November 29, 2017 • 45 mins
Doug tells fans and media to relax and stop overreacting to the Giants benching Eli Manning. He explains why Cavaliers superstar LeBron James deserved to get ejected and why he should stop complaining about the way he's officiated. And USC Head Football Coach Clay Helton joined the show to talk about preparing for the PAC 12 Championship game and QB Sam Darnold’s plans for after the season.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is the best of the Doug Gottlieb Show on
Fox Sports Radio. Boom, What Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show,
Fox Sports Radio Today, coming to you from the music
City of Nashville, Tennessee. I'nna be calling a game on Facebook.
I know it's UM. I might be the first ever
(00:23):
game analysts to be wearing a hoodie. They're like, yeah,
you gotta wear whatever. I was like whatever, Like yeah, whatever.
It's like, m how about a T shirt in a hoodie? Like,
We'll get back to you, so I'll let you know
before the UM, before the show is over, if I'll
be in hoodie. In the meantime, a guy who will
be in baseball cap this Sunday for the New York
(00:44):
Giants has been the talk of the National Football League.
You would think that Eli Manning is related to many
of my radio and TV brethren with the way in
which people have reacted to him being named the backup
quarter Erica. Actually he's he's taking some scout team reps
with the New York Giants. Of course, yesterday the news
(01:05):
broke during the show that Geno Smith nothing says tanking
like Geno Smith. Geno Smith would would start for the Giants,
as the Giants want to see Geno Smith, really want
to see Davis Webb, I want to see their entire roster.
And they went to Eli Manning and told him that
he would not be finishing games. And Eli Man's like,
(01:26):
you know, thanks, but no thanks. My streak isn't about
just starting. It's about trying to finish. That's the beauty
of what I've done. I'll be the backup, and so
that's led so many you cannot treat Eli Manning this way.
Here's Ben McAdoo, head coach of the Giants, on expounding
on the Eli Manning situation. I understand the emotions, I
(01:49):
understand the responses. Uh it's been a tough couple of days.
But we we feel we have to put our emotions
aside and uh make the best, make the best decision
for the New York Football Giants. And I'm at piece
with the decision. Again. No nobody says we're moving on
from from anybody. But when you're going through a situation
like this, this isn't this isn't my first time going
(02:10):
through it. Like you said, you know, there's gonna be
emotions involved, there's gonna be outrage and you have to
stick stick to your decision and do what you feels
best for the organization. Remember that this is an organization
that has only made the playoffs once since two thousand twelve,
(02:31):
right once, so once in the last five years they've
made the playoffs. Obviously this year they will not make
the playoffs as well. And and you look at like
they have made the playoffs and we we do have
this in we have this knee jerk reaction which we think, well,
that means they're done with ELI, Like that's not what
they said and that's not the reality of it. Now
(02:52):
we don't know what they could be done with ELI.
But they won't know if they're done with ELI until
they see Davis Webb. And they don't want to throw
David's Webb in there until they give for whatever he like,
you know, they feel like I feel compelled. You know,
Geno can play some let's have it, give him an audition.
Maybe we can trade Geno Smith and get something for
him in the off season or something, or maybe he's
(03:14):
good enough to be a viable backup. But this is
about Davis Webb. This is about Okay, let's take the
training wheels off and see if the kid can can
prepare and we can put him into the game. And
oh yeah, by the way, it's about tanking. Like all
of these, like my media brethren, have lost their collective minds.
(03:38):
Eli Manning's thirty six years old. He has taken a
savage beating. He gets rid of the ball super quick
because his offensive line hasn't been good, his running game
isn't good. They're not going to the playoffs. Like what
is the point of continue to throw Eli Manning out there?
Because you saw him win to the Super Bowls because
he hails himself the right way that and and you.
(03:59):
I almost feel like people feel bad because they made
fun of Eli Manning for so long, for Eli Manning face,
or for not being as good as Peyton Manning, and
now is I'm like, oh wait, I know we made
fun of him, but he's not as bad as we
made fun of. How will they ever know if Davis
Webb can play, If they don't play him, how will
(04:19):
they know what they have to do in the draft?
I mean, look, I get the old school values of
people saying we shouldn't live together before we get married,
but you know what you should do before you get married,
you should live together. I do several of the things
that annoy the hell out of my wife. I don't
(04:41):
know if you guys have noticed, but I do this
thing where I scratched the roof of my mouth with
my tongue. This you probably you don't know if you
can't hear it on radio, but music have you are?
You have been able to see that where I do,
I will scratch the roof of my mouth with my tongue.
Absolutely I've seen it. And sometimes you even just put
your finger and scratch. My wife insists that I have allergies,
which is a possibility. I don't like taking anything. I
(05:04):
don't like taking any sort of medicine. Maybe maybe I
do have allergies. She's like, oh, you have allergies. She
take some out and I don't want to take allergy medicine.
I don't have allergies. You scratch over of your mouth.
I was like, guess, because it itches. Why do you
think it itches? I don't know, so I do that. Um,
she says, there's a noise I make when I chew.
I also have a tendency to use any toothbrush that
(05:25):
I find that's weird. But why is that weird? Listen,
We've had three kids. There's not a there's there's not
there's there's no bodily fluids that have not been exchanged
between the two of us. But I'd like to use mine.
But if I walk in like, what's better? I mean,
it's not like I don't wash the toothbrush off after
(05:45):
using it. It's not like I just get get it
all nastied up with plaque and then I just kind
of leave it as is and then and then leave
it wet for her, Like I rinse it out thoroughly,
and I don't do it all the time. But it's
not like that's the grossest thing on earth. I mean,
I'm not grossed out by ABC Gum, I'm not engrossed.
But anyway, there are things that I do that our
irritants towards my wife. Now, I don't think these things
(06:06):
would have cost caused her to not marry me, but
we did not live together and we have been together
now for seventeen plus years of marriage. Um, I just
how are you going to know that Davis Webb is
a viable quarterback unless you see him play in an
NFL game? You see him prepare can he assimilate all
(06:29):
the information that's being given to him? Canny can he?
Can he do that? And if he can do that?
And I, oh yeah, but like people are freaking out, Hey,
Matt Hasseback was a really good quarterback. His career was
extended like six seven years by being a quarterback whisper.
Remember he was Andrew lux back up and then was
it was it last year? The two years ago he
(06:50):
replaced Andrew Luck and came in and won a couple
of games. This is actually kind of par for the
course for veteran quarter acts who want to stay in
the league. You gotta be willing to go like, hey,
you're not the start anymore, Well that sucks, Well you
don't wanna do? I prepare like I'm a starter every day.
(07:10):
Derek car talked about it earlier this year. He said,
when Matt Shob got pulled, they named him starter. He
didn't think he was better than Shob, and Schob said,
I'm mad about it, But you know what, from this
day forward, all I'm going to do is help you
prepare because that's what you've done for me. That's what
you're supposed to do. So we act like this and
we've never seen this before. The Nicks pulled Carmelo the
(07:30):
last two years at the end of the season. The Yankees, uh,
you know, got rid of Mark two Shara and got
rid of Alex Rodriguez to see what they're young guys
are gonna do. This is what you do. And in
the NBA, you play younger guys when you want to tank.
You're not necessarily tanking. You're not trying to lose get
nut tone guys to trick it off their foot. But
if you play younger, less experienced players, the likelihood that
(07:51):
you win when other teams you're playing against our poise
to try and make the playoffs becomes, uh, the likelihood
becomes smaller. So I just we it's so interesting that that,
and I'm not being critical of fans. Fans are supposed
to be emotional. Fans have hitched their wagon to elis
(08:13):
our guy. And the crazy thing is that many of
the Giants fans that are blown away by the fact
that Eli Manning is being pulled, the same guys who
have said and Eli Manning, he turns the ball over
time Eli Manning in the they don't even like Eli Manning,
but they just don't like being told that their guy
is no longer the guy and Gino is going to
be the guy until Davis webbs the guy. This is
(08:39):
how the business works. Tell the business works, I mean,
you know. I My first radio show, my first radio show,
national radio show that I did, was up at ESPN,
was with a guy named Chuck Wilson who is still
doing some radio oh um and some podcast stuff in
(09:03):
Rhode Island. Chuck was Chuck was one of the longest tantifout,
the longest like the original ESPN radio Game Night, which
is on Sunday nights. It was a great show. I
know it because during my year in between UH playing
at Notre Dame in Oaklama State, I went to a
junior college and I helped coach and practice with the team,
(09:23):
and a lot of times on Saturday nights or yes
on Saturdays, I drive up I watched my brother's team
play at cal Poli Sandleis Obispo. Then I'd swing back
through Santa Barbara and I had my my high school
girlfriend was the cheerleader at Santa Barbara, and we'd hang
out there and then on I'd hang out with her
on Sunday and then Sunday nights, I drive back and
I would listen. And that's why I had already been
(09:45):
in love with sports radio, but I felt even greater
love with sports radio. So back in two thousand and two,
Chuck was basically assigned as my partner. And he had
had a long time partner beforehand, and they were other
radio hosts at the time who fought the new management
in how they want to do it, and Chuck did not.
(10:06):
I'm sure he didn't want to work at first with
somebody who was young and really really green and had
a completely different way of looking at the world. And
he probably didn't want to work for a boss that
didn't appreciate his style of radio and said like, no, no,
I know you've done it for half of your half
of your life, but this is a better way. But
you know what he did, he did He did the
(10:27):
absolute best he could. Because all of us who have
our own radio shows, at some point somebody's gonna go like, hmm,
somebody else might be better, or you might need a partner,
or I might need to do updates. What do you
tell your kids, like life's not fair, thatt me it's fair,
(10:49):
Or there might be actually a bigger plan in place,
and how you handle it speaks to who you are
and and fans and frankly media members not taking a
eth and realizing that what's going on all throughout sports,
like the tanking thing is real. It worked for the Astros,
it's working for the Sixers, it's going to work for
(11:12):
other teams that do it. And you're like, well, I
just I like Eli Manning and I think this is
he's handled himself. Well good, you know what he's supposed to.
