Transcript of Greg Cote Is Getting A City Proclamation | Local Hour

Greg Cote of the Miami Herald is getting a proclamation tonight, on bowling night.

Hmm. Yeah. I mean, it's got to be big if I'm missing the first game of bowling. Not the whole evening of bowling, but just the first game.

The proclamation is what? It says, "Have you ever gotten a proclamation?"

I don't even know what proclamation is.

I have never gotten a proclamation. Has anyone here ever gotten a city proclamation? Nobody?

What do you mean?

Okay.

Is that better, worse, equal to getting a key to the city?

Greg?

It may include a big, uh, cartoonish key. I have no idea. This has never happened to me. It helps being from a fairly small town. Like, I'm not competing with the entire city of Miami, I'm competing with my little berg, my little burb, and so I'm more inclined to be singled out among a lesser number of people.

One of the details you do know: it's the city of Plantation. You kept saying little berb or berg, but you didn't tell anybody.

Oh, yeah. What do you want? What do you want, my address? I mean, I'm trying to keep a semblance of privacy here, but, um—

Isn't this open to the public?

It's open to Joe and Joanne public, sure. Anybody who wants to show up. City commission meetings are open to the public by nature. You want to show up at 6 a.m. or 6 p.m. this evening and—

I want to know what time this is. It's not that far from me. I want to know what time this is happening.

Okay, they told—

I could be a game-time decision.

Okay, they told me to be there at 6. I think the actual presentation is more like 6:30.

And is there, like, a stage set up outside? Like, what's the deal here?

No, it's going to be inside the chamber. Inside the city commission chamber.

What are you being honored for?

It's for my professional 54-year career at the Miami Herald.

For being laid off?

Moldy as feet. Can I show up dressed like this?

That's encouraged.

I'm going just to document and hopefully get some very good— and when I say good, I mean sad— video.

Yeah. Christopher, we're doing our podcast and I'm mentioning it on my podcast, and he says, "I hope I get sad video." I'm like, what are you talking about? I hope it's triumphant video.

No, no, no. All city commission video said, "Do you think Billy Corbin will be there?" Put it on the poll at Le Batard Show. Will Billy Corbin be at Greg Cote's proclamation in Plantation? And also put it on the poll, "Are all city commission meetings sad?"

I woke up with a smile on my face thinking about the sad pan when they go, "As we honor longtime Miami Herald writer Greg Cote." And then there's just a pan—

Yeah, 7 people there, all of whom still get newspapers. The last 7 newspaper subscribers that there are. The people who attend city commission meetings regularly because they don't have anything else to do. And Billy Corbin. What do you know about tonight? You're being honored. It's a big honor. Plantation, you're one of the most famous residents in the history of Plantation, a city named after, you know, slaves.

Let's not go there. That's why I'm honored to be honored. I mean, what can I tell you? They know who I am, and it helps that the mayor, who just won a big reelection last night, Nick Sortil— congratulations, Nick.

I'm sure he's listening to the Shadow Show.

He is. He's a big fan. And anyway, big Greg Cote Show fan. Anyway, Nick used to work for the Sun Sentinels, so he knows a lot of people I know. Mike Mayo, Alan Cherry.

Mike Mayo?

And so, yeah, Mike Mayo used to work for the Sun—

Alan Cherry.

Yeah, another guy who used to work for the Sun Sentinels.

Food names, you know?

You like food names?

I'm Chris, perks up whenever he hears Mayo. Like, you see how excited he gets?

Wait, OJ? Anyway, Nick Sortil, congratulations on your reelection.

Again?

He had enough in reelection.

Double congratulations. I still don't know anything about your proclamation.

And nor do I, because it hasn't happened yet.

I think I'm going to surprise you guys here, because you may be surprised, that while America was speaking loudly last night in repudiating the worst American president there has ever been, you'll never guess what I was doing. I was breaking down film of the trenches, UM Notre Dame, with Landon Tangle. And I'm telling you that Miami's got a problem with these stunts. They haven't figured it out yet. I'm surprised Alex Miróball hasn't figured it out.

Who are you?

