Curry Survives, Trae Melts Down + Ant’s Crazy Shooting with Kirk Goldsberry, plus WWE President Nick Khan Stops by

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Bill Simmons Podcast – "Curry Survives, Trae Melts Down + Ant’s Crazy Shooting with Kirk Goldsberry, plus WWE President Nick Khan Stops by"

Release Date: April 16, 2025

Bill Simmons returns with another insightful episode of The Bill Simmons Podcast, discussing pivotal moments from the NBA Playoffs, the evolving shooting landscape in basketball, and an engaging segment with WWE President Nick Khan. Here's a comprehensive breakdown of the episode's key discussions and insights.

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1. NBA Playoffs: Golden State Warriors’ Struggles and Playoff Implications

Bill Simmons and Kurt Goldsberry delve into the recent performance of the Golden State Warriors, particularly focusing on their narrow escape against the Memphis Grizzlies.

• Close Game Frustrations:
  Kurt expresses frustration over the game's tight finish, highlighting Steph Curry's clutch performance:

  "[03:32] Kurt Goldsberry: ...Steph Curry ... classic Curry threes when they needed it most. It was an incredible moment, but a real frustrating end, too."

  Bill echoes this sentiment, critiquing the Warriors' tendency to falter in critical moments despite their high basketball IQ:

  "[04:14] Bill Simmons: ...they got to a fascinating playoff spot just because Curry had those big threes..."

• Aging Squad Concerns:
  The conversation shifts to the Warriors' lineup issues, pointing out the aging roster and lack of depth:

  "[06:56] Kurt Goldsberry: ...Steph has a bandage on his hand, his shooting hand, and Jimmy ... limping ... This is an old team."

  Bill underscores the risks associated with reliance on veteran players:

  "[09:37] Kurt Goldsberry: ...are going to throw just a shitload of dudes at Curry ... trying to wear him down."

• Playoff Predictions:
  Both anticipate a challenging series against the Houston Rockets, questioning the current betting odds:

  "[12:07] Kurt Goldsberry: ...I think Fanduel is going to have the warriors as slight favorites, am I right?"

  However, Bill and Kurt express skepticism about these odds, considering the Warriors' dependency on key players:

  "[12:22] Kurt Goldsberry: ...Steph Curry ... and I think that is an astounding fact."

2. Trae Young and Atlanta Magic: Behavioral Concerns and Trade Speculations

Bringing in Ceruti, an Orlando Magic fan, the discussion turns towards Trae Young's recent on-court behavior and its implications for his future with the team.

• Behavioral Issues:
  Ceruti shares his discomfort with Trae’s demeanor during games, citing instances of referee confrontations:

  "[25:03] Ceruti: ...it just feels like ... he's yelling at the ref for calls ... it's uncomfortable to watch."

  This sentiment is reinforced by Kurt, who points out Trae's temperamental shifts when in foul trouble:

  "[31:18] Kurt Goldsberry: ...when the bonus light comes on, he totally changes into the worst, most annoying player."

• Trade Rumors and Speculations:
  The conversation explores potential trade scenarios, debating Trae's fit within the Magic and possible destinations:

  "[27:16] Kurt Goldsberry: ...illega Adoka is going to have these guys ready to ... incredible defense, physicality, rebounds."

  Ceruti expresses a reluctance to support a trade for Trae, fearing it might disrupt the team's chemistry:

  "[27:22] Ceruti: ...I would stop watching the team if they traded Jalen Suggs for Trey Young."

3. Shooting Excellence Awards: The Evolution of Shooting in the NBA

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to Kurt Goldsberry's discussion on the Shooting Excellence Awards, highlighting the transformative shift in shooting dynamics within the NBA.

• Outstanding Shooters:
  Kurt credits Steph Curry with unsurpassed shooting prowess:

  "[39:28] Kurt Goldsberry: ...this is just going to go to him. But ... Anthony Edwards ... could be the best shooter in the NBA in four or five years."

• Emerging Talents:
  Anthony Edwards and Malik Beasley are spotlighted for their exceptional shooting seasons:

  "[43:41] Bill Simmons: ... he hit 320 threes ... I think he was clearly sixth man of the year."

• Big Men Shooting:
  Discussion extends to versatile big men like Nikola Jokic, who combines efficiency with volume:

  "[50:34] Kurt Goldsberry: ...Nikola Jokic ... the most efficient jump shooter in the NBA."

4. Playoff Predictions and Future Series Outlook

Building on the earlier discussions, Bill and Kurt share their forecasts for the remaining playoff series and the potential NBA Finals contenders.

• Series Predictions:
  They consider various matchups, assessing team strengths and potential upsets:

  "[49:19] Kurt Goldsberry: ...the Warriors securing the seventh seed and a little Houston matchup."

• Finals Contenders:
  The duo debates traditional giants like the Celtics and Warriors against emerging powerhouses:

  "[54:14] Bill Simmons: ...sorry. Like they, we've just, we've seen this over and over again ... But on the other hand, it just feels like some of the teams in the west are still going up."

5. WWE Segment: Insights with President Nick Khan

Adding a unique flavor to the episode, Nick Khan, President of WWE, joins the conversation to discuss the intersection of wrestling and sports media.

• WrestleMania and WWE Strategies:
  Nick Khan reflects on the evolution of WWE's flagship event, WrestleMania, and its adaptation to modern media consumption:

  "[58:35] Nick Khan: ...WrestleMania will be there. It's already sold out, but it's a great viewing experience."

• Documentary Initiatives:
  The discussion covers the recent Mr. McMahon documentary for Netflix, addressing the challenges of depicting controversial figures:

  "[61:35] Nick Khan: A lot ... episodes six ... had a lot of, you know, tawdry allegations in there."

• WWE's Media Presence:
  Nick Khan emphasizes WWE's robust media strategy, leveraging platforms like YouTube and streaming services to expand their global reach:

  "[106:45] Nick Khan: ...you know, ahead of it, you know, Cocomelon, Mr. Beast ... nothing sports oriented. So we're number 10 there, which is phenomenal."

• Future Predictions for WWE:
  Insights into WWE's future endeavors, including new partnerships and streaming innovations:

  "[116:57] Nick Khan: ... we're going to have to reposition our messaging ... we put together with Turkey Al Shaykh to create a new boxing promotional company."

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6. Conclusion and Final Thoughts

The episode wraps up with Bill and Nick exchanging light-hearted banter, reflecting on the evolving landscape of sports media and entertainment. They touch upon the challenges facing traditional networks like ESPN amidst the rise of streaming giants and discuss potential future directions for both the NBA and WWE.

• Media Landscape Evolution:
  Nick Khan shares perspectives on the shifting dynamics of sports broadcasting, highlighting the importance of adaptability:

  "[117:46] Nick Khan: We're proud of that. But every week we're sort of anxious to make sure that it stays that way."

• Final Predictions:
  Bill presents his outlook on the NBA Finals, considering the depth and talent of potential contenders:

  "[135:40] Nick Khan: I think they're going to put Kamanji and Curry together ..."

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Notable Quotes:

• Kurt Goldsberry on Warriors' turnovers:

  "[05:06] Kurt Goldsberry: They're always among the league leaders in turnovers..."

• Ceruti on Trae Young's behavior:

  "[25:03] Ceruti: ...it was disgusting. Like, I just can't do it with Trey."

• Kurt Goldsberry on Anthony Edwards:

  "[41:00] Kurt Goldsberry: Anthony Edwards ... doing the research for the piece ... undeniable that this guy is ahead of schedule as a jump shooter."

• Nick Khan on WWE's global strategy:

  "[106:49] Nick Khan: ...we have to be competitive, and they can't expect that ..."

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This episode provides a multifaceted exploration of current NBA playoff dynamics, the transformative role of shooting in basketball, and an insider's view into the WWE's strategic maneuvers within the competitive sports media landscape. Whether you're a die-hard basketball fan or intrigued by the world of professional wrestling, Bill Simmons delivers a rich and engaging discussion filled with expert insights and informed predictions.

Transcript

[Bill Simmons]

You're listening to the Bill Simmons podcast presented by FanDuel. FanDuel Sportsbook is the best place to bet on the NBA. We have these fun little Tuesday Friday player performance stuff. We have same game parlays. We have picks for me sometimes and boosts and all kinds of fun things. Get ready in the playoffs. Download the FanDuel Sportsbook app today to get in on the action. And by the way, the Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit theringer.com RG to learn more. Listen to the end of this episode for additional details. Must be 21/president select states gaming problem. Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com Coming up, we're going to talk play in NBA Playoffs plus Nick Khan from WWE next. Hey, it's Bill Simmons from the Bill Simmons Podcast. The NBA Playoffs are here and Michelob Ultra is getting you closer to the game than ever with courtside seats and more. Enter now at michelobaltra.com courtside Michelob Ultra Superior Access Courtside 2024-2025 Sweepstakes. No purchase necessary. Open to US residents 21 or older. Ends on July 1, 2025. Multiple entry periods. Visit michelobutcher.com Superior Access/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines and official rules. Message and data rates may apply. Void where prohibited. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where we put up a new rewatchables. On Monday night we did Can't Hardly Wait, which was the height of the teen high school movies in the late 1990s. It was me and Joanna Robinson. You can watch that as a video podcast on Spotify. You can also watch that on The Ringer Movies YouTube channel if you missed Celtic City on HBO. And on Max, we put up episode seven, which was the very depressing 1990s, including Rick Pitino, who was in the documentary. Ryan Rossillo, you've heard him on this podcast, but he was in there as well. You can check out the first seven episodes of Celtic City on max. So there you go. Coming up on this podcast, I'm going to talk to Kurt Goldsberry about the playing games tonight. Tuesday night, some awards stuff, some best shooter stuff, some playoff stuff. And then after that, Nick Khan, President wwe, he comes on at least once a year. We talk wrestling, we talk ufc, boxing, and a bunch of sports media stuff. So that's the podcast. First, our friends from Pro Jam. All right, taping this a little after 10:00. Just watched Golden State. Hold off Memphis in the playing game. It was a fascinating one. Kurt Goldsberry. I love the playing game. 89 is great, super fun. We get a blowout, we get a fun game, we get some Trey Young trade rumors coming out of the. And then the second game. Memphis, a team that I was not a huge fan of for, I think is now 12 and 18 in their last 30, put up a spirited fight. There's a couple moments of this game where I was wondering if Golden State was actually going to blow this and be in this bizarre scenario of losing to San Antonio, losing in overtime in the last day of the season, then blowing this Memphis game at home, and now all of a sudden fighting for their lives just to play OKC, who just won 68 games, but instead they escape. Now they play Houston. What was your big takeaway watching this game?

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Oh, it shouldn't have been that close. It was a frustrating game for both teams, honestly. And Steph Curry, I mean, two giant threes, you know, I think he's bookended his season before the season, that masterpiece in Paris, and now to wrap up the regular season and secure the playoff spot for his team to just classic Curry threes when they needed a most. It was an incredible moment, but a real frustrating end, too. I mean, Draymond fouling out there, Jimmy Butler throwing the ball away. This team, oh, they should have put them away earlier, in my opinion, but they got there, they got it done. Now they have this fascinating season series coming up with with the Houston Rockets.

[Bill Simmons]

Bill, it's one of those weird subplots of this entire warriors run dating back to 2013. Abject sloppiness at the worst possible moments in crunch time. And they somehow won four titles and go down as the most, you know, one of the most memorable teams of this century. And yet at the end of games, they're up three. And I'm watching it, just expecting something stupid's going to happen. Curry's going to dribble the ball off his foot, somebody's going to lob a pass across court that's going to get picked. A dumb foul. Like, it's for a team that fancies itself on high IQ stuff. And they do have, you know, an unbelievable basketball cue. They sure do dumb, sloppy things at the worst possible times. It's really, really, really odd. I don't get it.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, they're always among the league leaders in turnovers and, and, and they're, they've been loose with the ball this whole era.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Loose with the Ball.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Little loose. Little loose with the ball. But yeah, the Draymond foul was like, dude, the time is on your side at that point in the night. And they just give him the free throws. The refs didn't help either. I'm not going to say it helped either team. Like phantom foul on Edie and Pods. Pods had a great block I thought was clean, but this is. This is the result I think we all thought was going to happen tonight. I think the warriors securing the seventh seed and a little Houston matchup.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, let me big picture on Golden State, a team that I was really bullish on. And this will be. This is now prison of the moment, Bill. This is my time of year. This is when I really shine. Overreacting over and over again and trying not to overreact, but I think Golden State's lineup stuff is a little alarming for a team that I thought really had a chance to win two, three straight rounds. Kaminga is now just out. Not only is he out, but you look at the box score today. Curry led the team in rebounds. That doesn't seem ideal. They got killed on the boards. Ed's size, I thought, what did ed finish with? 17 rebounds. Edie. Size really bothered them in this game. And it feel. Still feels like a team that's kind of grasping for stuff. And if Jimmy wasn't awesome in that first half, I think this game could have slipped away from them. But the big question for me, I was on Zach's pot on Monday. I didn't even realize that Kaminga got benched in that last game. I thought he was hurt because why wouldn't they play him? They need. This game was just a Kaminga game. This was an athletic physical. They needed his rebounding, they needed size, and they still buried him. So I guess he's just out. I don't get it.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, it's remarkable. I know. I was listening to you and Zach, too. It's great to have Zach in the network, but it was noticeable tonight. I mean, Golden State's old. You have Draymond, who's old, who had sort of banged up his neck the other day.

[Bill Simmons]

Old guy injury. When you have, like neck injuries, it's an old guy thing.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Steph has a bandage on his hand, his shooting hand, and Jimmy, I obviously was limping around after that Clipper game. This is an old team. So it's another reason why I expected to see Kaminga again tonight, just because of the depth. He's a young player. He's another body. But again, Bill, like you Said no Jonathan Kaminga early in the game, the bench actually saved them early. Memphis came out hot and Post and Gary Payton both, I thought sort of gave them a fresh burst energy. But yeah, what does Kaminga have to do to get some run out there?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I guess you could say Butler played 39 minutes and maybe they just don't want to play Butler with. With Curry and Kaminga and I think the lineups were the plus minus. Stuff with those three together were pretty bad for most of the season. And maybe they just made a decision. If we're going to play Draymond, he played 30 today, but he was a foul trouble and Butler 38. That's just not a lot of room left for Kamingo. But then you look at the rest of it like Hield played 12, Peyton played 19, Looney played 9, Post played 21 and was pretty good. I just. For this specific game, if I'm Memphis, I'm like, hey, that's great. Please don't play Kaminga because he's somebody that could carry some offense. I mean, when you, you have 75 points for two guys and you know, Peyton is your third leading scorer who just had wide open shots the entire game. Not great. I don't. You know, on the one hand, first round's great for Golden State because of the breaks between the games. Right. It's the same thing for the Lakers. The older teams, first round is where you want to be, where you might play Saturday, Tuesday, Friday, Sunday, you just have all the. But on the other hand, it just feels like some of the teams in the west are still going up and. Whereas the warriors have kind of leveled off and now are completely dependent on having big games from Stefan or Jimmy, and they're going to this Houston series where they're going to be able to throw just a shitload of dudes at Curry, and we already saw it with Ahmed Thompson two Sundays ago and try to wear him down. They also have a bunch of wings to throw at Butler, which brings back the Kaminga thing. But it feels like Kaminga is now in the attic with the Christmas ornaments and we're just not going to see him again.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, And I think he's going to be an interesting figure to watch in another way too, because Houston's one of the better rebounding teams in the league too. And you know, when Draymond's your big. And you're not getting a lot of rebounds with post out there, and I just. You just start to wonder, are they going to have to put Kaminga in just to match the athleticism and the physicality of this Houston team.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, because why wouldn't Houston be able to do the same thing that Memphis just did with Edie and Jackson when they put their double big lineup? I would think that would be a nightmare for the Warriors.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

The other thing that's interesting with that matchup, I believe is, you know, Dylan Brooks and Fred Van Fleet. Nobody stops Steph Curry. Curry. But those two guys have both done a great job defending Stephanie, relatively speaking, for the last five to seven years, Van Fleet in the 2019 Finals and Dylan Brooks for years on this Grizzlies group. Not to mention, as you said, Ahmed Thompson. I think Stefan had one of the worst games I've ever seen him have on April 6th. One of ten, three total points. The only three points he got, Bill, were on a 34 foot three bomb. He never got anything going. Ime Adoka was essentially calling him a crybaby to his face. It was just a nightmare game. And so I'm really fascinated by this matchup on a lot of fronts. And the question for me is, can this aging set of great players, hall of Famers match the energy and the physicality of Ime Adoka's fleet of youngbloods who are just dying for this moment?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, and it's. This is Houston Golden State. Just a classic old school NBA playoff matchup. The young guys against the older guys, right? It's like Golden State's washed up, but they're older and their guys have a lot of playoff years, a lot of playoff memories. But it's, you know, this is the 87 Celtics against the Pistons. This is the 91 Bulls against the 91 Pistons. Like we, we've just, we've seen this over and over again over the years. The, oh, Lakers against the O Blazers. And in this case, you know, I thought Houston would be favored in the series because they're the 2 seed. They have home court in game 7. They just kicked their butt a couple 10 days ago. What do you think the odds are in FanDuel? Because they came out. I know you've dabbled on the gambling side a little bit.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

You've been corrupted by Amy Howe a tiny bit to look at the eyes.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, we, we, we. I think Fanduel is going to have the warriors as slight favorites, am I right?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, you're right that they're favorites.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

It's not slight.

