← The Herd with Colin Cowherd
Loading summary
Transcript150 lines
- [00:00]
Camila Ramon
You know when you're really stressed or not feeling so great about your life or about yourself, talking to someone who understands can really help. But who is that person? How do you find them? Where do you even start? Talkspace Talkspace makes it easy to get the support you need. With Talkspace, you can go online, answer a few questions about your preferences, and be matched with a therapist. And because you'll meet your therapist online, you don't have to take time off work or arrange childcare. You, you'll meet on your schedule wherever you feel most at ease. If you're depressed, stressed, struggling with a relationship, or if you want some counseling for you and your partner or just need a little extra one on one support, Talkspace is here for you. Plus, Talkspace works with most major insurers and most insured members have a zero dollar copay. No insurance, no problem. Now get $80 off of your first month with promo code SPACE80 when you go to talkspace.com match with a licensed therapist today at talkspace.com save $80 with code SPACE.
- [01:00]
Julie Swerbinks
What's up everyone? Julie Swerbinks here along with former NHL player Nate Thompson. We're doing a new podcast together. Here we go. The name Energy Line with Nate and jsb. Each week we'll get together and talk about hockey life. All topics are fair game, right? Exactly. And you'll never know who will drop by to join us. Julie is pretty well connected. She has text threads going that you wouldn't believe. Listen to EnergyLine with Nate and JSB on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [01:33]
Camila Ramon
I'm Camila Ramon.
- [01:34]
Julie Swerbinks
And I'm Melissa Ortiz. And our podcast Hasta Bajo is where sports, music and fitness collide and we cover it all. The Arriva Asta.
- [01:43]
Camila Ramon
This season we sit down with history makers like the Sucar family who became the first Peruvians to win a Grammy.
- [01:49]
Chris the Bear Felica
It was a very special moment for us.
- [01:52]
Simon Hunter
It's been 15 years for me in this career.
- [01:54]
Chris the Bear Felica
Finally, things are starting to shift into a different level.
- [01:58]
Camila Ramon
Listen to Astavajo on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Elf Beauty, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports.
- [02:08]
Israel Gutierrez
I'm Israel Gutierrez and I'm hosting a.
- [02:10]
Chris the Bear Felica
New podcast, Dub Dynasty, the story of how the Golden State warriors have dominated the NBA for over a decade.
- [02:17]
Julie Swerbinks
The Golden State warriors once again are NBA champions today.
- [02:21]
Chris the Bear Felica
The warriors dynasty remains alive because of a scrawny 6 foot 2 hooper who everyone seems to love for what Steph.
- [02:29]
Simon Hunter
Has done for the game. He's certainly on that Mount Rushmore.
- [02:32]
Chris the Bear Felica
Come revisit this magical warriors ride. Listen to dub dynasty starting April 8th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or.
- [02:39]
Julie Swerbinks
Wherever you get your podcasts.
- [02:52]
Chris the Bear Felica
Welcome to the Favorites the podcast presented by Beth. We are part of the Volume Podcast Network. I am Chad Millman of the Action Network. Today I'm joined as always by my co host, my companion, my compadre, my bff Professional Better Simon Hunter. Hello Simon, Chad.
- [03:12]
Simon Hunter
How we doing brother?
- [03:13]
Chris the Bear Felica
Brother, we got a lot to unpack. Later in the episode we're going to be joined by one of the most beloved people in all of sports media, Chris the Bear Felica, my former colleague at espn, now the betting analyst at Fox Sports, host of Bear Betts the podcast. Very excited that he's coming on the show. But listen brother, before we get to Chris, we gotta get one of the other most beloved people in all of sports media and maybe right now in all of Chicago. Cuz we need to recap our amazing Chicago live show for this audience. We can't talk about it or promote it for a month and a half and not let everyone know how it went quickly. As a reminder, the Favorites podcast is presented by bet365 who also sponsored a live show. New bet365. Customers get $150 in bonus bets when you bet$5. Sign up using promo code favorites deposit$10 place a bet for $5 to get $150 in bonus bets. Those bonus bets can be used on spreads, totals, player props, futures and more. Whatever the moment, it's Never ordinary at bed 365 must be 21 or older and present in Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Illinois, Louisiana, North Carolina, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia or 18 and older in Kentucky. Gambling problem call 1-800- gambler or 1-800- beds off in Iowa. Terms conditions restrictions apply. All right, Matt Mitchell, great to see you buddy. By the way, Simon, do we not owe Matt Mitchell a huge bouquet of flowers? He organized the event, he was in charge of the details. He was the emcee of the event. He puts on an amazing show when we are there cuz it's part you and me talking. In this case we had Stuckey and Jim Root join us for college basketball, but it's really Matt Mitchell taking what people love about the show and incorporating it into trivia and games and giveaways with him acting as the PT Barnum and keeping people occupied. So Matt Mitchell, welcome to the Show. Great job in Chicago, Chad.
- [05:33]
Israel Gutierrez
It's like those old Vidal Sassoon commercials where he would end it by saying, if you don't look good, I don't look good. And that's how it feels. I just.
- [05:42]
Chris the Bear Felica
Man with no hair.
- [05:44]
Israel Gutierrez
That's right.
- [05:44]
Chris the Bear Felica
I can appreciate the reference.
- [05:46]
Israel Gutierrez
Like all of the best hairstylists. Yes, I'm. I'm bald as the dickens. But yes, I had a great time. You guys are fabulous. I want you guys in the correct head space to go in glad hand, which is definitely what you guys do best. That's who they want to see. And they don't want you worried about, you know, handicapping a Texas Tech basketball game. That's not what they're there for. So I thought you guys were marvelous. But our fans were. I mean, people drove from like 300 miles away from like Columbus and southern Indiana. It was insane.
- [06:16]
Chris the Bear Felica
I'm always surprised by this. Pleasantly surprised and thrilled. I met a listener who drove five hours from outside Detroit who like goes deep into the archives and said to me, you guys never really bring up the blackjack years, which is like the year and a half, two years where blackjack Fletcher was a co host of the show who was a great guy. Just like we morphed into something different. And then Simon joined the show, but he was like deep, deep into the weeds on action content. Going back to ESPN content. Loved that there was a whole group of buddies who traveled from Columbus. You mentioned there was a couple from that drove from south of Bloomington, Indiana. This was their date night away from their kids. Five or six couples on date nights. And that's always my favorite at these events. Everyone knows I love love. So when we see couples coming to the show together, which happens at every event we've had, there's always a half dozen that I meet. It's just the best. Half the time it's the couple listens to the show together half the time. Like the kid I met who's a grad student at Northwestern who, who dragged his girlfriend to the show. She ended up talking to me and my dad. I'm like, oh, please put a ring on that, brother. Because that is just next level commitment that she's coming to this godforsaken show with two guys she's never seen and she ends up talking to my nearly 80 year old dad.
- [07:48]
Simon Hunter
Mentioned the real trooper was the guy who made his girlfriend come, that had the torn acl.
- [07:51]
Israel Gutierrez
Oh my God.
- [07:52]
Simon Hunter
And she couldn't have been more of a love. She was so sweet, so kind. The fact that she came with that leg into that bar surrounded by just hooligans. I mean, people were absolutely out of their minds. And I was like, man, I go say hi to her. So that was really cool talking to her and her husband Chad.
- [08:08]
Israel Gutierrez
That couple that came from southern Indiana was Kent and Emily Summers. And I remember their name one because they're just lovely, and I hope to see them in Milwaukee. But also because when the event concluded, Emily and my wife became the very best of friends for many reasons. But one of those was that Emily shared that it had been. It had been very tough because she had had her daughter the week sports were canceled in 2020, and so did my wife had our youngest, Maxine Danger Mitchell, that same week. So bonding over that was. Was a lot of fun. They were a delight. And yet the lady with the tortoise, yeah, I forgot about that. She was like. She couldn't move at all. She was like, they got her in. She sat on a bar stool with her leg on another barstool. And that's what she had to say around. Yeah, Complete hooliganism. I also want to shout out Chad's father. So if you're at home, I want you to close your eyes.
