Aaron Torres & Jason Martin React to Haliburton's Game Winner, Talk Rodgers to Pittsburgh & More!

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Welcome in everybody, Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday, Aaron Torres,
Jason Martin is back. We're broadcasting live from the Fox
Sports Radio studios. Hope everybody's having a great Saturday. First
of all, j mart it's good to have you back.
For everyone who is not with us last week, Olden

(00:24):
Polonies was in. Actually no no disrespect to you, j Mart,
but had a lot of fun with Olden. We obviously
were coming on fresh off of the Eastern Conference Finals
clinching win for the Indiana Pacers. We actually, ironically, maybe
not ironically, talked a lot about Tom Thibodau, maybe more
than I was expecting, But we had fun. We missed you.
I listened to you on the car ride home. How

(00:46):
were you, How was your overnight shift filling in for
Bernie Fratto? And how is life for Jason Martin?

Speaker 3 (00:51):
Overall? Everything's good man. Yeah, I mean that's a late
night man, especially not being on the West coast doing
that four hours. I used to do that, and it
was good to give Bernie the week off. And I
was thinking about earlier. I was like, who was I
hosted with last week? Because I was going back through
trying to think about takes and all this random stuff,
and then it hit me, Oh yeah, nobody, it was

(01:11):
just me for four hours. So it is good to
be back kind of home, back where I'm used to.
I apologize for not being a former NBA or though well,
I was only able to catch the tail end of
the show with Polnies, and I was just like, yeah, man,
this is this is exactly what you would want right now,
is to have somebody that understands the league the way

(01:31):
that he does be able to comment on something as
big as what had happened that night. So it sets
it set everything up really really well. So it's good
to be back. But it was it was It was fine, Aaron,
it was fine. Four hours of solo radio is something
I've done a lot of in my career. It's not
something I would advise very many people to do.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Well, you did great from what I heard, and it
is great to have you back. It was a pleasure
to work with Olden Polinies, and he did have a
lot of great stuff to say about a lot of
different NBA topics, and we're gonna get to a lot
of different NBA topics, but I guess we should probably
start with what happened Thursday night. Listen have to well,
we probably do. Uh you know, I'll say this. I

(02:15):
don't think we're gonna spend a ton of time breaking
it down as much as you know over the next
three hours, looking ahead and talking about some of the
ancillary stories around game one, including the TV ratings and
things of that nature. We're forty eight hours removed nearly
at this point. But if you've somehow been living under
a rock over the last forty eight hours, Mary Mack,

(02:36):
I think we have the sound. This is how it
ended Thursday.

Speaker 4 (02:40):
Night, Rebound Indiana. Eight seconds to go. The Pacers are
not gonna call the time out. Paddleburton has it with
three driving, with two pulling.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Up ahead, heading with three tenths of a second to go?

Speaker 4 (02:55):
How many more times can this team do that?

Speaker 2 (03:01):
So weeds Baby that call via Pacers Radio network much
better than the ESPN co Yes, we might.

Speaker 3 (03:13):
Have to talk. You have to say it because you
knew exactly what it was.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
I canna say we got three hours. We might have
to talk about ESPN's coverage or lack thereof, or whatever
we're calling, what they're doing these days with their NBA product.
But let's focus on the court for now. Tyrese Halliburton
another dagger. Pacers were trailing by as much as fifteen
points in the fourth quarter, another rally. I'll go through

(03:37):
some of them in a minute of everything they've done
in these playoffs. I know what your reaction is. I
think everybody knows. But j mart is a thunderfan, so
the floor is yours, my friend.

Speaker 3 (03:45):
Look, manim is tough, and it's just the Pacers have
become one of those teams where if it's not over,
you'd better still be in the seats, or you'd better
still be watching the television screen because Rick Carlis was
not gonna let them quit. And really, just those guys
Siachham doesn't quit. Halliburton clearly does not quit. That's a
team that is just going to continue to fight you

(04:08):
until there's nothing left. And the Thunder got a little
tight down the stretch, and they just it was it
didn't feel quite as good. Early in the game. They
seem to be rolling. Third quarter, seemed to be rolling.
But there in the fourth when it got tight, when
it got down to single digits, you just started having
the same flashbacks. It's like, don't leave it in the

(04:28):
hands of the pacers at the end of this thing,
and after the miss on the other end, it was
set up perfectly, and Halliburton's gonna it just seems like
Haliburton's that dude, Like Halliburton is that guy that can't
have the ball in his hands at the end if
you want to win, and I mean for the other team,
Like he's just he's becoming so clutch in these moments.
I heard him compare it, and this was like another

(04:49):
part of this horrible dialogue.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
About whether or not he's a superstar.

Speaker 3 (04:52):
I don't even want to read. I want to try
to let it go. But the way that he was
being described to try and stop from calling of a superstar,
it was to say he was Robert Ori and I'm like,
can you stop, can you please stop? Someone said that, Yeah,
someone that makes a lot of most money in the
history of sports media.

Speaker 2 (05:10):
Oh my goodness, that was his way, you know, and
rich I can't believe in nob kidding.

Speaker 3 (05:16):
I know, yeah, yeah, exactly. I was just kind of like, looke, Yes,
if you want to talk about big shot makers, I
understand the comparison to or, but if you're saying, I
mean was right. But the question that was asked on
the television program was was Robert Orrie a superstar? And
I was just like, man, I hate everything about this.
I hate all the things that you choose to be like.

(05:37):
It's just so frustrating. He is a clutch dude, he is,
and because he's a pass first guard, he can't be
a superstar for some reason. All I know is he
is lethal, He is clutch, and he is cold blooded.
And he absolutely as soon as the ball left his hands,
you knew it was in. You just knew it was in.
I mean, And this one didn't require the bounce that

(05:58):
was heard around the world like Game one against the Knicks,
but same result on the road. Pacers snag won that
they should not have won, and you know now it's
up to the Thunder to answer the call in game two.

Speaker 2 (06:11):
Well, i'll tell you what about ten minutes from now,
we'll get into some of the comments about Haliburton, the
discourse and why I think it all plays pretty clearly
into a disappointing TV rating. That'll be about ten minutes
from now. But I'll say this for how you know
these playoffs go on so long that sometimes you lose perspective,
and you know, you see all these narratives, but oh
the Pacers come, and then it's like you actually go back.

(06:33):
April twenty ninth round was April first of all. April
twenty ninth, I think was during the NFL Draft. That's
how long ago.

Speaker 3 (06:38):
This was.

Speaker 2 (06:39):
Indiana Trail Milwaukee one eighteen one eleven thirty four seconds
left in overtime, Haliburton bucket, one point four seconds remaining.
Pacers win. May sixth, Indiana Trail Cleveland won nineteen one
twelve forty eight seconds left. They win one twenty one
to nineteen Haliburton game winner with one point one seconds
to play. As you mentioned, May twenty, first Game one

(07:02):
Eastern Conference Finals, Indiana Trail New York in that game
by nine with fifty one seconds left. Halliburton the shot
high off the off the rim, goes into force overtime
and wins. So basically fourth either game tying or game
winning shot with under two seconds left to go in

(07:25):
these playoffs, I don't even know, you know, like the
Superstar non superstar conversation is so dumb and I don't
want to get into like the he's more clutch than
this guy or that guy or that guy was never
as clutch as this. But it's like it is kind
of insane, like some of the all time great players
have not had moments like this over the totality of

(07:48):
their careers. He has four of them in one playoff run,
and you know, it's I think it's probably a little
early to start talking about all time playoff but I mean, listen,
four game winners, they're the four seed in the East.
Nobody had them here. We're continuing to try to figure
out ways to talk about this team because nobody expected
them to be here. This is an incredible run and

(08:11):
I think it would obviously go down as one of
the all time great runs if Indiana can close out
three of the next six.

Speaker 3 (08:17):
No question about it. And you know I said this
last week and I may have even said it a
couple of weeks ago as well, but Rick Carlisle was
just super underrated. Yeah, really really good coach that no
one was really talking about. And all we know is,
I mean, look for all of the pub that the
Knicks got a year or during this postseason run and

(08:38):
during this year, after the moves that they made and
all this I mean, they played the Pacers last year
and that thing was an absolute dogfight in the playoffs,
and then they match up again and you see how
the result goes. The Pacers have to go down as
one of the most underappreciated, disrespected teams we've seen in
a very long time, because the more that you watched them,

(08:59):
the more you realize they're really good. And we should
have known this, right, like everyone should have known looking
at their roster, looking at their depth, looking at the
way Carlisle game plans and schemes, and just they got
what you want. They've got Halliburton, who doesn't need to
go to score forty to just terrify you and have
to game plan against. Then you've got Siakam who on

(09:19):
any given night can give you forty. You've got guys
that can make threes, but they aren't content to always
have to make threes. They play good defense, they hustle
for everything. They got what you want, man, and like
everyone slept on them, completely slept on them. And now
you're seeing and this was what I this is what
worried me going into the finals, is it just looks

(09:42):
like this thing doesn't even need to be played based
on how it was talked about. It's just like with
a thunder and five, maybe thunder and four, how much
thunder in three? And I said, I said thunder in
five And it may still be that, but I said,
I hesitated to do it because I've seen what Indiana
has done and like you, you count them out at
your own peril, And that's what happened. Like, if you

(10:05):
do not play them down to the last second, you're
probably going to lose against this team. I anticipate that
the thunder are gonna blow them out in game two,
but I also thought the Knicks were probably gonna do
that in game two, and that's exactly the opposite of
what happened.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
Yeah, it's funny. I think we see this in sports sometimes,
but I in watching and you know, I think that
at this point we just have to acknowledge you're just
better than anyone realized. And I think most I think
most people with the brain probably realized this. I realized
that at this point now. But it was kind of
wild to watch, just a conversation in the lead up

(10:42):
to the finals. And I'm not even gonna blame anybody
for it, because I think it was pretty That was
pretty much a universal sentiment is thunder and four, thunder
and five, maybe thunder and six. I didn't really hear
anybody make the argument for like Pacers winning this series,
and if it, I don't think I heard anybody legitimately, like,

(11:03):
not sarcastically, not ironically pick the Pacers.

Speaker 3 (11:06):
Well, they were calling it a generational mismatch. I heard
that term from multiple people this week. This is a
generational miss uh mismatch. And I'm like, look, the Thunder
have never been here before. This group has a bunch
of guys that have never been in the NBA Finals before.
You can talk about the talent discrepancy between the two

(11:26):
and the Pacers haven't seen a defense like Oklahoma City
and all this. But when you get punched in the
mouth and you're not used to being punched in the
mouth and you have all the pressure on you in
the finals, that can be That's that's when things change.
That's when things equalize a lot. So, I mean, I'm
not surprised to find out that old and Polynese. At
the end of last week's show, right before I came off,

(11:48):
he he said the Pacers are going to win Game one,
and he was exactly right, and he wasn't. He didn't
look like he was right with four minutes left in
that game. But it didn't matter because when it was over,
the pers indeed had won Game one, and it's gonna
be a dogfight from here on out. That first game
against the Knicks completely changed that series. We're gonna have

(12:08):
to see how this one plays out. But yeah, I
just I didn't quite understand why everybody was so high
that there was no chance in the world for Indiana
in this series. It's just like, have you not been
watching the NBA over the last month and a half,
because as a Thunder fan, and I'm very confident in
those guys and I love them to death, but man,

(12:29):
this was the one team I did not really want
to see them match up against after watching their act
during the postseason.

Speaker 2 (12:34):
Yeah, I just don't know how you could say it's
a generational mismatch when we're talking about the team that
knocked out a one seed obviously in these playoffs and
then also just won the Eastern Conference Finals in a
series where they didn't have home court advantage, Like, it's
just it's not like they were a three seed playing
the eight seed in the in the Eastern Conference Finals.

(12:55):
It was like they beat two of the three best
teams in the in the league throughout the season, and
so yeah, I just I really, frankly did not get
that discourse. And I'm not gonna sit here and lie
and say that I thought that they were gonna necessarily
win the series. But I thought that it felt very
weird to me the way that people were just kind

(13:16):
of dismissing this notion that you know, that they could
win the series or that they would win the series,
and here we go Game one, Indiana Pacers win Game
two on Sunday night. But I think we certainly have
a series jmart Fox Sports Radio Air towards Jason Martin,
broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. We'll come back,
j Mart. We'll have the conversation that everybody's having. As expected,

(13:42):
ratings not so good. But I think it's a fair
conversation to have, because you know, now it's like, oh,
I don't care about the rating, Well guess what people do.
We're gonna talk about the ratings, why they're so bad,
and why I think there is one very specific person
to blame. That's next. Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 5 (14:03):
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Speaker 2 (14:15):
Welcome back everybody. Fox Sports Radio ertors Jason Martin broadcasting
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(14:36):
Tune into Countdown presented by BETMGM every Saturday and Sunday
morning right here on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app. Alright.
Game one NBA Finals in the books. As you've probably
heard by now, Indiana Pacers win essentially at the buzzer.
Tyres Haliburton shot with point three seconds left seals the victory.

(14:56):
Game two is on Sunday night, but jaymart On uh
on Friday, we got the piece of news that everybody
was expecting. But it's still hit on Friday, and it
is worth discussing here. And NBA Finals that everybody anticipated
before it even happened, would be one of the lowest

(15:17):
rated we've ever seen. Well so far, the prognostications are
very much on point eight point nine to one viewers
on ABC for Game one million. What did I say billion?

Speaker 3 (15:29):
No, you just said nine. Okay, it's like that might
be a little low.

Speaker 2 (15:36):
Not by much though. Eight point nine one million viewers,
yes million with an M. Not not close to nine total,
but yes, eight point nine to one million viewers at
aby MO.

Speaker 3 (15:46):
More people watch than our justices on the Supreme Court.

