Transcript of The Big Suey: Dave Mixes Up His Whities

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Welcome to the Big Sui, 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 man to Nowhere, Fatface, and the Habitual Liar.

This episode of the Dan Lebitard show is presented by DraftKings. Trap Kings. Trap Kings, the Crown is yours.

We are attempting to get David Samson's audio fixed, and he will be with us in moments if we do get it fixed. In the interim, I wanted to ask you guys about some the things happening in college football that I believe don't have a precedent. But you tell me if you think I have this wrong, because in a couple of places I was looking and I'm like, Man, this doesn't seem normal that before Halloween, you would have the following jobs come open at schools of some repute: Oklahoma State, UCLA, Virginia Tech, Arkansas, LSU, Penn State, Florida. That seems like a ton. In the middle of the season, buyouts, those are all programs that coaches would want the jobs. And then the other story that I saw that I was like, none of that can be real, but it's real. Lsu's governor is just saying, Oh, no. The LSUAD is not picking the next coach. Absolutely not. He's not picking the next coach. While Ed Orgeron is talking to the morning show at ESPN on Sportsmanlike and saying, not only, I'll I'll come back. I just got to go get my truck. I'll come back as Lane Kiffin's assistant if you want me to.

That seems like just total chaos, all of that, and we're halfway through the season. I have not seen, obviously, you haven't seen that with the governor and Ed Orgeron, fresh off his championship, looking better all of a sudden now that they fired Brian Kelly. But that's an inordinate number of good jobs to have open, big programs.

Dana, when you say LSU's governor, you mean the governor of Louisiana is saying that? When you say governor, like an MBA, my, I think, the owner, and then LSU has a governor of the football program.

That's weird. And he also referenced, Dan, the governor, when talking about why the AD is not going to make that choice. He referenced He's also the one who hired Jimbo Fisher at Texas A&M, and they had to pay him all that money. He's like, This guy sucks.

You have used sucks a great deal over the course of the first few minutes of this show. The governor's name, and it is the governor of Louisiana, is Jeff Landry, and the AD is Scott Woodward. Scott Woodward is not responsible for the extension that has the buyout with Jimbo Fisher, but he is responsible for initially hiring Jimbo Fisher for an enormous amount of money.

That governor, by the way, great accent. Oh, my goodness, Luke. Come on.

You're going to say thin ass.

Not only a great accent, Juju, it's exactly the way that I want my governor of Louisiana sounding, and it's exactly the quotes I want to hear him giving when he says, Oh, the AD is not making this higher. I'm going to make this higher with a bunch of important people. I just have never seen that happen before. Have any of you seen it happen before where the governor of a state comes out and says, No, my program, not the athletic director's program?

I love it. I think this is a lot of fun in our homogenous society ever more so. It's great. It's like Brad Wesley in Roadhouse. He plays by his own Woon set of laws. Well, I'm going to call the cops, he owns them, too. That's great. That makes it more fun, right? It turns it into a movie.

I know what homogenous means, but Chris was struggling with it. Can you break that down, bro?

No idea. I heard Amin say it a while ago. I thought I would sound smart.

I'm going to get richer.

I mean, Dan, you've never heard a governor talk. This is how the governor is talking about the current AD. We are not going down a failed path. I want to I'll tell you something. This is a pattern. The guy that's here now, we're not even saying by name. The guy that's here now that wrote the contract costs Texas A&M $70-some million. Right now, we have a $53 million liability. We're not doing that again. And you know what? I believe we're going to find a great coach.

Well, that sounded more like Zazlo than it sounded like the Cajun accent of the governor of Louisiana. That just sounded like the way you say Thai food. I don't think you weren't very deep in character on the Louisiana accent there.

I want to tell you something. It's a pattern.

No, it's getting worse.

No, I'm just emphasizing. I wasn't trying to do an accent. Just make sure everybody heard me.

