Transcript of The Most Astounding Thing About The Shohei Ohtani Scandal | Hour 3

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Trista and Juju will be around here together to talk about WNBA things that me and Zaslo weren't able to get to because there have been an assortment of things around here that we haven't been able to get to. Zas is arguing with his wife. He has put his foot down. He is simply refusing to go to something she wants to go to. And Amin also has a theme song update from yesterday, and I don't know whether we're going to have time to get to these things.

I also have an answer to Mike's top 5 about easiest cool people.

No, and Mike also knows who it was that James Johnson beat up on the Heat as well. It's— I happen to know, but we haven't had time to get to any of these things. And now I've got Tisha Thompson, who's doing real journalism out here. She's, uh, chasing down, uh, the story that for a brief flash we're like, hey, Shohei Ohtani, was he cheating? Was that what happened? No, interpreter took everything. Okay, Shohei's fine. All right, greatest scandal in the history of sports. No, nothing here. Okay, never mind. So she's been doing real journalism about this. She broke the initial story back in 2024. Now, The Betrayal of Shohei Ohtani is a 6-episode series. Thank you, Tisha, for joining us. How shadowy is all of this stuff? Like, what's real, what's true, and what's not?

Well, it took 6 episodes to tell the story. So I think that tells you there's a whole lot of information that we had to sort through to try to even get to the first article that we wrote in March of 2024. To help folks remember what was going on. I received a tip before the big news went out that Shohei Ohtani had signed a record-setting deal, $700 million, 10 years with the Los Angeles Dodgers. That whole time that everybody was talking about this big deal and, oh my gosh, so much money and he's going to be a Dodger, I was behind the scenes trying to figure out if this tip I've been told was true, which was Shohei Ohtani's bank account was sending half a million dollar wires to an illegal bookmaking operation. And I know everyone who watches your show is an expert on sports, but just for the folks who may not remember, not only is it against MLB rules to bet on baseball, it's also against the rules to use a bookie, an illegal bookmaker. So if you're a player with MLB, you cannot do that. So we were trying to figure out, well, what the heck was going on?

We knew it was connected to an illegal bookie. Well, who is that illegal bookie? We had to figure out who that was. There was a federal investigation that was under seal. And then just as I think I'm starting to figure it out, because I've actually seen the wires that have Shohei Ohtani's name on them, his bank account on them, I get tipped off again. It might be Ippei. Ippei might be the one laying the bets. And of course, Ippei Misahara is— or was Shohei Ohtani's interpreter. But as our podcast, The Betrayal Shohei Ohtani charts out, it was so much more complicated than that. This was not the normal baseball player interpreter relationship.

Okay. But walk us through so much of this here, because the cultural— the cultural transition is a difficult one. He's got to concentrate on baseball. And these amounts of money are a little bit crazy. From Dan Wetzel's column today about Ohtani, at the peak— at the peak of Mitsuhide's crimes against Ohtani, he placed an average of 26 sports bets per day with a bookmaker, 19,000 in total.

Total.

He won $142 million but lost $183 million, a negative balance of $40.7 million. To try to pay it back, he ripped at least $16 million using access to one of Ohtani's bank accounts and even going as far as impersonating the baseball great in security calls to authorize $500,000 wire transfers.

Uh, yeah.

And why did he talk to you?

Well, so in January of 2024, I see the wires, I see some of the wires, and I have gotten really good sourcing. But, you know, there's some confusion. Is it Ippei? Is it Shohei? Who's doing what? And by March of 2024, we think we've got enough information to go to Shohei Ohtani's agent and say we want an explanation for why Shohei Ohtani's bank account is sending all this money to an illegal bookmaker. And Ohtani's agent, through a crisis spokesperson who was hired to essentially deal with this, confirms, yes, the money is being sent from Shohei Ohtani's bank account, but he's doing it for someone that's close to him. And I say, well, I want to talk to Shohei Ohtani. I want to know what happened. And they say, maybe, but we can give you this other person. And I had heard— and I say to them, I, you know, I've heard it's Ippei, and they say you have really good sources. So that's always a nice thing to hear when you're an investigative reporter. And they say, we'll put Ippei on the phone with you to explain what happened. So, you know, they're dealing with a big scandal here.