Speaker 2 (15:49):
I guess so, yeah, I was the point nine to
one person. Okay, Well, all right, Well if it is
eight point nine one million and not just eight point nine,
what if it's eight point nine one million? It is
the lowest rated Game one NBA of the NBA Finals
since Nilsen began tracking ratings in nineteen eighty eight. That
does exclude the twenty twenty and twenty twenty one NBA

(16:11):
Finals that were you know, one was in a bubble,
the other one was kind of on a weird schedule.
But j Mart, the NBA Finals are as little watched
as people were anticipating. I have a take on who
is to blame and how we got here, And it's
not just because we have small markets. But I'll go
ahead and give you the floor first.

Speaker 3 (16:31):
I think I know where you're gonna go with that,
but I'll wait for you to say it.

Speaker 2 (16:34):
I mean, I can just do it right now.

Speaker 3 (16:35):
You want to do it, well, I'll say one thing quickly,
and that is yes. And I mean I have Martin
Medina on last week, and you know, he said kind
of the same thing. He was just kind of like, yeah,
I know it's gonna be discourse about how no, you
know the ratings are going to be down, and we
all knew they were going to be down, and yes,
small markets has something to do with it. If you
had the Knicks against the Thunder, we would have had

(16:57):
a completely different argument here. And it's not just because
it the Pacers. It's because one of the teams is
not playing in a big market. But at the very least,
if you would have had Nixon OKC, you would have
had Knicks against the reigning MVP and the consensus best
team in the league you know, pretty much all year round.
But I mean, it's not there's not much to analyze

(17:19):
because it's exactly what people expected. You were hoping that
the series was going to be good. On the floor.
But you knew that from a ratings perspective, this was
not going to be La New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Boston, Houston,
you know, anything crazy like that. So now you you
say what you were going to say, because again I

(17:39):
think I know where you're headed here.

Speaker 2 (17:41):
Yeah, I mean I think the people to blame are
Adam silver Yep and the media stakeholders. And you know
you referenced the highest paid person in media not knowing
how to break down Tyrese haliburtn other than to call
him a modern day Robert or And I think that
is a reflection of how we got here is you know,
we mentioned a few times Olden Polinie was in last week,

(18:03):
and you know he brought up a point that I
think I knew. I mean, I definitely knew, but you know,
hadn't necessarily put together. But this is not the byproduct
of Tyrese Haliburt and not being a superstar. He's a superstar.
It's not a byproduct of Shae Gildas Alexander not being
a superstar. I don't even think it's a byproduct of
two small market teams because we have seen in previous

(18:23):
years the Cleveland Cavaliers rate really well, you know, other
teams from other smaller markets. This is a byproduct of
the NBA choosing year over year over year to stuff
Lebron James down our throat, to stuff the Lakers down

(18:43):
our throat. Even when Lebron wasn't on the Lakers and
they weren't good, they were stuffed down our throat. And
I understand to be clear that you of course have
to feature certain teams and certain players, because you do
have to give the audience what they want. But I'll
go back to something Jason that we talked about about
five months ago. Now I went back and looked it
up this morning because I remembered it, but I wanted

(19:05):
to make sure I was correct. Saturday, January twenty fifth.
What was that day, Well, it was the first Saturday
without any football since August of the previous year. So,
in other words, we got a full slate of college football,
you know, September, October, November, December. Then we obviously got
the college Football Playoff. We got the NFL Playoffs, which

(19:27):
had back to back Saturdays. On opening of the opening
two weekends of the playoffs, Saturday, December twenty fifth, first
weekend first Saturday without any NFL football or any football
in six months, they put Lakers Warriors on their prime
time game. And I'm not saying that they're wrong. I'm

(19:47):
not saying they shouldn't have. But what I am saying
is when you continue, at forty years old to put
all of the eggs in the Lebron James basket, you continue, Listen,
Steph is still a great player. Lebron's a great player too.
This is not a criticism of Lebron necessarily, but Steph's
thirty seven years old. I mean, we're not talking about

(20:08):
Steph at thirty one. We're talking about thirty seven years old.
And so I just sit there and say, when you've
tried to force feed us bad teams and aging players,
when we have so many dynamic, interesting young stars and storylines,
this is what you get. This is the byproduct, and
this is how you end up with the lowest rated

(20:30):
game whatever. Because you decided not to talk about Tyrese
Haliburton until the Eastern Conference finals, and even then you
just told us he wasn't a superstar. That's how we
got here, and that's who's the play.

Speaker 3 (20:39):
Yep. Look, that's exactly where I thought you were going,
and you're one hundred percent right. It is the league's
job to market its teams. It is the league's job
to make it superstars. Yes, they have to back it
up on the floor. It's not for pro wrestling. You
can't pick and choose. But when you see somebody getting
some traction, when you see somebody starting to show out,
you start to showcase them. And I saw this week,

(21:01):
I think it was Alan Hahn said on TV that
Lebron James is still the face of the NBA. And
at first I was upset by the comment, and then
I thought, no, he's a right. You know why, because
Adam Silver won't allow it any other way. Lebron James
is still the face of the NBA. And that's a
huge indictment on the NBA. And to your point, and
agreeing with you, that's no slight on Lebron james ability,

(21:24):
even in twenty twenty five. It's that he should not
be that anymore. Like this should be sort of his
you know, his retirement years. And I don't mean him
like fully retiring, but this is like at this point
now he should just kind of be enjoying this. It
shouldn't be on his shoulders. There should be other guys,
and I think there are a ton of hungry young

(21:45):
players in that league that are really good that have
not been given a chance to show what they can do.
I mean, think about like Bnkaro in Orlando, and they're
getting really good all of a sudden, but nobody is.
Nobody know this because they're not being pitched. Sacramento a
couple of years ago became one of the best stories
in the NBA, but it wasn't being talked about enough

(22:07):
because it wasn't in a big market, it wasn't the Lakers,
and it wasn't Golden State. And that's kind of the
way that it's been. Kevin Durant should not be getting
a lot of the press anymore. He really shouldn't be,
but he still is because he's a made guy. This
is how you destroy yourself, because if you don't plan
for the future, then the league can never outlive you.

(22:31):
Like you don't just set up a league so that
it's still there when you die. You set up a
league so that it is flourishing and hopefully better after
the fact when you've moved on and they have stagnated
because they've just stayed in the same lane for so long,
and they've let player after player after player. They bet
on one guy and they got it wrong, and that

(22:52):
was Zion Williamson. Outside of that, it has been the
exact same guys for a decade now and with no
slight on them. Steph is as as most must watch
as you can find. But the problem is, I think
you need to use a Steph Curry, and use a
Lebron James, and use even a Kevin Durant or whoever

(23:13):
it is that you want to include this conversation giannas Ainsetkumpo,
whoever it is. You want to use them to create
new stars, and that means that when the Lakers play
against the Magic, you pub the heck out of Pailo Bankero.
When you've got them against Oklahoma City, if you still
want to feature the Lakers because you know they're a

(23:34):
ratings grapper, then really make it seem like the thunder
Matter because they can become stars on the floor against
your existing stars. They're good enough on the floor to
do that if you don't decap them all the way
in the run up to do it. And then they
get to the finals and they pitch this kind of
a rating and it's told you they weren't stars. Now

(23:56):
that's on you. That's not on them, that's on you.
Like I'll tell you one thing about the Pacers and Halliburton,
particularly Halliburton has a tremendous personality, tremendous. WWE has figured
that out because they continue to use him. He has
done research and the homework, he knows the storylines, he
can cut a promo. He's got, you know, that kind

(24:17):
of geeky side and all that. But that's a dude
that has personality. That's a dude that has some charisma
about him. There's other guys. They have natural charisma about them,
but they have to actually be given an opportunity with
the camera in their face, as opposed to in the
face of Lebron James trying to tell us whether or
not he's going to pick up his player option or not.

Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, it was funny about two three weeks ago, and
we can wrap on this get to disagra in a minute,
but I remember something happened. It must have been right
around the time that the Lakers got eliminated, and it
really struck me. I think, you know, I was just
watching all these games and I'm like, dude, Shay's awesome,
and Jalen Williams is awesome, and Tyreese Alliburton's awesome, and
Jalen Brunson even though I know they just lost in

(24:56):
the previous series, but Jalen Brunson's awesome. And it's like,
there's so many good young stars and I'll blame Adam Silver,
but I'll also say, like leb at this point, it's
crazy as weird as it sounds, I think Lebron would
actually be doing the league a favor by retiring, because
I just feel like he's kind of this black cloud
that hangs over the league. You and I have talked

(25:18):
about it. I don't believe that the Lakers are really
a contender. I don't believe that they're a player or
two away. But as long as he's in this league,
they're gonna keep talking about him. And it's just, you know,
it's just it just I don't know, it just I
feel like it it.

Speaker 3 (25:34):
The league can't move on. It test leaves.

Speaker 2 (25:36):
Exactly, and it wears down the conversation. And like I said,
there's just so many good, young, interesting players, and it
feels like they're not getting enough spot like Fox Sports Radio.
Aaron Torres, Jason Martin, we are broadcasting live from the
Fox Sports Radio studios, will come back talking about might
be time to just leave black Cloud over the league.
Aaron Rodgers. We'll talk about him next. Yeah, that's yeah,

(26:00):
that's most football fans this week. We'll get to that
next before we do, though, the SEGA. What's going on,
my man? What's trending?

Speaker 6 (26:05):
I feel like the NFL has moved on, and yet
Aaron Rodgers is still with us.

Speaker 7 (26:10):
What's going on?

Speaker 6 (26:11):
NBA Finals Game two is Sunday. By the way, Pacers
and Thunder this postseason entered the finals each at twelve
and four. Okase's regular season record was sixty eight and fourteen,
including a couple wins against Indiana. The Pacers record on
January first was sixteen and eighteen. So here in the
new year, this calendar year, these are the two best

(26:32):
teams that you have in this matchup.

Speaker 2 (26:34):
Who I knew that though?

Speaker 6 (26:36):
Yeah, it's just math. I mean, it's not a debate topic,
it's not an opinion. These are mathematically the two best
teams in the NBA and the calendar year twenty twenty
five two.

Speaker 2 (26:45):
And I don't mean to continue to put a spotlight
on another network. But obviously first take is kind of
the show that whatever. I would love for somebody to
track the first time they did a legitimate segment on
the Pacers these playoffs. I would guess it wasn't until
like now, beat up to the Eastern Conference Finals, exactly.

Speaker 3 (27:02):
That's right.

Speaker 6 (27:02):
How about the season, That's what I mean. They probably
kind of forced to as more teams get elimited.

Speaker 3 (27:08):
That's what they may have Actually, you know what, they
probably talked about them when they beat the Calves because
the Cavs being a one seed. But I bet they
framed it in terms of the Cavs being a failure
and not about the Pacers being good.

Speaker 2 (27:18):
And Donovan Mitchell's not a superstar, needs more help trade yeuh.

Speaker 6 (27:23):
Yeah, Pacers since January first, forty seven and eighteen, Oklahoma
City fifty three and fourteen since January first, And yes,
it was under nine million viewers for Game one of
the finals. Last year's Game one Maverick Celtics was about
eleven million viewers. You talk about TV market size in
the NBA, you have twenty eight markets that have teams.

(27:46):
For example, LA has two teams Indianapolis is number twenty
two on the list out of the twenty eight markets.
Oklahoma City is twenty sixth. Only New Orleans and Memphis
are smaller. But the NBA, in a sense already has
it's money because they have the new TV contract that
kicks in starting next year, and that's an eleven year contract.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
Less say, I don't gonna keep interrupting the sagarete, but
this is the most annoying thing to me is every
time somebody does want to have a conversation about the ratings,
it's like, well, look at the TV deal, everything's going great.
It's like, I'm sorry, but when every other sport is
trending up and you're trending down, don't tell me it's
going great. And the only less yes, congrats you got

(28:28):
a lot of money from the TV partners because live
live sports is the only thing that you can sell
advertising for. But stop telling me that. Like, like, has
the conversation become overblown? Maybe, but like the idea that
we can't talk about it because the NBA got a
new TV contract because everybody wants live sporting events just
drives me crazy.

Speaker 6 (28:47):
Yeah, I can't you cannot say out loud that the
low TV ratings are completely insignificant. Exactly, they measure something. Yes,
it's once again, it's math. It's not opinion. You're balls
are on this. And by the way, TV ratings these
days do include out of home viewing at sports bars
and so forth. So we're gonna have these exciting pacers

(29:10):
with Tyrese Haliburton after his game winner in Game one. That's,
by the way, five fifteen plus point comebacks this postseason.

Speaker 7 (29:18):
For Indiana, they're up one game to none.

Speaker 6 (29:20):
Kentucky Derby winner Sovereignty took the Belmont Stakes today, Coco
Goff won the French Open. WNBA wins for Indiana and
Golden State. Speaking of ratings, you know this was a
big CBS game tonight with no NBA tonight. It was
Indiana at Chicago on CBS and no Caitlin Clark still
out with a string quad Angel Rees played Indiana and

(29:41):
Chicago still played.

Speaker 7 (29:43):
So standing by on the ratings.

Speaker 2 (29:44):
Get in price three dollars. Swear to god, I'm not
making that up.

Speaker 3 (29:49):
That's not a joke.

Speaker 2 (29:50):
Now, I looked it up before. We'll be talking about
an hour two to segment. You could come back in
for you could come back in for that one.

Speaker 3 (29:55):
No, you get a lot of Mike, and that one, Steve.

Speaker 6 (29:57):
Indiana seventy nine fifty two was the fun. And we've
got three late games in Major League Baseball. The Angels
are holding on six to five of the over the
Mariners top of the six. Cal Raley with his twenty
fifth homer for the MS. Mets have three solo shots
and lead four to one at Colorado top of the
seventh Rockies. If they lose tonight, we'll be twelve and
fifty two this season. The Orioles have tied up the

(30:18):
A's in Sacramento four to four, bottom of the fifth.
Yankees held on to Boston, held on to beat the
Yankees in New York ten seven. Milwaukee Homard in the
ninth to beat San Diego four to three. San Francisco
Homard in the night to beat the Braves three two.
Atlanta has lost sixth straight. Saint Louis and Pittsburgh with
home wins back to you.