- [09:02]
Chris the Bear Felica
Barry Millman.
- [09:03]
Simon Hunter
Yeah.
- [09:03]
Israel Gutierrez
Just picture Chad Millman in an even smaller, older body, just as big of a mensch. And he looks like Stan Kroenke, the owner of the Rams. It was an absolute pleasure. He said the nicest things. What a sweet fellow your dad is.
- [09:20]
Chris the Bear Felica
He is a fantastic guy. I love him to death. True. Mensch. That's a great way to describe him. So many people in my life who have said to me, oh, Barry Millman, class act. Menschy. Menschy guy.
- [09:32]
Israel Gutierrez
Speaking of hooligans, you had a group of buddies that came, Chad.
- [09:34]
Chris the Bear Felica
I had high school buddies that came, and this was one of my favorites. Andy, Josh, Dave. I got to hang out with them, which was fantastic. And at one point, they were talking to a bunch of. There were, you know, a lot of fans there who listened to the show, and then a lot of fans who just brought friends with them, right. Who don't listen to the show. And that included. This is one of my favorite moments. This kid who graduated from Indiana, Simon. He grew up until he was 10 years old in Liverpool, moved to the United States. I told him, your family's from Burnley. And he's like, whoa. Like, even Liverpool looks down on Burnley. That's how bad Burnley is. And he ended up playing soccer at Indiana. Indiana has a great, great soccer program. Always does for generations. So we were talking about Indiana soccer and they went to the Final Four, like two of the three or three of the four years he was there. I went to Indiana. I had been on stage with you no less than 15 minutes earlier. And he looks at me and we're talking. And Andy or Josh or Dave, one of my buddies had said something to me about the show. And he goes, oh, you're. You're a part of the show. Had no idea.
- [10:46]
Simon Hunter
Yeah, I would say that was another cool part of the. Obviously many cool things. Me and all the fans was how many people there weren't actually gamblers. They were just football fans and just fans of me and Chad. Like, which was shocking to me because I thought everyone there would be big time gamblers. I talked to a lot of people. They just, they love hearing our football opinions. They love following along during the season and they love the offseason when we do all the interviews. So that was great. And yeah, piggyback off what M. Matt Mitchell said. Meeting Chad's dad and Chad's buddies from kindergarten, probably one of my favorite parts. Like, seeing pictures of young Chad was really, really funny. Especially in your like, 80s outfit. Got the high socks, the really short shorts, the T shirts. And then, yeah, met Matt Mitchell's wife. And you know the old saying, behind every good man is a great woman. Great woman, just so cool, so down. And you can tell, like even talking to her about gambling, it's like, fuck, I love women that love to gamble. So Matt Mitchell obviously hit a home run. It was just great too. Just run into everybody. True that we work with, right. Stuckey coming down, having drinks with him. It was a really good time.
- [11:50]
Chris the Bear Felica
Well, dude, you've just transitioned to my favorite part of the night. And I will say also that the pictures of me and Simon and my dad are just treasures because Simon is twice as tall as me and my dad. I don't think if my dad was standing on my shoulders, we would be as tall as Simon. My friends loved Simon. They felt like they had been friends with Simon for longer than he's been alive.
- [12:21]
Simon Hunter
So I'm invited to the vacation.
- [12:23]
Chris the Bear Felica
You can come on the vacation. And I forgot that my buddy Dave broke out pictures of me from overnight camp when I was about 11 years old. But here's my favorite part of the night. And then we'll get to the show. It's the second half of the Duke game. It's about to start. Simon, you had Irish. Goodbye. Irish exited God only knows when. Like, I could not Find you anywhere. I was surprised that I was still hanging on at this point. Stuckey is alone in the green room lamenting all the Texas Tech futures that he had that had blown up in the final five minutes of that game. Matt's wife Corrine is having the time of her life at the bar which she would pay for the next day. Meanwhile, Matt, who likes to go out and drink all night with Stuckey more than anybody I've ever met in his entire life in my entire life. Like this dude, if he's with Stuckey, he wants to be out until the sunrise. He has to be somewhat responsible for the entire event still. And I'm talking to a few listeners, including my favorite email pen pal, member of Chicagoland's Bravest, huge lifelong long suffering Bears fan Matt O'Donnell came to the event. One of the three fans that I'm talking to asks about Mitchell and I point him out at the bar and the guy says to me he goes man, that guy eats wings with rubber gloves. That is serious serial killer vibes.
- [13:59]
Israel Gutierrez
It's a smart man. I'll note that he didn't approach me or talk to me. So that's a good move on his part.
- [14:04]
Chris the Bear Felica
He didn't. Corinne was having too good of a time taken over that part of the bar and nobody was coming in.
- [14:11]
Israel Gutierrez
Yep. Want to run through So I make sure that listeners who did not participate hear about quickly one I will say the pictures of you, your dad and Simon look like one of those nesting dolls but it's missing several of the intermediary dolls. You just open up the big one and it's two little ones in the middle. I loved that. I wanted to pander to your friends directly Chad in my show intro so I started your intro onto the stage with he's made a lifelong commitment to eating like a small Amazonian bird and two of your buddies that they're going to have a heart attack and that's it. Those are the only two guys that laughed at that. I thought they were going to pass out so I appreciate that. The security guard that Joe's on Weed Shout out Joe's on Weed Elite venue could it was amazing. Unbelievable hospitality. Go there anytime, watch any game there can't recommend them enough. They gave us a security guard to make sure no one goes upstairs to the the private area where all of our stuff is. It looks like Ving Rhames couldn't have been a nicer guy. I also had a ton of features on Texas Tech making the Final four while me and Stuckey are having our souls leave our bodies. It's a Florida bar. And he kind of leans over and sees I'm not. Not having a great time. And he goes, who are you rooting for? And I realized he was a Florida fan. He had a little Florida pin on. And I go, oh, Florida. And he goes, all right, fix your face. So for that guy, I pretended to be a Florida fan for the rest of the evening. So shout out to him. Loved him. And I did have to load the four recliners that we used. It was too expensive to rent. So we just said, let's just buy the recliners that the four stars will sit on on the stage. But obviously one of those is getting loaded into my car and driven home, because, hell, we bought them. So if anyone in Milwaukee wants a recliner, it's only had an ass on it for like 55 total minutes. You just reach out to me. I'll put it right out front. You can drive it away. And then last but not least, shout out to an old, dear friend of mine from the University of Missouri. 900 years ago when I was there, ad agency creative Doug Lawson, who was one of my favorite people, who loves the show and I hadn't seen in a very long time. I'll note that I said, hey, didn't. Didn't you have an insane business card when we were undergrads 20 years ago? Do you have a picture of it? He goes, yeah, here it is. And he used this card to get a job when he was 22. The front is just mania with his information, but the back, this is what it reads. There's never anything interesting written on the back of business cards. So I'm going to tell you the best story I know. Once there was this old man who found a bug in a yellow rock. He used that bug to make some dinosaurs, and he put those dinosaurs on an island. But before anybody was allowed to go see the dinosaurs on the island, a couple scientists and Jeff Goldblum had to say it was safe. It was not. Newman tried to steal some of the dinosaurs in a can of shaving cream. And a guy got eaten by a T. Rex while sitting on a toilet. Samuel L. Jackson was there, too. He smoked a lot of cigarettes and said, hold on to your butts twice. That got him a job, because that's the. The rantings of a madman. So if you are anywhere in America and you need an outstanding ad agency creative, his name is Dud Lawson, dudlosson.com. he would hate that. I'M doing this right now, but he is terrific. One of my oldest and dearest and I thank you for coming out and thanks for being a fan of the.
