February 21, 2023 • 37 mins
Jason and Mike discuss the weekend of sports behind us, will Derek Carr or Aron Rodgers be the quarterback for the Jets next year, and why Mike will not take off his sunglasses in the studio!
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to The Jason Smith Show with Mike
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(00:23):
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(00:45):
And now address us with respect because we know we
have the year of TMZ and uh hey, so if
you need something where the show to go through, well,
we also need to just start putting things into existence
that other accounts with seven plus million people will start
picking up. Yeah. Well, look, we put out the presidents
of the United States of America and seven minutes after
that they put out a thing on the Presidence of
(01:06):
the United States of America. I mean the band, not
the not the actual president. Kim and Courtney called me, alright, alright, alright,
let's get it on. You're gonna get a phone call
from Courtney b Vance and I love Courtney b Vans
can come and hang out Courtney with the cake and
uh tried Kim Kim that Justin Turner's wife. And Kim
(01:30):
Carnes is going to call you because she's got Betty
Davis eyes t J. You know what I have to
what are you looking at me like that? Harmon? You
know what I had to look up she's got Yeah, Okay,
there you got Kim Carnes still alive. Just had a
second apparent. It's like call Kim cards Kim Carns in Hollywood.
(01:52):
Let's go. Okay, okay, when you're green hat, Harmon's dating
Kim Carns. Can you believe that she's redoing her song?
He's got Mike Harmon's sunglasses on while he's doing the show. Yeah,
because Harmon's wearing sunglasses doing the show tonight. And I
look good. No, you know, okayde WrestleMania when it comes
to Los Angeles, let's go. You do look like could
(02:14):
be wearing sunglasses indoors. You do. Look, you're getting ready
to do an interview with mean Gene Oakland on the
side in the middle of Saturday morning, like before they
go to break coming up as the marquee match of
the day special Delivery and Civic Center. Later on tonight,
I gotta tell you St Jones against Greg the Hammer Valentine.
But first I'm here talking with Mike Harmon about the
(02:38):
show this weekend, and you come out with the sunglasses
and the hat and everything whatever. I get to a
town Harmon, Harmon forgot his glasses night, so he's wearing
sunglasses in because you're the cow Rick of wearing glasses
every day less nine and a half years. But now
it's like I'm going through some kind of crisis. I'm
(02:58):
gonna midlife price. I'm gonna wear gonna wear sunglasses into
the studio to be a red man. If that's the
worst thing I do that, I've had an okay midlife
Right tomorrow, he's rolling up on a Harley. He's gonna
he's gonna have a convertible and it's gonna have one
of those raccoon tails. The side of everybody a raccoon scale.
(03:21):
Call me a raccoon one more time. You have a
bolo tie on pony tail. We've been bags. You talk
a giant cowboy hat. Get that pinky going on. It's
a mutton chops. Are you ready already gotta I gotta
let those girl over time. But you'll put fake ones
on you thinking in fake mutton. You'll never pay for
(03:43):
a beer again. You get those one. Um. So, Lebron
James has had a pretty big last twenty four hours
because he is now bought in for the rest of
this season. A quote pretty big with a pretty big
amount of hype rribally in it. How important after the
Lakers make a big flurry of trades before the trade deadline, Uh,
(04:06):
they win a big game before the the NBA all
start breaking. Everybody's thinking, all the Lakers are back, They're back.
They won one game. The Lakers are back. Lebron just
wanted you to know and wanted all of us to
know the stakes steaks of the rest of the NBA
regular season, twenty three of the most important games in
my career for a regular season top of mind set
that that I have and the guys will have coming
(04:27):
back off the break. I don't want to see myself
and not being pulled a part of the post season
for two years straight is not part of my DNA.
You know, We're sitting up here talking about the record
and things of that nature, and that's all cool, But
I'm more passionate about trying to make the postseason and
give ourself a chance to compete for another Larry O'Brian trophy.
So that's just who I am. That's when I'm cut from.
I hope I can, you know, figure out a way
(04:48):
to just make sure I'm available on the floor every
single night for these twenty three games. Uh okay, So
let the part that I have a real issue, it's
have a real issue with the statement, is not the
part about this is the most important twenty three games
in my career. Did he put his fake imaginary crown
on himself before that stament? Or someone said, because they
did that in the pregame of the All Star Game,
(05:09):
and they said, and I do know the l A.
King's play in Los Angeles, Now I I also know
that as well. Wow, that might be the dopeiest but
you watch the pregame oft pre game, not the Star
Watch the pregame was that the restaurant and it was
on you watched I had no sound. You watched the
pre game start, that's what they had on. No, I
get that the islands they had that surfing videos from
(05:31):
I don't know. Surfing videos are kind of cool. Yeah,
but they didn't play the before the guys were crashing.
We're all successful. They didn't play anything from point break.
You didn't get to see those. The ex presidents are surfers. Yeah, sorry,
spoiler alerts. You break a lot more highlights the remake.
I don't know where did they change, No, because it
wasn't surfers. It was like they were um uh, they
(05:54):
weren't surfers. They were like adventurers, like they like like
the sky dove and they ski and they so they
were they were like as back to the I think
just hey, we have some pretty cool cameras we can
get go pro video of, so we're going to do that.
So I think that's what you do that surfboard. I
think you've probably seen that. Let's do something different on
the giant screen. Could have worked either way. Utah, give
(06:17):
me too. Either way, that's what I saw watching the
pregame experience. We saw the aunt man. You couldn't wonder
you wearing sunglasses. Your eyes must hurt from watching the
NBA pregames. You could have spent time talking to your daughter. No, no, no,
I got watch asking me questions. And then she liked
(06:39):
the uniforms that Janice's team was wearing. She thought they
were nice. Hey, Dad, who's who's honest? Who's you? Tell me? Who?
That look? He shows up in TikTok and Instagram? Enough designer?
Is he a designer? En dinner? Can I buy those
clips all stay around about the honest teams? Is that possible?
(06:59):
Can I that? No, she's well aware of the Greek
free you don't wear jeans? It was on in the
restaurant watching you didn't you don't like it? Don't watch
your glasses? Makes sense, as my eyes hurt. My eyes
heard from watching the NBA party. If it had been
spring training Baseball of any deem, I would have been begging,
(07:21):
can you just throw show me guys doing long doss
like the sunglasses they put on the people in Bullet Train.
All right, they're just bleeding, right, blood coming from the eyes.
I don't think this watching the pregame, It's really kind
of what I felt like, boy, But they did like
(07:41):
a little tribute and you can see jay Z and
then the whole Lebron crowning himself now uncomfortable and piste off.
Look at Cab giving him the ball. How how much
you hate him being called the king? But you watched
the whole thing with the crown and everything else. Okay,
I tried to avert Uh. Now, look, I'm not upset.
(08:03):
I don't have an issue with Lebron sitting here with
the hyperbole of the most important twenty three games in
my career because okay, stop, but because what he's trying
to do is, look, he's trying to get motivated. He's
trying and if he's motivating the rest of his teammates.
It's kind of a not so subtle shot to a
d when he says, I gotta make sure I make
myself available for all twenty three games. So yeah, and
I have no problem with that, because you need to
(08:24):
find motivation other places where you're motivating yourself, motivating your
teammate's That's not what I have issue with. I have
issue with that. The second part of the sound bite,
where he talked about how hey, it's not my d
n A talking about breaking the record is great and all,
but that's not what I'm mean, not how I'm made.
I'm about winning the championships, adding to the Larry Obrian Trophy,
and that is a load of crap. Oh, now he's
(08:45):
about winning. He has not talked about winning for two years.
He's not talking winning for two years. Why because I've
told you he's done winning. He won the title in
twenty The team hasn't been good enough. He has moved
on to different goal posts in his NBA career, the
individual goals, winning a scoring title at the age of
thirty six, playing with brawny uh passing Kareem, getting to
(09:07):
forty thou points, putting his much distance between himself whoever
comes behind him, so we can hold onto the scoring
record as long as possible. Lebron is not about He
hasn't been about winning. In a couple of years. He
would have played more. He had a lot of time off.
He had many many days off for injuries that you say,
I don't know now he's about winning, Like now something's Oh,
I'm about winning, it's it's in my DNA. Wait a minute,
(09:28):
where was all of this the last two years? Where
was anything this year? Where hey we gotta wake up, man.
This is We're starting now terribly two and eight. This
is awful. We got where was I'm gonna grab the
team by the scruff of the neck and will the
team to the the playoff? No? Nowhere, No, there was no
ways making saying we don't have the guys right, we
didn't have shooters, we didn't know what the lasers all that,
which is when they made these deals all of a sudden,
(09:50):
it's like, well we got some of that. I don't
know how good these guys are. The fact that it's
not Russell Westbrook has everybody suddenly with the rose colored
glass is on thinking that this is the magic alick, sir,
and that suddenly he and a d are gonna be
healthy and dominated for twenty three straight games. This is fake.
