Transcript of The Big Suey: Chris Fowler's Game Prep (feat. Chris Fowler, Pablo Torre, Amin Elhassan, and Jason Tache)

Welcome to the Big Suey, presented by DraftKings. Why are you listening to this show? The podcast that seems very similar to the other Dan Lebitard podcast.

I'm sorry. I'm not going to apologize for that.

In fact, the only difference seems to be this imaging. I have been tempted in restaurants just walking past tables to grab somebody's fries if they're just there. That hasn't happened to you guys?

I've done it. And now, here's the marching band to nowhere, Fatface and the Pitchou a Liar.

This episode of the Dan Levitard Show is presented by DraftKings. Draftkings, the Crown is yours.

Chris Fowler will be here in a little while. Dominic Foxworth, at some point, will be here. We've got an assortment of guests crashing the proceedings at various points during the next couple of hours. In the interim, though, can you do me the favor, please, of playing the sound of show friend, nick Turturo, a brother of John Turturo, friend of the show, nick Turturo, just going crazy because the Dodgers also, at $60 million a year for four years, have Kyle Tucker, 45th in war.

You're going to be kidding me.

Kyle Tucker to the Dodgers? I thought he was going to be a fucking Met, of all things. What if we're looking at a three-peat now? You, what's going on? Mlb, do something. Enough is enough.

Everyone agrees. Is that the entire Marlins payroll? Did they just give- About 80 %. 80 % of the Marlins payroll?

I think the Marlins right now have 76 million committed to players on their Major League roster for next season, and he just got 60 to be their fourth best offensive player.

Loved him on NYPD Blue.

Chris Fowler is going to be here in a second. But the Harbaugh stuff, we haven't actually talked about it very much around here. The idea that Harbaugh wouldn't even be in any way interested in the Dolphins.

Steven Ross didn't go on my idea.

Or available to the Dolphins. Your idea of 50 million. Oh, he'd been available. 50 million a year? He He got 20 million a year. Zaz wanted to pay him 50 million a year.

He would have been made available, I assure you.

I mean, he would have been for 50? Yeah, he would have been here.

I'm not saying that they should have given Harbaugh 50. What I'm saying is if I had Steven Ross's money, if I wanted something, I would get it.

This is Exactly how I imagine the backdrop behind Chris Fowler would be. Just a nice house. Just impossibly slick, just impossible. All of the details handled, not a thing out of place, not a hair out of place. You're already ready. You're ready for this giant game, the most seismic game in the history of games, are you not?

You did a fast cleanup, man. There were shoes and packages over there by the door. I promise you, it's not tidy like this all the time. I'm trying to get ready. My chart's a long way from being full, Dan, but I've still got time.

Well, people probably don't understand how meticulous you are or what it takes to be as good as you are at calling this particular game. In all of the research that you've been doing, Chris, without giving away your best material, what are the things that you find most interesting, most unique to your experience covering college football about this game?

Well, the collision of the stories. I mean, Indiana has three postseason wins in their history. They began playing like an 1890 something. Coming into this year. They have three already and trying to get it to get a third win against Miami, 100 to one at the start of the season. People think, Oh, Indiana was good last year. This is not that surprising. We're 100 to one win a Championship at the beginning of the year. Miami was a hundred to one on Selection Sunday. People do not think they're going to get in the bracket, much less win it. So you got a really interesting collision of stories. Obviously, I could throw a mountain of data at you because that's part of the preparation. I knew Indiana was good, by the way. I prepped for the Rose Bowl. I watched seven Indiana games in the regular season because we don't cover the Big Ten in the regular season. And what jumped out at me was how solid they are. It didn't surprise me they crushed Alabama or Oregon. Nothing would surprise me from this team. I will not underestimate Indiana, as some Miami fans are still doing.

But no, it's It's the collision of these two stories and Miami trying to win a championship with a fifth different coach, which is pretty cool. And it's a home field game, not a home crowd game for the Canes. There's so many different angles to this thing. It's fun.

Obviously, historically, Indiana has an improbability, they would always be mozzarella. But have you encountered a lot of situations where the eight and a half point underdog doesn't get... The eight and a half point underdog with two losses playing the undefeated team doesn't get to be Cinderella.