They, they have, you know, MLB's golden boy there, this phenom who's never had a whisper of scandal attached to him. And they're confirming that his bank account has sent money to an illegal bookmaker. And they're giving me Ippei to explain what went down. So Ippei and I do what ultimately ends up being a 90-minute phone call. He is in Seoul, South Korea, getting ready for the Dodgers opening game against the Padres in what was the, you know, opening game of that season for the regular season. And I'm in— we're on the East Coast where I live. And for me, it's 10:00 at night. For him, it's the morning of that game. And, you know, I went into this interview thinking, well, maybe he'll give me a statement, maybe he'll give me some canned comments. And he, you know, he had a reputation, um, you know, the ESPN guys that I work with who cover the Angels and the Dodgers had said, be prepared, he doesn't say much, he doesn't talk much, and when he does, it's very short sentences. And that's how it starts out. It's short, it's quick, and then he gets talking and he talks and he talks.

And what he says, of course, is what The U.S. attorney who— the assistant U.S. attorney who prosecuted the case said what he says in that interview, which you can hear in episode 2 of the podcast, creates an international incident. It creates a scandal because what he says in that interview is Shohei Ohtani helped me pay off these debts to an illegal bookmaker. I'm the one who laid the bets. But I, you know, I got into this hole. I got into millions and millions of dollars in debt. And I went to him and I asked him, would he help me out? And so not only did he help him out, But Ippei tells me Shohei helped, like literally sent the money himself with Ippei's assistance to the illegal bookmaker. So that's a big deal. 16 hours later, right as we are about to hit publish on this story, I get a call and they go— the crisis spokesperson says, wait, wait, wait, wait. Ippei lied. He didn't just lie. He lied to all of us and Shohei only right now. Has found out that this story is happening and also that money is missing from his account.

So I call Ippei and I say, Ippei, did you lie to me? And he says yes. And I say, did you lie to Shohei? And he says yes. And I ask him a whole series of questions and he, he almost recants everything. Not everything. And that's a really important detail. But he recants almost all of it and says, no, I'm the one who was betting and Shohei knew nothing about it. And I, you know, like, well, how'd you get the money? And we spend a lot of the podcast really getting into the details. We talked to the federal investigators, first interviews they've ever done in a two-decade career, about what they had to do to try to figure out what was really going on between these two men, because I was being told two completely different stories.

And I still don't know what the truth is. Do you?

I know what the feds say. So the feds, in episode 5 and episode 6, we spend a lot of time going really into the weeds about the relationship between these two men from the perspective of the feds. And there is an IRS agent who went through 40,000 text messages between Ippei and Shohei. Can you imagine someone reading 40,000 of your text messages? So 40,000 text messages between these two men. They're all in Japanese. They all had to be translated. And then they matched up text messages with evidence that they had seized from Ippei's car, they had seized from the Dodgers clubhouse, from the bookie, his house, and his phone. So they were matching bank records with text messages. And we lay it all out. And I think it's, you know, I think it's fascinating what they had to go through. And they say that there is no evidence that Shohei Ohtani knew anything about the betting.

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Down levitar! For 5 minutes I was watching everyone just like, nope, not letting you in, not letting you in. So when I got up there, I had to say something, and I said it. Cheaters never prosper. Chris Cody, my buddy, was saying, not today.

Yeah, but you're not—

today I think that was what he was adding. Yeah, that would have been so So much better. But I'm telling you, the response I got from this guy, what I said was amazing. He got him. Cheaters never prosper. This guy yelled as angry as he could. I ain't cheating. This is the Dan Levatar Show.

Uh, Tisha, walk me through this, because if I was trying to tell this story from— and I'm not saying that you should be, but if I was trying to find the story that exonerates Shohei in every way. The way I would try to tell that story is by examining the cultural difficulties in trying to get acclimated over here while also playing baseball. And I would turn my translator into a magician who's running every facet of my life, and I would turn the baseball star into a giant infant who doesn't know how to do anything except play baseball for himself. That's, that's how I would frame this story if I were Shohei Ohtani's people. Did it happen? Like, do you believe that there's any sort of cultural transition, transition issue where the translator runs a good much of your life and it might be plausible that half a million dollars could somehow move because he's running the entirety of your life?

