Aaron Torres and Jason Martin talk Kyler Murray and AFC West!

Aaron Torres and Jason Martin talk about Kyler Murray’s new contract, Charles Barkley possibly joining LIV Golf as an announcer, the bloodbath in the AFC West, Jason’s rant on the ESPY’s, and more!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Fox Sports Radio. Welcome in everybody, Fox
Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday for the first time in
a few weeks. Aaron Torres, Jason Martin, both of us
getting in a little vacation time because football is coming fast.
Jason Martin, We're gonna get to Kyler Murray. We're gonna
get to a lot of stuff across the college space

(00:22):
over the course of the next four hours. But first
and foremost, how are you. Did you enjoy your last
Saturday off? I was off two saturdays ago. I hope
you had a good one last week. Whatever you were doing, Yeah,
it was a good time. We Uh it was my
wife's med school reunion for someone. You have to meet
some of those folks. Hey man, those are people that

(00:43):
do things for a living. I know, Like we talked
about sports and all this stuff, and you're around those people.
It's just like when the doctor conversation begins. I'm Homer
Simpson retreating into the ivy sure thing. Just all of
a sudden, it's like, you know what, I'm I'm gonna
be the meme right now. I'm gonna be here. I'm
gonna be And then they're like, oh, but your job, Like, yeah, yeah,
my job. Um he stores around here. Maybe I could

(01:05):
go visit over the next couple of hours, but no,
it was a great time and be able to golf,
had a good time, and then tonight I literally just
got home twenty minutes ago or whatever from the Tennessee
Sports Hall of Fame induction banquet, which is the first
one they've been able to run in three years because
of COVID. So it was three classes being inducted, including
Javon Curse, Jeff Fisher, Vanderbilt baseball manager Tim Corbin, uh

(01:29):
D'Angelo Williams, the greatest running back in Memphis history. Like
a bunch of folks. So there was a there's a
lot of sports happening in my universe today as well.
So why what were you there for anybody specific? Uh?
What what was the scoop there? What? And was just invited?
It takes place to the Omni Hotel in Nashville, So

(01:50):
them in the Hall of Fame, uh invited me and
Ramon and our producer and uh we were there three
years ago when Payton Manning went in and the director
at Sinnessey Sports of Fame used to be my program director.
Um here in Nashville on the day to day show,
and he stepped up into that role and they've been
nice enough to We just had a good relationship with him.

(02:10):
It's a really solid organization. The ahead of its Philip Fulmer.
As a matter of fact, we talk about Yeah, I know,
I know, we are we are going to talk about that.
We are. We are going to talk about Phil Fulmer
and some stuff that happened at Tennessee here in a
little bit. But let's get into a Jason. I'm sure
you talked about it on your weekday show with Ramon Foster. Uh.

(02:31):
It was a busy week in the NFL. Training camps
are basically here. A couple of teams have reported, everybody
will report by the end of the week, and of
course the big story of the week was that we
have another very well compensated quarterback. Kyler Murray, of course,
is the guy that I'm talking about. Arizona Cardinals signs
a contract that will pay him two hundred thirty million

(02:53):
dollars over the totality of his career. Over totality of
the contract, I should say, unlike Deshaun Watson, and is
not fully guaranteed, but there is an awful lot of
guaranteed money, a hundred sixty million or so. He's going
to make an annual salary of about forty six million
dollars a year, which puts him behind only Aaron Rodgers

(03:13):
in terms of the highest paid quarterbacks in the NFL.
Uh first reaction again, I'm sure you talked about it
during your weekday show, but another star quarterback breaks the bank.
I have some thoughts, but you go ahead, go first,
Jason Well, I mean I've talked to you before, uh,
during our time together about information that I had heard
from former teammates of Kyler Murray and people in Arizona

(03:37):
that really it just the way that they talked about
him was not flattering in terms of leadership, in terms
of last one in, first one out, aloof all of
those kinds of things. And now that's all been said
publicly by many, many people in our industry. I think
that eventually a quarterback has to come along where the
market resets, instead of just continuing to break the bank

(03:59):
upwards for the next guy. I don't think this was
the one. I think this was gone, This was inevitable.
This is gonna happen whether or not it was here
or if somebody else was gonna pay him exorbited money.
Dude's got all the talent in the world now that
you've paid him, though, I need to see those things
that I had kind of heard over the last few
years that have trickled in and out. Those kinds of
things need to disappear now, Like once you've gotten paid,

(04:22):
once the team has basically said all right, you're our guy,
now you gotta go do that, like you've got to
be a leader, which we have not really seen, and
you've kind of heard the opposite, and now you gotta
go win playoff games because there a whole lot of quarterbacks. Look,
there's another one that's that's trying to get paid right
now that has struggled in the playoffs and Lamar Jackson, Lamar,
I think it's worth more to me, at least than Kyler.

(04:43):
Murray is Kyler at this point. I'm gonna need to
see what happens from this point on. I'm gonna give
him the opportunity. He's still a very young guy. A
lot of young guys are immature, a lot of guys
grow into that role, find their footing all of that.
He's a different guy that's very obvious. He comes from
a different cloth. But at the same time, Aaron, what
what were the Cardinals really supposed to do here? There

(05:06):
was what what was the other option? Who was going
to play quarterback for them? What was better out there
than Kyler Murray for the Arizona Cardinals right now? If
they think the only only, the only way I would
answer that question differently is if I didn't think that,
or if I if I thought my team was absolute
trash and had no chance to do anything. And this year,

(05:28):
I don't think they're considered at all. I mean, I
think Hopkins being out pretty much they're gonna behind the
eight ball long before he comes back. In the division
that's still got to awfully get football teams in it,
along with Seattle, who's terrible. But I think that's the
big thing. It's just I'm not the biggest fan, and
I need him to show me something at this point
in time in terms of the leadership that needs to

(05:50):
come from the quarterback position. But I also understand why
Arizona did this, especially before the salary cap continues to
grow up and explode with the television deal, and this
deal actually more favorable two years from now that it
does right now. Yeah, So it's really interesting because I
think my initial thought when I heard it, I just
kind of moved on to the next thing it did
was anything that really resonated with me, because my first

(06:12):
thought was, well, of course he's gonna get paid. You
you pay all these guys. And I do think there's
an element too, like the Cardinals really didn't have any
better option, and it's not as though there's some like
crazy successful franchise where they can play hardball. Um, you know,
he is, by a lot of tangible measurements, probably the
best quarterback that they've really ever had homegrown. I know,

(06:33):
Kurt Warner, you know, had a couple of good years
as as a veteran, you know, addition late in his career,
But in terms of homegrown, as weird as it sounds like,
I think you can make a legitimate argument he's probably
the best that they've ever had. So I get that
element of it. But I also do think a couple
of things. One I am fascinated as to when that
breaking point is going to be in terms of the

(06:54):
organization that just says you're really good, but you're not
that guy. We can't give you that money. Maybe we
saw a little bit of that with Baker Mayfield this
past offseason. Yeah, it would be interesting to see what
would have happened, Um, you know, if Deshaun Watson did
not become available and they they you know, or if
Deshaun Watson just picked another team. I mean there was
obviously other teams that were interested in him. But I

(07:15):
just bring it up to say, this would have been
the one where it would have been interesting if if
the team had you know, not just kind of said no, no, no,
no no, but kind of held the line in the sand.
Because what I do find interesting about this one is
it's exactly what you said, Jason, is you're not paying
a guy forty six million dollars a year. And again
I understand that this is the market for start, you know,

(07:35):
star caliber NFL quarterbacks coming into uh you know, coming
off of their rookie contracts, but you look at this situation.
I mean, Kyler Murray Um terrible in the playoffs last year. Uh,
you know not. I just I look at it as
a few things. One, is he a guy that can
win you a super Bowl? Because I don't think that
he is, Uh, he's worn down the last couple of

(07:57):
seasons late as the season has gone on. You know,
put aside the Cliff Kingsbury, his team's generally fall apart
as it is late in the season. But uh, you know, small,
injury prone, and then on top of that you have
those leadership things. And that was one thing that struck
with me. Stuck with me on Thursday was the idea
of kind of that old cliche that everybody says, is like,
you know, money doesn't change people, it makes you more

(08:19):
of what you already are. And so to to think
about the leadership questions, the durability questions, Um, where is
he in the pecking order? No, he's not in the
bottom half of the NFL. But I don't I don't
think he's in the top you know. Uh, I don't know,
top five, six, seven, eight of the best quarterbacks in
the league. It's just one of those I get why

(08:41):
the Cardinals did it, but I also sit back and say, man,
oh man, oh man. Uh this could have been one
where I I wouldn't have been surprised if the team
decided to play a little bit more horrible. Yeah, look,
I think he's outside the top ten right now in
terms of quarterbacks. Without looking at it and trying to
figure it out. Just in my head. I know he was.
He was in that eight to ten range probably last year.

(09:02):
Now he's outside the top ten for me, even though
they started out eight no last year and looked apart. Uh,
it fell apart the way it always does for Cliff
Kingsbury and seemingly for Kyler Murray, both for Kingsbury in
college and Kyler Murray certainly in the pros. I just
don't like the makeup of of that team. Um, last year,
I liked it a lot better than I do this year,

(09:24):
and now you don't have Hopkins. I I don't mind
what they did in terms of the draft and the
talent that they got there and getting Hollywood Brown, who
doesn't have to be a number one potentially or maybe
there was a Baltimore problem there and Brown is gonna
be able to emerge. That would be you know that,
that would be intriguing to see. Do I think Kyler
could win a Super Bowl? Do I think he's got
the talent to win a Super Bowl? Yes? Do I

(09:47):
think a whole lot of things have to go right
for that to happen, Yes, Like if I had to
bet it now, No, I don't think Kyler Murray is
a super Bowl quarterback. I don't um I think his size,
I think his I don't know he's There are guys
Aaron in sports that you really want a round you
when things are going well, but they're the last person

(10:09):
you really want if things are going poorly. Sure, it
seems like one of the things that's happened in Kyler
Murray's career throughout is when they start to fall apart.
Late um, everything starts to go poorly. But then if
you don't have those leadership intangibles, that's when they really
come into clars. Like when things aren't going well, you
need somebody that can galvanize the troops. I don't think

(10:30):
Kyler Murray has proven to be anywhere near that guy
to this point in his career. I want to see
him prove me wrong because I've seen the skill set,
I've seen the highs. I've also seen a lot of
mediocrity and a lot of reasons to like a lot
of other guys in this league and feel a little
bit more comfortable with them leading my football team than
Kyler Murray. And Kyler Murray getting the money basically because

(10:52):
he's the next guy in line. That's a franchise level
quarterback for a team, and then what choice did they have.
That's the annoying thing about sports is it shouldn't be
next in line. It should be you're worth what you're worth, like,
whenever it comes up, that's what you should get. That's
just not how it seems to work in the NFL.
But again, with where salaries, maybe three years from right now,

(11:16):
I'll be curious to see how bad this deal looks
in a couple of years. I don't think it's going
to lead them too much this year. I think that's
a team that's not making the playoffs this year. And
so if you paid that quarterback that kind of money
to give you a nine and eight record, uh, I
don't know that that was money well spent. But I
also just don't know what the other option was, Like,
what else would you tell me, Aaron, what exactly was

(11:37):
Arizona gonna do? No, there was no better option, and
that's why you know, it's just it's one of those again.
It's why I don't think that I really had an
initial reaction because not only is he the next guy
in line, but again, it is an organization where UM,
it's it's been pretty bad. I mean it's been pretty
bad through the years, and they've tried a lot of
different things. Um, he is a better all turn native

(12:00):
to anything else that is reasonable for them, unless you know,
somehow they traded them or something and bottomed out, which
doesn't really happen in the NFL, So I get it.
I just think it's an interesting deal just from the
perspective of, you know, this felt like this could have
been a guy that you played a little bit more
hardball with. But Kyler Murray gets paid coming up another quarterback? Uh.

(12:20):
In the news to Shaun Watson, he reported training camp today,
I think the question becomes now what happens next? For
to Shaun Watson will discuss that next erran towards Jason
Martin here on a Saturday night 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 search f

(12:42):
s R to listen live. Hey, it's Ben, host of
the Fifth Hour with Ben Mallory. Would meet a lot
to have you join us on our weekly auditory journey.
You're asking one in God's name is the Fifth Hour.
I'll tell you it's a spin off of the Ben
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(13:04):
explored some amazing facts about the human nature and more.
Litsten to the Fifth Hour with Ben Mallow or the
I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast or wherever you get
your podcast. Welcome back everybody, Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday,
Aaron Torres, Jason Martin here on a Saturday. By the way,
you want to tweet into the show, feel free to
let us know what you think about the world of
sports at Aaron Underscore Torres at j mart Radio. Uh,

(13:28):
busy week, you know, Jason, it's it's a busy week.
And it really was even I think like two or
three weeks ago that we were like, Wow, you know
football is gonna be here before you know it. Enjoyed
summer while you can, Well, football is here. We've had
a few teams already reports to training camp. Everybody will
be at training camp by the end of the week.
And the big news today from the NFL was that

(13:50):
one Deshaun Watson did in fact report to training camp.
He reported with I guess quarterbacks and rookies reported today
in Cleveland. UM veterans will report later this week, but
DeShawn Watson is in training camp as this inquiry continues
to go on. I think there was some thought that
maybe yesterday in in a Friday news dumpish type type note,

(14:14):
that we could get some closure or some clarification on
what Deshaun Watson's suspension would be. We still don't know. Obviously,
by now, everybody knows four accusers. Deshaun Watson settled twenty
of those cases. There are still four civil suits pending.
He has met with the NFL's private investigator or or
you know, independent investigator, Sue Robinson. She should be coming

(14:35):
down with a verdict soon. He first of all, you
have any feel for I mean, this thing's gotta get
wrapped up pretty soon here, probably the next week week
or so, right, I mean we're getting pretty close to
to go time here. So yeah, I mean I thought
yesterday made a lot of sense. I think by next
Friday or by this coming Friday, it has to be done.
Like the Browns, not that I have any sympathy for them,

(14:56):
and it's not like they deserve any kind of special treatment,
but they do have to figure out who can quarterback
for them. They have to figure out what their situation is.
They do the Josh Rosen thing, which I'd like to
see that workout, because I just feel like that guy
has gotten a real crap d in the NFL throughout
his career. But you know, just Shaun showing up at camp,
I don't know what else I guess. I don't know
what else he's supposed to do. Um, we know he's

(15:18):
gonna get suspended. I saw the Florio thing. Like everybody else,
Browns are bracing for an eight game suspension if that's all.
If it that's all he gets, I may go nuclear
because it just seems like at this point, all right,
so what do you have to do to be actually
suspended for a season at that point in time? Um
from the optics and how long this has taken, but

(15:38):
we're getting to the point where it's actually an albatrow
sitting over the NFL season. It's not gonna hurt their
business at all, but we need to get this out
of the way so we can start thinking about football,
so that we can actually start talking about what's gonna
happen in these divisions. We already know this situation. Let's
let's find out how long he's out, let's determine what's
gonna happen here, and let's move on. Because, uh, maybe

(16:01):
I'm speaking just for myself in this case, but I
don't think so, Aaron. I'm tired of this. I'm so
sick of this story. I'm sick of all this. I'm
sick of talking about it because there's no good No
one wants to sit and listen to the details of
this for very long, and no one wants to get

(16:21):
into the legal stuff all that much either for very long.
And it's just like there's nothing new here, Like we're
we're just treading over the same ground over and over again.
They've got to get this thing behind them. Luckily, now
we have everybody going to camp. Now we can start
doing division previews. Now we can actually start to look
to the season. But this, this one thing is still

(16:43):
just sitting there hanging over this league, and they've got
to cut this chord. So I agree with everything you said, Um,
And you know, I just think it's gonna be really interesting. Um.
It's one of those where I feel like First of all,
I'm totally on board with everybody knows the details. By now,
I think everybody the other thing too. It this, Jason

(17:04):
is I think there are there have been examples where
there's off the field stuff where I think there's reek
How do I say this correctly? I want to make
sure that I when you have twenty four accusers at
a certain point, like I think we've all kind of
accepted that Deshaun Watson is not a hundred percent innocent

(17:26):
of being there's something not right here right like like
there have been sometimes where it's it's he said versus
she said. It's one accuser versus uh, somebody that says
they're completely innocent. And you can see the argument where okay,
this doesn't look good, but I can see that other
person's I could see the argument where maybe that person

(17:48):
didn't do what what he or she was accused of.
This is one where I think I've said it on
these air waves again. I want to be careful and
it's until proven guilty, you know, no, no, no criminal
charges brought by the district attorneys. I get all that.
I don't think anybody feels like nothing happened that that
there's twenty four individual people making up lives, and so

(18:09):
I think that's part of it too. And it's interesting
because I guess what I would ask is I think
the NFL is in kind of a weird spot, and
and from the situation that it sounds like I know,
you said eight games, Florio said reported that there might
be something in the neighborhood of eight games. But there's
also been conflicting reports that Sue Robinson, the independent investigator,
is hesitant to give out too much because there are

(18:31):
no criminal charges. And it was funny because Producer Bow
and I were talking before the show about Goodell. You know,
he has this weird history where Ray Rice it wasn't enough.
But then a lot of people think that he overstepped
his bounds with Zeke Elliott. Um, you know, Tom Brady
is obviously a completely different issue. I'm certainly not comparing it,
but a lot of people obviously believe he overstepped his

(18:53):
bounds with Tom Brady. And so I think whatever we get,
it's gonna be weird because of the fact that I
think there's going to be a certain segment of people
that say there was no criminal charges, um, you know whatever.
But I think there's gonna be a lot of people
that say, what what I just said. I don't want
to put words in your out, but what I just said,
it's clear something happened that isn't cool, It isn't kosher,

(19:15):
And I think that that unless it's it's an extraordinary
suspension the likes of which I don't think we're expecting
at this point. I think there's going to be a
huge part of the football population that isn't comfortable with
what comes out. Yeah, I think there's I definitely think
that there's something to the way this is coming down
for the NFL. But I would just say this, this
isn't the one to like try to get your own

(19:36):
optics right. This is the one where you have to
do the right thing. This is what where you have
to I don't care about that segment of society that says, well,
he hasn't been charge of anything, well, right, he's not
going to jail. That's that's that's a different standard here.
This is about a business. I might not go to jail,
but I might have done something that really harm my company,