No, I don't know who's Cinderella is, but it's definitely not Indiana. I mean, not at this point. I mean, the 100 years of futility has been convincingly wiped away here. It's first after first after first. And now that number has just been going up. So Vegas sets the number, and then the public agrees that Indiana is going to roll through this game, and that number just keeps climbing. So Cristobal has always told me that Miami has 20 years of hatred as fuel. Now they get a little more fuel because people don't believe on their home field that they can hang with the Hoosiers.

What do you think?

They better play clean. They better not make mistakes like they did against Ole Miss. Don't drop for interceptions. Don't have major penalties on defense, giving the offense a free 15 yards. Don't have false starts, moving your offense back five yards. You can't do that stuff because Indiana is not going to make mistakes, typically. And unless you can get them out of their pattern, it's frightening efficiency. That's what you see when you dive into the numbers, man. In every situational deal, third down, off the charts, red zone, off the charts. They don't commit turnovers. They take the ball away, they don't commit penalties. I mean, there are a bunch of 24, 25-year-old guys who played four, five, and six years of football. They just don't make mistakes. So Miami, you better not.

It's a crazy thing to say. So they'll go about 25% of the time RPO. They'll go back shoulder throws. You're expecting to see no mistakes from them offensively because Mendoza's 22 TD, zero interceptions in the red zone?

I'm not expecting to see that because Championship games have a weird dynamic, as we know, in any sport. A little bit static on the brain. People do things they haven't done all season because of the pressure. He seems pretty immune from that, But this is a Championship game, and it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for him. For a lot of those guys who have paid their dues and been very poised under pressure, I still think there's the possibility that you could have a mini meltdown from one team or the other. I've seen Peyton Manning choke in a Super Bowl. Not regularly, but it happens. And if that's possible, anything's possible in a football field. But if he plays the same way he played against Oregon, Mendoza put the ball exactly where it had to be. I've never seen ball placement quite like that against a pretty damn good defense with pretty tight coverage a lot of times. And it was exactly where it had to be. And it is undefendable in the way that Aaron Rodgers in his prime would put the on a spot. It doesn't matter how good the coverage is. It doesn't matter if the DB is an all-pro.

You can't defend it. At a college level, there have been games I've watched from Mendoza and Indiana's offenses like that.

You're down here, Chris. Is anyone hitting you up for tickets?

Yeah, the smart ones did so two months ago. I posted the prices for these tickets in the aftermarket, trying to discourage people. If you haven't called me by now, don't call. Yes, I've bought a lot People didn't get free tickets. I bought a number of tickets to various people, and the face price is 1400. So that's why the ticket prices are high with the scalpers, because the CFP is not letting the scalpers make all the money. The face price is pretty high.

Who's the historical comp on Mendoza? Not necessarily story. I'm talking about that collegiate accuracy.

Good question. I mean, Andrew Luck is pretty damn accurate. He's one of the most accurate guys that I saw, and his cerebral sense of what to do pre-snap, Mendoza lines up with that. He's a savant guy. I mean, so is Carson Beck. Carson Beck considers himself elite and mentally processing. He considers himself PhD savant level, and other coaches who've coached him and coached against him would agree with that. Beck's career is still undervalued, and Mendoza's burst on the scene as a guy that didn't beat a ranked team at Cal, no disgrace. He didn't have great teammates around him. So his rise has been meteoric in one season. And that's why I think there's still people who are waiting for him to come crashing down to Earth. And they thought it was going to be at Oregon or the last drive against Penn State, or Ohio State, or Alabama. He's just passed every test with an A. And the fact that he's down here playing the program that didn't recruit him. His dad played high school ball with Cristobal, as I'm sure a lot of your audience knows, it's just an incredible collision of stories down here that you really couldn't script.

Chris, what do you think the national reputation of Mario Cristobal the ball is.