- [17:49]
Chris the Bear Felica
Show and maybe Matt. Most important, our boosted parlay on bet3.5 that day was floored on the moneyline Duke under USC women it cashed. So congrats to everybody who played the boosted bet3.6 5 parlay. We're going to get to Felica Want to make extra money daily from your sports betting? Simon knows I'm always trying to find ways to take sports betting to the next level. That's why I'm excited to tell you about Edge Boost, the financial platform that pays you cash back to wager. Edgeboost is an online bank account that pays you for every deposit. With the Edge Boost Visa debit card, you receive up to half a percent cash back on all your sportsbook, daily fantasy site and casino transactions. That's free money back in your pocket for doing what you're already doing. It's a no brainer. Plus, your Edge Boost debit card starts with a $250,000 daily limit and will never be declined for gambling activity. They've got built in tools to help you stay responsible and there are absolutely no hidden fees or minimum required balances. So stop leaving money on the table. Visit edgeboost Bet to sign up. If you use Promo code favorites and deposit $25, you'll receive a 25 deposit, $25 deposit match plus Tier 2 status for faster bank deposits and more cash back. That's Edge boost.bet promo code Favorites.
- [19:07]
Camila Ramon
You know when you're really stressed or not feeling so great about your life or about yourself, talking to someone who understands can really help. But who is that person? How do you find them? Where do you even start? Talkspace Talkspace makes it easy to get the support you need. With Talkspace, you can go online, answer a few questions about your preferences, and be matched with a therapist. And because you'll meet your therapist online, you don't have to take time off work or arrange childcare. You'll meet on your schedule wherever you feel most at ease. If you're depressed, stressed, struggling with a relationship, or if you want some counseling for you and your partner or just need a little extra one on one support, Talkspace is here for you. Plus, Talkspace works with most major insurers and most insured members have a $0 copay. No insurance, no problem. Now get $80 off of your first month with promo code space80 when you go to talkspace.com, match with a licensed therapist today at talkspace.com save $80 with code space80@talkspace.com and now, on the heels.
- [20:09]
Chris the Bear Felica
Of our interview with Stanford Steve last month, we are delighted to finally welcome into the Favorites Lounge another towering figure in modern sports betting media. Someone are very, very longtime listeners will know from his original appearances on the behind the Bets podcast over a decade ago, his solo spinoff with Stanford Steve on Behind the the College Years, former ESPN producer now and college game day maestro, by the way, now the most popular sports betting figure across all of Fox Sports, maybe in America, Host of the Bear Bets podcast, handicapper of everything from the Rose bowl and the Breeders cup to the Valero cup and the battle for Atlantis, it's Chris the Bear. Felika, my brother, great to see you.
- [21:04]
Julie Swerbinks
Don't forget the college basketball crown, which is currently.
- [21:08]
Chris the Bear Felica
That's right, that's a huge event.
- [21:10]
Julie Swerbinks
I mean that was something where like weeks ago when the NCAA tournament started and the people knew this was coming. It was one of those where like guys that I know are like, we are just going to blindly bet the overs in these games because people are, there's going to be no defense. People are going to want to play them and get boost nil and score and just go out and have fun. And we saw games on, on Monday just completely soar over the total with relative and these games were moving seven, eight points and they were still going over easily. So yeah, we, we added the college basketball crown to our arsenal. What's going on, man?
- [21:48]
Chris the Bear Felica
Hey, listen, that's what I love about you. There is nothing, this is a little bit, you and Simon are sort of kindred spirits in this way. Stanford a little bit too. You guys will fire away on anything. You will find a way to handicap examine the games to discover the edge no matter the event. The amount of conversations I've had with you going deep in the weeds on horse racing, let alone like sports people actually pay attention to over the course of your life, is phenomenal. I love the fact that you even went deep on the college basketball crown, Simon. You can relate to that.
- [22:26]
Simon Hunter
For me, Chad, the action is the juice.
- [22:29]
Julie Swerbinks
That's right, there we go.
- [22:32]
Chris the Bear Felica
Tell people how you even got into betting.
- [22:34]
Julie Swerbinks
Oh, God. I, I was, I mean I was like, kind of like everyone else, just kid from, kid from Long island who grew up around it. Dad brings home the, the parlay cards from wherever the hell he got him from work, all card repair shop or whatever, who the hell knows. But yeah, I was just one of Those and put your, put your allowance on a three or four team parlay on one of those little parlay cards. However young I was, and I kind of, kind of knew to follow it then. But my, my dad's godfather used to write for a racing publication in New York. We had a little quarter horse track, Suffolk Meadows, near where I grew up. We were always going to the track and we had basically season season tickets or partial season tickets for Jets, Islanders, Yankees, for forever. So I mean I around sports and I always kind of knew the, knew the numbers and knew what was going on. So I was just kind of, kind of, kind of kind of grew up about it. And then going to school in Miami and being around football and horse racing down there, it was just kind of a natural deal. But yeah, no, it's, it's always dumb. Numbers and betting have always been a part of my life and it's turned into kind of a career as well. So kind of cool.
- [23:52]
Chris the Bear Felica
I do feel like Miami accelerates the process.
- [23:57]
Julie Swerbinks
You think?
- [23:58]
Chris the Bear Felica
I do. I really do. I think, you know, there is so much. It's a sneaky betting capital. Oh yeah. And there's a great story. Miami in the 30s and 40s. There was this tug and pull in the 50s really about the betting community. And everybody knew in local government all the way up to the governor that the people who visited Miami in the winter wanted to be able to bet. And so they relaxed all the gaming laws in Miami in the winter. And then as soon as everybody left sort of around March, there was a, literally a one man betting vice squad who would go around busting up all the bookies and putting them in jail, fining them. They'd try to make money off the fines, whatever. And then as soon as the winter came back around, everybody was free to do whatever they wanted to do again. Miami has always had that edge for betting that would make people want to bet even more.
- [25:06]
Julie Swerbinks
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And certainly you got things like, like highlight and dog, dog racing down there when I was in school there. That kind of a lot of that fixing. Yeah, you had, you had plenty of on campus bookies that were willing to, to appease that I never got paid by, by one of them. Kind of, kind of disappointing. We used to have a little bit of a, a routine where me and my, me and my buddies, as soon as we were done, I would get out of, we'd get out of our last class, we'd get together. Apartment 33Y. We would get together and kind of come up with our plan for the evening. And at the time, we used to love. We used to love, like, the reverses, and we. We didn't have a ton of money, so we're betting, like, 25 reverses. And then, like. And we used to. It was 92, 93 around there. So it was like, the Jazz and the Sonics were, like, great. So it seemed like for, like, every night, we were doing, like, a $25 reverse. Jazz and Sonics, and they were. It was winning, like, every night. And then. Then our boy from the pie cast never paid us, so it was kind of. Kind of shitty.
- [26:12]
Chris the Bear Felica
Why don't. How do you not have muscle?
- [26:15]
Julie Swerbinks
I had. I had no muscle back then. It was always, oh, yeah, there's an envelope coming. I'm getting an envelope today. Then the envelope. The envelope never came. And then it was like, okay, we need to. We need to stop wasting our time and disappointing ourselves.
- [26:29]
Chris the Bear Felica
Dude, you know what's freaky? We never even talked about this when I was starting at Sports Illustrated. This is, like, right out of college. There was a Super bowl in Miami. Might have been 94. I can't remember exactly when.
- [26:44]
Julie Swerbinks
Yeah, that would have been Chargers. Chargers, Niners.
- [26:46]
Chris the Bear Felica
Yes, exactly. I don't know if you were in school then or not.
- [26:49]
Julie Swerbinks
I graduated in May of 94.
- [26:51]
Chris the Bear Felica
All right, so I was in Miami for Sports Illustrated. We had decided to do a. Like, Simon wasn't even born at this point, but we had decided to do a gambling issue. And because I was one of the most recent graduates and could still connect with college students at the magazine. I was in Miami, and they asked me to start reporting and, like, talk to kids at U of M. Oh, wow. I ended up doing an entire. What's called a sidebar about bookies at the U of M campus.
- [27:25]
Julie Swerbinks
Really?
- [27:25]
Chris the Bear Felica
Yeah. Wow. I spent a whole afternoon with a group of kids who were in a fraternity at U of M who were booking the Super Bowl.
- [27:35]
Julie Swerbinks
I wonder. I wonder if it was the same one of the. One of the same guys.
- [27:38]
Chris the Bear Felica
It could have been.