Regionality is great. It's been taken away from college sports. It's why they mean more to the players than being a professional athlete. We need to get back to that, and I'll go extreme. What this reminds me of is my old idea that you should only be able to recruit guys from your state. Let's see who the who the best state is in college football. Let's see who the best state is for basketball and so on. As these Olympics approach, what if the NFL required that only people... The original six in the NHL for- You want to do state Olympics? For 25 years... I mean, people talk about the original six as though it was a funny little chapter in sports. It was a quarter century. There were six teams, and the Canadians won the majority of the Stanley Cups. Why? Because you had Because there were six teams. Well, but why then did the Rangers never win Stanley Cups? It's because you had negotiating rights with players within, I think, a 50-mile radius of City Center, which is his Heterical and fascinating. I don't know how anybody ever went to games in New York, except for the novelty of it, but you knew you had no chance of ever winning.

But setting that aside, yes, I would love a state Olympics. Let's do Let's see what is the best sports date. At minimum, what if you did that with the NFL? That Miami would do well, and so would Los Angeles. Yes, I mean.

Thank you, Dave. What Dave is talking about is from the olden days, the territorial pick. That's how the Royals would move from Rochester to Cincinnati, got Oscar Robinson. It wasn't because they were the worst team, whatever. It was because, Hey, he lives here, so he goes there. Same thing with the Philadelphia Warriors getting... Wilt Chamberlain is like, Yeah, because he's from Philly, so he gets to play here. The idea was that you could drum up local support if the hometown kid is there. But we found out later on, that's a dumb system, man. Let the players I can't be the only one who thought this.

When I was a kid growing up, I thought that the teams, you had to be from that city to play on that team.

You're absolutely right. You are that dumb.

No one else thought that growing up. Put it on the poll at Lebitard Show. When you were growing up, did you think that the players from your local professional team had to all be from that city? Yes or no? As I'm looking in the corner of our show today, and seeing this particular section of the Metalark Media Network, Lebitard and Friends Network, I don't believe that any entity that talks or makes things for a living has two people more different than Dave Dameschek, a Football America, and Juju Gadi, Ali U. I believe that between the two of them, we have two people who are wildly different, one of them perpetually references releasing movies from the 1970s. It is not Juju. It is Dave Damosheck. If you want movies like Heaven Can Wait and other coverage of movies from the 1970s, Football America A Monday and Friday's for You, Alley-oop, whenever important basketball things happen.

Tell me- Roadhouse was almost released in the '90s, Dan. It wasn't the '70s, it was 1989. Please.

Dave, I'm going to need to get you some help, okay? One thing you need to stop doing is interrupting Amin. Another thing you have to stop doing is saying, Amin, here, you can talk now. We'll handle that part, all right? Just allow us to handle the part where we're talking when we're supposed to talk.

I find it quite charming, actually. I like it, too.

Giving you permission to talk?

Yes, the gentleman across the aisle. I felt like I was in Congress.

Way more concerned about staying on the right side of Cash Patel. No offense, Dan.

He's not Cash Patel anymore. You got to keep up here with his costume changes.

I'm Intrepid Journalist Amina Mohaassen, working on stories, Uncovering Truths with Pablo Tori, who's coming on later on the show. Thank you, Pablo.

Pablo is coming on later in the show. Have we lost David Samson for good? We're trying to get his audio right. The Pablo Torre Finds Out has also been covering a lot that's Belichick related. I just wanted to read you guys the quote from Belichick because One of the Pablo Torre Finds Out reports recently was doing a deep dive on Mike Lombardi that I think a lot of people are going to find super interesting. He's just doing stuff that nobody else is doing. Belichick is objecting to a number of different things that are coming out about his team. And the quote that he's given here recently, he just lost in overtime to Virginia. Virginia has played three overtime games this season. Belichick lost going for a two-point conversion at the end in overtime I'm sure there's a lot of other people that want to get clicks and views and posts on my face or whatever, but it's just a bunch of garbage. This is his move, right, to just call it my face all over, just to keep merging-Mismissive. Myspace, FaceTime, Instagram. But I think that's- InstaToc. I think that's the first time he's gone my face.