It's improving. I'll tell you that. Because when they took a loss November 1, and I'm going to admit, when they lost at SMU in the first game of November, I'm thinking, Man, I know the history here. I know Mario's teams fade down the stretch. They don't get stronger and better when it's winning time late in the season, which is what you have to do if you're going to be in their position they're in now. And he turned that around. He got his guys to embrace the urgency, to embrace the pressure. They're obviously, as you know, played playoff games really since the beginning of November, went on the road for the last two of the regular season, played their best ball, went on the road at A&M in Dallas, in Phoenix, and played great games every time. I mean, not good enough to win. Gritty, tough, resilient games. And I think that people are now seeing him manage the game a little bit better. These situational opportunities he's had, which were not always his strength. I think Mario has grown tremendously as a coach this season, and especially the second half of this season. I don't know you guys think, but I think that's what I think.

And I think, nationally, people starting to see that he's got some great qualities as a coach. He hires great assistants. Heatherman was a great hire as DC, and I think he's made solid hires. And he's obviously always been a very strong recruiter, developer of players at certain positions. And now I think it's all come together. And I think that this run has reshaped what the national narrative is about Mario.

Mike, the last couple of days have been getting a lot of applause from UM fans. Caine's Insight is blowing up because Mike Ryan represents the voice of the fan. I just want an impartial national voice like you, Chris Fowler. Mike's been yelling at me because he thinks I have not been supportive of Miami. I'm just curious what your thoughts are when I tell you that Miami fans think I've been and am anti-Miami.

Well, I know you, Dan. You could be seen as anti because you didn't what? Jump on the bandwagon? I mean, have you changed your opinion? Have you changed your opinion in the last two months?

Well, but how could you not? They've won the three biggest games that they played in 20 years in a row, one of them as an underdog.

I just got done saying there were reasons to doubt November first after they lost SMU because it was some same old stuff, man. A ruffing the passer, a marginal call, maybe. But it prolonged SMU's drive. They don't lose that game if they don't commit that penalty. I thought that was a bad sign. But they've rallied together, guys like Mark Fletcher, Priceless leadership, Bane, Mesador. You got a lot of wise, older, experienced players. You got a guy like Tony who seems like he's 28, even though he's barely 18. So the ingredients on this team were there. If you didn't notice it from the outside, it's because you don't have that access, me included. I didn't know what to expect from this group, but they responded spectacularly. They played great football. They've been resilient within these games, and here they go. Now they're being counted out, not given a chance on their home field. World. If they play smart football, they can win. I think they present problems from Indiana that other teams have not. The pure physicality, we can go on and on. But I believed in this team. I was doubting after the SMU game, for sure.

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Don Levatard. Jess, you can't talk about double-digit national titles when every single call of you winning the national title sounds like this. Oh, there's Chubby Checker running down this island. If the audio- That's not true. Yeah. And there's a World War II veteran pitching into another white guy, and he avoids another white guy. Oh, my God. Notre Dame, the Fighting Irish, have done it again for the eighth time ever paying white people.

Still got Chubby Checker.

I'm sorry. He's He's black. He's black, and I was really going, what's a white name? Chubby checker. I'm sorry, man. I'm improv in here. It's a pretty cool rib. I'm a white Chubby checker running down down down down. His name is Chubby. Maybe you didn't hear me correctly. His name is Chubby checkers. There's an S at the end.

I feel like that should be the largest of five.

Chubby Chaka. It sounds like a college football name.

This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugats.

Chris, for two teams that never play one another, they actually If you read between the lines, know each other quite well with Signetti having Heatherman on his staff, with Brock Schott transferring over to Indiana. I don't know if this is a game that's going to have a lot of secrets, and it probably amplifies your point about execution, no?

Yeah, I don't know what the secret shot factor is that he's going to go over there and open the playbook for him. I think if you're a coach and you're naturally paranoid, you're a little bit concerned about that. But I think familiarity is a part of it. I mean, Signetti is pretty damn good at preparation. He leaves no stone unturned. And he knows stuff that maybe we shouldn't be surprised that he knows because I really haven't covered him. But he is like a savant that way mentally. And they're going to be very prepared. I think if you're Miami and Indiana's linebacker, Aiden Fisher, was over there calling out the play before it happens, judging the formation in his tape study, you should be concerned because he's done that in games this year. He did it to Oregon twice. And I think Alabama felt like, are they stealing our signals? Is There's some way? These rumors are out there, they've hacked into the cloud. That's how prepared they are, is that people think they're cheating to do it, which is preposterous. But I mean, Signetti is going to be prepared, and he's going to be hard to fool, and his staff is, too.

