Transcript of Local Hour: The Greatest Baseball Game Ever Played

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Greg, the Shadow Show is not a It's a visual experience. So how would you describe to the people through that mask what it is you're aspiring to today? What is your punishment?

It's not a punishment. I'm foreshadowing what I will actually look like in about Hopefully, 15 plus years when I'm laid to rest. Jeez. Why don't you go ahead and fix your mic there, Greg? What's that?

Yeah, we were closer to it. Fifteen plus years? Yes. Okay, so because it's not a visual experience, No, no. Nobody knows that you're wearing a skull.

A skull.

Looking like a Skeletor, dog.

No cross bones, just the skull.

What are you supposed to be doing in terms of grid punishments?

I have no... This is not a punishment. This is all a story.

This is just you for Halloween?

Yeah, I'm in the period of the holiday.

Okay. You just wore this mask because you were in the mood. You already started complaining before we even started that it's too hot, that you're not going to be wearing it all show, but you chose to do It's not even something you have to do. You just simply chose to do it?

It's a temporary thing, sure. Okay. Yeah. It's like when you put one of those things on Instagram that lasts about a minute and a half. It's a disappearing message. Yeah, you see it and then it's gone. Yeah. Whatever that is.

I just told you what it is.

A disappearing message.

Something like that. I think he meant Instagram's story, which lasts 24 hours. I did. Yeah, but you said it only lasts a couple of minutes.

I was thinking of what That's the thing they used to have that lasted six... A vine. I was thinking of a vine. I loved vine. My most popular vine was... I did one on the fourth of July, and in six seconds, I recited the whole pledge of allegiance. You got to go back. If Vine is still available, you got to listen to that.

Do you think you can do it right now?

If buying is still available.

In 6, 7 seconds, I can still do it.

All right, let's see if you can do it. Go ahead and try and do it.

I pledge allegiance to the flag in the United States of America, and to the order of Okay, that was longer than six seconds.

You did not. On Greg's defense, it was definitely under six seconds.

You need to try to do that again and honor America a little bit better. Let's try it again.

I'll do it on the fourth of July. Right now, let's not disrespect Halloween. Okay, let's take them one holiday at a time. I'm like a coach taking them one game at a time.

I thought it had been more like, let's not disrespect the anthem.

Well, it's just words.

As opposed to Halloween, which is an important spiritual holiday you wouldn't want to disrespect. Yes, that's right.

You know, some people are spuked by Halloween. I have a neighbor up the street. I'm not going to name them here, but they're- Name them. They're very religious people. Okay. And they do not put up any Halloween directions because they think it disrespects- It's a pagan holiday. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I don't agree with that, man. I got all my decoration up. They look fantastic.

Why are you dragging Roy into this? Roy didn't ask to be dragged into this.

That's canon. He's openly admitted that he also doesn't celebrate Halloween.

That is correct. We don't celebrate Halloween at the house. Why is that, Roy?

Religion. You are the neighbor that Greg is talking about, that all the other neighbors are judging for being anti-cuit costume in the name of their God. You don't want to name them, though. I respect that.

Look at Greg's face. He's judging, Roy.

Can you tell? I'm a grinning skeleton. I'm grinning behind this mask.

You're going to last about 15 minutes in this. I can already tell you. You're going to start complaining very early. This is the Dan Levatore Show with the Stugats podcast. We've got a frozen frenzy tonight. All of the hockey teams playing and also our baseball is back. Intro is not yet ready, so we cannot celebrate the greatest baseball game ever played that I don't believe anyone here, except for Jeremy, lasted until the end of. Mike Ryan got woken by his television and groggly ran over to it to turn it off because surely the game is still not going on at 2: 30, but it was still the game. It wasn't a re-air. It wasn't one of those re-airs-Replaced, yeah. You get of the Marlins or the Rays the next day of a night game the day before because they've got to fill the programming. That had to be confusing people last night at 3: 00 AM to be stumbling towards your television and to see an empty dodger bullpen and Shoheya O'Tani walked five times in a game.

I feel like today all around on radio, on television, all the sports shows, Let's just point out who's lying about having watched the entire game last night. It's going to be so many liars today.