Giving credit to Eli Manning for handling a benching the
right way is like you heard that Chris Rock thing
about about that about dudes like, yeah, handle my business
(11:33):
with my kids like you're supposed to. Don't ever say
your babysitting when you're watching your own kids and your
wife goes out, can't guys and babysitting. You're not babysitting,
you're parenting. You're not handling it. Well, you're being a professional.
This is your job. And oh yeah, by the way,
(11:53):
it's the giants job as well. To look out for
the future because the president isn't going anywhere. What is
gonna be what's gonna be proved by keeping keep throwing
Eli manning out there nothing nothing. Guys are just so
emotionally tied to people that grew up watching or cheering
(12:14):
for they maybe they feel bad Eli got a bad
rap and now Eli is getting pulled like, well, I
didn't want you to pull it. How do you want
you to fire him? Be sure to catch live editions
of The Doug gott Leap Show weekdays at three p m.
Easter noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I
Heart Radio app. Last night, Lebron James was ejected for
the first time in his NBA career. Here's Lebron in
(12:37):
the injection. Well, I think I'm one of the league leaders,
and pointing to Paint, I drive just as much as anybody.
It's like almost they trying to turn me into a
jump shooter. I can't be a jump shoot. I'm not
a jump shooter. You know. I watched the games every
single night, and I see jump shooters going to the
line multiple, double digit times every night. And I'm not
a jump shooter. And I get filed just like everybody
else do. So one time going to the line one time,
(13:00):
you know, three times or four times, that's that's not
that's not what it's about okay, Um, they want to
turn you a new jump shooter because everybody's playing you
to dry. Like, look, Lebron James is not the only
guy in the NBA that throws back his head, or
that holds his forehead every time he drives in there,
(13:22):
or that yells and throws up his arms. Um, James
Harden draws a ton of fouls, usually leads a league
in free uh in in free throws attempted and he
throws up his arms. And so I guess you you
asked a question. You're like, wait, why does James Harden
get more calls than Lebron James. Well, it's fair to
(13:45):
say that Lebron is known for selling some calls, right,
for acting like he got crushed. You We've we've gone
back enough and seen and seeing Lebron hold his forehead,
you know, like you go in there, you miss the shot,
you hold your forehead like your king for blood and
there is no blood. Whether it's because he's a victim
of super SlowMo and reps actually paying attention, whether it's
(14:08):
because he's so pronounced, and how he complains about it
last night, he deserved to get suspended, I mean to
get supended to get kicked ejected, to get kicked out
of the game. You know he thought he got fouled.
If you watched the replay of the one that set
him off, he didn't get fouled. And while running up
the court, he goes and he gets way too close
to an official, and then he he obviously used a
(14:28):
couple of the magic words, and the guy had had
enough and he got ejected with just one technical, which
you can, in fact do, But you can't be the
guy who's synonymous with throwing your head back, with holding
your forehead, with with laying on the ground a little
extra extra long and you didn't actually get hit. I mean,
this is boy who cried wolf stuff. How many times
(14:51):
can we see a replay to which it did not
look nearly as bad as Lebron sold it? UH with
without without questioning the validity of any call, of any call.
Harden leaves the league in in UH free throw attempts.
Then Jonice and the Dakompo, who I believe leads a
(15:13):
league in shots inside the paint. Anthony Davis, Dwight Howard.
Dwight Howard gets hacked a lot like Damian Little is
an interesting one. Because he shoots so many threes, but
he also he only shoots threes or right at the
right at the bucket DeMarcus Cousins per zingis uh shoots
a ton of free throw seven point to a game.
But yeah, they do want to turn him into a
(15:35):
jump shooter. He does shoot post shots, he does shoot
midrange jump shots. Like, let's not kid ourselves like Lebron
James as opposed to Jonas who can't Janice who cannot
shoot perimeter jump shots. He has no jumper at all.
He'll take a couple, but he really can't shoot. I've
never watched the game and thought, man, Lebron doesn't ever
(15:57):
get a call the the rules of basketball. Here's one
of the things that people don't point out about Jordan's
versus Lebron. The rules have changed to which it's very
offense friendly rules, and he has the perfect build for
those type of rules, right because now it's he creates
the contact. He goes down plays downhill, but it's called
(16:20):
downhill basketball. Well, your momentum is all going down towards
the basket, and you can't put a hand on him.
You can't hand check him out on the floor to
stop him. But because he's creating all that contact, he
didn't get as many calls. He plays bullyball, and nobody
likes a bully. Fox Sports Radio has the best sports
(16:40):
talk lineup in the nation. Catch all of our shows
at Fox sports radio dot com and within the I
Heart Radio app. Clay Hilton head coach of USC they
won their Division of the Pack twelve, getting ready for
the PAC twelve championship game. He joins us here on
the Doug Gotlup Show on Fox Sports Radio. Coach, how
are you doing well? Thanks for having the guests. Okay,
so let's let me just get your perspective before we
(17:01):
get to the rankings. Last night on your team, your
regular season is complete, how would you characterize your season? Um,
you know, tending to being able to finish strong in
November or second undefeated November was very satisfying. Uh. You know,
we've put ourselves in position. You know, you really want
to come in here undefeated or with one loss. But
(17:22):
in the reality is we have two losses and have
our last opportunity to be able to put our best
foot forward to put an exclamation on stamp on our
season with eleven with eleventh win. So playing a really
good Stanford team that's very hot in their own right
right now. Should be a great game and one word
looking forward to Uh, it's our first opportunity to have
(17:42):
a chance to win it and win that pack twelve
titles is two thousand and eight, and I know our
kids are excited about it. How different is Stanford now
from Stanford when you played them second game of the season. Um,
very different, to be honest with you. You know, I
think both teams have grown. Um where we have grown
our offensive skill and the maturity that has grown with
(18:03):
us as a football team. You see how they've grown,
especially defensively. I think they're playing wonderful football, especially the
last seven games. You know, the win over Washington and
Notre Dame really stick out to me. How well their
defense played. Changed a couple of things schematically that I
think has helped their personnel. And then the addition of
of kJ Costello down the stretch. Here you can see
(18:25):
coach Shaw in his play calling now mixing in both
run and passed. Where I thought he was um leaned
very heavily on Bryce Love early in the season. He's
doing a great job of mixing it up. And you
saw kJ throw for four touchdowns last week against Notre
Dame and a very balanced performance offensively. Look, your your
team has improved steadily. You've won your last four games,
(18:49):
obviously coming off the Notre Dame lass um. But one
of the reasons you played so well down the stretch
is that your quarterback has turned the ball over less. Right, Like,
he's cut down on some of the interception and some
of it was He's got a whole new group mostly
of wide receivers, completely different skilled position. And it's also
the first year to which he's been the starter of
the entire year. And and and you know, like, look,
(19:09):
I'm a little bit of Deshaun Watson. We're trying to
make some throws that maybe you shouldn't make because he
feels like he has to make plays When you watch film,
how much is Sam playing that definitively better or is
it just a case of receivers and luck that led
to the high interception numbers early in the year. No,
I think, hey, you know, early in the season, and
(19:29):
I'm played quarterback quarterback coach by trade, so I've got
a bias. I he's my kid too, so I've got
a little bias towards him. But when when I watch
it UM as a coach, I see a group of
receivers and skilled players that you know coming into the season.
I know we we would go through some growing pains
as they grew up, and and hopefully we were getting
(19:52):
some kids healthy, get us Stephen Mitchell healthy, get in
a Daniel Moore to baby healthy. And then all of
a sudden, about halfway through the season, we got healthy
and our younger kids started playing really good. Tyler Vaughan's
Michael Pittman getting Daniel Morre to baby back, and all
of a sudden, you know what Sam had done last
year up until all the way here, I see him
doing the exact same things. But as we grew as
(20:12):
a football team and matured as a football team, numbers
started getting better. And now you look up and he's
second in our league in passing efficiency, which is a
pretty darn good quarterback league. UM, and he's doing a
wonderful job. He's cut down on the interceptions over the
last eight games. I think he's throwing a total of
three UM and done done a wonderful job of leading
(20:33):
our team. And he does the most important staff to me,
he wins ballgames. Yeah, you know, like like they couldn't
been couldn't But the difference in him and Rosen. Rosen
looks great and makes some great throws, and at the
end of the end of the day Sam's teams, you
find ways to win when Rosen, who I think talent wise,
everybody likes. And I know there's other issues that play
(20:53):
there at u c l A. But you know they're
five and six and they lose. I want to ask
you quickly going back to last week, it's u c
l A um end of the first half, like, look,
he's in his only his second year as a starter.
How do you how do you coach him when he
makes an error in judgment the way he made at
the end of the first half. People don't remember the play.
He had just completed a yard passed Jante Burnette, got
(21:14):
ten seconds left. First down clock stops starts, so he
snabs the ball. He runs amround, makes a great play,
but instead of getting out of bounds or throwing the
ball away, so you kick a field goal to be
up seventeen seven and go into the half with a
two score lead, he ends up getting tackled U c
l A five Like three seconds to go and the
clock runs out, and you know you can see look
(21:35):
in his face like, you know, kind of a brain
fart there. How did you coach him in that moment? Well,
we always talk situational football, and there's actually there was
fourteen seconds left on the clock and and as soon
as he broke contain, usaid, oh no, because his competitive spirit,
commpetitive fire, and it's the mark of all the great ones.
They always feel like they can make the great play.
