05/29/2021 – The Fellas with Anthony Gargano - Fox Sports Radio

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Sports morningverybuddy, happy, happy, happy, happy sports Saturday,
Memorial Day weekend to all across the nation. And first

(00:21):
of all, of course, thank you to all of our
men and women who have served this amazing country. We
thank you for your service as we celebrate Memorial Day weekend,
the gateway to summer one. And uh, the great thing
about Memorial Day weekend and this year's we got ball.

(00:46):
Like I'm in the East coach, so I'm out of Philadelphia,
and it's raining up and down the East coast, so
it's it's cold. Usually it's summertime. Right. We have a
beach to the seashore nearby. It's fifty five degrees in raining,
so there's no beach excursions. But it don't matter to

(01:06):
me because all I care about is a ball. That's
what I care about. Some masket ball, that's right. Basketball
and the playoffs last night did not disappoint. Last night.
You saw tatum epic performance fifty spot. He throws a

(01:28):
fifty burger out there. Jason Tatum was incandescent last night.
These Nets get out to a nineteen to four lead
early and it looked like, well, yeah, it looked like
Brooklyn was going to blow the Celtics out and take
a commanding three oh lead in that series, runaway and

(01:52):
hide from the Celtics. But you've take him a lot
of credit. He was fabulous. Man, he came back strong
and uh, he was amazing all game long. Tatum drops
fifty and uh, somehow Boston is able to beat Brooklyn.

(02:13):
Amazing though. Man sixteen out of thirty five threes. He
had seven assists, six boards. Tristan Thompson helps out the
injury with Robert Williams. He grabbed your thirteen boards and
nineteen points. That that's a shame because somethings have been
banged up. You know, let's face it, going into this

(02:33):
thing without without having to be that shorthanded Jaylen Brown.
I mean, that's such a huge loss. So they come
up big, they survive. And speaking of survive, the Clippers
man facing extinction, go to Dallas down oh two and

(03:00):
in wow, down the stretch. What great defense. They really
outplayed Dallas big time the entire fourth quarter. Lucas out
of his mind forty four, but so is Kauai and
playoff pp oh, playoff Paul Georges, he showed up last

(03:23):
night nine, seven and four. Kauai was was terrific thirty
six and uh. Something to keep an eye out last
night that I found interesting was they got Rondo guarding Luca.
Luca was a man possessed like he was the first
two games of the series. Well, interestingly, fourth quarter Rondo

(03:48):
slows him down. The Clippers I think come back and
win the series, and I think they ride Rondo and
his defense against Luca. That's something to watch. So we'll
talk about that today. And of course the Hawks take
care of the Knicks. It's not even close. They Trey Young,

(04:10):
after being spit upon, has his revenge against the Knicks.
And I will get into it all all the drama,
all the games this weekend. But let me introduce where
the fellas. I'm Anthony Gargano and of course my main
man riding beside me every week. It's the great Figgy

(04:31):
Kevin Figgures. Good morning, Figgy man, Anthony. What's going on?
What's up? Baby? Oh? You know? Loving life? Loving this playoffs?
Right now? Dude, some good ball last night ball, you
know it's funny. I can just get shere enjoyment out
of Tatum and what a great ballplayer he is. What
a what a great player, and and the fact that

(04:53):
he goes and to single handedly take care of to
Big three. Not that I think that Bolson is gonna
in the series, but I do think there's a little
bit of vulnerability that nobody sees in Brooklyn. Then it
was exposed last night to a degree. I mean Jason Tatum. Now,

(05:14):
granted it's easy for me to say he's not gonna
score fifty every night, when he scored fifty and I
think three of the last six games he's played in
or whatever it is. It's gonna take herculean efforts for
him every single night, or from him every night for
them to have a chance to even win. And look
that they talked about it after the game. You know,
guys like Joe Harris, a lot of their role players
did nothing and look as great as superstar players are,

(05:37):
no team is ever gonna be able to win consistently
unless they get consistent production from their role players. Into
a certain degree. You can say that about the Dallas Mavericks.
I mean, look at what Tim Hardaway Jr. And Dory
and Phinney Smith were doing in games won. In Game two,
along with Luka don Check. Well, those guys don't show
up and get cooled off. You know. In Game three,
Luca don Check was just as spectacular as he has

(05:57):
been the first couple of games. But as the others
the other guys being held down, So will the Celtics
or will another team once the Nets. I won't say
if the Nets, but once the Nets, when the Nets
do advance, the key is being able to slow down
the other guys enough and knowing the Star players are
gonna do their thing. Will teams be able to do that?
I don't think they'll be able to do it consistently

(06:18):
until and less and until they play Philadelphia, which would
be a very interesting matchup. Um, but you're right, so
I do. I don't think there's a little bit of
the crack in the armor, maybe a little bit of
a formula for how you could beat the Brooklyn Nets,
and that is to allow the Stars to do their
thing and take away any of the other ancillary players. Yeah,
and and listen, I don't Boston doesn't have the manpower

(06:40):
to do it. And no, not for Jalen Brown and
Hayward and Walker and everybody's healthy, ready to go. You know.
I think they're formidable, but not this team. This team's
one main squad. I mean, that's basically what you got.
You know, you need. Jaylon Brown's is a big deal
because you're such a great defender. It's it's a great

(07:00):
two way player. This team can't do that. They can't.
But I was talking more about as you get further
down and including Milwaukee, because we'll see Milwaukee again tonight.
It's closed out time in Milwaukee Miami in that series.
And now I also said, we talked last week about

(07:23):
you know, series that were most likely to go seven,
and we thought that heat Milwaukee could be that in
Milwaukee has just trounced them from the outset in every
game that they've played. Well, it's amazing, right because the
first game was over time and it's a it's a
buzzer beat and the whole thing. And then, like you said,
those lays two game Route City, Route's City. So you wonder, well,

(07:50):
first of all you wonder, is Jimmy getting on everybody's there?
You know, it's it's one thing if you're stuck in
the bubble with him, you gotta do what he says
outside the bubble. I don't know, but it's a fascinating story.
Of Milwaukee. Is this the year that the box who

(08:11):
have disappointed Let's face it, they failed the last couple
of years. Is this the year that they come through?
And it's gonna be interesting to kind of watch this
thing play out because they I think they have a
formula debeat Brooklyn. Now the shame is is that they
lost Donte DiVincenzo, who's a really good role player. He's

(08:31):
out for the rest of the playoffs with ligament damaging
in his foot right, and depth is not their strength
to begin with, so you can't lose one of the
key guys that you depend on, especially on the defensive
end of the floor. But you're right, you know, this
has the feel of a team that's kind of flying
under the radar, that has not really lived up to
their expectations the last couple of years, and now nobody

(08:52):
really despite the fact that they won fourty six games
this year, and people really don't believe they're gonna do
much here. And I think this is probably a very
to say, just spot for them to be in as
opposed to them being the top overall seat with all
the expectations in the world. And I think people are
sleeping on him a little bit. Yeah, you know what
it is, Right Like, we've seen this before a million times.

(09:13):
You got this team, everybody's on him, everybody's on him,
everybody's on them, and then they disappoint, disappoint, and then
they people ignore him and that's when they break through.
And we've seen that plot line play out somewhat with
the Bills, right like, because everybody was down on Buffalo
because Buffalo, and all of a sudden, then they had

(09:34):
the breakthrough season to get them mad contention, right. I
think back to the Dallas Mavericks inven when they won
the championship and beat the Heatles in the NBA Finals.
Nobody saw that team coming from anywhere. The Mavericks have
been a perennial fifty win team. Dark had won the
m v P a few years before, and they lost
in the first rounds of the Warriors, who was an
eight seat at the time, and nobody thought the Mavericks

(09:56):
should do anything. All of a sudden, they come out,
they run the Lakers off the floor. Who I just
won back to back championships, you don't winning the conference
finals against Oklahoma City, I believe it was, and then
they win the NBA Finals against the Miami Heat. You
know this, this Milwaukee team kind of has that same feel.
They're a team that floats around the top of the conference.
You know, they're really good, but they disappoint every year
and you don't expect them to do anything, and then

(10:17):
for whatever reason, things kind of catch on for them.
And I do think Jrew Holiday is a big part
of why they can find themselves contending for the Eastern
Conference crown because he makes a big difference offensively and
defensively for them and take some of the pressure off
of Chris Middleton to have to try to score twenty
five a night because he can't do that on a
night in, night out basis. Yeah, dead on. Uh when

(10:40):
you got cooking, this holiday weaken you off the tomorrow,
Yeah off tomorrow. Just it's really just a just a
lay low kind of weekend. So, you know, doing some
of my engagement photos with the wife to be coming
up here on later this afternoon, man, So taking care
of that. It's been some time with the family. On
Sunday a photo is going to be at so we're

(11:01):
doing a couple of different things, but that this coming
weekend we have one other in the work that's not
locked in yet, so I don't want to mention it publicly,
but we're gonna go out on her parents. They have
like a really small, like like a little sail boat.
So we're gonna do some photos on the boat on
the water. Yeah. Yeah, so yeah, that's awesome. So so
that'll be fine. We're looking forward to the white pants.

(11:22):
I don't know if we're gonna do the white pantaby
the whole, the whole, the whole yacht theme. I don't
know if I'm going with that with that look, the
captain or anything. I guess we could do a captain.
It's a Neil sort of situation, but we're not. But
I thought you do a white party. Yeah no, no,
not really like d Wade. Yeah, for whatever reason, that's
not really my style. Were not really my style. I'll lead,

(11:44):
I'll lead out to d Wade and Lebron to do
to do that thing. So but that's that's pretty much
what I have cooking that a whole lot, just laying
low for the most part. So any anything big for you?
You got baseball this weekend? What's going on? It's wash out, man,
you know the weather huh, oh my god, it's horrible.
This weekend. It was gorgeous. It was like ninety degrees
right every day, ninety and sunny this weekend. Man, yesterday

(12:08):
the clouds rolled in, the tents dropped, and uh all
weekend fifty five and rainy through up until Monday. So
you know, so that means the kids are inside playing
Fortnite this weekend or what? Yeah? Yeah, in fact, I
can't believe you just said that. Yesterday they get it
for the PlayStation. Okay, they got to Fortnite, right, you know, Oh,

(12:33):
I know he's don't bother. Daddy six is a playing tonight. Yeah. Basically,
you turn on the video game, use that TV. Here's
Daddy's TV. You guys do your thing, you know right,
don't make too much noise, don't fight each other. You
know it's right that. Wow, you must be in my
house because I tell all that stop fighting. Stop fighting, alright, alright,
stop fighting. He's watching bull Man. Even though it was

(12:56):
years ago, mentally, I feel like I'm probably still a
child in some sensus. So that was me back in
the day. That was my mom yelling at us, don't fight,
play the video game, be quiet, stop being too loud.
It was the best we I fought so during with
me last like daddy, can we lay down with you? Yeah?
You know, so they come back. I got one on

(13:20):
like he's under my knucks, under my arm right the
the eight year old. I got the eleven year old
who's who's like baby shock. He's a monster. He's like
five seven, he's eleven years old, these monster and he's
laying on my chest. And then I got this monster
dog who's the good goochs, who weighs a hundred pounds

(13:44):
and he's laying on me. I got two three of
them laying on me. I was like a coma this
morning trying to get up. I was like, I gotta
take the bathroom. I was like, how what am I
supposed to? You guys got me trapped. That's the beauty
and God bless some day you will experience that lovely moment.
Can only hope I appreciate her brother the big thing

(14:04):
to eat, much like your biggest son. Laying on you
was like a dog. You know, the big dogs always
feel like they're the small ones. You know, they're the
ones that want to jump, you know, jump into your
lap and then the whole chair collapses. It's like, what
are you doing. You know, He's like, dude, daddy, can
I tackle you? I was like, no, buddy, I'd rather
you not. I'm good man. Alright, we get the hardwood

(14:26):
floor that doesn't feel like get tackled, that's sacked to night. Now, yeah,
because it's one of those just like all right, like
when they're younger or smaller, although tackle you fall back like,
oh no, now he tries to. Now he legitimately will
tackle you. He's taor forget about it. Ridiculous. Uh, we
got lots to get to Fellas on a holiday weekend,

(14:48):
Memorial Day weekend, just getting started, Figgy and Bow and Chris.
That's us every week right here on Fox Sports Radio.
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Fox sports
Radio dot com and within the I Heart Radio app.

(15:11):
Search f s R to listen live. Oh, welcome back
Fellas on a Saturday morning holiday weekend. Of course, the
Fellas are brought to you by Discover. Discovery matches all

(15:31):
the cash back you earn on your credit card at
the end of your first year. It's amazing because discovers
accepted at places in the United States to take credit
cards learn more at discover dot com slash Yes Nelson
Report limitations apply, So I can't wait for it. I

(15:56):
can't wait for it tonight. So the week started, let
me Philly. He's not like billion on everything, right, So
the week starts Ben Simmons. You know I'm a Ben fan, right,
So my man has fifteen fifteen and six six being

(16:16):
the points, fifteen dimes, fifteen boards in game one of
the series. Now, Game one between the Sixers and Wizards
was kind of sloggy because the big Man gets in
foul trouble and they were all for like ten days,
so there was a little bit of a ross and
it was never really in doubt like tonight's game. Never,

(16:37):
it's not really gonna be in doubt, and they're gonna
sweep the Wizards. But he guys, your fifteen fifteen six points.
Everybody's busting his stones about what not scoring enough points? Yes? Okay,
and it's like, you'll do you have fifteen rebounds fifteen
and six, Like what what's that's a big and he's
playing he's like Rivus Island playing to beat defense? Right?

(17:02):
Did you know Bradley Beale with Ben Simmons guarding him
was one for six, one for six. I mean, that's
that's reevous. Yeah. You know, the problem is, and this
sounds like an old man yelling at the at the clouds.
We're in the era of Steph Curry and Damian Lillard

(17:25):
and all these spectacular shots and all of that. And so,
first of all, the NBA has always been kind of
like a scores league, and we've always been infatuated with
guys who can fill up the stat sheet. It's probably
been Simmons can't score points. We know that he can
score him I can't shoot, but he can score. But
I mean, there's so many other ways to be able
to impact the game. That's one thing that I appreciated
about Jason Kidd in his younger years. You know, he

(17:47):
would have a lot of games where he would score
six points, but he'd have fifteen point, fifteen assists and
twenty rebounds and be able to dominate and control the
basketball game without even scoring. That is possible to do,
despite what some of the people knowing the highlights shows
show you. And so I think he Ben is a
bit of a throwback from that standpoint, And that's one
thing I do appreciate about his game. You know when

(18:08):
he's on and he's playing right, he doesn't have to
be able to score points to put his mark on
a basketball game. You can dominate a game without scoring
a lot of points. And he's he's the perfect example
of that. Yeah, because like you know, it's funny because
people want to denigrade and they call him Rondo, right,
I mean, Rondo is the same thing in Boston. He
could dominate games without scoring. Right, Except here's the difference
between Rondo and Simmons a foot Yeah, well yeah, that's

(18:31):
the obvious. Is really seven feats tall and moves like
a gazelle. Right, so we have never seen anyone. This
is why he's a unicorn that can guard one through
five and fig he drives means sane. These people, they
go knocks on this kid. He drives me nuts. So anyway,

(18:54):
he comes back in game two and has a monster
and he's the He scores, he does everything. It's a blowout.
People are happy. It's it's amazing, how man, how that
the whole narrative went, yeah, going, no, he was saying,

(19:18):
it's just you know, you score, Okay, So he scores
what twenty two points I believe is what he scored
UH in the previous game, and so is assists and
his rebounds are down. So you'd rather him have a
couple of more points and significantly less rebounds and assists.
And you feel like that's that's a better game. That's
not always necessarily the case. I mean, you don't believe me.
Look at what Kevin Durant and James Harden did on

(19:38):
Friday night and they didn't win. They sure scored a
lot of points, though, And that's not to say the
guys did that. They didn't play well and they didn't
do their part. That's fine, But there's other ways to
be able to control UH and and impose your will
on a basketball game than just scoring points all the time.
And I think this goes to your point. We're talking
about the Nets in general and why you think they
may struggle as they get deeper and deeper into the postseason.

