October 2, 2025 • 44 mins
DP and the Danettes discuss Mason Miller's performance against the Cubs and how fast the average fastball velocity might climb in the coming decades. Legendary sportswriter Peter King gives his pro-NFL tie case and hails the Big Red Machine as one of the greatest lineups of all time. HOF broadcaster Al Michaels shares the worst stadium to call an NFL game and previews tonight's TNF matchup between the 49ers and Rams.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You are listening to the Dan Patrick Show on Fox
Sports Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
I'm watching yesterday and watching last night. I'm fascinated by
Mason Miller. He he is the Padres closer, and when
he's on the mound, he's bringing three digits. It's one
hundred miles an hour. Fifteen total pitches were one hundred
or more miles per hour by the Padres versus the
(00:25):
Cubs yesterday. Eleven of the fifteen were by Mason Miller,
seven in the seventh inning, four in the eighth inning,
four by Robert Suarez, all in the ninth inning. They're
just bringing in one oh four point five on the
FM dial. I mean, it's impressive. And if you wonder
why they have a you know, they're going to be
(00:47):
a pitch count because there are more guys throwing, you know,
more than one hundred miles an hour. Now it I
mean it's jumped up almost five miles per hour. That's incredible.
We'll have more on that coming up, but you know,
I started to look at just the velocity with the
Padres bullpen. They had fifteen pitches of over one hundred
(01:08):
miles an hour. Last time that happened the Yankees game
three of the alds when they had twenty eight of
those pitches, and with Miller, Miller's faced nine batters, eight
strikeounts and he hit somebody sixteen of his forty pitches
or one hundred miles an hour or greater. Now, it
used to be that you would have a couple of
(01:29):
guys who threw hard. I go back to Bob Feller,
I go back to Nolan Ryan and Nolan Ryan. You
know the jugs gun. He probably threw one hundred and
four hundred five miles per hour. But there is a difference,
and I remember we've asked pitchers before, what's the difference
between ninety six and one hundred, and hitters will tell
you there is a big difference with that. But everything
(01:53):
is the speed and how often I see that. And
that's where you'll see guys get locked in. They'll say,
throw me that fastball. All hit that eventually catch up
to that. Breaking ball. That's different. Breaking ball will withstand
the test of time. Fastball they can turn on it
because they'll see it. You see one hundred mile an
hour fastball more often. It used to be you'd be like,
(02:15):
oh my gosh, I don't see anybody throwing like that.
Now it's commonplace. Now everybody's built that way. You're encouraged
to throw as hard as you can for as long
as you can, and then they kick you to the curb.
Tommy John Surgery, come on down. Somebody else is going
to come on in fewer innings. Now it's about you
(02:37):
get in. Throw as hard as you can, and then
we'll bring in somebody else. Throw as hard as you can.
I always wondered why pitchers would start out, and I
talked to Kurt Shilling about this many years ago. I said,
why do you throw harder the longer you're in the game.
He said, well, those pitches mean more. And I'm loose,
(02:57):
like I'm you're you're building up momentum. My nickname in
high school was fast but won't last, and that had
to do with pitching as well. Basel. Yes it is,
and I could throw really hard, but I couldn't throw,
you know, for a long period of time. It'd be
like seven pitches. Be like man, that guy, you know,
he can throw hard, and then all of a sudden,
(03:19):
I have a noodle arm. After that, these guys come in,
they know I got about fifteen or twenty pitches. That's
how how long I can go and then you'll bring
in the next guy. So starting pitching used to be
you were going six or seven in announcers are shocked,
like I'm a moto. He came back for another inning
and the announcers were like, oh, he's coming back. It's
(03:42):
just sixth inning. But it's just different now. The days
of finesse feels like long gone. But you still have
that breaking ball. That breaking ball is the great equalizer
in my opinion, and you see that with these guys.
You can have a fastball, but you better have a
breaking ball, something off speed, because if not, they lock
(04:03):
in and that's where you go. That's one hundred and
four mile an hour fastball, and he took it deep.
They can. They're geared for that, even these pitching machines.
When we were at the Super Bowl and we were
at the Giant's facility in Scottsdale, and we asked them,
they had the jugs gun down below the stadium and
we went down there to take BP one day and
(04:27):
I said, can you make that throw like Clayton Kershaw curveball?
And they said yes, like they've gotten it. So it's
not just they're throwing fastballs. They can throw off speed pitches,
they can throw breaking balls, they can throw sliders. That's
what amazed me because it's like even us, you know,
with an eighty five or ninety mile an hour fastball,
you can put your bat on it. But if you say, hey,
(04:50):
I'm not going to tell you what's coming, and then
all of a sudden, you know you're up there and
your legs give out. That's that's what's still amazing. That's
why Clayton Kershaw can still pitch the way he pitches
because he has that breaking ball. Now you have to
keep him hon Us with a fastball that is at
least in the nineties, but now and you're watching these
guys like I would too. PAULI text me to say,
(05:10):
Mason Miller's coming in. I went over to watch the game,
and he looks the part of a guy who throws
one hundred and four miles an hour. He looks like
he could be, you know, a linebacker. But that's baseball now,
and you saw that yesterday and last night. These guys
throw hard for as long as they can.
Speaker 3 (05:31):
Yes, Marvin, remember when Tim Linskin came on the scene
and everyone was like man, he's so slight. How is
he going to be able to last that long? Because
all these guys, just like you said, Mason Miller looks
like a linebacker.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Now, these guys got to be big. Also, well, you
still get that guy that defies logic. Where you go,
how does that guy throw that hard? And there are
certain guys like Pedro Martinez, to me, is one of
the most fascinating pictures of all time, one of the
greatest pictures of all time, one of the most underrated
pictures of all time, because if you meet him, he's slight,
(06:03):
but he had that ability. He was able to make
that ball move, but he also had velocity. Even when
you're around Mo Rivera, like you're standing next to him
and I'm going that guy is the greatest closer of
all time. And he doesn't look like he's a baseball player.
It's just like, oh, what do you do for a living? Uh?
You know, I'm a closer for the Yankees. You know,
(06:26):
enter Sandman. Oh okay, but that's the fascination you have
with baseball. There's certain guys who can do certain things
with the baseball that we can't. But what they're teaching
now is go out there and they've studied it's physics,
it's probably geometry, algebra, math, all that thrown in there.
Spin rate, you know, that's why you get that. You
(06:49):
want a little bit of tackiness on the ball, so
you get that spin rate there. Pitchers would complain about
that early in the year, but it's fascinating to watch
it really is. Yeah, Pauling, That's what I'm curious about.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
Is it the natural human development or is it things
like less ending so you could throw harder, more often,
better medical advice, better workout routines. Because in two thousand
and two, the average fastball Major League Baseball was eighty
nine miles per hour. Now it's ninety four. It's gone
up five miles an hour in less than a generation.
Does that mean it's going to keep going that way?
(07:21):
It's hard to know.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
I would have to talk to somebody who is in
physiology or smart people.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Yeah, See, if you can get somebody at Yale who
can join us this morning, we'll do Satan. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (07:33):
I think a lot of it is just how good
we've gotten at breaking down the mechanics rather than anything else.
You have such slow motion, you know, and graphics and
technology and all of this stuff that you're able to
understand if you're pushing off at the right angle, you're
doing all of these different things and the leverage that
your body creates or the torque that it creates to
(07:55):
throw the ball. I think we've gotten so good at
just figuring that part of it out. I don't know
how much better you can get at it, but I
think that's a big part of it.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
When we go to spring training, or I used to
go to spring training, I always love to see what
pitchers were doing, because you know, hitting hasn't really changed
other than you know, you're swinging up on the ball.
You know, you're trying to launch the ball. Launch angle
is the big one. But with pitchers, there's always these
different kind of routines, exercises they were doing, Like they
(08:25):
would take a towel and then they would you know,
have the pitching motion and they were just you know,
holding onto a towel, snapping the towel. Yeah yeah, And
I'm like, wow, okay, but you're seeing all of these
different things, and it goes back to Mark Pryor when
he was with the Cubs, like these are things that
guys have been doing and Tom House, who's a former
(08:47):
reliever with the Braves. He's a pitching coach, but he's
also helped Tom Brady. He helps a lot of these
quarterbacks and how you throw the football, you know, how
you torque all those things, and teaching a lot of
this modern phillot. It's like the golf swing. When you
look and somebody is hitting the ball less than three
hundred yards, we go, man, what's wrong with him? Okay?
(09:11):
Now it's you know, the shamba hit a three seventy two,
and we go, did he get all of it? Rory?
Some of these other guys, we're shocked when somebody doesn't
hit it three hundred yards. But that's technology. But that's
also understanding. They're using the ground now. It starts from
the ground up. It's not how fast you can swing
your arms or how fast you move your hips. You know,
(09:33):
you look at John Rahm, it doesn't even look like
he's finishing his backswing. They've studied this. It is a science.
It's not boy, he's just naturally gifted. Rory's naturally gifted,
so is Tiger. But they did understand how do I
get more distance? How do I get and how do
I compress the ball, the accuracy, all of those things.
(09:53):
That's what they're doing with every sport. It can be
kicking a soccer ball, kicking a football. In fact of
which Vic Fangio. Vic Fangio was talking about kickers and
he compared them to the steroid era in baseball. Have
that for you coming up. Also, Sean Payton is facing
(10:13):
the Eagles this weekend. He defends the toush push. We'll
have that for you coming up. We got a lot
of things to get to today. Your phone call is
always welcome. Will settle on a poll question. We'll discuss
that and the greatest lineups in baseball history. And I'm
talking about not Hall of famers, lineups that have MVP
(10:33):
winners in him. We'll talk about that as well. I
think I said in them. I don't think that's a word.
I think it's in them. Everyone gets in them. Yeah,
outam in them.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
Be sure to catch the live edition of The Dan
Patrick Show weekdays at nine am Eastern six am Pacific
on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 6 (10:55):
Hey, this is Jason McIntyre. Join me every weekday morning
on my podcast Straight Fire with Jason McIntyre. This isn't
your typical sports pod, pushing the same tired narratives down
your throat every day. Straight Fire gives you honest opinions
on all the biggest sports headlines, accurate stats to help.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
You win big at the sportsbook.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
And all the best guests.