You got to figure that very few people made it through that who aren't diehard baseball But everyone's going to portray that they saw it. Well, I got caught up this morning. I was watching this morning with my wife. She had a whole lot of commentary on what we were watching. She asked why Clayton Kershaw, she doesn't know who Clayton Kershaw is, obviously, but why he looked so old. She thought he was in his 50s. I'm like, That's the greatest left-handed picture ever. And she's like, It looks like the big Labowski. It looks like Jeff Bridges from the big Labowski. It looks like the dude? Put up this photo. He said, If it was lefty, it'd be They brought in Jeff Bridges in the 12th ending. I don't know if you guys saw that particular at bat. Dodger fans, that had to be as scared as they were all season, bringing him in with the bases loaded, seeing him go to a three, two count, seeing him throw two balls that he got bailed out on with foul balls and get out of the ending. But put it on the poll at Levitard's show, did Clayton Kershaw look older than Sandy Kofax last night?

Because the The other thing that my wife had as commentary was Sandy Kofax was in the stand. She's like, That person's too old to be dealing with two baseball games, essentially, 18 innings of baseball. I'm like, But he began the game as a young man, as a toddler. He started, and he's just 90 now. I wanted them to buy extra innings. I wanted them to just start putting runners on second again like they do during the regular season. It's dumb that they do it differently during the postseason than they do it during the regular season. The regular season rule is just, Hey, let's wrap this up.

Well, I mean, we saw that that was the hockey version. That was the Stanley Cup playoff version we saw last night. I mean, we get that game last night once a playoff in the Stanley Cup playoff, where they end up playing two games. All right, we got it for baseball. Now, I'm not going to sit here and tell you that I saw the game.

We don't get a lot of three overtime games in hockey, Zaz. We don't get a lot of time.

You'll get it once a postseason.

You get one that goes to 2: 00 AM on a postseason.

Had it gone 20 innings, Kofax would have been in the bullpen warming up. Look, even if it's a triple overtime hockey game, it doesn't last 6 hours and 39 minutes. That's excruciating.

May it never ever happen again. No, it was great. No, wait a minute. It was brilliant. No, wait a minute. It was great. It's the greatest baseball game any of us have ever seen.

It would have been if it ended in 12.

Well, if any of us had seen it. It would have been the greatest baseball game anyone had ever seen if anyone had seen it to completion.

I chose to go to bed after 17. I watched the 17th in my bed on my phone, and then O'Tani makes the final out of 17. I'm like, Oh, am I going to wait three more in.

So you stayed up until 2: 30 to then just miss one inning of action.

Why was 17?

Because I'm falling asleep.

I can tell you why. It was the 17th inning nap. That's what you needed. 17th.

17th inning nap. 17th inning.

The 17th inning.

I wish you had a photo, like a fly on the wall staring at me while I was just crushing pretzels in the 14th-inning. That's the move, right?

In order to stay awake for these late games, I'll go get a box of Cheez-It.

I'm wandering around my living room. By the 12th-inning, I was ready to fall asleep. You got to stand. And so I stood for basically the rest of the game. And I was just falling slowly all over the place, stumbling just to keep myself awake so that I could watch what was the most brilliant baseball game I've ever seen.

How are we feeling about this over here?

Are you green with envy?

It's a little dark. I don't know. It's on the line. Can we have a first base ump to check the swing here? Did he go? Is this racist? Roy, checking the swing?

Why are you asking Roy?

Oh, wow. He did not go. Thank God.

He had to think about it a little bit.

I saw that all of a sudden the bolts were being put in Jeremy's neck right before we started. We forgot that part of the costume. I do want to go back for a second on Greg Cody and just marvel at the greatness that is Greg Cody. I have an assortment of Greg Cody sound that we're going to get to in a second from the Greg Cody show featuring Greg Cody. But I just want to rewind on the Telstraiter, what happened, a second to go, and warn the audience that we're going to get a worse version of Greg Cody than we usually do because this mask is distracting and will weigh him down. These costumes are hard to do. Every time I do one, I leave here with a headache, physically leave here with a headache.

You look spent yesterday in your big wool suit.

Yeah, it was hard to do. It is hard to do. And what Greg just did, and you will see this deteriorate over the course of the show, he tried to make a seventh-inning stretch joke about the 17th-inning nap. He called it the 7th-inning nap. The joke didn't make any sense. He shouldn't have spoken. He instead spoke poorly, botched the joke, then tried to correct it, and it wasn't a joke worth telling in the first place, even if he had told it correctly.

Seven doesn't divide into 17. Maybe if it was the 14th, you could have said the 14th-inning- I don't think that's saying the 17th-inning nap.