Unanimously. I'm going to go deep in the weeds today.

No, Dan, I got to correct you. Three days out, you get into the mud. Thursday's for the weeds. Today we get muddy. I want to hear— I want to hear stats that I don't even know the meaning of. Give me acronyms.

Okay. I'm going to go into the trenches. I am. I'm going to be doing scoop blocks, crack blocks, kick out blocks. I'm going to be talking about it all deep in the trenches here. As America finally does the right thing last night, about 10 years late, the American people are fed up. They were fed up 10 years ago. They're fed up with their governance, period. They're fed up every two years, and it's basically because there's an affordability crisis. But in Texas, at least, Hispanics told you, "Yeah, we're not going for that kind of un-American on how you're treating brown people." But I want to get into the mud, then, on Notre Dame, UM, because the committee comes out with its first vote last night and says the easiest thing they had to do last night.

Most people don't know that we're actually doing some construction.

Miami defensive secondary that doesn't tackle very well and doesn't cover very well. What just happened there?

Is that a Zoom meeting for your construction company?

Well, I don't know what happened, but I saw Cornhacke appear on my screen as that was happening, and so I just assumed Jeremy was doing something that he wasn't supposed to be doing. Jeremy is in another room doing an Instagram Live for the entirety of the show. He's not even in here today. He's just going to be talking all show as Cornhacke— I was watching last night. Do you guys see the Cornhacke cam? The Cornhacke video that is him off-camera blowing his nose and doing things when he's not on television proper but is on social media?

My wife is a huge Cornhacke fan. She's a fangirl. Like, she will watch that network for him and him only. She just absolutely loves it.

Zazlo was surprised to learn today that Tommy Tuberville is governor.

That's not fair the way you say that. That's not fair.

I mean, you guys were in the same place I was in. Did it not seem that Zazlo learned this morning that Tommy Tuberville is the governor of Alabama?

It was a poorly written headline to Zaz's part.

So poor.

Like, the headline here, right here, it says the headline. I'm on ESPN.com, and the headline says, "Tuberville to be Alabama governor." That sounds like he just became governor. Greg, "Tuberville to be Alabama governor."

But it sounded like you didn't— it did sound like you didn't know that he was Alabama's governor already.

I live in Florida.

I mean, we are Alabama.

Yeah. I was going to say, why do you admit that you live in Florida? Geez.

The committee doing what it did last night. We'll get to the other parts of what the committee did, because there's plenty to parse here. The committee just told you that Notre Dame has to win this game or it's season's over.

Mm-hmm.

That was a bit of a surprise. I don't know, was there a bigger surprise yesterday than that one? Texas being that high is surprising to me as well.

Yeah, Alabama. It was surprising, because, like, Alabama, they got really one good win this season? I'm really surprised at the Notre Dame thing.

Yeah.

I thought that they would go the other way on that. Like, you still had an opportunity to have one versus two, given that the CFP—

Right, you told me that earlier in the week.

Yeah. If I had to bet, would Notre Dame be top two or outside the top ten? I would have taken top two all day. So I'm stunned by that. And yet, it kind of adds juice to this. That was a subtext to this game, that, man, it's going to be tough for Notre Dame to impress the committee if they lose this game. But they just told you. It's going to be damn near impossible. Not that this game, on a Saturday in college football, that really looks like it's going to be a Saturday for the ages. Not that Notre Dame Miami needs any more juice to its Saturday nights.

Well, what they did is basically punish Notre Dame. You've played one opponent we respect this season, and you lost the football game. That's what they did. They said, "You lost to BYU. It's the only team you've played. We're going to punish you for the remainder of your schedule." What did you guys think? No surprise to you that, by consensus, they're saying the easiest decision that they had to make is Miami's number one. We can start there. Everyone agreed on it. And yet, Miami's going in to Notre Dame, about as big a dog as I can remember, a consensus number one this late in the season.

First, I'm surprised by the first CFP ranking. To its credit, it was an interesting, surprising ranking. It's shocking to me that Notre Dame is number 11, because I think the CFP committee has a history of overranking Notre Dame. And although I think Miami deserved to be ranked number one, it would not have surprised me if 1, 2, 3 had been Georgia, Miami, and Notre Dame. I'm not surprised Notre Dame is favored, and I think that may grow because of what you said.

