History for KD, Tourney Madness, Astros Return

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Clinton and Adam Wexler or d team.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Doctab Tompson for the game winner.

Speaker 1 (00:09):
They will have the reviews. But I think we got it.
I think as a zero.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
The rooming on the floor to special baskets players.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Under review, Clint's jacket upon review the basket floor and
it's a game winter a man top tad with a
rockets word dottament. Tompson for the game winner.

Speaker 4 (00:36):
I think he made it, but it was probably before
what we played. Hope you guys liked it. No offense
to the people that work here, but man, some people
are really not very intelligent. Wait, okay, what's wrong with
my mic?

Speaker 3 (00:49):
Are we doing this?

Speaker 4 (00:50):
On the first segment of the show that there we go?
Was the pot not up? What's going on? Josh? It's
not him? Yeah, the pot was not all right?

Speaker 3 (00:58):
All right?

Speaker 4 (00:58):
I think what you wanna start to show over? I
mean would love to. Yeah, can we do it?

Speaker 5 (01:02):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (01:03):
Play the open again. Let's do it again. Come on,
let's try this again? Man?

Speaker 3 (01:11):
Why not?

Speaker 4 (01:14):
Oh we're here, we're not We got four hours. Whenever
you're ready. It'll be awesome. It's we're not in a hurry.
Our listeners are not going anywhere. You guys love us, right,
You've been waiting all weekend to hear from us, and
now we're all being babies about it. So as sides,
the countdown is on for opening day. It's a great week. No, no,
that's we're not getting into the show yet. Oh this
is like the best week ever. We're not letting it
get ruined right out of the gate. What happened is

(01:38):
when it's ready, he's gonna fire it off and we'll
just stop talking. She doesn't want to have dead air,
so we're gonna keep talking until it is ready. It's fine,
it's no big deal. Can't you guys have fun with this?
Did you enjoy yourself? I am having a blast right now.
I mean again, I don't want to say a word
about what happened since after we left on Friday and
before we sat in here on Monday, because there's too

(01:59):
much good stuff to get to, right. But I would
like to show start to show that right.

Speaker 6 (02:04):
That two lifelong Houston sports guys named Adham raised my girl.

Speaker 7 (02:11):
No.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
One Hockey, volted.

Speaker 6 (02:16):
By the magnificent roller coaster ride that is Houston Sports.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Chill lage down.

Speaker 6 (02:25):
For the only homegrown afternoon team is talking your teams,
Adam Clinton and Adam Wexler are the eight teams.

Speaker 4 (02:39):
I'm afraid to play it. So I still don't think
it's ready. Let's see, Yeah it's not. Here's what I
was talking about. Has nothing to do with Josh, nothing
to do with you, nothing to do with the computer,
has nothing to do with Pazza. Highlight twenty three A
then game winner? How long? And that's how it starts.
How long does it say? It doesn't matter, that's how
it starts. We was there two versions of it. There

(03:01):
are many versions of it, clearly, But if you're going
to put something in the system like that, I actually
already have it. I already you know, I have a
show to do tonight after the astro, after our broadcast
here Rockets basketball. So if I'd known somebody thought, let's
put the game winner in the system, but doctor it
up so you actually don't hear the game winning shot
and then label a game winner, I would have put
it in myself, you know, which is what I normally do.
Got started earlier today, so hopefully as everybody is having

(03:25):
as good a day as we are now, well, hang on,
I have to know who put it in that way.
It doesn't matter. It does matter to me because I'm
the one dealing with it right now. Nobody's dealing with
it anymore. We have four hours. By the time the
show is over, we will have heard the most important
shot that was hit the entire season, but we won't
open with it because we'll save it for a little
bit later on the show. We are here with you

(03:47):
on the A team. It's great to be with you.
Like I said, this was an unbelievable weekend heading into
arguably the best week here in Houston. That is not
football related, because I know some people say, hey, we
had a game this weekend. That's all I need. The
Texans playing, the Cougars were playing, the Owls were playing,
my college team was playing. Whatever the case may be.
Outside of football season, which is King Man, this is

(04:08):
some kind of week we have in front of us.
As expected, the regionals over at Toyota Center Thursday night
will include your Houston Cougars. So that is Thursday night.
Before that, we're going to be at the ballpark as
the Astros open up their season against the Los Angeles Angels.
Hunter Brown with the opening day start, and we'll be
with you from dyk in Park starting at ten a m.

(04:32):
For the three pm first pitch. That is exciting. We're
excited to see all you guys out there, and like
I said, we'll be live out there for four plus
hours before the game. Obviously, postgame coverage will begin as
soon as the game is over and the Astros are
looking to see if they can continue with the next
one to sixty one and remain undefeated. We'll do that
live from Dyke and Park, and those who so choose

(04:54):
might also start their day over at Memorial Park the
Texas Children's who open teas off Thursday morning. All of
that stuff is on Thursday, and we got three days
to get you there. Because of what took place this weekend,
we welcome you into the show, welcome you into your comments. Obviously,
in addition to winning twice over the weekend, since we left,

(05:16):
a question that was asked on the Friday shows me
you think the Rockets will win any games this week?

Speaker 8 (05:21):
A text from WEX about it over the weekend. Believe
it or not, it's always a believe It's always I
believe it. They won on a Friday night in a
very very entertaining fashion. Maybe not what was expected, but
it certainly was very entertaining, and then I don't think
there's much that could have topped how things went down
with their more recent game and how they wrapped it up,

(05:41):
the back to back, the five game homestand and Kevin
Durant obviously moving past Michael Jordan on the all time
scoring list. We're gonna filter this show with a lot
of stuff surrounding that there's only four players in NBA
history who have scored more than Kevin Durant, and he's
passed now three players to get to number five while
in a Rockets uniform. The highlights, all the audio from

(06:02):
Matt Thomas, from Craig Ackerman on the TV side, you're
gonna hear for however long into the future you get
to continue enjoying this. That's who's on it because he
is in Rockets gear.

Speaker 4 (06:11):
And as the season, while we discussed things before Friday
Night and Saturday Night, our shows consisted of Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,
following one and then two losses to the LA Lakers
in the fourth quarter. In both games, people were a
little bit out on the Rockets. Then, for obvious reasons,
I'm not really looking forward to the postseason looking forward

(06:33):
to the final few games. And I know they tried
to bring in here on Monday the very same way,
the fact that they needed a game winner in the
fourth quarter, in the final seconds, even though they led
by eight with three and a half plus minutes to
go in that very same game because of a monster
comeback they put together with tremendous shooting which had been
absent for so long. But they did win both times.

(06:55):
So we're looking forward to to getting into that discussion.
For sure. We're definitely getting into the end tournament. The
question was asked also last week, what's the best day
on the calendar in the sports world, and that is
an option the first day or first two days of
the tournament, and luckily we had four days of the tournament.
Nothing but what we always get, which is why we
always love it. Doesn't have to be better than last year,
doesn't have to be worse than last year. It always delivers.

(07:17):
It always delivers, It always delivers, It always delivers, and
yet there are people who want to complain about it.

Speaker 3 (07:22):
Not me.

Speaker 4 (07:23):
Loved every moment of it. And again opening week in
Major League Baseball, so great to be here.

Speaker 8 (07:29):
Yeah, and we have like we're in that spot, that
sweet spot with Houston weather that comes twice a year
on the calendar. It's right now and then it's usually
it used to be like October. Now it's like mid
November because the summer just decides to keep lasting longer.
Where the weather is, it's not just only bearable, it's
downright pleasant. So if you're outside like we will be

(07:50):
on Thursday, weather pending outside the stadium, it's just a
great time to be out and about. And yeah, this
is one of the best weeks out there. But I again,
it's not typical of us to come in on a
Monday and go all the way back to Friday night,
if not Saturday night. During football season, it's all about

(08:12):
the day before. Usually, if it's a Sunday traditional game
for the Texans, we're going to come in here and
that's going to dominate the conversation. And like Wex said,
there are so many things to get to, but it's
just it's also not that often where you've got a
guy like Kevin Durant who becomes a top five NBA
score in your uniform on his home floor in your city,

(08:32):
and you've got to stop the game to recognize something
like this and it was fantastic. Oh and it was
like the second best moment of the game that night,
because yeah, Aman Thompson with that game winner was absolutely spectacular.

Speaker 4 (08:46):
I wish they would have stopped the game. Then Miami
wouldn't have immediately scored. On the other end. It's the
most Rockets things, So they didn't. They were able to
get the tribute video that the obviously was ready to
go in anticipation again a five game homestand the likelihood
was very, very very high he would get there provided health.
He was healthy, and even with two very subpar output
games back to back eighteen point efforts against the Lakers

(09:08):
earlier in the week.

Speaker 8 (09:09):
By the way, we should he should have surpassed this
in one of those Lakers games. But because he was
so pedestrian for those only two games this season, you
didn't get to see this in person.

Speaker 4 (09:20):
You had I had the first three games the home stand,
you had the last two. Let's just say he hit
his average in both of the Lakers game, Well, that
would have only been sixteen more points. He just would
have got it against the heat and like the second
quarter instead of the fourth quarter. Yeah, I guess that's
p and there was a whole game of cushion in between. I,
like I said, I actually I don't know how it
made it to the airwaves. Last Friday, I talked about
the scheduling that I try to put together. I mean

(09:42):
I put it together. I could have easily manipulated saying, well,
I don't know how you didn't end up with this
Kevin Durant, all time greatest moment. Game just worked out
this way, my man. Now, this is the way to
do it. That's the most fair way, and it goes
as it goes. I'm sure it was an exciting night
to be out there both nights, and it was needed.
Like I want to enjoy the moment. I want to

(10:04):
enjoy the game winner moment. I want to enjoy all
the things that they finally did, which is make their
way back against this particular team. Not that they're the
greatest team, but there are certainly one of a very
small number of teams right now. Last several years, while
the Rockets have been good, they have the Rocket's number,
they have a way of just going off against them,
or whatever the Rockets do, it's just not enough. They

(10:25):
started the game eight zip for crying out loud and
could not have fallen behind by double figures any faster
with the run. They let the heat immediately go on.
But they found a way to get that win in
the same thick of things for the four or five
six spot in the Western Conference as they were when
they were losing to the Lakers, and they will have
a game against the team right there with them. They've

(10:46):
got the Minnesota Timberwolves part of this short or four
game road trip, and only last week. They mix in
these games so quickly, and that is one of them.
Will obviously put one team ahead of the other sitting
right where they do, same spot. Sixteen games over five hundred,
with now twelve games to go. All those things are great,
and they needed a win to make the moment that

(11:08):
much better. And so it was, and so we will
share more of that with you here the game winner
in its entirety when we come back, obviously you're here
the game the record breaker again, it's not even a record,
it's a record surpasser being fifth all time. It's not
a record. You're just fifth on the list, that's all.
MJ is sixth on the list. Five other players who've

(11:29):
done what he does put on an NBA Jersey have
outscored him now and Kevin Durant is number five, So
bring that to you. Obviously, want to get into the tournament.
I hope everybody else enjoyed it as much as I do.
And the fact you got two more baseball games to
start the season here in Houston at Dyke and Park
tonight and tomorrow against the sure Land Space Cowboys. There

(11:49):
are very few decisions left for the Astros to make.
They've made almost every necessary reassignment to minor league camp,
and you're not going to make the major league roster
internal announcements to their players. They have just a couple
of spots left, so we'll go through what we think
they might end up doing when we get here, to
the opener coming up on Thursday, and so so much more.

(12:10):
Best of X is now just fifteen minutes out. Steve Sparks,
one of our many weekly visitors to Sports Talk seven ninety,
began his weekly visits earlier today on the Morning Drive,
So we'll share some of that with you in a
little under two hours, actually, around three p thirty. It's
signature segment day on a Monday. That means we bring
you the good, the bad, and the ugly, and don't

(12:30):
think we forgot about it, since we do it every
single day for the last seven years. Football at five
here on Sports Talk seven ninety cot.

Speaker 3 (12:37):
To Reid, Reid right elbow out.

Speaker 2 (12:40):
The Durant setting fire.

Speaker 1 (12:41):
And Canna.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
Kevin durantbron Can go Comy. You've got Kaffany, the NBA
All time tug time.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
His name is Kevin Durant.

Speaker 4 (12:59):
Bounce passes. Shan went pretty So I'm trying to figure
out which point during that sentence go ahead. I can't. Well,
it's not my fault that stupid people still work here.
Why would anybody want this on a loop? I remember
it was on a loop from last Friday, but I
have not been able to take it off. This guy
is in rare form on a Monday. Well, the computer

(13:20):
in here is utilized on air. Yeah, so under no
circumstances would you ever want it on a loop? So
why it would be set on that makes no sense.

Speaker 8 (13:29):
So one specific SoundBite, only a severy SoundBite you play
in this particular audio system, would now be on a
loop because that is toggled on.

Speaker 4 (13:37):
Jeez, but I've toggled it off. I think I don't
want to test during the segment, though, might as well.
It's all good. Hey, did you know Kevin Durant moved
past Michael Jordan. Yeah?

Speaker 8 (13:47):
Hey, I was trying to figure out at what point
during that Matt Thomas call that the heat hit the three,
like five sevenkens in seven seconds in after he hit
the show.

Speaker 4 (13:56):
It was a little bit further down than that.

Speaker 8 (13:58):
If you look at the replay, which I know you've
seen a million times, probably a billion at this point,
watch albre and Schhingoon's face like, oh gosh, we gave
up another.

Speaker 4 (14:07):
Three right after we hit a three. It's what the
Rockets do this year. Well, no, really, they hadn't done
it at that portion of the game, or else they
never would have caught up. This is just a season
long thing. And Jabari Smith Junior back to back read
Aaron kd their fourth quarter three point shooting. It since
we keep harkening back to last week, and it's not
because he did anything in the Friday night game or

(14:29):
the Saturday night game. It's only because it had to happen.
And I don't know what they were waiting for. I
said it last week. I don't care if Aaron Holidays
won for his last a billion. I don't care if
he's missing every three. You have to play him when
the team is going through what it's going through, you
have to and ultimately may decided to do that. And
obviously in this instance it worked at a pretty high

(14:51):
clip because of the two huge threes that he hit.
But it's just more. But you got a bunch of
guys that are not making shots, and you're having ball
handling problems, and you want to get kid off the ball.
Don't play read forty eight minutes. But I mean, I
don't want that either. But that's all you're left with
if you won't play Aaron Holiday, and then the time
you want to take Kevin Durant off, the ball is

(15:13):
left with Well, then a men and Alpie and Jabbari
and Tari are handling it more. Nobody wants that. That's
the Rockets should not want that. I saw an article today.
It made me think of you, and I just I
couldn't bring myself to put it into the show. But
it was talking about it was looking back at the
deals that were made, whether they were trades in the offseason,
free agency signings in the offseason, or trade deadline transactions

(15:37):
and there was a list of ten good ones and
ten bad ones. The Rockets found their way onto the
bad list somehow. I think it was number seven. Yeah,
Dorifs signed exactly the least. I didn't like the list though,
no kind of lame.

Speaker 8 (15:50):
It was lame, especially when you consider on the good
list Kevin Durant being traded for wasn't anywhere on there.

Speaker 4 (15:55):
I'm sorry because Dalen Brooks on the list. So it's
clearly in the realm of Yeah, Phoenix go out a
lot better. But the Rockets got worse. Well they did.
They haven't gotten better. Well, they haven't got worse. That's fair.
If they don't finish seven and five, the record is worse.
Please tell me, if you get the best player in
the deal, you win the deal. They won the deal.
I guess this isn't gonna do anything this year. This

(16:15):
is not worth discussing. It's not, of course, but that's
not the point. The point though, they're not trying to
do something. They're trying to give themselves a chance to
do something. The Rockets are trying to win a championship. Yeah,
well they'll do that next year.

Speaker 8 (16:28):
The point of this, though, was that the tenth best
transaction was Jose Alvarado to the Knicks.

Speaker 4 (16:34):
I thought of you, it's really paid off, he said.
I think he had like two good games. We know
one of them. Well what about though? When I was
looking I I seriously want to curse right now. I
know I do it on purp. I'll say this so
I won't have to. When I was sadly in tears
reluctantly looking up if Tarr Easton was in fact the

(16:58):
worst three point shooter in the NBA over the last
fifteen games, and he is, you know who was right
next to him? No way, Yes, And he even talks.
He's like, right now, what are you? Your SHOT's not
going well right now? I suck. This is Jose Alvarado
speaking with the media. I can't make a shot, I
can't score. I suck.

Speaker 8 (17:15):
But what is the in this conversation you and I
had with Matt Thomas off the ear? It wasn't about
bringing him in to make threes or shoot well as
much as it's hey, we're turning the ball over twenty
five times a.

Speaker 4 (17:26):
Night, right, So play aeron holiday and tell Jose Alvarado
to stay where he is nowhere near here. That's hounds simple, it.

Speaker 8 (17:32):
Was, although you're only saying it like simple because you're
on the air right now, you would say much more.

Speaker 4 (17:36):
Of course, I mean I can I don't like him either,
but I think I can control I think I can
control myself. But the entertaining basketball, again, it's crazy that
they well they went three and two on this homestand
but the entertainment value, pure entertainment value for the fans
and attendance for those five games. You beat the Pelicans
miraculously with five unbelievable plays in succession down the stretch,

(18:00):
Shabari's three, Kadi's game winner, Katie's free throws, and the
two defensive plays in between those three makes that created
Pelican's turnovers. You follow that up with games that were
winnable in the fourth quarter. Late against the Lakers, a
forty burger from Luca wasn't real exciting, and a thirteen
or fourteen performance from Lebron also not very exciting. Two

(18:22):
losses ultimately not very exciting, but the quality of basketball
and the entertainment value through the roof. Then they had
one of their better quarters that they were able to
sustain all the way through victory against the Hawks. I
still have a wet blanket tidbit for the Hawks game.
I'll save it because this is a good positive moment here,
and then the game Saturday night. I'm sure you guys

(18:43):
said it a bunch. I know, Ryan and Craig and
Vanessa said it as well. Best game of the season
for pure enjoyment. They're hard to top that. It was
a shot making festival. It was a roller coaster ride.
It clearly had some unbelievable moments. I mean, if you're
on the other side of it and you force a
turnover in the final ten seconds and get the go

(19:04):
ahead bucket after losing your entire lead, that's pretty darn
exciting up until you play awesome defense on the NBA's
fifth all time leading scoring scoring list, and then you
don't have anybody to box out of men Thompson, to
be fair to the heat, it was an insane athletic
play by a man to even get that rebound, though

(19:27):
He's just kind of drifting in and drifting in and
where was there big in there? Because Adabaio was, like
I said, defending tremendously well. He forced a yagon awesome
by the way, I would say, every single player in
the NBA other than Kevin Durant puts a worst shot
up if they're defended that way by Audabai. I can't
believe it was even that close. I was expecting airball

(19:49):
with the way he had to double clutch, contort and
throw it up one handed.