Speaker 2 (30:36):
Thank you very much, Steve dis Seger, appreciate you. Sorry
I kept interrupting, but I was just so fired up
about some of these conversations. It says Fox Sports Radio
air Torres and Jason Martin, broadcasting live from the Fox
Sports Radio studios. Will come back and we'll discuss the
biggest name quarterback to sign this week. I just don't

(30:56):
know that it's gonna matter. Once the game start, we'll
discuss that next.

Speaker 1 (31:03):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (31:07):
Welcome back, everybody. Fox Sports Radio rators, Jason Martin. We
are broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. So
the story came out on Thursday, Game one of the
NBA Finals, j Martin. I remember we were filling in

(31:30):
it for Jason Smith and Mike Carmen in March, maybe
early eight I think it was late March, and it
was during the height of NFL free agency, and we
did a segment kind of mocking our peers in the industry.
It wasn't really intentionally to mock anyone specific, but it
was basically the least impactful moves of the offseason, and

(31:50):
what it really was was the moves that everyone's making
a big deal about but really are going to have
no impact on winning once the season starts. We talked
about Russell Wilson going to the Giants and Sam Darnold
going to the Seahawks, I don't know that I would
quite put Aaron Rodgers going to the Steelers quite in
that category. But forty one going on forty two year

(32:13):
old quarterback, four years removed from a MVP season, going
to a franchise that has not gotten out of Wildcard
weekend since twenty seventeen. Big name, big brand. But and
I don't think this is a unique take. I just
I don't think it's gonna be anything amazing. I think

(32:34):
it's gonna be totally fine, and they'll probably go ten
and seven or nine and eight and be on the
fringes of the wildcard conversation. It's just hard for me
to get excited. I hate to do it. It's just
hard for me to get excited about Aaron Rodgers being
a Pittsburgh Steeler.

Speaker 3 (32:49):
It's certainly interesting, but it is not impactful. Oh exactly.
That's where I am on it. I think it is intriguing,
like it's interesting because it's Aaron Rodgers, but it's not
impactful because it's Aaron Rodgers. In twenty twenty five, you
talk about four years removed from an MVP season, He's
two years removed from anything resembling like noteworthy football of

(33:11):
any kind. Like there was one game where the Jets
showed out and you like sent a ton of text messages,
j etys, that's the Jets, baby.

Speaker 2 (33:21):
It was a Thursday night game. Yeah, yeah, I remember Patriots.
Patriots think it was Toby.

Speaker 3 (33:29):
Work game action. That's the one. So other than that,
there's pretty much nothing else to write home about. There's
almost nothing to talk about here. Uh, he's older. We
haven't seen him play good football in about three years now,
even his last season in Green Bay that wasn't very
good either. Now he's going to Pittsburgh, who just let
George Pickens go on top of everything else that's going on.

(33:52):
And I keep hearing and I keep reading that this
is a team that's ready to compete right now, but
he might not be good enough to get him there.
I'm like, I don't know that they are. I think
they're third in that divisions. That's where I think they're
going to finish. I think Baltimore and Cincinnati are both
going to end up with better records than they are. Tomlin,
you know, notoriously always has a winning record. This is
the year I could see that stopping. And it's not

(34:14):
because I think that Aaron Rodgers is a cancer. It's
just because I think Aaron Rodgers at this point in
his career, we're talking, we're talking Twilight Man like Sunset
era of his career like this is, you know, putting
the lid on Biden at ten am like this. That's
about where we are when it comes to Aaron Rodgers
as a football player until further notice. We understand how

(34:37):
good he has been, but that has absolutely nothing to
do with what he's going to do now. I'm interested
in it because it's going to be fun to see
how it transpires. But I do not think that this
is going to work. I do not think that he's
the quarterback that is going to win for them, and
I don't think that they have enough talent on the
offensive side of the football right now even be considered

(35:01):
as any kind of a contender. So I believe they're
about an eight to nine win team with Aaron Rodgers
at quarterback, and that's if he plays all seventeen games.

Speaker 2 (35:08):
Transparently, I hate topics like this because I feel like
our opinion is literally the exact same. I haven't. It's
almost like we were talking about Okay, see indie, Indie. I
like I didn't hear anybody definitively make the case for
Indian five, Indian six, and who knows what's gonna happen there.
But I just bring I haven't heard anybody make the
argument for like this is gonna go way better, Like

(35:31):
the one thing you're missing about this is this, and
then make the definitive argument on why the Steelers could
be better. And you know, the thing I was just
talking to producer Ian about this during the break is
that the thing with this is like, listen, we all
know the best case we all know the worst case
scenario just a disaster. We all know the likely scenario

(35:52):
nine to eight, ten and seven. But even in a
best case scenario, the reality is you're going to go
You're going to come out of next season with a
forty two year old quarterback who, even if he plays well,
you have a forty two year old quarterback. And you know,
I know this is a very common discourse about the Steelers.

(36:14):
And I get it that Mike Tomlin doesn't want to
bott him out, that the organization doesn't want to bought
him out, but it's like, how many years in a
row are you just gonna go through this cycle of
quarterback year over year over year. And I know they
drafted Kenny Pickett in the first round it didn't work out,
so maybe they're a little hesitant to take a young guy.
But it's like, again, Kenny Pickett didn't work out, Russell
Wilson didn't work out. Even if Aaron Rodgers plays well,

(36:37):
does he have another year after this one? And if
he doesn't, then you're right back in the situation and
he's probably gonna win you just enough games where you're
not in position to get a true difference maker in
the top five, top ten next year. And so that's
what's I think a little frustrating to me about this
is I get, you know, not wanting to bought him out,
and maybe you never will, but you're just saying yourself

(37:00):
up to be in the exact same situation next year
where you're gonna need another quarterback either you draft him,
you side him as a free agent, whatever. And it's
just this never ending cycle that I think the Steelers
need to get themselves out of.

Speaker 3 (37:12):
So we know that Russell Wilson at this stage is
not very good. He's not terrible, but he's not very good. Right,
Like I think we're all agreed on that, and I
mean pretty much everybody listening would be in agreement on that.
Who out there thinks Aaron Rodgers is gonna do better
than Russell Wilson did last year in Pittsburgh exactly? That's
the point, Like the juice is not worth the squeeze

(37:34):
to win ten games and get beat in a wildcar round.
If that's let's say, that's the ceiling of this experiment,
what are you doing here? Like why not just resign
Russell Wilson because you're kicking the same can down the
same road. Like eventually you have to find a long
term answer. At the very least, even if they drafted
a guy we wouldn't have in that spot. At least

(37:54):
the Colts took a swing on Anthony Richardson, Like at
least they went for somebody else because they were they
used to be what the Steelers are right now, they're
going quarterback to quarterback, veteran to veteran to veteran to veteran.
Nobody thinks Aaron Rodgers is playing more than one more year.
I don't think. I don't see any universe where there's
any reason for that to take place whatsoever, Even if

(38:15):
it goes poorly again, I think at that point you
just have to cut your losses and move on to
do whatever else it is that you want to do
in your life. So I just look at this and
it's just like they're gonna be a mediocre football team
with Aaron Rodgers or a mediocre football team without Aaron Rodgers.
They've let him hold them hostage all the way through
up until now he's gonna show up at mini camp
or whatever on June twenty second. I think the date

(38:36):
was are you in a better spot today than you
were two three months ago when you had a lot
more potential options out there. I think the answer is no.
I think they misplayed this. They let Aaron Rodgers be
Aaron Rodgers, and now they're going to get Aaron Rodgers
in twenty twenty five, which to me is a middle
of the road at best quarterback that is not going
to be a difference maker for your franchise.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
Well, and that's the other thing too. The best case,
let's talk best case scenario, real quick. Best case scenario
is he completely exceeds expectations and you you know, again,
what is that eleven wins? Okay, whatever, then you're in
the same scenario next off Seth's right where he's spending
up until maybe not June, but he's spending most of
the offseason. Am I coming? Am I staying? Am I

(39:19):
going to my whatever? And it's just I don't want
to say I don't get why it was done. And
maybe i'd feel a little bit differently if they'd just
done this in March and it was done, but it's
just it does nothing for me. And listen, I speak
for seemingly everybody in sports media when I say third
best team in that division. Maybe they make the wildcard,

(39:40):
or maybe they make the playoffs as a wildcard, but
it's hard to see a ceiling much higher than that.
Fox Sports Radio Aaron Torres Jason Martin broadcasting live from
the Fox Sports Radio studios. We are just getting started
taking the up till two am Eastern. We'll come back
busy week across basketball. Tom Thibodeau out. So why don't
we know who's next? Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (39:59):
Don't listen? Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 2 (40:02):
Welcome in everybody. Hour two Taurres and Martin. Fox Sports Radio.
We are broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. Yes,
we are live midnight Eastern eleventh Central. Hope everybody's having
a great evening, tweeted us. Let us know where you're listening,
how you're listening, Well, where are you at? Aaron Underscore

(40:24):
tours on Twitter as well as J Mart Radio, We
are taking you till two am Eastern. Bernie Fratto of
The Bernie Fratto Show follows us J Mart a lot
of NBA talking Hour one obviously Game one of the
NBA Finals. In the books, do want to switch gears though,
I want to stay in the NBA, but switch gears
to another topic. That's certainly made headlines this week, and

(40:46):
I think what has now become increasingly interesting is not
just the headlines that were made with the initial news
piece of news, but then subsequently what's kind of happened since,
And that's the firing of New York Knicks head coach
Tom Thibodeau. So yeah, I was gonna say, if you
were listening in this time slot last week, it was
something old in Polonies and I actually talked about a

(41:07):
fair amount last week just from the perspective of Olden
obviously played in the league forever, and you know, he
kind of said, he's like, sometimes you know, you kind
of hit a ceiling. Sometimes, you know, a coach, the
voice kind of wears out, you know, you know, the
voice wears out its impact. Tom Thibodeau, of course, after

(41:28):
five years with the New York Knicks, and so just
talking to Olden, I don't think that he necessarily thought
it would be the worst thing for the Knicks to
to kind of go in another direction. And so I
guess I wasn't that surprised when on Tuesday we found
out that Tom Thibodeau was fired. I want to talk

(41:48):
about the firing first, but I also think what's become
increasingly interesting since the firing is that I assumed, and
I would have assumed when I was on with Olden
in this time last week, that if they were going
to move on from Tom Thibodeau, that they would have
a darn good option waiting in the wings. Doesn't really

(42:09):
appear that way. Just kind of seems like that we'll
figure it out after we get rid of Tom Thibodeau.
But Tom Thibdeau officially out of the job of the
New York Knicks, of course, leading them to the Eastern
Conference Finals for the first time since two thousand and
He's bounced a couple days later.

Speaker 3 (42:24):
Yeah, I mean, this just reeks. If somebody had to
take the fall here, somebody had to take the blame.
And I do think there's probably something to the idea
that internally some of the players might have wanted a change.
I don't know who, and I'm not sure from what.
But we know this about Thibideau. We've heard this for

(42:45):
multiple stops in his career. He wears on guys. The
way he practices it's hard, and you know, he can
be kind of gruff. He can be a little bit
of rough around the edges, and so guys eventually kind
of of his act. And so it's a possibility that
that plays into it here, that maybe they want a

(43:06):
fresh face or whatever else. But even though I do
think he was out coached, I mean, Rick Carlisle was
one of the best we've ever seen, so you know,
I don't think that that's a huge slid on him.
I do think he was out coached, But I also
think that Indiana is a better team, and I think
we saw that. I think they have more depth. Yes,
he played his starters too many minutes. I think by

(43:28):
the time they got to that series, they had played
a thousand more minutes than had the five for the Pacers,
so they were gonna wear down. And Brunson, of course
was playing. He seemed to be out there all the time.
But I think the larger issue is who were you
going to replace him with? Like it feels like you
have a succession plan and you have some idea of
where it is that you want to go, and it

(43:49):
just turns out, no, we're just gonna move on from
this guy. And that's very Nicks because you see the
list of names and very few of those names jump
out and say, well, yeah, he's clearly better than Tom
Thibideau in this case, especially considering what Thibodeau was able
to pull off this past season with that group. So yeah,
I don't know. We're gonna have to see, but whoever

(44:11):
walks in there is walking in to replace a guy
that did something for that franchise that we haven't seen
in a very long time.