(19:58):
We know they can score, can they do enough of
the other things? And Philadelphia is talented enough to be
able to do all that. You know, Ben Simmons doesn't
have to score twenty point tonight. If Tobias Harris is on,
you know, if for heaven's sake of Danny Green, can
show up once offensively for for a quarter or two,
will make an open shot and Seth Curry if he
can make out slideshots. Ben Simmons doesn't need to score

(20:20):
twenty points per game to be able to put his
mark on a basketball game. And that's that's the that's
the miss, the misconception that I think a lot of
fans have. If you're not scoring points, if you're not
any good, and you're not making an impact, and that's
a and that's a problem. Thank you. I mean, bless
your heart, Figgy, but you don't understand, bless your heart

(20:41):
because the craziness that ensues, it's it's unbelievable, the insanity
of it all. So tell me about the Lakers. So
here's my fear, okay, is that well it's not really
right fear, but it's it's that the Western Conference playoffs,

(21:03):
which I really thought we're gonna be drama filled, and
they're they've been good. I mean, obviously the Clippers Dallas series, fun, Portland, Denver.
But my fear is just a basketball fan, you know, onlooker,
he's that reality. There's no competition. Lakers were all right

(21:25):
through right through the West. I mean, yeah, look if
they continue to click the way that they are. For
Lebron James is as aggressive as he was in last
games in the last second half of the amazing again,
Oh my god. Sometimes I marvel at him and go
to clutches. Your word, man, you know, to do what
he's doing at his age with the injury, the ankle

(21:47):
injury that he's dealing with currently. You know, people were
wondering while he wasn't really aggressive at driving to the
basket in the first couple of games, and then the
second half of Game three, he just flipped the switch
and just drove every single time in the third and
fourth quarter. And then Anthony Davis, after not showing up
in Game one, has looked amazing the last couple of games.
It really comes down to those two. You know, they're
not making outside outside shots. That's been one of their

(22:08):
achilles heels even the last couple of years. But it
doesn't matter because they destroyed Phoenix on the inside. And
that's one advantage of the Lakers have over pretty much
everybody else. You have two of the best interior players
in the sport playing on the same team in Anthony
Davis and Lebron James, and that's really where the difference
comes in. So, I mean, they're dominant defensively, they're the

(22:29):
top defensive team in the league. So if they can
hold you down defensively and to dominate you in the paint,
what are you gonna do to be able to stop them?
So I agree they're the clearly the best seven set
of all time. And the way that this is stacking
up right now, Anthony, them being number seven instead of
number six is actually may end up working in their
favor because now you're talking about facing a Phoenix Suns
team with Chris Paul's hurt again in the playoffs, which

(22:51):
always happens. They're gonna roll through them. Then you have
the winner of Denver and Portland coming up in the
next round, so and you're probably gonna make quick work
of either of those teams. So then you're talking about
the Clippers or the Utah Jazz or potentially the Dallas
Mavericks coming up in the in the in the in
the conference finals. And I don't think people would believe
they'd have much of an issue with many of those teams.

(23:12):
Maybe Utah, but probably not. So I mean, to your point, yeah,
I don't think anybody in the Western Conference is really
gonna be able to stand up to the Lakers. They're
only there. Only issue is they're gonna have to get
some contributions from the role players. Eventually, you your k cps,
your your Kuzma's. Those guys are gonna have to make
their outside shots the deeper and deeper you get into

(23:33):
the postseason because a team like Utah, I'm telling you,
as good as the Lakers are defensively Utah, the way
they jack up threes and the way that they make
their three point You're not gonna be able to hold
them under a hundred points four times in a series.
That's just not gonna happen. You're gonna have to be
able to hang with them offensively. That would be my
only fear for the Lakers getting their guys going from

(23:54):
the outside. Lebron and a d can only do so
much between the two of them. You gotta you gotta
get help from somebody else. Do you to me the
only team that I think could actually beat them, he's
down to one. Yeah, the Clippers, absolutely, And even with
the Clippers losing those first couple of games against Dallas,

(24:17):
Dallas was just shooting at a ridiculous clip. I don't
know if it was a historic or not, but I
know they shot over from three point distance in game
one and game two, and look, the Clippers just didn't
make shots. In Game one. It was pretty easily explained
about why they lost Game two. They hung with them
right there. I mean, how does Dallas was The Clippers
were hanging with them. They just couldn't get any stops defensively.
So I just don't if things always progress or regress

(24:40):
to the mean, the Dallas Mavericks are not gonna be
shooting from three point distance the entire series. Dory and
Phinney Smith and Tim Hardaway Jr. Are Are good players,
are solid players. They're not lightening you up to twenty
and thirty every single night. So when you talk about
who's gonna win a seven game series, always try to
look back and look at things that are repeatable. What's
what's the most repeatable is something that can happen throughout

(25:01):
the course of an entire series. Those guys are not
gonna be able to play that way for an entire series,
which is why even with the Clippers being down old
two and having to go on the road for games
three and four. I still felt fairly confident that they
had a good chance of being able to win the series.
And I still and after what happened on Friday night,
I'm even more confident that they have a chance to
come back and win this series. Yeah, I think you're

(25:23):
I think you're dead right. I'll tell you on that note.
HiT's just some trending and then we'll continue. All right, Well,
we're talking about that victory that the Clippers had in Dallas.
One eighteen to one. Oh wait was the final score.
Kawhi Learnder made his first eight field goals, finished with
thirty six points, Paul George twenty nine points. They come
by Anthony to shoot sixty percent from the field between

(25:43):
the two of them, absolutely ridiculous. Luca don Chick was
no slout. She scored forty four points, nine boards, nine assists.
Still was not enough. Dallas is leading a series, as
we mentioned, is now down to two games to one.
Brooklyn's lead over the Celtics now to one as well.
Jayson Tatum scoring fifty points leading Boston to to one

(26:03):
nineteen victory. Atlanta has a two one lead over the Knicks.
Trey Young's coming out party seems to be in his
playoff series against the Knicks, twenty one points dished out
fourteen assists. The final score there was one oh five
to four on the Baseball Diamond. Plenty of Rainhouns. By
the way, as you were talking about inclement weather across
the eastern part of the country there Anthony, but got

(26:23):
some games in here on the West Coast, specifically the
Giants and Dodgers. Giants getting a victory and extra innings
over the Dodgers eight to five, Buster Posey hitting his
tenth on runder the season. He's having a resurgeon. What's
happened to him? You know? He'goria which like ten years ago.
It was right while Posey sat out last year because
of COVID so we opted out, had a full season
to rest and recover, and now he's playing back to

(26:45):
US to US m VP level form at this point.
They're pitching has been spectacular. They're getting contributions from God's
like Brandon Crawford. You know, they I don't know if
they're gonna go away or not. It's not a sixty
game season. We have to play one sixty two, so
we'll see if they can be game. The game failed
the games in the early starter. That's true. Oh yeah,
that's right. Your your old friend Gabe Kapler, the manager

(27:06):
out there in San Francisco. Elsewhere you at the Padres.
They scored seven runs on the top of the eleventh inning.
They came away with a ten to three victory over Houston,
Kyle Lewis with a home run for Seattle. They noted
the three to two victory over Texas Oakland, handing Showotani
his first loss of the season as they beat the
Angels three to one. Back to the Fellas, All right,

(27:28):
that's us, we are the Fellas. Yeah. By the way,
did you see the Padres are seven and out against
the American League. It's right, seven in the league play.
Pretty impressive, man, Pretty impressive by the Pods. Yeah, early on.
I don't know. I think it's been a fun it's
been a fun early early baseball season despite all the

(27:51):
strikeouts in the home runs and that kind of narrative,
but you know, the stats notwithstanding, it's been a fairly
entertaining early start to this season, you know. Yeah, right, So,
I mean a close race in the n O West
so far. I mean we expect that the Padres and
Dodgers to be neck and neck. I don't think anybody
thought the Giants would get off to the start that
they've gotten off to at this point. So that's that's

(28:12):
pretty exciting to see. You got the drama with LaRussa
in Chicago. Something new pops up every single week with them,
but they win in spite of it, you know. So
it's amazing, right, it's so you know what's crazy is that,
uh Joe Girardi has stopped talking to the media now,

(28:34):
well he he will not give updates. Yeah, well he's
he's all bitsy and and and it's amazing these dudes.
It still cracks me up to this day that these
coaches still don't get it. Yeah. Well, and it goes
into something bigger and maybe we can get into it.

(28:55):
I don't know if you saw it, nyami Osaka said
to bring it up. Yeah, I feel very strongly about it.
So talking about Joe and I know he had a
pretty coarse interaction with the Philadelphia media maybe a week
or two ago. We got really frustrated and that was
probably the genesis of this. Right. No, I don't disagree,
but yeah, these these guys are trying to skirt their

(29:18):
responsibility and talking to the media, and it's like this
is part of the job. You know, I don't understand,
you know, what the what the issue is. Joe has
been around long enough, Joel was in the media. He
come on, he knows how this thing works. I don't
always talking. I mean, you know, I mean, first of all,
and here's jell thing too. The other nonsense. When it

(29:39):
comes to the sports media, it's benign. In this day
and age, sports media is benign. So when I come
into Taylor that at the at the end of Oh
my god, Figgy, I mean, you want to talk about
the press being gackles, right, like these dudes, these dudes

(30:05):
would carve you up. I mean, I'll never forget how
nasty it was East Coast, all were all over La
times was tough, Like it wasn't just New York. I
mean it was all over and Chicago like Ja Marriotti,
Like it was like the end of the nineties. Like

(30:25):
so the eighties and nineties were vicious, early two thousand's
like this. The guys would get like I understood if
you were getting if you got tired of that, because
they would just rake you through the calls, right, I mean,
they're crawling up your geeky with a microscope. Nowadays, stop,

(30:48):
there's a million different outlets the you don't need, like
sports doesn't need mainstream media, so they don't get the access.
You know, they got it easy to deal with the
media well, and I think if you're a manager of
a baseball team, stop well. And with that, I think

(31:08):
the it's a generational thing where now we have social
media and these guys have rabbity ears because you know,
they're not getting as challenged by the traditional forms of
media like they have been in the past, but now
they're gonna bombard it with social media things, and so
they feel like they can control their own narrative. They
have their own Twitter accounts and all that, so they
don't they feel the need that they can just skirt

(31:29):
around all the traditional media stuff. I don't have to
deal with you. I don't want to deal with you.
But I still recognize all the darts that are coming
towards me. And because of all of those, and I
use Kevin Duran and as an example, Mr Burnery account,
all the darts that are come in my direction, I
can respond to you with the Burner account and I
can just blow off the rest of the media. I
don't want to talk to anybody. I want to talk
to any of you guys. So I'm just gonna go

(31:50):
off from the corner and do my own thing. I'll
put out a little thing in the Players Tribune, say
what I need to say, and I'll just keep on pushing.
And I think that's how a lot of these people,
a lot of these managers, and a lot of these
players and coaches think nowadays it's wild. I I want
to I want to set it up in a bigger
way and we'll bring the guys in and the whole thing.

(32:11):
But I mean, I just remember, dude, I remember guys.
I'll tell some good stories from good Matt like fights
and it was crazy like stuff that you couldn't even
imagine would happen. I mean, guys barking at each other
and stuff that was really like and columness that would

(32:35):
just eviscerate. But they would viscerate. It wasn't like social
media viscerased, right, it was. It was more like, you know,
it was eloquent and when you got ripped. And by
the way, there there wasn't a lot of voices like
see now on social media. There's so many voices that
it gets dulled right, like it's a lot of noise.

(32:57):
It's like whatever, it's all noise. Back then, there wasn't
a lot of of noise or espenically like a local team,
right like, so if you had you know, if you're
covering the Lakers or the Dodgers or the Yankees or
whatever for the l A Times in the New York
to New York Post, like they had the those the
Post in the Daily News. The tabloids in New York

(33:19):
were crazy like they would just I'll never forget when
pat Riley went to Miami every day for like two
hundred days. The back page and then anything that was
written about basketball. Pat the rat was at the top
of them and they had a rat with pat Riley's

(33:40):
face on it like they got me. They destroyed them
like there was like it was like sport fishing. And
Riley loved it like he did care, like there was
no there was no hurt feelings. He would fire back
at the next in New York. But it's weird, like
it's not anywhere near anything like that today. So Joe

(34:01):
Germardi gets up sad. These guys are all sensitive now
and the problem is the legit columnists, you know, you
don't like the Bill plash Ky's of the world. Their
message will get muddled with you know, Joe buck fan
seven five three eight on Twitter, who goes after it
makes takes personal shots at guys, you know, and so.

(34:22):
And the problem is a lot of the players either
can't or don't want to separate the two, and they
just see all criticism as negative criticism that you know,
and it's all a personal affront to them. Yes, and
so there's really sensitive at this point. Well, let's get
into this because that since we're we're we're need deep,
let's talk about that. We'll talk about the fan behavior.

(34:43):
We got lots to get to. We're the fellas, will
bring in the other guys right here on Fox Sports.
All right, welcome back, fellas. I'm because we got Figgy
Chris shaking, not much man doing all right here, Glad

(35:06):
to be back. Oh, it's good to have you back.
What did you do last weekend when so I, uh, well,
I got my second dose of the COVID vaccine. So
I got taken for a Bronco ride for about twenty
four hours where I just could not get out of
bed at all, but yeah, I mean it hits everyone differently.

(35:26):
I'm glad mine was only twenty four hours, but uh yeah, no,
I'm I'm excited. I think I've got one more week
before it all kicks in and then I know, California
fully fully opens I think June, so it all kind
of lines up and feels kind of a little bit
normal again, which is good because I've been living like
a hermit for almost a year. Yeah, I know, which

(35:48):
felt pretty good this Uh, we had that vibe this
past week because we had a we had eleven thousand
at the Sixers Wizards game, and stuff's opening and it's
gonna be it's back to full capacity next week. Yeah,
I know. I was talking with the bow about going
out for food sometime, but I think the real point

(36:09):
for me is actually going to be not until October though.
But that's because I'm having you know, I'll do a
lot of stuff for the Detroit Lions, covering the Troit
Lions and Michigan people. You know, we're scattered all over
the country and there's going to be from what I've
been working on right now, I'm gonna get quite a
bit of a meet up for some of the Lions
fans who follow our podcast here for Rams Lions, and

(36:30):
I'm gonna get to see so far the first time
and that's gonna be very fun. That's very cool, very cool. Right.
So the topic in hand and I want to get
to is this concept of media. Right. So, now it's
a little bit different with Naomi Osaka because she she

(36:53):
cited mental health as to why she did not want
she does not want to do press conferences at the
French Open Now when she comes out and she says, basically,
I don't want to be subject to a news conference
where people are doubting me and they're putting doubt in

(37:15):
my head and she battles depression, and uh, she had
talked about that before, about her mental health, and I
give her a lot of credit for speaking so openly
about mental health issues. The hard thing is, well, people
don't realize athletes mental health and listen, my my heart

(37:38):
goes out to her because you know, you want her
to be okay and and the whole thing. But I
do believe. Now, I don't know that I want to.
I'm curiously what you guys think, because I do believe
there is a responsibility for athletes to speak to the media,
because the media is a conduit to the fans. It's
not about the media, it's about the fans. If you

(38:01):
follow the sport, you deserve to get some insight into
the sport from its participants, because, let's face it, without fans,
you're not getting paid, in which case Naomi Osaka has
won fifty million dollars past this past year, so you

(38:23):
know there's a responsibility with that kind of financial earning.
Now again, I don't you don't want anyone to be uh,
you know, subject to abuse, but these press conferences are
really benign. Like, you know, we're not gonna ask you
at most, what were you thinking when you missed that

(38:45):
back end? You know, it's not It's not a nasty place.
So that's why I wond there is that more of
saying as sports psychologists, Is that more of that speaking
than in actual damage being done? Figuring what your take
on it? Yeah, I mean it depends. I mean there

(39:08):
there every now and then there is a press conference
where there's clearly a columnist or a writer who has
some sort of agenda with their line of questioning. But
to your point, I feel like those situations are few
and far between, and then also, you know, knowing you're
obligated to speak to the media, but you're not obligated
to answer every question the way that they wanted to
be answered, you can very easily say, you know, I'd

(39:30):
rather not answer that question, or I don't feel comfortable
answering that question or next question. We've seen it happen
multiple times over now you know that writer or media
person can be upset by it, but the question was
asked and they decided they don't want to answer it.
They're still doing the media session, they're fulfilling their obligations
to it. So to your point, I do respect her
and talking about mental health and guys, you know, planting

(39:52):
seeds of doubt in your in your head and all that.
I understand that part of it. But to your point,
you know, this is part of your job as a
as an athlete, just to talk to the media. And again,
if there's a question that you don't want to answer,
no one's forced you to answer it. You know, Marshall
Len didn't get fined for saying, oh, I'm just here,
so I don't get fined. You don't have to be
necessarily like that, but you certainly can find different ways

(40:14):
to skirt around certain questions that you don't feel comfortable
as answering while still fulfilling your duties and talking to
all the media members. Yeah, I mean, I just don't
understand why what like, what's the big deal? Right? I
don't know. I don't want to be, you know, the
guy stuck in in the dark ages of Yeah, help

(40:37):
me understand if I'm getting something wrong. I think there's
another element here that's not spoken about. But we were
kind of up against this off to give it on
the other side. All right, well let's kind of talk
about that. Yeah, yeah, well we'll get we'll get into that.
But there are many issues including I brought up the
Joe Girardi thing. We we got everything fell welcome back

(40:59):
number two. We're fellas. That's right. I'm Anthony Gargana. Was
about to say, big link, big links doing well. I
missed my man, and uh we are the Fellas Figgy
and Chris and Bo And that's us on a Sports
Saturday holiday weekend edition. Happy Memorial Day weekend. And by

(41:21):
the way, thanks to all of our men and women
who served and uh who have been with us and
fought and served and helped out in the middle in
our military, So thanks to all of our people. One
Memorial Day weekend, Uh fake, just curious, do you guys
have anything special? Like? Is Memorial Day weekend a thing

(41:42):
like for us on particularly in this carter of d C,
New York and Philly. There's it's it's a beach weekend. Yeah,
were you guys have it? Generally is as well here?
Um and obviously what the weather, which I wish I
could share with you on the East coast there, Anthony,
Unfortunately I am not unable to. But yeah, it's a

(42:05):
time for people to get out. You know, you get
a little barbecue going, you know. Um, a lot of
people want to wax patriotic, so you'll see a lot
of American flags waving around. People you know, want to
pay respects to to a lot of veterans as they
do on Veterans Day as well. Um. But yeah, it's
just it's kind of a way to kind of get
people together as schools are getting ready to get let
out here pretty soon. It's not that I wouldn't say

(42:26):
it's the official unofficial start of summer. That's more of
like a July fourth sort of thing. But it's definitely
kind of a sign of turning the corner where the
weather is starting and getting nice outside. You mentioned going
to the beach, having a barbecue out back, so it's
it's a lot of that. It's traditionally what we have,
uh in Los Angeles Memorial Day. Yeah, like for us,
it's the it's kind of the gateway the summer, you know,

(42:48):
because the weather turns and spring turns in the summer.
And uh, except for the this weekend, which his raining
and you know it doesn't sound like fun. Yeah, it's
right now it's forty eight degrees in raining and I
just see rain until tomorrow at tomorrow afternoon. The high

(43:11):
tomorrow fifty four. Can you remember a Memorial Day that
was fifty degrees in raining? So it's weird. We do
have that. It's weird. We've kind of had some of
that stuff in recent years. I'm assuming. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
it's weird. But now later in the week it will
get into the seventies and eighties, so it'll be back
to normal. Um. But it's a good day to stay

(43:34):
in and watch hoops baby all day long. That's right,
Oh we got man, it's all day long. I call
it the most wonderful time of the year. But of
course we know that's October because we got a little
bit of everything going on. That's correct, that would be October.
So yeah, you're right. The one thirty Eastern, ten thirty Pacific.