Speaker 6 (11:16):
Do yourself a favor and listen to Straight Fire with
Jason McIntyre on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
We were talking about great lineups in baseball history and
how many teams have MVPs in their lineup. You of
course have show a tany Freddie Freeman and Mookie Betts
with the Dodgers. We talked about the Big Red Machine
because those guys won their MVPs with the Reds when
you had Rose and Morgan and Bench and Foster Peter
(11:50):
King who covered the Reds. I believe for a little
while in Cincinnati, longtime NFL writer, where do you rank
the Big Red Machine as far as lineups of all time?
Speaker 7 (12:01):
Dan, It's got to be in the top five, clearly.
I think it's hard because you have to rank lineups
as you know, in their era, So I don't know
how a lineup could be much better, any better? Than
what the Yankees put on the field with Garig and Ruth.
(12:23):
But the difference with this Reds lineup is that, you know,
look a lot of times, obviously the pitcher's still hit.
You have Davy concepcionn betting eighth, you know, sometimes maybe
Caesar Geronimo. But I mean, you know, they they had
an all star batting eighth a lot of times, and
(12:44):
I don't know, to me, I thought it was so
dangerous and that was such a potent group. And you're right.
I covered them on and off for four years in
the late seventies and early eighties as an intern, and
and then I mean I actually went on the road
with the Reds three times in eighty eighty one and
(13:06):
eighty two, and so I got to know those guys.
I got to know Johnny Bench, got to know Tom
Seavers some and they were they were totally fearless. That's
the thing I loved about him. You know, I just
love the fact that Tony Perez conceptsi on, Hey, bring
it on, we love it.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
You know, we've been talking about Shoho Tani that he
has this added advantage that he's able to pitch, so
no matter what you do, hitting he's gonna be a
great hitter, but he always has that, and I'm wondering
if that translates to the NFL that Josh Allen and
Lamar Jackson have the added element of running as well
(13:49):
as being really good passers, and how that gives them.
Does that give them a little bit more of a
head start when it comes to MVPs.
Speaker 7 (13:58):
Yeah, I mean, sho he, Otani to me is the
guy in the NFL who'd be like him. Maybe is
Travis Hunter at some point, because you've always had mobile quarterbacks.
I mean, you know, he had Michael Vick running for
in Colin Kaepernick running for one hundred yards in playoff games.
(14:18):
I was at lambeau Field in I think O two
when Michael Vick came in and be far of twenty
seven to seven in the snow, and he did it
with his legs just as much as his arm. So
that has existed. Otani is so special because he's not
just a pitcher. I mean he might be at his
(14:41):
p I mean, he might be Garrett Kroschet. I mean, hey,
Garrett Crochet might be sho Hey. I mean, because I
don't want I don't want to demean show. Hey, Otani
because man, he's great. When I'm really looking forward next year,
I hope that we could see him pitch seven or
(15:02):
eight innings every fifth day.
Speaker 8 (15:06):
I hope.
Speaker 7 (15:06):
I have no idea what his body can take, but man,
what a treat it is to watch him play.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
All Right, So I get a random text from you
yesterday saying, basically, am I the only guy who is
affiliated with football who is okay with a tie in overtime?
Speaker 7 (15:23):
I actually liked ties? I mean the biggest reason, Dan,
I'll take you back to twenty twenty one. There was
one tie in the NFL that season. Pittsburgh tied Detroit sixteen.
All okay, that was you know, that was I mean
Detroit either was winless at the time or whatever. They
(15:44):
were a bad team at that time, but there was
a tie sixteen sixteen. At the end of the year,
the Steelers record was nine seven and one, okay. And
that season there were three teams in the AFC that
were nine and eight, the Chargers, the Colts, and the Dolphins.
(16:07):
So just imagine. And the Lions had a field goal
in overtime that they missed. So imagine if the Steelers,
if that field goal had been good and the Steelers
would have lost. I don't know who would have won
the tiebreaker, but it would have been a four team tiebreaker.
A tie basically eliminates a tie. At the end of
(16:28):
the seat, you know, you're either north of the Mason
Dixon line or south of it, but it eliminates it.
And plus, here's the other thing, Dan, that game the
other night was incredibly fun and at the end of it, Now,
if you're if you're a fan of one of the
two teams, you know, Green Bay or Dallas, maybe you're
(16:51):
ticked off that you And if you're a player, you're
ticked off that you got a tie. I mean, how
can a fan just watching at home, you see the
bizarre end the clock stop with one second left and
they're able to kick a field goal. How can you
be upset at that? I mean, it was fun. It
(17:11):
was scintillating the whole time. So I don't know. I mean,
I bet that was a lot more fun than the
sixteen sixteen tie between Pittsburgh and Detroit. That was a
fantastic football game.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah, it was a great meal, but I gotta have
dessert in coffee. And when we didn't get that, I
want to have. I'd like to have, you know, a
winner and a loser. That's why we play these games,
to win or lose.
Speaker 7 (17:40):
But but it's so unique, it's so I mean, you know,
there's they don't There isn't even on average one tie
per season. I think it's kind of cool. My grandson, Freddy,
who's a huge football fan, he's seven years old, about
to turn eight, and he watches all the games. And
(18:03):
he got up Monday morning to get ready for school,
and you know, my daughter said, hey, there was a
tie last night Green Bay in Dallas. A tie? How
does that happen? I can't believe it a tie? So
I don't know. I think once in a while, different
is fun.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
If I task you with make overtime, how you would
want to make it? Let's say it's different than what
it is now? Is how would you improve overtime?
Speaker 7 (18:29):
Well, you know, the selfish person in me would want
them to just play sudden death, don't have a clock
in overtime. The problem with that is, and I very
much empathize with the players I am. I was dead
set against a seventeenth game. I am deador set against
an eighteenth game. It's just not fair to these players.
(18:50):
It isn't You're adding on six percent more snaps for
a starting player and saying, ah, there's not any more
injury risk. Of course there is, so I understand why
you don't want to add more snaps to overtime. Selfishly,
I would like to see it go until it ends.
But I don't think right now, in my opinion anyway,
(19:14):
that there's a better system than this system that there is.
The only way you could do it differently is to
have first score wins, which I think is eminently unfair.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I'm wondering if the tush push is esthetically not pleasing.
Seeing kickers kick all these field goals is not esthetically
pleasing either. In my opinion, does the NFL how much
of it? Should they be worried about the glut of
kickers being so great at what they do.
Speaker 7 (19:46):
I would be because they didn't create this game to have.
I mean, let's just say Dan that you're playing the
Dallas Cowboys and your kicker skitter's one out of bounds
and you get the ball. You know, the Cowboys get
the ball at their own forty yard line. Think about it.
(20:07):
They need ten yards to get Brandon Aubrey and field goal.
It's and again, let's say they get it at the
run it back to the twenty eight. You know, they
only need twenty two to twenty three yards to get
him in field goal range, and not just a maybe
field goal. He is likely to make a sixty six
(20:28):
sixty seven yard field goal, you know, in in weatherless conditions.
I think the one thing the NFL has to look at.
And you know, and I don't really cover this obviously
now I'm retired, but I I've been reading about how,
you know, some of the balls that get broken in
the kicking the k balls they get broken in better
(20:53):
than they did before. And they're going to have to
look at that to see if that is a big factor,
because kicking a well worn football is much better for
a kicker than kicking a football right out of the box.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
I know you voted for the Hall of Fame. For decades,
there's been a lot of conversation about Russell Wilson. Can
you play your way out of the Hall of Fame? Now,
I don't know if you had russ in the Hall
of Fame in your opinion, but have players played their
way out of the Hall of Fame?
Speaker 7 (21:24):
I think so, and I think coaches can coach their
way out of the Hall of Fame. You've got to
consider a guy's entire career. I think Russell Wilson was
a borderline quarterback for the Hall of Fame. We have
to remember a few things right now about the quarterback position.
Look at the incredible glut of strong quarterback candidates for
(21:48):
the Hall of Fame. I mean, I think Eli Manning
is a strong candidate. Matthew Stafford is going to be
a strong candidate, Matt Ryan is a candidate. You've got
a lot of people who areates, who've put up really,
really good numbers. What differentiates you? And now we have
seen Russell Wilson be disappointing in Denver, kind of get
(22:11):
run out of Pittsburgh when they needed a veteran, they
didn't choose to resign him. And he has, you know,
two out of three ignominious weeks with the Giants and
loses his job. It's it all has to factor in
Dan it would you know. I think he and again
we'll see. I think he's got an uphill fight, but
(22:34):
then again, his career is not over.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Yeah, I think Russ was far more consistent than Eli.
You got ten Pro Bowls back when it did mean
something to be a Pro Bowl player.
Speaker 7 (22:43):
I'm not sure it did mean something in twenty ten
years ago. Dan, I don't think the Pro Bowl has
meant anything in twenty five years.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Okay, but he did. He was a better He's a
better regular season quarterback. His stats aren't. It's not even close.
Eli is an inch away from having one Super Bowl
with David Tyree's catch, and Russell is an inch away
with Malcolm Butler from having two Super Bowls.
Speaker 8 (23:11):
Blah blah blah.
Speaker 7 (23:14):
You know so what, I don't care. Could we go
back to the championship game in nineteen fifty eight and say, well,
what if Johnny Unitas hadn't made such and such a pass,
a miracle catch by whoever?
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Raymond Berry?
Speaker 7 (23:31):
Yeah, you can't. You can't act that way. In my opinion,
I don't think.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
We're holding it against him because he lost that Super Bowl.
If you win two Super Bowls and you have his resume,
he's a Hall of Famer.
Speaker 7 (23:43):
Okay, but Dan Eli Manning beat the best quarterback head
to head in the Super Bowl, best quarterback of all
time twice head to head. He beat the best coach
of this era, head to head in Super Bowl twice.