To a bad offense. For those of you who do not know, last year the Canes pass defense, at least in part because they had two first-rounders on the defensive line and could get pressure with four, which isn't something they can do this season, they went from ranking 43rd in the country in pass defense last season to 120th this season. 251 yards in the air, and teams are behind against them, so they have to throw. But per game, that's worse than all but four ACC Big Ten or SEC schools.

Okay, let's address the pressure with four. No, they didn't. Miami would send five, like, 70% of the time, at the very least, and they are infamous for blitzing their nickel corners. Like, Keontae Scott was always off the edge. In fact, I would say that the bigger impact on this team is not Mezador Bane. Even though those guys, they hit you in the backfield, you go down, which is something that they miss. It's Jacoby Thomas and Keontae Scott that they miss more, because Miami's main issue when it comes to pass defense is they're not tackling. They're not tackling.

I don't think it's a small thing, though, when you say how teams are throwing the ball a lot on Miami, because they're trailing for most of the game. And in a lot of these games, they're trailing big. It's like the Miami Dolphins. Miami Dolphins' pass defense numbers are not bad. You know why? Because teams are running all over them all game long. It doesn't mean they have a good pass defense.

Okay, no, but that's not what I'm watching, all right? North Carolina with a bunch of bubble screens. It's a combination of things, right? Because it's not just the bad tackling in the secondary. Damon Wilson, his last two games, has one tackle and zero quarterback pressure.

Yeah, he's been terrible since Clemson, and he's losing snaps because of it. My concerns aren't anywhere near what they were when we had Lance Gidry's defense with Cam Ward's offense. We've seen these players perform. We know them to be good. In fact, it wasn't but three games ago that Miami was top four in total defense allowed and number one in defensive scoring, and that's with playing wake on their schedule. I think this is a mid-season rut, but they need to run to the ball. They need to tackle. Right now, we're just flatly a bad tackle team.

We'll get to the numbers in a second. And Roy, get your muddy sounds in a second. I thought Wake Forest got jobbed yesterday, and the committee did set it up so that they only take the ACC champion. And they are not respecting what Wake Forest has done this year, which has surprised me. But before we get to—before we get to Mike Ryan's numbers here, which are an almost certain tune out, not because it's Mike Ryan, but because numbers make your heads hurt. Greg Cote, who's getting a proclamation from the City of Plantation tonight, your expert thoughts on UM Notre Dame as somebody who has covered this rivalry, and I think I can still call it a rivalry, right?

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

I don't know who's—Notre Dame's biggest rivals. These teams haven't played really meaningful games because they've been both good at the same time in a long time. Like, I guess Randy Shannon beat them once here 10 years ago, but they haven't played.

That was Mark Wreck, the turnover chain year.

Yeah, my bad. So, but they just haven't played a lot of meaningful games this century. Most of the rivalry was from, you know, before the 2000s.

Yeah, the '80s and '90s, yeah.

The biggest, most impactful game. I mean, they've played two big games, both at Hard Rock Stadium.

Last year was big.

Yeah, it ended up being one of the more consequential games of the season, if not the most. And I think their biggest rivalry was played off the field between, like, sparring media beat writers trying to tout their cases. It was the storyline from last year's CFP. So in a year where Notre Dame's rivalry with USC is on ice, this has stepped up and not just become, like, one of the best rivalries for Miami and Notre Dame, one of the best rivalries in the nation, I think.

Well, and this weekend, Greg, this is the biggest game of the college football season this weekend. Oh. It's been circled in red since before the season started, and everything that the two teams have done has amplified all of those expectations.

Dan Le Batard.

The blood that pours from me has your Lucian. Now drink. It's you. The figure in my dreams. Drink.

Greg Cote.

No. No, no, no, no, no. There is no leaving. You will not wriggle away.

Jonathan Sassolo.

Drink from me. And with this baptism of my blood in your mouth, throat, and veins, you shall be my servant.

