Transcript of Local Hour: Fear The Deer (feat. 5-Time Champion Fabian Wenzel) New

Chris, are you surprised that Zaslo is already wandering over toward hockey, away from where it is that the Heat used to play meaningful basketball games, and has dismissed the NBA playoffs so far as a dud, even though we've had like 4 minutes of NBA playoffs?

Surprised he's watching playoff hockey, if I'm being real.

Yeah, you seem pretty strong in your opinion that he hadn't paid attention to hockey until the Panthers were good.

Most unfair narrative.

I wasn't saying that. I was just saying that normally this time of year he wouldn't be checking out the entirety of the hockey landscape.

So it's exactly what you said. Yeah, no, he, he, he had to actually watch the playoffs before the Panthers got good.

Uh, I understand that, but when the Panthers the last 2 years were at the top of everything, he's watching the games with an intensity— like, you— we are aware, correct, that, uh, at his age, when he's complaining about having to stand for 5 hours at a UFC event and needs to be in bed at 9:30, that that person can't watch both playoffs with the same intensity. You have to choose which one you prefer. It's not possible to watch all of it. It's not humanly possible to have kids, a life, and watch all of it.

I mean, I spent a lot of time on the couch in the Zaslo mansion family room this weekend, Dan, if we're being completely honest.

Yeah, YouTube multiview, that, that's been a lifesaver.

I got the multiple TVs and, you know, then WrestleMania gets going in the evening, it becomes tough to watch 3 things at once. But I, I took a gander at the hockey, uh, much to, much to your bemusement apparently.

You like it?

Yeah, you know, it's a sport I might be able to get into.

You've dismissed basketball after 2 days.

Well, hold on a second.

Guy doesn't love ball. It's very, it's very easy to see. He likes puck now. He doesn't like ball.

It's okay.

Hold on a second. When the NBA opening weekend gives you 8 games, 4 on one day, 4 the next day, and one of them was compelling, Dan, it's fair for me to say it's been a dud.

Come on.

It's fair for me to say that we just got started. We don't do these measurements 2 days, 3 days at a time.

Is 1 of 8 a good percentage?

You had a big upset. It happens, you know, fairly frequently.

That was the one.

But, well, I mean, I can make the argument that immediately after Tony said that the Orlando Magic were a joke, that they did the two most impressive things I've seen done in the entirety of the playoffs. Both of them. Because the way they took out Charlotte, like, it's been a long time since I saw an NBA team play defense like that. Where Charlotte, you talk about a team that wasn't ready for any of that and just decided, oh, playoff basketball, I'm going to keep shooting threes from over here. It was awful. What the team that knocked out, that finished the Heat season, got— had all sorts of trouble getting the ball to the free throw line. Like, they were having trouble getting the ball over half court. It's been a long time since I've seen a team shut out like that on, on a good offensive team, shut out totally by a defense.

This is who we thought the Orlando Magic were going to be when they got Desmond Bane in the beginning of the season. We're like, wow, Orlando could be a sneaky interesting team in the East. And all of a sudden I say that they're a joke clown franchise and then they go on a great run of winning 2 massive games and then beating the Pistons. Like, what's going on here?

You more wrong about that or Con Kanipel?

No, I'm right about Con Kanipel. It's okay.

What are you right about Con Kanipel about?

That he's had a legendary rookie year. That's 100% fact.

First name is the right first name for him.

This is the Dan Levator Show with the Stugatz Podcast. Let's start the day, the show, and the week with some laughter and some lightness. Give me the funniest thing from the sports weekend, Imagen, please. Hey, people! Tell us what in sport made you laugh hardest this weekend.

It is a segment we call What Made You Laugh This Weekend.

Hahaha! A lot to choose from. From. So let's start with Zaslo. Zaslo, what is your funniest thing from the sports week?

Okay, so if you go back to Friday, the, the Charlotte Hornets and the Orlando Magic, they played a play-in game. The winner gets to face the Pistons. No spoilers, I won't tell you who won. But on Friday night, when LaMelo Ball was at the free throw line, there was a Magic fan who was sitting in the front row behind the basket and he was miming that he was driving a car and he was like spinning out of control. Like he was crashing the car.

The way LaMelo drives.

Yeah.

Oh, crashing.

Yeah, that was funny.