I care so deep because it's not Does he would
(10:11):
he like Look? Would he like to win? Sure? Every
player would like to win, But he's not pushed to
win and pushing himself to win like he did earlier
in his career. Look, that's why we why we love
Lebron because hey, who knew the guy wanted to win?
He wanted to secure his legacy, wanted to get to
final after finals and win. Great, but that's not who
he is, right, But this is this is now? Okay,
(10:34):
how do I win over the fans of my critics?
Next twenty two games? What am I going to try
to accomplish? Okay, let's see, so this season we got
rid of Westbrook, didn't work. I passed Kareem Great. The
next thing is getting forty thou points playing with brawny.
Figure things out at the end of this year. Okay,
the next twenty three games. Yes, I'm making sure I
dragged my team into the playoffs. Right? Last year? How
(10:54):
many time did he miss at the end of the
year because I told you he wasn't gonna be on
the court for Lebron couldn't drag get team to the playoffs.
I told you he's not about winning. He wants to
make it seem like he's about winning, because what else
can I do the last twenty two games. This is
for the media and for the fans and for his
critics to go, boy, look how much Lebron cares. I
haven't seen a guy care about winning that much in
the last couple of years, and now suddenly he's all
(11:16):
about it. Stop. But this whole thing is, show me
on the court for the rest of this season. You're
currently what seven and thirty two. You're the worst team
that isn't in San Antonio or Houston, right, they've fallen
off the face of the earth. Is for his Basketball
Participation Trophy Awards for this season, You're you're all the
(11:39):
way down there. There's a lot of teams to jump. Yes,
you can get to that ten slot, and everybody, oh,
look out, maybe they're maybe they're there. And there's a
lot of basketball to be played, a lot of heavy
minutes that Anthony Davis is gonna take one. And yes
there is a bit of lebron with the the shot
at a d S availability. You also have to look
at a mirror. Someone should hold up a mirror and
(11:59):
two him as well in terms of that. But show
me on the court getting in a Huffey and All
Star weekend press conference of oh, you'll never see me
more dedicated and determined than you will these next twenty
three games, because I need to redefine is is my
Are you fearing that your legacy, you know, the legacy
you control in in your mind when everything is um
(12:22):
Are you worried that people are starting to write stuff
that your inner circles feeding back to you. You know
that you never hear or see or whatever. That is
suddenly making you feel a little less comfortable because of
the way that breaking Kareem's record was received, Like there's
all these questions and good luck, Like if it they
(12:42):
win and they're playing, well, guess what that's good for us?
Oh yet their mediocre. That stinks. So either be terrible
and it just burns to the ground, or get into
the playoffs and if you can do some damage, all
the better and the league would love of every second
of it. But in the interim telling me how inspired
(13:05):
you are to go play and and what this means
to you, I don't care. I don't. It's supposed to
be about getting But if that was who he was
the whole time, if he was constantly trying to usher
the Lakers and push them through, I get it. Then
this is just part of who he is. But it's
(13:25):
not in his DNA. It was, and now what it
hasn't been in his DNA for a while. He has
not stood up and said I'm going to drag us
as far as he's not done that. He used to
do that. He doesn't because things have changed. He won
the championship in and he decided, Okay, do I need
to be motivated by winning and playing all these minutes
that No, No, I'm here now, I'm a star. I'm
in Los Angeles. This is where I'm gonna be for
(13:46):
a while. But to wait and see what's next to
my career winning is not what it was. You know what.
The Lakers, when we we get into the Tanka than World,
that's that's where it starts to get fun. Of remaining schedule, Mike,
the Lakers are Yeah, I know you were saying that.
You keep sending me that one guy that's all greasy
looking with the with the chains and he's very It's
(14:11):
like in slow motion. We're back, baby, We're back Lakers.
But yeah, the Lakers final wind strength the schedule left,
they have one against the Knicks, two against Memphis Memphis,
one against the Clippers, two against the Sons, two against Dallas,
(14:33):
one against the Pelicans. On the other side, ah, he
might be back by then. Maybe wish wishing and hoping.
On the other side, I don't think that's You got
two against the Rockets, two against the Bulls, and they
got Pat bev Man. Look out, now, uh look what
(14:55):
else you got? You got two against Okay, see they stink,
uh the Jazz, the Raptors and the magic. Okay, they'll
be a little bit better. They'll be a little bit better.
Could I see them going fourteen and eight? Yeah, and
finishing around five? Yeah, I could see that. I could
(15:15):
see him doing that. But that's fourteen and nine to
finish a five. They're not gonna They're not suddenly gonna
be look at this, they're unbeatable. That they're not. They're not.
But now Lebron wants to win after after not really
caring about winning. So hey, okay, we're the ends justify
the means, right, But if he turns it on, he
could say, look back to that faithful day in front
of the press. You hated everything about the All Star
(15:36):
weekend except for this, because look at Lebron James reascended
to the throne to take his Lakers into the playoffs.
Twitter and at about a Fresco might get swollen down
the Jason Switch Show with my best friend Mike Carmen.
He's gonna cut that pizza place to he might, he might,
speaking of the NBA, what I can't believe is still
(15:56):
going on after All Star Weekend. That's next from the
tirect dot Com studios. This is Fox Sports Radio. Be
sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith Show
with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven pm
Pacific Fox Sports Radio The Jason Smith Show with My
bass friend Mike Harmon. Since microphone has been traded into yes,
thank you, Yes, I turned him. I'm a radio professional.
(16:18):
Turn a microphone on. That's why it was off. Um,
we're gonna get into in a big way the outrage,
the fake outrage over the NBA All Star Game coming up.
I don't know how fake it is, though. There's a
lot of angry people. Yeah you know what, Yeah, you're right, cheating, bamboozled.
You watched the pregame show because you're biased, You watched
the pregame show. Many I was about the All Star Game. No,
(16:40):
no, no no, no, no. They had me sold. My daughter
kept looking over my shoulder. Why they keep their fireworks?
Why aren't there all these big video board colored tie
was Ernie Johnson wearing? Come on, you know it? Are
they gonna play basketball games? Like eventually maybe, but first
it can indulge me here for a couple of minutes,
because if you've been on the internet the last few days,
(17:02):
you watched ESPN at any time, you probably saw a
lot of great things being said about a guy named
Barry Sachs. And he was one of the great ESPN
producers coordinating producers of the last thirty years. And he's
a guy that had a really profound effect on a
lot of people's lives. He's a guy I worked with
(17:22):
for three years twenty five years ago, and I can
still hear his voice in my head. And he's someone
who brought the college basketball programming that you look at
ESPN does college basketball and college football really really well.
He was a guy in charge of that for a
long time. He was in charge of many different shows.
Many people that are doing things all throughout sports were
brought up at the feet of him. He was a guy.
(17:44):
He was the guy that you gravitated towards when you
started at ESPN, and for a twenty two year old
out of college like I was, to go to ESPN
and to start your life with your dream job. He
was the guy that talk to you understanding where you
were coming from, because you get there's a lot of
(18:05):
people that are just like, yeah, great, come in your office,
you have great start, Go do this, go do this.
He understood that, Okay, you're starting your life this first
time you lived away from home. Here you are in
a dream job while I'm going to hold you to
an incredibly high standard. And he did, and he held
everybody to a high stand. That was great that way. Hey,
I know what's going on in your life. I get,
but you need to do this and there's no mistakes
(18:26):
because we're ESPN and there was nobody like him. And
you've seen a lot of people say things and there's
been tributes on ESPN to him. I I can't tell
you his impact, but what I could do tell you
as a story that will encapsulate exactly who he was.
And it's an awesome It's my favorite, one of my
favorite stories and one of the best one liners I
could ever tell you in in in the world. Oh yeah, yeah,
(18:48):
Well well okay, I'm gonna have to. I'm have to.
I'm gonna have to. I'm gonna have to go through
an F bomb and not say it. Um Barry died
this past weekend at the age of sixty three at
a heart attack while he's playing pickleball. And it's been
it's been a shock. It's been shocked for me, it's
been a shock for many people. But like I said,
everybody in the business, you've seen all the heavyweights in
(19:09):
the beds. Tim Brando was writing a book and he said, Hey,
I gotta have a chapter on Barry Sachs in this.
He was a big New Yorker. He had a big
New York accent. He would tell you the Islanders suck.
The Ranges have always been the better. I don't care
about four Stanley cups. I don't care. That's who he was.