[Bill Simmons]

They're minus 200.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Dang.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that's too much.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Bill Simmons.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that's going to Move. And we did. Priscilla and I did the live Clippers Nuggets line on Sunday and I and it was way higher than now. It's like I think the Clippers are favored now but before the nuggets were like minus 1 60. That Rockets line is going to drop because all the dudes that they can throw at Curry, home court youth. The fact that Curry's banged up.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

The fact that Jimmy hasn't played like this kind of level of basketball over and over again in a couple of years where you're just like hey Jimmy, we need you now for 39, 40 minutes a night and the lack of like that third score, I don't know who I'm picking yet. I'm going to wait till Thursday. I really want to analyze it but to me this series is an absolute toss up and I think the double big lineup and all the people that could throw a Curry are real advantages for Houston.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

I assumed it was going to be this matchup all day and I'm with you. I don't know who I'm going to pick. I'm tempted to pick Houston because I'm sick of everybody just telling me Golden State's going to walk away with the series like it's going to be easy. And I know that's not going to happen. I know that's not going to happen. And I don't think those odds are correct. But yeah, I also could see a world where Golden State goes down there, steals game one or game two and feeling really good about their chances back in the Bay. I don't know, I just think those odds are a little wrongly priced. I think that IME Adoka is going to have these guys ready to, to do, you know what they do best which is incredible defense. Incredible defense, physicality, rebounds and rebounding.

[Bill Simmons]

If you punishing post up stuff, maybe a couple, maybe, maybe somebody starts making a couple threes from the corner that you wouldn't totally expect. Yeah, that the ceiling of their team is pretty high. I just don't know if they can hit it.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

They held golden state bill to 90 points in one of their where they play five times this year because the end season tournament and one of those games Golden State only scored 90 points. You know that's a pretty remarkable stat. I think Golden State needs to score a hundred to win. I think they're like 1 in 10 when they don't score a hundred or something like that. So if, if, if Houston's defense is able to clamp down on this Golden State offense, the Rockets Have a chance, a good chance to win the series.

[Bill Simmons]

It feels like we've had a lot of Warriors Rockets over the years and it also feels like Stephen Adams has played the warriors in a few playoff series over the years. Dylan Brooks, like, there's weird history between these two teams and some of the players, which makes no sense because Houston's such a young playoff team. But if I was a Houston fan, I would look at tonight's game and be like, that's our blueprint. Big size on the boards. Try to play up and down and as chaotic as possible. Try to get them into where they were. Is getting sloppy on offense. Use your athleticism, try to wear these dudes down and hope at least one or two of your guys can get a little heat Checky because the Rockets on the wrong day, when it just looks like a rock fight for them for the last seven minutes and you're like, what's going on with this team? They're in a little bit of same position as Golden State with. They're not positive who their best five is to close the game. It kind of depends on the situation. That always makes me nervous when I get to the playoffs. I kind of like to know who's my five, right? That's like the best thing about the Celtics and some of the best teams is the Cavs okc. They kind of know who their five is. But the other best thing that Golden State has going for them. How much would the league want a Golden State Lakers series in round two? Guessing I wouldn't want to be Minnesota or Houston from a, hey, like I'm just going into those series. But guys, we're probably not getting a ton of calls over the next two weeks. So just how are we going to handle this? Are we going to be cool with this? Because that's probably how it's going.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

It crossed my mind many times today. And the great thing about that too for the league is like it guarantees that either LeBron or Steph is in the Western Conference finals too, right? So if they get to round two, you know, either one of those glamour franchises and superstars is going to be in the Western Conference finals.

[Nick Khan]

So.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, that crossed my mind too.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, how about if the Lakers beat Minnesota and it's Houston Gold State on the other side? That's also a complete no lose for the NBA because Houston Lakers would be an awesome series that has the same kind of bad blood all over the place, including IME who got kicked out of a game for calling LeBron a bitch, which was amazing. Brooks who you know has tried to make his decades mission to be LeBron's rival to very little success. And then Stephen Adams who's always willing to bang into somebody. But that's just such a weird matchup. The Rockets going double big and the. And the Lakers don't have bigs.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

The Lakers don't have like real bigs. Rui LeBron have.

[Bill Simmons]

They just have masqueraded they both.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, yeah, it's interesting. Bigs, bigs in this Western Conference playoffs are a big piece of the puzzle. I think. You know, the Hartenstein acquisition changes Oklahoma City's ability to play big this time around. Obviously Joker is in there, but you know, I think the Western Conference there's three incredible series and let's probably expect that 18 series to not be that great.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I think that's, that might be an NBA TV exclusive. Do they still have the NBA TV series? They do, right? The OKC versus whoever. Yeah, that might, might be squandered. OKC Dallas. I think you just shoved that over on NBA tv.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Or maybe it's Memphis to be okc. Memphis by the way should be Vancouver, Seattle. Think about that. That would have been pretty crazy.

[Bill Simmons]

OKC Memphis would be a fun series because the thing about Memphis, I don't think they have any title aspirations whatsoever, but they are fun to watch high scoring games. The other team is always going to have two guys in the 30s.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, I hope, I hope our man John Morant is, is back and ready to go on Friday. Uh, I think he turned his ankle pretty bad. I have a really bad.

[Bill Simmons]

Or the Ewing theory might have to convene. Who knows.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Well, they did seem they played well. Bane had a great game. Bane almost did. He almost stole this game. Uh, he was making it seem like every shot and the ones he missed were like these torturous misses that would go in and out. He looked great. But yeah, Memphis played pretty well, I thought and I think OKC isn't going to have a problem there. But if John Morant gets to play okc, I think that would be, that would be really entertaining actually.

[Bill Simmons]

I can't say it was the greatest Jaren Jackson performance and I really agonized. I ended up leaving him off third team all NBA making way for a couple other guys. And it was, I just saw too many of those where it's like, he's good, he's solid, but you're also forgetting he's out there for large chunks of time. He's not. He's impactful, but not totally And I don't know, that was a game where I feel, especially with like Golden State, as small as they were going, it felt like he could have kind of dominated that game. And I just, I think the situation is what it is.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, he's, he, he settles for threes too much. Well over half of his shots again today against that smaller team. We're behind the three point line. You know, when, when he was sort of running that offense last year in the absences of Bain and Moran, he was doing a lot more driving and a lot more playmaking. That didn't exist tonight. Didn't exist tonight. And I'd like to see him be a little more aggressive against some of these matchups because he's so talented. He's got these like both. He can finish with both hands near the rim. But yeah, I still think they're going to, they're going to win against the winner of. I'll pick them to win against the winner of the Sacramento Dallas matchup. What are your thoughts on that one?

[Bill Simmons]

I think it needs a sponsor. Is there a dysfunctional product that could be the sponsor? Dallas and Sacramento, two of our most dysfunctional franchises, whatever that product is. Maybe. Is it like a. It's probably some sort of pharmaceutical product or maybe it's. Maybe it's like a CBD thing because you have to kind of get a little buzz on as you watch the dysfunction. But yeah, I have no idea that you could tell me. Dallas is just ready for the season and I believe it. Sacramento is always a roller coaster ride and both of them had really, really, really abnormally strange seasons like the Sacramento, the firing, Mike Brown going to Christie that. Just giving up on Fox a year early for reasons that remain unclear, bringing back the Levine DeRozan combo. And I don't know, it feels like two teams that I think are going to look a little bit different next season, whatever happens.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, I have no idea what to make of either team. I think I'm, I'm pretty sure that Sacramento's got enough to win this game.

[Bill Simmons]

It would seem like it, right?

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I said on Zach spot. I wonder if it's a 1, 2, 3 Cancun situation for Dallas. Like we just got booed for two months. Like let's get ready to call it a vacation. But I don't trust Sacramento either. Are we still lighting the beam in Sacramento or did we decide of going 500 for six months? Maybe it's not beam worthy anymore.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Oh, they're lighting that thing.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, they're still lighting it. Okay.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, they'll light it up. I think tomorrow night I think they'll light that thing up and then hop on a flight.

[Bill Simmons]

Let's take a break. I want to bring in Ceruti Orlando Magic fan to discuss the bizarre Atlanta Orlando game we watched tonight. So quick break. Right now the Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. Our friends, we're coming down in the stretch of the plan heading into the playoffs, the best place to get in on all the action for all the best games. FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. With FanDuel, there's so many ways for you to play. They've got all your favorite bets, player props, all kinds of things. They have futures, they have series bets. There's a bet I really like Lakers to beat the Timberwolves for the series, the Knicks to beat the Pistons and the Celtics to beat the Magic. If you parlay those three together on FanDuel right now, minus 113 kind of like it. Bet on the infrastructure of LeBron, Luka and the refs. Here's your chance for the next two weeks. If that sounds good, you can score an even bigger W on Wednesdays because FanDuel's giving you a profit boost for all of tonight's action on the second second day of playing games. So check FanDuel sportsbook app to see how much you got. Head to fando.com BS for more info. Make every moment more with FanDuel official sports betting part in the NBA must be 21 + President select states or 18 + President DC opt in required minimum three leg parlay required bonus issued as non withdrawable profit boost tokens Restrictions apply including any token expiration, max wager amount seat [e-mail], game prom call 1-800- GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com this episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Summer's almost here and you can now get almost anything you need for your sunny days delivered with Uber Eats. What do we mean by almost? Well, you can't get a well groomed lawn delivered, but you can get chicken Parmesan delivered. I love chicken parmesan. A cabana, that's a no. But a banana, that's a yes. A nice tan? Sorry, no. But a box fan? Happily yes. A day of sunshine? No. A box of fine wines? Yes. Uber Eats can definitely get you that. Get almost almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol in select markets. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. All right, Saruti is Joining us, the ringer's ironman just had a child but loves the NBA playoffs. And so wired from Cole Anthony Knight that he had to join us. What was that, a better Orlando win or a more fun Atlanta loss for you?

[Ceruti]

Yeah, it was all good. I was just feeding the kid and I was just like, you know, I might as well just stay up and hop in this Zoom record. I'm wired. I, I gotta be honest with you. I. I don't know that I'm happier about winning the game or that I just don't have to watch Trey Young play basketball against my team anymore. Like, that was, it was disgusting. Like it was. And maybe, maybe I'm super sensitive to it because they played the Hawks a couple times here down the stretch, but it, it's like he's yelling at the ref for calls that he's getting during the game. And it's, it just feels like, I guess, a bat. As a guy who just, like, likes to watch, enjoys basketball because there's a lot of people being like, what's his future this summer? Like, you know, he would, he would undoubtedly make the magic better. And I just can't. I could never talk myself into it. So I'm happy about the win, but I'm mostly just happy that I don't have to watch that anymore.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow. Scoldsberry, if I heard that correctly, that was Cerutty saying that win was a double win because Trae Young was so annoying in that game. Orlando might not trade for him this summer. So we won twice. That's how, that's how I interpreted that dude.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

I've never seen a player taunt a ref, like, with the ball. He was like going to pass it to him and he spun it back to himself like a big brother to a little brother. And that's when he got tossed. That was great.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a tough one. Well, it's one of those things that'll go into the off season now and it'll be a narrative. And I think he was going to be in trade rumors anyway for a bunch of different reasons. And, you know, the, the. I remember Paul Pierce at this point with the Celtics when the mid 2000s things weren't going great. And then he had that thing in with the Indiana where he, he showed up for the press conference with this head bandage and it was like, oh, man, is he trying to get traded? What's going on here? They ended up keeping them, but we've seen different players hit this specific point and it does feel like fork in the Road now for Trey. He was 2018 draft. So seven years. You know, I, I, I don't know what you get for him. You, you start is like is jaw. Is it like a jaw type of level for a trade? Is it a level below? Is Lamelo too high? Is it. Do you try to do your version of that Dejante Murray like some picks and an asset just get out of it. What would you do?

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Kirk Jalen Suggs. What do you think? Sorority Jalen Suggs?

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, God, no way.

[Ceruti]

I mean, I'm not, I'm not going to go like Dallas Mavericks fan level on that, but I would stop watching the team if they traded Jalen Suggs for Trey Young. That's, I mean, no way. I mean, that is Dallas Mavericks level. Just for the record, you can't trade a guy who, and I know you're just where this is just like a hypothetical, but like a guy who's like kind of the heart and soul of like the energy of the team for a guy who, I just don't know what Trey is like. I, you know, obviously had the conference final a couple years ago, and I think he's really talented. He led the league in assist this year. Obviously, maybe there's a situation that works for him, but I can as just like a basketball fan be like, yeah, I, I can't knight in night out root for that. I just can't. It was, it was uncomfortable to watch. I mean, he's, that's why it was so great, because Anthony Black a couple of times, who had a great game, by the way. Anthony Black, Cole, Anthony and Wendell Carter carried Paulo and Franz, I mean, more Franz a little bit. I mean, Paulo was good early and then, you know, got the cut above his eye, so who knows. But those guys were awesome. But it was great to see, like, the action of, of Anthony Black kind of got Trey tossed from the game. And I don't know, man. Like, I'd rather root for dudes that just like, kind of I, who just, I hate to be the old man, but play the game the right way. But, like, that's just. I, I don't want to watch. I don't want to watch foul baiting. I don't want to watch. I don't want to watch somebody yelling at the ref the entire game. And you know that, like I said, the magic would, would they need another elite guard? They need somebody, they need to get the ball out of Paulo and Franz hands all the time. They leave those guys on islands to like, at the end of Shot clocks, and they just do them a disservice.

[Bill Simmons]

That might be a coaching thing, though. I don't know. I don't even know if that's a roster thing. Like, it would be nice if the offense evolved even a tiny bit.

[Ceruti]

I'd love Cole Anthony, who is, you know, basically carrying them at parts of the game. Like, why does he come in with two minutes left in the third quarter? If you go up this massive run and now the Hawks are back in the game. Questions I have after the game. But, you know, he ended up doing it anyway. But, yeah, like, I just. I just. I can't. I can't do it with Trey Kirk.

[Bill Simmons]

All right, you're in the front office, Everybody gets together and you have the Trae Young conversation. And the problem with the Trey Young conversation, the stats are there. And the conference finals thing is the thing that screws it up because you can't say, good stats, bad team guy, because he made the conference finals. And you probably have to go back and really look through, well, how'd they make the conference finals? What happened? And then you have to really analyze that goofy Sixers series, which was, you know, the end of Ben Simmons's career. It was a shortened season. And how do you. How do you judge? Was this just a fluke or are we not giving him enough credit because he was one of the four teams left in a playoffs? I don't know what the answer is.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, I think he deserves a lot of credit for that run. I mean, what we saw him do in the Knicks series and like, getting. Becoming that villain and becoming a guy who's capable of winning those big games. There was a little bit tonight where I thought he was going to get it going. And that third quarter, Ceruti, where they opened it up and finally got your team running up and down the court, and he was at the forefront of that. And then, yeah, like, it's not ethical hoops. Like, he. The. When the bonus light comes on, he totally changes into the worst, most annoying player, with all due respect to Chris Ball, somehow is taking it to another level. When the bonus light comes on, Trey Young shines even brighter. But there is some value there. There is a team that would take a chance on them. Maybe it's somebody like Portland or Sacramento. I don't know. I don't like the player. I think what the Hawks have that makes it really interesting is they have this incredible defense waiting to be there with these wings, with Risha Shay, Jalen Johnson, obviously Dyson Daniels, Akongu. They have this like, fleet of young athletes that are ready to shine. I don't feel like Trey fits into that. So I'm among the other. I just. I believe that he will be mentioned in a lot of trades this summer.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. And I just wonder who the team is. So Serenity or Anthony Black and a contract? No, just then just. You're hanging up?

