PMS 2.0 1371 - Jalen Ramsey Traded to the Steelers, Adam Schefter, Peyton Manning, Shams Charania, Cal Raleigh, Darius Butler, & AJ Hawk

Summary

Summary of "PMS 2.0 1371 - Jalen Ramsey Traded to the Steelers, Adam Schefter, Peyton Manning, Shams Charania, Cal Raleigh, Darius Butler, & AJ Hawk"

Release Date: June 30, 2025

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1. Major Trade: Jalen Ramsey to the Pittsburgh Steelers

Pat McAfee opens the episode discussing a blockbuster trade involving the Pittsburgh Steelers and Miami Dolphins. The highlight of the trade is Jalen Ramsey, a nine-year NFL veteran cornerback, being moved to the Steelers.

• Pat McAfee [00:00]: "Jalen Ramsey's now a Pittsburgh Steeler. John Smith, also a Pittsburgh Steeler. Minka Fitzpatrick, no longer a Steeler, he's once again a Miami Dolphin."

2. Steelers' Strategic Moves and Financial Implications

The Steelers have been aggressive in bolstering their defense by acquiring Jalen Ramsey and John O. Smith, while trading away Minka Fitzpatrick. This move showcases the team's intent to "go all in" for the upcoming season.

• AJ Hawk [03:20]: "But no, this is what you call going all in this off season for the Steelers. And you ask, you know, how are they going to afford this?"

Darius J. Butler supports the decision, emphasizing Ramsey's prime and impact on the secondary.

• Darius J. Butler [07:09]: "He is a needle mover, he can do everything in the secondary."

The conversation touches upon the Steelers' cap management, highlighting significant contracts like DK Metcalf ($30 million/year) and the strategic signing of Aaron Rodgers at a lower quarterback cap hit.

3. Impact on Miami Dolphins and Player Movements

The Dolphins, previously struggling, have revamped their roster by acquiring talents like Tyreek Hill and drafting Tua Tagovailoa. However, trading away Ramsey and others raises questions about their future strategy.

• Darius J. Butler [05:03]: "Tyreek's still fast. Yes, he is faster than he was last."

The departure of key players leaves gaps in the Dolphins' lineup, particularly in tight ends and cornerbacks, necessitating moves in the free agency market.

4. Interview with Adam Schefter: Inside the Jalen Ramsey Trade

Adam Schefter, ESPN's senior NFL insider, provides insights into the complexities of the Ramsey trade.

• Adam Schefter [09:17]: "This was a very Surreal scene... The Steelers have stepped up, and they're paying all these guys right now."

Schefter discusses the Steelers' commitment to Ramsey and the financial adjustments made, including a partial assumption of Ramsey's $26.6 million contract by the Dolphins.

5. Contractual Concerns: T.J. Watt's Future with the Steelers

A significant portion of the discussion revolves around T.J. Watt, a cornerstone of the Steelers' defense, who is currently in a contractual dispute.

• Pat McAfee [11:27]: "Everybody just has assumed, rightfully, that the two Sides will figure it out, but I don't think they're very close right now."

Watt's absence from mandatory minicamps and the Steelers' unwillingness to renegotiate his contract leave his future uncertain, potentially impacting the team's defensive prowess.

6. Free Agency and the Miami Dolphins' Outlook

The Dolphins are navigating free agency amidst roster changes, aiming to strengthen positions left vacant by recent trades. Shams Charania comments on the team's strategic additions and the evolving dynamics.

• Shams Charania [12:41]: "It gives them options in the secondary Pat about how they want to go about doing this."

7. Peyton Manning Discusses NFL Quarterbacks on Netflix Series

Peyton Manning, guest on the show, delves into his recent project—a Netflix series focusing on NFL quarterbacks. He reflects on the stories of Joe Burrow, Jared Goff, and Kirk Cousins, highlighting their leadership and resilience.

• Peyton Manning [30:13]: "You'll see just how cool, calm and cool Joe Burrow is all the time."

Manning emphasizes the personal growth and challenges faced by these quarterbacks, providing viewers with an intimate look into their professional lives.

8. NBA Free Agency: LeBron James and Giannis Antetokounmpo’s Future

The episode shifts focus to the NBA, discussing LeBron James' decision to opt into his player option with the Los Angeles Lakers and comparisons to Giannis Antetokounmpo's situation with the Milwaukee Bucks.