(21:56):
And that's what you love about Sam Donald. I mean
his competitive spirit and competitive fire. Um, it's one of
the reasons that make him so great. But he is
he is a work in progress. Um, that's what I
love about him. As talented as he is, he's still
got a very very high ceiling. Um. He'll tell you
he's not a finished product. And we learned each and
every with each and every rep, and in that rep,
(22:18):
being able to break contain and say, you know what,
it's not there. I'm gonna throw the ball away. I'm
probably gonna coach will probably give me another down, maybe
before this field goal, or I'll take the three points.
That's a learning lesson, and you know that's my job
as a as a head coach is to teach situational football. UM.
I put that responsibility on myself rather than the kid.
(22:39):
His job is to know assignments and to learn those situations. Um.
You know, and when when we mess when we mess
one up like that, I'd rather put the pressure more
pressure on me than him. That's a voice of Clay
Hilton is the head coach of the South Division Champions
of the Pack twelve USC eight one in League ten
and two overall, and you played only one Nonpower five
(23:00):
school the entire year. You look at the depth of
teams on your schedule and that has to be not like, look,
we played, we play. Everyone we played is a capable
opponent every week in which we played them. Um, I
mean the the only team that you avoided. It wasn't
your fault that you would have wanted to play with Washington, right.
I mean other than that, you got everybody, and you
got Washington State on their own, on their on their field.
(23:21):
I guess the when you saw the rankings come out
last night, what was your immediate reaction? Um, you know
that we have another game to play, and we continue
building our resume and trying to put our best foot
forward um, you know, and and you look up at
these conference games, championship games, I think they're gonna mean
a lot to the committee. I mean, you've got six
eight teams there that are all trying to build their
(23:43):
best resume, and there could be a lot of two
lost champions um. So we just got to focus on
our job trying to go WINNIPAC twelve title, put our
best resume together, which I think is in a really
really talented football league that's got nine nine Bowl eligible teams,
plays a Notre Dame, plays of Texas, plays quality football
teams on a week to week basis, and and see
(24:05):
how it pans out. And I don't worry about things
I can't control. The only thing I can control right
now is on Friday night, and that's what we're working towards.
Has there been any discussion about stance future. No. I
tell you what what we've what we promised ourselves early
early in the year, before we even got started with
the season, is we would only concern ourselves about our
(24:26):
team and our team success. And then after the season,
after trying to win a championship, you know that then
we would sit down as with the family, trying to
get as much information as possible so he can make
the best decision from for himself. You know, if the
game is so hard to win games, especially at the
college level, especially at this level, that if you don't
put all your heart and soul in your focus into
(24:48):
each and every week just trying to win the game,
you're not gonna have to worry about what accolades or
individual success happens. Just worry about the team success. And
I credit the kid. He's lived in the moment, He's
lived in the now. He doesn't even want to talk
about what the future might hold. All he worries about
is who were you playing on Saturday? What do I
have to do to help our football team? And it's
(25:09):
one of the reasons I love him to death. I mean,
he's a special kid. Clay Helton our our guest. If
you could create a perfect playoffs scenario, what would it be? What?
How would how would you form a playoff bracket to
which still makes the regular season mean as much as
the regular season means now, but also creates more of
(25:29):
a true championship format. Yeah, well, each year, I think
it's different, to be honest with it, because you don't
have to be a conference champion. We're good here. I
think sometimes you look up there, you may be ranked
one through four and you're like, man, I like this
four team playoff and it sometimes you're sitting here at
number ten, going, man, I wish there was an eight
team playoff. Um, but you know, right right now, coaches
(25:51):
are just responsible for winning games. And again, we don't
worry about the things that we can't control. We raise
eighteen to twenty one year old kids and and try
to win conference championships and see if it's good enough
to get us in that playoff. Um. All right, well, listen,
we wish you the best of luck in the PAC
twelve championship game. It's been fun to watch your team
(26:13):
play and appreciate you spending some time this year on
Fox Sports Radio. Thanks so much. You take care. That's
that Clay Hilton, head coach of the Men. The Men
of Troy. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays at three p m. Eastern noon
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app.
On Monday, the league, the NFL submitted to players the
(26:35):
final draft proposal that, according to documents, would contribute nearly
one hundred million dollars to causes considered important to African
American communities. The NFL hopes that this effort will effectively
end the peaceful, yet controversial movement started by Colin Kaepernick
when players refused to stand for the national anthem last season.
(26:59):
This would be a huge win for the players, right like,
hey man, we've been we've been kneeling, we've been protesting
because we want change to be made. At some point,
there has to be tangible change. And the only way
there's tangible change to be made is if somebody puts
some money towards something. Um. But here's the problem. Not
(27:22):
all the players are in agreement with the proposal. Some
of the players who actively protests since two thousand and
sixteen are displeased with the NFL's approach and planned to
break from the Players Coalition, a group of roughly forty
players to negotiate with the league office over how its
leaders have handled the negotiations. Malcolm Jenkins and Kwan Bolden,
(27:43):
regarded leaders of the coalition, Miami Dolphins safety Michael Thomas
and forty Niners safety Eric Reid tweeted um Wednesday that
they are withdrawing quote. The players Coalition was supposed to
be formed as a group that represents NFL athletes who
have been silently protesting social injustices and racism. However, Malcolm
(28:06):
and an quon that's Malcolm Jenkins and Kuan Bolden can
no longer speak on our behalf, as we do not
believe the coalitions belief are in the best interests of ours.
The NFL's multifaceted offer earmarks eighty nine million dollars over
a seven year period for both national and public and
local projects. According to the documents. On the national level,
(28:27):
owners this year would allocate five million dollars, with their
commitment growing annually, maxing out at twelve million per year
for two thousand one through two thousand twenty three. At
the local level, owners will put up two hundred fifty annually,
expecting players to match that amount totally five hundred thousand
dollars for each team. Yah. So um, here's here's been
(28:58):
The problem with the protest is there was there was
no plant with like let's just protest, Like, okay, what
do we you know? What do we want? Isn't that
the protest chant? What do you want? Freedom? When we
wanted now when we want and justice when we want
(29:19):
it now. This is like the NFL players are marching
like what do we want We don't know? When do
we want it yesterday? How do we want it? My money?
Where do you want to be spend no idea? Now,
the number a hundred million looks a little bit bigger
than it actually is. Right, it's a seven year deal
(29:42):
of at least eighty nine million dollars. That's not a
hundred million dollars, Like a hundred million is a hundred million.
And keep in mind that the players have to donate locally.
That's that's where some of the some of that money
comes from, which I'm sure is a sticking point, Like,
you know, the owners can donate, but I ain't donating.
(30:03):
I mean because players. It's like the guy who throws
the party by way, I through the party and I
gotta thrown for the food. I through the party. Yeah,
but you didn't throw them for the food dots my house.
There's the cost, Like, that's not really the way it works.
So this, this to me, kind of signifies a lot
of the issues with the players. Is it's a it's
(30:25):
a lot like, uh, this weekend is the my what's
it called the my shoe? Um, you know my Mike
cleats my cause. Mike cleats my cause weekend. Everybody has
a cause. This is one of those that like, I'm
somebody that the the celebrations this year have been so bad,
(30:46):
most of them that it's kind of proven the point
of the NFL right now. They're like, what, however, you
under group celebrations fine, and some of them, like people
like Duck Duck Goose, people go crazy that the sack races,
like the Kancie Chieftain sack races, then got beat. I
would never do a touchdown celebration when when I'm getting beaten,
(31:08):
what's the point spiked the football or handed to the
ref or put it in the give it to the
managers that you get your you can set it to
your mom. But there's so many there's such like you
get overly creative or a lack of creativity, or you're
just too cheesy, to which you're like, you know, I
kind of like the better when they just spiked the
football and they got in trouble for too many hip
(31:30):
thrusts that that's kind of the problem here with the NFL.
Like the other NFL. You almost wish they would have
had a hard line stance because at least the players
were then united. We don't want a hardline stance. What
do you want? We want social justice. We want justice
for all. Like, okay, here's a bunch of money. Where
do you want it to go? We have no idea
what you're really gonna give us money? Yeah? Yeah, how
(31:56):
are you gonna spend it? No idea. This is always
has been the issue with This is the issue with
the players when it comes to contract negotiations. Like you ever,
ever ever look at this thing, You're like, wait, why
did the players? If you look back to the last
time they signed the collected Barte agreement, they were less
than a week away from NFL owners having to cancel
(32:18):
preseason games and maybe two. If they had to cancel
preseason games, that would have cost the owners a ton
of money because those dates are blacked out by stadiums,
and everybody loses massive money if they don't have the
if they're not playing now, players would have lost their
preseason checks as well. But the only way to make
(32:38):
owners hurt is to hit him in the pocketbook, right,
So instead of agreeing to terms early or instead of
holding out late. They held out and then stopped holding
out and signed what many people believe to be an
okay or even bad deal. But the truth is owners
(33:00):
have the money and you don't, so at some point
you gotta go to work if you want to make
that money. But the reason that they can't ever get
what they want the you know, the the top level
players want the cap to be bigger, want bigger guaranteed contracts,
whereas most of the rank and file, most of the
(33:22):
guys who vote are making a couple of hundred grand
a year and they just want to find ways to
elongate their career. And you hear Michael Bennett talking about
quarterbacks making too much money, but quarterbacks actually make the league,
so they make a bunch of money. And quarterbacks want
all these protections so they can play and not get hurt.
On the other hand, in order to be protected, you
(33:42):
have to have offensive lineman practice more offensive. I'm like, dude,
my career is short enough, short enough as it is.
Let's cut down the practice time. That's why the first
month of the season so bad. They haven't practiced together,
haven't played together. But but players, you have no middle class.
