Transcript of The Feel-Good Knicks, Award Movies, Week 18 Picks, and a Boston Sports Report With Sean Fennessey, Joe House, and Bill’s Dad

Hey, Happy New Year. I got a good pod for you. We're talking basketball and football and movies and New York sports and Boston sports. It's a New Year's buffet. It's next. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. I put up a new rewatchables on Monday night. We did Friday Night Lights, the movie, me and Mallory Rubin. We did it as a video podcast on Spotify, but you can listen to it anywhere. You can also watch it on YouTube on the Ringer Movies YouTube channel. You can watch all the clips and videos from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. You can watch Sal and I do our Sunday podcast live Live right after Vikings Alliance on Sunday night on that YouTube channel. Don't forget about FanDuel Sportsbook as well. We're doing 30 on 30 every Friday, trying to figure out who the 30-point scores are going to be. They put odds on all of it. I tweet out my favorite pics on Friday, so stay tuned for that as well. Coming up on this podcast, I'm going to talk to Sean Fentesey about the end of the Rogers era, the rise of the Knicks, and whether I should see a certain Oscar contender before the Oscars.

There's that. I have Joe House coming on. We're going to talk about NBA Futures heading into 2025, stuff that jumped out to us with title odds and win totals, MVP, all kinds of stuff. Then Million Dollar Picks Week 18, we've been smoking hot. Can we keep it going? We'll find out. Last but not least, my dad talking about the state of Boston sports. He's a wreck these days. We're just going to give him a platform and he can do his thing. That is all next First, our friends from Pearl Jip. All right, Joe House is here. We're taking this late morning Pacific Time. There's some sports that are going to happen after After we put this up. There's college football that will happen. There's a lot of basketball. There's some good basketball games as well. Where did you billion dollar pitch. We've been doing really well. Can't wait to talk about the games, how weird the slate is. But I sent you a bunch of NBA stuff because this is a weird inflection point of the season right now with awards, with odds, with conference stuff. I was going through it this morning, and I was really surprised by some of the odds for things.

The first thing was the title odds. Where Boston and OKC are right where you would think. Boston's plus 200, OKC's plus 250. The fact that the Knicks had better title odds than Cleveland, I was shocked by. The Knicks are 10 to 1, Cleveland's 11 to 1. Then after that, it's Denver, 15 to 1, Dallas, 17 to 1. They have when these futures, there's legacy stuff from the start of the season. They can't jack them around too much. Then we'll go through some of the other ones later. But I was really surprised Cleveland isn't being treated more favorably by the odds community. What else do people need to see from this team? Because right now, they're 29 and 4. They're over on our FanDuel for wins for the season is 61 and a half. I don't know. They're probably going to have home court advantage, round one, round two, round three. What don't people trust? What is your opinion on this?

Their performance in the playoffs. I mean, this is exactly why the Knicks are ahead of them. We watch these two teams Slightly different composition. But Cleveland, largely the same team as last year, perform in the most recent playoffs. And Cleveland didn't knock anybody's socks off. And the Knicks were unbelievable. They were an injury issue away from being in the Eastern Conference Finals that felt like the Knicks.

Slightly different Knicks team. I would argue slightly different Cavs team because they've got a totally different version Garland this year now that he's healthy. Mowbley went up a level. New Coach, who I think has made a real difference for them. Over and over again, they just answered these tests. I don't know if you saw any of the Warriors game the other night, but they just They're just slaughtering teams. It's very similar to what was happening with the Celtics last year. They're plus 11. I think they're plus 11, 3 rating. They're killing teams. They're up by 20 in a lot of these games. It was like last year where people didn't trust it with the Celtics for a while, and then eventually they trusted it. Maybe I trusted too much with them, but I really believe. I think they have as good of a chance as anybody, and I don't understand the odds.

Well, part of the thing with Cleveland, I think they're the only team in the NBA that is undefeated against teams that are 500 or worse, which is exactly what you want, right? That's a hallmark benchmark level of achievement.

When you play a team-In regular season.

That are worse than you in the regular season, you're supposed to their ass. And that's how you build up a great regular season record. And that's how you put yourself in a driver's seating terms of a home court advantage throughout the playoffs. I just think it's fair where these odds are, because when do we get to see some of the true leverage moments this team put under stress and duress? Now, the thing that could, if you wanted to talk yourself into the value proposition, Kenny Atkinson has all the chops. He has the pedigree with the warriors being along for that ride. He knows exactly how a good organization. He took the Nets and was really competitive with the Nets before he fell out of favor. He fell out of favor.

Yeah.

But I mean, that team overachieved that Nets team.

Yeah, they did.

And so he We, in our analysis of how this Cavalier season might go, when we were together in October, thought that he, more than any other element to that team, could be a real elevating force, and that's exactly what's happened.

We trusted the Garland comeback year. We trusted the stability with Mitchell. The big X factor was, what's Moby got for us this year?

Right.

Mowly went up a level, and he's hitting threes better. I think he should in the All-Star team. Even if you look at their last 20 games, their net rating is 11.9 heading into Thursday night in the weekend. The Cleveland, OKC, Boston, the Knicks, and the Grizzlies are all nine and above in net rating in the last 20 games. And Memphis is the one I could see more confusion about Memphis, whether what's real, what's not real with them, just because it doesn't... Morant, I want to see if can you just for a solid month and a half and just be out there every day. They've had some good schedule of luck so far. We'll see if that exists. But right now, they're building such a big nest egg. They're 23 and 11 right now. They're over and under. It's 51 and a half on FanDuel, which 51 and a half, that means you have to go 52 and 30. To me, that's a little bit of a lack of a trust, I think, from the betting community, at least with them. There's some weird ones, though. The Knicks, being 10 to 1 makes sense to me.

That seems like the right range for them. Denver is 15 to 1, I think just because of the legacy of what people bet for the season. Same for Dallas, 17 to 1. But if you go a little further and you dig in, like Memphis is 27 to 1, Houston is 44 to 1. Memphis and Houston are going to probably be top four seeds. When you just look at it like that, you're like, How do those people have way worse odds than Denver, a team that just seems like a mess night today, even though Jokuj is as great as he's been. What do you think of the Clippers at 75 to one to win the title?

No.

To win the title? Just to complete didn't even make you stop for a second? No. I'm not saying they're going to win the title. It just seemed like those odds seem really high to me.

The one that caught my attention, and I mean, all due respect to the Clippers, great job by them. I know this is going to run contrary to some action that we got down last week. Minnesota at 30 to 1. We're finally at a number for them where it's like, wait a minute. I mean, that team was in the Western Conference Finals last year, and they have a super duper star on their team. This first stretch of games, the first third of the season for them, 17 and 15 through 32 games, not up to the level that we might have anticipated in view of- To say the least. Well, the We thought there would be some depth that was added. The Karl Anthony Towns piece, we were saying, Well, maybe it won't really affect the defense that much. And what they get in terms of offensive versatility, Maybe their shooting won't go down.

But yeah, it did affect them all over the place.

In which way? Having said all of that, I mean, 30 to one, they still have Anthony Edwards.

They still have- The The only way that makes sense to me is if you're assuming that there's a Randall trade out there for them, that they can turn him into something else. Because the thing that's changed the last couple of weeks is Steve Vincenzo finally got going.

Yeah.

And that's added all the stuff we thought he was going to add before that trade. The athletic, John Krasinski, wrote a really good piece about it. We always forget the human element sometimes with these NBA trades. And Dante was just fucking bummed out the first The next month and a half of the season. He wanted to be on the Knicks. He had a great run with him. It was the best professional run of his career. Now he's on this weird Minnesota team, and he just didn't play well, and he didn't look like he was happy, reinvested himself, and now he's added a little something. I'm interested to see with Dillingham what they get out of him, too. Him and Reid Sheppard are the two X-factors of these rookies on good teams that don't really play.

Right. Good call.

Reid Sheppard hasn't been good either. I think Dillingham has been good in spots, but I'm just wondering what happens with those guys down the stretch. The Rockets are another one at 44 to 1. If you're just factoring in a trade, can they turn Vanvleet or Jalen Green into a much better version of those guys? Then maybe those odds go up, but I don't sense the appetite from them this year making a major move. So we'll see. Then Orlando at 43 to one is the only other one, just because they'll have their guys back at some point, the infrastructure they have with the defense and the coaching and the reps that they've been getting for dudes like De Silva, Anthony Black, and people like that. To me, the best odds are Cleveland, 11:01.

I'll go along with that. I don't have any argument with that.

I think they're favored in the first two rounds. It's probably going to be, I don't know, whoever It's whatever it is in round three, and it might not be my team. But game seven will be in Cleveland. That's not nothing. So a couple of over-unders really quick. Celtics, 59.5 just seems way too high. They're 24-9. That 59.5 basically is 23 losses. That's 14 more the rest of the way. They can't seem to get anybody healthy. I also don't really think they care about the one seed. Golden State is still 45 and a half, and they're 16 and 16 heading into tonight. What What world are they winning 46 games unless there's a major trade coming that I can't anticipate?

It's that. There is some possibility, I guess, that the market thinks that there's a trade for them yet to come.

It's going to be really hard.

It is a hard under for me.

Yeah, that's a hard under for me.

Go ahead.

Well, just Clipper's 46.5, that would make me blink just because of the injury potential the miles they're putting on hard, and I don't what they're getting from Kauai when he comes back, but the Golden State one, I don't see that. We're already in on Indy 43.5. We did the over even though they're 60 and 18. They're minus 250 to make the playoffs. Minnesota, you mentioned. They're minus It's minus 3:40 to make the playoffs right now, even though they're 17 and 15. So I think people are agreeing with the way you saw big picture, what's happening with them. But their over-unders, 47.5 now, which seems too high to me.

It's high. That's high. That's a tough stretch.

Yeah, that means they'd have to go 31 and 19, the rest of the way, something like that. 31 and 18? I don't see it. Okc 62 and a half is the over-under now. They're 27 and 5 I think they get it. I would still be bullish on that. Wouldn't you?

Sure. It's fine.

I feel like it's shocking every time they lose. It's just so deep.

We're already fully subscribed, fully allocated on every OKC But if you wanted to just see for fun another little bit to get down, will they get to 63 wins? It feels totally plausible. 63 and 19, sure.

It feels mid-60s to me unless there's another entry. Plus, they haven't even gotten chip back. Here are the two hardest for me. Phoenix was 45 and a half right now. They're minus 134 to make the playoff. People are putting a lot of faith into something turning around here. They're 15 and 17. I just... Even their last 20 games, they're 6 and 14, their minus 3.1 net rating. We really need this. This would be the first boost, season boost that we've lost. We had our boost this year was Cleveland and Phoenix to win 45 plus, OKC to win 55 plus. That's what we boosted on Fando. We're going nuts for it. I don't know if Phoenix gets to 45 wins. Do you see it? What's missing with them other than the worst centers in the league?

We really, I think, believed that the coaching change and what they be able to do from the perimeter Especially that they would change what the single biggest problem was a math problem, which was they didn't get up enough threes, and they didn't make enough threes. And we say, okay, Bud is going to come and change that.

And they're going to be this high scoring, super fun, entertaining team that just is winning 120 to 115.

And they're not that. No. And the problem is it's the same problem as last year when they were a great underplay. Durant can't really play night to night, and it really doesn't make sense for him to play night to night, and they just rotate two out of the three guys. And Biel doesn't move the needle. He doesn't help them win basketball games.

He's actually been putting up stats lately, and it doesn't seem to- He's perfectly fine.

Right, exactly. They're three and seven over the last 10, and he's in all of those games.

You know what? The big picture front office mistake they made was they tried to put together this big three model, which had been so successful in the late 2000s and the 2010s because the league wasn't as deep. Now the league is deep. You need depth. You need the ability to weather an injury for 10 games. You need random guys stepping up night to night. I just don't know if that big three model works. Great. Cool. You have three really good players. It doesn't matter. You're competing against other teams that have seven, eight, nine players that have real depth. That was something the Quippers figured out when they miraculously did an offer Paul George that fourth year and landed all these other dudes, and now they have depth and they have the ability to weather Kawhi not playing for two and a half months because they have enough guys. That's a hard under for me, and I think we're going to lose our bet. I'm bummed because that was one of my favorite streaks that we had going. The other one, San Antonio is 39 and a half, and that's up four wins from where we were at the start of the season.

They're 17 and 16. They're plus 360 to make the playoffs. What we've seen from Wemby, Goldspire and I talked about it a little on Tuesday. He's basically 29 and 12 every night now with four blocks, whatever it is, and is turning into this crunch time dude, and they have trades to make potentially if they want. They want to add another guy. I like the plus 360 for the playoffs for them as a flyer. Oh, okay. I don't know if they're going to make the playoffs. I just like the odds.

Let's look at this real quick. Where they're sitting right now is they're in the nine hole. Let's see who they have to climb over.

The Lakers would have to drop, which I really think I could see that happening.

That's not crazy talk.

That would be the team. They'd have to jump the Lakers, basically. Then you'd have to assume Phoenix, Sacramento, Golden State, those teams, they had to beat those teams as well. I'm not saying it's going to happen.