All Star Game, n HL All Star Game. It's in Boston,
(19:31):
and it's Ray Bourke had playing the All Star Game
at home. The two big stories are Ray bark playing
in the All Star Game at home and Wayne Gretzky
is about to get traded. Is when he got traded
from the Kings to the Blues. Now he got traded
after the All Star break, But Gretzky was the story.
He was a star. What is is Gretzky gonna getraded?
What's gonna happen? So this is back when I'm a
producer at ESPN. So the game is over. The All
(19:52):
Star Game is over, and Steve Levy and I are
there for Sports Center and NHL Tonight and everything else,
and we're outside the Western Conference locker room and so
there's so many other media there, but we're ESPN. We're
standing near the front. So they come and say, hey,
who do you want. We said, well, we want to
talk to ray Borg. So ray Board comes out. Ray
does the interview great, and they go okay, thanks, and
(20:12):
all everybody standing at ray Ry right right. He goes
back in the locker room and everybody's looking at us
like you blank, and he blanks, you blank, and he blanks.
So then he said and then they said who do
you want? And I said we gotta have Wayne, and
he said, okay, sure, no problem. So the guy goes in,
comes out with Wayne Gretzky who stands at the at
the at the he's he's just outside the locker room
and he sees all the media there and me and
(20:33):
lev here there, and and Leavi goes, Wayne, wait, Wayne
right here, right here. And Wayne Gretzky sees all the
media and he goes, no, you come here, and we're
like oh, and the security guards like look at us like, yah,
go ahead, So we walk up to leave. Does the
interview with Gretzky, Where are you going? What's gonna He's
the first time Gretzky is talking about being traded. He's not,
he's I'll talk about it after the All Star Game.
(20:55):
And he gives a great answer. He says, I expect
things to be done quickly, but I'm not sure or
you know, I don't know when, but I expect it
to happen whatever. It is a great answer. Right. So
then I'm on the headset with the with the with
the truck and I tell him, I go, you got Bork,
you got Gretzky right leaving, and I high five because
I mean, these are the two biggest things we just
Barry Sacks is the guy who's in charge of the
(21:16):
of the programming. So it's very hectic now because we're
we're we're we're we're in NHL tonight and we're sports
or all this stuff ready to go. Ever, and you
can hear the producer and the director right, or the
producer and somebody else we're talking about what to do next, right,
and they're going, okay, So when we come back from commercial,
why don't we play the highlight because Paul Korea was
(21:37):
the m v P scored a couple of gys. Why
don't we play Paul Korea's goals and Barry Melrose can
analyze it and we can we can throw you know,
we we we can throw down a watch he and
he can go over uh the goals and what he
liked about it and everything else. We go there and
leaving I look at each other like we just interview
Bork and we just interfew Wayne Kretzky and it's not
(21:58):
what's going on so and they're talking about what they're
gonna do or what do you do? What are we
gonna do? And all of a sudden, you hear this
big booming voice cutting over in everybody's headset. There is
nothing in the world more important than what's on this
blanket tape, right blanket now, and everybody is just silent.
(22:18):
Right leaving, I looked at each other like oh and
then like like two three seconds go hive just silence,
and then either produced a say, okay, we come back.
We'll throw down to the Steve interview with Wayne Gretzky
and then there you go, oh he was the best.
(22:38):
He was and there's he's one of those guys where
you could tell the top fifty stories about him. People
would say, you miss him. I mean he would, he would,
he would do that. He would. He was that kind
of guy. And the impact he has on sports television,
sports radio where it is right now, I can't even
tell you. And people who's who executives on air, people
like me, it's it's still there whether you work for
(23:00):
them for ten years, ten weeks, three years. That's kind
of what he was a lot of tributes and like
you said, a lot of the heavyweights. Would he rank
you as highly as you normally rank yourself in terms
of guys that were running around the building as producers
Island and a met fan, I don't even want to
talk to you like that? Was that? You know, another
one real good. We were trying to figure out for
the ten Sports Center we were gonna do it was
(23:22):
the ten thou Sports Center. We're figuring out what what
do we do? What highlights do we show? This is
like in the mid nineties, and we're talking about what
do we do for hockey? And then one of the
producers were in the we're in this room and say,
we ever had somebody score a goal to win a
Stanley Cup, like an overtime or something. Whoever have that?
And I just go oh, I said, yeah, Bobby and
ice Room Game six of the Flyers, and oh and
(23:42):
ever he goes, oh, and Barry looks, he goes, No,
Blanket Island is making this Blanket show because he was
a Ranger fan. When you've got control, man, oh man,
I'll tell you that's fantastic. Uh well, I'm glad to
know that you rank yourself highly. And the cadence that
(24:03):
you give of his speech patterns. Derek Carr, we'll have
to go back. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, Derek.
He's definitely gonna have that New York accent. He's definitely
gonna have it. Yeah. No. I like God blessed to
his family and all those that worked with him under
his tutelage learned the business, because it's certainly helped a
lot of us, either directly or indirectly, the way this
(24:26):
business has grown. He is amazing. Barry Sacks. Everybody misses you. Man.
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart
Radio Whip. Hey, so it's a Barry the Barry Sacks
interview up on Europe. Yes, I will, I will at
you on Twitter. It's it's awesome. I'll send it to you.
(24:48):
You'll love it. I used to play hockey with him too,
used to play hockey together and um because that was
my jam. Right. You told you how good a hockey
player I was. And there was one game where I
didn't play on the ESPN teams. I played on my team,
but ESPN had a team in the league and there
was one night where they needed they need I went
to the game to watch and Barry says to me,
so we need, we need some play. Do you want
(25:09):
to come play? Can you come play? And I said, yeah,
I got my stuff in the car, let me go play.
The game was gonna start, but I figured I would
jump in the first period. I come in after getting dressed, right,
so I put on my pads. Everything takes me about
five minutes. I come into the rink and they're screaming
and yelling and we have three players in the penalty box,
including Barry who was slamming his stick against the against
(25:29):
the I'm going what the hell, why do we have three?
What happened? So I go walking out, I got go
up to my go hey, there you go. What happened?
He goes, do you want to sit here at wine
in the penalty box? W do you want to go play? Go?
Plus said, okay, could you ever find out why he
was in the penalty box? Yeah, because we got a
penal and he mouthed off of the ref and the
(25:49):
ref do you want to exactly? And the puck fell
off the top of the roof. We couldn't play anymore.
Happened that way. Your impersonation of his voice is perfect,
because I still hear it twenty seven years later. I
can still hear it. He has that voice that resonates
(26:10):
with people they hold on for a lifetime. Yeah, he was.
We had that kind of impact. It really was something.
It really was. Thank you very much, Brian Fell. They
put that up there. Check out Fenley's interview with him.
He'll retweet it and get it up there. Barry and
now telling you that Barry my Barry Sacks impression, I
mean one of my best. I mean I have got
Jerry Jones. The Barry Sacks is pretty That's how we
talked Barry one. That's no whole Hank maor now one
(26:33):
now wait now I tell you Barry I don't think yeah,
my no hoole Hank is pretty good. Actually, uh so
the NBA All Star Game. There's lots of people who
are really upset. What a weekend. I don't understand why
people are so upset right all the the the NBA
All Star Game stinks. There's no defense being played anymore
(26:56):
because you watch the NBA for defense, right, No one watches.
The nick are tough to watch because they get on defense.
But they're my team. Um, they don't play anymore. It's
it's a glorified layup line. Here's video of four guys
standing on one side of the court and there's one
guy dribbling by, Um, hang on a second man. It's
(27:17):
not often I quote Kevin Durant because boy, Kevin Durant,
you know, but like, dude, I feel like Kevin Durant.
If you don't like it, don't watch everybody that hates
the All Star Game. I hate it. I hate I
hate it. What do you care about it? No one's
taking money from you. It's not like you gave money here.
I paid twenty dollars. Boy, this All Star Game stinks.
I want my money back. You know you don't it.
(27:38):
Did you know? You've got enough evidence as to what
the hell are you're about to see because you watch
the pregame, you know, I did you know? But I
mean the last couple of years you had the new rules,
the scoring rules. We're seeing scores forever in the one
forties now we're in the one seventies and one eighties
two At some point. The only thing I'm looking for
is when did they start holding up score cards for
(27:59):
the owns? You know what, a participate in the one
on Saturday? We just got your job? Are we got you?
That's at ten. That's what you can do. It's it's
not hurting you. You don't have to watch it. If
you're complaining about it's not a regular say it's not anything,
but but there's already complains about when it occurs or whatever.
