04-08-24 Hour 1 of Broncos Country Tonight

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to it, Broncos Country TonightPost Rockies edition. Benjamin all Bright here

(00:05):
with you. I hope you're enjoyingyour evening. Five six sixty nine zero
is the text line you guys wantto get involved in the conversation. Congratulations
to South Carolina game Cocks women's basketballteam, who beat Caitlyn Clark in Iowa
to complete a perfect season when thewomen's in Cuba Championship eighty seven to seventy

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five. Clearly South Carolina the bestteam in the nation all season and their
depth was just too much for Iowa. The loss ends a record breaking career
for Kaitlyn Clark. Leads is theold time score of bosth Men's and women's
NCAA basketball score thirty to lead Iowaon Sunday, but obviously not enough.

(00:49):
Chipped in eight boards five assists aswell. The reason I'm talking about that
is, you know, afterwards,I jumped online and as usual, well
saw the cesspool that is Twitter orX or whatever you call it. I'm
calling it Twitter. I'm not callingit X. I don't you know.
Sorry, Elan, You'll just haveto deal. I got on there and

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I saw the cesspool that was peoplebickering back and forth, and it leads
me to wonder, is framing everythingthrough the lens of who is the goat
ruining sports culture? Is framing everythingthrough the lens of who is the greatest

(01:37):
of all time? Ruining sports culture? Because as I looked online, I
had one giant group of people saying, well, Kateler Clark never won a
championship, she can't be the greatestof all time, which is stupid.
I mean, you could be thebest player and not be on a good
enough team, not be able tocarry four towl boys to a championship,

(01:57):
or in this case tell women,with all due respect to Iowa's basketball team,
like, I hate the way thatwe frame everything through that conversation.
Now is Dan Marino NodD in thediscussion for greatest quarterback of all time because
he didn't win a Super Bowl?Because Dan Marino was absolutely, by the

(02:20):
tools, one of the greatest quarterbacksof all time, by the numbers,
one of the greatest quarterbacks of alltime. So I hate the way that
we do that and the toxic culturethat emanates from that. Last year,
it was impossible to believe that bothLSU was a great basketball team and Katelyn
Clark was a great player, andthe same thing played itself out again this

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year with South Carolina. How isit implausible for people to figure out that
South Carolina is a phenomenal basketball teamand Caitlyn Clark he is a phenomenal player.
Why can't you hold both opinions?Why can't I not be worried about
arbitrarily defining nebulous terms like the greatestof all time? Why do I have

(03:07):
to quantify it? Why can't Iappreciate greatness in front of me? And
as usual, the Internet, ofcourse couldn't handle it. And so what
we get is a tox success poolof people bickering back and forth along arbitrarily
divided lines, sometimes Rachel, andit just baffles me. I look at

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this thing, and I'm like,you can appreciate greatness on both sides,
you know, city here and coveringthe broncos. I can appreciate the greatness
of Pat Mahomes, just like Icould appreciate the greatness of Tom Brady,
just like I could appreciate the greatnessof Peyton Manning. And does it matter

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who you're going to title the greatestof all time? Is it bad?
Do we need to really qualify that. Is having that definition intrinsic to appreciating
the greatness? Does it provide moreenjoyment? Does it make it better?
Even if you settle that question,is anything solved by settling that question,

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Because in settling that question, youreally have only settled it for yourself.
You're not settling it for anyone else. Sports talk, and a large portion
of sports talk, has become junkWho's on the mount? Rushmore of this

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who's the greatest at that? It'slazy sports talk. It's lazy talk and
jealous lazy debate. It's not evendebate. It's arbitrarily contrived content. To
my knowledge, I never been guiltyof it. I don't want to adopt

(05:01):
a wholier than that attitude. I'msure I've done plenty of lazy things in
my life, But I just Idon't understand how everything has got to be
something that's divisive. Why couldn't weall celebrate that women's basketball was front and
center for half a minute. Youknow, we were actually tuning in to

(05:24):
watch women's basketball. We all were. It's okay, you could admit it.
You could tell on yourself. Iknow you're listening right now. No,
I would never. Yeah, youwould, you did? We all
did. It doesn't mean I'm suddenlylike buying WNBA jerseys, but I enjoyed
watching women's basketball for a change.Okay, we all did. Branding personalities

