Transcript of The Big Suey: First Fake

You're listening to DraftKings Network.

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 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 Habitual Liar. Today's episode is sponsored by DraftKings. Stay tuned because you'll hear more about DraftKings and all it has to offer throughout the show. Draftkings, the Crown is yours. I walked together a dead lepetard for Christmas. Only a dead lepetard will do. No, Stu Got, Billy O'Roy. I want a dead lepetard to play with and enjoy. I want a dead lepetard for Christmas. Only a dead lepetard will do. No, Mike Wright, Lucy or Tony. I really like to get a levetard, only when I'm ever tired, he really likes to do. Mom says, Dan, will eat me up a den. Teacher says, Dan is a gluten-free human. I want to den that bit hard for Christmas. Only then that bit hard will do. None of the Cody's, not even smetting. I really like Dan Lepetard, only Dan Lepetard to me likes to do. This episode of the Dan Lepetard Show is brought to you by Smirnoff. We Do Game Days. Please drink responsibly, the Smirnoff Company, New York, New York.

That song, both strange and self-involved, not unlike our next guest, Pablo Torre finds Out is the name of the very popular podcast that nick Wright calls the World's Most Expensive Podcast. We will get to that in a second. But Pablo, I need your help with Andrew Hawkins and Amine, both of whom say, and they've shown it, they've proven it, that they can fake a take on just about anything, especially in their area of expertise, if they have not seen the game the night before. We want to play first fake with Amine and Andrew Hawkins, and I think I need to kick them out of room in order to do this. I think that needs to happen in the other room in the penalty box, and I need to ideate with you guys on what it is that we're going to do on first fake. What are the topics going to be? There's got to be a football topic. There's got to be a basketball topic. They have no information, and they're going to be able to fake it because I do believe Andrew Hawkins. I believe this game is too easy for Andrew Hawkins, not unlike with Matthew Stafford, that he gets bored by the easy elements of this game, and he can do the fakery better than he can do just whatever, going out there bored and giving you football analysis.

Dan, Amin is a master talker. He can talk about anything at any point to anybody. I've seen it in action. Sober, not sober. I got my money on Amin.

To win the first fake.

I like the upstart. I like the novice. Andrew Hawkins has a polish that Amin does- Not a novice.

Guys, he's actively doing this for a living on ESPN. He's doing it right now.

He's refining his skills on the GitHub. This is a dangerous This is a dangerous game that we're playing. Amin also is somebody who, famously, can talk to you about his own dreams for hours, and no one's sure if he made those up. He seems very squarely in his wheelhouse.

Well, we need to have him. I believe there's a competition going on now at Metal Art for all the space and all the money and all the places where it is that we have to fight for the things that we believe in. I believe when I call Andrew Hawkins a novice, I'm talking about around here. We've got We got a sage veteran who's been doing the take game and making fun of the take game. He's old and tired, man. Look at his face.

What happened? Is he all right? Is he being all right?

I'm just saying, Andrew Hawkins comes in here. He smells good. He smells like confidence. He He smells like I'd like to do all of the things better than these people around here do them. He's not coming here to be a peer. He's coming here to get past us. He's already past us.

I believe- But didn't Andrew Hawkins invent a virtual reality system? I just saw that on the internet the other I was like, Wait a minute.

He's not some ragtag upstart. Even around these parts, he walks in, he commands a room. He's the man.

Okay, you can do all you want in terms of supporting all the things Andrew Hawkins is. I believe he is those things as well. I also believe that he's about to dust a mean. No, says Tony. No way. All right, let's take our bets now before we do this, because we're going to get to this in a second. But go ahead and take our bets. Just tell me who you got, who you got, one name.

The guy that's doing it presently, actively for ESPN. I'm going to Andrew Hawkins. You know where I stand.

I'm going to go with Amine. Is this his comfort zone? I got Amin. No, Amin is playing hurt.

I'm going to go with Andrew.

Hawks' confidence is too high right now.

Amine Elhassen is absolutely going to destroy Andrew Hawkins in this.

Roy brought up a good point, though. He's playing hurt. Best ones do. You know what they tell their bodies? Not today. Not today.