Oh, we got another guest here. Oh, this is not promising. This is long-winded here, so I don't know if this is going to be short. Pablo, the University of Miami against Indiana, who are you picking?

Miami.

Okay, excellent work. That's the way we want to do that. That's my goal. Thank you, Pablo. Good contribution.

See you on the rooftop, bud. Bye, Pablo. Thank you, Pablo.

Thank you. Pablo Tori finds out the most popular sports podcast, Sort of Sports Podcast, showing right now in America as a hot new thing. I'm seeing on the screen here, it says, First take coming up, Chris Fowler joins the show.

I do join the show. That is the next assignment.

That's his hard out at 10: 00.

He's got a hard out. No, I got some time. That's a little bit later.

Okay, so he's got some time.

Chris Fowler- You're sandwiched in between Greenberg and Steven A. I don't know if you feel comfortable with that, but this is a Friday morning.

I want you as a professional broadcaster always polished. Your colleague here, ESPN Radio, Zazlo, he said this earlier in the week, I want you to translate it as a professional broadcaster.

What were the kids doing? Man, see, that's what I was afraid of. I got so much respect for Chris Fowler, and I'm embarrassed.

What was he describing here, Chris? Do you want to take any guess for what it is that he was trying to say here. What are you hearing?

I'm pretty sure it was English, but I don't get much behind that. I hear excitement. I hear enthusiasm. I hear- No, but translate this.

What is he What are you talking about?

Shit, do you want to know what were the kids doing?

I mean, not being a parent, it could mean anything. I don't know.

Okay, he doesn't have a guess, not in the world.

I mean, look, I would love to have Chris Fowler on with me and Amber Wilson on Monday for a college football campus tour. And now when he's asked, he's going to hear the name Zazla. He'll be like, why the guy doesn't know how to talk.

All right, so let's give him something else here. What is he saying here, Chris? What is your analysis? You said it's not just college football. You know professional football as well. You answer this question.

The packers win or the bears lose? The packers win or the bears lose?

I think both were wrong. So you're over two with that one.

The packers win or the bears lose? Man, it's bullshit.

But that's a legit question, don't you think? Yeah.

No, I don't think because the The packers. All right. Well, just because the game was won by the bears.

The packers win or the bears lose.

Yeah, but sometimes, Monday night, it's possible that Miami loses the game and Indiana doesn't win the game. I mean, on the scoreboard, they would, but what's the more important factor? Are your mistakes going to have a way with what the other team did? That's what I think he's trying to say.

Yeah, maybe I was using some nuance, right Chris?

I don't care what you say, man. The look over powers all the inability to communicate. I love the look, so just keep rolling.

It goes without saying that there's never been in the history of the sport, a historic sport, the Indiana story. What, in your perspective, is second place in terms of rivaling improbabilities of after this game, if they beat Miami, Chris, it's going to be hard to argue against them having the best season ever.

Yeah, not the best team ever. If you're going to look at talent, but the best season ever, because no one's done 16 or no since the 1800s, and Yale didn't have a joggernaut schedule back the year that they did it. A hundred to one preseason, despite the success last year, nobody gave them a shot. And I think it would be the postseason run that would define it. Let's say, and I don't think this happens, but let's say they crushed Miami. So a program that had won three postseason games in its history, three postseason wins, beginning with Lee Corso in the holiday ball, wins three postseason in games this run and crushes teams in the doing of that. To me, it'd be hard to argue with this because they're still the team that until this year had the most losses in FBS, had the worst winning percentage all time of any power for a team. I mean, they're not supposed to be in this position. That's why I think the storybook fits. But it's not Hoosiers, the basketball high school team, right? It's not that. It's not a bunch of 5'8 guys, wildly overachieving and and knocking off the big city school because Jean Hackman measured the hoop and it was just the same as their home gym.