[Nick Khan]

Yeah.

[Ceruti]

I'm not even taking that phone call. Before the Luca thing wasn't there were some talk about maybe the Lakers sniffing around late kind of LeBron thing. Trey worked.

[Bill Simmons]

I never believed that. I mean, Sacramento can never be ruled out with their last 12 years track record. You can't rule them out. And the San Antonio would be the wild card for me. I know for people who aren't watching this on video. Kurt just made a face and leaned backwards in disgust when I mentioned.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

I think that's the problem, dude. Like, when you talk about it with Ceruti's team, it's like there's this visceral reaction. When you talk about with my team, there's this visceral reaction.

[Bill Simmons]

But it might get to a point where if you feel like you can get him for 50 cents on the dollar, like, you know, his contract's not that much longer. I don't know. Yeah.

[Ceruti]

Isn't that. Isn't that kind of what happened though, a couple years ago where like it was Russell Westbrook and it was like, well, you know, like a bad team. Just take a flyer on him just to kind of be interesting. But there aren't that many teams. I mean, the Sacramento is probably the one, but there aren't that many teams that are just like, hey, we're so bad that we just need to be interesting. So let's just take a flyer on Trae Young. It feels like you talked about it, Bill. Like, there's just a lot of talent in the league. A lot of these teams are, you know, headed in the right direction. Even like, you know, the Wizards and the Hornets, like, why would they. Why would they do that? There aren't. There isn't just that team that's like, hey, let's just do this, because we have nothing else going on. And there really hasn't been teams like that for a few years now. It feels like, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Plus with the apron, everything's harder. Like moving contracts, you know, everything. Serie. Do you want to make the case for Orlando in round one against the Celtics?

[Ceruti]

I was texting our good with our good buddy Kevin Clark, and I. The thing I said was, they, I don't think they have any shot in the series, but I weirdly think that they could win two games. Like, I feel pretty good about that. And that's, I think it could be a six game series and it'll be tough for the Celtics, but I just don't think, I don't know how the Magic score with them. I mean I, I don't know how Celtics play defense.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, you're bet your best chance is almost on the road in Boston where the Celtics just seem to fall asleep every home game for whatever reason.

[Ceruti]

They'll probably steal a game one or two and then, you know, who knows, like, people might start losing their minds and say some irresponsible stuff, but they, you know, I can't imagine everyone's locked into the Magic all year long, but the offensive loss that they go through, it's, it's like uncomfortable to watch at times. You're just like, how is this? I think Zach mentioned it. I forget it was you or whoever. But it's just like, can we just get some sort of offensive coach in there to figure some things out? Why does, why does everyone that comes to Orlando a kcp? Was he one of seven? I think from three. I mean Paulo and Franz were oh for seven or eight combined. It's just like, why does, why does everybody go there just immediately and it's not even like, like some of them are open shots. They're just missing open shots. And I, you know, as much as I like to think, like I think that what they're 2 and 1 against the Celtics this year. I think they. A couple of those. Tatum wasn't around.

[Bill Simmons]

Listen, it's a couple years of Orlando having good games against Celtics. Like my dad, of course, who's always. Sky's falling in his text sometimes as we get to our playoff time. He was, he really wanted Atlanta to win because he's like, Orlando makes me nervous. Like, sorry. Like they, We've had trouble against them over and over. Now this is with Suggs. Suggs was always a big piece of. That is the difference.

[Ceruti]

Atlanta is a great like, you know when Alabama plays like an FCS team in the first week, that's a perfect like first round opponent. Like you just, you know, you get, you get warmed up a little bit. You don't really get beat up. Like the problem with the Magic is you're going to get beat up for five games or so, five or six games and it might kind of hurt you later on in the playoffs. That's, that's certainly a team that like isn't going to be awesome like bruise wise in round two and round three. But I just can't, I can't see the Magic without Suggs. The scoring situation, I can't see it happening.

[Bill Simmons]

Plus it seems like the Celts are happy. Kirk, Celtics sweep plus 1. 26 on FanDuel 4 to 1 is plus 1. 68. And Cerutty's two game prediction, that would net you plus 6, 10. Celtics 4 to 2.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Wow, that's. That's a pretty good price. A lot can happen in these games. People forget how few sweeps there are sometimes. I think that the case for The Magic winning one is like what they did to the Hawks three point shooters tonight. They had four made threes. Bill. That's like only out of the 1200 NBA games we watched all year long, only I think 13 times did a team, either team make four or fewer threes. So Orlando has been the best three point defense in the NBA all year. They've suppressed attempts and makes at a very high level. That said, I think, you know, the Hawks are not the Celtics. The Celtics and Missoula have a way of going from good to great against every defense and it's terrifying. But the case is they will sort of force Boston into, you know, and you watched them all year. If Boston has a below average three point shooting night, if they hit 26% of their threes, they're beatable. And I think if Orlando can get some better scoring, if they have Cole Anthony playing like this or Wendell Carter Jr. Playing like he played tonight, they could steal one game. I think this is a five game series. Um, but I wouldn't surprise if it were four or six. I would, I would say it's a five game series in my head.

[Ceruti]

It's also a, like an interesting big brother, little brother dynamic with the Jason Tatum, Paulo thing. Both Duke guys, they're friendly. Uh, I think Paulo was asked about it after the game and you know, he said like the ultimate, you know, compliment or whatever would be just playing well against him. You know, it's the guy who, I think a lot of Magic fans like hope Paulo that his career steers north to Jason Tatum. Like he's never going to be that defensively, but at least just kind of like the, you know, the caliber of player, the, you know, mvp, first team on base, like that thing. It's interesting storyline to watch. I just, I just watch Paolo too many times. I just go, God. Like I, I understand the criticism about the, the like the shooting and the shot selection at times, but they Just leave him hanging out to dry. So he's asked to do so freaking much all the time. And like, that's why when Cole comes in and gives him like a secondary ball handler, creator, like. And Cole was pretty inconsistent. He was awesome tonight. If they just had a guy that can. I don't know who that is necessarily. I wanted it to be Malik Monk in the off season. Who can just like ease the lot. Here we go. Gonna keep asking me, ask me. I don't know. Who knows? Let's see how the series goes and how depressing it is.

[Bill Simmons]

Jonathan Kaminga, he's available.

[Ceruti]

Yeah, I. That's. It's just an interesting dynamic to watch those two Duke guys going at it.

[Bill Simmons]

Who. What's your Tatum plan for this series?

[Ceruti]

I would just throw. I mean, Isaac and just. Hopefully you could just bother the heck out of him. Isaac's been. He hasn't been as consistent this year as he was last, although he played a lot of games. So I guess he stayed healthy. So credit to him. But I would do that. Maybe a little bit of Franz. I mean, they're certainly big. They've got the size to. You saw it tonight. I mean, the Hawks are a different team obviously than the Celtics, but man, they just. It's hard to get good shots against them. And Kirk said it, they're the best defensive three point shooter. They're the worst three point shooting team on offense, but they also defend and let teams make threes. So they're. They're kind of, you know, old school in that way. So that's. That. That's the path is just, can they just get the Celtics to not shoot well and play good three point defense and hopefully they can get some shot variance on offense.

[Bill Simmons]

Four for 21 from three. Iconic. It's a box score right out of the early 2010s. All right, Cerute, I guess we're natural rivals for. For the next two weeks. I'll look into it. All right, thanks for popping on Later. Kirk, you did a shooting column on theringer.com. yeah, a great website. And you gave out the shooting excellence awards, including the Wardell Award for best shooter of the year. Steph Curry, which is the number one award and the most important. That's like your best picture, basically. Is anyone ever going to win this award other than Steph Curry? How did you frame this in your mind mentally? Is, could somebody win it when he's still playing? Could somebody come and take it? And if somebody did take it, who would that be?

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, it's like the batting title in the Ted Williams era, right. Like this is just feels like this is going to go to him. But you know, in the piece I looked at some, some potential young players coming along and there's some surprising names that, you know, there's the Devin Bookers of the world that you think of. But dude, I'll give you a name that is really relevant for the playoffs. Who is suddenly an incredible jump shooter and that's Anthony Edwards, who is combining volume and efficiency and age. I would throw that in there at a ridiculous level. And some people early in the season sort of lamented the fact that this hyper athletic, you know, highlight machine was taking so many threes. But he's good at it. And so he comes to mind as somebody who like it or not, could be the best shooter in the NBA in four or five years if he continues this trajectory. I mean, I don't know if you saw the stats, but like very few players in NBA history have had more than 300 threes in a season. And now he's on that list and he creates a lot of them. And specifically with a step back bill, which is a very difficult shot that only players like Luka and Stefan and Harden have really been able to do reliably well, he's actually hitting that at a rate that's better than all those guys. And that really caught my eye this year. So Anthony Edwards could take the torch in a weird way. I would not said that last year, but doing the research for the piece, I was like, it's undeniable that this guy is ahead of schedule as a jump shooter.

[Bill Simmons]

I looked at his stuff long and hard because I was debating. I gave him a test drive for that last first team all NBA spot. I gave him a test drive for fifth spot mvp. So I was looking at all his stats. First of all, he won the three point title this year for three pointers made, which Curry has owned. If Curry's healthy, he just has. He just wins that every year. As long as he plays 68 games, you know, 65, whatever. Edwards hit 320, Malik Beasley at 319, Curry at 311 and nobody else had over 266. But I don't think people realize how many threes he takes and makes like people like us realize it. But I don't think if you ask the average person on the street who made more threes this year, Steph Curry or Anthony Edwards, I don't think anyone would say Anthony Edwards. So you have that. But he also took, took he made 415 free throws which was sixth. He took 496 free throws which was fifth. So he's moved into that kind of late 2000 and tens. James Harden. Harden was the all timer for this, but threes and free throws. Yeah, little bit of that. But then he's also doing all this other stuff including the defense and the athleticism and I just, I was really, really happy with where we landed in this ant journey. And now we have this Lakers series where we're going to find out can he, can he go up a little bit of a level here?

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah. And that's, it's, it's a perfect stage for him to, to, to, to check in and see if, where he's at because there's a chance that the, the Wolves will win this series and he's going to be just the, the, the, the star of the show on, on some of the biggest stages in the first round of these playoffs. And you know, when he came out of Georgia and was the number one pick, I didn't think that he would be the best shooter in sort of his cohort of early 20s players. I didn't think that was going to happen. I always thought I was going to be an athlete, but he's great. And then the other name you mentioned that I don't think people quite realize how great of a shooting season we just had was Malik Beasley. And if you look at just the catch and shoot stats, it's better than any Klay Thompson season except for one like Malik Beasley. It's not an exaggeration to say when you look at the volume of threes he's taking and the percentage he's making, it's like having Klay Thompson out there. In fact, it's like a better version of Klay Thompson for most of Klay Thompson's career. And I think that helps explain what's happened in Detroit. The sort of he's doing at the.

[Bill Simmons]

End of games too.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, and he doesn't even start which is why he's a six man of the year candidate. But he finishes a lot of games and he gives Cade Cunningham a. Just a great spacing weapon. But it's also just a, you know, Malik's been a great catch and shoot guy in the league for a while. Yeah, he had one down year in the Lakers, but this is not, this is, he's taken it to another level. So he's another one that sort of popped in this awards and gave him the best catch and shoot guy because I don't think people realize. And we'll see that in a big series too, with the New York Knicks.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, too.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Bill is, is. Can he continue this under the bright lights?

[Bill Simmons]

I couldn't believe that he wasn't the favorite for six man of the year. I voted for him. I voted for him over Pritchard. I watched, I obviously watched the Celtics the most. I thought Pritchard had an excellent, excellent season off the bench. But Beasley, you know, the Celtics could survive whether Pritchard was good or not. He could go one for eight for three points and it just wouldn't matter. The Pistons couldn't survive Beasley having a bad game against a good team. Like they actually really, really needed him. He was probably, you know, Duran is their second most important player, I think because of all the, the rim protection, rebounding, the alley oop stuff that he gives them. And Beasley's probably, it's probably 2A Durham and 2B Beasley, but with the shot. And I've talked about before. But the shocking thing was how they would run offense for him in big spots at any games. Like they, they really would come out of timeouts and be like, we're running this play and you're going to like the same way you would treat Klay Thompson. So to me, it wasn't close. I thought I, I didn't think it was close. I thought he was clearly sixth man of the year.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah. Anybody doubts, go to Basketball Reference and look at Clay and then look at Malik. There have been only nine instances of a player hitting more than 39% of their threes while also hitting more than 300 threes in a single year. Curry's done it six times, Clay has done it one time. And then this year, Bill Anthony Edwards and Malik Beasley both did that. So I think that was a stat that was like, oh my God. Yeah, there's more threes than ever. Nobody wants to hear me complain about that anymore. I get it. But we're seeing the emergence of more of these great shooting campaigns and this year it was Beasley and Edwards.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, he, you know, one of the things that screws up the six man stuff when you look at it is some guys will have these games as starters and their stats will jump way up when they're the starter and then when they're the reserve, the stats are different. You can look at all this stuff with the splits easily. It didn't really matter. He was just as impactful. No matter how many minutes he got, whether he brought him off the bench, he started 18 games, stats were like 4 points better but it wasn't dramatic. And he was, he didn't have.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Pritchard had that one game where he had like 45 against 4 point drive.

[Bill Simmons]

That's the thing. Naz Reed had a couple of those where he started and had big games. Beasley was he, you know, he averaged 16 points a game and I don't think he played. Did he play? I'm looking at it now. Sorry. 27.8 minutes, I don't know. Shot 41.6 from three, took nine a game. Like that's, these are crazy numbers for a six man. It's one of the better six man seasons we've had. So any other shooting seasons stand out for you?

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Well, relevant to this weekend, I'm going to say Tyler Harrow has had a bright breakout year. But he's, he's, he's mastered the floater, which is really interesting and kills, kills a lot of drop coverage and he's just the best at that. The floater sort of replaced the pull up jumper for young guards. You know, Chris Paul's generation would always pull up at the elbow off two feet. Tyler Harrow and John Morant's generation is definitely like running towards the basket, throwing up the floater. The stats back that up. And this year nobody has been better than that than Tyler Harrow. And you know, I think in the Butler absence, if you look at the Miami Heat's numbers over the last 15, 16 games, their numbers jump off the page. And I think whoever wins that game in Chicago has a really good chance, Bill, of taking the eight seed in the east from Atlanta. And I think Tyler Harrow in the.

[Bill Simmons]

Heat, I forgot we're not done with Atlanta yet. We, we have them again. We have felt like after that Trey Young game we, we were saying goodbye to them for the year, but now we're going to have them again.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

And, and both Chicago and Miami are playing above that 9, 10 level right now.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

And so I think whoever wins that game is going to have a lot of momentum going into Atlanta and I could see that being Miami and I could see Miami going into Cleveland and stealing a game.

[Bill Simmons]

So I noticed, by the way, I noticed the same thing with Miami because that line, I think it's like Chicago by one. I loved, I loved Orlando tonight and I also like Golden State, but they were favored by like 6, 7. That's not amazing to be like. I think, I think the two favorites are going to win. Tomorrow's a harder match of games and I really like the Chicago thing. I think they're fun to watch. But the same thing you made the key point with Miami. The numbers are pretty good for them. Just this last 15 and bam, I think finally looked like Bam and had a couple real kick ass games. But in J, you know, a couple times they played teams that are trying to tank stuff like that. But I just would be surprised if they lost tomorrow, I'll say that.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, me too. I think I'll go a step further. You have spo, you have these guys that have gone very far in the playoffs still on that roster versus Chicago group that you can't say that about. So I feel like I am picking Miami. You know, I like Chicago again. I think they're playing better than the nine spot right now.