All right, so this is pretty dramatic. Do you guys have a football question? I want to go football with both of them, basketball with both of them, and then I want to go to a subject that neither one of them know anything about.

Well, you're hosting the debate desk, Dan. You're throwing out the football topic.

All right, let's go to the other room and see what we have here. Again, this is all born of the chargers beat the Broncos last night, 34 to 27. Fun game. Charger defense all of a sudden can't do anything right. There's an advantage to going first or going... There's an advantage to going second here. I will go out to you first. The Hawk on your area of expertise. Can you please explain to me why Jim Harbaugh has been good at coaching defense, but why that defense, which was best for points per game the entire season, the last two games all of a sudden is getting shredded pretty good.

Look, when you're at this point in the season, you have to understand that things change. It's like that sophomore quarterback slump. You go out and you have a great first year, and then defensive coordinators adjust. They figure what your tendencies are. This is what happens late in the season. For Jim Harbaugh, him understanding both sides of the ball when you brought him into Los Angeles, you knew that's what you were getting. Not just a guy who can tutor the quarterback with all the ability in the world, but also his understanding of defense, bringing in mentor. In these moments where they go down by a whole lot of points and they surge back because of that prowess, because of that knowledge that he has on both sides of the ball, December is when you get the from your head coach.

Look at this, Dan Levatard. He didn't even answer your question. He didn't even address your question. The question was, the defense is great and has been shredded the last two weeks. You know why, Dan Levatard? I'm going to tell you exactly why that's happened. Because they figured him out. Because the book was out. He comes in. Yeah, he's been in the NFL before, but he's been gone for a while. A lot of guys, they don't know what he's doing, what he's thinking or whatever. He comes in with some new stuff, and everyone's like, How do we adjust? But guess what? The NFL, if anything else, is Study League. It's a league where we get playbooks and other playbooks, and we watch, and we learn, and we make notes, and we see what worked against other people and what didn't. What's happened in the last couple of weeks, Dan Leventhal, is the league has figured him out.

I think Amine… I think Hawkins concedes defeat there because Amine spit in his face with a swollen lip. They take notes.

If you asked me which guy is the former football player dealing with a lifetime of football injuries, I'd be like, It's the guy with the fat lip who is cognitively impaired, but also very sharp right now.

Hawk, would you concede that Amine won that because he said, take notes in your face and spit-spittle in your face.

He said it twice, and it was a lot. I couldn't hold it in at that moment because I tapped out by looking at his face. Then when I came back to, he was yelling notes with such emphasis. I'm What is going on here?

All right. So one-Better than savvy. One-nothing, Amine. It wasn't notes, it wasn't notes.

It was notes.

Note, yes. Let's go to Amine now. Amine, please explain to me why it is that Joel Embiid cannot get along with Philadelphia and if you believe he's not tough enough.

Well, Dan Leventhal, I think when you talk about Joel Embiid, there's a lot of things going on. Number one is I never want to fault a guy for getting injured. Injuries happen. Brandon Roy, Penny Hardaway, Grant There's so many great players, Bill Walton, whose careers were shortened and their legacies were impacted by injuries. At the same time, I don't think Joel Embiid does himself any favors when he talks in the media talking about, Look at all I've done for the city, even though they haven't got out in the second round of the playoffs since Allen Iverson was on the sidelines there. Even though he came back not to run in the playoffs, but because he wanted to go to the Olympics, he came back for a good show of space to play in the playoffs for the Philadelphia 76ers. These little things, these little microaggressions, as these kids like to call it, those are the things that do not endear him to a city that otherwise would love him. Also, one last thing, he ran the scapegoat out of town. If Ben Simmons are here, nobody would be blaming Joel Embiid for anything.

True lack of leadership. His ego is swollen like a mean's lip. That is the issue with Joel Embiid. From a leadership perspective, you cannot go out of your way to show everybody how much you care about personal accolades. You cannot go out of your way to show everybody how different you are, how cut above the rest of you are, because all the people that are tasked with following you feel that and see that, and they will go away from whatever it is you're trying to do. He cannot motivate anybody around him because it's so very clear that everything he cares about involves Joel Embiid. It's hard to get along with. In those locker rooms where everybody is high paid and everybody wants to be the star, a real leader does not separate himself from the group. He goes out of his way to say, Hey, all I care about is our collective success. Because of that, he will never get along with another star. He will never be in a position where he's in in the locker room, and people will fall in line and say, This is a guy that we believe in, and we will follow to the ends of the earth.