Speaker 8 (19:53):
He had the most forgotten about thirty twenty game in
the history of the NBA.

Speaker 4 (19:57):
Thirty twenty. He was dominating three and all the stuff
we talked about last week, and I still stand by
all of it, because he was hunting and it was
a joke what happened over the final few minutes of
the fourth quarter of that game.

Speaker 8 (20:08):
And Eric Spolstra cannot apologize all he wants. He still
looks like a jackass for doing it.

Speaker 4 (20:12):
But it's not to say bam Adebayo isn't an effective player,
and that was way more than just effective on Saturday night. Yeah,
he was great a man obviously, as KD said it himself,
saved the day with that moment. It is a little
it would have been a downer, obviously if you have
a record like that, it is a moment you have,
you know, generated a video for it, and everyone's seen

(20:33):
it and down the stretch you're winning. It would have
been a downer to lose that game. If you lose
a game where you set a record, it happens all
the time. But losing that game and the way that
they were about to give it away there at the
end obviously would have been pretty tough to take. It
obviously would also be tough to overcome, not mentally but literally.
The standings are. You know, there's only so many games

(20:53):
left in the season, and the Rockets place in it
is the same as it's been for weeks. The three
teams in four or five six right now. One of
those spots gets home court advantage in the opening round.
I don't think any of them will catch the Lakers.
They're all two and a half back, but they're all
in the same spot. The Nuggets and Wolves have each
played two more games than Houston, but each of the
three teams are exactly sixteen games over five hundred. Well,

(21:16):
the Lakers' best player isn't playing tonight, and that's his fault.
Why not he got a sixteenth technical rescinded. He got
it rescinded. Yeah, oh geez, he'll be out there. They
both both players got it rescinded. That's lame. I mean,
two guys yelled at each other in a foreign language,
which if referees did not know store till Luca mentioned

(21:38):
it to them, and then after the free throw, Because
it all took place at the free throw line, there's
probably a lead up to it as well. As Luca
was heading back down court, he also verbalized additionally to Goga,
and that's when the official decided to see both of
them up and subsequently this morning has rescinded what would
have otherwise been a suspension inducing sixteenth technical foul for

(21:59):
the Lakers superstar scoring leader in the NBA. They are
nineteen games or excuse me, twenty one games over five hundred.
That's why they have a two and a half game
lead over the others. They've won nine in a row,
the Spurs have won five in a row, the Thunder
have won eleven in a row, and the Thunder get
back Jalen Williams this evening for some portion of their
final eleven games of the season. The Nuggets and Wolves

(22:20):
have ten games remaining, and like I said, the Rockets
can handle their own business against the Wolves and that
they still see them twice, but probably a lot of
what happens in some other games. Absolute scoreboard watching time
has long been underway, and we'll be there for it.
Interesting twist and segue out of NBA basketball as we
get to the bottom of the hour and hour number one.

(22:41):
Besides Clanton, who knows who Leonid Redvinsky is or was
news generated out of his passing generated quite the replies
on X. Thus the best of X is next. Your
team for this segment was just scrimes. I didn't know
who Leandid was before a couple hours ago. It was

(23:05):
busy doing other things related to the program and had
missed this item, this news item, as we dive into
the best of X each and every weekd afternoon here
on the A Team, right around this time, not Thursday,
right around this time. On Thursday, we're gonna be handing
things off to Robert and Steve Robert Ford and Steve
Sparks for Astros Baseball, the first of one sixty two

(23:27):
as opening days just a couple of days away, But today, Tomorrow, Wednesday,
and Friday, we will hit you with the best of
X at two point thirty here on the A Team.
Unfortunate news did come down our earlier today regarding the
passing of someone who was worth four point seven billion
dollars at the time of his passing. That according to

(23:47):
our financial friends over at Forbes, this is only forty
three only forty three years old. Grew up in Chicago,
though was born in the Ukraine, got an economics degree.
Is that how you? I mean some people go economics.
I think I'm more of an economics guy. He got
an economics degree. He just flows better. It does from
Northwestern right there? And do you say iran, Well, if

(24:12):
I'm in a race, I say the latter. If not,
I say it like the country.

Speaker 5 (24:16):
There you go.

Speaker 4 (24:17):
He started a couple of businesses, obviously on his way
to amassing four point seven billion dollars, and several of
those businesses were in the same industry that ultimately as
he and his interest in the business, and then everybody
else's interest in his business, helped him go from what
he was modest earnings with a bachelor's degree to a millionaires.

(24:41):
As we noted, he had a site that required subscriptions,
a content creator site about three hundred and fifty thousand
content creators on the site that he and a other
gentleman tim S had helped him Create. He was actually
a father and son team who founded the business. He
bought it from them and then they sold subscriptions to

(25:02):
the individual's creators Individual Creators Content three hundred and fifty
thousand Content Creators in twenty nineteen, not long after the
business was founded and then purchased by Leonid Redvinsky four
point six million in twenty twenty four, according to filings
and their revenue from this business, which was at fifty

(25:24):
nine million, it was pretty nice, that's good. It grew
to one point four billion over the five years from
twenty nineteen to twenty twenty four. The business originally called
Myfree Cams and ultimately called Only Fans is the business
we're talking about. From forty three year old now deceased

(25:46):
Leo Redvinsky passed away peacefully after a long battle with cancer.
Families requested privacy at this difficult time. That's on the
statement released by OnlyFans his company. Normal for those who've
passed away to have their company on their behalf note
an unfortunate passing, a very young man passing at that age.

(26:09):
Obviously a post on this subject was made, and many
others have posted on this very subject. The passing of
this gentleman, and the comments underneath find their way into
the best of cks. Well, the first one I saw
got my attention someone known as Nandy. He will be
remembered for giving four million prostitutes a platform to dehumanize themselves.

(26:33):
And the best part is the picture of him that's
accompanied with her comment. He saw a business opportunity and
provided a service. Choose to either use it or not.
The idea lives on. This means the market is sustaining it,
which is rather obvious every time this topic comes up
for a number of different reasons, not just on this show,
which is rare, but anywhere else like it, dislike it,

(26:58):
in favor of it, not, in favor of it, helping
to finance it with your own personal funds or not.
There clearly is a market for this, and quite honestly,
from a technology standpoint, especially social media now, but much
before this video production, online, etc. And access to it
and monetizing all this stuff the industry might I don't

(27:21):
know if they'd be called trailblazers, but they're usually at
the forefront of the technology that everybody else then ultimately
uses for their own non pornographic platform needs to monetize
whatever it is they're doing digitally dis just in sex sells.
It's a tail as old as time. It's the oldest profession,
as they say. And this is just a guy who

(27:42):
found a way to monetize it. And again the reviews
are mixed.

Speaker 8 (27:48):
If you will, he'll be remembered for giving talentless and
unintelligent women the opportunity to escape poverty.

Speaker 4 (27:53):
That's good. If they're so unintelligent, Well, how did they
figure out a way to make money?

Speaker 8 (27:57):
They didn't figure out a way. They took him up
on his offer, and the offer of so many men
who wanted to see them. The yeah, great business. I mean,
it doesn't take a lot of intelligence to do that.
It just takes a functioning brain. If you're into that
sort of thing. One of the greatest businessmen who saw

(28:17):
an opportunity and took it. There should be a course
on his innovation in business schools. I like to see
what that's called in what the number would be accompanying it,
Like if it's a business degree, year.

Speaker 4 (28:27):
Could probably go something like this. When you're trying to
register for the class at the beginning of the semester.
This class has not been added this class is full.
I mean seriously, if the class was on OnlyFans, how
would it not be full? Seriously, that's what it would
be on This is on OnlyFans. I mean, I guess

(28:50):
not literally on OnlyFans, but you mean about now the
class was on only fans, that would be even more full,
like they might crash the servers.

Speaker 5 (29:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (29:00):
I mean, there's clearly a lot of money being spent
on this, and thus a lot of money to be made,
and a lot of people made a lot of money
and will still companies not going away.

Speaker 8 (29:12):
Markets don't create morality, they reveal it. If four million
people chose the path, the platform is just the mirror.
High value critique should focus on the demand, not just
the supply chain architect That is well said.

Speaker 4 (29:27):
Again, do you notice some of the responses are just
straight up black and white business answers only. It's strictly
about the business, about the financial side of it. Yes,
you can think about it that way, and many people did.
Many other people did not. He doesn't sound like the
problem to me. Why is the word problem keep coming

(29:49):
up here? People who have morals tend to frown on
things like this. I mean, okay, so that means you're
probably not subscribing to any of these content creators, right right,
and you can and then what are are you? Okay,
then it's the equivalent of change the channel if you
don't like it, I think so, yeah, I mean, it's
not like it's a Tommy Boy deal where you know,

(30:10):
it ruins the whole city of Sandusky, Ohio and the
plant goes down and they infiltrate the whole city, as
one of the board members suggested to her husband. But
to me, the part about prostitution this is that's the thing.
It's not that it's not really what this necessarily is.
I mean, but how is it that much different because
you're not with anybody, but you're paying for it digitally. Yeah,

(30:32):
so not with them. I'm here, you're there.

Speaker 8 (30:35):
It's the the the principle, The concept is the same,
but one can get you arrested and the other one can't.

Speaker 4 (30:41):
It's perfectly legal, exactly. So it doesn't sound like they're
the same. To me, it's the same.

Speaker 8 (30:46):
It's the same concept though, it's a means to an
end if you will. Yeah, but you're the only one involved,
or whoever's with you is the only one.

Speaker 4 (30:55):
There's two.

Speaker 6 (30:57):
They're not.

Speaker 4 (30:57):
They're not there, they're not in the room. They are
there no camera, No, they are not. There's something to
touch them, no exactly. But you're there for a sex act.
You're you're paying, just like you do for everything else.
So subscription service, Oh good, this game's on peacock. I
better subscribe OnlyFans. Was never meant to be a prostitution platform.
But prostitutes saw an opportunity to sell themselves, and he

(31:19):
saw opportunity to make money.

Speaker 8 (31:21):
And he did not put a gun on anyone's head
to sell themselves. Everyone makes choices business. Best of X Monday,
March twenty third. The Astros are home. They returned home
yesterday after their final exhibition game in FLA. Two more
exhibition games here in Houston. How are we feeling, Astros

(31:41):
fans about twenty twenty six next.

Speaker 4 (31:45):
As well?

Speaker 8 (31:46):
I hope you enjoyed our prostitution segment. If you didn't
get to hear it, sorry it's over. You careed, But
that's called a bacteas.

Speaker 4 (31:52):
All of our segments will be available to you via
the podcast on Sports Talk seven ninety dot com.

Speaker 8 (31:57):
All right, we have been very, very excited for opening
day in these parts for several several years, I mean
just more than usual. The anticipation for a championship run
each year over the better part of a decade has
always been there. He always felt like you were in
the mix, and you were typically coming off a division
championship the year prior, which is hard to do in baseball.

(32:20):
It actually still means something unlike the NBA, which shouldn't
even have divisions.

Speaker 4 (32:24):
It's a joke funny that you say that, why if
the Spurs win tonight and the Rockets lose?

Speaker 3 (32:30):
Uh huh.

Speaker 4 (32:33):
I don't even know the name of the division? Is
it Southwest?

Speaker 5 (32:34):
Still?

Speaker 4 (32:35):
Yes? Who cares?

Speaker 8 (32:37):
And by the way, for all of you losers in
San Antonio and abroad telling me that, well.

Speaker 9 (32:41):
They might win the championship this year, because that wouldn't
be He's so good. Look at him, he's so tall,
and he always makes his shots. Oh man, look at
how he beats on that drama after every home win.
Shut up, they're not gonna win crap this year. You
heard it here first, and I hope you enjoyed while
he because he's still going to have his career cut

(33:02):
short by injuries.

Speaker 4 (33:04):
It's science, all right. I'm done. Okay, so back to baseball.

Speaker 8 (33:08):
Yeah, so, how excited are you about this opening day?
And you can't be wex Yeah, I.

Speaker 4 (33:14):
Mean it's the last couple of years they've had some
interesting teams visit. This year they don't. It's not an
interesting team. I mean, there's only so many teams you
can get excited about in Major League Baseball every year.
Maybe they have a few stars, maybe they expect to win,
maybe they're a great rival that the Angels are are
pretty much none of those things, and it's reflected in

(33:35):
what people think about their upcoming season. Just happened to
come across another updated win total list for the upcoming season.
Among American League teams, there's only one team with a
lower win total than the Angels. It's the White Sox.
And if you're gonna ask me which two teams of
those two who I think is gonna win more games,

(33:55):
I would actually say the White Sox. I think the
Angels team that the Astros see for these four games
to open up the season will actually be a very
different team than they see later in the year. This
is going to be a year where if they have
anybody that they can move, they're gonna move them. I
think it's about time that they face those facts. There
are a couple of years removed from Otani, they don't
really have not had the ability to kind of see

(34:15):
some of their younger prospects arrive. Yet they're gonna start
to arrive, so it's probably time to load up on
even more prospects closer to obviously knowing that they're gonna
be good, or having a better feeling about it, just
playing closer to the major leagues. When the Astros get
to open with a team that stinks and hasn't always
been the case the last handful of years, and certainly
when they have performed poorly out of the gate, and

(34:38):
unfortunately Joe Spata has been here just two years and
he is very familiar with that, it does make things
very difficult. You are behind, being behind the eight ball
is nowhere to be start the year just five and
three or the opening homestand four and three, five and two.
It's just such an enormous difference to what you forecast
mentally the rest of the way, and something that Steve

(34:58):
Sparks mentioned this morning on the Morning Drive with Dan
and Cole, which is pretty important. I don't know the
everything that'll come from it. But there was some thought
that Jeremy Payne would stay in Florida in West Palm
Beach and work through the remaining stages of getting healthy
and then rejoin the team at some point, maybe by Thursday,
but likely after Well, that's why people were wondering if

(35:21):
that was what they would do. Well, they decided not
to do that. He flew back with the team, as
Steve mentioned this morning, and that means whatever necessary steps
Neil still need to be taken are probably limited enough
timing wise, and they still haven't ruled out Jeremy Paanea
for Opening Day. He's done everything. It's kind of crazy.
He just hasn't done it to the level that everyone

(35:42):
is ready to say, all right, you're good to go.
He's thrown the ball, he's swung the bat, he's obviously fielded,
and I'm pretty sure he could run this whole time.
He has a broken finger, but being ready, He's talked
about it before. It's more about it. It's a little
bit like you're on Alvarez. It's more about a feel.
If I feel like I'm in tune with my then
don't bother giving me three days of Sugarland Baseball. Just

(36:04):
get me out there and I'm ready to go and
let's go play. And it's very possible, maybe fifty to fifty,
that that's exactly what they're gonna do. And one Jose
Soriano throws his first pitch in the bottom of the
first inning on Thursday afternoon at dyke In Park, it
will be two Astros starting shortstop Jeremy Panye.

Speaker 8 (36:20):
Is he one of those aforementioned pieces that they might
be trading? Oh, I think absolutely. I would consider that
if I were them, if you have somebody with that caliber.
And I don't know what he's gonna do for the
first three plus months of the season, and it was
not difficult to earn the starting nod in their rotations,
but he was very good last year and he's just
I mean, you'd love to have something to keep, and
but they have so little and they're gonna.

Speaker 4 (36:41):
Win so little. I think in Sacramento last year he
was with them throughout. Why do I feel like, who
was we?

Speaker 7 (36:50):
There?

Speaker 10 (36:50):
You go?

Speaker 4 (36:51):
I'm getting them mixed up? Yeah, that was with the
contract that the Athletics signed Severino too. I thought they
based and it was really good money. But as soon
as he started pitching. While I thought, all right, they're
gonna dump him, but they also started playing good baseball,
and I was shocked to see the Athletics number at
only seventy five and a half. The Angel's number, by

(37:13):
the way, is seventy and a half. The Astros number
is eighty five and a half. You're saying, slam the
over on the ace. I would. I would definitely do that.
It's all about their pitching because they can unless they
They have so much offense that I'm not expecting Kurtz
to be the best hitter in baseball. He was for
a time last year. I expecting Jacob Wilson to replicate
what he did over the first two and a half
months of last year. He doesn't have to because they

(37:35):
also have list the other five guys that are awesome
Rooker and Butler and Langeliers and so the list goes
on and on. They just are full of young offensive talent.
So yeah, I would think that that would play at
over and at eighty five and a half. You're telling
me all you're looking for the Astros to do is
go eighty six and seventy six, which is one more
loss or than they had a year ago at eighty

(37:58):
seven and seventy five. Yeah, I would probably. I'd probably
play the Astros on the fun side of that, I'd
probably play them on the over at eighty five and
a half. Comes down to their offense that we did
not see in spring training. I'm not gonna sit here
and say, oh my gosh, the Astros pitch so well
in spring training, any worries about their pitching staff are gone.
In the same way, I'm not gonna say, well, they

(38:18):
hit so poorly in spring training. They're key players that
I'm concerned about their offense. I just don't think those
things are necessarily related. Thought. So, Emi is gonna give
up runs as a major league pitcher. He hasn't done
that yet. Mike Burrows is going to give up runs
more than once every five outings, which is what he
did during the spring. And I'm pretty sure the Astros

(38:38):
aren't going to put a starting lineup together with five
players with an ops of under six hundred in it MLB.
This is from a Yankees fan. By the way, this
is a text I received just now.

Speaker 8 (38:48):
MLB scheduling Astros versus Angels to start the season tells
you all you need to know what MLB expects from
the Astros. If they had any belief that Astros would
play a role, they would feature them with a better opponents.
The most misguided thing I think I've ever heard, because
the Astros have opened up the season have been against
crap team's plenty. They opened up their title defense against

(39:09):
the freaking White Sox the following year.

Speaker 4 (39:12):
So that's sorry. You know who you are. I love
you dearly, but that makes zero sense. Yeah, major League
Baseball Opening Day. From a television standpoint, it's not like
maybe people are imagining they have put a game on
Wednesday that's a nationally televised game, and then a small
small number of nationally televised Opening Day games will follow that.
The Astros are just fine. Starting with the Angels start

(39:35):
the three o'clock hour. Next, obviously a revisit of the
Big Big Rockets weekend, the huge weekend on the college
basketball hardwoods, including your Houston Cougar's coming home to continue
their run the seven ninety.