- [27:40]
Julie Swerbinks
Very, very easily could have been. Well, we'll have to share. Share.
- [27:43]
Chris the Bear Felica
I'll have to go back and look it up.
- [27:44]
Israel Gutierrez
I'll send it.
- [27:45]
Julie Swerbinks
We'll have to talk about that off the air. I don't want to reveal the names, but give away any trade secrets. But yeah, the. The. The. The. The name would be recognizable to. To some people.
- [27:56]
Chris the Bear Felica
That's too funny.
- [27:57]
Julie Swerbinks
The surname would be. Or would be. Would be recognizable.
- [28:01]
Chris the Bear Felica
Simon, doesn't it make you nostalgic for the opportunities to go book on a college Campus.
- [28:06]
Julie Swerbinks
Oh God. If we knew, if we knew now, Simon, what we knew, we could have known then or I said I screwed that up.
- [28:15]
Simon Hunter
The worst part of it though, that that work booking with college kids and then having a track down when you actually win to get your money was the worst. I think everyone went through that, right? Everyone had that guy that disappeared after he got into a huge hole with a bunch of different people and it's like, oh, that guy just left our school because he owed so many people money. So I'm with Chris. It's like the glory days. But it was also, man, dealing with that headache of chasing people and running from people was, was definitely a thing of the past.
- [28:42]
Chris the Bear Felica
Well, Felica, like you're, you're an og. You've been doing this forever. You know, we're now legal. We're seven years in to being legal. We're coming up on the seven year anniversary of paspa, the Professional Amateur Sports Protection act being overturned. Like what do you see the difference between pre legalization and today? Even three years ago and today you.
- [29:06]
Julie Swerbinks
See, I mean obviously you see the market flooded a lot more with just a lot more people trying to get their share of it from whether it's pick sellers, social media influencers just kind of creating that crossover between like just okay, I hear, I, I know what I'm talking about. And you should pick this. Is it more of a, an information based thing? Is it more of a, an entertainment based thing with depending on who the, the people on social media that you follow. But yeah, I, I just know. I almost wonder if we're to a point of. Or maybe we've reached the point as well. I'd like to ask if we reached a point of like saturation in the market where there's so much information and so many people out there that. Are we kind of at the point where we're going to start to eat ourselves and maybe we're going to see a little bit of a, a pullback on. So you're going to see a lot of people maybe getting out of it, falling by the wayside and it's going to kind of get back to just maybe not moderation, but fewer people. Fewer, I don't want to say tout, but fewer pick sellers, fewer accounts out there or are we going to continue at this level? Because it seems like we're, we're at a point where there's just a lot of bullshit out there.
- [30:25]
Chris the Bear Felica
Well, look, I feel like in 18, 19, 20, everybody was trying to figure out how to be a Sports betting, media analyst, because that was their way to get on tv. And I think very quickly there was recognition of where there was authenticity and fluency with the language. It's not easy to talk about these things and sound like you know what you're talking about. Right. You know, Felica, when I used to go on SportsCenter back in the day, before we started action and even a little bit after, the conversation was always, who's the anchor? Who can talk about totals, who can talk about spreads, who can talk about bookmakers outside of Scott Van Pelt. Right. Like, how are you going to have that conversation? Because the anchors aren't that comfortable with it. And to their credit, they don't want to be put in a position where they are uncomfortable with it. So it's hard to find the people who can even communicate the language. I think that's a huge issue. Simon, you've been sort of growing up in this space the past five or six years. You probably see a huge difference between the people who look and sound legit and the people who you can tell are just sort of doing it for the fame.
- [31:44]
Simon Hunter
Yeah, but it's always been this way where I think it's worse because it's so much more in our faces, right. With social media. But you guys grew up in the same thing where I did with the 800 number. I mean, there was always guys on the radio selling picks, selling their. And you'd call up, right? They do that. We got three free plays this weekend and went, 3, 0. Call this number for the one play that isn't free. Well, it's a guaranteed winner like that that is instilled into gambling, the folklore. And now it's a little different because it's these faceless people, right? It's these guys who make these Twitter accounts or social media accounts. They'll sell pics. People figure out quickly these guys are frauds and they'll delete the account and then make a new account and then hit one of their parlays, post a ticket, get people sucked in again. So I do think it's. We're in the weird stage of these people need to go through these frauds and realize this is not a get rich scheme. Like you're not going to win millions of dollars on parlays in your first year of gambling. And you know, that's, that's the toughest part to watch it because, you know, what are we supposed to do? We all we can do. I'm sure Chris has the same idea. I can only focus on myself and try to be as best as I can put out, the best info I can put out that I know is legit. Rather than waste time just badmouthing all these people all the time because there's no point. Like, that's why I love what we do is because eventually you're going to get figured out. Like people, if they're going to track you and follow your picks, they're going to eventually figure out, okay, this dude's a fraud. So I'm with Chris. Like, I hate that side of it. But luckily I think we're kind of on the back end of it. I think eventually people are getting kind of wiser to it. And you know, me and Chad, we, we talk about this all the time. The, the news shift is definitely the parlays, right? That's, that's the new thing in this sports media stuff where, you know, me and Chad like to give out our straight bets. We're now in a position of, you know, maybe we should give out one or two parlays a week because that's what people like to bet. So that's. That to me is the adjustment we're trying to make. Right, Chad? We're trying to adjust to what the people like to bet in the market where as professionals we advise against it. But if it's for fun, right, if there's a difference between betting $5 on a game and betting 100 on a parlay. Right. So that's what we're trying to really get into now. And I'm with Chris though. Like there's some stuff that makes my blood boil, boil that I see online and I just, I bite my tongue because I know there's, there's no, there's no point, right. It's that crab mentality. They'll just pull you down with you into the bucket. So there's no point of even jumping in. They're just gonna pull you down. So it is tough.
- [34:04]
Julie Swerbinks
Yeah. You know, you know what? Just let them, let them. You don't interact with them, you just let them do their thing and it's kind of out of sight, out of mind. But, but you did bring up something funny and I do have to just say it now. And now a message from the world famous Johnny Demarco. The ex coach Dr. Ron Bash has a five star winning. Used to be that used to be Saturday morning ritual on prior to College game day 7am we would get to the site and Fowler was like, Fowler was like leading the charge because he just loved the laughable Entertainment value. We'd throw on the sports advisors and you'd have Stu Finer and Ron Bash and whoever the hell maybe Kelso, Sturgeon, all of the Jim Feist, all the cappers of the day, the TV cappers. And we used to just, you'd have, you'd have Stu Finer in front of a green screen of Arrowhead Stadium behind him and you literally see his face and just 900 numbers and 800 numbers, just flashing stars. We watching the sports advisors on Saturday morning used to be the way we would get fired up for college game day. We just instant laughs. It was great.
- [35:27]
Chris the Bear Felica
Well, I do think there's, you know, it's Felica. We just had this event in Chicago over the weekend and we had a, you know, a few, several hundred people that came for inviting me. Yeah, listen, it was available, it was free, it was free for the public. You could have come out. But next time you can be a special guest. That would be a fun one. Get Felika to come be a special guest. I was talking to a bunch of kids who just graduated from Indiana. It's the son of a buddy of mine and all of his friends, all these really smart guys, really smart guys. Not sort of the sort of Indiana kids who don't major in business. These were the top of the top at Indiana and they were, they want to be betting heroes. They were excited about the same game parlay that they cast for fifteen hundred dollars. And I looked at the guy and he thought I was going to be like oh my God, that's amazing. I'm like yeah, you and every other fucker on the Internet. And it's like all anybody will talk about is cashing their $5 for 1500 dollars ticket.
- [36:37]
Julie Swerbinks
Yeah. It's funny because you look at like your thumb across your DraftKings and FanDuela because that's all I have really access to in Connecticut here. And it's just like Same game parlay, 30 for 30. Same game parliament. I'm looking like a, like a nice deposit bonus or like a 50 boost on a, on a single game or an underdog. Same game parlay, same game parlay, same game parlay.