• Adam Schefter [68:28]: "LeBron James is evaluating how he wants to finish his career, where he wants to finish his career."

The potential for LeBron to remain with the Lakers or seek opportunities elsewhere mirrors the dynamic nature of NBA contracts and free agency strategies.

9. Malik Beasley's Gambling Investigation and Its Implications

AJ Hawk brings up the ongoing investigation into Malik Beasley by the USDA's office concerning potential gambling on NBA games. This situation poses significant risks for Beasley's free agency prospects and the integrity of the league.

• AJ Hawk [82:23]: "What do we know as of recently with Malik Beasley?"

Adam Schefter explains the legal complexities and the potential fallout depending on the investigation's outcome.

10. Baseball Spotlight: Cal Raleigh’s Success with the Seattle Mariners

The show features Cal Raleigh, a standout catcher for the Seattle Mariners, discussing his role, batting prowess, and participation in the Home Run Derby.

• Cal Raleigh [99:34]: "I'm excited to be doing it. It's kind of one of those, like, dream come true kind of things."

Raleigh shares insights into his training, hitting strategies, and the challenges of balancing defensive duties with offensive performance.

11. NHL Expansion Talks: Potential New Teams in Indianapolis and Beyond

The podcast touches on the potential expansion of the NHL, with discussions about cities like Indianapolis, New Orleans, and Houston as possible new franchise locations. The implications for local economies and the growth of hockey in the U.S. are explored.

• Adam Schefter [75:07]: "We have a pretty big wrinkle into not only the Lakers at center, but other teams at Center."

12. Wrapping Up: The Evolving Sports Landscape

Pat McAfee concludes the episode by reflecting on the rapid changes in the sports world, the impact of major trades, free agency movements, and the intertwining of different sports leagues' dynamics.

• Pat McAfee [177:57]: "And then we see makeup. Fitzpatrick's, John Smith's going. Two late round picks. Who's paying for all this? Who's doing what? Wow, the Steelers are all in."

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Notable Quotes:

• Pat McAfee [00:00]: "Jalen Ramsey's now a Pittsburgh Steeler."
• AJ Hawk [03:20]: "They're going all in for this season."
• Darius J. Butler [07:09]: "He is a needle mover, he can do everything in the secondary."
• Adam Schefter [09:17]: "This was a very Surreal scene... The Steelers have stepped up."
• Peyton Manning [30:13]: "You'll see just how cool, calm and cool Joe Burrow is all the time."
• Adam Schefter [68:28]: "LeBron James is evaluating how he wants to finish his career."
• Cal Raleigh [99:34]: "It's kind of one of those, like, dream come true kind of things."
• Pat McAfee [177:57]: "The Steelers are all in."

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This episode of The Pat McAfee Show provides an in-depth look into significant sports trades, the strategic maneuvers of NFL and NBA teams, personal interviews with sports legends, and the ongoing challenges within various leagues. From the seismic Jalen Ramsey trade to the intricate negotiations surrounding top athletes like LeBron James and Malik Beasley, the show offers listeners a comprehensive understanding of the current sports landscape.

Transcript

[Pat McAfee]

Hello beautiful people, and welcome to our humble abode, the Thunderdome on this massive overreaction. Monday, June 30, 2025. This program begins now. Sports are happening in a big way. We got a lot of news, a lot of conversations. There's been a massive trade or trades happening with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Miami Dolphins that we'll dive into here in about four minutes with Adam Schefter who broke the news, I believe from the Oakmont Country Club in Plumborough, Pennsylvania. Huge news early. Jalen Ramsey's now a Pittsburgh Steeler. John ooh Smith, also a Pittsburgh Steeler. Minka Fitzpatrick, no longer a Steeler, he's once again a Miami Dolphin. Alongside a couple late round draft swaps almost between the Steelers and the Dolphins. Huge news this morning. Jalen Ramsey being traded had been a conversation that's been taking place for like a month now. Had a big price tag like 24 million or something along those lines, who was going to pay, who was going to make the trade, who was going to have Jalen Ramsey on their team at the age of 30, still in the middle of his prime, nine year NFL vet Darius J. Butler. Do we agree?

[Darius J. Butler]

Very much so. Very much in his prime just got re upped, what couple years ago. So hate to see him leaving the Dolphins.