(43:56):
We started all off with heat Box and whether the
heat can survive not get swept? Another great series, Denver importliness,
right man, Wow, Fake they never comes back takes game three.
I was surprised at that. Yeah, I mean, I will
do with the the individual performances, the back and forth
you know that we're having, specifically in that series with

(44:19):
Damian Lillard and the Joker, when those guys have each
dropped at least thirty in every game and they're going
back and forth. I mean, just just in general, one
of the takeaways for me are the individual performances by
so many of the great players. And this happens all
the time when you talk about, you know, all the
star players are aging out. Who's gonna replace m J,
who's gonna replace Kobe, Who's gonna replace Lebron? And I'm

(44:41):
looking at a kid at John Iran who's dropping almost
fifty points in his second season in the NBA against
a really good defensive team. You know, we're just seeing
that the super superstars keep trickling through left and right.
You always you always wonder who those next guys in
the next faces of the league are gonna be, and
they're right here in Dame's not going anywhere. Joker is
only twenties. I mentioned John Morant, who's what twenty one

(45:03):
if even that at this point in time. Just to
see a lot of these Jason Tatum a fifty spot
on Friday Night. I'm excited for the present of the
NBA and more excited for the future. Oh and by
the way, I didn't mention Luca don Nache, who's lightening
up the Clippers just like he did last year in
the playoffs. My god, that's incredible. And then Sixers Wizards

(45:25):
seven p m. Eastern, four pm Pacific and the final
game Jazz and Grizzlies, that series moves to Memphis, tied
it one. You know, would you have been the least
bit concerned if was if going back to Washington Westbrook
was healthy that you can possibly drop a game, or

(45:45):
did you think this will sweep all the way regardless? Noah,
I remember, you know, you look at a game or
two and see how series play themselves out and you
wonder if you saw something to change your mind. Nah, yeah,
I think they only said they're they're only like it's funny.
The Sixers had a lot of rust in Game one.

(46:06):
You could see the fact that they had that long layoff.
It's it affected him a little bit. They were never
in doubt. The game is never really in doubt. They
just don't have enough. I mean Westbrook, I don't even
know how you know, between Westbrook and bald they're terrific,
but they're not enough that that supporting cast is terrible.
I mean, they got nothing around that team. And here's

(46:28):
here's the problem for the rest of the league, or
let the rest of the East when it comes to
the Sixers, is that their role players are now kind
of taking form. So that team now, you know, I
know that team pretty intimately. So Doc Rivers now has
that team together, and he's got defined roles so important. Yes,

(46:56):
so fig like you know Simmonds, you know him be
and you know Tobias High. It's very scored thirty and
the first in Game one in the first half, right,
and he's been a very consistent score. He's the Sixers
number two score and he provides that second banana to

(47:18):
Joel and Bed. So that's his role and he's flourishing
at it. It's a bias is terrific. And so you
got him. You got the two spacers in Green and Curry,
who are your three point specialists. You got George Hill,
who is your veterans stabilizer guard. You got another defensive

(47:40):
stalwart in Thible batist table. Young player can guard one
through four, Simmons guards one through five, and this kid
can d up. The other night he had five blocks,
four steals and plays lockdown defense. And then they got
the from Kentucky who I love Tyrese Maxie who choke

(48:04):
shake Milton's minutes. Who is this energizer energy guy. They
get Milton and cork Mas who can shoot threes and
they don't have to play if they're not hitting their threes,
they don't see that. They don't see any minutes. And
then you got to White Howard to back up and bead.
I mean, that's that's a deep, formidable squad. Absolutely, Yeah,

(48:25):
it's hard to find a weakness there. If there was
another weakness, you say, maybe outside of Ben, you don't
have someone who's a natural creator of offense. If you
wanted to say that that was maybe a potential weakness
for them, But I mean, look, all you gotta do
is get the ball across the half court line and
give it to Joel and Bead and you're You're done.
What else do you need? You know what I mean?
Right man? And you got to buy is that that

(48:48):
you can create pretty well. And if Simmons see if
Simmons is playing like he played a Game two where
if you're gonna double and triple and Bead and he's
gonna just a actor in that way, I mean he's
tough to guard when he's going downhill, which better teams

(49:08):
are are gonna defend him more. You know, they're gone
him a tougher opposition than the Washington Wizards would. So
I don't think that's something that you can rely on
on a night and night out basis that Ben is
gonna score like that and be that efficient from the
floor attack in the basket against better competition. That's what
interesting question because I agree with you. I think you're

(49:30):
dead right about it. But when you look at the
teams in the East, they may not see that kind
of defense until the finals. And the Lakers because Brooklyn
plays no defense, and in Atlanta doesn't play the defense.
And even it was the Knicks, they're gonna losing four
or five anyway. So in reality, you may not see

(49:52):
that kind of play where it matters until the finals
because Brooklyn they just they don't. They play no d defense. Yeah,
it will be interesting to see if I think Kevin
Durant can play defense when he wants to, and my
guess is especially when they would need to, they can
put him on Ben Simmons, and I think that will
be an interesting matchup. Uh should have come to that.

(50:13):
I mean, we talked about Milwaukee. You know they play
some defense, So if if it's Milwaukee, I agree with you.
I think it's there and it's a lot. You know,
it's funny. Sixes in Milwaukee are very similar, yes, very much.
So you know we're Honest and Ben are very similar
kind of players where you could wall those guys off

(50:34):
because they're not great shooters and they're not great free
throw shooters. Yeah, definitely, And of course that the matchup
people will be eyeing in on because they're both two
bigs is uh Embiid and Janice And maybe there will
be times where Honest will be tasked with having to
defend uh Joel Embiid and that will be an exciting,
entertaining matchup to be able to watch. So that'd be

(50:55):
an intriguing one. Um, I still find Brooke Brooklyn making
a deep law stopping the ambased I mean, well, I mean,
Janice was the defensive player of the year. It's not
like he's a slouch. Um. So I thought bat was
the defensive player of the year and he wanted I'm
talking to I'm just last year. Ben might winner this

(51:19):
year and he should absolutely should. Yeah, it's just funny.
I I'm you know, right right right, you know, especially
like if the big man was here, I'd be tortured
right now, right And by the way, I'm with you,
like I there's nothing I'd love to see more than

(51:40):
Brooklyn not make it to the NBA Finals. So I hope,
I'm I absolutely hope I'm wrong. I'm picking them to
go to the NBA Finals. I know their defense isn't
that great. I still feel that they can find a
way to muster up just enough while being able to
score enough points. But here's here's my old Kidi side.
Look at it from a basketball standpoint, because you will
do that. And I agree with you, like k dcomplete

(52:01):
some D. But we're through support defense coming from other
than Durant. I mean, yeah, that's do it. Kyrie's wretched
defensive player. They have no rim protector. DeAndre George's yeah,
DeAndre George not what he used to be to say
the least. And it's almost as if you wish you

(52:21):
could have held on to Uh to tell you see,
your big man you traded over to Cleveland whose name
slips my mind right now, the big shot blocker uh,
because he would, but it made such a big difference
for you inside the paint. Blake Griffin never defends Jared Allen.
That's the weird. Um. Yeah, so you're right, you don't
have a lot of guys that can play that played
much defense. I'll give you that, um. But look, things

(52:42):
slow down a little bit in the postseason. Maybe they
can find a way to mustard some up here and there,
and maybe talking my way into it. Nobody, Yeah, nobody,
And so that's my point. And then the six years, well,
I guess who's gonna Ben Simmons can guard everybody, I
guess yeah, but yeah, but batist Tybal he's a hell

(53:04):
of a defensive like he's he's a he's a baby
bowing baby Bruce Bowen, like defenser of the player of
the Year, Bruce Boonen. Yeah, he's a baby b b
without just make this matchup even more intriguing because I
do like the ball as well. But is he gonna
lock down James Harden and or Kevin You know again,

(53:24):
he's not. You don't have to lock him down because
you're not gonna stop him. But he can slow him
down and then and then by the way, and then
you know, it's not like in beads his slouts because
he's a swat swat machine. The only point is, well,
those guys don't attack in the pain either. I mean,
Brooklyn's gonna live and die on the perimeter. You know,
you like, can't you envision a moment where beat comes

(53:47):
out to go after Durant? I can envision a moment
where he attempts to. Yeah, I don't know if it.
I don't think that's a good And there's of the
prime offensive players Brooklyn has. Joel Embiad is not a
matchup defensively against any of them. Does move his feet though,
like he's not a typical big who can't move his feet. No,

(54:09):
you're right, But when it comes to like someone like
Kevin Durant, who basically has an unblockable jump shot. You know,
basically they're great players. I'm not telling you they're not.
They're not gonna they're gonna shut them down. But Molly
point is that the Sixers team defense, I think really
slows down Brooklyn to the point where they can win

(54:29):
because on the other end of the floor, nobody's stopping him. Yeah. Now, look,
and I know Boston is banged up and so that's
not a fair but I mean Game one against Boston,
you know, they helped him to ninety three points. So
there's a literally you can't hold somebody the nine atree
point that I'm playing at least a little bit of defense,
you know what I mean. So they can find the
way to play a little bit of defense here and

(54:50):
there while knowing their offense is gonna show up every
single night. Look, They're offense showed up on Friday night.
They just had a herculean performance by Jayson Tatum. Yeah.
I well, we'll get to it. And uh, I want
to get back to this conversation about media and what
you guys think, so we'll bring Christians into conversation and uh,
lots to get to were the Fellas. That's right, the fixture.

(55:14):
Kevin figures the great figgy, I'm caused Fellas on Fox
all right, welcome back fall Laws on Fox with you
during this holiday weekend. Kevin figures, I'm Anthony Gargano. We

(55:36):
got Chris bo Young Nick, it's with us as well.
Figure out what did you make of all of the
fans behaving badly? I mean, it really is sad to
see when they're finally allowed to come back for the

(55:57):
first time, you think like you'll be raw gus. You
think maybe it's wrong for me to think they'd be
on their best behavior. Maybe I should have expected them
to not know how to act when they get back
in public and decide to take liberties. But I mean
throwing popcorn, spitting on people, which is just the lowest.
I mean that on top of on top of being
thrown out of a building for all of time, you

(56:18):
should be arrested for that. That's ridiculous. Family, Yeah, exactly,
on top of that, so im and then the racial
slurs being you know, held that John Moran's family in
Utah and that's certainly something that is unfortunately big consistent
with athletes in Utah at times. You know, this similar
situation happened to Russell Westbrook last year or two years

(56:39):
ago with some Utah fans as well. And then Boston
what Kyrie Irving talking about the experiences he's at there,
Marcus Smart, who currently still plays for the Celtics, doubling
down on some of the experiences. Uh So, it's sad
to see the problem is, you know, I don't really
know what the NBA can do about it other than
what they already have. Where is whenever these situations happened,

(57:02):
the fans get banned and they're not allowed back in. Yeah,
I mean, you know, I mean obviously, it's it's it's ridiculous.
It's the heightest stupidity. You're gonna you're gonna do that,
You're gonna go to It's come on, stop, it's stupid,
and let's face it, you know, Like I I, we
have railed against it in my town for a long

(57:23):
time because there is a there is there is a
bad reputation that so and I fight against it all
the time because it's like, wow, it's Philadelphia blah, blah
blah blah. And all they do is read the headlines.
They go out and say it's fairly when it happens everywhere,
as we have seen. But you know, as you could

(57:43):
single that. I saw you put a sweet out about
that when the Poplin incident happened the other night. Yeah,
now again that that guy is an idiot, and the
Sixers were right and they banned him, and that's what
they should have done. You know, he's out, and that's
he you know, that's it. You're creep, You're an it.
You know, there's no need. You know, there's no room
for that sort of thing. The shame of it is

(58:06):
that we're talking about a handful of bad apples, right,
and it just it spoils it. And I guess my
biggest fear is that it becomes like a divide with
players and fans. Right. Tristan Thompson came out pretty harsh,

(58:27):
and look, I don't blame players like you know your
Russell rust Westbrook. You know, there's no there's there is
no way in the world somebody throws pop popcorn on me.
I want to fight them too, you know, I completely understand.
And it's a shame because so an incident like that happens,
or the worst, which is the spinning, which is incorrigible.

(58:48):
When that stuff happens, guys, now they look at you
and they love there. It's human nature to then build
an island around you and not let any one across.
I mean, you do. I have to also recognize, for
a professional athlete, if it's not for fans, you aren't
who you are. You're not making the amount of money

(59:10):
you're making. I mean, how many times we talk about
the the NBA playing in that bubble last year, do
you guys say we have to get used to not
having fans around, or even this year when the fans
weren't allowed in when the when the season first began.
You know, it's it's comfort, it's familiarity. We get a
lot of Jews from playing in front of our home fans,
you know. So there's there's give and take there. There's

(59:30):
some positives and some negatives that come with it. Into
your point, you know, the bad apples there are so
few and far between. You know, it seems like it's endemic.
How often this happens in the grand scheme of how
many games actually get played in a season. It doesn't
really happen that often. Where we're talking about fam mis
conduct and fans throwing things that fans are saying, our
fans throwing things that players are saying, a lot of

(59:51):
you know, insensitive things to players on the court where
it gets to a point where they may they need
to be thrown out of the game. That just doesn't
happen that often. And you, again, you know, nobody wants
that stuff. Nobody wants that stuff. But I mean, and
it's different. Like I talked about players in sports figures

(01:00:12):
being more sensitive now than they were back in the day.
I mean, who who knows the sort of stuff that
was being hurled towards Michael Jordan back in the day.
Kobe Bryant when he was missing the first half of
games flying back from Eagle Colorado, when he was dealing
with his assault case, the kind of stuff that he
was hearing of, the kind of stuff that he was
When did you ever see Kobe Bryant get into it
with a fan in the stands about something. Do you

(01:00:32):
have the ability to be able to block all that
out and just focus on the game. And now, again
that's not absolving the fans of doing the things they
do on the stands, and they should be to climate.
That's so different. I I remember, so this is too
early two thousand's. I was doing a piece, a magazine story.
I was writing on the Eagles, right, it was like

(01:00:55):
inside the Eagles and Ady Reid, who why adore? I love?
And and Andy allowed me some uh all the access
that I wanted, right, So I was with them on
the sidelines, inside their locker room halftime. I was in meetings.
I was watching film with them. You know, I I

(01:01:16):
not only had a great you know, I was only
not only a fly on the wall, but I also
I didn't realize, you know, just how lucky I was
as a um. I was basically part of the team.
I wrote on Team Charters. I mean it was awesome.
And I'll tell you I shadowed Andy and and he

(01:01:36):
was a big guy, right the I'm never freeking out
any ad a lot of success. I'm walking b I'm
trailing him going into the tunnel, right, and I'm hearing
these I see this one guy stand up now they lost,
and he's yelling, you know, all kinds of derogged to

(01:02:00):
worry stuff with him being overweight, you fat like that.
It was like hatous and he's screaming at the top
of his lungs, and you know, and like that was
just one guy, And I'm just imagining the type of
abuse that he talked as the coach, right, I mean figure,

(01:02:24):
I mean it was vile. And I look up with
the guy and the guys like he looks like he's
possessed by the devil, hurrowing like these horrible you know,
the remarks about his weight. It takes a certain amount
of mental strength just to be able to block that
out and go on under your job. I always think
of Bill O'Brien when he was the head coach of

(01:02:45):
the Texans and he's walking into the tunnel and he
starts screaming, you know, bleep, you bleep, you you suck
to a fan who's yelling it at him. I've never
seen an NFL head coach do that before, you know,
crazy now, So I can imagine how many things get
hurt all that these guys on a day in day out. Basis,
when it comes to fans and guys who were just
able to keep on performing despite it. Now, it's different

