NFL Divisional Round Picks, Harbaugh to the Giants & a Miami–Indiana Preview w/ Kevin Clark, Plus the Legend Al Michaels!

Hey, we're Silla listeners. You can find every episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. The Ryan Rassilla show is presented by Draft Kings. On today's show, a lot of football. As we get ready for the NFL playoffs, we're going to go through every division around matchup. We're going to pick every one of them. We're going to do Kevin Clark. We're going to give you matchups and how you could like, all right, maybe if this team were to win, how are we going to do it that way? So it's really thorough. We enjoyed it. And also a pick for their his Miami Hurricanes in the National Championship game against Indiana, Al Michaels living legend. The miracle on ice. We'll go back to those days and run through his career a little bit as well and just hang out with a guy everybody loves hanging out with and we have life advice. And if he'll play off, let's go. 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Connecticut called 888-8-7897-777. Or visit ccpg.org. On behalf of Boothill Casino and Kansas, wait your tax pass through may apply in Illinois. 21 and over in most dates. Void and Ontario. Restrictions apply. Bet must win to receive bonus bets which expire in seven days. Minimum odds required. Four additional terms and responsible gaming resources, cdkng.co slash audio. Limited time offer. Why don't normally prep like this, but I did for our next guest. Wow, I just want to be locked in. I know he has a big weekend with NFL games. Kevin Clark joins us. ESPN. This is football part of Omaha's network as well. So I know, look, this is all just the appetizer before your canes take on the Hoosiers for the national championship, which we'll end with. But let's start with the last game. Rams at the Bears. It's going to be cold. Barry 23 degrees. What do you think is the biggest factor? I'll give you three factors that I think are important here. It is the Bears run success level, which is not great against what the Rams like to do running the football. Caleb and Loveland, who's become a stud here against what I would say is maybe not great corners are lack a depth at corner right now for the Rams or the weather, your choice or whatever, maybe off. Let's go off menu here for a second. Then we'll come back down to your keys. Those were great keys. I think a couple of things. I think the Bears are susceptible on defense to long throws, downfield throws. I think maybe bottom five in that. And I want to see if Matthews' effort is healthy. I know what the hell was going on with the finger last week. I just want to see the Bears catch interceptions. They have incredible ball skills. I think they're the best team in the NFL catching interceptions when there's no pressure, which is just indicative of just having good DBs who know where the ball is at all times. And then it's Caleb against that that Rams front seven. I think what's amazing with Caleb this year is he's holding on to the ball longer than he did last year, which I didn't seem possible. But the difference is his sacrate, his sacrate is unbelievable. It has gotten so much better. He is taking USC Caleb, all the escape ability, all the things we thought we could see. We didn't see it last year. And some people got off the bandwagon. He's got it now. He's able, I think he holds on to the ball longer than any quarterback in the NFL this year. And his his sacrate when he has the ball for longer than four seconds last year, it was almost 50 percent this year. It's under 20. So like he his is his awareness in the pocket is unbelievable. His ability to extend plays is unbelievable. He knows where everything is. And so for me, like I we saw one of the best throws we've ever seen on fourth down last week. I just think it's it's indicative of of the growth he has and the awareness he has. And if he can keep making those plays, I don't know if anybody can beat him. Having said that, I think this Rams team is really, really, really good. And as long as staff, it's finger is is is 80 percent. I'm going to pick them to win close. That's how I feel. I feel like the Rams. I mean, look there are my Super Bowl pick, even if there's some things that I can pick from the Carolina game. Doesn't exactly. It's still a ton of confidence in you. I talked with Nate Tyson this week. And I'm just like, can we figure out what's going on with him on third down? Like if you were ever thinking of O-line weapons, Stafford McVey, like how are you bad on third down all regular season? And then yet it seemed like another issue against his Carolina team. So, you know, on the Caleb point, because I thought the Packers game was the perfect Caleb game. Because if you if you dig into some of the stuff, you're like, man, there's still a ton of off target throws. Because if he gets off of some of these off target throws that just don't make a ton of sense, the counts worth has been annoyed by. I think Troy Ackman was annoyed by I think Brady did like seven Caleb Williams games this year that all the former NFL players again, Concer was not as a quarterback kind of like get on his case a little bit, which I totally understand. But if he ever figures out that part of it, it's going to be game over. The sack thing on holding onto the football, I think you'd agree that last year was holding onto the football and pure confusion. Yes, just like what the hell am I supposed to do where now it's a capability with maybe a plan while he's holding on to a route a little bit longer. And I'll say Ben Johnson Ryan Poles deserve some credit for that because last year was the offensive line just allowing unblocked pressures where you just had no chance. Just no, I'm almost like a college quarterback just like getting overloaded by seven guys having no idea what's going on and going straight to the ground. This year because the offensive line is more coherent, I would say the pressures are probably coming from more predictable places. If they're unblocked, he's going to see it. It's not going to be unblocked because of confusion. As you said, it's going to be unblocked because that's just how the scheme is looking and you can identify the puts and all that stuff. So I think it just shows you how much one guy that being Ben Johnson can turn around everything and professionalizing the offensive line, getting those weapons in there. And so I'm with you. I just think the fact that he's been able to refer to USC Caleb in a good way, that's a compliment in one gear is astounding because I think a lot of quarterbacks have been broken by last year and he wasn't. I think Ted Wynn had it from the athletic home. I'm sure you appreciate his work as much as I just incredible. Like he should be a bigger deal. So there you go. There's my little Ted ramp. It starts now. It starts right now. Momentum starts right now. So I was looking at some of the matchup stuff and you know, we all started getting really excited about this 13 personnel stuff because it actually was once you understood it, it was fun. I guess I just felt like I heard it a lot. And then you have a smile on your face a little bit. So just keep moving. But if you look at the Bears run defense against multiple tight end sets, they're the worst as far as like success rate or explosive plays against multiple tight end sets, what teams want to run against zone runs are 27. So there's just a lot of stuff on paper that tells you if the Rams just kind of stick to who they've been here in the second half of the season running the football, that's a good matchup for them. And then if you go to the Packers game, which, no, this is the part that I'm always going to struggle with criticizing head coaches. It's like, okay, dubs goes out of bounds. Golden goes out of bounds. Deep shot musk wave. Deep shot dubs again. But that was probably the only stretch where the Bears were just completely locking up the run game. And maybe it's just an offensive coordinator. It's a floor. It's just like, look, this is the matchup. This is the right call against this matchup. And now they're run blitzing us. They know they have to stop the run. So like, I can't not throw it here. Now it would be nice if somebody was in bounds and maybe they run a little bit more clock. But I'm wondering, you know, is there anything from that when the Bears absolutely had a buckle up and stopped the run? And look, they still, the Packers still move the football down the field there. If there's anything to be excited about despite some of those statistical matchups that would certainly favor Los Angeles. With the Bears defense, is there anything? Yeah, I mean, I mentioned it like they catch interceptions. And that's that in these types of games is big. Guess who didn't catch interceptions last week? The Carolina Panthers because Pukinakua broke up that late past and obviously, Mike Jackson got a couple of shout out Mike Jackson, my Marrakein. But, but you know, for me, I just think that especially if the fingers still an issue is that the Bears defense, their ball skills are going to come into play. And so I think that that's that's something to watch there. But I think with with the Packers, I was surprised to see maybe this is just the media's default. People say, oh, Matt LaFlor got conservative. He turdled. No, no, he didn't. They like things. She didn't go their way. They didn't catch the passes. Obviously, they were under man because of the injury stuff. I think Matt LaFlor is a hell of a coach. This is just a Bears team that and by the way, I think their aggressiveness is the reason that they're able to have these incredible comebacks is because they're very comfortable and forth and two, fourth and three, gotta have it down. They're practicing that all season long. And so in the office, I decided the ball. They they're I feel like there's a columnist, even when they're striking out in the first half from those four pounds. So I think match up wise, I mean, Ben Johnson, the fourth quarter, Caleb, the fourth quarter, it's as good as it gets. If it's a close game, again, I'd be very scared. I'm from my Rams pick. But I'm still I'm still going to favor the Rams here. I'm going to go Rams here. But yeah, the cold, you know, I know, I was thinking about it this morning because I feel like whenever I'll be wrong about something like this, it's like, Hey, the reason this weather thing is pointed out all the time is because it's real. It's real. Yeah. Like don't be dismissive of this. Remember all those, it's like those Tampa stats for, but a couple decades, it was like if kickoff is below this, like this is the record. I mean, I guess I could look back at the Philly game last year going, hey, they were writing this bunch of the same guys. But I mean, it just sounds so stupid. It's like, Hey, remember when you guys were cold last year, they really matters. It really like how often are how often are you genuinely cold in a given year now that you live in LA? Not that often. Yeah. But when you go back, you're like, holy, I'm rattled. I am rattled. I'm rattled. I don't go outside in the winter. I live in New York. I do not go outside in the winter. Now you don't have to tackle anybody. Yeah. It's like, well, I don't know. I've seen some stuff on X with that city of yours. What are you having? All right. Let's go Houston, New England. I just want to start with that four man pass rush for the Texans. It is an absolute thing of beauty. You know, when you watch some of these teams, you know, 60 plus 70 snaps, you can just see the pass rush die off. That's where, you know, look, the third downs are bigger, the Spagnolo approach of like, okay, where's the blitz coming? Because we just we know that he's going to die like this pressure late. It's not a matter of like if he's going to do it. It's just how is he going to do it? And the Texans, they're the most basic defense. They do not change who they are the entire time. And the first team to win a playoff game since the Bears in 1940 with two defensive touchdowns without allowing one as well. Granted, it was Rogers. It's going to be different against Drake May, but that defense, that front four man, like that is the epitome of everything you would want if you were building a football team. Will Anderson came across this dad. I was just playing our next chance at earlier. Will Anderson is perhaps on record. They've only been willing to listen to 2016, I think, or whatever. The best third down pass rush from the history of the sport, okay? 48 pressure is on third down this season. That is blows everybody out as far as pressure rate. And then we obviously do not hunter. We know what he can do on the other side. Will Campbell did not have a great game against the chargers. I feel like every few years it's always right and so funny because remember after the Giants beat the Patriots twice. It's always all right. We've got a copy whoever won the Super Bowl. So coming out of each Super Bowl into the off season, every media member, every former player on Prigant shows like, you know what this shows? You got to rush the passer with four guys. You got to be able to do it. Oh, thanks