This is the Dan Le Batard Show.

I expect a defensive effort for the ages from Miami, because they were so bad at tackling in the last game, and because Mario, after the game, emphasized that we didn't swarm to the ball like we usually do, like we have to do.

I think they're a bad defense, okay?

I don't think they're bad.

Well, the last three games, they've been bad.

Yeah.

That's irrefutable. The last three games.

And the last three games, they've been bad against largely bad offenses, although FSUs, I can make an argument for. FSU is just a bad team. I do think people are ignoring that Notre Dame is injured.

That's a huge thing here, dude. And really impactful players to take advantage of what Miami is struggling with.

Let's get muddy.

Right now, you have their green dot linebacker, who's been fantastic for them. He's out. You have one of the best safeties in the nation, a top 100 pick. He's out. You have cornerback number two. He's out.

He's out.

You have injuries along the defensive line that affects their depth.

They're out.

They're out.

You're going to be able to run up the middle on them because of what's injured right up the middle.

Well, you're going to be able to run up the middle on them because no one, including the number one rush defense in the nation, has been able to stop you. Like, you know that about Miami, and we'll see what Notre Dame commits in their game plan. I think Notre Dame has legitimate issues that are being glossed over because everyone's just hammering the spot here. Got to have it. Leave no doubt. The whole narrative entering this game. Notre Dame's got some legit issues that help contextualize previewing this game.

Can you get me the muddy sound and allow Mike to get into the numbers here that he wants to give the people?

So, to me, it's irrefutable. The biggest issue facing Miami is the lack of tackling. They are a bad tackling team, and it makes them go from a good defense to a bad defense. The numbers need to improve. Miami needs to be top 20 in both to win a national championship if we're looking at historic indicators. Right now, missed tackle rate against the pass. Omar Thornton was your best coverage DB, and he's actually been losing snaps. However, against the pass, his missed tackle rate is at 38%. Now, let me put that in perspective for you.

I've got Korn Hacke here in my picture-in-picture. He's been yammering to the Instagram Live audience. What do you have, Korn Hacke? What are you doing?

We are updating where things stand throughout the day from state to state, ranking to ranking, team to team, as we check in with our Korn Hacke cam over here. That's built into the wall. But we have you guys with the main Le Batard Show, and I want to dive into things as Steve Korn Hacke. So we look at the state of Florida. Now, Miami representing the state of Florida. Big wins, big wins in the margins for the state of Florida here when you see 8-0, a win over a team based in North Carolina in Wake Forest.

Thank you, Roy. I appreciate you fading him down. I also need him to get better at just simple handwriting. He continues to do a video product with words on a board.

It's too small.

And you can't read anything that he's writing there. You guys tell me. Let's see between us if we can see Greg.

It's a shitty marker.

Greg, what words can you read? There are about, I'm going to say, 25 words on that board there. Put the screen up big so that Greg can see it. He's got no chance with a small screen there. How many of those words can you read of the 25 that are on his board there?

I can read Georgia.

Georgia.

That's the only one I can read, Georgia. Is this pen running out of ink? Did we not get him a good pen?

Are we? Did we save money on ink? Is that what we're doing at Metal Arts Media? He doesn't have enough ink there. The committee.

Still a good bit.

The committee does not respect, and the people do not respect Wake Forest. And I'm puzzled by it. I've been watching all of Wake Forest games. I've been betting all of Wake Forest games. I've been betting all of Wake Forest offense because they score on everybody, and yet the committee is sitting here telling you that is what's happening here. Just Alabama and Texas have been better and more meaningfully over the last 20 years than Wake Forest. Is that what's happening to Wake Forest, or is it an ACC disrespect?

I mean, every unpopular thing about the CFP is controlled by the Big Ten and the SEC. This playoff expansion is to allow four lost teams from those conferences to get in. So what they're doing is establishing a template to be able to rationalize those teams getting over Wake Forest.