Speaker 2 (44:17):
Yeah, I think, you know. And that was I think
kind of Olden's point last week, and I certainly don't
want to speak for him, but basically, if you bring
him back, and I think in some ways I agreed
with it in real time, is that if you bring
him back. Basically, the the complaints about the rotations and
the this and the that, like and I vividly, I

(44:38):
vividly remember asking Old in this exact question, is top THIBODEA.
First of all, he's way older than I thought he was.
He's sixty seven years old. And I said to Old,
and I said, if you bring this guy back, like
there's no one that can like get to this guy
and say, like, hey man, maybe instead of playing all
these guys, you know, like like, is there somebody in

(45:00):
the organization that can get to him and say, like,
you don't have to play all of these guys all
of these minutes. And he basically said, you know, can't
teach an old dog new tricks. I mean, it just
it is what it is. I mean, you go through
the playoff minutes, Jalen Bruns had played almost thirty eight
minutes a game. Og Nanobi played thirty nine minutes a game.
Mckel Bridges played thirty nine minutes a game. Josh Hart

(45:22):
played thirty five minutes a game, Karl Anthony Town's played
thirty five minutes a game. And then outside of that,
you know, outside of those five nobody played more than
twenty one minutes a game, and so they were basically
playing seven players in the playoffs, really six because Miles
McBride really didn't get a ton of run as the
series went on, and you know, and that was basically

(45:45):
the argument is, it's going to be the exact same
thing it's been two years, the last two years, where
really your star players run out of gas later in
the playoffs. And it's funny because I don't even know that.
I feel like the Knicks guys ran out of gas.
I just think they quite literally into a better team
regardless of what the you know, the seting going into
these playoffs would would lead you to indicate. So, like

(46:07):
I said, I don't think I was as surprised or
maybe upset. It felt like most of the media discourse
was it's crazy, how could you do this? I don't
know that I felt that way. With that said, though,
I did assume that once that move was made, or
even very likely even before the move was made, that
there was a clear guy waiting in the wings for

(46:31):
that job, and I think everybody had kind of the
same group of guys in mind when the job opened.
Mike Malone is obviously a guy that's available. Jay Wright,
because of his ties to most of that roster, was
a a name that got thrown about. I will readily
admit as a Yukon fan who went through the Dan
Hurley Lakers stuff last year, I thought, could Dan Hurley

(46:52):
be a factor? Well, Dan Hurley, you know, a day later,
basically said I'm not interested in pursuing NBA jobs. When
he was asked about it today, turned it down, and
so I not turn it down, but basically said he
had no interest. And so I just bring it up
because I guess there's now some increasing buzz of like
could Jason Kid want to try to get in the

(47:13):
mix for the job. But it just it doesn't for
a team that's coming off the Eastern Conference Finals run.
Jalen Brunson is twenty nine years old, right in the
peak of his powers. It doesn't seem like there's this
long line of guys that are waiting to get it.
And frankly, there just might not be that a plus
plus candidate that when you fire a guy coming out
of the Eastern Conference Finals you would expect to get Yeah.

Speaker 3 (47:36):
And so why make the move now, Like what are
you accomplishing with it? You're not going to run it back.
But if you get worse, then what have you really
accomplished here? You're either going to go for an assistant
with some with one of these clubs. It's just what
it looks like it might end up being. I mean,
is Jason Kidd a giant like victory over Tom Thibodeau,
I wouldn't necessarily say that. And then you see Taylor Jenkins,

(47:58):
well he was just kicked out of Memphis. Mike Malone
I think is the obvious, like, well, yeah, I mean
he's won a championship in Denver, he's got a pedigree. Obviously,
he knows how to win, he knows how to maximize
his talent. But you know, outside of that, none of
these other names just haveaged. I mean, I saw Darvin
ham was, you know, in that list. I saw Steve

(48:20):
Nash was in that list. It was like, does Lebron
know this, because yeah, I'm gonna have to replace another
podcast host. I figured if he was going to replace
a podcast host, he would have made him a Lakers
coach first and kick JJ Riddick to the curve. Maybe
ESPN could pick him back up since they're gonna drop
their guys. But yeah, like, I don't know. I just
you talk about there not being the A plus candidate,

(48:41):
then I mean, I feel like this move was kind
of made half cocked, like it just was not this
thing was not fully thought out exactly. It was just
it feels like an emotional reaction to getting beat by
a team that you didn't think was better than you,
that was and was able to play their style more
often you talk about him not running out of gas.
The only reason I would disagree is because Rick Carlisle

(49:03):
knows that his team is best off of turnovers and
on the run, like when they can speed you up
from a pace standpoint, turn you over, score back. On
the other side, they're not trying to run the shot
clock down. They are trying to move both on offense
and defense. And I think they ran the Knicks to
death in that series, and the Knicks did run out
of gas. I don't know that it would have changed,

(49:25):
but I do think that it required. I don't think
there's any real coincidence that Mitchell Robinson was super effective
late in that series, because you know that dude had
been injured for a while. He came in. He does
a lot of the blue collar stuff anyway, that's where
he's going to be valuable to you. But he had
a lot fresher legs than anybody else out there, and

(49:45):
he had not been just run down by that pacer
stam And that again is a credit to what Indiana did,
and Thibodeau didn't really have an adjustment to it. But
I think the bigger thing there is I don't know
that the roster was there that he could have made
the adjustment that would have changed it. So I like
Thibodeaux always finds a way to get, you know, to

(50:06):
get the boot, because he does wear on people, he
wears on front offices, he wears on players, but he
also seems to win almost everywhere he goes. Oh yeah,
So I don't know what the Knicks are gonna do
from here, but this doesn't look great for them because
it doesn't seem like that job is quite as sought
after as maybe you would have thought. Like this kind

(50:27):
of feels does it kind of feel Kentucky ish? H
Does it kind of feel like cal leaving? And who's
gonna come? Is gonna be this guy's gonna be? This
Guy's gonna be this guy? And it turns out to
be Pope, Like there's and and Pope did a fine job,
don't get me wrong, but like sometimes you think your
job is better than it is. The Knicks job should
be pretty good. But here's the thing. You go to

(50:49):
work for James Dolan. How good can that possibly be?

Speaker 2 (50:52):
Well, and I'll say this too, is I'm one that
you know I hear all the time. Oh, like if
there's a weird firing, like, oh, why would someone want
to go there after that happen? And it's like, well,
there's only thirty of these jobs, like and whatever. I
do think there is something to that though, And again
I think there's something where Again, if the Knicks have

(51:14):
been back channeling with Mike Malone for weeks and oh
if we lose it before the finals, you're the guy.
That's a lot different than seeing them fire Tom Thibodeau
without a real plan and then them coming to you.
And again I listen, I don't want to speak for
Mike Malone. I certainly don't know them, but like you know,

(51:35):
I think you would probably take the job if he
was offered. But it's like, you know, do you want
to go there? And then do you want to go
to a place that just fired a dude coming off
in Eastern Conference finals. So I think sometimes those conversations
are overrated, but I think that in this case there's
probably something to it. Like listen, eventually they're going to
get a head coach, you know what. It actually sort

(51:56):
of reminds me of j Martin, And it's not totally
apples to apples, because they they made a higher internally,
but it was like the Cowboys when they fired Mike McCarthy,
and it was like, well, they waited, they they screwed
you know, they screwed it up so bad where they
waited so long, But they must they must have a plan, right, Oh,

(52:18):
no they don't. And now after basically all the good
candidates are gone or are not interested, they just hire
them dude internally. And so I don't think they're going
to hire somebody internally. But that's what it kind of
reminds me of, is if I remember the Cowboys stuff correctly,
it was like, this is such a disaster, they have
to have a plan that we don't know about, and
it's like, no, they don't have a plan. They just whatever,

(52:41):
And then they ended up with Shottenheimer. Does that seem
like a fair analogy.

Speaker 3 (52:44):
Yeah, I mean, I think there's something to that. I
think that that makes sense. I think that I don't know.
I think that there's another thing, which we talked about
this a few weeks ago. Maybe the Knicks were getting
too much credit because it was New York that maybe
they weren't quite as good. The argument that they had
the best starting five in the league was just not accurate.
And I don't know why that argument was ever made.

(53:07):
But is it possible that the Knicks front office thinks
they're better than they actually are?

Speaker 2 (53:13):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (53:13):
Is it possible that they bought their own hype as well,
and they got exposed by the Pacers and caught with
their pants down. They're just like, well, I mean, it
had to have been the coach's fall, right, and it
wasn't like I mean, I do think that Thibodeau again,
I do think that he got out coached. But I
don't think he was the biggest glaring error in that series.
I mean, all the turnovers, he wasn't turning the ball over.

(53:35):
What was happening in the last couple of minutes of
those games when the Pacers were making plays that the
Knicks couldn't answer. I mean those weren't on him. Brunson
taking that three and missing it deep late in that
game when there was still time to potentially get a
better shot or get somebody else open. That's not on
Thibdeaux either. It's not that the coach can escape all blame,
but to act like the blame pie deserves to be

(53:57):
at his feet. It's almost like we want to wash
our hands this and make it look like it's somebody
else's fault so that we can save some face, when
ultimately it's like, look, a lot of good teams lose.
I mean, the Bills. The Bills don't fire Sean McDermott,
much to our consternation, seeming a year after year they
continue to run that thing back. If Sean McDermott can
keep his can keep keep keeping on even though he's

(54:20):
never gotten gotten them to a super Bowl or anything else,
I mean, what's the difference At this point, Thibodeaux has
done this in multiple places. He wins everywhere he goes.
You'd better at least know where you're going after the fact.
And then when it plays out in public where guys
are like, nope, not interested, Nope, I have no interest
in pro jobs and all this it kind of makes
you look. Yep, it's just a bad look. Optics are

(54:42):
not good for the Knicks when they're being turned down,
even if it's sort of indirect where guys are like, Nope,
I'm happy where I am. Any open positions, I'm not
interested because we know they're talking about the Knicks.

Speaker 2 (54:54):
It is an interesting scenario. Nicks again seemingly have no
real play in which I guess just like I said,
I wasn't surprised that they made the move, but I
didn't think they'd make the move like without having a
clear you know, next guy doesn't feel that it feels
that way. And again I think to your point, jmart

(55:15):
I think everybody in that building may have overvalued just
how good that job is, or at least just how
desired it is. Fox Sports Radio aeron Torres Jason Martin
broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. Did you
know you could stream this show in all of our
Fox Sports Radio shows live twenty four to seven in
the new and improved iHeartRadio app. Just searched Fox Sports
Radio in the app to stream us live, and one

(55:36):
of the newest features in the app is that you
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your screen.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
Coming up.

Speaker 2 (55:51):
Switch gears to the WNBA, and I think we got
definitive proof this weekend that Angel Reese definitely not the
superstar that some people are trying to claim she is.
We'll discuss next Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back everybody. Fox
Sports Radio eriturus Jason Martin broadcasting live from the Fox

(56:11):
Sports Radio Studios. Got a lot of takes on the WNBA.
We're gonna do them in just one moment before we do.
The news desk to Sega, what is trending well?

Speaker 6 (56:25):
Now the loss for the Colorado Rockies. It is a
final Mets win at Colorado.

Speaker 2 (56:29):
Just pre record that.

Speaker 6 (56:30):
Yeah, we suld live. It's just running on a loop.
Eight to one is tonight's final. Colorado's record twelve and
fifty two.

Speaker 2 (56:38):
Last night.

Speaker 6 (56:38):
Francisco Lindor, the Mets shortstop, did not start broke in toe,
but he came on his pinchhitter and had the game
winning pinchhit. On Friday, he started three hits for him tonight,
Mets win again. They're forty one and twenty four. Seattle
has lost four in a row. They're losing tonight eight
five and Anaheim Angels lead.

Speaker 7 (56:56):
In the top of the eighth.

Speaker 6 (56:57):
Cal Rale of the Mariners did hit his twenty fifth
home that leads the major leagues, and the Orioles have
a six to four lead over the A's. In the
top of the seventh, Luis Severino was the a starter.
He is so good on the road, era under one.
At the quote home games in Sacramento, his ERA is
over seven and yes, he was the starter tonight and

(57:19):
they are now trailing after the early lead against Baltimore
on Fox TV for most of the country. Tonight was
the Boston win at Yankee Stadium ten to seven over
New York. Trevor Story three hits, five RBIs Milwaukee homand
in the ninth to beat San Diego. San Francisco homer
in the ninth to beat Atlanta Cardinals scored in the
ninth to ed the Dodgers. It was Pittsburgh two to

(57:39):
one over Philadelphia Phillies. First baseman Bryce Harper went on
the injured list with wrist inflammation. US men's soccer lost
its exhibition against Turkey two to one in Connecticut. The
Americans had scored in the opening minute. The US next
plays in Nashville on Tuesday against Switzerland. Then it'll host
the Gold Cup tournament this month, which will be on
Fox and FS one. The record for the new US

(58:01):
soccer coach is now five and four. The Americans will
be co hosting the World Cup in a year. Kentucky
Derby winner Sovereignty took the Belmont Stakes, beating runner up Journalism.

Speaker 3 (58:10):
Again.

Speaker 6 (58:11):
Sovereignty the first horse to win the derby, skip the
Breakness and then win the Belmont. The race was held
at Saratoga. Like last year. Belmont on Long Island is
being renovated, so the race was mile and a quarter
along instead of mile and a half. Coco Goff won
the French Open in three sets. Three WNBA games. Tonight
wins for Seattle, Golden State, and Indiana won at Chicago

(58:34):
seventy nine to fifty two. Caitlin Clark still out with
a string quad Angel rees of Chicago four points twelve rebounds,
and we have an update from UFC three six teams tonight.
Kayla Harrison has won was an Olympic gold medalist. She's
defeated champion Juliana Pana by submission, and now the men's
bantamweight championship is coming up back to you.

Speaker 2 (58:56):
Thank you very much, Steve Disager to saga, we'll be
back in just a few minutes here. Well, let's talk
about it, Angel Reese. So first off, forget forget the
stat line. Okay, but we have been sold this bill
of goods dating back to dating back to the college days.
But certainly all of last year we talked about it.

(59:18):
I think we talked about it. We might not have Jason.
A few weeks ago, Kathy Engelbert, the league commissioner, put
out a She did an interview, but it was basically
like a press release where she talked about, oh, the
rookie class and but but she basically gave herself credit
for the growth of the league. Anyway, I bring it

(59:40):
up because we have been sold this bill of goods
that Angel Reese and Caitlyn Clark, this this generation's magic
and Bird, Bird and magic, magic and Bird Caitlin and
Angel Angel and Caitlin. Well, I bring it up because
I think we got pretty definitive proof over the last
couple of days that that is not the case, and
not even looking at the stat line's case. So this
story caught my attention. Indiana Fever Chicago Sky again, they're

(01:00:04):
supposed to be the new age Celtics and Lakers, even
though the Skies think whatever, but they obviously played an
opening day that was the flagrant foul that launched a
thousand takes. They returned the game this evening in Chicago,
and unfortunately there was no Caitlin Clark. She's at with
the injury. But how about this, Jason. By the time

(01:00:27):
the game was played, get in price was three dollars
to watch the Indiana Fever minus Caitlin Clark against the
Chicago Sky with Angel Ree. I'm sorry. That is proof
to me that Angel Rees not only is not the
basketball player that we've been four that we've been told

(01:00:48):
she is, she ain't the box office straw that Caitland
Clark is either, Because it was a three dollars get
in price in Chicago, and uh ticket price is plummeted
by more than tickets plummeted by like seventy percent. Within
a week of Caitlin Clark's injury, it was down to
three dollars to get into the arena this evening.

