Transcript of Talking Football With Mike Florio, Bills New Stadium And HoF Speeches + Mt Rushmore Of Masculine Foods

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On today's part of my take presented by DraftKings, we've got our good friend Mike Florio on the show because we're talking football. We're so, so close. We're getting inching closer and closer. Training camps are going with the Hall of Fame game Thursday night. Preseason week 1 is happening this weekend. Football is so, so close to being back, so we thought we'd have our good friend Mike Florio talk some training camp storylines. He gives a very interesting hot seat candidate for a coach in the NFL. We're also going to do the Mount Rushmore of masculine foods, which is going to be a fun one. And, uh, we've got Who's Back of the Week. Henry's back, a preview of Who's Back of the Week. Hank is back in studio, so back, back from vacation. He's, he's refreshed, he's He's ready to roll. It's all brought to you by our friends at Cuervo. Cuervo Devil's Reserve, pineapple jalapeño infused tequila, like a spicy marg in a bottle. Smooth and delicious, Devil's Reserve is the perfect drink for when mischief is on the menu. Available in multiple sizes including 50ml shooters, perfect to bring your party or tailgate. It's time to listen to the little devil on your shoulder, pour around the shots and get ready to raise a little hell.

Listen, we're about to get to— we're talking about football. It's about to be tailgate season. Show up with some, uh, Cuervo Devil's Reserve shooters and you'll be the life of the tailgate. That's a fact. That's a part of my take guarantee. You will have a great tailgate with some Cuervo Devil's Reserve. So go to your local liquor store or go to cuervo.com to purchase your own bottle of Devil's Reserve and raise a little hell. Please drink responsibly. Okay, let's go. Hey, football guy! Welcome to Pardon My Take, presented by DraftKings. The crown is yours. Today is Monday, August 10th. And boys, we're so close to football being back.

Football's back. No, it's already back.

It's back.

It was the best Hall of Fame game ever.

Yeah, people, I, I did have—

I did see maybe the best preseason game ever.

I did see one straight tweet that made me laugh very hard. One diehard AWL was like, how did you guys do a choose your own adventure for the best Hall of Fame game ever? And I'm gonna say, I'm sorry, I apologize to the audience. We thought if there's ever a game that we could, you know, record before— we're gonna— we're about to be in football season where we're here pretty much every hour. We're like, hey, this, this Panthers-Cardinals game, we could take this one off. We can just choose your own. Boy, were we wrong. That game rocked. Yeah, Haynes King is him. Listen, and also injured now.

If it wasn't Haynes King— like, Carson Beck took the world by storm. Yeah, Carson Beck was the best preseason quarterback I've ever seen and then immediately passed the torch to Haynes King. Who led a great comeback drive at the very end.

Yeah.

What a great game. Football was completely back. The field looked awesome. The logos looked awesome. The coaches looked awesome. Mike Tomlin had a little personality up in the booth.

Mike Tomlin. Yeah.

Mike Tomlin, like, cracking a few jokes.

We're going to get to some more. Mike Tomlin.

We'll talk about Mike Tomlin in a second. But he is—

he shocked me.

I'll be honest. Mike Tomlin, when he made the transition to the booth, I was like, he's never been to me a TV guy. He's always been a guy that I'm sure would be a great football coach, great inside the locker room. But he was like happy. He was loose. He was telling jokes. Yeah, it was a good broadcast overall. Like, I, I legitimately loved the Hall of Fame game.

Yeah, it was great. The Hall of Fame speeches, I saw some clips of it. Adam Vinatieri, he was like, he was doing a roast. Yeah, he's having fun talking about Pat McAfee holding his balls.

Yeah.

Roasting Jordan, which I didn't like that.

Roasting. Yeah. Belichick.

See that clip, Hank?

I did not.

Oh yeah.

Venetieri.

I think it was not nice.

I know when you go to the Hall of Fame, you don't go as a team like you don't. It's not like baseball where you have to wear a logo of one of the teams. But if Venetieri had to pick, clearly a Colt, like he was wearing Jim Irsay's tie. He was talking about the Colts the entire time. He's roasting Belichick, making fun of Belichick.

He—

Vinatieri in his mind is a cult.

Can we pull— Max, you pull up the Adam Vinatieri speech where he roasted Belichick? He's struggling. Max, Max, I got—

I got curious about how many seasons he played in both of them.

Let's, let's give Max a little grace today. He had a travel day from hell.

Both our boys, great, not great.

Hank and Max had travel days from hell.

No one cares about a bad travel day. We're here.

Yeah, we're here. We're here. Uh, okay, here it is, Hank, so you can hear it for the first time. Tell us your thoughts.

I would repeat those last few statements about Coach Bill Belichick as well. Thank you for demanding excellence every single day. Your preparation, discipline, and attention to detail shaped far more than my football career.

Very nice.

Unfortunately, Bill couldn't make it here today. There's a lot going on at UNC right now. He may be on a recruiting trip right now looking for the next Lawrence Taylor. I thought it was because training camp had already started, but in truth, it's because he's judging his girlfriend's cheerleading competition.

He's not judging. That's, that's just not true.

He's, he's supporting his girlfriend's cheerleading competition.

You could tell Vinatieri was a little nervous to say that line because he kind of stumbled over it. He was like, ah, shit, should I really do this?

Yeah, he'd been, he'd been rehearsing that one. He felt good about it.

Uh, and this is the Hall of Fame that Belichick should be in. He should be giving a speech.

That's—

yeah, that's bullshit.

That's true.

This is—

this is the year that he— he should have been in. So next year, I was looking at the list for next year. It's going to be—

is it Brady and Belichick?

Let's see. No, I don't think so.

Okay. I don't know. All the years blend together.

Yeah, but it's a good class.

2022.

Let's see. Okay, Max, can you pull it up?

Roethlisberger, Adrian Peterson, Gronk, Richard Sherman, Antonio Brown. Damn, Bill Belichick.

Yeah, that is— I'm gonna predict that Antonio Brown gets left out.

I mean, he is a Hall of Fame receiver, but yeah, he probably will get left out this one, this go-around. But yeah, that's a, that's a stud class right there.

Antonio Brown speech will be must-watch.

Oh my God.

Yeah.

That will be incredible.

Hey, uh, Mr. Brown, we need you to sit for your bust.

Oh man.

Yeah, okay, I got you.

Yeah. Uh, okay, the, uh, the other news. So PFT, Larry Tunsell injured. We've— we talked about this on, I think, Friday's show. Like, yeah, there is nothing crueler than training camp injuries. It just sucks. Turn injuries off, get us to the season. What was going through your mind when you got the news?

I saw the video. It was like— I don't know who took the video, but it was the grainiest cross-field zoom in on like a, a T9 cell phone that you ever— it was taken on Motorola Razr circa 2002, I think. And then I had to study the pixels of that to figure out whether it was a stinger, a dislocation, a bicep, or as it turned out to be a tricep, which sucks. So he's out probably for the year. I know people are saying he's out for a long time. If you're an offensive tackle and you tear your tricep, you're you're pretty much done for the year. Yeah, it doesn't— that's a pretty important muscle. Yeah, to use at that position. So it sucks because we, we paid the guy, uh, we traded a lot for him. He's a great player, he's always like top 5 offensive tackle in the league. So that sucks. Um, the good news is we do have Brandon Coleman, who's been moved around a lot, and Brandon Coleman, uh, was the left tackle when we made it to the NFC Championship Game. So he's, he's a capable backup. And then we've got, uh, Obviously Connerly, the first-round pick from Oregon on the other side, we might move him to left tackle.

And then Brandon Coleman. I don't know what we're going to do. There's also a chance that we just hit somebody else up.

I got a question.

Be like, hey, I would like to see Taylor Decker get a call. I feel like he's itching for an invite. We got some cap space. Let's make it work.

I got a question for you.

What?

And you—

what did you say on Twitter about that?

Yeah.

About what?

You're— you're—

you're making proposals that I don't think you can Like, why? Honor.

Why?

Why not?

You said on Twitter, you said, hey, Taylor Decker, come to D.C., I'll give you my El Camino.

Yeah.

Oh, what happens if the Wizards don't make the playoffs?

I said it's all up for negotiation, including the El Camino.

Hmm.

So if he wants the El Camino to go to D.C.— Taylor, I know that you're listening to part of my take.

I—

if you want the El Camino, it's yours. And then it'll be just a loan through the season. And then, uh, when it's time for Hank to get it, if the Wizards don't make the playoffs, all Hank has to do is go to your house and be like, hey, I'm here to pick up the El Camino. And I'm sure you'll give it right to him.

I think Hank's right though. I don't think you— that the El Camino is tied up in a bet right now.

Well, if we want to play that game, the El Camino is kind of promised to Jayden Daniels.

Yeah, so you have a— you're a habitual just El Camino giver.

Oh yeah, it's called football team giving.

That's, that's not Guardian giving.

Excuse me.

He's got—

Jayden Daniels never accepted the El Camino.

But if he wants it, it's his.

He has first. But it's tied up with Hank right now.

But Hank accepted the El Camino.

Yeah, he's gonna get it. No, he accepted the bat. He accepted the bat.

The claws of the El Camino.

And I just said that it will be on loan with Mr. Decker if he wants it. That's only if he wants it. By the way, he hasn't accepted it yet. Okay, we're a long way away from that. It can be on loan for him. As an enticement to go to the Washington Commanders. And then at the end of the year, if we, you know, April comes around and the Wizards haven't reached a 1-8 seed in the East, then, Hank, you just go to his house and be like, yes, Mr. Decker, I'm here to pick up my car from you.

I feel like you would have to go get the car.

Yeah, you'd have to get it.

Okay, I'll go get the car.

Deal.

I think the El Camino is spoken for as of right now.

But I'd like to remind you guys again, this is— we're a long ways away from that.

Of course. But it's still— it's, it's, it's— you, you, you put it up into escrow.

Ponzi scheme. Yeah, it's doing a Ponzi scheme.

You know, you put your body in escrow. It's not Ponzi. It's escrow.

Yes.

You have to put it in. You have to put down your down payment, be like, hey, I'm good for this.

But I listen. I said it. And, Hank, you can understand this. I wasn't thinking clearly when I said it. I got bad news about Larry Mientusel. So I just start to panic. I panic. I lash out. And I'm just trying to Initially, I reached out to Trent Williams.

It was a panic.

And I was like, hey, man, if you want to get away from the substation, come on back home.

Well, I don't think he actually needs a car.

He does need a car.

Yeah, he's not paying his Porsche payments. Yeah, he had that.

He had a Porsche in 2021, allegedly didn't make a payment on it.

No, he made 2 payments, 2 payments that didn't— then missed the next $240.

And so he owes hundreds of thousands of dollars on the car.

That feels like he just didn't get the bill.

I— yeah, it gets in the wrong house.

Yeah, maybe his card—

that he got a new card, the card that was set up for Well, it's, it's like the auto payment, auto payment that Stephen Che got his car repossessed on.

Yeah.

Remember that?

I'm a—

I was just lashing out, Hank. I was casting a wide net. When you have a guy that important go down, Trent Kipp, you just want— I needed something to fill that hole.

Yeah. He wanted to just— he's a man of action.

I need a big guy to fill that hole.

Fair.

Man of action. OK, so that— yeah, that sucks. So my question for you, and this is a debate that it's a shitty— no one likes training camp injuries. They all fucking suck. Is there anything to be said? I was thinking about this, I don't know why, but like, for it to be an injury that was most likely going to happen at some point versus a freak injury, like a one-on-one pass drill injury. Yeah, feels like, you know, when someone like tears their ACL or like, you know what, that was gonna happen, like their, their knee was weak or something, where it's like, I can Again, they all suck. But in a weird, twisted way, as, as fans, we all do this logic where you're like, all right, at least it wasn't like the, the practice was too hard and someone got hurt because the coach was going too hard. It was just a one-on-one drill where his tricep popped and it was going to pop eventually.

I don't know if it was going to pop eventually. I think it's like football is a weird sport where you put yourself and your body into a lot of different positions and then you're the guy that you're going up against in a lot of different positions. And just like it lines up wrong and then snap. I mean, Tunsil's been a tough player. He's been a durable player for a long time. So I don't know that you could say it was going to happen anyways, but the cope that I went through first and foremost was, well, then I was like, at least I have an El Camino to give away to a guy to fill a spot here. And then second, I was like, well, maybe that just means that Dafe Owe is really strong and in that one-on-one rep, Yeah, it's like he's going to be tearing— if he's tearing Larry, Larry Tunsell's pec or his tricep, imagine how many other guys' triceps he's going to tear during the regular season. True. On the other team. So, and then the, then the third thing I thought was I'd rather it be now than it be like week 1.

Oh, for sure.

Because if it's now, we can try to fit somebody in, we can try to bring somebody else into camp, or we can figure out what we want to do with the guys that we already have. And get them meaningful reps with the first team at that position and get them ready to go for the regular season. And yeah, I mean, Brandon Coleman, he's a decent player. He played pretty well for us in 2024, but he's not like a difference maker. I'm going to own an entire side of the line like, like Tunsil was.

See, I do the stupid, like, whenever there's an injury, I'm like, if it's like a someone gets hit and, and like, or like a late hit or a blindside hit, I'm like, fuck this, this, this never should have happened. Where it's like if someone tears something, you're like, all right, their body was probably going to tear it eventually. That's what I just tell myself, just to try to cope, where you're like, it was going to happen eventually. It just happened. What are you going to do? Yeah, I know it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make it. But none of this makes sense when you're trying to, to cope with any type of injury.

It sucks. A good thing about David Blough's offense is you can move guys around.

Mm-hmm.

That's it. I just tell myself that I have no idea if that's even remotely— shouldn't his name be making sense or accurate at all? I'm just like, that's a good thing about this offense. It's built to absorb injuries like this.

Shouldn't his name be Block?

Did Chuck change the entire pronunciation? David Block, 100%.

I think we should call him David Block.

David Block.

Yeah.

Yeah. Block the Block Coast.

We're going to block you up.

Yeah.

Teddy Bridgewater retired.

Yep.

Also, Teddy Bridgewater was still playing football.

Didn't realize.

I feel like he retired and then came back.

Well, yeah, he went to go coach football like high school football, and then he got in trouble for paying for Uber rides. Yeah, that son of a bitch. And then he came back to the NFL.

Yeah. And then the Bills debuted their new stadium, which I— listen, I think the people of Buffalo take great pride in the Bills and in their stadium. But I did laugh. I think it was part of— partly because it was like an algorithm where I clicked on one tweet, but I saw so many things online today that essentially was like the entire Bills mafia were just building inspectors. Showing up to the new stadium. Like, one guy, like, saw, like, a little copper wiring under the cement. He's like, that's a problem.

Yeah.

Like, and then there was another guy who was, who was jiggling the seats in the cup holders. Uh, there are a couple obstructed views that suck. You know what, I'll say that, that is, that's a, that's a fair— I don't know how you could build a stadium with zero obstructed views, but a couple of them are like, that makes no sense. The ones with the, the, the stairs right in front, like, what? You could have figured that one out.

The Jumbotron's also just, it's just a—

I actually like that.

It's not a Tron. No, but Hank's right. You can't call that a Jumbotron.

I—

but can I say that I, I think that's actually better because when you go to some of these new stadiums, all you do is watch the Jumbotron and not the field. That— I don't know if they did this on purpose, but I like the fact that it's not taking like, like the Intuit Dome where the Clippers play, or SoFi, or Jerry's World, where you show up and you, you, you end up watching the Jumbotron more than you watch the actual field. I kind of like that they didn't do that. Again, I don't know if that was on purpose or if they were like, hey, maybe people will just spin zone this. But I saw it and I was like, you know what? That's fine. Watch the game.