I don't think anyone correlated that to the seventh-inning stretch.

Seventh, 17th. Yeah, it worked. If I got it nailed at first and said the seventh-inning nap, it would have killed. But nothing is better for a joke that didn't quite hit than over analyzing it and reviewing it like this I just did. That's what really works. So thank you for that.

Let's go back to the Greg Cody Show featuring Greg Cody. This is something he's been doing since I've known him as a young... Back when Greg Cody was a young person, there was a time, Greg Cody has been because he drinks so many beverages. It used to be a ton of diet soda as well. He's perpetually burping, and after he burps, he always closes his burp like a gymnastics routine that has a discount in it. He always closes his burps with a word of some sort? There's a few.

There's a few that he does.

The one I've heard most often, I believe the gold medalist is Brad. To just say the word Brad after a burp. What What are the bronze, silver, and gold medalists of words that you always say after a burp?

Up until they sound like words. The one that can be misinterpreted as Brad is probably my most common. The other one, of course, a lot of people say it or say the sound is sac.

Let's tackle these one at a time. I have everything we're talking about here. These are all in the wild while taping the Greg Cody show within the last couple of months.

But let me reframe it for the audience, okay? Because I do want to understand when this began, how this began, and want to explain even better to the audience what this is. It's you, to you, as a Sonic experience, the burp sounds like a word that you then conclude randomly with the name Brad?

Well, no, I don't say Brad. People think it sounds a little like Brad. The problem is this, okay? When a dog barks, he doesn't really say Bow Wow, right? He says something that in the cartoons, it says Bow Wow. They don't say Bow Wow. When a human being burps, it doesn't sound like the word belch. I'm not going belch. So when anybody burps, they emit a certain sound. I have been told that a couple of my random sounds sound like words. I can't help that. That's on the listener. That's not me.

Let's go through these. Here's the first one. Like you said, Dan, the most common, it's just a Brad.

Brad.

That's the most common one you'll hear.

It's a burp.

Brad.

Because it's like you're clearly burping. You could just stop there. Brad. Why do you say brad?

To get it out. You're loosing into the wild the burp.

All right. This one is from this most recent episode. We were doing Greg Doesn't Know Movies, and this one's my favorite. We got a sack in the wild.

What's next?

Moving A sack.

What?

I think, damn it. Luckily, we can isolate-Okay, what's next?

Moving on.

A sack.

Explain yourself.

My favorite part was Michael going, Wait, what? I can't explain that. It's just a sound that comes out.

Your mic wasn't on.

And we punctuate with ass wipe.

What are you doing tonight? You got anything fun going on?

Let's try it again. Swipe. Flawless swipe.

What are you doing tonight? You got anything fun going on?

He just goes on with his life.

He says it. It's normal. Repeats it back, and then just asks me how my day is going. Play it one more time.

Did you sniff the ass wipe after? It sounds like you sniffed. Swipe. Ass wipe.

What are you doing tonight? You got anything fun going on? Is it an When I whisper it afterward, I was mocking myself because that's another sound that people tell me sounds like ass wipe. So I'm mocking myself, self-deprecating.

A sack.

All right. I believe this is exactly the appropriate coverage that we should have after the greatest baseball game ever played, the greatest World Series game ever played. Freddie Freeman is now the only player in the history of the World Series and the history of that sport, which obviously has a lot of history, to have multiple walk-off game winners. This one, straight to center field, off a left hander, Little. Like the beginning of that at bat, you could see that he scared Little by how much he had him time to hit a foul ball that is screeching and then works a three-one count. The three, two pitch should have been ball four, but instead they called it a strike, and then what happens is he hits the ball still over the center field fence. Is Freddie Freeman... I know Hank Aaron exists, okay? And the advanced metrics will tell us more about on-base percentage and slugging. Hank Aaron will forever be, I assume, the greatest brave. But is Freddie Freeman the second greatest brave that there has ever been? Because Dale Murphy won a couple of MVPs.

Were we doing hitters?

Well, because you want to do Greg Maddox?

Yeah, I want to do Maddox and Glaven.

I think Larry is better than Freddie.

You think Chipper Jones is better than Freddie Freeman.

I think they probably hold Chipper in higher regard.

The reason I'm only doing hitters is because they play every day, right? So I don't think of... Well, I guess I could say that certain best players in franchise histories are pitchers. But when you play once every fifth day, I don't think of you as-I think Mike's right.