Speaker 3 (01:01:08):
Yes, Angel Reese is not a star. Angel Reese is
a foil Outside of Caitlin Clark. There's nothing there, Like
the only reason that Angel Reese has talked about is
juxtaposed with Caitlin Clark when she's on the other side.

(01:01:29):
There's interest there because there's vitry all there, because there's
history there, because there's a storyline there. If it's Angel
Reefs against anyone else, it doesn't matter. And if it's
Angel Reefs against Kaitlin Clark's team, but Kaitlin Clark is
not on the floor, it also doesn't matter. This is
and I said this to you a couple of days ago.
I said, look, Angel Reese is Dylan Brooks and Caitlin

(01:01:55):
Clark is Steph Curry or Lebron whoever it is that
Dylan Brooks was trying to ear at that point in time.
You don't care about Dylan Brooks. You only care about
Dylan Brooks in juxtaposition with one of those other guys
that he's kind of gotten into it with. And that's
what it is. Like. You're not paying to see Angel Reese,

(01:02:15):
whether it's four points and twelve rebounds or not. You know,
sometimes it's more than that. But Angel Reese is the
one that came out and said it's not just her,
I'm a star too, and that you guys better understand that. No,
we'd better not understand that, Angel, because it's not true.
And we knew it wasn't true when you said it,
and it revealed a lot about you in that moment,
because that really bothers you, and it really bothers this league.

(01:02:40):
But I said this last week when I was in
for Bernie Air and I said, I'm gonna lead off
with the WNBA, and I was talking about Clark's Clark
being out, and I said, I figure a lot of
you are kind of stunned that I'm leading off of
the WNBA because you probably didn't realize the WNBA was
still an act. And that's it. Like you can continue

(01:03:04):
to try and you know, push this under the rug
like it's not a thing, but it is a thing.
You don't have a league. You have one player. I'm
not saying there's not other talented women. I'm saying none
of them matter when it comes to a large swath
of the viewing audience, and certainly no casual fans are
tuning in to see anything outside of Caitlyn Clark. The

(01:03:26):
only reason that the w that women's basketball was talked
about at all last week is because Caitlyn Clark was
watching the Pacers eliminate the Knicks, and they kept cutting
over to her during the game because she was behind
the bench cheering them on in the same building. Right,
So that's your problem. If you're the WNBA. You can

(01:03:46):
continue to try to say what you want, and you
can continue to try and let this thing continue to build.
But without her, there is nothing to talk about. During
Game one of the NBA Finals, they showed here's their
upcoming television schedule, and they talked about Game two, of course,
but then they said WNBA Action on Saturday, and they
had a screen with two women on it, one from

(01:04:08):
whichever team it was and one from the other one.
I can't I've never laid eyes on either one of
these women before. I could not pick them out of
a lineup if you showed me a photo when there
was only one person standing there. I have no idea
who they are. I didn't even know when the two
teams showed up. I was just like, I'm not even here.
What the mascots of these teams are, I'm not sure
what they're called. I know these cities, and that's about it.

(01:04:31):
Like this has exposed the WNBA for what it is.
It is. It is a league with a unicorn in it,
where you pay to see the unicorn. You can continue
to try and say that the unicorn is not special
and that all the regular horses that have been there
forever are just as big a draw, but we all

(01:04:51):
know why the circus has sold out. It's sold out
to see the unicorn. It's not for everything else. And
so I don't think that there's even an argument to
be made anymore. All of the commentary and the discourse
throughout this season, which had barely even started, and every
take that was out there that was so bad and
so ill informed, and then you know, to the extent

(01:05:13):
of like whatever the hell that Ryan Clark, Robert Griffin
the third thing was, and all of this other stuff,
it's just like what are we doing here? And Cheryl
swoops and all this is just do you guys not
realize that we all have functioning eye sockets and we
saw this, like we know exactly what was going on.
We understand what we are seeing here. Stop telling us

(01:05:36):
that our eyes don't work. We know who the star
is here. You can tell us that it's not that
not that way, but we all know exactly what it is.

Speaker 2 (01:05:45):
It's interesting to observe. And uh yeah, no, I mean listen,
I think we all saw it to where last fall
it would have been when Caitlin Clark and the Fever
got eliminated from the whatever first second round of the
playoffs and just no one talked it is. It is
like amazing to me that she that there is so

(01:06:07):
much interest in her and that there is so little
interest in everybody else. And again, I was gonna reference
the WNBA finals. It was like the Caitlyn Clark's team
lost and it just felt like the season was over.
And by the way, and I know you know this,
but I think that's how pretty much most of the
girls in the league like it is. Hey, you know,
we got our own league over here. We don't need

(01:06:28):
you fans, blah blah blah blah whatever. But yeah, it
is amazing to me how little interest there is. You know, again,
we reference that show on ESPN at ten o'clock Eastern time,
and you know whatever, I don't have as much of
a problem with it as most people. I don't think
it's the best sports talk that you can find, but
I have noticed a complete lack of interest in even

(01:06:49):
talking about the WNBA since Kitlyn Clark's been injured. I
want to switch gears. I want to ask you a
question about Andrew Reese. I was thinking about this. I
don't know if I ever remember a player, and maybe
it's because she was so overhyped to come in, but
it is interesting to me that like in maybe like

(01:07:10):
eight months, six months whatever, basically back end of last year,
it was still you know, she's Caitlyn Clark's rival, and
she's got this double double record that no one cared
about until they tried to make it a thing. I
bring it up because now every time I go on
social media and something Angel Reese is involved, most of

(01:07:31):
it is just miss layups, and like, I'm not trying
to be a jerk about this, but One America is
having a reckoning where it's like we don't have to
pretend that Angel Reese is a superstar anymore, and we
kind of led the segment with that. I don't know
that I ever remember, and maybe there's no example of
this because we've never over hyped someone to the degree

(01:07:53):
that we have of Angel Reese. But it feels like
she went from like, oh my goodness, she is a
superstar are to I feel like she's kind of a
laughing stock now, Like I feel like people actively are
basically people are too, as much as you can say
they're tuning into sky games. Maybe that's not the right
way to put it, but like it feels like people

(01:08:15):
are going out of their way to just tune in
to see like how bad the mislayups are gonna be
and how many offensive you. I don't know if I
don't know that I've ever seen a person go from,
like I said, someone that we're told as a star
to basically a complete you know, I don't want to
be mean, but like punching bag, laughing stock, whatever you

(01:08:35):
want to use. Quicker than we have with Angel Reese
these last couple months.

Speaker 3 (01:08:39):
Well that's because she continued to try and tell us
how special she was when we all had paid attention
and knew otherwise, Like what she does, there's talent there, right,
Like I mean, there is talent to be able to
rebound the basketball and play that way, to be the
Draymond Green type or whatever like that. But like I
will say, if you can't make a you should probably

(01:09:01):
not be one talking very often, Like you can let
other people talk about the blue collar stuff that you do.
But I mean, man, I don't want to be mean either,
but like you're in the WNBA, you really should be
able to make, you know, fifty percent of your layups.
And there are way too many clips that are not

(01:09:21):
the same clip of her missing just bunny stuff, Like
it's it's kind of incredible, Like I recall her being
a little better at LSU, but that's only because I
saw her play like two games, both of which were
against Caitlin Clark. So maybe this is just what it is.
She's just offensively, she is nothing whatsoever, Like she has

(01:09:42):
no business being anywhere near the basketball on the offensive
side of the floor, and so you just let her
do everything else. But those games where she has like
a double double, I'm still trying to figure out how
those even happened, or like the games where she actually
had double digit points, it's like how, like how does
she make a free thrower? She can't make a layout.

Speaker 2 (01:09:59):
She's good offensive her, I'll give her credit, Yeah, good
for her when well, when you miss ten shots and
you get all right rebounds, you're gonna make a couple eventually.
That's all I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (01:10:06):
That's how you got That's right, that's right. But I
at the larger point, though, it's just let's let's stop.
Let's everybody out there that wanted to try and create
some kind of a narrative that Caitlin Clark is overhyped
and all this. Dude, she's the only hype you got. Like,
outside of that, that league ceases to exist completely. It's

(01:10:27):
just it just is what it is. Like you you
eventually just have to be okay with the fact that
this is your league. Either you accept that or you
can go ahead and continue to squander it and eventually
you're not going to have a league at all.

Speaker 2 (01:10:42):
Andel Rees four points tonight the Indiana Fever get the seventh.
How about this Jamart seventy nine to fifty two win, Like,
come on, man, hey, I'm not trying to poke it. WNBA.
Fifty two points in a professional basketball game. Not good.
Four points on two of seven shooting for Angel Reese,

(01:11:02):
by the way, for people scoring at home, Angel Reese,
the Chicago Sky's fourth leading scorer on a team that
is third to last in the standings in the WNBA.
Fox Sports Radio Aertors, Jason Martin. We're taking you till
two am Eastern. We'll come back. Steve de Sager will
get you caught up on everything that you missed from
throughout the day in sports. That's next. Fox Sports Radio,

(01:11:28):
Welcome back, everybody. Fox Sports Radio, Aer Tors Jason Martin,
broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios, as we
do every single show around this time. Let's get over
the news desk. Steve de Sager, get us caught up
on everything we missed from throughout the day.

Speaker 6 (01:11:48):
We got basketball to get to. But it is a
final in Anaheim. The Mariners have lost their fifth in
a row Angels eight to six. But cal Rawley, who
hit a three run homer in the first, hit a
solo shot in the ninth off Kenley Jansen, who did
get the save. Cal Rawley, Seattle's catcher, has twenty six
home runs this season now that leads the major leagues.

Speaker 7 (01:12:09):
Mets did win.

Speaker 6 (01:12:09):
At Colorado, and the other late game is still going
with Baltimore up sevent to four at the A's in
the bottom of the eighth. As for the NBA Finals,
Game two is Sunday, Indiana at Oklahoma City. The Pacers
course came back to win the opener. In fact, in
Game one, the league said the Pacers became the first
team in over a decade to win a finals game

(01:12:31):
without a single twenty point score. However, when they have
six different players score double digits, they are undefeated ten
to zero so far in this postseason. This Pacers franchise
has won the championship before, but they were ABA titles
in nineteen seventy, seventy two and seventy three, and then
after the ABA folded, they were part of the merger

(01:12:53):
with the NBA Spurs, etc. In nineteen seventy six. Indiana's
in the finals for the first time since two thousand
and I Will Tyrese Haliburton was born in two thousand.
The Oklahoma City Thunder you'd think would be aheaded series
at this point against Eastern Conference teams. During the season,
they went twenty nine to one. Oksee in the regular

(01:13:14):
season at home was thirty six and six. They had
the home lead in the opener. In fact, at home
in these playoffs they were eight to one and their
point differential was a plus two hundred and twenty one
at home this postseason, best ever through nine games, and
still Indiana came back to take Game one. Can a
four seed win the title? Indiana is a four seed.

(01:13:35):
Only one team lower than a three seed has won
the NBA Championship in the last forty plus years since
they went to the current playoff format, and that was
the Houston Rockets in nineteen ninety six. And interesting note
that the Pacers and the Thunder home arenas are less
than seven hundred air miles apart, shortest distance between the

(01:13:56):
two teams arenas in the finals since nineteen seventy one,
when it was Milwaukee and Kareem against the Baltimore Bullets.
But of course we must have all this time off
Game two, not until Sunday, you know, Case.

Speaker 2 (01:14:08):
I heard you guys before, I was talking about that.
It does feel like, I know, I don't really know
actually why. I mean, it's just why can't it be
every other day like it's been.

Speaker 7 (01:14:17):
You used to have Wednesday, Friday, Sunday all the time?

Speaker 2 (01:14:19):
Yeah, it's too much. I mean, at a time when
you're struggling for ratings, you're struggling to keep people invested.
I don't know this is the pathway that I would
have taken.

Speaker 6 (01:14:28):
Meanwhile, we've got a Stanley Cup Game three Monday night,
Edmonton at Florida. Series tied at one. The last time
a Canadian team won the Stanley Cup was nineteen ninety three.
The NHL Awards will be held just before game four.
We do know the coach of the Year. It's Washington
Spencer Carberry. He was voted the Jack Adams Award today
by the NHL Broadcasters Association. We mentioned earlier. The Steelers

(01:14:50):
have officially signed quarterback Aaron Rodgers. He passed his physical mandatory.
Mini camp starts Tuesday. He gets a one year deal,
reportedly worth ten million dollars incentives. On Sunday, the UFL's
Conference Finals take place, including on Fox TV DC at
Saint Louis. The Dome in Saint Louis will be hosting
the championship game next weekend. Regardless, Golf's US Open is

(01:15:12):
next week at Oakmont, Pennsylvania, and we're gonna get the
College World Series going soon. We've got the Super Regionals
this weekend, the best of threes and Coastal Carolina goes
into Auburn and eliminates the Tigers today four to one.
After at ten inning victory late Friday, the Arizona Wildcats
state alive, winning at North Carolina today ten to eight.

(01:15:33):
Because you see, the tar Heels had taken the Friday
opener of the best of three eighteen to two against Arizona,
but the Wildcats are alive. Miami forced to game three today,
winning at Louisville nine to six. Tonight, Florida State state alive.

Speaker 7 (01:15:47):
They lost the.