(19:57):
and so they're probably still gonna do something to me anyway.
The burden of proof is different. The everything about it
is completely different. Like I understand, yes he was not
charged all of these other kinds of things, we don't
know exactly the reasoning behind all of that. We also
know there's been a lot of settlements and all these
other kinds of things that are going on. We also
know that he is definitely tarnished. And and if he

(20:20):
is tarnished. What bigger stars are there in the NFL
than quarterbacks? How many guys that aren't quarterbacks are the
faces of their respective franchises? I mean really, like I
would have to sit here and actually really stop and
think of any of them. I remember at one point
the Texans, it would have been J. J. Watt. But

(20:40):
there have been there. I mean, there are a couple
of examples maybe, but but yeah, yeah, that's good. But
that's that's accurate. That's a good one. Um, So there,
I mean, there are examples, but not a lot of them.
But if you're if you're Deshaun Watson, you just got
all this money guaranteed you're the face of Cleveland Browns.
Like there's no there's no one else even remotely close,

(21:03):
especially with O'Dell not being there. The star power I
don't care about You know, Myles Garrett's a star, but
Miles Garrets not the face of your franchise. Deshaun Watson
is the face of your franchise. Thereby, he's a very
important representative and ambassador of the entire National Football League.
If you're Roger Goodell and you're the NFL, you have
to look at this and be like, we can't just

(21:23):
slap this on the wrist. It doesn't matter. Like you
can go back and talk about Ray Rice, you can
talk about Zeke, you can talk about Kareem Hunt, you
can talk about all of the things that have gone down.
This ain't the one to try and make a certain
segment happy. Somebody's gonna be unhappy anyway. I'm gonna be.
I'm just gonna with everything that we have heard. And

(21:45):
no one believes that none of this happened. Well I disagree.
Well I'll disagree with myself. There are people that probably do,
but there are a few and far between. Some stuff
went down here. These these ladies, As Jeff Schwartz has
told me before, it's not like they all called each other,
got on a text chain and came up with a
story that they all said almost all of them said
similar things. We know there are issues here. We know

(22:07):
that there are problems here. The NFL needs to remember
that half of its audience of female. It's the one
sport in America that has a large women audience that
has the entire family watching. They cannot get this wrong.
And the only way you get this wrong is by
being too lenient with the suspension. It's not about a
warning shot to the rest of the NFL, a warning

(22:30):
shot to other players. This is about, hey, this is wrong.
We're not going to tolerate this in our league. Um,
we are going to put the hammer down. That's what
I feel like it needs to be. And I say
that to then say this, I don't. I increasingly don't
believe that's what it's going to be. So I want
to continue the conversation about what it could be, what

(22:52):
it should be, what it will be. Will discuss all
of that next. Before we do that, I do want
to bring in Steve to Sager, see what's trading? What's up?
Say hello, gentlemen, back together again? Are you we have
for one whole week? One whole week? Get next week?
So to where is I forgot to tell you? And
to say are you here this too? Summer slams in
Nashville next Saturday. Uh so we're hosting a bunch of listeners.

(23:15):
I'm actually hosting. I'm hosting FSR at five a m. Saturday,
and then we're doing the Summer Slam thing with w
W on Saturday night at Nissan Stadium. So that will
actually be the last show that I miss. So it's work.
It is work. Yes, just gets dead silent. Gotta pay

(23:35):
the bills. I was thinking of your prior comments of
like comparing your job to doctors. Yes, summer. Hey, are
you guys the first event a post Vince McMahon. Am
I making that? No? Yeah, we are first pay per
view and it's a giant one at the Titans Stadium.
It's gonna be something else. We got, it's gonna be
something else. And the Vince McMahan stuff just makes it

(23:56):
that much more interesting. Jason Martin is gonna be like
the woes of w W E trying to get us
some scoops from Nissan Stadium. So that's awesome, man, that's awesome.
We'll have fun. We still got three and a half
hours left here, but continue to say I'm sorry, all right,
We have four ball games still going, including the one
on Fox TV. Dodgers for nothing over the San Francisco
Giants in the top of the ninth inning. Three Dodger

(24:18):
All Stars with homer's, Mookie Betts, Trey Turner, Freddie Freeman,
Orioles now leading the Yankees six three in the top
of the ninth inning, Matt Carpenter at an early homer
his fourteenth for New York, and Garrett Cole nine and
two was on the mound. He gives up three earned
runs in six innings, six strikeouts. There's a game on
FS one, Rangers at a scoreless top of the fifth

(24:39):
at in Arizona. It's Madison Bumgardner at the Diamondbacks leading
seven one over the Nationals in the top of the eighth.
If Washington loses this game, the Nats record will be
thirty one and sixty five. Boy, that sounds so good, Steve.
I love it when the national suck. Just it's so
such a good thing as a Braves fan. When the
national had to explain the division things the Atlanta Braves,

(25:00):
speaking of the Atlanta phrase, they did beat the angel
seven to tonight. Halo's have lost five straight. You know
they save show Hey Otani for that start last night
where he blew up in the seventh. Ohtani did at
his It is twenty homer in this game, but seven
two braves. The final Austin Riley is twenty eight homer,
the wind of Kyle Wright, who's twelve and four. Houston's
Justin Verlander thirteen and three after today's when at Seattle

(25:24):
three to one. Last night, Houston ended the Mariners fourteen
game winning streak. Cleveland and the White Sox split a
doubleheader Milwaukee and St. Louis each one. Padres beat the
Mets in New York two to one, Manny Machado with
a two run homer. The rest of the team just
three hits, but they got the victory. Cubs, in ten innings,
won six too at Philadelphia, and Toronto won its fifth
in a row. Last night, the Blue Jays won at

(25:45):
Boston to five, a mere four to one victory. Today,
Boston's lost four in a row, and Red Sox All
star third baseman Raphael Devers goes on the injured list
with a bad hamstring. Denny Hamlin earned the NASCAR Poll
for tomorrow at Pokono. No Gregson won the Exfinity Race.
The Phoenix Suns gave coach Monty Williams a long term extension,
according to ESPNY, just one NBA coach of the Year.

(26:08):
The Tennessee Titans signed third round quarterback from Liberty Malik Willis,
and the Rams signed quarterback from the USFL, Luis Perez.
Back to you, thanks, Steve Seger. This is Fox Sports Radio,
Fox Sports Saturday Errant tourist Jason Martin here on a
Saturday night. So, Jason, you know, obviously we're talking about
Shawn Watson. Um for people who who have not seen

(26:29):
Deshaun Watson did report to training camp today and we
still do not have a resolution. So I know that
you have said, what have you said? Two full seasons
you believe if you were commissioned. I'm not saying this
is what you're speculating, but is that what what you've said?
I really said more like a year and a half.
But I'd be fine if I never saw him again,
like from my outside perspective, internally inside the NFL again,

(26:51):
it comes down to this for me, I understand how
valuable individual players are to the league, but no one
but really quick the league loses a cent if Watson
never plays again, like the league is bigger than any
individual player. I guess my point just being I understand
the players and why you have a league, but there's
no individual guy that you can take away that's gonna
hit the bottom line of the NFL at this stage.

(27:13):
It's about them. Um, it's the same thing. Just to
the degree of this, it doesn't matter what's main eventing WrestleMania.
There are people that don't watch pro wrestling that will
watch WrestleMania every year because WrestleMania is that brand. It's
the same thing with the National Football League, which is
why I don't think that you need to be, you know,
too careful on your suspension here, because if Deshaun Watson

(27:35):
were never to play football again, I don't think there
is one person out there who would now not watch
the NFL who was going to watch it anyway. And
that's what I was gonna say, is you know how
I know he's not uh, you know, I don't even
say bigger than the league. You know, it's not that
he doesn't move the needle. But um, he didn't play
last year and right the league went on and everybody

(27:56):
was fine. New stars emerged, Um, Davis Mills by the
way played you know, all things considered pretty well in Houston.
And so so I'm with you, is is it'll be
so interesting to me? Is? Is? I still and again,
I think there's a difference between what I think will
happen and what I think should happen, or what I
think will happen and what yeah, what I think will
happen and what I think should happen. Um, I just

(28:18):
still go back to the fact that there are four
women that have not settled with Deshaun Watson, and um,
you know, it's pretty clear that the twenty that decided
to there was a pretty nice financial incentive for them
to do. So that's why the cases get settled, right,
And so I just bring it up because it says
to me there's gonna be stuff that comes out very

(28:41):
likely after this season. The civil cases will will be
you know, go to court after this season, and there's
gonna be some stuff that comes out that's very uncomfortable. Um,
And I don't get the sense, like like I get
the sense and this is just me speculating, but um,
you know, they didn't take the money. And sometimes what
you hear about victims in situations like this alleged victims,

(29:04):
is that it's about sharing a story. It's about making
it so other people feel more comfortable sharing their stories.
And if it was just about money, they could have
easily settled. So the fact that we still have four
civil cases that are going to happen at some point
in the off season, if I'm the NFL, I'm worried
about that, and I still go back to and I
apologize if I've I've made this point, you know, religiously

(29:27):
over the last month, six weeks whatever, since this stuff
really ramped up. But Deshaun Watson sat you down once
and already lied to your face, lied to the NFL's face,
slie to the Cleveland Brown's face, said there was nothing
else that was gonna come out. There were not well, well,
we got a new accuser, we got the New York
Times report that had like thirty something MASSUSA is that
we weren't even aware of. And I just can't believe

(29:47):
Deshaun Watson that there isn't more that could potentially come out.
And that's without even taking into account the civil cases
that are going to go to court here at the
end of the regular season, two of the more compelling things,
and one backs up what you just is the women
that haven't settled. In the Jenny Ventis piece in the
New York Times, the most recent one, the real kind

(30:07):
of shocker where you really learned way too much about
Shaun Watson and closed doors and all that other kind
of stuff, was that there were some women who came
to her, who who who came privately, who didn't want
to be named, Who was who weren't going to sue
Deshaun Watson, who weren't part of the complaint because they
didn't want their families to know because they felt shame.

(30:30):
That was huge to me. It was just this realization
was like, these people aren't trying to get rich. These
people aren't trying to get a sense. They don't want
to send They actually just want to put this out
there and say, hey, look, this happened to me too.
I don't want my name out there, I don't want
anything here. I'm certainly not gonna use this to get famous,
because my name is not going to be known by anyone.
But I want you to know. Jenny Vrentis in New

(30:50):
York Times, this happened to me. I haven't even told
my husband about this because of the shame that it
made me feel. That's when it really hit home to
me what was going on here, because anybody that's out
there's just like all these women are just trying to
get paid. Stop. That should stop you dead in your
tracks right there, Like, because there are there are women

(31:13):
who they could have gotten made they would rather actually
just preserve what their family doesn't know about what happened
to them than actually admit at all to having, you know,
been victimized in this situation by de Shaun Watson. That
right there is is the one where I really flipped Aaron, Like,
I don't know how many people really read that and

(31:34):
paid attention to it, but there are women who came
straight to the press privately and said, do not mention
my name. I don't want my family to know about
this at all. We will, we want our privacy and
I am ashamed. All of these other kinds of things
that that's when it really hit differently for me. Um,
it just there was a human side to that where
it's just like, this is not just a bunch of

(31:56):
people that want to be on TV. There there's some
there's some real hurt here and that needs to be considered.
And to your other point about he sat you down
and he lied to you at least once. The reason
Kareem Hunt got let go by the chiefs wasn't what
he did, it's did he lied to the organization? They
said that publicly. He sat him down and said nothing here,

(32:17):
nothing's gonna happen with this. And then the video came
out and they had to let him go because it
was a horrible look for them and they realized they
had been lied to by that guy. What's different about
that than this. I'm not sure there's anything. No, I
completely agree and uh, it's a it's a wild story. Um,
you know, as you said a minute ago, it's a

(32:38):
little bit. Uh you know, I get things take time,
investigations take time. But but it is something that I
do hope gets sudo resolved soon because I think we're
all kind of I don't wanta see tired of talking
about it, but we're ready to move on. This is
Fox Sports Radio Errant Torres Jason Martin here on a
Saturday night. Coming up. There is a lot to react
to from across the world of sports. Will hit on

(32:59):
a couple other things. Also, we gotta get to this
Charles Barkley story, some some NBA, A lot of good stuff.
Air towards Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio, Welcome back Everybody,
Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday erin towards Jason Martin.
You want to tweet into the show, Tweet us at
Aaron Underscore Tours at j mart Radio. Uh, Jason, you know,

(33:20):
much lighter note than the heavy Deshaun Watson stuff we
were talking about. Uh, All Star Weekend are also now
Star Weekend. All Star Week was here in l A
this week. Uh m MLB All Star Game home run Derby.
You're a baseball guy. You love the Braves. You should
have gone to the clinching game last year you didn't.
But that's neither here nor there. Uh what'd you make

(33:40):
All Star All Star festivities? It felt like, you know,
I don't know if it's just you know, because the
last few years have been weird with COVID and restrictions
and this and that. It just felt like a great week,
a great celebration of baseball. I thought the production by Fox,
with some of the in game interviews and in game
micups and stuff like that, was really good. What you
make of the All Star Game game here at Dodger Stadium.

(34:01):
I thought it was a big time success. I love
the home run derby, the way that they've reset that
over the last few years. I mean, slam Dunk is
dying a slow, painful death right in front of all
of us, like a snuff film at this point in time,
and the home run derby's gone in the opposite direction.
Like four or five years ago, people were talking about
that thing like it needs to be put out the
pasture the way that they've set it up, and of

(34:22):
course you've got this. It also helps that the stars
actually participate. A lot of your stars are participating a
home run derby instead of the tenth guy off the
bench for the Pacers, just just to throw an example
out there. So I think that that and just the
Baseball All Star Games, the one it always felt like
an All Star Games Pro Bowl. I've never cared about
pretty much my entire life. Um NBA All Star Game

(34:43):
is just a showcase and it's fun for what it is,
but it's kind of different the MLB All Star Games.
When I grew up, when I think All Star Game,
I thought of the MLB All Star Game and it
still has that feel and I think that's when you
recognize it as fan service. Then you make up the
players and you do all the little good to see
stuff and all this, and any baseball Pierce has a
problem with it can just go, you know, tell kids

(35:05):
to get off their lawn, basically, because it doesn't matter.
It shouldn't matter. I was hoping it was gonna be
tied because I wanted to see a home run derby
because when I found out that was the rule for
instead of doing next thing, I was like, now that's cool.
I love that in an All Star game you don't
do that, and you don't you don't have to change
your entire game. But the All Star games should feel different.
It's just feel fun. It should feel special. And I

(35:28):
know that some people still didn't care for and they
want to go off on the uniforms and all this
other kind of stuff. I just thought it was a
fun event. I thought it was well done. It looked
like a fun environment to have been in, and Baseball
Baseball showcased itself in a very positive light this week.
Outside of Rob Manford's comments about minor league baseball players,

(35:49):
which is one of the stupidest things I've heard in
recent memory. By somebody that has that kind of power.
I may have missed this. What did he say? He said,
I I take I take offense, I take objection and
uh to the idea that minor league players aren't paid
a living wage. He's like, we've been doing a lot
in the last few years to do this. And then
so I looked at the numbers and what's changed, and

(36:11):
yes it has gone up a little bit. Aaron, there
averaging fifteen grand a year. They're averaging fifteen grand a year.
You're averaging fifteen middle a year, Rob, Manfred, And you're
sitting there and saying, I would object to the idea
that that they're not being paid a living wage. Dude, Rob,
most of these players have third jobs, if they have

(36:32):
families at all. This ain't gonna get it done. This
is two thousand, twenty two a fifteen thousand dollars. That's
not a living wage for a fourteen year old who
still lives at home and doesn't have bills much less
than adult. Like that was just like, dude, you just
don't have to say it. Just say, hey, we're making strides,
we know there's still a long way to go. Don't

(36:52):
say I would object to the idea they're not making
a living a wage. It like, well, I object to
you being good at your job because it's never been
a thing. What did you think of the uh the
all was this the first year they wore the uniforms
that weren't their team uniforms. That was a big problem
for some people. I didn't really have that much of
an issue with it because it's an All Star game.
Like I get it, like where your own you can

(37:12):
wear your own lid or whatever. But if New Era
wants to sell some merch, if they want to go
out there and they want to put the gold unis on,
it really didn't bother me. Man, It just I don't know.
Maybe I've come to that point, but I always liked
the alternate uniform stuff from time to time. Now, if
it gets overdone, that's different. But it's an All Star game.
It's still your UNI and it's got gold on it.

(37:33):
I just me clutching my pearls over that was just
not gonna happen. Yeah, I'll say, in general, I think
a couple of things. One um at one, I thought
it was really well done. I thought the home run
derby was really fun. UM and I thought the game
was fun too, with some of the mic up stuff
and and all that um and and I think what
you said is right is it was funny. I was

(37:53):
filling in with Rob Parker this week on the Odd
Couple and when we talked about it does still feel
like it's the way if feels like it's the one
game where guys care and the Pro Bowl, Okay, it's
a joke whatever. Like I don't I don't even acknowledge.
I pretend it doesn't exist. Uh, the n NBA All
Star Game. It's gotten a little bit better with the
e l am ending at the end, but they care,
they care late, they care in the third and the

(38:15):
fourth quarter you start to seeing play defense. It's still
more of a hot dog show and you've got guy's
alley up into themselves and all this. But for what
that event is supposed to be, I usually have a
good time watching that. Also, I wasn't trying to poop
poo And I'm just saying, of the all star games,
the one that I always think of if you say
all Star game is the MLB All Star Game. Yeah, see,
I I it's not that I think that, like you know,

(38:37):
guys should be going, you know, picking up full court
and full full court pressing or anything. It's just it's
one of those where with the NBA, it feels like
in theory, like it seems like, oh, you know, we're
gonna get all these great players on one court together,
and then the game actually starts and it becomes a
pretty tough watch pretty quick. But the MLB All Star
Game really well done. And you know, I thought, and

(38:57):
maybe I'm biased because I live out here in l A.
But having it at Dodger Stadium, pack Stadium, um, you know,
the twilight for the home run derby. I just thought
everything about it was really good. And you know, it's funny,
right because sometimes and I get why, but you do
the whole You do the All Star Game at whatever
is the newest stadium, or you try to spread it around.

(39:17):
Having it in an iconic place like Dodger Stadium, it's
been home to so many big games, not only throughout
its history, but really in recent years, I think gave
it a big time feel. So yeah, I agree with you.
I just I thought it was a successful week for
Major League Baseball. Now, unfortunately for Major League Baseball, the
games that actually start to really matter for them are
being played when everybody's starting to pay attention to football.