Plus 360, though.

I just think a 4-1 chance of it happening basically seems reasonable to me, considering they have a guy who is now a top seven or eight guy.

I like this. Let's fire on it. Let's take a break in this podcast. We'll fire on that. I can get this down.

A couple of other ones. Mvp is basically a two-horse race. Sga minus 105, Jokuj plus 115. I think if OKC is in the mid-60s for wins and SGA is doing the stuff he's been doing all year, and Denver is a seven seed, 45-win team. Sga is going to win. I think if the way it's going now, I think SGA wins. I was surprised the odds were even. Where'd you stand on that?

Well, I I totally agree with the way that you're approaching this. And I also want to get down on this a sizable number because I don't see Oklahoma City backing up. I'm on wood. I mean, it would have to be some crazy injury situation. Wait till Chet comes back, right? Wait till they really have their whole team. The reason that I think it's especially compelling with SGA is because it addresses the thing that you and I talked about over the last couple of weeks, which is this transition mission moment for the league. The league really needs to start marketing the new class of stars that it has. And SGA should be a face of the league. He should be one of those guys. People need to see him. There needs to be some marketing around his campaign here.

He's winning the All-Star right now, which I thought was a good sign.

That's good. That's a good sign. Exactly right.

So even odds, and I actually think he should be favored by more. And if I was going to suggest anyone else, Look, I don't think he's going to win. But Wemby at 110 to one on Fandle.

No.

Listen, 110 to one? By the way, he has the fifth best odds on Fandle right now because it's SGA and Jokic, Giannis is plus 9,50, Tatum's 22 to one, and Wemby is 110 to one.

You want to put $10 on it?

No, I'm not allowed to bet on the MVP. I'm just I'm pointing out value.

I'll put $10 on it just to... They have to win 50-some games. They have I'm just trying to think of the last time the number five guy out of MVP- Fair enough.

Was over 100 to one. Fair enough. Because that's how dominant SGA and Jokuj has been. But we know at the league, SGA, he could get a dumb injury for four weeks. Jokuj, Denver could go slide backwards. Who knows? Tatum, 22 to 1 would be more fun if Boston was playing better. We're going to find out with Boston on this road trip there. Rook of the Year is a catastrophe. Zack Ittey is our favorite at plus 120. Missy on New Orleans is second now. And by the way, he plays crunch time for them, but it's a terrible team. Castle is 7:1. Wells is 10 to 1. Or Risa Shay is 25 to 1, who would probably still be my pick because he's starting to play more and more from them just for the odds. But I don't know who's going to win that.

I thought, did you see Tom Haberstro's breakdown just in the last 24, 48 hours of E. E? No. It's very good. There's a bunch of clips with the numbers, the plus minus numbers for E. E. E. Have been outstanding. There's a lot of good evidence about him, how active he is and how he's very quietly really propelling that team. If Memphis, over this stretch of jobbing week to week, if they're able to tread water for a bit, I think in the '80s minutes are still a relevant part of it. I think that's a pretty good bet at this stage. The plus 120, it's got my attention, to be honest with you.

Castle 701, I like, too. He had a little bit of a while the last couple of weeks, but I still like him long term. But yeah, Edy, everything we thought before the draft of if he goes here, he's this really interesting piece in a nine-minute rotation that you can... And he's been everything... The glass half full side of the Zack Edie argument? Yes. He's hit all of it. Defensive player of the air, Wemby's minus 270. For me, it's like if he's below minus 500 on that, just grab it.

Go ahead and lay it.

Most improved, the two guys that jumped out were Jalen Johnson, three to one is the favorite. But Dyson a 10 to 1, who is probably the best perimeter defensive player we have. I was surprised 10 to 1 was as high as it was. Then Coach of the air, Kenny Atkins' favorite, minus 180. Mostly a plus 950 jumped out to me because the fact that that team is five, six games over 500 with all the injuries they've had is crazy to me. Anyway, that is my... Out of all those bets we just talked about, what was your favorite?

The Oklahoma City over 62.5 win.

Yeah, I think I'm with you. It's like we already have more than enough on them. Anyway, that is our little NBA check-in. All right, we're going to take a break and come back. The Red Hot. Million Dollar Picks. All right, Million Dollar Picks, Week 18. I don't remember a Week 18, or in the old days, a Week 17, a last week of the season that had this many question marks of who's rolling over and who's not. I don't know why that's this year, but we even have playoff teams this year, like the Rams, where I'm like, They're not going to win? The The Hawks are minus 6 now favorites, and the Rams still have a chance to lock down a three seed. We were asking Peter Schrager about it this week, and he was texting us, The Rams haven't had a buy since week six. They're banged up. Mcvay wanted to give Stafford and the receiver and Kyron Williams a week to heal for the playoffs and really likes his backups. So that choice that the Rams have of like, if we locked down three, we're probably playing Washington in the three in LA, or we dropped down to four and we're playing the loser of Minnesota, Detroit.

I don't know. I really would have wanted to play Washington. No offense to your. No offense taken. C-words. I would have on for it, but I get it. That team must be really banged up is my takeaway.

Well, and we've seen it. We keep watching. That offense- Right.

Last three weeks, I bet.

Has been dragging. They just can't score. Schregs included included some of the stats for Kyra Williams. That dude needs a break. Give him a rest. It is a curious decision out of the Rams, except for that's what they do. Sean McVay has done this before. And whichever of the teams between Detroit and Minnesota that they get will indeed be banged up. Just in terms of battle scars from the game this coming Sunday night that will decide the one seed in the NFC. The loser of that game- Real stakes.

It's awesome. If you win, you don't get to play for a week. If you lose, all of a sudden you're traveling somewhere in five or six days and playing around one playoff game. Well, it ties into what we think will happen with that Detroit-Munnesota game, which we'll get to in a second. But I was looking at Rams plus six and a half against Seattle. Maybe they hang. I don't really know what Seattle's motivation is because they're out.

Well, there is some Gino Smith motivation. He's one of those guys with a bunch of incentives. He needs 186 yards. There's a basket of achievements for him that will get him an extra three million bucks this year. I think the team will know that, understand it. Mike McDonald is motivated to beat McVay in his first season. They lost in overtime in Seattle. So I think there's plenty of motivation for Seattle. I'm just not laying six and a half. The way that the rosters work right now, they have to play some of their good guys on defense. They can't sit their entire defense. And the defense has been the thing that's kept them. The defense propelled them into the playoffs. The way that the defense played over this past month, they saved the game against the Cardinals on Saturday with an interception in the end zone, right? I mean, the defense is the key. And Seattle's offense has been fits and starts. There is a difference for Seattle. Their splits when they play on turf and domes, they've been very good. There's only been a handful of those games this year, but they've scored prolifically. So that would be part of why you might be concerned.

They can win by margin if the Rams start start pulling guys, but I like the Rams to be live here.

Ram's money line with the over 38 and a half is plus 438.

It's fun.

Ram's plus six and a half, tease in a 4-point tease on FanDuel up to 10.5 with the Chiefs 14.5. Oh. That's plus 110 on FanDuel. If you want to talk yourself into Chiefs and Rams, not probably going to roll over in these games. That's it there for us. Quickly, and the Chiefs. I'd be really scared of taking the other side in this game. I could see the Chiefs winning. I don't think Wents is going to be that bad.

I wouldn't lay the 10 and a half, and I'll be glad to grab the 14 and a half if that's what you're offering me in this four-point piece. The Chiefs are not an F-around team. They They have been in this circumstance four times over the last five, six years or so, and they tend to cover and they tend to win outright. I think they've covered three out of the four of these situations, and they've won outright. At at least a couple of times. They are not to be trifled with. And this is still yet Denver on a losing streak with their rookie quarterback in his highest leverage game of his entire career. And he's capable of throwing He's been selling some pics. The Chief's calling card has been their defense all season long. Now, their secondary is vulnerable. But before we get super excited about Bo Nicks in a must-win playoff situation, I mean, 10 and a half, come on.

Yeah, it almost seems like maybe there's two ways to play it. We could just do smaller bets on the Chiefs plus 10 and a half and the Rams plus 6 and a half and assume you're going to split those and maybe win both. You could tease them together with the little four-point tease plus 10.5 plus 10.5 to plus 14.5 plus 6.5 plus 10.5. Or you have some fun, do Chiefs money over 39.5, that's plus 744. On FanDuel. Ram's money over 38 now plus 438. Just put small ones on both and hope one of them hits. We'll have an answer for you at the end of Million Dollar Picks. Two games I want to bet on I want to bet against the Pats, and I want to bet against the Titans. Here's why. The lines are crazy low. Bills are favored minus two and a half over the Pats. Texans are favored minus one and a half at the Titans. I have no idea why the Pats or Titans would want to win this game. You can go back to the Giants game last week and say, Well, you would have said that about the Giants.

I watched that entire Giants game. It was a complete fluky collapse by Indianapolis combined with Drew Lock just had a really good game. If you're Drew Lock, why wouldn't you want to have a good game? You're trying to prove that you could be a starting quarterback next year. That game just fell away from the Colts. It was a coaching abomination. There was a special team's touch down. There are all these specific reasons. Bill's paths, and I'm going to talk to my dad later in the pot about why Drake May is playing, just how just awful this Pats season has been. I can't believe that they would just give away the number one pick in the last week of the season.

Is Drake May really playing? Are they just saying that because- Maybe he plays one quarter and leaves? It really makes no sense whatsoever. None. The only person that it makes sense for is Gerard Mayo.

Is he in charge of the fucking football team? But this is the problem. If the coach and everybody knew they were coming back next year, this is where we go. We're going to start Joe Milton We want to take a look for him at him in week 18, and we're going to try some other guys. We're going to see Gonzales. If you don't know you're coming back, you want to win. You want to end the game on a high note. You don't want somebody to say, Hey, you guys looked like shit the last couple of weeks of the season. Because I benched my quarterback, motherfucker.

A week 18 win over the bills who said everybody is really going to change the career trajectory of Jared Mayo. He stunk off season long. We've had 17 games of evidence. The past to be fair, are exactly where they should be. It's what the market anticipated. It's why they had the lowest forecasted win total of the year. And here we are. Congratulations on getting it done. But the twists and turns have been bizarre, and it does make you wonder who is in charge. And I think this coming Sunday game, the crafts better step in. What's the GM's name? Van Pelt? Is that the guy?

No, he's the OC. The interim GM is Elliott Wolf, who had, after Jake May, put together one of the worst draughts in the history of the NFL. No, you have to lose the game. And it's indefensible because if they get the first pick, they're going to be able to trade back. Even if they trade back three spots to number four and get more picks. You're just basically giving away players, and you're not going to take a quarterback at the top anyway. There's no defense.

It's long term leverage. It's franchise altering leverage. When you weigh the risk, when you weigh the risk. When you weigh the cost-benefit of a week 18 win versus the trajectory for your effing franchise going forward, you have the cornerstone quarterback. The thing that you need to do now is get other good players on the effing football team. The only way to do that, the fastest way to do that, is by doing the thing you're sitting and looking at right the second, which is to lose the mother effing game and get as much as you can in terms of capital. This is like very basic business building Composition is shit right here.

Yeah, and we only have two good players. And González had a concussion last week, so he shouldn't play. May has been banged up, took a big shot last week. You sit those two guys and they just don't have enough talent to beat even the Bill's second string. I I like the Bills minus two and a half, and I really like the Texans minus one and a half against the Titans. I think the Titans are terrible. The stretch that they've just been on recently is just a roller coaster ride of shit. And The Texans have lost their last two. They've locked up the four seat for a while, but they need to play well for a game. You could say, They don't need the game. They're already in. It's like, No, they need to look good for three hours. I just find it hard to believe they're going to toss away the game and go into the playoffs, finishing 9:08 for the season, hosting somebody good, either the Chargers or the Stealers, and just not feel good about anything that's happened for a month.

I totally agree.

I want to bet both of these, and I think we split at least one. If the Pats and Titans both win, that means the Browns are going to have the first pick in the draft. When do things ever work out for the Browns?

I feel bad. Ever.

Sorry, Browns fans. You know it's true.

Yeah. I mean, Cleveland, writ large, did get LeBron, so we can't... Cleveland has some good fortune over the last 30 years.

21 years ago, and he left.

I'm just saying, 30. But he brought him a title. Over the last three years, we don't have to say that Cleveland's- Well, then they got the Kyrie.

They won the Kyrie lottery because the league felt bad for them. That's one of my top five. Are we sure this was... The lottery was on the level?

In any event, the guys on the Action Network, they call the Titans the Point Shavers, which I think is fantastic, and I totally agree with.

What are they, 2 and 14 against the spread? Yes. 2 and 15? Yes, the worst.

They have locked in the worst. They've already done... They're already at the worst, but if they lose this week against the spread as well, then they are historically the worst against the spread in the history of the NFL.

Yeah. And the thing is, their quarterback suck. I just don't see it. I think they're terrible. They lost to Jacksonville last week.