I think it's Chipper. I think Mike's right. But I will tell you, I feel like... Is Freddie Freeman the most likable player in baseball? No. No? No. Why do you say that?

His teeth.

Those teeth were gleaming. Those perfect fake teeth were gleaming as he round at the bases. They are perfect. Looks like the mask. They are perfect. They are too perfect. Your objection is that-Chiclets. Your objection is that they're too perfect.

What's like Matt Dylan in Something About Mary. What are we doing?

He's so likable, Freddie Freeman. How do you not root for him?

I don't like him. Put it on the poll at Lebitard show. Do Freddie Freeman's teeth look like Matt Dylan in Something About Mary? What a movie. Because they do look a a bit oversized, and they do look a little bit too perfect, especially perfect, while rounding the bases. How many of you, Roy, did you... I know that Chris reached out to his father and asked him by text, How deep did you get into the game? And he said, By the time the chief scored the third countdown, I was out.

So that's not- That's not that game.

The World Series, the fourth countdown?

When the football game became 28-7, I went to I don't know exactly when that was in the baseball game. Probably like the seventh evening.

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Don Lebatard. You don't remember the idea for a home run call?

I was probably like, That thing. Something.

Okay, no. The home run call was, That swing, that thing.

Stugatz.

Oh, it's a good call. Thank you. And plus, it doesn't matter who's hitting it. You're not tailing it to a particular name. All that jazz. You don't do that. That would be a great call. Up, up, and away. That swing, that thing.

This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugatz. It was, Jeremy, I want some of your thoughts as someone who did get to the end of that baseball game. There have to be some statistics from that game that have never been seen in the history of the sport. I I don't think that Dodger fans were more nervous at any point than when Clayton Kershaw was in the game with the bases loaded. My guess is that they were questioning Dave Roberts, even though he went lefty on lefty, for bringing in Clayton Kershaw in that spot. I'm so happy that Clayton Kershaw got that out because the last outing of Clayton Kershaw's postseason was a total disaster and would have been the punctuation on his Dodger career, where he's just hanging on as the greatest left hander ever to just get a ring that he didn't deserve because he wasn't doing much of anything effective by the end.

Dave Roberts had talked about wanting to bring in Kershaw at some point during the World Series, but that was with the hope that you had an eight to one lead in the ninth evening, that type of deal, where maybe That ends up happening in a clinching game, and he gets to be on the mound. That's really honestly what I'm rooting for at this moment. But to see him in that moment come in and throw six pitches, five of which were sliders at 89 miles an hour, and one of which was a fastball at 91 miles an hour because that was the hardest pitch he's thrown since July of last year. The guy has nothing left in that arm. He's got the grays everywhere in the beard, and he comes in in the biggest moment, three, two, bases loaded, two outs, and gets out of it. And you thought, oh, man, well, surely the Dodgers are going to walk off now. And then there were six more innings played.

So what's going to be the fallout now? Because they use 10 pitchers last night, and they're playing again tonight.

Everybody was used. Shane Bieber, the starter for today, was out in the bullpen getting ready. Yamamoto, who threw a complete game in game two, he was out warming up in the bullpen in the 18th innick. Will Klein Be crazy if Yamamoto came in. The Will Klein story is insane.

The guy who threw four innings- He pitched four innings, and he only allowed a couple of hits. One hit.

One hit to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. He's a guy who's 25 years old and had a career 5. 16 ERA going into last night. He throws four shutout innings. Mind you, that's like five hours after Tyler Glass now only threw four and two-thirds to start the game and allowed a couple of runs himself.

I mean, for Toronto, Eric Lauer pitched more than the starter Matt Scherzer did. That's right.

He threw four and two-thirds innings, and Matt Scherzer only threw four and a third.

So is everything screwed up for tonight now?

Yes, of course.

I mean, everybody's thrown everybody. Okay, yeah. And these are the two teams that had the most comeback wins in baseball. They're two teams that, by the way, have bad bullpins. Those are mediocre bullpins for teams that have gotten to the World Series. The fact that they pitched the way they did, that's why it's the greatest game ever played, because you had a bunch of nobodies. And there's going to be carry-overs. And in the middle of it, you had Clayton Kershaw come in there as the first ballot hall of Famer.