[Pat McAfee]

Obviously a lot of people, obviously Darius Butler, massive Dolphins fan, South Florida boy. But he has picked up some other teams as well because the Miami Dolphins have not had much success. Now when they bring Jalen in, they bring Tyreek in, obviously they draft tua, they start spending all their resources on trying to win in a big way and now it basically everybody's gone. Ramsey was supposed to go back maybe to LA to be on the Rams. Then the Steelers conversation started to kind of chime in. Now we know Jalen is a Pittsburgh Steeler, Minka Fitzpatrick is now a Miami Dolphin. And John Smith, who's a tight end for the Miami Dolphins, that was allegedly being shopped to the Pittsburgh Steelers over the last few weeks. But was he just trying to get a deal done? Was he just utilizing the media and insiders, his agent, to get a little leverage so that the Miami Dolphins feel obligated to pay John Smith, all pro great football player for the Miami Dolphins. Well, now we know John Smith was actually being shopped at actually trying to get traded. And Johnny Smith is now a Pittsburgh Steeler. So now the Pittsburgh Steelers at DK Metcalfe at $30 million a year, at wide receiver they had Aaron Rodgers at $10 million a year. They just Bring in Jalen Ramsey and John Smith and oh yeah, Darius Slay. Also on The Pittsburgh Steelers, T.J. watts. Deal still looming. Lingering out there. 40 million is what Miles Garrett got paid annually. How are you able to pay everybod Jalen and now John Oo Smith and obviously you had DK with the $30 million a year. Aaron Rodgers not getting paid a lot of money at the quarterback position, which is good news. But how are you able to get all this done? Who knows? Who cares? Says the insers. Let's go to one half of the hammer, dad. Cowboys. Apton already got a Ramsey jersey.

[AJ Hawk]

Already got a Rams jersey. Shout out. Shipping got here just like a couple minutes ago.

[Pat McAfee]

Is that like a throwback? Steelers. I don't remember those colors ever. Representing the Pittsburgh.

[AJ Hawk]

I think the website that I ordered from got colors wrong. So I'll send it back after the show. I don't want to say who it starts with. An F. Football. Football.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Yeah.

[AJ Hawk]

But no, this is what you call going all in this off season for the Steelers. And you ask, you know, how are they going to afford this? The con artist is, is going to figure that out. He is a numbers guy, a numbers cruncher.

[Pat McAfee]

Omar Khan. Yes. Omar Khan, who is the general manager of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

[AJ Hawk]

Before he became the gm, he was the, you know, the cap guy, the pseudo cap guy for years and years and years. So he's going to get that done. You bring in all these guys and it's, it's. They're going all in for this season. This is not a, hey, we're going to tank for a quarterback next year type season. This is, hey, we are looking at right now. We are not a reload, rebuild situation. This is, we're going to win super bowl this year with these guys. It's awesome. Now we did lose Minka. I will not say anything bad about Minka Fitzpatrick ever. For years and years and years, he was by far one of the best players on the team.

[Pat McAfee]

Was.

[AJ Hawk]

Was always a staller in the secondary. But if you would have told me yesterday, hey, we're trading Minka for John who? Smith and Jalen Ramsey. I would have taken it. It'll be interesting to see what they do at the safety position. But no, this is, this is awesome. This was, this was just what we needed today.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. And this is huge news. And this is a lot of the football rumors kind of ending. Yeah. You know, a lot of it coming out of the Miami Dolphins camp. Now that is going to slow down to a sizzle. I can't wait to hear a Miami Dolphins fan at Bubba Gumpino. The other half of the hammer down Cowboys. Dolphins got players still on the roster. Yeah, Minka. Glad to have him back.

[Adam Schefter]

Hate that we lost Jonu, literally our.

[Pat McAfee]

Best player last year. We're gonna have to hit the free agency mark because we don't really have a tight end and we need some cornerbacks. Well, that's the thing about the free agency market. Nobody had been doing that already, so there's a lot left out there. We're going fishing, you know, good luck to the Dolphins down there. We love McDaniel. We love Tua, we love Miami. We love the fact that they're, you know, they got great uniforms that look very similar to the one that AP Tone is wearing right now.

[Darius J. Butler]

Tyreek's still fast.