It will show up every single time playoff basketball comes around that he is not of the creme de la creme as far as NBA stars are concerned.

Pablo, your thoughts? Do I have a ruling here? I don't love that on first take, they're sharing a microphone. I think we need to do better than that. In the next version of this, we will make sure to- They're also sitting on a sofa. To produce this slightly better than I'm producing it right now.

He's also forcing me to face him because he's on the profile of it, and I feel like I have to turn that way, and I think he's putting Neosporin onto the mic.

This is the thing. Lots of it. Amin has been trying to hide his face for two days. Have you not noticed he's done the show with his back to the shipping container because he's looking at me? He's never been so attentive on me in his life, and it's just because he doesn't want people to see the scar on his face. Pablo, how's this going so far? We need a third topic.

I am going to argue that Amin Al-Hassan is currently the best version of himself as a debater I've ever heard. Amin, you can hear him. You can hear the Queens. You can hear the Stephen A in his voice as his cognitive impairment also is clearly upon him. I also would argue that Amin should probably try... You know what? Hawk knows this. Toradol is a thing football players get before a big game. Amin should actually hurt himself before debating. This is currently working for him.

This is my Toradol. Is that what you're saying?

It's the opposite of Toradol. You have whatever that is.

Were your feelings hurt by me underestimating you in this match What's your makeup?

Everybody, all of these guys. The only person I will allow Grace to is Roy because Roy said it means playing hurt. But all the other guys say, Oh, no. Andrew Hawkins, this, whatever. You guys don't understand. I do this for a living.

There it is. See, that's what I'm talking about.

You're cosplaying as Steven A. Smith. That doesn't count.

He's cheating. Had I known he was just going to be Steven A. That's the game.

That's the game.

Listen, it was one of those things.

Still, there's no way he'd not a leader.

You got to understand he's not a leader.

Now we have a fight. Now we got a fight.

I didn't know we were a cosplayer house.

Is that what you wanted?

You want to try again? You want a third chance on... Do you want a third chance on a topic neither one of you know about so that we I didn't do this correctly? Yes, you're both in a costume. You're both characters.

Now, here's the thing, Dan Levitard. I know that the scoreboard already says, I've won this thing. But if you mean to tell me I'm afraid of Andrew Hawkins, I will put my reputation on the line and I I'm going to say this, win a take all for this lap.

Can we do the debt ceiling? Can we do the debt ceiling as the topic?

No. You know what? Shut up, nerd. Can't get him out of here. What? Hold on a second. Just get him out of here. No. The debt ceiling.

That was a great topic for debate.

Minor penalty, two minutes for boring. Guys, the last take we'd like to have from you is the movie Wicked.

Ariana Grande and Cynthia Arevo both gave stellar performances. Both are nominated for awards coming up. But between the two as Galinda and Elfaba, which gave the better performance?

This is tough, man. Which, which?

Which, which? Okay. Did it on purpose. Here we go. Here's the thing, Dan Leventhal. I love Wicked. I took my kids on Thanksgiving Day to watch Wicked, and they were excited. We pre-gamed. We prepped by watching Wizard of Oz to get ourselves into the mood, get ourselves into the mind state to watch this wonderful pellicula, as they say down here in Miami. Miami. I love Miami. Miami's different. But I digress. Both actresses delivered an amazing performance. Both sang, both made us laugh, they made us feel. Now, what I What we'll say is this. I felt like Ariana Grande's character was more of a one note, so it was easier for her to play. Meanwhile, the Wicked Witcher of the West had a lot more complexity, a lot more texture to her. She had to go high, she had to go low, she had to go left, go right.

Talk about Latinas.

I'm going to go...

She's Italian, common misconception. I bet. His face is falling apart.

I choked at the end. Be even eighth, man, listen to me. Like my grandmama always tell me. Oh, my God. You can put a raccoon in the ass of a papa, but you can't make a Jackass jump. Everybody knows. When I'm watching Wicked Everybody, you mean to tell O'Reilly, Ariana Grande, the top, the best?