[Bill Simmons]

Giddy's hurt and playing which that part makes me nervous where he's like questionable but he's going to play it. I don't like that.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah. And then. Yeah, so I, I, I love that. But that was hero. What else in the piece is interesting, by the way?

[Bill Simmons]

The other one, I, I, I refused to make a pick, but if you actually forced me to make a pick, I would probably take Sacramento. Yeah, I don't feel great about it though.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

The last thing from the, the shooting piece that I think you'll enjoy is the best shooting big man in the NBA this year. You'll remember a couple years ago, Carl Towns claimed to be the best big man shooter of all time, which that wasn't true.

[Bill Simmons]

What? So did we debunk that to those.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Of us who watch basketball before 2000.

[Bill Simmons]

There were other big men before town, so I didn't realize. Oh, Dirk Nowitzki. I forgot. Oh yeah, that's right. The MVP who won a title. Yeah.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

But Nicole Jokic, among his many feats, is literally the most efficient jump shooter in the NBA. Among all the people that took 400 jump shots this season, which I forget, 98 players. So of the 98 players that took at least 400 jumpers, nobody's more efficient than Nicole Jokic.

[Bill Simmons]

But he also. That doesn't include that he was like 42% from three.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

That includes the three. It includes all jump shots. And I think that is an astounding fact. I know you and Ryan are debating the MVP votes, but I didn't know that going into that.

[Bill Simmons]

But just I'm not debating anymore because we had to mail it in today.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Oh yeah. And you and you ended up with Nicola. Right.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm going to save it for Thursday's pod.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

But you bet you, I mean some of the stats with him, like that shooting stat you just mentioned. There's like nine different things you could say about his season from either using counting stats or advanced stats that are just dumbfounding. I mean, nobody had, I'm pretty sure nobody had been in the top five in points, assists and rebounds per game in the same season. And he's in the top three. But he was also second in steals. And then he also shot 42% from three. And then he was also like, it was like a 19 point difference when he was on or off the court. Offensively for them, it's just like you start going through the stuff and it was like he did eight things that just don't happen ever.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

That's, I think the last one you said. For me, I really think the MVP vote comes down to how you look at the word value and valuable in this context. And for me, as a stats guy, those on, off differentials with, with, with the joker are so extreme that it, it proves to me the way I think of value. And again, I think this is a year where we have really unique two candidates. Both are deserving.

[Bill Simmons]

Two, by the way. Yeah, A plus candidates. This is not a. I have to talk myself into an MVP player.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah, yeah. But, but, but, but I, I always come back to. And I think you alluded to this with the 2 through 12 thing. But yeah, like when Nicola is sitting down for the Denver Nuggets, they're immediately a lottery team. They're immediately a lottery team until he takes off the towel and stands up and goes to the scorer's table and comes back into the game and then they're a playoff team again. It's.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you, did you vote for the Ringer 100. I can't remember.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

I didn't do it. I didn't do it.

[Bill Simmons]

Too tense for you? Well, I sent my last list and it's interesting. So a hundred players. I obviously took it seriously and really tried to rank everyone correctly and put time into it. OKC had seven of the top 96 for me. They had number two, 17, 18, 62, 65, 79 and 96 because I put Kayson Wallace in my top hundred because I think he's unbelievable. Denver had 1, 41, 60 and 78. And I had, I didn't. Jamal's not Even the top 40 for me at this point just because he's been so erratic this year, you know, and even when he starts playing well, then he gets some dumb injury again. And you know, the league is so deep, you start comparing him to like somebody like Desmond Bain tonight, you know, who's had a really good season and showed up when it really mattered. Um, but anyway, the point is, I thought that was interesting.

[Nick Khan]

This.

[Bill Simmons]

This one jumped out at me, too. I had seven Houston guys. My top 31, 43, 72, 73, 81, 83, and 95. It's not nothing. Then you look at Golden State, 6, 28, 40, and we're done. Three guys, you know, so that's not everything. But it is kind of instructive when you start looking at talent in a big picture of guys, teams compared to other teams. And one team has seven top hundred guys. The other team has three. Now, granted, one of them is number six.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

And it's one of the themes for me this season, too, Bill, is like, if you look at the top four teams, top two in both sides, there's something in common, is they're all pretty young. I think the Boston Celtics have a couple older guys in Horford. Yeah, yeah. But, like, when you look at the absolute core of the Cavs, Celtics, but also, obviously in the west, the Rockets and the. In the Thunder. It's a young man's game, dude. It's a young man's game. And in these playoff series, like, where I can see myself talking, Talking myself into the Rockets beating the warriors is like, dude, there's just these young bucks who have a lot more energy or a lot more resilient. Like when Jot turned his ankle. And like, for an older player, that's probably the game. Right. You can't come back from that.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like a week. Yeah. You're coming off on the wheelchair.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Yeah. Those are the moments. And I think there is a case for depth being more important than ever right now in the NBA. And I think the Rockets have that and the warriors don't. But, yeah, I think that's an interesting way to look at these playoff matchups, too, is who has the most depth. And what you just said about the Rockets is another reason I'm going to talk myself into taking them. I bet.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. I mean, they're bringing in Tari Eason for 17, 18 minutes a game, and it's just like. It's like you're unleashing him for those minutes, and it's like, oh, let's put him and Thompson together. Watch this. Yeah, I don't know what I'm going to do. I hate any series taking the team that doesn't have the best player. The warriors clearly have the best player. And then when you saw How Jimmy could flip the switch tonight with all the time off between the games, but I don't. The Warriors. The fact that Steve doesn't seem to really trust what his roster is makes me nervous. Cause I felt like he had a handle on it three weeks ago. It really did. I felt that Laker game when they beat the Lakers a couple weeks ago, I was like, oh, this team knows who it is. They know who their guys are. And now we're heading in the playoffs and I'm not sure they know. So I guess we'll find out.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

We'll find out, man.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, Kurt, I kept you up too late. We're going to go. Unless you got any University of Texas updates for us.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

No, I mean, it was great to see the Longhorn Corey Joseph back on the television screen tonight. I haven't seen Corey Joseph at all.

[Bill Simmons]

There's our update. It was the Corey Joseph.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Corey Joseph. Yeah. But yeah, Bill, thanks. And I can't wait for these playoffs to start, buddy.

[Bill Simmons]

All right. Great to see you. Your beard's looking as good as ever. Nice. Little salt and peppery. Really nice.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Thank you, brother.

[Bill Simmons]

Good to see you. Thanks for staying up with me. This episode is brought to you by Altra Running. Every pair of Altra shoes has a roomy toe box and zero to low drop which lets your toes spread and keeps your foot in a more natural position. All in the name of comfort and performance with a variety of styles. There's a shoe for everyone. It's comfort you have to feel to try Altra for yourself. With a free 30 day trial and free [e-mail] this episode is brought to you by Audi. The all new fully electric Audi Q6E Tron is a huge leap forward featuring effortless power, serious acceleration, the most advanced tech of any Audi ever. Experience technology that puts you center stage with a panoramic digital stage plus an optional screen for front seat passengers. Perfect for watching the latest sports documentary. The Q6E Tron is not just a new EV. It's a new way to experience driving. Learn more at audiusa. Com Always pay careful attention to the road and do not drive while distracted. All right. My friend Nick Khan is here. He is the president of WWE. They have WrestleMania coming up. Do you want to hear my WrestleMania 40 years ago story?

[Nick Khan]

Please.

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't have a lot going on, no girlfriends to be seen and the fact that they had a WrestleMania pay per view with Hulk Hogan and Mr. T was in the running for biggest thing that happened to me in 1995 maybe not related to the Celtics or Boston team. Couldn't wait. Felt like there was a real moment where wrestling fans were kind of shoved to the side. We were kind of at the kids table. We were the booger eaters. We weren't taken seriously. And then all of a sudden, MTV and Hogan and it's like, no, no, no. Now it's our time. The wrestling fans matter, but you're also a wrestling fan, so you remember it.

[Nick Khan]

By the way, WrestleMania 1 was so big, you watch it, I assume on closed circuit.

[Bill Simmons]

We somehow had cable in Connecticut because I was going to high school in Connecticut.

[Nick Khan]

Amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

We somehow were able to order it on cable and watch it that way. But I don't think everyone had that option. Some people had to go to, like, weird closed circuit places and stuff.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, I was closed circuit LA Sports arena, because at that time we were living in Los Angeles as kids.

[Bill Simmons]

So what was the crowd the most fired up for at the LA Sports Arena?

[Nick Khan]

You know, look, the Hogan, Mr. T with Snuka in the corner against Orndorff Piper and Bob Orton in the corner was huge. But that Andre the Giant moment, there's something about that. I think it was $15,000 body slam challenge or Body Slam match with John Stud that felt big also.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. The closed circuit era is so hard to explain to young people. I saw Duran Leonard one. I saw 1981. I saw Hearns Leonard, the Boston Garden, Closed Circuit. So that was what, November 1981? Something like that?

[Nick Khan]

Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

Saw that in the Garden. And just about everybody was rooting for Hearns. And I was outraged by the.

[Nick Khan]

Think about it. Like, we would pay tickets to go watch TV in an arena.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. On, like, a really crappy screen. And it wasn't even. It wasn't like it is now. Like, if you did like a watch party now, it's great.

[Nick Khan]

It's great now, but it was a blurry screen back then.

[Kurt Goldsberry]

Do you guys do that?

[Bill Simmons]

You have watch parties now?

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, we have a lot of international watch parties with Netflix for the upcoming WrestleMania. We did deal with KOSM, if you know KM.

[Bill Simmons]

Of course. I don't.

[Nick Khan]

Right. Kosm is. It's sort of like a sphere, like bar and lounge. It's in a few select cities, including Los Angeles, Atlanta. WrestleMania will be there. It's already sold out, but it's a great viewing experience. So we do them and we do them domestically as well.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, I want to talk about WrestleMania in a second, but since the last time you came on, we actually finished a Mr. McMahon documentary for Netflix. It was a multi year odyssey. I still can't believe it. It ran six episodes, six hours. A big history of wwe. Vince was prominently involved. You guys were. Vince was gone at that point. But the whole situation was pretty weird. And I think pulling it off was one of the craziest achievements I've ever been involved with. I still can't believe it actually aired. It felt like it was dead seven times.

[Nick Khan]

A lot, A lot. But by the way, it's a testament to you. It's a testament to Netflix, you know, to get that done. Obviously, in getting it done, the latter part, which you just referenced was quite bumpy, you know, for everybody, but it got done and it seemed to get, you know, quite high viewership numbers on Netflix.

[Bill Simmons]

So what was the response, like internally and like, you're in charge of wwe, you're doing this giant documentary that's, you know, it's warts and all, of a pretty controversial guy who's involved in a big legal proceeding. And did you get people going like, why are you doing this? Why hasn't this been killed?

[Nick Khan]

Well, look, episodes one through five, it was all fine.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

And then, you know, episode six obviously had a lot of, you know, tawdry allegations in there. So, you know, the most important thing at the company was, hey, this is not for us to spike it. That's not what the deal was. And the deal that was struck with Netflix was prior to me joining WWE on a full time basis. So it was sort of trying to help everyone stay calm who was watching it. And hey, we'll get through this thing and get to the other side of it, which hopefully now we are.

[Bill Simmons]

What was the kind of, what kind of feedback did you get from people on it?

[Nick Khan]

It went everywhere. From, hey, it was phenomenally done, like you did with Andrew the Giant documentary on HBO Sports, to, oh my God, this thing, it's not true, it's not factual. This and that. There were people who loved it as an objectively told profile of a person and people who were close to the subject who didn't like it, which I understand and I would think you understand.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it certainly ran the gamut of emotions. I was really proud of how it was done and I thought it was hardest thing I've ever been involved with just to, just to make, by the way, my compliment. That's when the story kept changing.

[Nick Khan]

My compliments to you. There were a lot of bumps in there. There were a lot of, you know, it was not easy and you stayed steady. You got through it, as did Netflix and You know, here we are.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I'm, you know, these things are documents. I feel the same way about the Celtics thing we're doing right now where it's like, you know, you, you hope that 20 years from now people will watch it. It'll be some sort of snapshot of what happened.

[Nick Khan]

But were you happy with the way the Celtics one turned out?

[Bill Simmons]

I really was, actually. Yeah. I mean, that's different because these big ass documentaries spread over a bunch of years. There's a certain level of expectations that come with them now and you kind of have to exceed those. People just assume they're going to be infomercials or they're not going to be good and they're prone to not want to watch it over. You almost have to convince them, no, no, this is a good one. You should watch this. So I'm proud of it though.

[Nick Khan]

Look, for whatever it's worth, I too thought it was phenomenal. I put it up there. And HBO Sports, as you know, you're one of the co creators of 30 for 30. But HBO Sports was the sports documentary Home for everything prior to 30 for 30. That Bird vs Magic documentary that Ezra did 10, 15 years ago, whatever that was.

[Bill Simmons]

15.

[Nick Khan]

I thought that was the best basketball documentary I had seen.

[Bill Simmons]

Excellent.

[Nick Khan]

I put this one up there with that. And I also loved Once Brothers. I'm not suggesting.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah, you did that one.

[Nick Khan]

I know you did.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that was a fun one.

[Nick Khan]

Loved it. I thought it was a deep, emotional story. But the Celtics one, it was not told simply through the lens of a fan.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Which I think, I don't want to say was difficult for you. I wouldn't know that. But I know you're a huge Celtics fan. So to be able to tell the story objectively, you know, warts and all, was impressive to me.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, we wanted to do like just have a interview. A hundred people tell the story of the city as it intersected with the team. And you know, I think when you're trying to do these, and we felt the same way we did the Vince one, you don't just want to tell the story, you want to also be levitating above it, trying to actually say something. I think that's when it gets hard. And like in wrestling there's been so many documentaries at this point, just about everybody's been done and they've been kind of varying degrees of quality and, and the ones that seem to resonate the most is like two different audiences for it. There's like the die hard wrestling fans who like dark side of the ring and all the nitty gritty stuff. And they're just gonna eat those up. And those are basically for them only. And then the question with the wrestling stuff is how do you get our wives to watch? How do you get our kids to watch? How do you get a much bigger audience for it than just the people that were gonna watch it anyway?

[Nick Khan]

Totally. Look, it's sort of the same thing we try to do weekly with wwe. You're going to have the hardcore fans who watch, you know, no matter what, and they'll either love it, hate it, or they're somewhere in between. And then you try to broaden the audience as I think, or at least I hope that we have over the last number of years to get people like your son back into it.

[Bill Simmons]

He's out again. We got to talk about this.

[Nick Khan]

Well, I thought he was coming to WrestleMania.

[Bill Simmons]

He is, but he's, you know, all the stages, he's in the state, the stage now where the next stage will be like age what, 24. When all of a sudden you come back hard. I'm in the. I'm too cool for this now. Yeah, we're going to have to. You might have to pile drive him.

[Nick Khan]

We'll have to have a private conversation with you and me on the side with them at wrestling.

[Bill Simmons]

He's excited to go, but it's not. He's not on it like he used to be.

[Nick Khan]

He's above it now.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, too cool for it now.

[Nick Khan]

I understand.

[Bill Simmons]

But he. But the thing is, he's not too cool. That's the thing.

[Nick Khan]

No one's too cool for wrestling.

[Bill Simmons]

It's the cycle of being a wrestling fan. So now he's here and then eventually he'll be back here.

[Nick Khan]

I know I've mentioned it before, but WrestleMania, I think it was 2016 in Dallas. So your son would have been nine years.

[Bill Simmons]

That was the wheelhouse. Yeah, my son was nine. That was the wheelhouse for him.

[Nick Khan]

You were sending me videos from your hotel room of him doing Ben, your son doing all the wrestling moves on your guys hotel bed. Now my son, who you know Sonny is nine, right. So I get to experience that firsthand in seeing him, my son do all the things Ben was doing nine years ago.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, and then Sonny also, when we saw him, he deceived us on what the WrestleMania was going to be. So you've already trained him to swerve people, trust little kids with information. We thought we were getting inside info for how WrestleMania was going to play out and what he told us wasn't true. I really respected it.