I think all the Daktronics money went to Kawhi, so they didn't have enough left over. But I think that, yeah, I don't hate the small Jumbotrons. I kind of agree with that take. I agree with the fact that sometimes it's too much of a distraction. But Hank's right. It shouldn't be called a Jumbo Tron. Just a Tron.

Now, TV.

I also— I like the guys that were going around and they were— it was like Dwight Schrute when he goes on a tour of the of who was that, our friend Mike Wallace's house. It might have been that he walks around and David Wallace, David Wallace, and just inspecting the house for all the stuff. There were some things that you see in these pictures from Bill's Mafia that are not actually taken from seats. They're taking from parts of the stadium.

Oh, that's not fair.

Where if you stood there, yeah, this would be an obstruction. Now, granted, there are also some obstructed view seats, and that does suck. I'm pretty sure they're listed on the tickets as long as they're obstructed view. Yeah.

Like you can go to Wrigley and there's a, there's a—

and I get it.

Wrigley's very, very old.

And this is brand I knew, but I— most obstructed view seats say it when you buy it. If they didn't say it, then that's bullshit. Then you have every right to be upset. The stairs thing was weird. I didn't fully understand that. That if you're— but, but I also did see— here's another plus— the, the leg space was insane. Really looked like you didn't have to stand up if someone came back and forth for a beer.

It's really—

that's incredible.

I think it's like shovel length.

Yeah.

So if it does snow, then when they bring Bill's Mafia in there to just clean the stadium out, they can just take it one snow shovel and just go straight down the aisle.

Yeah, it looked like a cool stadium.

I like to squeeze a little cup too.

That guy, uh, Andrew Buffalo Woody, shout out that guy. He was squeezing it, he was hitting the— he was like, seats aren't as loud as they used to be, but they're comfortable.

Yeah, um, I like it a lot. I think—

also, guess what? It's an outdoor stadium, and I'm gonna give them the benefit of doubt because it does not look like every other stadium. And I'm happy we still have someone still playing football outside.

Yeah, that's what I was going to say is when this stadium debuts, to me, at the very least, you can say the Bills have bought us 30 years of at least having one stadium that's going to be outside in the NFL.

And their uniforms look just as bad as we thought.

They were way worse than I thought.

Crazy.

I thought I'd get over it. I thought I was being soft when I saw those uniforms.

No, they're bad.

It's like, who cares? But then I saw Josh run out on the field and It looked really bad. Yeah, it looked— it looked like, uh, it looked like the team that, um, the Pittsburgh team was playing against in the Batman movie.

Uh, no pissed-offs either. Last one's here, fully operational. That is— that makes me sad. The Bills, as a fan base, are a pissed-off fan base. Like, they are. The Browns are a pissed-off fan base. There are certain fan bases where, like, you need it so that you can have as many dudes as possible all pissing in one hole. That's just what they do. So that was a miss by them. I actually think they should have like a handicap bathroom and then a piss trough bathroom. It's just be like, hey, for, for, for the old school real men of Bill's Mafia. And you don't even have to build a trough. It could just be a room with a, with just a drain in the middle.

I think all you need is you just need a ditch against a wall.

That's fine too.

Yeah.

But yeah, they're, they're a piss trough fan base and it sucks that they took them away. We don't need a million because it also, it's, it just takes longer. Urinals take longer, stalls take longer. Pistoffs, you're in and out. Okay. What other, what other story? Let me do it. Let me do our DK read real quick and then we'll see if we have any other stories before we get to who's back. We're right at that point where it's like, just get us the football.

Yeah.

Football. Because it's just, it's here.

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Terms at dkng.co/offer. Limited time offer. What other, what other stories we've got? The WNBA, just, I don't even understand what they do, uh, but they just always have— it's like someone, it's really just Caitlin Clark and Sophie Cunningham, they're getting beat up at some point over the weekend, every weekend, and it just gets us going again with ridiculous, uh, debates back and forth.

Yeah, it's, it's a sports league that I think 99% of the attention that's paid to it is now paid by people that don't watch the sports league. That's always a good combination. And Sophie Cunningham got jacked up.

She got—

she got clotheslined.

Kurt Rambis.

Maybe the worst part was the reaction from her coach.

Easily.

Stephanie White, who just can't seem to figure out anything. She just doesn't ever say the right thing, ever.

She was trying to defuse it, but she's doing it in the way she's basically showing, I don't have their back.

Yeah, she's throwing her own team under the bus. It doesn't matter what you truly think in that moment. You have to say— you have to say it's bush league, it's garbage, it's rubbish.

It's not true.

It's not true. They should throw her out of the league, kick her out of the league. That's— that's what you have to say if you're the coach. And for her to not have her team's back and then to have her saying these things while Caitlin Clark is sitting there just trying to figure out what the fuck do I need to do to just have a normal week in this league? I feel bad for her. I do, because like everyone's lost their mind in all the Caitlin Clark discourse. She just wants to go out there and hit threes. And that'd be— that's what she's good at. And that's what I would like to see her doing.

The coach said she's going to compete. No one's going to walk in for an easy layup. So I don't oppose the hard foul. And Kayla Clark was sitting next to her and just put her head like, yeah, head in her hands.

Defend your players also.

And just canter freedom.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That'll— that'll—

and Royce White, who's scared of airplanes.

This will be a story, I'm sure, in the next 3 weeks.

Yeah. Ennis Kanter and Royce White have declared for the WNBA draft.

Mm-hmm.

Royce White. That's, that's Royce White who couldn't get on an airplane, right?

Yeah.

I also don't think that Royce White has a great track record of being in the same room as women.

Oh, OK.

So maybe a whole locker room full might not be a great time.

I saw actually, I did see that exchange with Robin Lopez.

Yeah.

He had him pretty dead to rights.

He's got a He's got a rap sheet.

Okay. Other, other stories. I don't even think this is a story, but Michael Block just walked off the golf course. Blocky, did you see that, Hank?

I did see this.

What's his deal?

He, he showed up late for his tee time. I think he was, he was not going to make the cut.

Okay.

Showed up late for tee time. He was in on a sponsor's exemption, too, which is his whole life, which is tough.

Yeah.

Probably going to be tough to get another invite. He was like, you know, 6 shots outside the cut line. He bogeyed on 12. So he was, he was done. And then he just, he just left the course.

Blocky.

I don't hate it.

Is there going to be like a Grant Horvat or Bryan Brother apologizing for leaving that in?

Probably not. I mean, no, I think that it's the Senior Tour. They're probably just going to be like, we're not going to fight that. We're done with the Blocky show.

Yeah, I think it's kind of messed up that they left it in, though.

God, this guy hits one big shot. He's just—

I love him though. Like, oh, whatever, that's just Blocky.

He's like— you ever see those memes? They were like the, uh, it's like a bar graph and it's like hype is 90 out of 100 and talent is 10 out of 100. It's like, who is this? That's Michael Block.

He was also mad about the course conditions.

That was probably— oh, he was, he was, he was fucked.

He was playing terrible. Blaming the course conditions.

Got it.

And then just took his ball and went home.

No, it's everyone else's fault.

Of course it was. But the course was only bad for him. Hank, you left that part out.

Yeah, I'm not the problem.

It's everyone else. We have to start treating Mike Block with, with more respect because I feel like we've taken a lot of shots on his name the last couple of weeks.

He said he was— he got, he got a 2-stroke penalty for being late to his tee time. And on Instagram, he said, I was a couple of seconds late to my tee time, got caught up taking pictures for volunteers. First time in my career.

He's got a little Marlins, man.

Completely my fault. And I did tell my playing partners I was withdrawing. So he's saying withdrawing from what?

Like he was going through the report.

The report said that he left and didn't tell anyone that he was leaving. He's saying he did in fact leave. And the only reason he was late was because he was, he was taking pictures with volunteers.

Ah, he was too good.

Like a guy, man of the people, man of the people.

Oh man. By the way, RIP Don Nelson. Yeah, that happened. He's a— he's the second leading, second most wins of any NBA coach of all time.

Yeah. Absolute legend.

I think I knew this, but Don Nelson, his like retirement years—

he's a weed farmer.

He's a weed, coffee, and sugar farmer in Hawaii and was just— would just watch, would just hang out, have poker games. Hold on, I got to find it because it was like in all time. Like, this guy knew how to live and like finish his life correctly. Uh, okay, yeah. As of April 20, uh, April 2018, Nelson lives in Maui where he has a farm to grow flowers, coffee, and cannabis. He hosts local poker games with celebrities such as Willie Nelson, Woody Harrelson, Owen Wilson. I know how far I've come from being a hog farmer, Nelson said of his career. I've come a long, long way from being some country kid. I got in the fast lane and I've stayed there a long time. I've done pretty well. All I can tell you is he's happy. He's in Maui drinking Mai Tais and watching sunsets in Wales. Life's good, said his son Donnie. Yeah, life well lived. Yeah, that's a hell of a way.

It was great. They did an interview with him. I remember back in 2019, they said, what are you doing? What are you doing with your life now, Nelly? He said, I've been smoking some pot. Yeah, I never smoked when I played or coached. It's new to me. I grow a variety called Nelly Kush. It's not for sale. It's for personal use.

You've got to try.

You got, you got to treat it like a baby. Yeah. You got to water it. You got to have music for it. You got to bless it. It's a whole process. Yeah. He had a great post-NBA life also. He won a championship as a player, right? I think with the Celtics.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Great player. Better coach.

Maybe better hang. Best hang.

Great hang.

Great hang. Did you guys also see Monte Ellis said that if if, uh, they swapped him and Steph, they still would have won.

No, did they get rid of him?

Like, yeah, he said if you switch me and Steph out with the team that won championships, it'd be the same thing. Well, that's some revisionist history.

Yeah, I mean, sometimes you just gotta say stuff.

Monta Ellis was a bucket too, but he was. But then you say stuff like that and then everyone says that you stink.

Yeah, right.

So you, you can't—

you pick anyone else, Monte.

Yeah.

Just be like, yeah, I don't even know what I'm trying to think. Like, what do you say there? Because, yeah, he just set himself up to get absolutely roasted. Yeah, blocking.

If he had Rory's distance.

Yeah, he— but he just— he just had himself— yeah, Royce, this—

if he had thought about that Steph's 3-point shot.

Yeah, he should have said, if you swap me and Brandon Rush on the 2015 Warriors, we still would have won.

Yeah.

And everyone be like, dude, that's so true.

That's right.

Monta Ellis is a bucket. He's so fucking good. Unfortunately, he did the wrong thing and picked out the best shooter of all time. Fuck. OK, let's do who's back. And then we have Mike Florio and then we're going to do our Mount Rushmore on the other side of Florio. We'll be on the road this week, by the way. We're going to do some podcasting on the road, which is always fun. Zach, you ready for Megabed?

Could be so huge.

We're gonna make it this year. We're, uh— Who's Back of the Week is brought to you by our friends at Twisted Tea. Summer's here and so is the Twisted Tea Summer Party Pack. Twisted Tea's refreshing hard iced tea made with real brewed tea and 5% alcohol. They also have a new Summer Party Pack, has a brand new Twisted Lemonade. It's a refreshing hard lemonade made with real lemons. It's only available in their new party pack, so grab it while you can. Whether you're hanging out at the bar, hitting the lake beach for a weekend, or day drinking with friends, Twisted Tea is there to turn your day up a notch and make a good time a great time. Keep the good times going all day and all summer long. Keep it twisted. Grab a refreshing Twisted Tea today. All right, Hank, who's back? Vacation was good.

Vacation was great. Great time on island with the fam.

We missed the fuck out of you.

What island were you on?

Block Island.

Block Island.

Yeah. You went home early. Yeah, we missed the fuck out of you, dude.

I miss you guys too.

I didn't even talk shit about you when you were gone.

Really?

No, I actually— I— this might be the first time ever I actually am trying— I'm replaying. I think we just said we missed you. Oh, I did say— what was— oh, on Wednesday's show, I said that you—

I was here for Wednesday's show.

Well, you weren't here for the beginning of Hard Knocks.

And I said, that was on PFT's computer.

Well, he was trying to compute from a flight simulator.

It's a legitimate computer.

I mean, and we cut out the— he actually cut out like 6 different times.

It's a real— it's a real honest-to-God computer.

That's a joke.

We edited around those, but he kept on.

I was on the plane. I was on the plane in the group chat, like seeing just like it was like, oh, we're going to start. And then it was like an hour and a half later, like still going. I was like hoping that you were going to still be going when I landed. I was just going to pop on and be like, what's up, guys?

Yeah, no, he would say like 2 sentences, then it would freeze.

Zach, I don't want to throw Zach under the bus, but he gave me all the specs for my new computer that I went out and bought. And so it's like brand new.

How many computers do you have?

Why don't you use the one you always use?

I have one computer.

Those are great specs.

The one I always use is now subbed out.

Got it.

That's an old computer.

But that one works.

100% user error. Someone from the booth is saying back here that won't say it into the mic.

Is that memes?

Memes?

It wasn't me.

I, me personally, I was saying, how does he have a sauna installed in his house and not a computer?

I do have a computer. It's literally a computer. It's a full computer.

Is it more of an exact simulator?

No, no, it is 100% a computer.

That could be too much computer.

It might be because it's a lot of computers. It might be. That's the thing is it might be too strong of a computer. The only thing I've done on that computer computer. I download Flight Sim and then I have Google Chrome and Copilot.

That's it.

So I don't know.

Did you fix it after?

No, I need to get around to doing that. Yeah. I mean, actually, after, after I logged off, it stayed on for a while. So we might be back in business.

But you weren't running anything. Check it before next.

I know.

So why? Obviously it's going to stay on.

I was— no, I was online.

The flight sim works. That's—

that—

that's all that matters.

Oh no, nothing.

Oh shit.

No, that's what I'm saying. Like, the computer, if I try to turn it on, it gets like the wave.

You build the computer yourself?

No, Zach and I, we talked— talked through the specs.

But Zach, are you getting blamed for this?

No. I will say though, while we were in the call trying to diagnose the computer, he never cut out. So for like, yeah, 35, 40 minutes we were doing like trying to diagnose the issue. Yeah, but it was working perfectly on the call.

The way PFT is talking about it, it sounds like you you told him what to buy?

This— listen, is that true? This could definitely be my fault.

But did you tell him what to buy?

I definitely pointed him in the direction of some guys who know tech.

Zach, how's your computer doing at home?

Uh, we're after some open heart surgery. We're back.

Oh wait, so your computer's screwed up?

His computer's broken. Why?

Why can't you guys just have computers? No, I—

listen, I went out, I bought a very, very expensive, top-of-the-line new computer, and it's just What was its main purpose? It just fries.

Its main purpose is to game?

No, to be my full-time home computer.

Got it.

Yeah.

Zach, what's your computer's to game?

Your other computer, which I had the same one, works fine.

It was, it was showing signs of slowing down. I mean, it's what, 6 years old, 7 years old?

Yeah.

Pre-COVID. I think it's pre-COVID.

No, P-COVID. Like 2 years into COVID.

That's peak COVID. Yeah. You and I had different COVIDs.

Like, like that was— I mean, we were gaming. That's when I was gaming. So I got like good, good, good computers.