He won that one.

That round goes to Shannon.

That was when you're taking I know. That was winner take all. That's how you know I'm a favorite competitor, man. I got to give it to him, man.

I watch way too much Shannon Sharp. There is nobody that I enjoy more in life than watching Shannon Sharp, and that is the honest to God truth. I should have brought my muscle suit next week. That was great.

Good job, guys. Bravo.

I'll bring a suit suit.

We have embraced debate. Good. We will make this better and better. Also, just clip that last part where, Cut it out and edit it out where he says that he love Shannon Sharp. Send that out just to the internet without that context, please. Do it unfairly. I'm down with that. So that he can have beef with Shannon Sharp. You like some? I'd like him, too. He's great. He's wildly entertaining. Thank you, guys. Come on back in here, please. Pablo Torre finds out. I've told you, it is a very popular podcast. It is an award-winning podcast. It has, I'm going to say, the most critical acclaim from snooty elitists in the podcast world than any other podcast presently going in sports. I think I can say that.

Yeah, we lead the league in that in snooty elitist approval, definitely.

You are on MSNBC, and you are now in the middle of a liberal elite spaceship in one of your side projects. How is that going for you? I've seen you. You are now a regular on Morning Joe, correct?

That's right. I'm an MSNBC analyst. It is a fun ivory tower where I get to be a jock. That's what I am over there.

You're the popular- I'm the sports guy who gets to be chill and hanging out with the fellows.

That's what I do over there, unlike here where I'm not respected, really. In any way, I'm reduced to a inset picture-and-picture thing where I just laugh at people, do bits.

Tony, you were making faces at Pablo because that's what's happening. Pablo is the jock on where? No, if you guys had not noticed, I know, Tony, why you're not watching this.

It's Pablo.

To find Pablo on MSNBC now in the morning doing morning Bucklefest television at what I will say is a pretty dangerous time in America, and some people are going to visit the White House or Trump when they shouldn't be as journalists. But I'll say what I want there. You are in the middle of that show, and I'm not going to put you in more awkward position than that with that show. But you are absolutely the cool sportsperson who comes in- Oh, Dan.

Yes.

And everyone loves talking sports with you, even though some people on that set don't even want to talk sports and have never talked sports, but now because you bring sports to them, you're the cool guy.

I'm a palate cleanser. I'm a palate cleanser, a representative of the thing that Americans actually care about in a place where people are genuinely worried and fretting about politics, about whatever is happening in DC right now, which, again, I think would be an awesome debate topic for Shannon Sharp to tackle. What do we do about the jet ceiling?

He had to go. Shannon Sharp, a triumphant performance. He just left.

Very good. I think that my role there is... Look, I love talking about sports to people who don't actually know anything about sports. It's the inverse of the exercise you just did. What if you knew something about sports and the audience did it. It's fantastic.

Have you seen? I mean, it's too early for you on the West Coast because I've enjoyed... My friends are watching Pablo. They're talking about Pablo. Pablo is getting to a new audience, I would say. It's a different audience. It's a very different audience. Yeah, we've lived in these different... All of us have lived in the ESPN bubble, but it's different from here. They are fascinated by this shiny sports journalist who comes over and they're like, Wow, and he's smart when he talks about the toys.

Well, we picked the ambassador for sports to go on that show. It has to be someone that is palatable for those people. You couldn't...

A model minority. Pablo Torre is a model minority for the new America that we can all believe in.

You're welcome. It's one of those things where it's like, if you gave them an actual sportsperson, it might be too much, too intense for them. So you add a little bit of milk.

You give them one from the library. Get me a sportsperson from the library. Bring him over here.

Let him push his glasses up the bridge of his nose. Well, actually.

Don't wear glasses, actually. I'm the guy who doesn't wear glasses anymore. I wear contacts now. The library could be fun. Libraries can be fun. There are books in them.

Books could be fun to read. Put it on the poll, Juju, is the library fun at Lebitard's show?

Well, real sports guys want to go to real sporting events. As you know, listeners, there's only one place that you should check if you want to attend some of the biggest events going. We got college football, playoff games, NBA, big time NFL, games legacies on the line. If you want to be there, you download the GameTime app, you create an account, and use the code dan, that is D-A-N, for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. You get panoramic seat views, all in, pricing with a push up a button so there are no surprises when you check out. Download GameTime today. Pablo Tori, what time is it?