It's not that. These are really good football players. They're doing it in the modern way. They're doing it with guys who have been at two, three, four schools, who are 24, 25, 26 years old in some cases, and they're using the portal, and they're using NIL in a really smart way. So it's not like they're not good. They're not a bunch of good players who are wildly overachieving. That's not what this team is. It's And the story is remarkable because of their historical futility. But the way they've used the modern tools at their disposal, which was never possible before. That's why there's no comparable. Bill Snyder turned around Kansas State, obviously long ago, and they were the worst team in history, and they became competitive and came close to playing for a national championship in the late '90s. But Signetti did it in two years. And that's what you can now do with the modern tools. And if you use them brilliantly, which he has, this thing is possible going forward. We see it in the NFL, many times a team goes from last in the division to winning the division. It's almost common now.

But in college, it's been obviously impossible.

Two last questions here. As someone who knows that you are vastly overprepared for the moment, what percentage of your prep will make it into a game? What percentage?

I'm going to lean in and grab something here, so forgive me. I'm going to show you the chart. I posted this on Instagram, but this is the chart, not for this game, because the chart for this game has got a long way to go. But this is Miami having the football. Can you see how little this writing is?

Yeah.

This is the spotter chart. This is Miami's offense on the bottom, and this is all this is defense up top. And to answer your question, yes, wildly overprepared. A fraction of that gets in the broadcast, because if a lot of that gets in the broadcast, then I've done a terrible job. I've smothered the game with data. That has a Any one-line things reminding me to get to a story that I want to tell. It has performances in key games and situations. It has a lot of data about each offense and defense, but I promise not to ruin the game by reading it on the air.

But over under 10%, 5% of the material that you have prepared that you will actually use?

I would say, because there's much more that I've actually prepared that doesn't even get on the chart. I would say under 5% of the stuff I've seen gets on the air. What gets on the chart, 10% might be a good guess.

The reason I asked the question is because this game has so many story lines that when is the last time that you went into a game saying to yourself, Oh, I'm not going to be able to get all of the great stuff into this one. I know I'm not going to be able. I've got so much stuff that I'm going to be overprepared in a way that's really ridiculous.

I think you can't be overprepared. You can just overuse your preparation to make a distinction. So I believe in being as prepared as possible, but I think that with experience, hopefully you learn a couple of things, you don't overuse your preparation. And there's different levels of that. I think that the stories are so good, Dan. And the problem is we've had some of these Championship games with teams that play tempo offenses, which is what makes college announcing more challenging than an NFL game. These offenses don't play at frenetic pace. Miami certainly doesn't. So you have an opportunity to get in stories. You got to have three things in mind when you go into these games. What is the great story of Carson Beck? How can you tell it if you had 30 seconds? How can you tell it if you had one sentence? And how can you tell it if you have five words? Because that's sometimes all you get. Now, hopefully, you get the 30-second version because he's got a long story over seven years, just like Chamblas did last week for O'Mess. And Indiana has got a lot of as you could tell, too.

But you just hope that the game flow allows you to interject something that offers a little texture and context, because that is the challenge in college football to do that with the teams playing as fast as they do sometimes. Hopefully not Monday night.

Chris, I often lay in bed watching highlights of the game broadcast because I'm at the game. And I wonder, do you do that, too? Because I sit grinning with my cell phone light reflecting off my face, watching you say, Malikai, Tony, still running. Do you watch yourself back? Do you try to listen and pick up on stuff that you did?

Yeah, but I screen the game back just for preparation anyway. A lot of what I do with preparation is watching games back that we just called because that's obviously Miami's most recent game. I watched the Rose Bowl, which we call involving Indiana. And yeah, I get excited hearing those calls. I like those moments. It's a tremendous honor, man. It's so flattering to be a part of documenting these big games and have your voice, because that's what the role calls for, laying on top of those highlights and have fans of a team tell you years down the line that they played your call of Georgia winning or Alabama winning, et cetera, over and over again. When they need a boost, when they're in a bad mood, they'll play that play, and it's your voice doing it. That's a very cool thing that I don't stop and reflect on often enough. But yeah, it's very flattering. I listen to it myself, and it gets a smile. Sometimes they're very critical, too. If I think I did a subpar job on a game, I want to listen to back right away because it usually doesn't sound as awkward as it felt.