I like the college football playoff rankings. I do. Everyone's going to bust on them today. You know, I like it. The AP, you got so many guys who are voting. They all vote on their own. We know they don't watch the games. We had a few weeks ago, someone left Miami off their ballots. Can you imagine someone shows up into the college playoff selection committee room, they put their hat on that stupid thing, they walk in, and they don't have Miami ranked? Everyone else in the room's going to be like, "You're an idiot. You have to put Miami in." And they put Miami in. I like the rankings. That's malfeasance.

They hold you in check. They're all in the room together. You're not voting in your basement and sending in a ballot. "Oh, I forgot to put this team on. Oh, sorry." No, I like the college playoff rankings.

I agree with you. I love them. And I love them having Notre Dame number 11.

Wait a minute. What are you guys doing? Hold on a second. Hold on.

I like all the pressures on the Irish.

I don't trust the AP.

Hold on.

How will they handle it?

Hold on.

Very infrequently throughout the history of sports, all of sports, do people like the results being determined by judges?

It's a new day.

As opposed to scoreboard. You guys are sitting here liking and loving something that is not merit-based, that's subjective, that is left up to argument in the way that a scoreboard isn't, in the way that standings aren't. You guys are loving an antiquated, stupid system of measurement that is slightly less stupid than it's been, but still incredibly stupid as a measurement.

But it's not the end. They're going to play the games.

Right. You can like it as a television show. You can't like it as a measurement system. You're not allowed to like it as a sports fan as a measurement system because you just got a handful of gas bags deciding something, and some of them don't seem to be watching the games. If you're just taking Texas and Alabama because you've always taken Texas and Alabama.

I like it because all the committee is doing is picking the final 12, or soon to be the final 24. And from there, it's on the field only.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's not like the committee is deciding the matches.

You're allowed to like it as a television show. You're allowed to like it as entertainment. You're not allowed to like it as a good measurement system. Better than it has been, yes, but only because it's always been shitty.

No, I like it. And for example, you're talking about Wake Forest. You'd rather see Wake Forest in a playoff game than Alabama? No, not me. Not me.

I would rather see Wake Forest's offense against anybody in the country than just about all offenses.

We saw two Alabama games in the college football playoff. It was against a bad Oklahoma team, and it proved out that neither of those teams belonged, and they got absolutely waxed by Indiana in the Rose Bowl. What I don't like most about this is they send out that dude from Arkansas to just open his strap and speak a bunch of hypocrisies that can only be weaponized against him later on. For example, when touting the case of Alabama, he's like, "They have a win over Mississippi State." Now, if you look at the rankings right now, Mississippi State's not good.

Bad.

They were bad. But it doesn't matter.

I never understand. Like, what means more? Is it better to beat a team that was ranked at the time, but now they're not ranked because we know they're not that good? Or is it better to beat a team that wasn't ranked when you played them, but everybody was wrong about how good they were because they're ranked now? Which is better?

That argument was the argument that Miami made two years ago. "Hey, they were ranked when we played, and it didn't end up mattering."

I don't think it's surprising in the least or a bad thing that elite programs get the benefit of doubt. And the Wake Forests, who are not elite programs, do not enjoy that edge. It's no surprise that Alabama, even right now, is still living on the perfume of the Sabin era.

But Greg, Greg, if you're the committee, you got to be watching the games. Like, when you mentioned Mississippi State, Mike, did Camario Taylor play in that game? So he didn't play in that game.

No, he played sort of. He got hurt in the game. He held up that game of like, that's when they were good with that quarterback specifically.

Yeah, but he got hurt in that game, and he's obviously now out for the season.

Just for those of you, I get.

By the way, Mississippi State's defense was a disaster back then and remains a disaster.

I get why it is that everyone would simply say Wake Forest is not any good because they've never been any good except for that one year they had Riley Skinner and they went 10-1.

Down Le Batard.

And you do eat butt all the time, correct?

Greg Cote.

Oh, yeah. I just had some a couple of weeks ago.

This is the Dan Le Batard Show.

Chris Cote, give me the game logs just for those who do not know of Wake Forest this year because I think this is about the committee not thinking the ACC has anything good in it except for Miami. And they'd be wrong because Wake Forest's offense is simply elite. Give me the game logs this season, who they played, and the point totals they put on.