(39:40):
It is true, it is true here as as we said,
if guys are reporting to camp. It feels like there's
some interesting storylines in baseball this year though, with the
Yankees playing as well as they are, the Astros, the
Mariners are on fire. Uh, you know, the Mets are interesting.
So I'll say this, it's been a fun summer for baseball.
But yeah, but as you said, it's not as though
any but he is not going We're not gonna be

(40:02):
leading shows in September with Yankees, Astros or anything like
that once football starts, says Fox Sports Radio Aeron Torres
Jason Martin here on a Saturday night, Coming up, Charles Barkley.
I gotta talk about him, the next great golf announcer.
We explained next Fox Sports Radio, Welcome in everybody hour

(40:22):
to Fox Sports Radio, Aeron Torres, Jason Martin here Saturday night.
I know I've said it every week, Jason, but it
feels like this is supposed to be the slow time.
It doesn't really feel like they're it's slowing down. I mean,
it's gonna rent back up here in a minute. But
we have, uh, you know, the NFL stuff. Obviously, we
got a lot of college football to get to SEC

(40:42):
media days. Was this week we have oh, I don't know,
like three legitimate NBA superstars that could be traded. You know,
I've been doing sports talk radio that long. But it
feels like even when I when I when I was
starting three, four or five years ago, this time of year,
it was hard to find the content This offseason, man,
I don't know what it's like hosting every day and

(41:03):
and and you know, five days a week and everything.
But to do a Saturday show, it feels like we
have plenty to talk about this time here. Yeah, if
you're doing once a week, it definitely is. I mean
like if you're doing a daily, yes, there's this time
of year is never all that much fun. There have
been a few stories. The problem is some of them
haven't been the kinds of things as we talked about
last hour, because the things you want to sit there
and dive into for very long if you should help it. Um,

(41:27):
but you've had those things. You've had, you had a
pretty compelling NBA playoffs, and you certainly have had a
wild free agency. Again. Now there's Donovan Mitchell, and of
course there's Kevin Durant, and there's Kyrie Irving, and there's
whatever's happening with the Lakers and everything else. So I
mean there has been more, I think on the bone
than usual. And you've also had a smat of interesting

(41:48):
moves in the NFL with wide receivers getting moved over
the past, and that was kind of before the summer,
but it's kind of extended in to start now start
beginning to think what they're gonna mean to those teams,
and there's receivers have found the need to say things
that have then created even more content for us. Well,
i'll tell you what we do. You mind if I
saved that for next hour? Yeah, I wasn't trying to

(42:09):
set you up for it. There is another one of those,
however it is It is a very interesting comment that
we'll get to. But another thing that I didn't even
mention in all the different things that we're talking about.
You know, this lift golf thing is starting to get
a little interesting, Jason. You know, everybody threw up their
arms and what's gonna happen? And this is one thing
I I don't remember how much we talked about on

(42:30):
this show. Actually, I think the week that we really
got into it, you were off and VJ. Husky was in.
But you know, I got a lot of stuff wrong.
But I really felt like there was so much backlash.
There was so much pushback, you know, the Saudi oil
money all that. I said, once the first guy takes it,
takes the money and takes all the shots from the
media and the public, the guys are going to follow

(42:52):
after him because the money is so good. Uh, these
guys have no loyalty to the p g A. The
PGA just puts on events. The PJ has not treated
them well for years. And I said, it's just gonna
take one and ended up being Phil Phil Mickelson and
obviously since then Dustin Johnson. Uh, you know, Patrick read
all these guys with reports that Cam Smith, fresh off
a British Open Open Championship title last week, maybe headed next.

(43:14):
But the story of the week from Live was actually
in the announcer booth. I mean one David Ferrety, a
really well respected broadcaster, announced that he was going to
go over to Live or somebody announced it for him.
But now we get the plot twist of Live is
actively recruiting Charles Barkley to to take on some sort

(43:36):
of announcing role. Um. You know, Charles Barkley has had
some interesting comments about it, but at the end of
the day, um, he's it seems as though he's interested.
The money is obviously going to be great and there
could be a world where Charles Barkley is off of TNT.
The reports are Charles Barkley even said himself he he
doesn't think that t n T will allow him to

(43:57):
continue his role there if he takes on a roll
with Live Golf. What do you think about Charles Barkley
going to Live I got a few thoughts, but I
want to hear here at first. Well, here's the thing
about Live that I find really interesting. Well a lot,
but it's a gimmick. It's a gimmick until it's not.
I mean, it's no cuts. There's three rounds. That's with

(44:18):
a whole live deal. There's there's just a there's a
smaller field everybody goes through the end. It's set up
to be a product. It's set up as a gimmick.
It's set up more like an exhibition anything else, because
the guys are getting paid exorbered a money before you
even get to the persons, which are also huge, and
of course you've got the private jets and you've got

(44:39):
all this other kind of stuff. This is something completely
different than the XFL or something to that degree. This
is a gimmick. So what better gimmick than to go
get someone who's actually known for golf in a wrong direction,
but somebody obviously loves it, and somebody that's magic on
television because he's completely unfiltered because he'll say absolutely anything.

(45:03):
And then there's this he also never turns down a dollar.
He's a guy that gambles a lot. He's a guy
that's he's a dude with spaghetti stains on his shirt, right,
That's why everybody loves him. I love Charles Barkley. He
is an absolute gem. Even when I can't watch the
n b A for long stretches of time, I DVR
inside the NBA. Every single week during the season, I

(45:26):
watch it, and oftentimes that's how I catch up on
what's happened the last few nights in the n b A.
I host early in the morning, so a lot of
those games I just can't I just can't watch. But
Barkley's a gym because he's great entertainment. And if your
sport is, or if your league is more built on
the entertainment than it is the actual results. Like who

(45:47):
cares who wins a lift golf event? Right now? No
one does, but we care. But but the idea is,
can you make us care about the lift golf event itself?
And the way you do that is by window dressing,
It's by smoking mirrors, it's by creating something that becomes
incredibly intriguing. So you go get names. And one of

(46:08):
the things when we talked about live, I ran through
a list off the top of my head other guys
I believe mattered when it came to if you can
get this crop of guys or the vast majority of them,
you've got something. Dustin was one of them. Brooks Kevko
was one of them. Phil would be the other one
outside of Tiger, and you had, you know, justin Thomas
Jordan's speech, Rory. There's a few other guys, but generally

(46:29):
those are kind of it. And now here comes the
Open champion. He's Australian. Greg Norman grabs him. Greg Norman
would love to grab you know, Adam Scott, Jason Day
and have this Australian group and all of this. The
Live thing is really fascinating because they are approaching this
completely differently. They're approaching this live is like, couldn't you
see live like having a residency in Vegas? Like that's

(46:52):
kind of what live feels like to me. They're not
buttoned up there the exact opposite. Yes, the money and
where it's coming from hugely problematic, but at some point
that's gonna fade into the background in terms of how
people are talking about this. Barkley Spaghetti Stain just seems
like a guy. He seems like a dude and you

(47:13):
laugh at him all the time on TV. He couldn't
do this in a PGA tour because they take everything
so seriously. But for live it becomes another gimmick. It
becomes part of the side show. It becomes part of
the entertainment value of the product. It fits him because
nobody's gonna take him seriously as a golf analyst, but
it doesn't matter him. Being entertaining is gonna be enough.

(47:35):
David Verity is world class. You can let Charity do
that and let Barkley do the other thing. And then
the better part is you couldn't watch him do this.
I wouldn't want to see him do this every week,
but from time to time this would just be an
entertaining way to add something like the Manning cast to
Monday Night Football. So a couple of things. One as

(47:56):
weird as it sounds, I don't even know that people
really go him for NBA analysis, Like I don't know that. Um,
if I need a pick for the NBA Finals, he's
the first guy that I go to. We go because
he's knowledgeable, he has the background, but he's also entertaining,
and that speaks to a lot of what you said.
I have a question for you, though, because I want

(48:17):
to kind of take it in a different direction. Is
a couple of things you said stood out? I mean,
first of all, this is a guy, and I don't
blame him because we we all kind of fit into
this this bucket as well. Uh never turns down to paycheck.
And you know what I think is interesting is this.
So I'm not one to criticize I have I've I
haven't once criticized anybody for taking any amount of money

(48:38):
from Live. I don't criticize guys for taking a bigger
contract on an inferior team. Go get your money. Life
is short, take care of your family all that. Where
I do think the Barkley thing is interesting is the
idea that he could potentially have to give up inside
the NBA and so where I don't know, Like, like

(48:59):
I use this knowlogy the other day. It's kind of
like when your parents tell you, I'm not mad, I'm
just disappointed. Like if he if he did do this
just for a check and that's that's why, that's why
he would do it, it would be a little disappointing.
Like this guy is unquestionably the most entertaining voice. You know.
I think he's the face of of NBA media coverage.
I don't think there's a doubt about that. As a

(49:20):
matter of fact, maybe if you want to include the
entire inside the NBA crew as such, he's the face
of NBA coverage. He's great at what he does. He
makes the NBA so much more interesting and fun and
we laugh. And as you said, there's people there's a
lot of people that, uh watch more watch those T
and T They tune in more for the postgame analysis

(49:42):
than the game itself. I mean, I think you can
argue that's maybe I'm just trying to think off the
top of my head, one of the few appointment television
products that we have in sports, right, Like, like, there's
a lot of great shows, and I'm not criticizing anybody,
but you know, maybe College Game Day on Saturday mornings,
but then it's inside the NBA at night, like it's
you just do it on Thursdays, you do it during

(50:04):
the playoffs, you stay up until they decide that they're done.
And so if he gives all that up now, I
will say this is that he has said in the past, like, hey,
I don't know if I want to do this till
I'm seventy. I think the exact quote he said is
I don't want to die on set um. Like if
he just I know, he's already been in a world
where he says, I don't want to do this forever.

(50:25):
But if he just gave gave up what he did,
which he is incredibly good at, to just take a paycheck,
I would be a little bit disappointed. But I it's
one of those like I can't blame him because the
money is going to be ungodly, but it would be disappointed. Look,
I'd be sad about it because as you said he's
such great television. Look, he's a Tom's almost embarrassing covering

(50:49):
college basketball when he does the tournament, And I don't
and I don't care. That's my point. I don't care,
like I just find it entertaining. I'm not going to
my hands over how much knowledge he has over the
college game. I don't think he's trying to give off
that he has any knowledge. He's just talking about basketball,
and I love watching him when he breaks down basketball.

(51:09):
I'm entertained by it. Yeah, his picks oftentimes aren't right,
but when he's telling me individual traits about players and stuff,
I get a lot out of that. If he were
to if he if this ends up with him and
live and not on T and T, that's a net loss.
That is a huge loss, even if you could understand
it now. If we knew he was gonna step away
from T n T within the next two years, if

(51:31):
we already knew, hey, he's actually gonna be done twenty
twenty four, no matter what, I would have less of
a disappointment because I knew he'd be going away. I mean,
it'd be the same difference, right, It'd be like, Look,
I hate that Andrew Luck retired because I really wanted
to see that guy have a long career. I want
to see as many great quarterbacks in the NFL as
we can possibly have. But I get why he retired.
I understand why he walked away from it. Doesn't mean

(51:53):
I'm not disappointed that we didn't get more of a
career out of Andrew Luck, or see more success for him,
or or had a bunch more great moments out of him.
But I understand why he stepped away from the game,
why he felt like he needed to do that. So
I agree a million percent basically what I'm saying that, Yes,
if he stepped away, I would absolutely hate it, and

(52:13):
I would wish that was not the case. UM, in
terms of going to live in cash in a check.
At the same time, UM, he has made it clear
over the last few years he's not going to be
a lifer on TV. And if that's true and he
really believes that, then maybe this is the check that
enables him to really walk away and just enter the
next phase of his life. And you know, we can

(52:36):
have that discussion at a different time. Last one on
this would would you tune into live golf specifically just
to watch Charles Barkley like it's hard to say no
it would. I mean, look, when w w E started
running Saudi, I ran, I watched the first one and

(52:57):
then I just started to feel ugly about everything going
on in Saudi Arabia and all of this, and so
I was just like, I'm not gonna support this. They
paid them, they paid them forty five million dollars. So
w B is gonna pump this up like it matters.
It doesn't. Um, I'm not gonna be a part of this.
I was hosting a wrestling show on a weekly basis
during the first few years of their Saudi arrangement, and

(53:19):
we blackballed it. We just flat out wouldn't cover it.
We wouldn't talk about it because we all agreed it
wasn't something that we wanted to watch. UM live at
this point, yes, there are there are concerns there, there
are problems there, there are things that you have to
get past. There's also a moment where you have to realize, look, um,

(53:39):
it's here. If it's here to stay, it's here. I
mean that you've seen the comparisons, You've heard the COMPARI
the comparisons from Live to F one F one is
one of the biggest sports in the world right now,
just set an unbelievable television deal and any car is
nearly dead as a result of what F one did.
I'm reading a book right now that was suggested to
me by I might go with Junior as a matter

(54:01):
of fact, when he was on our program several months ago,
called The Club, and it's about the English Premier League
and how it became what it's become, how soccer in
England was dead and all these owners were inspired by
the NFL to just build these palaces for these guys
to play in and turn this thing into something. They
took something that was dead, gimmicked it up beyond all belief,

(54:25):
spent a ton of money, brought in the right people,
and now it's the most popular and biggest thing globally
in the world, the most important thing in the world.
And I read that book and I apply it to
what's happening in college football with the SEC in a
big ten, which is why it was originally suggested to us. Um,
certainly what's happened with F one and now what's happening

(54:45):
with live If you're not careful, if you're the p
G A, you're in trouble here because, as we were
talking about um about certain stars and guys that are
bigger than the league and all this other kind of stuff,
the p g a's biggest stars, outside of the select
few guys that I mentioned, many of them have already
gone to live. The biggest stars are guys by the

(55:06):
name of the Masters, the US Open, the Open Championship,
not even really the p g A title. You've basically
got three events that matter in the PGA tour that
people tune in to watch because of the event itself.
Outside of that, you don't have stars. So if LIV
could create events that mattered and had guys that you

(55:29):
cared about a little bit, more guys that you've known,
guys have won majors and all of this, all of
a sudden, p G as in actual trouble, that's what's
gonna be interesting to watch. Well, and I think, and
we're gonna get it, We're gonna wrap on this is
that I do think. That's like, like people think this
and you just said it. It's a gimmick now, but
and I don't mean to be disrespect it's a gimmick
and too it's not. But listen. The XFL and USFL

(55:52):
are a gimmick because they don't have players you want
to watch live has players that you want to watch.
They're gonna have the announcers and we will see what
happens from here. This is Fox Sports Radio Aero towards
Jason Martin here Saturday night. Coming up. We moved to
college football. Jeremy Pruett, Tennessee. I don't even know what
to say, Jason. We'll discuss that next Fox Sports Radio.

(56:13):
Welcome back everybody, Fox Sports Radio Aeron Torres. Jason Martin
here on a Saturday nights. Uh. Busy, busy week in sports.
As we've discussed, busy summer and sports, all things, All
things considered, we are starting to ramp up towards football
though both college and the NFL. Obviously, Jason and I
talk a ton of of college football here in this
time slot. We will be your home every Saturday night

(56:37):
when games go final for a media postgame reaction. And
I'll say this, Jason, Uh, this week with the SEC
media days, it feels like, you know, this is kind
of the unofficial launch of college football. Is all the
all the SEC coaches get together, say you been in
Jimbo and and Kirby Smart and all that, and actually
I want to talk about Kirby Smart in a minute.
But there was some news following media day. Is maybe

(57:00):
for to uh, you know, the good news to Tennessee
fans that that didn't drop during Media Days. But um,
Tennessee of course is going into the second year under
head coach Josh Hypel. And the reason they're going into
their second year underhead coach Josh Hypels because the previous
coach got fired, Jeremy Pruett. Uh. That was the story
for people who were who may remember, uh that there
were accusations that they were handing out money in McDonald's paperbacks.

(57:25):
Apparently that didn't happen, but pretty much every other rule
violation that possibly could happen, Jason, we found out yesterday
eighteen level one violations, which I mean, I could be wrong,
but it's by far the most that I've ever heard of.
Jeremy Pruett was paying players out of pocket. Jeremy Pruitt's
wife was paying players out of her pocket. I've never

(57:47):
see anything like this, Jason, to take it for take
it from here, I've never seen anything like this. Jeremy
Pruett was a disaster. He was a bad higher. At
the moment it happened, I didn't understand it. I didn't
understand why. Look, I host the show in Nashville at
the time that this story broke. I was the executive

(58:08):
producer of a show called Out Kicked the coverage right
here on many of the same stations you're listening to
across the country on Fox Sports Radio hosted by Clay Travis,
who was right in the thick of this entire thing.
And they didn't want Greg Ciano, and so they found
a way to make sure Greg Cianna wasn't a coach.
And by day I mean the fans and a loud
group of people, they end up with Jeremy pruittt I

(58:30):
didn't love it. I really didn't. I knew it was
coming from the saving deal, but it's just like, yeah,
I just don't know about this one. And then he
had a little bit of a success run at the
end of one of the seasons and into the start
of the next, and you started to think, maybe, you know,
maybe this is gonna work out. Maybe I was wrong
about this. I remember actually doing a take at one
point saying, who do you think the best coach in

(58:52):
the state of Tennessee is right now, Mike Vrabel or
Jeremy pruittt a question that I wish I had not asked,
but at the time it made sense to ask, and
it wasn't a slam dunk in the favor of Rabel,
who of course was last year's NFL Coach of the
Year and the Titans with the number one seed in
the a f C. Jerry Prewitt um rubbed everybody the

(59:13):
wrong way, rubbed his coach is a wrong way, led
to his offensive coordinator leaving to become the head coach
at Western Kentucky and basically just in effect saying, look,
he was handcuffed entirely. Prewitt didn't make good decisions and
all of this stuff. We've known about these things coming
for well over a year. I actually two days ago

(59:35):
we had somebody on the air who was at Media Days,
and when we talked to people all week, and I
was gonna say, have they just forgotten about this? Like
when are these allegations coming down or when is this
actual notice coming, or is it coming? Are they just
gonna have they just because of what the university has
tried to do or is this thing just gonna kind
of get moved on? And no, because we got everything

(59:57):
on Friday, and it was nice to them to not
put hype up there who spoke on Thursday with that
coming out beforehand, because he shouldn't have to answer for
stuff he had nothing to do with. His players shouldn't
have to answer for stuff they had nothing to do with.
Uh there, that's a completely different program than the one
that Jeremy Pruitt was running. But the McDonald's story, which
I think emanated on Dan Patrick and he even said, yeah,

(01:00:19):
I know that's not really a true story, but everybody
ran with it and we still joke about it. Actually
here it's just kind of a funny thing at this
point in time. The worst thing about Jeremy Pruitt is
with all of the cheating, they didn't win. Nope, like
not even close. Like they were a terrible program for
people leaving the program. Yeah awful, Like just and let

(01:00:40):
me jump in really quick. The reason he was fired
was because Tennessee uncovered those violations and not only did
they not fight for him, uh you know, they kind
of went out of their way to make sure the
n c A knew Hey, we're gonna do everything we
can to help you to find as much as you
possibly can. So that was why he ended up and
out really quick. Um, you know, I'll say this, Jason one.