They got swept by Jacksonville. It's an organizational disaster. I couldn't believe with my own eyes. I had gambled on them when they came to Washington, and they had just beaten Houston, and Washington was laying six and a half. I was like, oh, that's it. The Titans at that point had some advanced analytics that said their defense was good. They sucked to high heaven. I think Washington had 200 yards rushing in the first half. They're a business It's small organizationally. Really that. So easy to go against the Titans.

All right. We'll put stuff against the Pats and Titans. The two big games I want to focus on, and there's so many games where it's like, I don't know if that team is going to care. I don't know if this team is going to care. I don't know who's playing. I don't know what the motivation is. But we know Vikings, lines, and Stewards, Bangles. We know all four of those teams are going to give a shit about the game. Stewards, Bangles, everybody's on the bangles, it feels like. The line is The Bengals minus one and a half in Pittsburgh. The Bengals are eight and eight for the year. The bangles have really no good wins. Last week's win was probably the best win they've had of the season. I don't think their defense is good. Bondex missed multiple wide-open guys. He hit one, but he missed three others. I thought the Bronco should have won the game. I know Burrow is really good. I know Burrow with Chase and Higgins are really good together. Chase Brown ankle injury. They're not going to be able to run the ball the same. But to me, this is a Steeler's moment.

I think they need the game. If they win, they're the five seed. If they're the five seed, they get to go to Houston and play a Houston team that none of us think are good. They should beat the Houston team. They beat that Houston team, assuming the rest of the playoff goes chalk for round one, then they would go to Kansas City for round two. Kansas City coming off, God only knows what they do this week. Buy week, next week. Pittsburgh is going to go in to Kansas City be like, Yeah, we can play with these dudes. I don't really like what I've seen from Pittsburgh the last few weeks, and I know you don't either. But they also had this crazy three games in 11 days stretch against three of the five best teams in the league. And now I think their stocks too low. We've been at the Crafts Table house with the Stealers a lot, and we stayed a little too long in that Philly game, and we got our ass kicked. I'm ready to put some money and some dice and some chips down on the craps table on the Stealers again.

I think they're going to win.

Yeah, you and I are seeing this exactly eye to eye. And I think it's important to continue to emphasize that the perception of the Stealers, because of this three-game stretch, this three-game which was always circled in bright red as being an impossible task at the end of the season, going up against the three best teams in the NFL by a lot of ways you want to assess it. Yes, Detroit and Minnesota. But without their best receiver, an offense that needs that receiver, that needs that over-the-top option, and the perception of who the Bengals have become because they had a luck win against the Cowboys, a special team's luck win against the Cowboys. And then they beat the Titans, and then they beat the Browns, and then they held on against the Broncos at home. And what was for them a playoff game, because if they lost, there was no playoff possibility whatsoever. It was not exactly a cover in glory moment for the bangles. Their defense absolutely positively was right there trying to give up that game.

Well, think about the special team's piece, too.

Amazing.

I don't trust their kicker at all. No way. This is going to be a classic Stealers, Pittsburgh, Tomlin' game, and the Stealers have Boswell, and these guys have a kicker that I don't trust from any distance, basically.

Absolutely, positively right. Remember, the Bengals last loss was to the Stealers in Cincinnati, where the Stealers had 530 yards of offense. I think they have it dialed. I think they understand how to exploit the Cincinnati defense. And It feels like a tremendous opportunity to grab the Stealers here, getting points at home. It's like classic Tomlin moment. So disrespectful.

Stealers with some rest, 10 days between the Wednesday and the Saturday, so they're able to heal. I love this. This is a classic Tom game. Look, if they lose, if Burrow kills them, I'm not going to regret betting on the Stealers. I feel the same way. I'll take you up. The Stealers have come through over and over again in this spot at home. We've seen it too many times. I think there's real stakes for them. That's the piece. The Rams, I get it. It's like, okay, either we're going to be hosting Washington in the 3-6 or we're hosting probably the Lions coming off a really physical, brutal playoff game in the 4-5. It matters, but it doesn't really 100% matter. This Steeler's thing matters. The difference between playing Houston in Houston versus going to fucking Baltimore and playing Baltimore for the third time, this really matters to them. I think the bangles are 8-8 for a reason. I agree. It's not like Tee Higgins missed a few weeks, right? Other than that, this is who they are. They have a couple of good players and a lot of shitty ones.

It's the Defense. The defense has been bad all season. You can't count on that defense. The defense doesn't get stops when they need to. That's not who this team is.

Do you like the Stewards plus one and a half, or do you just like the Stewards plus 110?

I like the money line.

Yeah, the plus one 10. I think they're going to win. It's a little more advertising. Then the other one is Vikings Alliance. I feel like now every Thursday, I'm just talking about the Vikings, how I don't understand why people don't realize they're good. They came through again last week. The best possible thing happened in that game last week. They dominated. Their kicker missed a couple of field goals. The packers really got it going with eight minutes left when the Vikings were way up. They stopped blitzing as much and doing some of the stuff that got them to the spot there in the first three quarters, laid back a little bit, love started to look good, and all of a sudden it was a two-point game as the final score. It was not a two-point game. The Vikings are awesome.

That's been the tale for the Vikings all season long. You look at their resume, you're going to see a slew of one-score games. They are one-score games because they were beating the crap out of teams, and then teams came back on them. I mean, Jordan loved these nuts, did it twice. He came back and made the game inside of a one-score game. And this was... Very quick aside, Jordan loved these nuts. They need to handle their business against Chicago because I think Washington, this game will be going on simultaneously. I like Washington, but Washington, Dallas is always- It's a walker.

Yes.

You do not say, Oh, yeah, Washington should walk over. The packers need to show something. They got their ass beat. That was a physical... They got out-physicaled. Their defensive line got out-physicaled by the Minnesota front. Jordan loved these nuts, and the packers better show up and show out. But for the Vikings, I have one way that I want to play this, and I'm not convinced to move too far beyond the way that I want to play it.

What's here?

I love them as a teaser leg. I think it's an incredible teaser leg, taking them as two and a half dogs and pushing them up to eight and a half. The lions are not in any way, shape, or form in a position to win by margin, and they can't win by margin because they're defense- To protect the lead when they're at 14 in the fourth quarter. I can't do it. I respect the lines so much, but look, they could have and should have lost that game against San Francisco. I mean, the Niners had a million chances, missed field goals, pretty overthrowing guys. Both of his interceptions to and Kirby were grotesque overthrows. They were both directly on Brock Bird.

Then he got hurt at the end.

Yeah. I don't think Minnesota is going to aid and abet its own demise the way that the Niners did. But this game to me is like, razor thin. I have tons of respect for the Vikings and everything they've done. It's such a good matchup, Dan Campbell and KOC, like Really good coaching matchup and home team. The line seems right to me, two and a half seems fair. I just love the idea of the Vikings getting more than a countdown.

I think the Vikings are going to win, and I want to bet on that piece of it. That's fine. But I also want to put them in a tease because I agree with you. There's stuff we could do. We could do Pittsburgh plus four and a half and Minnesota plus seven and a half. That's plus one, twelve.

Great one.

We could do Washington minus 220 just to win with Minnesota plus seven and a half. That's around even odds. We can do that as well. Those would be my two.

I don't want to do Washington.

You're nervous about this Washington game. Yes.

I was nervous about the game. What they did against the Eagles, that come back against a division rival and everything they put out, and then for them to bounce back and show up and take care of business against the Falcons, again, in the most dramatic fashion possible at some point, the cumulative effect of that. This is a storybook season for Washington. They lead the league in come from behind, victories. They lead the league in terms of scoring inside the last minute. They lead the league in fourth down conversion reversions. There's a whole bunch of stuff. It would be a rightful capper for this Washington team to beat Dallas in week 18, push themselves into the sixth seed. That is an absolute unbelievable unbelievable miracle for the franchise. But man, the last 25 years, you must take recognition and take note. That's all.

So you're rooting for Trey Lance?

I am definitely not. Under no circumstances. I hate Dallas.

No, I'm saying you're rooting for Trey Lance to be named starter for this game.

Oh, that he starts over Cooper Rush.

That helps your crush. Because he's not a professional quarterback.

He is not. Oh, thank God. Yeah. If he's the quarterback, I'm really rooting for him.

It sounds like we should put Vikings plus 130 and Stealers plus 110, we should just bet those and then do a tease maybe with... I mean, the other way to do it is just do the tease and make that the big bet.

I like the tease better because I do think the resourcefulness of Detroit and their incredible backbone over the course of this entire season, even in the face of all that bad injury luck, they just keep coming out. I love so much the Campbell.

No Montgomery, too.

Yeah, I know. I I mean, look, it's just they're decimated. It's a bummer. I hate it. I hate the injury luck for them, but they're badasses.

I just want to hit my hat to them. My only fear is, I don't want to... If one of these two teams screws up somehow and then we lose both games, That's my fear because that happened last week. How did we lose? Because I love Minnesota last week, and you threw some water on it. You scared me off a little, and we ended up putting them in a parlay with the Colts, and the Colts lost. Then I just... I won nothing on Minnesota, even though that was one of my favorite I understand.

Part of me wonders- That is good.

Well, part of me wonders, just do the Viking Stealers money lines, and then maybe we do that parlay.

The Stealers can lose. You're saying individually, just play the separate money line?

Yeah, say separate money lines. No, not parlay.

Okay, fine. Great. I get what you're saying.

And then do the T's together.

Okay. Oh, I love that because the T's are for the Stealers, it's tremendous as well. From one and a half up to seven and a half. Love that.

I I think that's the move. We do Vikings Money Line, Stewards Money Line, Pittsburgh with the little T's, and then Bill's text and stuff. You want to put anything on Chief's Ram's or no?

If you want to do that, That four-point tease, I loved it. Tease the RAMs up to 10.5 and tease the Chief's up to 14.5. Kind of loved the sound of it.

Yeah, we'll just put a little tiny bit on that. Do you agree that we should probably scale back this Oh, my God.

Don't bet anything meaningful. We pulled everything out of our ass last week. The only thing that was a step back in any way, shape, or form was the stupid Colts.

I know, but you know what? We should have known better. We should know not to put They were seven-point favorites and had no business being seven-point favorites over anybody. That was a rare... We got suckered in on a bad team, basically just assuming the Giants would take care of business. It was just a classic. Colts an absolute, everybody needs to go situation. They probably will.

Hilariously, Atlanta is in the exact same spot right now. Atlanta is laying seven and a half, just the exact same way the Colts were laying seven and a half. Atlanta is laying seven and a half to Carolina, who's been spunky. I'm not doing that.

I'm staying away from the NFC stuff.

Okay, good. Fine.

All right. Million dollar picks, week 18 Last week, we went 641,000 dollars. It's pretty good. We're up 2.177 million dollars for the year.

Double the nut.

We're going to scale back this week.

Smart.

Because it's week 18. It's a stupid week. I want to have a nice little $2 million nest egg for the playoffs.

For the play-offs, baby.

Yeah. I don't want to be like, What are we doing? I don't want to be at the blackjack table 20 minutes too long after they change the dealers. Let's just take it nice and easy. Maybe we throw away the money line bets and just do Pittsburgh, Minnesota as the tease that we talked about.

Fine. It's one of my favorite bets of the week.

All right. First bet. Pittsburgh, we're going to do a slight adjusted parlay with them, plus four and a half, Pittsburgh against Cincinnati, with Minnesota plus seven and a half against Detroit. That is plus one, twelve on FanDuel. And the reasoning for this, We don't think Pittsburgh is being judged correctly after their horrible three games in 11 days stretch. They are now 10 days rest against a team that they put 500 plus yards on. They're home, they're underdogs. This is the all-time classic Tomlin situation. And then Minnesota plus seven and a half. I think we both think they're better than Detroit, but this gives us some buffer if anything weird happens. Even if they're down 10 or 14 late, they're going to get the cheap countdown because Detroit stinks. That's plus 1,12. We'll put 150K on that.

Okay.

Just to respect ourselves. Fair. Then I want to put 50K each on Vikings plus 30, and Steelers plus 110.

Great.

No argument.

All right. Then we are going to put 100K on two teams against two teams that should not want to win this weekend, the Patriots and the Titans. Bills minus two and a half, 100K on that over the Pats. Good. If the Pats win, I'm going to lose my mind. I'm just telling you right now. Just mute me on Twitter. Just do it now. I'm going to fucking lose my mind. Don't watch the Sunday podcast. I'm going to lose my mind if they win this game. Texans minus one and a half.

I'm waiting for it. I don't want to see it.

Texans minus one and a half over the Titans.

The Point Shavers. Yes.

The Point Shavers. The Titans.

Texans over the Point Shavers.

Let's go. Going for 2 and 50 and it gets to spread this season, which is the most of it. You just get to bet against them every week. You'd be up a cajillion dollars. That could have been a million dollar fix.

Yeah, right. A cajillion dollar.

So we're putting 100K each on Then last but not least, just a little 50K flyer on Chiefs plus 14 and a half adjusted with Rams plus 10 and a half. That is plus 110 on FanDuel. We just feel like the Chiefs are going to hang around and make the Denver fans nervous. I think the Rams are going to hang around because I don't think McVay is a, I just want to throw a game away guy. I think it's a, let me see. Let me see what we have of Blake Corum. Let me see what Jimmy G. What do I got here?