Well, as you can imagine, I had all kinds of questions about the relationship between these two men and the relationship Shohei Ohtani had with his agent and his financial team. How does, how does someone not notice? Whether it's Shohei Ohtani or his financial team who's in charge of taking care of his financial health. Because when you're making $125 million in endorsements a year, plus you're making $5 million and then $30 million and then, you know, oodles and oodles of millions of dollars to play for a baseball team. And then there's all your other business that you have. When you have that kind of money, you have a big group of people who take care of your money. And that was something I really wanted to get to the bottom of, is not just how did Shohei Ohtani not know that this money wasn't in his bank account, but how did all these other people miss it? And we, as a result, we spend a lot of time looking and answering the question of who is Ippei. And Dan, it's fascinating. Here was a man who everybody knew. And when I say everybody, I'm talking about fans, the media, the players, you know, anyone who wanted to talk to Shohei or get near Shohei, including his agent.

And his financial team had to go through Ippei. So Ippei wasn't just an interpreter. He was a gatekeeper. The only way you could get access and the only way you could communicate with Shohei was essentially through Ippei, especially in those early years. And that was a, that was a revelation that, yes, he's his interpreter, but he is— it's very clear. We interview people who have worked in this business people who have had Ippei be their interpreter who are not Shohei Ohtani, other baseball players, interpreters who have interpreted for Japanese baseball players both in Japan and the United States. And it's very clear that this was an unusual relationship.

It was unusual. It's not a supersized concierge type of relationship where somebody's just managing every aspect of your life.

Everything. Everything. He was not just an interpreter. And not just a gatekeeper, but he, you know, he was doing things like walking Shohei's dog. He was driving Shohei around. But he was also, you know, he was the catcher to Shohei's pitching. It's Tim Keenan, who you guys all know, unbelievable reporter. He had been following Shohei and Ippei around for years trying to profile Shohei. And he says Shohei is easily the most enigmatic athlete he's ever tried to cover, the most inaccessible athlete he's ever tried to cover. And in part, that is because Ippei was the gatekeeper. But as Tim pointed out, Ippei was the one working out on the field with Shohei. It wasn't, you know, the hitting coach or the pitching coach. It was Ippei. And so he was training with Shohei. And then, and then we later come to find out through the federal investigation that Shohei was paying Ippei to essentially be his personal assistant and his manager. Now, there are plenty of athletes who have people that do that for them, but normally it's a team. It's a team of people. And what's clear to me And we really get into this in episode 6.

What's clear to me is that this was different, that it was just Ippei. Ippei was the only one. There wasn't another Japanese interpreter. You know, if God forbid Ippei went on vacation, I don't think he did. There wasn't another manager who was dealing with Shohei's personal affairs.

Yeah, just running his life. It makes sense, actually. This is what Dan Wetzel is calling all of this. He is saying is the backdrop to one of the most astounding stories in recent years, he says, brilliantly told in The Betrayal of Shohei Ohtani. You've had your life consumed by this over the last 2 years. When I say a little bit— when I say what's the most astounding thing in here, what, what is your answer to that?

I will say I've had plenty of people lie to me over the course of a 2-decade career of being an investigative reporter. That's not a new phenomenon, but the utter strangeness of the 24 hours leading up to and after the interview that I did with Yi Pei. And it was really two interviews. Um, that is one of the strangest and sort of, as I say, one of the most bonkers days of my life. You don't run into that very often, and you especially don't run into it when you're dealing with someone who is that famous and has that many people helping him and working around him. It was a crazy, crazy day, and it was really a night into a day. And then all of the fallout that has come out since then. I mean, to me, it's a fascinating story. It's a cautionary tale. And, you know, in episode 4, we talk to the bookie and we get it from the bookie's perspective. And I think anyone who likes to sports bet or anyone who loves someone who likes to sports bet really ought to listen to it because the bookie is really upfront about how he lures in his clients, how he hooks them, how he keeps them.

And so he's trying to milk them for everything that they've got without letting them go bankrupt. And he starts to talk about the kinds of clients he has. And Shohei Ohtani, his bank account is not the only Athlete Bank account that he has dealt with.