The quote from LaMelo Ball, you guys saw this on television, right? After he defeated the Heat and he was just sort of asked, what were you thinking at the end? He just said on television, I bleeped the game up and so I had to go win it. That was his analysis. None of that belonged in the playoffs. Nothing that was happening with Charlotte. We were fooled by them for 2 months. And for me, it's just great to watch. Oh, Orlando has little playoff experience. Charlotte has none. That's what happens at the very bottom of the conference with a team that I was actually believing in when it's led by Kareem LaMelo Ball. That you cannot trust any of that.

All the talk. Really for the last 2 and a half months of the season about the Hornets. They didn't make the playoffs.

Chris Cody. So do the, do the Hornets now have playoff experience?

No, they have fake playoff experience.

Okay, so they don't have playoff.

No.

Next year's fake playoff though.

No, that's okay. But they don't have playoff experience. None. Because that those two games don't—

they're fake.

Yeah. Chris, what was the funniest thing from the sports weekend?

Tony and I are actually sharing this one because it's so good. As much as I don't want to give Buffalo fans credit, Sabers fans just really brought it this weekend. Before the game, they were just attacking a Boston Bruins dummy, just losing their minds. I had never heard a stadium as loud as that stadium when they got that game-winning goal. Look at this guy just falling over.

Like, that's the best part, is that somebody throws like a hat or a shoe in the middle of the way he's skating backwards. Doesn't feel like—

look at this guy for the audio audience. Okay, there's a dummy and a guy on skates lost the fight to him by falling backward, tripping.

These guys have jobs, I think, and families, and yet this is what they do on their weekend.

Buffalo sports fans deserve— they deserve better than what they've gotten from their teams over the years, especially this one. Like, this one, this one hasn't— when's the last time this one won a playoff game?

14 years.

14.

Yeah, I'm not gonna lie, watching all of it, that pregame stuff, the noise, the pop when they got their big goals, it did make me think Maybe we don't like hockey that much down here.

They were booing them by the second period because they were down 2-0 and then 4 goals in the third period, 3 in 4 and a half minutes in the last half.

Yeah, I have a question for you guys because I don't know how, how our listeners are listening to this. Do they always hear— is the noise and the construction that I am hearing throughout the show for the last 2 weeks, is it something that our audience is always hearing, sometimes hearing, often hearing? What's the answer to my question.

Well, let's sample the YouTube comments. You can follow the show live on youtube.com/lebatardshow, but I do think it does come out sometimes more than others.

Jeremy, the next time it makes an appearance here on the show, I want you to go find that sound for me, and I want to televise you broadcasting from the jackhammering or whatever it is that's happening there. What is the funniest thing, Jeremy, that you thought that you saw this weekend?

The Mets. Yeah, they've lost 11 in a row, Dan. 11 straight games. They've been outscored 62-19 over that stretch. There's only one team ever that has lost 11 in a row in April and made the playoffs. It was the 1951 Giants.

Uh, YouTube chat is saying they don't hear it so far, but we'll check back.

Uh, Mike, what was the funniest thing from the sports?

You know me, you know I love a good chug video. And George Kittle, for several years now, has been attending WrestleManias, and anytime he shown on screen, he chugs. In fact, he was taking over other people's chugs. Halliburton, who's on plenty of medication, was shown on screen threatened to chug. George Kittle helpfully came into the frame and said, don't worry about it, I know you're on medication, I got this one. And then on Sunday, he had to chug face-off with Gronk. George Kittle, fun guy.

Now it is a large cup, but he is doing like a third of it.

It's a huge—

it's a gigantic cup. Like, I preface that because it's a tough cup.

Can you do that or no?

No, not a full— if I could do what he did, a third of it.

When's the last time you funneled a beer?

Funneled?

I've done shotguns of, like, cans, but with the funnel? No, it's been a long time.

To Jeremy's point, the last time the New York Yankees lost 11 straight games was 1913. Like, that doesn't happen very often. I wanted to talk about the sale price of the San Diego Padres, $3.9 billion, because the Mets sold 5 years ago for $2.4 $4 billion. And I just can't believe the rate of inflation on sports teams when the San Diego Padres are worth twice as much as the New York Mets 5 years later. Like, that's totally nuts to me. My funniest thing from the sports weekend, Jon Kruk in a suit. It just doesn't fit. It's not something that people should be— it's just he's uncomfortable.

And you didn't tell me I was Jon Kruk. I don't think I would have recognized.

Really?

Yeah. I mean, like, I've seen him a lot recently. I know, but I don't know. That looks very unusual.