I don't care what his stats were. I don't care numbers,
(24:04):
and I understand I'm not saying he's a walk in
Hall of Famer, But what I'm saying is, at the
biggest moments, how about Eli Manning going into Green Bay
when it's nine hundred below zero and beating a team
that is used to playing like that in that a lot,
beating Brett Farv in overtime, and you know, look, I
(24:28):
think Eli Manning. I in my opinion, I'd vote for
Eli Manning, And I'll tell you why, because at the
biggest moments of his career he produced. And You're right,
his regular season record, a lot of it is mediocre,
even though he put up huge numbers. But I am
(24:50):
more of a fan of let's not get totally hung
up on the numbers, especially because the numbers for quarterbacks
now don't mean this same thing as they used to.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
But I can argue that the defensive line won that
Super Bowl, that first one against Brady. They beat the
hell out of him. They dominated that game.
Speaker 7 (25:10):
How about the Joe Namath Super Bowl? Did Matt Snell
have a much better game that day than Joe Namath, Yes, yeah,
and did and did the Jets defense totally snuff out
the vaunted Colts offense.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
Yes, yes, yes, But Joe.
Speaker 7 (25:30):
Namath was drafted by the New York Jets, was you know,
chose the AFL over the NFL. And he had the
signature one of the great wins in history, and he
predicted it was going to happen. And so I understand
what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
But that's not enough to put him in the Hall
of Fame. I don't think Namath had Hall of Fame numbers.
He didn't.
Speaker 7 (25:55):
That doesn't matter. He had Hall of Fame impact in
a Hall of Fame impact, huge, huge impact. Oh, I
understand the ara, and I think it's it's more I'm
not one of these guys. I just of course, you
look at his numbers. You look at Ken Stabler's numbers.
You know you're gonna say, geez, that's fairly mediocre. You're
(26:18):
judging it in a different thing. How about Joe Namath
thrown for four thousand yards in a fourteen game season.
That is incredible in those days. So I'm only saying
I'm not I don't think you can say that. Well,
Joe Nama didn't have Hall of Fame numbers. No Craps Sherlock.
I see the numbers too, but he had Hall of
(26:41):
Fame impact.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Lenny Dawson was a better quarterback.
Speaker 7 (26:45):
Okay, don't I don't.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
Did he have did he?
Speaker 7 (26:48):
Did he do what Joe Namath did? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah, he beat he won the Super Bowl. He didn't
do no guarantee sixties. He didn't know one.
Speaker 7 (26:58):
No one in the sixties did what Joe Namath did
for the sport of pro football. No one, no one,
And so in my opinion, he absolutely belongs in the
Hall of Fame. Was Joe was Len Dawson? A better quarterback?
Was Darryl Lemonica?
Speaker 6 (27:13):
Was?
Speaker 7 (27:14):
You know, I'm not. I don't really care. I mean,
I just don't care.
Speaker 8 (27:19):
I like you fired up?
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Do you want to get right?
Speaker 9 (27:24):
Dan?
Speaker 1 (27:25):
Who do you?
Speaker 8 (27:25):
Dan?
Speaker 7 (27:25):
Who do you like?
Speaker 8 (27:26):
Tonight?
Speaker 2 (27:27):
With the Red Sox in the games, Red Sox the Eggs. Well, here,
since I'm talking to you, I'll take the Red Sox now.
Speaker 7 (27:36):
I mean, hey, look, they're relying on a kid who
started the year at a ball right.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Both of these starters, I don't think they shave. They're
only they're like twenty four years. Whatever happened to deep
pitching staffs?
Speaker 7 (27:49):
Yeah, well, starters, the whole thing has changed. It's a
bullpen game. I know it's a bullpen game. And I'll
tell you what. These two games, I don't know. I
got it. I'll tell you something. Both these teams, I
don't know how they get to the park and don't
just pour themselves into their chair and say, geez, I
need a nap. I mean these games, just to watch
(28:12):
them have taken a ton of it. I mean they've
they've really been fun. This has been good for baseball.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
What were you doing forty seven years.
Speaker 7 (28:21):
Ago, forty seven years ago today? Yes, I was with
my good friend Tony Grossi of the Post, the student
newspaper at Ohio University. We skipped class that day and
at two o'clock in the afternoon, we walked into the Union,
the nice little bar on campus, and we asked the
(28:43):
guy to put it on I think ABC, right, put
the TV on ABC, and we watched the Yankees and
Bucky Bleeping Dent win that game, and the class we
skipped news writing and editing. We were seniors. The professor
of the class came in midway through the game. At
(29:08):
the end of the class and he just said, yeah,
you guys are in trouble. But he knew that we
were going to be there, and we watched the game.
It was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Don't be a stranger, Pete. You know something bothers you
get you fired up, you let me know.
Speaker 7 (29:23):
Thank you, Dan, really appreciate your reaching out.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
That's Peter King, Hall of Fame NFL writer.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to listen.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
Live Thursday Night football companying the baseball Today and Tonight. Now,
Michaels will be on the call with Kirk Herbstreak and
it's an NFC West matchup. It's the Niners and the
Rams kicking off at SOFI at eight point fifteen Eastern
on Prime Video. Home game for you.
Speaker 8 (30:01):
Dano, nothing better than a home game.
Speaker 9 (30:03):
You're kidding, you know, get I get per diem and
I get mileage.
Speaker 8 (30:07):
It's perfect. Man.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Is there a stadium though that if you look back
or you go to and you go that's the best
place to call a game. And then the stadium where
you go that's the worst place to call game.
Speaker 9 (30:21):
Well, you know, Kansas City was built like in nineteen
seventy one or two Arrowhead and they built it vertically
and we shit right over the field, I mean at
the fifty yard line.
Speaker 8 (30:31):
It's perfect.
Speaker 9 (30:32):
That's a game that I could actually call with the
naked eye and not even have to look at the monitor.
So far is really good. The newer stadiums, you're a
little bit higher. They're all pretty good. The worst of
all time, of all time, and of course it was
the worst stadium of all time, as well as Candlestick
Park in San Francisco. It was cold, it was windy,
you know. I did the Giants for three years and
(30:53):
then but calling football, you were in a press box
that was so high. One night, I said, I think
on Monday night foot. I said, it's the only place
where you look down on the blimp.
Speaker 8 (31:03):
That was the worst.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
Did you ever have all time? Did you ever have fog?
Speaker 8 (31:09):
And so everything?
Speaker 9 (31:11):
You know, when I was doing the Giants and they
were Moribun franchise, and they had chapter eleven and that
a man named bobb Leery no relation to Jeff came
in and saved the team in nineteen seventy six. But
it was so bad at Candlestick that one night they
handed me a slip of paper with the attendance figure.
We had an intern, his name was Larry Behar, who
was not the president of the team, and he was
(31:31):
an intern in the press box, and he gave me
a slip of paper and I looked at and I went,
you know what tonight's attendance.
Speaker 8 (31:37):
Why don't I just tell you who's here?
Speaker 9 (31:39):
Jim McAlpine have come in from Little Valley, Harvey Fluki
and has come up from San Joseana station wagon with
the dog. Those were the days my friend and I
had left oft forget. I had left the Cincinnati Reads,
the Big Red Machine because simply, you know, obviously it
was a money grab. I mean, the Giants were going
to triple my salary, so what was I supposed to do?
But that's crazy, since you and I, you know, I
(32:02):
announced the Reds, and you grew up in the area
and loved the Reds.
Speaker 8 (32:05):
So I'm listening to the game the other night.
Speaker 9 (32:07):
The last time I'd forgotten, the last time the Reds
won a playoff series nineteen ninety five.
Speaker 8 (32:13):
I did it. I did it.
Speaker 9 (32:15):
They beat the Dodgers in the divisional round and have
not won a postseason series since.
Speaker 8 (32:22):
What's going on?
Speaker 2 (32:24):
What about the I brought up the Big Red Machine.
I think it's the best National League lineup that I
can remember. You called those games with the Big Red Machine,
and I'm probably biased because I was there all the
time and got to listen to you call those games.
But is there a National League team that would compare
to them?
Speaker 8 (32:46):
I can't think of one.
Speaker 9 (32:47):
I mean, look, you were there, you know as a kid,
I'm announcing those games. I mean you have Pete Rose
in his prime, Johnny Bench entering his prime, Tony Perez
in his prime, Joe Morgan getting traded over in his prime,
Day eighty conception on his prime, Sparky Anderson Hall of
Fame manager. I can't think of any team that, you know,
I'm sure there have been through the years some that
(33:09):
people would say, hey, listen, they compared to that, But
I can't think of one. In my last year, the
nineteen seventy three, you know, we call up our top
guy from the farm system. His name happened to be
Ken Griffy Senior, who's kid had a pretty good career
as well.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
But if you were going to call, I'm going to
give you your pick of any sport to call.
Speaker 9 (33:31):
Well, I used to love baseball. I mean I built
my career around baseball. I love baseball. I've been removed
from it. I haven't done a game since the nineteen
ninety five World Series Atlanta against Cleveland. So obviously I've
been now involved with you know, football prime time. This
is the fortieth year of doing primetime football between Monday night,
(33:54):
Sunday night, Thursday night. I'll go to you know, if
I live long enough, I'll do it like a Wednesday
three am.
Speaker 8 (34:01):
So you know, right now, it's it's all about football
for me.
Speaker 9 (34:04):
You know, hockey is you know, obviously the centerpiece and
uh that's the most relevant thing that you know, happened
to me in my career obviously with Lake Placid.
Speaker 8 (34:14):
But hockey is a hard game to call, A rough game.
Speaker 9 (34:16):
I mean, it's it's so fast and and you know,
obviously I have such great respect for the guys like
you know, Mike Emrick, who who did it for years.
That's that's that's the toughest game to call. But as
a fan, I think, you know, I love hockey. I
love it I think king season tickets for thirty three years.
Season starts next week.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
But being locked in on a game where you have
to call, you're constantly calling the action. Whereas baseball you
can let it breathe, football you can let it breathe.
Hockey you can't let it breathe.