Tisha, I will let you go on this note. I'm just— I know you're fact-based and the facts are important.

Very fact-based.

But if you had to guess on what happened on that most astounding day of your last 2 years, from my perspective, it has seemed like he told you the truth the first time. This is, this is from afar. And then the machine fell on him. It's just a personal assistant talking to a woman who doesn't— he doesn't understand necessarily what journalism is or what it is that you're asking him. And this, uh, the machine fell on you between the time you had the innocent first interview and everything that happened after that. That's my appraisal from very far away. Do the details make you lean in that direction? Yes or no?

I'm going to tell you, you got to listen to the podcast because you're going to know everything I know. And it's complicated. It's complicated. But at the end of the day, I am an investigative reporter and I have to go with what the feds say, which is Shohei Ohtani did not know about the gambling.

She didn't answer my question.

Take that.

Yeah, I had to take it.

Listen to the pod.

Listen to the pod if you want to answer your questions. I'm not going to give you that. I'm not going to give you the good stuff here. You got to go.

Go to the podcast.

Podcast, Dan. Uh, thank you, Tisha. I'm thankful that someone is out there doing this work somewhere in the world because not a lot of people are doing it anymore. Uh, the story— I'm sure that there will be perspective and nuance in that that will explain things better than we handled it when— is this a scandal? It's the greatest scandal! Oh, it's all the interpreter. Okay, never mind. All right, we're good. Everybody good?

Thought we had something.

Yeah, no, it's gonna be the biggest thing. No, that guy took the blame. Okay, good. All right, let's move on.

Dan, important question here journalistically.

Is Dan Wetzel the heir to the Wetzel's Pretzels throne or no? I begged Tony to ask that in the middle of the interview.

Put it on the Rob Lebatard Show. She said, I've been lied to a lot. And Chris Cody does a personal show for me where he says, know the feeling. I've been lied to a lot by my sources. And Chris Cody gives me a personal show right in my right ear.

It doesn't feel good.

I've been doing some reporting. I know who James Johnson beat up.

Oh yeah, we have.

We get a breaking news sound or anything?

Happen to know? It's got to be happen to know.

Happen to know.

It's got to be happen to know.

I've worked sources.

The story, if you do not know it, is Udonis Haslam said an unnamed person took a beating from James Johnson after, uh, deigning to call James Johnson very imprudently.

He happens to know.

After working my sources over the course of the last few days, my sources, I have a name. The person James Johnson beat up was Briante Webber.

Yeah, I can see that.

I can see that.

A lot of people are like, who?

That's according to my sources.

It's a lot smaller than James Johnson. The nation is not really reacting to that story, I'd say.

No, it's not a big enough name.

Yeah. What happened is better is we all just leave this behind.

Yeah, the story's better as a mythology when you don't know the player. It's ruined.

Was it Hasan Whiteside?

Yeah, it's like the magic trick being explained to you and you're like, oh, that's all you did there? That's not—

oh, it's—

oh, whatever.

Really? You just were hiding the card behind your hand? That's really— it wasn't that you read my mind?

Defender.

I didn't have the red ball in my ear.

No.

VCU.

Story gets ruined by your news. This is why people don't like journalists.

Mm-hmm.

It takes away from the mythology of Bloodsport.

I want to clear something up. I'm an insider.

You are, but you, but you've got so far inside that you ruined it. You're— the story is now less interesting than it used to be when we did this. Greg Cody is right. Less information is better. Less information is more.

It also leads me to believe it's always so funny when, you know, things like the Tyler Hero-Bam thing gets out, because there, there are so many fights like James Johnson v. Briante Webber that happened.

We should tell all of them that we should never let We should just tell little series stories and have people on just to talk about those fights.

I once saw Raja Bell and Leandro Barbosa choke each other. What? Same time?

Like a choke-off?

Like Homer Simpson?

Yes, but it was mutual.

Good follow.

