Transcript of Hour 1: Dan Le Batard Is An Insane Person

This is the Dan Levatore Show with the Stugats podcast. Ookanakuwa.

Ookanakuwa. Ookanakuwa. Ookanakuwa.

Ookanakuwa is here for you and me with that we can all agree. So many receptions mean up comes had the perception that he could become the MVP.

We should all anticipate, we should all anticipate this because he's got precision greatness echoing throughout eternity. Stafford throws a frozen rope in and his purpose hands are open.

It's a shutdown for you and me. Everybody do the Puka Polka.

His quarterback is not the tongue of a loa.

So come along now, rise and shout, tell the whole world about Nakuwa for you and me.

That is the Puka Polka. I would like to never hear it again. Do you guys have an explanation for how it is that the Rams do that? Where they can just replace Cooper Cup at 2,000 yards for a season, no look passes in the Super Bowl. And then, I don't think anyone had Pukenakuwa being this. In his last game, it's a surprise that Pukenakuwa only has four catches. I gave the stat earlier in the show that the Seahawks haven't allowed a 20-yard play on defense in more than a month. But when they last allowed it, it's because you cannot stop Pukenakuwa. They will target him 18 times a game. They will get the ball to him 10 to 12 times a game. I think it's pretty rare to have a player like that that nobody thought would be unstable coming out of college being totally unstable. Do you guys feel like that's just the combination of McVay having the Hall of Fame quarterback and that he'll figure out a way to do that with whoever his number one wide receiver is.

Yeah, I think it's equal McVay and Stafford. I think you got to have the quarterback- He did it with Goff. Yeah. He did it with Goff when he rescued Goff's career, made it to a Super Bowl with Goff. There's just incredible alignment between the head coach, the quarterback, who's an extension of the head coach, and also the front office that does a really good job of not just scouting, but scouting specific to their team, their identity, and for what their coach needs. He puts a value on wide receivers that can block downfield. Speed isn't so much like something that they value. They like it. They have 2-2 Atwell, who's obviously super fast, but they scout specific to what the coach wants, and they go out and find these gems that fit perfectly. You don't believe that Nkua would do this with another team, right?

Well, I just find that part fascinating, right? I find fascinating the idea that they can just turn Cooper up into something that's never been seen in the history of the league, where they're playing in a Super Bowl and they're literally winning the Super Bowl when all of us and the bangles know, oh, look, all their receivers are hurt. Clearly, Stafford is going to go to Cooper Cup here. Look at this. Stafford is doing no look passes in a Super Bowl to Cooper Cup, even though everyone in the stadium knows that the only healthy thing the Rams have left is Cooper Cup. And I don't understand how it is that one coach can do that and none of the others None of the others can do that.

I can understand it. In every walk of life, there are people that are better at their jobs than other people. It makes sense. At football, Sean McVay, for my money, is the best. Like, Kup and N'Kou are not similarly built, right?

Cooper Cups significantly bigger, right? They're both very physical receivers. And what Mike says is true about they get receivers who can block. Like many of the things that they do everywhere on the field are helped by the fact that their receivers can block. Pukina Kou has said, because of the style of play, that he's going to be done before he's 30 years old, because that is a very difficult way to play football. They've got three tight ends, and I don't know. Higby, to me, is just somebody who's an assortment of junkyard parts, where you just put... I'm expecting a carburator to be somewhere in the temple of his head because the way they play is unusually physical. But now they're going and running into a team. This is It's funny to me, right? That I've got Jared Stidham playing in a Championship conference game, and the thing that I think is most untrustworthy this weekend is that Sam Darnold is going to screw that up, right? And I don't think I'm alone in having the doubt that everything that Seattle is is going to get undermined by the fact that the Rams have a quarterback who is better.

And in fact, the Seahawks are 8-0 in their last eight games. The are five and three and have a lot of weird losses. But that spread is two and a half in favor of the Seahawks when normally, if the teams are even, the spread would just be three. I believe Sam Darnold is the reason for that half point, just a general distrust of Sam Darnold. I mean, I felt that way last week, too.

I thought the 49ers were going to win that game.