Speaker 9 (34:46):
Yeah no, And you know TV and radio are pretty
much the same. You almost have to do the same
coal that you did on radio. On television there's very
little spacing there and it's a it's it's a great
little back and forth between the play man and the
analyst in hockey because the analyst has to pick his foss.
He has to know exactly when to come in. And
(35:08):
on that note, I mean, I just have to shout
out to the late Ken Dryden who passed away, you
know in the past month, who was my partner in
Lake Placid, and you know, in the middle of the
Olympics for calling seven games including obviously the Soviet game
and the victory over Finland that since the gold medal,
and Kenny had never done, he'd never done announcing in
his life. He has just retired from the Montreal Canadians
(35:30):
after winning six Stanley Cups something five as in the Trophies.
It was unbelievable. He had to pick his foss, get
in and out in eight seconds. It was a tough
thing to do when he did it.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Talking to al Michaels will be on the call Thursday
Night Football on Prime Video with Herbie and that will
start at eight fifteen Eastern. But working with somebody else,
I mean, there's chemistry, synchronicity. But how do you how
do you suggest to your analyst, don't go as long
as you're going, because I still have to get I
(36:03):
have to set up the play. How do you do
that in a professional manner?
Speaker 9 (36:07):
Well, I think I've been lucky through the years because
when I started doing Monday Night, Frank Gifford had done
it for a lot of years, and then we added
Dan Dierdorf for in nineteen eighty seven, and Dan had
had done a lot of broadcasting in Saint Louis. So,
you know, the guys that I worked with are guys
that have had a lot of experiences. Obviously, when I
had John Madden in two thousand and two through two
(36:29):
thousand and eight, he understood top to bottom. Chris Collinsworth
had had a lot of experience. I mean the only
and I also had Dan Fouts for two years, but
I had Dan with Dennis Miller. Now that was that
was tricky. But Dennis was so smart, you know, he
kind of figured out how to how to pull that
thing off. But those were I got to tell you,
those were two wild years. If you remember on Monday
(36:50):
Night football with Fouts and then do.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
The Howard Cosell relationship, how would you sum that up
of working with somebody who was you know, there's been
nobody like him since, but dealing with somebody who had
an ego that he thought he was probably more important
than anybody else who was playing in a game.
Speaker 9 (37:12):
Well, I did a lot of baseball with Howard in
the seventies and into the eighties. It was a lot
of fun at first. I got to say, I mean,
the one thing about working with Kohell is you knew
you would always come away with the story.
Speaker 8 (37:24):
And I've got a million of them, right.
Speaker 9 (37:26):
And Howard was He was fun to work with to
a degree early on, and he got toward the end
of his career in life just became bitter and it
became very, very.
Speaker 8 (37:38):
Difficult to work with him.
Speaker 9 (37:39):
In like nineteen eighty four, nineteen eighty five and finally,
you know, that was the end of Howard's broadcasting career.
So you know, at first when you know, like in
the seventies and early eighties, and it did a couple
of world series with him as well. He he was
fun and as I say, I go home and have
you know, five stories from the night before. And then
after that it was he did you know, he just
(38:01):
grew tired of like everything at the end.
Speaker 8 (38:04):
So it wasn't a pleasant departure.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
You never got close to Fistokovs like Brent Musburger with
Jimmy the Greek.
Speaker 9 (38:12):
No, no, not at all. No, he wouldn't have been
able to handle them. At the end of my right
before yeah, I left Jem you know what.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
I tell you, you would have thought that would have
helped him.
Speaker 8 (38:24):
I would have pulled his stupe off first.
Speaker 2 (38:27):
You know, do you want to do one more baseball game,
one more hockey game?
Speaker 8 (38:33):
No? No, not really because uh.
Speaker 9 (38:39):
With baseball, I mean, I've been out of him for
thirty years then, so I'm you know, beyond rusty. And
I used to know obviously when I was doing baseball,
we knew everybody. Now I you know, I watched the
All Star Game this year. I knew like six guys,
seven guys. But I will say this, man, I do
love postseason baseball all of a sudden. I mean it's
(38:59):
it's great. I mean, you know, totally immersed in it already.
So postseason baseball is as good as it gets. And
just you know, it's in October, just the way, just
the way the sun is. You know, we watch the
day games and the shadows and the whole thing. It's
I don't want to say it's romantic, but I mean
(39:19):
it's it's really it's very it's very very cool.
Speaker 8 (39:21):
I miss it. Where do you part they miss for sure?
Speaker 2 (39:23):
Where do you stand on overtime in the NFL?
Speaker 9 (39:28):
I think they should go back to fifteen minutes. I
think it's okay for a game to end and to tie.
And when it went when it was fifteen minutes, it did.
But the ten minute thing is is you know somebody
obviously the other team can get the ball. Now they've
changed that rule, so each team is going to get
in no matter what the first team does. If they
score a touchdown, the other team is going to get
(39:48):
an opportunity. But they may only have two minutes, so
you know, you might have an eight minute drive. So
I think I don't know why they went to the
ten minute thing. I think maybe to reduce injuries. But
you know, I mean, what's the difference at a certain
point whether the game seventy minutes or seventy five minutes?
Speaker 8 (40:02):
You got the only thing I would change, I'd go
back to fifteen.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
You got the Rams and the Niners, and here you
got the Niners. A lot of interchangeable parts here. How
does that change your approach tonight broadcasting doing play by play?
Speaker 8 (40:14):
Well, I mean the Niners are star crossed. I mean
last year six and eleven because of all of the injuries,
and here we go again. Brock Perdy is not playing tonight.
George Kittle is is still an injury reserve. They're two
top receivers Pearsol and Jenny's are out. They've got you know,
I mean, DeMarcus Robinson or Marcus Valdez Scamming are two
(40:36):
of their guys that are going to, you know, be
the receivers tonight. Kittle's out, They've got a rookie left guard.
Speaker 9 (40:41):
They've got Mac Jones starting, but he's won two games
for them already, so, I mean the Niners are They're
just a mass unit right now, but you know, it's
the National Football League and anything had happened. Meanwhile, the
you know, the Rams look great. I mean, the Rams
are definitely a Super Bowl contender. We were talking in
our meeting last night about the offense. You've got Stafford,
(41:03):
You've got Kyrien Williams, one of the best backs in
the league. Puka Nakua is over the moon. I mean,
this guy is phenomenal. They got Devonte Adams. Higbee is
a tight end. He's out tonight. They built you know,
they built their team dan around the defensive line. What
they've done with that defensive line, with the Verse and
(41:24):
Fisk and the other guys that they brought in and drafted.
Speaker 8 (41:28):
They did what the.
Speaker 9 (41:29):
Niners did in the late nineties with John Lynch and
Excoose me nothing that the late nineties, but like in
the late teens in twenty eighteen nineteen in that area,
they went to two Super Bowls by building that defensive
line around both and the other guys.
Speaker 8 (41:43):
Now they have none of those guys.
Speaker 9 (41:45):
And the Rams have morphed into what the forty nine
Ers became on the defensive front. So, I mean the
Rams are a full flowed Super Bowl contender.
Speaker 2 (41:53):
Any problem with Tom Brady being in meetings with teams
as a minority owner of the Raiders.
Speaker 9 (42:00):
Not really, No, I mean you can get all the
information you need without necessarily being in those meetings.
Speaker 8 (42:08):
No, I have no problem with it at all.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
Ever been told something in the meeting that you wondered
if it was true?
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Oh?
Speaker 8 (42:18):
Yeah, a lot. But that was in the early days.
Now the guys are much better.
Speaker 9 (42:22):
But my favorite meeting Mike Marris's coaching the Rams when
they were in Saint Louis and around two thousand and
two or three. It's a Monday night game and we're
in there and Mike says to us, hey, off the record,
and he tells us something. And I have the Saint
Louis Post dispatch on the desk in front of me.
I said, Mike, here it is. It's on the front
page of the Sport Session. Off the record.
Speaker 8 (42:47):
It became on the record. Well while we were sitting
here at this meeting. Yeah. Now, most most of the meetings.
Speaker 9 (42:55):
Look, the coaches understand it now, especially the younger guys,
and they understand, you know, how to with the media.
Had to do with the you know, with the broadcast folks.
We were talking.
Speaker 8 (43:05):
It's funny.
Speaker 9 (43:06):
We were talking to Kyle Shanahan yesterday on the Zoom
and Kyle was talking about, you know, every press conference
now is you know, how's this guy has that guy?
Speaker 8 (43:13):
Is it a ligament? Is it attendant? What is it?
Speaker 9 (43:15):
And so all of a sudden he says, you know,
I didn't go to medical school. I'm answering all these questions,
which reminded me of one of my favorite stories, Doc Rivers,
who was my partner on the NBA back twenty years ago.
Speaker 8 (43:25):
And Doc was coaching the Celtics.
Speaker 9 (43:27):
Like in the eight to nine area, and I think
Paul Pierce had gotten hurt in a playoff game. So
the first five questions are about Pierce. You know, how
long is he out for? Is it an acl is
it a ligament?
Speaker 8 (43:38):
What is it? Blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 9 (43:41):
So after five or six questions, Doc finally looks down
at the guy and he goes, hey, listen, He says,
you do know, Doc is a nickname.
Speaker 8 (43:47):
Right, So.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
Steak before or after the game, you.
Speaker 9 (43:55):
Know, tonight, maybe a little a couple of bytes, maybe
at halftime. But you know, I'll have like maybe a
I'll have a burger at the hotel before I go
over there, and then some candy corn during the game,
and Junior mentioned and maybe maybe two or three bites
of a steak maybe tomorrow night. Tomorrow night, for sure,
Dan at Tuscana.
Speaker 2 (44:17):
Probably, yeah, maybe you can leave some scraps for Herbie's dog.
Speaker 8 (44:23):
Absolutely.
Speaker 9 (44:24):
Herbie's dog's already almost one hundred pounds.
Speaker 8 (44:27):
He's just a baby. What's going on here?
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Crazy stuff? Matt, have fun tonight. Great to see you again.
Thank you about it.