I think he hasn't done Insta talk, but he's done a number of them. I think my face is not something that's made an appearance before. Your thoughts, Zazlo, because you were at North Carolina.

I was listening. I could hear any whispers of scandal. I didn't hear anything, though.

I have an update from David, by the way. He wrote, Everything is broken. Bleep it. I'm furious. Good vibes from David this morning.

I feel bad.

I saw him. He was struggling.

He's having a tough time. He's making time that he does not have for our show, and then he can't get his equipment to work. He's just going through it in a way that's just unholy. I feel super bad for everything that's happening with David Samson. You can check out nothing personal as he continues to work through really horrific heartbreak and pain because he really does care about his audience. I mean, I wanted to talk to you about the Phil Jackson news that came out yesterday where he was talking about, among other things, he's selling a book here. I don't know how much damage Phil Jackson did to his legacy at the end, but it is hard to go from winning as many championships as he did to being the guy who falls asleep on the subway and runs the Knicks into the ground, and they only get repaired after he leaves. The quotes that were excerpted from his book are about how the relationship with Carmelo Anthony was totally unsalvageable, unfixable, and that he just decided to up and go because they couldn't get along.

Yeah. The book, by the way, which is called Masters of the Game: A Conversational History of the NBA in 75 Legendary Players. It's not about his Nick's tenure, but the excerpts that have come out via the New York Post are obviously the nick related stuff. And it's disparaging to Carmelo. It's making it seem like the relationship was broken largely because of Carmelo. Carmelo, for his part, he thinks Phil Jackson is the reason why he didn't finish his career as a nick. He said, I wanted to stay, and they pushed me out. Jim Dolan and the owner of the Knicks and Phil Jackson had a very specific conversation about, We need to Carmelo Anthony if we're going to rebuild this thing. So I wouldn't say it's shocking. It's what we already assumed happened, but it's just a little bit more detailed from Phil Jackson's perspective.

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Don Levatard.

It doesn't matter anywhere. We could do it in Buffalo or Baltimore, either. He said you could do it where? Anywhere. Oh, whoa. No, that's crazy. That's crazy. That's crazy. He said he could do it anywhere. That's crazy. Murder. Tell him.

Stugatz.

I had no idea if Mena had that in his locker.

That might be his best. I'm not kidding. That's crazy killer. It's two America's dead. You don't get it?

This is the Dan Levatard Show with the Stugats. I was mentioning before because Bill Simmons was super defensive on behalf of the legacy legacy of Bill Belichick, and that Bill Belichick's legacy will not be impacted by this ending because history doesn't remember the punctuation. History remembers the statement before the punctuation, and Phil Jackson's legacy, obviously, is golden forevermore. But if you're someone like Phil Jackson or Bill Belichick who wants to keep working in his '70s, what good is a legacy being untarnished if you actually get jobs that you want anymore despite your legacy? You can tell me it's not going to impact the way that you think about someone 100 years from now, but while they're living right now and they can't work in their business anymore because the ending is such a disgrace that Belichick can't work in the pros anymore and that Phil Jackson couldn't get a job right now if he wanted.

That's why it is going to affect Belichick's legacy. That's exactly what... Phil Jackson could have kept coaching after the Lakers if he wanted, could have any job he wanted. A matter of fact, when he wanted that, Nick's front office job, he got it. Belichick can't get an NFL job.

I think both of them are proof that you can tarnish your legacy. It's nothing is untarnishable if you f up as much as they did. With Phil Jackson, he could have kept coaching the Lakers. You know why he wasn't a coach at the Lakers or any other coaching job? Because Phil Jackson wanted to coach home games only. All right, bro. You got to know when to hang it up and step back at that point. He became a head of a front office with zero front office experience. He talks about, Oh, I didn't want to hire Derek Prischer. I went to hire Tony Bennett. But Tony Bennett wouldn't do it because his kid was in high school. I'm like, Buddy, that's the job. That's the job. But he didn't know, he didn't understand the job. So to me, it's a great corollary, Dan, between the two of them. The only way I think we remember them kindly, sadly, is after they're dead. But as As long as they're alive, all we're going to remember is how it went down.