(01:01:04):
First of all, I want I want to like set
one thing that's straight that I've I've seen a lot
of I've seen a lot of people say, oh, you know,
in the n I L world, this isn't like a
big deal. It's like, no, no, no, no, no, even
in the n I L world. Now, our players getting
paid and whatever. Yes, but in the n I L world,
n I L is name image likeness. Paying players out

(01:01:24):
of your pocket is not allowed in the n I
L world now, is it's still happening. Of course, it's
still happening, But a head coach cannot pay players out
of pocket. As a matter of fact, schools can't even
be involved in n I L except for like a
very limited basis in terms of setting up deals all
that stuff. So don't tell me that it's no big
deal because we live in n I L world now. No,
no, no no, no, this would not be allowed in the

(01:01:45):
current world that we live in. But again, the thing
that keeps tripping me up. We go back to his
wife was paying players for him. I should mention apparently
he met her when she was working in compliance. Neither
here nor there. I've never heard of the wife getting
her hands dirty for her husband. I mean, in some
ways I respected that that whole til death do Us
part thing in sickness and in health, rich and poor. Uh.

(01:02:07):
She she she took those vows very seriously. But I
just never heard that before. And I was blown away
when I saw that she had her finger dirt under
her fingernails as well. With all this stuff. Yeah, um,
I mean to your point, Tennessee, at some point, when
they realized they wanted to get out from underneath it's
Jeremy brewd thing, they didn't really want to pay that

(01:02:29):
buy out. So this was a way to, yeah, maybe
we're gonna take a slap on the wrist. Maybe this
is even gonna be a postseason band for a couple
of years. Maybe it's gonna be sanctions, because when you
do this, you're open up to cannon worm for them
to find everything, and they're gonna find stuff. But if
you don't want to pay twelve to twenty million dollars

(01:02:50):
like what Auburn's paying, gust Malls on like twenty mill.
I think it was the buyout A one of the
biggest reasons they had to go to the big tense
because they're a hundred million dollars in debt, largely because
of coaching buy out. Don't say anything, don't say anything
bad about Jim More and I certainly can go. But yeah,
but they didn't want to pay prue it because the
stupid buy out that they didn't need to set up

(01:03:12):
in the first place, because they don't understand. This is
a universe. And we'll get into it because I know
we need to get to the seger, but I don't
understand this rush from supposedly smart people in positions of
power universities across this country giving all these extensions to
coaches that haven't done anything. So I actually have a
perfect segue to something else that I want to talk about.

(01:03:33):
We'll discuss the next first really quick. I want to
bring in producer both for half a second producer, But
did you have something? Yeah, which which college wife and
girlfriend is funnier? Jeremy Jeremy Pruett's wife or Poul Assassin
the UH Texas coach Texas coach girlfriend with a monkey
that pit the kid on Halloween. Last story is phenomenal Texas.
You know, that's a great, great story. And it's also

(01:03:56):
because it's Texas, to like, if that happened at like
Oklahoma State, it would still be funny. But because it
was Texas and they had just lost to Kansas, it
made it that much more incredible. So I'll still go
with the pole assass And I mean, you know that
was just quirky. I mean, Jerry Prue's wife in some ways,
I respect her. The pole assassin story was insane. So yeah,
the Poles, I I gotta go with Pole sasson as well. Alright,

(01:04:19):
says Fox Sports Radio, going a lot of different directions
that I air towards Jason Martin here on a Saturday night. Uh,
coming back, I do want to kind of continue this
conversation kind of with context for something else that I
want to discuss before we get to that. Let's get too,
Steve to say with what's trending? What's up? Steer? So
he met her in the compliance office. Yes, well she
was working in compliance okay, yeah, and learning much apparently

(01:04:42):
well no, apparently she was learning to comply with whatever
her husband told her. To do. I think that's the whole.
But Aaron Torres, I cannot thank you enough for pointing
out what should be obvious to everyone. That is, this
has nothing to do with the current n I L.
That's for your own name, image and likeness. It doesn't
of you the right to pay off the bills of
moms that you want to be recruits, etcetera, etcetera. And

(01:05:05):
as I mentioned on a show yesterday, actually there were
more Level one violations in these allegations than were there
were wins in his three years as Tennessee coach eighteen
to sixteen. For the record, and while we're talking college football,
I brought it up on the Sunday Night Show before
it's the first weekend of September that everyone has their

(01:05:26):
opening game of the season. That is almost everyone. They're
a handful of teams like Yukon that play on the
last Saturday of August. Yukon is gonna be on FS
one at Utah State. Fox TV that last weekend of
August is going to carry a college football game from Dublin,
Nebraska against Northwestern. And then once we get to September,

(01:05:46):
with the NFL having not started yet, that first weekend
of September. There's college football Thursday through Monday night that
whole long weekend, including a Thursday night Fox game of
Penn State at Purdue. There's a Friday night game as
well with FS one Illinois, Indiana and USC. S opener
on Saturday will only be on PAC twelve network, so

(01:06:07):
only Arnie we'll be able to see it same network.
Nobody in Los Angeles is going to be able to
see USC or U c l A that day. That's
the Pac twelve doubleheader, believe it or not. And uh,
we've got on that first Saturday, by the way, and
looking forward to it. Oregon is going to be an action.
Ohio State's going to be an action. There are good matchups.

(01:06:29):
The Oregon games against Georgia at the Falcon Stadium that
first Saturday in September, and then the Saturday night game
is Notre Dame at Ohio State. There is one Sunday
night game September four, l s U is gonna play
at the super Dome against Florida State and then the
Monday night games back at the Falcon Stadium Georgia Tech
against Clemson. There is just one ball game still going
on in the Major Leagues. It's the top of the

(01:06:51):
seventh the As holding on to one over the Texas Rangers.
The Atlanta Braves are now just a half game behind
the first place Mets in the at least, Mets gave
up a two run homer to Manny Machado and lost
at home to San Diego two to one. Meanwhile, Atlanta
was a seven two winner over the Angels, who've lost
five straight. Kyle right, the winning pitcher for the Braves,

(01:07:12):
is twelve and four six innings, eight strikeouts. Today on
FS one, Houston got another win from Justin Verlander, a
three one victory at Seattle. Verlander thirteen and three this year,
e r a one point eight six wasn't he injured recently?
Nine strikeouts in seven innings Today, The Mariners offense went
four for thirty overall, and Seattle rookie outfielder, the All

(01:07:34):
Star and Rookie of the Year candidate Julio Rodriguez was
out again today with a sore rist. Houston's won four
in a row. Last night, Houston ended the Mariners fourteen
game winning streak the loss to Logan Gilbert of Seattle. Today,
He's ten and four grade d R a two point
seven seven. He had eight strikeouts in six innings just
two runs allowed, but Stros were just better. Houston's record

(01:07:55):
sixty three and thirty two. Let's compare that to the
Washington Nationals, who are one and sixty five after losing
again tonight seven too at Arizona, beaten by Madison Bumgarden,
who had nine strikeouts in his eight innings. Juan Soto
or as some would call him, Ted Williams, and Mickey
Mantell rolled into one was over four with three strikeouts.

(01:08:15):
Soto is batting two forty seven for the Nationals this year.
Cleveland split a double header at the White Sox. Dodgers
won their seventh straight game. St. Louis and Milwaukee each
one the Brewers, of the first place team in the
NL Central, still a game and a half over the Cardinals.
Toronto won its fifth straight today four one at Boston.
Cubs won in tenetings at Philadelphia six to two, and
Baltimore came from three nothing down in the fifth inning

(01:08:37):
to beat Garrett Cole and the Yankee six to three.
Aaron Judge did have four hits, but the Yankees with
runners in scoring position went one for fourteen in this
game the Tennessee Titans in third round quarterback Malik Willis
from Liberty. Rookies continue to report to training camps through Tuesday.
Most teams have veterans reporting on Tuesday. The Phoenix Suns

(01:08:58):
gay coach Money William the long term extension, according to
ESPN Denny Hamlin or the NASCAR poll for tomorrow at
Pocono and in Oregon. Tonight, at the World Track and
Field Championships, the US won the women's four by one relay,
beating Jamaica. In the men's sprint relay, it was Canada
defeating the US. Back to you, thank you, Steve to say,
this is Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday errant towards

(01:09:19):
Jason Martin here on a Saturday night. So, Jason, right
before we got to the Sager, you did mention that, um,
you know, Jeremy Pruroke getting this weird contract extension, and uh,
somebody else got in a contract extension this week. Kirby
Smart now the highest paid head coach and all of
college football, eleven plus million dollars a year on his deal.

(01:09:41):
But why you know it was funny, right because I
don't think there was as much pushback especially now in
the n I L world where you know, ten years ago,
ten years ago, probably three years ago, if Kirby Smart
got this contract, it'd be like, you know, of course
he's getting eleven million while the players don't get anything.
But I you know, when I saw the number, I
just said, this is the going rate four contracts in

(01:10:04):
college football right now. And I bring it up to
to kind of tie back to the last segment. You know,
melt Tucker got ninety five million dollars last year. Last year,
he's got thirteen wins as Michigan States head coach. James Franklin,
by the way, got a seventy five million dollar extension
after a seven and five season. So Kirby Smart breaks
the bank. But you know, in the new world of

(01:10:25):
college football, and it's not changing with the TV contracts
going up, this is the going rate for a championship coach.
It really is. Yeah, it is um And look, I
mean how long was Mark Rick that Georgia and Mark
Rick was a very good football coach that could not
get them exactly where they wanted to be and where
they felt like they deserved to be. You bring in

(01:10:46):
Kirby he knocks on the door of the National Championship,
has it won, loses a few years ago, then comes
back and wins it even after losing the SEC title
games to Alabama, And you look at it and you
just say, yeah, I mean, you have to pay that guy.
In congratulations to Nick sabum, because anybody that makes more
money usually helped him make more money. Because I think

(01:11:07):
he has to be in the top three according to
his own contract, so I don't know where the other
guys are. He may still be number two on that list,
so he needs to see some other people get paid.
By the way, Jeremy Pruett, who got that job in Tennessee,
you know who who they another guy that they picked
Jerry Pruitt over melt Tucker really just to put the
yeah melt melt Tucker. Yeah, that's absolutely right. Um. And

(01:11:29):
then the the a D that they couldn't wait to
run off. And in John Curry, who was trying to
hire Mike Leach and who was responsible for Greg Siano. Uh,
he's not outwake for is doing pretty well. Um. Things
that things have not gone great for Tennessee. But to
the point about the buyouts and all this kind of stuff,
the only thing that I would have any problem with

(01:11:49):
for George is just I mean who exactly, Like, I
don't know who you were bidding against at that number, um,
but I understand why you pay Kirby whatever you feel
like you gotta pay him, reward him whatever you have
the money, Go ahead knock yourself out now that now
that the guys are able to to uh make some
money themselves, you shold have less of a problem if
you did before with what coaches are making, because you

(01:12:09):
understand the difference in a good and a bad coach.
When you look at a Nick Saban and you look
at everything Alabama had since Gene Stallings before Nick Saban
got there, it explains it. But stuff like uh, the
will must Champ money and the buyout that had to
be paid at South Carolina and the prow A deal
that they're basically they are trying to get out from

(01:12:30):
underneath by what they've done to let everything get exposed
in terms of what's happened in Tennessee with violations all
of these guys like why wouldn't you just look at
the coach and just be like, look, if you think
you can get something better somewhere else, go right ahead.
But there's no reason to extend you, like you haven't
done anything. You haven't won a national championship. We're talking
about Kirby Smart. That's a different argument. But so many coaches,

(01:12:53):
it's like these A d s and these universities can't
wait to give them three and four year extensions for
no apparent reason. Like there's a lot of these coaches.
I would call their bluff to us. I'm I'm, I
would totally call their bluff. This. I'm with you, and
it's funny. This is the time that I noticed that
you'll laugh and we gotta get to break. We can
come back on the other end. But I remember you'll

(01:13:14):
laugh when I say this. When Butch Jones got an extension,
like after Tennessee made a bowl game. Butch Jones, by
the way, was the guy that was the official head
coach before Jeremy Pruett. There was a hiring in between
that didn't go down as you just explained a minute ago.
But when Butch Jones got an extension after making a
bowl game, I was like, isn't that kind of why
you're paying him to be the Like is it a
bowl game? Like a baseline minimum? Do we need to

(01:13:36):
extend the contract because he did exactly what he is
supposed to do. So we continue this conversation coming up
because there is another element of the Kirby conversation that
I want to talk about. We'll discuss all that next.
Eron towards Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio. I don't know
what the song is, don Brownie got me fired up? Okay,
you know I'm not a music at Fox Sports Radio.

(01:13:56):
Eron towards Jason Martin here Saturday night for the break
we're talking. Kirby Smart is now the new highest paid
coach in college football. Kirby Smart is making well over
eleven million dollars per year. Kirby Smart also signed this
contract during a week in which he had some comments

(01:14:18):
about n I l which, I'll be honest, Jason, I
don't know if you were somebody that got worked up
about this stuff, but uh, the comments, I think we're
taking a little bit out of context. But I all
it's one where I actually see both sides. Where I think,
if you actually listen to what Kirby Smart has said
about N I l Um, I don't think it's quite

(01:14:38):
as bad as people are making out to be. But
I also do think it is a little bit hypocritical
based on on some of the things he said. Essentially
what he said, what this is, I'll read the exact quote. Um,
he said, you give a young man eight thousand a
month or six thousand a month, you could say he
deserves that. Well, he might deserve that if he earns it,
if he goes out there in place. I'm all for

(01:14:59):
taking care of guys that have been part of the
program and stay in play. It's just that it's a
reverse system right now. Where the bottom line is that
is actually not the quote here, here's the here's the
full quote that that matters. He said, what do you
think he's doing with that? It's is it actually going
to make him more successful in life? Because I promise
you if you handed me ten k a month as
a freshman in college, I probably wouldn't be where I

(01:15:20):
am today. So Kirby Smart basically said, you know, essentially
what he said was, um, you know, it's a reverse system.
The we shouldn't be paying for recruits. We should be
paying the guys that are on campus. And then he
kind of clarified it at media Days where he said,
by the way, all ninety five of our guys on
on on our roster have some kind of n I
L deal, But they've gotten to campus, they've they've you know,

(01:15:43):
contributed to the team, they've contributed to the school where
you upset Kirby Smart the eleven million dollar man criticizing
n I L and players getting paid because there was
a lot of outrage without the context of most of
the quotes this week. I mean, I understand the argument,
and I've heard many others make the same one that really,
in I L, the point of this was not to

(01:16:03):
pay you to come to school. It was to pay
you after you've accomplished something and done something that deserves
to be rewarded, as opposed to just sitting there and
making money for a coach and making money for a university.
But at the same time, if it's a free market,
it's hard to say, yeah, well you don't get until
you come here and you've been here for a year.
I mean, that's insane. Like if I start a company,

(01:16:27):
if I create something, if I invent something, I'm able
to go ahead and make that a thing immediately. I
don't have to prove something for a year. If somebody
wants to pay me before that they can pay me
before that. I get the spirit of it. I get
the idea. Yeah, like you'd want to reward Will Anderson, right,
you'd want to reward in the case of Georgia, Jordan
Davis last year, Like you'd want that guy to be

(01:16:49):
cashing in because his name, image, and likeness matter because
of what he's done at the University of Georgia. I
get that. But we all know better than this. We
know how recruiting has blown up. I mean, there are
millionaires out there that have started scouting websites and creating
star ratings and all this other kind of stuff where

(01:17:11):
kids go to camps to try and get the highest
star rating they can and get scenes so they can
end up in the schools they want to end up in,
and all this other kind of stuff. It's a griff
from top to bottom. It always has been. So all
of what Kurt, what Curry Smarts saying is not necessarily incorrect.
And of course he's got to let you know everybody's
on in an I L deal, and that is directly

(01:17:32):
to the kids that he wants to come to Georgia next.
He wants to make sure everybody knows, Hey, you come here,
you're gonna get an N I L deal. Now. I
don't really like certain things about this. Again, the problem
with all of this is there's just no guardrails surrounding
it for anybody. What a lot of stuff Sabing has
said has been accurate. He's been kind of the messenger
that that's gotten hit for saying it because he's benefited

(01:17:53):
from the way that he has found crafty loopholes and
different things, and he's you are the rules to his
advantage for such a long period of time. Kirby's experiencing
similar things. He's putting putting together great recruiting classes. You
just won a national championship. They seem to be in
the mix every single year now. So now he's gonna
get a little bit more of it. I don't necessarily

(01:18:14):
have that big of a problem with what he's saying.
I also think it's naive. You're worth what somebody is
willing to pay you. And if you're a high school
kid and somebody wants to offer you ten million dollars
to come be a quarterback in a couple of years
at some university, it's hard to say no, you're not
allowed to do that. Like who are you to determine

(01:18:35):
what someone's value is when there's guys that can go
pro and tennis at thirteen. Yeah, it's funny because I
think there's some corollaries to the NFL right where, um,
you know, the rookies are no longer the highest paid
players like they were maybe ten twelve years ago, but
rookies get paid very well. Uh they get off the
off the quarter, off the field compensation without having quote

(01:18:55):
unquote proven it. And so there's some corollaries there to
high school uh football recruit rooting. Um yeah, I just
I look at it and and I do like it
doesn't bother me because what Kirby said was essentially like
like it cracks me up, right because a year ago
it was everybody was, you know, well, you know, they
deserve to make money off their name, image likeness. They

(01:19:16):
deserve to make and we all agree. I haven't really
heard anybody say they don't deserve to make money off
their name, image likeness. Um, but it's quickly kind of
turned into pay for play, which was never part of
the agreement. Like even the most ardent, you know, the
most ardent people that were against uh, you know, the
n c A weren't necessarily like, hey, you gotta pay
them a salary, You just gotta it should be an ail.