Speaker 8 (39:50):
Hey look at that three hours of simulcast starting now
on Space City Home Network.

Speaker 4 (39:56):
We had that little like hour situation. Yeah, now the
spring training is over, you'll we'll have the one, ten,
two ten, three ten starts on occasion for Astros Baseball.
Other than that, we're pretty much good to go from
three to six most days on the simulcast. Did you
guys see it this weekend? Did you did you see
it this weekend? Did you see our boy? I don't know.

Speaker 8 (40:15):
I happen to have the wife and the sun along
for the ride on Saturday night, and he's typically he's
just all about the atmosphere, and he was this night too.
But the end of the game, they wound up moving
just behind our broadcast position, so they got to see
Kadi pass mj obviously on the all time NBA scorers list,

(40:37):
and then, unbeknownst to all of us at the time
that it would come down to that, they ended up
getting to see a men Thompson's game winner. How how
sure were you when Kadie hit that shot that the
Rockets were gonna go ahead and salt away that game?
It looked pretty good.

Speaker 4 (40:54):
At the time. I wasn't sure they were gonna salt
it away, meaning they took an eight point lead and
they were gonna win without needing some miracle. I thought
they were in good position to withstand a run which
was definitely coming. The way the Rockets have defended the
Heat over the last couple of years, these specific players
that they had out there, it was pretty unlikely they
were just going to continue running away because they needed
to actually come back. The Heat went on a ten

(41:15):
zip run at the end of the third early fourth
to turn a one point game into an eleven point game.
The Rockets trail by eleven in the fourth quarter. The
Rockets also led by eight in the fourth quarter, that's
how well they were playing offensively, finally burying three point
shots from multiple different players, a pair from Jabari, a
pair from Aaron Holiday, another couple from Reed Shepherd, and
then a couple late from kd all a part of

(41:36):
putting them in very good position. And still the Heat
not only came back, they took the lead with under
ten seconds remaining. So it did take a little bit
of a miracle. I was felt like they had done
what's necessary to win the game, Like we score and
they had the ball like five more times. Hit any
one of these shots and you're probably in great shape.

(41:57):
You're probably not faced with what they Ultimately they just
and hit that killer shot one more time to push
it from six back to eight or from eight to eleven,
or from five back to eight. That's where they struggled
inbounds play. That was unfortunate. Well, it was the second
of them, I mean the first inbounds play. Tari was
trying to get the ball from Jabari and didn't, and
then Jabari threw it in and then they ultimately inbounded

(42:18):
it right after that, and Tarry did get the honors
of inbounding it. It's just not a very good place
to throw it, whether or not it makes it to
its mark. You really don't want to throw it underneath
your own basket in traffic, and that's what he tried
to do. Tried to get it to Read Shepherd. It
was immediately knocked away and two players at the basket.
First player drew the defense, second player put it off
the window quickly, so when Jabari Smith Junior blocked it,

(42:40):
it was an obvious goaltend and then the Rockets had
to call their time out, put their five on the court.
They wanted to give themselves the best chance to win
a Men Thompson inbounding, KD shooting, and Amn Thompson tipping
it in for the win.

Speaker 8 (42:51):
Well, as you might imagine, And we knew this would
be the case when it happened, but after the fact,
it's easy to look back. So oh yeah, we knew
that KD would provide us we're with some fantastic soundbites.

Speaker 4 (43:02):
But he actually started that twenty four hours earlier.

Speaker 8 (43:05):
So you remember we played last week on the show,
Kendrick Perkins talking about the vibes in the locker room
and how they don't go to team dinners together and
how they hate each other. I'm paraphrasing, of course, the
Rockets chemistry. You could just tell. Yeah, he could just
tell from TV. Now I know that Katie and him
are there. Yeah, they're former team, but they're a little close.

(43:26):
Like Kendrick Perkins was in town with his kids and
Katie stopped by. I mean, there's a video of this,
Like they're closer than your average Katie's closed with a
lot of guys. Yeah, but you know, so when he
was saying that, I was like, Wow, I mean, Charles
Barkley and Michael Jordan aren't friends anymore because of this
kind of thing.

Speaker 4 (43:45):
That says more about Michael's mentality. Yeah, So Monday and
Wednesday they had lost to the Lakers and the national
spotlight in both games, so everybody had seen whatever it
is they wanted to see, to say whatever it is
they wanted to say. We're talking about Kendrick Perkins. Right,
it's pretty clear as we know, if it's said, then
it usually makes its way to social media. If it
makes his way to social media, most people that are

(44:07):
like Kevin Durant, or very specifically most people that are
Kevin Durant, they know about it. And it seemed pretty
obvious after they won Friday night against the Hawks that
it was very obvious that he was aware of it.
And again they won. The games that were being discussed
by Kendrick Perkins were games that they lost. The game

(44:27):
Friday night was a game that they won. So Kevin Durant,
as usual, he's done it like almost every home game
this year. He made his way to the postgame table.
I was quibbling with somebody last night. There's no podium,
there's just a table they sit at. He made his
way to the postgame media table or a Q and
A session, and as he sits down and doesn't really
even need to wait for the first question. As soon

(44:49):
as it started, he had his own little thing to say.

Speaker 5 (44:52):
How was a body language? Tonight was a good vibes,
good vibes.

Speaker 4 (45:02):
I said this myself, many, many, many, many times over.
This team doesn't look like they're having any fun. This
team doesn't like each other. They're flat, they're not into it.
Clearly there's no energy. There's something wrong with these guys. Yeah,
they didn't win, they got out played. They're losing. It's

(45:25):
every sport, and they can they say it in baseball.
I don't even know what to say, because it's just
not like the energy you bringing to the diamond when
you're standing there doing nothing for two and a half hours,
unless you're batting, Like I don't ever understand that. But
these other sports, like why do you think the vibes
are so bad? But in this case they're I know,
And that's true everyone. Every bit of what you're saying

(45:48):
is true. With one caveat, and it's a big one.
Even if you don't believe the burner stuff about Kevin Durant,
it's out there, and two things happen right after that story,
whether you think it's true or not. One he fired
everybody at his social media whatever you can conglomerate, he asked, everybody. Hey,

(46:09):
you guys that work for boardroom, you can go ahead
and get out of the boardroom. Yeah, like Ari Gold,
get out. And then number two, can you read this?
It's in dry erace. And two he stopped posting on
social media. He's been like a ghost. He hasn't been
as active. He's saved as most of his stuff has

(46:32):
been very related to him and his brand, the Longhorns
for instance, and what Matty Booker just did over the
weekend with commercial Yeah, all these things that are related
to some of his interests, more so than the rockets,
but not just his usual back and forth with absolutely
So those two things tell me that there was at
least some truth to it. I don't know how much, right, Yeah,

(46:54):
So all of that is to say, you know, has
the body language good, he's seeing it's okay. Yeah, it
was great.

Speaker 8 (47:01):
That was perfectly done, perfectly executed. But again, he was
very and he's been this way, I mean all along
the way, even before he got to Houston, very thoughtful
about his comments. When he passes a big name, and
in my opinion, there's nobody bigger than now number six
on the list.

Speaker 4 (47:21):
The best ever, number six on the all time scoring list,
passing the greats to KD. What's it mean to be
in the same category with the greats?

Speaker 11 (47:29):
I mean, like I've said, a lot of these guys
have inspired me to come out here and work on
my game as much as I can and contribute to
a team in a positive way. So I've been inspired
by all of these players that I'm either coming close
to or passing up. And MJ is in the world
of his own, He's in the planet, the galaxy of
his own, and somebody that I look up to respect

(47:49):
and who basically shaped.

Speaker 5 (47:51):
The game for me. To be in the same category
with the greats, I mean, I.

Speaker 4 (47:54):
Wasn't sure if I'd fix it. That's why I didn't
want to tell you to do it all there. I
have not this, uh disenabled the loop function.

Speaker 8 (48:03):
This is ridiculous, I agree, but like you get the
idea right there. And by the way, he went on
to share some thoughts. I don't know exactly when it was,
but it was released yesterday. His boardroom interview that he
did where he.

Speaker 4 (48:20):
Talks a little bit more about it was before it
was recorded with Rich Kleiman, who was obviously is co
businessman basically in that venture and very much involved. And
it was recorded long before this happened. Anticipation's going to happen.
But what he talks about, I don't know if you
have it or not, but oh yeah, sure you want.
Might as well play out before we before we address it.

(48:40):
Oh okay, Oh what is it on a loop?

Speaker 11 (48:44):
No, it's bigger than the stats with mj I don't
think he has an equal in any industry.

Speaker 5 (48:49):
Everybody's talking about Mike every day all day. I'm just
bigger in the game.

Speaker 11 (48:52):
I mean, no matter who passes him in the stats,
who wins more or it's gonna be hard to win
goals fiction. Oh but even if you were to pass
him anything, just as impact on export and just Kolcha
in general is just too big.

Speaker 4 (49:06):
Here's the thing, and I'm wearing a copy of it.

Speaker 8 (49:11):
He's doing this while wearing Michael Jordan's logo on his jersey.
It's that's why. And again I have a bias. I'm
very anti Lebron in about a billion different ways. The
longer Lebron goes, the less I think is impressive to me.
As far as the because it just looks like his

(49:33):
whole career the last five years or so has become
one giant stat padding affair. He's not winning anything. He's
not gonna win anything else. You can say what you
want about the Lakers. They're not gonna miraculously win the
NBA title this year. There's just too many teams that
are better than them that will knock them off. It's
not even about Lebron, is that? Sorry to interrupt, No, No,
you're good. What's the difference between what he's doing what

(49:54):
Katie is doing. Uh, you're not winning anything.

Speaker 4 (49:56):
In that regard.

Speaker 8 (49:58):
There's I can't argue with that if you but don't.
I don't see KD staying in games on certain nights
and barking at his teammates because they took a stat
away from him.

Speaker 4 (50:09):
That's I don't either. However, you know who Amn Thompson is. Yeah,
he's the only player in the NBA this year that's
played more minutes than Kevin Durant, I know.

Speaker 8 (50:18):
And the funny thing about that is, though, it's like
if you watch a Rockets game and you watch a
Lakers game, and just the flow of how they do things.
First of all, there's no one on the roster that
is clearly better than Kevin Durant right now at scoring,
there's not even close. It's a great thorn in our

(50:38):
side as a collective. You know, with the Rockets, there's
somebody that's a lot better than Lebron James on his
own roster, And you might be able to argue there's
two people that could score more effectively than him right
now in his own roster. That's the biggest difference. I mean,
that's certainly fair. I mean, he's still shooting. Effective field

(50:59):
goal percentage is still higher than his career numbers. He's
still going for twenty one, six and seven while playing
the fewest minutes per game in his entire career.

Speaker 4 (51:07):
And playing the fewest defense in his entire career. And
they're also they're all doing that one of the best
teams in the league.

Speaker 8 (51:14):
Yeah, yeah, Ben, I can't argue with nine in a
row against the Sisters of the Poor and two Rockets games.

Speaker 4 (51:19):
Yeah, since you brought that up, we'll hit on one
more thing about the Sisters of the Poor when we
come back. But the least predictable Carlos Correa story you
might have seen it. We're gonna discuss this same next
that's saying Yankees fans helping me with text messages. Wednesday
is the opening day for Major League Baseball, but only

(51:39):
two teams play on Wednesday. The Yankees are one of them.
JV's old team is another in in ain't Houston. It
is the Giants, Ain't the Mets, Giants and Yankees on Wednesday,
and then the Astros and the rest of Major League
Baseball get it going on Thursday, not one of the
national games. So obviously we got a right here for you,
right here on Sports Talk seven to ninety and sch

(52:00):
End three ten first Pitch. There's still a little uncertainty
about what the roster will look like and what their
lineup will look like for obvious reasons. When you're uncertain
about the situation revolving around Jeremy Paanya, I would say
with certainty Carlos Korea is starting on opening day for
the Astros, but I wouldn't say with certainty where he

(52:20):
is starting in our lineup. In the field, he'll be
their opening day shortstop if Jeremy Payania is unavailable or
on the il to open the year with the broken finger,
or he will be over at third base with Jeremy
handling the duties as he normally will over at shortstop
where they slot these guys in the batting order, and
I don't think there was a whole lot to glean
from how it was done during spring training. Still likely

(52:42):
that it won't be much different. Jose Altuve was just that,
bottom line, he was terrible, had a very bad offensive
spring training. I don't really think it matters other than
he's obviously trending in the wrong direction during his regular season,
So it's definitely something to consider. But I would imagine
he's batting near the top of the lineup. Esak Perettis
comes out of spring training just how he entered spring

(53:04):
training healthy and one of their most important bats. He's
probably batting near the top of the lineup. And I
don't know how many batters you want in front of
yourd On Alvarez. So that's already four guys some formation
of those four guys near the top four spots. If
Paanya is among them, well that's probably your top four,
and then Correa and then Christian Walker, and then Cam Smith,

(53:24):
and then Yaner Diaz and then Jake Myers and then
the unknown left fielder for the Houston Astros. One of
the other uncertainties as we get to opening Day.

Speaker 8 (53:35):
About that before we get into what we're gonna talk about, Like,
I wonder if at the end of this season or
let's just say by the mid season point, and I
know injuries factor into all this kind of thing, is
that solidified?

Speaker 4 (53:49):
Is that? Or are we still doing this dance all
season long and into the postseason potentially? Well, I think
they have to dance regardless if everyone's healthy, right, because
if we're getting Jeremy payaniall to the to the starting
line and he's out there on Thursday, well, now all
of a sudden, you have that logjam again, which is gone.
If youred On Alvarez is your left fielder at dik

(54:10):
And Park against the Angels, which is exactly what I
would do, then Escoch Perettis's bat is in the lineup
on opening Day, which it should be. You have your
option of using Jose Altuve as a DH and putting
Pettis at second. They probably would go the other way
and have Perettis as the DH and with Altuve at
second base. It's nice to have bats that you can

(54:32):
count on to come off the bench to pinch hit.
That's great, but you don't want all Star caliber bats
on your bench, ready to pinch hit and take one
at bat in random games when it's necessary. Escoch Perettis
is too good of an offensive player, means too much
of this offense. If he's on the roster, he needs
to be in the lineup. If you want to start
spreading it out to where, where's how we're gonna get

(54:53):
everybody one hundred and forty five games and you know,
six hundred and whatever at bats by all means figure
it out. Usually in will dictate it. But like I said,
there's going to be a day pretty early in the season.
It looks like, unless something happens between now and Thursday,
we have a healthy group, and i'd like to think
that Joe A Spotta will put the healthy group best
bets in the lineup.

Speaker 8 (55:14):
So we'll and we'll have plenty of time to discuss that,
not only Thursday when we're hosting five hours of pregame basically,
but all season long as the numbers game juggling continues
for joe'spot end company. But I look this Carlos Koreas
story that Brian McTaggart wrote on MLB dot Com. I

(55:36):
don't want to say it came out of left field,
but it kind of did. I didn't know about it,
and I don't think a lot of people did until
he started kind of talking about it himself. But first
of all, I'm going to obviously make the Purple Rain reference.

Speaker 4 (55:50):
I have to. It was the same lake. The story
about what he believed, and certainly as he was going
through it with his son, a near death experience, not
being able to stay above water in the.

Speaker 8 (56:02):
Lake Lake Mannatanka to be specific for all you Prince
fans out there who have seen Purple Rain. But yeah,
in all seriousness, and it was serious. He's got his
oldest son, Kylo on his back with a life jacket on,
he doesn't have one on, and he's basically halfway between

(56:22):
the boat they had been in and the shoreline and
couldn't swim, couldn't stay above water, and he found a
booie and basically screamed out one last time because as
he put it, that's all he had left. And it
was his father, his father in law, that came out
to get him and you know, send him a life
jacket and he ended up being okay. But he said,

(56:44):
basically he said a prayer and he told God if
you save me, I'll serve you and serve you forever.
And he's made good on that so far. And it's
really like the whole story is the Siri part obviously
at the beginning, but it's more about him kind of
being more of an evangelical figure in the community. But

(57:10):
I just I'm it's crazy to me because we kind
of prop up these guys sometimes as superheroes.

Speaker 4 (57:15):
How what situation are you in?

Speaker 8 (57:17):
And I know you got a three year old on
your shoulders, but this guy is like a finely tuned athlete.
I don't know if he's not a strong swimmer or
if there was more to it, but I just can't
believe he got it. But we see this all the time.

Speaker 3 (57:30):
There was.

Speaker 8 (57:32):
Who was the athlete that it was a It was
a professional wrestler that his son got caught in an
undercurtaent I think off the coast of California. He wound
up drowning saving his son. Kind of stuff can kind
of creep up on you. That's more of an ocean situation, obviously,
but this kind of stuff, you get yourself in these situations,

(57:53):
I guess easier than you would think on the surface.