I think you guys are overstating the dent that this puts into Phil Jackson. The Knickerbockers are, to me, just an afterthought. I mean, he did it with the Bulls and the Lakers, as you know, Bill Belichick has really wrecked his legacy, in my opinion. It now stands to me if on either side of Tom braided, he was a mediocre coach, mildly successful, I guess, with the Browns. But in total, yeah, Belichick has really done some damage. And obviously, people want to genuflect to him, legend and all of that. But the stuff with the woman is weird, and that also dents his legacy.

Let me ask you a question, Dave. Is it your opinion? I'm not talking about public opinion, your opinion, that Bill Belichick maybe wasn't that great of a coach?

That is exactly what I am saying. The magic of Tom braided is hard to put your finger on what exactly he figured out about pro football that made him thrive and win over. I'm not saying Belichick was a passenger along for the ride, but he was really playing at the fringes when the bulk of the work was being carried by Tom braided.

Clearly. Belichick He's been a coach in the NFL for 10 years, minus Braady. One playoff went.

One. Braady wasn't coaching the defensive side of the ball, though. So there has to be some like, All right, Belichick did something. It wasn't just Braady doing everything. But Braady went somewhere else.

But, Katie then went somewhere else and won.

This is amazing. Katie won a Super Bowl 13 to 3. That's not Katie winning that Super Bowl.

I feel like we're really oversimplifying everyone's contributions. That first Super Bowl, when they beat the Rams.

One shutdown pass the entire postseason for Tom braided that year that they won the Super Bowl.

He was just an incredible defensive mind, and they put together some solid offenses. Also, remember the Matt Cassel year? Am I the only one who Was it Matt Cassel year?

When they didn't make the playoff? Yes, I do remember that one.

The Dolphins year.

Absolutely. Quarterbacks, when you have the man, and he's still on his rookie deal, as has been often discussed, you can really load up on defense, and that's what's going to carry the day. There have been a number of guys in the 21st century who are high in QBs who won Super Bowl's more because of the defense. Russell Wilson, Ben Rothsberger, the first one against the Seahawks, and Tom braided, that first Super Bowl against the Rams. Of course, that one is stained by the Spygate stuff, and there's Deflategate, and there are a number of the TB12 stuff and everything else. I think there's all a stink on that entire Patriots era, as glorious as it was for Boston sports fans. I think it will loom and it's not what's going to be in 100 years. Right now, it has a stink on it.

Tony finds out. What gave me 30 seconds of him talking, he's biased. He's absolutely biased as a Pittsburgh Steeler fan. Talking about stuff from 2003, 2004, when you were in the running for making Superbles. Dude, I hear it. That's it. Tony found out. Dave Damosheck, bias.

What Dave Damosheck is saying is that Bill Belichick should have checked himself before he wrecked himself. That's it. That's it. And you can bet on that.

I don't think that's what I was saying.

It seems to be your signature line. You have said, though, you have declared that the legacy is indeed wrecked. I I just don't know what value a legacy has. If it's not going to be wrecked 10 years from now, but right now, when you want things that cash in on your legacy, you're not someone who can actually cash in on your legacy.

Cash Patelhassen is what my name is. Dan, the reality is... I think you just hit the nail on the head. Let me take this all so I can differentiate that I'm not Cash Patelhassen right now. I'm Emuno Hassen. The reality is, legacies don't matter. They don't matter if they only come posthumously. Pete Rose, if he goes to the Hall of Fame, who cares? He didn't get to enjoy that. That's really what it's all about. That's why I think it is something that you need to be cognizant of as you're an older individual in sports is not doing things that have the potential to ruin it. I think Phil Jackson, it's not just the failures with the Knicks, Dave. It's also like the LeBron's posse stuff. It's a lot of out of touch, old generation white guy stuff that he said that really mucked it up. If he had just been a failure, a great example is Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan, by all accounts, was a failure as a basketball executive and as a basketball owner. He's still Michael Jordan, though. So when it's Insight to Excellence, I'm there. Phil Jackson can't have an Insight to Excellence segment on national TV because everyone's going to be, they're not the dude that was saying that LeBron just has his boys around and That's it.