- [37:00]
Chris the Bear Felica
I'm like, like come on, not gonna happen.
- [37:03]
Julie Swerbinks
I know.
- [37:05]
Chris the Bear Felica
So that's impactful for you because you transitioned from sort of back of the house, sometimes on camera but mostly producing, supporting, researching to now being fully on camera as a straight down the barrel sports betting talent. Is it what you expected?
- [37:34]
Julie Swerbinks
Yes. Yeah, it's been great. And it's something that when we, when we were at ESPN and when Patrick first got overturned, like the guys involved on game day, new for. And that was. People always ask me like, like what were you? Like, maybe they'll ask me or I'll just volunteer and say like. The thing I was most proud of in my time at college game day in my time was like being at the forefront of getting wagering type information out there whether, whether it was a reaction to a spread or a historical note that might find a game interesting. We didn't beat around the bush. We knew people were betting on games and we were just going to be in the forefront like. But the challenge for us before it was free and legal and it wasn't the wild wild west was just a way to phrase it and get it out there where it isn't just like, okay, we're laying eight and a half with Ohio State today. It was like, okay, the odds makers expect Michigan State to lose today against number one Ohio State. They're a 10 point underdog. But keep in mind the 15 games at Michigan State where Mark Dantonio's team has been a double digit underdog, They've won nine of them outright and cover that. So it's like a way to make it informative where the average fan who isn't going to bet on a game still might find that interesting. But the fact that we're able to do that made me very happy at game day and I think not only myself but Lee Fitting, who is the producer for the time for a long time, Fowler, Herb street, they always saw this by. And it's the same thing that you saw when you met me and ran into me. Just the passion and the knowledge and the getting animated and getting the, the New York hands and voice going loud and. And they like, we need to capture this on television. And then finally they were like, okay, game day expanded to like three hours and it was like, you've got no more say in the matter. We're always worried. I don't want to look like an idiot and, and start rambling and get, and get going. And I didn't necessarily worry about like freezing or being scared of doing it. I was just like, I don't know. And then finally, nope, we're doing it. And I'm glad, I'm glad we did. We were able to figure out a way with the board and just kind of interacting and throwing some historical nuggets in there at times and it worked out well. And that's one of the things that I don't want to say. It's pushback or bows and arrows. But it's just a little bit of depending on your viewpoint of things. Like one of the things right now where I don't struggle with it because I, I'm free. I'm fully transparent. I say like I'm, I'm a researcher at heart. That's how I got started in, in, in, in sports and numbers and, and math and history and studying and digging through media guides for a note in the middle of the night. Like, I'll always, I'll come up with the historical, like a bunch of historical notes about the NCAA tournament and what does this have to do with this year? And be like potentially nothing. I'm a, I'm a historian. I'm a researcher at heart and I'm just throwing some information. Not everything that I put out there has to be gambling related. But I will say this a lot of like the specific things that I'll tweet out during football season about maybe an unranked team favored by a certain number over a top 15 team or whatever. Like the teams may be different, but the types of teams and the situations remain the same. So I do think there is some value in some of those situational types type deals where you've got things that fit a system. Even like I said, a game in 2004 between Miami and Florida State might not have anything to do with it between a game between Ohio State and Michigan in 2024. But if the situation works then, then it's still something. I think that, that's interesting and maybe follow away in the back of the mind.
- [41:35]
Chris the Bear Felica
You know, it's funny you bring that up. We have Evan Abrams, who I'm sure you, you remember from.
- [41:41]
Julie Swerbinks
Where is he, by the way?
- [41:42]
Chris the Bear Felica
He. I don't know where he is right now.
- [41:44]
Julie Swerbinks
Matt Mitchell, I saw him on the invite. Yeah. Oh, he's.
- [41:47]
Israel Gutierrez
He's busy doing March Madness videos for, for me.
- [41:49]
Chris the Bear Felica
Oh, he's doing something else. But you know, he'll come on the show every week during the football season and he will always come on and oh, he's in there. He's in the chat. He says, hello, what's up, brother? And he will always come on and he will give this incredible information similar to what you were just talking about. And I think the hardest part, Simon, I want you to weigh in on this because I think this is important for people listening is trying to decide how much to let historical trends and precedents influence what we are looking at in the moment. For me, it's always a little bit of a mind fuck. It's hard to determine when to lean into that and when to not.
- [42:32]
Simon Hunter
Yeah, but we say all the time, Chad, it's just another tool in the toolbox. Like, it's just something else you can use. Try to find an edge. And I love it because I am a big believer that history just always repeats itself. Like, you're always going to have the outliers, right? Like Leicester City winning the Premier League. Never going to happen again the rest of our lives, right? This team that was 50001 to win the Premier League, never gonna happen. You know, Villanova, that was 85, having that crazy run, probably never gonna see something like that ever again the rest of our lives. Those are outliers. But a lot of other stuff, like you really dive in, you break it down. It's great info and something you should really listen to and take serious. Like, Evan came on and literally told us, if a team's greater than, what was it, 18 to 1 or 15 to 1 to win March Madness, they're not gonna win. Like, historical data shows us the top favorites even on. Even when it's a crazy year and George Mason's making a final four, the chalk team still is probably gonna win the end. And here we're sitting now with four teams in the final four and it's like, okay, this is why Evan gives us those type of stats where it's like, this might not ring true, but I'm trying to give you guys an edge on the fact that mathematically, if you're betting these long shot odds on these March Madness, it's a dumb bet. Go with the chalk long term. The future market, that's going to pay out. And I mean, like we just said, here we are. It's like, that's why Evan gives all that info. It's. It's good info, but he's not telling you to do it. He's just showing you a path of the way that it could go. That's why I love that stuff. It's like another great tool to use.
- [43:56]
Julie Swerbinks
And that's one of the things too. Like I was like, when you, when you fill out your bracket, odds are you're only going to want to use at most two number one seats because people are going to think that all in all, the number ones are going to get through and it just happened to be an outlier. That's going to be a great question moving forward. Is this year an outlier? We're all for it. Is it just a situation where these four or five Teams were just better than everyone else or is this going to be the norm moving forward where we're going to get three or four number one seed? But, but that's one of the. Oh yeah, they're going to. We're good. We're going to get all four this year. But I'm just thinking it of like a historical play on like game theory. Like if you're filling out your bracket, like you want to differentiate your bracket and not have all four. But hey this year. But you know what, as a fan, that's the thing that a lot of people struggle sometimes as that separating better and fan. Like as a fan, having these four teams, the best four teams that we've said all year long and watching them play is great as a better not having a single moneyline upset in the, in the elite in the elite eight or the Sweet sixteen and the fewest historical upsets ever in terms of points for it hasn't been great as a better. I mean maybe it's a year where the public is doing. The NFL. Public did great in the NFL. Public's done great in college basketball. No underdogs at one. This is an easy business. Chad and Simon Moneyline parlay all the favorites all the time. Right?
- [45:20]
Chris the Bear Felica
Yeah, sure. What, what has surprised you about this this tournament that has these four number one seeds. Do you think that there is a sea change? We're always trying to figure out get ahead of the market. Right. In any respect. And I want to ask you about the NFL too. Last year was a really hard year for NFL underdogs. This year has been a really hard year for college basketball underdogs. Is this an anomaly? Is this a sea change?