Speaker 4 (57:56):
Yeah, if everything's perfect. You're fine. Everything was not perfect,
just you know, as a describes hamstrings and quads cramping
obviously without a life jacket that you know, changes things dramatically.
He is here, and he is continuing to you know,
thankfully be able to spread the message that he has
and just kind of a not the kind of thing
you'd ever want to be in, and happy to be

(58:17):
back out of it on the right side of it
back here in Houston as he deals with it. Had
mentioned this harrowing incident to a church group previously and
then now share the story here publicly. It's a big
part of the Astros for a long time, and I
would think this is probably the last stop for he
and his family. I'm sure he would have liked to
it to have been his only stop. He actually signed

(58:39):
contracts with multiple teams in his exit and ultimately ended
up signing a second contract with the Twins. And then
as they said, this baseball not for us here in Minnesota,
and we're kind of under it with in terms of finances,
so we're gonna gut the team. He happily said, Well,
if the guys over in h Town can make it work,
let's do this. And Twins said, well, if they can

(59:01):
just give us nothing, then we'll do it. If they
can offer up nothing in return, then we' will happily
send you there, and we'll even pay for part of
your salary. And Dana Brown said, whoa, hey, let me
talk this over with Jim. Let me see if we
have any nothing in our system to give them, and
if they're okay with that, and we can find this
player who won't matter to them at all and they'll

(59:21):
immediately get rid of that will never be a major leaguer,
no offense to the individual, then maybe we can go
ahead and call him back and say yes, do you
think Jim Ran instead of walk to the phone to
say yes, we'll take that up, take your offer. They
still it did bump up their costs because they had
a much cheaper alternative than having him and now Perez

(59:41):
and Pania all playing the same positions. But at the time,
obviously you did not have one of them on the field,
so it also made baseball sense. It makes a little
less baseball sense now considering how many players they have
for so few positions, but it also brought back some
leadership they'd clearly lost with Alex Bregman. You know, I
think Alex Eregman was phenomenal for the Red Sox last year,

(01:00:02):
and we were talking about win totals earlier. I think
the Cubs win total is one that would likely get
surpassed because he's there now, and I think what he
does for his team in game, in pregame, on flights,
in the cages, in the pitchers meetings, in addition to
probably hitting thirty bombs and driving in one hundred this
year for the Cubs while competing with Matt Chapman for

(01:00:25):
the National League Gold Glove this year, Yeah, I think
he's gonna matter a lot. And I think the Astros
maybe it's not that they recognized it and needed to
make up for it, but Carlos Korea can still play
very good baseball, and it does feel a need. They
need some leadership. They need some players that have been
there and done that, as obviously that number of players
was getting smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller every

(01:00:46):
single year. So I think he provides a lot to
this team, and hopefully the offense is there. He was
okay last year offensively, be nice. If he was a
little bit better than okay offensively this year. He's not
too old. He should not be over the hill, not
expecting the best season of his career. But I am
expecting somebody who's apparently fully healthy going into the season,

(01:01:07):
and I'm sure he will take the necessary steps to
say that way. Don't be alarmed if sometime during this
opening homestand you see Carlos Correa with some sort of
heating element on his back. It'll be a pretty common occurrence.
It has been for years. But staying on the field
and doing what you want to do, and maybe playing
more third base than he ever has before because it
only started last year, helps on that front. All Right,

(01:01:29):
It was good to see it.

Speaker 8 (01:01:30):
Glad he's fine, obviously, and we'll see what he has
when with a full season here in Houston coming up next,
Spark he's back. His biggest positive takeaway from spring training, You'll.

Speaker 4 (01:01:44):
Love what you hear. That's next.

Speaker 1 (01:01:47):
The AE on sports Top.

Speaker 8 (01:01:49):
We are doing what we need to do to let
you guys know, let you in on the information you
need to get your hands on rockets, Bucks tickets. So oh,
at four o'clock, you're gonna need to be listening because
we're gonna tell you what to do. At four thirty
so that you could eventually win some Rockets Bucks tickets.

Speaker 4 (01:02:10):
Yeah, Rockets Bucks back at home April first, after this
four game road trip. We got a pair of tickets
to give to you. We'll do that at four thirty,
but you're probably not gonna win them unless you listen
at four o'clock. So that's what you have for your assignment.
But you guys are with us throughout the afternoon, and
we really appreciate that. We like hooking the listeners up
with whatever goodies we have, and in this case, it's

(01:02:30):
a pretty good goodie tickets to go see the Rockets
and the Bucks. As they begin the final month of
the regular season, they will play through April twelfth, then
they will take five days off or six, depending on
when their Round one playoff game is for. Right, did
they stay out of the play in tournament, which takes
place when the six good teams get to rest? And

(01:02:50):
I believe the Rockets are one of the six good
teams in the Western Conference, the six good teams in
Major League Baseball, they go to the playoffs in each
respective league. The Astros were the seventh best team in
the American League last year. They did not go to
the playoffs because of that. Hopefully that will be different
this year. Steve Sparks made his appearances weekly visit with
The Morning Drive with Dan and Cole earlier today. We

(01:03:10):
will normally share some of that with you when we
have the opportunity following that appearance, and we will do
so here. The full interview can be found at Sports
Talk seven to ninety dot com. Should be subscribing to
all of our podcasts, that's the easiest way to get it,
and he certainly can do that via the iHeartRadio app
all of our podcasts there as well. But the portion
for you guys here centers around his biggest positive takeaway

(01:03:33):
as he just spent the last month with the Astros
at spring training. Steve Sparks, what is that biggest takeaway?

Speaker 3 (01:03:40):
Right away? Went Burrows? You know that you watched his
bullpen and then you watched how he competed. I think
that was the underlying thing is he just looked really tough.
So to have a one two punch with Hunter Brown.
I love those two guys. They look like they'll fight
you hey, and I love that. And Burrow's stuff was
really good. First day I talked to him, in spring training.

(01:04:03):
He said that Brent Strom played a big role in
his development last year in spring training with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
He was a pitching coach over there last year and
he said, you know what, I don't think your arm
slot looks natural. Had you always thrown from way over
the top. He goes, yeah, he said, I mean, if
you want to your next bullpen, if you want to

(01:04:24):
drop down a little bit in an experiment, that's fine,
and if it doesn't feel good, let's just go right back.
So he did, and he dropped it. He dropped a
little bit more, dropped a little bit more, and after
about five or six little slots, he found one that
the ball was just exploding and his change up started
just dive bombing. Everything just came into place for him.

(01:04:47):
And he said, the biggest thing about it was and
how he knew it was right, is because he barely
got sore after he dropped that slot a little bit
and it was more natural. Straw he was right, and
he's been off to the racist sense. And something that
Strawmy told me about Burrows too after we got him.
He said, hey, the Pirates really babied him last year.

(01:05:09):
I mean he could have gone two more innings in
a lot of his starts last year, but he was
coming off Tommy John. They wanted to make sure he
was going to be fresh and healthy for the duration.
So the Astros can benefit from that too. But he's
he's the one that stuck out right away. It is like,
all right, this is a kind of a top of
the rotation type of starter, and the Astros had him

(01:05:30):
for a long time.

Speaker 10 (01:05:31):
When when you look at what he maya has been
able to produce in such a quick time, what stands
out about him being in the four hole? But honestly,
for most teams you could say that he'd be a
quantity number two, right, you know and cool.

Speaker 3 (01:05:45):
I think what probably sticks in my mind more than
anything is when you think back to Eachurusuzuki when he
came to the United States and he would show, hey,
o Tani if there was a kind of a routine
and a method to what they did in spring training.
Even lou Panela was saying each row. His manager was Seattle.
When he came over, he said, hey, can you even
pull the ball? And I mean it looked bad kind

(01:06:08):
of early on in spring training, and then when the
season started he lit it up. He was MVP of
the league everything, So I think I saw the same
thing with Emi. I mean, he just gradually got better.
And that last game he changed from one side of
the rubber to the third base side of the rubber
and all of a sudden, his velocity hopped three or

(01:06:30):
four miles prior. You're going, wow, I mean this guy,
this guy can figure some stuff out. And he's just
going about his routine. He's just doing what he needs
to do. But he's got two unique pitches that this
slip finger fastball acts like not many other pitchers do.
It really drops really fast and hard and late. And
the other thing. It's a kind of a gimmicky pitch.

(01:06:52):
But it's his slider that backs up, and that doesn't
happen very often. There's a couple of guys that have
done that on accident from time to time. But he
can do it on command, so equally effective against righty's
and lefties because they see the spin going one way,
but it goes the opposite. So that's tricky, I mean,

(01:07:14):
and that's going to play really well. His fastball's coming
from a very low spot or a low arm slot.
He's got some hop to it. But I think he's
going to be solid. You know, he's somebody that's he's
got an idea of what he wants to do, and
I think he competes, you know, with those top three guys,

(01:07:35):
and I think he might probably got to pitch Game
four the way things have kind of lined up in
spring training. But with those three guys, with Hunter Brown
and Mike Burrows, the Astros have some studs at the top.

Speaker 12 (01:07:46):
So to start the season, you your opinion, how would
you handle Jeremy Pinya if he tells you he can go?

Speaker 4 (01:07:52):
Or are you letting him go?

Speaker 12 (01:07:53):
Or do you feel like just those two weeks of
missing that important time, Maybe let him build up a
little bit and see what you've got. Obvious knowing what
you've got with Esach peretis being part of the fold.

Speaker 3 (01:08:04):
You know. The first day that Jeremy got back into
spring training, I told him, I said, hey, I broke
that exact same finger, my throwing hand, the ring finger.
All that I broke it in a game. The one
hurdle I think he was going to have to pass
wasn't swinging the bat, especially since it's the top hand
which doesn't take really the brunt of the swing or

(01:08:26):
the force, but it was going to be throwing because
when you throw a ball, a lot of that blood
rushes to that area and that's what that for me,
that's where the sharp pain was, you know, when I
was trying to come back from that injury. And I've
seen him throw and it looks very natural and it
doesn't look like there's any trepidation at all, and I
think that's a great sign. And the other great sign

(01:08:48):
is I mean, I think people were wondering, is he
going to stay back in Florida and try to get
as many A b's as he can or is he
going to travel with the team and get some AB's
in this Sugarland double dish on Monday and Tuesday and
go from there. And he says, you know, he's more
about feel and if he feels okay, he's going to
give him the thumbs up. And I think it's a

(01:09:10):
great sign that Jeremy Pagna was on our flight back
to Texas last night, so he's here. I think he's
probably going to play in one or two of these
games and see how it feels. But I think it's
better than fifty to fifty that he's going to start
the season on the active list.

Speaker 4 (01:09:27):
Well, we mentioned to earlier Ste've mentioned that note just
a guess on his part about fifty to fifty, but
the fact that Jeremy Paanni and I only made the flight,
and if you want visual proof of that, just hit
Sports Talk seven to nine. He via the X platform.
He's running the bases right now over at Dyk and
Park a workout today in advance of tonight's game. They
played tonight and tomorrow against the Space Cowboys, and they

(01:09:48):
still have not ruled Jeremy Payna out for the opener
coming up on Thursday. A couple other roster decisions to make.
We will have a chance to discuss a few of
those things as we continue here. But lots of good
news hopefully on the front for the Houston Astros. Now,
there was only one thing in my opinion, it was
bad for you of h fans, Cougar Hooper fans this

(01:10:09):
tournament so far when they won by thirty one points twice.
I'll tell you what that one bad thing is.

Speaker 1 (01:10:15):
Next the A team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (01:10:22):
It is the eighteen Sports Talk seven ninety Space City
Home Network didn't do the full research on this a
little disappointed, but there's a lot of things to look at.
You got sixty eight teams in the tournament, four of
them get sent home during the first four, and you've
got sixty four teams in the tournament. By the end
of it, sixty three teams sixty seven total have lost.
Thursday and Friday, thirty two teams said goodbye to the tournament.

(01:10:46):
Saturday and Sunday, sixteen more teams said goodbye to the tournament.
Were left with sixteen teams and fifteen more of them
we'll say goodbye to the tournaments. One team per region
has advanced that doesn't belong the top four seeds. By seeding.
It should be one verses four and two versus three
at every single regional if all goes according to plan
and Cinderella never gets fitted for a slipper, but four teams,

(01:11:10):
one in each region, made their way into that four
remaining teams. The worst seed to continue playing basketball plays
right here on the iHeartRadio family of networks, the Texas Longhorns.
They actually already have three tournament wins because they were
in the first four. If you guys are interested in
a Cinderella discussion, we can have it, We're not gonna

(01:11:31):
have it here. Though one team made it to Houston
for their regional, the South Regional, that does not belong.
It's not U of H. They belong. They are a
number two seed and they crushed, beating their opponents about
thirty one points apiece. We had an extremely entertaining Nebraska
Cornhuskers game which they were able to win and thus

(01:11:52):
advance because of they won't play each other. U of
H is playing the fighting Ali and I. They are
number three their seed, and they have too much trouble
winning their two games. The matchup for the team from
Nebraska not what we expected. And it's interesting that I'll
spin it this way, but to me, the one piece

(01:12:12):
of bad news for the University of Houston Cougar's coming
into a likely very very very very very very red
even though they put in black seats. Toyota Center coming
up on Thursday night, if you haven't already heard, U
of H has the second tip off against Illinois. The
opening game will be the Nebraska game, and Nebraska, as
the four seed who toppled the five seed, was set

(01:12:35):
to see obviously the number one seed in the South Region.
All they had to do was win. They won their
first game by fifty nine points. Nice and the math
that I said I did not complete if I'm not mistaken,
and I could be wrong. The two teams following this
weekend's worth of games that have the highest point differential

(01:12:55):
U of h sixty two and Florida fifty eight, but
Florida only won one time. Their season is over here.

Speaker 1 (01:13:05):
We go eight point nine to play. Skirts hit the
catch Stirts bound pass to the cutter, bulgaris for three.

Speaker 9 (01:13:14):
Ya takes the lead by the one wonder.

Speaker 1 (01:13:20):
Ponded one to lead Lee across midcourt.

Speaker 4 (01:13:24):
Lee speeding to the basket lead leads it underneath.

Speaker 1 (01:13:27):
Six for the first time. Six nineteen ninety.

Speaker 3 (01:13:31):
Nine, we'll head to the Sweet sixteen as.

Speaker 4 (01:13:35):
They knocked off the defending national champ who reached the
tournament as a deserved number one seed, and they won
one game. They beat a first four winner, Prairie View,
by fifty nine points. Their point differential is fifty eight.
They went one to one. They lost by one big
three pointer hit by the Hawkeyes with about four seconds

(01:13:56):
remaining to take a one point lead. After they've lost,
the Lee late made their way back and the big
ten the Midwest invasion of our city. It'll be underway
in a couple of days. I'll have some practices and
then the games on Thursday night. Illinois, Nebraska, and Iowa

(01:14:16):
trying to topple the favorite now here in Houston, the
Houston Cougar. So what's the bad news? They don't get
to avenge their loss to Florida now in Houston in
a regional final. Not saying they definitely would have, but
the option is now no longer available. Thought it would
have been great, especially since I thought the Cougars were

(01:14:37):
better in some previous years, but I never thought they
had as good a chance to win it all and
certainly make the final four as I do this year.
I thought their region was very winnable. I don't know
if i'd use the word week or weakest of the four,
but I probably would. And the teams that they were
matched up against the first two pretty obvious, whether it
was Saint Mary's or Texas A and M. In the
second game, I don't think either one of them could

(01:14:58):
give them much of a fight. In Texas A didn't
take him a fight for about eight minutes nine minutes
or so, and then the Cougars went on a run
and buried him and that was that, and they coasted
through the second half. So they they've had their way
in this tournament. They played very well, both defensively and offensively.
And maybe when I say they don't have as good
a team, it's relative to what you can do. They're
missing something on the interier in terms of offense, and

(01:15:20):
a post player and a guy who can maybe give
the ball to and you feel like you're gonna get
a good possession out of it or a good shot
from that player. Roberts and other bigs that they've had
the last several years. But what they didn't have is
multiple elite ball handlers. They've had LJ. Cryer, They've had
Marcus as Or, they've had Jamal shed They're all elite,
especially as college basketball players. All three of them, by

(01:15:42):
the way, are playing rather important roles in their respective
NBA teams this season. But they have three at the
same time, Emmanuel sharp Uzan and obviously Kingston Flemings, and
I think that could actually set them apart in a
good way this year.

Speaker 8 (01:15:57):
Well maybe now that everybody doesn't expect them to win
it all like they have, especially last year, and they
darn near did it because they were in the championship game.
They had a chance for sure. Maybe that's you know,
sometimes this is what happens. Kelvin Sampson's program has been
building on this, this kind of slow, steady trajectory, and

(01:16:21):
I really thought it was going to culminate last year.
I think we all did, especially after they beat Duke.
It was like, all right, well Florida's good, but U
of H is just a good chance to win this thing,
and it, I mean it went down to the wire.

Speaker 4 (01:16:33):
Basically, Yeah, one team's been to the Sweet sixteen seven
straight years. It's them. Yeah, they're they're the best currently,
they're the best program in college basketball for sure. If
you had that hasn't won a national title, you could argue,
even without one, the staying power they've had year in
and year out over now almost a full decade, Another
thirty one season for Kelvin Sampson, hopefully with four more

(01:16:54):
still to come, and again they do get to play
here in Houston. A lot of people were already scrambling
for tickets before where the tournament bracket was announced, scrambled
for tickets even more once they got the two seed
in the South Region know they were coming here if
they were able to win two games tickets and it
stayed that way. The attendance is not going to be
an issue whatsoever at these games. Now how many fans

(01:17:16):
will invade Houston, which is a good thing. You want
fans from other teams to arrive in your respective cities.
It's not all the time where the home team is
in there. There is a home team, it's not their
home arena. They're playing at Toyota Center, but it is
their home city. It says Houston across their chests, and
these three teams and their fan bases are traveling to Houston.

(01:17:37):
If you saw any or heard any of the Nebraska
games this weekend, you could I think you could hear
very very clearly how many of them were there. And
I think the same number are going to come to Houston.
Whether they're all in the arena with tickets, we'll find out.
But I think this is going to be or one
of the best atmospheres in college basketball because of that,

(01:17:58):
both the local angle clearly, the fact that I think
these fans from these three other programs will be here.

Speaker 8 (01:18:04):
Yeah, I mean, you wouldn't talk about invasion and all
that kind of stuff is funny because to be read,
what's the big deal? I know it is funny though,
because just because it's in the city doesn't mean the
amount of fans that you would assume will get access
to all of those seats.

Speaker 4 (01:18:22):
Yeah that I've attended a Final Four as a fan
or a regional as well as a fan, and you
can see which fans come there or not, and you
can see that there are fans there of basketball. You're
in a basketball city, You're in a basketball mecca if
you want to get down to it. In most of
these regional spots, fans are gonna buy tickets because they
want to see basketball. They're not necessarily Cougar fans or
whomever fans. They don't know who's gonna be here. They

(01:18:44):
bought their tickets months ago. But I do think it's
a pretty nice added bonus that I honestly think the
Cougars will take advantage of. They are two and a
half point favorites to win their first game against Illinois,
slight favorites, Nebraska slightly larger favorite to their game over Iowa.
But more on the college basketball's postseason. The other twelve

(01:19:04):
teams that have arrived. At this point, we'll get into
a little bit also, we get to say goodbye to
awful Todd, Golden and Florida, and I do mean awful.
We'll tell you and we get to the top of
the r exactly how to win those rockets bucks April
Fools Tickets next.

Speaker 1 (01:19:22):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 8 (01:19:25):
Kirk Wex over the air, ac right here. Josh Jordan
is our producer, as we have officially we have. We're
not oversaturating you with it. It's just it was such
an eclectic and electric and fantastic moment from over the weekend.
I can't get enough of Kdi passing MJ and then

(01:19:47):
Aman Thompson tipping in his misshot for the game winner,
and the vibes being immaculate. If you will over at
Toyota Center as they continue, I don't know, are you
like me?