He trusts Jimmy G.

Yeah. What do I got with my third and fourth receivers? Maybe I'll run some trick shit. I think he'll have some fun in this game and get the team ready. So 50K on that. And those are the million dollar picks for week 18. There's one more stake for this house heading into the weekend. I need a Houston win, and I need an Arizona win. I finish Future Over Under. That's all I did before the season. I'll be 27 and 5. Right now, I'm 25 and 5. Houston win, they go over. Arizona win, they go over. 27 and 5 house.

That's That's getting the job done. That's very well done.

At some point, that's just impressive. As I said it last week, to sell- You don't have to say it. No, we need the positive media account. Somebody who just points out positive takes that people had or great takes on something or just, Hey, this person's been successful lately. Like cousin Sal with the wise wagers when he was 13 and 2. Hey, look at this. Kudos to him. We need more positivity on social media in 2024. Anyway, Houston, Arizona, if I can hit both of those, 27 and 5. I'm rooting for you. Keeping my fingers crossed.

I'm rooting for you.

Good luck with Washington. When you're here for round one, Ram's Washington is in play.

In play. I mean, I don't want to talk about it. It's just too rich of a possibility. Let's just humbly acknowledge to the football guys, there is some possibility if everything went the way the universe worked out.

Ram's get the three seed, Washington gets the six seed. Maybe Maybe that's the Amazon Saturday Night game. You're going to be here. We'd have to seriously consider going to that game.

No, we wouldn't consider it. We're going. I already know who we're going to sit with. We've got Washington fans in Los Angeles. The ownership of Washington would be so thrilled to see some of us. I think we'd have a tremendous time.

Rooting for it. Well, you'll see us there. I would actually root for Washington I'm interested in that game, I think.

Thank you. But I'd also be rooting because I'm sure we'd be with Chang.

Yes, we would be. I'd also be rooting for his three and a half hour roller coaster ride of a possible mental breakdown, watching him do it as he just angrily eats stuff. He gets out all his neuroticism with food. That would be really fun to watch.

That's why we get along well, me and Chang. Yeah.

All right. House, happy New Year. Great to see you.

Happy New Year. Great to see you as well. Let's go.

Sean Fentany is here. Gamut of emotions for him right now. End of the movie year, end of another depressing jet season, but maybe the start is something special with the Knicks. So I don't know. You You want to start positive for once?

I would love to. What do you mean the start of something positive? It's been an amazing three plus years here.

Now you're feeling contendery in a real way. Yeah.

I mean, I'm glad to hear you say that. You were pretty down on that Bridges trade. I think we were both down on the Carl Anthony Towns trade. A lot of pics. Yeah. Can we talk about the pics?

Well, they're not going to matter that much if the team's really good for the rest of the decade.

That's what I was going to say. I'm not crazy about that 2031 pick, but all these other pics, I don't know. If they're a 55-win team for the next five years, who cares?

Who cares? It's a great way to think about it. The Towns thing is the win of wins, though, because that could have gone nine different ways. It feels like at least so far, we're two and a half months in this season. So far, it's gone as well as it could have possibly gone. He's way more popular than even I could have expected in my wildest dreams. He's really fun to watch. It just feels like he's at the peak of whatever his power's on.

I was not really a fan of him as a player, but I think watching him on the Knicks has revealed how much I was not watching the T-Wolves, honestly, because he's even more skilled than I had realized, and he's a good fit with this roster. I thought for some reason that him and Thibodeau had a really bad experience together, but that does not seem to be the case. They did.

No, that's true.

They seem to be getting along great now. I don't understand how they repaired that, but he fits this team very well. Obviously, he doesn't play great defense as your key interior defender, but that's not the plan, I don't think, long term. I don't know. It's weird. They had a cupcake schedule in December for sure, but they've also played a ton of games on the road. It's weird. They really could be a 55-win team, and they might be the second or third best team in the NBA right now? Maybe fourth. Fourth seems right.

Yeah, I'm talking later in the pod, I talked to my dad about the Celtics, and they have a really hard part of the schedule coming up. There's a chance for the Knicks to grab the two-seed here and have at least home court for the first two rounds if they wanted to. But the thing that I mentioned this to Goldsbury on Tuesday, the thing that I worry about as a Celtic fan with them is the buyout potential of one or two guys who are like, Yeah, cool. I'll be in New York for three, four months shoot some threes for you and grab some rebounds.

I heard you say that to Kirk. So who's on that list in your mind? Who's somebody who could come over? It's hard to say.

Because so many teams are doing well or doing decent or haven't really packed it in yet. You don't know who the candidates are yet. Detroit had that terrible Jaden Ivy injury yesterday. Detroit was playing really well. He was a huge part of what they were doing. Then Cole Anthony goes in his leg. He's out for the air. It sucks. But now maybe that's a team that says, Yeah, maybe we're not a playoff team now and goes the other way, and now there's buyout guys in the team. I just don't know.

Knicks fans have been talking about getting beef stew in the mix in some way for months. I think since the Towns deal happened, knowing that they needed more interior defense. He feels real Knicksy to me. I think he would fit in really well with this crew of guys.

I think you'd have to trade for him, though, is the problem. We would, yeah. Yeah, you're looking at more the dude's I don't know. I'm the Portland, those teams, the Sacramento's, who knows? But I'm sure it'll be somebody, and it won't be somebody we're expecting either. But yeah, it's fun. That Nicks Celtics, probably going to be round two, probably going to be the two, three would be my guess unless something dramatic happens, and that will be the most meaningful Celtics, Nicks. These teams are actually pretty even in 40 years.

Bill, I'm sensing a little bit of a sadness in your voice about this, about the Nicks being a legitimate franchise.

No, I'm happy for the fans. No, it's better when the Knicks are good. I'm happy for the fan base.

Everyone says that, but if we go to the NBA Finals, we will be insufferable. Everyone will hate the Knicks in a second. Ask Philadelphia fans how they feel about Knicks fans right now. They fucking hate us because of what happened last spring. I think it's cool that we're a good story. What can you say? Leon Rose, I never would have guessed in a million years that he would have been this good at roster construction. Almost every move he has made, barring a couple of signings, like the Kemba signing, have been brilliant. He's been able to wriggle his way out of bad moves very well, and he's drafted well. It's wild. It's been very exciting.

There's a really fun scenario where the Sixers are in the plane and somehow get to a spot where the Knicks are the two seed, and somehow the Sixers win the 7-8 game, and all of a sudden we get Sixers, Knicks again, because that's starting to be the best rivalry in the NBA with the hatred from the fan bases.

Yeah, obviously, the Sixers look a lot better now, too. And the matchup would be so significantly different because you've got Paul George and Mikael Bridges and Karl-Anthony Towns who were not a part of that matchup last year, plus a bunch of other guys affiliated to their roster, too. So it would be different but the same. I mean, one of my favorite sports memories of 2024 is the Devo Double Bang, which didn't end that series, but it felt like it ended that series. I felt like a tide shifting in the conference when that happened. I was like, Oh, wow, we are where the Sixers were three years ago. We are a team People are like, They're not the best team in the conference, but you don't want to fuck with them. We are missing Dante. Can Dante be bought out and resigned? Is that on the table? Can you resign if you've been traded?

Yeah, I don't know the rule on that, but he's playing too well. I don't see a scenario for that. You'll get somebody interesting. It's weird to see you because not only do you have this, but the Met still Soto from the Yankees. You have that, too. We head into 2025 with real New York sports optimism from you for once.

Yeah. I feel like I'm about to be fired or something. It's like things are going well for me with my sports teams. We will get to the Jets. But yeah, the Soto thing is unreal. I don't even know how to talk about it. This is something that never would have happened through the first 40 years of my life. Obviously, Steve Cohen has changed the Mets pretty dramatically. I also don't think that they're a playoff team right now if you look at their roster. So I'm not going to get over my skis about the Mets. They still have a lot of work to do, and their pitching staff, when you compare it to the rest of the National League East, is not very good, candidly. Really? The Soto thing is unreal. Soto, Lindor, Vientos is very exciting, but we'll see. We will see. What's going to happen with Pete Alonso? Will they trade for a pitcher? There's a lot to happen there. But they've totally changed their reputation in baseball, which is fucking awesome.

All right, enough optimism. The gets.

You couldn't wait. You could not wait to get off of that.

This is it. This is it for Rodgers and Devante Adams and the coach You need a new GM, and you obviously need a new owner, but that's not happening. There was a big athletic story about how weird it is with the owner and his kids being involved. It was just over and over again. The data confirming, the anecdotes confirming, the eye test confirming that this is one of the most memorable shit shows in a while. You predicted it before the season. It's been even worse than I think you would have imagined.

I would not have predicted 4-13. I would have said maybe 7-10 when they missed the playouts or 8-9 when they missed the playouts.

Because last year, they were 7-10 with Zack Wilson. Yeah.

They were 7-10 with Zack Wilson two seasons in a row, and they're about to go 4-13, probably, with Aaron Rodgers, and basically great health. They have not had a lot of mass injuries. They lost C. J. Moseley for a while. They've had some health issues on the offensive line, but Rodgers hasn't missed a game. Burrice Hall has only missed one or two games, I think. Garre Wilson hasn't missed a game. I mean, their best players are playing, and they stink. They're terribly coached. Aaron Rodgers is obviously an awful influence on the organization. I still don't really understand the fuck he's talking about in public, 85% of the time. I have no idea why he's grinding axes the way that he is, considering how poorly he's played. His stats are really good, and they're very deceptive if you've been watching the games, which I unfortunately have been. He can't move as well in the pocket, and he's so so careful in his desire to not make a mistake that he often doesn't take chances where you need to to have an exciting offense. It's just not fun to watch what should at least be an entertaining offensive team.

They've sucked on offense this year, so it's been horrible.

The body language doctor is not like anything he's seen.

No. We got to get him out of there.

That point that you made earlier, though, not being able to understand what his agenda or his point is in some of his interviews. I think it's a great point because sometimes I'll see transcripts or there'll be some clip that goes on Twitter and it's like, Roger says this on McAfee, and I watch it and you almost wonder, is this a bit? What's What's he doing?

I think he's just really online and really responding to the critics, but we don't know who the critics are because we don't see his mentions, the mentions of his mind. I mean, he just seems like a really weird guy right now.

Well, that's especially to be the guy who's supposed to be the calming force, the driver of your race car, when you have somebody who's super addict, who now seems like he's clearly hoping he doesn't have to come back next year, and seems like he's getting a little Bridge burny, so maybe get rid of them.

Can I suggest a theory to you?

Yeah, let's hear it.

Let's look at the last 10 years of professional athletes. We've had more and more great stars play longer and longer into their careers. We've got Tom braided, we've got LeBron James. Even Federer played for a very long time. A lot of great athletes who extended their careers for health reasons or what have you. But a lot of those people have gotten more and more odd in their public persona. One way to think about it is being famous for a long time makes you crazy. It makes you paranoid, it makes you entitled. But I'm about the same age as Aaron Rodgers, and I'm getting weirder, and I'm getting riddled with anxieties. There are certain things that my body is breaking down, and I'm getting bent out of shape about it. I've got a family, and I've got different kinds of responsibilities. It's like when you're 27 and you're locked in on your sport and the thing that you're doing, it's because you don't have anything else going on in your life. When you get older and your parents start dying and you start thinking about your legacy, whatever the hell that is, you get weird. And Aaron Rodgers just seems like he's been going through a midlife crisis for four years.

And we keep thinking he's the guy from 2011 in Green Bay. And he's not. He's just a middle-aged guy who just happens to be one of the best throwers of the football of all time. And so it's been fucking annoying that the one time we got a genuinely great quarterback, it happened coincide with him going through a personal emotional crisis, and we're watching it transpire in real-time.

It's a good theory. Well, I wonder how much of that ties into COVID and how weird so many people got just being alone for 9, 10 months during COVID and getting pushed to be more and more online. If you didn't have a family around, and you're just by yourself a lot, what were the ramifications that? We both know people in our lives that just pre-post-COVID just felt like they were slightly different people.

Yeah, look at He's completely fallen apart.

Yeah, CR is. I mean, I wasn't going to mention that. Cr is now a maniac. Now, I don't know how it plays out, but I do feel like there's some end game with him where he's not going to retire, and he clearly I think something is happening for him next year somewhere, and I just don't know where that is.

Yeah, I was thinking about that, too. He probably should retire. He can clearly still play. I don't know if he can play at a high level. I don't know.

I don't feel like he can move in the same way He can't. The thing that's notable this year is he used to be so great at evading pressure and buying himself two, three. So he just can't do it anymore. No. As you said earlier, it doesn't seem like he wants to make mistakes. He's going to finish the season with 26 touch downs and 10 picks. On paper, it'll look great, but he also... He only does throws that are these safe throws down the sidelines, these timing catches or these quick things. You We'd rather see him just being like Josh Allen, gunning it.