- [45:50]
Julie Swerbinks
I don't want to overreact certainly in college basketball because people the knee jerk reaction and maybe it's going to prove to not be a knee jerk reaction is that oh Nil has destroyed it all these mid majors and low major, their best players are going to go to all of these teams and they're, they're going to dominate and you're not going to get these seed updates, seed up upsets in the tournament anymore or they were just the, the point spread upsets but I don't know if I want to just I'm not there yet. You look at the last like you look at the last four years, the seeds in the Final Four, you had two number ones last year but, but you had a San Diego State who was an eight seed and a UConn who was a bad, badly seeded team. They were four seed. But you had Miami get to the the final four yet NC State is an 11. You've had all these low, all these low seeds make the Final Four. So I don't know. And yet I think the last I went back and looked yesterday, I tweeted it out, but I think off the top of my head it was like the previous four years you had like 18, 18, 20 and 19 upsets in the tournament to this point where you had 11 this year. So like I'm not willing to say this is going to be a year in, year out type deal. So I hope I'm wrong. I think we can get there's a happy medium here, there's a happy medium of getting the upsets early in the tournament but having your higher seeds win in the elite eight and the elite in the sweet 16 and you get a final four with two ones, a two and a three and you get that maybe you get an 11 seed in the sweet 16 or you get a 10 seed or whatever. But getting back was funny. I was thinking too what Simon was saying about some of the stuff that Evan and I have put out there, like how history tends to repeat itself. And I think one of the the interesting things was it's something that Evan might have been even involved in looking it up initially when I was at ESPN with Keith Lipscomb as well when we put together the the NCAA tournament packet was just this kind of and I don't know if it was with West Virginia one year. I don't know if it was with with Iowa State. I don't know who the team was. But like the these unranked teams at the start of the year that wind up getting a two seat and you had two of them this year in Michigan State and St. John's where they were unranked at the start of the year you have this completely off the charts great regular season and the previous 39 teams to do it. None of them reached the Final Four. And the theory is these teams that weren't necessarily thought to be good before the year magical runs to the Final Four in the national title games just typically don't come from nowhere in that sense. And it wind up did holding true again this year with both St. John's and Michigan State coming up just short. Spartans made a good run.
- [48:40]
Chris the Bear Felica
But see that's what's great about that. We can all complain. All the ex ESPN heads complain. Can complain about a lot of things at espn. ESPN freaking loves sports.
- [48:54]
Julie Swerbinks
Yes.
- [48:54]
Chris the Bear Felica
And the research to me, the research group, whether it was you know, Sig or any other part of it, like those are die hards what you and Evan would do and that entire team that was involved in research in any way would do with research and come up with those stats. It's freaking glorious.
- [49:17]
Julie Swerbinks
It was. And part of it too is just having the, the financial backing and the creative backing of being able to say, Evan Bear, go, go build an NCAA tournament database. Go build an AP top poll database with all the historical spread like being able, just given free reign. To be able to do that, knowing that you're going to get a payoff off of that was. It was just incredible. And still use it today. Update him and have my own stuff and do it. It's great.
- [49:51]
Chris the Bear Felica
True story. In 2017, when I had gotten the call from the Chernin Group, who was the company and the the private equity business that wanted to launch what would become Action, it wasn't anything yet. They called and said, do you want to come found this sports media betting business with us? And I was debating, am I going to leave a very comfortable life overseeing ESPN Digital and living in central Connecticut? Bear. And like a kid who was a freshman in high school and you know, a little bit another kid who's a little bit younger and they've got a great life, am I going to dump that to go to this startup, make half as much money on the hope that it will all get paid back if we sell it one day? I'm sitting with John Skipper, who was the president of ESPN at the time. And one of the things he offered me to stay was to take over Stats and information, which called SIG, which is like a two to 300 person group that is the heartbeat of every stat, every bit of research you see across every show at espn. I think it is an amazing group. Wasn't enough though.
- [51:12]
Julie Swerbinks
I was gonna say that. That's a scoop.
- [51:15]
Chris the Bear Felica
Yeah.
- [51:16]
Julie Swerbinks
Know that.
- [51:16]
Chris the Bear Felica
Wow, those are good times. Bear, I want to ask you a little bit about the NFL because you had a tweet the other day. Simon read the tweet that he had because I feel like you and I and Chris all have difference of opinion on this particular topic.
- [51:33]
Simon Hunter
Yeah, Bear, I thought it was really interesting you tweeted out, you know, four or five days ago that you would love to know how the QB position and depth and development got so bad in the NFL. Is it a college thing? Is the guy's been cited for agency. That makes zero sense. Which, what's your view on that? You just think we have really shitty QB play or you Just talking about the back end, like the, the back 25 to 32 guy.
- [51:54]
Julie Swerbinks
It just amazes me that we are at a point in 2025 headed the season that like there is a demand that Russell Wilson and Aaron Rodgers and Justin Fields like are like considered starting quarterbacks. Like, like, like, like I don't know where, where is the end? I think someone who replied back like it's not that different. There's always been really bad quarterback play at the end. But if someone who watched the jets last year, like I look, I love I, I rooted for Aaron. I was excited when he came to the jets and it sucked that he ruptured his Achilles when he, when he did. But you're looking at a guy now that what's he going to be 41 start of the year coming off of an Achilles injury. Like is the market that bad that you're really looking to run out there and have this guy who at times last year look like he was done. Like if you're Mike Tomlin on the Steelers, are you, is that really your, your end game? And I guess part of the problem too is maybe it's just a league wide pandemic where so much of the league maybe is in the middle. But look at what, look at what the, the, the, the Bear like Justin Fields like left and like what he was able to, what the Bears like got for him. There was no mark of him and now he's making whatever it is like it's insane are paying him compared to what the market really, really was for him just a year prior. But I lost my train of thought there. But oh yeah, the Steelers I think are a perfect example. They're a team that needs a quarterback. But like so much of the league now with the parody and everyone's in the middle. It's the worst place to be in the NFL. And like you kind of think okay, we're a quarterback away. We need that was one piece and maybe it's lightning in a bottle with Russell Wilson. Maybe we get one year at a Aaron Rodgers and it's magic. But like you're never good enough to like make the super bowl, but you're never bottoming out where you're in a position to draft a quarterback who's ultimately going to be a team, a team changer and get you on court year. You're, you're nine and eight, you're making the playoffs as a wild card, you're picking 18th every year and, and it's like the worst place to be in this and Maybe that's part of it as well but maybe the college part of it as well with, with the RPO and the. In some of these spread offenses. Maybe the, maybe with the portal now in college football where guys staying in the league earlier they're older. I don't, I don't know what the answer is. I'm curious to get your guys takes up but. But it's just fascinating to me that we're just kind of recycling in these same guys over and over again again. And maybe I don't claim I know everything about the position but it's amazing the sport that I watch every Saturday like and see some of the guys that are there. I'm like why can't these guys be quarterbacks in the NFL?
- [54:57]
Camila Ramon
You know when you're really stressed or not feeling so great about your life or about yourself, talking to someone who understands can really help. But who is that person? How do you find them? Where do you even start? Talkspace. Talkspace makes it easy to get the support you need. With Talkspace you can go online, answer a few questions about your preferences and be matched with a therapist. And because you'll meet your therapist online, you don't have to take time off work or arrange childcare. You'll meet on your schedule wherever you feel most at ease. If you're depressed, stressed, struggling with a relationship, or if you want some counseling for you and your partner or just need a little extra one on one support, Talkspace is here for you. Plus Talkspace works with most major insurers and most insured members have a zero dollar copay. No insurance, no problem. Now get $80 off of your first month with promo code space80 when you go to talkspace.com match with a licensed therapist today at talkspace.com save $80 with code space80@talkspace.com we've definitely seen a switch.
- [55:59]
Simon Hunter
Too where you know we had that lost generation right with that Andrew Luck RG3 like the only guys I feel like survived it was Stafford and Rogers right that little like two guys out of that whole group that 10 year run we just even when Cam Newton came in he had a year or two like a really incredible but was sustainable and we've seen now I think just because athleticism now has moved to be such a crucial part of the quarterback position like you know long like Tom Brady as much I love Tom, we all know he's the goat. He, he wouldn't be in the league now. Like you go back and look at his tape from back in the day.
- [56:33]
Chris the Bear Felica
That's crazy.