Speaker 4 (01:19:59):
Where you're like?

Speaker 8 (01:20:00):
I thought we were going to have all these home
games and they are, but now they're off on another
four game road trip.

Speaker 4 (01:20:05):
Well they were flipped to one side for such a
long period of time. Yeah, when you have a five
game homestand that usually flips you back in balance. Basically,
you got thirty five home dates that have been played.
You got thirty five road dates that have been played.
I just remember when they would go on like a
five game road trip and then come home for a
game and then be back out on the road again.
I figured they'd go to the road. We had this

(01:20:26):
conversation five games ago. I would have said, well, they've
only played thirty home games and they've played thirty five
road games. I mean, five straight at home is a first,
and that's what aligns them back. The good news is
after these four they'll be in a bad spot again
on in the tally mark. But that means they have
that many more home games. That means they'll still have

(01:20:46):
to catch up with home games. After this four game
road trip, they got three straight at home New York, Milwaukee,
and Utah. They finished the season with three straight at home.
So after this four game road trip, they have two
on the road the rest of the season. Of their
final eight, six are at home and against neither of
those road teams. Are they seeing a team that well,

(01:21:07):
one of them probably quote unquote makes the playoffs. I
think Phoenix will win their way into the playoffs, but
they got playing tournament teams Golden State and Phoenix on
the road. They still have two games against Minnesota, one here,
one there. The game against Minnesota this week is two
nights from now, rather important considering both of those teams
are sixteen games over five hundred. I'm not really sure

(01:21:29):
what the Wolves really might be, and we'll probably see
them without Anthony Edwards, but we also have to respect
what they've been doing without Anthony Edwards. Last night was
a really good example of that. They fell behind by
double figures right out of the gate, and we're down
fifteen on the road at the Celtics with no Edwards,

(01:21:50):
and they had a twenty five point turnaround and they
beat the Celtics by ten. The Edwards list basketball games
that the Timberwolves are playing, they've been very good. Lost
to Portland, but they've won three of the other four.
Like the Rocks to take care of business and give
themselves a little bit better chance to finish fourth.

Speaker 8 (01:22:08):
Well, it took care of business over the weekend. Can't
really argue with the results, even though maybe how they
got there was a little bit different.

Speaker 4 (01:22:16):
Like the Hawks game.

Speaker 8 (01:22:19):
Honestly was more surprising to me because the Hawks came
in having won eleven straight.

Speaker 4 (01:22:25):
I mean, say what you will about that. You win
eleven in a row against anybody, that's impressive. All right now,
I can tell you how unimpressive it is. Been waiting
for this all week. I know you because we spent
the day Friday not mentioning it all. You know, we're
trying to look how tough an opponent this is for
the Rockets, the hottest team in the league. Eleven straight wins.

(01:22:46):
How can you stop this machine? Number one net rating
in basketball. During this eleven game winning streak, they're outscoring
their opponents by seventeen. I hope, by some act of
God can snap their two game losing streak against the
mighty soaring Atlanta Hawks, who piled up these eleven consecutive

(01:23:09):
victories against the Nets twice, the Wizards twice, the Bucks twice,
the Mavericks twice, and the Sixers Blazers. And there's your
eleven game winning streak. Okayn, the magic, the crap, the crap,

(01:23:32):
more crap. And then they got to see all those
crappy teams the second time it beat them all. And
then they played one playoff team. There's twelve teams in
the playoffs and They're not one of them. They played
one game against a playoff team, and that team is
the freaking Magic. Do you differentiate between the Eastern and
Western playoff teams? I mean, not in the top top six?

(01:23:54):
Is top six?

Speaker 8 (01:23:55):
I mean because other than the Rockets are like in
the middle of this and I still don't know what
happened in either of those games.

Speaker 4 (01:24:01):
It's just the Rockets did to the Hawks what they
did to the Hawks the first time, even though this
is a totally different version of the Hawks. Well, I'm
talking about the Lakers winning streak. A Lakers winning streak
I would call much more reputable. It is just in
the form of the Rockets being on it twice.

Speaker 8 (01:24:16):
Yeah, well, it also includes the Pacers and the Bulls
and the Magic win last night.

Speaker 4 (01:24:23):
They had to leave Luke Canard like wide and I
mean wide open, extremely well defended in bounds play way
to go match, just unbelievable. Listen, the Magic. I was
keeping an eye on that game.

Speaker 8 (01:24:38):
The Magic basically led by three the entire night, Like
it was right in that three to five range the
entire night until the very end when they didn't.

Speaker 4 (01:24:46):
They've won nine straight. Four of those wins are against
the Knicks, the Nuggets, and two against the Rockets, oh
and Minnesota. So five of the nine are against teams
they just think they're actually doing something in the playoffs,
not let alone being in the playoffs.

Speaker 8 (01:24:58):
That's a good winning streak. At least they've got play
at the Pistons tonight. Oh wait, they don't have Kate Cunningham. Yeah,
it happens.

Speaker 4 (01:25:04):
It's happened to everybody over the course of this season,
probably more than any other. When we go into the
conversation about awards, because we've noted it all year, these
award winning players, these award winning seasons, these all NBA seasons,
it's just littered with players who've been off the court.
Almost all of them are gonna miss fifteen games this year,
many of them are gonna miss twenty to twenty five.

(01:25:25):
All that being said, two things are very very likely
to happen for Houston in that regard. KD is one
hundred percent making All NBA this year. I'm not certain
that he won't make All NBA first team this year
because of some of these absences. And Amn Thompson's got
the same thing going for him when it comes to
all defense, as He already was there last year, as

(01:25:47):
we know. But if they're they're gonna be eligible. They've
these there's so many other players for these respective spots
won't be it. I don't think it's crazy if a
men finishes these last twelve Rockets games like he's played
individually his last twelve Rockets games for the same reason
Katie's sliding up the All NBA list, So is a

(01:26:08):
men Thompson. If six or seven of the best fifteen
players can't be voted on, you're opening the door for
him to slide into a third team spot.

Speaker 8 (01:26:17):
I think a men Thompson is playing his best basketball
this season right now too. Even when the Rockets weren't winning,
like they lost the two games to the war or
to the Lakers, why was.

Speaker 4 (01:26:29):
It because men Thompson was awful? It was like, actually
quite the opposite. He was great in both of those games.
It was everybody else that sucked. No argument here, We've
been talking about it quite a bit here. It was
unfortunate that it wasn't leading to more wins, and they
obviously don't, you know, run things through him. But it's
what we said the other day about you know, Jannis
Well I don't care how he gets his thirty. He

(01:26:50):
gets thirty every night. I don't care how men gets
his twenty two. Every night he's getting him. He's hit
a couple of corner threes at a little bit higher
clip than he normally would. But obviously it's not a
huge part of what the Rockets want or set up
to do. But what he's doing, he's watching other guys
handle the ball and set up the offense, or as
soon as he's the one who brings it up, he
goes into his familiar spot. He spent the first two

(01:27:11):
years of his career doing something that nobody could stop
him from doing, and the only person that stopped him
from doing it this year was Fred van Vliet, and
the Rockets mistakenly gave him the basketball. I swear if
we go back and pull the reel to reel from
our first show following the Fred van Vliet news, which
we heard about right here, that was my number one concern.
I know a men can handle and play point, and

(01:27:34):
I know Reed Shepherd can, but I don't want Amen
Thompson running the show for this team, and unfortunately they
did that for such a long period of time. He
barely does it anymore, and guess what's happening. He's having
a massive impact on the Rockets' ability to play better basketball.
Had a career high with eighteen rebounds, the last of
which won them the game. He's scoring very regularly in

(01:27:55):
the twenties twenty to ten, almost every night. If his
teammates were shooting well during this stretch, probably be averaging
eight or nine assists. And it's all without commanding the
ball or getting the ball where he's stuck in a
one on one situation against the defender that can't stop him.
He's been super aggressive, which he should. That's on him
and maybe the coaching staff to help tell him more

(01:28:16):
of this. Just face guys up and when the space
is there, take him to the basket, pull up for
that eight footer, you know, run all the way to
the basket, and scoop it with the left hand, the
right hand finish at the goal. He's very, very difficult
to stop once he's going downhill, even in the half court,
and he's just doing more of those things. Obviously, the
dunking hasn't stopped either. No, he's been in the dunker

(01:28:37):
spot a lot. He's been able to get free from traffic.
He's made a lot of back cuts when guys are
overplaying elsewhere defensively in the half court. You're right, you
said it very simply. It's the best basketball at best
NBA basketball of his career, and it seems like it's
only getting better regularly.

Speaker 8 (01:28:52):
Meanwhile, Kevin Durant's been playing some of the best basketball
of his life this season for the Rocks, even though
those games against the Lakers weren't great, and that is
a big reason why he finally passed MJ over the weekend.
And the interesting thing about this is, I mean, we've
we've talked about this a little bit, and here's where

(01:29:14):
you're gonna want to pay attention. By the way, if
you want to win Rockets, tickets were giving away coming
up in the four at the bottom of this hour,
I should say he was asked, you just passed Michael Jordan,
what's your favorite MJ moment?

Speaker 4 (01:29:29):
And his answer was very interesting.

Speaker 11 (01:29:31):
Nah, I mean he's that's like asking to you got
do I got a favorite Drake song?

Speaker 3 (01:29:35):
Right?

Speaker 13 (01:29:37):
Nah?

Speaker 5 (01:29:37):
They're just all great.

Speaker 11 (01:29:38):
I mean MJ has so many great moments that it's
hard to pick one. He just personifies iconic, god level
just everything that I believe and he personified.

Speaker 4 (01:29:49):
And do you have a favorite MJ moment?

Speaker 12 (01:29:52):
Nah?

Speaker 4 (01:29:53):
And just I mean everything he said totally relatable. Do
you have a favorite Drake song? That's what it's like saying,
especially for you, very relatable, very very relatable.

Speaker 8 (01:30:02):
His teammates, by the way, they were in awe of him,
and a man Thompson, who, by the way, said his
greatest moment as a Rocket was Katie's game winner earlier
this year.

Speaker 4 (01:30:11):
This is what he had to say about KD after
the other night.

Speaker 13 (01:30:14):
It's crazy, you know, just I mean, that's legendary. Just
being on a team with like greatness like that, It's
it's inspiring for sure. And witnessing him like break these
records to watch.

Speaker 4 (01:30:26):
It was brought to his attention by a reporter. You
had said, what Ac just said, your favorite moment was
his KD game winner earlier? Is that different?

Speaker 5 (01:30:33):
Now?

Speaker 4 (01:30:33):
He goes, yeah, yeah, it's different. Sorry, Katie, it's this one. Yeah,
it's tonight, I would hope, so game winner.

Speaker 8 (01:30:39):
We're gonna hear what Reed Shepherd had to say about
KD And would you have done this personnel move if
you were running the Rockets It's like an under the
radar situation.

Speaker 4 (01:30:50):
I can't wait to hear Wex's reaction reaction to this.
It's when we come back.

Speaker 8 (01:30:56):
Katie, playing with Katie, watching Katie a blitter, rate the
record book, and just being around a guy who's one
of the all time great.

Speaker 4 (01:31:04):
Certa Men Thompson last segment, talk about that. Here's what
the Kentucky enthusiast had to say about Katie. It's crazy,
you know, it's it's crazy.

Speaker 14 (01:31:15):
You hear the name Michael Jordan and you're like, all right,
that's the best player ever. And then you see Kevin
passing him and stuff and scoring, which is which is crazy.
But now, Kevin's a great player, a great teammate, you know.
So I'm happy to be out there on the court
and watch him do what he does. Read not a
Lebron truther.

Speaker 4 (01:31:36):
I like that. So twenty six points per game is
roughly what Katie is averaging. And this is actually the
number he needed to pass Michael Jordan on Saturday night,
which he obviously did. If he scores twenty six points
per game moving forward, this is what I was doing
to try to tell you he was doing going to
break Jordan's mark during this five game homestand, and I

(01:31:57):
was totally barely correct when he got it done in
the late late stages of game number five of the homestand,
but his path to passing Kobe Bryant if he maintains
that same level of scoring Kobe Bryant at thirty three thousand,
six hundred and forty three, Kevin Durant now two points
better than Jordan thirty two, two hundred and ninety four,

(01:32:19):
twenty six points per game for the next fifty two games.
In the fifty second game, he would pass Kobe Bryant
and move into fourth on the all time list. So
presuming he plays if they're still seating, it's possible he
plays all twelve remaining games this year and probably hits
right around that number next year. Hopefully he's just as
he was this year and plays in nearly all of

(01:32:41):
the games, So sometime around the fiftieth game of the
season will really or fortieth game of the season will
really start looking at he's about to pass another legend
in a Rockets uniform, which will mean he will have
passed Wilt Chamberlain, Dirk Novitzky, Michael Jordan, and co Bryant
in a year and a half in a Rockets uniform.

(01:33:04):
It's about where it will be now if he's going
to pass another player. Karmelone is third. He's almost at
thirty seven thousand. Whomever the Rockets gm rafel Stone obviously
who signed him to this first extension, would have to
sign him, likely to another extension, but very early in
that additional season, more than two full seasons away. He

(01:33:28):
if he keeps up a relatively similar pace, could move
into third.

Speaker 8 (01:33:32):
Speaking of rafel Stone, he famously I guess stood pat
at the deadline. Ye didn't didn't bring anybody in, especially
in the backcourt, where a lot of people think he
should have.

Speaker 4 (01:33:47):
Yep, I mean a lot of people do think that.
I don't why they have what they have, and they're
totally to me. They didn't have. They weren't going to
make this year's team significantly better with what it would
have taken to go get some player that could have
done that. I was pretty much totally uninterested in every

(01:34:08):
guard or point guard that was available to them for
what they would have had to give up to get him,
and then any player that was better than that. I
just didn't think they had anyway to get them.

Speaker 8 (01:34:17):
Of all the number one overall picks that have been
disappointing in some way, shape or form, varying degrees of disappointment,
where would you rank Mark hel Fultz pretty high on
any list, Like more disappointing than Michael Oloa Candy for example.

Speaker 4 (01:34:33):
I mean, now it depends how far back you're going
Swami Brown. I mean he's pretty just say this century, Okay.
The other thing is do you separate it from how
disappointing they were for the team that drafted them and
anything they might have done since. I mean, Fultz's career
has been bad no matter how you put it. I
hate to put it on the player. He didn't tell
you to take him first year. The guys who said, hey,
this guy's the best player in the draft, like he

(01:34:54):
reminds me of Anthony Bennett, we should take him first.
I mean, you didn't even get to him. He's definitely
the worst basketball player of all these guys. He's definitely
worse than Kwame Brown. Like how much does that tell you?
That's pretty bad. So there have been some bad overall
number one picks, just bad decisions made by gms. Obviously
in a draft where a ton of players were better
than that, and you could have taken any of them,

(01:35:15):
that's who you chose. Fultz was very disappointing.

Speaker 8 (01:35:19):
Now how much of that was because of injuries versus
just not being able to play at the NBA level.

Speaker 4 (01:35:25):
I mean he had injuries and some other issues personally
that kind of kept things, remember materializing, But I mean
not a good shot maker kind of was the number
one thing. He doesn't make a lot of shots, and
he cannot he's guard and he cannot shoot from outside
the three point line. I'd fit in great with the Rockets.
Then he wouldn't even you can't can't put It's hard

(01:35:47):
to put those players on the court.

Speaker 8 (01:35:49):
They're getting a ten day contract for him drawn up
in Toronto.

Speaker 4 (01:35:54):
So for what to play basketball, I'm not even I'm
not even joking. Yeah, Markel Foltz is signing a contract
to play basketball with a team headed to the playoffs. Yep,
they'd probably just have a roster spot to fill. He
last played in the NBA last season, peered in twenty
one games for the Kings. He spent time this year
with the Raptors nine oh five G League team. Yeah,

(01:36:17):
this is not that's not to help them win games.
That's more procedural for this cone, no more probably for
some maybe there's some future. I guess who's already part
of the organization. He managed to get on the court
a whole twenty one games last year for one of
the worst organizations in basketball, and wasn't very good. That
was Sacramento.

Speaker 8 (01:36:37):
Injuries have plagued him since the Sixers drafted him in
twenty seventeen. He appeared in fewer than twenty games in
each of his first two seasons. He has since evolved
into a strong defensive guard capable of moving the ball
on offense. His best season twenty two to twenty three,
he averaged fourteen points and nearly six assists while shooting

(01:36:57):
fifty one percent from the field for the Magic. It
was impressive to have that number. He recognizes his shortcomings.

Speaker 4 (01:37:04):
That was the one season he shot better than fifty
percent from the field, and that was one of all
of his seasons where he barely takes any threes. He
knows he can't make them, so he doesn't take them.

Speaker 8 (01:37:13):
And to what you were saying, the Raptors are in
a tight race with the Hawks, Sixers, Magic Heat and
Hornets to stay out of the Eastern Conference playing.

Speaker 4 (01:37:21):
And not that we need to spend a lot of
times time on the only team that doesn't play in
America for half their games, but their roster. It's they
have to their starters have to be great. They do
not have a good team up and down, and it's
really helpful that Jamal shd is there because they need him.
Their production from the players that do not start for

(01:37:41):
them is so limited, and when the Rockets saw them
both times this year, they were playing without their only
big basically on the entire roster, Yaka Perl, not even
a great player, but they have nothing on the interior
when he doesn't play. He's only played thirty five games
this year. Barnes Ingram quickly RJ Barrett. That's their whole team.
They get so little from six through twelve, so finding

(01:38:06):
a minute or two or ten minutes from somebody else
maybe it's not out of the question, but they rely
heavily on their starters to get it done every single night,
maybe more so than any team in the league.

Speaker 8 (01:38:17):
It does make me, though, think about what is continuing
to pick up steam on social with each passing day.
What's the Rockets record now with read as a starter.

Speaker 4 (01:38:28):
It's very good. It's not quite winning games against teams
that the Hawks beat during their winning streak, but it's close.

Speaker 8 (01:38:36):
Ten and two, I believe is the mark. Yes, that's
not a huge sample size, but it's not a minuscule, so.