See, I didn't think that just because every year for many years, I was fooled always by the fact that the Wild Card team looks good during Wild Card Weekend and then goes and plays a team with a buy. And that buy is, to me, the biggest advantage that there is anywhere in the playoffs. Anywhere in the playoffs, the buy of a better team is good enough to get an extra week of rest, and the 49ers expend themselves that way to get past Philadelphia, I'm generally going to assume that the following week, the team with the buy is going to drag the lesser team. But I had to learn that the hard way. It's only because I was wrong for several years and always getting infatuated with, Oh, look at what Josh Allen does in Jacksonville. That's going to carry over. And then it doesn't carry over because I don't think that there's a greater advantage that the Patriots took advantage of in 20 years of Belichick and braided, then get the buy, make sure you have the home game, and make sure that whatever's coming into your stadium for the first playoff game, if only two you have to play to get to the Super Bowl is a broken team that had to play the week before.

Yeah, it's odd that the Broncos are perceived to be the broken team here. But yeah, the war of attrition. We know how physical playoff games can be. You're usually picking the bones off an opponent that's pretty soft.

I think that the only thing keeping me from picking the Seahawks in this game is the distrust of Darnold because it's usually too much to ask about any football team, no matter how good, what you're asking of the Rams, which is go win three road playoff games. It's just a giant ask, and it's a giant ask because Stafford's fingers were hurt in the first of those games. Just the amount of damage done to the human body makes it hard for me to look at this game and analyze it accurately because I've got such a pervasive mistrust of Sam Darnold. The last time I had this mistrust of Sam Darnold, the Minnesota Vikings, who were 14 and 3, went on the road and lost 27 to 9 because the announcers were screaming at Sam Darnold because he was seeing ghosts. He's holding it too long. Throw it, man.

So let me get this right. The only reason that gives you pause to pick the Seahaw straight up is throw it man, Sam Darnold. What about Oz the Mentalist picking the Rams versus the Broncos before the season started? Glad you brought that guy up. No. What's up with that guy? We've had him on before.

He goes everywhere.

He impresses everyone. He's one of two things, the biggest fraud ever or a warlock. I think it's a second one. It's one of those two. There's no middle ground here. As someone I'm the one that has traditionally watched a lot of AFC football on CBS, I've seen the promos for The Mentalist. I know that there's a thing there. Really perceptive people that ask you a bunch of questions, but how did you nail the Broncos? It's cool to go inside the Ram's training staff, ask questions, and yeah, you took a real reach there. This Ram's staff and players, they're good. But how did you get Ram's Broncos? If Stidham does this, guys, the government needs to call this guy in and make him a part of some special force that's not that hard these days, but he needs to be protecting us. Or the piece.

Oz, the Mentalist would be picking the Broncos, and so What, too, would Greg Cody of the Miami Hérald. Greg Cody has put in print that the Broncos will indeed beat the Patriots, and Oz the Mentalist, is somebody, and you can find many videos of this. I'm sorry if the algorithm grabs you after you've done it, but Oz the Mentalist shocking people is something that is all over the internet, shocking credible people with things that they don't understand how he gets right. I believe most people would point to warlock before they pointed to fraud because there's so much evidence, evidence on the internet of credible people being stunned by what Oz the Mentalist is doing. You would think somebody eventually would come out and be like, All right, before he did ask me. Nobody has afterwards been like, Oh, he asked me this, though, and that's how he knew.

There's none of that. He's being too nice, which actually leads me to believe that he might be a warlock of some sort, because if you're a warlock, you don't want people to know that you're a warlock. He's costing himself a lot of money by downplaying how powerful he actually is. Publically, he's very humble. He's like, No, I just pay attention. If you actually lean hard into warlock, you actually might become a cult leader. There is no end to the power you could accrue. I can see that. I'm saying global domination. We've already ushered in a new world order. Oz, you could be an evil leader if you choose to. Could run the cults.

Let's advertise- It's a cult leader. The cults are the cults. The Wizard of Oz. Let's tell... All very worthy interruptions. Let's tell people about what it is that Tony is doing this weekend with the MMA hangout He is hustling at all times. I don't know if you guys have noticed, there are a whole lot of people who care about MMA, who are complaining vigorously about how Dana White has checked out that his indifference about going to press conference and selling things is obvious to everyone. I actually don't know the minutia and the details in what goes on when you're making all of these changes. I don't know how much Paramount needs him. I don't know how self-sufficient that thing is or how bored he is by the fact that he's been at this several years, and I could see why he would lose stamina for the press conferences. But a whole lot of people are noticing that Dana White has just almost completely checked out on the governing of that stuff. But Patty the Baddie is fighting this weekend, and he's one of the few signature draws that they have. So make sure the Dead Flamingo, which is always very good to our show, is something that you check in on this weekend, the MMA hangout, UFC 324.