Next. Dan Levitar. I ain't never met nobody in the world that's done hate on Blue's Clues. Great nomination. Like, who don't like Blue's Clues, bruh? If you don't like Blue's Clues, you're a loser. Juju Gotti. Look, you get one paw print. That's the first clue. You put it in a notebook. Now what do you do? Blues Clues, Blues Clues. Sit on the chair and think about it. This is the Dan Levitan Show. Bam, bam, bam. Welcome back to Good Follow Man presented by DraftKings. Sports. I'm the Kid Juju Gotti, joined with my sister as always, Trista Crick. How are you doing today, sis?

Oh man, I'm so glad to be home, Juju. It's been a long, long journey. We were at All-Star Weekend turning up in Chicago. Teaspoon got the win. JJ, Jonquel Jones, Juju, was 50 to 1, 50 to 1 to win All-Star MVP. She did that, right, bro?

Surprised the hell out of me. I would have never thunk or thought, especially Caitlyn She had that look in her eyes early. I was like, oh, sis going for the 50 tonight and the MVP. Yeah, bro. How you feel about it? What stood out to you the most about the All-Star Game, from the All-Star Game, goofy or not?

All right, so skills challenge, I thought, showcased how fucking good Azzi Fudd is as a shooter. Like, you listen, she's one of them ones, you put the ball in her hand and it's coming off the exact same way, like it's made out of machinery. And it doesn't really matter who you put up against her. I really do wish that, uh, Sabrina Ionescu was in that as the defending champ. I really wish Caitlin McBride was in that as one of the best 3-point shooters in the league. I really wish Caitlin Clark was in that. So imagine AZ Fudd, Caitlin Clark, Sabrina Ionescu, Caitlin McBride. Chat, why didn't we get that?

Salute to that. That, that was the highlight of the weekend to me, the skills challenge and seeing Big Edd back. Oh my goodness, draining half-court jumpers. Ha! Take one.

Ha!

Take this one. Ta! Here go another one. Like, bruh, that was fire as hell. But I got something to say, man. This is my— I got something to say at risk of being the bad guy, you feel me? WNBA, yes, all the players, whenever I say something good about y'all, y'all don't never come and be like, thank you, bruh, I appreciate it. Y'all ignore that, so ignore this shit too. The All-Star Game, man, y'all boys need to take a page out of Unrivaled book, man. This shit boring. I'm so sorry, this is the most boring game I have ever watched in my entire life, and I gotta act like I give a damn. Hell no, we need to clean this up now, and I'm talking about NBA and WNBA. But that thing boring as hell. What, what say you? Am I tripping?

No, I think you're right. I mean, but how do you fix it? I don't know. Are we doing Team USA versus Team World again, like that's starting to become more of a reality as the international players start to come to play. Like you got the Gabby Williams of the world, you got— I mean, even to a degree you could put Sabrina in that role if she was ever going to be an all-star ever again, which we're not sure with her back injuries. But like, yeah, it feels like they don't really care. Oh, gay versus straight. Oh my God, I need gay versus straight.

See, now we talking. Now, are you watching that? Because I'm locked in.

Studs versus femmes. We got a straights and a gays. We got 3, 3 of them. We got straights and then we got stud gays and we got femme gays.

Or guess what? Let's go 2 on 2. One male from the NBA, one woman from the WNBA, tournament style. Winner gets $5 million cash tonight. Play for it. It's above the rim. You feel me? Something like that. Make it fun. Make it battle of the whatevers. But this product right now that I'm watching. When I'm watching A'ja Wilson try not to even block my sister Angel shot and still get the block in the All-Star Game. I'm watching Ali Houston on the dome, that dome didn't give a damn about them damn alley-oops either. Nah, bro, come on now. We got too much folks in the building. Broke the record too, by the way, uh, attendance record. Salute. So I'm so sorry I had to watch that, bro. Matter of fact, let me call my sister Jess in. Jess, are you here today? Because I need your opinion on what I'm saying. What can we do to fix this?

Well, I think they need to bring back the 4-point line, first of all. Um, I think that was— the fact that the players didn't know that until like an hour before the game was crazy to me. Uh, and the fact that we didn't know that as fans was also crazy to me. So I think they need to bring that back. What about you?

Yeah, I like that, bro. Anything to improve it, man. We just can't sit here and do nothing though. But the story from the weekend, man, and I hate to do it too, DeeJanae dropped the bomb, the big bomb.