Speaker 8 (44:33):
Always always great, Dan, take him in Al.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Michaels Al on the call with Herbie tonight Thursday night
Football in Prime Video. It'll be at so FI at
eight point fifteen Eastern Niners and the Rams.
You are listening to the Dan Patrick Show on Fox
Sports Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
I'm watching yesterday and watching last night. I'm fascinated by
Mason Miller. He he is the Padres closer, and when
he's on the mound, he's bringing three digits. It's one
hundred miles an hour. Fifteen total pitches were one hundred
or more miles per hour by the Padres versus the
(00:25):
Cubs yesterday. Eleven of the fifteen were by Mason Miller,
seven in the seventh inning, four in the eighth inning,
four by Robert Suarez, all in the ninth inning. They're
just bringing in one oh four point five on the
FM dial. I mean, it's impressive. And if you wonder
why they have a you know, they're going to be
(00:47):
a pitch count because there are more guys throwing, you know,
more than one hundred miles an hour. Now it I
mean it's jumped up almost five miles per hour. That's incredible.
We'll have more on that coming up, but you know,
I started to look at just the velocity with the
Padres bullpen. They had fifteen pitches of over one hundred
(01:08):
miles an hour. Last time that happened the Yankees game
three of the alds when they had twenty eight of
those pitches, and with Miller, Miller's faced nine batters, eight
strikeounts and he hit somebody sixteen of his forty pitches
or one hundred miles an hour or greater. Now, it
used to be that you would have a couple of
(01:29):
guys who threw hard. I go back to Bob Feller,
I go back to Nolan Ryan and Nolan Ryan. You
know the jugs gun. He probably threw one hundred and
four hundred five miles per hour. But there is a difference,
and I remember we've asked pitchers before, what's the difference
between ninety six and one hundred, and hitters will tell
you there is a big difference with that. But everything
(01:53):
is the speed and how often I see that. And
that's where you'll see guys get locked in. They'll say,
throw me that fastball. All hit that eventually catch up
to that. Breaking ball. That's different. Breaking ball will withstand
the test of time. Fastball they can turn on it
because they'll see it. You see one hundred mile an
hour fastball more often. It used to be you'd be like,
(02:15):
oh my gosh, I don't see anybody throwing like that.
Now it's commonplace. Now everybody's built that way. You're encouraged
to throw as hard as you can for as long
as you can, and then they kick you to the curb.
Tommy John Surgery, come on down. Somebody else is going
to come on in fewer innings. Now it's about you
(02:37):
get in. Throw as hard as you can, and then
we'll bring in somebody else. Throw as hard as you can.
I always wondered why pitchers would start out, and I
talked to Kurt Shilling about this many years ago. I said,
why do you throw harder the longer you're in the game.
He said, well, those pitches mean more. And I'm loose,
(02:57):
like I'm you're you're building up momentum. My nickname in
high school was fast but won't last, and that had
to do with pitching as well. Basel. Yes it is,
and I could throw really hard, but I couldn't throw,
you know, for a long period of time. It'd be
like seven pitches. Be like man, that guy, you know,
he can throw hard, and then all of a sudden,
(03:19):
I have a noodle arm. After that, these guys come in,
they know I got about fifteen or twenty pitches. That's
how how long I can go and then you'll bring
in the next guy. So starting pitching used to be
you were going six or seven in announcers are shocked,
like I'm a moto. He came back for another inning
and the announcers were like, oh, he's coming back. It's
(03:42):
just sixth inning. But it's just different now. The days
of finesse feels like long gone. But you still have
that breaking ball. That breaking ball is the great equalizer
in my opinion, and you see that with these guys.
You can have a fastball, but you better have a
breaking ball, something off speed, because if not, they lock
(04:03):
in and that's where you go. That's one hundred and
four mile an hour fastball, and he took it deep.
They can. They're geared for that, even these pitching machines.
When we were at the Super Bowl and we were
at the Giant's facility in Scottsdale, and we asked them,
they had the jugs gun down below the stadium and
we went down there to take BP one day and
(04:27):
I said, can you make that throw like Clayton Kershaw curveball?
And they said yes, like they've gotten it. So it's
not just they're throwing fastballs. They can throw off speed pitches,
they can throw breaking balls, they can throw sliders. That's
what amazed me because it's like even us, you know,
with an eighty five or ninety mile an hour fastball,
you can put your bat on it. But if you say, hey,
(04:50):
I'm not going to tell you what's coming, and then
all of a sudden, you know you're up there and
your legs give out. That's that's what's still amazing. That's
why Clayton Kershaw can still pitch the way he pitches
because he has that breaking ball. Now you have to
keep him hon Us with a fastball that is at
least in the nineties, but now and you're watching these
guys like I would too. PAULI text me to say,
(05:10):
Mason Miller's coming in. I went over to watch the game,
and he looks the part of a guy who throws
one hundred and four miles an hour. He looks like
he could be, you know, a linebacker. But that's baseball now,
and you saw that yesterday and last night. These guys
throw hard for as long as they can.
Speaker 3 (05:31):
Yes, Marvin, remember when Tim Linskin came on the scene
and everyone was like man, he's so slight. How is
he going to be able to last that long? Because
all these guys, just like you said, Mason Miller looks
like a linebacker.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Now, these guys got to be big. Also, well, you
still get that guy that defies logic. Where you go,
how does that guy throw that hard? And there are
certain guys like Pedro Martinez, to me, is one of
the most fascinating pictures of all time, one of the
greatest pictures of all time, one of the most underrated
pictures of all time, because if you meet him, he's slight,
(06:03):
but he had that ability. He was able to make
that ball move, but he also had velocity. Even when
you're around Mo Rivera, like you're standing next to him
and I'm going that guy is the greatest closer of
all time. And he doesn't look like he's a baseball player.
It's just like, oh, what do you do for a living? Uh?
You know, I'm a closer for the Yankees. You know,
(06:26):
enter Sandman. Oh okay, but that's the fascination you have
with baseball. There's certain guys who can do certain things
with the baseball that we can't. But what they're teaching
now is go out there and they've studied it's physics,
it's probably geometry, algebra, math, all that thrown in there.
Spin rate, you know, that's why you get that. You
(06:49):
want a little bit of tackiness on the ball, so
you get that spin rate there. Pitchers would complain about
that early in the year, but it's fascinating to watch
it really is. Yeah, Pauling, That's what I'm curious about.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
Is it the natural human development or is it things
like less ending so you could throw harder, more often,
better medical advice, better workout routines. Because in two thousand
and two, the average fastball Major League Baseball was eighty
nine miles per hour. Now it's ninety four. It's gone
up five miles an hour in less than a generation.
Does that mean it's going to keep going that way?
(07:21):
It's hard to know.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
I would have to talk to somebody who is in
physiology or smart people.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Yeah, See, if you can get somebody at Yale who
can join us this morning, we'll do Satan. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (07:33):
I think a lot of it is just how good
we've gotten at breaking down the mechanics rather than anything else.
You have such slow motion, you know, and graphics and
technology and all of this stuff that you're able to
understand if you're pushing off at the right angle, you're
doing all of these different things and the leverage that
your body creates or the torque that it creates to
(07:55):
throw the ball. I think we've gotten so good at
just figuring that part of it out. I don't know
how much better you can get at it, but I
think that's a big part of it.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
When we go to spring training, or I used to
go to spring training, I always love to see what
pitchers were doing, because you know, hitting hasn't really changed
other than you know, you're swinging up on the ball.
You know, you're trying to launch the ball. Launch angle
is the big one. But with pitchers, there's always these
different kind of routines, exercises they were doing, Like they
(08:25):
would take a towel and then they would you know,
have the pitching motion and they were just you know,
holding onto a towel, snapping the towel. Yeah yeah, And
I'm like, wow, okay, but you're seeing all of these
different things, and it goes back to Mark Pryor when
he was with the Cubs, like these are things that
guys have been doing and Tom House, who's a former
(08:47):
reliever with the Braves. He's a pitching coach, but he's
also helped Tom Brady. He helps a lot of these
quarterbacks and how you throw the football, you know, how
you torque all those things, and teaching a lot of
this modern phillot. It's like the golf swing. When you
look and somebody is hitting the ball less than three
hundred yards, we go, man, what's wrong with him? Okay?
(09:11):
Now it's you know, the shamba hit a three seventy two,
and we go, did he get all of it? Rory?
Some of these other guys, we're shocked when somebody doesn't
hit it three hundred yards. But that's technology. But that's
also understanding. They're using the ground now. It starts from
the ground up. It's not how fast you can swing
your arms or how fast you move your hips. You know,
(09:33):
you look at John Rahm, it doesn't even look like
he's finishing his backswing. They've studied this. It is a science.
It's not boy, he's just naturally gifted. Rory's naturally gifted,
so is Tiger. But they did understand how do I
get more distance? How do I get and how do
I compress the ball, the accuracy, all of those things.
(09:53):
That's what they're doing with every sport. It can be
kicking a soccer ball, kicking a football. In fact of
which Vic Fangio. Vic Fangio was talking about kickers and
he compared them to the steroid era in baseball. Have
that for you coming up. Also, Sean Payton is facing
(10:13):
the Eagles this weekend. He defends the toush push. We'll
have that for you coming up. We got a lot
of things to get to today. Your phone call is
always welcome. Will settle on a poll question. We'll discuss
that and the greatest lineups in baseball history. And I'm
talking about not Hall of famers, lineups that have MVP
(10:33):
winners in him. We'll talk about that as well. I
think I said in them. I don't think that's a word.
I think it's in them. Everyone gets in them. Yeah,
outam in them.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
Be sure to catch the live edition of The Dan
Patrick Show weekdays at nine am Eastern six am Pacific
on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 6 (10:55):
Hey, this is Jason McIntyre. Join me every weekday morning
on my podcast Straight Fire with Jason McIntyre. This isn't
your typical sports pod, pushing the same tired narratives down
your throat every day. Straight Fire gives you honest opinions
on all the biggest sports headlines, accurate stats to help.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
You win big at the sportsbook.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
And all the best guests.