It's like, you know what, let it go, you know,
and and and the overarching messages that the the this
(28:24):
is it. The overarching message is that this is a
new normal of All Star Games. We're not going back
to the great old days of where the American League
wanted to beat the crap out of the Nation League,
and vice versa, and then BA All Star Game guys
played defense and foul Orlando Blackman to put him on
the free throw line to hit free throw. Those days
are gone, right, Those days are gone. Nobody's taken it
(28:47):
serious like Kobe or anybody else. Those days are gone
because that's what it is. All Star games in general
are the relic of a by gone era, and it's
about gimmicks to just get people in the door every
year to keep watching. If the NBA just kept putting
the regular All Star Game out there, and and Emmy
analb did it too, you would watch the viewers go down, down, down.
They would lose way more than the trickle it is
(29:09):
at right now. All the different leagues are trying to
do is to keep the number of viewers and not
lose tons and tons. The new normal is gimmicks every year.
Just like when you go to a website to buy something,
Monday is free shipping, Tuesday is thirty percent off everything.
Wednesday is buy one, get one half off. Because you're
not going to website just buying stuff regular, you need
(29:31):
to go there for a gimmick that's what All Star
games are. This is USA versus the world. This is
the World versus Canada. This is Canada versus Mexico. This
is Hawaii versus Alaska. Oh, we're gonna do something different.
We're gonna play four Co're gonna play eight quarters, gonna
play twelve quarters. We're gona play with twenty foot, We're
gonna pay with a five foot tuop, all different things
to try to get people some kind of interest in it,
so the viewer numbers stay somewhat flat and you don't
(29:51):
lose so many off of it. That's all the All
Star games, and we're just trying to keep the game going.
It's a new normal that you've had a chance time
to get used to for a long time. It's not
going back to the old days about a three day
party and for the players, a week's vacation. Right, if
you're not selected for the All Star Game, full week off,
go disappear to the islands, go deal with your family
(30:13):
and friends and whatever else, and just get away for
a little bit. Even with the and that was the
whole thing with the All Star Game. Even now, right,
we don't pick up again till Thursday, and some teams
not till Friday, so you get several days off again,
go attend to your personal business and you've got to
break in season, which or if you're the Bulls next year,
well there's that too, but they're active. Pat Pe is
(30:36):
gonna get he's gonna get them to the tent spot.
But legitimately you have the only other story out of
it was all look who got picked in the last
look where Yokich got picked. Okay, so they did the
little w W E set up and then the guy
that plays for the hometown team went last, big pop,
big ovation to end things. Kevin Durant going into the weekend, remember,
(31:00):
because we talked about that the whole draft thing and
how they were upset because someone was gonna have to
be picked last. Kevin Durant, he don't understand why all
stars would feel slight of quote. It's like the brokest
millionaire getting based. So you know, another chuck went up
again for for Kevin Durant in that regard. But all
(31:20):
of it is it's a big exhibition. There's some concert stuff,
there's some history lessons, right, a little tribute to Lebron
and the record and whatever else. Here's a little little vignettes,
not quite like Tom Rinaldi, but still let's let's get
some hey, get to know the younger all stars, little
interview segments for the guys you don't see all the time.
(31:40):
And it's all about showcasing the game and doing to
make good for all your corporate partners. We understand that
if you stay for what's labeled as a quote unquote game,
that's on you Twitter at how about a fresca? Mike
gets swollen down The Jason Smith Show with My best
friend Mike Harmon coming up next. After what was said today,
I'm gonna make a big, bold prediction about the biggest
(32:02):
star in Major League Baseball. Keep it right here, that's
next Fox. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern,
seven pm Pacific Fox Sports Radio The Jason Smith Show
with My best friend Mike Harmon. Hello, it's God worry
but whatever. Who's ready for a big bowld prediction about
(32:24):
the baseball season? You're ready for this bold prediction about
the baseball season. Big story tonight is it about the
mats sucking? I'm just gonna go blow past that and
pretend you never said that they've got a great vibe.
You walked in here and did the first two hours
of the show with sunglasses on. Welcome back for the
ten o'clock Shut up, shut up, No, that's live Drop
(32:47):
Friday Show. Hey O. Tanny's agent Dodgers talked Monday at
something many people in sports I thought potentially could happen.
What happened at some point that Otani is likely to
explore free agency. Doesn't mean he's not gonna come back
and sign with the Angels, but he is likely to
(33:08):
explore free agency. Quote. I've always been open to it.
This is nes Blello, but there's several layers of this.
One show has earned the right to play through the year,
explore free agency, and we'll see where it shakes out.
So let me just connect the dots for you here.
Who's gonna be the biggest guy available in free agency
at the end of next year. Who's gonna be available
(33:30):
at the deadline this year because the Angels are gonna Boy,
are you really gonna get him? We can always sign
him in free agency. We can send him somewhere for
a little while. You want to go someplace else and
try to play for a pennant. Do something, Hey, go
ahead and knock yourself out. We'll get some We'll get
some prospects and figure it out. Who's gonna be the
team that says, you know, we just lost out of
(33:52):
a three hund million dollar player. It doesn't matter. We're
going into the season with our team. But we get
to the deadline, guess who I'm gonna go get show
Heyo Tani Shoyotani will be a met by the trade
deadline because Steve Cohen doesn't care. He's gonna go out.
What prospects you want? Brett Baty, you want a couple
other guys, and he could be a walk away guys
who's not gonna cost that much. Not Juan Soda where
(34:13):
you get him for three seasons before you know you
could potentially lose him. So it's not gonna be that expensive.
And who's gonna be I'm not afraid. And then we'll
negotiate with him the free agency. Come here, you like
it here in New York. Here's five hundred million dollars.
Here's a here's a five year, five hundred million dollar contract.
So we'll give you a hundred million dollars a year.
Whatever you want, ten years, five hundred million, we'll give
(34:34):
it to you. The Mets will wind up with Shohyotani
at the deadline because Steve Cohen will go pay for it,
and then I'll pay for him. At the end of
this year. Otani's gonna be a met on principle, I
can't have that happen, but it's going You can't have
nice things. It's going to it's going to happen. Show
Heyo Tani. Is that why you left the Yankees out
of all of the mix. When's the last time the
Yankees went out and paid for a guy that wasn't
(34:56):
Aaron Judge. We have to bring him back. He at
sixty two home runs. They don't go out and do that.
I mean they can't, but they don't go and do that.
But this guy is a game change. If the Aims
are gonna trade show Heyo Tani, they're not going to
trade him within the American League, not gonna trade him
to it. You gotta trade with the Yankees and can
come back and win and he jump start that. Don
does you know trade him out to the National League?
Who would be okay trading for him? Steve Cohen because
he doesn't care. Did you just trying to make the argument?
(35:20):
Does Angels wouldn't trade him within the American League? Now,
probably to the Yankees. That would be the Major League
Baseball would show up and they would they would have
they would have all kinds of protests around Angel Stadium.
They to companies about selling the squad and they come on.
They'd be able to get right inside because not many
fans go. So we get inside. But has our buddy
(35:41):
Bill Plashy. But is Steve Cohen gonna be outbid for
Showy Otani? No, not gonna happen. What do you want?
What do you need? I'll give it to you. Show
hey free an. You like it? The interest to baseball?
Trust me? Why well, I just baseball is upside. I
feel like John Henry baseball. You know. One of the
things what is John Henry saying? Moneyball? One the things
money allows you to do is not give a crap
(36:03):
what baseball has to say. That's Steve Cohen, and that's
Steve Cohen. He's not gonna care. Oh yeah, yeah, I'll
get a Swani. Here's a couple of prospects here, we'll
sign it. At the end of the year. Maybe not.
If not, we have Otani for a Pennant drive and
get the playoffs. Yeah, but we can stupid Drostburg. When
it comes down to it, what do you have four
or five teams that can actually play in this ballpark?
(36:24):
Right in the show, hey, Otani business Dodgers at the top.
The Dodgers, they'll be in it. But the Cubs have
restructured and they decide they want to go spend some money.
You've got the Mets, the Yankees, and then always waiting
to see misertain they won't be there. I mean, they
(36:47):
made a big splash today. Elvis Andrews came back and
everybody was excited about that. I like how they put
home runs in four teen seasons in MLB. You got
I would have just kept pumping up the store and
base totals and runs and four Wait a minute, that's
like exactly Jason Goggenheims will sell a painting and buy
(37:09):
Steve Cohen. Steve Cohen's gonna buy the Guggenheim Museum. He's
got really great vibes this year, though, Twitter at how
about a frescup? Mike gets swollen dumb going back to
the nineties. Coming up next, two big quarterbacks in the news.