About 6 years old. Not an old computer, but it was, it was slowing down. Got a new one. I thought it would be the answer to all my problems. I haven't even looked at porn on that computer and it's already fried.

You look at porn on the computer?

I have looked at porn on the computer. Yeah. Hand up.

You do porn in the flight sim?

No, no, that's sick.

I'm, I'm on team that.

I don't, I don't— like I said, I haven't looked at porn even on this computer.

Speaking of porn, what— can we talk about this lotion, Big Cat?

Yeah, it's for my new tattoo. I got Stella tattooed.

Oh, nice.

Yeah, sorry.

Speaking of— no, I was just looking at it. I was confused.

Yeah, yeah, no, there's a big bottle of lotion sitting right on my desk. I can understand why that would be confusing if you missed a couple.

Good question.

Very fair question.

Good question.

Fair question.

Everyone's asking fair questions around here.

No, I'm a little— I'm a little nervous. I, I got a new tattoo and they were like— Mitch, who does our tattoos, awesome dude, uh, and he like ran me through everything you're supposed to do after. And then I remembered I'm gonna be like in 100-degree sun for the next 4 days, so I've been extra lotioning, moisturized.

Yeah, you should go arm sleeve.

Oh, you should get— you should— you should get sun sleeves.

Still see Oh yeah, that's a good one.

Yeah, it's all of it still.

The other week I got—

you should become a sun sleeve guy.

I got a—

just one sleeve.

Yeah, I have a fake tattoo sleeve that I got a couple of weeks ago just for fun. And it's—

yeah, it's pretty— rewind there.

Yeah.

What do you mean you just got it for fun?

I was at the Jersey Shore with a group of friends.

That's all you need.

That's all you need to know. I didn't get the hair, but we were going out to the casino for a little bit. And so they're like, hey, we should. We should get some tattoo sleeves. So we all rolled out with tattoos.

That's fun.

You're at the shore. That's all I need. It was fun.

Yeah.

All right. Who's back of the week?

My least back of the week is holes. Oh, there was a Brazilian soccer player that scored a goal. He ran to the sideline. He jumped over like a little, little, little mini fence and did not realize there was like a massive hole. I don't know, 20-foot hole. Yeah, right behind him. And he just disappeared. I thought it was AI. It was one of those videos that seemed—

it looked like Mario.

So ridiculous. Well, the other couldn't have been real, but he literally looked like he jumped to his death.

Wrong video, Max. That's the Uruguay soccer game that started.

It's also a car crash.

Yeah.

Did you see the alternate angle? No. Yeah, it's like a staircase and he just jumped right into the staircase. He had no idea. That's nuts.

Was he okay?

No, he was injured and the goal was disallowed.

Oh, that sucks. They should have—

you know that, Hank?

No.

Yeah, the goal was disallowed.

If you get injured selling, celebrating a goal, it should stand.

Whoops.

Yeah.

He's like Mario going down one of the tubes.

Yeah.

Holes are back. WNB is back. Freedom was back at his canter, but we talked about that.

Yep. All right.

Good.

Who's back to the week, Hank?

Thank you.

Great. Who's back to the week, Hank? My other who's back of the week.

You have another?

Is Liv Golf. Oh, come on, Hank. Did you not— you missed the news last week?

Do we not talk about it at length?

No, after you left there was more.

Do tell.

So LIV announced that they officially have a new sponsor and they said they're going to—

but they didn't say who the sponsor was.

They won't say it. They won't say it.

And also it's a secret sponsor and it really doesn't matter because they have to pay out everyone. We did kind of talk about it. Yeah, they have to pay out everyone.

But the day after there was more news directly from LIV.

Yeah.

I mean, the event this week was a, was a huge success.

I know, it's crazy. Uh, they're still talking about it.

Joaquin Niemann won his 9th event.

Yeah, he's, he's— dudes are just giving up shooting like +26.

Well, it's a hard course.

Yeah, it's hard course.

I mean, PJ, it's just kind of, you know, birdie fest. 39 of 56 players are currently over par, and Joaquin Niemann shot 14 under, which just shows how, how good he truly is.

You have a question? I think if Liv was smart, they would invite Hank on tour. I would agree.

They did invite me. I think I'm going to go to— there's an event in Indiana in a couple of weeks. No, the Four Aces reached out.

No, wait, which one? Which is the—

just the account, the team account.

Is there a—

they're going to be able to— you're going to be able to park like next to the tee box.

Well, yeah, I mean, it's the Four Aces. They're, they're, they're, they're— Four Aces are inviting me. It's going to be a red carpet.

It's really their tour. The Four Aces is— have you—

oh, it's the individual championship. It all comes down to Indy.

Yeah.

Wow. Hey, have you thought about that? Like, LIV Golf's problem and probably the only problem they have is that the Four Aces are just so popular and the other teams don't have that same name recognition and that same razzle dazzle that the Aces have.

I disagree. They got a lot of pressures. You got Torquay Legion 23.

What was that called?

Torquay.

It's not Torque.

No, it's Torquay. Have you never watched an event?

I have not watched.

Oh, whenever they talk about—

you caught me in the—

I don't know the announcer's name, but like the main announcer, it's Torquay.

Okay.

Yeah, they got— they got plenty of teams. The Cliques.

I'm just saying they have one team, the High Flyers, that's so popular. Like kids everywhere asking for Four Aces merch.

Are you going to wear all black for the funeral?

No, I'm aware I'm wearing all aces.

So it's over.

So which one is the ace of spades? Do they divide up by suit?

I don't think so, Max.

I don't care. I don't care.

I didn't bring it up here. I wasn't going to.

Well, no, we were going to bring it up on Friday and then we decided to wait.

We did bring it up on Friday.

You brought up Friday. I was like, you probably should wait till Hank gets back.

So the official statement is they have an agreement in place with the lead investor signed by the investor. And approved by the board to anchor the transaction and play a key role in supporting the path forward driven by and for the players. We're also seeing strong interest from more than a dozen additional parties to serve as minority investors.

Domino.

That sounds like they're having to beat, beat money guys off with a stick. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. I mean, private equity, they tried to get into FIFA. They, they couldn't.

And now What's the booth saying right now?

Memes just keep saying that they should— they need to put Hank actually on.

I agree.

On the tour.

On the tour.

Get him out of our hair.

Yeah, Hank would be so bad. Uh, that's what I'm saying.

But it would be fun. View— I mean, they would get viewers, but we have to— the only— I will release Hank from, from part of my take, but PFT and I get to negotiate with Lip. With directly. Wet the beak, Hank. You'll be playing for $0. We'll be watching you for millions.

Great.

Yeah, be awesome.

I should get to— if I could play a lefty-righty scramble, maybe I'd still—

no, that would be—

that would be awesome.

It's true.

If they're gonna—

if they're gonna struggle for golfers, we got two right here.

Lefty-righty scramble would be sick.

Are you kidding me?

You should get paid for the job of two people.

Absolutely.

Like, what man could you find that will do the work of two besides Hank? Hank.

OK, my Who's Back of the Week. I got a couple umpires.

Yeah.

Did you guys see Chris Sale got ejected before the game even started today? Braves-Yankees game. It was awesome. So he was— so he was arguing with Dan Bellino, the crew chief, the day before over a balk call, I believe. And The umpire crew was walking out before the game and one of the umps just like turned to the dugout and just fucking tossed Chris Sale. It was like, get out of here. Awesome. I love this. I want more of this. Also, did you guys see that since Scooboo got traded to the Dodgers, they're 1-6 and the Tigers are 5-2? Tigers are going to make the playoffs after all that. Like, they're going to, they're going to probably be in it. Fighting tooth and nail to the end.

Yep.

They might not actually make the playoffs, but they're very much alive to make the playoffs, which is very funny after selling at the deadline. But yeah, umpires are back. That was an awesome ejection. To be able to eject someone before the game starts, that's just a— that's just such a power move. And then speaking of baseball, Ichiro's back because he hit a bunch of home runs in the Mariners Legends game, which was sick. That's awesome. And the, and the story goes, I, I had forgotten this, but Ichiro said, and I believe him, he said that he could hit 40 home runs a season if he, if he like gave up being an average guy. And he's like, I have the pop. And there's like stories about him in BP hitting like mammoth home runs. But he was like, if I did that, I'd probably hit like .220, but I could hit 40 home runs just I feel like he could still get out there and get on base. Yeah, just one of the best hitters of all time, if not best.

Yeah, I feel like guys like him, Tony Gwynn, RIP, like that's a skill that you can do till you're 45. Mm-hmm.

Okay, Zach, finish us off.

My Who's Back of the Week this week is going to be none other than Ben Simmons. Oh, gentlemen, did you see Ben Simmons make his return?

No.

In what?

Fishing?

Not fishing. This looks to be— look to be to me basketball court. Ben Simmons tarps off on the court, letting everybody know, grateful for where I've been, proud of where I stand, ready for wherever this goes.

Okay.

Wow.

This time, do we believe him?

Big 3?

Um, maybe. I believe him that he's ready for wherever this goes.

Where do you think it goes? Where he's implying it goes?

Probably not.

Ah, somewhere where he's ready.

He's still young, dude, and he was He's tall. He can play every position. He looks absolutely hard every position.

Yeah. Listen, I think, I think he can still do it. I would like to see Ben Simmons take one last shot at it.

I mean, look, that's an athlete. He's ready to go.

That's him right there.

Might not be him.

No, that's what I might look.

I might have got got.

Would you get got by?

I guess that is him. No, no, that's him. That's Ben Simmons. He looks ripped. He looks shorter than he was.

Okay.

So, so here's Ben Simmons. I want you back in the league. I think, I think you can do it. You have to follow my one piece of advice. You just have to say, I've been wrong my entire life. I am actually right-handed. I'm sorry for trying to say that I was left-handed. It was a mental condition I was going through and I figured it out. I'm right-handed. Let's play hoops. What's up, Hank?

That'd be it.

He does everything else. He does everything else right-handed and he claims that he's a lefty when he shoots.

What?

What if you— what if the Celtics got Ben Simmons?

I'd be down.

And then they beat the Sixers.

I think they could. I think Ben Simmons, I think, still has got something in the tank.

Would that destroy—

I might just be like something in the tank guy going back to our conversation last week.

I want to come back on the Sixers.

If you watch him when he fishes—

awesome.

The guy fishes right-handed. He does everything right-handed. But for some reason he's like, no, I'm lefty.

Hank, did you see a clip from Eagles training camp over the weekend?

No.

Two of your favorite people were together.

Yeah.

Big Dom and LeBron.

Jaylen Brown.

Oh yeah, that makes sense.

Jaylen Brown saying all the right things.

Well, Jaylen Brown is also meeting with, with Hurts.

Well, he just went to—

he was just saying— what do you say?

Yeah, that makes sense.

But what do you say? No, no, all the right things. Oh, he—

oh, the—

okay.

Yeah, I remember that. Zach, you got another who's back? Also, Ben Simmons.

Did you guys also see the Lissa Kwais off-paper demands from 2019 recirculating?

No.

What were they?

No, they were—

this feels like we're about to get caught.

Kawhi, one, one partial ownership stake in the franchise.

Okay.

One, two, maybe a private jet at disposal.

Oh, this was his uncle's.

But via—

yeah, yeah, fair. This is his uncle's talking to the Lakers, right?

Yeah.

Like, this will be when, when we— when Hank, Hank negotiates with Liv, people will be able to take it out of context later and be like, did you see what Hank demanded from Liv? But it actually was his uncle's PFT and Big Cat negotiating with Lyft.

But is that because his uncle's— no, he can't say it, so he'll say it for him.

Hank, are you cool with me negotiating unlimited Reese's Peanut Butter? Well, we already kind of have Reese's Unlimited, but like extra unlimited.

Yes.

Okay.

I'd like a new computer.

I'd like an El Camino backup. I got any— PFT makes any promises to anyone else?

On Friday, I was driving home from the course and I was going down the highway and there was a broken-down El Camino that was being pushed to the side of the road that had blocked up traffic for about 15 minutes going back. I just rolled my window down. I was like, I'm sorry, brother. I've been there.

Been there.

Yeah.

I'd give you mine, but I already gave it to Taylor Decker, Jaden Daniels, and Hank.

Yeah.

How's it running?

Great. Thanks for asking. Drove it. Actually, I drove it to Target this morning. And then when I walked out of Target, there were 3 different groups of— it was 3 different 60-year-old guys that were just having a conversation about the El Camino, standing around the El Camino.

That's got to be the best feeling.

It was great.

You can't—

Yeah, yeah, it's pretty good for you.

Just walk.

Well, then I walk up and they ask me a question I don't know the answer to. Like, does that thing have the 6.7? And I was like, yeah, yeah, sure does.

Just say yes. Oh, I always say yes.

Yeah, you're damn right it does, brother.

Absolutely. All right, good. Who's back? Good. Do we have— Do we miss anything? I think we got— I mean, I'm sure college football will be back.

Steadman Bailey's back. OK, so he got arrested for fucking in an arcade. Oh, down in Florida, although he claims there was no penetration. So the pants were off. So really free Steadman Bailey.

Yeah. Yeah, we're, we're, we're at the sports calendar part where I saw the Pop-Tarts click clip. That looks like an awesome sport. We're going to do that on After Dark. And then donk. Did you guys see donk? They're throwing like inflatable donkeys onto what looks like a bullseye. I just need college football back. Yeah. And then I need NFL back. I just need it so bad.

I think the coaches poll came out. Yeah.

Okay.

So that's good.

Yeah, we're close. But this is the first Saturday where I was like, man, it feels like we should be watching college football right now. Like, I really, really need it.

I'm—

I basically have used all my time to fight against Shohei Ohtani, and I think Shohei Ohtani is an incredible player.. But I am— I have had to, you know, turn my back on him for the rest of the year and slander him at any cost. That's, that's basically all my free time is PCA MVP talk. Okay, should we get to Mike Florio and then we'll do Mount Rushmore on the other side?

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Okay, we now welcome on a very, very special guest. It is our good, good friend Mike Florio. Football is almost back, so we thought let's have Florio on. Let's talk some football. He was in Canton for the Hall of Fame game, the greatest Hall of Fame game ever played. We're still singing the praises of what Haynes King did in that final drive. But Mike, we're so close, you can feel it.

What—

let's start with the Hall of Fame game. Did you learn anything from the Hall of Fame game? Did you hear any buzz around the league?

What—

you, you're talking to people, you're, you're shaking hands. How was the Hall of Fame game?

Well, yeah, the game itself, it's a glorified scrimmage in full pads, and what Haynes King did was impressive, but he's going against guys who— and I don't want to take anything away from their journey, but we know how this goes. There's 90 guys on the roster, 90, and there's going to be 53 by the end of this month. So a lot of these guys aren't good enough to play in the NFL. So I don't read anything into what happened. I saw some of the buzz coming out of the game that Carson Beck may be starting by the middle of the season because he played well. There's no game planning. It's not the starting defense. Let's just enjoy it for what it is. But understand what it is. It's a preseason game. It's fun to watch because football's back. It looks like real football. We just don't know many of the guys, and we won't get to know many of the guys. So that's my caveat on the whole Hall of Fame game experience. But yeah, it was great to be on the field talking to different people, picking up some things. I had some reporting before the game about Aaron Donald's future, for example.

I learned some more stuff today. I think he's coming back, and I think we may, we may, we may hear from him by Friday. Oh, that he is coming back, if he decides to come back. That's the key. He's got to decide to come back.