Speaker 6 (11:16):
Do yourself a favor and listen to Straight Fire with
Jason McIntyre on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
We were talking about great lineups in baseball history and
how many teams have MVPs in their lineup. You of
course have show a tany Freddie Freeman and Mookie Betts
with the Dodgers. We talked about the Big Red Machine
because those guys won their MVPs with the Reds when
you had Rose and Morgan and Bench and Foster Peter
(11:50):
King who covered the Reds. I believe for a little
while in Cincinnati, longtime NFL writer, where do you rank
the Big Red Machine as far as lineups of all time?
Speaker 7 (12:01):
Dan, It's got to be in the top five, clearly.
I think it's hard because you have to rank lineups
as you know, in their era, So I don't know
how a lineup could be much better, any better? Than
what the Yankees put on the field with Garig and Ruth.
(12:23):
But the difference with this Reds lineup is that, you know,
look a lot of times, obviously the pitcher's still hit.
You have Davy concepcionn betting eighth, you know, sometimes maybe
Caesar Geronimo. But I mean, you know, they they had
an all star batting eighth a lot of times, and
(12:44):
I don't know, to me, I thought it was so
dangerous and that was such a potent group. And you're right.
I covered them on and off for four years in
the late seventies and early eighties as an intern, and
and then I mean I actually went on the road
with the Reds three times in eighty eighty one and
(13:06):
eighty two, and so I got to know those guys.
I got to know Johnny Bench, got to know Tom
Seavers some and they were they were totally fearless. That's
the thing I loved about him. You know, I just
love the fact that Tony Perez conceptsi on, Hey, bring
it on, we love it.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
You know, we've been talking about Shoho Tani that he
has this added advantage that he's able to pitch, so
no matter what you do, hitting he's gonna be a
great hitter, but he always has that, and I'm wondering
if that translates to the NFL that Josh Allen and
Lamar Jackson have the added element of running as well
(13:49):
as being really good passers, and how that gives them.
Does that give them a little bit more of a
head start when it comes to MVPs.
Speaker 7 (13:58):
Yeah, I mean, sho he, Otani to me is the
guy in the NFL who'd be like him. Maybe is
Travis Hunter at some point, because you've always had mobile quarterbacks.
I mean, you know, he had Michael Vick running for
in Colin Kaepernick running for one hundred yards in playoff games.
(14:18):
I was at lambeau Field in I think O two
when Michael Vick came in and be far of twenty
seven to seven in the snow, and he did it
with his legs just as much as his arm. So
that has existed. Otani is so special because he's not
just a pitcher. I mean he might be at his
(14:41):
p I mean, he might be Garrett Kroschet. I mean, hey,
Garrett Crochet might be sho Hey. I mean, because I
don't want I don't want to demean show. Hey, Otani
because man, he's great. When I'm really looking forward next year,
I hope that we could see him pitch seven or
(15:02):
eight innings every fifth day.
Speaker 8 (15:06):
I hope.
Speaker 7 (15:06):
I have no idea what his body can take, but man,
what a treat it is to watch him play.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
All Right, So I get a random text from you
yesterday saying, basically, am I the only guy who is
affiliated with football who is okay with a tie in overtime?
Speaker 7 (15:23):
I actually liked ties? I mean the biggest reason, Dan,
I'll take you back to twenty twenty one. There was
one tie in the NFL that season. Pittsburgh tied Detroit sixteen.
All okay, that was you know, that was I mean
Detroit either was winless at the time or whatever. They
(15:44):
were a bad team at that time, but there was
a tie sixteen sixteen. At the end of the year,
the Steelers record was nine seven and one, okay. And
that season there were three teams in the AFC that
were nine and eight, the Chargers, the Colts, and the Dolphins.
(16:07):
So just imagine. And the Lions had a field goal
in overtime that they missed. So imagine if the Steelers,
if that field goal had been good and the Steelers
would have lost. I don't know who would have won
the tiebreaker, but it would have been a four team tiebreaker.
A tie basically eliminates a tie. At the end of
(16:28):
the seat, you know, you're either north of the Mason
Dixon line or south of it, but it eliminates it.
And plus, here's the other thing, Dan, that game the
other night was incredibly fun and at the end of it, Now,
if you're if you're a fan of one of the
two teams, you know, Green Bay or Dallas, maybe you're
(16:51):
ticked off that you And if you're a player, you're
ticked off that you got a tie. I mean, how
can a fan just watching at home, you see the
bizarre end the clock stop with one second left and
they're able to kick a field goal. How can you
be upset at that? I mean, it was fun. It
(17:11):
was scintillating the whole time. So I don't know. I mean,
I bet that was a lot more fun than the
sixteen sixteen tie between Pittsburgh and Detroit. That was a
fantastic football game.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah, it was a great meal, but I gotta have
dessert in coffee. And when we didn't get that, I
want to have. I'd like to have, you know, a
winner and a loser. That's why we play these games,
to win or lose.
Speaker 7 (17:40):
But but it's so unique, it's so I mean, you know,
there's they don't There isn't even on average one tie
per season. I think it's kind of cool. My grandson, Freddy,
who's a huge football fan, he's seven years old, about
to turn eight, and he watches all the games. And
(18:03):
he got up Monday morning to get ready for school,
and you know, my daughter said, hey, there was a
tie last night Green Bay in Dallas. A tie? How
does that happen? I can't believe it a tie? So
I don't know. I think once in a while, different
is fun.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
If I task you with make overtime, how you would
want to make it? Let's say it's different than what
it is now? Is how would you improve overtime?
Speaker 7 (18:29):
Well, you know, the selfish person in me would want
them to just play sudden death, don't have a clock
in overtime. The problem with that is, and I very
much empathize with the players I am. I was dead
set against a seventeenth game. I am deador set against
an eighteenth game. It's just not fair to these players.
(18:50):
It isn't You're adding on six percent more snaps for
a starting player and saying, ah, there's not any more
injury risk. Of course there is, so I understand why
you don't want to add more snaps to overtime. Selfishly,
I would like to see it go until it ends.
But I don't think right now, in my opinion anyway,
(19:14):
that there's a better system than this system that there is.
The only way you could do it differently is to
have first score wins, which I think is eminently unfair.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I'm wondering if the tush push is esthetically not pleasing.
Seeing kickers kick all these field goals is not esthetically
pleasing either. In my opinion, does the NFL how much
of it? Should they be worried about the glut of
kickers being so great at what they do.
Speaker 7 (19:46):
I would be because they didn't create this game to have.
I mean, let's just say Dan that you're playing the
Dallas Cowboys and your kicker skitter's one out of bounds
and you get the ball. You know, the Cowboys get
the ball at their own forty yard line. Think about it.
(20:07):
They need ten yards to get Brandon Aubrey and field goal.
It's and again, let's say they get it at the
run it back to the twenty eight. You know, they
only need twenty two to twenty three yards to get
him in field goal range, and not just a maybe
field goal. He is likely to make a sixty six
(20:28):
sixty seven yard field goal, you know, in in weatherless conditions.
I think the one thing the NFL has to look at.
And you know, and I don't really cover this obviously
now I'm retired, but I I've been reading about how,
you know, some of the balls that get broken in
the kicking the k balls they get broken in better
(20:53):
than they did before. And they're going to have to
look at that to see if that is a big factor,
because kicking a well worn football is much better for
a kicker than kicking a football right out of the box.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
I know you voted for the Hall of Fame. For decades,
there's been a lot of conversation about Russell Wilson. Can
you play your way out of the Hall of Fame? Now,
I don't know if you had russ in the Hall
of Fame in your opinion, but have players played their
way out of the Hall of Fame?
Speaker 7 (21:24):
I think so, and I think coaches can coach their
way out of the Hall of Fame. You've got to
consider a guy's entire career. I think Russell Wilson was
a borderline quarterback for the Hall of Fame. We have
to remember a few things right now about the quarterback position.
Look at the incredible glut of strong quarterback candidates for
(21:48):
the Hall of Fame. I mean, I think Eli Manning
is a strong candidate. Matthew Stafford is going to be
a strong candidate, Matt Ryan is a candidate. You've got
a lot of people who areates, who've put up really,
really good numbers. What differentiates you? And now we have
seen Russell Wilson be disappointing in Denver, kind of get
(22:11):
run out of Pittsburgh when they needed a veteran, they
didn't choose to resign him. And he has, you know,
two out of three ignominious weeks with the Giants and
loses his job. It's it all has to factor in
Dan it would you know. I think he and again
we'll see. I think he's got an uphill fight, but
(22:34):
then again, his career is not over.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Yeah, I think Russ was far more consistent than Eli.
You got ten Pro Bowls back when it did mean
something to be a Pro Bowl player.
Speaker 7 (22:43):
I'm not sure it did mean something in twenty ten
years ago. Dan, I don't think the Pro Bowl has
meant anything in twenty five years.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Okay, but he did. He was a better He's a
better regular season quarterback. His stats aren't. It's not even close.
Eli is an inch away from having one Super Bowl
with David Tyree's catch, and Russell is an inch away
with Malcolm Butler from having two Super Bowls.
Speaker 8 (23:11):
Blah blah blah.
Speaker 7 (23:14):
You know so what, I don't care. Could we go
back to the championship game in nineteen fifty eight and say, well,
what if Johnny Unitas hadn't made such and such a pass,
a miracle catch by whoever?
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Raymond Berry?
Speaker 7 (23:31):
Yeah, you can't. You can't act that way. In my opinion,
I don't think.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
We're holding it against him because he lost that Super Bowl.
If you win two Super Bowls and you have his resume,
he's a Hall of Famer.
Speaker 7 (23:43):
Okay, but Dan Eli Manning beat the best quarterback head
to head in the Super Bowl, best quarterback of all
time twice head to head. He beat the best coach
of this era, head to head in Super Bowl twice.