Speaker 4 (01:38:44):
You could look at it this way. They are only
sixteen games over five hundred all year, and half of
them are in the twelve games that he started. Like,
he's got to start moving forward, right, Yeah, Emay was
asked and address that earlier during this home stand when
they made the switch. Easton was going through a miserable
three point shooting slump and it definitely was affecting, you know,
some of the rest of his game offensively, was struggling

(01:39:07):
to really put the ball in the basket from most spots.
Still playing most of his game fairly well defensively other
parts of the offense, fine, he just couldn't make the shots.
So they made the switch. There's an obvious It's not
only that, it's you're not switching an A player for
an A player. These are two totally different types of
players that give you a totally different look, and it's
the look that they should have gone to a long

(01:39:28):
time ago. I don't think the Rockets did much of
this intentionally. Like the way he answered it was like
they did do it intentionally. Oh, Josha Koge started a
bunch of games. We wanted to get a look at that,
Tarry Easton started a bunch, gonna get a look at that,
and now we're gonna get a look at Reid. Like
they weren't concerned with how it impacted the team big
picture for the games that might have put them behind

(01:39:48):
the eight ball starting or cost him wins period, but
rather we're just trying to figure it out and take
our time figuring it out for when we get to
the postseason. There's no way they can look at these games,
those twelve that you're bringing up the recent few. Of course,
it's their best look, and I can't imagine any of
their seven possible opponents that there's any other look they
would want to start with. This is their best five

(01:40:10):
to start with, and quite honestly, other than the offense
for defense switching at the end of the game, which
in a close game they will do, it's their best
closing group. It's their best group. I mean, there's really
no other way to slice it. Reed Shepherd is a
part of it, and he looks I mean, I know
we talk about this a lot, whatever you think of it,
he just he looks way more confident. He sat himself.

(01:40:32):
It's the most confident I've ever been.

Speaker 8 (01:40:35):
But he's shooting as such, he hadn't always make them.
You would like it to be a little bit more
consistent from a make standpoint, because it's a makero miss
league at.

Speaker 4 (01:40:43):
He's twelve of twenty three in his last three games.
It's pretty from three point Wow, that's a small sample,
yes it is, but he has been you know, Davion
Mitchell six or seventh, the eighth, the best player on
anybody's team. He plays for the heat. He took up
the basket repeatedly. It's still an issue for this team
and they have to figure out best ways to go
about it. But you have the good shingoon guy taken

(01:41:06):
to the basket as well, So now it's a bigger problem.
The Tad Cone forty percent of your defense might look
like that, but you know Reid's playing good enough basketball
that it quite clearly outweighs it. Men. Thompson's eighteen rebounds
obviously gets a big nod. But he also he also
reads set a career high with fourteen assists and did
not turn the basketball over. I don't know what more
you can do.

Speaker 8 (01:41:26):
So the moral of the story is WEX would not
have signed markel Foltz if you were exactly.

Speaker 4 (01:41:30):
The GM of the Rockets.

Speaker 8 (01:41:31):
We're gonna give away Rockets Bucks tickets and we're gonna
get to the good, the bad, and the ugly from
over the weekend next. Oh the good, oh good, the
bad that's not good, and the ugly.

Speaker 5 (01:41:43):
Don't make me good with.

Speaker 1 (01:41:45):
The eight we're selling you the good.

Speaker 10 (01:41:48):
The bad.

Speaker 4 (01:41:53):
It's time to give away tickets. We do have our
signature segment here, the good, the bad, the ugly. We
will jump into that after the payoff. Who mentioned about
an hour ago and gave you something to listen to
about half an hour ago. So you know the answer
to this question. We're gonna ask and with the answer
you win. Rockets tickets. Got a pair of tickets to
go see the Rockets and the Bucks April first, first

(01:42:15):
of their final month's worth of games here at Toyota Center.
Pair of tickets Rockets, Bucks April first. You call them
with the answer to the simple question, and you will
be the winner. If you were listening to the show
when we gave you some Kevin Durant postgame audio, you'll
know the answer to this question. Seven one three two
one two five seven ninety after he eclipsed Michael Jordan

(01:42:39):
on the all time NBA scoring list with a late
three pointer helping the Rockets to an eight point lead,
which they lost and then ultimately won the game. But
when asked that question, is there a favorite moment with
him or a favorite mj moment for you that comes
to mind as you move past him on the all
time scoring list? His answer, it's very interesting. Well, what

(01:43:03):
was his answer? The question is a simple one, what's
your favorite moment from Michael Jordan? His answer also a
very simple one that you'll know if you heard it
when we played his answer, which just about half an
hour ago right here on the A Team. You call
in it seven one three two one two five seven
ninety and give us the answer to that question that
he answered, What was his favorite Michael Jordan moment? Kevin Durant,

(01:43:25):
what is it? Tell us and win good bed. The
ugly is here for you.

Speaker 7 (01:43:30):
Now.

Speaker 4 (01:43:31):
I'll keep it pretty simple. It is two parts. They
are both on the hardwood. It was pretty entertaining basketball.
I thought this weekend on pretty much all fronts, whether
it's collegiately or on the NBA side. But on the
NBA side, I hope you've heard it by now, but
if you have it, here's how the Rockets got their
victory over the Miami Heat.

Speaker 9 (01:43:51):
Late Thompson to his right for Durant out of mid
court with four with three right.

Speaker 12 (01:43:56):
Elbow double clutches Backron Tapa.

Speaker 1 (01:43:59):
As a that's it.

Speaker 2 (01:44:01):
That's about top ten for the game winner.

Speaker 6 (01:44:04):
They will have to reveal it, but I think we
got it.

Speaker 1 (01:44:08):
I think a man as a zero.

Speaker 4 (01:44:11):
They are mobbing him.

Speaker 2 (01:44:13):
Thompson rebound eighteen, put back at the buzzer.

Speaker 4 (01:44:18):
Upon review the Matthew scores, and it's a game winter
a man.

Speaker 1 (01:44:26):
Top ten.

Speaker 4 (01:44:27):
Thanks James Capers and Adam Klanton and Matt Thomas, the
three voices you heard right there amongst the screaming fans
inside to out a center. Same thing we'll see this week,
even though the Rockets are out of town all week.
They left for Chicago yesterday, which was also an interesting
side notes. It's still in play, but had Kevin Durant

(01:44:48):
not passed Michael Jordan last night. Oh, he would have
passed Michael Jordan tonight in Chicago, where there's a statue
of Michael Jordan. Now he will go to this game
in this state that basically Michael Jordan built, and he
will already have passed him. So I'm sure something of
note will be recognized in some form or fashion, maybe

(01:45:09):
just the fans booing him because he's well, he's obviously
better than Michael at scoring in the NBA. Yeah, And
Kevin mentioned it during his postgame commentary last night about
how many points were left on the board. He could
have mentioned himself, considering he missed an entire season with injury.
Mj obviously missed some time early in his career with injury,
but mainly he missed time because he wasn't a part

(01:45:31):
of the National Basketball Association on more than one occasion,
at his own request and his agent's request. And then
he came back at his agent's request, he sent a
very very long press release with two words said he
was back, and then he played for the Wizards. Probably
gave some points away there too, but nonetheless, a.

Speaker 8 (01:45:47):
Couple of minutes ago, Space City home network's X account
posted a video of Kdie's arrival. The rest of the
Rockets too in Chicago, but only after a very slow
trip around the aforementioned Jordan's statue, which if you go
to Chicago to see it, like I did back in
twenty seventeen, I get to the United Center and I'm like,

(01:46:10):
where is it?

Speaker 4 (01:46:11):
I thought it was out on the street. It was,
and then they moved it inside in between.

Speaker 8 (01:46:15):
This little area where the team shop for both the
Bulls and the Blackhawks is located, and then the face
of the arena they've glassed it in.

Speaker 4 (01:46:23):
It was an addition, obviously, and it's a little bit.

Speaker 8 (01:46:26):
It actually looks like from the video that Space City
Home Network just posted, it looks like they've added to
that sense. Then you can't even get as close as
I was at the time to that statue. It's iconic, though,
it's very iconic home with the Blackhawks. Michael Jordan's statue.

Speaker 4 (01:46:40):
The other good was kind of goes without saying, and
it really doesn't generate a fantastic game winning call, but nonetheless.

Speaker 3 (01:46:48):
Is heading ahead for the Sweet sixteen, their seventh consecutive
trip to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament.

Speaker 4 (01:46:58):
With a one one sided victory over Texas A and M,
which was preceded by a one sided victory over Idaho.
They were plus thirty one against Idaho seventy eight forty seven.
They followed that up with a plus thirty one against
Texas A and M eighty eight to fifty seven. They're
playing very, very well, and they definitely took care of

(01:47:19):
business as well, if not better than any team in
the country with their respective opening two opponents. That's the
good the bad. If you have procured a winner, which
I cannot tell because you've been frozen on our monitor
for well over an hour. But if you have, Josh,
would would you like to share with us the bad?

Speaker 3 (01:47:39):
Sure?

Speaker 15 (01:47:40):
According to Nick Harris of the Fort Worth Star Telegram,
the Cowboys are discussing the possibility of trading for a
zis Al Shire of the Texans or Jordan Brooks of
the Dolphins. This is bad on a few levels because
obviously I want him on my team, not the Cowboys.
But I don't buy any of this, do you. I
understand they could have interest, but I don't buy that
the tech since we'd be looking to trade, I'll Shire.

Speaker 4 (01:48:02):
Right so take it for what it is. You're a
football team that wants to get better. You would like
to do that by trading for a player that would
make you better. And you have heard from inside that
team's departments, your sources, that's something that they're interested in doing,
very specific to this players, I'll shire. So you report it,
no problem. Now you have people that know the other

(01:48:24):
side of it. He's not trying to say there's a
deal eminent, and he's not trying to say that they
think they might be able to get him. And as
Josh points out, probably too softly, there's a zero literally
zero points zero percent chance of this, less than zero
I guess percent chance of this. The defense is a
ease as much as the other players are awesome and

(01:48:45):
set the tone or make plays, I guess he does
set the tone. He's the quarterback, he's the CJ. Stroud
of the defense coming off an awesome year. And not
only that, his relationship with the head coach is one
that they're going to keep him here zero point zero
zero one that Nick Cassario goes to Demico and disease

(01:49:05):
his agents and say, well, here, we want to extend
you because we love you. And here's what we want
to do, and they say, no, that's embarrassing, that's you're
insulting me. Absolutely, we're not going to go for that.
And thinking about this, you might as well just send
me out of here. I don't want to be here
if that's how you feel about me. We all know

(01:49:26):
that's not happening. They're going to extend him because this
is not going to be his last year here, and
it's nice to have interest, but there won't be any
interest reciprocated from the Texans. Yeah, he's not going anywhere,
So stop asking Dallas. He that we would get mad
at or a GM of another team. We said, Adam,
they didn't even they didn't even ask, They didn't even
make the phone call. Go ahead and make the phone call.

(01:49:48):
Talk internally about it. But no, he's uh. He's part
of the best defense in the NFL and a big
enough part of it that they will want to have
him back and not an account his uniform ever.

Speaker 8 (01:49:59):
No, all right, I will I'll get to the ugly
plus what are you doing cam skataboo. We'll discuss all
of that next. By the way, I hope we did
get our answer for our rockets tickets. Did we not
no favorite moment? Too many to name For Kevin Durant
s he's a trick.

Speaker 4 (01:50:17):
Question, but listening to the program pays off. Yeah, you win.
When you listen, you probably even knew the analogy he made.
It's like asking what your favorite Drake song is. Wex
certainly did relatable.

Speaker 5 (01:50:32):
All right?

Speaker 4 (01:50:33):
The ugly Uh.

Speaker 8 (01:50:35):
If the Seattle Mariners are having to put out statements
about the fact that Randy A. Rosarina and Cal Rawley
are good after the stupid World Baseball Classic non dapt
flap thing, it's just further for the proof they're going
straight into the toilet this year.

Speaker 4 (01:50:54):
I would like to think that it's ugly it more
than once now, this being the second time Arosa Rena
had crafted a statement saying, hey man, all good, I'm sorry,
no big deal, We're back, We're ready, we're playing. Let's go.
So we'll see if that is in fact the case.
Now two days, three days from now, one of everybody's

(01:51:17):
favorite ASTROS marketing campaigns will launch again with one of
your local grocers being a part of the Astros again.
I can't wait to see jose L Twovey's acting chops Yep,
Carlos Correa will make his return. I bring that up
because he doesn't talk at all at all. I hate

(01:51:38):
to say this, but I definitely think it's true. And
they've done this for a while, but I've actually seen
the new batch of Mariners commercials for their team. They're
not for any particular sponsor that they have. Well, they
don't have awesome grocery stores in Washington. Yea, it's just
for them, you know, their season and season tickets or whatever.
And they're actually very very they're very very clever. I

(01:52:01):
think they're actually very funny, and they do have players.
We run into this from time to time with the
fiercest of rivals, and yet maybe all these guys aren't
that hateable and it kind of plays out in some
of these spots. Listen, I have spot for Torpedo Bats. Yeah,
they have like five guys who had kids over the offseason,

(01:52:22):
so they play on them being dads. This year, there's
a couple pretty clever spots the Tridents up have put out. Yeah.
I hope they finished dead last. Naylor Naylor. Okay, so
this is a quote. I understand that with opening Day
a few days away, I don't want it to be
a distraction. Ooh, a Hunter Brown extension, Jeremy Penny extension.

Speaker 8 (01:52:44):
This is Randy a Rosa Rain talking about him and
Cal Rawley not dapping it up behind home plate at
the World Baseball Classic.

Speaker 4 (01:52:52):
Well, don't let what you said a minute ago go away,
because it's a keeper now and you might not even
realize it. The no DAPT Flap to be referred to
movie for forever as the NODAPT Flapped.

Speaker 8 (01:53:01):
I'm gonna copyright that Cal and I have talked, and
I apologize for what I said after the game. Nothing
in the World Baseball Classic takes away from the fact
that we are brothers and teammates.

Speaker 4 (01:53:12):
What's the old phrase, thou dost protest too much?

Speaker 8 (01:53:16):
If you want this to go away, stop talking about it,
releasing a team statement and by the way, nothing you know,
I apologize for what I said.

Speaker 4 (01:53:26):
What he said was f off and go to hell.
It wasn't like he just said, ah, yeah, well that
wasn't very cool. No, he was like, very what do
you do if you're the team they've returned, they're gonna
see more media right now, right because they're back home.
They've finished with their spring training portion. Of the schedule,
So that's obviously those quote right, But those who might

(01:53:47):
not have traveled to the team's facility after the World
Baseball Classic to get their questions in to see what
things were like. So now they're gonna get their opportunity
now that the season has begun and there's more of
their media around it, and obviously to be for them,
I left something off.

Speaker 8 (01:54:01):
So they put a statement rally said good to see
you and that the catcher can quote shove it straight
up his You know what? These are three quotes from
Randy rose Arena about Cal Rawley, and then they're releasing
a statement.

Speaker 4 (01:54:13):
I need this team to implode so bad. I can
feel it. I know you guys. I know Randy and Cal.
I appreciate you joining me for this joint interview, and
I know you have already put out a statement on this,
but I'm just curious, is is it easier for you, Randy,
to put all this behind you, because like like you
guys America also losers. Do you remember when Scott were

(01:54:35):
you happy when Team Venezuela won? Randy, do you remember
when Scott Pippens said, if anything, he owes me an
apology for coming and playing with this. Sorry, fat butt.

Speaker 8 (01:54:45):
Did you see why that was a problem? Why because
then Scott got traded out of town. Well, you guys
got to play together.

Speaker 7 (01:54:51):
Now.

Speaker 4 (01:54:51):
Did you see what Scott's been up to lately?

Speaker 8 (01:54:55):
He auctioned off some things, didn't he in the spirit
of commercials. Oh yeah, he has a new commercial.

Speaker 4 (01:55:01):
I forgot what is it? I know I saw this,
but I can't remember. For a soft drink, I don't
think I saw this. After all. Well, you'll enjoy it
because it's very last dance take off. Okay, I'll let
you enjoy it yourself. I'll find out without giving any
deeds here. We could play the audio, but then we'd
have to hear Scotty's extremely deep voice. Yeah, and you know, well,

(01:55:23):
I'll just leave it at that. Listen, this is whether
they want to admit it or not.

Speaker 8 (01:55:28):
They being Mariners fans, this is uglier than they would
like to We'll see, like you finally broke through. You
eclipsed the Astros. It took you to the last weekend
of the season, and everybody was hurt on their teams.

Speaker 4 (01:55:39):
They have a game where Cal comes up short, strikes
out with the bases loaded, throws a ball away yet
out at home plate. Who knows is this gonna.

Speaker 8 (01:55:47):
They go to Randy for his postgame thoughts and he goes,
you know what, On second thought, he can go directly
to hell.

Speaker 4 (01:55:53):
I assume you didn't see. You know, last week we
were talking about food items you can get this year
at different ballparks. Yeah, you didn't see the parody new
food item at Safego for the Mariners. Well, it's a
beef related No, it's it's a dessert. There, it's a dessert.
There's no beef. What is it called? It's something maybe

(01:56:15):
the Big Dumper, Chocolate Sunday or something. Yeah, that sounds
like something I don't want to consume. Yeah, well, I
think the what it's being served out of was why
it was very obviously a parody item. What was it
being served out of? A small, little miniature commode. That's disgusting.

Speaker 12 (01:56:33):
Right.

Speaker 8 (01:56:36):
If I were the Astros back after the scandal broke,
I would have been instead of helmet nachos, I would
have put trash can noth.

Speaker 4 (01:56:43):
I would have leaned into it is a thing. Yeah,
Like I would have totally gone all in, like Adam
stepped in with the Hawks and the Magic with the
Magic City Monday. Yeah, you don't think Rob would have
stepped in and said to the Astros. I mean, I
can appreciate you leaning in to your now what you're

(01:57:04):
known as LL role, but we would prefer if you wouldn't.

Speaker 8 (01:57:08):
I'm just saying, there's no there's no just oh, sweeping
this under the rug, coming back from shove it directly
up your backside, go to hell like Deezer.

Speaker 4 (01:57:17):
Right, Well, let's spin it the other way around. It's
it's not talking to one of them after they have
messed up or not won a game because of a
performance where the other guy says, yeah, I knew it.
This guy doesn't have it? Is it more about cal
Raley and Rose Arena is on second base. He's the
winning run, the go ahead, go ahead run, the tying
runs on third. Raleigh comes up with a huge ninth inning,

(01:57:39):
two out single and here comes a Rose Arena coming
around third. He's headed for home. He slides in and
he's safe, and everyone gathers around a Rose Arena. They're
jumping on it there throwing gum and then what Raleigh
just walked away? He wouldn't even high five him.