I remember him with like a buzz cut, like a state trooper would have. And now he's got like this long kind of Barry Melrose hair going down.

But the suit is— it throws you off.

He should have played first base with a cigarette in his mouth. That's what it— what did Drew Holliday have in his mouth yesterday? Did we ever figure out what it is that he had? Some sort of— people were wondering whether it was a toothpick.

That's what the internet was thinking.

But But couldn't have been a toothpick. But Jrue Holiday was playing an NBA basketball game. It looked like with something in his mouth. And I didn't— I didn't know whether he got stitches that were weirdly like— just it looked like fishing line. It didn't even make sense to me. Roy, what was the funniest thing from the sports weekend?

Inside the NBA was talking about Ice Spice getting slapped in a McDonald's, and now McDonald's apparently is a sponsor of Inside the NBA. And Charles Barkley said, I don't think that this is what McDonald's was expecting when they sponsored Inside the NBA.

We can't play the sound, but it was just 2 minutes of gold. Them starting a segment, this segment brought to you by McDonald's, and then they just go on to talk about things McDonald's wouldn't want to happen in their stores. They talked about the health calories of McDonald's. It was just 2 minutes of what they definitely did not pay for.

So what McDonald's did not want from its sponsorship was just Shaq and Barkley let loose talking about McDonald's in ways that don't quite have the sponsor's bullet points in them.

Right. And Kenny Smith was calling Chuck Georgia Tech. He did it a few times and he's like, you know why I call him that? Because he's a rambling wreck.

Uh, Charles Barkley and Michael Jordan have fixed their friendship, or on the way, they're on their way according to Charles to fixing their friendship. They haven't talked in a long time because Michael Jordan, who continues to be a NASCAR champion again and again, he's dominating. He's— Michael Jordan is now— is dominating ownership in racing. Instead of basketball. He and Charles haven't talked for a long time because Charles said on television Michael Jordan was doing a bad job running the Charlotte Hornets.

Bobcats.

Bobcats. Excuse me. Bobcats back then. And so they haven't spoken in a long time. And Charles was hurt by that and bothered by that, but said consistently, I have to do my job and my job is to tell the truth and say, you know, say what I think. And Michael Jordan hasn't been good at that job. And Michael evidently was thin-skinned about it.

You got to figure that all the winning recently with, with the NASCAR has helped unfreeze that relationship, right? Where like, you know, because he was telling Michael, you're bad at this job, you only have yes men around you. And now like Jordan's like a winner again, you know, I got to figure that that has helped Jordan soften up a little bit.

I saw the interview that Jordan did with Gayle King, which was only 1,000 times better than the one that he did with Tirico that they've been playing all season on Peacock. And it It was interesting to hear him say, over here in NASCAR, I can just have the joys of a thing that doesn't have the burdens and pressures that I had as a godlike figure and a myth, you know, a mythological figure in basketball. It seemed like the burden of being him in basketball was such that the interview he gave Gayle King talking about horse racing is more enthusiastic and inspired than I've ever heard him talk about basketball. He seems bored when talking about basketball because everybody wants to talk to him about basketball. And he was radiant during this interview.

If you saw Michael Jordan at a basketball game, you wouldn't even try to go up to him. You wouldn't even try to get near his atmosphere. He could be sitting courtside and you'd be like, he's just not at all accessible. And NASCAR does such a great job, like the fan treatment and access. You could be walking through the garage. It's not that hard to get garage access. And Michael Jordan's as close to me as Tony is. Right now. He's accessible. He takes photos. I mean, he's still Michael Jordan. You have to kind of respect his space. It's not like, you know, going up to any other owner, really. But it's crazy to see how welcoming he is, how different his personality is around that sport. And he gave voice to it in that interview with Gayle King. Him going to a basketball arena is a larger-than-life experience for him because of what he represents to that sport. He is essentially a god. In that sport, where in NASCAR he's Michael Jordan and it's a side project, but he is not this huge cult of personality associated with the sport. Michael Jordan, you could argue, was bigger than the NBA.

He and Barkley have a lot to catch up on. What do you think's like the first thing they talk about? What's happened?

Wow, Chuck, you're thinner.