I believe it's game time. It is game time, sports guy.

Just game time. You don't have to use four words when you can use It's game time. Just you hit it. I believe it's game time. You got to have some conviction. I believe.

If my calculations serve correct.

Pablo Tori, fight.

That's right. What we need more is just overconfident declarations of things as opposed to an open-minded curiosity. Sure, let's go that way instead of the way that I'm at.

Pablo, are you here to shill on behalf of Pablo Tori finds out? Is it the episode with you, me, and Mina, or is it something else you're promoting?

I'm actually here to say thank you, Dan. It's been a really long but incredible year for us in New York. We are a satellite upon the moon, upon the sun. Let's upgrade it to the largest celestial body that is you guys in Miami. What I come here to say is, yes, we have a great episode today with Dan and Mina. Yes, we had a great episode yesterday with Paul Feinbaum and the secret history of his collars and their criminal histories, which are both hilarious and profound. His collar? His collars.

Oh, multiple different shirts. Got it.

They are not normal collars. Do not find a news plant. What I'm here to say is that it's a show that we really couldn't launch without Dan. When Dan talks about how much it costs, I reckon with that because the whole thing is that we make a show with ambition that is powered by people who otherwise are not getting paid. We are paying journalists to go report stories for us. We're trying to go to death row as well as trying to buy a sculpture of myself made out of butter. We're trying to do serious stuff and silly stuff. I just want to say thank you legitimately because the premise of this company was we would get to make something from scratch that lived up to some amount of hype. I am very proud that on some level we have done that, and it's really hard. So thank you to Dan and to everybody in Miami for enabling the nonsense that I know you guys like to make fun of. But deep down, I think you might like, just like a library you know has some fun stuff in it, too.

It only costs $242 million.

Well.

This month.

Inflation adjusted.

This month, You should have seen what I found out when I started looking at some of the numbers.

Okay, hold on. By the way, just as an FYI, what I found out is that Dan should never be in a finance meeting. I shouldn't. Dan comes out of that thing and he's like, I got takes. I'm like, Oh, God.

Oh, No, I got to come out of those things and I'm like, I got taken by everyone in our company, everybody who wants more. I just looked at some of those numbers. It's a dizzying array of following everybody's curiosities totally into an abyss.

I said thank you.

That makes it okay.

It does make it okay, actually. You know what? That is happy holidays. Legitimately happy holidays. I said when you got on here, this is our last show of the year. We're going to celebrate in the club with an assortment of sounds from the year. But I am grateful for everyone here who has made this machine work, everyone on the other side. We've got close to 50 employees. I don't know where it is, and a whole ton of contractors. It is a- They all work for Pablo. It is a spaceship. Yes. We got a ton of contractors, most of whom work for Pablo.

Mike, can we get Dan out of the meetings? Why is he in the meeting? I thought the whole thing was he shouldn't be in the meetings, and now he's in the meetings at the end of the year.

What Happy holidays from our fan to yours, with special gratitude for our entire Metal Art crew.

I groan and run my finger nails across his neck, and he gasped, a strangle moan. You're going to unman me, Anna. You take me. I stick down onto him, rambling in the fullness of my possession, rambling in his reaction, washing his I rattle beneath me.

I feel like a goddess.

Ana, touch me, please. I lean forward and steady myself with my hands on his chest. Come on, baby. I need this. Give it to me. And I explode, my body a slave to his, and wrap myself around him, flinging to him like a vine as he-am I paying all these people? Then collapse all of them. All of them? Pressing me into the mattress.

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Don Levatard. But it's just his titties are sitting on the shelf that is his belly. Stugatz.

He said titties. He shocked me a little I wasn't quite prepared for titties.