You can watch it with us live. That's something that Tony has built out of nothing, and it has become very popular. Start time, 9: 00 PM Eastern, they will be getting going.

You Dana might have lost enthusiasm, but Tony and Louis have not. So check them out live on our YouTube channel. Yeah, go watch it, baby.

That is correct.

First UFC fight on Paramount Plus, by the way.

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Don Levatard.

It sounds to me like everybody could use a hug because a hug is always the right size.

Stugatz.

All I have put in my body today is three cups of coffee and an entire cup of honey.

Go to the Palo Alto. Don't let him fool you.

He said in the break that he's jittery. This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugats.

Speaking of watching things, we've been telling you for a while, and everyone around here knows that when the University of Miami is relevant, college football is better for it. Monster numbers, just giant numbers for that championship between the University of Miami and Indiana. Not since the Cubs were winning the World Series as a sporting event, nonprofessional football division done the numbers that Miami did. Chris Cody, do you have the sound for me of the Spanish call of Fernando Mendoza's miracle run through the Hurricane Secondary on fourth and 5, the signature call by a coach in this game. And Spanish is better as a language in terms of fun and funny than English is.. Mendoza. Fernando Mendoza. I-i-i is exactly what everybody in the Miami fan base was feeling on that. Ay, Ailey, Ailey. Fourth and five, as The best part about it is that's just as they're getting the play set up.

Ay, Ailey, Ailey. So that is just his pure panic before we get going. I wonder what he said. It was a stadium full of before that ball snapped.

And the hurricanes knew what was coming, and they couldn't stop it anyway. They knew what was coming.

Yeah, they just got the call in too late, according to Cory Heatherman. It's an all-time play in the history of college football. When they put out a montage of national championship game moments, That's up there.

I saw him talking Fernando after the game, and then he's like, If it was zone, I'm running. If it was man, I was going to pass.

But the hurricanes disguised it, so he wasn't sure. So he just was like, I had to trust myself and go for it.

Let's do what Mike is saying there, though, and take the context and the inventory of the moment. When Mike Ryan says correctly that what Mendoza did on that play, given the stakes, given the circumstance, fourth and five. Again, I will remind you, and this is just unbelievable to say, and the hangover is still felt in Miami. The win probability of Indiana, given all of the things that you throw into the machine after having seen the game was 14%, because I think many of us could argue it's a losing argument because of the scoreboard, but we can argue that Miami is the better team. It's a nowhere argument because they lost. Scoreboard decides. Measurement system is imperfect. It's imperfect forever. Indiana had two shutdown drives in the game, one of them aided by multiple third down penalties, the other made possible by two, fourth, and five conversions. When Mike Ryan says it's a play for all time, he's got it right. But what are the others that go in that discussion? When you think of plays for all time- Vince Young.

Yeah, Vince Young's run in the penalty flag on Miami in the fiesta ball in terms of like, Championship game moments. You think other people think about that? I'm not sure.

How can you not? The two-a-throw.

The two-a-throw. The two-a-throw. The two-a-past. The two-a-throw. But average college football fan remembers Ohio State's flag.

The only reason that I would say that you have to remember that is because you never have the situation of fireworks in the sky. I think one team is the champion. Oh, there's a flag on the field. Never mind. The other team now gets to win the championship. It's just not something that has a precedent. But you're right when you say that doesn't have a name attached to it. Locally, it has Terry Porter, referee attached to it, but that doesn't have a name attached to it as a play. And usually when you talk about plays for all time, it can never be a penalty flag, and It's usually a play that has an accomplishment on it. It is a success. And ends the game. As a play, it's not something that you're just weirded out because you don't understand how a referee just decided a game.