I'm guessing that that would be high on the list. Yes. Although if insults are indeed the language of intimacy among males, it won't come up because he's not going to let Charles know that he looks good. But let's— before we get this sound real quick. I want you guys to hear this sound and, and watch it because, uh, the, the part that caught me off guard about this interview is the amount of enthusiasm he had for doing the interview. Like, that's not— I've only seen bored Michael Jordan being Michael Jordan in interviews almost the entirety of his adult life. Like, after— soon after he became famous And the sneaker campaign went to the myth-making. The next thing you knew, all of a sudden, Michael Jordan became some very, very careful personality. You guys have seen that Nike has dipped, at least in part. Windhorst is saying it's because NBA players are just less popular than they used to be.

I've got a lot of takes on that. I think they— Nike went after the wrong guys and didn't pay the right guys to get them in, because if Ant Edwards was a Nike athlete, can you imagine the shoes that they would be making and they would be selling? So there's a lot, a lot there.

And globally, Nike's reputation around soccer has has really taken a huge dip. They've been lapped by Adidas.

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Don Lebatard.

John, can you rate my Al Pacino from that billiard scene in Carlito's Way if I do it for you? I think it's pretty good.

Yeah.

Okay. Stugatz.

You think you're big time? Well, you're gonna die big time.

That is on my infamous scale of 1 to 10, that's a, that's a 7.6.

Solid. Good job.

Good job. That's a Sui nominee right there.

Good. This is the Don Levatar Show with the Stugatz. As it relates to Windhorse's theory, though, that people don't like NBA stars the way they used to, the Nike machine got rolling behind this star who, as we can say flatly, right, was always a boring interview, was, was never interesting as an interview. But here he's just enjoying talking. Listen to this.

When I say I wanted to retire and get to a quieter life, I wanted to get away from basketball in terms of what I represented in that arena and what, you know, how big I've gotten. And it was such a huge burden for me in that sport.

Burden.

Here, the burden's not quite the same, you know, and I'm not in that same Brent, even though it has evolved to be that now because of the lawsuit.

When you say burden, what do you mean burden?

The burden of living a certain way, you know, living up to trying to maintain whatever everybody's perspective is for you.

Yeah.

Or was for you. Uh, that is a, that is a burden, you know, and it's a lot of people that has to endure it. And there's a certain period of time that you can go through it, and then at some point in time you say, I'm tired of, you know, I'm tired of doing that.

Is there, is there a teeny tiny part of you that misses basketball, that misses, that wishes you could pick up a ball?

Oh, 100%. It's not just a teeny, it's a huge piece. But I've compensated that, that feeling through NASCAR or through fishing. And I go, I like going fishing. But that urge to dream that if I wish I can still pick up a basketball and you would still—

you would—

I would love to do that. You believe my competitive juices Yeah, I would definitely love it.

You surprised to hear him call being Michael Jordan a huge burden? Like, wouldn't all of you out there just assume it must be marvelous to be Michael Jordan? I remember Charles Barkley did tell us one time, you don't understand the differences in my fame and his fame. I can walk into 7-Eleven. He can't. Like, he's just— Matt Damon used to talk about this when Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie were a couple. Like, they— Brad Pitt and George— I'm sorry, Matt Damon and George Clooney would laugh because the paparazzi— like, laugh and point because the paparazzi would go running over to where Brad Pitt was, and his life, because he was in a celebrity couple, was worse. Are you surprised to hear him say a huge burden to be Michael Jordan in basketball?

I'll tell you, my biggest takeaway from that is I find myself mesmerized watching him speak to Gayle King there because it's— we rarely get to hear him speak in some type of genuine fashion that I still feel like this aura when he talks, like, oh wow, like I want to listen to every— it's why even the stuff with Tariko, like, it was so vapid, but still it's Michael Jordan sitting there talking.

Well, the way all of this gets crafted for public consumption is interesting in a number of different ways because many of our The greatest athletes give you very little. Tom Brady, Tiger Woods, in interviews, they just close down entirely because giving the interviewer vulnerability does nothing but create distractions. You just want everybody to go away. Uh, Tiger Woods presently finds himself in a predicament, a real predicament, because his lawyers are trying to make sure that nobody sees what his pills what his pill consumption was beginning in January because of this misdemeanor DUI accident. His lawyers are trying to protect— they don't want Public Records Act, they don't want anybody to be able to look at what the prescription medication, the dosages, the number of pills, uh, the frequency, uh, since January. They don't want anybody to see it. And I've— I'm left to assume, even as much as I'd like to fight for privacy for everybody— everybody deserves privacy— I'm left to assume, as I imagine you are, that he's got something to hide there, that it's not— he's not freedom fighting on behalf of privacy. His attorneys aren't freedom fighting on behalf of privacy, though they'd be right to do so.