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helps helps to build those kinds ofaudiences, giving you something to root for.
That's one of the things that forall the negatives about fantasy football and
gambling, it's that's what they've done. They've given you individuals to root for
them. We do, and oncehere's an individual to tune in for,
we do tune in. But whydoes it always have to be about why

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do we have to put a titleus She's the goat, he's the goat?
Well, okay, maybe why doyou think that? Or why not?
Okay? Now is anything solved byyou having that opinion? Tell me
what more enjoyment you got out ofthat game by knowing that Caitlin Clark was

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or was not the greatest of alltime? What did it enhance for you?
Nothing? So we spent pointless hourswith a ramped up rhetoric debating something
that did not matter. It didnot add an ounce of joy to your

(06:56):
life. You didn't you weren't happydebating. You were frustrated the other person
didn't see your point of view.You aren't happier now because you didn't change
any minds. No one ever changesanyone's mind. When's the last time somebody
changed somebody's mind? On the Internet, we pour countless hours into quibbling over

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the most trivial nonsense. Appreciate greatness, all of it. Appreciate greatness that's
on your team while it's there becauseit's fleeting. Appreciate greatness in your opponents
because it makes it that much moreworthwhile when you win, when you defeat

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that, when you find a gameplan and execute and it works, you
don't have to You don't have todown and play the accomplishments of anybody in
order to enjoy sport. There arealready enough things to bicker over. This

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world already has enough things in itthat are divisive. Sports and athletics are
supposed to be the thing that unitesus, the true meritocracy, a level
playing field for all, And somehowwe've decided to take that down. The

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first take called pizza whatever it's calledroad, the ruiner of all things sports
talk. When they started getting thepolitical guys putting the formats on these morning
shows. Goda made it unbearable tolisten to. I just get that stuff

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too. Do you hear what Skipperstephen a here, And with all due
respect to them, is they figuredout how to maximize an audience. And
if that's your goal, congratulations.If your goal is to continue to draw
in the maximum sized audience, thenthat's what your content is gonna be geared
toward. And it's gonna be clickbaitycontent. It's gonna be fake debates,

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it's gonna be goat arguments and Mountrushmoores. It's gonna be bad magazine,
radio or TV. I hate thatstuff. I just got. I hate
that stuff. I just don't havethe time for it. And that's not

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my goal anyway. I mean,you work at entertainment, and you're measured
by whatever you're measured by, andin this case, for us, it's
ratings, and so I have anappreciation for growing an audience, but this
is not my goal. My goalevery night is to sit here and entertain

(09:54):
and inform And I probably have thosetwo in verse order, because I want
to be informative. I want topass along to you guys the stuff that
I have information I have that youmay not, and vice versa via the
text line information you have that Imay not. I'm down to lord of
something because at the end of theday, we're all just dudes and chicks.

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Wanted to talk ball right, wantedto have a good time, wanted
to forget the stresses of work,the anger that we've built up at the
world around us over the course ofa day, and release that into something
hopefully fun. Hopefully that's what wedo here at the end of the day.

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I hope that everybody listening to thishas come away with something new.
Every day that I walk in andget in front of this microphone, I
hope that I come away knowing somethingI didn't before I got here. We
have great people that, you know, that help us out with all this,
Grant and Coover and you know,Nick and and I feel like,

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you know, I feel like alot of people treat this like, well,
I got to put this rundown togetherand I gotta I gotta program this
show. And you know that's that'snot I've never been about that. I've
never done that this way. Andthere are you know, there are people
that look at me horrified when Iyou know people that work in this industry
a long time, when I tryto explain what it is that we do
here do here is try to enjoyit, inform and enjoy. That's why

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I think I get so irritable whenpeople say that I hate Sean Payton.
I don't hate John Payton. Idon't. I've been more critical of him
than I've been of I think anycoach since I've been doing this particular thing
in Denver, and that's because SeanPayton's the first coach that we've had here
that wasn't a first time head coach. He advanced Joseph you had Vic Fangio,

(12:03):
you had Nate Hackett, Sean Paidencoached in the league for fifteen years.
So yeah, my criticism towards himis gonna be a little harsher.
I'm not gonna have as much leewayearly on because he's not learning things.
He already knows them. He's beenin the league at decade and a half.
He's been the top guy he knows. But I don't hate Sean Payton,
and I want Lebroncos to succeed.I want this to be fun.