- [56:34]
Simon Hunter
He had led, he had led in his shoes, Chad. He could not move, he could not run. You can't be a drop back, stand in the pocket, passing on a phone anymore. If you are, you're going to be Derek Carr. Do you want Derek Carr in your team, Chad? No. You don't want a guy who just stands back there and you, you don't want that anymore. It's, it's evolved, right? You need a mobile guy who can move just because the athleticism is just off the charts now. And it's funny going back even like I, I before he came on, I went back and looked and you know what, what were we working with in 2005? Like who were the bottom guys? Because I just want to look at, at what Chris was talking about here. And I looked at the passing leaders, right? Not even looking at rushing, just the passing leaders. In 2005, the bottom of the list, the worst quarterback in football, Chris Simms, not a shocker left, which was right above him. Trent Dilfer, right above him. David Carr, right above him. So it's like Aaron Brooks right above them. So we've always had just the shit at the bottom. Yeah, I agree with you. Now it feels like it's more so because everyone wants to lie to themselves to be like, well, the 49ers got there with Jimmy Garoppolo, right? Or you could say the, that Eli Manning got to two Super Bowls and won two Super Bowls. Like Joe Flacco got to a Super bowl and won a Super Bowl. Everyone thinks they can get away with having a bad quarterback, but I feel like Chris kind of nailed it there. That we've entered this stage of it feels like it's impossible now unless you have just one of the best teams ever put together where it used to be, you kind of hide the bad quarterback now. To me it's, there's no hiding it. Like if, if he's not a great athlete, if he's not a great passer, defense are going to figure out they're going to take away whatever you're good at. They're going to take it away and make you look like what we just talked about, a below bottom 25 quarterback. So yeah, it's interesting hearing your view on it. I just think that we're just in a weird stage of we had a dead period there. We had these lost years where we didn't have any quarterbacks really coming out because it was a transition of that pocket passer to being mobile athlete. Like it it's you look at the position now. Josh Allen, if you dropped him back, I mean think how crazy we were about Mike Vick. You dropped Josh Allen back to that time period. Holy. People's heads would be exploding. It's like wait, this 6, 5 white dude who weighs 250 can bulldoze a linebacker and then the same move ship, like shift off the cornerback and throw a deep ball at six. It's just crazy how much it's just grown the last 20 years. Like especially going back and watching film from 2005, it just feels like a totally different sport. I don't get the same view, Chris, but to me it's just we're in different worlds now.
- [59:00]
Julie Swerbinks
Yeah, it is. And one thing that I was thinking of as well, I was going to say before Chad jumps in, I wonder if this overreaching and like taking some of these quarterbacks too high in the draft and guys just absolutely flopping, like whether it be a Mac Jones or a Zach Wilson or a Fields or who name the quarter you can go down. The list is endless of guys that wind up going in the top 10, top 12 that absolutely flopped. And I wonder if that's maybe part of it as well where like teams take these guys who really shouldn't go this high and they predictably fail. Like do we just have this negative kind of. He, he, he stinks. He stinks. He stinks. Oh yeah. Why would they want him? He stinks. So it's, it's like I wonder if it's kind of like this self fulfilling prophecy on our end to just kind of be negative.
- [59:54]
Chris the Bear Felica
I don't know guys, this is all contextual. There are no absolutes here. There are always going to be bad quarterbacks. There are always going to be great quarterbacks. There are always going to be quarterbacks who come out of nowhere and surprise you to become great quarterbacks. And there's always going to be quarterbacks taking the top of the draft who absolutely flail and we're like, this dude sucks. I will say this about Tom Brady. You don't become Tom Brady because you don't adjust. And what Tom Brady did, and I think what a lot of quarterbacks don't do, they don't spend the time to self scout. They don't spend the time to be intellectually honest. You cannot succeed in anything unless you are intellectually honest about what's in front of you, whether it's what your tape says, what your numbers say, etc. So you can actively improve for any better. Simon what are we spending this whole off season doing? Self scouting trying to figure out where did things go right? Where do things go wrong in the 2025 season? Do we need to make adjustments because of previous rules changes? How do new rules changes impact what we might want to be doing? Our favorites going to regress to where they were before. Tom Brady was a master of self scouting. Bill Belichick was a master of self scouting. That is a gift that so many teams and so many coaches are not accepting as a part of their responsibility. They work out thinking they need to improve their body, they need to improve certain elements of their game, but they don't actually work on the elements as in depth as they need to. That can actually make them better because they were terrible at it. That's what Tom Brady did. He would have adjusted. He did adjust. And I would also argue it's not like Joe Burrow or Matthew Stafford are the most mobile quarterbacks.
- [61:49]
Simon Hunter
He is Joe Burrow. Chad would burrow.
- [61:51]
Chris the Bear Felica
No, no, let me finish, Let me finish. They're great in the pocket. Their mobility is defined to the space that they are supposed to stay in and then ability to be creative when they need to be creative within a, you know, 10 yard radius in front of them, behind them, to the left of them, to the right of them. Tom Brady was great at that too. Only he did that within a two yard radius. Right. It's just the little bit of footwork to me that is the difference.
- [62:20]
Simon Hunter
Yeah, he was a goat. I mean, we're not taking that away. I'm just saying that if you took him and he was a six round pick at that time because he was good in the pocket, he was a good pocket passer. No one would even throw his tape on now because it's like you need a guy that can run outside the pocket. Like, that's what I'm trying to get to is that I look at the NFL now, Stafford's been grandfathered in, right? He's of that last group, like Aaron Rodgers that passed. Aaron Rodgers was a great athlete too when he was younger. So was Stafford. But we've hit a point now of when I look at this draft class, like, there's no one just stand in the pocket type of guy that goes high in the draft anymore. Like, even when I go through all these previous jobs, like we joked about Mac Jones, you know, he was kind of a guy that was probably would have been all right in the early 2000s. Now, he's not athletic enough. Like he's not mobile enough. He can't get outside the pocket and throw on the run. His career is over. And it's just, I look at our list now where all of our top 10 guys, we talk every year coming in, they're all incredibly great athletes. Like it's just the way it is. Where back in the day, like my, our one of my favorite errors was that, you know, Peyton Manning was a statue in the pocket, Tom Brady was a statue in the pocket, Drew Brees was a statue in the pocket. It was like these guys were so gifted mentally, they didn't need to run and scramble. Right. They knew exactly where the defender is going to be. And I think what we're talking a little bit about here is that you, you need that smarts in the pocket, but you need the athleticism now. And that to me has been the biggest shift of, you know, people. Every day they're like, oh, we don't have the 5,000 yard passing and the 60 touchdowns. It's like that was the one year anomaly we saw. That's never going to happen again. Like those are the force outliers ever. It's just a new age of, you know, these guys are going to throw for maybe 4,000 yards, but like Josh Allen, you'll see maybe a thousand yards rushing and him rush for 15 freaking touchdowns. It's like, it's just so different now that, you know, we try to compare it to the old age and I just look at it, it's like we've evolved. We've evolved so quickly that these new kids coming in, like we just talked about, you know, Bo Nix, in what world is he a first round pick but in the new NFL he is now, right? And it worked. Like, I mean Matt Mitchell is losing his mind about it and it's like, you know, because he saw him in college for what, five, six years and now he comes in and it works out. So it's just crazy how that shifted now where the studs in college who are just dropped back passers, they just don't make it to the league like they used to. You have to be able to move in the pocket and scramble outside the pocket. So that was just what I want to push on, was just that, you know, I get where Chris is coming from. But like you just said, Chad, there's always just been dog shit from that 25 to 32. It's just always been that way.
- [64:47]
Julie Swerbinks
Simon, you said the magic two words there. Draft props. Have you guys seen anything out? Like it's like in Connecticut, I mean we can't play them on DraftKings and FanDuel or whoever else. But, like, do they exist anywhere? Like, I know they're at spots where. Who will be the number one pick. Yeah. Who wants to. Yeah. Cam Ward, minus 16. But, like, in terms of, like, who the second quarterback's going to be, number of quarterbacks in the. In the first round, like, stuff like that. Does this exist anywhere outside of the little bubble that I'm in in the state of Connecticut?
- [65:20]
Simon Hunter
So the bookmakers I've talked to Bear, they got crushed so bad these last three years in the draft. They don't want to put it out until maybe two weeks beforehand, maybe even a week beforehand, just because it's not worth it for him. Like, they just. They can't beat the rumor mill.
- [65:36]
Julie Swerbinks
Right.