I don't think his medical secrets from January are relevant to what it is that happened in a recent accident, but, uh, it seems like there's something embarrassing there. I don't know how you arrive at any other conclusion other than that.

I, I think it could be relevant to what happened. We don't know the count out of his medication. He could get a prescription for something in January and still be using it, um, when the incident happened.

And he turned down a blood test on the scene.

Yeah, and it wasn't alcohol in his system. So I think that this is an attorney team trying to get some discovery and, and help build their case. You could argue that it's outsized because of the celebrity attached.

And no, I would argue that it's a misdemeanor DUI. This is not something that's aggressively fought by lawyers. Misdemeanor DUIs go through our court system pretty simply.

He's super famous, but it's also not his first incident, which also matters here. And while it might be outside, so is flipping your car in a residential neighborhood.

Uh, it's misdemeanor DUI. Like, that legally it's a misdemeanor. So you, you can say, yeah, that's— yes, flipping your car in a residential neighborhood is what brings this attention. And now the government is snooping around in his medical records. I don't know that any of us would necessarily want the government invading our privacy that way, would we?

No, but I mean, there are consequences. And also, I don't think we're ever going to see those because he's got really good attorneys and this is all going to go away for him.

The part that was interesting to me beyond whether or not his great attorneys will be able to ransack Orlando's prosecutor or not is the fact that they made sure to try and shut down all public records requests that that any— that even if they lose something here, they don't want us to see any of it. Uh, are you guys then believing though, because of how some of this stuff happens, right? Melania comes out with that weird press conference, you know, there's something back there that she knows that she's trying to get out in front of. Are any of you looking at, uh, Tiger Woods's, uh, rehab stint here with skepticism where it's like, oh, he's— that's step one in the public relations campaign. It's not necessarily that, uh, he's bought full in, or are you thinking that it's a sincere effort after yet another embarrassment to actually try and retrieve help?

No, I think it's PR.

I'm not comfortable speculating.

I mean, it's an easy conclusion to draw.

Like, I, I mean, yeah, if you're a cynic, yeah, if you want to be cynical about it, I guess. I mean, it certainly helps. He needed to do something initially. He was getting very bad advice. TMZ was reporting he's not going to get a driver, he's not going to seek treatment. It wasn't great. I mean, he's on the— the optics of him, like, talking to the president seemed like a man that wasn't ready to face these consequences. Finally got good advice. The news stream was bad to him. So yeah, but also one of the things that could have gotten to him was his family. And look, the public— since nobody got hurt in any of these accidents other than him, thankfully— the public was still supporting him. There weren't victims with these alleged crimes and crimes before. So he had a lot of public support and a lot of people rooting for him and a lot of people genuinely hoping that he would get help. So I hope sincerely that he is doing that. And yes, there is a PR spin to it. I mean, it's not great if Tiger Woods just continues to double down and continues to be a terror in Jupiter with his vehicle.

When you talk about facing the consequences of your actions, like, does that have to also live in allowing people to see your personal life? Because like, I think you can keep those two things separate of facing the consequences of your actions, but also being like, hey, I'm gonna keep this stuff private.

Whether he committed a crime or not, I think people are totally entitled to their privacy, especially when there isn't a victim. If there were somebody else getting hurt here, your rights to your own personal privacy, that stuff gets diluted, and rightfully so, I think. You do lose some of that stuff.

Yeah, but I'm not— I'm actually not talking about the larger privacy issue because I'm assuming that all of us here, okay, if we were not guilty of something, we would not have any problem allowing our privacy. We wouldn't be fighting on behalf of our privacy if we didn't have anything to hide. If there wasn't anything that we were embarrassed by there. Like, if Tiger Woods was totally clean here, he wouldn't even want this part reported, that he's trying to keep this stuff from becoming public. If he were totally clean, if there wasn't something there that's embarrassing to him, I don't think he becomes somebody who's fighting on behalf of his privacy.

I mean, we all saw the video. Clearly there's something there, and it's not an uncommon uncommon request at all for people to get your prescriptions, for prosecutors to get— to at least ask for your prescriptions. It's uncommon that we're talking about it on a national show.

That's exactly what it is. It's like you're not normally dealing with someone so famous. I'm going to try to see if there are other examples in celebrity.

For misdemeanors, you're going to have a hard time finding some of this for a misdemeanor.

