Post,
works for w fa N. Nobody's is tied in to
the Jets and their current dysfunction, as Brian Costello Hopefully
(19:25):
it's headed eventually in the right direction. I know, And
I like Joe Douglas the GM let's hope. So listen,
Darnald worked with fifty six different offensive teammates, none of
them a pro bowler, none of them. I mean, you know.
I mean compare that to Baker Mayfield, who has the
number one graded offensive line on Pro Football Focus. Two
(19:45):
great backs, Jarvis landry O b J. I mean compare
that to almost any quarterback was there. I mean, obviously
Sam didn't have a ton to work with with your sourcing, though,
did you hear things the gay side? Were there frustrations
with Darnold? Because I heard one out of college he
was under coached at USC, which has been in sort
(20:07):
of this malaise for years, that he wasn't great on
the white board in the draft rooms. Initially that's why
Baker got drafted, that he'd just been under coached, and
Baker had Lincoln Riley, who's brilliant. When did you start,
you know, because people talk and chirp, and gays wants
to protect his legacy in his job. When did you
start hearing some maybe misgivings or doubts about Darnald a
(20:30):
little bit in Gasee's first year. I thought that, you know,
the Ghost game was kind of a pivotal moment. Everyone
remembers that game, right the week before Sam had come
back from Mono. They beat the Cowboys. Yeah, and Sam
throws and ninetyr touchdown to Robbie Anderson and they stunned
the Cowboys. Right, this is Dak Prescott and the Cowboys.
(20:51):
So everything is riding high. And then they have Monday
Night against New England and he can't do anything. He
looked lost out there. And yeah, he says he gets
a don camera. I'm seeing ghosts And I thought that
kind of explained it. Sam. Someone said this to me
a while ago, and I think it's right there. Sam
is more Brett Farve than he is Peyton Manning. He's
(21:11):
not a guy who's going to be reading the defense
and picking everything apart he can run around and make plays.
You know, he's not far He doesn't have five's skill level.
He doesn't have five's arm. But that's what he's good at.
He's gonna just run around and making things happen. Schoolyard ball,
he's not good and like read one to read two,
read three to read four, he's not good at that.
(21:31):
And so that's what you know. The Jets thought bringing
in the Shanahan system with Mike Lafloora, that might help
Sam if they kept him. And we'll see if Joe
Brady can do that with him. You know, I just
like in Gasee's gaze, the system is complicated. It's the
pay manning system from Denver So and Adam did not
want to dumb it down that much, so to speak.
So I think it just didn't wasn't a good mix there.
(21:54):
You know, I've heard the same things that That's exactly
what I've heard, is that Sam is best being in
tuitive and just making plays. And by the way, that
was so popular in the seventies, eighties, nineties, it's less
popular now. The big ben the kind of remedial audible system,
make it up as you go. It just doesn't play.
(22:16):
It's more of an Aaron Rodgers, Tom Brady you know,
own the line of scrimmage pre snap Drew Brees League.
You know, Brian, you've talked about this in your stories
with a post and I'm sure you haven't the fan
that it wasn't a given maybe six weeks ago to
move off Darnold, that Sala liked him. What I mean,
(22:37):
did it come down to, essentially Zach Wilson gives us
four straight years of a rookie contract. I think that
was a big part of it, you know, I think
it was just the timing was off with Sam Colin
because I was, like, I've said to people, there's a
lot of people who said, oh, they kept Sam. There's
a lot of Jets fans trade the number two pick,
get a million picks and build around him. So I'm like,
(22:57):
all right, let's play this out. What's the best case
scenario for the twenty and twenty one Jets? Right? They
still have holes? Who were their starting cornerbacks? You don't
you probably don't know who their starting cornerbacks are right
right now? It's Bryce Hall and Bless Austin. They do work.
They don't have a running back. You know, they signed
Tevin Coleman, He's not a lead running back. They still
have questions at receiver. So play this out. Let's say
(23:18):
they keep Sam and he has, you know, a decent year,
twenty touchdowns, eight interceptions, and the Jets win six or
seven games. Because that's about the ceiling for this team
right now. Then what do you do Colin? Do you
give him a contract extension off that year? Like, I
don't know, I wouldn't pay someone off of that year.
I haven't seen enough. So that's to me and Joe
Douglas's mind, It's like, you know, it's just not enough
(23:42):
time to evaluate him. In a year, he's not gonna
show you enough where you're gonna give him this long
contract extension. You can start over with Zach Wilson and
start over with the rookie contract. And I think they
really liked Wilson. They fell in love with him watching
the film, and then they kind of they guy. Finally
got to see him on that pro day and he
basically answered all the questions on that reaffirmed what they
saw on tape, and that's when they said, all right, Carolina,
(24:04):
let's go, let's talk um overall. How are the Jets
viewed and treated in your eyes by the city's media.
I think rough. I think it's it's been rough because
they've lost for the last ten years. You know, they
haven't made the playoffs now since twenty and ten, and
they've had a lot of called Jetsy type stories. Gino
(24:24):
Smith gets punched in the face, Sam Donald gets monoonucleosis.
They bring in Tebow and you know they don't use them. Um,
you know, there's just a lot of crazy stories. Colin.
I mean, the gays press conference, there's just just they
there was a plane flying over practice, that said fire
John Issick. So it's there's a lot. You know, there's
(24:44):
been a lot. So yeah, I don't I don't think
it's been unfair. I think um, I think they get criticized.
And you know the thing about New York media, and
I like asking guys who've been in other markets, and
there's just more of us. It's just a little bit
louder here than other places because there's more of us,
and and the back page is sort of a different animal.
You don't have that in every town. You know, the
(25:05):
back page can be rough on guys. Page six doesn't
exist everywhere. Like I'm the Jets beat writer, right, Colin.
You know how many conversations I've had to have with
quarterbacks about them appearing on page six and explained to them, yes,
that's the New York Post, but that's not me. I
like Mark Sanchez, we had a picture of him on
(25:25):
the front page eating breakfast with Ava Longoria. That doesn't
happen in Green Bay, Colin, Right, And so like I
had to go face Mark the next day and be
like sorry, you know, and you know, Sam Dorn rented
a limousine and brought up had a big party after
one game and it was in page six and I said, Sam,
I'm sorry. You know, so that kind of stuff doesn't
happen anywhere, but I think, you know, I think Chicago,
(25:48):
South Florida. I think there's you know, there's markets where
they people get covered just as tough as here, but
it's just a lot more here. M h. That wraps
it up for the week. We're heading into another big
week here at The Volume. Make sure to subscribe and
(26:10):
follow us at the Volume Sports on Twitter and Instagram.
The Volume
Host
Colin Cowherd
Popular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.