[Nick Khan]

But by the way, there's a precursor to that conversation. He said to me, hey, if Bill Simmons asked me, what's going to happen in Royal Rumble, do we trust him? Do we tell him? I said, we trust him, but we don't tell him. And he said, okay, then I'm going to tell him Cena's taking the whole thing. And I said, okay, great. He never said any of that, but I'm just kidding.

[Bill Simmons]

I wouldn't believe that. But that's what happened. He told us Cena was winning Royal Rumble, and we were like, wow, Nick Khan's kid. He's got to get that kid in line. He told us the wrong thing, or he told us the right thing, and then it turned out to be the wrong thing.

[Nick Khan]

Listen, someone in this room and to the listeners, there's only two of us in this room, told me years ago, hey, keep in mind, everybody tell somebody.

[Bill Simmons]

So, you know, it's the Jacoby Trust triangle.

[Nick Khan]

The Jacoby Trust triangle, yeah. So we had to keep it tight that Cena was not winning the World Rumble.

[Bill Simmons]

So that was the biggest decision you guys have made with a character in the company. I don't even know since when this was somebody that you protected for 20 years. You never turned him over. He was always a good guy. Even as the crowd, he's polarizing and is 50 50. But that was the cool thing. But he always tried to stand for something. He was a role model. It helped. The thing I always heard was the merchandise made it so much easier to just sell a bunch of stuff because there was always this next generation of kids coming. And then you finally turned them right near the end, out of nowhere.

[Nick Khan]

So here's what I thought was interesting about that whole process. Number one, John Cena's merchandise still off the charts.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Nick Khan]

Top of show at every event, or almost every event. The sort of collective decision to make that heel turn Triple H, Cena, Dwayne Johnson, Cody, everyone immediately on board with the whole thing.

[Bill Simmons]

Had they pushed Cena to do that before or.

[Nick Khan]

No, not since I had been at WWE and not since Triple H had been in charge of creative. So, I don't know, 10, 15 years ago, perhaps, but certainly not in the last five years.

[Bill Simmons]

Because when they did it at WCW with Hogan, that was kind of a form of desperation. Like, he was really. Peter Hulkamania had petered out with WWE and then was petering out with WCW again. And they flipped it at the perfect time. And just, by the way, that jump.

[Nick Khan]

Started it as, you know, one of the greatest heel turns in the history of wrestling. But as you just articulated, sort of had to be done.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Cena on his, you know, final run with us. You've even. You even saw the fans prior to the heel turn, the one who were saying, cena sucks. And you know, we love Cena. There was no more Cena sucks. It was 98%, overwhelmingly positive reaction to John Cena for at least the last couple of years. So to do it when again, Triple H and Cena and everyone else decided to do it, I thought was phenomenally and phenomenally effective and really smart.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Cause we went to the show in LA the day before the fires, which seems like it was January 6th, seven years ago, and had this. You guys had your first Netflix show. Cena, there was a popularity with him that it felt like a little nostalgia tinged with. We kind of know this is the end. And it was probably the most tied into him that I felt like I had seen a crowd in a long time where people were like, we love this guy. We know we can see the finish line now. And it was one of. That was the two legacies from that night were that and then Hogan just got booed out of the arena, which I can't imagine you guys ever thought would happen, right?

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, look, it was also Rock showed up that night, Travis Scott with Jey uso, if you remember him coming through the crowd doing sort of the yeet thing with Jay. I thought there were a number of moments that resonated. But yes, Cena sort of announcing. It had been announced, but sort of physically announcing, like, hey, this is it. This year is going to be it, and you're not going to see me again in the WWE wrestling ring. You'll see him across our stuff, you know, well past the end of this year. But to turn, if that was January 6th, Elimination Chamber was March 1st, and that's when the big heel turn was. So over the course of seven weeks, you know, massive, massive turn.

[Bill Simmons]

We always talk about wrestling. It's like the NBA where you have, like, draft classes or eras or generations, and the talent kind of ebbs and flows. And I can't tell. I think that the company right now seems like it's as successful as it's ever been. Right. And it seems like wrestling, at least for you guys, the WWE version of it, is the most successful it's ever been. I don't know how much of that is how you've handled the behind the scenes the last five years. You And Triple H and some others. Or is it just a talent boom? Obviously it's both. But what's the seesaw? Like, being smart behind the scenes versus like, if you had this much talent, it's probably going to happen anyway. Right. Like, what's the seesaw?

[Nick Khan]

I think, look, to me, it always comes down to the talent and the creative. That's what drives wwe. So if you think about it, Roman Reigns went through, you know, some illness.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

And came out on the other side of that positively. CM Punk had left the company as, you know, 10 plus years ago, and it seemed like he would never return. He returns. Dwayne Johnson hadn't wrestled. You know, he showed up at the Smackdown premiere on Fox. If it was 2019. 2019 at what was the Staples center. But he hadn't done anything, you know, long term with us in, in a long time. Cody Rhodes had left to go elsewhere and Seth Rollins sort of elevated himself on his own. Just a handful. Rhea, Ripley, you know, Pops, Liv Morgan comes along. So there's something definitely special going on with the talent right now.

[Bill Simmons]

But in Roman's crew, I think was another one where you. That was one of the best crews. That's another 50, 60 years of wrestling Cruise. I mean, you know, like the four people, the five people. And it's like, oh, these guys might turn on each other. Oh, no, they're fine. No, they might turn it. Like, that's the legacy of wrestling.

[Nick Khan]

It's the bloodline. To your point, it goes up there with dx.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

It goes up there with the Four Horsemen. It goes up there with any of those great factions that you said, oh my God, this is special. And you know, it's not going to last forever. But as long as it did last, it was phenomenal. Phenomenal.

[Bill Simmons]

NWO before they started letting everyone in, it became like the Soho House. Wait, is there anything special about being in this place?

[Nick Khan]

Full Soho House.

[Bill Simmons]

Everybody's getting in. It's like, ah, there's Virgil Scott, Norton.

[Nick Khan]

Vincent, not Virgil in wcw, but yes.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that was, that was pretty rough. They kind of lost the narrative fast. Yeah, no, it seems like this is the. The best run, but you still needed the main guy. And it felt like the big thing this decade was just getting Cody Rhodes and get it. First of all, stealing him from your competition, but then also seeing that you could build him as like the face of the company, which I gotta be honest, I didn't see. I thought he could be like one of the guys. I didn't realize he could be the center of everything, which I think he is.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah. I think what's really amazing about Cody's story to me is he saw it before anyone else saw it.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

And to ask to be let out of his WWE agreement, I guess it would be, you know, eight or nine years ago.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a classic bet on yourself moment.

[Nick Khan]

Classic bet on yourself. And by the way, to your credit, you leave espn, you don't have to.

[Bill Simmons]

Bring me into it. I'm just saying it's a bet on yourself moment.

[Nick Khan]

These things when people bet on themselves and it works out. And as you know, it doesn't work out for a lot of people. There's a lot of people who asked out at WWE and you sort of never heard from them again. A lot of people who left espn, you may never have heard from them again. You went, you built something, you monetized it. And now we're doing the podcast from your home, you know, eyeball test here, 24 bedrooms, this house. So that's a nice accomplishment. And for Cody. Back to Cody, you know, he leaves. He doesn't like the Stardust thing. He thinks he can do much more than that. He leaves, he hits the indie circuit like, so whatever he was making at WWE at that time, he left that guaranteed money to go on a night by night basis. He took a full bet on himself. He went, he started part of another league. And then you sort of saw him fade out over there. And it's something that we talked about at wwe. It was like, well, this is interesting. It used to be, hey, this is about the wrestlers. This is about empowering the wrestlers. This is. Cody's one of the co founders. And then that narrative shifted. And that's when we decided, when we knew contractually we could make the call, to make the call and say, hey, why don't we get together and have a conversation? The deal was done in minutes and Boom, he returned. WrestleMania 2022 at AT&T Stadium just three years ago.

[Bill Simmons]

Right.

[Nick Khan]

And a year later was in the main event of WrestleMania 2023 at SoFi.

[Bill Simmons]

To his credit, he's never really talked about what happened with those guys.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, he doesn't, he doesn't talk a lot of shit in a negative way, which is something I admire about him.

[Bill Simmons]

He moved on and he's in a better spot. It felt like it probably got a little credit grabby over there. That was just knowing nothing, just from reading and following the breadcrumbs and reading stuff like Meltzer's newsletter and weird shit like that where you're just like, ah. It seems like there's a lot of people in this kitchen right now claiming that they cook the pot roast.

[Nick Khan]

You know this drill. I saw you do it at Grantland. I saw you do it when you replicated Grantland at the Ringer. Everyone knows who the founder is. You don't sit there saying, I this, I that I this, I did Spotify. Me, me, me, my this. The people who do that, I've never really seen them succeed. I feel like the actual leaders, they're the ones, they'll take credit when something's a disaster, which you should as the leader of a company. When something is success, give credit to everybody else. It doesn't matter.

[Bill Simmons]

Compliments are currency. Another Dave Jacoby.

[Nick Khan]

Jacoby James.

[Bill Simmons]

Baby Doll Nixon too. That's one of his mantras.

[Nick Khan]

Baby Doll. One of the all time great characters in the modern history of the Nice compliment, nice currency.

[Bill Simmons]

We're at the Masters. It's just a slew of. It's like watching the anchorman for fight with all the anchors, except nobody's fighting. Everybody's trying to get along, but it's all these different people with competing agendas being like, hey, what's going on?

[Nick Khan]

Everyone's friends all of a sudden.

[Bill Simmons]

Do you miss that? Do you miss being an agent?

[Nick Khan]

Does Babydoll smoke at the Masters?

[Bill Simmons]

He's like a chimney.

[Nick Khan]

What are you talking about? That's amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

He was on fire. Do you miss being an agent, though?

[Nick Khan]

Listen, I loved being an agent when I was an agent, but when I decided to stop doing that five years ago, that was the end of that for me. I have had the good fortune of sort of being a friend of court to a number of former clients if they need advice or want advice or just friends who may want advice from time to time. I'm always happy.

[Bill Simmons]

Or you just hire former clients.

[Nick Khan]

Just put them, put them on camera.

[Bill Simmons]

Put them in CM Punk, who for some reason, you were always kind of involved. And that was one of those where I was like, Nick's nuts. Like, this guy's. This guy's a cancer. Like, you can't let this guy. And it's been. Seems like it's been great.

[Nick Khan]

By the way. It was so obvious to me that he wasn't a cancer I had in having been an agent, assume I had dealt with some personalities that were not the easiest from time to time.

[Bill Simmons]

Sports media. I can't believe that that's part of the job.

[Nick Khan]

I had always found him to be a gentleman. I always found him to be honest, responsive, And I felt if he was that way outside of the company, if given an opportunity to come back to the company, he would be that way. And he said that he would be. And he's been a gem to work.

[Bill Simmons]

With, I think, because I certainly feel this way. But myself, back in the earlier days, I think when people have trouble dealing with somebody who's not good or doing a bad job or has no vid for some reason back in the day, I would take that really personally. It would make me upset. I would try to fix it. I would get all wrapped up in it. And I think as you get older, you're like, you know what? Most people are terrible. And once you kind of realize that, it's like, I just got to navigate around. It'll be fine. Once you realize that it's a different way of living. And for whatever reason, it took me till my mid-40s to realize it.

[Nick Khan]

I think there's a constant through line in it, Bill. I think for the supremely talented people. Punk yourself.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, thanks for putting us together.

[Nick Khan]

Sure.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Two of the greats.

[Nick Khan]

Two of the greats.

[Bill Simmons]

Thank you.

[Nick Khan]

Two of the greats. Right. Yourself, Triple H. The biggest challenge is to deal with mid level management or.

[Bill Simmons]

Lousy mid level management. Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Correct. Right. You had, I said refer to at one point as like the khaki brigade.

[Bill Simmons]

The blue shirt and khaki police.

[Nick Khan]

The blue shirt. Correct. Those are more the mid level coming in.

[Bill Simmons]

Coming in to sit in on a meeting and have some bad ideas and screw everything up. Right. And then tell us to lead with the Lakers.

[Nick Khan]

You were young and creative and had ideas and many of them were great ideas. And when you come up against no different than Phil, I. E. CM Punk, and you come up against sort of bad mid level management, they can stifle creativity and stifle ideas. And when you're young and you got a little bit of chip on your shoulder, which I think most people who end up successful do, it can be stifling and cause a lot of anger.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. If you take incompetence personally, it's probably not a great way to be.

[Nick Khan]

It's. By the way, think about it. When you.

[Bill Simmons]

Chapter in the book I'll never write.

[Nick Khan]

When you say most people aren't great. It applies to every profession.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

You know, servers in restaurants, executives at networks or buyers. It's the same thing like, like club.

[Bill Simmons]

Coaches and youth sports. Like, it's. That's why when you find somebody that's actually really good, you, like, treasure it.

[Nick Khan]

No question.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow. This. This teacher My daughter has. Is amazing. I'm so happy this person exists.

[Nick Khan]

It applies to everything. I'm with you.

[Bill Simmons]

No, it is true. Yeah. So it's been. I think CM Punk probably got a little older, maybe put some stuff in perspective, tried a couple things, had a couple failures.

[Nick Khan]

All of those cliches apply. When you said you finally. My words calmed down on it. In your 40s, I'm sure. Triple H, as he got older, you have children, you get married. You realize sort of the don't sweat the small stuff thing that maybe you may have sweated years ago. And it seemed once Phil and Triple H reconnected in my brain, it was going to be magic. And boom, he reappeared. Or he surprised everyone at Survivor Series Chicago a year and a half or so ago. And it's been magic since.

[Bill Simmons]

And one of the other big things you did was splitting up WrestleMania, which I'd like to credit you at least partially with that one. I don't know, you might deserve all the credit, but that was one of those things. That was an idea that was sitting there for years. The event was so long you almost needed an iv. You seat for eight hours. My son would never move. He was in that stage.

[Nick Khan]

Really.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm not going to the bathroom. I'm not going anywhere. And it was just these interminably long shows and the audience would die over the course of the show.

[Nick Khan]

If the number one sport in the United States, as you know, is the National Football League. And they effort to have three hour games and a three and a half hour super bowl. And yeah, of course there can be overtime and longer games and all this stuff.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

And why shouldn't we effort to do the same? So, you know, seven hours, eight hours of wrestling, of WWE in one night.

[Bill Simmons]

Is a lot especially the crowd is doing that. They're. They're on a roller coaster during the thing. They're excited, they're. They're intense. Like, you know, do you have breaks? You just. It's really. Anything longer than four hours, I think is really hard. Right.

[Nick Khan]

It's really hard. This is also our first one, at least in the last five years that's not on Final Four weekend.

[Bill Simmons]

So that was another thing you were. This is why I get mad with the NBA. You actually looked at the schedule and try. We're trying to figure out weekends that would be advantages for you guys.

[Nick Khan]

Totally even. Look, we've done the American only holiday weekends, if you think about it, Fourth of July, there's such a lack of sports on that people and it's with no disrespect intended, we'll actually watch the Nathan hot dog eating contest. Yeah, but why wouldn't we do a WWE event on that weekend? So we do. And Labor Day weekend, even though there's early college football, why wouldn't we have a big if people like, oh, well, you can't get butts in seats. Well, sure you can. Internationally, it's obviously not a holiday there. And now that everyone can watch on their phone, it doesn't really matter what day it is, as long as it's not a cluttered sports calendar. I think you saw college football get into a little bit of a mess with their playoff system going, you know, right around the NFL games coming out at compelling NFL weekends. Hopefully they reconfigure that, but it's something we put a lot of time and effort into.

[Bill Simmons]

The good news, it's the only mistake college football made. They've nailed everything else that's been perfect with having these giant, ridiculous conferences and teams that are 3,000 miles apart, kids supposed to be in school, flying cross country.

[Nick Khan]

It's tough, right? When it's fragmented. Any of these sports makes me mad. The NBA is not fragmented. There's a league. The NFL, wwe, we're not. Ufc not fragmented. There's a league. It's what even on the boxing side caused such destruction. Four different, you know, sanctioning bodies, interim champion who's actually the champ, all these different weight classes. It's all chaos. Until there's sort of a central, you know, holding account, or central boss, if you will. It's going to be tough to get any of that in line.