He's coming back. Come on, let's stop the charade. He's coming back. He's gonna be really good. The Rams are going to be loaded. I guess the only question I have is how much is he gonna get paid? That's literally all I'm wondering, because everything else I know. He's coming back and he's going to be good.

Well, and that's an issue that they're going to need to figure out, not just from a salary cap standpoint but from a cash standpoint. Every team has a budget. And to have a guy like Aaron Donald show up when you've already spent your budget, you're going to have to fill out some forms and genuflect before certain altars to try to get the money necessary to get Aaron Donald. But I can't imagine the Rams ownership not seizing this opportunity. But here's what's weird about it, okay? Aaron Donald's making this decision as to whether or not he can be Aaron Donald again, but unless he's hiring the equivalent of football sparring partners, he doesn't know how he's moving relative to everyone else. And Lawrence Taylor ultimately retired because he came off the field and said to Bill Parcells, man, these young guys are fast. And Parcells said, no, you slowed down. And that's when Lawrence Taylor decided that's that. Aaron Donald's not going to know whether he's slowed down until he's back out there practicing with the team, but he's going to make his decision before he's in that, that space to find out. So it's kind of a strange cart before the horse but he's making the decision soon, and they'll have him on the field week 1.

I reported Thursday night, 30 to 40 snaps week 1 if he's back in time to get ramped up. And yeah, it's going to make the Rams— like, anything but going to the Super Bowl is going to be a disappointment for the Rams if he comes back.

Yeah, also, if I were him, I would come back week 2. That way I don't have to fly all the way to Australia and then come back. Uh, the two teams taking very different approaches to that trip. Uh, the 49ers getting there a week early. What's behind McVay's decision? We were talking about it last week. To me, it sounds like he listened to a podcast about sleep, and, and he has, uh, he has got an edge in terms of like he's hacked how much you have to sleep to adjust to, uh, to jet lag. So they're going to try to power through it. They're just going to go down there, pretend that time zones don't exist. What have you heard about the decision why they're going to do that?

You know, it's funny, and the thing about consulting with experts, and I learned this when I was practicing law, you can find an expert to support pretty much any conclusion that you want.

Yep.

I'm assuming they, they found an expert who told them, hey, it's better to just barnstorm in, show up the day before, leave the day after. And I guess on one level, if you never change your clock, and if you never accept the fact that you're in a different time zone and that it's still a night game, late afternoon game, LA time, you can pull it off. But there's still the wear and tear of the travel that you have to recover from. I mean, sitting in a playing for all those hours, it takes a little while to spring back from that. But that seems to be what they're going to do. McVay was asked about it at a press conference the other day, and he refused to talk about it. And he rarely refuses to talk about anything. And I don't know whether he hasn't talked to the team about it yet, whether he's concerned they're going to be grumpy about the plan. But yes, two very different approaches. And of course, whoever wins or loses the game, someone's going to say, well, it's, it's because of the the travel approach, that's why that team won or that's why that team lost.

100%. Um, Mike, I got a question about your team. Uh, Kyler Murray feels like he's gonna be— like, it's a mess again because Kyler Murray feels like he— from everything reading, he's going to be the starter. How do you then go to JJ McCarthy if Kyler Murray's not good? Is there a chance the Vikings might trade Kyler or, uh, JJ McCarthy? Because it feels like that's the only solution that will keep everything calm with, with both the locker room, the fan base. Just rid yourself of this mistake and try to get something back for it.

Yeah, conspiracy theory would be they're making it look like a close competition so people will think, hey, hmm, maybe JJ McCarthy's a guy we should add to our team. And we know how much Jim Harbaugh likes JJ McCarthy. Yeah, Justin Herbert is Trey Lance. Maybe they could salvage something. And that's the other side of this too. Whoever loses that quarterback competition isn't going to be very happy. Kyler Murray didn't go there to be the backup. JJ McCarthy feels like he hasn't gotten a fair shake, won some games down the stretch last year, arguably still a lot of room to grow and improve. And it doesn't seem like anyone is really seizing the job, but it could be, let's make McCarthy look good, let's showcase McCarthy in the preseason, let's hope we can unload him, and then go with 3 guys Murray, Carson Wentz, who showed up very late last year and played fairly well considering he didn't sign until August 31st. He played well when he got pressed into service. And then they got Max Brosmer, who they still really like, which tells me they watch—

yeah, the game against Seattle.

Yeah, but, but they got 4 guys, and if they really like Wentz and Brosmer, then yeah, whoever doesn't win the starting job presumably may not be there. But then the other side of it is you want to keep the other guy there because Murray's gotten injured, McCarthy's gotten injured. I feel like if they're both there week 1, we're going to see both of them play at some point this year.

Maybe 2 quarterbacks at once on the field.

That would be a hell of a— that, that would be a hell of a plan.

It would be. What about the, uh, what about the Colts and their quarterback situation, Anthony? Well, actually, I have one more question about 9, about McCarthy. What would you think that the trade market would be like for Nyne? Because I could see a position where the Vikings, they think, yeah, it's probably for the best if we, if we traded him, if he doesn't win the starting job. But then somebody makes an offer and the best offer they get is like a 4th round pick. And the Vikings would be like, well, we don't want to do that because we obviously just, you know, we, we, we, we put ourselves in a position where we spend a 1st rounder on him. And that just doesn't seem like it's a, it's a great deal for our value right now. So like, what do you think other teams would offer?

Well, you know, it depends upon what other teams thought of him, and they're not in the business of advertising to the world what they thought of a guy that someone else took with the 10th overall pick in the draft. But you may have some evaluators and coaches out there who are thinking, hey, we can handle this differently. It was a confluence of bad— yeah, led to this outcome. We see something in McCarthy from his Michigan tape, from his tape when things went well down the stretch in Minnesota, and shit happens in Minnesota, and maybe a fresh start will be good for him. The other side of it is, this isn't the Jets burning through highly drafted quarterbacks who go somewhere else and flourish. You could argue, if the guy doesn't flourish under Kevin O'Connell, who's he going to flourish under? So that would be the risk, that this guy just isn't going to work out. But it may be he needs to take a hard step back, be a backup. It would be a cheap contract relative to what it costs to go out and find a veteran backup. He's got playing experience. 31 other teams, I'd like to think somebody would say it's worth rolling the dice.

Definitely. Yeah.

Worked out for us.

Yeah. No, definitely. I, I've just— I'm of the belief that if he doesn't win the job outright here in Minnesota, it's kind of over for him because it's very hard to draft a guy, have him, you know, get injured, which that obviously sucked and it wasn't his fault, but then have the yo-yo of last year where it's, you know, the soft benching and all this controversy and everything going back and forth. Do we want him? Do we not? And then have Kyler Murray come in and beat you out for the job. It's like, you got to just wash your hands of it. You can't just keep— you can't keep doing it year after year because that's how a team kind of starts to, to devolve and everything falls apart.

There's a thought out there that the GM who was fired in January, Quisido Femenza, that he's gone because McCarthy was his guy. I think the more important flaw was last year when they went with McCarthy, didn't keep Sam Darnold, didn't keep Daniel Jones, didn't have a veteran proven there who could play if McCarthy got injured or was ineffective. And I suspect that O'Connell was saying we have to have someone else, and that others in the organization said no, we're going to ride with 9. And then look what happens last year— who's gone, who stays— kind of tells you the rest of the story. I think the way they mishandled the quarterback position last year—

yeah, yeah—

and that Kwasi Odofomense is gone.

And he could still be the starter. I mean, he could still win the job. I'm not saying that it's totally over him. I'm just thinking that if you don't win the job, then, then the Vikings probably have to think about what the next step is.

Yeah.

Yeah. You can't put him on ice for his third NFL season and then say, oh, next year when Kyler Murray's gone, you're going to be the starter again. How do you command the room when you've been jerked around like that?

Right.

Yeah.

You can't ice 9. Vonnegut taught me that. What about the Colts? With the Colts, with Anthony, uh, Anthony Richardson. Is he— are they going their separate ways? Are they moving on? Are they out of the Anthony Richardson business?

I think the reality is they haven't found a trade partner yet, obviously. And he's got an affordable contract. It's a fully guaranteed $5 million plus. No one has given them a trade offer that they're ready to take. So you just hang on to him because all it takes is one injury in training camp, in the preseason, early in the regular season, and all of a sudden there's a market for Anthony Richardson. Now the question is, will they keep him beyond week 1? But they owe him that full salary. All they would save is the league minimum that he would sign— that he would get if he signs with another team. So there's nothing to really lose by keeping him because you're paying the vast majority of his salary anyway. And Daniel Jones gets injured, and Daniel Jones has gotten injured a few times in his career. All of a sudden you may need Anthony Richardson. Look what happened last year. Jones gets injured in December. Richardson's not available because of that freak accident that happened in the locker room where the, the band broke and he, he took a weight in the eye and broke his orbital bone.

They, they didn't want Riley Leonard. They, they dusted off Philip Rivers to come in and play. So at some point, you got to at least account for the possibility Jones is going to get injured again. Then what are you going to do? You got Easton Stick and Riley Leonard as the other two guys if Richardson isn't there.

Well, I mean, at least Chris Ballard has a job for life, so I don't think they really have to press for it.

Are there other people that are in the Colts organization that still like— they want Anthony Richardson to do well, that are still believing in Anthony?

You have a lot of, I think, momentum behind a guy that you made the 4th overall pick. It's the same power structure. The only difference is ownership. And yeah, you'd like to salvage Anthony Richardson if you could. He still has the same skills that made him the 4th overall pick. The problem was he didn't have much experience playing. And he's gotten, I think, 15 games with 11 starts in 3 seasons. So he still needs more chances to play. Now, how much of it is on him? Remember when he got benched, the thinking was he's not putting in enough work. Remember he tapped out of that one game because he was tired? That seemed to be the kiss of death in his second season. But the guy's still got incredible skills. I just think it's, it's like with McCarthy, it just gets to a point where it's poisoned, it's toxic. And maybe the best move for everyone is a fresh start.

What, uh, what's going on in Tampa Bay? Is it— it feels like, uh, they might have, you know, keeping Todd Bowles a year too long after how it ended last year. Vita Vae's upset, Baker Mayfield's not happy, rightfully so. Both those guys, rightfully so. Are they gonna— are they gonna sign both those guys? Are they gonna fix this before the season starts? Because this feels like one of those teams that they've, they pushed some chips in and it's like it all could kind of fall apart in a second.

Oh, and it fell apart last year down the stretch. They had a great start and then they just couldn't stop the bleeding once the losses came, and they ultimately blew the division to the Carolina Panthers. But Vita Vea, they can say all they want that they don't plan to trade him. How many times have we heard that and then the guy gets traded? It's just a matter of getting an offer. Remember when Dexter Lawrence said he wanted to be traded? Nobody thought the Giants were going to trade him, But when you're looking at keeping a guy who doesn't want to be there, that can be just a problem for the entire locker room. He doesn't want to be here, it's a mess, he's got back tightness or whatever it is, it's keeping him from practicing. You don't want that distraction. So I think if they would get a good offer, they would move on from Vita Vey. You also have to be willing to pay Vita Vey or whatever he's looking to get paid. But the Mayfield thing is far more interesting to me because Baker Mayfield is no different than the guy that he was when he was drafted first overall by the Browns in 2018, and they pissed him off.

And what happens when you piss off Baker Mayfield? I could see this play out. And I know they talk about the franchise tag, but he's gonna have $30 million in dead money that applies next year even before they would sign him or at least attach the franchise tag. The only way to deal with that $30 million is to work out an extension, and you can play salary cap games. If they tag him, they're looking at nearly $80 million under the cap for him in 2027. I could see him getting to the open market. The Buccaneers believe— and I think this is why they haven't gotten a deal done— they believe when, if he gets a chance to go to the open market, they will always be offering more than anyone else. And once he's a free agent, it doesn't matter if somebody else is offering less. He could take less just as a middle finger to the Buccaneers for not paying him when they had the chance. I could see him taking less money to go to Pittsburgh, to some other— like, Pittsburgh is the perfect— it just feels like the perfect destination for him.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And, and, and he could beat the Browns twice a year.

I know, I never thought of that, but that— you're right about that. And Pittsburgh could finally— wouldn't that be perfect? It would be a radical change for Pittsburgh to get so young by getting like a, a young 30s quarterback, which we're big Baker guys. We— I, I think he's really, really good. I don't understand what the Bucs are doing, and I think they're just in this weird spot where Jason Light's a really good GM and he's drafted really well. But I think it all comes back to Todd Bowles keeping him in a year when it was so clear he lost everything. Like, he lost the locker room. Mike Evans goes to San Francisco to— to Mike Evans who's like 40 years old is going to practice next to a substation every day just so he doesn't have to be around Todd Bowles. So I just think that's a very precarious situation that feels like it could fall apart very quickly.

Again, here's the biggest problem when it comes to veteran quarterbacks: the range now is like $45 million. And where do you peg Baker Mayfield? And from Baker's perspective, it's easy to say, hey, look at this guy who got $50 million plus, look at that guy who got $50 million plus, look at that guy I'm as good as them. And the Bucs could respond by saying, well, those teams did stupid-ass deals. We're not going to do a stupid-ass deal. We're not going to put ourselves in a position where maybe this all blows up, you get a serious injury, and then we've got some massive cap charge and this massive financial liability. We don't want to do that. He wants to do it. And I just think it all comes down to this year. Let's see how he plays. He— I was impressed by One of the things I learned in the quarterback series, because I'm not able to follow college football the way I'd like because I'm always traveling on Saturdays, I didn't know that when he didn't win the job at Texas Tech, he just left and enrolled at Oklahoma without a spot on the football team.

Yeah, I mean, this guy has rolled the dice over and over again, and he's willing to roll the dice this year.

Yeah, the one thing that I'll say about Baker, and I, I love Baker, I, I think most teams should want to have a guy like Baker as their quarterback, he's not always super honest about his injuries. During this season. So he will try to like push through things, fight through things. And if— when that happens enough, I think it makes it hard to believe him in the offseason when he's like, I'm feeling my best, coming into camp in great shape. And it might make teams a little, a little bit more reluctant to want to like commit that guaranteed money to him because they're like, we know that, we know you're tough as shit, but part of being a quarterback has to be like, you have to be able to admit when you're injured.

Well, it's one thing to play through an injury and play well. It's another thing to play through an injury and not play well. And I think this is one of the reasons why it fell apart for him in Cleveland. He refuses to come off the field even if the injuries are causing him to be significantly less than what he would be when he's healthy. And that also goes back to one of the things he said in the quarterback series. Junior year in high school, he didn't win the starting job. Fourth play from scrimmage, first game of the season, the starter gets injured. Baker takes that job and never lets it go. We've seen it with guys like Brett Favre. You don't want to come off the field ever because you don't want the next guy to have the chance to take your job. And I think that stubbornness has caused him to refuse to come out when there's got to be situations where the backup at 100% is better than Baker Mayfield at whatever reduced percentage he is. But that's part of the risk. Can he avoid— like, he's always going to play through the injuries.

Yeah.

Can he avoid getting injured in a way that causes him to not be the best Baker Mayfield he can be? And there's there's tension there, there's resistance there, and I respect the mindset. But from the team's perspective, we want to have a quarterback out there who's at his best, and you're taking these hits you shouldn't take, you're getting these injuries, and we admire you for playing through them, but the team is damaged because of that.

Yep. Uh, got a question for you about the Commanders. Larry Metcalf tears his, uh, triceps on Friday.