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I want sports to be fun.How many little girls watching what should have
been a crowning moment in women's sportswere forever turned off by sports because you
had adults bickering, putting each otherdown over something they didn't need to put

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each other down about. Who cares? Is Kaitlin Clark the greatest of all
time? I don't know, certainlythe most prolific scorer. Do we need
to wad into the minutia of itis having or applying that arbitrary title which

(13:15):
isn't awarded by anybody but us individually, adding to anyone's experience. You could
say it, we all know theanswers now, So at the end of
the day, what are we doing? Let's find a better way to do
this? And for my part,I'm going to find a better way to

(13:39):
do this too. I'm gonna makesure that each and every time I'm up
here on this microphone, I'm notpresenting something lazily that's that same. We
won't have a bad segment here orthere. I might have an idea that
turns out not to be a goodone, but I want to make sure
that I'm giving you the maximum amountof effort that you're giving in listening to

(14:05):
the show. You're depositing your timewith me. I don't want to fill
it up with bickering over nonsense.I don't want to waste your time quibbling
over who's the greatest of all time? It doesn't matter. Did you enjoy

(14:33):
yourself, did you have fun?Did you bond with the loved one while
you were watching sports? A sonand a daughter. Did you get the
opportunity to create a cherished memory thatat the end of the day you're going
to hold deer and reflect on.Those are the things that matter. Because

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I can tell you there isn't amoment in my life and maybe I'm really
talking to me here because I thinkwe've all seen my social media. There
isn't a moment in my life whereI reflect on something and I say,
you know what, I'm really gladI had that argument on Twitter. I'm

(15:20):
really glad I showed that bozo Ieducated them. They didn't in any way
change their minds, but I gota couple of good digs in. There
hasn't been one time in the entiretyof my forty three plus years on this

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planet where I've sat there and saidI'm sure glad I spent that extra time
on Twitter creating the mount Rushmoar ofquarterbacks. I can't reflect on anything I've
ever done in programming a segment.I can't find one memorable segment where we've

(16:08):
had a top four of anything ora goat conversation, except for that time
we talked about goat yoga and GiovanniCarmazzi. That one was pretty funny.
So my point is this sports issupposed to be fun. Sports talk,

(16:33):
I feel like, is supposed tobe fun. It's supposed to give you
a safe space to lement certain things. But in the end, it's supposed
to be fun. We're not doingany goat conversations here. We're not doing
any mount rushmoors here. Listen toBroncos Country Tonight, Koa, go back
to It, Broncos Country Tonight,Benjamin all right here with you Post Rockies

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Edition five, six six nine zerosA text line. I got a couple
of good texts coming in there.Appreciate you guys putting up with my extended
rant in the last segment. Ijust want this stuff to be fun.
I want it to be I wantedto inform, but I want it to
be fun. And I'm tired ofvitriol. I'm tired of the negativity.

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I'm tired of it all. Sowe're going to do our best to keep
it fun. And speaking of fun, we need to talk about what John
Calipari did. Speaking of basketball,John Calipari left Kentucky and it's going to

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take over as the new head basketballcoach at the University of Arkansas, and
a lot of people are confused bythat. Calipari had been at Kentucky for
fifteen seasons. He had won quitea few championships in the SEC. Done

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very well there. I mean,if you're a Kentucky you're expected to.
But it hadn't hadn't been great lately, been bounced by Saint Pete in Oakland
the last two years. And thatis not yet it done at Kentucky.

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He did win a championship back intwenty eleven twenty twelve. He's been to
quite a few elite eights, twofinal fours in addition to that national championship.

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I'm pretty sure I'd have to goback and look. I'm pretty sure
there were two seasons they didn't makethe tournament. One of those was when
postseason was canceled due to COVID andthen I think after they won the championship,
was it to twenty twelve. Ithink the next season I think they
were in the NIT But other thanthat, Kentucky was always always there Memphis

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before that. So Arkansas is gettinga good coach, but Kentucky I think
had been ready to move on.The Calipari success had not really been the
same since before. Covid says beforethe nil, some coaches on the football

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side they figured out, hey,look I'm not cut out for this.
I'm getting out the game. Wesaw what happening, Nick Saban and I
all changed the way you recruit,and some coaches were not prepared for that.
We're not cut out for it.I still think John Caliparr is a
heck of recruiter, but it hadnot been the same. And you know,