Wake Forest game log, Roy hit it. All right. Akron, they won 38-16. At Purdue, they won in double overtime, 38-36. They lost to Miami by 13. They beat Louisville by 3, 30-27. They rocked Stamford, 57-3. They won at North Carolina State, 38-14. They won at Cal, 41-7, and they won home against Virginia, 51-7.

They're 1-1 against ranked teams.

What's Notre Dame against ranked teams?

I don't know offhand.

I'm going to say 0-1.

They got a big matchup. They got something called Merrimack this week.

They got Merrimack this week.

Wow. Merrimack River.

You can't even click on their team in this game log.

That's good. So we at least have two weeks to tout the Deacons of Mass Destruction before they go all ACC on us. I'm always scared to put Wake Forest over because the ACC can never get out of its own way. Anytime you prop up one of these teams, they always end up losing to Syracuse.

That did just happen to SMU in a way that I'm still mystified by. I just watched that game, and I just didn't understand how SMU lost that game.

And Jelly's just never healthy for them. And Calvin Russell, former five-star out of South Florida, looking good.

I want to hear from Marcus Freeman here talking about Malachi Toney and some other University of Miami things because he's very complimentary.

And then you got Malachi Toney, who he's elite. He's a racer. He's as good as anyone you'll see. And so the thing about him is that he does like everything well. Not only does he catch, he runs, he blocks. He's a pot returner. He does everything well and plays the game the right way.

Oh, coach, you're missing something. He throws too. And he's going to do it against your team.

Shh. Why are you telling? You guys are telling everybody.

Yeah, you're awfully loud about that.

He says that he does.

He won a game with a pass and a two-point conversion this season.

He does block. I think the thing I'm most surprised by when it comes to Malachi Toney.

Malachi.

Is the way that he blocks because he shouldn't be at that size the kind of blocker that he is.

He's one of our best blockers. In fact, when we bring it in jumbo, and we bring the offense in tight, we put him right in the slot, and he gets after. Like middle linebackers, he loves blocking. And that's an important part of teaching the younger guys. Like, all right, look at your star, is in there blocking and getting nasty with the big boys. That's what you guys got to do because there's been an era where Miami wide receivers just didn't block for anybody. With Josh Moore being out, there's a real spot on this roster for your conventional nine-route wide receiver, and Dre Jacobs just needs to come further along when it comes to the downfield blocking. You will not play as a wide receiver on Miami if you don't block downfield.

When Marcus Freeman says Malachi Toney isn't a racer, what does that mean? Because I have not heard that for an offensive player. I could make the argument that that's something I've heard for a defensive player, but I have not heard an offensive player. Is he saying there that all your other players can make a mistake?

That's what I think it is. I think he's so good he can cover mistakes.

Yes, we can play you perfectly, which is what North Carolina pretty much did, and ultimately they'll call a player, and number one will end up making the play.

Are we talking about like the eraser at the end of a pencil or the standalone eraser, the little like rectangle thing?

I never liked having that. It was annoying. Like, I always felt if I rubbed it too hard, it was going to break in half.

Exactly.

And then it's hard to hold. You know what I'm saying?

I don't think it's even eraser. I think he means it as erasure.

Ooh. Well, wait a minute. Is it eraser or erasure? And I want to get to Zaz's point here. The industry that makes the standalone eraser has to be hurting.

Agreed. I'm going to look it up, but yes.

Well, but it has to be defuncted. Put it on the poll at Le Batard Show. Is the standalone eraser endangered or is it extinct?

It's a little rectangle, and it's like angled.

It's pink.

At the end.

I love it.

School supplies. It is not defunct. Still business.

Yeah, but you say school supplies, and I sort of imagine some of these things that are going that are very basic to my childhood that are going defunct, whether it is cursive, whether it's the way that I used to do math, whether it's just in general pens because so much is computerized and digital now.

Dan, on Amazon right now, 12-pack of pink erasers. How much do you think that's going for these days? I just want to clarify. We are not talking about the little tiki-looking one that you put on the end of a pencil. We are talking about the rectangle. You guys know.