You've got rich players and low income rank and file guys,
(34:02):
nobody in between, and those two sets of players can't
get along. You have all these different players with all
these different causes. They can't really get along. That's why
they have them just you know, one weekend you can
wear whatever shoes you want. And then with this deal,
you have so many woke NFL players that want to
do something to help the injustices of our society. And
(34:26):
when pressed, because they have the opportunity to get about
ninety million dollars, like, we have no idea exactly who
want to do, we'll have to meet on that. 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. He is
a host on Serious XM NBA Radio. You should listen
to him because he's got a ton of knowledge in
(34:48):
regards to how, why, and what's going on inside the association.
He's David Griffin, formerly of the Cleveland Cavaliers, their general manager.
He joined us on the Doug Gottlip Show. David, how
are you dog doing really well? Thanks for having me on. UM.
I wanted to ask you, you know you uh you
discussed um on your radio show and it's been picked
(35:08):
up nationally on how ultimately the trade of Kyrie Irving
to the Celtics won't be viewed as a good trade
for Cleveland because Kyrie is really, really good and the
likelihood is that, you know, Isaiah Thomas coming off of injury,
maybe even the top draft pick for the Nets. Like,
there's a lot of unknown and we know that Kyrie
(35:29):
is going to play well and and and be the
focal point at least at some point for the Celtics offense.
I guess my question is dowing back even further, like
when did these when did the feelings of unhappiness professionally
for Kyrie first kind of rear it's rear its head
when you were there. Yeah. So first, first of all,
(35:51):
just to address the first part when I when I
was asked the question, frank I Sola actually asked me
the question on his show with Scalabrini. And when they
ask me, they said, do you think it will be
historically viewed as a good trade for Cleveland? And I
don't think it will be historically viewed as a good
trade for Cleveland because even if they were to win
a championship. Even if Isaiah and Crowder are the perfect
(36:13):
fit in the short term, unless that Brooklyn pick turns
out to be unbelievably good, the likelihood is that because
Kyrie is twenty five years of age and is special talented,
they're going to continue to hear about how we can't
believe you traded Kyrie, and so historically, if the kid
plays another ten years, everyone's going to talk about what
(36:36):
a great deal of Boston got. That doesn't mean that
if you were playing the cards Kobe Altman and his
staff had, you wouldn't have done exactly what they did
because they checked an awful lot of boxes in that deal.
So the point I was making, or attempting to make,
and obviously that poorly, was it's the length of time
Kyrie is going to be special that's going to make
the historical bent look bad. It's not the trade itself.
(36:59):
Uh um, yeah, well, I think it's kind of similar
to that, Griffin, isn't it kind of similar to you
know people, uh want well wait a second, you traded
you know, the number one your number one pick to
get Kevin Love to Minnesota and now uh and now
you you look, what's happened up in Minnesota In terms
of like point, you're like, well, you don't remember that
at the time, Like, we got Lebron James, and we
(37:20):
wanted to win an NBA championship, and so you're not
gonna in an NBA championship with the nineteen year old
wing as opposed to we needed a versatile power forward
who could guard, who could rebound, who could would wouldn't,
wouldn't need to be an alpha with the basketball and
and that's why we made that move, right. Isn't there
some similarities to that trade? Oh, I see a lot
of similarities, and I think it's a good point by you.
(37:43):
I think again, the Wiggins trade is going to be
viewed as one for years and years where people will
say that we can't believe griff traded Andrew Wiggins for
Kevin Love. Well, that's because Wiggins can play five, seven
and more years than Kevin. But when the subset of
of criteria that you're using is we must win a
championship within the window. We have Lebron James and he
(38:06):
signed a one year deal. You play the cards you
have to play. You don't look at it in terms
of geez, how is this going to be viewed historically.
You look at it as we have a chance to
win a championship and we need to capitalize. Um. There.
You know, when when you were fired by when your
contract wasn't renewed by Cleveland, uh Lebron put out a
really really nice tweet of you know, in regards to
(38:29):
his time with you. Um, but I guess you know.
My question is always like, couldn't he couldn't you do
the Jimmy Chitwood. Couldn't he have said? You know, I stay,
Griff stays, I stay, Griff goes. I go like, is
that is that too much to ask? Right? Well, I'm
really gratefully didn't put me in that position because when
when we put out that it was a mutual parting,
(38:50):
that was absolutely true. So there wasn't a whole lot
that could have been done to keep me there, And
there wasn't much I'd have done to make Dan want
to keep me there. So when you're not locked together
on the vision of the future, the most important thing
you can do is to separate and do what's right
for the franchise. And Dan has every right to want
to do what he wants to do the way he
(39:11):
wants to do it, and in my particular situation, it
just was obvious we weren't the right ship for each other.
So I feel incredibly blessed that there was no pressure
brought to there on Dan to do something that maybe
he wouldn't have ultimately been comfortable with, because I've seen
this said many times, and it's true. If ownership, front office,
and head coach are not on the same page, you're
(39:32):
doomed to fail. And I think in this particular situation
that was a blessing for everybody. It's it's honestly, it's
no different than in college sports. You know, it's like
one of the things Tennessee is still looking for a
football coach. Why because the a D, the president, the boosters,
that the important owners are not all lockstep. And until
you you you are not going it's it doesn't mean
you're not gonna win. It makes it prohibitively more difficult
(39:54):
to win when everybody's not pulling in the same direction.
Fair comparison, yeah, I think it's very fair. But I
think what makes it even more convoluted in the situation
that the university is who knows which donor thinks they
should be the loudest voice, and they can continue to
try to be the loudest voice and give more here
and there, and you you never really know who you
(40:15):
need the people holding too. As a as a chancellor
and an athletic director, it's a really complicated situation. I
would think running a major university like that. Um. I'm
watching Lebron and he does appear to be more efficient. Uh.
He complained about not getting calls last night, which I
think all of America rolled their eyes. Although he's only
twentieth and free throw attempts. Um. It feels though that
(40:36):
that he like his game has been fine. Some of
his defensive movements not great. It's the it's the rest
of the team. What do you think of their overall
roster compilation, as they've been dealing with injured players and
new players and trying to fit them in and only
now has it started to hit with their winning games. Well,
it's it's funny that it finally came out that Lebron
isn't getting to the free throw line that much last year.
(40:58):
At one point during the year, we made the league
aware of the fact, and in the way that we can,
which is through the league channels, they enable you to
utilize the system to question officiating, and we used that
in house system and tried to explain that Lebron is
at that time that we sent it in. I wanted
to say it was twenty four and free throw attempts,
(41:19):
but he was number one in drives to the rim,
which is it's impossible to be that. So I think
in fairness to Lebron, he doesn't get a terribly favorable
whistle from a foul standpoint. He may get some other
beneficial things, and on the defensive end maybe gets away
with some things, but I think he does get hit
an enormous amount of the time and things are not called.
(41:42):
So I think that's part of the issue. Relative to
the Cavaliers team as a whole, I think Kobe Altman
and his guys did a great job of putting enough
depth there. And ironically, because Derrick Rose has been hurt,
they're they're almost benefiting from that because it forced them
to go away from a line up of Rose, Wade
and Lebron that may not have sit together very well.
(42:05):
Wait's now running point guard with that second unit and
they can continue to space shooters around the floor and
do what that whole roster was really put together, which
is playing space and pace and bang threes on you.
So they were being asked to do things they weren't
terribly comfortable with early, and I think because there's fewer
mouths to feed, it was easier to integrate the bench,
(42:26):
and Tyler and staff ended up with perfect rotations right now,
and that's a huge part of why they're winning. All right.
I don't want to ask you about Alonzo Ball. Obviously,
you know part of being a g M is player evaluation.
But you're not simply evaluating a player. You're evaluating all
the other factors, including how old he is, how much
time he's spent on the NBA floor. Here's the guy
who's never played pick and roll, he's never really played
(42:47):
solid defense, he's learning. Um. How much cause for concern
is there from your perspective as a former general manager
and a paid professional evaluator as to Alonzo balls first
year with the Lakers, I don't have a great deal
of concern at the moment because point guard, as you
know than anybody, Doug, is the hardest position to learn,
(43:08):
um to play as you go through the levels and
as you raise your level, figuring out how your role
is going to fit within. That's much more difficult for
a point guard than anything else, So I think you
have to be more patient with players that played that
position just as a baseline, and then you add to it.
This kid was hailed as the savior of one of
the most important franchises in our league, and he's playing
(43:30):
at home under the scrutiny that comes from having that,
plus a father who brings additional scrutiny to the situation.
I think if you look at his overall numbers minus
the shooting component, I think he's been everything you should
have expected him to be. He's he's just a kid
whose body hasn't even matured yet, and he's trying to
(43:51):
figure that part out let alone everything else he has
to deal with. So for me, I don't see signs
that make me concerned. What I see is a situation
that's going to be very, very difficult for him to
ignore the noise in and really just focus on his game.
I know you gotta run, but I gotta ask you
one more. And bead Or Simmons, if you had to
(44:11):
bet on one being a superstar longer, who would it be. Well,
I think just Simmons because I have more faith in
the health situation. If you guaranteed me Joel would be
healthy forever, I would stay Joel because what he does
is frankly I think revolutionary for the big man position.
I think what he's capable of has never really even
(44:32):
been seen on an NBA floor before. If he's completely healthy, um,
I mean you have to go back to the days
of of Will Chamberlain in terms of the dominance that
guy could have on Bolton's court relative to his his peers.
But again, putting that all together for the long haul
and staying healthy long enough to show it is is difficult. Here.
(44:54):
I'm on Serious x M NBA Radio. David Griffin, griff
anytime you want to just talk ball, let us know,
and uh, the floor is yours. Thanks so much for
joining us. You're on Fox Sports Radio. Thanks Doug, I
really enjoyed it. Pleasure is mine. David Griffin joining us.