Um, you survived the cyanide. I saw your—

yeah, nightmare, nightmare scenario. Well, I won't say nightmare because we do have Brandon Coleman, and Brandon Coleman played pretty well at left tackle in 2024, got to the, uh, the NFC Championship Game. So he's, he's no slouch. Obviously Larry Mutonsell is a game changer. He's one of the best tackles in the entire league. So like, you want a guy like that on the field. Uh, but seriously, it's a serious injury, probably won't play this year. Have the, uh, Commanders committed to Brandon Coleman, or do you think they're going to get on the phone and be like, hey, Taylor Decker or somebody else? Um, you know, I don't know who else out there would have that same resume like a Taylor Decker, but is there any look to upgrade over what they have right now, which would be Brandon Coleman at left tackle?

Hey, look, this is the time of year where every team's got 90 guys. Some teams have too many players at a given position and they have to make decisions. What are we going to do? Are we going to trade a guy? Are we going to cut a guy? We see so much activity once the roster's cut to 53. There will be opportunities Taylor Decker is an interesting possibility if they could work that out. I assume he's on the Lions reserve retired list, so they'd have to do some sort of a deal with Detroit, I think. I don't think he was just released, but I haven't researched that.

That's a fancy way of saying I don't know, but I think he was officially— yeah, he got released by the Lions, uh, March 9th, 2023.

He's out there. But look, it's hard to find good left tackles. Because there aren't enough of them. The supply doesn't match the demand. And when you have a great left tackle, that's why you keep him, that's why you pay him, because there are so few of them. So it's going to be a challenge, and they're going to need to hope that, you know, the other guys they have can get it done. And they're going to be able to— they're going to need to be able to hope that they can find someone else who can come in and be coached up and, and fill the void. But, but obviously it, it hurts. And that's, that's the thing that I hate about training camp Like, you're sitting around all the time waiting for that notification.

Yep.

The key player on your favorite team is fucked.

Yeah.

And you just want to get through it all and get to the regular season.

And it's extra cool. We talked about it last episode. It's extra cruel because you're not seeing it, which I know doesn't really change it. But when you just see the tweet, oh, the cart's coming out and you don't have any video and you're like, what the fuck?

I saw the video. Yeah. And it was a lot of cope being like, I hope that's a stinger. He grabbed his arm. Is that what a stinger looks like? A lot of asking AI to identify what injury it was, and AI fucked me. AI was like, yeah, it's probably, probably a stinger.

AI lied.

It was a triceps. Um, but yeah, so if you were the command— like, what do you think they're going to do? What's your sense? You think they're going to look outside, or you think— because some GMs are like, we, we have depth for a reason and we trust our guys.

You know, I was in a team's facility once, and it really shows how dehumanized football players can become there's a big board, and I assume most facilities are like this. There's a big board at the front of the room, and it's got every position on the team with the players listed by best to worst. And then on the other side of the room is every position and their list of the 10 guys or so that they would go get if one of these guys isn't available. And so the Commanders have a board like that somewhere. They know who they would look to outside the organization. The question is, can they get them? But, you know, the general managers are always looking for someone in the event lightning strikes and we lose a guy. We're going to activate our plan. What is our plan? And the problem is sometimes you just can't pull it off. The guy's not available, the guy wants too much money, the trade request is too much. But they have some time to try to work it out. They're not going to tell us what their plan is, but I would be— it would be a mistake if they aren't doing something behind the scenes to look for a way to reasonably upgrade while Laramie Tunsil is out.

Yeah, okay. Uh, give us a couple teams that you're hearing from that are, uh, either like— there's obviously it's, it's training camp, so everyone's got enthusiasm, everyone thinks they're going to go undefeated, but are there any teams you've heard from, maybe not from the team directly but from other people, being like, hey, this team looks like they've finally got all the pieces together. Maybe it— maybe it's CJ Stroud looks better in Houston, maybe the defense in Cincinnati looks better. One of those stories.

I don't really have anything along those lines because there haven't been any joint practices yet. And you know, you have a bunch of national reporters who are hopscotching around training camps. I don't put a whole lot of stock in secondhand information.

I like this.

You know, I mean, let's be realistic about it. Nobody knows what's going to happen until it's time to start playing the games. Nobody knows, and it all plays out one week at a time. Teams that are supposed to be bad end up being good. Teams that are good end up being bad. Injuries are usually a big factor in all of that, but the margin between the best team and the worst team from a talent standpoint in the NFL isn't like it was when I was a kid and you'd have these 53-10 games on a regular basis. The worst team, if they can get their shit together and if they can avoid injuries and get a few breaks, they've got a chance.

All right, so let me ask a pointed question Okay, I'll get more direct. How do you think Aaron Rodgers is going to play this year?

Well, he's 42, if you haven't heard.

Yeah.

And he's got this full circle moment with Mike McCarthy, which, you know, that's nice. But I really wonder how long it takes, because it was the good in that relationship that made Rodgers enthusiastic about playing for Mike McCarthy again. They won a Super Bowl together. To cap the 2010 season. That was the best it ever got. But by the time it was over, if you look at any of the reporting from Tyler Dunn— he was with Bleacher Report at the time— it's kind of a shit show between Rodgers and McCarthy. If they encounter adversity, I mean, we know how Rodgers is. It's never his fault. He's gonna be pissed. He'll go on McAfee and say whatever he wants to say. We've already seen that recently. And yeah, if they win, it'll be great. If they lose, it'll be ugly because it won't be Aaron Rodgers' fault. It'll be McCarthy's fault or somebody else's fault. Because we, we see that every time we see him rip his chin strap off. The body language tells us it's not my fault, somebody else fucked up.

Okay. All right. So I agree in large part with what you said about Rodgers there in his career. But is this not a different situation in the fact that it's Mike McCarthy's first year? Mike McCarthy knows he's going to be the coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers next year. Aaron Rodgers knows he's not going to play for the Pittsburgh Steelers next year. So as much as there is maybe the bad that could happen, like McCarthy's got to have the freedom of being like, I know this is a 1-year thing, like let's try to make the best of it, but you're not gonna— you're not gonna cost me my job as a Steelers head coach. The Steelers aren't gonna fire a head coach after one year.

Wouldn't that be something if they do?

As I said, I was like, did I just make a clip and everyone's gonna shove my face?

Yeah, I mean, that would be hilarious. I'd feel bad for McCarthy, but that would be hilarious if they did it. Look, here's— we're so conditioned to the Steelers being contenders. 19 years with Mike Tomlin. If you haven't heard, never had a losing record under Tomlin. What if it just goes sideways this year? What if they're 2-6 after the first 8 games? What if it's just one bad thing after another? I don't think they have an overabundance of talent there. I've seen some people suggest that they would be a team that has an outside shot at getting to the Super Bowl. I mean, really? I, I, I, I think— and I, I'm not rooting for this, but I'd be fascinated by it if it happened. It'd be very good for our business because it'd be a huge talking point. There's a chance this thing goes, goes sideways. And, you know, you get to the trade deadline, you can have Aaron Rodgers maybe asking to go somewhere that may, you know, need a quarterback, some contender that may need a quarterback, because get me the hell out of here, this is my last year, I want to have a chance to play into the postseason.

Now, there's a lot of ifs in that, but it's also— hey, McCarthy was 6-10 his first year with the Cowboys. He took an 8-8 team under Jason Garrett in 2019, and he went 6-10 in his first year with a team that was good enough to go 8-8. So if they just, you know, post Tomlin can't win games— it's, it's impossible to envision it now, but once we get into the week after week after week, if they're losing and they're losing and they're losing, the pressure is going to get greater and greater and greater. Who the hell knows what's going to happen? Because as you said, McCarthy's not getting fired. It's Rodgers' last year. I think it's a mixture that could get, that could get, uh, combustible.

It's Will Howard time.

Will Howard.

Will Howard.

And that's the thing, like, if, if we're not contending by Thanksgiving, why do we want to play out the string with Aaron Rodgers? Why do we not want to get one of these other guys some reps if the season ends up being lost? I'm not saying it will, but I think it'd be stupid to just assume that they're going to be contenders and that everything's going to be fine when you change coaches after 19 years.

That's why you're the best, Mike. The starting off with the fan fiction of what if Aaron Rodgers requests a trade this year?

Yeah, that's why. That's good. That's good. I asked the wrong question. I was like, give us like general picture. No, I got to go crazy.

It's not crazy. That's what makes it perfect. Yeah, it's fun to think about.

Yeah.

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Hey, how about this? Is Joe Burrow going to be on the Bengals next year?

TBD.

See, it's good. I gotta just ask more pointed questions.

But look, look, guys, They, they've missed the playoffs for 3 straight years. Yeah, I was surprised that they brought back Zach Taylor and Duke Tobin this year. They go 4 straight years without a playoff appearance when you've got Joe Burrow and Ja'Marr Chase and Tee Higgins. 4 straight years when there are 7 teams per conference making it. Now you got Joe Burrow and you miss it 4 straight years. After the season, I think it goes one way or the other. If they would miss the playoffs, they either have to just give the keys to Joe Burrow or Burrow is going to say, get me out of here. It was 8 years for Carson Palmer before he said, I'm out. This is 7 years for Joe Burrow. I think if they've missed the playoffs and they don't make changes that make Burrow happy— remember how dejected he was, that press conference on his 29th birthday?

Yeah.

I think that if they don't make the kind of changes that Burrow wants after this season, if they fail to make the playoffs again, he's going to want out.

Yeah. The fact that it was on his birthday made it so much more sad.

Yeah.

It was like, wait, you're upset already, but it's on your birthday, man. You got to put a smile on a little bit. At least be like, so, so a little enthusiastic. What about the other, uh, the other team in Ohio? What about the Browns? What are they doing? Where is it going to be Deshaun? Because I heard that before practice they said it was going to be, uh, Sanders taking the first team reps, right? And then they may have lied about that because the reporters that were there said that it was all Deshaun Watson getting the first team reps. So if we're, if we're doing that quarterback battle, where we at?

I feel like they're using Deshaun Watson as the carrot to get Shaedur Sanders to do everything that they need for him to do. I feel like Shaedur Sanders, like Brett Favre used to be, he just wants to show up and play in the games, and he doesn't really care about all this other stuff because he knows when it's time to play, he'll be good enough. And he was good enough last year, not great, but hell, who's been great in Cleveland since they re-entered the league in 1999? I feel like they, they want to motivate Shaedur. They did it, I believe, during the offseason program. They started to put out this idea that Deshaun Watson was running away with the QB1 position. And then by the end of the offseason program, Sha'Dur Sanders had made a lot of progress. So this may be kind of like, you know, mid-training camp doldrums, trying to light a fire under Sha'Dur Sanders. And through it all, the one guy that seems to be making the most buzz is Dylan Gabriel. Coach Todd Monken said recently he's earning more reps. What's the point of performing well if you don't get a reward?

It would be crazy if Dylan Gabriel stole this thing because neither of the other two ran away with it. I just think that's what— anytime you have a quarterback competition, that's what the coach is waiting for. They want one of the guys to seize the job and make it clear to everyone that they're the guy, and no one has done it in Cleveland yet. I'll be shocked if it's Deshaun Watson, but you know, they got to figure out somebody who's going to play quarterback. They have a lot of other good pieces. They could be, you know, better than they were last year. They just need some stability at quarterback, and they need one of these guys to seize the job, and, and no one has done it yet.

Yeah.

All right, here's another team that feels like they're, uh, at a crossroads, so to speak, where I'm not saying they're gonna have a bad season. I think they're gonna have a really good season, they go to the Super Bowl, but this season might dictate what happens in the future. It's the San Francisco 49ers because They feel like a team that they have not been— they've been kind of all in for the last few years. They have this like weird gap in their, in their first round picks where they made the Trey Lance trade that didn't work. So they didn't— don't have anyone from '21, '22, or '23. Their roster has a weird like really, really good older guys, stars that are maybe at the end of their career, but they're stars. And then a lot of young unproven guys. And then Kyle Shanahan, who's been there for a really long time. So what's that going to be like? What is that situation from what you're hearing?

You know, last year they had a lot of injuries, but they were able to stay competitive even though they had all the injuries. And look at all the injuries they've already had. Thank you, electrical substation. I don't know what it's going to be. Hey, I don't think we should underestimate the importance of not having Kyle Shanahan at 100% for the first 2 weeks of training camp. That's a critical time in the life cycle of an NFL season. That's when the tone is set. They had confusion. They had their leader not there. He was there, but he wasn't there. He's kind of there, but he's not there 100%. Chris Forster's running the team. I don't remember that happening at any time in the 25 years since I've been doing this, where a coach is kind of there but not there in the key couple of weeks that start off training camp. So getting him completely back up to speed, and it looks like he'll be ready to go for their preseason opener and definitely for the regular season opener. But they do have a lot of older guys, you know. They're happy they brought back Drake Greenlaw and Deebo Samuel after they were each gone for a year, but how much do they have left in the tank?

Mike Evans, you mentioned him earlier, like, he's their clear-cut top receiver and he's in year number 14 or 13, I think it's 13. He's had hamstring issues. He missed 9 games last year. He's got a quad issue now. He's been out for nearly a week. You're putting a lot of eggs in this basket of keeping guys healthy. Nick Bosa all of a sudden has knee soreness. He had the torn ACL last year. He hasn't practiced for a few days. There's just a lot of stuff, and they, they got to get the hell out of that, that practice facility. There was a profile of one of their executives in The Athletic, and it was kind of buried near the bottom, that they're looking at moving to a new practice facility because they need more space. I don't care what the stated reason is. This whole substation thing just kind of takes on a life of its own, and you can find anyone to come in and tell you it's fine. If the players think it's a factor and it gets into their heads, the only way you're ever going to fix this thing is to get the hell away from that.

Yep, fair point. Uh, what about the Raiders? They, they were in the news this weekend. Apparently the training camp fight from hell.

I need that video.

Badasses going after it. Kirk Cousins and Max Crosby got into a fight. Who started the fight? Who was the aggressor between Kirk Cousins and Max Crosby?

Well, I don't know that yet, but remember when the Jets were on Hard Knocks? I think this is when it happened. Rex Ryan instigated someone to go start a fight. Yeah, they wanted to toughen someone up or something like that. Here's the conspiracy theory, and I say this tongue-in-cheek, okay? Conspiracy theory. Max Crosby deliberately started the fight, um, get both himself and Kirk Cousins knocked out of practice for a day so Fernando Mendoza could come in to get the first-team reps and have an opportunity to prove that the number 1 overall pick in the draft should be able to beat out a 37-year-old quarterback who still hasn't been the same since he tore his Achilles tendon 3 years ago. So Crosby did it on purpose to get Mendoza more first-team reps. I'm kidding.

But yeah, and the only problem with that though is that Max Crosby getting kicked out, how do you know Fernando Mendoza like he— we famously know Max Crosby is an actual game wrecker in practice. He's a practice wrecker. So how do we know that Fernando Mendoza is better than Kirk Cousins if Max Crosby isn't there wrecking practice?

But it makes it even easier for Fernando Mendoza to come in and play well. It's just true. It's odd to me, you know, this isn't like the Chiefs of 2017 when they had a perennial playoff team, Alex Smith taking them to a point but only to that point. So they draft Patrick Mahomes, they sit him on the bench for a whole year because they have a team that's going to get back to the playoffs again. And they did that year. The Raiders, what have they done? They've been to the playoffs twice since the last time they went to the Super Bowl to cap the 2002 season. They don't have the luxury of saying, we think Fernando Mendoza is better than Kirk Cousins. Why else would you have drafted him if you didn't think he would be better than Kirk Cousins? We're going to put him on the bench for a year and see what happens with Kirk Cousins. It doesn't make any sense to me. They need— I think that any quarterback needs reps. And if you are looking at a guy that you think can't jump in and play right away, why are you making him the first overall pick?