I mean, look, every site I've gone to for law practices, they've all said that that oftentimes in a misdemeanor DUI, in any DUI, they will request your prescriptions. Now, we don't normally know about those things. I don't believe any of us have gone through that process, and, and if we had, maybe we would know that that is a common request from the opposing attorneys. But it's just dealing with a famous person, which is the reason why it's all publicized. It's why he would want to not give those things up, because we'll find Is Tiger also trying to protect his doctors that are maybe doing stuff that—

well, that's again a speculation of maybe the doctors are prescribing a little bit more because it's Tiger Woods.

Yeah, but that—

yeah, that might be reckless speculation. I don't know if you want to play that.

It is absolutely reckless speculation.

Yeah, we saw what happened with Michael Jackson when he OD'd. Like, they came for the people that prescribed these things.

Time to throw away all journalistic credibility and get reckless. Here There is something we like to call reckless speculation. You're good.

I mean, if I'm going to recklessly speculate, he's going to protect the guys and make sure that he gets what he needs on a daily, weekly, monthly, yearly basis. You don't want all the name— Dr. Sanchez is out there and he's like, whoa, dude, that was in confidence. I gave you those, you know, to take care of yourself. Why are you out of me now all of a sudden? But again, that's reckless and completely speculative, but just had to be said.

All right. So I want to get to some sound here. The only sound Nikolaj Jović has made made over the last several months as a member of the Miami Heat who is collecting an exorbitant salary for not playing. Let's hear this sound here, and is this or is this not a fair criticism?

At one point you feel like you're good enough for the team, you help, and then all of a sudden you're at the end of the bench and you feel like you're never going to see the floor again. And, you know, it's so ups and downs, like, just the way the Heat is, I guess, you know. It's just, you got to be good every night for them to, you know, continue playing you, and the minutes I have, I got to be perfect to get that system minutes, and if I don't, you know, I'm just gonna be at the end of the bench, I guess.

I mean, it's a really bad look for him. The contract that he signed doesn't even go into effect yet, so he had a completely nothing year. And we're making it as if, you know, like the team believed in you enough to give you the contract when you had showed pretty little anyway. And, and now like you're, you're blindsided by what the expectation is of you with this team that you've been on 4 years. I don't know.

Okay, so, uh, what Zazz is saying is so his extension doesn't kick in until next year, he is going to be the guy with the longest contract security that anyone on the Heat have. Pelle Larsson ends up taking his minutes, right? Like, that can't happen. Like, that's— it's just— that can't happen. Like, he was supposed to at least be giving you what Pelle Larsson gave you at the very— if he were giving you that, people wouldn't be looking at that and saying it's such a bad contract. But he started the first game of the year and then it's just doesn't play the rest of the time. That's, that's wasted money on somebody who's supposed to be a part of your future. And it's now someone who creates blockages for you because that's not— is that even a trade? I guess all the contracts in the NBA are tradable, but what value are you trading right now?

When he signed it, it was met with skepticism. This wasn't like— there were some people celebrating that if this guy continues this trajectory, that that is a tradable contract, even if he doesn't live up for it. But he's not playing at all. So So I guess via, via that prism, it's not a great contract whatsoever. But I guess you have to consider it can be two things in this instance. It can be a disastrous contract, but you also have to trust the Miami Heat because one thing that I won't take the Miami Heat to task is their reputation when it comes to developing players. And oftentimes this is a stage in the development of these, of these prospects where they don't see the floor. For many, many games and it ends up working out. So when it comes to developing and bringing a young player along, I trust Mike Keefe.

But Mike, the— when you talk about developing young players, not after you've given them the deal. That ain't what they do. Not after you've given them the deal.

That's a fair point.

When you've given them the deal, it's because you believe you've already developed them. They didn't give it to Caleb Martin. They didn't give it to Gabe Vincent. They didn't give it to Max Kruse. They gave it to this guy because Any one of those guys would have wanted that deal. Don Libertard. While there's nothing official and conversations are still ongoing. Was that a fake Schefter?

Because it was pretty good.

It was excellent. I feel like there's legs.

I tried at the beginning and then I lost confidence in it. Why?

It was good.

It was good.

You got this.

There's nothing official. Conversations are still ongoing.

Stugatz.

It is trending towards Nick Sirianni remaining the head coach of the Eagles. This is the Dan Levatar Show with the Stugatz.