[Bill Simmons]

It's one thing I love about ufc.

[Nick Khan]

It's the best, dude.

[Bill Simmons]

It's so much easier to follow for casual fans like me. I just want to watch the pay per views. I watch every pay per view. I love UFC. I'm not going to watch 52 weeks a year. I'll listen to Ariel's podcast sometimes. I'll read some stuff occasionally, but for the most part, I fully admit I'm a little better than a casual fan. But I'm a casual fan, and it's so much easier to follow when there's nothing. 95 fucking belts.

[Nick Khan]

By the way, look at what Dana and the Fertittas created. If you ask them, they'll tell you we took everything we liked about boxing and incorporated that and all of the other nonsense that we hated. We made sure to get rid of that. So even if you haven't watched for a moment and you order a pay Per view. And you're like, oh, the number one contenders fighting the champion. Yeah, that makes sense.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Number three is fighting number eight. And I know what the featherweight division is. Cool.

[Nick Khan]

Totally.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, totally.

[Nick Khan]

They nailed it. And that's to their credit.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, so baseball did this almost out of necessity where they were like, we have a major problem, we have to fix this. And there's other leagues. Football is just a monolith at this point. They can do whatever they want. They're going to go to 18 weeks whenever they want. It's going to work. And basketball is the one that it feels like is going to have to start to get a little more innovative with the schedule and everything. You always look at stuff like, why not? Why can't we do this? Like, all right, I get that we did it that way, but why wouldn't we do it this way? I don't understand why people that run big things like that don't all just think that there's such a fear of, ah, well, that's the way we've always done it. We can't move from that. That's what the fans are used to. I don't feel that way at all. Do you?

[Nick Khan]

At all. All like what? One of the dilemmas in baseball which was sort of fixed with the pitch, the pitch clock, the pitch count clock, you know, you didn't know in Los Angeles if you went to a Dodger game, oh my God, was it going to be a three hour affair? Was it going to be a seven hour affair?

[Bill Simmons]

Like would you ever have taken your son to a Dodger game with the old rules? Your nine year old son is like, make me home at 1:30 in the morning.

[Nick Khan]

Brutal. How do you go to a nighttime game on a weekday that starts at 7:00? Why would you even do that? It's so hard to get in and out of there. By the way, my first year as an agent, which was in 2006, somehow I met the baseball hall of Fame. I don't think we've ever talked about this story before. And that's Cooperstown. And I went there and they said, we're not making a lot of money, what do we need to do to fix this thing? I said, shut down this whole Cooperstown operation, move it to Vegas. Never heard from them again. Never heard from them again. But to me it was like that was what they should have considered if they wanted it to be a year round engagement. But again, that's the way they had always done it and that's the way they Wanted to keep it.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a tough one because on the one hand, every baseball fan makes the pilgrimage to Cooperstown once, but you don't do it ten times.

[Nick Khan]

Fun.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

By the way. Travel it, do something with it, but don't do what you're currently doing.

[Bill Simmons]

No, it feels. You're right. There should be a big version of it. But, you guys, the WWE hall of Fame was an idea that's sitting there forever.

[Nick Khan]

That hasn't happened yet, but it's happening this Friday. Standalone, by the way. See, you disrespect Triple H. Triple H is being in, oh, the brick and mortar hall of Fame, you're saying?

[Bill Simmons]

I want the actual. I can walk into it. I can go around. There's videos, there's. I mean, maybe you could be the ones that finally did the Pantheon idea that I've always wanted to do with the levels. Listen, if you're like your five level hall of Fame and you get to the top level and it's just like Hogan, San Martino, like all the great.

[Nick Khan]

Greats, who's your Mount Rushmore for wrestling?

[Bill Simmons]

Should we wait until my dog starts barking?

[Nick Khan]

We can bring him in. Whatever you want to do.

[Bill Simmons]

Hogan has to be in it. Sammartino, John Cena, Ric Flair.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, I get that.

[Bill Simmons]

Cena's probably the shaky spot. I think Hogan. Hogan and Flair have to be in it.

[Nick Khan]

No Austin for you.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a pretty brief apex.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah. Shorter run. Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

Talking five years, you know, I think Rock, potentially, but Rock is another one where the actual apex wasn't long enough. Like, if you're going hall of Famer, the career has to be part of it. Like Flair and Hogan, how long they lasted was amazing. Even Sammartino wasn't as long as those guys. Who do you think it is?

[Nick Khan]

Flair, Hogan, for sure.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

And then as you just sort of articulate in a different way. The final two are tough. Cena deserves some sort of recognition. You're talking about a 20 year run.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

What Roman's done the last couple of years thinking.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I mean, he's definitely in the conversation now.

[Nick Khan]

Tremendous. And then you think back, you know, Samm Martino was just before me, but you would read in Pro Wrestling Illustrated, oh, he held the championship for this period of time, and superstar Billy Graham, you know, came along and this and that, but definitely Flair and Hogan. I would put Austin somewhere around there just because of the impact he had. I think if I'm remembering correctly, he retired at like 39 with injury and, you know, all of those things. Rock Left early to go pursue a different career and was doing movies like the Tooth Fairy and was in the Get Shorty sequel. You know, Play By Rock didn't have.

[Bill Simmons]

His extra five years when he was just kicking ass. Like, basically Hogan's late 80s. I think the two. The two biggest apexes were Hogan and Stone Cold.

[Nick Khan]

Oh, my God, that was tremendous.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm not just saying that as like a WWE homer. I don't know. WCW never had anything like that.

[Nick Khan]

No, it's. And by the way, and Rock obviously went on to monumental success.

[Bill Simmons]

His feud with Hogan, I mean, with. With Vince, when that really hit, it's like there's been. There's nothing like that. It was rejuvenated. The entire company.

[Nick Khan]

Can't miss tv. And you think about it, you had Austin Hogan, Rock, Triple H, dx, Mick Foley and oh, yeah, you had Undertaker Kane and all those other guys as well. Just an amazing, amazing bench that all hit at once.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, the other thing with Hogan and Stone Cold, it's the only two times they shifted the actual popular culture, right? Hogan definitely in the 80s. And he's part of this whole patriotism boom that's like Sly Stallone and Schwarzenegger. And we're Russians are the bad guys and we're like big usa. He was right in the middle of that. And then Stone Cold, right as we tried to cover this in the Vince talk a little bit, right? As something was shifting in America and people were just getting edgier in general, and he just felt like he was one of the people. Him and DX felt like they were at the forefront of something. NWO was like that too, but he was at the top of it of like, it's okay to be the anti hero. When you think about, like, him as an anti hero, which hadn't really happened in wrestling before. I mean, there are pieces of it in different guys, but nobody had been like, I'm going to just own this. And I would have been a heel 10 years ago, but now everyone's rooting for me. Then it moves into the Tony Soprano. I was just going to say that's kind of what TV became in the 2000s. He was like the first.

[Nick Khan]

He's the precursor. So when everyone says, well, Tony Soprano was the first anti hero, you know that you were rooted for 100.

[Bill Simmons]

Stone Cold.

[Nick Khan]

Correct. It was Stone Cold. That shows you WWE was ahead of the game. And sometimes, you know, Paul Levesque and I will sort of, you know, semi joke, like, life is wwe. WWE is life. It's our product is great when it's reflective of the times, which you just articulated through Hogan and the Reagan, you know, era with Arnold and Sly and all that. And then in the Clinton era, with the proliferation of cable news and information and what was going on in the White House at the time, and the Jerry Springer show and this. Then people. There was more of a populist movement where people who hadn't had a voice before were starting to have a voice. And I think, to your point, DX and Stone Cold both reflected that. Nailed it.

[Bill Simmons]

Do you feel like you could argue now there would be a moment to tap into that, but weirdly, UFC seems to be the one that's tapping into this side of the universe. Right. You could see all the people that were at UFC the other night, and it's. It's been this side. That was one of the reasons Trump won the election again. But this whole movement, basically against the far left. But wrestling has avoided it this time around.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, wrestling's avoided. But it was interesting because two weeks after. Two weeks, give or take, after the Netflix Raw Into a Dome premiere, you and I were both at the UFC fight at the. Into a dome in the heart of la. You and me there. And it's as many. You know, LA is probably as left as it gets at this moment in time.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Place was sold out. And remember, the main event, you know, fell apart, you know, a couple days beforehand. Boom. Dana in the UFC move quickly. They put in, you know, another opponent. No one asked for a refund. Packed house. Yeah. Huge crowd, huge gate. I think their product appeals to everybody, just like the WWE product appeals to everybody. It just happens to be that the CEO of UFC is close friend of.

[Bill Simmons]

The president, and UFC definitely has an attitude of we don't judge. We don't judge over here in ufc. Come in if you like. Watching people in the Octagon. Welcome aboard.

[Nick Khan]

By the way, that's how Los Angeles used to be, right? It used to be, if you've been married 10 times, don't worry about it. Move here.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Like Jerry Buss. We don't. We don't judge. The Lakers owner does his own stuff. We don't care.

[Nick Khan]

Correct. Who was the producer on Karate Kid? Weintraub. Who had, like, two wives or something like that?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, we had Simpson and Bruckheimer. There's like a million of.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, but like, I think this guy in particular, there was an HBO documentary on him. He had, like, two wives at once.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Nick Khan]

Not like, hey, get divorced and this. And by the way, it was like hey, that's your life, right? I don't. And I still judge. I. So I have nothing to do with that. You have nothing to do with me. Live your life. Yeah, and somehow LA shifted, you know, a little bit outside of that. I think UFC stayed consistent. If you like our product, we want you. And that seems to be a good winning hand.

[Bill Simmons]

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[Nick Khan]

And WWE and PBR and IMG. PBR is professional bull riding. IMG and on location.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm just talking from combat standpoint. But you don't have the boxing piece yet. But then, I mean, the last time you were on the pod, we talked about this, and this is your favorite sport. And it feels like just me knowing nothing from afar. It feels like there's a boxing opportunity, slash momentum for something, for somebody to corral at least a big piece of it. And you talked about it last time. Are you any closer?

[Nick Khan]

Well, I think you caught both the announcement. You know, Dana, myself, our partners, Turkey Al Shaykh to create a new boxing promotional company. A couple of months ago I did, yes.

[Bill Simmons]

But nothing's. Nothing's happened with it yet. You can announce whatever, but you still need to me, it's like, okay, they're going to do this. That means they're going to acquire something. But you haven't acquired the something yet.

[Nick Khan]

No, nothing. Nothing to be acquired. We're going to grow it organically. But I'd look for, if we're, you know, mid April now, I'd look for a big announcement. On that in the next four to six weeks as to what our first card's going to be and who's going to be on that card.

[Bill Simmons]

So this is all going to be one off stuff. Not like something that potentially has a chance to be ufc, wwe.

[Nick Khan]

No, we want it to be UFC and wwe. Like, but you'll, you'll see an announcement with more to come. I don't mean to intentionally be cryptic on the whole thing.

[Bill Simmons]

You could be as cryptic as you.

[Nick Khan]

Want, but we have a plan now.

[Bill Simmons]

Because I saw the first thing and I'm like, all right. They're just, just kind of planting a flag, but nothing is actually happening. But now you're saying something's going to happen.

[Nick Khan]

That's that, that's the thought. That's the hope. We'll see.

[Bill Simmons]

What are the opportunities in boxing right now?

[Nick Khan]

I think look as.

[Bill Simmons]

Other than cohesion.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, exactly. It's been proven. You know, with the ufc, people like to see a good fight. They just have to know, as with the ufc, who the fighters are. It's same with wwe. If you get invested in the fighters in ufc, which they've done a phenomenal job of doing, UFC has. If you get invested in the wrestlers in wwe, more likely you tune in, more likely you show up. It's the same thing in boxing. If you know Max Kellerman, who you and I both known for a long time, used to say, if you pull up to a four way stop sign, on one corner, a guy's putting a golf ball, the other a guy's throwing a football, the other guy shooting a basketball, and the other two guys are fighting, what are you going to watch? You're going to watch the two guys fighting. He said. But the problem with boxing is you pull up to that same corner and it's Tiger woods in his prime putting the golf ball, and it's Jordan in his prime shooting the basketball and it's Mahomes throwing the football, and it's two guys. You've never heard of fighting, then it's a different choice. That's the issue with boxing. It's a series of one off events where as soon as the fight ends, it's. Dana White says it often. It's a going out of business sale. Let's charge you the most we can for one night. Let's give you the least in return. No good undercard fights, no reason to sit in your seat other than 10 minutes prior to the main event. And hey, if the main event's bad, then if you feel that we stole your Money at home on pay per view, no big deal. That's on you. If you do it the opposite way of all of that, then you have a chance of actually building a product that has some sort of viability.

[Bill Simmons]

The Saudis, I think, have shown a little bit of the blueprint because the cards are better. And the card they had in, what was it, February? Was awesome. Even though they had one fight fallout last minute, they had to fly out of shape. Bacoli, my guy, cross country.

[Nick Khan]

No, Bacoli got paid.

[Bill Simmons]

He took one hit. His trainer's like, we're done. And we escaped.

[Nick Khan]

Now, here's the good thing about what Turkey is doing there. He's bringing Bacoli back.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, right.

[Nick Khan]

That's what you should do. If you step in on a fight on short notice and you lose the fight, give the guy another chance. You don't have to be 30 and O for it to matter.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. Well, that's what we grew up with.

[Nick Khan]

Of course, everyone fought everybody. You and I didn't know Marvin Hagler as the WBA middleweight champion. We knew him as the middleweight champion, and he fought Hearns and he fought Durant, and he fought Leonard, and he fought some of them again. And the best fought the best. It's the same with Ali, Foreman, Frazier.

[Bill Simmons]

I think it's somebody like Ken Norton. Like, he fought everybody.

[Nick Khan]

Everybody.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. And by the way, he fought Ali three times.

[Nick Khan]

Think. Think about that. By the way he also fought. It was Foreman Lyle and then Foreman Norton. Or was it Cooney? Norton, where Cooney destroyed Norton.

[Bill Simmons]

That was the end of Norton.

[Nick Khan]

That was the end of Norton.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that was like 1980 range.

[Nick Khan]

And those are all heavyweights, obviously, not the Hagler group, but the other group we're talking about, like, just have the best fight. The best. It's that simple. It's what the Saudis have done. It's what the UFC and Dana White have done. If it can be replicated in boxing, hey, you have a winning hand.

[Bill Simmons]

That sounds pretty enticing. How has Netflix changed your business? The scope of it?

[Nick Khan]

Number one, their default is yes on anything that you ask for. It's, yeah, sure, we'll get on it right away. I always say this about the executives I like the most. I don't have any of their office numbers. You call them cell to sell. It's sort of like with you. I call you, hey, I'll call you right back. Or give me an hour. You pick up and, you know, we have the conversation. Do you even have an office number now? Yeah, same. I Don't have one. So they're phenomenal. It's also their, their power, their brand. And I know this is going to sound really naive. I didn't realize globally that it's the same interface that it is at home. So, you know, sometimes if you travel internationally, like, where do I find the NBA game? And yeah, you're looking and you can't find it. It's the same avatar that you have at home and your kids avatar and your wife's avatar and you click into it and it shows you, hey, here's where you paused and watching all the other things. It's the same exact interface. So I like the user accessibility. We certainly love 300 million plus subscribers. That's just households, by the way. So assume that's 700 million plus people. And you've seen our international ratings go through the roof in a number of different countries because, again, easily accessible.

[Bill Simmons]

Were you surprised that you. It seems like every week you're trending as like the number one TV show for 36 hours.

[Nick Khan]

I'm always pleasantly surprised by that.

[Bill Simmons]

I was surprised by that.