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to be honest with you, thelast three years, well four seasons
really they went nine to sixteen intwenty twenty one, and then the last
three seasons they'd made the tournament combinedthirty nine and fifteen on the regular season,

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but got bounced in the round ofsixty four there out of thirty two
and the rout of sixty four againby teams like Saint Pete Oakland, Kentucky
was ready to move on. Iwas talking to people with that are fans
of that, you know that areaffiliated with the Kentucky program as this thing

(21:10):
was kind of breaking yesterday, andyeah, I was kind of the same.
It's kind of one of those thingslike Arkansas is getting a good recruiter,
question is whether or not he cancoach, and that it was kind
of a win win for both parties. Traditionally speaking, going from Kentucky to

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Arkansas would be a step down.In fact, back in nineteen eighty five
it went the opposite way when Kentuckyhired Eddie Sutton, and Sutton had to
quote, I would have crawled allthe way to Lexington. Kentucky has a

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high bar. It's gotten to thepoint where it's like it's like the U
used to be in football in Miami, where the bar had gotten so high
that if you don't win at acertain level, they're going to they're gonna
get to the point where they wantto move on. Col's recruiting class has
always had style and flair. Yougot to witness John wall at the Davis

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Devin Booker four trips to the Finalfour, only one national title though,
put a lot of players in theNFL or NBA, But Kentucky really has

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fallen out of favor with him sincetwenty eighteen. They took that loaded thirty
eight no team to the national semifinals and then got upset by Wisconsin and
it just wasn't the same after that. They've won one NCAA tournament game since
twenty nineteen, and there's a higherbar set at Kentucky and Calipari I think

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was a little frustrated that there wasn'ta larger nil commitment, and now he's
getting that five year deal at Arkansasworth eight million, seven and a half
to eight million dollars a season insalary and another seven and a half million
to eight in NIL commitment for him. I think that's I think that that

(23:36):
is what he's looking for. Ithink that he wanted that sort of commitment.
Obviously, the biggest booster at Arkansasin this case, John Tyson.
Tyson foods familiar with with Calipari.They're they're they're sort of friends. So
after Eric Musselman bolted for USC,Arkansas comes up with probably the best get

(24:03):
that they can get, and Kentucky, who wanted to fire cow but didn't
want to pay the thirty three milliondollars that it would take to buy him
out of his contract. Gets tomove on for free. They don't have
to pay the money. And it'skind of interesting because this contract didn't have
a buyout like cal could have lefton his own at any point. The

(24:25):
university had to buy him out ifthey wanted to fire him, and so
this sort of creates a situation that'sthe best of all worlds. The biggest
question is how many of his toprecruits are going to jump out of the
deals with Kentucky they have and headto Arkansas. Will he be better at

(24:45):
utilizing the portal? These days incollege basketball, the two biggest things are
NIL deals in NBA development period,point blank, end of discussion. Being
blue blood doesn't really matter much anymore. Teams are built via the nil and

(25:10):
transfer portal. Anyone can buy aplayer, not just shoe companies or old
established under the table recruiting operations.Kentucky still remains a major brand without Calipari.
It'll be interesting to see who fillsthose shoes, whether it's Dan Hurley
or Chris Beard or whomever. Butthis is a rare situation where you get

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a win win, I think whereeverybody wins five six, six, nine
zeros A text line, get ussome football here. One of the players
that I had touted that the Broncosshould look at, Texas defensive tesch Tovandre

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Sweat. On Sunday, News brokethat Texas defensive tackle Devondre Sweat was arrested
for d w I k x A. N News reported he was arrested in

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Austin, booked a Travis County jailat two twelve pm. By the way,
driving well intoxicated, Class B misdemeanor, bond set of three grand.
Sweat's a big nose tackle, wasa big twelve D Player of the Year
Outland Trophy. Not a big sackguy, but at the at the nose

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able to, you know, tokind of push the pile and be something.
I think that the Broncos have hopedthat Mike Purcell and you know and
others would fill You. Put himwith DJ Jones and Zach Allen Allison,
you got a pretty good front threeeating up those blocks and for advance Joseph
defense, that's essential. For advanceJoseph defense, you've got to have big

(27:07):
space eaters up front. They're eatingup those blocks so those linebackers can shoot
the gaps, and I think DevandreSweat would have potentially beten that guy.
Sweat is a h a big dude, three hundred and sixty six pounds,

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But now it's gonna be uncombent onteams interested in him to ask some questions,
like, for starters, why wasSweat allegedly driving drunk at two in
the afternoon on a Sunday? Howmuch alcohol does it take to get a

(27:52):
three hundred and sixty six pound manabove the legal limit at point oh eight.
Sweat was a guy who already hadto answer questions about his partying early
in college, told teams that thatstuff was behind him. Apparently it's not.