You know you nailed it, though, on Carson Beck with his legs. You went and got that from the Nether region. I felt that. That came in from somewhere in the quads, in the hamstrings. It worked its way up through the sole when it came out.

No, I think that what you hope, though, seriously in those moments is that it just happens naturally. You can't predict these. People think, Do you script the lines? Of course, you can't script the lines. How do I know he's going to run the ball on the end? Still running. I mean, that's the last thing you think. And that's why I said it that way. The last thing you think is in a decisive moment, Carson Beck, the runner, is going to win the game. And that's why it just comes out that way, because you could actually see that if you're a Miami fan, you're probably thinking, Run, run, because you saw the space. He's still looking over here at the receiver on the right side of the field. He's got a yauning acre of grass over here to run to, and he finally spots it and goes over there and does it. And it was a three-yard run. I think it seemed like it took 20 seconds to unfold, right?

Yes. Also, though, as bad as Miami has felt over the last 20 years, it's rarely felt as bad as toward the end of that Mississippi game when you're putting your voice on. And Miami is completely unraveling. Chris, I know you got to go. Thank you for the time.

Hey, man, don't you thank fans for thinking the same thing when they're getting these personal fouls? Just don't do that Monday night. I don't like to see bad football. I mean, we just hope for a good game, the same thing all the time. I want both teams to hang in there and come down to the last position, but I don't want to see his injuries, which we've seen too many of, and bad football. Don't go jack the quarterback up. Don't club him in the head because you want to intimidate him and give the other team 15 yards when the other team is Indiana and we'll say, Thank you very much. We're headed to the red zone and the 10 zone. That's what's going to happen if Miami does that. So don't unravel Monday night, either team.

Chris, good seeing you. Thank you. I appreciate your time.

A pleasure, man. Always, Dan. Be well.

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Skoda. Dan

Levatard Show with the Stugats.

Really? Another guest is coming in to predict Miami. Oh, this is early for him. Amin, this is very early for Amin. He got up early to predict Miami, Indiana. What do you have for us, Amin?

Oh, damn. What a matchup we have. Miami, of course, had the up and down season, but they always were managing to hold and keep up with their defense. The defense has seen them through the whole year. Meanwhile, the guys on the other side, they've got the Golden Child. He's got a halo. He protects his team from all those untoward allegations. The piety helps him being leading with Christ all the time. But give respect. He's one of the very best offensive players you've seen in a very long time. Look, there's a lot of doubters in Miami. The betting lines would confirm that, but I think they're going to surprise a lot of people come Monday night. Having said that, while I do have Miami covering, ultimately, I got to go with the Warriors.

Sorry. That's not the game we were asking about.

Heated Warriors Monday night.

That's not the game we were asking about. Miami Golden State. No, I I said Miami, Indiana. You heard me say Miami, Indiana, and then you decided-They played last week. You decided to go in a different direction. I asked you about the college football game, and you decided to do basketball, and you decided to do a joke, and nobody knew what you were talking about before you held up that warrior sign, a visual joke for an audio audience.

Yeah, I said warriors. First of all, I said it out loud, the visual joke is for the visual audience.

I asked you Indiana, Miami, and then asked you about that.

They said, What was going to happen in the Miami game Monday night? And I I did all this research.

That is how we prepped him.

That's on us. I thought he was a good team. I did all this prep because the Pacers played the heat last week.

I got binders. You think Chris Fowler is the only one who does research? I got research. I do my job. I can't How can I help it if you guys are vague. Hey, who's going to win the Miami game on Monday night? Well, I'm like, Surely. They're asking me about Warriors?

All right. Thank you, Amin. Fall off me, Coach. I appreciate your time. I appreciate the contribution. I actually want to ask him a basketball question. Aren't you interested on his Ja Morant opinion? Because Barry Jackson and others, Wendy, they're reporting that a heat pursuit of Ja Morant is, quote, highly unlikely that the heat wants to cap space for 2028 when there could be good free agents. Miami has made no offer, and it's only a consideration if it's a complete giveaway by the Grizzlies, and that Memphis might want to even throw in a first. What are we doing there? There's no way that he can be had for free, correct?