Former Calves general manager,
This is the best of the Doug Gottlieb Show on
Fox Sports Radio. Boom, What Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show,
Fox Sports Radio Today, coming to you from the music
City of Nashville, Tennessee. I'nna be calling a game on Facebook.
I know it's UM. I might be the first ever
(00:23):
game analysts to be wearing a hoodie. They're like, yeah,
you gotta wear whatever. I was like whatever, Like yeah, whatever.
It's like, m how about a T shirt in a hoodie? Like,
We'll get back to you, so I'll let you know
before the UM, before the show is over, if I'll
be in hoodie. In the meantime, a guy who will
be in baseball cap this Sunday for the New York
(00:44):
Giants has been the talk of the National Football League.
You would think that Eli Manning is related to many
of my radio and TV brethren with the way in
which people have reacted to him being named the backup
quarter Erica. Actually he's he's taking some scout team reps
with the New York Giants. Of course, yesterday the news
(01:05):
broke during the show that Geno Smith nothing says tanking
like Geno Smith. Geno Smith would would start for the Giants,
as the Giants want to see Geno Smith, really want
to see Davis Webb, I want to see their entire roster.
And they went to Eli Manning and told him that
he would not be finishing games. And Eli Man's like,
(01:26):
you know, thanks, but no thanks. My streak isn't about
just starting. It's about trying to finish. That's the beauty
of what I've done. I'll be the backup, and so
that's led so many you cannot treat Eli Manning this way.
Here's Ben McAdoo, head coach of the Giants, on expounding
on the Eli Manning situation. I understand the emotions, I
(01:49):
understand the responses. Uh it's been a tough couple of days.
But we we feel we have to put our emotions
aside and uh make the best, make the best decision
for the New York Football Giants. And I'm at piece
with the decision. Again. No nobody says we're moving on
from from anybody. But when you're going through a situation
like this, this isn't this isn't my first time going
(02:10):
through it. Like you said, you know, there's gonna be
emotions involved, there's gonna be outrage and you have to
stick stick to your decision and do what you feels
best for the organization. Remember that this is an organization
that has only made the playoffs once since two thousand twelve,
(02:31):
right once, so once in the last five years they've
made the playoffs. Obviously this year they will not make
the playoffs as well. And and you look at like
they have made the playoffs and we we do have
this in we have this knee jerk reaction which we think, well,
that means they're done with ELI, Like that's not what
they said and that's not the reality of it. Now
(02:52):
we don't know what they could be done with ELI.
But they won't know if they're done with ELI until
they see Davis Webb. And they don't want to throw
David's Webb in there until they give for whatever he like,
you know, they feel like I feel compelled. You know,
Geno can play some let's have it, give him an audition.
Maybe we can trade Geno Smith and get something for
him in the off season or something, or maybe he's
(03:14):
good enough to be a viable backup. But this is
about Davis Webb. This is about Okay, let's take the
training wheels off and see if the kid can can
prepare and we can put him into the game. And
oh yeah, by the way, it's about tanking. Like all
of these, like my media brethren, have lost their collective minds.
(03:38):
Eli Manning's thirty six years old. He has taken a
savage beating. He gets rid of the ball super quick
because his offensive line hasn't been good, his running game
isn't good. They're not going to the playoffs. Like what
is the point of continue to throw Eli Manning out there?
Because you saw him win to the Super Bowls because
he hails himself the right way that and and you.
(03:59):
I almost feel like people feel bad because they made
fun of Eli Manning for so long, for Eli Manning face,
or for not being as good as Peyton Manning, and
now is I'm like, oh wait, I know we made
fun of him, but he's not as bad as we
made fun of. How will they ever know if Davis
Webb can play, If they don't play him, how will
(04:19):
they know what they have to do in the draft?
I mean, look, I get the old school values of
people saying we shouldn't live together before we get married,
but you know what you should do before you get married,
you should live together. I do several of the things
that annoy the hell out of my wife. I don't
(04:41):
know if you guys have noticed, but I do this
thing where I scratched the roof of my mouth with
my tongue. This you probably you don't know if you
can't hear it on radio, but music have you are?
You have been able to see that where I do,
I will scratch the roof of my mouth with my tongue.
Absolutely I've seen it. And sometimes you even just put
your finger and scratch. My wife insists that I have allergies,
which is a possibility. I don't like taking anything. I
(05:04):
don't like taking any sort of medicine. Maybe maybe I
do have allergies. She's like, oh, you have allergies. She
take some out and I don't want to take allergy medicine.
I don't have allergies. You scratch over of your mouth.
I was like, guess, because it itches. Why do you
think it itches? I don't know, so I do that. Um,
she says, there's a noise I make when I chew.
I also have a tendency to use any toothbrush that
(05:25):
I find that's weird. But why is that weird? Listen,
We've had three kids. There's not a there's there's not
there's there's no bodily fluids that have not been exchanged
between the two of us. But I'd like to use mine.
But if I walk in like, what's better? I mean,
it's not like I don't wash the toothbrush off after
(05:45):
using it. It's not like I just get get it
all nastied up with plaque and then I just kind
of leave it as is and then and then leave
it wet for her, Like I rinse it out thoroughly,
and I don't do it all the time. But it's
not like that's the grossest thing on earth. I mean,
I'm not grossed out by ABC Gum, I'm not engrossed.
But anyway, there are things that I do that our
irritants towards my wife. Now, I don't think these things
(06:06):
would have cost caused her to not marry me, but
we did not live together and we have been together
now for seventeen plus years of marriage. Um, I just
how are you going to know that Davis Webb is
a viable quarterback unless you see him play in an
NFL game? You see him prepare can he assimilate all
(06:29):
the information that's being given to him? Canny can he?
Can he do that? And if he can do that?
And I, oh yeah, but like people are freaking out, Hey,
Matt Hasseback was a really good quarterback. His career was
extended like six seven years by being a quarterback whisper.
Remember he was Andrew lux back up and then was
it was it last year? The two years ago he
(06:50):
replaced Andrew Luck and came in and won a couple
of games. This is actually kind of par for the
course for veteran quarter acts who want to stay in
the league. You gotta be willing to go like, hey,
you're not the start anymore, Well that sucks, Well you
don't wanna do? I prepare like I'm a starter every day.
(07:10):
Derek car talked about it earlier this year. He said,
when Matt Shob got pulled, they named him starter. He
didn't think he was better than Shob, and Schob said,
I'm mad about it, But you know what, from this
day forward, all I'm going to do is help you
prepare because that's what you've done for me. That's what
you're supposed to do. So we act like this and
we've never seen this before. The Nicks pulled Carmelo the
(07:30):
last two years at the end of the season. The Yankees, uh,
you know, got rid of Mark two Shara and got
rid of Alex Rodriguez to see what they're young guys
are gonna do. This is what you do. And in
the NBA, you play younger guys when you want to tank.
You're not necessarily tanking. You're not trying to lose get
nut tone guys to trick it off their foot. But
if you play younger, less experienced players, the likelihood that
(07:51):
you win when other teams you're playing against our poise
to try and make the playoffs becomes, uh, the likelihood
becomes smaller. So I just we it's so interesting that that,
and I'm not being critical of fans. Fans are supposed
to be emotional. Fans have hitched their wagon to elis
(08:13):
our guy. And the crazy thing is that many of
the Giants fans that are blown away by the fact
that Eli Manning is being pulled, the same guys who
have said and Eli Manning, he turns the ball over
time Eli Manning in the they don't even like Eli Manning,
but they just don't like being told that their guy
is no longer the guy and Gino is going to
be the guy until Davis webbs the guy. This is
(08:39):
how the business works. Tell the business works, I mean,
you know. I My first radio show, my first radio show,
national radio show that I did, was up at ESPN,
was with a guy named Chuck Wilson who is still
doing some radio oh um and some podcast stuff in
(09:03):
Rhode Island. Chuck was Chuck was one of the longest tantifout,
the longest like the original ESPN radio Game Night, which
is on Sunday nights. It was a great show. I
know it because during my year in between UH playing
at Notre Dame in Oaklama State, I went to a
junior college and I helped coach and practice with the team,
(09:23):
and a lot of times on Saturday nights or yes
on Saturdays, I drive up I watched my brother's team
play at cal Poli Sandleis Obispo. Then I'd swing back
through Santa Barbara and I had my my high school
girlfriend was the cheerleader at Santa Barbara, and we'd hang
out there and then on I'd hang out with her
on Sunday and then Sunday nights, I drive back and
I would listen. And that's why I had already been
(09:45):
in love with sports radio, but I felt even greater
love with sports radio. So back in two thousand and two,
Chuck was basically assigned as my partner. And he had
had a long time partner beforehand, and they were other
radio hosts at the time who fought the new management
in how they want to do it, and Chuck did not.
(10:06):
I'm sure he didn't want to work at first with
somebody who was young and really really green and had
a completely different way of looking at the world. And
he probably didn't want to work for a boss that
didn't appreciate his style of radio and said like, no, no,
I know you've done it for half of your half
of your life, but this is a better way. But
you know what he did, he did He did the
(10:27):
absolute best he could. Because all of us who have
our own radio shows, at some point somebody's gonna go like, hmm,
somebody else might be better, or you might need a partner,
or I might need to do updates. What do you
tell your kids, like life's not fair, thatt me it's fair,
(10:49):
Or there might be actually a bigger plan in place,
and how you handle it speaks to who you are
and and fans and frankly media members not taking a
eth and realizing that what's going on all throughout sports,
like the tanking thing is real. It worked for the Astros,
it's working for the Sixers, it's going to work for
(11:12):
other teams that do it. And you're like, well, I
just I like Eli Manning and I think this is
he's handled himself. Well good, you know what he's supposed to.