So how do you not put the blame on Nikola Jović then? Like, like, they've been developing, they've spent their time on him, and now on top of spending their time on him, they've spent their money on on him. Like, they have every reason to play him, and instead they went with the second-year player who, again, if Nikola Jović is talking about, "I gotta be perfect every night," what do you think, they just like, you know, they think Pelle Larsen's better looking than you? Like, no! Pelle Larsen is clearly doing the things that they would like you to do, and that's why he's playing and you're not.

Uh, I had a conversation with somebody the other day who's like trying to grow in their job, and they were complaining about their boss, and they were saying, "He's just, he's always getting on me because I'm a little late." They're getting on you because they want you to be perfect all the time. Like, yeah, they— well, they'd like you to be good, but I understand that he's playing with some fear. Like, you— it's very hard to play basketball looking over your shoulder thinking your quarter— your coach doesn't have confidence in you and is going to yank you. Like, that's— that'll affect your jump shot. Like, if, if you feel like you're going to get yanked— this is a complaint I hear all the time from NBA players— like, this is not something that is developmental. Like, you will fold under the pressure of— I The thing that got Max Struis playing time in Miami over Duncan Robinson, and the thing that made Duncan Robinson improve as a player, is that Duncan Robinson was taking 4 shots and then afraid, looking over his shoulder, and Struis is like, I'll take 10 of them. And like, that's the fire.

That's, that's what they do to make these guys better, is yes, your playing time's on the line. There are other people here who want your, your time and your money. You got the money though. You, you ended up getting The thing about that contract that is so strange is they weren't giving that money to anybody. Like, they, they let all their guys go because they're like, they, they had to have thought this was going to be a special player. Like, they had to have thought that.

It's multiple things here. He's a first-round pick who in terms of talent had a higher upside. He actually started game 1 of this season. If you look all the way back and then never started again. But he actually compared his own situation to Duncan Robinson. He, he said, I should probably talk to him because he's a guy who excelled, got paid, and then after getting paid ended up with zero minutes in the rotation, only to then earn his way back and play well enough to get another big contract with Detroit. So that's a guy who he would look to. And the reason they paid him and not a Vincent or a Struis or Caleb Martin, who they tried to pay, was because of the age. Like, those guys were in their mid to even later 20s. Jović was 22 when he signed this contract because he was drafted so young.

And Jeremy, we've talked about it, they completely renovate their offense, they change everything thinking that Jović is going to be a big part of it.

Him and Hákess would be the guys that would benefit.

And Hákess has done it.

Yep.

And Jović didn't, right? Like, it's a very simple thing. We did this for you, we gave the money to you, and you do not deliver. It's a very easy understanding of why you're the 15th guy at the edge of the bench.

I believe that we have failed as a show in not having in the funniest thing from the sports, uh, weekend anything from this deer calling championship. Uh, we failed as a show, uh, not playing any of sound before now, uh, not showing you any of the video of these incredible weirdos who like to call deer. Uh, Chris Cody got hypnotized by this. This— I love this this weekend.

You love this?

What do you love about the deer calling? What is it that you enjoy?

I love that there are no deer at the deer calling competition and that it's judged by just judges who sit there with their eyes closed and really listen. We can play it underneath here as I talk about it, but it's in Germany, and it's the world's best deer callers.

That's crazy.

And they're assessed. Now, Fabian Wenzel has won this thing 5 years in a row.

Oh, wow. I have to explain to the audio audience that this is—

wow.

This is vulgar.

Yeah, this is pornographic. It's phallic. These instruments that are being used What do you mean?

Chris loves this.

They're simulating fellatio.

Sounds like my dad's cow call. My dad has—

Straight out of the gutter.

Anytime you drive by cows with my dad, he goes, "Mmm." Careful, that's number 14.

That might be a catchphrase. It might deserve to be a catchphrase. Greg Cody, every time he draws, he drives past cows.

As any good parent would do. This is honestly something that I've picked up. Now anytime I, if I'm with my daughter and we drive by cows, cows. I am— Zazz, you don't do this.

Well, you just keep your eyes on the road.

Well, you can keep your eyes on the road and make a— make a cow sound. Like, you can— both things can be true. No.

Does your daughter acknowledge it, or does she just like sit there with her iPad?

She just—

at this point, I'm embarrassing her, and she just like rolls her eyes.

So this video needs to be blurred, by the way.

Fabian Wenzel, 5 times in a row he's won this thing.

Yeah, you mentioned that. It was weird that you would have that knowledge, and for some reason you decided to mention, uh, 5-time champion Fabian.