A big bomb.

I'm talking about the biggest of bombs. What you thought, sis, about that bomb? Was it a fair or foul bomb to drop, first of all? Second of all, since she put us in the business, let's be in it.

Let's be in it. You guys did it. Don't get mad at us just because we're commenting and reacting to what you put online. I wasn't asking about DeeJanae and Alyssa's relationship over All-Star weekend. You decided you were gonna bring it back up. It was old. This is old shit. Secondarily, the thing that is getting lost that I need to make a video on— thank you for reminding me so much. Yes, like, okay, you've got all these different storylines, which is like, number one, Nelissa cheated with some G-Leaguers. Hilarious. Number two, Nelissa ended up on the same team as her ex-girlfriend's new girl, which she hard launched. We already kind of knew they were together anyway. That's two. Like, number 3, Melissa goes on the chat and says like, who cares who was cheating on who, which means you were cheating on her. Number 4, you did that shit.

Whatever they say you did, you did.

You did it.

Number 4, she's out sick the next game.

Sure.

Number 5, she's posting from the hospital bed with the IV.

My bad, I'm not laughing. As a matter of fact, get well soon, bitch.

Get well soon.

Felt like Gemini to me. I don't know.

And but number 6, the biggest thing that no one is talking about— I've heard all this, but what is like the biggest news flying under the radar is how does Nalissa Smith have this crazy pull to pull Dijonae, Aliyah Nye, and Deja Kelly? These are 3 of the hottest femme lesbians in all the WNBA, 2 of which I think she brought over to the gay side.

Damn, she recruited 2, 3 actually.

Dijonay said, I'd never been with women before and I'm not even gay, I only like Nelissa. Post-Nelissa, she's telling men, I don't fuck with XY chromosomes. She turned 3 women hotties all the way out, Juju.

Look, man, when you got it, you got it, man. It's called charisma, man. I ain't never seen—

you feel me?

Ain't nobody ever accused Nelissa of not being him.

And you pulled them, you pulled two of them when everybody knew you were with Dijonay, and Dijonay's scary as fuck, and they were still like—

they still didn't know.

You know the best part of this too, by the way, sidebar, and we're gonna go to Jess to see how you feel about this. I cannot believe God has blessed us with Aces versus Sky this Saturday. Yeah, appointment television.

What I think is that All-Star is for the gays, and we love the relationship drama. We have all the positivity from Gabby and Maureen, which I love. You know, Gabby shouting out, oh my God, All-Star Maureen, uh, warms my heart.

And then Gabby did the one leg on the first try. Or Maureen, incredible. Love is— I love love.

I love love.

You know what, speaking of loving love, okay, we gotta talk about Megan Gustafson, Gustafson, whatever, Gustafson, AKA now Meg DeLeo. Yes. So she got married in the middle of the season and she changed her name immediately.

Yeah, man, we love love, we love love, we love love.

But you got me.

What do we think about this?

I'm not buying a second jersey.

That's what I'm saying. How do I say that delicately? Like, it's Nike, finna take this Gustafson back because she don't play for them no more. I want the DeLeo.

They gotta do like the, the patch, like where you can bring your jersey in and then they trade the patch on the back for you.

Exactly.

I think it's just screen printed.

See what I'm saying? I think you being a Portland, a Portland soldier, I think you have to lead this charge. You got to somehow get word to Meg that, hey man, it's a whole bunch of us out here, a bunch of us out here with Gustafson on the back of our shirts. What can we do? What can we rectify? You got, you got $100 on it I can borrow?

Bam, bam. Like, I'm about to just change the back of the jersey to Pancake.

You might as well. Pancake will be around.

I know, like, as much breakups and makeups, the one thing I know is that she's keeping that corgi. That's the one thing I do know. I, I feel like Juju, it's a little narcissistic to change your name in the middle of the season and expect everyone to just roll with it on July 20th. And like, from now on, don't even make a mistake. Don't call me Gustafson.

Well, Trista, you had that firsthand experience. You just had an all-pass with the Fire. Major congrats, major congrats. But you had to deal with this.