This is the Don Levatard show with the Stugatz. Now, I like these guys. I like their information. I really do. But you have to understand that there are a whole lot of people in sports who will look at these two guys, Jordan Brenner and Peter Keating, and say, What do these knobs and all their math and all their numbers and all their data What do these knobs know about sports that they can tell me who are underdog values? We couldn't get Peter Keating to get his technology right last week. He was upside down. He was confused. His sound didn't work. What does he know about anything in sports? Well, I will tell you that these guys, and Greg Coty and Stugats every week around here, they're anti-information, they're anti any new data. These guys for 20 years now have data to draw from. And they believe in certain fundamental truths. So thank you again for being on with us. We will get to some of the things happening in sports in a moment. But Jordan, if you can explain, basically, how do you feel about a whole lot of people in sports just saying, Shut up, nerds.

You don't know anything with all your math.

I wish I were a better nerd, first of all, because half the time I'm relying on Peter for the math. I'm not doing the numbers myself. I'm just numerate. So what I would say is this, first of all, in my case, I've been covering I've played sports for 20 years. I talk to coaches, I played sports, whatever. So if you want to label me that way, weird outside person on Twitter, that's fine. But what I always say to this is people who are like, I don't like analytics. And then I'll say, Okay, so how do you tell if a player is good? And they'll be like, Well, you hit 40 home runs. I'm like, Okay, you just use analytics. You're just not using the best number possible. Like the old motto of Faber College, knowledge is good.

I want to say, I think there's something a little deeper going on that we should pay some respect to, which is that modern analytics have moved baseball away from base stealing, have moved football away from rushing, have moved basketball away from the inside game. A lot of people grew up where sports meant a lot more violence and physical contact and beat the hell out of the other guy. Over time, more information discovered other ways to defeat your opponents. There are people who just don't like that, people who don't like how thinking about these things and the bruising competitions they're used to enjoying go together. But it's all just information. It all just makes it smarter. It all just makes it more fun. You're right.

You don't have to choose. You don't have to choose. You don't have to. Baseball is a solved game, Peter. But unfortunately, in solving the game, it's less fun to watch.

That's what's happened, right? The evolutions are such that I'm watching my second basement pull a card out of his pocket so he can stand in exactly the right place, and then I see a line drive hit there. You're making it so scientific that you are taking some of the joyous spontaneity out of it.

It is the eternal struggle that sports are facing right now. We know the optimal way to play, but the optimal way to win games may not be the optimal entertainment value. So, Dan, you're exactly right. How many times your brain is trained to see when a ball goes up the middle, you're expecting it to go all the way to the center fielder. And now we've learned how to shade that way, so we take away that hit. And it's the same thing. Look, there's a reason why Adam Silver is suddenly discussing refining the game a little bit, because basketball has been largely solved through the incredibly complex equation that three is worth more than two. So I get it, and I don't get it, if that makes any sense.

But there's something a little more general to keep in mind that a way through this is to embrace the crazy, embrace the randomness. People want to ascribe events to reason and character and moral turpitude. Sometimes, shit just happens. I mean, yeah, we've been studying college basketball for 20 years. The closest we've been able to get in explaining the variance and what happens in Earth is it's not anywhere close to 100%. You can embrace the fact that crazy stuff happens, appreciate it, doesn't have to be sustainable. It still should be really enjoyable when unexpected things happen, even if it's a little more predictable. This interview is presented by Masterclass. Learn from the best to become your best.

Peter, can you tell Tell me what you have seen in sports that the math has changed more than the stupidity of holy... We were playing basketball the wrong way the entire time, trying to get the most contested two instead of the least contested three.

Well, the three-point revolution, I mean, if that's the paragon example of how things have changed, sure. But you got to remember, sports can also legislate against too much change. I mean, baseball just passed rules against the shift and instituted a... For 150 years, baseball intellectuals were writing that the great timeless thing about baseball was there's no clock. Well, they changed it and it made things better. We can't all get together and decide if this is too much. We don't have robot umpires yet. If we don't want robot umpires, nobody's going to force us to have robot umpires. We can all get together and decide this is too much change. Let's keep things a little more fun if we want to. Sports have done that, too.

The NBA has done that before. Look, in the late '90s, early 2000s, the game had gotten really boring. We wistfully remember those Heat nick series, but it wasn't good basketball. It was just good drama. But the NBA had too many games that were '72 to '77, and they legislated a lot of the holding off the ball out of the game. And when Steve Nash was with Phoenix in the early days of pace and space and the early days of the Warriors, it was a great blend. The game was way more exciting. It's probably tipped too far in the other direction. And then there are things you can do, whether it's move the three-point line back or put some of the physicality back in the game to change the dynamic of what points are worth. And by the way, the one thing that's still worth a ton of value always and has been is getting to the rim and getting to the free throw line.