So I disagree with this entire approach. I think any, any first-round quarterback, especially top-10 quarterback—

I agree with this—

has got to be ready to go week one, or you should have drafted someone else.

Schlereth was the one who changed our mind on this like a decade ago, where he's like, if you're not— if It— because I always was like, oh, uh, a Derek Carr— or sorry, David Carr— like, he got ruined. And Schlereth was like, the point is, if he's not mentally tough enough, he was never going to be the guy anyway. Like, yes, it's bad that he got sacked a lot. You don't want to put your quarterback in that spot. But if they can't get over it, if they can't find a way to, to overcome that, they probably weren't going to be the superstar you thought they were going to.

And I would also say that if you look at the Raiders schedule this year, they say they don't want to have Mendoza start the season, but but there's no real, real easy place where you could imagine Mendoza taking over. If you're trying to like ease him in there, you might as well just have him start week 1 against the Dolphins, if you believe him. I like your conspiracy. I would actually say I could see a world where it was set up beforehand, where Cousins and Crosby knew, and they're like, hey, let's get into a fight so we don't have to practice for the rest of the day.

But Cousins is the one who's looking at possibly losing the starting job, and hell, I don't know, does he want to. I think he wants to play, but it's not like there was anyone else offering him a starting job. That's what's so weird about this. You got a veteran quarterback who has played well, has made a ton of money over the years. No one else was offering him the QB1 position. If Fernando Mendoza cannot beat him out— and it feels like they're not going to let them have a fair competition— but if he can't beat them out, why in the world would he be the first overall pick? Why not take David Bailey? Why not take Arvell Reese? Why not? I was— I was going to say Jeremiah Love, but I mean, they already have Ashton Jenney, but take somebody else or trade out of that spot and get yourself a bunch of picks you can use to address the many holes in your roster.

Mm-hmm. Good point. Mm-hmm. Memes, do you have any questions for our dear good friend Mike Florio about your beloved Jets? Not really.

I mean, oh, good job.

Yeah. Podcast here.

When do you think The Athletic's going to conclude their investigation? Good question, Mims.

Well, hey, I mean, they said a few weeks on or about June 11th and June 7th. It was when it was reported that the guy who runs The Athletic, the executive editor Stephen Ginsberg, had said it's going to be a few weeks until they finish their investigation. I'm starting to think they're just never going to do it for whatever reason. Either they don't want to put any of that stuff out there, and if they do that, they're going to have some people at The New York Times and at The Athletic The Athletic who are upset, or maybe there was some sort of a deal that was struck between Diana Rossini and The Athletic for this thing to go away. She's not going to tell her story, they're not going to finish their investigation. She clearly doesn't want them to do that, or they've just decided the whole thing is so damn complicated, it really is taking a lot longer than they expected. But it's odd that it's taken this long for them to do their investigation and come to a conclusion. There's a lot of pressure internally. There's an awkward culture there because the New York Times reporters believe The Athletic athletic reporters have a lesser standard, and this case is a prime example of the lower bar that applies to the athletic having and triggering a worst-case scenario.

So I thought we'd have it by now, and I still think there's a chance she's going to sit down with Oprah Winfrey the night before the regular season opener and tell her story. I, I'm not saying she will. I'm just saying, with the Patriots playing that Wednesday night, 2 days after Labor Day, that Tuesday night right before that game, man, that'd be a hell of a time to drop a big old turd in the punch bowl if she decides to do that.

Oprah. Oprah will be wild.

Yeah, I hope anyone— whoever it would be, some big primetime interview, Diana Rossini breaks her silence, tells her story, and who the hell knows what she would say.

Yeah, pardon my take.

Yeah, imagine the numbers.

That would be great. Yeah.

Um, what's going on with, uh, with Aaron Rodgers' injury, by the way? Do they skirt the rules, Mike?

Oh, they absolutely skirted the rules. They deliberately did a risk-reward calculation. Aaron Rodgers was sick before the playoff loss to the Texans. They sent him home from the team hotel. I believe they talked it all through.

Let him go.

Let him go.

Let him go.

So in the playoff loss, he was sick going into it. Yeah, he had a stomach issue. What was it?

Yeah.

I guess that's it, but we don't know what he had.

Yeah, here's the problem. Here's the problem. Yeah, and you guys dabble in the, the gambling trade from time to time.

Nah, I never touch this stuff.

This is the problem. We've seen these scandals pop up in other sports when there is inside information that, that people have but the public doesn't have. We don't know who knew that Aaron Rodgers was that sick. We don't know who they told. We don't know who hammered the under on his passing yards. He had 145 passing yards. I suspect the under cashed. Hammer the under on his passing touchdowns. He had zero. The under cashed. His rushing yards, I don't know what he had, but if he's sick, it's just an edge. You know, you're not going to find a silver bullet, but you're going to get an edge if you have inside information. And that's where the scandal is going to come from. The NFL, for the most part, has avoided that. It's been a basketball and baseball thing. That's why they need to care about it, and I don't know that they do. I don't know what they're doing about this one. But remember a few years ago, Bijan Robinson woke up sick on a Sunday game against the Buccaneers and they didn't disclose it, and all the people lost their minds because he was the rookie then, he was the hot fantasy football prospect, and he barely played in the game.

They got in trouble for that. So I think the Steelers did what they did knowing there was a chance the shit was going to hit the fan later. But they decided screw it, we're— he's gonna play the whole game, that's all we care about. And if it comes out later he was sick and we get in trouble, we'll deal with it at the time.

Michael, I have a question for you. Uh, can I ask a question?

Yes.

Okay. Um, so, uh, Big Cat, part of my take, I, I, I commend you and, and your pursuit because I actually agree with you. Like, I, I agree that the, the teams need to be disclosing these things. When it comes to this specific case, is there a chance that the Steelers were absolute dog shit all year on offense and the Texans were awesome. And no matter what, Aaron Rodgers could have taken steroids before the game and felt like he was 25 years old and they still would have gotten their dick kicked in.

Yeah, absolutely. But that's not the point. The point is, I know, I know, inside information. And it's going to take—

it's just funny in this specific scenario because it's like it had nothing to do with him being sick. This was always going to happen. But I know what you're saying.

But he was sick and they didn't tell us. It's not what would have happened if they told us, it's the fact that they didn't. It's going to take some massive scandal to make the changes that protect the consumers. You want to protect— and I know the sportsbooks end up getting screwed too because the inside information gets out there and somebody goes out and hammers the under and it cashes and they get a lot of money. But they started the injury report years ago because one side had the inside information and the general public didn't. It's not there for competitive reasons. It's there to give the general public some sort of a level playing field when it's time to make wagers. And, and that's— and it's, it's like in the stock business, it's insider trading and people go to jail. And I'm stunned that it's been 8 years now since they've opened the floodgates for legalized gambling in every state. So I'm stunned that we haven't seen some effort to have real standards that avoid inside information. And this Aaron Rodgers case is a prime example of inside information. And who knows what the people who had access to it did with it, who they told, who placed bets.

We may never know the answer to that question, but we do know there was inside information they didn't share.

I love this.

This is my— yep, when you're sleeping, you're— you are the meme for us. Like, when we're sleeping, you're, you're taking all the bullets for us.

You want me on that wall?

We need you on that wall.

100%.

That's a fact. Um, all right, Mike, uh, you— but let's, let's actually just, before we do the Roback question, I was— and we love Mike, uh, by the way. He, he has a chapter, incredible chapter, about the Italian, uh, Sports Hall of Fame. He also wrote the back of our book, Pardon My Book, out August 18th. Florio's all over it. You can't tell the history of Pardon My Take without Mike Florio. That's a fact. Uh, but When we were scheduling—

if you ever have a Hall of Fame, then I get in 100%.

Yep, you might be a first-baller.

All right, here we go.

It's like you, Whitney, uh, Mr. Portnoy, like first ballot, like guys who, you know, right at the beginning. Joe Buck, Scott Van Pelt. Now we're just listening to everyone.

Um, all right, put Jerry O'Connell in. Hey, I, I've told you this.

No, no, no, we keep him out. Steroid era. He's on PEDs. People don't realize that Jerry's on PEDs.

I could listen, and I don't know what it is.

He's the best.

When he's on your show, I could just listen to that guy talk all day long. And maybe it's just me, but I get such a kick out of Jerry O'Connell.

So no, he's an incredibly talented and hilarious. And you know what the best part about Jerry O'Connell is, is he's exactly the same. If I call him on the phone and I'm like calling him, I'll call him on the phone sometimes on my way home after we record. It's the exact same thing. Like he is just always, funny. He doesn't have an off moment. We're about to go to Camp Barstool. We just sit in that cabin and he just entertains us in his like little tighty-whities. He just walks around, uh, and entertains us. But what I was gonna say was we were scheduling this and you— I was like, hey, can we do 7:30? And you're like, yeah, no problem, we're gonna go see The Odyssey, uh, at 8:15. Then you got on, so then we moved it up to 6:30. You got on, you've already seen it, you're just gonna go see it again.

Yeah, we've been— I mean, we loved it.

But you could have got— you could have been— you could have been 5 minutes late, assigned seating, right?

Yeah. Well, and the night that we went, we went the Monday night after it came out. My son and I went to the last showing of the day, 9:30 Eastern. There was no one in the theater. Now, a few people came after we got there, so I don't expect at 9 o'clock at night on a Sunday there's gonna be a lot of people there, but But yeah, I mean, I appreciate your flexibility. We still would have been able to get— I don't know, maybe I would have been rushing to get there, maybe not. It's not that far from here. But yeah, I love The Odyssey, and it's not just because I'm employed by NBCUniversal.

It's awesome.

I can watch it every single day. I don't know if you guys have seen it. I have not yet. Awesome. It is entertaining. And my son and I talked about it for 2 weeks after we saw it. So we're going back, try to get my wife to go.

It's good.

I liked it. I didn't like the fact you had to get a sex change to watch the movie, to buy a ticket. But that's the price that I pay. It's a great film.

I might go just, uh, I might— I'm gonna wait till it comes out on streaming and watch it on my phone, like on a flight. That's how I'm gonna watch it, the way that Christopher Nolan intended. Yeah, really enjoy it. All right, so Rowback question. R-H-O-B-A-C-K.com, promo code TAK, 20% off your first purchase. Q-Zips, polos, hoodies, joggers, shorts. Rowback.com, promo code TAK. Zach, you want to give us— give Mike a last question, or maybe two?

Mike, I got a quick question for you. Hope you're doing well today, man. Uh, we're gonna go down to the great state of Texas. Jerry Jones recently let everybody around the league know he's looking to trade. He's looking to mix it up. What do you think he's willing to put on the line in his eyes that would make a big enough return for the Cowboys to maybe do this thing before he dies?

Well, he's made it clear he's willing to move future assets. Now, some of that is Jerry's habit of creating attention by saying whatever pops into his brain, and he's very good at that. There is some speculation out there that Max Crosby could be a target for them. Think back to what happened with the Ravens trade. It was March, two first-round picks. The Ravens got cold feet once they had a chance to do the physical. Dr. Daniel Cooper, who's the Cowboys team doctor, was involved in the evaluation, but Crosby's healed now.

Now.

And if the Raiders aren't looking for two first-round picks, we get into the season every year, the Raiders are looking to trade anyone before the deadline. What if he's available? What if the Cowboys are willing to give up first-round pick to get Max Crosby? So I just think Jerry— look, I, I have long believed that this whole thing about Jerry being obsessed with not winning another Super Bowl and being tormented by it, I just think that's part of his carnivore Barker vibe where he just acts like he— I mean, they're making so much freaking money and he knows what it takes to get asses in seats. And it would be sad if he's been truly tormented the last 30 years of his life by not winning another Super Bowl. The guy's got a 400-foot yacht, for crying out loud. If you can't be happy with a 400-foot yacht, something is wrong. But they, they, they seem to be inclined to at least entertain it. The question becomes, what can they get? Can they get it on their terms? Is Max Crosby available? If the Raiders suck out of the gates, that's when it gets interesting, because whether it's the Cowboys or somebody else, I think this Max Crosby trade possibility is going to move back to the front burner.

I like that. Yeah, good question. It is kind of weird that they, they traded him, then he went back and they're like, hey, sorry about that, just business, you know, not, not personal. We did try to trade you. There's no way that you can just forget that and move on if you're Max Crosby.

Yeah, it's not like George Costanza quitting his job and showing up the next day and acting like nothing happened. I know That's a very timely and hip reference, but there are so many lessons from that show that apply to everyday life. It's awkward, it's weird, and they can say anything they want to say. It's still a weird scene when they traded the guy and everybody thought he was gone. He did his farewell video and then he's back.

Yep. Yeah, yeah. I, I do have one last question for you. You can take this in any direction. Give me a coach that might be a surprise hot seat topic come, let's say, week A guy that we might not be thinking of right now.

Wow, man, whoever I say is gonna get me in shit. Yeah, I—

but you don't care about that.

No, I mean, oh well, I know coaches read— coaches read Pro Football Talk.

I don't need the phone calls, I don't need the text messages. And trust me, there are certain coaches who, if I would say their name, they will text me, they will call me, they will piss and moan, which will further prove why they may be on the hot seat come Week 8. Because if you're worried about something I say during training camp, you got your priorities all out of whack. What about Jim Harbaugh with the Chargers?

Oh no, I love it though. You just— on him, I love it. You, you spend 30 seconds explaining why you're not going to do it, but then you're like, you know what, Jim, what about Jim? Have you thought about Jim?

Yeah, I mean, he's gotten the Chargers like— remember what they were under Brandon Staley?

I know, but there's this urgency to get to the next level.

Of course, but they also had no one blocking for Justin Herbert. Like, that was a joke of a playoff game.

Here's the wild card that could make guys who otherwise wouldn't be on the hot seat out the door. Mike Tomlin is going to hover over the entire season, and he told Chris Collinsworth the other night when he was in the booth for the Hall of Fame game He hasn't thought yet about whether he wants to come back because he knows that he won't really be able to tell until the regular season starts. For now, he doesn't miss it. And I got to spend a lot of time with him last week. He is awesome. Just being around him, just listening to him. He's got so many stories. He communicates so clearly. He could get me— and I would say run through a wall, but I can't run through a wall— he would get me to bounce off of a wall for him if he wanted to. I just love being around the guy, and he's going to be great on TV. And they're going to be owners who are trying to get him, and it's not just going to be owners who are already committed to firing their coaches. There's going to be owners who think, you know what, I'm fine bringing this coach back, but if Tomlin's coming back and somebody's going to get him, I want him.

I'll fire my coach if I can get him. So I think there's gonna be a shitload of teams that are, are hovering around to try to possibly get Tomlin when the season ends. And there could be guys that are perfectly safe right now, but if their team can get Tomlin, they're gone.

Is it— could it be a situation where, like, you know, uh, there's always stories about a scout going to a high school for one specific guy and then they see another guy and that becomes the greatest player of all time? Could it be a situation where owners are watching Sunday Night Football for Mike Tomlin and they're like, oh my God, we should hire Jason Garrett.