So that's the part that I think is the corollary with Belichick. I think Belichick's failure is one thing. I think the bigger thing is like, you're making an ass out of yourself with this girl and all that stuff. And that's the part that really threatened it. If he was just merely like, Oh, he's not winning anymore, I think that wouldn't be quite as crazy. Another example, I know I'm rambling here, but I was thinking about Larry Brown. Larry Brown, Hall of Fame career, legacy of jumping from city to city coach. His last couple of jobs were all in college, and he coached a high school team. But it's Larry Brown. Nobody says-He loves basketball. Exactly. That's all that comes out. Larry Brown loves basketball. He wasn't wildly successful towards the end of his career. We just give him that grace. I think it's the handle portion of it that does a lot of the tarnishing.

Well, but one of the things that Damosheck is saying here that I do think bears repeating, Phil Jackson is 11 championships. It's not seven with one quarterback. It's 11 championships.

Two different places. Eleven championships, ladies and gentlemen, with Michael Jordan, Shaquille O'Neill, and Kobe Bryant. It wasn't the same quarterback the whole time. It was still Hall of Fame, elite, elite, elite talent. And don't get it to us. And Dan Lebitard, you, of all people, should remember, coaches, if you don't have players, what are we talking about? This is talent-driven business.

Okay, but hold on. He got to the Lakers and took over a team that had Shaquille O'Neill Keelanio and Kobe Bryant.

They weren't any good. They hadn't won. They weren't any good. They had 57 games. They hadn't won the Championship. Oh, wow.

They hadn't won the Championship. Guys, you can't do that. You can't act like, Oh, my God, what are we going to do? How do we play basketball? Phil Jackson comes in and says, Give it to the big guy. What a genius. We never would have figured that out. Look, I'm not trying to discount his contributions. What I'm trying to do actually is the same thing for Belichick. It's like, yes, these guys put great talents in positions to be successful, but we cannot just throw away the idea that they had great talent to begin with.

Let me do this with you guys then and just do a thought experiment with you because you mentioned Larry Brown, and obviously, Obviously, that Pistons team responsible for one of the great upsets in basketball over Shaq and Kobe. That was a team that didn't have a star. And so Larry Brown gets forever credentials based on winning something that had Chauncey Billups or Ben Wallace as the best player on the team. When I ask you, give me the coach with the greatest pedigree of championships- Joe Gibbs. Who has done it with an assortment of talent that you would not consider great talent, who's the top of the pyramid, who doesn't do it with the Michael Jordans and Shacks where you're winning multiple championships because Larry Brown is one championship, but you're winning... That's a good one. Joe Gibbs is a good one because who was- Bob Knight. Who was... He had- Spolstra. He had Isaiah Thomas, right? I don't think anyone... Larry Brown is going to be somebody who obviously goes to the top of this list in terms of winning without a superstar player. But when we talk about multiple championships or a coach that has an unimpeachable record because you're looking at that coach and saying, Well, I don't know how he did it with multiple teams and not Shaquille O'Neill and Kobe and Michael Jordan.

Rick Carly.

I was just about to say that one. That's a great That's a great one.

Dirk Nowitzke would like a word.

Yeah, but he was old at that point.

He wasn't that old.

He was old.

He wasn't old.

He did it with JJ Burrear back in down LeBron.

That's a good nominy. He did it last year with the Pacers that no one likes. I thought we thought about championships, my bad.

They were on the precipice of work.