Yeah. I mean, it's hard to watch what the contemporary superstar quarterback is now relative to what his play is like and what the Jets' quarterback has been like for the last 50 years. That's the thing is, if he finishes with 26 and 10 and throws for 3,800 yards, that's a top five quarterback season in Jets history. That's how pathetic the team is, even though he has been terrible. It's not ideal. I feel like, I don't know, if the Finals trade Kyler Murray, is there a one-year Aaron Rodgers thing that could happen there? You know what I mean? It feels like there are some spots where you could comfortably see him in a warm weather situation, having one last hurrah, but I just don't want it to be in New York.

I think braided has ruined our ability to look at all of this stuff, logically, because quarterbacks are supposed to hit their late 30s and just get worse every year, and then braided, it just didn't happen with him. I've said this before, but it's very similar to the LeBron thing. The LeBron thing is just really unusual. We're not going to see a lot of people just play until they're 40 and be able to put up 25, 10, and seven and just bowl through guys, even though they've had a gajillion miles. I don't know. I think this is what it should end like. This Kirk Cousin, same thing. You should hit your late 30s, and you should start becoming worse at quarterback. It's too hard to play. Movies. I'm still getting through all the movies. There were a lot this year, and I fell behind because of basketball and football, but I've seen a lot of them now.

It was a really busy December. There was a ton of new movies in December.

Yeah, they really dumped a lot of them late. It felt like this weird award strategy or something. It's been hard to get through all of them with all the other stuff, but I've been trying. I don't have a movie that I really absolutely love this year. I know you're talking about this on your podcast constantly, but was there a movie in 2024 that you're just like, I'm fucking ride or die. I love this movie. I'll fight anybody who didn't like it. It doesn't feel like that movie exists this year.

No, I have not given five stars to any movie this year.

You're like Dave Benser?

I Like a five-star match? I'm honestly developing that. I'm trying my best. I think I've given out eight five-star films in the last nine years or 10 years. Yeah. So, yeah, no, there were not any this year. Now, my favorite movie is The Brutalist, which we can talk about. It is a divisive movie, and if people don't like it, I'm not going to pick a fight with you about it. I understand why people don't like aspects of that movie. But no, I think the thing and the thing that you're feeling is the same thing that it seems to be will be an issue for the academy because we've never really gone this far where, at least since I've been doing this, where the best picture race is as open as it is. I think people genuinely do not know what's going to win best picture, and it speaks to that lack of consensus that you're talking about.

Yeah, all these different films have pieces of things that feel like it's the movie of the year, but not the whole thing. We had somewhere, what was that three billboards year? We never really decided what the movie was that year.

And then all of a sudden- That was the Roma and Green Book year as well? Or was it the previous year? Maybe that was the previous year. Maybe that was the previous year. It was like, Get Out and Lady Bird.

Yeah, but those years, those were like ride or die movies. We were like, Get Out. We had great arguments that year. I remember that three billboards year. We just... It's Black Clansmen. There was a bunch of them where it was like, I liked it. But I wasn't all the way there. I thought that way about Anora. I thought the first hour of Anora, I was just absolutely riveted. The second hour, it lost an air. But I was still really glad I saw it. I thought it was a really original, awesome creative movie, but it was a little flawed, too.

I think that's probably the front runner as much as there can be for a best picture. It's a movie that I really like. I really like all of Sean Baker's movies. It isn't my favorite of his movies. I think it's got a great central performance, and that helps it a lot. But it's a fairy tale about class. It's not going to be the most crowd-pleasing movie despite having this insane screwball energy that people seem to be responding to.

Well, also, the second biggest part in the movie is somebody who's basically insane for two hours. He's Russian Borat. It's a choice. Listen, it's really memorable, and it has a couple of distinct, memorable scenes. But if that one best picture, that would be shocking. Conclave has the big twist in the end. Conclave has all the breadcrumbs of what a best actor, I'm sorry, best film looks like. It's another one. It's bringing into this world. It's cool. There's great actors that I like. I got like 82% there for me doing percentages. It didn't get 100% for me.

I watched it the second time with my wife over the break, and I had the same feeling, which is the feeling that I had. I think it's very propulsive and entertaining. It's a great watch. I think the twist is a little silly and ham-handed. I had someone suggest to me, I was just talking about this with Amanda. Someone suggests to me that if they had put the twist in the middle of the movie and only had the Ralph Fines character know the twist and no one else know, it might have changed the dynamic of the movie and maybe not made the twist feel as rushed, which was cool. I don't usually like being like, your movie would have been better if you just done this because I don't know what I'm talking about. But that was a cool idea that I think maybe would have made me feel a little bit better about the movie because the craft is really good. It's edited beautifully. The great performances, like Ralph Fines is exceptional in the movie. You got Lithgo and Toochee and my guy Tedesco vaping. It's just some great stuff in that movie. But it felt a little bit silly and a little bit like tada with the reveal at the end that made me not like it.

It didn't feel a little like tada. It felt a lot like tada. Yeah. It was like, How do we end this? Then somebody got an idea over coffee one day, and all of a sudden, that was the end of the movie. I didn't think he was better than Chalame. I thought Fines was really good. I thought what Chalamet did. Ciar and I did a little Ringer Movies YouTube thing about it. I know you talked about it, too. I didn't love the movie. I really liked watching it. I don't know if I would watch it again, but I think I liked watching it for the actors and not the actual movie. I thought it was really conventional. But I really liked watching Shalame. I liked all the main actors that thought were excellent. I didn't know Shalame had that in him. I was really proud of him. I felt a little... I don't know.

Our little baby is all grown up. Yeah. He did it. The world's number one Bill Simmons fan is now the world's number one young movie star. Yeah, I fully agree. I agree with everything that you said in your conversation with Chris. I feel the same way about the movie. I think the movie is... James Mangle doesn't make bad, boring movies. His movies are always rock solid, good watches. This is by far, far from his best movie, in my opinion. I think it is pretty conventional. There's not a lot of story. I think the movie makes a good choice by not trying to explain who and what Bob Dylan is, that he's more like this spirit that moved through this period of history, and Salomé embodies that spirit really well. And obviously, his singing and guitar playing, it's It's amazing. I mean, it's just amazing.

My expectations were C plus is a win, and it was in the A range.

A hundred %. I really think he could win. I really think people's heads have been turned. I think a lot of people had the lowered expectations that you were talking about. I know I sure did. I was terrified to watch this movie as a psychotic Bob Dylan fan. I think for the most part, got the idea of Bob Wright. I wish the movie tried to explore a little bit more of the why instead of just showing you stuff happening.

But But the performance- A friend of mine had a really good point that I was hanging out with on New Year's Eve about the movie that so much of the movie hinges on the person that's watching it understanding the before and after of Dylan, which they try to do in the movie, and they're just showing you. But if you're under 35, you don't get it. You don't understand it because you don't know the backstory of it, that it was like, music was like this, and then it became like this. It wasn't just Dylan, it was the Rolling Stones. It a lot of different artists, the Beatles, all these different artists who went from basically black and white TV to color TV in music over the course of four years. The movie shows us that, and it's trying to tell us that, but I don't know if it ever gets a message across for somebody like my daughter who doesn't know anything about the '60s. You know what I mean?

Yeah, I do. I think the movie is not really pitched at her. I think there's a little bit of a bait and switch here because Shalameh is the star. Of course, in theory, it's a movie that should appeal to young people, but it's a movie for boomers and for older people. I was texting with Juliette yesterday, and she said that her parents were profoundly affected by the movie because they grew up admiring Bob and listening to folk music and that being a meaningful part of their lives. How could it not be? My mom would have loved this movie. She would have just felt so close to it. She would have loved the idea of a young movie star getting Bob Dylan the way that Shalameh clearly does. If you listen to his press interviews, he knows everything about Dylan. He's read every book. He knows every bootleg recording. He is encyclopedic about it, which is pretty cool, but you can't expect a 19-year-old to have that same level of information. Hopefully, what it will do is it will put people on a path to finding out about some of this stuff and the way the culture shifted over that time that you're describing.

Yeah, I felt differently. I felt like I knew everything in the movie, so I was learning basically nothing. So I was just concentrated on the actors. There are no surprises at all if you knew. I mean, you're a bigger Dylan fan than I am. We were like, oh, my God, I didn't realize there was nothing like that.

No, and I said this before the movie even came out that for me personally, that's just not the most interesting period of time in Dylan's life. It's also a period of time that is extremely chronicled. There are multiple documentaries about this period of his life. There is lots of contemporaneous footage of him talking during period. But once you get into '66 through 1980, there's not a lot, nearly as much. I mean, he's doing way less press. He disappears for like years at a time. He shifts his musical style so dramatically. So That stuff, all that is like, that's discoverable territory where you could interpret what was happening. What we see in '62 through '65, that's legendary American music history. So I felt the same way. I just didn't feel like I was seeing anything new. But maybe that's not the movie's job. Maybe the movie's job is just to represent that period in time, and they did the best they could.

It was missing that one, like Walk the line. I always had Johnny Cash, volatile guy. It's a relationship with this way. It had this hook that I was like, I want to know more about this. I always wondered what this was, and it dove into it. And this didn't really have the Joan Baez relationship, but it didn't feel like... Just wasn't as riveting.

I mean, you're describing the dramatic tension. You Off the Line has dramatic tension. There's no dramatic tension in the Bob Dylan movie. It's like, he came along, he blew people's minds. He was the first meaningful folk artist who was performing all original songs. People are literally in the audience staring with their mouth open at a 23-year-old kid explaining God and the universe and the way we relate to each other. They were breathless taken away, falling in love with him. Everyone all fell in love with him at the same time. Then he betrayed them by leaving their movement. That's the whole movie. There is no dramatic tension in that story. It doesn't mean it's not fun to watch. It is fun to watch.

Two movies that I'll kick their coverage for me. We haven't talked about this. I really liked Heretic. I thought it was one of the best horror movies in a while. The only reason I just was late seeing it. My daughter had seen it in the theater, and she's like, You've got to see this movie. I knew nothing about it. I intentionally read nothing. I thought it was one of the best horror movies of the last 10 years. I don't even know if you'd call it a horror movie. Whatever genre that is, I thought it was really cool, really well written. I liked the actors. I thought Hugh Grant was great. It made me think about shit. I just thought it was really good. It wouldn't be shocking if that was one of the 10 best films, right?

I think it's on the outside, but maybe not as far on the outside as I would have thought three months ago. Hugh Grant is nominated for Golden Globe, which is happening on Sunday. In 12 years of knowing you.

Golden Globe to me is like Rotten Tomat for you when I bring up rewatchables. It's a little bit more respectable than it was five years ago.

They're owned by different people. They have different voters. But you're right, it's not that big of a deal. So In 12 years, I don't know if you and I have ever had a Hugh Grant conversation. Where do you stand on Hugh Grant?

Fascinating career. We're three plus decades now. Go back to early '90s with him, and there's been a lot of iterations from him, and now he's into this old creepy English guy version of Hugh Grant, which I'm all in for.

He's playing a lot of dirt bags and villains, which has been very fun.

Dirt bag Hugh Grant is great. So you'd like Teratek, too, or did I like it more than you?

Love the first two-thirds, love the killer man traps two women in his house stuff. It gets a little funky at the end for me when it twists on the story. I thought some of it was interesting and some of it I didn't love as much. But I love the writing. It was very like post-Tarantino guy explains all his theories to people stuff that I always think is fun. Hugh Grant is so game. Him making the connections between the Hallies and Radiohead and Lana Del Rey and the board game stuff. I thought all that was so fun. Yeah, I dug it. I really like those two young actresses is Sophie Thatcher, who's on Yellow Jackets, and Chloe East, who is the girlfriend in the Fablemen's, both of whom I think could be big stars someday.

Yeah, but that also fits into 2024, where it was like, this movie I really like, but it was missing something. I agree with you. The last 20 minutes. It's like, you landed the plane, but I hit my head on the ceiling of the plane as you were landing it. But we made it. But I like it. I'm glad I watched it.

I was really glad I watched it. I'm glad I watched it. That was fun. I like the guys who made it, too. I just wasn't crazy about the ending.

Nickel Boys, I thought. I'd heard some people mention it, but I just thought it was so inventive how the filmmaking was just a really cool movie. It was really unusual and unique, and it really stood out to me.

You watched it at home?

Yeah, which was probably a mistake. I wish I had seen it in the theater.

Did you find it challenging to lock into it? Because I saw it at a film festival and people were walking out because it is really unusual the way that it's done. It's done in this first-person, perspectival way where you are the character, essentially. It was cool. I never really seen anything quite like it.

I could see it in a movie theater that it would make you almost want to throw up. So maybe it was better I saw it at home.

It was disorienting at first for sure. I really, really like it. It's one of my favorite movies of the year. I think the guy who made it, who played point guard at Georgetown, by the way, Ramel Ross, who's best player, who's a great guy, super smart guy. But there's nothing like it. There's nothing like that movie. It's really deep, has a lot to say. It's just really, really interesting the way that they made it. I'm stoked that you like that.

Yeah, because it made me think that guy, maybe it's his next movie or two movies from now, will have an awesome movie. You know what I mean? Yeah. All the ingredients were there for, I want to see what this guy does next.