Deshawn. Deshawn Watson for Clemson. But it's rare that the moment is not happening at the very end, because I do think there was a huge pump block, and that's going to have its own set of lure. But I think you have a Heisman winner surrounded by a big brand logo on players collapsing on him and him, scrappy Indiana guy, displaying world-class balance and strength, literally wheeling his team over the line. Yeah, Jameis with the countdown drive for FSU at the very end of the game.

Do you guys know what's funny about the Mendoza thing. I actually believe everything about Mendoza is both sincere and sweet. And yet when he jumped into the end zone there and extended the ball, I'm like, wildly unnecessary. He could have just run in. He did that because he knew the size of the moment. Yes, I didn't think it was necessary.

I'm not sure he knew.

You think in the moment, he knew, Oh, this is dramatic.

I've got to extend the ball. That is back to the- That's crazy, man. I'm not exactly sure he knew where other players were. That is right. He was just like, blind and like, I'm going to put all of my six foot five frame into this. That's nuts. I understand why, because it was like extra dramatic, but he got spun around like a couple of times. That guy, you think that guy is like, Oh, a flare for the dramatic.

I've got to extend. Not only, Jeremy, do I believe that? Because I believe he knew he was going to get in, but the other way looks more theatrical and wonderful. I'm not even criticizing him for it. I'm simply saying that that part he was giving you a little extra. It was not necessary because he knew the size of the moment.

Man, I think it's the buildup to him. I've got nothing left. I've just fought through hell.

I'm spinning around, just diving in.

Which way is the other theatrical, he says. I'm just going to javelin myself into this end zone.

I am telling you that I believe... Look, he got it by more than the length of his body. He didn't need to do that with the football.

Yeah, but that's going to be the statue. Correct. And he put his body in the perfect place for the statue.

I'm I'm really not criticizing it. This is very critical. How is it critical? What's critical about it? It's not critical. It's just insane.

This is the diary of an insane person.

No, I don't believe it's the diary of an insane person.

I think it's a little bit of both. I'm going to watch this play again because I think you're way off. I think it's a little bit of both. This is crazy. I can understand why Dane, it was like he put a little flair on that, but I also think it's just like, just like, I did it.

He knew he was going to get in either way, so he did it that way. It's the better to do it. But he knew he was going to get in. He was there. He was already there. He was safe, and he was fine.

You're making it seem like he's breaking down the sideline and had it the whole way.

No, what I'm saying to you is- Can you get the Telstraight around?

You got six guys around him.

This is nuts.

Can we get that play on the Telestrator?

I don't believe we're allowed. I don't think we can. Just a still? We can do the still. Maybe Dan will recreate it back there. We can do the still if you guys want, but I believe he put a little extra mustard on it. What's wrong with that? A little extra sauce on it, a little extra theater on it. You guys are all disagreeing with me on this, everyone. I am alone in this opinion of thinking that Mendoza put an extra little spice on it because he could, because it's wonderful to be him. He had his moment and he was in the center of everything, and he knew exactly what it is that he was doing, and it was theatrical. I'm alone. Okay. Yeah.

Just because you're associating him with me doesn't mean he's doing something theatrical.

I'm not associating him with you, although your narcissism is amazing in thinking, anytime I'm thinking of the theater, I'm thinking of you. Well, every time the theater comes up, you call me a theater kid every single time, which, by the way, the New York Times says, is a derogatory insult, Theater Kid, a new political insult. The numbers on these ratings.

You delivered that theatrically. Nothing on that, kid. I put a little mustard on it.

The numbers on these ratings to have this be the biggest sporting event, non-football division. I know this is cheating, right? Because every year, the top 100 things watched in America, 94 of them are football-related, professional football related. Then the other six is like some royal family interview or something that Oprah did. But to have this game produce. This still doesn't help me because- Dan. No, but no, this doesn't help you because you're looking for something that doesn't exist.

Let's throw up the still image that Dan is looking at, please.

The still image that doesn't help me here. He didn't need a dive? Look at that. It's full extension. Yes, the still image.

Has a clubbed hand.

Moten has a machete in his hand. He's looking to punch him.

It looks like if he didn't jump, he'd be dead.

That's what it looks like in the still. The still does not help me. I will concede that the still buries me, but in real time- He did walk into the end zone, as Dan described. I did not- You said he had it. He did have it. He clearly had it, and he did it for the flair of the dramatic, for a theatrical decision.