(01:03:07):
with why I actually throw something at you. That's a
whole different level of schools out. Man, Come on, man,
that's there's no place for that. I mean, I think
that's pretty obvious. Chris, What do you have to say
about this? I'm curious. Well, it's funny because now you're mentioning,
you know, when we're talking about n b A and
early two thousands, I kept waiting for Yeah, I kept

(01:03:29):
waiting for my home, for my my pistons to kind
of come up. It's up there now. But it's it's
funny because that's kind of the other side of the coin,
because I keep thinking about this, and I don't know
how much of this is involved, but I keep thinking
of the other side of it. When you'd hear guys
talking about how hard of a place the Palace was
to play because the crowd was so hostile. And I

(01:03:50):
feel like there is a part of be it fan
pride or local pride, or even sometimes encouraged by the
teams to make these places allowed to play in, to
make crowds hostile to the other team, to get to
give them that that is the one power of a
fan you have in one of these games used to

(01:04:11):
create that home court advantage, and I think it does
kind of create an environment where, yeah, people do take
it a little too far, and they're wrong for taking
it that far. But at the same time where we've
kind of created this environment where we're also proud of
making things nasty for the opposing team. It's just then

(01:04:32):
when it crosses that that lion and goes too far,
we get very we get very upset about it. We rightly,
rightly should, but I think we do kind of prime
the prime prime some people to maybe take it a
little too far sometimes, you know what, some trending and
then I want to continue because it's interesting topic. All right, Well,

(01:04:54):
we'll start with the NBA. The Mavericks got off to
a hot start, like they have in the first couple
of games of this series against the Clippers. They actually
led thirty to eleven in the first quarter. Yet the
Clippers fought all the way back at a fourteen nothing
running the first quarter, and they would actually come away
with a one eight team to one away victory over
the Mavericks. Paul Georgia, Kawhi Leonard would combine to shoot

(01:05:15):
sixty eight percent from the fields, and they were able
to outdo a Luca don Chick, who scored forty four
points in a losing effort. MAVs now lead the series
two games to one. Atlanta had seven players score in
double figures. That includes Trey Young, who had twenty one
points in fourteen assists. The Hawks took a two to
one series lead over the Knicks with a one oh
five to ninety four victory, Jason Tatum scoring fifty points

(01:05:37):
while Marcus Smart scored four as the Celtics with a
one nineteen victory over Brooklyn. Nets lead in that series
is two games to one. On the ice. Mattias yard
Mark were yan Mark excuse me, recorded a hat trick
for Las Vegas in their game seven went over Minnesota
six to two. Was the final and that one. In baseball,
the Giants beat the Dodgers in extras eight to five.
Oakland over the Angels three to one. Tigers walked off

(01:05:59):
the Yankees. Padres beat the Astros ten to three. That's
five of the last six games that they have lost,
that being h Town, Toronto, Boston and Seattle with victories
as well. Back to the Fellas, all right, that's us.
We are the Fellas right here. We got my man Chris, Figgy,

(01:06:20):
Bo and Nick and everybody's hanging around on this holiday weekend.
I hope you're having a beautiful Friday into its Saturday
morning and then you have a great rest of your
holiday weekend. Relax, start to hug people. It's it's great
as we come out of the pandemic. Um, we're talking
about some of the fans stuff that has happened. You

(01:06:43):
saw what happened to Garden with the spitting incident. We
talked about popcorn in Philly and actually the same night, Fig,
I don't love if you saw this, but there was
a fight between a Dodgers fanity and an astro. I
saw it. Dodger fans were all over man and Made
Park in Houston, for sure. Man, that was that was

(01:07:05):
a pretty nasty kind of deal. That was intense. I
mean there was even yeah yeah, And I shouldn't say
that I expect it. But when there are some animus
between two teams like that, uh, and now you have
fan bases that are converging together, um, it shouldn't happen.
But I can't say that I'm surprised that that happened,

(01:07:26):
and it probably are. Were a couple of other fights
that weren't captured on a video or that didn't go
viral in that stadium. Uh, in that particular situation. Now
that's fan on fan violence, not fan on player violence,
but still something that you shouldn't want to see at
a professional sporting event or any sporting event for that matter. Noah. Now, Now,
Chris brings up a great point about this concept of

(01:07:50):
home field advantage or home court advantage. And you know,
guys beating in a froth for the opposition, right, Like,
there's that you saw that? Uh, fotags. I think it's
a mean now where the dude sticking up both middle
fingers at Westbrook. You know you see that. You didn't

(01:08:11):
see that one, you know, So you got this whole
thing about you know, home court and listen, we and
for years there was I lived in the I grew
up in the shadows, a veteran stadium which was a
house of horrors for opponents, and it was like a
big deal and like the fans knew it, and that

(01:08:33):
was a part of the landscape where nobody wanted to
come here and it provided a strong home field advantage
for the Eagles. Yeah. Well, I feel like a lot
of times and this I think kind of goes to
Christ's point. You know, fans are like Okay, what can
I do to help the team? I clearly can't dribble

(01:08:54):
the basketball. I can't catch a touchdown pass. There's but
I can yell at this guy and try to get
in his head. Yeah. How many? How many times have
we seen Spike Lee drawing from you know front? So
how many how much research can I do on this guy?
And I can talk about his mom or his sister
or whatever else. If I can get him to glance
at me, that's a micro second that he's thinking about

(01:09:16):
me and not thinking about the opponent. And now I
got him, and now I'm helping the team. Uh. And
So I do think there is an element of that
in there. So how do you do? How do you
have both? It's hard to police. I mean there's certain
you know a lot of times there's there's friendly heckling.
So I work with a former Eagle quarterback, Rodney Pete.

(01:09:37):
I work with him every day locally on a five
seventy other sports or l A affiliate, And we were
talking about this topic on Friday and he mentioned like, yeah,
you know when there are times when I play on
the road and you know, I've married His wife is
as an actress, Holly Robinson. He said, there are times
they call him, hey, Rodney Robinson, nice pass or whatever
you look like you're things like that, and someone say

(01:09:57):
that's crossing the line. But I mean, compared to some
of the things that other people say, that's fairly team
you know. So there's there's heckling like that, and then
there's I'm gonna do blank to this person in your
family and blank this and blank that. That just crosses
a certain line. Got to a certain point. I remember
a game when Marcus Peters played for the Rams a
couple of years ago. He actually ran up into the

(01:10:20):
into the Colisseum stands. I've never seen this before where
a football player walks into the back of the all
the way to the back of the bench, goes up
the steps and challenges a fan to a fight. Like
I don't know what was said or or what the
situation was, but that that tells you right there how
bad it is at this point in time where players
are actually physically going into this Mantres Harold did it

(01:10:40):
when he was a member of the Clippers a couple
of years ago in Memphis. A fan said something to him,
it seemed like it's getting worse and worse at this point,
and what you can do for it. I don't know
how you police that. Do you remember the amounts at
the Palace? Chris, I was so I think I was
in college at the time, so I wasn't even home
to really see it. But I know, I know plenty

(01:11:03):
of guys still still talk about it. I know a
lot of people. I think there was a few years
ago we hit an anniversary for it. It comes back
up a lot, and there is quite a rich oral
history of the malice at this point. And you know,
they say that guy, you know, made up with uh
with the metalworld peace, which is always which is always
good at the end of the day, but you know it, Yeah,

(01:11:24):
it's funny because for I know, at the time, a
lot of people panicked about it, and now I think
a lot of us just kind of look back on
it as just kind of a weird quirk of that
particular moment of the NBA history. We're kind of black
mark a giant stain more than a weird quirk. Maybe.

(01:11:44):
I just know some other people like Dan Lebotard and
a few others have just kind of you know, even
Detroit Free Press kind of goes back, and maybe it's
because everyone made up in the end for it that
you know, people kind of look at it a little
jokingly now, like they talk about the one guy who
came out from who who went into the back comes
out with a brew with a with a push broom
to try to fight guys. Yeah, I don't know how

(01:12:08):
that became cartoonish though, you know what I'm saying, Like,
I think, I think it's time. It's just you know,
you get farther away from it, you put it further
in the back of your mind. It's it's not as
it's not as uh staining, I guess. But and especially again,
we have all these incidents out here where it's okay,
this was a guy throwing a beer at Metal World Peace,

(01:12:29):
which was bad, which is bad, But maybe it's the
people involved there versus you know, we're getting slurs and
spit and all kinds of things. Now. I mean, I
don't know. I think it was probably worse back then.
I think so. Yeah, I think it was a big moment.

(01:12:52):
It was a big wake up call, I think too. Yeah.
I just think that at some point and those days,
I mean, we're hite, we're more and more sensitive to
things we have. There's more decorum now, and so when
you have a list of behavior, it stands out more sure.
For for instance, I mean seriously, when I remember being geez,

(01:13:19):
I mean I remember being in the in the nineties
in stadiums and particularly my own, and they were just
when I tell you, fistfights like so the security people
were yellow jackets at Veteran Stadium. And so if you saw,

(01:13:41):
like if you're if you're a what, you're in the
stands or you're actually on the field, you look up
and you'd see these yellow jackets swarm like bees to
a certain area because you could just see fights break out,
like massive brawls you were about, you know, And and

(01:14:04):
it happened in a lot of stadiums across the country.
There was what this was not as civilized endeavor, particularly
in the NFL and Sundays. No, I still don't think
it is really for a lot of places. I you
always hear horror stories in almost any kind of stadium
to this day about you know, if you're wearing the
wrong jersey in the wrong section, you can you can

(01:14:25):
get into And it's not just Philadelphia, but plenty of
other places to Cleveland. That's my point. Yeah, I mean
it's like it's all listen, I remember being in outside
Dodger Stadium and you do, Nancy, that could be Dodger Stadium.
We figure all the gang Bangers. There's a lot of
you know, I remember doing those a lot of those
games Dodgers. If you were wearing the phillies, those phillies

(01:14:48):
people are getting a costket. Yeah there there, and it's
it's it's definitely better now than it was even say
ten years ago. But yeah, and like mid two thousand's
when it was and again to my point on the
mauice of the palaces, like that did boil over. But
going into that year and then years after, you would

(01:15:09):
always hear even stand Ving Gutti would talk about it's like,
oh the Palace, and it was. It was hyped up.
It was part of promotional to get fans to come out.
It's like, this is a nasty place to play. You
don't want to play the Pistons in the Palace because
the home crowd is just nasty and yelling on top
of you, and they're incredibly loud, and you know we're
gonna bust out all the all the uh what what

(01:15:32):
is it for the audio, for the decibel recounters to
see how loud these places are gonna be. It was
it was a point of pride, But again, those points
of pride can also lead to people going way overboard sometimes.
I missed that campaign where the Malice at the Palace
was used as a point of pride or as a
promotional tool. No, I'm just saying that's that's the other
side of it, though, is But I'm saying enjoying the malice.

(01:15:55):
It's like you don't like a player, chuck your beers
at him. Everybody will buy you another one. I think
you're kind of taking you're you're you're missing my point here,
but I'm not missing your point. Just yes, and just
says Anthony to say, busting your balls there, Christ No, No,
I know, I just I know what you mean. I
want you, you want you. They're encouraging our raucous environment,

(01:16:15):
but you can only control that raucousness to a certain
point before it over it overflows. I totally get yeah,
And I guess I guess for some random person out
there who just doesn't know how to behave sometimes in
their points of life, it's like, Okay, how do you
tell that person where that line is. Yeah, you're giving
them license to do. You want me to add crazy?
He told me to add crazy crazy. You know. It's
like I get it. I know people like that. It's like,

(01:16:41):
I really don't want to take him to the game.
He's he gonna end up, you know, and he's gonna
end up in stadium jail and it's gonna be the
entire thing. I just I don't want to deal with that.
That's great, all right, where the felons. We'll come back
and uh put a bow on this whole thing, a
nice little neat bow among the anarchy, where the fellas

(01:17:04):
right here on Fox Sports Radio, welcome back fellas, my
man Nikki on the Tech Sports Is. You know, it's
funny I didn't get how long that How that Dodgers
Astros fight lasted that long without saying a security guy?

(01:17:27):
Did that seem like extra long to you? Fake? Absolutely
absolutely without a security official coming down there, and it
kind of died down. It seems like the fans, the
surrounding fans, are the ones who calmed it down. I
don't know if I ever saw a security official unless
there was a longer video clip that I missed. I
never saw a security official come down there. I just
saw surrounding people kind of you know, one guy got

(01:17:47):
punched in the face, and then the guy who punched
him kind of backed up, and everybody just kind of
backed up a little bit and it just kind of
slowly dissipated on its own. But I was a little
surprised by that. I don't know where security could have
been at that point. Yeah, man, and that was that
was bizarre. Yeah, it's scary because who knows. I mean,
if they hadn't calmed it down, they could have fanned
the flame and it could have turned out into something

(01:18:08):
even bigger. You know, Oh my god. By the way, uh,
last night baseball, did you see pas? Oh my god,
Oh my god. Yeah, that's a shame, man, would be

(01:18:30):
that which was highly criticized by a lot of people
who was all, well, wasn't extremely productive with the Angels
the last couple of years, specifically this year was hitting
under the Mendoza line when the Angels decided to let
them go. Are they quote unquote mutually decided to part ways?
Um so and the there's no d H in the
National League this year, So people were just kind of

(01:18:52):
missed on why what sort of value he would add
to the Dodgers. Now he's adding the value because he's
actually getting some starts at first base. They've had some
injury issues this year, and for the most part, he's
been pretty productive for them in limited duty. Uh So,
and he's a good clubhouse guy. Obviously, nobody could ever
deny that. So I guess the way that the Dodgers
are generally built guys who have a lot of versatility,

(01:19:13):
guys who can play multiple different positions, and that's something
that Appert Pooles really doesn't bring you at this point.
Uh he hasn't had a lot of pinshion opportunities in
his career. Uh In the in those opportunities, he hasn't
been very successful. So when you connect all those dots together,
people were kind of scratching their heads as to why
they would bring them in. But it was also a
very low ricks risk signing. If you bring him in

(01:19:34):
and he doesn't do anything for for a month, you
can easily cut him loose. He's still getting paid by
the Angels, so it doesn't really cost you anything to
bring him in. Yeah, it made sense to since they
have such you know, they're so lefty heavy, right, I mean,
you know they got if you look at all baby

(01:19:57):
lucks to your cioga, right, they're all left handed. Yeah,
they also who they also just brought in. It's okay,
but they just traded for him again because they had
issues with health and their lineup and they were just
trying to get bodies into the lineup. I feel if
they had not had an injuries, if you know, if
Seeger and Bellinger and all these guys have been healthy,

(01:20:19):
all the pools is here, Sugo wasn't here, you know,
it was it was more you know, you're right, I
mean without Balinger and see here, I mean I mean
those two cripply Yeah, I mean you're first of all,
you're two most potent hitters are that than Mookie And
he has been playing terribly so for his standards. Yeah,

(01:20:40):
you know, he'll he'll at some point you'll heat out,
You'll think. I mean, he's dealing with the shoulder and
the back issue. And I know he's not trying to,
you know, put a spotlight on it. He's simply saying
he's not playing well. But I do think those injuries
have something to do with it. And I do think
with him having some offensive issues at times, he's trying
his best to play through it and that's may be
not helping either. Are you worried about the Padres? No, no, no, Well,

(01:21:05):
it depends on what you mean by worried, like worried
that as far as the division or beating them in
a playoff series or a yeah there, legit threat. They're
a threat. But I still think, especially when it comes
to pitching the Dodgers, to let the leg up, and
when the Dodgers are healthy, they're a better team. So
the Padres are a very good team and they I
guess they could win the NLS. But as of right now,

(01:21:28):
as we sit a Memorial Day essentially and the Padres
are I think a half came up. I still think
the Dodgers are the favorites to win the division and
still will win the division. That sounds good, all right,
We got lots to get to big our head, fellas
having a Memorial Day with you Fox Sports Radio, Well,
good morning, good morning, good morning, happy happy Sports Saturday.

(01:21:52):
Memorial Day Weekend edition. Always loving the gateway to summer
twenty one. And I love the fact that it's Memorial
Day and here it's raining on the East Coast, but
we got four NBA games, four playoff games, first round games.

(01:22:14):
I gotta admit, I'm loving the fact that it's raining
and I could sit back and watch four basketball games.
I guess that's pretty lifeless, I guess, but guess what
I'm gonna do it wos it's uh, it's it's very
interesting having the calendar, with the calendar, and with the

(01:22:36):
pandemic shift the calendar, the sports calendar, and how it
happens and how it stays like, uh, fix, do you
think the NBA sticks with this calendar. I can't imagine
them having the start up the season again early after
another one of these long seasons. Um. I think they're

(01:22:59):
probably probably land somewhere in the middle. They probably don't
want to end this season in late July, but maybe
you can see it maybe trickling into early July, maybe
around trying to end closer to July four or something,
as opposed to ending around June twenty one, I believe
is what the NBA Finals are generally ending. I think
you can only help them to start a little bit later.

(01:23:21):
You might not start on Christmas Day, but maybe you
start closer to Thanksgiving as opposed to starting, um, you know,
in early November. Just it just gets lost so much
in the baseball playoffs and the NFL in full swing
and the first part of the season, people just don't
pay much attention to. So I think they probably take
a few cueues and maybe start a little bit later,
but and end slightly earlier than their ending this year.