guys. No, yeah, the Giants cracked the code. We got it. The Giants cracked the code. You only need four guys. If you get pressure on Tom Brady with four guys, good things can happen. Like, yeah, we know the problem is it's expensive. It's hard, schematically. You know, you can try to do different stuff, but normal, you don't have the personnel for the Texans have the personnel for their ability to get to know Hunter and Will Anderson out there. And then you add in. So I had a Jeffrey Simmons on my show yesterday. And he I love Jeffrey Simmons, but he hates the Texans. He said he hates the Texans. He hates a lot of things. He does. And but he was that means you're a great guest. He was a elite guest because he hates a lot of things. And I was like, what offensive line left? Because he put like eight playoff teams. I was like, what offensive line gave you the most problems of the team to your left? And he was like, and then he like halfheartedly like praise Trent Williams and Grace Able and then got out of the question because he just he just hates the idea that any offensive line good trouble. And he's considering his year. He's probably right. He is right. That's the point. He is right. But one of the things he said was about the Texans. Obviously praise defensive line, but he was saying in the back end, they've got unbelievable debees who don't have to cover for very long. That's what's so deadly about it. Lois pass the rating allowed among debees this season, including the playoffs. Okay. Kalen Bullock, second best in the NFL, Derek Stingley, fourth best in the NFL, Jalen Petri, fifth best in the NFL. Okay. Like pass or what you throw to those guys, bad things happen because A, they're good and B, the defensive line is speeding up the process. It's unbelievable. And then you add in the linebackers. Then you add in Jalen Petri. Derek Henry told me Jalen Petri hit him harder than anybody's hit him in a long time this year. Like he's a beast, man. I mean, you can be thrown off by the Kazoo helmet there, but I mean, it's every time he is coming up, the tackling in that Pittsburgh game alone, even if the pressure didn't get there. So keep going. And so I just I love this defense. I think Demica runs awesome. I think if you're asking CJ Stroud to do just enough, good things are going to happen. Having said that in my research, Drake May is the best quarterback under pressure in the NFL this year. 65% completion percentage best pass or rating under pressure. And so I don't think he's been so good at downfield passing this year. I don't think that's going to be able to happen. But if he's able to get out and escape a little bit of the pressure and make some of these miracle throws, they've got a chance. But I'm picking the Texans, man. I'm picking the Texans as well. Three point favorites at this point. So obviously, Vegas thinks it's a little bit closer here with this. Maybe it's just a Stroud game from last week, which I do want to spend a little bit of time on. But that may pressure number. Does that change when there's an eighth guy out there? You know, well, I mean, look, there was a three. I think they had a three man rush where they beat Pittsburgh up front. Yes. Not that they were going with it. But I was like, oh, man, they only sent three in the same like mep they got home. Roger said the worst. Roger said the worst CPA for a quarterback like in playoff history or something last week. It was the worst QBR. I think it was playoff career too. Yes. Yes. And it looked like not very much fun. But to your point, May is the great equalizer in this because of the dropback. Like I've been a little obsessed with the schedule thing. But when you're talking about like what his success rate is on these deep throws, if he were five years in, I wonder if all of us would just be like looking at it more like Josh Allen. Like I think Denver is the perfect defense for trying to slow down Josh Allen. But it's like nobody wants to pick against Josh Allen. And because this is only year one with May with all these things that tell us it's Houston's game and Stroud doesn't even have to be that special all this defense. I think the way may even with this receiving core that Henry throw just all these throws over the season. It just feels like he's so special with this that that can keep any team in a game. I'm with you. I think Drake May is amazing. And I think his ability to stay he's very even keeled. I think his ability to stay calm. It really it really is kind of a Josh Allen style demeanor. And so I think again, I think he's going to have some miracle and miracles are on term because obviously he's really good in record season with these downfield throws. I think he's able to escape this pressure and make some big throws. I just don't think he's able to do it consistently enough. I think that the Texans are able to maybe pick him off a couple times because of what we talked about. The Nico Collins thing is big. The fact that he's out because the connection between Stroud and Nico Collins is as efficient as any quarterback-wide receiver combination. But I think they're going to score enough points. They have some crazy stat where they have one unbelievable amount of games in Houston when they score 20 points. So you reach 20 points. You get kind of get there. I think they do on this weekend. Yeah, I don't know that Kirk's going to match that production that he had. The Nico thing is absolutely massive. And like as somebody who's felt like, hey, you know what's, when I've said this, probably too many times now, but it's like, man, Stroud is like a complete afterthought after like he and Nico coming onto the scene as rookies. And then you look through how he closed the season. You know, the funny thing is that I mean, again, like whatever you want to do with QBR, his QBR in that playoff game where he was atrocious. He had five fumbles. He lost two of them. I think the most alarming single play in that game is the interception in the red zone because you can tell at that point like he's lost. He's completely lost. He was forcing the issue. And he was looking back. Yeah, he's looking back to the sideline being like, I hope you can see how little confidence I have in myself. And I'd like somebody to confirm that. And I just can't fathom that he's going to have that same exact game again. The funny thing is, is that game still graded out QBR wise because it's not going to factor in recovering three of your own fumbles. I don't think. Yeah. QBR wise, that was still better than like four of his last five closing games of the regular season. And so, you know, eventually I kind of have to get to the point. Like I know I cannot believe he was that bad. I wouldn't expect him to be that bad again, but that was concerning. I was talking to somebody from Ohio State when he came out and when he was like that that off season and then into the rookie season. And they're basically that the light bulb came on against Georgia in a way that even surprised people at Ohio State. You remember that game like all of a sudden, he's taking one of the deepest, toughest defenses of all time and he's absolutely torching them to the point they were a kick away from by the way, Ohio State figure out the kicking thing. It's been a while. It's been a while. That was a national championship. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it cracked, cracked. And they could have made that kick and won that in a game where I think everybody thought as you made coordination for Georgia, CJ Strauger's just absolutely popped in that game. And I wonder if he's and in your year this phrase all the time with coaches, I wonder if he's a confidence player. I wonder if he needs to see the ball go through the hoop a little bit and he's going to go on another run. The problem is we just haven't seen it from Straug the last few weeks. I think that if he gets a game where he's able to throw a couple of dimes, a couple, uh, hey, like, uh, prove it throws, then then you're going to see him go on a run here. I just want to see that. Like, if we get that, if we get like three huge chunk plays where we go, oh, CJ Strauger's back, they're probably going to win the Super Bowl. But I just got to see it first. Yeah, that's how I feel about this defense. Like I just, I just need him to be average and I don't think that long term he's average. Like I don't think we get done with the CJ Strauger's story. We're like, you know what? He ended up just kind of being an average guy and they wonder if they could do better, but you know, they signed them because everybody just gets signed. Again, we don't have to worry about any of this stuff right now, but even as somebody that's been pretty, I don't know that I've ever felt like CJ Straug doesn't feel like a quarterback. You have to be like super defensive about they don't introduce you and get up going, hey, this is a CJ Strauger. I don't know if anybody's really doing that out there. I think that, uh, I think the offensive line has been a problem too because like some of the hits he's taken the last two years, not only does he get hit. He gets last year was brutal. Yeah, but it gets hit hard when he gets hit. I don't know why the, you know, he does hold on the ball longer, all that stuff, but still that that has played a play to roll in it. Buffalo, another road favorite of all places at Denver. Point half this morning. Don't know if that'll flip. Um, I think the best thing here for Denver is the two things, and I've already alluded to it. Personnel wise, how they can get after somebody, you know, it almost feels like, certain as a waste in this game. Yeah, yes, yes. When you, when you're like, are you, are you going to hit Coleman for a big one? It was like, hey, he's still around, you know, cooks, who I think cooks has one of the most fascinating careers because everybody raves about having him and everybody gets rid of them after like one year. Um, and it's like, man, he's still in the league. It's like, there's been no fight for the 31st pick for like four straight off seasons. They're just like, yeah, you got a three. Yeah, we'll take Brandon coach. Yeah, because it was like, hey, he's made a quick available. It's like, well, of course he is. Like we were psyched to bring him in here. And we know he's put up some big numbers. But my god, you're right. Like every year it felt like he was getting traded and like a pretty decent level of like resource coming back for him. It's like, well, what the hell's the problem with this guy? It's like the offensive offensive Marcus Peter. So we're just contenders just just passing him around saying, hey, one Marcus Peter, sure, we're going to win the Super Bowl. Yeah, sure. Yeah. This guy's physical, great, match that like competitive as hell as off seasons. Like, hey, can we flip this guy for a third pounder? All right. So I, uh, you know, look, all the Josh Allen stuff is fairly predictable here. But I do love two numbers here. One is that since the by week, phonics seven best QBR in the league for a guy that I, you know, he goes down his leg in this game. I'm not going to be surprised either. But this, this feels like a group because I also love their linebackers too. And I love their front. I just like a lot of the personnel on this Denver defense. And I think that they, they have a much better chance in Allen against this game than other teams would. I agree with you. I actually was, I, I circled that patch to 10 point because he's allowed three down field receptions the entire year. And now it's like, okay, well, I don't think Coleman's going to make it for. I think we're good. I think we're good on that. They're going to have him spy Allen. Be like, we're not even going to put you on Shakir. Like, there's no point. The little tunnel screens. I don't scare you for a close Shakir. So, Tami, now I have to watch as Jersey after this game. Raleigh Moskets gets targeted a lot. So he sure does. I swear to God, that guy is on TV more than any corner in the NFL this season. I mean, and it's, it's always when it's bad too, you know, and you're like, does he suck? And then you look at the grades and you go, no, he just gets thrown at every single time. So I think he actually grades out to be slightly bad. I don't know if you know that. I have a number from, from PFF. He's been, excuse me, from next end, he's been targeted 108 times this year. Which is tied. That guy's the shape. I'd for the most in the league. Nate, what about that in Denver, too? Yeah, you want to do. Well, we're going to draft you and you're going to turn and run full speed for the entire season. Sounds awesome. So because of the volume, next chance, that says 17 passes defended in the reception. He saw 102 targets last season. So slightly off, but the completion percentage allowed is down from last year. So he's actually, he's playing better than he was last year. He just, he, it's, it's a problem because Patrick Tams on the other side and maybe quarter quarter, quarterbacks might assume he's getable. Yeah, I look, I'm probably a little guilty of it, too. It's like, what's going on? Is he a safety? No, no, no, he's a corner. Um, but, have you saved