Speaker 8 (01:57:53):
All I'm saying is if this were Jordan Alvare and
I don't want to say, yiner.

Speaker 4 (01:58:03):
What if this was like fromber Valdez and Sesar Salazar. Oh,
you mean that happened already.

Speaker 8 (01:58:08):
Like seriously, if this were two Astros, the national media
would be all Jeff Passon would.

Speaker 4 (01:58:14):
Have to change his pants way out in Seattle. I'm
telling you.

Speaker 8 (01:58:17):
If this were the Astros, national media would be all
over this, and instead it's a nothing burger.

Speaker 4 (01:58:23):
Jeff, Well, we tease camp scattaboo, he'll find his way
into football at five. He's on the wrong side of
football at five. The guy on the right side of
football at five is a very very rich Ohio state
wide receiver. All that next on the final hour of
the show, five o'clock hour always starts with football at five, wexsay,
Ce and Josh here with you as per usual. Great
to have full week of shows other than Thursday, and

(01:58:45):
we will have Astros Baseball opening up their twenty twenty
six campaign. We'll have several days to remind you of this,
but Thursday is a pretty big day. We got Astros
Baseball coverage beginning at ten am with US live out
of Dyke and Park will shift into the Astros on
deck show at two o'clock, first pitch at three ten,
and all of that will be here for you on

(01:59:06):
Sports Talk seven to ninety. With the Longhorns playing the
early game at their regional five thirty coverage of that
will start. That'll be over on nine point fifty KPRC.
The Cougars have the late start. The second start here
in Houston probably starts nine to fifteen. Nine thirty are
scheduled at nine ten, but i'll be thirty minutes after

(01:59:29):
the first game concludes between Nebraska and Iowa. That game
will begin right here on Sports Talk seven to ninety.
When did you get joined? As necessary U of H starts,
maybe a little bit before UT wraps up. It'll be
joined on KPRC after the UT game ends, and we'll

(01:59:49):
update you on any Saturday broadcasts when either or both
of those teams win. I think both of those teams can. Obviously,
Texas has already beaten the team in BYU and they've
already won three games. Nobody in this tournament's one more
more games than the Longhorns and Sean Miller, I don't
know if we need a Cinderella conversation yet, but we

(02:00:10):
certainly don't need it here in football at five major
news across the NFL, as it pertains to two different
groups of players. One of those groups of players catch
passes from their quarterbacks or running backs if they throw them.
Wide receivers the new highest paid wide receiver in the NFL.
He just won the Super Bowl with the Seattle Seahawks,
and he was the best wide receiver in the NFL

(02:00:32):
this past year. Goodyear to do it when the option
for his team to extend him the window was open,
and it's now been jumped through with no glass in
the way whatsoever. Forty two point one five million per
season on an average annual value, Jamar Chase had put
himself way ahead of everybody when he signed his extension.

(02:00:54):
Number three became Justin Jefferson. Today Jefferson's at thirty five
million per Jamar Chase is more than five million dollars
ahead of that at just over forty And now JSN
is almost two full million dollars over that. And was
this signing and others and extensions that have happened this offseason.

(02:01:16):
Nico Collins currently sits eighteenth on the list of highest
paid wide receivers based on average annual value. Didn't He
recently also have his deal renegotiated. They have not done
it with his contract, though it's likely just a matter of, well,

(02:01:37):
we haven't find another free agent to do this. It
hasn't eaten up any more cap space because of that,
so we'll do it if we need to. But if
we don't, and they will, then we won't. I'm sure
that with so many other players, I guess I thought
they just had other players. I think without an extension,
which is also a likely or possibility, a restructure, might

(02:01:57):
not be ideal. It can be done, and I think
both parties would be happy, but I think it's more
likely that they could end up with an extension again
when it's necessary. It's no different to me than disease.
Disease is not playing next year with the Texans in
the final year of his contract, and I don't think
Niko will either. There's no reason for it. They have
the ability to do it, even though they have a
ton of dead cap space this year. They're remarkably in

(02:02:19):
pretty good shape for the upcoming years when it comes
to that. So this is where you do applaud Nick
Cassio and how he puts them together and how he
kind of lines things up, and it makes sense, and
I think that's why they're able to do the things
they want to do each off season. It also matters
to the fact that just a couple of years ago,
in twenty twenty three, April twenty seventh, twentieth overall pick

(02:02:42):
that was JSN the Seattle Seahawks twenty twenty three draft
the same draft the same day the other first round
picks were taking that year. The Texans made two first
round picks in twenty twenty three, CJ. Stroud at number two,
Will Anderson Junior at number three, so we already knew
that the extension window for those players was open. Well,

(02:03:03):
now the best player at his position has signed a
new deal and he's number one at his position group.
It's exactly what's going to happen for Will and Anderson Junior.
And it's all just relative to the edge defensive end position.
But it probably doesn't do anything to hurt the timetable
because I don't really there's no real timeline like deadline

(02:03:25):
or anything. I don't think it relates too much to
anything else they want to do, so It's not like
they're well, when this happens, and this happens, then we'll
make that announcement. It's coming and he is going to
be exactly what JSN is. It's going to be the
highest paid player at his position this offseason, and Nobod's
new extension.

Speaker 8 (02:03:45):
Nobody here is going to even bat an eyelash at it.
And yet I feel like if you were to do
the same thing right now as CJ. Stroud, you would
just hear this collective.

Speaker 4 (02:03:55):
But yes, and A, it might not mean he became
hum's the highest paid player in his position, although I
think he would. In Will's case, they're already there are
only five players making forty million at edge and then
next is Max Crosby and he's at thirty five to five. Well,
Will Anderson Junior is going to make that list six.

(02:04:18):
Cleveland has one, Pittsburgh has one, Detroit has one, and
Green May has one, and the Texans will have two.
Danil Hunter with his extension got to forty million point one,
and like I said, I think Will probably it's probably
forty eight million. You know, it'd be a million and
a half more than what Micah is getting at forty
six point five, it's been a year since he signed

(02:04:39):
his extension with Green Bay. Seems pretty normal, reasonable for
a year to year increase, as the salary cap also
had another massive increase this year. I would think that
that's a reasonable place. Forty eight million a year, a
shade under two hundred million if he gets a four
year deal. That's what I think we're looking at. And

(02:05:00):
everybody in the NFL, his fellow edged players, his fellow teammates,
other players in his locker room that want to get theirs,
will be just fine with it.

Speaker 8 (02:05:10):
It's the cost of doing business, and he's a keeper.
When you're the best in the business, it's very much
an expensive business to be in.

Speaker 4 (02:05:17):
And considering this list of now six or seven, if
you include Max Crosby because he makes the conversation that
much more interesting. Micah traded because the team that had
him and watched him play awesome defense changing football said
I don't think so, not for us. Somebody else can
pay him. Aiden's team said, you better believe we're keeping

(02:05:38):
Aiden Touchinson here. TJ. Watt's team has said it more
than once. We're keeping him here. Miles Garrett team, he's
not going anywhere, even though he demanded a trade once
just to get his money, and Max Crosby never traded, officially,
never traded. He's only played for the Raiders. Yeah, and
then Will Anderson would be the same as all of

(02:05:58):
those players, and he's early enough his career it's a
little bit different, but all one team players except for
Daniel Hunter, who for some reason, I guess at the
stage of his career. Maybe they thought a obviously they
knew would be cheaper to sign Jonathan Garnard, which they did,
and he's played very well. But I don't know what
they were expecting or where they thought. This was not
money well spent. He's he's been better than Grenard, He's

(02:06:22):
been better than almost everybody playing the position for the
two years since he left. And the Texans are very fine,
very happy with paying the only one of the top
paid edge rushers that's played for more than one team
other than Micah Parsons.

Speaker 8 (02:06:36):
It's crazy to think this defense could be better this
upcoming season than it was last year. And yet I
keep going back to like, barring a health's like a
major major health situation.

Speaker 4 (02:06:49):
I think they will. Yeah, they don't have a hole
on the defense, but they do need to address edge
behind Daniel Hunter and Will Anderson Junior played through an
almost flawless health wise season, and Derek Barnett's not necessarily back.
He does not have a new home, but he has
not signed here. Dinico Autry, same thing. They don't have

(02:07:11):
anybody in the house that can handle that. I don't
think all year long, thirty percent of the snaps every
single week. Dylan Horton's here, and he probably is. He's
in a great position to have that job. But they
need to go out and get better. And more than that,
at least for I don't think even for competition standpoint,
they just need better. They need to go out and
find a veteran player, and wouldn't be surprising, in addition

(02:07:31):
to dtackle and offensive line and maybe tight end, that
they would address edge in the draft, even though that
player wouldn't immediately be a starter. You don't have to
draft him in the top fifty or top seventy, but
you can find a player can help your team and
play four good years for you out of the draft. Yeah,
that's what the offensive line picks are for immedia starters,

(02:07:53):
those guys maybe, well, they've got to be a spot
for him. Currently, there is one spot where competition even exists,
only one spot, just center, and that's a that's a maybe.
I thought you were gonna say one of the guard spots. No,
ed Ingram did not sign to be in a competition,
and I don't think Wyatt Tellor signed to be in

(02:08:13):
a competition. Same for Braden Smith. And I don't think
they're drafting a player that pushes Ursery to the bench.
It's really just the center position. And Jake Andrews, if
they think that his health had him playing down last year,
then maybe they think healthier he'll play up a little bit.
He obviously knows the system. They must feel like he

(02:08:34):
can help them more so than he did this past year.
But competition for him, I think is something I would
like to see. Well, then that's going to be interesting.
If they draft a tackle or something of that, like
with a high draft pick, I mean, yeah, the only
thing that might indicate is that they're less tied to
the positions that the players they have are playing. I mean,

(02:08:56):
it'd be great if that player, say, outplayed Trent Brown
and was immediately your swing tackle. It might be even
better if he was on the field for you. If
you've used that particular pick. But remember, you draft a
guy in the first round. If they do, if they
have twenty eight, or if they move around, that player
is essentially under contract for an absolute minimum of seven
years if he's awesome. It's not like he has to
walk right in the door and till these veteran players

(02:09:17):
who've played good football get out of the way. I'm
better than you. I wouldn't be mind if he did.
But it's not a you're not drafting them this year
finally to immediately get on the field and make you better.
I mean, Urseri didn't do that last year either. No,
he was silently, steadily he was better than what they had. Congratulations,
ty Ursie, you are better than Cam Robinson.

Speaker 8 (02:09:39):
Well it did help created the guy that would have
beat him out, clearly. But yeah, no, what you're saying
is true. All right, we will get to the Camp
Scataboo story. I promise you it's actually yeah, sorry, yeah,
it's already old. To begin with, very old news, very
very old news. I don't even know why we're talking
about it.

Speaker 4 (02:09:56):
We'll do that.

Speaker 8 (02:09:56):
Plus we will give away or I'll tell you about
get away some concert tickets that you're gonna want to
have when we come back here on a Monday edition
of the program.

Speaker 4 (02:10:08):
Hey, wex Yeah, do you think this CTE is real? Yep,
Well that would be the difference between you and scam
camp scataby the only difference. So you go out and
get uh, Hey, what's what's your favorite football memory? Ever's
what's your favorite play? Everywhere involved in we'd give the
same answer. Helped my team win a state championship. Broke

(02:10:31):
like fourteen tackles. It was awesome. He was on I
would say that if I was suffering from CTE, because
my memory would be shot. That didn't happen. I didn't
even I did not win a state championship on the
football field. Do you have a podcast called Bring the Juice? No,
he didn't either, but he was on one called Bringing
the Juice. It's an interesting little podcast. Camp scatibo uh

(02:10:55):
second year running back for John Harbaugh in New York,
New Giants head coach. He was pretty excited when he
got a phone call from Johnny h at one o'clock
in the morning. He was looking over film. He thought
that was pretty cool. He's like that man is pretty nice.
I liked this I'm kind of on board with our
new head coach. About two weeks ago, he made an

(02:11:15):
appearance on this podcast. If you glance over some of
the work done by Bringing the Juice, it's about five
thousand subscribers. Nice little following. He's had some other NFL
players on before, Will Hernandez, Bobby O'carake, Quinn yours. They've
all been on the pod before, all within the last

(02:11:36):
six weeks. Quinn's appearance got seventy two views, seventy two
people viewed it on YouTube, Bobby's got sixty two, trending
in the wrong direction, and then Will more recently I
got forty three views. Yikes, even fewer views for some reason.
Camp Scatawow's got four point one thousand, a little over

(02:11:57):
four thousand views. Not a huge nun but a nice
place to maybe get things off and running for your
your podcast, even though there's well over eight hundred videos
that they've made at Bring the Juice, but maybe more
people since this was released almost two weeks ago to
no fanfare. But then when somebody must have come across

(02:12:19):
it and thought, hey man, maybe they should clip this up,
maybe make a little short, maybe fired off on social media,
maybe maybe YouTube short, maybe on x maybe on maybe
on TikTok. See what people think about Cam's conversation about
the topic you just brought up, CTE. He also talked
about the other made up malady that faces people, those

(02:12:40):
that use inhalers for I don't know what reason, because
they have asthma, which is also hm hmm. Let's hear
what they had to say. Let's let's dive in, let's
bring the juice. Do you think CT is a real thing?

Speaker 10 (02:12:50):
No?

Speaker 4 (02:12:52):
More? Oh, definitely. Do you think CTE is real?

Speaker 13 (02:12:56):
No?

Speaker 4 (02:12:58):
The answer giving was Cam Scautabo's answer. Do you think
ct is real?

Speaker 14 (02:13:04):
No?

Speaker 4 (02:13:04):
Was his answer. So from the beginning, it continues, do
you think CT is a real thing? No, that's an excuse.
I think asthma is an excuse too. Yeah. Is that
a hot take? No, that's a good take, valid, Yes,
asthma's face. Is there anything worse than when you're in
fourth grade and someone's huffing and puffing? You're just soft? Yeah?

(02:13:26):
Just literally? Bet there? Do you think's free there? Do
you think asthma is not real?

Speaker 7 (02:13:34):
No?

Speaker 4 (02:13:34):
I think it's a good take. In your soft suffer
from asthma? You're soft? And ct is not real. Do
you think even though he said this and it was
posted on social media YouTube thirteen days ago, he probably
didn't think too much of it for the last thirteen

(02:13:55):
days after he said it, or twelve days, because yesterday
Cam scout both thought, uh oh, people saw this, people
heard this. It's been out there and now people know
about it. Probably need to issue an apology. More than
forty one hundred people saw his apology. By the way,
one point nine million views of this post on x

(02:14:18):
I recently did an interview, had a lapse in judgment
which resulted in me making a tasteless joke about CTE
and asthma. I always prefer the tasteful jokes about those
two things. It was never my intention to downplay the
seriousness of head injuries or asthma. I sincerely apologize to
anyone who was offended or that was offended by my remarks,

(02:14:39):
and I assure you that I'll be more mindful and
respectful going forward. Much love. Three exclamation points. So that
was from at cam Scatibo five correct. Someone quote tweeted that,
oh yeah, who has it? Shared her thoughts? Uh oh
at Becky Scatibo. That's the missus his mom, the one

(02:15:02):
with the good hair, who has the bad hair? I
don't know, but Becky had the good one. Oh, I
get it. There it is dad joke. That's for you.

Speaker 8 (02:15:12):
What's it?

Speaker 4 (02:15:12):
What's it from? I can't I think it was a
Beyonce song.

Speaker 5 (02:15:15):
I don't know, And.

Speaker 4 (02:15:17):
Becky writes, if only people knew how many times Cam
had to quote run and Get Moms in Haler, they'd
realize the sarcasm. You'll never make everyone happy, and you'll
never say all the right things, and people are bound
to spend something sooner or later in the direction. It
was never intended to go.

Speaker 8 (02:15:35):
Well, that's all well and good. But my favorite response
was Barry, you're familiar with his work. Barry was here,
Barry on here on here.

Speaker 4 (02:15:45):
I knew it was something that had been changing from
the extreme original form. Yes, too little, too late on
this one, Cam.

Speaker 8 (02:15:53):
I spent all night crying in my bed, naked, thinking
about your remarks. Then when I woke up to this morning,
I burned all five of your jerseys that I own.
I know a person whose cousin suffers from asthma, and
what you said is unforgivable.

Speaker 4 (02:16:09):
Do better.

Speaker 5 (02:16:12):
I like that.

Speaker 4 (02:16:13):
Probably would have gotten a lot less attention even throw
the floated out there long after the interview if it
was an asthma mentioned only even though it's equally tasteless.
I think the Becky and camer could easily have said,
come on, man, he's not serious. But he could have
been equally as unserious and a joke about CTE. It's

(02:16:35):
just it's very difficult in the NFL to joke about that.

Speaker 8 (02:16:39):
I get what he said and all the reasons people
are offended, and I hate these just condescending what he
said in the grand scheme of things, How much does
it really affect your day to day life, like this
guy says, oh, who freaking cares scatterby?

Speaker 4 (02:16:56):
It's all good man. But then for every one of those,
one of the best public apologies I've seen has all
the aspects of a good apology.

Speaker 8 (02:17:07):
Owning mistakes publicly is part of growth. Those are two
separate ones, like be more sanctimonious if you can. I
don't think it's.

Speaker 4 (02:17:16):
Possible, right, But again, we're referencing people all over the
x platform and the replies which we poke fun out
every day for how ludicrous some people take it to
one extreme or the other. I think most people recognize
this for what it is. I do think if he
is as successful a player this year, the fans in
the visiting stadiums will have signage. They will make note

(02:17:37):
of this. They will hopefully have clever ones. We probably
see a game day sign about this this upcoming year.
Give this guy a mass. I mean, there's all sorts
of things that probably asmatic. I accept your apology. Thank you.
That's from Josh Reynolds. See how easy this is.

Speaker 5 (02:17:54):
It's good.

Speaker 4 (02:17:55):
He was clearly making a sarcastic joke the world has.
It's funny that all this whole conversations about having asthma,
Thus you're soft, and someone says Cam didn't need to apologize.
The whole world has gotten so soft. My favorite was
he joked about CTE. So now the Giants are going
to say this was a fake account, even though they've
been tagging it all year.

Speaker 3 (02:18:16):
Now.

Speaker 4 (02:18:16):
The really unfortunate part is it's so clearly attached to
him because of the way he's played and because of
what happened this season, and on top of that, it's
attached to his quarterback who had multiple concussion issues. And
this was the team who got fined for how they
handled it during the game on the sidelines with their

(02:18:37):
doctors and the non affiliated doctors. The Food Guy says,
you could make it all go away. You could blame
it on CTE. I know that's very very easy. Could
you do me a solid, though, like the Food Guy?
Can I get a bio read on the Food Guy?