(01:23:43):
But I don't think it's gonna be drastic. I don't
think we're gonna see the NBA ending its season in
July or August and then starting well, okay, so so
you think they'll move it, they'll start up in November. See,
the problem is you still have to play eighty two games.
Are they to get back to the games schedule? It's
gonna be interesting to see what they do that. I

(01:24:04):
don't think they know, which is why they haven't really
played their hand with it yet. When they're talking about
this ridiculous mid season soccer like tournament, which is stupid.
It makes no sense to me whatsoever. Um. And so
if they were to agree to that and have money
involved in that, they will reduced the regular season and
play this tournament. Um how long that would take? I

(01:24:27):
don't know. If it involves every team. I don't know
if they they they even fully know how it would look,
but I know that's what their plan is. And that's
something that uh Adam Silver has doubled down on earlier
this week, talked about it, saying that it's something that
they definitely are intrigued by, but they've gotten a lot
of pushback, and rightfully so from the players association. So
I don't know if it's actually gonna get pushed through
or not, but I know what's something the league wants well,

(01:24:49):
and this is something that Chris Chris is a big
soccer guy. Can you can you can you integrate See
I don't know how you integrate those soccer style tournaments
with within a league, you're still playing to win the title,
nothing else matters. And in soccer, they're not playing three

(01:25:10):
and four games a week like they do in the NBA. No,
there's there's I mean, there's always room for kind of
midweek stuff and but like even with international breaks, like
you're still playing like two three at best a week.
But I think when you talk about you you mentioned
it there that at the end of the day, it's
just the title is the goal is the goal is

(01:25:32):
to get the ring. It's most of our sports in
North America are very singularly focused on that goal, regular
season goals, having point totals or win records. See we
we kind of uh we we we don't really think
that highly of them because we always hold up things like,
oh the Patriots, they went sixteen and O and then

(01:25:53):
they just lost the Super Bowl or you know, what
does it matter? You know, hockey teams won't even touch
the trophies for you know, for you know, getting the
most points in in the regular season. They just want
the Stanley Cup. Whereas, yeah, in soccer culture, you do
have this kind of everyone has a different goal, everyone
has different levels to it, and it's not about just

(01:26:16):
you know, this this zero sum to just getting like
champions or a domestic title. Other teams are fighting either
to stay alive or they're in an f A Cup
or anything like that. You would have to completely overhaul
the mentality of the entire sport of the NBA to
make those kind of mid mid season cups actually matter. Well.

(01:26:38):
The other aspect of it too is you know it's
different in Europe because you know, if you're in the
ep L, you play champions, right like you're you know,
you have other and and it's a real deal, and like, listen,
it makes sense, right, So not only are you competing
within your league, it would be like the n b
A completing competing on a global level. The problem is

(01:27:01):
no one could compete with them on a global level,
so you can't have you know, you can have all
you want to you want with international tournaments. It's it's
the the you know, the NBA team is not gonna lose. Yeah,
i mean we've seen international basketball kind of come a
long way, but yeah, as you say, it's still the

(01:27:21):
NBA is still kind of the drain that that you know,
if you if you are any kind of talent anywhere
in the world for basketball, you come to play in
the NBA. It's it's very different there, right, So how
do you Yeah, I'm sure that they probably thought about, like,
is there a way to integrate and the international tournament. Well,
we do have that, it's the FEBA Tournament and guys

(01:27:43):
just bout all the time, our fourth and fifth option
guys out there for that, right, But I'm talking about
if you're the NBA and NBA Section one that would
take place. But I don't know how you do it. Yeah,
I don't. I don't see why it's necessary, especially what
we always get caught up on ratings and interest and
we want games that matter. Well what does it matter?

(01:28:06):
Or like, okay, at the incentive of the players to
win this mid season tournament is they get a million
dollars each. It was like, all right, that's cool if
you're fan doesn't care about that. The a one the
fan doesn't care about that, and the one percent in
the NBA. You think Lebron James gives a rip about
one in a million dollars in a mid season tournament,
you know, Yeah, car Corkman is from the Sixers might,

(01:28:27):
or some guys playing on a minimum contract might. But
the star player, Anthie Davis, the guy don't care about
playing playing for a million dollars. I rather rest for
two and a half weeks. Yeah, we're doing that. Maybe
give them a buy into like, you know, the NBA
tournament player, you know, the NBA tournament near the end
of the year. But I mean now you're kind of
getting dangerously close to what we've always kind of hated about.

(01:28:48):
What what what Baseball has made the All Star Game into.
It's like the All Star game matters to get home
field advantage in the World Series, like instead of just
how well you play? What what are we doing here? Like?
You know, I it it runs the risk of either
being not relevant at all or a very artificial relevancy.

(01:29:11):
That right if you If it's artificial, people are gonna
like that. They know that, and then now you're scrolling
it up so much that it really doesn't make sense.
Just you know, I mean, people just go listen, just
play the season. I don't mind the play in Twitter.
Did you like to play in tournament? I'll guess both,
you guys. I'm not generally I'm not a fan of

(01:29:33):
it because I think that diminishes the regular season two
and we didn't see it this year. But you know,
if we do this in the future, what if you know,
the seventh seed has a five game lead over the
eighth seed and there they should in a normal year,
you clearly be in the post season. Now all of
a sudden, I'm in a position where I have to
play my way in when I used eight two games
to earn my way in. This is why I hate

(01:29:53):
the wild card in the in Major League Baseball. And
if you're gonna make it if you're gonna have the
wild card at least at the at least make it
best two or three. Don't but don't make it. Don't
make me play one six two and have it come
down to one game. That's ridiculous. But of course the
league likes it because it's another meaningful game and people
do watch it and they make money, so that's why

(01:30:14):
they do it. That's why the NBA did it, and
that's why it's not probably not going anywhere. Yeah, I
mean they're exciting games, and I was, I really got
into them. But as you say, like now we're talking
over half the league potentially playing to get in in
the postseason, and you know, to to bring it back
to soccer where they don't have a postseason where it's
literally whoever has the most points you get the title

(01:30:36):
and then you move on to champions very like that's
all they have is their regular season, whereas the NBA
is almost on the other side the axis where they've
devalued their regular season so much. That's just most guys
are just seeing it as seating if that, And I mean,
we're really testing it out this year with plenty of
teams who just decided the regular season didn't matter the

(01:30:58):
postseason and the baseball is in there too. If they're
talking about playoff expansion and allowing more teams in, you're
doing the same thing. Like I I know, I'm a
very old soul when it comes to this, but I
kind of enjoyed back when you know, in the American
League of the National League, the teams are the two
best records West YEA, they just played for the If
you at the top record, you had home field advantage,
you at the A O Championship Series, the n O

(01:31:19):
Championship Series, and even way before then, you just whoever
had the best record in each league just played each
other in the World Series and that was it. You know,
So the regular season was the playoff. And this is
why I'm against expansion in college football to a certain degree,
to because they're talking about valuing the regular season. You know,
the all those games in the regular season, you know
you're talking about throwaway series against the Royals in June,

(01:31:42):
Well those matter if you don't end up making the playoffs,
because only two teams make it at the end of
the year. We are kind of get stuck in this
trap where it's like we like the excitement of these tournaments,
of these post seasons there, you know, they it's a drug.
The narrative to them is amazing, and us all these
leagues are like, all right, well, how do we get
more of that? And unfortunately every time they try to

(01:32:04):
add more of it, it just ends up devaluing the
regular season, which is supposed to be your bread and butter,
your meat and potatoes on their products. People complain about
why ratings are terrible. It's like, well, why am I
watching this game? If in the grand scheme of things
that if both everybody's making the playoffs, what does it matter?
And the players are saying it's the players are You
have players just going out there and saying the regular
season doesn't matter. So your fan is saying, okay, well

(01:32:25):
if Lebron's saying that, then why am I watching? Yeah?
You know you know it's true. And it's funny because
I think back to the alternative and you mentioned it,
which is the p L right, which is there is
no playoffs. But see I hate that, Like I look
at that and go I feel empty. Like the two
things I listen. I think, I love I think soccer

(01:32:49):
is really really great sport and it really is. But
the two aspects that I just can't have that I'm
too Americanized and I have a tough time with are
no playoffs and aggregate scoring. I don't know, goals is

(01:33:10):
the word I hate that. I do like we we
can't do it now because just how our pro sports
structures are with you know, the owners and revenue sharing.
I do like the relegation system because I think that
would be a great way to distance distancent Avice tanking
in pro sports. Oh my god, it would be awesome.
It would be fantastic, you know. You Just the problem is,

(01:33:33):
can you get a secondary league that it's viable? Right?
So if you chuck the what is it the G
League and you is there a way to have them
play in certain markets that where it's actually competitive that

(01:33:53):
you would relegate four NBA teams Like that would be
all right. I just can't see NBA ownership signed off
on that because it's okay. If I'm being irrelegated, that
means I lose that on potential TV money for a
full season. Uh, certain major sponsors aren't gonna want to
sponsor me if I'm not playing in games that matter.
You know, I just I just I think we're too
far down the whole to actually go back and do that.

(01:34:15):
I mean, help, We've seen it with some of the
super the big the biggest brands in Europe too in
soccer trying to break for even when they were trying to,
you know, get this idea of a super league out
there which would have no promotion. Irrelatively, yeah, but I
mean I'm looking at the you know, American landscape. Maybe
if you like completely rejiggered how the farm systems work,

(01:34:38):
that maybe you could do that in baseball, But like
I can't. I don't even think we can get thirty
competitive teams in the NBA right now. As it is,
there is a massive even with them expanding the playoffs,
there's still a massive underclass in the NBA of teams
that that aren't relevant and will not be relevant for many,
many many years and are just there to just feed

(01:34:58):
out wins to the Lakers and the Nets of the world.
That's a great point. By coming up, I got something
for you, guys, and I want you to look at
it that I It's gonna be interesting to see what
your take is on these things. On this topic, and
the question is do we work hard enough in these

(01:35:22):
in the sports, like in the the players work hard
enough today? And I talked to somebody and I want
to give a point to set it up, and it's
gonna surround the picture who is gas covering first base?

(01:35:43):
And then it's going to lead us into this whole
topic of the players actually work hard enough and do
they actually want to play? We'll discuss where the fellas
right here on Fox Sports Radio, Chris coming out with
a little gutman Action's got some of this line around

(01:36:09):
where the fellas? I'm Anthony, I gotta Kevin figures the
figure we got Chris Bow and Nick Bo's training Nick
to that young Nick from Syracuse, New York, Nick Battalia,
and uh Bo, how's it going? Are you doing a

(01:36:31):
good job training them? He's doing great? Is he stut?
That's it? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's picking it up
pretty quickly. You've made a few words. I appreciate that,
uh fig. So here's the deal. So there was a

(01:36:55):
game list week where the Phillies starting pitch here a
guy named Spencer Howard, four years old, was admittedly gassed
after he was forced to cover first base. So he

(01:37:17):
pitched really well first inning and then you could see
him just drop off with his velocity. And then after
the game he went, yeah, I got really gassed after
that play. We're out of cover first. That's interesting. And
all I kept thinking about is why you're You're twenty
four years old and you've got gassed covering, like you

(01:37:41):
want to talk about shameful? Now, what was this the
final out of the inning and he let off the
next day or like, what was the situation? It was
like the fourth inning. No, he's he's done after whatever,
it's four innings, he's got, he got lit up in
he got lit up in the fifth, he got and
he's saying the reason I got lit up in the
fifth is I was because I had to cover first.

(01:38:02):
So I had this conversation with actually a few coaches
during the course of the week because I started to
think about this for a second. And uh, I was
talking to remember Charlie Manuel, one of the great great
baseball man, World Series manager with the Phillies. Yeah, the
Indians took to try there. You know, he's a with

(01:38:24):
a great baseball man. So we were talking about what
guys doing spring training, And it used to be in
spring training players would get a hundred, a hundred and
fifty at bats in spring training anywhere between that those numbers.
You know why because it prepared you to hit when

(01:38:46):
you got when the season started. And you know how
it works, right, you start off and when spring training games,
when the Grapefruit and Cactus League begins, you play, you
get you with bats, right, and then you work your
way up to three and then you're playing full games, right,
and then they might scale you back a little bit

(01:39:07):
towards the end. Right, So usually like two weeks out,
you're playing full games. The last three days you're getting
scaled back. You know, you work your way up right, Well,
they don't do it anymore. In fact, guys are getting
twenty and thirty at bats for the entire spring training, which,

(01:39:28):
when you think about it, how ridiculous that is. Because
you can hit all day all. You can hit all
day long off of a t or a coach throwing
BP or a machine. It can't replicate a guy trying
to get you out right, a guy with that kind

(01:39:51):
of arm action that's going to give you with movement,
you're not. You only get that if you playing a
game in spring training. So that's baseball. The NBA We
just got done a season where nobody played in a
regular season. We just talked about it, right, guys, very

(01:40:12):
few guys played. And it's like the whole thing in
the NFL. Teams aren't even having O T s anymore.
Some teams, right they're sending guys home. I talked to
coaches that are beyond frustrated because they just can't work
their guys. The rules in place by the Players Association

(01:40:35):
prohibit them from having real practices. Obviously, we know about hitting,
and you know, what's the best way to get ready
for a season is to build up causes, right, But
they don't do that. Yeah, especially in training camp. I
don't know if you need to tackle during olt, but

(01:40:59):
once you get to camp, the fact that they have, yeah,
no padded practices or a few fewer they used to
do two days. I don't think they do those anymore.
They just has gotten has gotten worse and worse or
maybe worse isn't the work right way to put it,
but it's it's definitely different. They've scaled it back dramatically,
even over the last five to seven years. So my

(01:41:19):
question is, doo guys work hard enough? And so when
I was talking to a number of cars made at
my point to talk to about I'd stay with six
eight guys. And there were various coaches, uh, head coach,
assistant coaches across three sports, basketball, football, and baseball, and

(01:41:45):
all of them had the same reaction, which was, guys
don't want to play either. Like that's a big problem
that they have, is that guys are happy on the
injured list, Guys are fine not playing, Guys would rather
not practice. How do you combat that? UM, I don't

(01:42:09):
know how you can. I do think there is a
tie into a certain degree where we're talking about games
that mean things and games that don't, and it's like, well,
you want me to be healthy for the games that matter, right,
It's like, well, it's it's great if you're healthy, but
do you know what you're doing? Like are you effective?
Are you not gonna get hurt because you're not well conditioned.
So it's like one of these these loops that just

(01:42:31):
keeps going around and around. UM, And I don't know
what the right answer is. I don't know if there's
much you can do, especially considering the players associations are
on board and putting in legislation for these sorts of things.
It's not just players saying like, you know what, I
don't feel like playing or I don't feel like practicing.
The association is like, nope, you have this amount of
hours to practice, this amount of days to do this,

(01:42:52):
this many days says you can't do that, and so well,
let me just jump in and and and follow this
up with you. I don't want you to answer this.
Is this a case of get off my lawn? You
know I want to make it, or that we know
what we're talking about, or is it legit or is
it a legitimate concern that guys just don't work hard enough,

(01:43:15):
that they're compensated so vastly that they don't need to
work hard, and if you took it away, they go
whenever I'm going for the rest of my life, there's
no hunger. That might be true for some I think
it's hard to make a blanket statement and say guys
in general don't want to work hard. Um. I think
a lot of them will probably say they're working smarter

(01:43:36):
as opposed to just working hard and just grinding out
all the time, all day long. You know, the guy's
nutrition nutrition is workout guys and trainers has never been
better than than it is today. And I know a
lot of old school people will say like, well, guys
never got her back in the day, it was like, well,
I mean they did. Uh. The value maybe a little
bit different nowadays. I also think that guys are training.