That's not why it's the greatest game ever played. It's the greatest game ever played because it went 18 innings. The fact that the bullpins are bad is particularly interesting when you consider the Blue Jays really mash They really hit the baseball. They had four runs by the fourth ending and finished with five runs once they got into that bullpen, which is the Dodger's only weakness. The Dodger bullpen is the only weakness that baseball team has, and it gave them, this is crazy to say, 14 innings against that offense of one-run baseball, 14 innings.

Those bullpins did pitch well, but it should be noted that the ball was not flying. They kept commenting how it's going to be colder tonight It was colder last night. It's going to be warmer. The ball will be flying better tonight. I loved hearing smolts throughout the game just deteriorate and get annoyed with how every ball... How many balls to the warning track were there in extra innings? Well, that's what it was. There were back to back. Every inning, it felt like they were excited about a ball leaving the park, and then it was just be... It was a game of inches.

In the 13th inning, you had a bunt from Miguel Rojas that was one of the most beautiful bunts you're ever going to see. It almost hit him in the face. It almost hit him in the face, and he laid it down on the sacrifice bun. And then you end up with intentional walks to both Ohtani and Betts to load the bases to get to Freddie Freeman, where you're thinking, All right, here's his moment where he'll walk off, and he hits a bomb, and it dies at the warning track. He could tell right away.

He could tell it. It wasn't out.

But then in the next sitting, in the 14th, Will Smith comes up, and he thinks he got all of it. He poked it. And it also dies at the warning track. That's why the Freeman home run is so crazy, because the temperature was dropping the further we got throughout the game. They kept mentioning, It's going to be 90 degrees tomorrow. The ball is going to be flying. Every reason for tonight's game to be one of those games where it's 11: 00 to 9: 00 because bullpins are tired, starting pitchers are going to need to go deep, and the starting pitcher for the Dodgers, it's Shohe O'Tani.

Dan, you know about that O'Tani?

He's a pretty good baseball player. They didn't want to be pitching to him last night, and he hit a home run anyway early in the game.

Can I beg the question? Okay, you decided after four... Why did you make that face?

Because you can't beg the question. That's not appropriately said.

Start Why are you begging? I'm going to beg this question.

It begs a question.

Why didn't they walk him earlier in the game? First base was open on three of his first at bats. You just figured out that he's good after four for four? Because after four for four, they're like, Now we clearly can never pitch to him again. A little hindsight here. You're just going to throw to him until he goes four for four with two doubles and two home runs? Oh, and then you're going to have this ground-breaking idea, Hey, let's not pitch to him anymore. Probably should have done that the first three of bats when first base was open.

I mean, the second home run, you're- Should have started the game.

You're up. He just started the game. Walk him.

Okay, so he starts the game with the double, and you're saying you should have intentionally walked him to begin the game. Do you think they're going to do that today?

I'm just saying they made the decision midway through the game. We're done pitching to him.

Well, yeah, because he was four for four With four extra base hits, two of which were home runs, and the second one was a game-tying home run. But when you're up by one, you're not going to intentionally walk him to get to bets where now they could take a lead. You let the solo run hurt you.

Yeah, you idiot.

God, he's amazing. He's the greatest Who's the greatest athlete who's ever lived?

He is. Fact.

End of discussion. Greatest athlete who's ever lived. Do you know who he's in conversations with, both on the mound and at the plate? All right, I'm going to go out and I'm going to go try to create a Venn diagram of all of the different people he's just joined statistically. Yeah, you go. I'm going to go. You guys are going to miss me, but I'm going to go.

No, I'm not normally in favor of your Venn diagrams, but if it means you'll leave, I'm going to be in favor. I love you, too. I'm going to be in favor of that, and you can leave for a second.

Have fun having this conversation with a bunch of people that have not watched the game.

We're not going to have the conversation.

We weren't having fun with the conversation that was with the person that was watching the game.

I'm also skeptical that Jeremy watched it. Are you? He was in the group text until 1: 00 AM. I know he popped up at 3: 00 AM.

There's going to be a lot of liars today.

I'm just saying there was a big gap in the group text. He was involved until 1: 00 AM. I'm willing to hear this. It was me and Kyle Seeloff into the wee hours. I didn't see any of Jeremy in the group text.

Take that name up.

Put it on the poll at Lebitard show. Are there going to be a lot of liars in the media today about having watched all 18 innings of that game?

I'm going 90% of the people on television and radio today who are talking about the game and claiming they saw it did not.