[Nick Khan]

Here's why. I said, I feel like in anything in your business and our business, like the clock resets at midnight for a reason. No matter how good or how bad the day was, the day's over and you have to go and replicate it again and try to build something even bigger the next week or the next show. It's the same for you in what you do. Same for us. So we're proud of that. But every week we're sort of anxious to make sure that it stays that way.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I think talking to the Netflix people, I think the pleasant surprise for them was people watching it. The people in Europe waking up, totally. Sometimes that's coming on their sleep. But waking up and watching them getting these pockets of viewership from when either people woke up or pockets of viewership from people they didn't expect would get up early to watch it or stay up late and just watching how the different parts of the world interacted with it, I know that there's some areas that they were probably hoping maybe you had a star that you could develop that would be exciting for that specific area.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, look, it's part of our recruiting for the last year or so. It's, you know, you can't just pipe out American content globally and internationally. So, you know, if you look at Axiom, who's on the NXT roster, he's a Spaniard, born in Spain. When he showed up at our show in Barcelona unexpectedly Two, three, four weeks ago, whatever it was, crowd went crazy. People like their own. And that's good. Even if you look at the collaboration we're doing with TNA and Joe Hendry, he shows up at our Glasgow show. People love that. Obviously, Drew McIntyre, main roster for us on the Glasgow show. People love that. So it's the, the, the unique aspect about WWE is for our talent. It's as much about marketability as it is ability.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

If you can, if you're marketable and you have charisma and you have the it factor, we can sort of help with the rest. And then, yes, every so often you'll get someone who has both. John Cena.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, there's a line you don't want to cross, which has been crossed a couple of times where it's like, we really want to get this part of the world going. And watch this. And then if the person doesn't have the chops, gets a little dicey.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, look, the height of what can work, and this is the obvious one, when you had Bret Hart and Owen rest in peace and the faction with British Bulldog and all of that, and you would see even the Montreal screw job, if you will. Like that was in Canada that. That happened, like, unbelievable. Where Brett was and is a hero. And at that time, even if he was sort of perceived as the heel in the United States, you know, hey, I look down on what wrestling has become, which was all part of his character, you know, at that exact moment in that exact city, just phenomenal, phenomenal content.

[Bill Simmons]

So if you were going to create stars from scratch, you could pick any part of the world. I would assume India and Brazil would be top two big ones.

[Nick Khan]

Throw Mexico in there and Mexico.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, those would be your three for sure. So anyone listening from those countries, email Bill, get your shit together, hit Bill.

[Nick Khan]

On Instagram or Twitter, whatever it is, since I'm not on any of those platforms, and send your audition tape to.

[Bill Simmons]

Him and he'll really start smart. He'll get them touched on social media. Not great. Better. What are any other big predictions for the year for WWE?

[Nick Khan]

So our deal with Peacock is coming up in 11 months. They've been phenomenal partners again. WWE, as you know, was on our what were called pay per views became premium live events. They were on WWWE network until 2020 when we did the deal with Peacock.

[Bill Simmons]

And they have a bunch at your library.

[Nick Khan]

A bunch. They've outperformed our expectations. We'd like to think we've outperformed their expectations. And now we'll sit down Together and see if there's business to be done.

[Bill Simmons]

Moving forward, is it better to even have stuff on a streamer like that versus, like, how do you. Your YouTube. You guys were one of the first people to blow out a YouTube presence. And now you have, what, 15 years of YouTube videos at this point, one of the biggest channels anyone has. Like, is it just sometimes you think the way YouTube has grown and skyrocketed, does it just make more sense to double down on that?

[Nick Khan]

Well, look, we love YouTube. We have 110 million subscribers.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh my God.

[Nick Khan]

10Th most subscribed to YouTube channel. That's not sports channel, that's channel. So you have, you know, ahead of it, you know, Cocomelon, Mr. Beast, some Indian music channels, but nothing sports oriented. So we're number 10 there, which is phenomenal. We're also on CW, which is a broadcast network. We're also on USA basic cable in the United States. We're on Netflix streaming globally. We're on Peacock streaming domestically. We want our product to be available to everyone, everywhere, depending on how they like to receive it.

[Bill Simmons]

Isn't that funny how different that is when they launched the network, what was that 10 years ago?

[Nick Khan]

It was in 2014. Yeah. 11 years ago.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that was when I did the pod with Triple H right around there. And it was the right move at the right time to do that. And it was like, we're going to go on demand. We'll own our rights. People will pay for this. We'll be able to build. We'll make more from it this way. Now the mindset is completely different. We want as many people to see our stuff as humanly possible. And we want to be tied to platforms where anyone can see our stuff.

[Nick Khan]

To totally look at it. First of all, in 2014, when WWE went to WWE Network, which just so we're clear, obviously I had nothing to do with.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, you were.

[Nick Khan]

And that was a brilliant, brilliant decision. The biggest scam that I've ever seen in television was the fee that In Demand, Dish and Direct would take for pay per view. So just to plug you in anywhere from 30 to 60% of a WWE event, of a boxing event, of UFC at that time. And then WWE got out of that business and UFC got out of that business and took it exclusively.

[Bill Simmons]

It was an all time big, maybe the biggest vig ever. Now Apple probably leads the way with vigs where they get 30% on apps.

[Nick Khan]

30% on apps.

[Bill Simmons]

Big person.

[Nick Khan]

These guys were taking a vigorous.

[Bill Simmons]

At least.

[Nick Khan]

And in demand was all the cable companies together. Was like a legal, you know, consortium.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

That would just come down on you. And if you said, no, I don't want to do it at that fee.

[Bill Simmons]

Great, what are you going to do then? You wouldn't be able to show what you wanted.

[Nick Khan]

Totally. So streaming also fixed that and it got you out of the volatility of, well, what pay per view numbers are we going to do this weekend? What are we going to do this weekend? What are we going to do this weekend? So you knew with consistent subscribership, you could actually plan for a publicly traded company on what financials would be coming in.

[Bill Simmons]

I want to talk about the TV business in one second, but do you feel like you have a rival? Because two years ago could make the case. Last year it seemed like no. Now it just seems like you guys are all powerful again and aw is not a rival in the same way. Their kind of moment just, I have no dog in the race. I don't really care. But it's just from a, from afar it seems like their moment came and gone and they're like just firmly number two now.

[Nick Khan]

Well, look, we, we're always the underdog at wwe. We, we always feel that people underestimate us, that we're looked down upon and we like it that way. Like bet against us. We, we prefer that. And allow us to show you what we can do.

[Bill Simmons]

Short our stock. Go ahead.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, I don't know about.

[Bill Simmons]

You can literally do it. Go ahead. Bet against us.

[Nick Khan]

Bet against us. You know, if you look at the stock price now, it's far in excess of what it was when we all started together five years ago. And, you know, we're quite proud of that. And at the same time, we gotta keep, you know, re earning our keep on a daily basis here. So we feel like it's a good moment, but we still feel like there's a lot of room for growth in terms of the other wrestling promotional company. They have a lot of talented wrestlers and we're happy about that. When contractually, you know, they're available to be, you know, talked to and have conversations with, assume a number of them will come over. And nothing but respect for the father.

[Bill Simmons]

Who, oh, that was way too nice.

[Nick Khan]

Finances it and owns the Jaguars and all those other things.

[Bill Simmons]

That was very pleasant. Look at you.

[Nick Khan]

That's it.

[Bill Simmons]

So magnanimous.

[Nick Khan]

I'm 50 now. So different than when we were much younger.

[Bill Simmons]

Yes, well, your biggest issue is sometimes you don't want too much talent because you only have so many spots to put people and you end up Just kind of wasting people.

[Nick Khan]

Look, that's something we won't do. Yeah, we won't sign.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that happened in the past, though. Maybe before you, perhaps.

[Nick Khan]

But we won't sign and bench people. You know, we sign people who we want to use.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm not saying bench people, but you sign somebody and then within a couple weeks, you know, they're barely being used because you have too many people.

[Nick Khan]

I'm saying if another entity signs and benches people now, like, that's not something we would do.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh. Because that is a thing that happens.

[Nick Khan]

That's. That's what I've been told from time to time. Not us.

[Bill Simmons]

Not awesome. From a TV standpoint, you're one of the world's most astute media watchers, and we always end up talking about ESPN when we do this stuff. But since the last time we talked, Netflix is in sports in a huge way, as you personally know. Amazon's in. We had this whole basketball deal shake out, and it feels like everything is moving toward streaming stuff. And the networks are kind of holding on for dear life and overpaying to keep up the fight. Most notably espn, which I think has had a really rocky couple years. And for what they paid with basketball especially, there's probably going to be some repercussions with that in other parts. And it seems like they've moved behind big talent contracts, a couple big right fees, and then try to cut costs elsewhere. Almost like a movie where you're like, we want to get our four guys for the poster and we'll get a really good director, but maybe we can save money over here. What do you see the future of the networks that you used to work with?

[Nick Khan]

I think, look, Netflix was saying years ago, we're not going to get in sports, we're not going to get in live. And I think anyone who was following it, who had a reasonable point of view knew that was just a temporary position. And obviously Netflix knew that. They went in with the unscripted shows, the after shows live. They went in with the Chris Rock comedy special, you know, live. And I think they saw the power of it. So much so that when Gabe Spitzer got hired to run sports, I don't know that they had any sports rights. And all of a sudden they wake up with the Mike Tyson fight and WWE and NFL games and their own hot dog eating contest. And hey, more and more is coming. And that's my understanding. So immediately overnight, they become an impact player. I thought they did a phenomenal job with, even with the halftime show. For the two NFL games, they go all in. It's one of their superpowers.

[Bill Simmons]

And Amazon does the same.

[Nick Khan]

Totally. And you saw Amazon again, this sort of a tease. Amazon went into tennis in the UK and parts of Europe early. Let's see if we can do it. Let's see what it looks like. And then, boom, hey, we're going all in with the NFL. And then, boom, the big NBA deal. So you're seeing, you know, the power of live, you know, the power of sports. You know, you're at the top of the heap in the media business in terms of your knowledge about all of that. What about what happens when more folks get into it? You saw YouTube with their Sunday ticket deal. So I think for the traditional buyers, they need to have run smart businesses at the same time. They have to be competitive, and they can't expect that. Hey, you know, years of doing it one way. Well, this is how we've always done it, as you said earlier, you know, here today. So we've always done it. Why would we do it any differently? If the universe has changed, you better change with it. If not, you're going to be left behind. So we'll see who gets left behind.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, they, they missed on UFC for a while and then belatedly got into it. And that's been okay. Although those rights are coming up, Right?

[Nick Khan]

Well, think about it. HBO Sports years ago, that's the biggest miss.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Ari Emanuel set up a meeting for Dana White in the UFC with HBO Sports when HBO Boxing was still booming. And for whatever reason, I think it was ultimately the UFC's decision not to go there. UFC it was. HBO wanted to produce the events. Dana wanted to make sure he controlled his own production. The deal didn't make, and you've seen what the UFC has gone on to do. HBO Sports doesn't exist anymore. So at one point, as you know, they had Wimbledon years ago and I think other tennis tournaments, then the Kings.

[Bill Simmons]

Of Boxing, Boxing, Hard Knocks documentaries. They had a foothold of something.

[Nick Khan]

Correct. And then I think they sort of got comfortable. And by the way, if you ask the folks at the NFL, some of the folks at the NFL right now, what's your biggest concern? They'll quietly tell you to make sure that we never think like Major League Baseball thought in the 70s, which is, hey, we're the number one sport.

[Bill Simmons]

Right?

[Nick Khan]

So lucky us. It's sort of, what do we keep needing? What do we have to do to make sure that we stay number one? And like you said, hey, there's an 18th game coming. And hey, let's take the combine out of Indianapolis and hey, in Philly for the first time six, seven, eight years ago, whatever it was, let's take the draft on the road and let's monetize that. Everything they do is constantly evolving that product. I think it's the same thing with the UFC and their business model. I hope that WWE is perceived in the same light. Yeah, sometimes if we get it wrong, if Triple H and I talk, or Lee Fitting or Chris Leggentle, other senior executives at wwe, it'll start with, hey, I think we fucked this thing up. It'll be one of us saying that and then, okay, how do we fix it moving forward? And the most important thing is to identify the problem and realize you have a problem if you're trying to avoid it or you're trying to say it's someone else's problem. By the way, much like the last presidential election, and you and I are not overtly political, but what I saw was one person saying, I'm going to take care of you, I'm going to look out for you, and another party saying, don't vote for this guy. Right.

[Bill Simmons]

And with no message at all.

[Nick Khan]

I've just never seen that work. Yeah, I don't. I don't vote for.

[Bill Simmons]

Vote for us. Because you can't vote for him.

[Nick Khan]

Absurd. Like, how. How do you make that decision? You and running the ringer, when you bring talent over here, it's, let me tell you what we can do together. It's the same thing at wwe. It's not, don't go with the other guys, that maybe it works on one or two deals, but it doesn't work long term. You got to figure out that problem is. And change the messaging.

[Bill Simmons]

What is ESPN five years from now?

[Nick Khan]

Look, I think it still continues to exist in a meaningful way. The sub loss has obviously hit them hard, but I think they've actually made some good moves with a lower subscription audience. So, as you said, they fixed their NFL talent issue. They fixed their NFL relationship, at least that's my perception.

[Bill Simmons]

I think I, I would agree with that.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah. And look, they went in on retaining their NBA rights, the Finals being quite meaningful to them. They don't have their first super bowl, if I might say.

[Bill Simmons]

A lot of college football.

[Nick Khan]

A lot of college football.

[Ceruti]

Right.

[Nick Khan]

They went all in on the sec, they went all in on the playoff, in the championship. They went all in on certain talent, as you just articulated. And hey, it's sort of reflective of the US Economy, if you will. Relatively speaking, the middle class there got squeezed. The people making a lot of money made more money. And hey, if you want to make entry level money, there'll be a spot for you. Again, relatively speaking, reflective of the US economy.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a weird one because I think the thing that's changed from maybe 15 years ago was the sense of we also want to do great stuff. There was a bar for we at least a couple times a year, want to be looked at as a place that did an awesome thing or inspired somebody in some way or did some piece of content that could really impact people. And I don't know if they still feel that way.

[Nick Khan]

Look, I think as soon as budgets shrink, those tend to be the first things to go.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, well, I think they've just kind of, we're showing games, we got games and highlights and that's kind of what we are for the most part. And they'll still do some other stuff, but maybe to have ambition like that, when you have a company the size of that, I think maybe it's too hard to juggle everything.

[Nick Khan]

It could be that or it could simply be, hey, we had 100 million subs at one point. What is it now? 54 or 55?

[Bill Simmons]

Isn't that crazy?

[Nick Khan]

It's crazy, but as soon as the bundle went away and people actually had a choice in terms of what they could subscribe to, I don't think it's a reflection on espn. I think it's. It was bundled in and people sort of had to have it. And when they didn't have to have it, the people who still wanted it kept it. So if you're dealing with smaller numbers, those then tend to be the things that go first. If you have, you know, a surplus year, you got to be careful because next year may not be as good for this WrestleMania. Coming up, coming off of the success of WrestleMania Philly 2024, we have WWE World, a partnership with Fanatics. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, all day event. The two night WrestleMania which we talked about already. We have Smackdown on Friday, we have Raw on Monday. We have the hall of Fame standalone show. Friday night after Smackdown, we have the Undertaker. One Dead Man show is sort of one man show, if you will. Jesus, right after WrestleMania Saturday. And then we have Tony Hinchcliffe roast of WrestleMania after WrestleMania Sunday. And then by the way, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. We also have an after party with our partners Medium rare at the Fountain Blue. You'll see WWE stars there, you'll see other celebrities there. It's all day all night. That's coming off of the success. We think all of these will be successful. All indicators are they're going to be hopefully phenomenally successful. And then next year we got to go build something bigger. That's just the way it is.

[Bill Simmons]

So you think for ESPN it's the grind of where Amazon and Netflix can just parachute in and out of stuff that they want. ESPN has a 365 day responsibility still at this point to have stuff. And I think they have way more competitors than they used to. I remember when FS1 got their 2013 and like, here comes FS1. And ESPN's attitude was like, how dare you? We're gonna. And I felt the same way. I was like, we're gonna crush these guys. Come get us. Now there's seven, eight different people with real money coming at you and it's really hard to stay on top.

[Nick Khan]

Look, I remember the FS1 thing. ESPN was so dominant.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, you remember the FS1 thing because you made a lot of money just parlaying the two networks for a lot of clients.

[Nick Khan]

Made a lot of money.

[Bill Simmons]

You remember that as the heyday.

[Nick Khan]

Those are clients who went along.

[Bill Simmons]

Nick Khan. The greatest year in Nick Khan's life. It's like, oh, you're like at a school auction, getting the two drunk parents bidding. Do I have. Do I hear 20k for the trip to Mexico? 22.