This is Fox Sports Radio Live. The tirack dot com
student breaking Derek Carr has just been signed by the
Thanks for listening to The Jason Smith Show with Mike
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night ten pm to two a m Eastern seven to
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(00:23):
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And now address us with respect because we know we
have the year of TMZ and uh hey, so if
you need something where the show to go through, well,
we also need to just start putting things into existence
that other accounts with seven plus million people will start
picking up. Yeah. Well, look, we put out the presidents
of the United States of America and seven minutes after
that they put out a thing on the Presidence of
(01:06):
the United States of America. I mean the band, not
the not the actual president. Kim and Courtney called me, alright, alright, alright,
let's get it on. You're gonna get a phone call
from Courtney b Vance and I love Courtney b Vans
can come and hang out Courtney with the cake and
uh tried Kim Kim that Justin Turner's wife. And Kim
(01:30):
Carnes is going to call you because she's got Betty
Davis eyes t J. You know what I have to
what are you looking at me like that? Harmon? You
know what I had to look up she's got Yeah, Okay,
there you got Kim Carnes still alive. Just had a
second apparent. It's like call Kim cards Kim Carns in Hollywood.
(01:52):
Let's go. Okay, okay, when you're green hat, Harmon's dating
Kim Carns. Can you believe that she's redoing her song?
He's got Mike Harmon's sunglasses on while he's doing the show. Yeah,
because Harmon's wearing sunglasses doing the show tonight. And I
look good. No, you know, okayde WrestleMania when it comes
to Los Angeles, let's go. You do look like could
(02:14):
be wearing sunglasses indoors. You do. Look, you're getting ready
to do an interview with mean Gene Oakland on the
side in the middle of Saturday morning, like before they
go to break coming up as the marquee match of
the day special Delivery and Civic Center. Later on tonight,
I gotta tell you St Jones against Greg the Hammer Valentine.
But first I'm here talking with Mike Harmon about the
(02:38):
show this weekend, and you come out with the sunglasses
and the hat and everything whatever. I get to a
town Harmon, Harmon forgot his glasses night, so he's wearing
sunglasses in because you're the cow Rick of wearing glasses
every day less nine and a half years. But now
it's like I'm going through some kind of crisis. I'm
(02:58):
gonna midlife price. I'm gonna wear gonna wear sunglasses into
the studio to be a red man. If that's the
worst thing I do that, I've had an okay midlife
Right tomorrow, he's rolling up on a Harley. He's gonna
he's gonna have a convertible and it's gonna have one
of those raccoon tails. The side of everybody a raccoon scale.
(03:21):
Call me a raccoon one more time. You have a
bolo tie on pony tail. We've been bags. You talk
a giant cowboy hat. Get that pinky going on. It's
a mutton chops. Are you ready already gotta I gotta
let those girl over time. But you'll put fake ones
on you thinking in fake mutton. You'll never pay for
(03:43):
a beer again. You get those one. Um. So, Lebron
James has had a pretty big last twenty four hours
because he is now bought in for the rest of
this season. A quote pretty big with a pretty big
amount of hype rribally in it. How important after the
Lakers make a big flurry of trades before the trade deadline, Uh,
(04:06):
they win a big game before the the NBA all
start breaking. Everybody's thinking, all the Lakers are back, They're back.
They won one game. The Lakers are back. Lebron just
wanted you to know and wanted all of us to
know the stakes steaks of the rest of the NBA
regular season, twenty three of the most important games in
my career for a regular season top of mind set
that that I have and the guys will have coming
(04:27):
back off the break. I don't want to see myself
and not being pulled a part of the post season
for two years straight is not part of my DNA.
You know, We're sitting up here talking about the record
and things of that nature, and that's all cool, But
I'm more passionate about trying to make the postseason and
give ourself a chance to compete for another Larry O'Brian trophy.
So that's just who I am. That's when I'm cut from.
I hope I can, you know, figure out a way
(04:48):
to just make sure I'm available on the floor every
single night for these twenty three games. Uh okay, So
let the part that I have a real issue, it's
have a real issue with the statement, is not the
part about this is the most important twenty three games
in my career. Did he put his fake imaginary crown
on himself before that stament? Or someone said, because they
did that in the pregame of the All Star Game,
(05:09):
and they said, and I do know the l A.
King's play in Los Angeles, Now I I also know
that as well. Wow, that might be the dopeiest but
you watch the pregame oft pre game, not the Star
Watch the pregame was that the restaurant and it was
on you watched I had no sound. You watched the
pre game start, that's what they had on. No, I
get that the islands they had that surfing videos from
(05:31):
I don't know. Surfing videos are kind of cool. Yeah,
but they didn't play the before the guys were crashing.
We're all successful. They didn't play anything from point break.
You didn't get to see those. The ex presidents are surfers. Yeah, sorry,
spoiler alerts. You break a lot more highlights the remake.
I don't know where did they change, No, because it
wasn't surfers. It was like they were um uh, they
(05:54):
weren't surfers. They were like adventurers, like they like like
the sky dove and they ski and they so they
were they were like as back to the I think
just hey, we have some pretty cool cameras we can
get go pro video of, so we're going to do that.
So I think that's what you do that surfboard. I
think you've probably seen that. Let's do something different on
the giant screen. Could have worked either way. Utah, give
(06:17):
me too. Either way, that's what I saw watching the
pregame experience. We saw the aunt man. You couldn't wonder
you wearing sunglasses. Your eyes must hurt from watching the
NBA pregames. You could have spent time talking to your daughter. No, no, no,
I got watch asking me questions. And then she liked
(06:39):
the uniforms that Janice's team was wearing. She thought they
were nice. Hey, Dad, who's who's honest? Who's you? Tell me? Who?
That look? He shows up in TikTok and Instagram? Enough designer?
Is he a designer? En dinner? Can I buy those
clips all stay around about the honest teams? Is that possible?
(06:59):
Can I that? No, she's well aware of the Greek
free you don't wear jeans? It was on in the
restaurant watching you didn't you don't like it? Don't watch
your glasses? Makes sense, as my eyes hurt. My eyes
heard from watching the NBA party. If it had been
spring training Baseball of any deem, I would have been begging,
(07:21):
can you just throw show me guys doing long doss
like the sunglasses they put on the people in Bullet Train.
All right, they're just bleeding, right, blood coming from the eyes.
I don't think this watching the pregame, It's really kind
of what I felt like, boy, But they did like
(07:41):
a little tribute and you can see jay Z and
then the whole Lebron crowning himself now uncomfortable and piste off.
Look at Cab giving him the ball. How how much
you hate him being called the king? But you watched
the whole thing with the crown and everything else. Okay,
I tried to avert Uh. Now, look, I'm not upset.
(08:03):
I don't have an issue with Lebron sitting here with
the hyperbole of the most important twenty three games in
my career because okay, stop, but because what he's trying
to do is, look, he's trying to get motivated. He's
trying and if he's motivating the rest of his teammates.
It's kind of a not so subtle shot to a
d when he says, I gotta make sure I make
myself available for all twenty three games. So yeah, and
I have no problem with that, because you need to
(08:24):
find motivation other places where you're motivating yourself, motivating your
teammate's That's not what I have issue with. I have
issue with that. The second part of the sound bite,
where he talked about how hey, it's not my d
n A talking about breaking the record is great and all,
but that's not what I'm mean, not how I'm made.
I'm about winning the championships, adding to the Larry Obrian Trophy,
and that is a load of crap. Oh, now he's
(08:45):
about winning. He has not talked about winning for two years.
He's not talking winning for two years. Why because I've
told you he's done winning. He won the title in
twenty The team hasn't been good enough. He has moved
on to different goal posts in his NBA career, the
individual goals, winning a scoring title at the age of
thirty six, playing with brawny uh passing Kareem, getting to
(09:07):
forty thou points, putting his much distance between himself whoever
comes behind him, so we can hold onto the scoring
record as long as possible. Lebron is not about He
hasn't been about winning. In a couple of years. He
would have played more. He had a lot of time off.
He had many many days off for injuries that you say,
I don't know now he's about winning, Like now something's Oh,
I'm about winning, it's it's in my DNA. Wait a minute,
(09:28):
where was all of this the last two years? Where
was anything this year? Where hey we gotta wake up, man.
This is We're starting now terribly two and eight. This
is awful. We got where was I'm gonna grab the
team by the scruff of the neck and will the
team to the the playoff? No? Nowhere, No, there was no
ways making saying we don't have the guys right, we
didn't have shooters, we didn't know what the lasers all that,
which is when they made these deals all of a sudden,
(09:50):
it's like, well we got some of that. I don't
know how good these guys are. The fact that it's
not Russell Westbrook has everybody suddenly with the rose colored
glass is on thinking that this is the magic alick, sir,
and that suddenly he and a d are gonna be
healthy and dominated for twenty three straight games. This is fake.