Well, but what is your ruling on this? Because what I've been doing, and I've been doing this for a while because there's just so much going on in sports, I don't know what these are It used to be called CliffNotes when we were talking about getting condensed versions of a book that was just 30 pages instead of 300 pages. I watched that game last night for a few innings on the front-end, and then when I get caught up, I'm watching the boxed form of 15 minutes of, Here are all your important moments in the game with all of the fat cut out, which our algorithm gives you on just anything, anything you want to watch. If there's a football game that you have not seen on YouTube, they'll give you in 15 minutes everything that you need so that you're not actually missing anything. They can cut all the fat out of it. Do people in the audience know what CliffNotes are? Is that still- Like the original CliffNotes? I don't know. Who is Cliff? Is Cliff a person?

Well, how you took all the notes for us, dog.

What is the history of CliffNotes? Is it named after somebody who's first or last name is Cliff. Put it on the poll at Levitard's show. Have you heard of Cliff Notes? First of all, because I imagine there's a generation that doesn't know about Cliff Notes.

You know who has right here? That's the original cheat sheet. You thought AI was cheating in the classroom. Cliff Notes was the original-Save me in school, Cliff Notes. Why am I reading Grapes of Rath? Cliff Notes can give it to me in a minute and a half. I write a book report. I haven't even opened a book. Cliff Notes. Save it.

Back in my day. It's perfect. Actually, give him the Back in my day music and see if he can do a CliffNotes version right here. It is a Tuesday. He hasn't tried to do a Back in my day in over a year.

Yeah, I'm too busy singing songs for the Levitard show, producing music. It's tough to do everything, Dan. Cliffnotes was started by a Nebraska native by the name of Clifton Hillagrasse in 1958. There they go.

It's his first name, and he even shortened Clifted. It wasn't even... His name wasn't Cliff, it was Clifted.

No one would say, Hey, can you get me those CliftonNotes? Cliftnotes, so much better.

Clifton. He just used to ban it.

I would have guessed that Cliff was his last name. Wouldn't you have guessed? No.

Who do you know his name? I would have guessed Cliff. Jimmy Cliff. What are you, Insane?

Jimmy Cliff.

Jimmy Cliff. There you go. I like it.

We have talked a lot.

How do they come?

Don Lebetard. Punctuate this segment with what is your strike three call?

Strike one would be, Strike. Then you stand and you give a good point to the right. Stugatz. That's same for strike two. But strike three, you get down low, you got your hands behind the catcher. The right arm goes up into the air. And then you finish it with the punch. The right arm flings way up into the air. I wish I could see that.

It's terrible. The audio is great. This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugatz. We have talked a lot about the baseball game, but I did want to talk about a couple of things locally. One of the things that I wanted to talk about locally is the feisty Shannon Dawson. He gives good press conference. He is better speaking, spicy than any coordinator that I can remember in the University of Miami's history since Gary Stevens. What is he upset about here that the fan base is complaining about how stubborn he is about running it straight up the middle, even though for two games, there's been nothing straight up the middle?

Let's set the tone with this eight-second clip, please. And so the question about the ball hitting up the middle, they can keep asking it, and you all can keep asking it, but I'm not going to change what we're doing. That was pretty much the entire press conference. He goes a little bit more into detail. Now, look, Miami is primarily a shotgun team. It's hard to run outside in the shotgun. You have limited options. And he tries to, you don't know ball, the assembled press.

Infatuation of, how do you want me to get a ball outside with the running back? It's a question to me. How do you mean do it? How about the offensive? You mean run option? I'll run option with Carson. That's smart. Genius.

It's a tall sweet.

You're on a tall sweet from underneath? Yeah. We'll go underneath.

How does that impact the defense, though?

What you're saying obviously makes total sense, but- It doesn't?

It doesn't. But you've got a. I got to ask that question a lot. I don't think it makes total sense, to be honest.

Why did you beat a dick?

Well, because Shannon Dawson, look, he had the greatest offense in the history of the University of Miami, aided by one of the greatest quarterbacks ever play at the University of Miami, a quarterback that would often check out plays at the line of scrimage. But Shannon Dawson has been a really tremendous hire for Miami Miami. That being said, this isn't a good faith discourse because the problem isn't that you're running a gap. That's a team's identity. The problem is you're running a gap when teams are selling out to stop the a gap.

When he says, I'm not going to change, why wouldn't you change if someone's not working?