Giving credit to Eli Manning for handling a benching the
right way is like you heard that Chris Rock thing
about about that about dudes like, yeah, handle my business
(11:33):
with my kids like you're supposed to. Don't ever say
your babysitting when you're watching your own kids and your
wife goes out, can't guys and babysitting. You're not babysitting,
you're parenting. You're not handling it. Well, you're being a professional.
This is your job. And oh yeah, by the way,
(11:53):
it's the giants job as well. To look out for
the future because the president isn't going anywhere. What is
gonna be what's gonna be proved by keeping keep throwing
Eli manning out there nothing nothing. Guys are just so
emotionally tied to people that grew up watching or cheering
(12:14):
for they maybe they feel bad Eli got a bad
rap and now Eli is getting pulled like, well, I
didn't want you to pull it. How do you want
you to fire him? Be sure to catch live editions
of The Doug gott Leap Show weekdays at three p m.
Easter noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I
Heart Radio app. Last night, Lebron James was ejected for
the first time in his NBA career. Here's Lebron in
(12:37):
the injection. Well, I think I'm one of the league leaders,
and pointing to Paint, I drive just as much as anybody.
It's like almost they trying to turn me into a
jump shooter. I can't be a jump shoot. I'm not
a jump shooter. You know. I watched the games every
single night, and I see jump shooters going to the
line multiple, double digit times every night. And I'm not
a jump shooter. And I get filed just like everybody
else do. So one time going to the line one time,
(13:00):
you know, three times or four times, that's that's not
that's not what it's about okay, Um, they want to
turn you a new jump shooter because everybody's playing you
to dry. Like, look, Lebron James is not the only
guy in the NBA that throws back his head, or
that holds his forehead every time he drives in there,
(13:22):
or that yells and throws up his arms. Um, James
Harden draws a ton of fouls, usually leads a league
in free uh in in free throws attempted and he
throws up his arms. And so I guess you you
asked a question. You're like, wait, why does James Harden
get more calls than Lebron James. Well, it's fair to
(13:45):
say that Lebron is known for selling some calls, right,
for acting like he got crushed. You We've we've gone
back enough and seen and seeing Lebron hold his forehead,
you know, like you go in there, you miss the shot,
you hold your forehead like your king for blood and
there is no blood. Whether it's because he's a victim
of super SlowMo and reps actually paying attention, whether it's
(14:08):
because he's so pronounced, and how he complains about it
last night, he deserved to get suspended, I mean to
get supended to get kicked ejected, to get kicked out
of the game. You know he thought he got fouled.
If you watched the replay of the one that set
him off, he didn't get fouled. And while running up
the court, he goes and he gets way too close
to an official, and then he he obviously used a
(14:28):
couple of the magic words, and the guy had had
enough and he got ejected with just one technical, which
you can, in fact do, But you can't be the
guy who's synonymous with throwing your head back, with holding
your forehead, with with laying on the ground a little
extra extra long and you didn't actually get hit. I mean,
this is boy who cried wolf stuff. How many times
(14:51):
can we see a replay to which it did not
look nearly as bad as Lebron sold it? UH with
without without questioning the validity of any call, of any call.
Harden leaves the league in in UH free throw attempts.
Then Jonice and the Dakompo, who I believe leads a
(15:13):
league in shots inside the paint. Anthony Davis, Dwight Howard.
Dwight Howard gets hacked a lot like Damian Little is
an interesting one. Because he shoots so many threes, but
he also he only shoots threes or right at the
right at the bucket DeMarcus Cousins per zingis uh shoots
a ton of free throw seven point to a game.
But yeah, they do want to turn him into a
(15:35):
jump shooter. He does shoot post shots, he does shoot
midrange jump shots. Like, let's not kid ourselves like Lebron
James as opposed to Jonas who can't Janice who cannot
shoot perimeter jump shots. He has no jumper at all.
He'll take a couple, but he really can't shoot. I've
never watched the game and thought, man, Lebron doesn't ever
(15:57):
get a call the the rules of basketball. Here's one
of the things that people don't point out about Jordan's
versus Lebron. The rules have changed to which it's very
offense friendly rules, and he has the perfect build for
those type of rules, right because now it's he creates
the contact. He goes down plays downhill, but it's called
(16:20):
downhill basketball. Well, your momentum is all going down towards
the basket, and you can't put a hand on him.
You can't hand check him out on the floor to
stop him. But because he's creating all that contact, he
didn't get as many calls. He plays bullyball, and nobody
likes a bully. Fox Sports Radio has the best sports
(16:40):
talk lineup in the nation. Catch all of our shows
at Fox sports radio dot com and within the I
Heart Radio app. Clay Hilton head coach of USC they
won their Division of the Pack twelve, getting ready for
the PAC twelve championship game. He joins us here on
the Doug Gotlup Show on Fox Sports Radio. Coach, how
are you doing well? Thanks for having the guests. Okay,
so let's let me just get your perspective before we
(17:01):
get to the rankings. Last night on your team, your
regular season is complete, how would you characterize your season? Um,
you know, tending to being able to finish strong in
November or second undefeated November was very satisfying. Uh. You know,
we've put ourselves in position. You know, you really want
to come in here undefeated or with one loss. But
(17:22):
in the reality is we have two losses and have
our last opportunity to be able to put our best
foot forward to put an exclamation on stamp on our
season with eleven with eleventh win. So playing a really
good Stanford team that's very hot in their own right
right now. Should be a great game and one word
looking forward to Uh, it's our first opportunity to have
(17:42):
a chance to win it and win that pack twelve
titles is two thousand and eight, and I know our
kids are excited about it. How different is Stanford now
from Stanford when you played them second game of the season. Um,
very different, to be honest with you. You know, I
think both teams have grown. Um where we have grown
our offensive skill and the maturity that has grown with
(18:03):
us as a football team. You see how they've grown,
especially defensively. I think they're playing wonderful football, especially the
last seven games. You know, the win over Washington and
Notre Dame really stick out to me. How well their
defense played. Changed a couple of things schematically that I
think has helped their personnel. And then the addition of
of kJ Costello down the stretch. Here you can see
(18:25):
coach Shaw in his play calling now mixing in both
run and passed. Where I thought he was um leaned
very heavily on Bryce Love early in the season. He's
doing a great job of mixing it up. And you
saw kJ throw for four touchdowns last week against Notre
Dame and a very balanced performance offensively. Look, your your
team has improved steadily. You've won your last four games,
(18:49):
obviously coming off the Notre Dame lass um. But one
of the reasons you played so well down the stretch
is that your quarterback has turned the ball over less. Right, Like,
he's cut down on some of the interception and some
of it was He's got a whole new group mostly
of wide receivers, completely different skilled position. And it's also
the first year to which he's been the starter of
the entire year. And and and you know, like, look,
(19:09):
I'm a little bit of Deshaun Watson. We're trying to
make some throws that maybe you shouldn't make because he
feels like he has to make plays When you watch film,
how much is Sam playing that definitively better or is
it just a case of receivers and luck that led
to the high interception numbers early in the year. No,
I think, hey, you know, early in the season, and
(19:29):
I'm played quarterback quarterback coach by trade, so I've got
a bias. I he's my kid too, so I've got
a little bias towards him. But when when I watch
it UM as a coach, I see a group of
receivers and skilled players that you know coming into the season.
I know we we would go through some growing pains
as they grew up, and and hopefully we were getting
(19:52):
some kids healthy, get us Stephen Mitchell healthy, get in
a Daniel Moore to baby healthy. And then all of
a sudden, about halfway through the season, we got healthy
and our younger kids started playing really good. Tyler Vaughan's
Michael Pittman getting Daniel Morre to baby back, and all
of a sudden, you know what Sam had done last
year up until all the way here, I see him
doing the exact same things. But as we grew as
(20:12):
a football team and matured as a football team, numbers
started getting better. And now you look up and he's
second in our league in passing efficiency, which is a
pretty darn good quarterback league. UM, and he's doing a
wonderful job. He's cut down on the interceptions over the
last eight games. I think he's throwing a total of
three UM and done done a wonderful job of leading
(20:33):
our team. And he does the most important staff to me,
he wins ballgames. Yeah, you know, like like they couldn't
been couldn't But the difference in him and Rosen. Rosen
looks great and makes some great throws, and at the
end of the end of the day Sam's teams, you
find ways to win when Rosen, who I think talent wise,
everybody likes. And I know there's other issues that play
(20:53):
there at u c l A. But you know they're
five and six and they lose. I want to ask
you quickly going back to last week, it's u c
l A um end of the first half, like, look,
he's in his only his second year as a starter.
How do you how do you coach him when he
makes an error in judgment the way he made at
the end of the first half. People don't remember the play.
He had just completed a yard passed Jante Burnette, got
(21:14):
ten seconds left. First down clock stops starts, so he
snabs the ball. He runs amround, makes a great play,
but instead of getting out of bounds or throwing the
ball away, so you kick a field goal to be
up seventeen seven and go into the half with a
two score lead, he ends up getting tackled U c
l A five Like three seconds to go and the
clock runs out, and you know you can see look
(21:35):
in his face like, you know, kind of a brain
fart there. How did you coach him in that moment? Well,
we always talk situational football, and there's actually there was
fourteen seconds left on the clock and and as soon
as he broke contain, usaid, oh no, because his competitive spirit,
commpetitive fire, and it's the mark of all the great ones.
They always feel like they can make the great play.