I care so deep because it's not Does he would
(10:11):
he like Look? Would he like to win? Sure? Every
player would like to win, But he's not pushed to
win and pushing himself to win like he did earlier
in his career. Look, that's why we why we love
Lebron because hey, who knew the guy wanted to win?
He wanted to secure his legacy, wanted to get to
final after finals and win. Great, but that's not who
he is, right, But this is this is now? Okay,
(10:34):
how do I win over the fans of my critics?
Next twenty two games? What am I going to try
to accomplish? Okay, let's see, so this season we got
rid of Westbrook, didn't work. I passed Kareem Great. The
next thing is getting forty thou points playing with brawny.
Figure things out at the end of this year. Okay,
the next twenty three games. Yes, I'm making sure I
dragged my team into the playoffs. Right? Last year? How
(10:54):
many time did he miss at the end of the
year because I told you he wasn't gonna be on
the court for Lebron couldn't drag get team to the playoffs.
I told you he's not about winning. He wants to
make it seem like he's about winning, because what else
can I do the last twenty two games. This is
for the media and for the fans and for his
critics to go, boy, look how much Lebron cares. I
haven't seen a guy care about winning that much in
the last couple of years, and now suddenly he's all
(11:16):
about it. Stop. But this whole thing is, show me
on the court for the rest of this season. You're
currently what seven and thirty two. You're the worst team
that isn't in San Antonio or Houston, right, they've fallen
off the face of the earth. Is for his Basketball
Participation Trophy Awards for this season, You're you're all the
(11:39):
way down there. There's a lot of teams to jump. Yes,
you can get to that ten slot, and everybody, oh,
look out, maybe they're maybe they're there. And there's a
lot of basketball to be played, a lot of heavy
minutes that Anthony Davis is gonna take one. And yes
there is a bit of lebron with the the shot
at a d S availability. You also have to look
at a mirror. Someone should hold up a mirror and
(11:59):
two him as well in terms of that. But show
me on the court getting in a Huffey and All
Star weekend press conference of oh, you'll never see me
more dedicated and determined than you will these next twenty
three games, because I need to redefine is is my
Are you fearing that your legacy, you know, the legacy
you control in in your mind when everything is um
(12:22):
Are you worried that people are starting to write stuff
that your inner circles feeding back to you. You know
that you never hear or see or whatever. That is
suddenly making you feel a little less comfortable because of
the way that breaking Kareem's record was received, Like there's
all these questions and good luck, Like if it they
(12:42):
win and they're playing, well, guess what that's good for us?
Oh yet their mediocre. That stinks. So either be terrible
and it just burns to the ground, or get into
the playoffs and if you can do some damage, all
the better and the league would love of every second
of it. But in the interim telling me how inspired
(13:05):
you are to go play and and what this means
to you, I don't care. I don't. It's supposed to
be about getting But if that was who he was
the whole time, if he was constantly trying to usher
the Lakers and push them through, I get it. Then
this is just part of who he is. But it's
(13:25):
not in his DNA. It was, and now what it
hasn't been in his DNA for a while. He has
not stood up and said I'm going to drag us
as far as he's not done that. He used to
do that. He doesn't because things have changed. He won
the championship in and he decided, Okay, do I need
to be motivated by winning and playing all these minutes
that No, No, I'm here now, I'm a star. I'm
in Los Angeles. This is where I'm gonna be for
(13:46):
a while. But to wait and see what's next to
my career winning is not what it was. You know what.
The Lakers, when we we get into the Tanka than World,
that's that's where it starts to get fun. Of remaining schedule, Mike,
the Lakers are Yeah, I know you were saying that.
You keep sending me that one guy that's all greasy
looking with the with the chains and he's very It's
(14:11):
like in slow motion. We're back, baby, We're back Lakers.
But yeah, the Lakers final wind strength the schedule left,
they have one against the Knicks, two against Memphis Memphis,
one against the Clippers, two against the Sons, two against Dallas,
(14:33):
one against the Pelicans. On the other side, ah, he
might be back by then. Maybe wish wishing and hoping.
On the other side, I don't think that's You got
two against the Rockets, two against the Bulls, and they
got Pat bev Man. Look out, now, uh look what
(14:55):
else you got? You got two against Okay, see they stink,
uh the Jazz, the Raptors and the magic. Okay, they'll
be a little bit better. They'll be a little bit better.
Could I see them going fourteen and eight? Yeah, and
finishing around five? Yeah, I could see that. I could
(15:15):
see him doing that. But that's fourteen and nine to
finish a five. They're not gonna They're not suddenly gonna
be look at this, they're unbeatable. That they're not. They're not.
But now Lebron wants to win after after not really
caring about winning. So hey, okay, we're the ends justify
the means, right, But if he turns it on, he
could say, look back to that faithful day in front
of the press. You hated everything about the All Star
(15:36):
weekend except for this, because look at Lebron James reascended
to the throne to take his Lakers into the playoffs.
Twitter and at about a Fresco might get swollen down
the Jason Switch Show with my best friend Mike Carmen.
He's gonna cut that pizza place to he might, he might,
speaking of the NBA, what I can't believe is still
(15:56):
going on after All Star Weekend. That's next from the
tirect dot Com studios. This is Fox Sports Radio. Be
sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith Show
with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven pm
Pacific Fox Sports Radio The Jason Smith Show with My
bass friend Mike Harmon. Since microphone has been traded into yes,
thank you, Yes, I turned him. I'm a radio professional.
(16:18):
Turn a microphone on. That's why it was off. Um,
we're gonna get into in a big way the outrage,
the fake outrage over the NBA All Star Game coming up.
I don't know how fake it is, though. There's a
lot of angry people. Yeah you know what, Yeah, you're right, cheating, bamboozled.
You watched the pregame show because you're biased, You watched
the pregame show. Many I was about the All Star Game. No,
(16:40):
no, no no, no, no. They had me sold. My daughter
kept looking over my shoulder. Why they keep their fireworks?
Why aren't there all these big video board colored tie
was Ernie Johnson wearing? Come on, you know it? Are
they gonna play basketball games? Like eventually maybe, but first
it can indulge me here for a couple of minutes,
because if you've been on the internet the last few days,
(17:02):
you watched ESPN at any time, you probably saw a
lot of great things being said about a guy named
Barry Sachs. And he was one of the great ESPN
producers coordinating producers of the last thirty years. And he's
a guy that had a really profound effect on a
lot of people's lives. He's a guy I worked with
(17:22):
for three years twenty five years ago, and I can
still hear his voice in my head. And he's someone
who brought the college basketball programming that you look at
ESPN does college basketball and college football really really well.
He was a guy in charge of that for a
long time. He was in charge of many different shows.
Many people that are doing things all throughout sports were
brought up at the feet of him. He was a guy.
(17:44):
He was the guy that you gravitated towards when you
started at ESPN, and for a twenty two year old
out of college like I was, to go to ESPN
and to start your life with your dream job. He
was the guy that talk to you understanding where you
were coming from, because you get there's a lot of
(18:05):
people that are just like, yeah, great, come in your office,
you have great start, Go do this, go do this.
He understood that, Okay, you're starting your life this first
time you lived away from home. Here you are in
a dream job while I'm going to hold you to
an incredibly high standard. And he did, and he held
everybody to a high stand. That was great that way. Hey,
I know what's going on in your life. I get,
but you need to do this and there's no mistakes
(18:26):
because we're ESPN and there was nobody like him. And
you've seen a lot of people say things and there's
been tributes on ESPN to him. I I can't tell
you his impact, but what I could do tell you
as a story that will encapsulate exactly who he was.
And it's an awesome It's my favorite, one of my
favorite stories and one of the best one liners I
could ever tell you in in in the world. Oh yeah, yeah,
(18:48):
Well well okay, I'm gonna have to. I'm have to.
I'm gonna have to. I'm gonna have to go through
an F bomb and not say it. Um Barry died
this past weekend at the age of sixty three at
a heart attack while he's playing pickleball. And it's been
it's been a shock. It's been shocked for me, it's
been a shock for many people. But like I said,
everybody in the business, you've seen all the heavyweights in
(19:09):
the beds. Tim Brando was writing a book and he said, Hey,
I gotta have a chapter on Barry Sachs in this.
He was a big New Yorker. He had a big
New York accent. He would tell you the Islanders suck.
The Ranges have always been the better. I don't care
about four Stanley cups. I don't care. That's who he was.