[Nick Khan]

Listen, I was just. Right place, right time, what can I say? But ESPN was so dominant that it was. Okay, we're going to keep our 11 o'clock sports center and we're going to bring back Keith Olbermann to put him on ESPN too to make sure. Just in case you're thinking of I don't want to watch SportsCenter. We have something else to offer for you. And oh yeah, we got Grantland programming. And what was the name of your. Your unsanctioned NBA show? The great basketball show. Grantland Basketball shown basketball show.

[Bill Simmons]

We did 10, right.

[Nick Khan]

So it was like even unsanctioned, we're going to have, you know, high end content here. And again that I would say the first 50, 30 for 30s, if you will. Like amazing. Shockingly, like just the quality off the charts and then over time, like there are only so many.

[Bill Simmons]

We had some stinkers to be fair, early on. Yeah, we. I'm so happy everyone remembers them all. Finally.

[Nick Khan]

Maybe the, maybe the Colts one wasn't as good as.

[Bill Simmons]

No, I was. I wasn't going to name names.

[Nick Khan]

I thought you. I'm just saying you winked at Me and said, let's name names, people.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like anything else. As the years pass, people remember the best 10 or 12 and think, how.

[Nick Khan]

About when you have to spike the Marion Jones one? No one talks about that.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, there you go. Yeah. I don't know. So the wb, all that stuff. Any predictions? Any predictions for anything?

[Nick Khan]

What do you mean, the wb?

[Bill Simmons]

I don't know. You always have the Warner Brothers. They're trying to work around the fringes now with. They didn't get NBA, but now they're. I can't tell. There was a big piece about them this week.

[Nick Khan]

Yes, I read it. I read it.

[Bill Simmons]

Which was a weird. It was one of those. I have a lot of information going in all these different directions and the reader is just going to have to figure out what to make of this. But the basic premise was Warner Brothers stuck between these two worlds. This world that used to exist in this world that's about to happen. Kind of feeling like that maybe is a strategy. Thought that was pretty interesting. Yeah. I don't know if I agreed with it.

[Nick Khan]

I think like any company, maybe they made a couple mistakes here and there, but I think they now see that and if they can figure out, okay, what's the programming to bring in post NBA, that. It's tough, right. When there's so many mouths to feed. Tnt, tbs, Max, hbo. Oh, true tv. Oh, this. Oh, that. Like, it's a lot.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

And those are still generating revenue. So you'd think.

[Bill Simmons]

Which one is Dr. Pimple Popper on? I can't remember.

[Nick Khan]

Dr. Pimple Popper. I don't remember which one that was. Yeah, that's. But I still have DirecTV, so I see it on the grid, you know.

[Bill Simmons]

You still have DirecTV?

[Nick Khan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Who do you call when something goes wrong?

[Nick Khan]

It's brutal.

[Bill Simmons]

Do they even have people working?

[Nick Khan]

Listen, it's brutal. I tried to order the Terence Crawford, Errol Spence boxing match off of DirecTV. They said I was at my pay per view limit. I called someone, spoke to someone overseas. I said, what are you talking about, pay per view?

[Bill Simmons]

How is there a limit? I just want to spend money. Am I up your service?

[Nick Khan]

Am I up to date on my bill? Yes. Then how is there a limit? And what am I ordering on pay per View that would put me past that limit? There's no UFC on DirecTV, pay per view, there's no WWE. It's a mess, but I still have it. That's YouTube TV and Apple TV.

[Bill Simmons]

I can't wait to explain DirecTV to my great grandkids 50 years from now. Yeah. So they used to come in, they would put a dish on top of our house. They would give us a receiver. If you cancel DirecTV, you would have to mail the receiver back or it would cost you $500. You couldn't. Nobody would answer if there was an issue. I can't wait to Bill.

[Nick Khan]

How about this part of it?

[Bill Simmons]

It's a documentary, so we.

[Nick Khan]

We connected on me coming on your podcast.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

What if you said to me, show up somewhere between 8am and noon and, you know, hopefully I'll be there? Which is what the cable companies and DirecTV said. Like, they'd give you this window eight at noon.

[Bill Simmons]

How about like eight to three? Right.

[Nick Khan]

And at 11:59, you'd call and be like, hey, my guy hasn't shown up yet. Like, what's going. Oh, we're so sorry. We have to reschedule for 10 days from now. You wouldn't allow your doctor to do that. You wouldn't allow your accountant to do that.

[Bill Simmons]

Can I just put you on hold for one second, sir? Please don't. No, please, no, don't put me on hold.

[Nick Khan]

How about when they'd hang up on.

[Bill Simmons]

You after a while and then you're just start starting the process.

[Nick Khan]

Starting the process over.

[Bill Simmons]

One of the happiest days of my life was. Was moving to streamer stuff full time and not having directv.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah. By the way, again, like the In Demand Dish Direct vig that we were talking about football. Too much hubris, too much arrogance with their product.

[Bill Simmons]

Because they had football, they felt like they could do anything they wanted. Correct.

[Nick Khan]

Instead of, by the way, as you know, it was a big brag in, like 2000, 2001, if you had DirecTV, you were like, yeah, you were the guy.

[Bill Simmons]

It was like one of the first things I ever splurged on.

[Nick Khan]

Correct.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

I don't have cable. I got satellite.

[Bill Simmons]

I can get all the football games, and then I get all the basketball games.

[Nick Khan]

And they took full advantage of the consumer, as did the cable companies, the traditional cable companies. We'll be there between 8 and noon. We'll be there between noon and 5. Like, it was a joke. The whole thing was a joke. And then, hey, someone came along with a better product and, you know, ate part of their lunch.

[Bill Simmons]

Who buys? Who becomes the next agar successor? Who takes over? Who's your money on?

[Nick Khan]

I would say 60% chance insider, 40% chance, outsider.

[Bill Simmons]

So I'm a little interesting because they have the four. It's really three Candidates coming from inside. Matt Bellany wrote a really good piece for Puck. Our guy Matt, I read it about.

[Nick Khan]

Also very rich, like you now, Matt.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, he's loaded. He's crazy. He's on TV shows now. He's doing great.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, he's a scripted actor now.

[Bill Simmons]

He's on the studio. But he had a whole piece about could Disney go after Sarandos, which A, I was really jealous of. Great idea. I don't know how I just so mad that I didn't come up with that B, really interesting idea. If you're going to do an outsider, why not do a maverick outsider? And one of the things I was wondering was, would Iger even want that? Would you want your successor to be somebody who would actually be a little more cutting edge maybe than you are, and maybe somebody that could reinvent some things and modernize your company in some different ways? I don't know. I thought that was fascinating. And then if you're Sarandos, would you want to do that? Are you already in the Disney of now? Do you even need to leave Netflix?

[Nick Khan]

Well, think about his career arc. You remember when they split, what was it? Netflix and Quickster, whatever it was, quickstar.

[Bill Simmons]

Almost ended his career.

[Nick Khan]

Almost ended his career. But then quickly they realized, like we were talking about, no, we've made a mistake here. We better change this and we better shut that down and we better hyper focus on the fact that people aren't going to be really renting DVDs for that much longer. Yeah, and they nailed it. And then early on, okay, let's put on the Kevin Spacey show and Orange is a New Black. Let's cater towards, you know, the critics, if you will. Sarandos came out and said, we need to be HBO before HBO becomes us. Which he corrected six, nine months ago in the New York Times Q and A where he said, what I should have said was, we need to become hbo, cbs, the BBC, and all of these other things before they all become us. And to his credit and Netflix's credit, they did do that, right? There's something for everybody there globally, not just domestically. So when you turn it on, you're like another Menendez brothers documentary. Like, yeah, people watch it. They also realize, like, I've always thought a lot of people lie about their taste in things. Even if it's anonymous polling, people lie. I think to me that the first sign I saw you remember, like in the late 90s, early 2000s, the radio ratings were done off. Writing it down in a notebook, what you listen to yeah. So you'd see classical music on FM radio, smart talk on FM radio, and as soon as the rating metric shifted to the ppm, the Portable people meters, and they could actually tell what people were listening to. No one was listening to classical music. No one is listening to smart talk. But when you're put on the spot of like, hey, Bill, do you like smart talk? What are you supposed to say? No, I like dumb talk, right? Oh, yeah, of course I like smart. Do you like classical music? Yeah, I love classical music. Netflix realizes, like, people like all kinds of programming. I think Bravo realized that years ago. Also with the Housewives.

[Bill Simmons]

MTV realized that. Yeah, for sure. Coupons. Got it for.

[Nick Khan]

By the way, think about Jersey Shore, its first season.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Like, people not in la. La. You could always say what you're watching. There's no such thing to me as a guilty pleasure if you like something like it. But in other parts of the country where that kind of program was looked down upon, people like, oh, yeah, I watch Jersey Shore. I just don't admit it. In L. A, you admit it. It was great tv.

[Bill Simmons]

Listen, algorithms don't lie.

[Nick Khan]

They don't lie.

[Bill Simmons]

Algorithms are a window into your soul. It's like, do you like true crime documentaries where somebody got kidnapped and they couldn't find the killer for three episodes? I do.

[Nick Khan]

But by the way, think about.

[Bill Simmons]

You're going to love this Gabby Petito doc.

[Nick Khan]

Totally.

[Bill Simmons]

She's a blogger and she disappeared and her boyfriend might have done it. Great. I'm in.

[Nick Khan]

I'm in. How about Netflix did another OJ Documentary.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, they're just running.

[Nick Khan]

I watched it.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm ready for Bundy again. They haven't done Bundy for five years.

[Nick Khan]

They got to come back.

[Bill Simmons]

Reinvent Bundy as a sitcom.

[Nick Khan]

By the way, how about the Dahmer scripted series?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, we're back.

[Nick Khan]

Tough to watch on an airplane.

[Bill Simmons]

Brought back Manson.

[Nick Khan]

Tough to watch Dahmer on an airplane. The hooking up with the man.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't know. I'm. I think I'm good with Dahmer for a while. Manson, I was like, I gave it a. You know, I like Manson stuff.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

But it was one of those. I was like, all right. I don't know if. How much I learned from that, but, yeah, they're rerunning the hits now.

[Nick Khan]

Did you like the Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Manson storyline in the movie?

[Bill Simmons]

I love that movie.

[Nick Khan]

Love.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Nick Khan]

Love. I feel like people, like, didn't love it the way I thought they should have loved it.

[Bill Simmons]

You know what Happened. I was just talking with Fenisting Chris about this. Covid happened. It came out, it had its whole run through 2019. We were at Sundance, we did a live rewatchables of that movie maybe beginning of February and then it was about to have this whole run with the Oscars and all the way through and it just would have moved it. And then Covid happened and Covid messed everything up.

[Nick Khan]

That really did.

[Bill Simmons]

Just people didn't have the same conversations about anything. So I always felt like that was weird because it has been five plus years since that movie came out.

[Nick Khan]

Phenomenal movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Now they're making a sequel.

[Nick Khan]

I just read that the other day.

[Bill Simmons]

Fincher's gonna direct.

[Nick Khan]

Pretty new, right? Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Tarantino written movie.

[Nick Khan]

When was the last time he wrote a movie that he didn't direct? True Romance or something after that?

[Bill Simmons]

There's probably something since then, but yeah, it's pretty rare.

[Nick Khan]

I just watched True romance with our 13 year old daughter for the first time.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, Jesus.

[Nick Khan]

Skipped a couple of the early seasons. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

This is when you have to really know the movie and fast forward.

[Nick Khan]

The early Gary Oldman stuff, you gotta skip a little bit. But after that, even the Christopher Walken, Dennis Hopper scene, you can watch it.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Nick Khan]

With your kids, it's no problem.

[Bill Simmons]

Bathroom Bra with Tony Soprano and Patricia Arquette is pretty brutal.

[Nick Khan]

Pretty brutal.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a great movie though.

[Nick Khan]

Amazing, amazing casting.

[Bill Simmons]

All right. Thing you're most excited about for WrestleMania this weekend, if you had to pick.

[Nick Khan]

One thing, what's going to happen in Cena Cody, where does that go?

[Bill Simmons]

You think that's the number one? I haven't watched wrestling all year, but this is the one thing I should care about storyline.

[Nick Khan]

I think it's very close with Roman, Punk and Seth because with Roman, Punk and Seth, there's an argument that's been made as to why each person should win. And you know, do you see Roman getting pinned when he got pinned last year by Cody, you know, how's that going to turn out? Roman's still at his peak. He's not on the back nine. Not even close to it from our point of view.

[Bill Simmons]

How old is he now?

[Nick Khan]

What happens? Roman, I think is 36.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh my God.

[Nick Khan]

36, 37.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, wow. He's got. Yeah, he's got at least five peak physical years left.

[Nick Khan]

No question. He takes phenomenal care of himself. It's sort of like the Floyd Mayweather thing. Floyd never got fat, never drank, you know, always kept himself ready to go, which I always respected. Roman, Cody, these guys who keep Themselves in that top swim, physical shape, just eating almonds. Amazing. But the baseball people, and I'm not a huge baseball guy, would tell me, hey, the stats show you past the age of 39. That's the furthest you can go as a prime athlete before the drop. And then you see Tom Brady and what he did and the time he put into maintaining, you know, where he was.

[Bill Simmons]

Maybe LeBron, we'll see with him. But it's. These guys are. There's such aberrations. You can't even.

[Nick Khan]

By the way, we got lucky with this Golden State loss the other day. So WWE WrestleMania does not go up against Lakers Golden State this Saturday.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. You have Lakers Minnesota instead. Yeah, I'm going to. I'm coming Saturday. I'm going to be at the triple threat.

[Nick Khan]

Yeah, I'm glad you're going to be there.

[Bill Simmons]

It's going to be.

[Nick Khan]

Who wins the NBA Finals this year.

[Bill Simmons]

I sure hope the Celtics OKC is going to be really good. There's artists nobody believes in, us building with them. Uh, the Clippers are excellent. Cleveland's really good. There's like five teams that could take it this year. It's unusual.

[Nick Khan]

Is Celtics, Lakers still the. The best? That's the highest rated.

[Bill Simmons]

The wet dream of all time for the league.

[Nick Khan]

I was looking at the master.

[Bill Simmons]

Although Knicks, Lakers would be bigger. It's not going to happen this year, but I think if you had New York LA, the Knicks not having one since 73 and then generations of Knicks fans, that's probably bigger.

[Nick Khan]

Lakers make it to the championship?

[Bill Simmons]

No.

[Nick Khan]

Who makes it from the West?

[Bill Simmons]

No. Okc. Maybe the Clippers. I'm not going to rule out the Lakers, but Clippers are in there. Lakers OKC is a heavy favorite.

[Nick Khan]

How about Clippers with the hot hand? Late.

[Bill Simmons]

Unbelievable.

[Nick Khan]

Amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

I can't. I know all the Clipper fans are just nervous that the rug's going to get pulled out with Kawhi again. But they've been, they've been awesome. And then, you know, you can't count out Denver just because they have Jokic. But I can't see them winning three rounds in a row. But it says they're in a spot a little bit like you guys, where they just have a shitload of talent right now. You just have these matchups where you're like, cool. Clippers, Denver. This is like, you know, four of the top 25 guys in the league are in this series.

[Nick Khan]

Who's the best player in the league right now? You know, basketball obviously far better than any can't be stopped. Jokic is the best and not afraid of anybody.

[Bill Simmons]

SGA Giannis Tatum Luca Tatum sick Luca Runson. All right, well I'll see you in Vegas this weekend. Thanks for coming over and doing it.

[Nick Khan]

Thanks for having me on.

[Bill Simmons]

Good to see you.

[Nick Khan]

I love this mansion. This is at least 45,000 square feet minimum. That's my take. Thank you for having me. Always good seeing you. Appreciate it.

[Bill Simmons]

All right, that's it. Thanks to Nikon, thanks to Kurt Goldsberry, thanks to Gahao and Jesse as well. Thanks to Saruti. And we will be back on Thursday. I have a fully fledged action packed podcast for you so I'll see you on Thursday. Must be 21 plus and President select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 + in President D.C. gambling problem. Call 100 Gambler or visit rg-help.com, call 1-887-897777 or visit ccpg.org chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-550 for 24. 7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8-HOPE NY or text Hopeny.