Well, I was actually asking I'm not asking about multiple championships, right? I was asking- Whiting Ford?

Who is asking that? Whiting Herzog. Whiting Ford. Whiting Herzog. I got my old baseball player.

That is Whiting's mixed up.

Old Whiting's mixed up. What is that, Stan? Okay. I'm sorry, Dave. I'm going to have to do this again to you. Oh, no. Again? I'm sorry.

Leading the league in penalty. Minor penalty, two minutes for tripping the entire show.

You can't get your Whiting from. Get your Whiting's right. You're supposed to be an expert. Look at you. You got to be an expert in whitey.

Dave, your whiteies need to be more tidy.

Kicking yourself out? Kicking him out, dude.

He's going, too. No, he's taking him. He's taking him to the penalty box as Cash Patel. Look at- What happened here? What happened to your headset? What happened to your helmet? Why are you falling apart physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually?

Listen, being a race car driver, it's not as easy as it looks.

I didn't know you were bald, brother.

Juju, I told you those costumes are harder to do. He's going to be exhausted by the time he leaves here. You keep telling me I'm tone deaf because I said that I get headaches whenever it is that I have to wear the costumes. In my meager defense, by the way, because many of you have pointed out, really, Leventard, you got a headache because you wore a suit. The headache was because I was wearing those Bad Bunny glasses and trying to read with them, and I can't, and my eyesight is bad. When I was trying to read, I was having all sorts of problems. Also, the Bad Bunny gloves made it so that I whispered to Louis, and it went out over the air, Get me the Brian Kelly dancing video, because the gloves-The glove, you pressed the wrong button because of the gloves.

No, it was fat.

My glove finger was fat, and it didn't press the button, the talk back correctly. It's one of the many things that gave me a headache. I'm making an assortment of excuses, but it is harder, correct, than you would think it is. You're going to be more tired. Where are you going this weekend as part of your college football coverage?

I have a really busy day today, too, because I'm on ESPN tonight also, and I can feel the headache coming on because of this helmet and the weird ear plugs that I'm wearing. Tomorrow, I'm going to Jacksonville, world's largest outdoor cocktail party, Florida, Georgia. I'm very excited about that.

I don't want to make this easier, but I would be fine if you held it under your arm the whole time, because that's how I picture a race car driver. They have the helmet under their arm. No, helmet on the whole time? What do you guys think?

Whatever, man. I'm all right for now. Don't worry about me.

Don Lebetard.

You're getting started on the Breakfast Flaw. Oh, man.

I've been singing a song to myself all morning while I'm like, Breakfast Flaw.

Stugats.

Have you never heard the Breakfast Flaw song?

No. Hit me with it. Okay.

I wish I had some Breakfast Flawn. Breakfast Flawn. Where can I find a breakfast like that?

This is the Dan Levatard Show with the Stugats. What are your thoughts about the SEC that I believe has been exposed in recent weeks and is being carried by Texas A&M, which is clearly good, but Texas A&M wasn't what we were expecting to be at the top of that conference. We were expecting Georgia to look more like Georgia, Alabama to look more like Alabama. You've got Vanderbilt and Missouri able to beat those schools, able to play close games against those schools, and last weekend, okay? Because Texas really labored and barely won. They're not good. They're just not good. We're just saying flatly that Texas is not good. They're not good. Texas ends up laboring, and Georgia ends, or Alabama ends up laboring when you're talking about South Carolina and Mississippi State. Those are supposed to be the dormats in the conference.

Yes, South Carolina stinks. Mississippi State's sneaky, decent team, even though they have not won a conference game in two years. I know it sounds stupid.

Wait a minute. Can you be, put it on the poll at Levitard show, can you be a sneaky, decent Decent team when you haven't won a conference game in two years?

He's right about that, though. They're always in the mix. They're always playing. It's like, Oh, they're only down seven to Tennessee.

Dan, look at these.