All Star Game, n HL All Star Game. It's in Boston,
(19:31):
and it's Ray Bourke had playing the All Star Game
at home. The two big stories are Ray bark playing
in the All Star Game at home and Wayne Gretzky
is about to get traded. Is when he got traded
from the Kings to the Blues. Now he got traded
after the All Star break, But Gretzky was the story.
He was a star. What is is Gretzky gonna getraded?
What's gonna happen? So this is back when I'm a
producer at ESPN. So the game is over. The All
(19:52):
Star Game is over, and Steve Levy and I are
there for Sports Center and NHL Tonight and everything else,
and we're outside the Western Conference locker room and so
there's so many other media there, but we're ESPN. We're
standing near the front. So they come and say, hey,
who do you want. We said, well, we want to
talk to ray Borg. So ray Board comes out. Ray
does the interview great, and they go okay, thanks, and
(20:12):
all everybody standing at ray Ry right right. He goes
back in the locker room and everybody's looking at us
like you blank, and he blanks, you blank, and he blanks.
So then he said and then they said who do
you want? And I said we gotta have Wayne, and
he said, okay, sure, no problem. So the guy goes in,
comes out with Wayne Gretzky who stands at the at
the at the he's he's just outside the locker room
and he sees all the media there and me and
(20:33):
lev here there, and and Leavi goes, Wayne, wait, Wayne
right here, right here. And Wayne Gretzky sees all the
media and he goes, no, you come here, and we're
like oh, and the security guards like look at us like, yah,
go ahead, So we walk up to leave. Does the
interview with Gretzky, Where are you going? What's gonna He's
the first time Gretzky is talking about being traded. He's not,
he's I'll talk about it after the All Star Game.
(20:55):
And he gives a great answer. He says, I expect
things to be done quickly, but I'm not sure or
you know, I don't know when, but I expect it
to happen whatever. It is a great answer. Right. So
then I'm on the headset with the with the with
the truck and I tell him, I go, you got Bork,
you got Gretzky right leaving, and I high five because
I mean, these are the two biggest things we just
Barry Sacks is the guy who's in charge of the
(21:16):
of the programming. So it's very hectic now because we're
we're we're we're we're in NHL tonight and we're sports
or all this stuff ready to go. Ever, and you
can hear the producer and the director right, or the
producer and somebody else we're talking about what to do next, right,
and they're going, okay, So when we come back from commercial,
why don't we play the highlight because Paul Korea was
(21:37):
the m v P scored a couple of gys. Why
don't we play Paul Korea's goals and Barry Melrose can
analyze it and we can we can throw you know,
we we we can throw down a watch he and
he can go over uh the goals and what he
liked about it and everything else. We go there and
leaving I look at each other like we just interview
Bork and we just interfew Wayne Kretzky and it's not
(21:58):
what's going on so and they're talking about what they're
gonna do or what do you do? What are we
gonna do? And all of a sudden, you hear this
big booming voice cutting over in everybody's headset. There is
nothing in the world more important than what's on this
blanket tape, right blanket now, and everybody is just silent.
(22:18):
Right leaving, I looked at each other like oh and
then like like two three seconds go hive just silence,
and then either produced a say, okay, we come back.
We'll throw down to the Steve interview with Wayne Gretzky
and then there you go, oh he was the best.
(22:38):
He was and there's he's one of those guys where
you could tell the top fifty stories about him. People
would say, you miss him. I mean he would, he would,
he would do that. He would. He was that kind
of guy. And the impact he has on sports television,
sports radio where it is right now, I can't even
tell you. And people who's who executives on air, people
like me, it's it's still there whether you work for
(23:00):
them for ten years, ten weeks, three years. That's kind
of what he was a lot of tributes and like
you said, a lot of the heavyweights. Would he rank
you as highly as you normally rank yourself in terms
of guys that were running around the building as producers
Island and a met fan, I don't even want to
talk to you like that? Was that? You know, another
one real good. We were trying to figure out for
the ten Sports Center we were gonna do it was
(23:22):
the ten thou Sports Center. We're figuring out what what
do we do? What highlights do we show? This is
like in the mid nineties, and we're talking about what
do we do for hockey? And then one of the
producers were in the we're in this room and say,
we ever had somebody score a goal to win a
Stanley Cup, like an overtime or something. Whoever have that?
And I just go oh, I said, yeah, Bobby and
ice Room Game six of the Flyers, and oh and
(23:42):
ever he goes, oh, and Barry looks, he goes, No,
Blanket Island is making this Blanket show because he was
a Ranger fan. When you've got control, man, oh man,
I'll tell you that's fantastic. Uh well, I'm glad to
know that you rank yourself highly. And the cadence that
(24:03):
you give of his speech patterns. Derek Carr, we'll have
to go back. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, Derek.
He's definitely gonna have that New York accent. He's definitely
gonna have it. Yeah. No. I like God blessed to
his family and all those that worked with him under
his tutelage learned the business, because it's certainly helped a
lot of us, either directly or indirectly, the way this
(24:26):
business has grown. He is amazing. Barry Sacks. Everybody misses you. Man.
Be sure to catch live editions of The Jason Smith
Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern, seven
pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart
Radio Whip. Hey, so it's a Barry the Barry Sacks
interview up on Europe. Yes, I will, I will at
you on Twitter. It's it's awesome. I'll send it to you.
(24:48):
You'll love it. I used to play hockey with him too,
used to play hockey together and um because that was
my jam. Right. You told you how good a hockey
player I was. And there was one game where I
didn't play on the ESPN teams. I played on my team,
but ESPN had a team in the league and there
was one night where they needed they need I went
to the game to watch and Barry says to me,
so we need, we need some play. Do you want
(25:09):
to come play? Can you come play? And I said, yeah,
I got my stuff in the car, let me go play.
The game was gonna start, but I figured I would
jump in the first period. I come in after getting dressed, right,
so I put on my pads. Everything takes me about
five minutes. I come into the rink and they're screaming
and yelling and we have three players in the penalty box,
including Barry who was slamming his stick against the against
(25:29):
the I'm going what the hell, why do we have three?
What happened? So I go walking out, I got go
up to my go hey, there you go. What happened?
He goes, do you want to sit here at wine
in the penalty box? W do you want to go play? Go?
Plus said, okay, could you ever find out why he
was in the penalty box? Yeah, because we got a
penal and he mouthed off of the ref and the
(25:49):
ref do you want to exactly? And the puck fell
off the top of the roof. We couldn't play anymore.
Happened that way. Your impersonation of his voice is perfect,
because I still hear it twenty seven years later. I
can still hear it. He has that voice that resonates
(26:10):
with people they hold on for a lifetime. Yeah, he was.
We had that kind of impact. It really was something.
It really was. Thank you very much, Brian Fell. They
put that up there. Check out Fenley's interview with him.
He'll retweet it and get it up there. Barry and
now telling you that Barry my Barry Sacks impression, I
mean one of my best. I mean I have got
Jerry Jones. The Barry Sacks is pretty That's how we
talked Barry one. That's no whole Hank maor now one
(26:33):
now wait now I tell you Barry I don't think yeah,
my no hoole Hank is pretty good. Actually, uh so
the NBA All Star Game. There's lots of people who
are really upset. What a weekend. I don't understand why
people are so upset right all the the the NBA
All Star Game stinks. There's no defense being played anymore
(26:56):
because you watch the NBA for defense, right, No one watches.
The nick are tough to watch because they get on defense.
But they're my team. Um, they don't play anymore. It's
it's a glorified layup line. Here's video of four guys
standing on one side of the court and there's one
guy dribbling by, Um, hang on a second man. It's
(27:17):
not often I quote Kevin Durant because boy, Kevin Durant,
you know, but like, dude, I feel like Kevin Durant.
If you don't like it, don't watch everybody that hates
the All Star Game. I hate it. I hate I
hate it. What do you care about it? No one's
taking money from you. It's not like you gave money here.
I paid twenty dollars. Boy, this All Star Game stinks.
I want my money back. You know you don't it.
(27:38):
Did you know? You've got enough evidence as to what
the hell are you're about to see because you watch
the pregame, you know, I did you know? But I
mean the last couple of years you had the new rules,
the scoring rules. We're seeing scores forever in the one
forties now we're in the one seventies and one eighties
two At some point. The only thing I'm looking for
is when did they start holding up score cards for
(27:59):
the owns? You know what, a participate in the one
on Saturday? We just got your job? Are we got you?
That's at ten. That's what you can do. It's it's
not hurting you. You don't have to watch it. If
you're complaining about it's not a regular say it's not anything,
but but there's already complains about when it occurs or whatever.