(02:18:58):
Hold on.

Speaker 8 (02:19:01):
At missus two four five hub Comma New York Yankees
baseball emoji, New York Jets football emoji, Notre Dame with
a clover and football emoji, and enter with a soccer
ball emoji residing in Florida. Quote difficult takes a day,

(02:19:22):
impossible takes a week, and then it has the inspector.

Speaker 4 (02:19:28):
What's the little thing that you put on a monicle?

Speaker 6 (02:19:30):
Yeah?

Speaker 8 (02:19:31):
Not a real libertarian, thank god. After all the sports,
we get to the politics.

Speaker 4 (02:19:37):
That's one of the most descriptive, detailed, informative bios that
has absolutely no information about why his handle is the
food Guy. Yeah, I don't know. It's at MJ.

Speaker 8 (02:19:51):
Torre's twelve thirty. Alright, congratulations at the food Guy. It's
actually hashtag food guy with a trademark.

Speaker 4 (02:19:58):
Neighborhood of a month away from the draft, which should
overtake everyone's consciousness because we're getting close enough to it
that now a quarterback who wasn't even good in college
and only played one year and was maybe going to
be a first round pick, do you think the Raiders
should take Ty Simpson over Fernando Mendoza is littering our
airwaves now. Please know, there are certain things I like

(02:20:22):
to talk about and other things I'm just never gonna address,
and that's one of them. That's a conversation you're never
gonna hear here on the A team, even in in
case you missed it, even if Josh put it in
as number three, even if he wants us to answer
the question, I will refrain and you'll find out if
he has it. And in case you missed it, next

(02:20:43):
five point thirty, want to mention we do have concert
tickets to give away May twenty third, at the House
of Blues, the Psychedelic Firs will be performing final segment
of the show. We will have tickets to that event,
a pair of tickets to give away, So stay tuned
for that and listen up closely so you'll know what
the answer is to whatever it is. We might add.
First of two exhibition games in Houston for the Astros

(02:21:04):
and the Space Cowboys. You alread knew Tatsui em I
was throwing tonight and we were speculating on when that
might mean he would throw in the future, which would
be his first major league start for the rookie pitcher,
he's not pitching in the major leagues before. He could
be a thousand years old and played professionally in every
other league on Earth. But if he hasn't played in
the major leagues, neither of those items matter. He is

(02:21:27):
a major league rookie this year. I'm sure we'll have
comments about it throughout the season if he pitches well,
and whiners will say he's not a rookie. It's pretty simple.
Either you are or you aren't. None of those other
factors apply. He will have Altuve at second base, Perettis
at third base, Korea at shortstop, and essentially all the
regulars out there to start tonight's game. Joey Lo Perfido

(02:21:50):
the choice to play left field, and no Jeremy Pana.
But as we mentioned, he's obviously here in Houston. He's
been working out with the team again over the course
of the day, and no need to speculate on the
remainder of the Astros rotation. When Joe Spottom met with
the media earlier this afternoon, he addressed.

Speaker 7 (02:22:07):
It couple of roster moves. I used to finished talking
to spenc Aurghetti. He will start this season in triple A,
Christian Javier will start gating three. EMI was start game four,
and Lance pick callis were start getting five hoverss.

Speaker 4 (02:22:24):
You noticed on our during our Steve Sparks interview replay
we had four you at three thirty. I had a
little portion on the right hand side that that said
likely Astros starting rotation. That's exactly what was on there
for you. Christian Javier. The timing of when these guys
each got the ball. He didn't mention his first two
starters because they were already known. Hunter Brown gets the

(02:22:45):
ball Thursday for opening Day. They have a rare seven
to fifteen start Friday evening, and that will be Mike
Burrow's first start in an Astros uniform. Why is this
seven fifteen? Uh? Forget which Apple additional network is also
carrying that? Yeah, because Apple would have been exclusive. Correct,
all right. I'm actually still more.

Speaker 8 (02:23:07):
Curious about EMI's fourth spot in the rotation more than
anything else.

Speaker 4 (02:23:14):
It was more about he's come over. Here's what we're
working on. He's used to pitching every sixth day rather
than every five and as we get him ready for
the season, this is makes the most sense for where
he is. It pretty much goes out the window anyway,
and then you have an All Star break to reassess things. Also,
I don't think they view him as their fourth likeliest
starter to have a good year. Clearly, that's what this says.

(02:23:36):
I think it's more likely he's perceived to. They're just
trying to make sure he's often running as he should be.
The Friday night game is actually an Apple broadcast? Is
it exclusive?

Speaker 5 (02:23:48):
Though?

Speaker 4 (02:23:49):
I believe it is? All right, there you go, It's okay.
It just means schn it's wide open to carry Rockets
basketball on the twenty seventh, which they do even though
when they have multiple games there's an alternate sech and
they have it taken care of either way. All right, Josh,
what else do we have in case you missed it?

Speaker 15 (02:24:06):
Yeah, besides the news of mccullors making the rotation, how
about Travis Kelcey not just JSN hitting a payday today?
Kelsey officially signed his new deal with the Chiefs. Most
people thought it was going to be a one year deal,
and it kind of is, but it's not. Technically it's
a three year deal with incentives. But basically PFF is
reporting that it's really a one year deal for about

(02:24:28):
twelve million with three million in incentives, and if he
does decide to play another season, they'll rework the deal.

Speaker 4 (02:24:33):
At Travis Kelcey signed for one year at one hundred
percent of their cap. Like, if everybody else got cut
and had no dead money on this year's cap and
he got all of it, all three hundred million of it,
he would still probably be the one being asked to
sign a prenup.

Speaker 8 (02:24:50):
Yes, that's by yeah, absolutely, and I can't believe they're
going to pay him twelve million dollars to lead their
team and with five touchdown catches.

Speaker 4 (02:24:59):
Again, yeah, if he should, he should be able to
play at a comparable clip to last year. But the
time is barslow well as it relates to other NFL
tight ends, especially in the AFC, he still was pretty productive.
There's probably five, there's a probably six or seven at
least you'd rather have, but they might be a little
bit earlier in their career. Obviously, brock Bowers and some

(02:25:20):
others in the NFL are going to run circles around
him in terms of how they're used, But at some
point this had to this had to also be reality
for them. You want somebody else to be your bigger target,
You want somebody else to have the twelve hundred yard season,
and they don't have anybody else to do that. As
much as it's nice for him to be able to
remain there and stay there, and I'm sure it'll be
a nice con, I think this is all that he wrote,

(02:25:42):
and Josh explained it very well.

Speaker 8 (02:25:44):
It's really a one year deal for Travis Kels and
then he'll retire. What else do we have, Yeah, we.

Speaker 3 (02:25:50):
Have Hannah McNair with the new title, right.

Speaker 15 (02:25:52):
They announced that she will serve as the vice president
of the Texans Foundation. Was named the chief Community Officer.
She provi ech visionary leadership and plans to align with
the club's community initiatives with broader strategic business priorities.

Speaker 4 (02:26:06):
Way to go, Hannah, Yeah, she was the VP of
the Texans Foundation. Adds the that title someone who used
to work for the Texans. Steve Johnson was also added
in the planning capacity. He actually had football and business
responsibilities between twenty twenty and twenty twenty four. Also worked
with the mcnairs outside of the Texans for the last

(02:26:27):
couple of years. Now back inside, a lot of this
is surrounding, obviously the new facility the Toro District. There
are other initiatives around this city, especially everything that Hannah
has already been doing, but a bigger, better advanced position
along with the one she already helped. You think she
got a raise, I mean, I would she draws a salary.

(02:26:50):
She works for the team. I'm sure that she did.
It's an elevated role. We have increased your credit limit,
I car, and I would assume she does in that
she holds that position. I don't know, like you're the
CEO in Cal's case, the you know, the owner of
the team? Is your family? Are you signing? Is your
name at the top of the check and at the

(02:27:12):
bottom of the chill? He has to ask jas Well,
I mean, I would assume it's been a while since
her signatures appeared on any checks. That's why other people
are running the company. Don't sell her short and does
the team president sign the checks. I've never drawn a
check from the Texans, so I really don't know the answer,

(02:27:32):
nor have I, and I don't. I think it's safe
to say I never will. Carly's husband also will be
available to the media tomorrow when we get the show started.
What about her? Don't believe the wife of Wyatt Teller
new Texans guard will be on the zoom call. Then
the PR team has made a boo boo. She needs
to be a thing. If he's already gone back, I'm

(02:27:54):
sure he's left town. Like they came in and did
the signing, and she was obviously with him. Omar, you know,
I love you. I need this. Most of these guys,
especially like Logan Hall, could not have been more comfortable,
relaxed and reclining for his zoom and read blanket. Ship
was obviously back at his house and whatever exciting White's
office he probably uses for his podcast, and she was
clearly in a hotel psyched about going to the rodeo. Right,

(02:28:19):
So I would assume if he's Ella Langley, if he's
back at the house, she will. I mean, they live together,
they got a family, She'll be there. You know how
I donned my Ella's Fella's shirt last week. I made
no mention of it.

Speaker 8 (02:28:30):
Did you see who else did that as a team
on their charter the I don't know most of the
Dallas Stars, all right, they're Ella's fellas too.

Speaker 4 (02:28:40):
Are you a Stars fan?

Speaker 5 (02:28:41):
Now?

Speaker 14 (02:28:42):
No?

Speaker 5 (02:28:42):
Good?

Speaker 4 (02:28:43):
Good job.

Speaker 8 (02:28:43):
I was offered a jersey sweater for my son. Should
I take it? As Stars jersey?

Speaker 4 (02:28:49):
Pretty nice? I'd rather have an Arrows one. They have
existed before. I got one in my closet right now.
I was in charge of merchant after all. I think
I can maybe get myself a deal. Do you think
you could find me another XL I might be able
to do that. We will get you those tickets we
mentioned to the Psychedelic Furs and we used ready for Rockets, Basketball, Rockets,

(02:29:12):
and bulls. Tonight here on Sports Talk seven ninety get
to something very intriguing in just a moment. But first
we have to make good on what we promise. Promise
to hook up our listeners. We got concert tickets. We've
got a lot of great people inside this family over
at iHeartRadio. We got tickets because of it. Psychedelic Firs.

(02:29:32):
They're playing the House of Blues May twenty third, exactly
two months from today, May twenty third, House of Blues
Psychedelic Furs. We got a pair of tickets to go
see them. You can also get tickets via ticketmaster dot com.
They are on sale now should you not win them here,
But because you've been listening to the show, we'd love
to hook you up. Because you've been listening to the show,
we know you know the answer to this very simple question.

(02:29:54):
And you can call in and win at seven one
three two one two five seven nine if you know
the answer to this question. All right, So we were
talking about cam Scataboo earlier and he was talking about
how uh he well, he was apologizing for something he
had said on a podcast a couple of weeks ago,
basically saying that CTE wasn't real, that it was an
excuse is how he put it. And there was one

(02:30:16):
other medical condition that he referenced in his comments that
he has since apologized for. What was that medical condition?
Seven ninety seven one three two seven ninety Yeah, just breathe,
Why do you have to do that every time? Why?

Speaker 7 (02:30:38):
What did I do?

Speaker 4 (02:30:39):
He gave away a ridiculously detailed hint. So the condition
he was talking about was death, and he was making
a joke about it by saying just breathe, and then
you doubled down on it by trying to act like
you're innocent. You do this every time. I mean, I
didn't do anything you did. I don't think so. Was
your mic on? Were you speaking the red lights on?

Speaker 8 (02:31:00):
Oh my gosh, you are the worst. Okay, good luck everyone,
now that he's given you the answer. Here's the deal.
You are very well aware of Ken Griffy Junior's place
in the game of baseball, one of the sweetest swings ever.

Speaker 4 (02:31:16):
Yep, he and Randy Johnson, two of the all time
greatest left handed Mariner photographers. Glad you brought that up.
Isn't that crazy? Like where you at? Echiro? Where's your
eye for the lens? I mean he batted left handed,
but he threw right hand and doesn't take pictures of anyone?

(02:31:36):
Did you see what they're doing?

Speaker 13 (02:31:37):
So?

Speaker 4 (02:31:38):
The Masters is upon us right, we're less than a
month away. Obviously the Texas Children's Houston open usually right
before it, as it is this year. Ting off first
round is Thursday, some events today, tomorrow and Wednesday. So
not just anyone, not just any entity.

Speaker 8 (02:31:53):
The Masters themselves, and this is according to front Off
of Sports has released a trailer which I can't obviously
play for you right now because well it's it's I mean,
it is a video, but we don't have that ability
at this exact moment.

Speaker 4 (02:32:07):
But it's a trailer for a feature on Junior, who
shot Rory McElroy's win last year at Augusta as a
credentialed photographer. It's called Photographer Number twenty four and it's
a documentary that's gonna profit premiere April fifth on NBC.

(02:32:28):
I totally want to watch this. I'm sure it'll be awesome.
If you were paying attention, I know most of you were.
The first couple weeks of May, he was spending time
in the photographer as well at the World Baseball Classic.

Speaker 8 (02:32:40):
I mean, it's not like there's guys that will do
something after their playing careers and you're like, oh, that's
cool because they were this role player here or that play.
There's not a lot of like guys that have been
as prominent an athlete in their sport made the amount
of money they did because if they were one of
the best of the best all time and then they

(02:33:02):
go on to do something like this, and he's not
like it's not he's not halfway anything about it.

Speaker 4 (02:33:07):
This is the real deal he is. He looks like
he's got the lenses of any of these guys you
see on the sidelines at an NBA game or an
NFL game, Like this is legit. He is all about it.

Speaker 8 (02:33:19):
I don't know if he did he go straight from
high school to the majors basically, Okay, so he never
went to school and did photography or which you can do. Obviously,
that's incredible. I mean he's and he's good. It's I mean,
not that he wouldn't be, give me credentialed.

Speaker 4 (02:33:36):
You got to have some sort of talent, but like,
it's just fascinating me that Ken Griffy Junior is this
major sports photographer. Now, yeah, people in the in the
sports industry, publishers, content producers, website, same thing as us here,
Like we'll go looking for photos and every once in
a while the photo you're looking for is his, by his,

(02:33:57):
And the thing is, who better just specifically shoot baseball
photo you're looking for, right, Yeah, you better have your
you better have your your permissions. Who better?

Speaker 8 (02:34:07):
Though, just for the sake of talking about Baseball because
you mentioned the World Baseball Classic.

Speaker 4 (02:34:12):
I would love to see his disc after his memory card.
Yeah that after an Astros game that he shot at
Dyke And Park. It'd be awesome, and I obviously want
to talk to him about it.

Speaker 8 (02:34:26):
If I promise not I have talked about anything baseball related, right,
Can we just talk about like photography. I just I
guess I'm more into this because I feel like in
another life I would have liked to have done that job.

Speaker 1 (02:34:38):
I love.

Speaker 8 (02:34:40):
I love like there's guys like Logan over at Toyota Center, Eric,
some of these guys that have taken the Bill Baptiste is.
That's my boy from way back, some of the most
iconic Rockets Championship era photos.

Speaker 4 (02:34:55):
I guarantee you he took them. Well, Logan, you bring
him up and then just because it happened the moment
he's Kevin Durant's coming back down court after the game winner,
He's got that perfect shot and Men Thompson's being encircled
by teammates. I just posted that one on Instain. I
did the very same thing he does. Amazing work. Works
a lot a lot of Rockets games, nearly all of

(02:35:16):
the home looks to catwalk, but he also works around
the NBA. They send him in a bunch of different places.
We luckily know a lot of the photographers here that
work Houston. You know some of the other ones you mentioned.
Just find the events around Houston high school baseball, football,
you know, events over at Constellation Field, TDCU, you name it,
they're going to be there. Karen Warren, longtime Astros photographer
with the Chronicle. Treek Komer who does all the almost

(02:35:40):
all of the Texans work, and even the team photogs
for each of the respective teams. Those that still employ
one in that role have been phenomenal. I feel bad
like the Texans just lost their team photographer. He's going
to Carolina. Zach was insanely talented, wasn't Uh Oh, never mind,
I'm thinking of a different story.

Speaker 8 (02:36:00):
Somebody in Carolina on their PR squad had a foot
like a little little little hiccup.

Speaker 4 (02:36:06):
They got in trouble for it. But it wasn't anybody
from the Texans, I would imagine. Not again, I don't
think it even started yet.

Speaker 8 (02:36:11):
There no, no, somebody left the Texans to go to Carolina.
Was it not the Panthers that they went? He went
to or was it you know what I'm talking about.

Speaker 4 (02:36:20):
They lost a PR person to the Titans. He went
to Nashville, That's who it was. What was his name ever?

Speaker 5 (02:36:26):
Ever, that's right.

Speaker 4 (02:36:27):
I remember that. That was before last season.

Speaker 3 (02:36:29):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (02:36:30):
Now he's working with a whole new coaching status. He
is well. Speaking of that, there was a Pro Days.
This is a huge week for Pro Days. Texas is
later this week. BC was today, so some of the
Patriots beat writers on X were posting pictures of Rabel
and Bill O'Brien chopping it up on the practice field
over at BC. Tons of NFL talent coming out of BC,

(02:36:52):
tons of personality in that conversation. It's kind of a
big year where out hate each other. One of them's
trying to repeat AFC champions and the other one is
trying to convince BC to continue keeping him on staff
as head coach. Hey keep paying me money for being
a coach. They just need to be They were bad,

(02:37:12):
they were very bad, and it's a tough time in
college football with nil and everything that goes with it.
But if they don't win more, he won't be there.
We'll get you into Rockets basketball launch pat His next
obviously countdown follows I'll have that for you, and then
the call of the game tonight with Mt. Rockets Bulls
trying to win a third straight game right here on
Sports Talk seven to ninety. Looking forward to that as

(02:37:34):
I was off the call for the last couple of games,
so ready to get back into it.

Speaker 5 (02:37:38):
Did.

Speaker 4 (02:37:38):
The Astros obviously have their game this evening and tomorrow
to get ready for the season off day Wednesday, and
then Hunter Brown gets the ball on Thursday. Full coverage
on site at Dyke and Park from US beginning at
ten am on Thursday. So very fired up for that
as well. Happy to be with you man. We finished
just like we started with a bang. What an open
to the show today, What a close right now? I

(02:38:00):
had a great time, how about you guys? The A. T.

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