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I think a lot of teams areconcerned. What am I bringing in
here? This is a guy who'salready going to be a weight management guy.
What happens when I give this guya bunch of money? What if
you're the general manager of the draftsand he drives drunk and he kills somebody?

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What in your decision making matrix thinksit's a great idea to go have
too much to drink and go drivingthree weeks before the draft. And it's
not like you don't have an examplethere in state dak Prescott at a duy
he went on to have no issues, but he had one right there prior
to the draft. You have onestaring you in the face. As an

(29:07):
NFL prospect, your job is tokeep your nose clean an ace a month's
long job interview. Devandre Sweat didnot do. That. Harkens back to
the days when the Green Bay Packerssigned Coran Robinson, who blew multiple chances

(29:30):
in Minnesota, finally by drunk drivingand leading the cops on a high speed
pursuit. I don't know if everybodyremembers that one or not. And look

(29:52):
that one up, charged with DWIand feloony fleeing its back in u August
the two thousand and six I believemade the Pro Bowl after alcohol problems had
derailed his career. In Seattle,police clocked his blue BMW Sidan doing one

(30:15):
hundred miles an hour to fifty fivemile an hour zone, refused to stop,
and was finally arrested by police tenmiles away from where the Bright Vikings
hold their training camp. Was chargedof fleeing police. Two DWI and three
other misdemeanors. Field test measured hisblood alcohol at point one point one.

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You just have to make sure thatyou're not getting a guy who's going to
present those kinds of problems. Sweatwas a guy who was already projected as
a Day two draft pick, andthat may be something that pushes him down
draft boards. Rightfully, So ifyou're a general manager, your job is

(31:03):
on the line here. You takinga guy who was known to have partying
issues early in his collegiate career,looked like he finally put it together in
his final season. He got onejob, and that's to get prepared for
the NFL draft. And he's outthere drinking during the day on a Sunday.

(31:26):
Bro you're drunk driving at two inthe afternoon on a Sunday. I
think I'd have some questions, andSweat was somebody I wanted here in Denver.
Felt like Vance and Sean Bayden couldhave, you know, kept him

(31:48):
in line. I feel like havingthat big body here at the nose as
a space heater would have been hugefor this defense. Probably not to be
now, although to be fair,the Broncos do have most of their picks

(32:14):
outside of the top one fifty,and I guess he could follow that way.
Now, I just don't understand.I don't understand having everything in front
of you and knowing like all Ihave to do is make it to this
day and get drafted. Teams willhave questions, Teams will have a lot

(32:39):
of questions for him, and hestill has some visits lined up. I
don't I don't know how that's gonnago. It was a quick note today
about the Chargers being interested in MarquezValdez. Scantling started his career four seasons

(33:02):
in Green Bay, past two incase C win his Super Bowls, Chiefs
didn't want to pay twelve million tokeep him this year. With the Chargers
cutting Mike Williams and trading away KeenanAllen, Valdez Scantling is one of the
few available options with some name recognition. The Jets seem to have abandoned the

(33:25):
Aaron Rodgers friends and former teammates planmay not have many other options. The
Charger is going to be scary man. This is not gonna be a pushover
football team at the Broncos who justwhizzed passed the last couple of years,
the Broncos cut wins over the Chargerswith Drew Locke run on the show.

(33:47):
Jim Marvel is going to have thatteam ready to play and you know,
getting some speed in there, whichthey do need. It's been a problem
for that team for the last fewyears. I think could be beneficial.
They're going to be a ground andpound team with Gus Edwards leading the way.
But you've got Herbert there and hecan throw. Now that scantling would

(34:12):
give him somebody to build off ofplay action, get him the deep ball.
Be interesting to see what that numbercomes in at this Nebroncos country tonight
right here on Kawa Say fifty amninety four one FM News Talk Sports,