They lost in overtime to Texas last week. They lost by two to Florida on a late interception the week before. And a couple weeks before that, they lost in overtime to Tennessee. I'm telling you, Dan, this is a decent team is in a state.

Zazlo, listen to me.

You know about Starkville?

Billy Napier got fired for the indignity of playing a close game against Mississippi State.

They were going to go to the buy, Dan. Timing was perfect.

You know, he's the third coach in the last five years to get fired after beating Mississippi State. Usually, you don't get fired after a win. Two of them, it was Jimbo Fisher, Billy Napier. The other one was the end of the season. That one's a little bit of a cheat. It happened three times after beating Mississippi State.

But that's not Sneaky Decent. That's a team that hasn't won a conference game in two years and has gotten three coaches fired for playing close games against them. Not losing to them.

I'm not retracting. I'm sticking with it. Sneaky. You can put that on my tombstone. Mississippi State, 2025. Sneaky Decent team.

Why would you want that on your tombstone?

Because I own that take.

That's fresh. But why would anybody want that on their- You know what?

Hang on a second. Mississippi State, Sneaky Decent Team, copyright.

Only thing that doesn't suck, apparently, according to Zaz, Mississippi State.

I'm trying to expand my vocabulary, all right?

All right, let's cover this. Just to be clear, Derek Jeter, sucks. Oh, my God. Mississippi State, decent.

Sneaky.

Phil Jackson, sucks. Mississippi State, decent. Sneaky. What was the other thing that you said, sucked? You said something else, Sucked. I think there were three Suck.

The helmet?

I mean, definitely yesterday, I told you, Charlotte Horn, suck.

Well, they do. That is quite the miracle, though, that Michael Jordan did pull off being the owner of the Hornets who haven't won a playoff game in 10 years and a playoff series in more than 20. No effect to the legacy. None whatsoever. You're overseeing what is a cataclysmic effort by your basketball team. Half the teams make the playoff, the salary cap and equality reward that when you're bad, you get good. Not Michael Jordan, but he gets insights into even though he hasn't sniffed them in more than 25 years.

He's excellent. I'm not going to stand here and have you just disparage the good name of the greatest to ever lace them up.

I have to jump in here to announce this. Michael Jordan, the all-time greatest of his sport. Mario Lemieux, though, stands as the most significant figure to one franchise in North American sports history because Because as opposed to Michael Jordan, as soon as he retired, he saved the franchise by then purchasing the franchise and then winning three more Stanley Cups. When they needed him to do it, he put the sweater back on and returned to the ice. There has never been anyone more significant than that. However, let me just say, Michael Jordan, that was a different job. He was a player, then he became an exec. Are we dinging Tom braided from going from football player to broadcaster/executive? I I think we are getting to that place.

To that note, we never talk about Tom braided and the Raiders. What happened? What happened there?

It's coming.

I thought everything will be different now. Are we going to fix everything? You're going to save everything. Tom braided, you're a genius? What happened? We don't even mention it. We don't even bring it up.

Mississippi State is 14th out of 16 teams in the SEC.

I'm glad you didn't say sneaky decent. You would owe me some money.

On your tomb tombstone.

That's how copyright works, Dan.

Copyright. You guys are just deal it first. Copyright.

On your tombstone.

I'll tell you what, they're going to win this week. They're going to beat Arkansas. First conference win, two years. And then you all are going to be like, Wow, that He had it first. That's right. I did.

They didn't win a conference game with Mike Leach before he passed away, or was he the last winner of a conference game there? Because when When Lane Kiffin and Mike Leach went to the SEC, God, this seems like a charming quaint time a million years ago, but before Oklahoma and Texas went to the SEC, brought all their reputation to the SEC, and now the SEC stinks. Mike Leach and Lane Kiffin went to the SEC, and those are perfect jobs for those guys because there are no expectations. What a great job for Lane Kiffin that he's just as good as some of those teams at the top of that conference, and we're giving and assigning him all the credit for beating teams that aren't that good because any time they win a game on the road, we're giving Lane Kiffin all of the credit for having at the quarterback position, one of the great names in all of sports, Trinidad Chamblas.