They'd probably lose the game if he doesn't do that. You're an insane person.

You've lost your mind. He did not. This does not help me.

Mouth is looking to destroy him.

I will grant you that this one does not favor me. This, in terms of circumstantial evidence, this particular photo does not help me, but- Still not helping.

He's getting him from the side.

He could have just run right in. Run right in between all of them. Could have made it standing. Could have made it standing without being not doing so.

Your conviction is dwindling. You think this is the guy who dives into first base for the flair of the dramatic rather than running through the bag. That's what you have this as.

He knew he was going to get there, and he was going to get there, whether he dived or not. The numbers, though, on the game- Why do you think that is?

Because this number is insane. Miami has a brand that we've been told for 20 years is nationally relevant. I guess the Miami U helmet does mean something. A lot of people have suggested the Indiana story has gone there. I think it's a combination of everything. These were two great stories. And obviously, the most important component is the game was good. I think you're discounting the bump that it got from Domeno.

The second half was Good. The first half was a little bit hard to watch. The second half, anytime you have drama of that kind, close game, Miami ends up scoring three shutdowns in the second half, and it's not enough. The second half of that game was wonderful.

I also think that Miami, in particular, played four really interesting games in this college football playoff. So even people who are passive sports fans or casual observers, my dad got into it because of the Cuban thing. But the games that Miami were in were edge of your seat type of games. So people were more familiar with this story. The balance of the entire postseason as a whole set the table so brilliantly for a final that really captured a nation. It looks like we got some breaking news as as the college football playoff goes next year. They are not expanding.

It's going to remain at 12.

The power four conference champions are guaranteed a spot in the top 12. Duke, of course, was not guaranteed a spot this year. They're going to be guaranteed a spot this year. The group of six champions, guaranteed a spot. And of course, Notre Dame with the bullshit, if they're top 12.

They should keep it at 12 because there were six teams that were worthy of winning a championship among the 12, and we allowed to 12 in. But there weren't 12 teams playing extra games at the end of this season that could have won the championship. There were a bunch of teams in there, half the teams, that couldn't win the championship. Alabama, Oklahoma among them, by the way. I'm not just doing this with James Madison and Tulane.

I think, hopefully, the lasting legacy from this, outside of what it's done to the sport, because the sport has an insane juice right now, is it did, I think, firmly chip away at this SEC narrative so that the next time, you could certainly argue Notre Dame deserve to be in over Oklahoma and Alabama. I mean, the next time this happens, people are going to remember that. Listen up, folks. It's game day, and you already know what that means, the noise, the Jersey The noise, the jerseys, the group chat's going crazy.

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Dan Levatard.

Can I tell you something? I don't know, maybe like a month ago, and I decided to watch Pitch Clock, and I told Jeremy, Stugatz, this is a good show you're doing. This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugatz. I do think this is really crazy, though, as a backlash, right? That Duke should have been in a team that lost, what, five games and not James Madison, who scored 34 points against Oregon, more than most of the teams that they played. Okay, but still more than most of the teams that they played. And by the way, Indiana is basically James Madison. All of their difference makers, all of their coaches came from James Madison two years earlier. And yet we're just going to say, Oh, no, because we don't like the uniform, those are the teams that shouldn't be in.

It's all of you are calling me crazy. Look at this still now. If you're going to use bias stills that favor or support arguments only, you tell me this is where Mendoza, and I saw it. This is what I saw. Look, he's looking at the end zone at the corner of his eye, and he's like, How do I do this? Do I run in or do I just dive? Let me get my Heisman moment here.

His legs, his hips are turned the other way.

He's closing the audience. Look at where his head is.

I'm sorry to exclude the audio audience this way, but look at his head.

He sees it and he's like, right there, he's doing the calculation. I could go in normally or I can do this dive that makes- He's being tripped up. That makes everyone remember me for all time. Look.

I love how Dan has him.

He could just look at him. Look at him.

He's looking out of the corner of his eye. As if he could just...

His feet are tangled.

The only way he could get in is by jumping.

He could dozy-doll if he wanted to. Oh, not docey-dough. He could do-si-do. He could spin around.

Yes, he could do it. I thought I saw Dan's side. I'm off that. His body's turned the other way.