It's funny that you say that, though, because I had him on the show in December, and he was like, I'm not really a director. He's like, I'm a college professor, and if I want to make another movie, cool. If not, no. His previous movie was a documentary that was nominated for an Oscar, but I wouldn't say he stumbled into it, but he's not strategic in the way that all these directors I interview, they're always like, And then my next movie is going to be a sci-fi epic. He's not like that. He's just like, whatever. If a book comes I think he did the movie because the Brad Pitt's production company called him and they were like, We liked your documentary. Do you have any thoughts on this novel by Colson Whitehead? And that's why he made it.

Right. Two that didn't get there for me were The Substance and Baby Girl. But I was glad I saw both.

Okay.

I've never wanted to watch either again. Baby Girl, I have people in my life, like my mother, who absolutely hated it. Usually, it's the movie she likes because my mother's weird. But really good performances at the top of it, movies that were trying to say stuff and took swings. I don't know if you've talked about both, but I appreciated the swing. It just didn't... Neither movie worked for me.

The Substance is exciting for me as a fan of crazy horror, as a fan of body horror and this explosive stuff that is almost never built around female characters. It's like a female writer-director The whole movie is about the female perspective, what the expectations are of women in our society, etc. Seeing that and then watching her basically go all the way with it, make a 2 hour and 20-minute movie that's just disgusting and explosive incredibly primal, just pus and gore and blood dripping from Demi Moore. It's really gross. The fact that that movie is an Oscar contender is so wild to me. I really liked it as just an act of, Here's everything. It's maximalist.

Admirable effort.

Yeah. Like you said, it's a big swing.

I don't know if it needs to be 2 hours, 20 minutes long, and I did not enjoy watching the last 30 minutes, which I think was the point of the movie.

It's exactly right.

You're not supposed to enjoy the last 30 minutes.

Exactly right. It is durational. It's like, sit through this and fucking watch what we do to women. That's what the end of the movie is. And what women do themselves because of how they feel about the expectations that they have. Baby Girl, I think, is a little less successful in the substance. I'm so interested in your mom not being into it because it's obviously an update on the erotic thriller.

But I would argue- Well, that was her take. She was like, The '80s movies did this so much better. This is trying too hard. I'm not buying it. I don't understand why Nicole Kidman wanted to do a movie like... It set her off.

I would argue that it's a little bit more of a black comedy than that, that it's almost like using the erotic thriller to springboard to make a comedy of manners. It's meant to be received a little bit more humorously. Everything Harris Dickinson is doing to Nicole Kidman in the movie is very funny to me. Like the glass of milk and ordering the glass of milk. I don't want to spoil the movie for anybody else. There's a couple of things in there that I was laughing in the theater, and not a lot of other people were. I was like, I think they went in expecting nine and a half weeks or expecting disclosure.

So maybe that was a marketing thing.

I think they wanted to push it as a sexy movie. And it is a sexy movie, but it's I don't know. It's very humorous. I have interviewed the director of that movie a couple of times now, and she's super funny. She's an actress, and she's very outgoing and charismatic and goofy. When you meet her, you're like, this is not supposed to be some Ryan Line movie from 1989. That's not her energy at all. But your mom has got some of the goat taste, so I'm not going to challenge her.

Nosferatu. As I told you, I'm not a Gothic Dracula vampire guy. I'm I'm not the audience for that movie. Some people in my life really liked it. Some other people are like, eh.

Netshee popped on and he was like, he loved it.

Yeah. That's been Dracula for my entire life, though, or vampires or whatever version of this I just, for me, personally, I'm not a fan.

Break it down for me.

Why do you not like the vampire? Never liked any of them. I didn't even like the Coppola one.

But is it about something about the blood-sucking, the fangs, the Eastern European thing? What is it that you're turned off?

I don't know. It just doesn't work for me. I can't defend it. I can't explain it. Even since I was a... The last one I liked was... They used to do the creature feature, whatever, the double features, the Christopher Lee movies. They would show all the time on channel 56 in Massachusetts. The Hammer Horror. Yeah. It was always the Dracula ones or those movies from the '50s. I don't know. I just could never get there with any of them. I always was more for horror where I was always more of the, I want to be able to relate this in some way. I can't relate to going to some weird dark mansion in the middle of nowhere and trying to figure out. It just doesn't work for me. But other people love it.

Can I give you an opening to suggest Nosferatu for you? Nosferatu is a movie about real estate. The whole movie is about- I did notice there was a redfin element to it. There is 100% a redfin element. Account summons a real estate agent to his castle because he wants to buy a little hacienda, a little in Germany. That's the plot engine of the movie. Guy wants to come to a German town.

So selling Sunset, dark Germany?

Absolutely. Selling Sunset with syphilic metaphors about sex and blood?

It might have been better for me in the theater being trapped to it. Like being trapped to the screen versus I saw it at home. I'm sure that was a piece of it. But Yeah. I mean, my wife falling asleep with a half hour to go was minus a thousand on FanDuel, and then that happened. But what's weird is my daughter didn't like it, but my daughter's boyfriend loved it and saw it in the theater twice. I just think in Really? And then, like, Jeffrey Kyle loved it. Some people, this is a type of genre they love.

Yeah, I mean, it's literally a 100-year-old thing. I mean, the original Nosferatu was in 1922, and it's a story that never expires. People just love vampires. They love vampire stories. I like vampire stories. I've probably seen hundreds of vampire movies at this point in my life. This one, Robert Eggers is the director. He's made four movies now. All of his movies have the same thing where there's attention to period detail. The lighting and direction is so specific and focused and unique. His level of craftsmanship is basically unmatched in genre filmmaking.

That was the fun part to watch. It's an exceptionally well done movie. Yeah.

But if you don't like those stories, you don't like those stories. You don't like those stories. You don't like vampire.

I don't even know if there's a vampire movie. I didn't even really like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all that stuff. I just never got it. Maybe I'm more of a werewolf guy. Is that possible?

Well, the Wolfman is coming to the theaters in January, starring Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner. It's a blood house.

The brutalist I've not seen yet. It's 200 minutes.

You sent a very attacking text message to me over the weekend. What did you send? What was that?

I said I might not have the 200 minutes until after the playoff. It might have to be like a two weeks before the Oscars situation. 200 minutes is I could take a train from Back Bay Station in Boston to New York, and the Brutalist wouldn't be over as I'm getting into New York.

Maybe you should watch it on the train ride on your iPad.

Just stuck on the Xela watching Brutalist? I mean, the length- It seems like it's a movie for you. It seems like it's a movie for the diehard movie nerds, and I get it.

What's the run time of the Godfather, Bill?

Three hours?

It's 2 hours and 55 minutes.

Okay, so 175 minutes.

You're tacking on- You're going to compare the- 20 minutes.

To The List of the Godfather?

Well, I'm only comparing it because other people have been comparing it because it's meant to be an American epic, the same way that The Godfather is with big gestures and breathtaking performances and beautiful craft and a movie with full of ideas that is also extremely entertaining. It's not as good as The Godfather. I'm not suggesting that. Have you seen it twice? I've seen it twice, and I'm seeing it a third time on the big screen next week. I really like this movie. I think it's not perfect. No movie is perfect. But I think that there's the conversation around how long it is and whether or not it's only for film nerds is like, I don't know, man, you like Apocalypse Now?

You like The Godfather? I really do.

You like great grand, epic visionary movies. You like There Will be Blood?

It's in the same tradition. I do like There Will be Blood.

What's the problem? What's the issue? You'll watch nine hours of a horrendous Netflix show.

I'll watch 10 straight hours of NFL on Sunday and watch some of the worst quarterbacks we've had this decade.

That's right. I've watched... How many hours of Aaron Rodgers have I watched in 2024? For fuck's sake, I can sit through three and a half hours of The Brutalist. I'll get it done.

It seems like it's a can't miss her. There's been some Roma, and there's been some over the last 10 years. I'm just tapping out. I just don't care.

Okay, here's the case I'll make. I think the second half of the movie has been much more controversial than the first. The movie is bifurcated. There's an intermission, a literal intermission, 15 minutes in the middle. The first half is just, here's the sell. It's a classic story of the American Rise. An immigrant comes to the country and they try to make a better life for themselves. In this case, it's someone coming after surviving the Holocaust from Hungary. He's an architect and an artist, but he has to start at the bottom, and he has to build himself up and he has to have opportunities come his way.

So he's blogging?

He blogs. He blogs for a hoop site, and he does rumors, and he manifestsests trades. The movie is just like the first 90 minutes of the movie is just up, up, up, up, up I know how that's going to go. The second half is, it's a roller coaster. Roller coasters are fucking fun. The Brutalist is a pretentious art film? Yes. Is it also an incredibly fun movie with big bowl performances? Are you a guy, pierce guy?

For a long time, never understood why Hollywood stopped biting.

He's incredible in this movie. Very funny, ridiculous over the top. He's a very familiar character. I think if you can carve out the time, you can I just got to clear out.

Nobody in the house. I just got to clear out, focus, put my phone in another room.

Yeah, just one room without Pistons Hornets. You don't have to watch that game tonight. Just turn yourself over to the brutalist. And maybe you'll learn something about yourself.

Even Heretic, I had little Sixers Kings going on the bottom left TV. Keep me grounded. Brutalist, no basketball on any TV.

That honestly hurts my The idea of running Heretic.

Just wanted to see what was happening. It was like it was a nonstop action.

Was this pre or post Mike Brown firing?

No, this was last night.

Oh, last night. Okay. So you were like, I want to see who took over for Mike Brown? I don't even know.

The great Doug Christie. Oh, right. Former basketball wife star.

Was Jackie there? Was she in the front row?

Probably. Probably doing little finger points on it. So who wins best film right now? I mean, the odds really aren't out yet until we get to final 10. It seems like it's wide open.

Amanda came back to the show today.

Yeah. Congrats, Amanda. Welcome back.

She's back. She was like, I think it's wicked, and the wicked thing is happening. If that happens, I might need to go to Hawaii for a few months. I might need to bail for a while.

Four minutes.

That's how far you made it. Yeah.

It's not for me.

That was what she said, too. She was like, It's not for me. I'm in the business.

If I had a four-year-old daughter or Or if I was you, I would have gone. I would have sat through it. But it's not... I'm out.

My daughter liked it, didn't love it.

It's so long. I think there's two kinds of movie people. There's the kind you or the movie where you have to see literally everything. Then there's the pick and choose diehard movie fans. I've hit the pick and choose part of my life at this point. You learned it. I'm not going to see everything anymore. I'm going If there's a couple of people in my life who are really, really pushing a movie that I trust, I'm like, Oh, they seem really... All right, fine. But for the most part, I don't feel... There's also way more movies out than there's ever been. In the old days, there was always like, you knew, Oh, this is an awards movie. This is a big popcorn movie. This is a movie trying to get a lot of people. Now, there's just a lot of movies coming out where I don't even know what was the goal of the movie to make money. Who greenlit this? It was the goal to try to make this in under three million? It feels like we have more of those than ever before, and it's really hard to tell which are the essential ones to watch.

It's a great question. I've thought about it, too. I was just watching an interview between Conan O'Brien and Billy Crystal, and Billy Crystal was talking about his experience hosting the Academy Awards. And Conan was like, You had it easy, man. There were 38 movies, and everyone had seen all of them. And now, there's 300 releases just in America every year.

Plus all the streaming shit. Then you start adding in the carry-ons and all those movies. I just feel like there's more choices than we've ever had before. And weirdly, the TV has gotten worse.

Yeah, I'm I'm curious to see if TV shows are better next year. I've never watched as little TV as I watched in 2024. This is the fewest. I mean, since I was five years old, probably. But yeah, I don't know. The movie stuff is hard. It's obviously making me crazy because I feel like I have to watch everything, and that's not healthy. It's like it doesn't make sense to try to watch 300 new movies a year every year. I'm going to fucking burn out.

They're also getting longer. That's the other piece. It's like when we do rewatchables and Craig's like, whoa, it's an hour 34. I'm so excited. All these movies now feel like they have to be gigantic. But I feel like the creativity is still there. I think there's more choices than ever for what you like. I still feel like we have a nice generation of younger actors now that we were really... You came on here a couple of years ago. We were really worried about the next generation. Now I feel like there's so many under-35, under-40 actors that I really believe in now.

It's a great time. Just look at Dune part 2. It's Shalame, Florence Pew, Zendaya, Austin Buller. We're good.

Even that Florence Pew, Andrew Garfield movie that my wife and daughter loved. I'm glad people are making those movies, though. It's like, here's our audience. It's Cancer and cooking, and this lady's going to die in the end. That was the original title. That was the original title. Cancer and cooking.

I like that movie because it felt like 1996. It was a really good 1996 draw, like weepy. Yeah, look, you have to work harder than you used to have to work to know. It used to just be like buy entertainment weekly. They'll tell you everything you need to see. Anything beyond that, you're a real film fan. You're a real cinephile. Now, I don't know. I mean, there's movies I haven't seen that came out this year. That came out last This year. In theory, I should know. I should have seen everything. I just... It's impossible to make the time and to recommend all the right stuff. It's challenging, but I think 2025 is going to be a good culture year. I feel pretty strong about that.