Well, it depends on your definition of free. Was Trey Young acquired for free by Washington? Yes. Then I think, yes, John Marant could absolutely be had for free, if that's a definition. If that's a definition, if we're just talking about a couple of good players and no obligation in terms of draft picks or anything like that, that is pretty much for free. He's under contract. He's got two more years after this. To me, prioritizing the cap space in 2028, I think what we've seen over the last three or four years in the NBA is free agents don't get to free agency. Who's the last free agent that got to free agency? These guys are getting traded before they become free agents, and they're signing extensions. The idea of like, No, I've got to preserve all my cap flexibility to be able to go out in the market and sign somebody. Who's the somebody that's going to be available? If Ja Morant's available for Terry Rozier and Simone Fantecchio, I think you get them, and then you figure out everything afterward. I don't think you sit around and- It can't be that.

It can't be. Come on. I think it can. It can. It cannot be that. I think it can. No, there's no way it can be that.

Dan, we're at a place where his contract, combined with, obviously, his attitude issues, whatever you want to call it, and then, most importantly, his health. He has not shown the ability to stay on the floor consistently. Throughout his career, even when he was playing well, even when they were good. He's still playing around 60-some-od games a year back then. At At this point, they're looking at it as, I got to get up, what's that, 90 million, maybe $120 million of salary off the books just so I can have some breathing room to move things. They got way more than they probably should have for Devsman Bain. I think they can afford to take less for Ja Morant.

Put it on the poll. Thank you, Amin. Appreciate the time. Put it on the poll at Lebitard show. That sounds asinine to me. Can you get Ja Morant for Terry Rozier and Simone Fantecchio? That sounds asinine to me. It sounds like a joke. That sounds It's like somebody's trying to make a joke.

He's making a huge mess right now, Ja.

Zack Lo said basically the same thing. He included Casper Asiaka Chonis and a pick swap in his theoretical thing that was thrown out there. Even that on its own, you're looking at somewhere in the middle because it's a lot of money to commit to a guy who has not been on the floor.

I would push back against those reports that the Heats are trying to keep salary cap space for whatever season. That makes no sense. There's literally no such thing in this league anymore, like Amin said, as having salary cap space for free agents. That is not the way. Free agency is every single year, and it's via trade.

It would be trading into that cap space for what it's worth. That's the price.

It's not the way it works for the most part now. So I don't buy into it having gaps.

We have to respect the music. Ja, not Ja. Ja, no habling. Tony has arrived. Are you outside the Rathscaler?

Yes, Dan, I'm outside the Rathscaler.

Rathscaler.

The Rathscaler. The Rathscaler. Right now, obviously very much emptied. They're cleaning the tables inside, but I wanted to tickle you here, and I wanted to get some of your stories from the rat.

Well, that's a lot better than the condition that the rat scaler I was in was in. They put some money into that. In a concrete den, I saw Todd Klein throw a hamburger into a guy's tuba who was playing it downstairs, and the tuba made a. It was unbelievable. It was a hamburger. But it didn't look anything like that. The rat scalers now It's a beautiful place.

Can Todd Klein enter the transfer portal? We need one next season.

He had Mendoza-like accuracy. He threw from the second floor, Todd Klein threw a hamburger, and it landed in a tuba. Then we heard the marching band. We heard it ruin the note. Yeah, it was great.

Is that the only PG one you could tell? You don't have any other rated on ones you can tell?

I've got some good ones, yes, but I don't want to tell those now. The place always smelled terrible afterwards. You're not close enough smell what the Ratzgeller smells like after Miami students have gotten done with it, correct?

No, we're still... Again, this is a school, and there's people at college paid a very, very, very pretty penny to be here. So there's not really a lot of traffic footwise. So we're still waiting on the Ratzgeller to open. I think it opens maybe at 10: 30 or 11: 00. So maybe I can have a nice picture of Miller Light here once the Ratzgeller opens in.