In 2023, Dan, Mississippi State won at Arkansas, seven to three. They're going to beat Arkansas again. This weekend.

Wait a minute. So the last win by the sneaky, decent Mississippi State was a 7-3 win against Arkansas. And you won on your tombstone the copyrighted knowledge that they are a sneaky, decent team. That's right.

No one's going to be laughing when they get that first SEC win this weekend. They're like, Wow, Zazlo. Thanks a lot. Hot tip. You're welcome.

Zaz, how you feel about the Florida Gators going against the Georgia Bulldogs this weekend?

Can they have a chance? I think they're going to keep it close in the first half. It could get away from them in the second half. Gators defense elite. All right. But boy, they're not good this year. Maybe they play for their new coach. I don't know.

How good is Texas A&M, though? Because for all of this money being spent on coaches and buyouts, what does it tell you when Mike Elko is leaking in there and he's nobody's favorite coach? But clearly, Texas A&M is the best team in that conference. There's not a dispute about that. We've all been unimpressed impressed by whatever it is that Alabama and Georgia are now, even though they could both be playoff teams. Nobody has been impressed by how it is any of those schools look, and everyone's been impressed by what Texas A&M is.

Well, the irony with college sports has become that the way to close the gap on the heavyweights is with NIL, which is the opposite of why baseball has the Dodgers so hated because they spend more than everybody else. The sneaky fact with Lane Kiffin and Kurt Signetti and otherwise is they've closed the gap. By the way, Kurt Signetti, a good name to add to your list of coaches who win without stars, but they both are able to add stars that they wouldn't have been able to get a decade ago because of the NIL age.

I don't think there's any reason You don't pay the coach like that anymore. Like these buyouts and the coaches, you don't have to pay them like that. If you're going to just give somebody... If Andrew Luck is going to come to your program and bring you a donor who says, I'll give you $50 million as he's done, isn't that what you want more than anything? If I say to anyone listening to this, what do you want right now? Given what you've seen from Brian Kelly and James Franklin, and given that the top of the sport now has Signetti and Mike Elko in it, if I say to you, What would you rather have? I guess nick Saban would be an outlier here because most people are just going to say, I'd rather have nick Saban.

Kirby's smart, too.

What would I rather have? Would I rather have somebody who simply brings me $50 million donor by virtue of running my athletic department? Or do I want the coach who's going to be whatever, leadership guy that creates a program, but I'm guaranteed nothing. These buyouts, what are some of the numbers being thrown out on just the buyout figures that we've had this year in the amount of money that's being paid to coaches to not coach?

Between three guys, been $170 million that have been fired. And then I see with that, Oh, that's a quarter billion dollars.

But you can spend that money so much better. If I were just to say, You know what? I'm just going to have somebody who oversees this and is somebody who raises money, and I'll have my coordinators handle it, and I'll spend the money on players. I'd rather spend it on players. In the pros, you wouldn't be telling me to go spend the money on the coach. You'd be telling me to spend the money on the players.

The previous record for buyouts combined in a season was 118 million, and we've already hit 170 million, to Tony's point, with three months left in the season.

But then what you're describing is, again, the professionalization of college football, which is when you don't have to spend on the labor, I got all this extra money. So yeah, I'm going to spend on nick Saban and all these guys. But as you put it, in the NFL, I got to spend on labor. I only got so much I could spend on coaching, and that's what's happening. So now that the labor is getting money, you don't need to pay as much as the coaches.

What an interesting thing to live through, just to watch it happen. It wasn't that long ago that Ta-Nehisi Coates was writing for The Athletic about, or No, it wasn't Tana Hasey Coates. That was reparations. What are you saying? You understand how I make the connection between injustices. But where they were just talking about how ridiculous it is that the NCA had the rule system that it has in place and everything is caved in in the last five years.

I'm all over Mississippi State plus four.

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