Well, we know the TV is going to get better, and hopefully, there's some good movie stuff, too. All right. You can listen to fantasy in the big picture. You can hear them on the rewatchables every so often. Congrats on the next. Congrats on not having Aaron Rodgers in your life anymore after this weekend, probably. We'll see.

What if they bring him I can't imagine.

I texted you that Gareth Wilson, the move needs to be... He just needs to go off on Aaron Rodgers. And just the Jets fan base would be like, Finally, our savior has spoken.

Let him just say the words him or me out loud into a microphone. I would love it.

Yeah, that sounds great. All right. Happy New Year, Sean.

Thanks, Bill.

All right, my dad is here. We're taping this 12:30 Pacific time on Thursday. We're three days away from Bill's Patriots waiting to see if the Patriots are going to do the right thing and actually not intentionally lose the game, but maybe structure things a certain way so that they don't get a win. What's the mood like in Boston with this Patriots team as we head into week 18?

Well, people I've talked to this week are furious that Mayo is thinking of even starting May. He almost had concussions in two games now. He led us to believe in a press conference over the weekend that he was going to start the other rookie and give him a shot. Now all of a sudden, they interviewed him last night It's typical of what he's done all year. It flip-flops. It seems like he changes his mind or listens to different people. Now he says, Well, May is healthy. We want to give him a chance. Nobody wants to give him a chance. We want to shut him down.

Right. Yeah, there's two reasons he want to shut him down. One, he gives us the best chance to win. They don't want to win because of all these extra assets you get with the pick. The other thing is he's getting the crap kicked out of him. At this point, I'm just happy. That hit he took in the Chargers game, I'm just happy to put him on the shelf. González, same thing. Get him out of there. Let's just get out of the season and then figure out what we have with the team. Instead, to win this game and to lose out on all the extra assets you would get from a trade down, to me, it almost looks like organizationally you have to look at it and go, who's running the team? Does the coach think he's going to be there? Does the GM think he's going to be there? What do the owners want out of this? It's a recurring theme that we've had for a year. It doesn't seem like anybody is really in charge.

It's ludicrous. It's apparent, at least that's the scuttlebutt, if you listen to talk radio here, that Mayo thinks if he wins this last game, he shows ownership that he's got the team back on track. Meanwhile, if I'm ownership, I'm surprised they haven't suggested to him very strongly that shut May down. González didn't practice all week. He had a concussion the last game. Shut him down. He's probably shut down anyway. And play all the reserves.

Yeah, let's see what we got with Joe Milton.

Yeah, I'd love to watch Joe Milton, actually. They say he's got a rocket of an arm. I'd love to see him out there. Now, Now, if he played too well, I'd be upset. But we're in line for that number one draft pick. We've had a terrible season. Don't let the coach think that he can save his job by winning a meaningless game.

But this is what happens when the coach's motivations and the GM's motivations aren't aligned with the owner's motivations. If the coach knows he's going to be here next year, you're totally fine throwing the game away because you know the team, it's the best thing you can do for team. If you feel like you're on thin ice, you're thinking about it differently. But the guy who's really on thin ice is Bob Kraft, who I think over the last year, it's been one of the biggest turns, I think, of a fan base feeling about somebody that belonged to the fan base, where you would go to these Celtic games every time they showed Kraft, if he was in the stands, standing ovation or huge cheers. This year was not the case, right?

Well, this year, I've only seen him at one game, and he wasn't even recognized on the Jumbultron. He was sitting next to the owner, so I knew he was there, but they didn't recognize him. The same was true when Belichick used to come to the games. He'd get a standing ovation. He hasn't come this year, which I guess makes sense.

He's probably- He's got eight jobs.

Yeah, he's got a lot of jobs elsewhere, and he has to satisfy his young girlfriend. But the craft thing is interesting. I bet there's a piece of Bob Kraft that doesn't want to finish as the number one worst team in the league. There's an ego thing maybe for the owner, too. Do you think so?

I hope you're not right.

I hope I'm not right, but to have the worst team in the league, that takes an ego hit for the owner of the team, too.

Well, I remember when we were talking about Missoula after that first year and whether they should bring him back or not. We were really concerned about a bunch of stuff that we saw during this season from him. But we were always factoring in. This was about as unfair of a situation as somebody could possibly be in. He gets the job right before the year. He's the number four assistant. He loses other assistants that were on the team during the year. He's young. He's friends with some of the guys in the team. Everything, there was the Grant Williams, Marcus Smart pieces. There was a case like, Hey, they give him the offseason. They give him a better bunch of people. They made the Graham Williams market smart trades. Let's see what he's got. And he's gotten better as it's going on. I don't know what the case is with Mayo.

I agree. It's a good comparison because remember, though, that Celtic team still achieved pretty highly.

Yeah, that team won a lot of games and lost game seven in the Eastern final. So it wasn't like he was a dumpster fire.

No, I'm not defending Missoula. I think he has learned a lot over the two years, now three years.

You promoted him. He's first row Joe for you now.

He's just Joe Missoula, the coach.

Yeah, we like Joe Mizzola.

Mayo is a lot. He's a different case. His press conferences or even when he gets interviewed by a journalist, he's all over the place. I don't think he really has an idea what he has in mind for this team. Even as evidence this whole week, is he going to play May? Is he not going to play May? Does he want to win this game? Well, he got interviewed the other day, said he wants to win. He's not interested in draft placement. The fans are. I mean, we are.

Well, it's such a dramatic difference in assets. And I'm not a huge tanking guy, and I get why it's... I think sometimes it could be really cancerous if that just becomes a strategy. When you're in the situation they're in here where the quarterback's banged up, it just makes no sense. I don't know why they wouldn't want the number one pick.

Put the draft pick aside. I don't want May to get hurt. We might have the worst offensive line in the league.

It's certainly the worst we've ever had since you and I have rooted for that team.

That I can remember. The worst for the Patriot team. I don't trust that he won't get hurt with this offensive line, unable to protect them. He shouldn't be out there. Now, I I guess that begs the question any quarterback to put out there is vulnerable, but you can't put out the franchise quarterback.

Well, especially when he's a little bit reckless, which is a great quality unless... Like that, what he did last week in the Chargers game was pretty reckless. He was going out of bounds, he spun back in, ends up taking this huge hit. It's the first drive of the game. It's weird. I feel bad for Mayo because he seems like a nice guy, and I just think sometimes it's the wrong job. I don't know if he was ever actually the defensive coordinator. I think he was part of the team. Belichick's obviously running so much of it, but he just seemed to overmatch this whole year. The press conferences, even though they don't matter that much, but they do, too, because they're the connection of the fan base, and the connection is seeming like you're stable, and you have some North Star that's guiding you. Even the Ramondre Stevenson, he's not starting this week. We're starting Gibson. It's like, no, actually Ramondre is starting. Hey, what happened, coach? How was the coach's decision? No other team does this, where the guy just changes his mind, and he's had five of those.

Yeah, he probably I guess I had more than five. But I can't say the fan base here has any trust in his ability to be a head coach. It's interesting. For the two years before Belichick left, Mayo was on TV, like a pregame show or aftergame show. He discussed the game and the defense, and he was very eloquent. He knew his business. It's a lot different, though, stepping into the head coaching job. You and I talk a lot about assistant superintendents or assistant coaches. Sometimes you're meant to stay in the assistant role and do a great job.

To be the number two guy or the number three guy.

I just think he's over his head and he's overwhelmed. It just seems like he's overwhelmed.

The big thing for him, though, is that every head coach has to have some specialty. Sometimes there's the culture coaches, and it's somebody like Harba who's good at everything as a coach, but he's really about a culture and coaching different parts of the team. I think the best coaches have always been guys that do everything and have some identity of that. But then there's other coaches who are like, Well, at least I really know this. I'm really good at offense. I'm really good at defense. He was supposed to be this defensive guy, and the defense is abominable. I mean, it's basically the same guys. González is back. They basically flipped González for Barmore. They lost Bentley this year. But for the most part, it's the same guys. The secondaries, it's just a train wreck. And DBOA-wise, I think they're the worst team in the league. They never seem like they know what they're doing. And that's where you get to the other side roll all the penalties and all the stupid stuff. They just don't seem well coached. I don't see how anyone can watch them and be like, Oh, well, they're doing this well.

They're not doing anything well.

It's possible Mayo would have been helped if he had picked the right defense a coordinator or picked a different offensive coordinator.

Well, obviously, the Van Pelt was the 12th pick.

Others turned it down. The defensive coordinator that he picked was a line coach.

That guy is not staying, the Covey team. He's not staying next year.

No, but lots of teams have a philosophy. Actually, the Celtics did it this year, and a little bit last year as well. Mizzola got the opportunity to bring in his own coaches. Now, who did he bring in? He brought in veteran coaches. He brought in guys like Casselle who have been around the league a long time and can help him as he's learning over the two and a half years on the job. The The Patriots didn't do any of that. Their offensive coordinator certainly has experience, but I've never seen that he's successful where he's been. So they brought in a guy who hasn't been successful from Cleveland and elsewhere.

One thing he's good at is admitting that he hasn't done a good job. He seems like a nice guy, but it's like, you're the same guy who's running bubble screens on third and 17, and we're going backwards more than we're going forwards in some of these drives. So the question for me is, sometimes you can just miss with the coach. I tweeted out all the one and out coaches that have happened in the NFL. It happens, it seems like it's about once a year where somebody's like, We just picked the wrong guy. Like Nathaniel Hackett on the Broncos. They were like, This guy's a disaster. We should probably get out of this one. And they fired him during the season. The question for me with Mayo is, how attached this craft to the decision? Because this was his guy. He He basically was out and said, I decided five years ago, this is my coach. He really believed in this guy as a person, a human being. By the way, he might be a great guy. I just haven't seen any evidence he's a real head coach. The problem is you have Vrabel sitting there who we know is a good coach.

That's who everybody in New England wants. You bring this guy because they talk about, Oh, can we get Tee Higgins? I don't think they're going to get anybody if to the outside world, they look poorly coached and poorly run. Jake May is a great asset, but that's not enough to lure people to come here.

I wonder, though, if you're bringing up what's part of the problem. Kraft handpicked Belichick's successor. It makes him look bad if the guy gets fired after one year.

Yeah, but couldn't he extricate himself with it by being like, Look, I love this guy. I really believe in him. My mistake was giving him a job that maybe he wasn't 100% ready for yet because he didn't have enough experience as a Coordinator. There's ways you can get out of that.

Yeah, I'm not sure at Bob Kraft's age that that's the route he's going to take. He could make him vice President of the paper company. Just move him over to the- He could be make him the GM.

Just move him up.

We could have co-GMs.

Yeah. I mean, he wouldn't do a worse job as a GM that Elliott Wolf did in the spring.

That's the whole other issue of the GM. You look at our draft from last April, It's horrendous. Now, they had to take May. He fell in their lap. They couldn't not take May in the first round. You look at the pics after that. That's why I'm a little worried. Even if we finish with the worst team in the league and we get this big package from the Giants or somebody, Oakland or Las Vegas, excuse me, are you confident that we're going to make good draft picks?

No. But that's the thing is, at least last year compared to this year, now they have this asset. They have a franchise QB. They also, hopefully, will have the number one pick in the draft. They have González. They have all this cap space. If you're looking from the outside and you're somebody who actually knows your shit, that's a good job now. I don't know if it was a good job a year ago. What was the job? It's like, I hope Drake May is good. That's really about all you're bringing to the table. Now it's like, yeah, we have franchise QB Maybe you can really build something. We've seen it happen too many times. Carba goes into the chargers. They probably had more assets than we have heading into the offseason. But just the move from Brandon Staley to Harbaugh was worth five, six wins, and now they're in the playoffs. It feels like the Pats... Do you see their schedule? They're playing the NFC South next year. They're playing all the last place teams. You think it wouldn't be that hard to turn this out.

I agree. That's a good point. For some reason, despite finishing with the third worst team last year, we had one of the toughest schedules in the league. I know. Now, some of those teams didn't pan out as well as projected, but it does seem like we have an easier schedule next year. And you're right, teams turn around in the NFL, but they typically turn around because the whole administrative structure, coach, GM, whatever has been turned around.

Well, Washington did it, right? They Dan Quinn, they hired Adam Peters. They did all these super smart free agent signings of these second-tier dudes. They got Daniels, they got their quarterback. They immediately built a great team around them. A great team for what the ceiling was. They're going to be a 10-win team. I don't know. Nobody saw that coming. But I think the bats- Your home team, the charges.

Nobody expected.

I expected it.

You expected with the coaching change?

Yeah, because I thought Staley was that bad last year. I just think you could tell when an NFL coach doesn't have it at this point. Anyway, we'll see what happens. Nerve-wracking week 18 Pats game. That would be unbelievable if they somehow beat the bills for no reason.

Well, I mean, last year we won an inexplicable game that we shouldn't- That Broncos game. Yeah. It cost us the same draft.