the bike up with the Eagles, with the guys who think blank and ship is to Jean? Have you seen this? Yeah, yeah, he's like, I'm the other one. Sometimes I feel like we've come so far. And then I hear that mic up and I just go, no, this is why Alex Karrista doesn't go higher. Like, what's this guy's not like he's balding already and I'm supposed to fucking draft this guy. Like, no, he's pretty athletic. Sure, sure. He is. All right. Um, all right. So, uh, yeah, pretty bacon. Well, go ahead, stay, stay, stay, stay as long as you want. You don't have to get to the big Broncos are second best four man pass rush team in the league. Second only to argue some Texans. Uh, I think if there's anything to be concerned about, it's the Josh Allen is actually, he's getting pressured less than he normally has. Um, but in his career, when he's taking more sacks when he gets pressured and my guess is that's because the receivers aren't getting open. Uh, my guess is that's because if he doesn't hit a, a, a running back or a tight end that he's got to do a little bit of, of maneuvering around. Uh, he's throwing the ball shorter than he ever has in his entire career. I, I have a hard time picking against Josh Allen because I think he's the best player on the planet. Uh, but I, I, I, I love this match up for the Broncos. I just, I'm sorry, I just, I feel like this is Josh Allen season. I just, I also think I'm curious to see it. The bills couldn't, couldn't stop the run on, on Sunday. And if Liam Cohen decided he was going to play caveman ball and just run with Michelle to it and over and over again. And TN is over and over again. I think they control that game and I think they win it. I think he got a little bit bored and threw the ball too much and got away. I'm like on outside runs the numbers of tutin' or astounding. I don't know why he, he abandoned that. I think that a lot of times, especially if you're fatal flaw, I think when the, uh, I think it was the Patriots and the Rams I want to say a couple of years ago, when they met in the Super Bowl, there were the two worst defensive, uh, uh, Rush Defense teams in league. You can get away with that because NFL coaches, my theory is they go bored. Like, I had, no, I'm sorry, I had the name drop here, but I paid Manning my boss on a show a couple weeks ago and we were talking about how not getting bored is like the, like the hack in this league. Like, like the problem is if you run four times, the, the play calling head coach is like, hey, what if we took a shot here? What if we just do a little shot? And it's like, no, run, run five times. It's fine. And, and I think that may have happened with Liam Cohen on Sunday. I'm curious to see if that works. Wish on Peyton, whether or not they get away from it or not. 100% agree. By the way, Peyton Manning comes on your podcast. I think it's totally fine to reference that. And it's an awesome point because it was, I'm a little biased on that point because I think that's exactly what happened in that game. Yeah. We know what you can do against the bills. You can run against the bills. Their explosive play rate is abysmal. I mean, it's one thing to just give up yards. It's another thing to be the worst run defense against explosives, which they have been in the regular season. And then when I was tracking and past run selection, you know, first 30 was, you know, it wasn't like it was 25 passes, but I think it was 17, 18 passes out of that stretch. And you're watching them run the football and you go, you know, this, this is actually like a coaching thing that I want to, you know, I'm just going to get it in now before we get to the other game. I get as an owner and as a front office, you're like, okay, we're going to figure out like, you know, I've kind of gone back and forth about the McVeigh tree and all that kind of stuff. And I feel like generally it's been successful, even if it was an easy thing to make fun of. But when you bring in somebody like that, it's not shocking to have them go to your point. Like, all right, let's, let's get them out wide here. You know what I mean? Like, hey, I want to be passing on first down next, next floor balls. Like, let's just start opening it up. Let's just start opening up like to your point of boredom. Like if you're bringing in somebody that is all about offensive genius, and they see the numbers and they see the matchups, so they see a weak spot in the secondary. I think it's really hard for the, I mean, it's like watching anybody who wants to take a three now. Like, guys or two or three, they shouldn't even take three. It's like, man, everybody takes three is like, we're in my attempts. I, I don't know that you ever sent anything more accurate and then backed up by Peyton Manning. Well, also, that's why the two high shelves work so well in this league is because you can just burrow and my homes are great at taking the five yard check down and say, all right, we'll get, keep moving, keep moving, but most of the quarterback's going to go, I think I can split the safety seer. I think I can do a whole shot right now and then they've ended up throwing a pick. So Chris Canty was telling a story about Peyton a couple weeks ago in my show where he said that about the don't get bored thing. So they had a giants game where they, it was something like they had two healthy defensive tackles and they thought they could get away with it because they were like, you know what, Peyton's going to spread the ball around the yard. He's going to go to Dan Marvin Harrison and Reggie Wayne and Dallas Clark. We can get away with the defensive tackles and only the sign of any guy. He said that Peyton Manning checked into a Donald Brown run for the entire game. He was just like these defensive tackles are tired. Donald Brown, Agap, Donald Brown, Agap. And he said, can he says one of those miserable experiences of his life? And if more people operated like that, more teams would win. All right, I like all that stuff. San Francisco Seattle. Yeah. We gave teen wasn't great for San Francisco's offense. 173 total yards, two and nine on third downs. I say conversely, there's some Donald stuff here. First half, second half that is very real. There's also 20 total turnovers, which I thought was an interesting number from the SPN stats and research that it's the first number one seed since 1978 to have the quarterback lead at the NFL in turnovers. So if you're a nighter span, even with all the injuries, adding Kiddell to the pile, coming off this great win in Philadelphia where it feels like party wasn't that wasn't it wasn't like party came in there and gave you the A game and that's how they were able to get one on the road at all. I was kind of surprised how long it took him to kind of look like himself. That's the thing you're banking on. You're banking on Donald. You're banking on Donald's matchups in the red zone except you just wonder can this nine or linebacker core look as good as they did in a second game here because I thought Hendrix love is like man when they draft this rookie and it's like no well obviously we know he's been around a really long time. I thought he played great against Philadelphia. I think it's asking a lot of these guys to play like that a couple of weeks in a row. And can they generate the pressure? It just hasn't it hasn't been going on it like 16% dropback pressure rate on Jalen Hertz last week. That was the lowest in the game. The season of core next chance stats for me. I look at it. No one has been more wrong with the Niners than me frankly. And I we did a topic on TV last summer. Has the Niners championship window closed and I said I had because they're an aging expensive roster that gets hurt all the time. That's what happens. Everybody said the previous year. Oh, they get hurt too much or they got hurt. It's fine. They'll be healthy this year. No, when you have a bunch of old guys get hurt. That's that was my reasoning in the summer. And I was right about that. The problem is they keep getting better. Like they keep oh no Fred Warner fine. We're good. No Nick Boasa. Okay, we're good. By the way, Fred Warner's practice window is opened. And by the way Trent did not play in this game. The last game of the regular season and people weren't even sure he was going to play in this Philly game and then he was fine. So go ahead. Right. And then you just look at it. They keep getting banged up and they keep getting better. This is the best coaching job of Kyle Shanahan's career. I think by a wide margin and some of the young guys have hit. And so I've been wrong every step of the way in this 90's team. I think some of the the win last week was just the Eagles and their offense and just just not being able to execute anything. That was a disaster. But I'm picking the sea ox for a couple of reasons. As you mentioned, the Donald thing, the turnovers. I don't think the 90's meal before those. I think the offensive line has been much better this year. I think Grazable. Again, Jeffrey Simmons had Grazable. Is it going to end up being one of the best players in the league? I think the 49ers defense is good enough at keeping everything in front of them typically. But Jackson Smith and Jigba, like some of the stats on what percentage of downfield throws are JSN on that team. It's like historic. That's it. It's historic. I mean, Ormars reminds me. It's like what do they call it in Columbus against Notre Dame? They call it like the third down Jeremiah. I think Grazable throw third in Jeremiah. Like third in JSN. Just like just just he's down there somewhere. It's going to be fine. I'm picking the sea ox. But as soon as they can do enough and then on defense, keep the score down. I always love the t-shirt that said one with three quarters of the earth is covered by one or the other quarters covered by Eric Berry. Yeah. That was a big thing in the late 2000s. Yeah. It was a had Reggie Nelson. There was a Reggie Nelson shirt in Gainesville. I remember seeing when I got there. Visiting my friends. Eric Berry is probably a better t-shirt candidate than Reggie Nelson. And now the SEC isn't good anymore. So they can't even make those t-shirts. That is. That's true. There's one down in Coral Gables. Sure. So that's like Malik Tony. It's like you know, KKontay Scott. KKontay Scott. KKontay Scott. KKontay Scott would be a good one. That kind of thing. I thought I'd read something about the Kane secondary not being as good. Don't worry. Don't worry. We're getting to it. We're getting to it. I'm not doing no fall starts here. Well, you're 100% right because like sometimes I forget about who the number two option is as a receiver for the Seahawks. Thielins second most targeted guy. I believe in the red zone, which is kind of asking a lot. Maybe it's Barter who with their red zone failures and weekend teen against this nine or Steve Fence. You could say, look, he was in and out of the game. He's going to be healthier. He's going to be good to go here. I just it's really hard for me to think about them going up there. I love him. McDonald has done the entire for which Leonard Williams, the detacles Murphy, where they've talked about like we were practicing in the elements all week long. Although I don't know how many teams with the number one seed in the buy party for a week and go on vacation. Is that is that they were kind of like Leonard ruins is like, hey, it's not like we're going to Mexico or something like that. I'm paraphrasing a bit. I'm like, do a lot of teams that have the one seed be like, here's what we need you guys to do. Go on a little bit of a bender. Wait, didn't the chance you that didn't the chance you that the book picture. Yeah, I think so. Was that was that before the playoffs? I'm pretty sure. Oh, I think you might be right. Let's look at it on it. Oh, it was before the wild card game. Maybe did they already know they were going to get killed though. They weren't they weren't they an awesome team that year? Where are they? I don't remember. They lost 38 to 13. Yeah, there you go. Victor Cruz says it definitely quote definitely wasn't worth it. You're right. It was before the playoffs. Thanks for the packers. By the way, Victor Cruz College roommate Liam Cohen. So we learned to not run the ball. This is Victor guys. Great. I'm never going to run the ball. Would you do would you hire Harbaugh for every team? Some teams? No teams. I love this. I love this. It was a stupid stupid way to ask that. I love this. I love the giants. The giants higher. And here's why I think Joe Shane's a pretty bad GM. I think that the narrative about the young core in New York, I must have missed the young core. It was just like this happened with the draft two years ago. Like Joe Shane hit on all his picks. Did he hit on Mollik neighbors? Let's not go roster by roster. But I think that was overrated. I think Jackson dark and play. But I think the biggest thing that they needed because they haven't hit on a higher since time cough. The biggest thing needed was somebody to come in and tell them how it was going to be, how to win football games because the organization seems incapable of doing it. And the fact they were keeping Joe Shane and the