(01:19:39):
So anyway, it's an interesting deal because I do see
both sides to it, and I don't think it was
probably the sharpest move by Kirby, but I do kind
of understand what he was saying, and it kind of
got misconstrue. Fox Sports Radio eron Torres, Jason Martin here
on a Saturday night, coming up, switch back to the
NFL A lot to discuss Welcome back everybody, our three

(01:20:01):
Fox Sports Radio aeron towards Jason Martin here on a
Saturday night, about an hour from now, our buddy Bernie
Fratto will join us straight out of Vegas. You can
hear Bernie following us at two a m. Eastern eleven
pm Pacific, But we're taking me up through eleven pm,
UH Pacific time to a m. Eastern and Bernie will

(01:20:21):
follow us. I want to go back to the NFL,
and you know, Jason, really quickly, we talked about Kyler
Murray to open the show. Um, you know, we we listen.
It is what it is. By the way, if you
missed any of that segment, you can go back and
download the podcast, which would be up immediately following the show.
But um, you know, Kyler Murray gets paid, and you know,

(01:20:42):
I think both of us kind of have the same opinion.
Is again, we kind of just we're talking about Kirby Smart,
the n I L stuff. We we get both sides
of that coin, and I kind of get both sides
of the Kyler Murray conversation too. But I will say
it is kind of interesting, and it was a point
that you brought up, is that at some point somebody
is going to draw the line in the sand and

(01:21:02):
organization is gonna draw a line in the sand and
say we're not giving you that massive, massive, massive contract
simply because the last team gave it to their guy.
And I'm not saying that Kyler was the team, it
was the guy that you should have done it with.
But it is interesting that a guy that that has
never won a playoff game, um, that has supposed leadership issues.

(01:21:22):
And I don't even think it's supposed, Like I don't
even think it's reports at this time. I mean, you know,
Hopkins in and somebody I'm blanket on who else, but
but you know, DeAndre Hopkins talked about Um, you know,
communication issues within within the offense over the last couple
over the last season, well, communication issues pretty much fall
on the quarterback. So I just find it interesting. I'm

(01:21:43):
not saying that I wouldn't have paid Kyler Murray, especially
the Arizona Cardinals who have not been able to find
a franchise quarterback for the better part of their entire
franchise existence. But this does feel like the one where
there could have been maybe a bit more pushback from
the organization before they actually he'd get, you know, a
bit more pushback on the details, or wait till after

(01:22:03):
the season or whatever. But Kyler Murray is officially done
and he will be an Arizona Cardinal and a well
compensated Arizona Cardinal for a long time. I definitely think that,
and you mentioned this early in the program. I think
it's important to remember again that this is a team
that has been a barren waste land at quarterback throughout
much of its its existence. You had Jake Plumber, and

(01:22:26):
you had Carson Palmer, and certainly you had Kurt Warner
who almost did win that Super Bowl. UM, but out
side of that, it's been pretty slim pickings. It's been
almost nothing that you could feel like you could trust.
Even when you drafted Josh Rosen early in the first
round that lasted for a year, and then you got
him out of town, and then Kyler and Cliff King's

(01:22:47):
came in together. So I think it's that. I think
it's if you just look at Kyler and watch him.
It's so dynamic to see what he does and how
he creates and sometimes to his own detriment, the way
you runs, and all those other kinds of things. I
get it like you look at it and it's just
it's flashy, it's fun. It's the kind of thing that

(01:23:08):
you know your patrons will pay to come see. Uh.
And again, if you're a top ten to fifteen quarterback
in the league, that means you're not one of the
bottom ten, and that means that and you don't want
to be in that bottom ten. And Arizona has been
in that bottom sen so much in the past that
perhaps perhaps you do a little bit of reaching. Perhaps

(01:23:30):
you feel a little bit more desperate than a franchise
that's had more success at that position, and maybe thinks
there's another one out there, there's another guy you can get.
But for Arizona in the moment. I just don't know
what else was there for them. Um with all the
with the quarterbacks that did move, the few that did move,

(01:23:51):
and the ones that have already gotten paid, I mean,
where was the guy coming from? Arizona's trapped? Because I'm
not so sure Kyler Murray can when you was Super Bowl,
I need to see him win a playoff game before
we can get there. And the worst thing that, in
my opinion, the worst thing you can have in the
NFL is a quarterback that's just good enough, but isn't

(01:24:12):
good enough. He's just good enough to make sure that
you're drafting in the late teams early twenties every year
instead of drafting in the top five and getting c J. Stroud.
The best thing could happen if you're Atlanta Falcons fan
this year, unless des Ritter is actually gonna be the truth,
at which point I'll I'll rescind this at the time,

(01:24:34):
but for now is to bottom out. If you're Seattle fans,
exactly what you want. You don't want to see him
do anything. You're almost worried Metcals being paid, or you're
worried that he's still there. He's not disgruntled. You want
to bottom out because you don't have a quarterback. Drew
Lock Nope, not gonna be the answer. Jeno Smith, Nope,
not going to be the answer. Doesn't look like Garoppolo
is coming there. Garoppolo could have won you some games.

(01:24:55):
But Garoppolo is another one of those guys. He's just
good enough to make it hard to place without having
to give up draft assets to get up higher, uh
to trade with another team. That's the problem for Arizona.
Is is Kyler good enough to win you a super Bowl?
Or is he a ten win guy or an eleven
win guy. That's good, you're winning a lot of games.
But the goal of this league and the elite of

(01:25:18):
the elite quarterbacks right now, what are they all talking about,
whether it's Alan Mahomes, Herbert Burrow, all of them, it's
about Super Bowl success. And now that you've seen Joe
Burrow do that in his second year in the NFL,
When you've seen that, now that kind of becomes the blueprint.
That might be outside the expectations, But if I'm paying

(01:25:38):
a quarterback a hundred and sixty hundred seventy million dollars
guaranteed on a giant two hundred plus million dollar deal.
I want to see that dude in the Super Bowl.
I'm not paying him to win the NFC West, even
if it's a good division. That dude, he earns that
paycheck for me in January. Another guy that and by

(01:25:59):
the way, if you missed any the Common Murray conversation
should go back and down with the podcast. Another guy
that probably fits into that category, h Derek Carr. Derek Carr,
the the Las Vegas Raiders have reported to training camp.
The whole team is there and they're one of you
that you know. Everybody's there. They're they're getting ready, all
that good stuff. There was an interesting conversation. Of course,

(01:26:19):
Remember Derek Carr has a new running mate. His former
college teammate, uh Davante Adams is now with him former
Fresno State Bulldogs, both of them. Davante Adams is now
in Vegas. Some interesting comments from Davanta Adams this afternoon.
I mean, anytime you change quarterbacks from you know, Hall
of Famer to Hall of famer, you go, you know,
Stabler to to rich Gainnon or whoever you go to,

(01:26:41):
it's gonna be a little bit of an adjustment and
you know, both are great players and great to be around.
So I'm just enjoying that process and getting better myself.
You're not trying to do as much as I can
to help these guys go out there and win as
many games we can. That sound curtsys CBS Sports. First
of all, I love, um, you know Davante Adams saying,
you know, making sure to throw in the two Raiders

(01:27:01):
legends there. You know, he's he's ingratiating himself well with
the fan base. But what do you think of Davante
Adams calling Derek Carr a future Hall of Famer Because
to the point you just made a minute ago, he
kind of fits into that category where he's elevated the
organization another organization that hasn't had that guy. But I
don't know that he's that guy that can take you

(01:27:22):
much further than they went last year when obviously they
got into the playoffs. Yeah yeah, I mean see, I'm
pretty high on Derek Carr and I'm high on the
Raiders this year. I feel like they're being slept on
by some people. Look, I'm a Denver Broncos fan, so
this is very difficult for me. But what Davante Adams
saying similar to what Tyreek Hill said when he basically

(01:27:42):
said two is better than Patrick Mahomes in this category.
In this category, it's mobbing for the It's mobbing for
the new guy, screw the old guy. Kind of now,
Davante Adams said hall of famer to hall of famer.
If he had just said from one great quarterback to
another great quarterback this when he and be talked about,
it wouldn't it wouldn't be mentioned. It wouldn't matter because

(01:28:03):
you could certainly say, Davante Adams calling Derek Carr great
is all right? Now, if you said from an elite
quarterback to a great quarterback, you're probably more accurate, right
because certainly Aaron Rodgers is a better overall football player,
with a better resume, all of that than Derek Carr.
The problem for Davante Adams here is his bias is
gonna help him. It's gonna help Derek car because they're friends,

(01:28:25):
because they know each other, because they played in college,
because they have that relationship. It's really hard. It's really
hard to say negative stuff in public when you're asked,
when you're biased in favor of somebody. It just is
it's difficult. Like if somebody were to ask me about
you Torres in some other context in an interview, I'm
not gonna bury you because I like you, I respect you,

(01:28:48):
even though we will disagree from time to time and
all of that and will poke fun and all that
other kind of stuff. I would do the same thing.
I would do the same thing for Ramon Foster, my
partner in the Mornings. I'll always stand for that guy
in every context, even to a fault. That's just part
of human nature. So I think in the Davante Adams case,
it's a little bit more excusable than the Tyrek Hill

(01:29:09):
case because one, Derek Car has done more in this
league than to a Songoboloa, and two because of what
I just said, there's just he's always going to say.
Probably he's probably gonna be a little bit too high
on Derek Car at all times, which great. It's great
because their chemistry ought to be really, really good, and

(01:29:30):
it seems like, you know, there's gonna be there's gonna
be kind of a build up and what's going on there.
That's the other thing about the Raiders. Car is sort
of an interesting guy, sort of weird on social media,
a little bit too much in his feelings at times.
But I also think that he's a guy that when
things are going going well and he's really feeling it,

(01:29:51):
he could be really, really dangerous. And Davantae Adams, we
already know what he's capable of and what he's gonna do.
I wasn't bothered as much by this, except that calling
Derek Carr hall of Famer is preposterous. That dude needs
another half decade of football higher than any level he's
played to this point in his career, and at least

(01:30:13):
one ship, if not to um to, to even be
in a discussion like right now, he's not even in
the Matthew Stafford Philip Rivers. He's not even close to
that kind of discussion. That's a little bit much, But
I'm just gonna I just kind of looked at It's like,
all right, all right, and I know what you're saying,
and I know what you're doing. It's all right. Have
a tremendous amount of respect for the football acumen of

(01:30:36):
Davante Adams. I think that Derek Carr is best football
is certainly in front of him, especially with the weapons
that they have. I'm gonna give it a mile pass.
But certainly you get an eye roll because no one
hears Derek Carr and says that's that's a lock right there,
that dude's going straight to Canton, Like, no, no, we
We're gonna need to see a lot more in his

(01:30:58):
career that you can come close. Yeah, I don't, I think,
you know, I don't even think he really really knew
what he was saying. But it was an interesting quote.
But it also speaks to how interesting the a f
C West is as a division with four really good teams,
four teams that are playing for They're all playing to

(01:31:18):
get to the playoffs and win in the playoffs this year.
I want to continue the conversation because I have two
interesting thoughts on the division. We'll discuss that next Eron
towards Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back everybody, Fox
Sports Radio. Aeron towards Jason Martin here on a Saturday night.
By the way, you want to tweet into the show
at Aaron Underscore Tours on Twitter at j mart Radio.

(01:31:40):
For the break, we were talking a little bit about
some comments that Davante Adams made, basically saying Derek Car's
the future Hall of Famer. Um, you know whatever, I
I don't. I don't really care that much about the comment,
but I do think it speaks to a very interesting
just dynamic in in the a f C West where, um,

(01:32:00):
you know, the only thing I can really equate it
to is is as we get ready for college football season,
it does feel like the the a f C West
kind of became like the SEC West, where it's like
everybody's just going for it, right, and like, you know,
you mentioned some teams that are kind of taking a
step back and whatever. Uh, Seattle, are they really gonna
push all the chips in the middle with Drew Lock

(01:32:21):
or are they happy to to finish, you know, to
to struggle to hopefully get in position and get a
good quarterback next year? Kind Of same with Atlanta. You know,
we'll see with a couple of other teams as well.
But I bring it up because you look at the
a f C West Raiders, go get Davante Adams. Uh,
your Broncos win and got Russell Wilson. Um, the Chargers
kind of added some some bulk on defense. Khalil Mack.

(01:32:43):
This is by far the best division, by far, the
most fascinating division. I have like two pretty strong opinions
about it. But but but you mentioned We'll start with
you mentioning last segment that you think Oakland the Las
Vegas Raiders have a chance to be better than people think.
Keep in mind, they of course made the playoffs last year.
But why do you say that, Jason? What makes you
so confident? I mean, look at the weapons. I mean

(01:33:04):
we can point to teams that have had defenses that
have struggled and have still won Super Bowls. I mean,
Kansas City did it with just a couple of decent
defensive players. When you think about Car, car is certainly competent,
if not a little better than competent. I think he's
better than competent. Personally, Josh Jacobs is playing for his career.
He's playing for money because he didn't get the fifth

(01:33:27):
year option picked up. So if he's healthy, he's got him.
He has a reason, even more so than just playing football.
He has a reason to be great. Davantae Adams is
the best route runner in football. He's the best like
first three or four yards off the line of scrimmage
guy that you will find. He is an unbelievable talent.
I think I'm still more fascinated to see what happens

(01:33:49):
in Green Bay in Kansas City than anybody else in
the league, just to see what those teams look like
without Tyree Cable, without Davante Adams. Hunter renfro is incredibly underrated.
He's been taken care of financially. Darren Waller is an
absolute weapon, and now he doesn't have to be the
guy all the time. But now he's going to be

(01:34:09):
double less. When you got Davontae Adams, now you've got
the reverse problem of Kansas City. Kansas City. I can't
wait to see how many double teams Travis Kelsey has
to face now that he didn't have to see when
Tyreek Hill was there. Let me jump in on that
because that is one of my hot takes. So about Oh,
I don't know. A few weeks ago, I was filling
in with Dan Buyer and we just kind of started
talking about whatever, and I forget how the topic even

(01:34:32):
came up. But um, I forget. We start talking about
the A C. West and he goes, who do you
realistically think is going to finish in last place? Because
somebody's gotta finish in last place? And I don't know
that this is like a ten out of ten in
terms of my confidence, like like I'm i'm I'm I'm
sticking my you know, I'm sticking my flag in the
ground and planning my my opinion on this. I think

(01:34:55):
it's more likely than people think that Kansas City could
finish in last place in this division. And it sounds crazy.
They just went to their you know, twentieth straight a
f C championship game, obviously two years removed from a
Super Bowl appearance, three years removed from a Super Bowl title.
But when I look at Kansas City and I'm not
saying like it's definitive, I'm saying, on July Tree, it's official.

(01:35:15):
They're they're, they're they're going six and eleven. But at
the same time, one you look at their schedule, it's brutal.
I mean you right now, they have let's see here, five, seven, eight,
eight of their first nine games are against teams that
made the playoffs last year. And that doesn't include a

(01:35:35):
back half of the schedule that includes trips to Vegas
to play the Raiders, trips to l A to play
the Chargers, the Rams at home the Bengals, and you're
Denver Broncos. So The schedule is a component the fact
that the offense was really up and down last year.
For some reason, nobody ever wants to criticize Patrick Mahomes.
He was not very good for big stretches of last season,

(01:35:58):
and I do think that's hire kill thing matters, Like, like,
I know, there's this notion of just you know, hey,
you know, wide receivers are a dime a dozen now,
and you just you know, you trade guys when it's
time to pay them, and then you get the next one.
There's no next Tyreek Hill five ft eight with sprinter speed,
And I forget all the stats, but I think, you know,

(01:36:19):
he he you know, I think he had some crazy
stat where most yards after catch or something like that,
because there's so many ways to get him the ball.
No Tyreek Hill, I do think fundamentally changes this offense. Uh.
The schedule is brutal, the division is brutal, just baseline.
Do you think I'm crazy for saying that I could
see a very likely scenario where Kansas City finishes in

(01:36:40):
last place in this division. No, I can see any
of the four teams finishing last in the division. So no,
I don't think so, Like I I I need to
see what this mixture of wide receivers looks like for
Patrick Mahomes because, outside of Aaron Donald, I think Tyree
Kills the most irreplaceable player in the NFL because of

(01:37:04):
his speed, because he can take a two yard hooker
route and still make you look dumb, and because of
what he can do to tire out of defense in
the second half, because you've had to chase him for
seven to ten seconds while the magician with the quarter
or the magician with the football in his hand continues
to keep the play alive and eventually your defense is
going to succumb to that. Him not being there makes
a tremendous amount of difference. McCole Hardman is super fast.

(01:37:27):
I mean that dude's a track star too, but I
need to see him stop making some of mistakes that
he's made earlier in his career and step up and
maybe he's ready to do that sky more. People pretty
high on him, but I'm gonna need to see that
in an NFL game, Like there's a lot of draft
picks were high on then we watch him and it
doesn't end up working out. This This this is not
about one thousand kinds of situation. No one ever has,

(01:37:48):
No one ever will. Travis Kelsey has eaten because you
haven't been able to double team him because of Tyreek Hill.
If that changes, that could be a massive problem for
Kansas City and for Andy Reid and Eric b Enemy
and everybody that's helping to craft that offense, for Patrick,
and certainly for Mahomes himself. So there's a scenario where

(01:38:09):
every team in that division could finish last. Denver could
do it. If Russ is more the guy that we
saw in the last handful of years in Seattle, where
it wasn't a Seattle problem, maybe it was a Russ problem.
If that's what happens. And certainly injuries notwithstanding, we know
if a team gets injured, that's gonna be it. I'm
very low on the Chargers, and the reason why is

(01:38:30):
because I see all this hype and I haven't seen
anything happen on the field yet. I haven't even seen
him make the playoffs. I love justin Herbert, we all do.
I get it, but eventually you gotta do something with
this talent. And you've got a young head coach that
last year made some questionable decisions, we should say, and
he's gonna need to clean some of that up or

(01:38:51):
he's gonna have to be right where his team's gonna
have to make him look right even if he makes, uh,
you know, a controversial decision. I need to see more.
I need to see them actually do something and if
they get injured, you know, and just like anybody else,
they can get beat. And then certainly with the Raiders,
we've seen them not live up. We've also seen Josh
McDaniels in the past. Is a head coach fail. There's

(01:39:14):
a reason, there's a reason to look at all of
those teams and say they could they could be in
for an underwhelming year. The other thing is, there's all
this speculation and all this talk out there. All man,
you can get three teams out the a f C
West or four, they're gonna beat the crap out of
each other, Folks. These four teams are going to destroy

(01:39:36):
one another. They're gonna be awesome games to watch. Man. There,
it's gonna be can't miss stuff. I mean, it's my
division again, I'm a Broncos fan. There are not three
teams coming out of the West. It absolutely is not
going to happen. You don't have to worry about it.
We can pick the other two divisions where there's gonna
be somebody else coming out. I think you're getting one
out of the South personally, whether it's the Titans of

(01:39:59):
the Colds. I think you can get two out of
the East potentially, and you can certainly get two out
of the North, and that's probably about it. I do
not see a universe where you getting three out of
the West because it's just gonna be such a grinder
for all of those teams just in the division, much
less what they're playing outside the division. There are gonna
be some records at the end of the year where

(01:40:21):
you're like, man, that was a damn good football team
that just went nine and eight. Like that's what you're
about to see in the West. Two were getting out
of the West because there's just too much talent in
that division. But I do think that it's gonna be
an interesting case study and how how great a difficult
division actually is because we've never seen something quite like this.