Speaker 6 (01:15:48):
Opener yesterday, but won three to one at Oregon State.
UCLA took the opener at the best of three five
two over ut San Antonio, Arkansas won its opener against
Tennessee for three. Duke beat Murray State's LSU against West
Virginia sixteen to nine. LSU Tigers there. As for Major
League Baseball, Milwaukee beat the Padres four to three on

(01:16:10):
a solo homer in the bottom of the night. The
Padres had just tied the game in the top of
the ninth. San Diego blows a chance to tie the
slumping Dodgers for first place in the NL West. San
Diego will be hosting the Dodgers in a series starting Monday.
The Giants are still one game back, Padres still one back.
San Francisco won against Atlanta on a two run homer

(01:16:31):
bottom of the ninth by Matt Chapman. Giants have won
four straight six straight losses for the Braves. They started
the season zero to seven. Remember now in the last
three weeks, the Braves are four and fourteen and veteran
reliever Craig Kimbrel was seen on the mound last night.
Up from the Miners was designated for assignment today by Atlanta.
They blew a great start from the Brave starter today,

(01:16:53):
Bryce Elder, no decision, eight innings and twelve strikeouts, but
another l for the team. What is the Dodgers wreck
in about the last month? The answer is fifteen and seventeen.
And again they're not only going to San Diego starting Monday,
then they'll be hosting San Francisco and San Diego after that.
The Dodgers' offense is the problem this past week. The

(01:17:14):
starting rotation has been a problem all season. Saint Louis
scored late to win two to one over LA Here.
A week ago the Fox Game was the Dodger scoring
eighteen runs to beat the Yankees. Well, in the seven
games since eighteen runs total for LA, and this has
been the best hitting team with runners in scoring position,
over a three hundred batting average as a team in

(01:17:36):
those spots, and yet this weekend in Saint Louis one
for twenty five with runners in scoring position. The only
Dodger run today came on a wild pitch on a strikeout.
The game was scoreless in the eighth. They do have
one great starter, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, had no decision. He had
nine strikeouts and six innings. LA pitcher Tony Gonslim, with
a sore elbow, goes on the IL. That is the Dodgers'

(01:17:59):
tenth starting pitcher listed on the IL. Plus, they have
seven relievers on the injured list, including Blake trin And
the Cubs have an offense this year. They had five
home runs at Detroit today and beat the Tiger six
to one. Say A Suzuki with two long balls. Jamison
Tyan hot on the mounds seven innings. He got the win.
He's six and three. Phillies first baseman Bryce Harper went

(01:18:19):
on the injured list with wrist inflammation. The Phillies have
lost four straight. They've lost eight of their last nine
lost at Pittsburgh two to one today, even though Ranger Suarez,
who had been four to zher pitched seven good innings.
Kyle Schwarber hit his twentieth home run, but the offense
went four for thirty for Philadelphia, and Cincinnati took two
from Arizona. They completed a Friday suspended game and in

(01:18:43):
ten innings it was Red's four to three, and then
then the regular game thirteen to one. Cincinnati. Gavin Lux
ex Dodger with a grand Slam Toronto five to four
winners at Minnesota. Blue Jays have won four straight Texas
and Jacob de Grom got a five nothing win at Washington.
To Grom with seven innings, just two hits allowed, eight strikeouts,

(01:19:03):
no walks. He's six and two with an ERA around
two ten inning wins on the road for Houston and
Miami and the Fox game tonight. So Aaron Judge go
oh for four at Yankee Stadium, three strikeouts, his batting
average down to three ninety. Boston beat the Yankees ten
to seven.

Speaker 2 (01:19:19):
Thank you very much, Steve Seger. This is Fox Sports Radio,
Fox Sports Saturday and the Sunday air towards Jason Martin.
We are broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios.
We'll come back. We got one hour left. We still
got a lot to discuss Game one thoughts. By the way,
j Mart, we have not talked about the ambiance or
lack thereof of these NBA finals. I got a KD

(01:19:40):
take two that I need to uh, I gotta get
I gotta get this off my chest before the end
of the show. So we are taking up till two
am Eastern. Plenty left. This is Fox Sports Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:19:50):
Don't listening to Fox Sports Radio Radio.

Speaker 2 (01:19:53):
Welcome in everybody, our three tours martin Fox Sports Radio.
We are broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. Yes,
we are live one am Eastern time. We're taking it
up for another hour two am Eastern. Bernie Fratto will
take it over for us. Bernie Fratto cannot wait to

(01:20:14):
hear what he has to say on a busy weekend sports.
If you missed any of today's show, can always download
the podcast. We'll give you the full details here a
little bit later. But we have already talked a little
bit about Game one. We've talked about the sagging NBA ratings,
we talked a little bit about Aaron Rodgers, and another
forgettable performance from Angel Reese, but still got one hour

(01:20:36):
left in the show. Jay Mart, let's circle back to
where we were at the top of the show. NBA
Finals are underway, Game one on Thursday night. Back and forth. Okay,
see doing what they did? Up by as many as
fifteen points in the second half. By now you know

(01:20:56):
what happened. But here is what the final seconds of
the game sounded like.

Speaker 4 (01:21:02):
Rebound Indiana, eight seconds to go. The Pacers are not
gonna call a timeout. Cattle Burton has it with three driving,
with two pulling up and heading.

Speaker 3 (01:21:13):
With three tenths of a second to go.

Speaker 4 (01:21:16):
How many more times can this team do that?

Speaker 1 (01:21:22):
So weets baby.

Speaker 2 (01:21:26):
Indiana Pacers win Game one, final score one to eleven,
one ten. It was the fourth time in these NBA
Playoffs that Tyres Haliburton has either hit a game tying
or go ahead shot with under two seconds to go.
Indiana Pacers up Gay up one nothing in this game
in this series. J Mart, I'll let you take it

(01:21:47):
wherever you want. In reaction to Game one, I'm gonna.

Speaker 3 (01:21:51):
Look credit to the Pacers for just continuing to fight
even though the thing almost got away from them. Several
times before they finally made that run, got it close
enough to where they sort of made the Thunder sweat
a bit. And they've been in this position before, have
the Thunder and have the Pacers. And that's what Oklahoma

(01:22:14):
City said afterwards, like we've been here before, but the
Pacers have too. And the Pacers have done this now
multiple times in this playoffs. They did it to the
Knicks and completely changed the tenor of the series in
Game one by stealing that first one at MSG and
it was Haliburton that sent it to overtime. In this case,
it was Haliburton that won it. He's the one guy
you didn't want to have the ball in his hand
to take that shot. They got it to him and

(01:22:36):
he was able to get that shot off and that's
all it took. So now you got to win four
out of six if you're Oklahoma City, and you know
at this stage all the pressure is on them tonight
in Game two and for Indiana, you are in the
driver's seat like it's right there in your hands. And

(01:22:58):
I don't know that you use any of what the
media set about you as fuel, but nobody gave you
a chance in this series as I mentioned earlier one
of the things that I had read and seen all
week was it's a generational mismatch. And I'm just like,
please stop saying that there's a thunderfan. Please stop saying that,
because I think it's ridiculous. First of all, but we're

(01:23:21):
not talking about an Oklahoma City Thunder team that's been
to five straight finals or three of the last five
NBA finals and they have multiple rings. Like, these guys
are babies a lot. They're so young. This is their
first opportunity here. I mean, let's not crown them before
they actually pulled this off. We saw this happen to
the Orlando Magic with Shaq and Penny, Like they didn't

(01:23:43):
get there and then they never got there again. They
got there once Nick Anderson missed some free throws, the
Rockets stole Game one. They end up sweeping the series,
and the Magic never sniffed the finals again until Dwight
Howard against Kobe and Paugasol. So like, let's let the
games play out. Indiana's really good. They've been underappreciated, under discussed,

(01:24:03):
and certainly underrated all year long, and certainly all the
way through this playoff run. Are people gonna learn or
are they gonna have to watch Indiana actually win this
championship to give them credit.

Speaker 2 (01:24:15):
It's an interesting conversation and it goes back to what
we said in our one is I just I don't understand.
I didn't understand either, Like listen, did I pick the
Thunder to win?

Speaker 7 (01:24:27):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (01:24:28):
Yeah, but like I, you know, because the thing is
too Like with the Thunder, it's like, well, what what
are what has made them so successful? Well, they're great defensively,
they got five guys that are all switchable, all athletic,
all this all that. It's like, well, the Pacers have Halliburton,
who's you know, six four sixty five Siakam is a
matchup nightmare. And they got a lot of guys too

(01:24:50):
that kind of athletically match up very nicely with with
with okay, see really quick obviously Game two is on
Sunday night. You know, listen, you know, I feel like
the analysis we're about to give is really cliche, but
I'll toss it over to you. Like, I think it's

(01:25:12):
hard to see the scenario where the Thunder don't jump
out to you know, Thunder at home. I find it
hard to see the scenario where the Thunder don't jump
out to an early lead, and I think that they
are favored. I think they should be favored. Do you
expect anything other than Thunder respond in Game two on
Sunday night?

Speaker 3 (01:25:32):
No. But the only thing that scares me about that
is I thought the same thing about the Nixon Game
two and they came out and the Pacers, you had
that crazy game by Siakam, beat them and then took
that thing back to Indiana up to h I don't
think that will happen. I do think the Thunder are
likely to get out to a big leading and cruise

(01:25:53):
to a victory in this one. But this Pacers team
is not going to make it easy on them. They're
gonna come in and I think they're going to come
in confidently and with a little bit more knowledge under
their belt because they've seen what Oklahoma City brought and
how they wanted to play in Game one. What adjustments
are going to be made by both clubs. But yeah,
I mean I agree, I think that Oklahoma City will win.

(01:26:16):
I think they'll win by double digits. They're favored now,
I think by ten and a half. The first game
is nine and a half. It feels like one where
you have to put the throttle down and go right
through the finish line and risk crashing into the wall
even to make sure that you get all the way home.
But you know, stranger things have happened in this postseason already,
So Oklahoma City can't just assume that they're going to

(01:26:39):
be able to waltz through this game because Indiana is
going to make it difficult on them. But I agree,
I mean, I don't see a scenario where it changes either,
but because of what happened to that Knick series, it
at least gives me some pause.

Speaker 2 (01:26:53):
I'm looking right now. The Pacers have had a few
blowout losses in these playoffs, but not many. Ten and
a half feels like an awful lot really quickly, Jmart,
because we haven't had a chance to talk about it.

Speaker 3 (01:27:04):
Something.

Speaker 2 (01:27:04):
You know, you and I kind of keep a dialogue
going throughout the week, knowing that we're going to be
on air here for three hours on Saturday, sometimes more
depending on you know, different situations and something that you
and I both picked up on, and we certainly weren't
the only ones. But the presentation of Game one of
the NBA Finals, let's do the conversation now because no,

(01:27:26):
I'm just my sigh is because it was so abysmal.
It was bad, and so I'm sure, you know, I
can't listen to everything that everyone on this network says,
but I'm sure others have talked about it, but I
saw people on social media reference it. I think it's
one hundred percent correct. Putting aside how bad the broadcast
team is, which we might talk about here in a second,

(01:27:50):
the court look like it blew my mind, jmart Is
that there was nothing about the court that made you
realize that it was the NBA Finals, right And you know,
I think there's a lot of criticisms of the NBA
right now, some valid, some not, But this is your
premier event. This is the event that is you're supposed
to make feel special, and this is an event that

(01:28:12):
in previous years you've made look special. I mean, I
saw so many people sharing the picture of Staples Center
in the Kobe Shaq days with the NBA, you know,
the Larry O'Brian trophy basically taking up the entire court
in terms of not the actual Lariobrian, but the Larry
O'Brian logo, you know, and there wasn't even an NBA

(01:28:33):
Finals logo on the court, and it was.

Speaker 3 (01:28:35):
I was stunned by that, Yeah, stunned by it, especially
when the CarMax logo was digitally shitted, like because I
saw it pop on the screen once before a free
throw and I was just like, you're gonna digitally add CarMax,
but we can't get the NBA Finals logo on the floor.
I don't know that I've ever seen that in it.
Like all the years that I've watched the NBA, one

(01:28:58):
of the things that stands out about the finals is
you've got the finals logo. But when we go back
to it, the Eastern Conference in Western Conference finals used
to have stuff on the floor too, sure, and so
I don't know what it is, but it is not
a good look when you're playing tournament or not your
playing tournament, But you're what is it what happens at
the beginning of the season, so that we we mock

(01:29:20):
form in season tournament. Yeah, the East they changed, but
they aren't changing it for the finals. Like this looks
like any other game being played in January or something
like that. There's just there's no there's nothing behind it.
And if you're watching the TV broadcast, except for the
fact that a few things are tinged in gold, like

(01:29:43):
a couple of the numbers are in gold, or a
couple of the backgrounds are in gold, you wouldn't even
know that it was different. From that perspective, there was
nothing about this to make it come across as special
and that that, to me, is just absolutely a failure
on all fronts. Like if you're Adam Silver, I would
be in barre. I would be like, man, before Game two,
we better have a logo everywhere, because that stood out

(01:30:04):
I was looking for, is like, is it on the
baseline that they have the finals logo next to the
thunder logo? No, like nothing was there. It's like, this
is unbelievable.