fact that it sound like his job was never under evaluation. Like they firebrand able. They said, hey, Joe Shane's going to lead it. And then the leaks coming out to me were astounding. It was like, oh, Joe Shane modernized the scouting services, computers, or whatever. And it's like, okay, well, did he get good players? Because I feel like the IT department can handle the scouting, the scouting computers. And so they needed somebody to come in and whether I feel I felt this way about Ryan Poles and to a degree less need is a better GM than these guys. But with polls and now Shane, your job and you can go on your business card is to be the head coach's buddy and to support him and to get the players that is needed and all that stuff. You can win with Joe Shane in the building. He just can't do a lot for for for more outstanding. And I think John Harbock coming in is going to probably bring in some front office guys. You have a football team or that extended tree. He's already hiring top monk and to be the office coordinator. I think Jackson dark and play. He can get through to Jackson dark and telling protect himself or change, you know, change the way he plays a little bit because that really is a huge problem. I think it's awesome hire. I think it's what they need. I've been banging this drum for two months. They needed a Harbock on my Tom one on Marcus Freeman. Just a huge personality is going to come in and say, this is my organization now. Very similar to what Sean Payton did in Denver. Sean Payton just changed. No one thought that was if Russell Wilson was there and they know Hack it was there screwing up everything. Nobody thought that the turnaround was going to be that quick. And by the way, it wasn't. They lost 70 to three or whatever to to to to Mike McDaniel. Like it took a while, but they ended up getting there. You have to have the only way to change your organization is for one guy to come in there and tell you how to change whether that's Sean McVeigh whether that's Sean Payton whether that's John Harbock Mike Tom on whomever. I think it's a home run hire. Yeah, I think you're right. I think he's probably not for everyone. You know, like, okay, wait a minute. Does he call plays as he quarterback guru? It's like no, but remembered like early on, we just having all that success the first five years of Baltimore. It was funny because, you know, this is a lot of the result thing. The Josh McDaniel success early in Denver, still being the best example ever of playing the results on how we would tell the story after the fact that because he was young, everybody related to him. And it was like, okay, except for the part now, we want to fire but early on with with Harbock, it's like, you know, what's great is that he doesn't come from a defensive side. He doesn't come from the offensive side. He's special teams. It's more people. There's more turnovers. You have to learn how to like delegate authority and all these different things. And he's like a football CEO and all this stuff. And then towards the end of the way out, when it's like him being talked about as a potential head coach for other teams, it's like, you know, he doesn't really call any plays. He's like, he's never, he's never, he's never built a defense. But the adult in the room thing is like some of these teams need it more than they want to admit. And for the giants, like this might not even, like, it might not be Jackson Dart, you know, it might not be, I would think a few of these guys defensively. I might like some of the names on the defensive side of the ball more than you do. Because I think there have been times where I'm like, God, that guy like stands out today. I mean, look, it even happened with the jets a few times this year. I'm like, dude, why are there like five guys on this defense with the jets that I really like? And it seems like this team absolutely sucks. So I think it makes sense. So we agree on that one. There's two things I want to say in Harbott's favor. Number one is that people who are in Baltimore, and this is before my time covering the league, people were in Baltimore when he took over Ed Reed and Ray Lewis and and that defensive core, they didn't exactly go to John Harbott's house with cookies and be like, welcome to the club, man. Like you had to, you had to earn their respect. And I think it kind of took a while. And I the people who were there practice said it was really astounding to watch that process unfold and how well he commanded that that that room when it's not an easy thing to do when it's a play or lead franchise sometimes like that was especially on the defensive side of the ball. The coach has to earn his stripes. John Harbott did that. So he's that's when you say could he be higher anywhere? He would have won over 32 locker rooms because people just love him. The other thing is I kind of feel like he's been written out of the organizational support for Lamar, especially in the beginning. So there was that nugget. I think Albert Breer had it maybe a year after Lamar was drafted. Like the Patriots loved Lamar Jackson. They just knew they had to change their entire operation to run an offense where Lamar Jackson's a quarterback. John Harbott said, okay, hand up, we'll do it. We'll change our whole operation. We'll draft for Lamar Jackson. We'll change the way our offensive line plays for Lamar Jackson. We're good with that. We'll hire the offensive coordinator where that was Greg Roman at the start who I think is with that. Obviously, I think you probably that was a well deserved change in the chargers. But I think Greg Roman did a lot with the run game there early on and helped Lamar Jackson initially. Todd Monkin was an awesome hire. I think made some dumb mistakes. Like you know, the Kansas City game offensively, I think they ran into a stacked box like 36 times or something or sorry, passed into into into light. Basically, the defense is playing the past. They passed into it anyway against Kansas City like a historic rate. So they made some dumb game management mistakes. But there's a lot of teams that would take that floor and that level of success. I think the world I think the giants are probably two years away from playing for real stuff in the NFC East. If you're looking at the landscape as some of the available coaches, because you know, I think the floor is Miami timeline. And then what floor has just done since because even if you're talking about somebody who it seems like everybody that understands defense is like disguised incredible. Like you can plug them in with kind of any personality. He's going to figure out a way and he's going to like end some of these Cubes. Like some of these Cubes, they get really excited about that. Maybe you've got bounced around a little bit that had limitations, but it put up numbers like maybe I'm thinking, Darrell, maybe I'm thinking, golf a little bit. And then it's like, floor is going to come in and just ruin it. He's going to come in and ruin it. But then I think back to the Miami thing, it's like you hire the coach who apparently hated to us so much that like it was so obvious that first year that he's a two, he thought he sucked. And it's not the way like two appears to be kind of a sensitive guy. Like it was just the wrong personality matchup. And so then you look at McDaniel and you're thinking, okay, well, you have to go this way. Like tell your quarterback, he's awesome. You just spent this pick on him. You might as well just convince him that he's awesome. Convince yourself that he's awesome. Like whatever it is, like you'd be old school football, tough guy mentality, but that's not really what the job is. The job is to maximize this one position. And then McDaniel kind of does that to a level that I never thought was going to happen. So I find them interesting in that like I hope floors gets another shot at this. I don't want the old school coach to be done. But I guess I would have reservations about thinking like, do I bring this guy in? And if I give him the wrong quarterback that can't handle this hard coaching, like am I am I wrong from the jump? Even if I think he's a great coach because of like going back to that Miami experience. Well, let me ask you a question. They're both available. Who would you rather have? Let's say you're okay. Then if I, but I don't know the quarterback, like who's my quarterback? Can he be told what about Tennessee? Cam work. I think Cam can handle it. I do too. Yeah. I do too. I think Cam work is one of those confident people that's ever played this sport of football. So I think that Brian Flore is being like, you shouldn't have done that. I think I think you can handle it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Can you pick it? I don't know. Imagine, imagine the owner being like your number one job is to empower Kenny Pickett. This feels very mean towards Kenny Pickett. So I know I don't want to keep doing this. Five. That's what the money's for. I was just trying to think of a name. I was just trying to think of a name, but I love I love this exercise. Like I kind of want to do it three more times, but we're just going to be naming guys that aren't starters. So go ahead. All right. Well, I just want to say I've been surprised. Top down the George the organization runs through Anthony Richardson. Didn't work. I just want to say on this note, I've been surprised at the reaction to Kevin Stepanski's interviews. Like Dolphins fans were like, no, thank you. He won coach to your twice. He knows that he run an offense. I know people were especially Cleveland fans because I tweeted something positive about the fans. He said, well, the team made a bunch of mistakes and penalties in the run discipline. I certainly think fans because they're really good coach. I think it gives you a really good floor. And I think that the roster got so bad on the off the side of the ball. And they obviously were victims of he let's assume let's assume he didn't have as much a role in the Deschamps Watson trade as Andrew Berry and Jimmy has once assumed that. Okay. I think that's probably the case. He was on the receiving end of the worst trade in the history of sports. And I don't think you can draw that out. Oh, man, that's so I never thought about that. That's so good for the Browns. Fifth of Luka trade. There's already limits to be made. I can't say it. I can't say it's a worse trade in sports anymore. Thank you. Nico. By the way, Nico was at the Miami game the other day. Did you know? She never stopped scouting, never stopped evaluating. As Dennis says, Brian's in a sleep trying to give Malik Itonia away. All right. So it's to fans. He's good. I think I'm intrigued to see what the Steelers do because I think Jerry Doolock had said yesterday, there's 0% chance that they hire a guy with experience like they're going to want the next Mike Tomlin, the next Bill Cower, the next Chuck Nol, all of whom were I believe were defensive assistants, all of whom were young. I don't know if that means it's going to be defensive assistant. Could be Kershula. Could be any other side of the ball with the Rams, Nathiel House. I think there's a lot of possibilities there. I find this coaching cycle as intriguing as as anything we're ever seeing. What's up with this 30 year old guy that like does he have incredible PR or is this grant grant grant you Dinsky? Yeah. The Jaguars guy. I'd say both both Jaguars coordinators are going to get some some looks. I don't know. I don't know. I never met him. I never met Grant you Dinsky. What I'll say is that when you say incredible PR, it's typically and again, I have no idea whose agent is typically coaching agents are really good. There's like five of them and they're all awesome at their job. When a name appears at a nowhere, typically they'd be either hired an agent or and you'll see it. You're going to see it. You're going to see guys. I'm not even talking about anybody you've already named. Tomorrow, you're going to see a national guy be like, you know, she get a look and that's the guy you've never heard of and then they're going to get a look. That's how this tends to go. I think that that's interesting, but I also think that that's a part of we don't know. We don't have any tape on these guys. There's a Grant Gdinsky's in Jacksonville. Liam Cohen is a strong play collar there. So we don't we don't know how good or not he is. We don't have much tape on that. He called plays in the preseason, I believe. So we have that tape. But I think that in general coaching is an extremely inexact science. When I read that he called plays in the preseason, all I could think of was PR agent manipulation. I'm like, who the fuck ever says this about anybody that is on the radar? And probably if you're connected with him on the representation side, the point is to start to mental awareness clock for him. Like, here, like, hey, he's not getting a job in this cycle. But if we just kind of get a couple of things out there, when I read that somebody was like, you know, people raved about his preseason game calling. I'm like, who? I was like, I don't know that I've read that a lot ever. So, so the other problem I'm not even