(01:43:58):
You're around more nowadays, and I think that's why they
get hurt. And that's one thing that doesn't get facted.
And when people talk about guys in the old days,
when the all season happened, back then, those guys stopped,
they didn't do anything. They went to work, They work
in a factory and then come back, you know, all day.
I'm not talking I'm not going back after Well some
people do, though, you know. There's like, you know, Bob
Gibson through nine thousand innings in a row and they

(01:44:20):
had no days, right, it was like all right, well
that's completely you know. So, but people like to go
back to that sort of stuff. I'm not saying you do,
but many many people do. Yeah. I'm just I'm just
wondering about the concept of working and you know, what's
the what's the fine line between get off my lawn

(01:44:42):
and yo, dude, how about we do actually need to
work more? Yeah? I don't know, I think organizationally, I
think it comes down to a matter of preference when
it comes to certain teams and organizations and how much
you value guys putting in a certain amount of work,
uh in the off season or in actis or you know,
at or spring training, whatever you wanna call it, versus

(01:45:04):
way that versus the value of having you as healthy
as we possibly can during the regular season. And if
you are having issues, like I'll say, Mookie beats, I
don't know how many bats he had in spring training,
I feel like you played a pretty healthy amount, but
I'm not exactly sure the amount the exact numbers. If
you're struggling, just use the regular seasons to find a
way to break through it. This is like the NFL nowadays. No,

(01:45:25):
none of these guys playing in preseason. I think I
saw Sean mcveassay the other day. There are no tiers
with the Rams. Their stars are playing at all in
the preseason, and basically they're using the first few weeks
of the regular season to get themselves ready to go,
which seems like which has unheard of even as recently
as five years ago. You lose your you know, if
you start out one in three, A lot of times
you're screwed. So but it's just it's a different mentality

(01:45:48):
now than it was back then. You know, they just
guys don't want to be playing back. I might even
going back in the last century, all about five years,
yeah exactly. I mean we're talking about you know, two
days ended somewhere around eleven, right, like we're talking about
you know, working inside a decade, insights ten years. Well,

(01:46:12):
and and if guys, but if guys can't if guys
weren't in shape and get hurt because they're not working
hard enough, well, what does that say? Well, I guess
the problem is how can we prove that that's the
reason why guys were getting hurt Because someone say, guys
are getting hurt because they're working too hard, they're doing
too much, and this is why they want to scale back.
So it's it's it's very difficult to gauge as to

(01:46:34):
why if they're if injuries are pop in a particular season,
what that coaches Let's take football for say, the football
coaches say, I got guys that don't even know how
to tack all. They can't they they're they get hurt
because they haven't build up calluses and these are guys.
You know, what's the difference. Like when we talk about working,

(01:46:56):
there's two kinds of work. There's football work and then
there's training. Right, you need to put the football work
in to make any kind of training payoff, right, correct? Correct?
So what are according to these coaches? Yeah? So I
guess what separates the teams who Because the Seahawks and
this is right around the end of the legion of Boom,

(01:47:18):
And that's right around the time where all these you know,
training camp restrictions were being placed and you can't tackle
and all that, they found some sort of they found
a system to use to be able to teach other
guys how to tackle in spite of the fact that
they couldn't do it live and they let the league
in tackling me, they didn't they didn't miss tackles. How So,
how are the better teams able to gay to guard

(01:47:38):
around that and find a way to make it work?
Because I mean every team the people say bad tackling
is a pandemic or epidemic in the NFL, and maybe
it is. I don't know what the stats are, um,
but a lot of the better teams, there are some
good defenses out there that tackle extremely well and they're
dealing with the exact same rules, are playing with the
exact same situations as the other teams are. So what

(01:47:58):
are they doing that other teams aren't. And if that's
the case, is it just about the work smarter or
not harder situation the coach is that up to the
coaching stay have to find a way. Okay, here are
the rules. How do we work around that to make
sure we're as good as we possibly can be. Yeah,
it's just funny. Coaches in every sport had the same
thing about guys don't work, don't work hard and want

(01:48:22):
to work and it's such a weird thing. I know, Chris,
you do you see it more like get off my
long thing or more like, well, that's actually a fair criticism.
I'm gonna be honest. I'm still for for me. The
jury is still out on this one, just because I
I think I do recognize, especially us as fans, it's easy,

(01:48:45):
I think to take that stance of Okay, I saw
this when when a guy gets hurt and practice, that
just seems like the worst, right, that just that just
seems like that that you just want to just that
you agree, and you want to scale up at because
it feels like, especially especially for football, I don't know
how many years we have where guys get you know, hurt,

(01:49:08):
hurt during camp and it just it feels like your
season just gets tanked even before it even gets off
the ground. So I I don't think it's get off
my lawn. But I'm not sure what the solution is. Yeah,
I mean, but is that like if a guy tears
his a c L during your practice and training camp,
is that because he was out of shaping in training

(01:49:28):
hard enough or was he overworked and that's why is
a c L happened? Or did it just happen and
things happen in injuries happened at certain points in time. Yeah,
I think injuries just kind of you know, happen. It's
but yes, So I don't know if you can correlate
that with whether or not players are working hard enough
or training hard enough. Now, in this individual situation with
Spencer Howard that Anthony brought up a second ago where

(01:49:49):
he said he was gassed running to first base, you
know that could be an individual problem. Um, And I
know he said it's it's been an issue he's talked
to other coaches about this and in separate leagues, and
I think maybe to a small scale, there was a
sense of entilem up for some of these players who
just feel like, well, I've got my contract, I'm fat
and happy, I don't have to work as hard, or
I'll use training camp to get myself back into shape.

(01:50:11):
But I still feel that's probably more of a minority.
And if it's not, and if the rules have been
changed and the goal posts have moved on what in
shape is and what time and how time is being
used during the season and or the off season to
get into shape, then that onus is on the coaching
staffs and the organizations to figure it, figure out a
way around the system to make sure their team is

(01:50:32):
as prepared as they can be when this season starts.
And I think that's what separates the better organizations from
the ones that are not. I think it also separates
on the players too, because like, yeah, you have that
example of a guy who's just you know, it's probably
winded coming in. But I remember I talked with um
uh If he just signed with the Lions, Jamal Williams,
and he was I was talking about this idea of

(01:50:52):
you know because back back back when I talked with them,
the NFL p A was making all these stances about
we're not gonna come to you know, TAS or summer
training or all these mini camps, and he was saying, look, man,
I'm I'm working out every day. I I I know
exactly what I am doing. You don't need if if
I'm not motivated to work out and to train on

(01:51:16):
my own time, then I'm not going to be in
the league for very long. So for him, impetus to train,
to to perform, to get better, that's that's not lacking
at all for him. So I think it is it
just does come down to personal responsibility at the end.
Yes and no, it's there's a there's a fine line though,
between practice and working out as a team, not just

(01:51:42):
you know, doing your running and doing your lifting and
keeping in shape that way more from a football standpoint,
that's what these coaches are challenged. I guess for me,
the end game would be, do you have you seen
a significant slip in the quality of play in the
league for you where you would say a the lack
of practices or training camp where people tackling all that

(01:52:04):
tible effect on the way the game is being played.
They think that's the case when it comes to defense. Okay,
oh yeah, I'm just giving you with these Yeah, I
don't know. The baseball thing makes more sense, a little
more tangible, right, Yeah. And you can see guys struggling
out of the gate and they're not taking this, they're

(01:52:24):
not playing as much in spring training. Yeah. Right, And
if we're talking about certain guys who are getting off
the slower starts, than that definitely would have something to
do with it when when it comes to a conditioning
because if you're a picture and you run out of
breath just running the first base is one thing. If
you're running the basis. I get that many pictures have
had that issue over the years in the National League,
but that that sounds like more of just an individual basis.

(01:52:46):
I can't there's not like a large situation of where
that's happened fairly often. When it comes to baseball and
then the basketball, the other name of the game is
being in shape, so that that that's almost never an issue. Wow.
But in basketball coaches, because I told you to eyes
and they've talked about guys the load management piece of it,
and also the lack of they get frustrated with a

(01:53:09):
lack of practice time, which you know, during the season
it's hard to have a lot of practices, and the
players Association it's really against especially during the season, they
limit your get together time. Yeah, and you know coaches, right,
all they want to do is practice. They want to
teach and they want to practice. So when you limit

(01:53:31):
that stuff, that kills them. Right. I would say in
the NBA more so than any other sport, it makes
sense that you would want to go with more of
the rest than the overwork situation, because you know, all
vital one player, I say, one or two players, just
one player if it can be on an individual roster.
So if if I have all this money tied up

(01:53:52):
in Lebron James or Kawai Leonard or whomever it may
be that may have a history of injury or who
may be getting worn down a little bit, it will
behooved me to rest him and not run him into
the ground so he doesn't tear as achilles and he's
out for the rest of the season. So I think
it's a little bit different in that league when when
talking about the NFL or even Major League Baseball. Yeah,
forgive me my allergies are killing you. It just hit

(01:54:16):
me a few weeks ago. It look like I look
like a I look like a villain from a Marvel movie.
My eyes were so red. So trust God, it's exactly
how it's been horrible. These allergies are terrible. Um, alright'll
do this fake it's with some trending, all right, and
then and then we'll get back to We've got lots
of stuff to do that, all right. Well, we're talking

(01:54:36):
about the NBA, and I mentioned Kauai Leonard a second ago.
He had a huge night for the Clippers. Actually made
his first eight field goals, finished with thirty six points
in leading Los Angeles to a one eight teen to
one away victory over the Dallas Mavericks. Paul George actually
chipped in twenty nine for the Clippers as well. Dallas
now sees their series lead shrink to two games to one.
Brooklyn's lead over the Celtics now also two games to one.

(01:54:59):
At Jason Tatum scored fifty points for Boston in a
one to one nineteen win. Atlanta has a two one
lead over the Knicks. Trey Young twenty one points and
fourteen assists, leading the Hawks to a one oh five
to nine four victory. There. In the NHL, Las Vegas
with a six to two victory over Minnesota in Game
seven of their first round matchup. In Major League Baseball,

(01:55:20):
you at the Giants outlasting the Dodgers in ten innings,
eight to five. Buster Posey with the home run there,
Fernando Tatzis Junior with the four his fourteenth home runder
the season, leading the Yeah, leading the Padres. That's what
the bat shoulder by the way there, Anthony's oh god,
He's had to adjust the way he's holding the bat
to deal with his shoulder, because they said if he
keeps swinging the way he had been swinging, is gonna

(01:55:41):
keep popping out. And it doesn't seem to have affected
him at all. Uh So they actually scored seven runs
on the top of the eleventh inning. The Padres did
came away with a ten to three victory over Houston.
Uh you had Kyle Lewis with a home run for
Seattle as they beat Texas in Oakland, roughing up Shoho
Tany and the Angels for a three to one victory.
Back to the Alright, that's azz. Don't forget fellas brought

(01:56:03):
to you by Discover. Discovery matches all the cash back
you earn your credit card the end of your first year.
It's amazing because discoverers accepted at of places in the
United States. That's say credit cards. Learn more, Discover dot com,
slash usneals and report limitations apply. Coming up, I gotta

(01:56:23):
share with you an incredible story. I brought up Charlie Manuel,
but there's an incredible story about that involving him, a
veteran manager, coach, and a bunch of little leaguers. I'll
share it. Coming up. Lots to get to and we'll
get back to the NBA playoffs and uh kind of
analyze each series where they stand. Big Hour. Coming up next.

(01:56:47):
Fellas right here on Fox. All right, welcome back, Fellas
hanging out on a Memorial Day Saturday. Don't for a
get listen for hot water that never runs out. Go
Tactless with Navy, and that's right. Navy and Tactless water

(01:57:11):
heaters provide endless hot water for a spotlight comfort. Visit
Tactless made Simple dot Com. Save hundreds with local rebates.
Tankless made Simple dot Com, Navy and amazing experience. All right,
So I gotta share this with you and I want

(01:57:34):
uh and it's gonna be a question at the end
of it. So last Sunday I had a I had
a little league game. But you know, my little guy
plays his little travel team baseball. He's eight. He loves it.
Fig he's a little ballplayer, plays like five games a
day or something. Right, it's just unbelievable. Like he's schedule.
It's like, you know, like he plays for the Dots

(01:57:55):
or exactly, you know whatever, I'm gonna drive across the Jersey.
It's crazy. Anyway, So I was talking to Charlie and
I said, dude, what are you doing in the morning,
because he was in town scouting and doing some stuff.
Charlie manuel, yes, And I just brought it up. I'm sorry,
and I just brought it up. That's why I brought

(01:58:16):
his name up list list segment. But he was a
manager for the Phillies, the Indians. He's he played years.
He's one of these baseball lifers. He's one of the
most beautiful guys you ever want to meet, one of
the greatest people ever, and he exudes baseball. So he said,

(01:58:36):
we said, we're talking. I said, I said, what do
you how about I pick you up. I said, come
to the game. The kids would love to see it.
The parents will go nuts, and you work with the
kids in the cage. He said, you don't want anythingy
I'll do it. So I picked him up like eight o'clock.
I got a couple of cups of coffee and we
go to the field. And the kids, like I had

(01:58:56):
showed them videos of who he cause and when he
was about, and you know, they understood it, and parents,
of course, we're guthing. And so this little town all
shows up to greet Charlie and it was one of
these beautiful moments of a big league manager who takes

(01:59:19):
time out of his day to come and coach kids
for a morning. That's amazing. And I thought it was
all an entell. The experience, the look when the kids faces,
it was awesome. So if I ask you give me
young Figgy, ten year old Figgy, and you could pick

(01:59:40):
the sport and the coach or the player to come
to practice or come to the game to give him instruction,
who would it be? Tommy Lasorda, don't even have to
think about it. Wow that you didn't, Oh my god.
And I was an Angel fan growing up as a kid.
Anybody that knows me knows that. But I mean, how
could you not love Tommy as honest, as as fourth

(02:00:02):
right as anybody out there? And I would think now
he probably wouldn't use choice words with kids like he
would with the pros. You know, he would be just
as critical and be on top of you. And I
love that I responded to that type of coaching. I
feel like someone like Tommy would have been a perfect
coach for me, And that would have been amazing if
he would If I would have been able to receive
his instruction from somebody like him back when I was

(02:00:23):
a child so easily, that would be so cool. Yeah,
I'm with you, man, I guess I guess, as Chris
would say, Wayne Fons, Chris, what do you got man?
I was gonna I was gonna go to you next.
This is always a weird one because I just didn't
play that many sports as a kid, like I played
some baseball, and um, I'm thinking, yeah, I was a kid.

(02:00:47):
He was a different kid. That was a different all right.
But imagine who would you go, Oh my god, he's
coming to practice to work with me, Like here's Charlie
working with kids individually for like ten minutes only. I
think the only coach I would have recognized my faces
probably would have been John Madden, So I would have
to go with with that. Um, if I'm using kind

(02:01:09):
of my recognition now a little bit, I think, you
know what, I would have recognized Jimmy Johnson. I think
Jimmy Johnson showed up, that would have been a big deal. Absolutely,
And I feel like, I feel like Jimmy's so flexible.
I feel like as a person that he would be
able to just kind of adapt whatever situation you throw
it him, right, you know. And I guess you know,

(02:01:30):
I would love to see that on a regular basis,
almost like community service, like you got to spend one
day a year coaching kids. Yeah. I think a lot
of these guys get so lost and you know, the
job of being professional coach and a lot of times
we talk about these guys being more managers than actual coaches,

(02:01:51):
and I think it'll be nice to bring them back
down to earth a little bit and get back into
the actual coaching aspect of coaching and not the business
administration as at of coaching that many of these pro
head coaches and managers are nowadays. I think you're dead right.
Oh my god, I actually agree with you. I think
I think it would breathe life into them a little bit.
What he would love it. It would help them because

(02:02:13):
their teachers at heart, they're all teachers at heart. They
want to teach the game. They they want to protect
their students and teach the game and make them do
well and elevate them and see that's what's in their soul.
Right anyway, we're gonna come back. We're gonna go through
all the playoffs series where they stand. What it looks like.

(02:02:34):
Where the fellas right here on Fox Sports Radio. All right,
welcome back Fellas. That's Truyn, Anthony Gargano. We got Kevin Figures,
Big Figure, we got Chris and Bo and Nikki and
that's the crowd right here. On a happy, happy Memorial

(02:02:57):
Day weekend to you guys, Happy sports Saturday, and uh,
a happy gateway to summer one. That's what Moral Day
weekend is. It signifies the start of summer. And we
want to thank all of those men and women who served,
so thanks guys, we appreciate it. And uh it's a

(02:03:20):
weekend now. On these coats were getting beat up by
some rain it's pretty nasty, but it's uh, it's you know,
it's a great day to watch basketball. It's a little
John Bloom coming in late May, but it's a little
but it's also a good day to watch basketball. Yeah right.
You know if anybody that has you know, the wife

(02:03:41):
or someone else tells you have to you have to
do X, Y and Z. I can't you see the weather?
They're out there, that's crazy. I gotta stay here. No,
I'm not going out there. So let's do it. Fig
Let's let's dive into each series because I know you've
got a boogie and I want to get into where
each series stands. Let's start Nix and Hawks. Hawks win

(02:04:04):
last night. They now are up to one in the series.
Game three on Sunday in Atlanta. Trey Young was magical, amazing,
He really was. De Rose played well and you know
who's come up small two for fifteen last night in

(02:04:26):
foul trouble fourteen points, eleven boards, five fouls, and again
two for fifteen, two for seven from three figure. It
looks like he's just trying to do too much. He is. Well,
you know the issue with the Knicks to they just
don't offensively is their issue. You know, TIBs can coach
defense like anybody, but when it comes time to actually

(02:04:47):
go and get a bucket, who are you going to now?
Derek Rose has had a bit of a resurgence this year,
especially in the second half of the season. He was
amazing on Friday, but they just don't have dudes essentially
to too. If I'm gonna make it this very simplistic,
Atlanta has guys they can go to that they can
rely on night and night out, or if one guy
gets cold, they can go to somebody else. Bogdanovitch can

(02:05:08):
score for you. Gallinari can score for you. You know,
we know what Trey Young can do. John Collins wants
scoreless the previous game, drop fourteen. He can get you
twenty and ten one one night. The Knicks they basically
have to have Julius Randall play well every single night
for them to be able to win games. Derrick Rose
is not going to score thirty points every single night.
That's that's an anomaly. And if you're the Knicks, you

(02:05:29):
feel like you wasted a performance of his on Friday
because he's not gonna be able to do that every night.
He's just not and so that was the big deficiency
for the Knicks coming into the series, where you have
to get baskets. Who are you going to And Julius
Randall is showing us so far that he's not the
guy to do that right now. He can't be. He's
had an excellent year, but he's not a number one
on a real viable playoff team. What are you thinking? Series?