(21:56):
And that's what you love about Sam Donald. I mean
his competitive spirit and competitive fire. Um, it's one of
the reasons that make him so great. But he is
he is a work in progress. Um, that's what I
love about him. As talented as he is, he's still
got a very very high ceiling. Um. He'll tell you
he's not a finished product. And we learned each and
every with each and every rep, and in that rep,
(22:18):
being able to break contain and say, you know what,
it's not there. I'm gonna throw the ball away. I'm
probably gonna coach will probably give me another down, maybe
before this field goal, or I'll take the three points.
That's a learning lesson, and you know that's my job
as a as a head coach is to teach situational football. UM.
I put that responsibility on myself rather than the kid.
(22:39):
His job is to know assignments and to learn those situations. Um.
You know, and when when we mess when we mess
one up like that, I'd rather put the pressure more
pressure on me than him. That's a voice of Clay
Hilton is the head coach of the South Division Champions
of the Pack twelve USC eight one in League ten
and two overall, and you played only one Nonpower five
(23:00):
school the entire year. You look at the depth of
teams on your schedule and that has to be not like, look,
we played, we play. Everyone we played is a capable
opponent every week in which we played them. Um, I
mean the the only team that you avoided. It wasn't
your fault that you would have wanted to play with Washington, right.
I mean other than that, you got everybody, and you
got Washington State on their own, on their on their field.
(23:21):
I guess the when you saw the rankings come out
last night, what was your immediate reaction? Um, you know
that we have another game to play, and we continue
building our resume and trying to put our best foot
forward um, you know, and and you look up at
these conference games, championship games, I think they're gonna mean
a lot to the committee. I mean, you've got six
eight teams there that are all trying to build their
(23:43):
best resume, and there could be a lot of two
lost champions um. So we just got to focus on
our job trying to go WINNIPAC twelve title, put our
best resume together, which I think is in a really
really talented football league that's got nine nine Bowl eligible teams,
plays a Notre Dame, plays of Texas, plays quality football
teams on a week to week basis, and and see
(24:05):
how it pans out. And I don't worry about things
I can't control. The only thing I can control right
now is on Friday night, and that's what we're working towards.
Has there been any discussion about stance future. No. I
tell you what what we've what we promised ourselves early
early in the year, before we even got started with
the season, is we would only concern ourselves about our
(24:26):
team and our team success. And then after the season,
after trying to win a championship, you know that then
we would sit down as with the family, trying to
get as much information as possible so he can make
the best decision from for himself. You know, if the
game is so hard to win games, especially at the
college level, especially at this level, that if you don't
put all your heart and soul in your focus into
(24:48):
each and every week just trying to win the game,
you're not gonna have to worry about what accolades or
individual success happens. Just worry about the team success. And
I credit the kid. He's lived in the moment, He's
lived in the now. He doesn't even want to talk
about what the future might hold. All he worries about
is who were you playing on Saturday? What do I
have to do to help our football team? And it's
(25:09):
one of the reasons I love him to death. I mean,
he's a special kid. Clay Helton our our guest. If
you could create a perfect playoffs scenario, what would it be? What?
How would how would you form a playoff bracket to
which still makes the regular season mean as much as
the regular season means now, but also creates more of
(25:29):
a true championship format. Yeah, well, each year, I think
it's different, to be honest with it, because you don't
have to be a conference champion. We're good here. I
think sometimes you look up there, you may be ranked
one through four and you're like, man, I like this
four team playoff and it sometimes you're sitting here at
number ten, going, man, I wish there was an eight
team playoff. Um, but you know, right right now, coaches
(25:51):
are just responsible for winning games. And again, we don't
worry about the things that we can't control. We raise
eighteen to twenty one year old kids and and try
to win conference championships and see if it's good enough
to get us in that playoff. Um. All right, well, listen,
we wish you the best of luck in the PAC
twelve championship game. It's been fun to watch your team
(26:13):
play and appreciate you spending some time this year on
Fox Sports Radio. Thanks so much. You take care. That's
that Clay Hilton, head coach of the Men. The Men
of Troy. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays at three p m. Eastern noon
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app.
On Monday, the league, the NFL submitted to players the
(26:35):
final draft proposal that, according to documents, would contribute nearly
one hundred million dollars to causes considered important to African
American communities. The NFL hopes that this effort will effectively
end the peaceful, yet controversial movement started by Colin Kaepernick
when players refused to stand for the national anthem last season.
(26:59):
This would be a huge win for the players, right like,
hey man, we've been we've been kneeling, we've been protesting
because we want change to be made. At some point,
there has to be tangible change. And the only way
there's tangible change to be made is if somebody puts
some money towards something. Um. But here's the problem. Not
(27:22):
all the players are in agreement with the proposal. Some
of the players who actively protests since two thousand and
sixteen are displeased with the NFL's approach and planned to
break from the Players Coalition, a group of roughly forty
players to negotiate with the league office over how its
leaders have handled the negotiations. Malcolm Jenkins and Kwan Bolden,
(27:43):
regarded leaders of the coalition, Miami Dolphins safety Michael Thomas
and forty Niners safety Eric Reid tweeted um Wednesday that
they are withdrawing quote. The players Coalition was supposed to
be formed as a group that represents NFL athletes who
have been silently protesting social injustices and racism. However, Malcolm
(28:06):
and an quon that's Malcolm Jenkins and Kuan Bolden can
no longer speak on our behalf, as we do not
believe the coalitions belief are in the best interests of ours.
The NFL's multifaceted offer earmarks eighty nine million dollars over
a seven year period for both national and public and
local projects. According to the documents. On the national level,
(28:27):
owners this year would allocate five million dollars, with their
commitment growing annually, maxing out at twelve million per year
for two thousand one through two thousand twenty three. At
the local level, owners will put up two hundred fifty annually,
expecting players to match that amount totally five hundred thousand
dollars for each team. Yah. So um, here's here's been
(28:58):
The problem with the protest is there was there was
no plant with like let's just protest, Like, okay, what
do we you know? What do we want? Isn't that
the protest chant? What do you want? Freedom? When we
wanted now when we want and justice when we want
(29:19):
it now. This is like the NFL players are marching
like what do we want We don't know? When do
we want it yesterday? How do we want it? My money?
Where do you want to be spend no idea? Now,
the number a hundred million looks a little bit bigger
than it actually is. Right, it's a seven year deal
(29:42):
of at least eighty nine million dollars. That's not a
hundred million dollars, Like a hundred million is a hundred million.
And keep in mind that the players have to donate locally.
That's that's where some of the some of that money
comes from, which I'm sure is a sticking point, Like,
you know, the owners can donate, but I ain't donating.
(30:03):
I mean because players. It's like the guy who throws
the party by way, I through the party and I
gotta thrown for the food. I through the party. Yeah,
but you didn't throw them for the food dots my house.
There's the cost, Like, that's not really the way it works.
So this, this to me, kind of signifies a lot
of the issues with the players. Is it's a it's
(30:25):
a lot like, uh, this weekend is the my what's
it called the my shoe? Um, you know my Mike
cleats my cause. Mike cleats my cause weekend. Everybody has
a cause. This is one of those that like, I'm
somebody that the the celebrations this year have been so bad,
(30:46):
most of them that it's kind of proven the point
of the NFL right now. They're like, what, however, you
under group celebrations fine, and some of them, like people
like Duck Duck Goose, people go crazy that the sack races,
like the Kancie Chieftain sack races, then got beat. I
would never do a touchdown celebration when when I'm getting beaten,
(31:08):
what's the point spiked the football or handed to the
ref or put it in the give it to the
managers that you get your you can set it to
your mom. But there's so many there's such like you
get overly creative or a lack of creativity, or you're
just too cheesy, to which you're like, you know, I
kind of like the better when they just spiked the
football and they got in trouble for too many hip
(31:30):
thrusts that that's kind of the problem here with the NFL.
Like the other NFL. You almost wish they would have
had a hard line stance because at least the players
were then united. We don't want a hardline stance. What
do you want? We want social justice. We want justice
for all. Like, okay, here's a bunch of money. Where
do you want it to go? We have no idea
what you're really gonna give us money? Yeah? Yeah, how
(31:56):
are you gonna spend it? No idea. This is always
has been the issue with This is the issue with
the players when it comes to contract negotiations. Like you ever,
ever ever look at this thing, You're like, wait, why
did the players? If you look back to the last
time they signed the collected Barte agreement, they were less
than a week away from NFL owners having to cancel
(32:18):
preseason games and maybe two. If they had to cancel
preseason games, that would have cost the owners a ton
of money because those dates are blacked out by stadiums,
and everybody loses massive money if they don't have the
if they're not playing now, players would have lost their
preseason checks as well. But the only way to make
(32:38):
owners hurt is to hit him in the pocketbook, right,
So instead of agreeing to terms early or instead of
holding out late. They held out and then stopped holding
out and signed what many people believe to be an
okay or even bad deal. But the truth is owners
(33:00):
have the money and you don't, so at some point
you gotta go to work if you want to make
that money. But the reason that they can't ever get
what they want the you know, the the top level
players want the cap to be bigger, want bigger guaranteed contracts,
whereas most of the rank and file, most of the
(33:22):
guys who vote are making a couple of hundred grand
a year and they just want to find ways to
elongate their career. And you hear Michael Bennett talking about
quarterbacks making too much money, but quarterbacks actually make the league,
so they make a bunch of money. And quarterbacks want
all these protections so they can play and not get hurt.
On the other hand, in order to be protected, you
(33:42):
have to have offensive lineman practice more offensive. I'm like, dude,
my career is short enough, short enough as it is.
Let's cut down the practice time. That's why the first
month of the season so bad. They haven't practiced together,
haven't played together. But but players, you have no middle class.