It's like, you know what, let it go, you know,
and and and the overarching messages that the the this
(28:24):
is it. The overarching message is that this is a
new normal of All Star Games. We're not going back
to the great old days of where the American League
wanted to beat the crap out of the Nation League,
and vice versa, and then BA All Star Game guys
played defense and foul Orlando Blackman to put him on
the free throw line to hit free throw. Those days
are gone, right, Those days are gone. Nobody's taken it
(28:47):
serious like Kobe or anybody else. Those days are gone
because that's what it is. All Star games in general
are the relic of a by gone era, and it's
about gimmicks to just get people in the door every
year to keep watching. If the NBA just kept putting
the regular All Star Game out there, and and Emmy
analb did it too, you would watch the viewers go down, down, down.
They would lose way more than the trickle it is
(29:09):
at right now. All the different leagues are trying to
do is to keep the number of viewers and not
lose tons and tons. The new normal is gimmicks every year.
Just like when you go to a website to buy something,
Monday is free shipping, Tuesday is thirty percent off everything.
Wednesday is buy one, get one half off. Because you're
not going to website just buying stuff regular, you need
(29:31):
to go there for a gimmick that's what All Star
games are. This is USA versus the world. This is
the World versus Canada. This is Canada versus Mexico. This
is Hawaii versus Alaska. Oh, we're gonna do something different.
We're gonna play four Co're gonna play eight quarters, gonna
play twelve quarters. We're gona play with twenty foot, We're
gonna pay with a five foot tuop, all different things
to try to get people some kind of interest in it,
so the viewer numbers stay somewhat flat and you don't
(29:51):
lose so many off of it. That's all the All
Star games, and we're just trying to keep the game going.
It's a new normal that you've had a chance time
to get used to for a long time. It's not
going back to the old days about a three day
party and for the players, a week's vacation. Right, if
you're not selected for the All Star Game, full week off,
go disappear to the islands, go deal with your family
(30:13):
and friends and whatever else, and just get away for
a little bit. Even with the and that was the
whole thing with the All Star Game. Even now, right,
we don't pick up again till Thursday, and some teams
not till Friday, so you get several days off again,
go attend to your personal business and you've got to
break in season, which or if you're the Bulls next year,
well there's that too, but they're active. Pat Pe is
(30:36):
gonna get he's gonna get them to the tent spot.
But legitimately you have the only other story out of
it was all look who got picked in the last
look where Yokich got picked. Okay, so they did the
little w W E set up and then the guy
that plays for the hometown team went last, big pop,
big ovation to end things. Kevin Durant going into the weekend, remember,
(31:00):
because we talked about that the whole draft thing and
how they were upset because someone was gonna have to
be picked last. Kevin Durant, he don't understand why all
stars would feel slight of quote. It's like the brokest
millionaire getting based. So you know, another chuck went up
again for for Kevin Durant in that regard. But all
(31:20):
of it is it's a big exhibition. There's some concert stuff,
there's some history lessons, right, a little tribute to Lebron
and the record and whatever else. Here's a little little vignettes,
not quite like Tom Rinaldi, but still let's let's get
some hey, get to know the younger all stars, little
interview segments for the guys you don't see all the time.
(31:40):
And it's all about showcasing the game and doing to
make good for all your corporate partners. We understand that
if you stay for what's labeled as a quote unquote game,
that's on you Twitter at how about a fresca? Mike
gets swollen down The Jason Smith Show with My best
friend Mike Harmon coming up next. After what was said today,
I'm gonna make a big, bold prediction about the biggest
(32:02):
star in Major League Baseball. Keep it right here, that's
next Fox. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Jason Smith Show with Mike Harmon weekdays at ten pm Eastern,
seven pm Pacific Fox Sports Radio The Jason Smith Show
with My best friend Mike Harmon. Hello, it's God worry
but whatever. Who's ready for a big bowld prediction about
(32:24):
the baseball season? You're ready for this bold prediction about
the baseball season. Big story tonight is it about the
mats sucking? I'm just gonna go blow past that and
pretend you never said that they've got a great vibe.
You walked in here and did the first two hours
of the show with sunglasses on. Welcome back for the
ten o'clock Shut up, shut up, No, that's live Drop
(32:47):
Friday Show. Hey O. Tanny's agent Dodgers talked Monday at
something many people in sports I thought potentially could happen.
What happened at some point that Otani is likely to
explore free agency. Doesn't mean he's not gonna come back
and sign with the Angels, but he is likely to
(33:08):
explore free agency. Quote. I've always been open to it.
This is nes Blello, but there's several layers of this.
One show has earned the right to play through the year,
explore free agency, and we'll see where it shakes out.
So let me just connect the dots for you here.
Who's gonna be the biggest guy available in free agency
at the end of next year. Who's gonna be available
(33:30):
at the deadline this year because the Angels are gonna Boy,
are you really gonna get him? We can always sign
him in free agency. We can send him somewhere for
a little while. You want to go someplace else and
try to play for a pennant. Do something, Hey, go
ahead and knock yourself out. We'll get some We'll get
some prospects and figure it out. Who's gonna be the
team that says, you know, we just lost out of
(33:52):
a three hund million dollar player. It doesn't matter. We're
going into the season with our team. But we get
to the deadline, guess who I'm gonna go get show
Heyo Tani Shoyotani will be a met by the trade
deadline because Steve Cohen doesn't care. He's gonna go out.
What prospects you want? Brett Baty, you want a couple
other guys, and he could be a walk away guys
who's not gonna cost that much. Not Juan Soda where
(34:13):
you get him for three seasons before you know you
could potentially lose him. So it's not gonna be that expensive.
And who's gonna be I'm not afraid. And then we'll
negotiate with him the free agency. Come here, you like
it here in New York. Here's five hundred million dollars.
Here's a here's a five year, five hundred million dollar contract.
So we'll give you a hundred million dollars a year.
Whatever you want, ten years, five hundred million, we'll give
(34:34):
it to you. The Mets will wind up with Shohyotani
at the deadline because Steve Cohen will go pay for it,
and then I'll pay for him. At the end of
this year. Otani's gonna be a met on principle, I
can't have that happen, but it's going You can't have
nice things. It's going to it's going to happen. Show
Heyo Tani. Is that why you left the Yankees out
of all of the mix. When's the last time the
Yankees went out and paid for a guy that wasn't
(34:56):
Aaron Judge. We have to bring him back. He at
sixty two home runs. They don't go out and do that.
I mean they can't, but they don't go and do that.
But this guy is a game change. If the Aims
are gonna trade show Heyo Tani, they're not going to
trade him within the American League, not gonna trade him
to it. You gotta trade with the Yankees and can
come back and win and he jump start that. Don
does you know trade him out to the National League?
Who would be okay trading for him? Steve Cohen because
he doesn't care. Did you just trying to make the argument?
(35:20):
Does Angels wouldn't trade him within the American League? Now,
probably to the Yankees. That would be the Major League
Baseball would show up and they would they would have
they would have all kinds of protests around Angel Stadium.
They to companies about selling the squad and they come on.
They'd be able to get right inside because not many
fans go. So we get inside. But has our buddy
(35:41):
Bill Plashy. But is Steve Cohen gonna be outbid for
Showy Otani? No, not gonna happen. What do you want?
What do you need? I'll give it to you. Show
hey free an. You like it? The interest to baseball?
Trust me? Why well, I just baseball is upside. I
feel like John Henry baseball. You know. One of the
things what is John Henry saying? Moneyball? One the things
money allows you to do is not give a crap
(36:03):
what baseball has to say. That's Steve Cohen, and that's
Steve Cohen. He's not gonna care. Oh yeah, yeah, I'll
get a Swani. Here's a couple of prospects here, we'll
sign it. At the end of the year. Maybe not.
If not, we have Otani for a Pennant drive and
get the playoffs. Yeah, but we can stupid Drostburg. When
it comes down to it, what do you have four
or five teams that can actually play in this ballpark?
(36:24):
Right in the show, hey, Otani business Dodgers at the top.
The Dodgers, they'll be in it. But the Cubs have
restructured and they decide they want to go spend some money.
You've got the Mets, the Yankees, and then always waiting
to see misertain they won't be there. I mean, they
(36:47):
made a big splash today. Elvis Andrews came back and
everybody was excited about that. I like how they put
home runs in four teen seasons in MLB. You got
I would have just kept pumping up the store and
base totals and runs and four Wait a minute, that's
like exactly Jason Goggenheims will sell a painting and buy
(37:09):
Steve Cohen. Steve Cohen's gonna buy the Guggenheim Museum. He's
got really great vibes this year, though, Twitter at how
about a frescup? Mike gets swollen dumb going back to
the nineties. Coming up next, two big quarterbacks in the news.
This is Fox Sports Radio Live. The tirack dot com
student breaking Derek Carr has just been signed by the
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