- [65:36]
Simon Hunter
They're just behind on the info. So it's. I'm with you. It's been really interesting where I remember even last year I was able to get bets down after the combine on the draft. Yeah. On. On things like that now. Yeah. I think the bookmakers know that they can't leave themselves open to it. So I'm with you on. It's brutal. Just been waiting for these props to come out.
- [65:54]
Julie Swerbinks
Chad, wouldn't you. I'm gonna put you as the book of Chad. Wouldn't you want to post these things, get people in the door? And you know what? You lose a little bit and the player wins. You know what the player is going to do? Players are going to come back and players going to bet that money that they just won right back at your shop.
- [66:13]
Chris the Bear Felica
Yeah, I'm a little surprised that they wouldn't be more aggressive even for really small limits. Right. Because you're. You're capping it at 50 bucks. You're still sort of letting people continue to play and put their money into the book. But. So, yeah, it is. It is a little bit surprising to me. I'm actually looking for at bet365 to see what kind of draft props I can find. It's hard for me to find them quickly right now.
- [66:52]
Julie Swerbinks
That's the thing. I always never know if I'm looking under college football, if I'm looking under NFL.
- [66:57]
Chris the Bear Felica
Right.
- [66:59]
Julie Swerbinks
Special NFL draft tab.
- [67:03]
Chris the Bear Felica
Simon's right. There were years, like, just go back to the. The Mac Jones year. Was he gonna go number three? Was he not gonna go number three? And books got crushed on that because people like Simon, you know, they're connected to the league, they were hearing things, and all of a sudden they're putting down six figures that he's not going to go number three. And that's a huge risk. And I do think that the books generally are looking to. It's a lot of jockeying. It's a challenging time to be a sportsbook operator. Right. Everyone is trying to acquire customers not to get into the weeds of the business as efficiently they can and then drive revenue as high as they can because those are the expectations and there are a lot of challenges and things are slower during the non football season than they are during the football season. It's going to be harder to make up that money on a quarterly basis for all these publicly traded companies if they have to go out and report they had huge losses in the NFL draft and they didn't make it up with the beginning of Major League Baseball or March Madness or NBA. Just gets harder and harder to.
- [68:12]
Julie Swerbinks
It's so funny. Simon mentioned Bo Nix. I'm sitting here thinking and I was like him I'm like. And Matt like what the hell have we seen in Bo Nix playing six years of college football that, that he's going to be a first. And I remember seeing the yes, no will Bonix be a first round pick? And you immediately bet the no. And then like all the, the, the, the prices. And then about a week maybe before the draft last maybe it's a week maybe, maybe a little bit longer before like I get a call from someone who's he's like Bonix is going in the first round. I'm like no, like Bo Nix is going in the first round. I'm telling you right now, Bo Nix is going in the first round. So fortunately I was able to actually make a profit because the, the yes price was longer than the no that I bet. But yeah, I was stunned. And you're right, it's the, it's the information and just being kind of privy to things that not everybody can get it can get ahead on. So yeah, I, I'd love to just for a book to just to kind of put themselves out there and throw a Will Jackson dart, be the second quarterback taken in the, in the, in the, in the NFL draft. We're over under two and a half or three and a half because I, I think we're, I think we're definitely going to get three and, and I wonder like I know McShay talked about Tyler Schuck like could. I don't know if we'll get four but I think we're definitely going to get three quarterbacks in the first round. So I'm curious, I'm sure it'll be over two and a half. Juice to the moon is what they'll wind up posting once they do post this stuff.
- [69:47]
Chris the Bear Felica
We'll get there as we get closer for sure. And Jackson Dart is the guy, you know, we're going to dig deep into the draft of the next few weeks. He's the guy who's going to be on everyone's board for sure.
- [69:58]
Julie Swerbinks
Yeah. And then they'll throw on his Florida tape and the Florida game where he was absolutely terrible and cost Ole Miss a playoff spot. And that'll be the that, that'll, that'll be the the detractors tape where it's you want to take this guy with the number whatever pick on the draft. Look, look, look. Look at this game. And he was terrible against the Gators.
- [70:16]
Chris the Bear Felica
Well, then we get into the space of you can make anyone look good or bad at any time. Bear, it's great catching up with you, brother. Absolutely awesome to see you. As a reminder, the Favorites podcast is presented by bet365, a new bet365 customers get $150 in bonus bets when you bet $5. Sign up using promo code favorites deposit $10. Place a bet for $5. Get $150 in bonus bets. Those bonus bets can be used on spreads, totals, player props, futures and more. Whatever the moment, it's Never Ordinary. At BET365 must be 21 or older in present in Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Illinois, Louisiana, North Carolina, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia or 18 and older in Kentucky. Gambling problem. Call 1-800- GAMBLER or 1-800-BITS OFF an Iowa Terms Conditions restrictions apply. Simon and I will return with our next episode of the Favorites on the Action Network YouTube page Thursday, 11am Eastern with special guest Bears Fox Sports colleague Danny Parkins. My Chicago Brother. Download us from Spotify, Apple Pods, wherever you get your pods. Rate Review Subscribe Leave us. 5 stars. Say whatever you want. Feedback is a gift. Until next time. Love you.
- [71:32]
Camila Ramon
Action Network reminds you Please gamble responsibly. If you or someone you care about has a gambling problem, help is available 247 at 1-800-GAMBLER. You know when you're really stressed or not feeling so great about your life or about yourself, talking to someone who understands can really help. But who is that person? How do you find them? Where do you even start? Talkspace. Talkspace makes it easy to get the support you need. With Talkspace, you can go online, answer a few questions about your preferences, and be matched with a therapist. And because you'll Meet your therapist online. You don't have to take time off work or arrange childcare. You'll meet on your schedule wherever you feel most at ease. If you're depressed, stressed, struggling with a relationship, or if you want some counseling for you and your partner or just need a little extra one on one support, Talkspace is here for you. Plus, Talkspace works with most major insurers and most insured members have a $0 copay. No insurance, no problem. Now get $80 off of your first month with promo code space80 when you go to talkspace.com match with a licensed therapist today at talkspace.com save $80 with code space80@talkspace.com what's up everyone?
- [72:44]
Julie Swerbinks
Julie Swerbinks here along with former NHL player Nate Thompson. We're doing a new podcast together. Here we go. The name Energy Line with Nate and jsb. Each week we'll get together and talk about hockey life. All topics are fair game, right? Exactly. And you'll never know who will drop by to join us. Julie is pretty well connected. She has text threads going that you wouldn't believe. Listen to Energy Line with Nate and jsb on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [73:15]
Camila Ramon
I'm Camila Ramon.
- [73:17]
Julie Swerbinks
And I'm Liz Ortiz and our podcast hastavajo is where sports, music and fitness.
- [73:22]
Camila Ramon
Collide and we cover it all.
- [73:24]
Julie Swerbinks
The Arriva A.
- [73:25]
Camila Ramon
This season we sit down with history makers like the Sucar family who became the first Peruvians to win a Grammy.
- [73:32]
Chris the Bear Felica
It was a very special moment for us. It's been 15 years for me in this career. Finally, things are starting to shift. Shift into a different level.
- [73:41]
Camila Ramon
Listen to Astavajo on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Elf Beauty, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports.
- [73:50]
Israel Gutierrez
I'm Israel Gutierrez and I'm hosting a.
- [73:52]
Chris the Bear Felica
New podcast, Dub Dynasty, the story of how the Golden State warriors have dominated the NBA for over a decade.
- [73:59]
Julie Swerbinks
The Golden State warriors once again are NBA champions today.
- [74:04]
Chris the Bear Felica
The warriors dynasty remains alive in large.
- [74:07]
Israel Gutierrez
Part because of a scrawny 6 foot.
- [74:09]
Chris the Bear Felica
2 hooper who everyone seems to love.
- [74:11]
Simon Hunter
For what Steph has done for the game. He's certainly on that Mount Rushmore.
- [74:15]
Chris the Bear Felica
Come revisit this magical warriors ride. Listen to dub dynasty starting April 8th.
- [74:19]
Israel Gutierrez
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.