No, those are Fugazi erasers.

The little Fugazi one, the little tiki-looking thing you put on the edge of an eraseless pencil?

They just had their best year ever. Incredible. Standalone pink eraser.com says they continue to sell steadily as a budget-friendly classroom staple.

I did find it funny. This is the episode where Dan looks into a room of a bunch of dads with elementary-age daughters being like, "Man, I don't have erasers." Yeah, I don't know what your school supply situation looks like, but this is what I think.

You can get a pack of 144 of the little tiki ones you put on the pencil for $16.71.

I tripped over two of those yesterday.

I love those. I'll tell you, you put those, the ones that Chris is talking about, you're goofy if you use that.

You are. Because they fall off. You try to erase something, and then they fall off. You look like an idiot.

That's why the standalone eraser is flourishing because the little tiny one on the tip of a pencil, they break off, and then you're trying to erase something.

And I don't get to do it right.

Yeah, you're trying to erase it. Yeah, they do.

You can't be violent.

They're designed to break off, okay? It's intentional obsolescence. They are designed to break off so that you'll buy another pencil. That's a scam by the pencil industry.

So you're saying this before Apple started devising products meant to rip you off and paying millions of dollars in lawsuits because they make your products break in order for you to have to buy more products within seven months. I want to put that on the poll at Le Batard Show. Is the eraser at the end of a pencil intentional obsolescence?

Yeah. Actually, the phrase is planned obsolescence would be the more common use.

I think in this divided time, we can all get behind one thing, which is the Ticonderoga pencil, best pencil out there.

I'm assuming, and I may have been left behind by a bunch of parents with kids and parents who trip over erasers in their homes, but I assume the pencil was going the way of endangered.

Oh, Jesus, this guy.

I've always been an American number three guy.

Yeah, Ticonderoga number one.

You used to use a number three pencil? What are you, a maniac?

Number one? What are you doing with a number one pencil? I thought universally, I thought there was consensus on this. The best pencil is the number two pencil.

Right. Those are the ones that Scantrons read. But if you go up to your teacher on test day and you're like, "Oh, I got the number three," they look at you with a little like, "Whoa."

All right. Put this on the poll at Le Batard Show. Is the pencil endangered? And also put on the poll the best pencil, number one, number two, or number three, because you guys are saying things that are blasphemous. Like, I would have thought the number one and the number three had already gone extinct. That if any pencil was still surviving, it was the holy and sacred number two. That it was not the number one, and it was not the number three.

You're stuck in the past, man. Get to 2026. We got ones and threes around.

The number three is offensive to me.

Kind of gets the juices flowing though. When the teachers see it, they're like, "Whoa, where'd you get that?"

Greg, could you find a pencil in your home right now?

Yes. Yeah, we love pencils.

My dad's junk drawer. I can picture the pencil just sitting there.

We're a pencil household. To your point, the number two is the charter inductee into the Pencil Hall of Fame. But yeah, I have a number of pencils. We stayed in a hotel once. I can't remember where it was. I'll ask my wife.

See where this story goes.

We stayed in a hotel once in Europe where it was the Pencil Hotel, and they don't have pens in those rooms. They have pencils. And I was so impressed by that that it's unbelievable that some hotels still do that. What a joy.

Chris, look up the Pencil Hotel and give me more information on whether this is true or not or your father's making it up. And also, when he says the charter inductee into the Pencil Hall of Fame is the number two pencil, there cannot be anything else in that Hall of Fame.

Oh, no, not true. The big mechanical pencil and also the half pencil that they give you at customs.

There's no way that that's a Hall of Fame member. You can't give me that cheap-ass half a pencil. It's not even half a pencil.

And that wasn't an eraser either.

It's golf cart pencil. It's not even half a pencil. It's not half a pencil. It's like a third of a pencil.

Maybe a quarter.

It's not a half.

It's valid. It's an eraser, yes.

I feel like it's a symbol for the entirety of the shrinking pencil industry is that all that's going to be left at the end is those shitty little miniature golf pencils.

Zaz, how was your pencil break game?

Oh, like pencil fighting?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I was good at pencil fighting.