Look, in all seriousness, I'm stunned. Now, I, I think he probably made a mistake signing on with Joe Judge to be the offensive coordinator to the Giants after his time Cowboys ended, but he's another one that tells great stories. He understands the game. I've loved being around him the past few years. I just know that there's a much greater sense that there's going to be a land rush for Mike Tomlin. Look at what happened with Jon Harbaugh because he jumped right back into it. It was clear Tomlin wasn't going to coach this year or they would have been the same kind of zeal and effort and leverage. And he's going to be in a great spot, and it's all going to come down to whether or not he wants to coach again, whether he's going to miss it. You know, in his current job, he's not going to be putting in the kind of hours, and it's an unhealthy lifestyle. Sean Payton was able to, to sit out for only one year before he jumped back into it. John Madden retired at age 42. He was only 42 when he retired. He never looked back.

So we'll see where Tomlin goes.

All right, Mike, you're the best. We love you. Enjoy Odyssey for the second time, uh, and, uh, can't wait for football to be back.

Thanks, guys. Great talking to you as always.

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Okay, Mount Rushmore time. Hank is back. Uh, Hank, so the scores: myself, memes, and Max 44, PFT 33, Hank and Zach 31. What did you think about your boys' performance on Friday without you here?

I mean, I feel bad. I feel bad for leaving them. I think that's, that's on me. I take full, full blame and responsibility. We're a team and I left them out on an island while I was on an island. And that's just being a poor teammate. Sana, horrible pick.

I still can't believe you didn't pick trading cards.

Yeah, I was, I It is what it is. We're— we're— that was last week. We're on to this week. That's, that's my official statement.

What's your unofficial statement?

How long did you guys— when you make the topic and how long before you decide?

Well, here's the thing is, is Zach wanted the topic because Zach thought of it because he was opening trading cards.

Zach picked the topic, probably an hour elapsed, and then Zach picks Sondra.

Yeah, saunas, sauna, sauna.

I don't—

I love saunas. I might be the— I might be the biggest sauna guy on this show, despite the fact that you guys both have saunas.

I saw it today.

I still probably sauna more than both of you guys.

I saw it today. Did you? I saw—

I didn't.

I saw it 4 times a week. I go usually 250 degrees, 45 minutes.

That's not true. This is not true.

I know, but every time I go in there, I just say that I go harder because that's what you got to do. If you're a real sauna boy, you just up your stats.

The sauna guys who get it, you guys are just rich.

But I actually like love saunas. I like— if you guys didn't have saunas in your house, you would not sauna.

I wouldn't have— I wouldn't have a house. I just have a sauna. If I— if I lost all my money, I just have a sauna.

I'm going to sell it. If I ever go broke, I'm going to sell my house off room by room.

Yeah.

The last one to go is going to be the sauna.

I'm like, I get to live in the sauna, but I still would never—

fighting about how good of a pick this is.

I know.

I know. My point about— my point was to say Except my point was to say I still would not have—

correct.

I don't think that would have entered a list if I had to pick 100.

The door is the worst part of the sauna. Mm-hmm.

But regardless, we're again, we're, we're, we're moved on. We're on to Monday.

The door is the portal to the sauna.

It's also—

you could have just picked doors.

It's also the portal out. Big mistake on Oliver. I feel like your eyes for things that you open should, should have been one of the picks.

Yeah, sometimes it's not the best.

It happens.

Like, actually, I don't like opening my eyes in the morning. I actually— the worst.

But no, every day you open your eyes is a gift.

No, that's why I'm tired. I wish I could keep sleeping and I can't. So I open my eyes, I'm like, fuck, I wish I could see.

Sounds like you need to open your heart.

No, I just not sleeping enough. So did we— do we talk at all after the sauna or no?

We text a little bit.

We're—

we're—

Listen, there's a lot of Rushmores left where we're not really very much—

we're—

I mean, we're right. We're in striking distance.

That's true.

And that's all that matters.

Anything could happen.

Anything could happen.

Yeah.

And we play better on the road and we're going on the road.

A lot of road.

Is that true? You guys play better on the road.

That's all we're telling each other.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Good thing to tell yourself. All right. Mount Rushmore of masculine foods. This one is— this one will be tough to fuck up.

Yeah, okay, say anything.

Okay, actually, yes, it is. This one is tough to fuck.

There's a lot of picks. All right, uh, what does the order mean? We go first and then Hank.

Hank.

Okay.

Yeah.

All right, we're gonna run the ball with our first pick and we're gonna go with Steak. That's a, that's an easy one. I actually think this is the—

I think what's that He didn't do a face.

I actually think, looking at this, this, and I like— I'm— I don't think I'm giving anything away. I actually think this, this first round is just loaded. But Steak is— yeah, there's a loaded first round. Everyone should do well in this first round. We should get out of this first round and be happy with everyone's picks. Do you not agree, PFT? There's a load. Now I'm—

now I'm concerned.

Hank gave a look to Zach. Oh no, I don't know what that was.

Okay.

We're going to take ribs.

Okay.

All right. All right. All right. So loaded first round.

Yeah, we had it.

Yeah, we had it.

Good pick.

We had it.

Loaded first round.

It is.

PFT is about to take a big pick.

I'm going to take bacon.

Okay.

Yep.

Good pick. Very masculine pick.

Good pick.

My second pick. I'm going to go with pork chops.

Okay.

Wow.

Okay.

Hey, good pick. Now, Zach is freaking out right now.

Freaking out about pork chops are masculine.

That's a good pick.

Yeah.

Well, you wanted to take pork chops?

No, never.

I'm not freaking out about—

I'm just kind of curious where this draft goes. I don't know.

I got it, Zach. We're going to take chicken and we're going to take ground beef. Oh, no.

Fuck. Oh, no. Wow. He's got it.

But we didn't.

So you got chicken?

You got chicken?

Yeah. Okay.

Uh, did you see the two I just texted?

Yeah, I mean, yeah, we're gonna take—

nervous little bird.

Yeah. Yes, we're gonna take— we're gonna take buffalo wings.

Okay.

Um, and burgers and burgers. Okay.

Yeah, I mean, we don't have—

right now we have steak, wings, burgers.

Yeah, yeah, those are great foods. I, I thought about chicken wings.

How did you not take wings?

Yeah, I thought you were for sure good.

I don't think chicken wings are necessarily masculine.

Oh, but like, we took chicken.

Okay, so you're taking what, grilled chicken? Chicken wings? No, no, no, you got to eat buffalo wings and chicken or—

what are buffalo wings made out of?

Yeah, but you don't go— you know, it's— you just try to take ground beef too. You can take it. I'm not going to argue. Go take ground beef.

We have some.

We—

yes, go ahead.

We also—

we also took—

so we're just going to take red meat and you get every single red meat. Meat.

No, I mean, there's lots of different—

yes, ground beef.

There's lots of different chicken.

You, you actually technically did take ground beef.

There's chicken tenders, there's grilled chicken, there's— right, there's Southern fried chicken.

There's— when Hank took chicken, I thought to myself, like, I, I understand the pick, but it's too broad, right?

Yes.

But you didn't— no one said that.

No, it's— you're allowed to take it. Yeah, yeah, it's a fair pick, but it's— yeah, I think the broadness of the pick could end up hurting you.

What you— you technically did take your next two picks. You have ground Beef.

All right.

And I wouldn't argue. We have hamburger. Yeah, we have hamburger. We should— technically, we should just make it— it should be— it should be burger.

Yeah, burger.

Yeah.

Cheeseburger. No, there's a burger.

Burger. Burgers.

Burgers.

Okay.

Steak burger.

Steak wings burgers.

I love the Hank. I need to— I need that clip of Hank saying, all right, we got it, and then took 2 picks when he wasn't supposed to. 15. But I've got it.

I've got a pick, and I'm not sure if it's going to be allowed.

Oh, I know what it is.

No, you don't.

Okay, I don't know what it is.

You don't know this one?

Okay.

Um, well, is it a food? Yeah, one of them is food. I get 2 picks right now. One of the 2 is, is certainly a food.

Okay.

You know what? I'm, I'm, I'm going to go against everything that my brain is telling me to do because up to this point my brain has absolutely sabotaged. Just take a shot, Rushmore's.

If it's not a food, we'll talk about it. This is what Mouse Rushmore's for.

Yeah, I'm going to go with a fish you caught yourself.

Okay.

A fish you caught.

I—

okay.

I like that. It's out of the box, but it is masculine.

It's a very masculine thing.

Fish aren't masculine.

But no, but, but if you catch catch it yourself.

But anything you catch yourself, correct?

My last one is going to be pussy.

Yep.

We, we, in our meeting, we literally said he's going to take pussy.

He's going to take it. Came down to pussy or ass. And God, and it's definitely— God help me, I just love vaginas.

So is that a food?

Nope.

Okay. Horniest guy we got by far.

All right, Memes is Mr. Nudes over there.

You still don't know.

Captain News. Captain.

Captain Jack did miss that because Memes and PFT had an off-camera argument about nudes.

Memes just is walking around insisting to everybody he gets more nudes than them. And I'm like, okay, dude, you got it. I believe you.

All right. So you need something else than pussy?

Yeah. Yeah, I got ass.

That would not be a food. Okay.

All right. So we won't go ass or pussy. I'm going to go with sausage.

Okay. The opposite of pussy.

Yeah.

Sausage.

Very phallic.

Very masculine, though.

Masculine and phallic.

Yeah.

Hank, do we do it, Zach?

Big B. Yeah, we can take the Big B. Bison. Oh, we had it on there. I don't think I've— I know I have had bison.

It's good. Bison burgers.

Bison burgers are great. Yeah, there used to be a, uh, it was like right across the street from my defunct film school, but it was just a Bison like restaurant, so I went there a lot.

Max, you want yours?

I mean, yeah, you gotta let it rip, Max.

You gotta.

Yeah, we have meatballs.

There you go, there you go.

We had that, we had to have it.

Yeah, we, it wasn't our highest rated on the board, but No, we had a lot of our mustache left. Yeah. Cheesesteak, chili, ground beef is—

you couldn't— that would have been whatever.

What?

Wait, what? Venison.

Wait, what was it? Finish that thought.

No, it doesn't matter.

No, finish that thought.

It doesn't matter.

We have burgers.

You have ground beef. We couldn't take chili.

No, you can take chili. Oh, cheesesteak is ground beef.

No, it's not. It's ribeye.

Yeah, no, that's okay.

That's why it doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

Chopped cheese is ground beef.

Yeah, pulled pork.

Okay, brisket was a big miss, I'll give you that.

Yeah, brisket.

I, I put in our chat we should do brisket, but I actually think we had meatballs.

We had to get me thinking back on it. So nobody took chili, right? No, I think chili might be a first round Yeah, yeah, we had—

we had in our Must Drafts— our Must Drafts were steak, burgers, wings, ribs, fried chicken, brisket, meatballs, cheesesteak, chili.

So the eggs— yeah, eggs, eggs.

I don't know, eggs are kind of feminine, but like, if you're thinking— we were thinking of like the masculine—

what do you—

you know, if you're trying to get like protein—

yeah, I said that.

Yeah, I said—

I—

he said protein. I was like, but those guys who like work out so much are not really masculine.

We were talking about like what are the most feminine foods and Big Cat argued that chicken and rice is a feminine meal.

Well, no, memes said— okay, no, no, it's grilled chicken. You said grilled chicken. I said that's a chick meal. Grilled chicken's a chick meal.

It can be if you're adding it to a salad.

I don't think so. I think it's like, if you're like masculine is trying to get the most amount of protein.

Yeah, but I— those guys are the masculine, the guys who like go on Instagram and like flex and shit.

But chili's more feminine.

I'm not— yeah, I'm not following because they're just getting— chicken wings are not masculine. You have to like fucking lick your—

lick your hands.

Yeah, it's masculine.

You're just You're describing what a woman would never do.

But Hank, you're saying that it's too messy?

You're describing why we have a bunch of napkins and it's like— women don't eat buffalo wings for everything you just said.

The juices don't run— it's too juicy.

I mean, if you're saying chicken and rice is not masculine, then, then chicken wings aren't either.

Um, I don't think— I— here's the thing, I don't necessarily agree that chicken wings are masculine. I think that they're— chicken wings are for everyone.

So grilled chicken, masculine?

I didn't say that. No, fuck. I didn't say that either.

Potatoes.

Potatoes.

Potatoes. Not like, not like French fries. They're just potatoes.

Like maybe a little bit of butter. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Boiled sausages, brats. You did sausage. Here's one that I didn't— I couldn't— we were arguing about. I don't know if I've ever seen a chick eat sunflower seeds, but then Max said they put them on salads, which I didn't realize. So sunflower seeds with the shells.

Yeah, de-shelled sunflower seeds.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I had— so the one that I was debating, and since we had already been through chicken gate twice, I was going to say the biggest piece of chicken.

Okay.

Like the big piece of chicken in a bucket. That's, that's, that's dad's piece of chicken. That's the biggest alpha male in the room.

Yeah.

They claim the monster breast of chicken.

Yeah. Burritos.

Big ones.

I got a burrito Saturday night that was was like, it was like 3 burritos in one. Fucking made me feel like a man. Meat lovers pizza.

Yeah.

Chicks don't eat that. Oh, like sausage pepperoni.

Yeah.

That you like when it's just like, it's basically you can barely see the pizza. There's so much meat on it.

Yeah.

Sloppy Joes.

Sloppy Joes. Good.

Beef jerky.

Beef jerky is a good pick.

I was thinking combos. Yeah, I feel like chicks don't eat combos.

Chicks eat combos.

Yeah, I thought you, you went a little, you went a little outside the box. I was trying to think about it.

Yeah, I was trying to think of even gas station.

Yeah, yeah, I was, I was trying to think of what the—

by gas.

Yeah, he said Cool Ranch Doritos, which was crazy.

Yeah, listen, I was trying to think outside the box. I, I was trying to think of what the most masculine fruit is avocado.

No, no.

I landed on orange. Like a big orange, not a clementine.

I think even though it's kind of shaped like a dick. Yeah, it's the least like juicy.

Yeah, but like when you have to peel an apple, it could—

I think it might just be an apple.

No apples. No, that's what— that's what got Eve.

No, didn't Eve tempt Adam with it?

Oh yeah, that's— yeah, that was a very chick move.

Her.

Yeah, big time. Chicks love apples too much. What about— I feel like watermelon.

Watermelon.

Pretty masculine.

Yeah, that's pretty good.

Blueberries. Bloobs.

They're so dainty.

Yeah, but big fat ones.

Handful. They— I mean, I like— I like blueberries.

I'm a Bloobs man.

Yeah. Blackberries might actually be up there because they kind of got a little something to them and they're not, you know. Yeah, they're like the manly version of raspberries.

Seeded watermelon. That's a man's.

Oh, yeah, yeah. The unseeded is like child's play. Like, what are you doing?

Lemon.

Yeah, that's a man's fruit.

Yeah.

I love a nice lemon drop shot.

Yeah.

No, no. Just like, yeah, take a bite out of a lemon.

Like, what do you think about TV dinner?

Like, yeah.

Hungry Man. Yeah.

Hungry Man.

Hungry Man's maybe.

Meatloaf is a good one. I mean, it's in it. Chicken pot pie.

Hungry Man is maybe the most unhealthy meal that you can ever eat. But goddamn, it's good.

Yeah.

Ramen.

Now, chick, that's the most chick.

That's chick. You think just like the brick of ramen is— Yeah, yeah, yeah. I disagree.