(01:40:42):
This is the greatest quarterback division in the history of
the NFL. You will not find another one better, and
it's just going to take its total Aaron, I'll tell
you what, I have a lot of thoughts on that.
I also have one other uh, you know, I don't
know if you want to call it hotel, but but
strong opinion on the a f C West. We're going

(01:41:04):
to discuss that next. Before we do, though, let's get
to Steve to say or third time this evening. What's
trending to Hello, guys. The a f C West quarterbacks
this year are Herbert and Russell Wilson, Derek Carr, Patrick Mahomes.
The a f C West quarterbacks in three where Dan Fouts,
John Elway, Jim Plunkett, and don't forget Seattle was in
the a f C West back then, so Jim's orn

(01:41:25):
and Dave Craig worked into there. You are absolutely right
on the Charger comments. We haven't seen it yet, standing by,
should be talented, should be in the mix. And as
far as fourth and Staley as it got called with
the coach going for it on fourth down so often,
I could see why initially because they started the season
seven for seven on fourth downs. It's the reason why
they wanted Kansas City early. It's also probably the reason

(01:41:47):
why they lost to Kansas City later. Don't steal my
segment for next segment. Guess what is the first of
those Thursday night streaming games. Once we get to the
regular season, it's Chargers at Kansas in mid septem By
the way iconic game last year at a SOFI Stadium.
Between those two last yeah, maybe even topped by the

(01:42:08):
classic finale to the whole regular season, the Chargers at
Raiders finish, which was just silly. I mean, it just
got even better than that, if possible. And I like
your coming about Tyreek Hill. I looked up there was
an SI offseason article about is he a deep threat?
And the answer really was no. Because the Chiefs threw
about twice as many passes to Hill last year at

(01:42:28):
the Linus Grimmage or behind it as they did thirty
yards and Mahomes in fact, in going thirty yards are
deep on a pass attempt to Hill, Patrick Mahomes was
four of sixteen on those they did to draw three
defensive penalties. But yeah, it was a little bit a
little bit different than the perception. As for the MLB,
the late game was at Oakland. It has finished on

(01:42:50):
FS one the a's three one winners over the Rangers,
who committed three years. Dodgers won their seventh in a
row four two over San Francisco. Atlanta sent the Angels
to a fifth straight lass, seven to two. Meanwhile, the
Mets were beaten at home San Diego's Manny Machado with
a two run homer to one Padres the final, the
first place Mets in the NL East just a half
game ahead of the Braves. Now elsewhere it was St.

(01:43:13):
Louis and Milwaukee each winning, so the first place Brewers
in the Central still a game and a half over
the Cardinals. Baltimore trailed the Yankees and Garrett Cole three
nothing in the fifth and still came back to beat
them six three. Minnesota finally back playing tonight. They were
still on All Star break this whole time until this
evening eight four Minnesota one at Detroit Cubs in ten innings,

(01:43:33):
one at Philadelphia six to Justin Verlander, and Houston got
a three one win at Seattle today very Lander. Thirteen
and three. Toronto won its fifth straight game four one
at Boston, winning Picture All Star alec Manoah not miked
up apparently tonight eleven and four for the Blue Jays.
At the World Track and Field Championships in Oregon, the
US won the women's four by one relay beating Jamaica

(01:43:56):
and the men's sprint relay Canada defeated the US. Canadian
Damien Warner left the decathlon with a hamstring injury. Denny
Hamlin or in the NASCAR poll for tomorrow at Pocono,
Noah Gregson won the ex Affinity Race. I mentioned the
NFL schedule Don't forget the full release when it came
out shows three NFL games on Christmas this year, which
falls on a Sunday that includes rams Denver and the

(01:44:18):
rams is defending champs will have the opening night game Thursday,
September eight, hosting Buffalo. The preseason opener is a Thursday night,
August four, the Hall of Fame game with Raiders. Jaguars.
Rookies continue to report to training camps through Tuesday. For
most teams, Vets report on Tuesday. Titans rookies reported to
camp today. Tennessee signed third round quarterback Malik Willis from Liberty.

(01:44:40):
The Bengals place five players on the physically unable to
perform list, including running back som J. P Ryan, tackle
Lyle Collins on the non football injury list now. The
Lions hired former Ohio State quarterback JT. Barrett as an
offensive assistant. The Rams signed quarterback Luis Perez from the
USFL Baltimore Wave defensive back Ema Marshall, and the felony

(01:45:01):
battery case against Saints running back Alvin Kamara is due
back in court August first. He was arrested during Pro
Bowl weekend in Vegas. Back to you, thanks, Jeve Sega.
This is Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday, Aaron Torres,
Jason Martin here on a Saturday night. Uh and to
Secre just kind of reference what kind of my my
second I guess strong opinion would be on the a

(01:45:23):
f C West. We started talking Raiders. I I kind
of explained why I think the Chiefs could finish in
last place. I think there's a weirdly big microscope on
Brandon Staley this year as a head coach. Um. You know,
obviously you know it's weird, right because because you're one
almost make the playoffs, you have justin Herbert. So I

(01:45:44):
think there's this notion that you know, listen, I mean,
unless something disastrous happens whatever, who cares? But I look
at it and the Sega reference that final I guess
it would be Week eighteen now game against the Raiders
where he made you know, want to call him baffling
decisions because he used that whatever analytics he believed were
important in that moment to make those decisions, but they

(01:46:08):
were just not sound solid decisions. And sometimes you got
to balance the yes, we're a team that relies on
analytics or believes in analytics, with somebody that isn't over
reliant on them. And so, you know, as the saker said,
started out the season well analytically, a lot of things
worked out really well for them. They kind of got
their pants pulled down in that Raiders game to end

(01:46:30):
the season. Raiders obviously have the walk off field goal
to make the playoffs. And I just sit there and say,
I think there's gonna be a bigger microscope. And I
think if this guy goofs off too much and this
guy makes every I guess what I would say this
everything that he does is gonna be under a microscope.
And when it doesn't work out. I think last year
it was like, well, you know, it's the analytics, what
are you gonna do? Whereas this year I think it'll

(01:46:51):
be like, uh, Staley did it again, what's he gonna
do next? And I think it's going to be a
bigger talking point. I think it's gonna put more pressure
on him where I don't think he can be I
don't want to he can't be as reliant, but I
don't think he should be UM because I I just
I just think the way last season ended was a
really bad look for him. And there's gonna be a
bigger microscope. Well, there's definitely a bigger microscope because everybody's

(01:47:14):
telling you they've got a top five roster or they've
got a top three roster. Here comes Khalil Mack, here
comes J C. Jackson. Justin Herbert's a wonder kid. Um,
You've got all the receiving talent, You've got Eckler, who's
a drastically underrated back. Like everything is set up, and
that's why I look at this and I'm just like,
I'm waiting for this to fail. I'm waiting for this

(01:47:35):
to fail. And it's not necessarily Brandon Stately, but there's
a lot of pressure on Brandon Stately because with great power,
and in this case, with great roster comes great responsibility.
And right now, because the super Bowl, you tell me,
you correct me if I'm wrong, Aaron, But the super
Bowl is not handed out on July. It's not it's you.

(01:47:55):
You don't get that invite, you don't make the playoffs
in July. Either. Cleveland Orounds often made the playoffs in
July every year over the last like four or five years,
because they got a top five roster. Here's g Q,
here's the ESPN, the magazine, here's everybody telling you how
great the Browns are. And then the Browns go play
football and they are still the Browns. And in this case,

(01:48:19):
the difference is you've got a quarterback that you like
a heck of a lot more than the Browns with Mayfield,
even though at the time people were buying into Mayfield
as well. I just look at the Chargers and I say,
that's a whole lot of hype for a team that
hadn't done squat. That's a whole lot of hype for
a team that hasn't been in the playoffs. That's a

(01:48:40):
whole lot of hype for a guy that's in the
second year as head coach. In the first year didn't
exactly go swimming lee. That's a lot. That's a lot
on a bunch of young guys to coalesce in a
division that, as we've just discussed over the last ten
minutes or so, it's an utter meat grinder. And there's
dudes in that division that have super Bowls. None of

(01:49:02):
them are on the Chargers though, like the quarterback doesn't
exist on the Chargers. Yes, the Raiders have the same problem,
but yeah, the Chiefs that that's super Bowl winning quarterback Broncos.
That's super Bowl winning quarterback the Chargers. To me, there's
just so much hype. It makes me immediately think this
is gonna be the one that when we get to
the end of the year, we're still wondering why this

(01:49:23):
didn't happen, and that that, and it could just so
easily happen because of the difficulty of winning in the
league period, and certainly in a division like the a
f C West. But to the point specifically about Staley, again,
with great roster comes great responsibility. He's got the roster.
Everybody tells you that every time you look, go read

(01:49:44):
any preview magazine, go listen to any NFL podcast, look
at what they did in the draft, look at free agency,
look at the roster. Stuff on ESPN that Bill Barnwell
has put up in all this the weapons everybody loves
the Chargers, and so the coach better get it done
because it's going to fall on him first and then
and eventually we're gonna get to that point where you

(01:50:06):
start looking at the quarterback because the quarterback takes a
lion share of the blame. But right now, Staley is
the one guy where the microscope has to be biggest,
because you can't squander talent like this. If if everybody's
telling you have all this talent and the coach isn't winning,
that it's gonna be on the coach. Well, and you
can't squander talent in situations where you're not putting your

(01:50:27):
team in the best position to succeed, which I don't
care what the numbers say when you're going for it
inside your own twenty you know, deep in you know,
deep in your own territory on fourth down and key spots.
I don't care what the numbers say. It doesn't make
make you look good and it doesn't put your team
in the best position to win really quickly. You being
a Broncos guy, didn't turn plan to turn this whole

(01:50:47):
hour into uh a f C West talk, but uh
you know, Russell Wilson's there, and I think it's interesting.
I mean, you watch the team more closely than I do.
I think that there's a lot of talent around him.
I do think like this narrative of like, oh, they
were just a quarterback away, like I don't know that
they're there. Their their talent is quite as good as

(01:51:07):
a lot of people have made it out to be.
But Russell Wilson is there now. As a Broncos fan,
I know you're excited, but but what do you deem
realistic expectations. I need to see it. But the roster
is again. But I'm not gonna be hypocritical in this
case and say anything about the roster because the roster
so far as good as the roster were told it is.

(01:51:28):
And as we know, look, Justin Simmons was the top
of Fowler's NFL Executives Insiders list at safety position. We
understand Bradley Chubb hasn't necessarily lived up to the fifth pick,
but he has been good if he can stay healthy.
The receivers, the receiving talent is outrageous on the team.
Judy is the guy that really needs to step up,

(01:51:49):
but we know what he's capable of doing. Javonte Williams,
I do think is a stud and I think you
saw enough out of that in his rookie season to
know it. No A fan played well, but I remember
hearing our Fox got League Mark Slero say I'm glad
Fant was part of the deal instead of certain because
the guy backing up Fant is better than Fan and
everybody in a building knew it already, so they you know, basically,

(01:52:12):
the Seahawks bought into that, and that's exactly what the
Broncos wanted him to do. The roster is very good,
it really is. The question is, is unrestrained Russ with
an offensive minded head coach who apparently wants to run
the exact same system that Russ wants to run, and
that they're on the same page and they're speaking every
day and they're hanging out and they're building chemistry, is

(01:52:34):
that going to unlock the rust that we haven't seen
in a while, or maybe the rust we've never seen before.
That's that's the answer, is Like, is Nathaniel Hackett going
to be the secret to Russell Wilson the way Sean
McVeigh was for Matthew Stafford. That's the question that still
needs to be answered. I don't know how I feel.

(01:52:56):
I'm exciting because I love Russell Wilson and I want
to see him in a Broncos you to for him,
and I'm really excited for what it could look like.
But I'm also cautious because it could go south. It
could go south really easily, and there's a possibility that
some of the knocks on Wilson over the last couple
of years there's some legitimacy behind him. We're gonna get
answers to a whole lot of questions about guys this

(01:53:17):
year across the NFL. I think that makes the season
so interesting, even past who's gonna end up in the
super Bowl, It's like who's gonna underperform expectations and who's
gonna prove various narratives about them true and our false
during the course of the season. I think we have
more of those kinds of questions entering this season because

(01:53:39):
of some of the moves that have been made, the
blockbuster changes that have happened in the league. That to
me makes this season so much more interesting. This is
Fox Sports radio eron Tords Jason Martin here on a
Saturday night coming up, De Saga rejoins us extended segment.
He's got some great stuff on two red hot MLB
baseball teams. That's next. Fox Sports Radio. Welcome back, everybody,

(01:54:02):
Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday, Aaron Torres, Jason Martin
Here on a Saturday evening, as we do every week,
at this time, I want to bring into Sega for
an extended segment to segar what do you got for
us this evening? Well, an odd night for baseball last
night and maybe an otter one tonight. Last night, in
case you didn't see, the Red Sox lost at home

(01:54:23):
to five to the Toronto Blue Jayson and then lost
to him again today. So Boston, I saw everyone making
the same joke. When Boston was down twenty five to three.
Everyone kept making the Toronto needs three more runs before
Boston gets serious, you know, like the Super Bowl reference
states about ten people make that reference. I was expecting

(01:54:45):
some sort of cfl or Rouge comment or some sort
of scoring with there, But here we had all those
runs last night. And by the way, the Red Sox
going into today, in just a three game span, including
whatever that was last night, they had given up fifty
five runs which is almost the record of the last
century of the major leagues for how bad you can
be in a three games fan. But then major League wide,

(01:55:07):
the folks at Stats Inc. Just passed this along that
here we had a full day on the schedule and nobody,
not one player had a two homer game, nobody had
two steals in a game. Not one player scored three
runs in any of the games today. Certainly nobody threw
a complete game after all the scoring last night, no
team scored ten runs in any game. Today, no team

(01:55:29):
won via walk off. They say, in MLB history, when
you have a schedule with ten or more games, when
it was full like today, there's been ten thousand days
like that in MLB history and never a day like
this where none of those things happened, not one. But
we did have a compared to last night. Yes, no,

(01:55:49):
there was a lot that went on today. It's just
we had a lot of offense and not very good
pitching as it turns out. And if you saw the
inside the Park Grand Slam at Fenway had a center
fielder lose the flyball and then actually not turn around
and go after it at the outfield wall. He let
the left fielder run all the way to the center
field warning track to get it, so some were saying
I would have pulled him right then. As for the Orioles,

(01:56:10):
believe it or not, they came back and beat the
Yankees and Garrett Cole tonight six to three. The Baltimore Orioles,
just three short seasons ago, at one point had a
record of forty seven and one fifteen. They are in
contention for a playoff berth this year. Just last year,
the Orioles late in the season, we're forty seven and
one oh two. Right now they're forty seven and forty seven.

(01:56:33):
And keep in mind there is one extra playoff berth
for wild card in the new format in each league.
Red Hot not only the Dodgers, but the Atlanta Braves,
who had another sellout crowd tonight about forty three thousand
in attendance, one of their largest crowds since the park
opened five years ago. And when they score first, they
usually win best record in the majors in that category.

(01:56:54):
Atlanta's record forty three and seven when they score first
in a game, and red Hot not only the winner
on the mound Kyle Right has twelve and four, but
Austin Riley hit his twenty eight home run of the season.
He has three hits. His batting averages over to ninety
a fifteen game hitting streak. This guy is hitting well
over four hundred his last twenty games. But the Braves

(01:57:16):
have the best record in the Majors since June one,
thirty five and eleven. The Dodgers won their seventh in
a row, beat the rival Giants again, four to Dodger
third baseman Justin Turner out this weekend at least with
an abdominal injury, but the three All Stars had. Solo
Homer's Mookie bets is twenty second. Trey Turner hit one out.
He's batting over three hundred. Freddie Freeman of Solo Homer,

(01:57:36):
he's batting three. Pitcher Clayton Kershaw starts tomorrow. The Dodgers
have won eighteen of their last twenty games. How do
the sports TV ratings do this week? Well? Wednesday night
was the sp Awards on ABC two point five million viewers,
Baseball All Star Games seven point five million on Fox
the night before. In fact, the previous night, the Home

(01:57:57):
Run Der Beyond Cable got six point nine million, in
which means the Baseball All Star Game and the Home
Run Derby each got better ratings than this year's Pro
Bowl or NBA All Star Game, or certainly higher than
the NHL All Star Game. And I mentioned on the
show before us tonight that the revenue numbers are out

(01:58:18):
from the Green Bay Packers, which is always an indicator
of what NFL teams get because we find out the
Packers numbers because it's a publicly traded company. Total expenses
last year for the Green Bay organization was about five
hundred million dollars they spent, so you've got to get
revenues of over five d mill to turn a profit.
They turned a profit of seventy seven million dollars last year.

(01:58:40):
Now with the pandemic the previous year they actually lost
money they didn't have full houses, but now larger local
revenues an extra home game for them as well. Just
by being in the NFL, your franchise gets nearly three
hundred fifty million dollars from the league as your cut
of the billions in the pod that includes the National

(01:59:01):
TV money. The exact number of the Packers received from
the league three hundred forty seven million dollars. You get
to add that to your bottom line, hence a profit
for the packers and I'm sure many others. Thank you,
Steve Saker. This is Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday Errantwards.
Jason Martin here on a Saturday night, coming up our

(01:59:22):
rant torres. Well, guess what we're doing in our for
that baby? Bertie Fratt will join us. I have a
question for you, but first Jason Martin's Espi's rant. You
do not want to miss this Fox Sports Adio. Welcome
in everybody, our four errantords. Jason Martin here, Fox Sports
Radio Saturday Night. But show so far covered some Kyler

(01:59:43):
Murray news from college football. H Bertie Fretta will join
us in about twenty minutes from now, straight out of Vegas.
Of course you can listen to Bernie at the top
of the hour. I do have a couple NBA related
questions for Jason, but before we get to that, Jason,
it sounds like somebody's got something you want to say
about the the sp Awards, So so the floor is yours.