Speaker 2 (01:30:14):
Yeah, it's really funny. I actually had that thought. Is
I wonder if the bat signal comes from the league
office of let's get any literally any logo on the
court that reflects that it's the NBA Finals. I'll be
curious if there is something on Sunday night and it
goes back to what I said, is like, you know, listen,
I think that I think that some of the criticisms

(01:30:37):
of the NBA are justified. I think some of them
are not. But the one thing that I've kind of
found through life, Jason, is that, at least in sports,
is that when something when a product year over year
is not good, there's usually a reason why, right, Like
you know, the Cleveland Browns are bad year over year

(01:30:59):
over year, year over year over year over year of year,
and you realize it's not a coincidence, Like Jimmy Haslm's
kind of a train wreck, doesn't know what he's doing.
The Knicks forever, James Dolan doesn't know what he's doing.
They're bad year over year over year. He actually leaves
for a while to go build the sphere in Vegas.
He's gone, then they get good. So the point I'm
trying to make is that sometimes it's not a coincidence

(01:31:20):
when things consistently are going the wrong direction or things
bottom out. And I think this is a metaphor for
the state of the league, like like it's the little
things that separate you, that's the little things that get
fans fired up. And when you can't do the little
things right, you're certainly not going to get the big
things right. And so I don't know if I'm explaining

(01:31:41):
this the way that I want to or properly, but
it just like the everything's trending in the wrong direction
for the NBA, from a ratings press, from this, from that,
from whatever, and it's like the little things that you
could do right, that you should do right, that you
need to you can't even do the little things right.
And so again, I don't even know if that metaphor
totally made sense, but it's just it's like it's just
one of those perfect examples of why the NBA is

(01:32:03):
going in the wrong direction in terms of a consumer product.

Speaker 3 (01:32:05):
Listen, Like, I mean, we dog on Adam Silver a
lot on this show. We have done that now for
probably three or four years at least. I would argue
maybe we go harder on Adam Silver than any national
radio show in the country, because most of them probably
don't talk about them all that much. But the reason
we do it is because the attention to detail is

(01:32:26):
so pathetically bad. It's so lacking in so many respects.
It's like just the bells and whistles are missing in
this league. Then we can get to all the we
can't advertise our stars because we can't move on from
what was taking place ten years ago, and so now
we have a finals where we have guys that we
could market, but we wasted too much time and so

(01:32:49):
now we're having to do it in real time and
it's way too late, and like everything about it, it's
just bad. And it falls at the feet of the
commissioner because he's the one that should be getting this
stuff right. He's the one that needs to be forward thinking.
He's the one that needs to make sure his league
is being marketed properly, that he is doing the things
that matter and not worrying about the things that don't matter.
All these things are just falling through the cracks, like

(01:33:12):
you've given Christmas to the NFL. Everything about this league,
like it should not be struggling like this. It should
not We should not be able to do segments like
this as often as we can. And it's because Adam
Silver is just not very good at the job. Not
that he's a bad guy, and I hate to say

(01:33:33):
that about somebody, but I'm going after the performance here,
not the performer, Like this is just unacceptable on this level,
Like you should not be this just kind of lackadaisical
about the stuff. Like if you're going to buy a
new car and you buy the top trim as opposed
to the bottom trim. You're expecting a whole lot of
bells and whistles. You're expecting all of the added stuff.

(01:33:56):
You're expecting the air conditioner to blow fragrances at you,
everything under the sun because you're paying for that premium.
We're in the NBA Finals and we could not tell
it except for the fact that we cover the league
and we know that it's time because we're in June.
Like the Olympics. For all that you want to say
negative about the Olympics, those five rings are everywhere. Sure,

(01:34:18):
they're in your face everywhere you go every channel. They're
on the screen, they're on the floor, they're on the mat,
they're in the pool, and you can see them through
the water. Like it's absolutely everywhere. You can't get your
finals logo or an image of your trophy anywhere on

(01:34:38):
your floor. You can't make this thing look like it
is special. Why would any casual fan tune in and
think this matters because the league doesn't make it look
like it should. It's like, does the league care? Does
the league think this matters? Or are they hoping this
goes away because it's Oklahoma city in Indiana, because that's
what it looks like to me. I know that's not

(01:34:59):
the case, but you're doing absolutely nothing to enhance this product.

Speaker 2 (01:35:04):
We'll see if it gets any better. Game two of
the NBA Finals Sunday night. Will make our picks in
the final segment, and I will say just this really quick,
as we put a bow on the segment, I am
genuinely curious if there is a change of some degree.
And if there is, we know it came from the
bat signal from the Commissioner's office. And if that happens, well,
guess what, that's probably not a great sign to begin

(01:35:25):
with the fact that it took the bat signal to
get us there. So Fox Sports Radio aeron Torres Jason Martin,
we are broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios,
should mention, but be sure to check out the Fox
Sports Radio YouTube channel a ton of great content from
all of our Fox Sports Radio shows. Just search Fox
Sports Radio on YouTube and you'll see a whole bunch
of video highlights from all of our Fox Sports Radio programming. Also,

(01:35:47):
be sure to hit the subscribe button so you always
have instant access to all of our Fox Sports Radio
videos on YouTube. We'll come back, j mart when we do.
A star is on the trade block, but should anybody
want them? Should anybody want them? We'll discuss that next
Fox Sports Ready, Welcome back everybody. Fox Sports Radio Aaron Torres,

(01:36:10):
Jason Martin broadcasting live from the Fox Sports Radio studios.
Take it till two am Eastern Time. Bernie Freddo of
The Bernie Freddo Show follows us. By the way, J
mart one quick thing before we get to the topic
that I teased, I kind of just pulled up, you know,
NBA ratings, you know, from previous finals, just to kind
of look at stuff. It is pretty interesting that near

(01:36:34):
universally ratings actually drop after game one. So like game
one to game two is there's usually a dip. So
he grants to the NBA lowest rated finals outside of
the two COVID finals ever in the Nielsen ratings, and
as we head to game two, those are very likely
to dip again in the coming in the next few days.

(01:37:00):
Think out, yeah, I.

Speaker 3 (01:37:01):
Mean that's not a You got to hope that's not
the case, but it would make sense. Right you tune
into game one of the finals. If you're a casual fan,
you're just gonna see what's up. And then if you
especially if it's not teams you have any kind of
real dog in the fight with you just kind of
trail back off and maybe you just kind of you'll
flip onto it for five minutes and you'll go back

(01:37:23):
to what you were doing and things like that. It's
the hardcorees that are going to stick around throughout the
finals unless it just becomes incredibly compelling where you just
have one of those kind of great matchups that you
know is gonna rate. Well. I imagine when you think that's
probably true for any seven game finals, that game one

(01:37:43):
is likely to be your high point except for a
game seven.

Speaker 2 (01:37:49):
Yeah, or certainly as the series ramps up. So yeah,
so yeah, I'm trying to look at if there's like
a comparable like for the World Series. Let's take a
quick look here. Yeah, World Series, it's kind of a
dip after game one as well, although in twenty twenty
three there was an uptick in game two. So yeah, no,

(01:38:11):
it makes sense. It makes sense, I guess, and I
know you know where I was going with it. I think,
to me, the bigger thing is that if the ratings
were basically at historic lows in Game one. There isn't
really any indicator to expect them to bounce back up
heading into Game two. So, by the way, Jeff Sorenson
just tweeted in said, love your guys take on Adam

(01:38:33):
Silver in the NBA. Been a bad product for years.
So yeah, we're just talking to Adam Silver all that
and the lack of logos and whatever on the court.
All right, I want to switch gears, pseudo switch gears,
and I do want to talk about what is going
to come in the NBA offseason. Is that I think
we all think that it could be a pretty busy

(01:38:54):
offseason from you know, kind of like a superstar trade moves.
This that you know, Yannis clearly seems to be open
to a move in a way that he hasn't in
the past. And I bring it up because I think
this is going to come off as a controversial take
and I don't know if it should be Kevin Durant

(01:39:16):
like like, so I'll say this. It's like it feels
like listening to people in the media that it is
basically people that cover the league on a day and
day out basis that it is a foregone conclusion. Kevin
Durant will be traded this offseason. He won't be a
member of the Suns, and it makes sense. Team bottomed out,
missed the playoffs. They fired Budenholzer. They just hired a
you know, kind of a young, cheap assistant. And maybe

(01:39:37):
he's good, maybe he isn't. But basically, after going, you know,
after hiring an NBA championship head coach, it doesn't work
this year. They go in a different direction. I bring
it up, Jemart because I'll be real, Okay, So Kevin
Durant all time great. I'm not saying that he isn't.
But at the same time, does Kevin Durant. I guess

(01:40:01):
we have to see what team he lands on, where
he goes whatever. But this is a guy, you know,
I guarantee you when the finals end, this will be
the lead conversation on every show every day. This yeah,
this inianness until something happens with you know whatever. But
I bring it up because Katie and I love Katie.

(01:40:23):
He's an all time great. I'm not this is not
like a teardown and everybody in the NBA stings, but
he is a He's coming off a season where he
played sixty two games to really about. You know, basically
post Achilles, he's had one year where he's played more
than sixty five games, So basically he's missed twenty plus games.
And here's the stat that I don't think people really realize.

(01:40:46):
Since he left Golden State in twenty nineteen, his team
has not made it out of the second round of
the NBA playoffs. Yep, you know, people know the history.
I think we you and I are, Me and Arnie
were on air that that famous game against the Milwaukee Bucks.
But you know, they lose, they get they get swept
in in his last year in Brooklyn, make it to

(01:41:09):
the second round in his first year and get beat
up pretty bad by the Nuggets. Last year, they get
swept in the opening round by Minnesota. This year they
missed the playoffs. I just it feels like it's not
quite Aaron Rodgers to the Steelers, but it just feels
like a story that we're gonna make a huge, huge,
huge deal out of. I just don't know that Kevin
Durant's that dude anymore. I really don't.

Speaker 3 (01:41:31):
He's not listen. I said this last week on my show.
I kind of went off on this. You probably didn't
hear because it's deeper into the show and you were
probably asleep. There has been this discourse about how Kevin
Durant needs to go to Minnesota to team up with
Anthony Edwards, and I said, that's the last thing Anthony

(01:41:52):
Edwards needs, because at what point has Kevin Durant been
a leader? Like why would you want somebody who like
Anthony Edwards. I'm still questioning his leadership in Tangibles right now,
and I'm not sure that he has that in him.
I'm not sure that. I said, I feel like he's
more Durant than he is Curry because I think he

(01:42:14):
wants to go out there and ball, and he has
all the talent in the world, but there's just these
moments where it's like I need him to take the
throttle of the team, and Martin Medina actually told me
he goes. You know, I talked to Anthony Edwards about
this and he said, look, I had a problem for
a while in trying to take the lead when there
were a lot of veterans on the team, guys that

(01:42:34):
were older than me, and that he took strides in
that arena this year and became more of a leader
I didn't see it, but I'll take Medina's word for
it on that Durant's not going to make him a
better leader. Durant's going to come in and ball because
that's what Durant does. And he's also going to get
hurt because that's also what Kevin Durant does. At this point,

(01:42:57):
he is older, he hasn't won with anybody, and he's
been around a lot of stars. He's been around young stars,
he's been around to Devin Booker, He's been around guys
like that, and he's been around veteran stars as well.
I feel like if you send him to Anthony Edwards,
it's like you're putting the bad influence next to him.
I hate to say that about Kevin Durant, but unfortunately
that's kind of what he's become. Like. He has become

(01:43:19):
a guy whose skill on the floor is outweighed by
just a ton of negatives that seem to accompany him
wherever he goes. Coaches don't seem to last with him.

Speaker 2 (01:43:31):
His health statuti or coach year or something like that.

Speaker 3 (01:43:34):
Yeah, I'm it's bad. I think I saw a stat
where he actually has the worst playoff record of any
active player in the NBA right now, Oh wow, which
is astonishing as good as he is walking in the
Hall of Fame, one of the greatest offensive players we've
ever seen. Just he's got everything that you want, except
for the fact that I never saw him lead. Russell

(01:43:56):
Westbrook was more than the leader in Oklahoma City. We
all know Steph was the in Golden State. Then when
he went to the nets, they had no leader and
so they got nowhere. He went to Phoenix and he
really has not been the leader there either. Just because
you're the best player doesn't mean you are the de
facto leader. And a team needs a leader on the

(01:44:17):
floor just as much as it needs one on the sidelines.
And that's not who Kevin Durant is. He's told you himself,
I want a ball, I want a hoop. That's what
I love doing, and he's great at it. But putting
him with Anthony Edwards, I feel like, is putting exactly
what Anthony. What Anthony Edwards needs to see is more
a guy like a Jawen Brunson, more a guy that

(01:44:38):
is an actual leader on the floor, that actually controls
things and is more of a general as opposed to
whatever it is that Kevin Durant is, which is just
a great basketball player, because I think Anthony Edwards is
the new version of that already. So that was like
I specifically was talking about it in regards to Anthony Edwards.
I understand, like Kevin Durant, you would want him on

(01:45:00):
on your team, but for the fact that everything that
he does to your team that's not just scoring and
doing whatever is actually on the basketball floor, seems to
be a net negative for every franchise he has joints
that's golden sake, it's.

Speaker 2 (01:45:13):
All great points. You know, I hadn't even thought of it.
I I you pegged it down better than I did
as far as why, because you know, Olden when you
were out last week, Olden Polonies was in and old
and kind of said, oh, you know, yeah, Minnesota Timberwolves,
and I love old And it's not a criticism of
the take. Everyone's allowed their opinion, but I just said,
I don't think Kevin Durant's like they missed enough wide

(01:45:33):
open threes, Like, you know, they don't just need another
guy to jack up a bunch of threes. And I
think the maturity thing is it. And it's funny. I
was just thinking about this way you were speaking, is
that you know, sometimes we talk about guys from the
perspective of like is that guy a true number one?
And I think, you know, we talk about a guy

(01:45:54):
in terms of like can he be the best player
on a championship team? And I think what's interesting is
it's that, like with Durant, he can't be a number one,
for he could be your most talented player, he can't
be your leader though, you know, so he's like almost
number two from that respective even perspective. Excuse me, even

(01:46:15):
if he wouldn't be number one as far as uh,
even if he could be number one, is the most
talented player?