I want you to look at what you're seeing as a threat at his feet is a hurricane who has been pancaped. What you are seeing at his feet as a threat is a hurricane who's on his back with no ability to make that tackle.

He has hands. He could trip him up. He's spinning the other way. Full head of steam.

There is that.

And his legs are actually pointed towards the end zone where Mendoza's aren't.

He could have. That is, he could have done jazz hands on the way in. Hello, my baby. Hello, my darling. Instead, he decided to dive in theatrically.

Moton coming back, by the way.

Good for him.

Good for us.

Let's play... No, I wasn't saying that Moton coming back is good for you. I was saying that Fernando Mendoza, good for him that he chose to go theatrical there.

Yeah, because that was certainly not good for me.

It's a play for all time, at least in part because he chose to go It's a less impressive play if he doesn't... If he runs in standing up, are you remembering it the same way? The answer is no to that. Yeah, he broke four tackles. Yeah, but you're not remembering the play the same way if it doesn't conclude with the punctuation of a dive.

It's why I think Mendoza is going to be a great pro because Miny turned him into Cal Mendoza in that game. He's not playing his best football at that time. And the pros is all about overcoming those little moments of adversity and still putting the team on your back when you don't have your best. I came away from this entire season as impressed as I could possibly be with Mendoza. I think even though he didn't have the game that you'd expect, he still delivered for his team in the crucial moments. I think he's going to be an awesome pro unless the Raiders ruin him like everybody else.

Let's play some sound here. I don't know how you guys feel about this. Many people have been in my circle texting me saying that Tom braided has gotten a lot better, and I believe what's happening there, even though he probably has gotten a lot better, at least in part because he couldn't have gotten a lot worse, is that he's now being compared to Romo, who has gotten a lot worse. Here's Tony Romo talking about Josh Allen. Here he is calling a play and calling a game involving Josh Allen. Go ahead and watch. Rome's right here. He's going to go ahead and get back and look. What the hell? Tony Romo, have you guys noticed the slippage? Because there were the reports about 18 months ago that CBS had to stage an intervention, that Romo was golfing too much and not concentrating on the broadcasting enough, and that he was being less than workmanlike when it comes to the things that are required, the discipline that's required from these announcers. You can't just go in there and wing it. You have to work at it.

We're on these devices that have a hell of a lot of influence. I can't tell if I'm being swayed by other people noticing that someone's gotten good and bad because it's time It came out the same way, is this confirmation bias. But yeah, I'm finding myself being annoyed by Tony Romo during these broadcasts and longing for the dude that was there before. Also, while that's happening, I am noticing Tom Brady's not talking as much. And I'm liking the stories that he's given me. And I think that the perspective that he's given me in these games is starting to get better. And now I'm starting to associate his voice with bigger games, which was also foreign to me. But I don't know if I'm just reading awful announcing and being like, They're making good points.

For me, it's just proving how good Buck and Akemen are.

They are just the best. Well, you want to talk about that? Have you seen the numbers for the Manning cast? Down. Huge. Down Huge. You could always count on a million and a half more people watching. I was watching the Manning cast even while I was on the air saying, I don't think this is as good as everybody's making it out, but everybody was heoping praise on it, in part because ESPN's Monday Night Football Booth was bad. You get Akeman and Buck in there, it's 600,000 people watching the Manning cast. It's cratered. I've never actually watched Manning cast. I've seen clips, but I don't watch games. I have to watch the actual game.

I don't watch games like that.

I watch the regular broadcast. I would also add, none of this stuff bothers me. People, they don't like Romo, they don't like braided, they complain about Collinsworth. None of this stuff ever bothers me. I'm never watching the game like, Oh, my God, this guy gets on the call.

I can't stand it. Okay, but that's you, because I would say that in my history covering sports, there's very little that is more consensus unpopular than whoever is doing the broadcast on the game. I don't understand the distaste for Collinsworth, but I will not say that there is not a distaste for Collinsworth. The thing, though, that I find interesting about this is that the broadcast is so sacred that people don't want anything that's new, and I do. I like that Netflix is trying to talk to Emmett Smith or Clinton Portis during the game because they're trying to give you something that's different. I like the Manning cast attempts, just like I liked Dennis Miller and Tony Cornheiser in the booth. But I am in the minority, as I am with the theatrical Mendoza diving at the goal line. I'm in the minority because people do believe that the broadcast needs to be sacred. They just want big and epic. They want Joe Buck and Troy Akeman to do it. That's not what I want. I don't want Joe Buck and just Troy Akeman. I want my sporting broadcast to evolve beyond the way it's always been done.