(02:05:54):
You give the Knicks shot? Are you? Are you all?
Are you all hawked up? They have a shot because
they're so good to offensively and when things are working. Look,
I mean today's NBA. You hold a team the one
hundred and five points, that's not a bad defensive night,
you know, now, granted Atlanta issued from the field, but
but even with that, you know, you hold a team
under a hundred and ten points, that's a good night
on defense. They just got to find a way to

(02:06:15):
score more points. So they're in it. Do I think
they'll win it? No? And in going into what I
thought the Hawks would win in six, and I've obviously
not seen anything to change my mind on that, but
I would not be surprised if the Knicks won the series.
I could see an avenue for that to happen. Yeah,
you know what's funny, I'm I'm with you, but I agree.
I think at Atlanta, I just think they have more
consistent offense, and I think that's what don't want to

(02:06:38):
win in the series. They're up to one and I
wouldn't be surprised on Sunday you take commanding lead. The
Nets are up to one now. Boston wins last night
herculean effort by Tatum dropping fifty. You know, it's interesting
is that I hate the Celtics Figgy, I hate them right,

(02:07:01):
despies them. But I was rooting for him last night
because you hate the Nets that much more. And it's
not even the Nets, it's just the principal figures on
the Nets. You know. I saw a pole I don't
know if it was last week or two weeks ago,
about like the most hated teams in the NBA nationwide,
and the Nets had a slight edge over the Lakers.
And it's like, I don't think people hate the Nets.

(02:07:23):
I think people can give it to about the Nets
as an organization, but when it comes to the combination
of hardened Kyrie, Kevin Durant's those are some pretty hateable
figures for a lot of people. It's funny because I
saw that same pole and like I looked at you know,
it was funny that that pole and they went by
the one by states state to state by state. Yeah. Yeah,

(02:07:44):
So it was it was really a two horse race
Brooklyn and the Lakers, and then you had Boston. The
Celtic fans hated the Sixers, and the Sixers fans hate
the Celtic. Those are the other two, right, Jeff, I'm
very funny, Yeah, which is great, But I canna tell
you it's funny. I look at the Lakers and this

(02:08:06):
Lakers team. I can't hate. No, I'm not gonna tell
you I'm a fan or I wanted to win, but
I don't hate. I can't hete. I can't hate Lebron, okay,
because he's a very obviously, as you know, a polarizing figure.
And then some would say the way that Anthony Davis
forced his way out of New Orleans to the Lakers
probably turned some people off. So I would understand why

(02:08:28):
you wouldn't like the Lakers or why you'd hate them.
That makes sense. So Lebron is so good, it's so clutch.
If you love the game, it's almost impossible to hate him. Yeah,
I mean, look, there are certain guys that you can
love watching too. I love watching Kevin Durant and when
he's when he's on, like he was Friday, he was on,

(02:08:49):
He's amazing. But I don't know if I'm necessarily a
fan of his because of all the other antics, you
know what I mean, the Twitter trolling and all that stuffy.
I don't hate Kate, I hate Harden and I hate
and Hardened for me, is not fun to watch. I
don't want to see a guy prey into the free
throw line thirty times a game and and hunting for fouls.
That's not entertaining to me. Well even when it is

(02:09:09):
too I just think he's a stat whore, right, Like,
That's what I think he is. So you know, I
call him the hassa, which is from Scarface that's a
pig that doesn't fly straight. I will say, I guess
for the series with Boston and Brooklyn, I guess one
concern for Brooklyn is that, I mean, Durant and Harden
are probably not gonna play better. I mean, they scored

(02:09:30):
thirty nine and forty one points and you're still lost.
And so that leads into people like yourself or not.
You know, fully in on them is they can play
that well and still lose. You know, what are their
prospects as they get deeper into the postseason and play
better and better competition, assuming they beat Boston, which they should. Ye,
So I'll totally understand that Clippers, And this is an
interesting is it? What a series? Clippers and Dallas? Clippers

(02:09:54):
come back. They're on the brink, right, they lose both
first two games at home. They go to Dallas and
a win, which is going to give them supreme confidence.
So I ask you, who's got the upper hand in
that series? Well, it's very odd that a team that's

(02:10:14):
down has the upper hand. I'll put it this way. Um,
it might sound weird to say that a team that's
up to one has a must win coming up in
Game four, but I do feel that Dallas has to
win Game four. If the Clippers find a way to
win both games on the road in Dallas, then, by
the way, I picked the Clippers still to win the series.
I said that before before Game three and feel even

(02:10:36):
more confident about it now now they've got themselves some
confidence on the road and found the found their mojo
a little bit. So if Dallas doesn't find a way
to win Game four on on Sunday, then yeah, that
series is over. And it wouldn't surprise me if the
Clippers won four straight. Yeah, I think the same thing.
I look at this thing and I'm going this could
be bad now if I'm the Clippers. Did you see

(02:11:00):
how Rondo played Luca in the fourth quarter, got up
into him. He's not that big, by the way, you know,
that's the thing. He and Patrick Beverley are about the
same size, and you would think that Pat Beverly is
a better defender, but you know, you can't. You gotta
say something for for savvy moxie Rondo getting in people's
heads to a degree. I do think he messed with
Luca a little bit, so do I and I would

(02:11:23):
keep him. I think they might have stumbled onto something. Yeah,
well that and they also it's funny what the what
the Mavericks did was basically hunt for mismassage mismatches in
Games one in Games two versus Luca, and I found
that the Clippers tried to kind of exploit a little
bit of a Christas Porzingis and get him moving on
the defensive end. A little bit in Game three and
that kind of threw him off and he was ineffective

(02:11:44):
on both ends of the floor. So there might be
something to watch here the next few games. Yeah, yeah,
I'm with you. I'm with you. Um all right, Fox
heat is a great one. So it's three. Oh, I mean,
I'm shocked, same. I can't believe it now. I thought

(02:12:04):
Milwaukee would win, but it would be a close, hard
fought series, and yet it's three. Oh. The worst. I
would have thought it would have gone six. You know.
I thought Milwaukee would winning six games, and we even
said last week we thought this series could go seven.
But Miami is just not getting the same production from
the guys they got last year. If that's a function
of the bubble or whatever you want to call it.

(02:12:25):
But you know, you're Tyler heroes, You're Duncan Robinson's. They're
just not firing the way that they have been. And
whenever the problem is when their offense struggles, especially from
the outside, you know, it affects their defense. And Milwaukee
has been shooting like lights out the last couple of
games from the outside too, So you put those combination,
the combination of those things together, it's the classic NBA

(02:12:46):
story we see this year and in recent years. You know,
one team is hitting threes and the other is not,
and the one that's not keeps jacking them up because
they know that's the best way for them to get
back into it. But if they don't make them, you know,
eight point deficit turns to fifteen fifteen terms and five
turns into thirty. And that's exactly what happened to Miami
in Game two and Game three as well. So and

(02:13:08):
I really don't see anything that would, you know, change that.
Maybe they muster up something and get and get a
win today because they're playing at home. But I mean,
I honestly don't see that happening. Most of the time
when a team goes down three nothing, it's you know,
they pack up. Once to three can cool, and let's
get out of here. One to three can't com Well,
said Sixers Wizards. This series I think is a sweep.

(02:13:31):
They're playing the night the Sixers are a six point favorite.
Well of our betting animal is coming on next to
give us some picks. But I mean, I don't see
anything other than they sweep here. Same, Yeah, I agree,
and especially what the Westbrook was healthy maybe maybe there'll
be a little bit of a difference with him going
back home, But if he's hard and he's out, then

(02:13:52):
there's there's absolutely zero shot that the Wizards can even
compete with Philadelphia Denver poor in great series. Denver wins
Game three in Portland's now the Blazers with a four
and a half or a fournand point favorite at home
for Game four. This has got seven written all over it.

(02:14:15):
It does, it doesn't, and Lillard and Yoki have been
going back and forth with just these scoring binges. But
for me, for just a series overview, Denver is better
defensively than Portland is, and they both can score points.
But when it comes to now who can get stops
and who can't, I think I have to go with Denver,
and I don't think Portland has anybody in the front
court that can stick with Yokick. I know nurkis former teammate,

(02:14:37):
he can match up with him a lot. But there's
a reason why Yoki is gonna win the m v
P this year. He's been spectacular in this series. Michael
Porter Jr. Has made a giant jump, Aaron Gordon helps
their perimeter defense. So I just think they're more complete
team than Portland, and Portland we're playing against the team
that didn't play as good a defense. They'd have a shot,
but I think Denver is kind of hitting their stride here,
so I thought Denver would win in six, and uh there,

(02:15:00):
I've seen nothing to change my opinion on that. All right.
I'm I'm still holding that whole a game hope that
Portland's can overtake them. But we'll see. You're probably right.
Jazz Grizzlies interesting Griggs getting no respect that series won.
One shifts to Memphis after the split in Utah Utahs

(02:15:23):
of Road favorite prohibitive one. Now game two it was
over because I just thought the grizz BIG's got hit
with are only foul trouble and the valance has got
too TICKI tax fouls early, they come out of the
game right now. I'll also say, you know, and I
mentioned earlier in the show about you, and when it

(02:15:44):
comes to a series, what are things that are repeatable
to help a team win? Dylan Brooks is not dropping
thirty points every single night, you know what I mean?
Too many things would have to go right for Memphis
for them to win the series. So I know they
were able to come in and maybe they're writing the
momentum of the playing tournament to get a victory over Utah,
who was maybe rusty in game one. And I don't
think that they would get run off the floor or anything,

(02:16:06):
you know, like they'll lose by twenty every single night,
or lose by double digits like they did in game two.
But quite honestly, I thought Utah winning five, and I
still think that they will when they're clicking and they
get Donovan Mitchell back, you know, and he's still working
himself back in he scored twenty five though, because second
game back when a guy comes back, is usually a dip,

(02:16:28):
he could have it. I agree with you. I think
Utah wins a series, but I think Memphis could be
live tonight. It's possible. It's possible, um, but I want
to see Dillon Brooks go off again. And look, we
know what John Moran can do. I mean, he's spectacular.
It's the other guys, you know, getting production from your
Kyle Anderson's and the Jaren Jackson juniors and even Valanciuni

(02:16:48):
will show up on a night in, night out basis.
And to your point, maybe that game plays out differently
if he doesn't get into early foul trouble. Uh So
that's something the worth monitoring too. But I'm I still
feel fairly confident that you how, we'll be able to
win this relatively easily. All right, quickly? And lastly, do
you give the Sons another game? With CP banged up?

(02:17:10):
Do you give them another game? Or is just Lakers
in five? I had the Lakers in five before Chris
Paul got injured. Uh So the fact that he's, you know,
running on whatever gives them even less of a shot.
So I think the Lakers wrapped this one up in
the next couple of days. Yeah, I'm with you. This
is my brother. Always enjoy the best. We love you,

(02:17:30):
and you have a great weekend. Enjoy it with your fiance.
I appreciate your brother. Always fun. We'll do it again
next week. Sounds great. There he is the great Kevin
Figgers coming up, Brad Feinberg, our betting analysts that you
hear each week, he's going to give you a props.
He now the props the last couple of weeks on
the show. I believe he's unbeaten. If I'm mistake, we'll

(02:17:53):
track all the playoffs from a betting standpoint. That's next
of the fellas right here on Fox Sports Radio. All right,
welcome back fellas on a Saturday. Happy Memorial Day weekend, everybody.

(02:18:14):
Let's take a look at your weekend from a betting
standpoint and uh, joining us the betting analysts we always
have on. We love him, he's the big brain on. Brad.
Brad Feinberg. Good morning, Brad, Happy Memorial Day weekend, My brother,
how are you, my friend? Great to hear your voice. Yes, yes,

(02:18:37):
my man. Yes, I was telling the our nationwide audience
that our weather here on the East Coast is not
very good, not very good at all. It's I'm right here,
came down Fromorial Day weekend of the Jersey shore your
Atlantic city, is that correct? Yeah, New Jersey, which is

(02:18:57):
very close to week day. But the weather is just
not good, my friends, cloudy, everything bad, moy. Yeah, I'm sorry.
It's a good day to stay in and watch games,
watch our sport. That's the positive. That's always look at
the eggs. It's a good day to make money. There
you go, buddy, there you go. So I gotta tweak

(02:19:17):
you because I gotta start getting you. Don't think I
know this is coming. So Brad I do a couple
of hits. Uh during the week, we were good buddies.
We love each other and uh and Brad is all
over Brooklyn and I can't stand Brooklyn because Brad's a
professional better right, like he does this for a living.

(02:19:38):
I'm just a hater of Brooklyn hater and a Sixers fan.
So I'd like to tease Bread all the time. I go,
I'm a basketball guy. I don't say it. And Uh, anyway,
that was good. Listen, we saw Tatum last night was
just spectacular. Look again, like that was I guess the
fear in Brooklyn can't they defend? And you know, we

(02:19:59):
watch Tatum go off for fifty and uh, look, they
clearly showed it. You know all that last night. I
guess its sea. It's not going necessarily be a walk
in the park to them. I still think their talent
level to beat them four times will be a challenge,
but yeah, no question about it. You know, last night
was eye opening in a lot of ways. Yeah, yeah,
and you're right. I mean, listen, they're gonna win the series.
I just think it's gonna have one next one, that's

(02:20:21):
for sure. Yeah, you know, we've been talking about this
potential Milwaukee Brooklyn series. Does that make you change things
that you look at things? And then does that affect
how you'll kind of look at, say, futures like this.
You're always one thing. I have a saying, I'd rather

(02:20:41):
I'd rather be right than be consistent. Right, And what
I mean by that is, you know, I'm always looking
at every single situation. Do things change? You can't. You
can't be stubborn if you're a sports gambler, Anthony, and
the one thing you can't do is is be stubborn
and think that you know everything and things can't change.
Things are constantly evolving, thoughts constantly changing changing. So yeah,
I'm only when I look at Brooklyn absolutely like they've

(02:21:02):
been power ranked, is my number one team? Uh? And
I definitely have a big position in the future market.
But if I see that it's just not necessarily clicking
and because the defensive issues or whatnot, it doesn't look
like I necessarily think they're the best team at that point,
I'll get off that position in two seconds slot and
that's what you gotta do. Again, I'd rather be right
than be consistent, all right, So let's look at this

(02:21:25):
weekend's games and kind of where they stand and kind
of what you're looking at as a better So let's
start off with today. We'll go in order of the games.
And we got Bucks and Heat and Milwaukee a five
point favorite about to close the series and it may

(02:21:47):
be a sweep. Somebody else told you Milwaukee would win
the series. But you know, just saying, how would you
how do you look at today? Does the Jimmy and
the Heat did they have any kind of pushback? Well,
you know, look, they're they're they're basically you know the line,
you know what your Game three line was one and
a half from Milwaukee. Now it's at the five. Because again,

(02:22:09):
when what it traditionally happens, and then when you have
a team that's up three zero, you get a lot
of times where that team is just gonna like as
you said, mail and and they know they're not gonna win. Um.
I just you know, I'm trying to just go back
and try to be objective here, and I just do
think that Miami is one of those rare teams where
normally I would not be looking at back to team
gets down three zero. I just wouldn't because I think

(02:22:31):
usually more times not that team does mail it in.
I do think Miami is a team that having gotten
just humiliated two straight games. Um, I'm not gonna say
they're necessarily going to cover the game, but I think
I'm gonna get a good effort. I really think I'm
going to get a good effort, and I don't think
they're just going to get blown out again. It's just
my opinion. I'm definitely on the Miami side here getting

(02:22:54):
the five points. There's a prop I like in this
game is very much anthy. Trevor Reason average four and
a half rebounds and he went under five. He made
this over under five and half freebounds, which he's gone
under about two thirds of the time. Here's the best
part about that bet. He averaged twenty nine minutes the
game and the regular season. The last two games he's
only gotten eighteen minutes. This will unders should be three
and a half, Anthony, not five. Half crazy edge taking

(02:23:15):
Trevor Reason under five and half freebounds. Wow, that's interesting,
and that's one that would fall through the cracks. It's exactly,
it's a fall through the crack kind of bet. But
if this is why I have to find these things
because I I like to pick the stuff up that
goes through the cracks. Those are the kind of winning
bets you make. Again, maybe he gets six rebounds, but
I can tell you this for a fact, that's a bet.
If you could bet at a hundred times, you'd make

(02:23:36):
a lot of money. Yeah, because here's the victily your
point minutes for one minutes minutes. Yeah, man, when you
when you have a guy he averaged he averaged about
four and a half rebounds, or at the bat it
should have been four and a half by the fact
that the average twenty eight minutes the game in the
regular season. Now he's down to eighteen in these last
couple of games they've gone away from him. Um to

(02:23:56):
me that again, I would have made this number maybe
three and a half. So you know, getting six is
a pretty big gask in my opinion for Trevor a reason.
All right, Uh, the game itself you're good with. Let's
go to Denver and Portland's which is next. Portland's is
a four and a half point favorite over the Nuggets.