(02:00:04):
I'm gonna step aside. What is Jason Martin's espies take?
I'm curious here, all right? So I realized that we
haven't been hosting together during an Espies time, so you
haven't got to hear this before the Spies is dumb,
like really really just but stupid in my opinion, And
the main reason why is because we already have awards

(02:00:27):
in sports. There's already there's already you know, m v
P trophies and everything else. But there's things that are
given out, like you give out the Oscars because those
are the honors for the movies that came out outside
of like your box office receipts and all that kind
of stuff. The various awards are the accolades for those films.

(02:00:48):
But in the n b A, they give away a
trophy at the end of the season for the champion,
and they give away a Most Valuable Player award to
the most valuable player in that league. And they have
this thing called Super Bowl and the Lombardi Trophy in
the NFL. Then they have a World Series trophy. Then
they have something called the Stanley Cup. It's this big thing.
A lot of people drink things out of it, uh

(02:01:09):
in hockey. And then they have trophies for all the
majors in golf, and they give away this nice little
plate to the women at Wimbledon and this big Cup
to the men at Wimbledon. All sports are played for
the purpose of crowning champions. We don't need an award
show when the entire sport itself, the entire sports landscape,

(02:01:34):
is the awards show. We've watched all of this and
we have crowned the champions based on what they've done
on the field. We we understand this. And in the
media we're given out AP awards, they're giving away Fox
Sports Awards, all these other kinds of things, and then
everything's decided on the field in terms of the actual championship.
Your award show doesn't need to exist, all right, So

(02:01:56):
if so James Conn passed away, James Conn first paragraph
is obituary will be you know what he was nominated for,
all those other kinds of things. When all of the
great actors of this generation pass on, the first paragraph
of their obituary is gonna include three time Oscar winner,
two time Oscar nominee, whatever that is, because those accolades
have meaning. Dude, how far in Lebron James's obituary will

(02:02:23):
you have to go before they mentioned fourteen time SP winner,
twelve time sp nominee, all of that kind of thing,
Like there are the trophies that you put on the mantel,
and then there are the ones that go in a drawer,
and then there are the ones that are in the
garage in a cardboard box that might just be thrown

(02:02:44):
out in a yard sale or when it's time for
bolk giveaways. We're just gonna put this in the old trash.
Can they can take this one away? The reason I
have a problem with the SPS is it's a celebration
of something that's already celebrated with awards. It's just this
love fest for the network that created it to sit
there and celebrate sports in a way that it's already celebrated,

(02:03:08):
because sports never stops. Aaron like that's that's it's just
such a meaningless deal, Like who even knows, like who
that's one spiece that's like a legit star in sports
that has any idea how many sp awards they've won
or how many times they've been nominated. How many of
them didn't even know they were nominated, probably found it

(02:03:29):
out later on some frison. Hey man, I saw the spish,
I saw that you were nominated for Best Individual Male Athlete.
I was I have no idea, like I would rather
get the Slime Award from the Kid's Choice Awards, then
I would the SP If I was a top flight athlete,
that would be my rantbel that's probably your best best

(02:03:49):
rant that I've heard. And I would say, and I've
heard some good USFL rents too, by the way, Um,
you know, I guess what I would say is I
had never really taken into consideration that, yeah, we don't
really need to award awards to people who um, by nature,
there is a definitive winner and loser. Um. And then
I guess I had never really thought about the fact

(02:04:11):
of how insignificant it is to even those that not
only those that won, but to those of us that
like cover sports as a living, Like nobody can name
any SP winner from previous years. Is I take it
a step further to say, I don't even think I
can name categories. I mean, I think there's like a
best NBA player, but it seems kind of counterintuitive when
we have a NBA, you know, m v p UM.

(02:04:34):
So I had never really taken that much time to
think about it. It's just not something that interests me. Um.
It's a self serving thing. I get why it's done.
It's a way for that network to promote itself and uh,
frankly just also just have something sort of sports content
related to have on a day when there's no sports. Um.

(02:04:57):
But I couldn't even venture to guess the last time
him that I that I watched it. Um, I would
venture to guess that outside of the jim Valvano speech,
I don't think anybody can remember. I don't remember any
memorable moments from there's one. There's one. Jimmy V is
number one. No no, no, no no. I mean, Craig

(02:05:17):
Sager was very good, had those kind of moments. But
the best moment outside of Jimmy V that's on a
tip for totally different level is Norm McDonald is Norm
McDonald's monologue, which is well worth if you have not
If you're out there and you have not heard it,
go to YouTube. Just one of the most brilliant comedians
of all time who we sadly lost. UM last year.

(02:05:40):
Norm McDonald's monologue was so biting and so direct, it
was hilarious unless you were in the room and you
got to see, maybe for the first time ever, athletes
reveal how fragile their egos actually were like we all
sit around and we have very fragile egos and probably
gets us all on all of us. We see athletes,

(02:06:01):
and a lot of times we see them the way
that they want us to see them, unless they're on
a police blotter or something like that, just like we
could be on a police blotter. But them sitting there
and this comedian lampooning them and them not being able
to hide their scorn and disdain for this just revealed

(02:06:24):
to all of us what athletes are, and it's they're
just like us. And of course he told he know
j joke as well, because he's Norm McDonald and he's
just he's gonna do it his way. It is an
absolute treasure. If you have not seen that, watch the
athletes reaction when Norm calls them out individually during that monologue.

(02:06:46):
That is the greatest moment outside of Jimmy V and
ESP's history. And then when you get to the rest
of it, outside of the stuff with Sager and and
that kind of thing, which we can put in a
different category. I just it is most meaningless nothing awards show,
and that's covering ground because a lot of a war

(02:07:07):
shows feels like they're meaningless. That joint is meaningless. Very interesting.
I had never taken the time to consider that, but
probably because I just don't care exactly exactly, Aaron, and
you love sports like you eat you You're watching spring games,
You're going to spring games. You're on the West Coast,

(02:07:27):
and you were in Atlanta this past week. I found
out at SEC actually wasn't you weren't there? I had
an intern there. Yeah. I did a radio this morning
and they were like, so, tell us about SEC media days,
and I was like, I didn't have the heart to
say that. Yeah, I just I set this one out.
I okay, okay, well fair enough, but you you're you're, you're, you're.
It's not it's not out of bounds to think you

(02:07:48):
would have done that. You love sports, you absolutely love it.
You cherish it. It's your life. It's what we get
paid to do. We don't say, man, did you see
that Steph Curry one best Man? I don't even know
who won. I know he hosted, but I don't even
know who won. I don't know who won a single
award because I don't care. I care more that the

(02:08:09):
Braves one seven to two last night than I do
anything about an sp award show, because yet again, I
don't care who you tell me the team of the
Year is. I know the Rams won the Super Bowl
and like that that that's that's where it goes to me.
I understand how this whole thing works. I understand Kansas

(02:08:30):
win in the National Championship. I understand the Georgia Bulldogs.
I understand that that's what sports exists to do, award
honors for people who win championships. So don't give me
a trophy and a four hour SPS presentation to just
I don't even know. It's a fluffer for the network

(02:08:50):
that that's mainly what it is. And it's just become increasingly.
It's just I see it every year and I just
get irrationally upset because I'm like, why are we still
doing this? Like why are we still doing this? Grift?
And the sager said it in the last hour two
and a half million viewers. Okay, let's just say this.
If we can put the Pro Bowl out the pasture,

(02:09:11):
can we please put this farce out to pasture as well?
Very interesting? Had I considered it, Uh, Bernie will be
joining us in about ten minutes from now. I did
have an an NBA segment I wanted to get to Uh.
We we don't have very much time, but I'll just
I'll just throw a very simple question out there and
you tell me, you know, and we can kind of
go from there before we bring in Bernie here in

(02:09:31):
a few minutes. Why is it Kevin? Why is there
no trade market for Kevin Durant? I like, like, I
think they're like there is one, but I don't think
it's nearly as robust as everybody made it out to be. Um,
I have some thoughts, as I always do, but I'll
throw to you first. I find it very interesting that
maybe the most talented basketball player in the world doesn't

(02:09:52):
want to be where he is, and nobody seems to
be willing to give up an arm and a length. Again.
So here's the problem as it relates to this for
Kevin Durant. If this woman you're with, you're you're she's
cheating on her husband with you, how could you ever

(02:10:12):
trust her enough to marry her? Because if she cheated
on her husband with you, in the back of your head,
even if it's five, you're never going to be quite
sure that she's not cheating on you with the next guy.
That's the problem. I look at this and I say
to myself, Kevin Durant is maybe the best basketball player

(02:10:35):
in the world even now. Janice is my guy right now,
I believe your honest is the most talented basketball player
in the world. I believe he presents the most problems
of any player in the world in terms of trying
to defend him, trying to deal with all of what
he does. I think he is the guy. But Kevin
Durant is right there. So why would you why would
this not happen? Why wouldn't you want to do this?
This is the equivalent of Patrick Mahomes being out there.

(02:10:57):
It's the equivalent of something like that, like all of
a sudden Aaron Rodgers. Really it really does want out
and actually he's gettable. But if you don't think the
guy is going to stay with you because of what
you've seen him do already in his career, then are
you going to wager as Scottie Barnes, Are you going
to wager a young star against somebody that will look,

(02:11:19):
he has had a torn achilles, he is getting a
little bit older. And the biggest thing is, just like
when we were talking about Kyler Murray. If I'm paying
that dude, if I'm bringing that dude in in that moment,
and I'm gonna have to gut my franchise in order
to do it, or give up the future to do it,
I need that guy to be a leader. And I

(02:11:39):
think Kevin Durant just wants to play basketball. I think
he wants to be an elite basketball player, but he
doesn't want to be a leader. That would make me hesitate.
Add as was the fact that or as is the
fact that we haven't even begun the four year extension
that he signed last year and he's already telling you
he wants out. How could I trust him to bring

(02:12:02):
him into my organization because I just saw what happened
the last time he got his way. Uh, he got
very malcolmdented very quickly. And now he's reportedly wanting out.
The conflicting idea of maybe he did that just to
get Kyrie out, I don't buy that. But generally speaking,
I just kind of say, I've seen this before. I

(02:12:23):
saw what you did before. I'm a little bit scared
for you to come in here right now and rex something.
If I if I have a young player that I like,
I don't know if I want to hand that guy
away for somebody that that's that is increasingly feels like
a mercenary. If that makes any sense. Well, I think
you hit on exactly what my thoughts are is that
I just don't think you can mortgage your your entire

(02:12:45):
future for a guy that is perpetually unhappy. And we've
we've all been through it, everybody on this network. Because
obviously talked about Kevin Durant. Um, but you know, I
had a great thing going in Okay, see, Okay, we
get it. Westbrook's a lot to deal with. Goes to
Golden State, he's not happy. They're fine early lands in
a spot where all I'm playing with my best friend
I and and I mean, you know, my frustration the

(02:13:05):
day that Kevin Durant demanded that trade was dude, okay,
you're unhappy and go uh okay, see I get it,
you're unhappy in Golden State. I I actually did kind
of get it. Like you're Stephs, you're never gonna it's
never gonna be your team whatever. But you picked your
your teammates, you picked the head coach, you picked the city, Um,
you picked the surrounding parts in terms of outside of Kyrie,

(02:13:28):
and the guy's just never happy, and so I don't
see the scenario where he, you know, immediately becomes happy
somewhere else or stays happy over the long term. And
I just don't think you can get your franchise. By
the way, Like when the um when the Golden State
Warriors conversation started to come up to these last few weeks,
I said, I don't get that either. Be one thing
if the Warriors fell short to be one thing. If

(02:13:48):
they didn't make the finals, would be one thing if
they even got to the finals and didn't win. But
when you're the reigning champ and you're pretty set up
pretty nicely for not just the present to maybe go
back to back next but the future with a lot
of young talent Jordan Poole, uh, you know cominga maybe
you know, Andrew Wiggins is still pretty young, and you're
gonna give up all that to get Kevin Durant to

(02:14:10):
to to have a championship window when you're already in
a championship window coming off a championship. I didn't get it.
And I'll say this, I think it's increasingly likely that
he's back there in Brooklyn next year, because there just
does not seem to be I don't wanna say there's
no market, but no market relative to what you're what
is what is a realistic trade hall for the nets
in terms of um, yeah, there's a market, but they're

(02:14:32):
not gonna give him up for nothing either. Fascinating to
watch and we'll see it all unfold. Fox Sports Radio,
Eron towards Jason Martin here on a Saturday night, coming up,
we go out to Vegas. Bernie Frido has got some
good stuff for us, as always, on some college football,
on some betting, on all things, pretty much everything. Bernie
Frido is next, Aeron towards Jason Martin, Fox Sports Radio,
Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports Radio, Aeron towards Jason Martin

(02:14:55):
here on a Saturday night, The best walk up music
into radio. When you hear Big pimpin at one twenty
Eastern time every Saturday, when it's really Sunday Eastern time,
that means one thing. We're going out to Vegas. Bernie Fretto.
What's up, Bernie, gentlemen, And you know, not for nothing.
The Dodgers, Rangers and Cincinnati Reds once had a player

(02:15:18):
tenure manor league career named Cecil sp I know Disagrea
will remember this. I wonder if Cecil sp ever won
an sp Award, nobody would remember except for him, maybe
not even you know. The sp awards count of reminds
me of a guy who throws a surprise birthday party
for himself parked his own car down the street two
blocks away, so no one is always there. Right, Yeah,

(02:15:40):
I'm good night, I'm done, all right, Bert, Well, let's
get to some serious stuff. First of all, I say
it every week, but uh, you know, especially matters in
the Midwest. UM, your time in in UM, in Detroit
and in Michigan is so you know, it's so valuable
to us. And obviously all the talk right now in
college sports remains on if there is another move for

(02:16:01):
the Big Ten. Are you hearing anything interesting with the
Big Ten and Notre Dame specifically, Yeah, you brought this
shoup a couple of weeks ago, and I really got
my uh got my interest because I'm of the belief
Notre Dame will never join a conference. But Dan Patrick
reported that the other day that NBC and Notre Dame
are negotiating, uh for a seventy five million dollar contract

(02:16:23):
TV contract. NBC currently pays Notre Dame about fifty million annually.
So I really looked into this, made a few calls.
Here's the bottom line. He's not wrong, but Notre Dame
is very much taking a wait and see. There's a
wait and see component to this thing. It turns out
that that deal maybe predicated on Notre Dame joining the
Big ten. Notre Dame wants their independence, they want their money,

(02:16:46):
and they wanted to find path to the playoff. They
want their cake and eat it too. So what they
want to see are a couple of things. One, the
College Football Playoff and its current format expires in They
want to see with the next format is going to
look like, because if it's very sort of at large friendly, well,

(02:17:06):
Notre Dame is not inclined to want to join a conference.
So as long as they can get their money and
if they have to join a conference, they will. But
if they can get like maybe sixty millions from NBC
and not have to join a conference, uh, then that's
good enough for them. They don't really need to make
a hundred million a year, plus they share money in
other ways. They do just fine. So that the long

(02:17:27):
and short of it is, nothing is going to happen
for about a year. That's what I'm told. A year
for now I could get much more interesting. Uh and
then two years from now maybe even more so. But
for now, I'm kind of sticking to my guns. It's
gonna take a lot for Notre Dame to move. Well.
It's also the idea, right Bernie, that Notre Dame loves
to feel special, they love to feel different, they love

(02:17:48):
to feel unique. If the next situation is twelve teams,
it's a twelve team expanded playoff, a lot of which
are not automatic qualifiers, then the most then maybe the
pathways still exists out there for them to continue to
be that independent, that one that's out there. It's like, yeah,
we're not part of the Big ten network because we're NBC.

(02:18:08):
And if NBC is willing to pay enough money for that,
they're still able to kind of pick and choose their schedule.
Then why would they necessarily feel that need to join
the conference? Exactly right, And the only way they really
would benefit for further realignment is if they do join
the Big Ten. But I'm also told that the conference,
the Big Ten Conference has no current plans right now

(02:18:30):
to add any initial team. So a lot of talk,
a lot of speculation, but I think you're gonna have
to let this play out because there are a lot
of moving parts. And you bring up a good point
about the twelve team playoff. I absolutely believe based on
people I've talked to the n c A, a a lot
of the member conferences are ruining the day they couldn't
come to an agreement last January on this playoff expansion.

(02:18:51):
It would have solved a lot of problems, and I'm
told it probably would have prevented USC and U c
l A from leaving the PAC twelve. Well, what's really interesting,
and Jason, I didn't have a chance to talk about earlier,
but Greg Syanky, the commissioner at SEC media Days this week, said, Um,
we're gonna draw. We're gonna we're gonna scrap everything that
we've talked about and go back to plan one. And
I think he thought he was being nice last time around,

(02:19:14):
and I don't think he Yeah, I don't think he
plans on being nice this time around. Real quick burn
one thing, another topic Jason and I want to get to.
We haven't had a chance yet. We saw the report.
Something that you've told us for a few weeks is
that the Raiders officially had the the highest ticket sales
out there in Vegas. I remember talking to about this
probably two three weeks ago. Um, just the you know,
the interest locally with the local fan base, the traveling fans.