Guys, this is a little bit dry. The numbers are dry. Can we just do anything to make it a little more interesting in video, please? Mike, what do you have? You seem to be all excited here.

Well, I'm actually really loving this segment, and it sparked a side conversation, continued from our conversation yesterday that Amina and I had where, okay, well, we all agree everyone knows something's wrong with basketball. The numbers indicate this, and true leadership pushes the sport along. What can we find consensus on? Because, yes, three is bigger than two. We get that. Do we make the court bigger? Do we move the line back? Amin had a very practical solution that I think you also invoked a little bit here.

Are you talking about the baseball theory? So guys, every baseball park, where's the home run line? Well, it's different in every park, right? I came up with the suggestion the three-point line should be home court dependent as well. In Milwaukee, they might have it in the paint because their best player, their highest volume player is Giannis. He's going to get hit a bunch of threes from right in front of the rim. Meanwhile, in Golden State, they're like, Hey, we got the best shooters. Let's move it as far back as possible. Let's move back to 30 feet or whatever. Now you got some variance, some strategy going, right? Hey, guys, we're playing at Milwaukee tonight. Pound the paint. I don't want to see anybody standing outside. I want everyone inside the It also demands a lot from front offices, too.

How you build out your roster, you essentially have a division specialist because they have more mid-range three-pointers in this. I thought that was a very novel concept. What do you guys make of that?

I would love to see the unintended consequences. When is the last time a baseball team actually succeeded when they tried to recruit a free agent because they said, Oh, look, I'm going to ignore this video trickery. I just want everybody to know my hat's still pointing up. Often that doesn't work out, which just adds to the fun. Listen, I think it's within certain bounds. There are rules about how far the fences can be in baseball. You can't just do whatever you want. There's certain minimums and maximums. That could be really interesting.

You know where it would be a fun place to test this out is the completely boring and largely useless in-season tournament. So make that. Change up the rules for that one.

Tests it out. I mean, he's blasphemed against you. The NBA Cup, by the way.

Look, man, the NBA Cup is not for any of us. It's for children. It's for people who are 10 years old who are watching this and seeing guys celebrate and be happy, and then 10 years from now when they're in the league, that becomes a point of emphasis. I want to win MVP. I want to win finals MVP. I want to win an NBA Cup MVP.

You're finding yourself give the take that LeBron James and Giannis have now won and cared about this tournament, and therefore this will be a requirement for future greatness. That's ridiculous.

It's not because the example those guys set, those are guys that a bunch of kids grow up wearing their sneakers, buying their jerseys, idolizing them. Those kids one day will be in the NBA, and they'll say, I want to do everything that my idol did. Look, Dan, how do we get to a place where you got kids saying, Paul George is the greatest player of all time? Because 11 years ago, these are the kids who are like, I don't like LeBron. Who's in his way? That guy. He's really good. That's how you get kids grow up saying, Paul George is the greatest player of all time. Those kids are in the NBA now. If you're telling me that a kid can grow up thinking Paul George is the goat, you They're not going to grow up thinking that the NBA Cup is something worth winning?

Guys, before you get out of here, again, Jordan Brenner and Peter Keating, the Underdogs is the name of the podcast. We are out of time, but your Underdogs of the Year, that episode that you're doing, what are the highlights so people can go get it over there? Because we've run out of time here, and I didn't leave enough to actually get into that as subject matter.

We'll just have to come back then, Dan. But that show drops next week. It's a two-part episode. We got a lot of Olympics sprinkled in, a couple of big college football upsets, but I think there could be some debate in how high we have some of those Olympic events unless you really like bicycling.

No Florida Panthers, because we decided excited because we do a lot of analytics work. We decided Connor McDavid wasn't overrated.

There. Okay. We'll get you on to argue with Greg Cody then, and I think he would have the winning argument. Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate the time.

Thanks, Dan. Thank you.

Happy New Year.

Likewise.

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