I don't care what his stats were. I don't care numbers,
(24:04):
and I understand I'm not saying he's a walk in
Hall of Famer, But what I'm saying is, at the
biggest moments, how about Eli Manning going into Green Bay
when it's nine hundred below zero and beating a team
that is used to playing like that in that a lot,
beating Brett Farv in overtime, and you know, look, I
(24:28):
think Eli Manning. I in my opinion, I'd vote for
Eli Manning, And I'll tell you why, because at the
biggest moments of his career he produced. And You're right,
his regular season record, a lot of it is mediocre,
even though he put up huge numbers. But I am
(24:50):
more of a fan of let's not get totally hung
up on the numbers, especially because the numbers for quarterbacks
now don't mean this same thing as they used to.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
But I can argue that the defensive line won that
Super Bowl, that first one against Brady. They beat the
hell out of him. They dominated that game.
Speaker 7 (25:10):
How about the Joe Namath Super Bowl? Did Matt Snell
have a much better game that day than Joe Namath, Yes, yeah,
and did and did the Jets defense totally snuff out
the vaunted Colts offense.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
Yes, yes, yes, But Joe.
Speaker 7 (25:30):
Namath was drafted by the New York Jets, was you know,
chose the AFL over the NFL. And he had the
signature one of the great wins in history, and he
predicted it was going to happen. And so I understand
what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
But that's not enough to put him in the Hall
of Fame. I don't think Namath had Hall of Fame numbers.
He didn't.
Speaker 7 (25:55):
That doesn't matter. He had Hall of Fame impact in
a Hall of Fame impact, huge, huge impact. Oh, I
understand the ara, and I think it's it's more I'm
not one of these guys. I just of course, you
look at his numbers. You look at Ken Stabler's numbers.
You know you're gonna say, geez, that's fairly mediocre. You're
(26:18):
judging it in a different thing. How about Joe Namath
thrown for four thousand yards in a fourteen game season.
That is incredible in those days. So I'm only saying
I'm not I don't think you can say that. Well,
Joe Nama didn't have Hall of Fame numbers. No Craps Sherlock.
I see the numbers too, but he had Hall of
(26:41):
Fame impact.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Lenny Dawson was a better quarterback.
Speaker 7 (26:45):
Okay, don't I don't.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
Did he have did he?
Speaker 7 (26:48):
Did he do what Joe Namath did? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah, he beat he won the Super Bowl. He didn't
do no guarantee sixties. He didn't know one.
Speaker 7 (26:58):
No one in the sixties did what Joe Namath did
for the sport of pro football. No one, no one,
And so in my opinion, he absolutely belongs in the
Hall of Fame. Was Joe was Len Dawson? A better quarterback?
Was Darryl Lemonica?
Speaker 6 (27:13):
Was?
Speaker 7 (27:14):
You know, I'm not. I don't really care. I mean,
I just don't care.
Speaker 8 (27:19):
I like you fired up?
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Do you want to get right?
Speaker 9 (27:24):
Dan?
Speaker 1 (27:25):
Who do you?
Speaker 8 (27:25):
Dan?
Speaker 7 (27:25):
Who do you like?
Speaker 8 (27:26):
Tonight?
Speaker 2 (27:27):
With the Red Sox in the games, Red Sox the Eggs. Well, here,
since I'm talking to you, I'll take the Red Sox now.
Speaker 7 (27:36):
I mean, hey, look, they're relying on a kid who
started the year at a ball right.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Both of these starters, I don't think they shave. They're
only they're like twenty four years. Whatever happened to deep
pitching staffs?
Speaker 7 (27:49):
Yeah, well, starters, the whole thing has changed. It's a
bullpen game. I know it's a bullpen game. And I'll
tell you what. These two games, I don't know. I
got it. I'll tell you something. Both these teams, I
don't know how they get to the park and don't
just pour themselves into their chair and say, geez, I
need a nap. I mean these games, just to watch
(28:12):
them have taken a ton of it. I mean they've
they've really been fun. This has been good for baseball.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
What were you doing forty seven years.
Speaker 7 (28:21):
Ago, forty seven years ago today? Yes, I was with
my good friend Tony Grossi of the Post, the student
newspaper at Ohio University. We skipped class that day and
at two o'clock in the afternoon, we walked into the Union,
the nice little bar on campus, and we asked the
(28:43):
guy to put it on I think ABC, right, put
the TV on ABC, and we watched the Yankees and
Bucky Bleeping Dent win that game, and the class we
skipped news writing and editing. We were seniors. The professor
of the class came in midway through the game. At
(29:08):
the end of the class and he just said, yeah,
you guys are in trouble. But he knew that we
were going to be there, and we watched the game.
It was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Don't be a stranger, Pete. You know something bothers you
get you fired up, you let me know.
Speaker 7 (29:23):
Thank you, Dan, really appreciate your reaching out.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
That's Peter King, Hall of Fame NFL writer.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to listen.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
Live Thursday Night football companying the baseball Today and Tonight. Now,
Michaels will be on the call with Kirk Herbstreak and
it's an NFC West matchup. It's the Niners and the
Rams kicking off at SOFI at eight point fifteen Eastern
on Prime Video. Home game for you.
Speaker 8 (30:01):
Dano, nothing better than a home game.
Speaker 9 (30:03):
You're kidding, you know, get I get per diem and
I get mileage.
Speaker 8 (30:07):
It's perfect. Man.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Is there a stadium though that if you look back
or you go to and you go that's the best
place to call a game. And then the stadium where
you go that's the worst place to call game.
Speaker 9 (30:21):
Well, you know, Kansas City was built like in nineteen
seventy one or two Arrowhead and they built it vertically
and we shit right over the field, I mean at
the fifty yard line.
Speaker 8 (30:31):
It's perfect.
Speaker 9 (30:32):
That's a game that I could actually call with the
naked eye and not even have to look at the monitor.
So far is really good. The newer stadiums, you're a
little bit higher. They're all pretty good. The worst of
all time, of all time, and of course it was
the worst stadium of all time, as well as Candlestick
Park in San Francisco. It was cold, it was windy,
you know. I did the Giants for three years and
(30:53):
then but calling football, you were in a press box
that was so high. One night, I said, I think
on Monday night foot. I said, it's the only place
where you look down on the blimp.
Speaker 8 (31:03):
That was the worst.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
Did you ever have all time? Did you ever have fog?
Speaker 8 (31:09):
And so everything?
Speaker 9 (31:11):
You know, when I was doing the Giants and they
were Moribun franchise, and they had chapter eleven and that
a man named bobb Leery no relation to Jeff came
in and saved the team in nineteen seventy six. But
it was so bad at Candlestick that one night they
handed me a slip of paper with the attendance figure.
We had an intern, his name was Larry Behar, who
was not the president of the team, and he was
(31:31):
an intern in the press box, and he gave me
a slip of paper and I looked at and I went,
you know what tonight's attendance.
Speaker 8 (31:37):
Why don't I just tell you who's here?
Speaker 9 (31:39):
Jim McAlpine have come in from Little Valley, Harvey Fluki
and has come up from San Joseana station wagon with
the dog. Those were the days my friend and I
had left oft forget. I had left the Cincinnati Reads,
the Big Red Machine because simply, you know, obviously it
was a money grab. I mean, the Giants were going
to triple my salary, so what was I supposed to do?
But that's crazy, since you and I, you know, I
(32:02):
announced the Reds, and you grew up in the area
and loved the Reds.
Speaker 8 (32:05):
So I'm listening to the game the other night.
Speaker 9 (32:07):
The last time I'd forgotten, the last time the Reds
won a playoff series nineteen ninety five.
Speaker 8 (32:13):
I did it. I did it.
Speaker 9 (32:15):
They beat the Dodgers in the divisional round and have
not won a postseason series since.
Speaker 8 (32:22):
What's going on?
Speaker 2 (32:24):
What about the I brought up the Big Red Machine.
I think it's the best National League lineup that I
can remember. You called those games with the Big Red Machine,
and I'm probably biased because I was there all the
time and got to listen to you call those games.
But is there a National League team that would compare
to them?
Speaker 8 (32:46):
I can't think of one.
Speaker 9 (32:47):
I mean, look, you were there, you know as a kid,
I'm announcing those games. I mean you have Pete Rose
in his prime, Johnny Bench entering his prime, Tony Perez
in his prime, Joe Morgan getting traded over in his prime,
Day eighty conception on his prime, Sparky Anderson Hall of
Fame manager. I can't think of any team that, you know,
I'm sure there have been through the years some that
(33:09):
people would say, hey, listen, they compared to that, But
I can't think of one. In my last year, the
nineteen seventy three, you know, we call up our top
guy from the farm system. His name happened to be
Ken Griffy Senior, who's kid had a pretty good career
as well.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
But if you were going to call, I'm going to
give you your pick of any sport to call.
Speaker 9 (33:31):
Well, I used to love baseball. I mean I built
my career around baseball. I love baseball. I've been removed
from it. I haven't done a game since the nineteen
ninety five World Series Atlanta against Cleveland. So obviously I've
been now involved with you know, football prime time. This
is the fortieth year of doing primetime football between Monday night,
(33:54):
Sunday night, Thursday night. I'll go to you know, if
I live long enough, I'll do it like a Wednesday
three am.
Speaker 8 (34:01):
So you know, right now, it's it's all about football
for me.
Speaker 9 (34:04):
You know, hockey is you know, obviously the centerpiece and
uh that's the most relevant thing that you know, happened
to me in my career obviously with Lake Placid.
Speaker 8 (34:14):
But hockey is a hard game to call, A rough game.
Speaker 9 (34:16):
I mean, it's it's so fast and and you know,
obviously I have such great respect for the guys like
you know, Mike Emrick, who who did it for years.
That's that's that's the toughest game to call. But as
a fan, I think, you know, I love hockey. I
love it I think king season tickets for thirty three years.
Season starts next week.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
But being locked in on a game where you have
to call, you're constantly calling the action. Whereas baseball you
can let it breathe, football you can let it breathe.
Hockey you can't let it breathe.
Speaker 9 (34:46):
Yeah no, And you know TV and radio are pretty
much the same. You almost have to do the same
coal that you did on radio. On television there's very
little spacing there and it's a it's it's a great
little back and forth between the play man and the
analyst in hockey because the analyst has to pick his foss.