Speaker 3 (01:46:20):
Yes, that's exactly right. Most talented does not equate to leader,
It doesn't equate to alpha. It just means that you
can ball. It just means that you're an incredible basketball player.
We already know that Anthony Edwards is exactly the same.
And so when you hear when Medina tells us that
you know, Anthony Edwards took some strides and that he's

(01:46:40):
continuing to try and grow in that way, then I
want to see that continue. And I actually think that
stunts the second Kevin Durant gets there because I think
that it will actually reflect bad habits onto Anthony Edwards
that he is desperately I would say right now trying
to get away from Kevin Durant is the epitome of
what Anthony Edwards has been, not who Anthony Edwards needs

(01:47:03):
to be if that team is actually able to win
a championship.

Speaker 2 (01:47:06):
This is Fox Sports Radio Air Tours, Jason Martin broadcasting
live from the Fox Sports Radio studios. Come back a
couple more topics before we get out of here. A
lot of ground to cover between now and two am Eastern,
but before we get to all that final time this evening,
Steve de Saga, what's training? Well?

Speaker 7 (01:47:22):
Hello once again and yes.

Speaker 6 (01:47:24):
Game two of the NBA Finals is Sunday, Indiana at
Oklahoma City. The Pacers came back to take the opener.
My favorite stat from that opening game of the best
of seven, what would you guess the record is in
the last three minutes of a Finals game if your
team is down nine or more. The answer is oh
and one eighty two since nineteen seventy one.

Speaker 2 (01:47:46):
And well one hast broken a lot of those one.

Speaker 6 (01:47:51):
Yes, absolutely, Center Zach Edia the Grizzlies will reportedly miss
the start of next season. It'll have ankle surgery. WNBA
wins for expansion, Golden State for Seattle. Indiana cruise to
Chicago seventy nine fifty two, even though Caitlin Clark is
still out with a string. Quad Stanley Cup Game three
is Monday night, Edmonton at Florida, series tied at one.
The NHL's Coach of the Year as Washington Spencer Carbury.

(01:48:14):
The Steelers officially signed quarterback Aaron Rodgers. He passed his
physical mandatory. Mini camp starts Tuesday. He'll speak then at
UFC three to sixteen. Kayla Harrison a winner tonight, beating
champion Julianna Pania by submission, so she'll now face Amanda
Noonez next. In college baseball Super Regional Coastal Carolina eliminated Auburn.

(01:48:34):
Coco Goff won the French Open. Kentucky Derby winner Sovereignty
took the Belmont Stakes. The late Major League Baseball game
went to Baltimore seven to four at the A's, who
had actually won two straight. Before this, they had lost
twenty of twenty one. Seattle has lost five in a row,
lost eight to six to the Angels. Cal Rowley did
hit two more homers, numbers twenty five and twenty six

(01:48:56):
of his season already that leads the Majors. Julia Rodriguez
left with an ankle injury.

Speaker 7 (01:49:01):
The Mets.

Speaker 6 (01:49:01):
Francisco Lindor had three hits back in the starting lineup
despite the broken toe. Mets one at Colorado eight to one.
The Rockies record twelve and fifty two. Milwaukee edged San
Diego on a solo homer bottom of the ninth, four
to three. The Padres had just tied the game in
the top of the ninth. Padres still a game back
of the first place Dodgers in the NL West, Saint
Louis two to one over LA. Dodgers record in about

(01:49:24):
the last month, it's fifteen and seventeen, and they'll be
playing at San Diego starting Monday, and then hosting San
Francisco and San Diego after that. San Francisco won on
a two run home or bottom of the night from
Matt Chapman. Giants have won four straight, beat Atlanta three
to two. Braves have lost six in a row. The
Cubs hit five home runs, two by Saya Suzuki at a

(01:49:45):
six to one win at Detroit, ten inning road wins
for both Houston and Miami. The Fox game for most
of the country, Boston ten to seven over the Yankees,
the lost to Ryan Yarborough save to Eraaldus Chapman, Trevor
Story of Boston three HiT's I have RBIs back to you.

Speaker 2 (01:50:02):
Thank you very much, Steve Sagrea. Have a great evening.
You are off to Mark.

Speaker 7 (01:50:06):
That is correct.

Speaker 2 (01:50:07):
I hope you're doing something.

Speaker 7 (01:50:08):
Yeah, it should be family party.

Speaker 3 (01:50:10):
Yes, okay.

Speaker 2 (01:50:10):
I don't know if you're going back.

Speaker 6 (01:50:12):
Rare Sunday night, but yeah, it should be back one
of the Jason Smith shows at least this week.

Speaker 2 (01:50:17):
I don't know if you're going back to Lake Tahoe
for three weeks.

Speaker 7 (01:50:20):
Or what it was gorgeous, I will say.

Speaker 2 (01:50:22):
Awesome to say, have a great evening off and uh,
you know, hopefully Chris playing.

Speaker 3 (01:50:26):
Fourteen and fifty two for the Rockies as you well
said that twelve sorry, So can you imagine being that
bad and then looking up and realizing you still have
one hundred games to play?

Speaker 5 (01:50:39):
That is true?

Speaker 3 (01:50:40):
That is like how how like just demoralizing, Like you're
fifty games under five hundred, but you still got to
play one hundred more like you're totally out of it,
but you still have one hundred games.

Speaker 2 (01:50:52):
As of this.

Speaker 6 (01:50:52):
Past week, they had already registered their fourth eight game
losing streak of the week.

Speaker 2 (01:50:57):
Ah, that's just what if.

Speaker 7 (01:51:00):
You're the broadcaster.

Speaker 3 (01:51:01):
Yeah, like exactly, I mean, I know, like, yes, it's
a dream to play major League baseball. It's a dream
to call major League baseball. I understand all this, but man,
those are gonna be some rough summer loss right.

Speaker 2 (01:51:12):
The fact that they can rattle off fifty straight wins
and then still be just five.

Speaker 7 (01:51:16):
Hundred at that point, that's true.

Speaker 2 (01:51:19):
I'll say this. I you know, Bernie Freddo, I know
you're listening. I said this to you last week to Sega,
and unfortunately Bernie Freddo wasn't in. I said, Bernie Freddo,
I need the I need the dollar amount that you
would be up if you just bet against the Rockies
every single game. Now, I guess straight up, yeah, I guess.
I guess. You know, with the odds, you'd have to
bet more to win less. But still, I mean, you

(01:51:40):
just took them every single game to lose, or took
the run whatever. Anyway, All right to saga, enjoy your
evening and.

Speaker 6 (01:51:46):
They're still playing I mean, Giants and Braves next week.
It's not like they I don't know who they. You know,
the easy wins would be on their schedule.

Speaker 2 (01:51:53):
But Savannah Bananas are not on the schedule.

Speaker 3 (01:51:56):
I'm not sure that's an easy win either.

Speaker 2 (01:51:58):
It isn't. Well, I'll tell you watch it. I actually
sort of have a question about that, but we'll get
come back. We'll wrap the show. We do have to
talk Game two of the NBA Finals. We got to
talk about a bunch of other things before we get
out of here. Ertors Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio, Welcome
back everybody, Fox Sports Radio. Ertorris Jason Martin broadcasting live

(01:52:20):
for the Fox Sports Radio Studio. Should match it shortly
after the show, podcast going up. If you missed any
of today's show, check out the podcast. Just search Fox
Sports Radio and be sure to follow and review the podcast.
Give it a quick five stars. Again, just search Fox
Sports Radio wherever you get your podcast and you'll see
today's show. Post it after we get off air. Jami,
I want to talk Game two in a second, but

(01:52:40):
I actually was kind of curious about this, and so
I mentioned the Savannah bananas. I'll be real, I might
just have my head in the clouds on this or
in the sand in this may be the right way
to put it. Every Saturday they're playing in front of
like ninety thousand people in a football stadium. I don't

(01:53:02):
really get it, and I don't really know anything about it, Like,
are you familiar with why they're so popular or are
they just basically like the Harlem Globe Chritters of baseball?

Speaker 7 (01:53:10):
Right?

Speaker 3 (01:53:11):
Yeah, So, I mean they do. There's a lot of antics,
and it's it's more of just a it's more of
a performance than anything else. But I don't really understand
it either, and I haven't dived deep enough into it
to fully grasp. But I knew some people that covered
them a few years ago. But I mean, you got,
what was it, Adam Thielen was there, I think this

(01:53:33):
week or something like that. Yeah, I just I don't
I don't know, Like I don't have very much more
knowledge than you do. It's not something obviously that we
were going to ever cover. So it's just like I
just kind of have always viewed it like, Okay, it
just seems like it's a party of a minor league
team or something. But obviously it's it's like bucket list

(01:53:55):
material or something for a lot of people out there.
And I love the I love the Savannah banana name.
I'm a huge fan of like Minor League Baseball names,
Montgomery Biscuits and you know, all of that kind of stuff.
Big fan and the bananas. That makes all the sense
in the world. And it rolls off the tongue and again,
it looks like a fun thing for kids or something.

(01:54:16):
But I'm not sure why it's become like this big.
I would have to read a lot more into it
to fully understand.

Speaker 2 (01:54:24):
Yeah, I'm just looking right now. World Tour. And you know,
to their credit, they're on ESPN because, like I said,
I was slipping channels today, just a little downtime. And
they were playing in Charlotte and packed house. And when
I say playing in Charlotte, I'm not talking about like
the eight thousand seat minor league's team. They were playing
at Bank of America Stadium where the Carolina Panthers play,

(01:54:44):
and huge crowd. They were in Nashville at the you know,
Nissan Stadium where the Titans play. They were in Clemson
a few weeks ago. They will then in a few
weeks go to Washington, d C. Where the Nats play.
Fenway Park, Citizen Bank Park, Camden Yards are all on
the schedule coming up. I was just curious if you

(01:55:04):
knew anything about it.

Speaker 3 (01:55:05):
No, I mean not more than just I know they're
super popular and it's clearly something that a lot of
people get a lot of enjoyment out of. So that's great.
Maybe someday. I mean, they were here in Nashville and
I could I guess I could have gone. I didn't
even know it, but it does seem crazy that you're
putting that you're gonna football stadiums and that many people
are coming out for it. They must just be wildly entertaining.

Speaker 2 (01:55:28):
Yeah. I had a excuse me, a female friend overseas
who knew I covered sports, and she was like, oh,
I don't really know anything about baseball, but the Savannah
bananas are fun. And I'm like, oh, maybe this thing
is way bigger than I am. I'm looking right now,
they have ten point two million followers on TikTok, and
let's see how many they have on Instagram. I know

(01:55:48):
this is bad radio, but I just you know, and
they were showing highlights on TV and I just, you know,
I'm just trying to figure it all out. Three point
three million followers on Instagram, ten point two million followers
on TikTok So. Andy Dalton and Adam Thielen were among
those that were in the crowd on Saturday night in Charlotte.
All right, let's wrap the show. We only got a
couple of minutes left. Let's talk game to NBA Finals.

(01:56:13):
We have Indiana at Oklahoma City. Talked about it a
little bit before, you know, I'll just be real. I'll
give my kind of quick take on it. Okay, See,
I give them credit because they've had some pretty you know,
crushing losses Game one against Denver. Earlier in the playoffs,
they lost a game or two against Minnesota, and we're
able to bounce back. They are very young, but they

(01:56:35):
seem to be very resilient. They seem to do a
good job of putting things behind them quickly. And to
their credit, they were in complete control for most of
that game. They did force twenty six total turnovers. You know,
I just think that as crazy as it was, I
guess it was twenty five total turnovers. But as crazy
as it was in game one, I do think they

(01:56:56):
come back and win Game two Oklahoma City on Tuesday night.

Speaker 3 (01:56:59):
I mean, they kind of have to. I feel the
same way. If they don't, boy, it's gonna be just
don't even text me, just let it go. Yeah, I mean,
I feel like they're gonna blow them out. But again,
I felt the same thing about the Knicks. I don't
think the Pacers are gonna go down that easy. I
just feel like the most likely scenario is the Thunder

(01:57:19):
come out hot and put the thing out of reach
pretty quickly and just keep the foot on the gas
all the way through, and they go back to Andy
one one to one. I feel like they'll win by
fifteen or more tomorrow. That's just my gut feeling on it.
And it terrifies me to say that because the Pacers
just seem to stomp predictions like that really quickly.

Speaker 2 (01:57:41):
It seems like you had you had the Thunder winning
the series. Did Game one change anything outside of the
game's outcome as far as what you think how you
think the series is gonna end up.

Speaker 3 (01:57:54):
No, I mean, I said Thunder in five and I
still think that that could be true, but this might
push it to I also think that more than anything else,
This is just one of those where it's just like,
this is why I didn't like the discourse about this
being a giant mismatch and the Pacers having no shot
and all this kind of stuff, because they're really good
and when you get to this point, there's a reason

(01:58:15):
why you made it as far as you did, and
this team did not have an easy road to the
NBA Finals whatsoever. And now they've taken game one on
the road against a very young team that's in their
first NBA finals. That's still I mean, really, I mean,
they're babies in a lot of respects. As good as
they are, especially at this point, they just they don't
have that requisite experience. So I look at that and

(01:58:37):
it gives you a little bit of pause, but I
think it maybe pushes this series to six. That's about
as far as I would go. I still think the
Thunder are the better team and will prove that out
throughout the course of this series. But it's just one
of those that remind you that the games actually have
to be played, and there's a lot of talent on
both sides.

Speaker 2 (01:58:55):
Yeah, I'll take the Thunder as well. I still think
the Thunder win the series. I never thought it was
gonna be in four. I don't think I ever thought
it was gonna be in five. I definitely don't think
it will be. Now we gotta get out of here. Well,
Thank the crew, Mary Mack on the board, Ian In
for Free, Steve Sega on the update desk for my partner,
Jason Martin Amra Torres, Do me a favor, do us

(01:59:16):
a huge favor. Make sure to download the podcast wherever
you get podcasts, download Tours and Martin Fox Sports Radio Weekends.
Coming up next Bernie Fratto of The Bernie Fratto Show.
He's got so much on a busy weekend sports Bernie
Fratto's next for Jason Martin Ameraturs

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