We call it pencil break and pencil fighting.

How about the wiggly pencil when you go like this and you wiggle it?

Oh, yeah. Whoa, how did it do that? That's a good move. That's a good move.

Have somebody bring you a couple of pencils, and I want you guys to see if you have a pencil fight because you just conjured a memory. You guys just summoned a memory for me that I have legitimately not had in half a century, which is the joy of pencil fighting. I think there might be people in our audience who don't know what a pencil fight is. I think that the pencil fight might be largely dead. What do you think of me saying that? Because I have not heard anyone talk.

I had some battles in my day.

The controversy with pencil fighting is like there was always like a little it's like with arm wrestling. You don't know if there's cheating. Are they grabbing too much? Are they using too much of their other hand to give them power? Like, are you flicking it too much with your wrist? Are you letting the pencil do the work? It's just a dangerous game to like judge it fairly.

Do we have pencils in the office that we can go to? And in the interim, please put up a photo of Mario Cristobal and Alex Maribal so that people can see what I believe to be the funniest, just physically coaching combination that you will find if you put them next to each other. And that's a decent picture, but it's not that is an optical illusion that I believe helps Alex Maribal because Alex Maribal, who's been at Cristobal's side, I would not recognize.

Three minutes for.

I would not recognize Mario Cristobal if Alex Maribal weren't next to him. But Alex Maribal, his offensive line coach, is someone who looks like he might be at the end of Mario Cristobal's keychain, just hanging from his keychain, or be the eraser on the top of his number two pencil.

In the picture we just showed, he's almost at his shoulder. I can guarantee you he's at his hip.

Yeah, no chance.

Like height-wise, he's at his hip. He's like Don Chalillo.

So he's going to stall there on the field?

He's standing on somebody's back. By the way, I just got thrown in from the other room.

Oh, a classic.

A classic standalone eraser from where, Chris Cody? Ticonderoga, that's right.

Blue.

Best pencil in the game.

Way to go, Chris. Way to give Tony the help as he realized.

He's been small writing.

No, he's been terrible since he thought he knew my story from Halloween.

Speaking of terrible, yesterday on the show, Zaz put into the system a bad video clip of why it is that he is feuding with Bill Simmons, and it didn't accurately reflect why it is that Zaz is feuding with Bill Simmons. Cody, you've been around here for a while, and I want a verdict from you. I'm assuming that this is going to be the right video because yesterday, Zaz, who was terrible, as Tony mentioned yesterday, put in the wrong video. So Zaz is feuding with Bill Simmons because he claims that Bill Simmons has simply stolen an idea that he's been talking about on this show for more than a year.

If you missed a peanut punch and you actually punched the guy, I think it should be a 15-yard penalty. I think there should be stakes for the peanut punch. Right now, there's no stakes.

Oh, interesting.

You just get to haul back and punch as hard as you possibly can. And if you miss, like you either hit somebody in the shoulder, maybe you hit him in the helmet, doesn't matter. Because it's like, oh, I get to hide behind the peanut punch. I think you're right, but have we seen anybody miss?

Have we seen anybody miss? You watch football? Have we seen any? Is this first day watching football? Whoever that is. And by the way, Bill Simmons, Bill Simmons says it as if he came up with this grand idea that no one has mentioned yet.

Yeah.

Bill, I've been saying it every day on the show for a year and a half.

Have you patented the idea? Have you tried to trademark it?

They're going to name it after me, the rule. I'm going to be the founding father of that rule.

What's it going to be called? The Zazlo rule?

Yes.

Okay.

These pencils they brought in here are just not fair.

We're not doing that.

The dirtiest pencil I've ever seen.

Ticonderoga, like I said, the monster pencil of the world. Here it is, the heavyweight championship.

They're weight classes for a reason, guys.

It's not right.

Are you guys going to pencil fight or you're not going to?

If we get two.

I'm not. You're the wolves.

If we get two evenly sized pencils.

I want, during the Nick Wright segment next, I want you two pencil fighting with two fair pencils, not one corrupt contaminated pencil.

What are you, a maniac?