mad about. The other problem I have on my end is that when I do meet these guys, how they interview and explain their offense has very, very little to do with whether they're going to be successful coach. Okay. Like, just because you're thoughtful, like, I think we've talked about it. I interviewed Freddie Kitchens before we took the job. I did not think Freddie Kitchens was going to be an expelor check after that interview. Okay, so sometimes you get that. I thought the world of Brian Callahan because of our conversations since Cincinnati about Joe Burrow and how thoughtful he was and all that stuff. But he wasn't calling place. Is that Taylor was calling place? And then we saw him call place. I think Brian Callahan can still be an awesome offensive coordinator. Maybe one day he'll be an awesome head coach. But the only thing we had to go on was that Brian Callahan, when you're hiring him, was that he gave, he seemed like a very thoughtful guy in interviews and he helped Joe Burrow prepare. And then he was kind of, he was heavily involved in the rise and the kind of the blending of the playbooks between what they did at LSU with the bangles, the McVeigh, Shane, and Hanoffence merging and all together. Brian Callahan was the in-strandle part of that. That seemed to not help in tennis with that roster. It seemed to not help with Kim War early on. And so it's hard for me now, and this is a lesson I've learned in the last three cycles to say, Oh, great example. Aaron Glenn. Aaron Glenn gave me great quotes on Dan Campbell. So he gets hired and I go, Oh, he gets you to give me great quotes on Dan Campbell. Turns out that didn't help at all. Final thought here. Are you annoyed that the U is back is being replaced by his college football forever chain? Because the Hoosiers pulled this off. Because the U of, I mean, there, Miami's an eight and a half point dog here, but the U is back thing is now like, you know, we don't even get to do it because what the Hoosiers are on the cusp of accomplishing here next week. Well, Miami was a nine and a half point dog against Ohio State. And I wasn't, I was at that game. I'll be at the game on Monday. I was never too worried about Ohio State winning that game. Once the game started, once again started. And I thought I was going to be a fourth quarter game against Ohio State. And Indiana Indiana, Indiana game is very similar to me. And I wouldn't get to that in a second. But what's interesting to me is so Patrick Everston does a great job covering the sports books. I talked with his four Ohio State. The public really thinks Miami stinks from a betting perspective. And that what was happening with Ohio State was the sharps were trying to bet it down. And because I thought it was going to be a close game. And the public could not be hammering Ohio State more. That's happening with Indiana. If you look at the, I think at one point, I think I saw it was like 80% of bets run Indiana at seven and a half. And now it's time to eight and a half. And we'll see if the sharps are able to bet that down. I don't, if I, if I barely covered, if I barely watched college football, which most betters do, I would see the SMU and Louisville losses and go, oh, okay, whatever. But it also probably look at the tech saying I'm win the Ole Miss win that defense that offense was unbelievable. And Miami was able to kind of crowd them and then obviously the Ohio State win. I'm shocked at the fact that there's still my, me still being dismissed even after those wins. That they haven't really played a bad game since the loss to SMU, which has a lot of, had a lot of mitigating factors. I was really, I don't want to get an, I, I, I very rarely, terrible dimensions. I very rarely care about the reaction I get to anything. I was downright shocked or so low when I came on your show in November. And you asked me if Notre Dame and Miami played now who would win? I said Miami would win because the issue is that in August, Notre Dame couldn't block Ruben Bay and Niki Mezzador and they wouldn't be able to block them now. And I was shocked at that. And I, I'm sorry, shocked at the reaction that I got from saying what I thought was a pretty simple truth. And the fact that this, that has played itself out over the past month and I probably would pick Miami to beat Notre Dame again if they played. Monday. You're better positioned now for that. Yeah, yeah. But I was shocked at how the negative the perception was of Miami going into those playoffs. And I hope that I, I don't know. Like the Krist Jahball jokes. You can say a lot of things. They show up in big games. They beat Notre Dame. They beat Ole Miss. They beat Ohio State. They beat Texas sail. Now okay. When they seem to struggle is when it's the sleepy he's lost four games over the past two years in regular season. and they've been sleepy, Georgia Tech, Syracuse, Louisville, SMU. Like they've been those sleepy games. He's beaten the rivals, he swept the rivals in each of the last two seasons, and neither of them were particularly close, the in-state rivals. And so I hope the conversation going forward changes around Miami. I doubt it does. It seems like people are dismissing the Ohio State win already. Caleb Downs and Caden Curry said that the Ohio State would win nine out of ten times. I disagree. They would get whipped on the line of screaming to join out of ten times. And we probably see a lot more than one win out of ten if they played again. So I don't care if I'm called a homer about that because I'm right. And I almost were siloed to bring you into this. I almost endowless at the Ohio State game. I got pretty drunk, almost sent a really taunting tweet and then decided not to because I was just so shocked at the reaction. No, no, no, no, no. To the reaction that I got after that pod, you look at my mentions after that pod. And it was like there's no way, but no way. No, but it was like it was all these people saying there's no way you believe Miami's good. There's no way. I believed it because I was right. And so it wasn't about you. It was about the reaction that I got from that. And it was actually like it really pushed me off. All right, a lot of good points in there. I'm going to give you two words for this title game. Carson Beck. How did you feel about the old Miss game? I felt that the last drive was really astounding. There was third down dime, secure, and marion and stuff. The tip pick was bad, but that's that you can't put it on him. I think that the old Miss game that shouldn't every game, it's actually funny. You bring that up every big game they play this year, the games I mentioned, they've all looked the same, which is the first quarter. It looks like Miami's the more physical team. And then they just kind of fuck around that information for three quarters. Like they don't go up three scores. They don't like, you know, they're just like whatever. And then in the fourth quarter, there's a gotta have a drive and they cash that has happened in I believe every all all four of those games. Notedame, text, and I'm Ole Miss and in Ohio State. All four. They'd have fourth quarter drive where they just put it together. I think there's an awareness on how good the defense is. I think there's an awareness that Carson Beck gets in a lot of trouble when he throws the deep ball. That was the Louisville game. People keep talking about Jeff Brown figuring out the Miami defense. No, they figured out that Carson Beck throws bad deep balls and you can catch them. And they threw four in receptions on that. Two of them just pure bad deep balls that were picked off by athletic defensive acts of Louisville. And so they're not gonna not gonna ask him to do too much. I don't think he's, I think, Fred and Amanda was obviously going to do a hell of a lot more on the off the side of the ball at the quarterback position. But I think that it can be I'd be shocked if this wasn't a fourth quarter game. All right, fair. Fair. I just, I'm gonna say I trust Mendelsohn more than I trust you guys. I was more dismissive of your Miami arguments last year. November was a weird time for a lot of us because I feel like they were entering the college football rankings at the worst possible time where everybody's just like, hey, here we go again. And unfortunately, previous seasons stick to you for college football programs, both positively and negatively. Like if you're able to solve pre-existing perceptions of things, then credit to you as a human being. It's just really hard to do. All right. So that means I'm going Hoosiers, you're going Keynes. And then our NFL picks Rapid Fire. I got Rams Houston Denver. I'm going Denver at home and then Seattle. I agree with you except bills. Okay. Feel good to the Buffalo Jills. I love it. Yeah, that is Kevin Clark. This is football. Paint Manning was on it. Not a name drop. Not a name job. Right. Enjoy the weekend. Enjoy your national championship game, buddy. Thanks, buddy. This is a pleasure. It's an honor. We have Al Michaels from Amazon. Again, the Thursday night football broadcast of the NFL and just a legendary voice that I grew up with. I'm sure so many of our listeners did. He joins us now with the run the back miracle event presented by Michael Oltra. He is in the locker room as we look back on something again that it's been a backdrop in sports history, your call of that game. It's good to see you. Thanks for doing this out. Oh, this is my pleasure. Anytime I can get associated with something like this and when make a love ultra cold instead that we'd like it to be a part of this, I jumped at it because in the comeback and revisit the late class and I don't get to do this very often. And then to get together with Jim Craig and Michael Rosione and Mark Johnson, it's going to be very, very special. I always think about like when a famous actor runs in another famous actor, they don't even necessarily need to know each other, but they kind of know like they've had a very similar life. And there's this immediate respect. I wonder what it's like for all of you to get together from this this memory from 1980 and each year that it's it's celebrated. What that connection is like for you to realize how special this was. I'm sure you knew it was special in the moment, but there has to be this extra level that just is so rewarding to you when everyone that played. It is and with the guys and I talked to them with some frequency and especially when you have the 10th anniversary of 20 to 30th, 40th, the next big one coming up is going to be 50 in four years. But I mean the story, I don't want to say it doesn't die, it gets better. It really doesn't, especially to be here in late class, they got here last night, had dinner with Michael Rosione and a few other people on everybody in the restaurant, all of the service people, all the patrons, they couldn't wait to say hi and just share their remembrances of what that meant. And you know, Ryan, if you were old enough to you know, to remember that night, the memory is fantastic. People can remember, let's say, late classed number one, but then you have Pearl Harbor, if you're old enough to remember that or the challenge you're blowing up in 1986 or John Kennedy getting assassinated in 63 and certainly 9-11, they're all terrible memories. This is something that everybody just glows when they talk about it. And even if that you weren't there, I think the movie Miracle and the documentary on HBO and I know Netflix has another one coming up, it's kept that story alive and people now can even know they weren't here and are much younger, they know what it is. And every time like a father and son or a grandson talks to me about it, they just smile and can't get enough stories. As people know, you know, it's the construction of the roster, it's the favorite Russians, also the backdrop of like peak cold war stuff or maybe I guess you could say coming out of it a little bit, maybe I'm being a little bit too biased in how old I was, but then you know, even the 84 Olympics, it's like, okay, it's in LA, so like the positioning of Russia or the USSR at the time in America and this just absolutely strange relationship. So I'm wondering, is it even possible to understand even though that's all current event stuff that's happening at this time? Is it even possible to like realize the perspective of what this moment is going to mean as you were doing it? I sort of did it in a way, Ryan, because this country just wasn't in a very good space. And I mean that we had a recession going on. Our hostages were being held in Iran, that we felt very inept. The Soviets had invaded Afghanistan. We had threatened to boycott their summer games, which we did. And of course they paid us back by not coming to our games four years later in Los Angeles. The prime raid was 19.5 percent. People can look that up. Yet gas lines, a lot of things weren't very good at that particular time. And the Soviet Union with this great hockey team, you know, we had a bunch of amateurs average age 22. They were all listed as students and soldiers. They were professional hockey players. They played 11 months a year. They were paid to do this. They were the greatest team in the