You had to deal with the DeLeo change, and she was the leading scorer for the Fire. So I had to say DeLeo's name fucking a million times, and I'm like, I don't want to do this. This is her get-back game against her former team. She cried the last time she played the Aces because they didn't value her. She was like, man, they were sleeping on me. When you're playing behind Asia. And it's like, man, I would feel better if it was a woman's name, to be honest. The fact that it's a straight relationship and the fact that it's a man that plays basketball and you took his name in the middle of the W season, in the season of gays, I just didn't like it.

Yeah, I like to remind everybody in the audience right now too, we're comedians, you know, we're going for the joke here, we're not serious. We love Meg and her new man. Salute to you, brother. We'll be watching this with You should bite your bottom lip, bro. Calm down, man.

I'm just kidding. I love love, and I love— I'll continue to say DeLeo, but the jokes are right there.

They are there. I'm talking about by the rim, alley-oop style, you dig it? But speaking of rims, right by the rim, by the way, we are right by the mid-season, which means trade deadline is here, and I'm hearing a whole bunch of stuff. Jess, what you hearing?

Well, I'm hearing Kelsey Plum doesn't want to stay with the Sparks.

I'm hearing that too, bruh. Trista, what you think?

Uh, that when I was at the All-Cast last night was apparently shocking to those within the Fire organization. I was like, where have you been? The Sparks, the Sparks are a nightmare. Yeah, go ahead, put your name in that hat, go out and get Kelsey Plum who's on a bum ankle. Uh, yeah, no, I, I felt like this was a long time coming.

Yeah, they say they gonna trade sis before Sunday, you feel me? So where, outside of Portland, where do you think she should end up? Like, what makes the most sense?

The Liberty. 3-team trade. 3-team trade. Send Sabrina Ionescu to Golden State.

Oh, I'm hurt. I'm actually hurt.

Send, uh, KP to the New York Liberty. Send Kayla Thornton and somebody to LA.

Somebody— oh, so now we got to get that somebody.

No, this somebody is Pauline Astier. You go out and you get Astier, who is a nice young guard as you're rebuilding. This Sparks team needs picks. You probably need to attach a pick, uh, someone.

Why is New York gonna give up Astier?

Because KP is one of the best bucket getters in on planet Earth.

All right, all right.

When she is healthy, watch her. Me and, me and Juju watched firsthand KP fry, right, baseline on, on, uh, Unrivaled Finals.

This is true.

But KP and Sabrina are both major ball handlers.

Yeah, that's why.

Yeah, but like, oh, you want Sabrina to leave the Liberty? That's gonna hurt me, Trista.

She goes, she goes back home to play for the Bay Area.

Yeah.

She said she would never leave the Liberty until they won a ring. Sorry, sis, you got it. The only person that's hurt is Jonathan Colbin. Baby, you will be okay.

And Jessica will be hurt.

And Jessica, she don't like KP. Wow.

No, I love KP, but I love Sabrina.

Sabrina can't stay on the floor, Jess.

I know.

Neither can KP right now. This is true. That's a lot to give up for, like you say, a, a person on the bone leg or the bone knee. You feel me? Because STA, I think that might be enough, you understand? STA and some cash. A salute to, uh, everybody involved. It's a Satu. I don't know how much you got left in your legs.

Yeah, maybe Satu, maybe it's Satu, you feel me?

But hey, who else but— oh, Nafisa Collier, bruh. They talking about they might ship sis off in fear of losing her to next year because of contract up.

What I heard, the Knicks What I heard, Juju, is that Cheryl is shopping her.

Well, you guys did say early on this season that this might happen, that you thought there was some sort of situation going on between Fia and Cheryl.

What I would do, package Lambman and a pick for Nafisa Collier.

Oh, in Dallas!

And have her in Dallas. With Jess Shepherd back to reunited. Paige, AZ, Arike comes off the bench, and now we are cooking with fucking gas, bruh.

I'm scared.

You know, a trade, both teams have to agree to this. I'm pretty sure Minnesota is not gonna give a damn about no Lambman coming back. Boy, we need, uh, Lambman was deep.