He has shown in his time here that he can be a bit stubborn, and I think the blueprint is out on Miami how to beat them. Not super disciplined. They'll have pre-snap penalties. Maybe you can bait them into it. It'll put them in bad running situations, and they're still going to have a running game that lacks creativity. Again, not asking to become an outside zone team, not asking to find a way to run a stretch from a shotgun, asking for about four outside runs a game, which is an uptick from what we usually do. And they usually do have big plays there. I think for Shannon Dawson, I get where he's coming from. There's a lot of people saying, why are we running up the middle? They have no idea how it works? I get that. The problem is you're running a gap when teams are effectively stopping it and you don't seem to have an answer.

So let me ask the group this question because I've told the story before. Jimmy Johnson, when he was coaching the Championship Cowboys, was always asked, Why don't you run more screen plays with Emmett Smith? Screen passes. And he's like, We're not good at it. We don't do it well. He's tired of this question. And I understand this question. It's easy to be the offensive coordinator from Section 129. When things aren't working, you've always got a better solution. So the frustration, he keeps getting the question because over the last two games, after a few games when I thought they were going to run up the middle on everyone all season because their offensive line looked that good, after two games of total constipation up the middle, when the coach is telling you this honestly as someone who has more information than all of us do, How do you want me to do it? We're not good at it out of the shotgun. Mike and we keep saying, Well, just try it a couple of times to the outside. We see people out of the shotgun throw pitches to the side out of the shotgun. I see the chiefs do it.

There are plenty of people doing it. You can run outside out of the shotgun.

In Shannon, in Miami's defense, it's only one and a half games. In the second half, they broke through. Agap, finally, you assert You did your will and you broke teams down, and it didn't matter that they had an advantage in the box. But to Dan's point, a little bit more creativity. It should also be noted that Shannon Dawson did not design the running game. That responsibility landed primarily on Alex Mirabal. While Shannon Dawson calls the plays. But you have to have tendency breakers. Miami has very clear tendencies. We saw it against Notre Dame, even, when they failed to get a first down, and we saw it a little bit against FSU. Creativity in the play calls help you ice a game. And Miami struggled in that department. And I think that ultimately the stubbornness there, unless they infuse some creativity and have some tendency breakers, that might be this team's undoing.

I think an alternative to pitching wide is to throw real quickly to Fletcher in space like the Dolphins have been doing successfully with H-an. There's another way to get a wide play without the traditional pitch.

I feel like they did that a lot on Saturday.

Zagaki, they had some varying levels of success. We've seen it be successful with C. J. Daniels and Malikai Tony. There was one bewildering play called to Elijah Lofton, who I'm a fan of, but sustained an injury in fall camp and is not in the same shape that he was last year. He was always a heavier guy with a weird body type, a tweener that you didn't know what exactly to do with. But getting them in space doesn't seem to be the move so far.

The numbers say otherwise on what it appears to your eyes is happening. Because Pro Football Focus, 79 of their runs have gone directly up the middle. Those runs are averaging 4. 1 yards per carry. Also, another 54 additional interior runs have gone between the guards and tackles, and those are averaging 5. 5 five yards a carry. But UM's outside runs are averaging 4. 2 yards per carry when they try it, and that's good enough.

The context there, though, is maybe those numbers got fat. Let's see after FSU, because there's a line in the sand when it comes to how teams decided to play Miami once they established their tendencies. And the running game, since FSU, hasn't been what it was pre-FSU, and that's because FSU decided, We're going to make Carson Beck beat us. Now, they lived by the sword and died by the sword in that game. Carson Beck made them pay, made incredible plays out of play action. You had the combination of a team selling out to stop the run game in this first half that was very troublesome if you were a Miami fan. And Carson Beck wasn't checking out of it, and we were also not trusting him all that much to make the big plays. And that was a little concerning to me. And I'd hate to see Miami season get derailed because they were stubborn and married to a certain plan.

Wait, it already has been derailed. It just hasn't been totally derailed. Look, Louisville gave everyone the blueprint, gave everyone the blueprint on how it is you beat this football team. And the offensive coordinator just put his name and voice on, I'm not changing. Keep asking all your questions. I'm answering honestly. We don't do that well. We don't know how to do it. When he throws the question back at the media, How would you like me to do it? He's telling you flatly, I have not had success with this over the last six of the last eight quarters, and I get this question a lot, and I'm tired of this question. He's not telling you, I appreciate the question. He's not answering the question by saying, We're going to do anything differently. He's saying in your face, I don't care how upset you are about this. If you're going to beat us, you're going to beat us because you've stopped us from running up the middle. We're going to continue to try to do that, and we think we can wear everyone down the way that we wore Stanford down.