world, bar none. And then for us to have this happen at that moment in time, it really galvanized the country like nothing I could think of could have done it at that particular time. Were you more nervous about the outcome or I mean, is it is it true that you would only call one other hockey game ever? That is absolutely the truth. What happened? I'm remember I'm on I'm the young guy on a Mount Rushmore staff that included Howard Coacel, Jim McKay, Keith Jackson, Chris Shankill, Frank Gifford. I'm the new kid on the block. So why did I get the hockey assignment? All of those guys had never done a hockey game. I did one. I grew up in New York. I love the New York Rangers. I knew what I see once. I knew what offside was. And that's how I got that job. I love talking about you, just listening to you talk about your career. So this is fun for me. Were you more excited when you started as a scout for the dating game or you were like, hey, I'm kind of miss baseball. That was before I actually started my broadcast the career. But I got married. I'm still married to the same fabulous woman to this day. And we had got married, I think on August 27th 1966. So I'm looking for a broadcasting job. But we are working for the dating game and Chuck Barris, who's one of the craziest guys of all time, wrote books that movies the whole thing. And we also started a show called the Newlywood game. So I am helping to pick the girls for the dating game to hell with job. But I'm a Newlywood myself. So I had to be very careful. And my wife was also working in the office at that time. So I could go just so far. That's good. I didn't know she was working. I didn't know the backstop of that one. Because I know the Chick-Hern story. And I know that you ended up having a great relationship with him. But it's funny because like my first job was played by playing minor league baseball. I had grown up in Massachusetts. I loved all the old school guys. There's something about baseball. Even on the radio. It just reminds you of growing up. It reminds you of summer. Just this kind of beautiful back-drop. And the skills that it takes to call hockey, to call basketball football, and then baseball. And like baseball, as I'm getting started, I'm really insecure. And I'm also like, it's funny. There was somebody who was already established that was in the booth that was calling all the games. And then oddly enough, they were like, hey, you're going to have this Ryan guy call three innings with you every game. And my guy, Dan O'Toole at the time, was incredibly nice to me. But I could also understand that he's turning you aside. I'd be like, whose idea was this? So as I've read about your story, where you thought you were going to be calling the Lakers and you're being fired as you're getting on the plane, I know that initially you thought it was Chick-Hern. But that had to be just an unbelievable tease and moment in your career where you're like, maybe this isn't going to work out. Well, my career was going to start as Chick-Hern's color announcer or analyst. He had none in those years. Chick had always worked by himself. But Jack Hencook owned the team. And he was trying to get Chick to embrace bringing somebody in with him. And that somebody turned out to be hot rod hungry. So I was, who was just retarded as a player. So I was the sacrificial lamb. I'd gotten a job. I was going to work in PR. I get a call one day. No, you're going to be Chick-Hern's color myth. What did that mean, Ryan? I'll tell you what it meant. When we were on radio, I did the Half-Time stats. And at the end of the game, I did the end of the game stats. On television, I just sat there and kept stats for a chip. That lasted about 12 games, counting about four preseason games. And then we're ready to make a trip early that season to Boston and Cincinnati. I am now also the traveling secretary. And I get to LAX and my job is to hand out the tickets to the guys on a commercial flight. And Bill Van Bredekoff is the coach. And Bill says, hey, listen, he said, I just got word for the office. Let me have those tickets. I'll take care of him. You've got a call, Alan Rothenberg, who was a big guy and soccer, subsequent years. And I knew that I was going to get fired. So I knew I had to go back to Beverly Hills, get fired. But the hardest thing for me, Ryan, at that point, I'd already checked my bags. So now I have to get my bags off that plane before that plane leaves for Boston. And here I am, they said they'll be able to do it. And they did. But I'm a, I'm a lone figure at the carousel at LAX waiting from back to come down waiting to go to see Rothenberg to get fired and making the call to my wife, which I know is going to be the hardest to go all. Did you think, like, did you understand all the moving? You couldn't have that young and being so new to the business. I don't know that you could have understood what all the moving parts would have been as this thing is happening to you, right? Yeah. But I had a sense. First, I'm going, what am I doing? As shikerns, color man, I'm not a color man. I'm a guy who reads some stats keeps stats for each stats. That wasn't the job. I didn't understand what my role was, but I couldn't turn that down. Well, I'm going to get on the air. So I sort of could sense that this was not going to end particularly pleasantly. And I mean, the irony, they're showing the ironies in my life, Ryan. I mean, so I wind up obviously going to ABC doing Monday night football. And my first super bowl was in 1987. And wouldn't you know it? The Washington Redskins are in that super bowl to play the Denver Broncos in San Diego. And who owns the Redskins? Jack Kent Cook, the guy who fired me, right? Who'd hired me, fired me, broke my heart, right? And he does, he did an interview with somebody in the Washington Post or Washington Times, again, remember which in which he took credit for my career. I had to call that writer a disapuse, a disapuse that part of the story. You did call the writer. Oh, I did. I said, wait, I said, I said, you can't believe this crap. Come on. This guy almost ended my career. So anyway, and then of course, you say you want 42 to 10. What kind of tell you? Well, I can imagine after like, you know, you have to be pretty driven, right? You have to have an idea of what you want to do. We can all say here's, hey, put in the work and all this kind of stuff. There, I think there's an obsessive line of like, I don't care what anyone else thinks of what my path is going to be. Like I know that my path needs to be all these things. And you know, as everybody that knows your story, you end up in Hawaii after all this. There must have been some moments you go, hey, maybe, maybe this tempo of life for me is just fine. And I don't need to be in a major marketer. I don't need to be, I wonder if you ever let your mind flirt with the idea of that I don't need all of it. Never. Ryan has a totally driven as a kid at Arizona State. And I got to announce tons of games at Arizona State as a student, including a baseball team that had South Bando Rick Monday and Reggie Jackson on it. So I had a lot of experience. And that's how I wound up getting the Hawaii job, the minor league job at white. But I always dreamed big, big, big, big, big. I want to do the world series. I wanted to do the Olympics. The Super Bowl didn't even exist when I was in college. But I'd be in it. And then when it came into being, and I got to ABC. So I was able to, I was one of those lucky guys who lived out every dream. But let me tell you something, a lot of it had to do with my name. I have a tape. I thought, oh, I can do this. Of course, I could do this. And then I think back to some of the breaks I got along the way and they go, well, how in the world did that happen? So I, you know, I have a rabbit's foot in my back pocket or something or four leaf clover because all this stuff, you know, came to fruition. But I look back now and I go, whoa, how do I wind up there at that point? And then, you know, when I was doing the Hawaii Islanders, we were the most successful minor league franchise. We drove them for the half a million people. That got me into the mix for the Cincinnati Reds job and I'm 26 years old. The big red machine. I get hired to do Rose Bench Morgan Perez that he, so that's, you know, that's the launching band really for me. It's at that particular time of the early 70s. I worked at Chris Fowler for a bunch of years at ESPN. You know, I love Chris. And he had said something in an interview because he didn't say it to me, but he had said it to something in an interview once where he was like, I want to be attached to history. I want my voice to be heard and I was thinking like, oh man, maybe I need to have like higher goals for myself. What a profound statement. When you knew you were prepping for this game, what were you trying to, like, you know, you're going like, okay, do I need to come up with some way if they have an upset? Like, what went into the prep for that game for you to tell that story if it were going to play out the way it ultimately did? I didn't think the US had a chance to win the game. Why? These Ken Dryden and I had gone over to the Soviet Union about a month and a half before the Olympics to scout all of the teams except for the US team. They weren't there. And I had seen the Soviets play any number of games and I saw them in the run-up to like, class it. They would toy with people. They might win a game four, three. They could have won the game by whatever score they wanted to. They beat us 10, three in an exhibition game at Madison Square Garden three days before the Olympics. It could have been 20 to nothing. They were just so much better than every team. So our hotel here in Link Placid was about four or five blocks from the arena. The game is going to start at five o'clock and Kenny and I live the Hilton Hotel at like, one 15. And in that 10 to 15 minute walk, I think I said it can at one point. What's the best we can hope for to keep an audience? If it's like three ones, Soviets, midway through the second period, at least the audience would be hanging around at that point. I'm thinking totally intelligent terms. I just feared it was going to be six than I think. I thought they would blow us out of the building. So in that game, as you know, we came from behind three times. They outshot us 39 to 68. So as that game was played in front of Jim Craig, they put an intense pressure on and then out of nowhere, Mark Johnson gets that goal at the end of the first period as time expires. Jim Craig is fabulous in the second period. They out shoot us 12 to two birds only three to two get a power play goal from Mark Johnson in the third and then a Ruzzioni scores with 10 minutes to play. I'm going, whoa, then all of a sudden it's like, it's almost surreal. Is this really happening in terms of trying to button up the game? Absolutely not Ryan because I was working in a very intense state of concentration. Crowd is going crazy. The production truck is going crazy. The screaming gibberish. I hear the booth is shaking and it was all I can do to just concentrate. I was like a horse with blinkers call the play play by play by play and the Soviet somebody pressure up. So to come up with the line at the end, the end the game could have ended with a Soviet goal. You know, and how stupid would some line of have sounded at that point? The game could have wound up as a four four time. But when the puck came out to centerize with about six or seven seconds remaining, I remember the word that came into my brain was miraculous. And miraculous got morphed into a question and an answer and it's like, boom, game over it. And then all you know, it's television. And I think at one point I said, no words necessary, only pictures. What was I going to do put into people's minds what they were thinking? You had this vast country with a lot of diversity and different thoughts. So I thought the pictures told the story and look, I got unbelievably lucky coming up with I guess a Coda and the word miracle, you know, it was the title of the movie that they did back in in 2004. But believe me, I have some periods of time, Ryan, right? I think back on I go, man, man, I could have screwed that baby up too. So again, there's that rabbit's foot again. I would always thought about it though. And you know, I know a little bit of that story. I'm so glad that you shared it with us here is that your the unexpectedness of that game led to such a natural reaction that it was way better than you planning out anything because it just wasn't, it was so unexpected. It's why we remember this game so much. And for all the reasons that we pointing out, but that you were able to allow a completely natural reaction at what I think now is a spot where so many, and I don't blame play by play people for doing this. You want to be prepared. You want to have some sort of moment for a Super Bowl win for a World Series on and on and on. But it was it was so human and it was exactly what everybody was feeling at the time that it was the best thing ever that we ended on a scenario that you were never imagining. Never imagine. And you know, the