You've got rich players and low income rank and file guys,
(34:02):
nobody in between, and those two sets of players can't
get along. You have all these different players with all
these different causes. They can't really get along. That's why
they have them just you know, one weekend you can
wear whatever shoes you want. And then with this deal,
you have so many woke NFL players that want to
do something to help the injustices of our society. And
(34:26):
when pressed, because they have the opportunity to get about
ninety million dollars, like, we have no idea exactly who
want to do, we'll have to meet on that. 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. He is
a host on Serious XM NBA Radio. You should listen
to him because he's got a ton of knowledge in
(34:48):
regards to how, why, and what's going on inside the association.
He's David Griffin, formerly of the Cleveland Cavaliers, their general manager.
He joined us on the Doug Gottlip Show. David, how
are you dog doing really well? Thanks for having me on. UM.
I wanted to ask you, you know you uh you
discussed um on your radio show and it's been picked
(35:08):
up nationally on how ultimately the trade of Kyrie Irving
to the Celtics won't be viewed as a good trade
for Cleveland because Kyrie is really, really good and the
likelihood is that, you know, Isaiah Thomas coming off of injury,
maybe even the top draft pick for the Nets. Like,
there's a lot of unknown and we know that Kyrie
(35:29):
is going to play well and and and be the
focal point at least at some point for the Celtics offense.
I guess my question is dowing back even further, like
when did these when did the feelings of unhappiness professionally
for Kyrie first kind of rear it's rear its head
when you were there. Yeah. So first, first of all,
(35:51):
just to address the first part when I when I
was asked the question, frank I Sola actually asked me
the question on his show with Scalabrini. And when they
ask me, they said, do you think it will be
historically viewed as a good trade for Cleveland? And I
don't think it will be historically viewed as a good
trade for Cleveland because even if they were to win
a championship. Even if Isaiah and Crowder are the perfect
(36:13):
fit in the short term, unless that Brooklyn pick turns
out to be unbelievably good, the likelihood is that because
Kyrie is twenty five years of age and is special talented,
they're going to continue to hear about how we can't
believe you traded Kyrie, and so historically, if the kid
plays another ten years, everyone's going to talk about what
(36:36):
a great deal of Boston got. That doesn't mean that
if you were playing the cards Kobe Altman and his
staff had, you wouldn't have done exactly what they did
because they checked an awful lot of boxes in that deal.
So the point I was making, or attempting to make,
and obviously that poorly, was it's the length of time
Kyrie is going to be special that's going to make
the historical bent look bad. It's not the trade itself.
(36:59):
Uh um, yeah, well, I think it's kind of similar
to that, Griffin, isn't it kind of similar to you
know people, uh want well wait a second, you traded
you know, the number one your number one pick to
get Kevin Love to Minnesota and now uh and now
you you look, what's happened up in Minnesota In terms
of like point, you're like, well, you don't remember that
at the time, Like, we got Lebron James, and we
(37:20):
wanted to win an NBA championship, and so you're not
gonna in an NBA championship with the nineteen year old
wing as opposed to we needed a versatile power forward
who could guard, who could rebound, who could would wouldn't,
wouldn't need to be an alpha with the basketball and
and that's why we made that move, right. Isn't there
some similarities to that trade? Oh, I see a lot
of similarities, and I think it's a good point by you.
(37:43):
I think again, the Wiggins trade is going to be
viewed as one for years and years where people will
say that we can't believe griff traded Andrew Wiggins for
Kevin Love. Well, that's because Wiggins can play five, seven
and more years than Kevin. But when the subset of
of criteria that you're using is we must win a
championship within the window. We have Lebron James and he
(38:06):
signed a one year deal. You play the cards you
have to play. You don't look at it in terms
of geez, how is this going to be viewed historically.
You look at it as we have a chance to
win a championship and we need to capitalize. Um. There.
You know, when when you were fired by when your
contract wasn't renewed by Cleveland, uh Lebron put out a
really really nice tweet of you know, in regards to
(38:29):
his time with you. Um, but I guess you know.
My question is always like, couldn't he couldn't you do
the Jimmy Chitwood. Couldn't he have said? You know, I stay,
Griff stays, I stay, Griff goes. I go like, is
that is that too much to ask? Right? Well, I'm
really gratefully didn't put me in that position because when
when we put out that it was a mutual parting,
(38:50):
that was absolutely true. So there wasn't a whole lot
that could have been done to keep me there, And
there wasn't much I'd have done to make Dan want
to keep me there. So when you're not locked together
on the vision of the future, the most important thing
you can do is to separate and do what's right
for the franchise. And Dan has every right to want
to do what he wants to do the way he
(39:11):
wants to do it, and in my particular situation, it
just was obvious we weren't the right ship for each other.
So I feel incredibly blessed that there was no pressure
brought to there on Dan to do something that maybe
he wouldn't have ultimately been comfortable with, because I've seen
this said many times, and it's true. If ownership, front office,
and head coach are not on the same page, you're
(39:32):
doomed to fail. And I think in this particular situation
that was a blessing for everybody. It's it's honestly, it's
no different than in college sports. You know, it's like
one of the things Tennessee is still looking for a
football coach. Why because the a D, the president, the boosters,
that the important owners are not all lockstep. And until
you you you are not going it's it doesn't mean
you're not gonna win. It makes it prohibitively more difficult
(39:54):
to win when everybody's not pulling in the same direction.
Fair comparison, yeah, I think it's very fair. But I
think what makes it even more convoluted in the situation
that the university is who knows which donor thinks they
should be the loudest voice, and they can continue to
try to be the loudest voice and give more here
and there, and you you never really know who you
(40:15):
need the people holding too. As a as a chancellor
and an athletic director, it's a really complicated situation. I
would think running a major university like that. Um. I'm
watching Lebron and he does appear to be more efficient. Uh.
He complained about not getting calls last night, which I
think all of America rolled their eyes. Although he's only
twentieth and free throw attempts. Um. It feels though that
(40:36):
that he like his game has been fine. Some of
his defensive movements not great. It's the it's the rest
of the team. What do you think of their overall
roster compilation, as they've been dealing with injured players and
new players and trying to fit them in and only
now has it started to hit with their winning games. Well,
it's it's funny that it finally came out that Lebron
isn't getting to the free throw line that much last year.
(40:58):
At one point during the year, we made the league
aware of the fact, and in the way that we can,
which is through the league channels, they enable you to
utilize the system to question officiating, and we used that
in house system and tried to explain that Lebron is
at that time that we sent it in. I wanted
to say it was twenty four and free throw attempts,
(41:19):
but he was number one in drives to the rim,
which is it's impossible to be that. So I think
in fairness to Lebron, he doesn't get a terribly favorable
whistle from a foul standpoint. He may get some other
beneficial things, and on the defensive end maybe gets away
with some things, but I think he does get hit
an enormous amount of the time and things are not called.
(41:42):
So I think that's part of the issue. Relative to
the Cavaliers team as a whole, I think Kobe Altman
and his guys did a great job of putting enough
depth there. And ironically, because Derrick Rose has been hurt,
they're they're almost benefiting from that because it forced them
to go away from a line up of Rose, Wade
and Lebron that may not have sit together very well.
(42:05):
Wait's now running point guard with that second unit and
they can continue to space shooters around the floor and
do what that whole roster was really put together, which
is playing space and pace and bang threes on you.
So they were being asked to do things they weren't
terribly comfortable with early, and I think because there's fewer
mouths to feed, it was easier to integrate the bench,
(42:26):
and Tyler and staff ended up with perfect rotations right now,
and that's a huge part of why they're winning. All right.
I don't want to ask you about Alonzo Ball. Obviously,
you know part of being a g M is player evaluation.
But you're not simply evaluating a player. You're evaluating all
the other factors, including how old he is, how much
time he's spent on the NBA floor. Here's the guy
who's never played pick and roll, he's never really played
(42:47):
solid defense, he's learning. Um. How much cause for concern
is there from your perspective as a former general manager
and a paid professional evaluator as to Alonzo balls first
year with the Lakers, I don't have a great deal
of concern at the moment because point guard, as you
know than anybody, Doug, is the hardest position to learn,
(43:08):
um to play as you go through the levels and
as you raise your level, figuring out how your role
is going to fit within. That's much more difficult for
a point guard than anything else, So I think you
have to be more patient with players that played that
position just as a baseline, and then you add to it.
This kid was hailed as the savior of one of
the most important franchises in our league, and he's playing
(43:30):
at home under the scrutiny that comes from having that,
plus a father who brings additional scrutiny to the situation.
I think if you look at his overall numbers minus
the shooting component, I think he's been everything you should
have expected him to be. He's he's just a kid
whose body hasn't even matured yet, and he's trying to
(43:51):
figure that part out let alone everything else he has
to deal with. So for me, I don't see signs
that make me concerned. What I see is a situation
that's going to be very, very difficult for him to
ignore the noise in and really just focus on his game.
I know you gotta run, but I gotta ask you
one more. And bead Or Simmons, if you had to
(44:11):
bet on one being a superstar longer, who would it be. Well,
I think just Simmons because I have more faith in
the health situation. If you guaranteed me Joel would be
healthy forever, I would stay Joel because what he does
is frankly I think revolutionary for the big man position.
I think what he's capable of has never really even
(44:32):
been seen on an NBA floor before. If he's completely healthy, um,
I mean you have to go back to the days
of of Will Chamberlain in terms of the dominance that
guy could have on Bolton's court relative to his his peers.
But again, putting that all together for the long haul
and staying healthy long enough to show it is is difficult. Here.
(44:54):
I'm on Serious x M NBA Radio. David Griffin, griff
anytime you want to just talk ball, let us know,
and uh, the floor is yours. Thanks so much for
joining us. You're on Fox Sports Radio. Thanks Doug, I
really enjoyed it. Pleasure is mine. David Griffin joining us.
Former Calves general manager,
Host
Doug Gottlieb
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