(02:24:19):
Do you think a rebound for Portland even the series? Yeah, Like,
the only way I can look in this game me
is the U is the Portland's side. Now, again, I
give Denver a lot of credit. They you know, come
back after getting just you know, losing that first game
and then you know, joke, it has just been He's
unbelievable and he's just a really good player to while

(02:24:41):
I love watching him play. Um, I think Portland, I
just I will say this. I I give coach Malone
credit because I think when I look at just two
players on the both sides, I think Portland's should be
the better team in my opinion, like they have more
more a little more talent overall right now than have
very injured Denver team with missing you know, their second
best player in Murray, missing guys like Will Barton or whatnot. Um,

(02:25:05):
I do think Portland's gets this one again four and
a half not necessarily cheap the one by five, But
I would be surprised if Denver wins this one. I
think this is an all in game for the Blazers. Um.
I just think that they're a much better offensive team
in my opinion. I think they just have more firepower.
I expect them to get this one. And there's a
couple of props in this one, Anthony, I do see

(02:25:25):
some value in Uh, Damian Lillard and CJ. McCallum. It's interesting,
Uh Lillard and McCollum both go under four and a
half rebounds, you know, about sixty two at the time.
The over unders four and a half. A little bit
of value taking that under on both of them, on
both of them. Yeah, yeah, on the rebounds. Well, it's funny.
It's so not in human nature to take unders, right,

(02:25:50):
and it's so not in human nature, don't right, Yeah, yeah,
it's so funny you said it because I was like,
my ears are are curious. I'm like, I wonder if
he's going to go over Dame's points. But yeah, it
was really high to night. I think it was like
thirty three and a half orty. It was the right number. Again,
I I say again, either bet for two ways. Either

(02:26:13):
bet to win money or you bet for action. Most
people bet for action, which, by the way, totally fine.
I get it. I bet to win money. Uh, if
it's a right number on something, I'm not looking at
bet it. I'm looking at hopefully actually be a profitable
in this. And um, I thought that was the right number.
And you know, but he's Cheffie huge Knight, cann No
doubt about it. Yeah, Sixers and Wizards that tonight's Sixers

(02:26:36):
can go up three. Oh you know, I feel I
think this is see what do you like in this game?
How do you see it going? Pa? Well, you know, look,
and I know anything. We did briefly talk about this before,
like with Philly, with me, I need to see Russell Westbrook,
what his what his status isn't And I like to

(02:26:56):
deal with certainties, and I have an uncertainty on how
healthy Westbrook is, so I can't get myself to beat
this game. Now. I will say this, if Westbrook is
healthy and playing, the only way I can look is
the Washington side. I know what you're saying. You talked
about it from a matchup point of view. You just
thought this favorite Philadelphia by a wide margin. I get that,
there's no question about that. You're right, but we saw

(02:27:17):
it last night with Brooklyn against the Nets. I'm sorry
Brooklyn against the Celtics. You know, you can get these
game three situations where the team comes home and they
and it's they're all out, you know General Patton speech
game where they where they come out and they and
they just have to win the game or whatnot. Um,
Philadelphia has been these last few years. Answer me, as
you know, being a Philly guy, probably that they're splits

(02:27:40):
at home versus road. Have been probably the biggest of
any team in the NBA. They've been the best home
team in basketball huntel and one's even been close, and
they've been very mediocre on the road. They're laying aid
at home and then laying six on the road. Again,
I I like that spread in the sense that I'd
much rather take them laying aid at home versus laying
six on the road. Uh. The only way I can
look here if Westbrook is healthy is the Washington side. Wow. Wow,

(02:28:08):
I'm not saying they're gonna win the I mean there
was no props in this game that I saw that
I that I that I you know, thought were worth
doing or whatnot. Um, But again, obviously I think guys
like uh I will say this. I I saw it posted,
I didn't see it up yet. But Davis Burton's of
the Wizards. Um, they had his over under in Game

(02:28:30):
one at eight and a half points. I like that
over and then they didn't have it up again. If
they if you can get Burton's over eight and a half,
he'd gone over that. I believe like fourteen of the
last seventeen games, UM, sharp shooting guy, uh, big three
point shooting guys. So just it's a couple of threes
to get over eight and a half. Not a huge
as haven't seen it up posted yet, but it was
up for game one and he at like fifteen points,

(02:28:51):
so if you can get that, if that gets posted later,
I would like Burton's over eight and a half. Couple
was simmy to score the first basket and they try
to get him off early. So I kind of think
the odds are pretty good to take a shot with Simmons. Well,
one thing I like about that, man, they look, what

(02:29:11):
is that a bet like that? What are you looking at?
And for me, the thing I'm looking at is who's
gonna win the jump ball? Um? And obviously when you
when you have like someone like embad, who's you know,
seven ft two guys a good chance he's gonna win
when the opening tips. So if you're looking for a
like that like that, I would always be looking for
the team I think it's gonna win the jump ball
because you've got just such a huge advantage getting the

(02:29:33):
ball first. When it's scoring the first point or whatnot.
And obviously, yeah for the Sixers, you know ben Is
certainly is can get it done. And yes, seven to
one odds theoretically every player should be nine to one
if everyone was equal. Um, and in fact, the Sixers
probably will get the ball first. Um, I can't. I
can't find a ball with that I like, I like

(02:29:54):
and beat over thirty one and a half point thirty
and a half points. You know, he's been quiet first
two games of the series, imply the game will be closer.
He was in foul trouble and then he was limited
because of the blowout. Yeah, and assuming you're right in
that the game, sir, he'll play more minutes, which means yeah,

(02:30:19):
I would say there's a lot. Definitely a correlation. Everyone
out they're listening is when you when you're getting it
over in a prop everything is tied two minutes. Everything
that's that you want to raise your i Q if
you know how many minutes someone played, and if you're
gonna look to take it over, you obviously want the
guy to play minutes. So if you're taking you don't
want to blow up because it's a blowout game. You're
maybe indeed normally averages that say, thirty four thirty five minutes.

(02:30:42):
One of these games they only get twenty nine minutes.
It would be too hard for him to get there.
So absolutely, the game like this, I would be much
more apt Anthony to take the sixes overs in props
or Washington's overs for that matter. And the sense that
I think you're going to get a much in my opinion,
better chance from a non blowout like we saw in
Game two. A Brad, did we favorite sit tight? We

(02:31:03):
gotta do a quick trending and I got that. You're
in a treat, Brad. I got the Lord of trendings,
the one, the only ill. Hello Baby, good morning. We
got a double treat because our beloved jam Master is
coming up and just I can't wait it makes his

(02:31:26):
weekly visit. We start with a rundown of Friday's NBA
playoff action and Jason Tatum of the Boston Celtics dropping
fifty on the Brooklyn Nets and the season one five
to one nineteen game three victory. Brooklyn still leads the
series two games to one, the Atlanta Hawks defeating the
New York Knicks one oh five to ninety four. Hawks
lead the series two games to one. Trey Young twenty

(02:31:47):
one points and fourteen assists for the Knicks. Derrick Rose
scored thirty. Julius Randall had fourteen but was two for
fifteen from the field. The Los Angeles Clippers to beat
the Dallas Mavericks one eighteen to want to wait. Despite
forty four more by Luca Unchach, Mavericks still lead the
series two games to one. In the Stanley Cup Playoffs
on Friday Night, the Vegas Golden Knights won Game seven
over the Minnesota wild six to two to advance to

(02:32:09):
the second round. Behind him at Tis Ye and Mark Hatrick.
It'll be the Vegas Golden Knights and the Colorado Avalanche.
Game one on Sunday Baseball Friday Night, Giants led the
Dodgers five to two going to the bottom of the ninth.
The Dodgers scored three runs to tie it, and then
Albert Poolholtz came to the plate. Here is Joe Davis
on sports Net l A pool holds six one deep

(02:32:31):
pool field talk then, and that's some mostion. A roller
coaster continues to the tenth, Mike Topman robbing Pools of
a game winning home run. Giants went on to score
three in the top of the tenth to win it

(02:32:53):
eight to five. Finally, hold your ears, folks, it's time
for our jam, mr Jam of the Week. We go
back earlier this week to a matchup between the Yankees
and White Sox with Mike Ford. Mike Ford at the plate,
pitches hit in the airt a deep right center, hit
us high, let us far, us gone. Oh, there's a

(02:33:18):
Ford in the Yankees future. A long home run of
bamaroo to the right center. Mike is Ford tough. That
was a triple whammy. But for me, what stood out
the most was not any of the Ford stuff. Bomb aroom,

(02:33:40):
it's so weak, it's strong. Back to you, a man,
I love you the best, buddy. I'm gonna go bomb
arooing around the studio. All right. Let's with the fellas
hanging out with you and joining me our betting Anna.
Let's go through the weekend. Could weekend? Make some core
go and throw it. Brad Feinberg, the big brain on Brad.

(02:34:05):
People can follow you on Twitter. We're at Brad Brad's
Best Bets. Here you go at Brad's Best Bets. Utah, Memphis, Brad,
that's tonight. I think Memphis is live. Am I nuts. No,
I don't think you're nuts at all. Again, I think
Memphis we saw in a couple things in Memphis because

(02:34:27):
they're a non glamour team, so to speak. I think
they've been underrated all year and they actually had the
third best record a t S against the spread in
the entire NBA this year. And we're also like about
the scene. The team is not was not healthy a
large part of the season. Morant missed a lot of time,
Jaren Jackson missed a lot of time. Jonas Lancy Unis
missed a lot of time. This is a team that
really hasn't even healthy. Now they are. I think they're

(02:34:49):
a good team obviously. Look Jazz getting Mitchell back huge
thing for them, no question about it. Jazz at the
best record in the NBA. Really good team. But you know, look,
I thought this line she's been closer to three and
a half for Utah. It's five. I think the submits
here and taking the Grizzlies getting five, I think the
lines about a point they half too high in my opinion. Yeah,
I Valichuda's got some ticky tack fast early took them

(02:35:11):
out of gain. Yeah that hurt him. Yeah, that hurt
him for sure, And I don't know. I like, I
agree with you. I think they're on theer rated squad man.
I think so uh Eddie props that you you like
in this one, there was not. I didn't get any
props in that game. One of them. One I did,
forget to tell you, brook Lopez forty four and twenty
six two under five and a half rebounds to submage

(02:35:35):
taking brook Lopez under five and a half. That's about it.
Almost a two out of three bed as well, brook
Lopez forty under five and a a freemounds And when I
when I stretched it out, so the last two under games,
it was the same kind of percentage. I forgot to
mention that one Lopez should not get six rebounds tonight.
Wow wow, all right tomorrow when we look at tomorrow's games,

(02:35:58):
because it's a lot the full slate, Knicks Hawks Hawks
up to one in this series. There are five point
favorite over the Knicks. Yeah, like listen and I really
the Knicks were number one team a TS this year
against the spread. But I I felt like and I
last light, I did like Atlanta and I'm gonna like

(02:36:20):
Atlanta again. I think Atlanta is just better uh. And
I think that what we saw with the Knicks Anthony
this year was my favorite story in the NBA. I
really thought they played so hard. But we see this
a lot of times in the NBA. An it's the
one sport where because they played hard every single night
for you know, for seventy two games this year, I
just don't think they have that second year these other

(02:36:41):
teams had where maybe they're playing hard fifty times a
night is now max effort, and and they don't have
I mean, you know, look, they have Rose and they
have Ramble, but they just don't have the firepower and
might open even close to what Atlanta has. Any Atlanta
is like clearly more accounted. And the only reason we
all these teams have the same record this year was

(02:37:02):
because the Knicks played max intensity every single night. I
was hoping to get Atlanta in this series getting a
price give. You know, the linemakers that are actually right
in my opinion, actually favored the Hawks. I was hoping
because the Knicks were, you know, we're going to maybe
because a spread record this year, maybe I was able
to take Atlanta. But um, I think Atlanta's gonna win
this one. I just think Atlanta is the better team. Um,

(02:37:23):
I just think there's a real talent difference here. And uh,
we saw the Knicks come back in Game two when
they were down twelve thirteen in the third quarter. I
just don't think they have the firepower to keep up
with Atlanta. I think Atlanta gets it done, all right.
Uh the Lakers and Sons Chris Paul crushed kind of

(02:37:45):
you by the way, you were dead on with the
DeAndre eight and his props. What do you see? Yeah? Yeah,
well again, well they've made eight and the last couple
of games is over under between twelve and a half
and fourteen. Then he averaged fourteen and a half points
this year. Okay, in thirty minutes a game. In these playoffs,
he's getting forty minutes the game. So again, when you

(02:38:06):
all you need here to know is minutes. If you
have a guy who's getting an extra more minutes in
the averages around fourteen and a half, he should be
able to get another four to five points the game.
So I would look to take eight and again at
his over unders in the fourteen and a half fifteen
and af area. That's a huge by price for me.
Now the game itself, Um, Look, I'm gonna be a
little bit stubborn here. I talked about I'd rather be
consistent with me, Right, I get that, But I I

(02:38:28):
still just I believe that Phoenix, you know, was so
good all year. And actually I know Paul's banged up.
And I give you know, the Lakers credit. They clearly
you know, won that last game, but getting seven points,
I just still think it's too many points. I think
that Phoenix is actually gonna make this a close game.
I wouldn't be surprised that Phoenix won the game out right, Um,

(02:38:50):
I you know, getting seven to me, I think it's
a big number. Um. I think Phoenix has a real
chance to actually win this game. Um. And I think
I get the lines. I think the lines too. Wow,
that's awesome. Uh, Brooklyn and Boston at it for game four.
I'm I'm assuming you like Brooklyn right minus six and
a half? Yeah, anyway, I can look, here is the

(02:39:14):
net side laying the six and a half. Look, I
give credit to Boston. They did what they had to do,
no question about it. And look, maybe maybe maybe you're right, Anthony,
Maybe you know, like we talked to, you know, and
in all those movies that you know when they say
talk being gasy, being fake, maybe Brooklyn does have a
stakeness to them which will be exposed in these playoffs.
Certainly possible, but I don't think it's gonna be Boston

(02:39:35):
the team that does that exposing. Um, I just think again,
for one night Tatum was that great. Maybe he'll do
it again, but you know now that the line, you know,
has actually gone down. Uh, the only way I can
look here is the next side, all right? And then finally,
the last game of the weekend, or at least of
Sunday is Clippers Mavericks. Dallas is a three point favorite. Um,

(02:40:01):
I don't know. I like, I mean, I think the
I mean Clippers are three point favorite. I like the Clippers.
I think they even a series and they may not
lose a love of game. Yeah, I mean, I'm gonna
I'm gonna go the other side on this one. Look,
I give them credit, and they did what they had
to do last night. And I'm sure they had every
one and their grandmother's telling them how bad, you know,
they were, being down to nothing and everything like that,

(02:40:24):
And they give them a lot of credit. They did it.
They want to convince the game in Dallas. Um, I
just again, I kind of think this line in me
when I made it. I think the line should be
closer to a pick. I'm getting three points in the
game that I consider a true coin flip. That's just
my opinion. So if I'm getting three points, if you
want to take an hour forty with the money line,

(02:40:44):
only the way I can lean in this game with
me is to the underdog side. I do understand what
you're saying. The Clippers were the South with Rondo. Rondo
is gonna be on Luca and that's going to change
the face of the series. Certainly, could be, certainly, could be.
Uh And I understand that, But I I don't know.
I just do something about this Clippers team and me,

(02:41:05):
I can't just quite get myself there. Um again, I
think it's a game. I'm not saying I think the
Clippers are necessarily going to lose the game. But with
the three point line, the only way I could look
is taking the three points. My brother, great stuff. Listen,
have a safe and happy Memorial Day weekend. Okay, I
want to give you one baseball game, Anthony. Oh yeah,

(02:41:26):
you really like the Marlins today? Plus a dollar forty
against the Red Sox Rogers has been as good as
any picture in the major leagues. Not only again, I
would take him, pick him getting plus a dollar forty
nice Memorial Day gift. Nah, look at you. I love it.
Thank you, brad Ley big brain on Brad Feinberg at

(02:41:46):
Brad's bets on Twitter. Check him out. He's terrific. And uh,
it's just talking guy talking sports. That's it. We'll come
back and wrap up the show where the Fells every
week right here on Fox Sports Radio. All right, welcome back,

(02:42:08):
fasous on a Memorial Day Saturday. Don't forget fellas brought
you by Discover. Discover matches all the cash back you
earn on your credit card in your first year. It's
amazing because discovers accepted at n of places in the

(02:42:30):
United States take credit cards. Learn more at discover dot
com slash yes deals to report, limitations apply. Thanks to
uh Brad Feiberg for giving us some plays for this weekend.
She'll be a fun uh fun weekend of basketball and
uh and the curious thing to be looking at is

(02:42:50):
are the next vulnerable? How does Milwaukee play without Dante
g Vincenzo, who's a good little role player for them?
Does that impact them? That did the Sixers keep turning
it on against Washington In the West, the CP three
is that injury completely derailed The Sun's rad says no.
I think the Lakers are a walk and the Clippers.

(02:43:14):
That to me is that it's gonna challenge the balance
of power in the West. Can the Clippers come back
and beat Dallas If they found something with Rondo on Luca,
that could be a big deal. Anyway, it should be fun.
Enjoy your weekend everybody, Thanks for having out. Be safe.
We love you. We'll see you next Saturday.

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05/29/2021 – The Fellas with Anthony Gargano

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