Do me the favor of taking-in your honor. Take us in there, because I remember when I I was on the University of Miami campus 40 years ago, and I was at what was their Rec and Exercise Center. It was prehistoric. It was something that would be embarrassing to anybody who thought they were walking into a fitness facility. But what it is now is one of the most moneyed places anywhere in South Florida because they've refurbished everything on that campus. So I'm looking at that, and I can't believe what the Ratzkeller has become because it was a loner.

It's incredible. I got my hair cut on campus yesterday. They have a fully operational salon.

Shout out to Oliver over at Club. You know Miami, the football program is the reason all that money poured into that university, correct?

Yes, at least initially. U Health has done quite All right for itself, too. Since? Yeah, and real estate ventures.

Yeah, U Health is pretty big.

And this CFP run.

That's a lot of money. Thank you, Clemson and FSU. We get to keep all of it.

$20 million. The last game made $20 million for Miami. Are we going to stay with Tony as he walks around campus here? It is beautiful. It is beautiful out there. Tony, you got a nice day, too. It's cold, but not too cold.

How many dead iguanas? Or frozen over iguanas?

None right now. I was going to say they get thawed out and they're fine. So I'm going to see it says... Oh, watch out. I'm going to go, Okay, perfect. So it says, Sorry, we're closed here at the Ratskeller, but it looks like the door is maybe a little ajar that I can maybe peek my head into it and see. Do you want to send Rose in there first?

That's exactly what I said not to do, just walking in the doors without asking.

Okay, so in all transparency, Chris Cody, before I do my hit, is like, Hey, buddy, listen, you know what you do to make things great? Don't do that. And I'm like, Why? And he's like, Well, you know... So you want me to do stuff that makes it great, or do you not want me to do stuff that makes it great?

I just said Dan's done enough damage for us this week, and I need you to just play cool.

That's what I said. No, I'd like to see the inside of the Ratskeller, though.

Dan, when it opens. Dan, I'm playing it cool.

When it opens.

Clearly says closed on that door right there.

Okay, we'll wait for you.

They open at 11: 00 AM.

All right, that's fine. We'll see you in 40 minutes.

We'll check in at the beginning of the club. Yeah, we'll check in with you. Okay. Thank you. Is there anyone there that you want to interview? Anyone there that you want to get seen from, buzz from, energy from, predictions from?

Yeah, let's see. It looks like there's a guy in some sweater there. Okay, so no. That may be interesting. No, not really. Okay, It looks like a dork.

All right, good.

The problem is we're close to the School of Music. We're close to the School of Music where Sean McGill had his run-ins with the University of Miami. The problem is here, Dan, the School of Music, dorks. Everybody's a dork. Everybody's a nerd. They don't really care about the football program. We have to get to another side of town. That's even better.

Tony, that's even better. If you're on the UM campus talking to students about the University of Miami football team-Talking to dorks? And they still haven't forgiven Todd Klein for throwing a hamburger into the tuba of a bandmate 30 years ago.

They have a wanted poster. They have a wanted poster of Tom Klein in the Frost Music Department.

All right, we'll check back in with you. We will see who you have found over there, and you'll be there for the next hour. Really? Really, this is what you guys are doing. You guys, I've told you to get as many friends of the show as possible, and you've gotten Jeremy's brother. All right, Jeremy. I love this kid. All right, Jeremy's brother, Indiana or Miami, who do you got?

Of course, Dan. We're Cuban, baby. It's all about the U.

Let's go. Yeah. Okay. Dall-e.

The greatest of tachés.

He's a little more... He is a more Cuban taché, correct? I love him. No? Can we swap?

You want to see my PowerPoint?

He didn't make a whole PowerPoint.

Yeah, I would love to.

Beautiful.

All right. The Canes are going to win, baby, of course.

Fernando Mendoza, you know what he is? He's a dork, Dan.

He's a dork. You know what Ruben Bane does to dorks, Dan? He makes them meet fan.

And you know how we know this, Dan?

Because the U is going to win and because mis abuelos are from Havana, Cuba.

Let's go, baby. Yeah. Electric.