But I am not with a popular viewpoint there because the sports fan just is like, Give me meat and potatoes. I just want the game. Just give me that and don't take any chances. Well, if you remember in the '80s, I think it was an MBC game.

I think it was Jet's Dolphins when they had no commentators. It was just game footage and game sound. Do you want that?

No. I want you to take risks and to entertain me. I thought this is one of the things that's confusing about it to me, right? We live in an age where we all have a bit of ADD. We need extra stimuli. We need to be watching this and have our phone and have and have four screens on. We want more, more, more, but not when it comes to the football broadcast. It's not true when it comes to the football broadcast. Somehow, 11 minutes of action, which is all that a football game gives you, 11 minutes of game action, 3 hours, and all you're getting is 11 minutes. People want less. People do not want anything other than, Give it to me the way that I've always gotten it. To me, it's super weird because it doesn't run parallel to anything else in energy Everywhere else in entertainment, you want more. You want more things. You can't get enough of more things. The Manning cast is an example. Now, I don't think that's done all that well because Eli and Payton are only so interesting. I do think that people underestimate the fact that performers on television have a skill set that former athletes might not have.

Content makers who have made content all their life are going to be better at the making of content than athlete X who's been doing something else the rest of his life.

I like sidecast as a concept. I think they largely exist for social media traction. They live for moments, big reactions to big moments, because when your team is playing in that game, you search that stuff out. I do like all 22 and stat cast as a second screen experience. I'm with Dan in that I want more chances being taken, but I want them being taken by voices that I associate with big time moments because watching broadcast are nostalgia. And it took a minute for Fowler to get there. I wasn't the biggest fan of Fowler calling the games, but he was doing it from a place in which his voice was still always associated with big time college football. So it wasn't that hard, and he's also improved at that sport. I love knowing that when Tariko and Collinsworth are on a game, it's going to sound big and people are going to have their opinions. But Chris Collinsworth laughing, there's a nostalgia to it. It's something you miss. Just like John Maddon, I don't know how it would work today. I mean, the guy's making crazy noises. He's an older guy. I'm not even sure how that would land, but people love the character of John Maddon.

The thing is, though, what's super unusual about football is that outside of what it is that you're presently saying that people are now rejecting the Manning cast, usually football is so enough that it does not matter who is broadcasting it or what's happening around it, because Seattle Rams is something that people are going to watch, and it really doesn't matter if we do it the way Roy is saying of make the broadcast totally silent. People will complain about it, but they'll stay there, and that game will do monster numbers.

I don't understand that take. I really don't. I hear you. The Manning cast is proof positive as to why the broadcast matters, because they had more than twice the audience for that Manning cast, and I was one of those curious people because I hated the ESPN Monday Night.

You're missing my point, though. It's because you've got multiple options, so people will select the one they're used to. If the Manning cast is all I gave them, that would be doing the monster numbers. If the football is always enough. The football doesn't need anything else.

But Monday Night Football's ratings have gone up since Buck and Akemen have been there. I do think that there is something to a certain quality, an editorial overlook on how good the broadcasts are, whether it's perceptible. I understand we're going to be there no matter what. I'll do that weird thing where there's no sound at all. I'll be there no matter what, except for the AFC Championship game. I'm not watching that shit.

Espn's pregame and post has improved.

So I feel like that is not all Akeman.

No, and it's games have improved. Look, this has more to do with Mike McQuade than anybody at ESPN, because what they produced on Saturday, a playoff football, was so much bigger than the bad Texans games that I've been watching for, I don't know how many years of Saturday football, wild card football Texans.

Saturday, 3: 30. How does that franchise always do it? They always play playoff games that I don't want to see. It's crazy. 17 different quarterbacks, it doesn't matter.

And you and I are both liars. We're going to end up having to watch Bronco Seahawks. And it's not just because we have to talk about it the next day, it's because football's king.