He has to know exactly when to come in. And
(35:08):
on that note, I mean, I just have to shout
out to the late Ken Dryden who passed away, you
know in the past month, who was my partner in
Lake Placid, and you know, in the middle of the
Olympics for calling seven games including obviously the Soviet game
and the victory over Finland that since the gold medal,
and Kenny had never done, he'd never done announcing in
his life. He has just retired from the Montreal Canadians
(35:30):
after winning six Stanley Cups something five as in the Trophies.
It was unbelievable. He had to pick his foss, get
in and out in eight seconds. It was a tough
thing to do when he did it.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Talking to al Michaels will be on the call Thursday
Night Football on Prime Video with Herbie and that will
start at eight fifteen Eastern. But working with somebody else,
I mean, there's chemistry, synchronicity. But how do you how
do you suggest to your analyst, don't go as long
as you're going, because I still have to get I
(36:03):
have to set up the play. How do you do
that in a professional manner?
Speaker 9 (36:07):
Well, I think I've been lucky through the years because
when I started doing Monday Night, Frank Gifford had done
it for a lot of years, and then we added
Dan Dierdorf for in nineteen eighty seven, and Dan had
had done a lot of broadcasting in Saint Louis. So,
you know, the guys that I worked with are guys
that have had a lot of experiences. Obviously, when I
had John Madden in two thousand and two through two
(36:29):
thousand and eight, he understood top to bottom. Chris Collinsworth
had had a lot of experience. I mean the only
and I also had Dan Fouts for two years, but
I had Dan with Dennis Miller. Now that was that
was tricky. But Dennis was so smart, you know, he
kind of figured out how to how to pull that
thing off. But those were I got to tell you,
those were two wild years. If you remember on Monday
(36:50):
Night football with Fouts and then do.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
The Howard Cosell relationship, how would you sum that up
of working with somebody who was you know, there's been
nobody like him since, but dealing with somebody who had
an ego that he thought he was probably more important
than anybody else who was playing in a game.
Speaker 9 (37:12):
Well, I did a lot of baseball with Howard in
the seventies and into the eighties. It was a lot
of fun at first. I got to say, I mean,
the one thing about working with Kohell is you knew
you would always come away with the story.
Speaker 8 (37:24):
And I've got a million of them, right.
Speaker 9 (37:26):
And Howard was He was fun to work with to
a degree early on, and he got toward the end
of his career in life just became bitter and it
became very, very.
Speaker 8 (37:38):
Difficult to work with him.
Speaker 9 (37:39):
In like nineteen eighty four, nineteen eighty five and finally,
you know, that was the end of Howard's broadcasting career.
So you know, at first when you know, like in
the seventies and early eighties, and it did a couple
of world series with him as well. He he was
fun and as I say, I go home and have
you know, five stories from the night before. And then
after that it was he did you know, he just
(38:01):
grew tired of like everything at the end.
Speaker 8 (38:04):
So it wasn't a pleasant departure.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
You never got close to Fistokovs like Brent Musburger with
Jimmy the Greek.
Speaker 9 (38:12):
No, no, not at all. No, he wouldn't have been
able to handle them. At the end of my right
before yeah, I left Jem you know what.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
I tell you, you would have thought that would have
helped him.
Speaker 8 (38:24):
I would have pulled his stupe off first.
Speaker 2 (38:27):
You know, do you want to do one more baseball game,
one more hockey game?
Speaker 8 (38:33):
No? No, not really because uh.
Speaker 9 (38:39):
With baseball, I mean, I've been out of him for
thirty years then, so I'm you know, beyond rusty. And
I used to know obviously when I was doing baseball,
we knew everybody. Now I you know, I watched the
All Star Game this year. I knew like six guys,
seven guys. But I will say this, man, I do
love postseason baseball all of a sudden. I mean it's
(38:59):
it's great. I mean, you know, totally immersed in it already.
So postseason baseball is as good as it gets. And
just you know, it's in October, just the way, just
the way the sun is. You know, we watch the
day games and the shadows and the whole thing. It's
I don't want to say it's romantic, but I mean
(39:19):
it's it's really it's very it's very very cool.
Speaker 8 (39:21):
I miss it. Where do you part they miss for sure?
Speaker 2 (39:23):
Where do you stand on overtime in the NFL?
Speaker 9 (39:28):
I think they should go back to fifteen minutes. I
think it's okay for a game to end and to tie.
And when it went when it was fifteen minutes, it did.
But the ten minute thing is is you know somebody
obviously the other team can get the ball. Now they've
changed that rule, so each team is going to get
in no matter what the first team does. If they
score a touchdown, the other team is going to get
(39:48):
an opportunity. But they may only have two minutes, so
you know, you might have an eight minute drive. So
I think I don't know why they went to the
ten minute thing. I think maybe to reduce injuries. But
you know, I mean, what's the difference at a certain
point whether the game seventy minutes or seventy five minutes?
Speaker 8 (40:02):
You got the only thing I would change, I'd go
back to fifteen.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
You got the Rams and the Niners, and here you
got the Niners. A lot of interchangeable parts here. How
does that change your approach tonight broadcasting doing play by play?
Speaker 8 (40:14):
Well, I mean the Niners are star crossed. I mean
last year six and eleven because of all of the injuries,
and here we go again. Brock Perdy is not playing tonight.
George Kittle is is still an injury reserve. They're two
top receivers Pearsol and Jenny's are out. They've got you know,
I mean, DeMarcus Robinson or Marcus Valdez Scamming are two
(40:36):
of their guys that are going to, you know, be
the receivers tonight. Kittle's out, They've got a rookie left guard.
Speaker 9 (40:41):
They've got Mac Jones starting, but he's won two games
for them already, so, I mean the Niners are They're
just a mass unit right now, but you know, it's
the National Football League and anything had happened. Meanwhile, the
you know, the Rams look great. I mean, the Rams
are definitely a Super Bowl contender. We were talking in
our meeting last night about the offense. You've got Stafford,
(41:03):
You've got Kyrien Williams, one of the best backs in
the league. Puka Nakua is over the moon. I mean,
this guy is phenomenal. They got Devonte Adams. Higbee is
a tight end. He's out tonight. They built you know,
they built their team dan around the defensive line. What
they've done with that defensive line, with the Verse and
(41:24):
Fisk and the other guys that they brought in and drafted.
Speaker 8 (41:28):
They did what the.
Speaker 9 (41:29):
Niners did in the late nineties with John Lynch and
Excoose me nothing that the late nineties, but like in
the late teens in twenty eighteen nineteen in that area,
they went to two Super Bowls by building that defensive
line around both and the other guys.
Speaker 8 (41:43):
Now they have none of those guys.
Speaker 9 (41:45):
And the Rams have morphed into what the forty nine
Ers became on the defensive front. So, I mean the
Rams are a full flowed Super Bowl contender.
Speaker 2 (41:53):
Any problem with Tom Brady being in meetings with teams
as a minority owner of the Raiders.
Speaker 9 (42:00):
Not really, No, I mean you can get all the
information you need without necessarily being in those meetings.
Speaker 8 (42:08):
No, I have no problem with it at all.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
Ever been told something in the meeting that you wondered
if it was true?
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Oh?
Speaker 8 (42:18):
Yeah, a lot. But that was in the early days.
Now the guys are much better.
Speaker 9 (42:22):
But my favorite meeting Mike Marris's coaching the Rams when
they were in Saint Louis and around two thousand and
two or three. It's a Monday night game and we're
in there and Mike says to us, hey, off the record,
and he tells us something. And I have the Saint
Louis Post dispatch on the desk in front of me.
I said, Mike, here it is. It's on the front
page of the Sport Session. Off the record.
Speaker 8 (42:47):
It became on the record. Well while we were sitting
here at this meeting. Yeah. Now, most most of the meetings.
Speaker 9 (42:55):
Look, the coaches understand it now, especially the younger guys,
and they understand, you know, how to with the media.
Had to do with the you know, with the broadcast folks.
We were talking.
Speaker 8 (43:05):
It's funny.
Speaker 9 (43:06):
We were talking to Kyle Shanahan yesterday on the Zoom
and Kyle was talking about, you know, every press conference
now is you know, how's this guy has that guy?
Speaker 8 (43:13):
Is it a ligament? Is it attendant? What is it?
Speaker 9 (43:15):
And so all of a sudden he says, you know,
I didn't go to medical school. I'm answering all these questions,
which reminded me of one of my favorite stories, Doc Rivers,
who was my partner on the NBA back twenty years ago.
Speaker 8 (43:25):
And Doc was coaching the Celtics.
Speaker 9 (43:27):
Like in the eight to nine area, and I think
Paul Pierce had gotten hurt in a playoff game. So
the first five questions are about Pierce. You know, how
long is he out for? Is it an acl is
it a ligament?
Speaker 8 (43:38):
What is it? Blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 9 (43:41):
So after five or six questions, Doc finally looks down
at the guy and he goes, hey, listen, He says,
you do know, Doc is a nickname.
Speaker 8 (43:47):
Right, So.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
Steak before or after the game, you.
Speaker 9 (43:55):
Know, tonight, maybe a little a couple of bytes, maybe
at halftime. But you know, I'll have like maybe a
I'll have a burger at the hotel before I go
over there, and then some candy corn during the game,
and Junior mentioned and maybe maybe two or three bites
of a steak maybe tomorrow night. Tomorrow night, for sure,
Dan at Tuscana.
Speaker 2 (44:17):
Probably, yeah, maybe you can leave some scraps for Herbie's dog.
Speaker 8 (44:23):
Absolutely.
Speaker 9 (44:24):
Herbie's dog's already almost one hundred pounds.
Speaker 8 (44:27):
He's just a baby. What's going on here?
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Crazy stuff? Matt, have fun tonight. Great to see you again.
Thank you about it.
Speaker 8 (44:33):
Always always great, Dan, take him in Al.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Michaels Al on the call with Herbie tonight Thursday night
Football in Prime Video. It'll be at so FI at
eight point fifteen Eastern Niners and the Rams.
Hosts And Creators
Todd "Fritzy" Fritz
Dan Patrick
Patrick "Seton" O'Connor
Paul Pabst
Marvin Prince
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