Venison.

Venison is good. Shepherd's pie. That's just literally meat and mashed potatoes.

Shark fin.

Shark. Yeah.

What about the— What about just a meat pie? The Australian meat pies? That feels like that. That's masculine shit. Stew.

Yeah, beef stew. Beef stew on here.

Chili and beef stew.

I had elk. Yeah, I don't ever had it like a backstrap of elk. Pretty good. I had a turkey leg.

Fried turkey leg.

Yeah. Or smoked. The one that you walk around with at the fair.

Mm-hmm.

And then memes. I thought you might take pieces of shit like you for breakfast.

Hmm. Nah, he didn't.

You piece of shit.

Breakfast.

What else would you guys have? What else, Zach? Did you have any that didn't make the cut? You were thinking— it's fun to debate on some of these.

We were for a second, we were torn between like, is it masculine foods or is it like the most masculine foods you could eat? Like, is it like the—

sounds the same thing, like, like bison and like shark and like buffalo.

Buffalo. Like, is it like we're going out, we're hunting down this lion and getting mashed?

You have 3 I was just thinking of guys. It's like guy food.

It's like you eat—

it basically was, what can you eat to gain its power? It basically was the most straightforward. Mount Rushmore is like, can you just recite what we eat on football Sundays?

Yeah.

What about pizza?

Yeah, I said meat lovers pizza. Yeah, that is the most masculine.

I think a stromboli.

I love stromboli.

Yeah, I've never— I don't think they have stromboli here.

Never seen a chick eat stromboli.

Yeah, I love calzone too. Yeah, calzone. Like I've never seen a girl eat calzone. No, that's when you buy a calzone, you're making like a commitment. That's a commitment to the next like day and a half of like stomach pain and eating. Yeah, it's, that's a serious relationship you're getting into with the calzone.

Yeah. Chicks could never have a commitment like you don't flippantly order a calzone.

You're like, oh yeah, let me throw on a calzone. It's like, no, no, I'm going to, I'm going to sit down with this calzone. Then the calzone is going to sit with me.

If you for a while, if you do a stromboli or a calzone, you're making not just a choice for your day, you're making a commitment really for— it's pretty much a lifestyle change for the rest of your life. If you decide to eat a full calzone or strumble in one sitting, you're like, okay, I've officially fucked off.

Yeah. You're just— you're basically like, hey, yeah, pizza, I give up enough. I need double it.

I give up. You win.

What about Italian sub? That's— that's a masculine— I mean, that's just any— so many types of meat in there that you're just like—

you guys are just talking about the foods that you like the most.

Well, yeah. Yeah.

Masculine, which is fine.

Yeah.

But that is—

I mean, how many times How many times you've seen a woman eating an Italian sub?

Like, I love like steamed clams. That's, that's not a—

Yeah, I like baked clams. Yeah, I like sushi.

That's a chick. Yeah, love sushi.

That's chick food.

Yeah, big time chick. You know what's the one, one chick food that I love? Yogurt. That's chick food.

Salmon. Yeah, I like salmon.

Yeah, salmon's chick food.

Yeah, salmon's one, one chick food. We should have just done the chick food draft.

What is yogurt? We should do that next. What is the—

we just talk—

we just gave our picks away. What's the most masculine vegetable?

Oh yeah, potato, corn. No, potato.

It's a root, right? I don't think potatoes are— is that a veggie?

Corn.

Corn might be—

potatoes are vegetables.

Okay.

They're just starchy vegetables.

I'll say broccoli does take like a little bit of a— although no, then they steam it. Yeah, they steam it, put lemon on it.

It's the whole thing.

Yeah, they make it a whole thing.

What do you think?

Broccoli is the most masculine vegetable.

What about the taste of your own blood? Pretty masculine. Yeah.

What?

It's funny. Beef and broccoli. It is the most masculine vegetable you can eat.

It's the—

yeah, the little, the little, the little carrots in your kung pao chicken. That's the most masculine. Yeah. Oh, oh, chicken parm. Although chicken parm can go— chicks can eat chicken parm for sure. They can.

The green onions that are shaved on top of a chicken parm, the scallions, that's the most masculine vegetable.

What's the most masculine dessert?

You shave the little parsley. Yeah, either parsley or sometimes it's like the little bits of tiny green onion that you put on top of it. Yeah, it's a garnish. Chicken parm, you're eating It's not like actually part of the dish, Matt. It's like the green sprinkles they put on it.

Oh, you know what chick food I like? I like tuna salad. Yeah, I love tuna. Big time chick food. Egg salad, also a chick food.

Tuna salad, very good. But I hate it when they don't put the onions.

Yeah, chicken salad is a man's food.

No, but chicken salad with grapes is a chick food and I love it. I love it, dude. The grapes are so good in it. Although you gotta have the onions and into this.

It's a must. You have to have the— what about, what about biscuits?

Oh, biscuits and gravy.

Yeah, that's a pretty masculine food right there.

Yeah. What's more masculine, pancakes or waffles?

Pancakes. Pancakes.

No, waffles.

No, really? You think so?

Oh, you need your little crunch. You need your little squares.

No, the crunch. It's so soft. Pancakes are literally soft.

Yeah, but pancakes are no discussion.

They're soft.

Hank and Zach have just not said it.

They're just thinking about their picks. You're just, you're just thinking about What about your picks?

I like, I like a waffle. I mean, Max and Big Cat can talk about food further.

I just like, I know that I don't have the passion for food that you guys.

Max, Max, listen, a pancake is no frills, you just pour the batter onto the thing. A waffle is no frills, you pour the batter on.

No, no, no, I'm with PFT here.

You have to have a little— it's fancy.

An iron.

And it's French. Yes, Belgian. Now that I'm looking at it.

Fancy.

Yeah.

Pancake is a man's— like, you just, you just bam, put the batter on the hot thing. Yeah. And it's also, I mean, offensive line play pancakes.

Yeah.

You don't waffle someone.

I did WUB one time and get waffled a couple weeks ago, and they were— they did a sandwich draft, and I spoke so passionately about my opinions on the sandwiches that I now have to come back every Friday for the sandwich segment.

You played yourself into a job.

He did sound like— he sounded like he was a politician when he was giving the stump speech for the Italian grinder. Yeah, it was, it was pretty impressive. But I think most of it was because he was just sick of talking about Nick Sirianni using AI because that was like two segments that they did on that show. And Max just refused to admit that it happened.

Well, I mean, people do light reading before, before bed.

Yeah. Zach, help us out here. Most masculine dessert.

I mean, is it a pizzookie? Is it ice cream with the cookie?

I know what did you—

pizookie?

Cannoli is a good pick.

Cannoli is a good pick. I have a shot of espresso.

Yeah, I have an unpopular cannoli opinion.

I don't like them.

I'm with you.

They're not great.

I think they suck.

They're not great. The shells are too hard sometimes, are stale.

It's not a good dessert.

Every time I see cannoli, I want to eat it and I want to eat it thinking that the shell is going to be soft. Soft and it's never soft and gooey.

It's always— why would it—

stale.

Why would you think it's going to be soft?

I want it to be crunchy.

I know, I want it to be soft. It'd be better if it was soft, right?

No, it wouldn't.

Frankly, it'd be much better.

No. PFT. Yeah, I'll go one further. Italians don't do dessert well.

We talk about tiramisu.

I don't know, I'm not the biggest tiramisu guy, but the cookies are always dry.

I agree. The, the colored cookies, the rainbow cake sucks. They're terrible.

The cannoli is overrated.

Yeah, the cannoli is fantastic.

Now I am biased in the fact that I just like ice cream as my dessert. Gelato is good.

It's actually different. It's much different, Max. But yeah, listen, cannolis, great food for other people, not for me. I'm sick of pretending to like cannoli.

Yeah, all right, I agree with you.

You're wrong, but that's, that's okay.

I'm living my truth now.

Now I will say, there is the— have you ever had cannoli dip? Yeah, great.

That it's the same fucking thing.

No, it's not.

No, dude, your little cannoli, it You take one bite and then you're just fucking holding like a mishmash.

What do you think they make cannoli dip out of?

Cannolis. And it's much better.

Something magical.

It's honestly better the less shell it has in it.

Oh, most masculine dessert might be like, you're getting bad cannolis. Most—

I've had— I've had your cannolis, Max. I've had the cannolis straight out of the heart of Philly.

Oh, you know, it's not going to like this. Who we're seeing tomorrow. Oh, no. We should probably cut this. I mean, Security Mike's going to kill us.

Yeah, he was swimming.

He texted me. He's like, can I swim in your pool right now? Right now. And I was like, yeah, not here where we're going.

Pool.

I don't have a pool at home.

The—

but yeah, he's going to kill us.

Yeah, he likes—

he's going to be— he loves cannolis.

Cannolis are—

sleeps with the cannoli.

They're frankly not, not very good.

Maybe a bowl of Lucky Charms dessert. Man dessert.

Yeah.

Or when you—

I was—

pop the Tupperware back open, you just go back for a little bit of dinner.

Yeah, that's true.

Yeah, I think pie. Pie is a nice masculine dessert. I also think that maybe a masculine food we didn't take was when you just dry scoop protein.

Mm.

Protein powder. But yeah, I don't think that.

Yeah.

Counted as a food. Oh, hey, Hank, any other picks you had?

No, we went through them all. Pork rinds.

Yeah. Pork rinds.

Big miss.

That's good. Maybe like— no, not almonds. You can't do any nuts. I was thinking peanuts.

Yeah. Most masculine nut.

But they put it on the salad.

Got to be like a— probably Macadamia, maybe pecan, boiled peanut, boiled peanut.

Good.

Yeah. Walnut, maybe. Walnuts, not like something that anyone's trying to like.

You don't— no one actually enjoys eating a walnut.

No, you got to eat it in a chicken salad or something like that. You're not like going out and getting walnuts.

What about chestnuts? Max hates chestnuts. Not a titty fucker.

Mm-hmm.

All right. Good show, boys. That was fun. Food talk.

Love food.

Max just narced on us.

Yeah, of course.

What?

I texted security Mike being like, oh, what the fuck, dude? You tell— you dimed us out to the cops.

Fact. Why would you do that?

You're literally a snitch, Max.

Yeah.

I will have Mike on this week to defend himself. Yeah, you will have him on to defend all Italian desserts. And he's gonna probably fight us.

No, I will give you most of the cookie— Italian cookies are bad.

Yeah, and again, I'm also speaking from a place where it's like my dessert is just ice cream.

So should we do—

I'm not exactly a refined palate when it comes to desserts.

Should we do a quick, uh, Dingers Only update after one month?

Yeah, sure.

All right, Hank's in first place with 60 dingers.

There you go.

By the way, congrats, I found out I had 4 guys injured.

Yeah.

You got to stay up to date.

Chase in 2nd place, 51. Jersey Jerry, 3rd, 49. Big Cat, 4th, 44. PFT, 5th with 43. Brandon is in 6th with 41.

That's got to be killing him.

That he's in 6th?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh no.

Max is in 7th with 38. Memes, you're in 8th with 35.

5.

And in last place is Zach. Zach has 29.

Zach has 2 guys who are just in the minors.

And wait, they're, they're in the minors?

A couple guys who aren't at the league.

They're AAA.

Yeah.

That is, uh, what's, what's it called if you're in the, if you're in a minor?

Franco?

No, they're not in 2 minors. They're in the minors.

Wait, they're inside the, they're inside the minors? They're, they're inside of mine.

They're inside of my minor league base because we did make the Wander Franco.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Did we ever preface which leagues they're hitting home runs in?

That's true. Should we count his? I actually think about it.

If you get DFO, I think if you get—

I think if he's hitting home runs, then tell Stephen, okay, all minor league home runs should count, right? Yeah, why not?

I mean, there's gonna be some going yards, going yards. Yeah, I'm okay with it. Um, but maybe Memes and Max might not be okay with it because that might put them in the last place. I don't know.

Well, from here, I'm all right with it from starting now.

All right, so tell Che, starting now, Zach's minor league home run.

Yes.

I'm guessing they're not going to be hitting a lot of home runs in the minors. How many home runs is it?

There's no way it's that many.

We got to figure that out. Well, starting out, what if it's none?

Starting now, it's not.

It's literally zero. I got two guys on, on IL that I think the rules, the officials, it out. Official ruling should be all minor league home runs count as a half home run. You should get a half a home run.

I'm fine with that. Yeah.

Yeah.

Allowed.

Yeah. So text Che and tell him that.

Do half home runs back pay or half starting now as well?

How about now?

Now?

Sounds good. Yeah.

Starting now.

Yeah.

And I think what we'll do is whoever loses this year will just do a video in the fall with Che and the loser.

Yeah.

One big video because we got a— Che lost last year.

Yeah.

So. Oh, Mike said we own desserts. I'm going to have to do some research.

Who—

what other culture? I mean, Americans own desserts, right?

Yeah. America's like—

we have Chili's lava cake. France.

No, no. France is good. France. Respect to the French.

But let's have some pride, boys.

Mexican desserts. Pretty good, too.

We've got it all.

Churros.

Yeah. Churros are great. Tres Leches.

Yeah.

Tres Leches.

Banger.

Pretty good. Yeah.

Oh, everything Reese's.

Yeah.

Reese's.

Canadians do pretty good desserts, too.

What do they do?

Maple syrup.

French syrup.

Yeah. All right. Good show. Let's do numbers.

17, 3, 23. Who won it last?

Shane.

Shane.

Shane.

You just won, right?

Yes, sir.

That's it. That was it. Oh, you give that vote back. All right.

Yep.

66.

7, 15, 69, 23, 28.

The meme Shane rivalry is one of my favorite rivalries.

It's pretty one-sided.

Cool guy. Shane memes just started calling Shane cool guy.

You know, Shane's been playing MLB The Show against Colton's brother.

Yeah, he's a cool guy.

Colton's brother's been kicking his ass and then sending like cookies to the office to apologize for being—

Oh no, what a cock.

Yeah, I was, I was cold.

I hadn't played in a few months.

Last game, beat his ass.

Oh yeah?

Yeah.

How much— what's the record?

Uh, I think 4-1.

He's 4-1 against you?

Yes.

Or yes, he's 4-1 against me.

Yeah, but I came out of retirement.

It's like, yeah, you're back.

Yeah.

Have you been working on your squad?

Fuck him.

Oh, you've been working on your squad?

Yes, sir.

Taking a while today.

There we go. 41.

41.

Anyone?

That one felt— that one felt like it was somebody's number.

I did.

What do you You have Colton 69.

What do you have, Memes?

I have 3.

Never gotten it.

I've gotten it.

88. Roger Cain, Showtime.

88.

88.

88.

What'd you say?

28.

Love you guys. Happy birthday to Deion Sanders. Happy birthday to Ja Morant. Happy birthday to Darnell White— or excuse me, Darnell Wright. Happy birthday to Kylie Jenner. Happy birthday to Bob Chesney. And happy birthday to Glenny Balls.

Oh, we just got an update, by the way, the Kyle Shanahan, uh, uh, car crash. Uh, it's reported that it heard it wasn't a car that hit Shanahan, it was Deebo. It's an AI picture of fat Deebo, and then it says Bing Bong. That was from Jerry O'Connell.

That's Dr. Bing Bong.

He just texted us that, reports that, text us memes like a week late. But they're great, they always make laugh.

Also, happy birthday to Marvin Harrison Jr.

It's good to eat it. Yeah, so his dad doesn't get mad.

Yeah, love you guys.