Throat goat. Hall of Famer.

These people look exactly as I would have imagined that all of them look. They're all white. They're wearing— well, yeah, yeah, but not just— not, not— this is, this is pornographic. This is— look, this shouldn't be on television. This shouldn't be—

if you're watching at work, we're sorry.

This is, this is wrong what's happening here. But also No, no, there's nothing right about what we just did, including not our judgment. Our judgment was not right.

I'm going to go for— we're going to try to get Fabian Wenzel on.

Have we seen the women competition?

Just wondering. Get me the sound of Giannis on Goran Dragic's podcast, please. As Giannis continues to talk in a way that I don't think is serving Giannis at this point. I think Giannis needs to be quiet for a while because I don't know that there's anything— hypothetically, hypothetically, Zazz, is there anything that he could say right now that isn't going to have the recoil? We always do this, right? We always do this. The first few times the disgruntled superstar talks, we cannot talk enough about it. And then over time, everyone turns on the disgruntled superstar because, at least in part, they're tired of how often others are talking about the disgruntled superstar.

I don't think anything good comes out of any any current athletes doing these podcasts. I don't think there's anything good that comes out of it. And in this case with Giannis, unless he were— and I've not heard this yet— unless he's going to get out there and talk about all the mistakes he made over the last year in allowing this story to become what it's become, I don't think it's good for any of these guys to talk.

Let's credit Gogi's Garage, which is a, is a real podcast. And one of the things that you'll see is hanging over Giannis's shoulder is two banners for both of his championships that he won in Milwaukee.

Let's play that sound.

This was the first time that it was like real.

Yeah.

You know, like it was, it was a lot, you know what I'm saying? And I'm not saying that it was real, that I wanted to trade. Like it was, bro, everywhere I went, like in the street, people would tell me, don't leave, don't do this, don't do that, please stay. If I'd ever been in that position, if I could change something, maybe I come out and shut it down because I think people wasn't listening to me. Like I was saying, like, oh, Yanis, come out and ask for a trade. Yanis, come out and do this. Yanis. I'm like, first of all, people that I respect and people that I love, yeah, I would have conversations with them. And I had my coach, my GM, you know, through that closed door, of course.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, but I kept saying, like, I would say, guys, I'm here. I'm not going nowhere. Oh, well, yeah, yeah, whatever, whatever, blah, blah. Yanis is going to the Knicks. Okay, 2 weeks later, I'm here, guys. I'm locked in. I got hurt, but I'm coming back to play here. Oh, Giannis is going to Miami. They wasn't listening to what I was saying, right? So, you know, if I could turn the time back, I would maybe say, come out a little bit earlier. It's like, hey guys, hey, this ends today. Look at me in my eyes. I'm staying with Milwaukee until further notice. Ends today. Stop, you know, making stories and after stories and after stories.

I thought Goran Dragic was great in that clip.

He's adorable, man.

I love him so much.

But Giannis did it again there where he said, I'm staying. I wish I would have went back and said, I'm not going anywhere. I'm staying in Milwaukee. And then he added, until further notice. You could say that about anything.

Yes, that's correct. Until further notice changes everything.

I'm staying here until I decide that I'm not anymore. That's what he just said.

It's why him flirting with the concept of loving Miami is so funny because on the same, on the same podcast, it was Goran trying to recruit him.

They're talking about Miami.

They're asking him questions.

I mean, it's great. That's what it's there for.

The Garage is to recruit.

Uh, he said that he doesn't like LA because it's too flashy, uh, but Miami, uh, too superficial. Let's get that sound authentic here. Let's, let's get the sound of how it is that Los Angeles is too superficial, but Miami has great Depth, the depth of a library.

Vacation, LA or Miami?

Miami.

Miami. Miami. I think LA is super superficial. I don't like LA.

You can't know Miami at all and think it's not superficial.

It's less superficial than LA, we can agree with that.

Is it?

Yes.

Is it?

Yes. No.

Come on. Oh, Mike, please.

You've never been to California.

How have I never been to Cali? I've been born—

You know why.

I've been to California more than you have.

No, you haven't.

California off.

Oh, also, we'll talk after the show.

Lean in.

Who's been to California more often?

It's been a California off.

I've been many times.

California off. Many times. He's afraid.

He's afraid.

He doesn't know that I've been many, many times.

All right, put it on the poll, Juju, @LebatardShow. More superficial, Los Angeles or Miami?

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