other thing too is if you're doing a Super Bowl or whatever other big event it is, you know, the crowd is mainly 50 50. You got this this group ready for one team, this group ready for another team and a lot of people neutral just enjoying the game. So this was the one game I did where 99.9% of the audience is going one way. So that that line will work for that. And I always says that that one 10 to 1% a bunch of KGB agents, maybe somewhere out in the middle of Nebraska, who cared about them. So that had that, you know, I don't like to root at the end of a game and whatever I try to say, I try to make it, you know, down the middle and and not lean one way or another. Just talk to the drama of the game, but that worked for that particular game. So I could have gotten luck here. This is incredibly cool. Al Michaels joining us from the locker room here thanks to Michael O'Boltra and the run back the Miracle event. I know that you have a lot planned here in this partnership as we ramp things up. So just close with with whatever else you have going on. Well, I'm just saying I'm very excited to be here because this is going to be a great night when the arena, the herb Brooks Memorial Arena here in late class and to come back here, I mean, now I can I can feel it in my bones. Obviously, you know, they've done a lot of work in the arena and all of that, but to be back here with with Mike and Jim and with Mark Johnson, who's done a fantastic job as the women's hockey coach. I think they won eight national championships at the University of Wisconsin probably on their way to a night. And half of his team is going to be on the US women's Olympic team coming up in Milan. So it's it's great at this point in my life and my career to be able to come back here one more time. You know, thanks to Michael O'Boltra putting this whole thing together is wonderful. It just it's and I've got my two grandsons here as well. So I mean, this is like the perfect night for me. Oh, I appreciate it so much. And like I said, I've a bunch of friends that work with you. It just love being around you. Love thank you, worries, professionalism, the whole deal. So enjoy this. I hope you enjoyed every single year and we look forward to watching the on Thursdays for a long time. Thanks. Before we get to life advice, the Alliance, the divisional round marches on. So Rudy Kyle, who's got the board as of right now? Well, I mean, NFL wise, we've only done one bet before this. Kyle and I did hit last week. You know, we're doing threat not all together. Right. What is it all together? I think it is me still technically because I've got those two like, you know, no bets that Kyle hates. But shit, man, that's what happens. All right. Yeah. We'll be on me say like, Kyle, you're also doing fine. I would help Ryan. You know, there's a little room for improvement, but I'm not, I'm not worried. Would I give out the Packers last week? You had the Jags. I had the under and Niners Eagles Kyle had Drake May, rushing yards, which was way over. So for doing overall records, Ryan's four and six Kyle. I'm sorry. Ryan, yeah, Ryan's four and six Kyle six and four on five, three and two. So come on. I'm sorry. Julie. All right. Anyway, all right, Kyle, lead us off. I guess I should go then, right? I was going to do the, that was a little, I think you should leave reference that my dad and I love in case anybody was wondering, but I was trying to do the Drake May. I was trying to do the Drake May, rushing, but they've like totally jacked it up now. And it's like something I don't feel comfortable with. I think it was like they wanted to be like almost 40. I'm not going to, I'm not going to ruin our parlay with that. So I went with Ramon Dre Stevenson, Rush and receiving yards been getting a couple touches in the backfield now. So that's going to be plus, I think they raised it. I had it at 63 and a half. We're moving it up to 64 and a half. Still feel pretty good. Correct. Rush and Madre. Hold on to it. Ryan, why don't you go because you're in the same game. All right. So I'll, I'll go use some plus three on the road. Sorry. This has been such a bummer of a podcast with your Houston love. I knew we were going to end up meeting each other eventually. So it's been super huge bummer. I love that from four. I don't know what to tell you. I love it. Sorry, the schedule was so easy and everyone who didn't watch it had to just complain about games I never watched, but whatever. Would you want to be staying in the Jets game after 47? I really enjoyed it. I really did. You should enjoy it. Yeah. I enjoyed that stuff too back in the day. All the things could be true. The editorial schedule and they're still a good team. I feel like that's the reason we'll say, you know. Yeah, I haven't heard much of that on this show. Just more of the schedule thing, but Drake may, there's been a lot of Drake may love, which I do. You missed the other show you worked on. Does it like the past more? It did like the past a little more. Yeah. It might be, you know, fair. It's a fair question. And I wasn't even trying to start anything. I wasn't trying to make it tense or anything, but I just know that's what I get. You know, you open your can of worms. Sorry. What's your bad? I'm uncomfortable. I'm uncomfortable now. So I'm just going to go. I'm going to take the over and Rams Bears. I try to figure out how to like a bunch of different ways to bet this. Rams team total over. Kale Williams passing yards over. But like, I don't know. I think these two defenses are kind of sneaky, not great. And you know, if one of them scores, you have to kind of keep up. So I like over 40 and a half Rams Bears. I like the ramps to win to you. But I'll take the over. And that weather, right? Yeah. Not worried about it. Don't worry about checking a ball. 23 degrees. It was cold. And the packers came too. And that thing was, I mean, I'll see that your best case is probably take the second half over because like bear second half or insane. Kale just like goes off and starts slow and then goes off. So maybe that's the play. If you're looking for something spicy, but no, I'm not worried about the cold. Come on. He's in first place. Why I'm even messing with any of your picks. I love it. Yeah. Arguably. Hey, tell Kyle that. All right. Those three get us to plus 700. So this is a nice little bet for your boys. I like it. I feel really good about it this week. You want details? Bye. I drive a Ferrari 355 Kavriela. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the south fork. I have every tour you can possibly imagine. And best of all kids, I am liquid. So now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Let's get to it. Life advice. Life advice are at gmail.com. Hello to everyone. Hey, I'll including our international audience. All right. Anything. Anything we need to cover real quick? No. Just a step into it. Yeah. All right. I watched that. Well, real quick. We got to watch that. Yeah. Okay. Number of the day Franco, Alice and Bri together movie last night. Woof. It's intense. Wow. I'm going about it. I have the first time heard of it. I think it's crazy. It's basically like, you know, it's not really like a spoiler thing, but like they go into some cave and then their bodies just start like extracting each other and they just like become like they they start like nelting with each other essentially. It's it feels like a spoiler. Wow movie. No, that's probably it's probably it's probably about like a mebos. That's what I'm picturing. Yeah. I guess in a way, but like, you know, one in one thing their arms are just like, you know, they're just together and they got to like basically cut them off. It's intense. It's like a body horror. Took me a lot of go to sleep last night. Is it like stranger things where they keep totally randomly guessing exactly the supernatural thing that's going on through through metaphors you're like, dude, that could have been anything and you just guess what the fuck that was. Oh, yeah, well, there can't be any slant any stranger thing slander on this pod now. Come on. I just found it a little funny that at like through five seasons, they were like, oh, and what if this acorn is vectine? And this is us. And what if we just have to walk backwards? And that's how we get into it's like what it's like there was constantly figuring out like things that scientists could never figure out. And these kids are just like, oh, yeah, it's kind of like Dungeons and Dragons. Anyway, whatever. I didn't watch it. So I don't I don't know what you're talking about. I did. You're right. Damn, I was hoping you were because you would have been like, yeah, there was a little way. There's no way. I was in that strange thing. It's got you would hate that show. I thought I was back. Shout out. I watched the first few episodes and I thought it was like so cool, so incredibly done. All these different things that they were capturing. I think like in that sense, when they franchise didn't, you're like, I'm out. Oh, no, Modine started going at me. Yeah, that's right. This last whole down thing. And so I was like, you know, not giving this guy views. What are we doing totally forgot? All right. We had a follow up on the MIA dick email where the guy celebrated his friend's birthday who was in Italy with this girlfriend took the pictures. I think I can't imagine any sane person not agreeing with everything that we said about that one. Although you never know, you know, sampling. We haven't got all the pull that back yet. Love the show. The guy that wrote in Isidic for giving that Fing P word $100 gift card. P word. Did you do that? Or was that a crafted email? What do you mean? Did you put the P word in there? Did you substitute that or he wrote that? I did. I subbed it out. I don't know. I mean, it's a perfect word for sometimes how I feel about myself at times. Yeah. You know, so I may call myself it. A cold turkey P word is just it's tough. Yeah. I can't just read that. Like it's just like, oh, all right. It's going to start to stand. Especially with a transition. I mean, it was both. Like there was no warm up. We'll get right to it. The whole email was one sentence. So, okay. What am I supposed to do with that? Okay. All right. Question here. A little maintenance. Long time listener, mostly exclusively on audio was excited. Check you guys out on Netflix. Confused Watch Kyle is voicing the Affleck intro. Is it a clearance thing? I've never watched on YouTube or Spotify. So maybe it's always been that way in video. Yeah. Basically, he nailed it actually. Yeah. I mean, we couldn't use it. And we were like, what do we do? And I really like the animation that our guy Francis did. And I was like, I don't want to lose this. What could we do? So I asked legal. Could we have Kyle voice it? They said, yes, surprisingly. And honestly, I think it's all I think it's awesome. Like genuinely, I'm not even blowing smoke. Dude, I think it's very good. I love that because I was really nervous to send it out. So now the cadence is right. It like doesn't really miss you added like the little keychain stuff. The key toss in there. Like for the audio. There's a reverb on there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's a little little easter egg in there too as well. Maybe it's not that compliment that are complicated to figure out. But yeah, that's that's it. And so Rudy was the one that told me he was like, what do we do here? I was like, bring in honestly the most real you're the most like any athlete character. You think about it. You know, well, you know what? I do it. We have some similar stats. Yeah, I think so. Some that aren't very similar. But yes, I fucking kill the have what you have. All right. Can I switch to cowboy boots? I like this one. A specific I have this first time long time six four two twenty seven. I'd say yes. But that's a lot of height with the boots. I'll get right to it. Can I switch to wearing cowboy boots? I have a friend who does. It looks cool. And he swears. I can. I love this simplicity of the scene. I just have to commit to it. But I have my doubts facts below for your help in assessing love the show. I live in the South half for 20 years, but I live in Metro Charlotte. So not exactly big sky country. No, born and raised in Delaware. Again, not big sky country. My mom grew up on a farm and I had visited my grandmother there. But that's about as close as I've ever come to living or working on a farmer ranch. I do not own a truck. I do not hunt. It's in the blood. I don't know that you have to have a truck. But there's a few cars you probably can't have. You're going to be getting out of it in the pair of cowboy boots. And you're going to be rocking it like six six in these things too, which you know, who knows who doesn't want to be six six some days. So go for it. But I like that you're worried about it. I would say go for it. I'm not going to lie. I've looked at a couple pairs every now and then I had a board of patrol back when people didn't hate the border patrol. He was a border patrol guy in Texas. He'll Rio Grande in the 70s, I think early 80s. And so he always had cowboy boots, but he was in law enforcement. And you know, whatever. I mean, he was living in Texas. So I think he made sense. Then my dad had a pair for a little while. I don't think it took because that made him even like a weird. He always argued that six five to six sevens when it gets weird. I think he may have just said it because he was six five. And he just felt like, Hey, I'm the perfect tight. And then he's like, once you get over that, it's like the one after. Right. Right. You just made it six sevens up there in those boots. I just think that there has to be some kind of car where when you get out of it, you're stepping down. Okay. Sure. I think there needs to be a decent amount of ground clearance for the car that you're getting out of. If you're going to be, I mean, we're talking full-time cowboy boot guy or we talking, you know, with these perfect jeans type deal. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of a lot of things you can pull off here. Like I wore a pair in college a couple times. And that didn't go well at all. And that was it. Those were times. Yeah, you try to see the college. Yeah, you try. You've always tried stuff. I think there's always wear and you know, we have this. Yeah. Miss match suits. It does kind of match. Man. I can't imagine some of the fraternities. It was like, you're going to be a cowboy heck. I have a fuck dude. You're going to play since on Valley. Like I actually do like a little ranching. You're from you're from Westport. Like this doesn't work. I don't know. Well, sorry. I got distracted. So I only have I very limited experience with this. I think it does more cow like LA. I guess it's probably just an anomaly, right? Like dudes just decide they're going to wear hats and boots and they're not from one of those places. And I think maybe LA is just a different thing. But I'm wondering like, is it, do you think it's weirder in the south if like there are people that probably know guys who are like about that cowboy boot life and they just see you walking around or if you're just in a place where it doesn't actually make sense like maybe upstate New York because I do have a pair of boots that we had a we had a Tacova sponsorship a bunch of years ago and I jumped on that and I'm actually not very sturdy. I'm kind of like a fucking baby deer in them. They're a little slippery on the bottom. But like so that can that like not being super confident walking in them as well as not being confident outside wearing them. I'm not really sure what I should be doing. LA it seemed like there was a place in Hollywood called like Desert 5 and it's just like a cowboy themed rooftop bar two things that really don't go together at all. But it's like all right, this is LA and everyone's out of their mind. So now that I'm here, I look at them every once in a while there next to my shoe rack and I'm just wondering like, do you think maybe upstate New York is a place to try this out? Probably not. I mean, every I know where do I have to go? I think you might just for tough to pack in a suitcase. You don't have to be a posh mark situation where it's just like you gotta give up. Yeah, that's not gonna total give up. Yeah, but I think I don't know. It is one of your shun one day. Could do that. You never know what we all end up. That was a odd tone. No, no, I'm just saying like you could be. It was now you mentioned everyone. I'm not it was there was nothing mean about it. Just handle knows. Maybe he's like maybe he's moving Austin too. Like everybody else and yeah, we're gonna do a new show right in. But it is fun now somewhere this year. There are like regions obviously have their own like uniform right their own dress code. Like do people who there's like somewhere from the south and moves into the northeast that they automatically have to start wearing like, you know, the patty, agonia, vests and collard shirt button down. Do they feel like posers if they're not like in finance or something? Like I don't know. I don't I think if you're walking around people aren't gonna ask too many questions and if you wear it competently, you're probably gonna be fine. Charlottes like close enough where I think I think I don't think it's that big of a deal. I remember you know, back in the day, working on Wilkins show, he worked cowboy boots all the time with a pair of Levi's and dude, it looked great. He was in Connecticut for most of the time. It's just about getting him guy too. Yeah, it's a guy you look good in him. I couldn't personally. I don't think I can personally pull that off. But I thought he's legitimately like a Texas guy. He is and yeah, I think he even tried to rant. He read loans from Dove and like move to go work on a ranch. Yeah, he had that he had the bonafides. Yeah, I would. Wow. They said that he showed up with like a revolver and the old rants pants were like, what are you gonna do with that throw it at the pair? They're like making fun of his gun. Like he said, he was that guy. Like he read loans from Dove, blew his mind, got a job on a ranch. I thought he was gonna write like a great American novel and bought a gun and started riding around. And he was like in the beginning, it was all that ever happened was the old guy. It just made fun of me the whole time. Told me that's because man, that must have been great. Just live in the dream. That's work. Well, everyone hates me. I think Charlottes actually, I'd say you get the green light for me. Are we saying that though? Because we're all northeast guys because I don't see me Charlotte that way. Like sure, is there a crew of guys that you could probably look all too far outside of Charlotte? Would you have to go before you weren't surprised that there was like a bar with dudes that have their cowboy boots on? How far would you have to go really? Well, if it's based on how far a bar is with these kinds of themes, like I could argue that down the street from ESPN, good old Cadillac ranch that never disappointed that people were there. There you go. I was done. Yeah, it was honestly. I believe that's a big big cosplay, right? The number one line dancing bar in the north, Easter, some some ridiculous stat. And that place, I used to live in the hotel that shared the parking lot and that place went off. People will come from all over New England to go to that thing. So how about a grocery store? Honestly, I think it's about what's up here in the old brain. Okay. If you want to wear them and you like the way you look, who gives a shit? I think you should try to have a good first experience. You know what I mean? When you're doing it, so like maybe pick the right thing to go to wearing them. I don't know if I'd go to work in them, but I don't know. I remember my dad went to Santa Fe and came back with a Stetson hat and was all pumped about it. They're pretty hard not to buy when I see him. Those are pretty hard to buy. I tell you what, they'll never see them wear it one time. Yeah, that's what I think would happen. It doesn't play in Connecticut, unfortunately. Yeah. Let's see here. We get a gym one. Speakers of the gym. Am I wrong? 31, 63, 210, 225, bench, 405 squats, deadlift. Don't really care to go higher after some long-term injuries from six years of, 16 years of playing rugby. All right. So we've got a rugged dude here. I was just at the gym now working out. He sent it, wow, he sent it as soon as it happened. In between sets, I hear your voice being drowned out, but what I can only describe is unintelligible throat screaming. I take my headphones out and try to see if it's the gym playing music for the speakers, which would be weird to do it midnight, UK time. All right. So we're guys overseas. I turn around to see two younger guys about five, nine, 170 each. There's two of them. There's two of them. That sucks. I already sucks. Mike Lailey wouldn't care. Each have a speaker outblasting it. I've never had an issue telling people to stop playing music in public. It's quite big and it's been punched in the face enough to know I can take it. Wow. This guy's just unloading the resume at toughness. I stand up and say,, well, hey, can you turn that down? I can hear it over my headphones. They both instantly jump up and ask why they should. Oh, no. Giza. That they come in all the time and do that. Nobody has an issue. They don't, as I've been going to the gym five days a week here for seven years. I've never seen them. I tell them, okay, they're probably annoyed listening to this shit, but don't want to deal with you. I don't mind telling someone to be rude to stop. They then go on about how it's a public gym. They can do what they want to which I retort. Yes, it's a shared space, but not your sitting room. Have respect for others. They then claim if I just asked them politely, they'd done it. Now, I'm just going to turn it up louder, which is an obvious lie because I already talked them politely and they got aggressive. I in the confrontation by saying, aren't you embarrassed to publicly tell everyone you're too poor to afford nice headphones. Love that. Love that. That's a tough to which they try and make fun of my old running shorts and hoodie. Damn. I think your comeback was way, way tougher because if you're a decent sized guy and you went hoodie running shorts and you were putting together a workout, you probably, you know, whatever. I then put my phone down, turn it on to video, which picks up the music and send it to the gym's complaint office. Oh, so we took a video of them. So now I feel like a bitch for not just turning off their music in a snitch for telling further, I have quite middle class accents. So I feel calling someone out who probably not as well off as I am poor is quite out of the line. I think I'm just sick of music and public and needed event. Yeah. I don't know. What things start getting mixed up in a argument. I think there's that's not a line you you can cross that one. There's a couple that you wouldn't cross, but you know, I think that's okay. You're just trying to hurt feelings. You got to be efficient. So I think that's okay. Yeah. And you clearly won that that that exchange. So I think you're fine. It would be funny. Like can you I'm trying to think can you tap in if it's like a Bluetooth speaker and just tap into one of their speakers and start playing stuff that you want to play? I think you have to un-pair. You'd have to be pretty sneaky and un-pair. I think might be the move. If you're bigger don't mind getting punched in the face. Said you weren't. Well, he five Jimmy Lage. Down the age. He doesn't want to be throwing down with shitheads. He's 31. I didn't take that away. She's 31. He probably missed that part forever. It was clear this guy, you know, basically told us it's a tough for guy. And I think ultimately he's really offended at 2.59.170 guys. Really much. That's what it is. That's what happens. There's strength and numbers. Those guys get emboldened when there's, you know, and it multiplies by however many there are. So that's unfortunate. How old that's a really guy's words comes down to. What's that? Did they say these guys were like 20s? They're definitely younger than them, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's unfortunate. You said two younger guys. Yeah. I think it's whenever I see like a corner getting into it with a left tackle. Like during a game. And you just have to think like the left tackle just wants to go even if I'm not good at this. I'm probably going to kill you. Like you might be the toughest dude ever. But like more often than not, like it's going to be so frustrating when you're one of these massive, like especially over here, a tough offensive lineman and you're getting into it. And like obviously the corner can't back down. It's the NFL. Like you can't back down from anybody else and all this stuff. But there's probably times where it's just like this is so stupid. Like why are you like let's not kid ourselves here? And I think that's what this has. Like sure, you could have just gone up and turn it down. But who knows? Like what if you beat up two guys at the gym, then you're dealing with all sorts of other stuff, which is where almost none of this ever actually goes. So yeah, you can feel like a snitch a little bit and take the video and the whole deal. You probably could just put headphones back in and then let it go. But I don't know. Some days you just don't want to let it go, man. Some days you just don't want to let it go. Somebody the other day brought their dog in, you know, to a place where people were eating. And the person was so out of central casting. Allowing everywhere. Fucking all made up. And it was like, you know, and it's like, oh, but you get to bring your dog in. And then there was a sign that's specifically like don't bring your dog in. And it's like, well, I get to. And everybody just looks at that person. It's like so maybe somebody's had bad enough a day. We want to say so the most of the time we're just trying to get through our day and finish our burrito. All right, that'll do it for the show today. Thank you our entire crew here. Make sure you download and check us out at Netflix as well with a little like on there. If you could, the Rhymer Solo Show, Barstool Sports.