Kyle and I watched it together. I know. We ended up with Drake, who might end up being the best guy out of all these guys, though. We're taping this for the Celtics little road trip here. Celtics are 24 and 9. You've been to a bunch of the games. What's not going well with this season? What's missing?

Defense. Defensive energy, defensive effort. It's inconsistent. It's like they try to turn it on, usually in the fourth quarter. It's helped them at times to win games that it looked like they were going to lose, and then other times they just haven't been able to come back. The other thing I've noticed, and this is obvious, we're getting the best effort from every team that comes in here.

Yeah, the Bullseye games.

I think we've lost six home games already. We only lost four last year. Some of them have been close. A couple of them have been crazy games that we weren't even in the game. Yeah. And I could say it's been injuries, but a lot of teams have had injuries this year. The Porzingas thing, you and I, when they traded for Porzingas, we liked the trade with one caveat, his injury history. He got through almost all of last year into the playoffs pretty healthy, and now we're seeing little things happen. Then the other guy, holiday, a terrific addition, great veteran on the team, but missing some games. He's a good example of the three-point shooting. I think he was 40 something % last year. He's 34 % this year. Of course, he gets the same thing.

And Houser's down, too.

Hauze is down, too. The only guy who's really up is Pritchard. It's inconsistency, and the defensive effort is not always there. I don't know if it's lack of effort or they just think they can turn it on when they need to, or it's the injuries or a combination of all of that. Then on top of that, every team that comes in here wants to beat the champions. You can see it. When Philly came in Christmas Day, that's the best game Philly played all year.

Yeah, that was a game seven for them. I went to the game. I saw in person that Brooklyn game when they still had all their guys, and those guys were going all out. It was going to be the highlight of their year if they beat the Celtics Boston.

Yes, and we're seeing a lot of that.

You know what's interesting about that, though? Because we've seen this go the other way after you win a title, where you win the title and then the next year, you're even better and more awesome. You come in and now you have a chip on your shoulder in a good way. You're like, We're the champs, and here's why. I was leaning toward it being more of that a season, but instead it's the, Oh, we have an on/off switch button. We're always going to be able to turn it on if we need it, which I can't say I was really expecting because Tatum and Brown have been healthy this whole season. Usually, when you have your two best guys, that's going to push you a certain way, but it hasn't happened.

Well, they did start off, I think they were 16 and three, the first 19 games. But You've seen the month of December was a disaster.

I think they were seven and six.

Again, a lot of them were home losses, where I walked out of there saying, How did we lose game? Or how did that team beat us? Because the talent levels weren't equal. There's one thing, though, that's pretty consistent happening now. It's happened the whole month. Other teams are killing us in the paint. With Porzingas healthy, that wasn't happening. It's happening now because he's not out there. On top of the fact that I love Al Horford, but he's lost a step.

And His shooting- You just don't think he's playing too much?

Well, he has to play so many more minutes with Porzingas out. His three-point shooting has been horrendous.

You see, my fear with that is they just were putting way more miles on him than they wanted to this season because of the Porzingas piece and because Cornet got hurt. I just wonder if they put too many miles on the car ride for Al.

I think it might have been the case. I mean, he loves and the crowd loves him. I like him a lot. I just think that with Porzingas not out there, they don't seem to have any confidence in Tillman. So they're playing Keita and they're playing Cornet.

Well, Keita gives them at least the rim protection. Yeah, Al's down to... He's shooting 42% from the field, 36% from three this year. But he's playing around the same minutes and playing more games than they probably were hoping. He's played 26 of the first 33 games.

But he's playing different minutes because last year, when he was starting, he was coming off the bench, playing against other team, second team. Now he's starting, and he's not as effective. Obviously, the stats show that as well.

I will say if we go positive, I think Tatum has been exceptional. I think Tatum and Brown. I think this is as good as... Yeah, Brown, there's a couple of shot selection things with him sometimes, but he's always playing hard. I don't really love that little... He added this weird, I don't know if he was working on it all summer, that weird little turnaround at the foul line that he tries to do all the time now. I think it's gone in twice. But both of those guys are playing hard. But Tatum has been just awesome. I mean, he's 28, 10, and 6 every night. His three-point shot's back. He plays super hard on both ends. I don't feel like from an effort standpoint, you never see him mail it in. He really gives a shit.

No, I agree. I think, and defensively, he's played very well. Unfortunately, though, there's a piece with Porzingas being out. Oftentimes, you'll see Tatum trying to go out the center on the other team. A good example was not the most recent game, but the previous game when we played Toronto. Portals, the center for Toronto, I think he had 32 points against us. He hasn't had a game like that in his life, but we have no rim protection with Porzingas out.

Pertle always kills us, though. The other thing that changed, Derek White was awesome. In the first five weeks. I'm just looking at his stats quick. Yeah. All his stats were down in December, and he seemed like he was banged up in a couple of different ways. You had holiday, who's been off and on. You have White, who definitely was not 100% as we left December. That's why we're taping this before this little West Coast trip they have, where every game they have on the trip is hard. Last year, I would have said, They're going to rip through this trip. They're going to lay this back down. They'll go four and over, three and one. This year, I have no idea what to expect. I don't need that. I can tell me any scenario, and I would believe it. You could tell me they're going to own 4 on the trip, and I wouldn't be shocked. Last year, I would have been shocked.

Again, as you said, these are Western division teams. They're only going to see them once on the road. If I'm Minnesota, that's who they're playing tonight?

Yeah. They're playing teams. First of all, Minnesota was always a good matchup. They always played really well against the Celtics. Denver, Jokic has always been awesome. So that's the last game. And then in the middle, it's Houston and OKC. Houston's a bunch of fucking pitbulls. They're terrifying. And then OKC is the best team in the league.

It's quite a four-game road trip. You also have the Houston piece with the coach of Houston. Going into Houston, they're playing really well.

But Schengen is a good example, what you were saying earlier, where there's going to have to be stretches where Tatum actually has to guard Shengun. I think the thing that they really lost this year so far, and I'm not panicking by any means, but just last year with the lineups, they could go small, they could go big. They could basically do whatever they wanted each game. And just because they haven't had all the guys together, they're stuck with lineup certain day. And I think it becomes easier for teams. Also, teams know that they're going to shoot 53s a game. Sometimes those threes aren't going in the same way.

We haven't talked about that. They're averaging over 50 threes a game compared to 42 a game last year.

Yeah. Some of that's Pritchard because he's playing more.

I guess that's a good point.

But yeah. It's a work in progress, not panicking. I think the only thing short term is the Knicks might pass them. The Knicks might win the division. The Knicks, I think, were plus 260 on FanDuel and they're a half game back. Half game back. But you're not- I don't think they're going to catch Cleveland as the one seed. That's just a fact that I don't think they're going to have home court in round three or round four this year. Last year, it really mattered.

It did matter, but I don't think they're going to catch Cleveland. But again, it's January second. Everybody knows. It's what's your health look like in April and May. If they're purposely keeping Porzingas out because he rolled the ankle of the leg that he got injured last year.

It just seems like he's had the worst luck, where it's like he's almost even odds to step on somebody else's foot at all times in every game.

As a big guy, maybe it does happen more frequently But I'm okay if they hold him out until he's 100%. If he can ever be 100% again, I guess he can. They're not saying anything about him. Holladay is a different case. He got a shoulder impingement on his screen He's old. He's older. He did say that it's never going to be 100%.

I hate to hear a basketball player say that. How many of them?

I wanted to be healthy in April. I I guess. I think the next are going to pass us. Our schedule looks terrible, really hard.

Yeah. It feels like a two or three seat. I don't think they catch Cleveland. How many times has we gross back into a game this year? Is he still coming at the same frequency or no?

Yeah, I'd say so. Because that's another one.

I think that was all supposed to be settled right around now, but I think they have so many suiters If the process is taking longer and it's probably going to push to March now. I had always been told it was going to happen sooner than that, but I just think there's a lot of people kicking the tires on it.

One of the articles in the Sunday paper said they hoped to have all the bids in and some decisions made by the end of January.

Yeah, I don't think that. I think it's going to be later than that. Before we go, I have to ask because I always ask this to you at the end of the year or start next Who's the guy in Boston right now?

The guy?

Yeah. Who's the guy? Who's the most popular Boston athlete right now?

It's probably May. I I mean, I should be saying- No, I know everyone loves Tatum, but I don't think people understand how popular May is with the Patriots fans. I should be saying Tatum, but I really think it's May.

What do you think it is? That's ridiculous. What do you think it is I know. But what do you think it is that he's resonating with the fans like this, other than that it's just so hard to get a franchise quarterback, potentially?

I think that's part of it. I think after having so many years of Rady, maybe we never thought we'd see a franchise quarterback again, that we'd be a team living with the sets for the next 10 years. That's part of it. And I think the other thing is everybody sees this potential. You watch other quarterbacks who have time because their offensive line gives them time. And those quarterbacks play very differently and are much more successful. May has no time. He's waiting for his life every play. You can envision his talent behind a good offensive line, having time, and hitting receiver after receiver.

With decent receivers, too. That's the other thing.

Well, that's the other thing.

That's what I've been trying to tell people, watching what he's doing with the supporting cast he has, with play calling with the offensive line. I can't believe he's even upright. There's been so many times when it just seems like three guys were going to sack him, and he turns the corner, buy some time. It certainly worked out way better than we ever in a million years could have expected. I will say, though, Tatum is... Coming back for a couple of games this year, Tatum really is beloved. It feels like he's hit that final level of Boston athlete, so it's a good battle. I just think Drake's the new shiny toy. Tatum was like this as a rookie, right? When he came in and we were all like, Oh, my God, Tatum. We could all see it. And the main thing reminds me of that.

Tatum is still my favorite athlete. That's not how you ask the question, but They ask the buzz in Boston.

What's happening in the city.

I think people are so desperate to have a franchise quarterback.

Well, it's just there's more football fans, too, I think, is the other piece.

That's probably true, too. Although you wouldn't know it by the half empty stadium that the Patriots play in right now.

Can you imagine ever going to any of those games? No. How depressing that would be. What I grew up with for the most part.

This last home game of the year, Sunday. It's 40 miles an hour winds here. It's about 25 degrees or something. I don't know who's going to go to that game, particularly if Buffalo doesn't show up.

Right.

Are you going go to root for your home team to win? It's an odd situation.

Speaking on the most popular athlete thing, I think Jalen's climbing the ladder, too. Jalen's 2024 was really incredible for what he meant to the city, the stuff he does off the court, the fact that he came through, him and his relationship with Tatum together. To me, that's about as good of a top three as we've had in a while with the two Celtics in May.

Yeah, I Unfortunately, I can't think of a Red Sox that gets into the action. I can't think of a Bruin that gets into the action. You have the two teams to look at right now, Patriots and Celtics.

The Red Sox have this really interesting farm system thing brewing, like this Roman Anthony. I mean, we've had this happen before, but that really does seem like their farm system is pretty crazy loaded.

We have, but somebody- Somebody reminded me the other day when we made the trade for sale, when we gave up our two prized prospects, Munkaita and Kopek. And look what happened. Neither one of them ever panned out. So you don't know with prospects.

You never know.

Yeah. But we can be helpful.

We'll see with Jake May. So we're not going to see you in Foxborough on Sunday for Bill's Pets?

I think I have to go to church on Sunday. I'm not going to be able to make the paper.

Are you excited to get your Your granddaughter back soon?

I'm very excited, actually. We talked with her boyfriend today. He called Molly to a share of success on her retirement. That was awfully nice.

That is really nice. What a kid that is. What a great kid. I can't believe he was a Heat fan, but a great kid.

One more thing on the Celtics. Your daughter and her boyfriend went to the Miami Heat game against the Celtics. The next time we went to the game, the guy, Mike, who sits in front of me who's season ticket holder, he said, That awful Miami fan was sitting behind me that whole game. He was screaming and yelling. Everything Miami did. Oh, no. Unfortunately, the Celtics won, but I think Tommy might have gone over the top of the game.

Aren't you hoping Miami trades Jimmy and makes a dumb trade?

Yeah.

I'm really hoping this somehow doesn't work out. They're in a very strange spot.

I hope I text Tommy before you When they do that.

All right, dad. Happy New Year. Thanks for your loss to report. Good to see you.

Good to see you. Happy New Year.

All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to my dad. Thanks to Joe House. Thanks to Sean Fentesey. Thanks to S seeing Kyle and Gehow as always. Happy New Year. Enjoy the weekend. I will see you on Sunday with Cousin Sal. Don't forget, we are doing it live on my YouTube channel, the Bill Simmons channel. So right after the game ends, we'll be going on. We'll be talking about guessing the playoff odds, all the playoff implications of the games on Sunday, lines, Vikings, breakdown, everything you want. We're going to have all of it. Enjoy the weekend. I will see you on Sunday. Must be 21 plus in President Select States for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus in President DC. Gambling problem? Call 100 Gambler or visit rg-help. Com. Call 188-789-7777 or visit ccpg. Org/chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp. Org in Maryland. Hope is here, visit gambling helpline ma. Org, or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support, Massachusetts, or call 1-877-8 Hope, NY, or text Hope, NY in New.