(02:19:38):
Does this come as a surprise to the folks at
the Raiders. Is this exceeding their expectations or is this
pretty much what they were planning for when they decided
to move to Vegas. It's pretty much expected because Las
Vegas is an international destination. And so when you create
a situation where there are eight home games from visiting
teams not just the uh, the same divisional teams that

(02:20:01):
visit here you know, Kansas City, Denver, and the Chargers,
but other non divisional teams from the various conference from
you know, around the country, fans plan their junkets and
their vacations and their boondoggles around the football game in Vegas.
So it creates an incredibly high artificial demand over the
you know, the finite supply. So it's really as simple

(02:20:23):
that as simple as that. UM Vegas is a place
people want to be, especially if their favorite football team
is here. The Raiders have benefit from that. Plus the
Raiders are close to California, we get a great California crowd,
the Raider Nation. A lot of Raider Nation folks live
in California, they still come into games. So it all
adds up to be sort of the perfect storm. What
do you think about the a C West as a
whole right now, Briandon, we're getting to the point where

(02:20:46):
we can actually start to look at divisions, and we
talked a lot about the a f C West a
little earlier in the program. I need to see it
with the Chargers. I'm not really buying all of this
hype because I've heard of a lot of rosters that
have won titles and in July that they get to
January and we're wondering why they're not in the playoffs.
So I need to see that before I can believe it. Denver,

(02:21:06):
we gotta see what the what the Russ situation is,
whether or not he's able to kind of get back
to where he was Kansas City without ty Tyreek Hill
is the most one of one player in the league,
and in my opinion, outside of Aaron Donald. And then
you've got the Raiders and because of your experience their
knowledge of Vegas, the Raiders of the team, I still
feel like are being slept on. I think the Raiders

(02:21:26):
are really good. I think their offense is really good.
I think that car has not played his best football.
Do you agree? Do you think I'm off base? Well,
the Raiders certainly have a lot of weapons. You bring
in Davante Adams to pair him up with Hunter, renfro
and Darren Waller, and I think it's all, all of
a sudden one of the best groups in the league. Unfortunately,
one of the big you know, the biggest challenges for

(02:21:49):
the Raiders is their offensive line. That's going to be
an issue. You bring up the Chargers. They pick up
uh Khalil Mack to join Joey Bosa probably the best
ed dressing can have been football, but again they have
weaknesses in the rest of their interior line. Denver picks
up Russell Wilson. Now, for my money, they may have
the best weapons of anybody with Jerry Judy Courtland, Sutland,

(02:22:12):
kJ Hamler out of Penn State, Tim Patrick mayde to
give up no offense, but they're gonna be loaded. But
Denver no longer has the great pass rush until you
slay the dragon, which are the Kansas City Chiefs. And yes,
they're going to miss Tyreek Hill. It's primarily going to
change how teams defend Kansas City more than anything else.
But I still think Kansas City with Patrick Mahomes and

(02:22:32):
your DNA are the favorites. The rest of that, they're
gonna beat each other up. You're gonna have to win
in your nonconference games, and you're gonna have to win
on the road. Pick which team you think can do that,
which can be the most the most successful in the
nonconference games and the most successful in winning the road games,
and you're gonna find your a f C West winner.

(02:22:53):
They always people are saying, well, this is one division.
It wouldn't surprise me if any of the four finished first,
or any of the four finished last. I don't know
if I go that far chief saying finishing last? Whoa
shots fired? Because I said I thought they might me
and burn and hear the story earlier. So if you
said it there, and I respect you man, by the way,
I want to give you a little props quickly on
college football, Aaron, Right after the playoff game last year

(02:23:16):
between Alabama and Georgia. Uh, you know you right away
started to talk about with Will Anderson when yes, you
know when the Hidsman Trophy this year, Well a better
came in this week to Sesars and put eleven hundred
dollars to win forty four thousand one odds on Will Anderson.
And there's a couple of things you gotta remember. And

(02:23:38):
by the way, a week to September, Alabama, I think
the game is in Texas. Have to look at it. Okay, Yes,
they'll probably open up a can of whoopass on Texas
and he'll have a great game in front of everybody,
and I think that's going to set the stage. You
often know a Heisman Trophy winner sets the tone early,
gets out in front like a horse race, and se

(02:23:58):
easy if you can hold on. So let's not forget
a who won it last year, Broyce Young. Other than
Archie Griffin, there's never been a repeat winner, and I
don't think they'll give it to Bryce Young. And number two,
let's look who finished second last year, eight Hutchinson. A
lot of people thought would I think the the stars
are aligning and if Alabama runs the table, they don't
exactly have a daunting schedule, unless you count Austin p

(02:24:19):
and Utah State, Louisiana Monroe as a daunting schedule. Their
biggest game obviously October eight at Texas A and M.
And maybe Will Anderson makes his bones in the top.
Props to you, Aaron, because you said months ago keep
an eye on Will Anderson. I'll tell you right now,
I almost never bet props, but I may throw a
few shekels on Will Anderson at forty one. Yeah, I

(02:24:39):
should have won it last year. Is the best player
in college football last year? Well, I agree, And that
is a large part of why I think it will
wrap on this. But you know is that I think
there's a lot of negative things about social media, but
I do think some things about social media are positive.
Where the momentum already started last year. Um, it was

(02:25:01):
a huge thing in the Alabama community that he didn't
even get invited to New York. And so I do
think it's going to be one of those things where
unless there's a court, yeah, where where national people that
cover the sport are gonna be sitting here saying this
guy that you know, don't sleep on this guy, don't
just give it to a quarterback because we always do.
So that was kind of my thought there. Did you

(02:25:22):
have something happen to you? Guys? Top credit. You just
nailed two things which will heavily play into this one.
He wasn't invited to New York and two people in
the know believed he was the best player in the country,
which would should have went last year. And by the way,
not for nothing, he didn't win an sp Award either. Well,
that that's for something. They give him credit for not

(02:25:43):
winning an sp I can't wait till he wins the
Heisman and then the national championship. And on the podium,
he says, I was inspired by not getting that sp
last year, inspired by Megan Rappino. Man I just wanted
to mention my name, Bertie Frado straight out of Vegas.
You can hear him at the top of the hour
two a m e. Sir, time has all sorts of stuff,
not only on the Vegas stuff, but on college football,

(02:26:03):
the NFL. We're getting we're getting close burn. Thank you
for the time. We'll be listening at the top of
the hour. Thanks you, guys. Fall of Fan Game Raiders
and Jacksonville Week from Thursday fantastic more about that than
the sp Awards. I know that I do so thank
you to Bernie Fratto. Uh and uh yeah, Bernie Fratto.
Top of the hour straight at of Vegas, Final time
this evening. Let's get to Steve disagree what's trending before

(02:26:26):
we get to the baseball. The Tennessee Titans signed third
round quarterback Malik Willis from Liberty. The Bengals place five
players on the physically Unable to perform list, including running
backs and j. P. Ryan. The Phoenix Suns gave NBA
Coach of the Year Monty Williams a long term extension.
According to ESPN, the PGA tours in Minnesota and then
Michigan these next two weeks. Scott Piercy led the three

(02:26:47):
m opened by four strokes today when bad weather stop play.
The next live golf tournament is next week in New Jersey.
Denny Hamlin or the NASCAR poll for tomorrow at Pocono
and at the World Track and Field Championships in Oregon. Tonight,
the US won the women four by one relay, beating
Jamaica in an upset. In the men's sprint relay, Canada
defeated the US. The Major League Baseball the Atlanta Braves

(02:27:08):
sent the Angels to a fifth straight lost, seven to two.
Mike Trout still on the Injurlist show Heyotani with his
twentie homer, but the Halos have lost fourteen of sixteen. Meanwhile,
Austin Riley it is twenty eight homer of the season,
fifteen game hitting streak with fifteen RBIs in that stretch
and batting four thirty five during the hitting streak, Kyle

(02:27:29):
Wright twelve and for the winning pitcher, and the Braves
second in the NL East, now a half game behind
the Mets, who gave up a two run homer to
Manny Machado and lost to one to the Padres. Chris
Bassett seven strong innings but took the loss. The rest
of the Padres had just three hits. They struck out
fifteen times and still won the game. Blake Snell was
one in five but got the win for the Padres.
Five scoreless innings with five strikeouts. The Dodgers have won

(02:27:52):
seven in a row and eighteen of their last twenty games.
After beating the Giants again four to two solo homers
from Mookie Betts, Trade Turner and Freddie Freeman. Julio arias
the win against X Dodger lefty Alex Wood. Cleveland split
a doubleheader at the White Sox, getting three runs top
of the ninth to win the opener, but then the
White Sox five four winners in the nightcap with two

(02:28:12):
runs bottom of the eighth and an actual good start
from Lance Lynn in Chicago, six scoreless innings, six strikeout
snow decision. Arizona and Madison bum Gardner beat Washington seven
to two. Oakland took the late game three one over
Texas Rangers with three errors. Kansas City ended a four
game losing streak with a six three victory over Tampa Bay.
Bobby witt Jr. Of the Royals his fourteenth homer and

(02:28:33):
his nineteen stolen base. Pittsburgh left ten men on base
and still won a one nothing game over Miami St.
Louis Is six three winner at Cincinnati. Winning pitcher Stephen
Matts lowered his e r a below six, but left
with a strain knee in the sixth inning. Paul gold
Schmid a solo homer. Milwaukee still the first place team
in the at L Central game and a half over

(02:28:53):
the Cards. The Brewers and Brandon Woodruffe defeated Colorado nine
to four. Brewers beat him in thirteen innings. Last night.
Baltimore was down to the Yankees and Garrett Colt three
nothing in the fifth, still came back and beat him
tonight six three, even though Aaron Judge had four hits,
but the Yankees with runners in scoring position went one
for fourteen. Minnesota was still off last night. This tonight

(02:29:14):
at Detroit and eight four win was their first game
since Sunday. Twins All Star outfielder Byron Buxton out this
weekend with a knee injury. Luisa Rias, a Twins All Star,
had three hits in this win tonight. He's batting three
forty two Cubs in ten innings. One at Philadelphia six two.
Cubs beat him fifteen to two last night. This evening
at Philly, Kyle schoarber three strikeouts in a walk, He's

(02:29:34):
batting two oh seven. Toronto won its fifth Strade game
four one at Boston. Alec minoah All Star the win.
Jordan Romano All Star got the save. Red Sox All
Star third baseman Raphael Devers goes on the injured list
with a bad hamstring and on FS one This afternoon
Houston was a three one winner at Seattle last night.
The Stros had ended the Mariners fourteen game winning streak. Today,

(02:29:55):
Seattle Rookie of the Year candidate Julio Rodriguez was out
again with a sore risk. Justin Verlander the winning picture
now thirteen and three e r A one point eight
six And don't forget the Hall of Fame induction ceremonies
for baseball are tomorrow, including David Ortiz and six other
respect to you, Thank you, Steve to Seger. This is
Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday, Errant Tours Jason Martin

(02:30:17):
here on a Saturday night. You know what we have
not one, but two big stories I want to get to,
including my arch enemy. He's going down hard. Oh we're
discussing that. Next. You got your sp s Rant well,
me and Jerry West given go baby, that's next. Fox
Sports Radio. Welcome back, everybody, Fox Sports Radio, Fox Sports Saturday,

(02:30:39):
Aaron Torres, Jason Martin. One segment left, Bernie Fritday. You
just heard from him. You'll hear him at the top
of the hour straight out of Vegas to a m
Eastern to six am Eastern. All right, So Jason in
Sports there's some great rivalries. We got h Yankees, Red Sox,
Michigan Ohio State, we have tours versus Reddick. Uh, it's

(02:31:01):
not really a rivalry, you know. It's kind of like
that Michigan Ohio State thing. I mean, I basically ran
away with it. For people don't remember, JJ Reddick tried
to punk me on something college basketball related. Then I
ended up being a hundred percent correct. I reminded him
of it two or three times and then he blocked me. Well,
I bring it up because j J Reddick, you know,
sticking his foot in his mouth a lot, you know,

(02:31:22):
coming to Torres, gets punked, came at Bob Couzy, called
him a plumber or a fireman, got punked by Bob Cuzy,
and Jerry West was actually asked about the comments surrounding
Bob Cuzy for people don't remember. Again, JJ Reddick basically
said that anybody that played before Night you can't compare
because it's a bunch of firemen and plumbers who they

(02:31:43):
were playing against. Jerry West, the logo was asked about
JJ Reddick yesterday on Sirius XM. Here's what he had
to say. I know, j j Uh just a little bit.
It's a very smart kid and everything. Tell me what
his career look like. That was determined games you have
with twenty every twelve points a game in the league

(02:32:04):
that was serious x M and shots have been fired.
How about eighty four year old Jerry West coming after
j J Reddick, Jason, did you hear this? Did you
only hear about it? Because I forced it down to
you in Bo's throat today, Jerry Reddick j Jerry West
calling it basically real quick. Jerry West just basically said,
oh yeah, JJ Reddick, you're the plumber and fireman of

(02:32:27):
your generation. Sit down, young in, I'm gonna teach you
a lesson about basketball. Yeah. I didn't know. I saw it,
and I was like, all right, let me look up
Jerry West and see why I'm being talked about because
I hadn't seen the Reddick portion of like what did
Jerry West say? What did Jerry West do? Then I
realized see a comment and on Reddick, I'm like, Okay,

(02:32:48):
now I get it. I it's just kind of funny
because this is what you get right when you say stuff,
you get stuff back. And that's kind of what happened
to j. J. I understand where j J was coming
from with his original point. Um, I also understand why
guys like Jerry West, Bob Kuzy and the like would
then push back against that. The stupidest arguments in sports

(02:33:12):
are the ones about this player would beat this player
in this generation because everything's changed. Physiology has changed, even
the body structure has changed to some degree in terms
of how much faster and bigger, and all of a
sudden kinds of things have just changed. But the mindset,
I think what would be hilarious is like, all right,
so JJ says that if you brought Bob Cuzy into

(02:33:33):
now Is Basketball, this is what Bob Couzy would be. Well,
what would happen if you put JJ Reddick in Bob
Couzy's day? Would he just dominate like that or would
he experience things he's never seen before. It's just kind
of one of those things that happens when you talk
a lot for a living, and you also seem to
get more attention when you say certain things. And we've

(02:33:53):
seen that, especially when you get on TV. It seems
like guy's deteriorate a little. I think Reddick's really good
on TV. Really enjoy his commentary but I've seen moments
where he has kind of teetered on the brink of
I feel like this is happened. This has happened to
Dan Orlovsky. Orlovsky very early on was excellent before he

(02:34:15):
was on TV at all. We booked him on Fox,
and I thought he was awesome, especially breaking down quarterbacks.
He was raw, he was willing to talk and all
this stuff. Now, a lot of what he says, I'm
just like, I don't know if I believe that, you
believe that. I can't tell. I don't know if this
is TV Orlovsky or if this is Dan. And Dan's
always been really genuine, so he may this may just

(02:34:37):
be how it is. But it seems like he's become
more of a TV persona, and I think that's what
happened to Reddick. I find this funny, and I think
it's it's funny that West, who looked West, ain't gonna
take any slights either. A lot of these old school
guys are not gonna sit there and tolerate this. What
he's saying about Reddick's pretty funny because I think Reddick
had a better career than many thought he was gonna
have in the pros. He actually had a really good career.

(02:34:59):
He was really helpful to a lot of different teams. Um,
he was more able to transfer what he did a
duke to the pro game than a lot of people
assumed that he was going to be able to do.
But yeah, if you're JJ Reddick and you comment on legends,
they're gonna come back and say, how dare you comment
on legends when you can't even spell the word? Certainly

(02:35:20):
not when it's placed next to your name, because no
one would ever accuse you of being a legend. And
of course Torres, you got into it with him, so
I'm sure you've got great joy out of this. And
decided that in Winning Time season two, who's gonna play
you in that? In that series? Because if j if
Jerry West is back, if he's part of it, then
you've got to be there somewhere. Yeah, it's funny because

(02:35:43):
you know, I didn't know if if I just had
extra interest in this story, because Reddick chirped at me,
and then I chripped back, and then he blocked me. Um.
But it was the number one trending topic on a
bunch of websites this morning, so I decided to to
kind of play into it. A couple of things. One.
I first of all, I agree with the idea that
when you do what we do for a living, when
you talk all day every day, there's gonna be twenty

(02:36:06):
thirty second clips that are taken out of context, um
or even not even taking out of context. You just
you're not gonna be perfect every single day, and you're
gonna say stuff that looks dumb in hindsight. So for one,
it's mostly fun. The one thing I will say is
a couple of things. One, I'm with you on the
comparing eras it's so dumb because we've talked about it. Um,
you know, No, you can't compare the athletes of now

(02:36:28):
with the training they have now, with the meal planning
they have now, with the skills coaches they have now,
to nineteen forty. But also put Kyrie Irving in nineteen
forty when he has to go work a job during
we can't even get Kyrie Irving to show up for
most of his games now he's got to go work
a second job during the summer. Let's see him or
Ben Simmons or James Harden or whoever. So it's two

(02:36:50):
different years, two different whatever. Atally I need to see
I need to see Ben Simmons worked his first job,
any job, job, lot of I need to see him
work in the basketball job first. A lot of jokes
this last couple of weeks about Ben Simmons showing up
to more NET Summer League games than he did his
own teams games during the regular season. Lastly, what I
would just say really quickly on that is Jerry West.

(02:37:10):
For people who do not know, um, you could put it,
dude average forty six points in a single playoff series. Okay,
I don't care what era. By the way, he played
with Wilt Chamberlain, who's maybe the greatest athletes ever play
the game. I would say maybe outside Lebron Ja like
a guy was an unbelievable athlete. Elgin Baylor was an
all time athlete. So it's not as though like Jerry West, Okay,
you want to talk about Cuzy, you know, in the

(02:37:32):
first generation the NBA whatever, Jerry West average forty six
points per game, uh, in one playoff series. That dude
could play in any era, really quick, Jason, I didn't
want to get to another kind of well, I think
that first one was a feel good story but this
is this is definitely a feel good story. I want
to give a quick shout out. I saw this on
social media right before we came on. UH Handsel a

(02:37:52):
manual for people who do not know Google the name. Uh.
He is a high school basketball player. He lost an
arm tragically obviously in uh. He grew up in Haiti,
I believe in there. I think it was it might
have been during the earthquake or or early in his life. Uh,
there was an accident in his house and he lost
his arm. Okay um, but that is the sad part,

(02:38:14):
the not sad part earlier today, Uh, he's taken up
basketball the last couple of years. He's a senior in
high school and he just committed to Northwestern State Division one.
And go ahead and find his clips on YouTube or
on Twitter or Instagram or whatever. The kid can play.
And I just think in a world where everybody's looking
for sympathy, everybody's looking for to be a victim, this

(02:38:37):
kid one arm got a scholarship today to Northwestern State.
Want to congratulate him on his success. I don't even
know what to said to that, other than I'm glad
that you pointed out to me because I hadn't seen it,
and you mentioned it during the break and I was
just like, Yeah, that's exactly what you need in the show,
something to remind you that there are people out there
that that just deserve all the accolades, that have fought

(02:38:59):
through so much. And now I just want to see
this kid succeed and and hopefully he will, and hopefully
we'll be able to talk about them much more on
fs ARE. Thank you to the crew, producer bo Don,
Steve Di Sager. Thank you to Jason Martin fer Torres.
This his Fox Sports Radio Bernie Frenn Next