It's a gutsy move. He may end up being right, but when you put your name to those quotes and you go at people like that, if you You have another first half against Stanford or you have another game that you had against Louisville, it's held against you that much more. So Balsey from Shannon Dawson, who I, again, I hold this man in very high regard. I think he's a really good offensive coordinator, but I think this team is a little bit stubborn. And quite frankly, when Tyler Van Dyke short-circuited a little bit, that wasn't all Shannon Dawson either. Mario Cristobal got involved and said, Hey, he's turning the ball over too much. If we don't turn the ball over, we win these one-score games. Let's dial it back some. I would think that there's an element of Mario Cristobal also seeing a four turnover game and getting a little spook.

But let me ask you guys the question of stubborn, please. When he says stubborn, and the counter to that is, no, this is our identity. It's who we are. You're being stubborn about that. No, it's who we are. It's who we're going to be, and it's who we are. Is that stubborn or is it only stubborn after you've lost to Louisville?

I think everyone begins to question it after you finally lose, but I don't think they trust Carson Beck enough. I think they should put the ball in the game in his hands more than they do. Carson Beck, going into the Louisville game, Carson Beck was the Heisman Trophy front runner. He still could be. They're taking the ball out of his hands.

I'm with you. I think it was an overcorrection to them getting spuked by Louisville making tremendous plays, and you made a sizable NIL investment in this player. He has proven throughout his time, not just here, but in Georgia, he can shake off some turnovers. That's part of the deal when you have a person back.

You said you're with Greg Cody. I'm not. He's thrown himself out of the Heisman conversation. He will not be invited to that ceremony.

No, he won't now.

It does not matter what he does the rest of the season. That four interception game in a loss that people were watching, he will not be invited to that room.

Yeah, that loss, though, was an anomaly. Louisville beat Miami with surprises, with gimmickry. With three quarterbacks on one or two plays on the field at the same time. You could visibly see on the sideline, the Miami coaching staff did not know what had hit them. I think that's an outlier of that game. I don't agree that the season has been lost or ruined or whatever word you said.

Derailed. The word was the season will be derailed by that. It already has been derailed. Look, they're better than Louisville, and in that game, there wasn't that much proof of that. And it wasn't just gimmicry. They were beaten. They got too roughing the passer calls they did not deserve. They got a fumble at the end of that game. They did not deserve that game. That game could have very easily been them blown out at home in the fourth quarter if Louisville had just held on to the football.

I don't think Miami is going to get blown out or debattled because they're really good along the lines, and it's hard to blow out teams along the lines. There was a four turnover discrepancy between those teams, and Miami was not in position to get blown out. They were in position to tie the game at the very end. There's not many teams in Miami. That's how you know Miami's ceiling is very, very high, in that you have the situation, you have the trick plays that work. You have the gadgets. You have the quick release. You don't have Ruben Bane doing. By the way, Ruben Bane was a highest rated pass rusher yet again by pro football focus despite not getting a sack. He absolutely wrecked it for 48 snaps on Saturday. But this is This is the trouble with when you get into the playoffs, single elimination. You're going to run into a team that has answers for you. I don't know if you display enough faith in your quarterback or enough faith in yourself to set aside your identity a little bit and mix in some tendency breakers. They're buckled.

I mean, your season has been derailed when you need help just to qualify for the ACC Championship game.

Not the payoff.

If you win out, you're in the payoff. Well, probably. No, not Most likely. No, not probably. If Miami wins out, they're in the playoff.

You can't say it definitively when we're talking about people's opinions.

They're 100 % in the playoff.

The rankings are opinions. They're not standards.

They are 100 % in the playoff if they win out.

If Miami wins out, they are in the playoff.

I don't know how you could say that when it's people's opinions.

I don't know how you could even open the door to that. It's Asanine. If they win out, they're in the CNP.

They don't control their own fate in the conference is what he's saying.

They can get in the playoff without being in the ACC title game.

The path to the playoff is actually easier if they don't make it to the ACC Championship game, because if they lose that game, they'll hold it against them.

That's Asanine. That's totally asinine.

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