Listen, Lambman Lambeau was DPOY. You didn't give a fuck about Jess. Lambeau was DPOY with Cheryl. She can get that back out of her. You give her a first-round pick, maybe you give her a young player as well, and, and I feel like, ooh baby, if I'm the Lynx, keep Lambeau.

That's between y'all and Lambeau, that little million dollars y'all gave her. Now, is we gonna start talking at AZ? That's where we start talking. All right, you'll lose something that's gonna hurt Well, oh, oh, or we just ain't got to do business with Dallas. I see you, Dallas, salute. Uh, but, uh, any other takers out here?

I'm pretty sure. What about Toronto?

Toronto, LA, you feel me? I'm talking about sis want to win because this still— she ain't— this is Queen Fee. So I imagine her being one of the recipients of that package you said earlier. Sabrina, Pauline, like, she, she's gonna demand that type of—

Valkyries. If the Valkyries got Nafissa Collier, they'd win a title tomorrow.

Yes, 1000%. 1000%.

Send them like Salon and Repair.

Repair is repair.

And I think Minnesota would love that. You end up not losing Phi for nothing. And it's Gabby and it's Chen and it's Phi and it's our girl Veronica Burton. Maybe you send Veronica Burton there. I would hate to see that.

But But listen, now they need her.

They need her. But Fee though.

But look, before we get out of here, man, I'm gonna just go ahead and say this, you feel me? Because I don't like to say this too much, but if y'all want to come to a team where, you know what I mean, you ain't got to worry about the owner all in your videos, you ain't got to worry about the GM talking all in your post-game interviews, come down to Atlanta, man. It's very fresh down here. We about activism. You remember we got Loughlin the hell up out of here? That's us. You remember we fought Vote for Change, Warnock. Yeah, that's us. Remember, we got Renee Montgomery still. Same, same folks.

What are you giving up, pal?

What am I giving up? Unfortunately, now we talking about fee. We talking about fee.

Anything you want.

Madina Okai, I'm so sorry, you are a GOAT, but like a young GOAT too. But you, ma'am, seem to be one of the things they could use up there with Olivia Miles as well as— look, my little sister, bro. I don't want to— I don't want her to go nowhere but Tahina Pow Pow, you know. I'm not—

I'm not salary match. What about the salary?

We're gonna match that salary at this last one because this last one gonna hurt. This last one gonna hurt like, like a mother trucker. Bree Jones.

Wow, I can't believe that you just said that.

I mean, I'm not saying this is— we talking about Nafissa Collier. That's true, that's true. We need great people to get that great person back, you did. And so this is not a try to Bree Jones, this is not a try to Pow Pow. This is not a try to Medina Okot. This is a salute to y'all. Y'all believe— I love y'all so much. I think y'all can make Fi.

That'd be such an interesting fit too, because you got Angel there. Like, it doesn't feel Fi, but it kind of does feel Fi.

You feel me? I feel Fi, you dig it? Or it's gonna have to be somewhere— LA, New York. It got to be somewhere big time for Fi. But it's now time for the DraftKings Sports Pick of the Week presented by DraftKings Sports. Man, oh man, oh, it's this week. We got them fever going to Minnesota, going to Minnesota. It get cold like Minnesota. And guess what? For the first time in this whole season, I get to say these two words. We get to watch Nafisa all year. 100% keep your eyes on sis. And on the other side, hey man, big Caitlyn, she got that look in her eyes, man. So I might need you to keep an eye on Caitlyn, but I'm pretty sure you already will. And man, them Lynx, they looking powerful. They getting it together. They're not even at full strength right now, but I'm still taking the Lynx to get the W in in this week's game, man. And this segment was presented by DraftKings Sports. DraftKings Sports, available now in all 50 states. The crown is yours. Thank you to our sister Jess for pulling up. Any last words, Jess?

Go Liberty!

Ah, damn it. Tristan, before we get up out of here, any last words, sis?

Free Kelsey Plum! Free her!

Yes sir, free her, man. And make sure to subscribe to Goodfellow's YouTube page and all of his socials @GoodFollowShow, man.

You can catch all new episodes of Good Follow every Thursday wherever you get your podcast and on YouTube. Good Follow is presented by DraftKings Sports. The crown is yours. We will see you next time.