[Pat McAfee]

Yes, he is faster than he was last. I believe. Love Tyreek Hill in his ability to play football and get open and everything like that. Waddle's awesome at one of the greatest celebrations. Yeah. By far.

[Connor]

In all of sports untouched. Really.

[Pat McAfee]

That stock stable at boss of Connor and attire Schmidt. A couple things to go back to there. The con artist, which some people who might be watching don't know, that is Omar Khan. He's the general manager of the Pittsburgh Steelers. That is a favorable nickname.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yes.

[Pat McAfee]

That is like, hey, this guy is an artist. His last name's Khan. And it kind of goes together with a negative kind of terminology and calling somebody a con. But in these deals, he always feels like he's getting a good deal. He's a good deal maker. He was a salary cap guy for a very long time. Knows the ins and outs of it all. I also think that Omar Khan knew, you know, because for a long time, general manager of the Pittsburgh series was Kevin Colbert. Kevin Colbert. Since, like, the beginning of time, he was there. So then Omar Khan becomes general manager of the Pittsburgh Steelers. So how the Pittsburgh Steelers had been run, everybody assumed was just going to maintain the same way. Hey, this is how the Steelers do it. This is how the Steelers do it. This is how the Steelers do it. Now he's changing things up in a big way. Coach Tomlin's changing things up in a big way. And I think it's because they heard the outside noise of all the ins are saying, we're tired of being nine and eight. You have an over.500 winning record. We are proud of you. That is awesome. But it leaves us in purgatory. They're making massive moves that they don't normally do. D bus.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah. This isn't necessarily the Steeler way as been over the years, but you're in a division. What I mean, I think two top five quarterbacks and pretty good teams around them. Obviously the Ravens are clearly, I think, the number one team going into this season, but you never know where Joe Burrow is going to be. And then bringing in a guy like Jalen Ramsey, like he is a guy, he's a needle mover, he can do everything in the secondary. Actually it was a video from about four years ago and a million dollars worth of game podcast where he kind of talked about that. But me personally, my style, I like Charles because I think even though I say Deion is the best corner to play the game, I say Charles is the best defensive back to play the game because he played multiple positions in the secondary. He played corner, he played safety, he played nickel.

[Pat McAfee]

He did.

[Darius J. Butler]

He did a bunch of different stuff, you know what I mean? And he affected the game in so many different ways. And you know, me coming to LA like that's kind of a role that I started to being a little bit.

[Pat McAfee]

Like I'm still on the on the.

[Darius J. Butler]

Edges, on the corner majority of the time, but here and there I'm start they starting to, you know, let me be me a little bit more, mix it in playing a little bit of nickel and then at some point in my career, if it take me there to safety, I want to do that as well. But I want to have the mix of all so that me looking at it. That's what I say. If I had to pick one person, I'd pick Charles.

[Pat McAfee]

Shout out million dollars worth of game.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah, for sure. And that was four years ago. So now he's going into year 10 still playing the outside at a very high level, can play on the ins. One of the gripes he had with Fangio when he was in Miami was he didn't let him match up, didn't let him go inside a ton. You put him on his Steelers defense, he could be in that star position where he played at Florida State and really impact the run game in the past game. Phenomenal, phenomenal player. He talked about C. Wood. C. Wood won the defensive player of the year at age 33 back in 2009 with the green Bay Packers. So he's a player that can do this. It's just going to make everybody around him better as well.

[Pat McAfee]

I love that. Let's see if that's the plan. Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, is a man who is part of the news break this week. Morning from I believe one of the hardest golf courses on earth right there in the hills of Pittsburgh. Ladies and gentlemen, Senior NFL Insider for espn. Adam Schefter, Shefty, we'll get to you golfing at Oakmont here in a bit. And you being in Plum, our hometown, which we hope you go pay your respects to. Rudy Subs Get a whole Italian hot lettuce, onion, mayo, fries, cheese on a side, Turner's jug to go. Let's talk about this deal. We just showed that million dollars worth of game clip from 2021 and Deb just talked about Jalen Ramsey in very high regard whenever it comes to being a D back in the NFL with how athletic he is, how diverse he is, how everything really comes together if they let him. Are the Steelers planning on utilizing Jalen Ramsey in any certain ways? Do we know at this point? And Minka heading out of town. What does that mean for the Steelers following that?

[Shams Charania]

Well, it means they have an opening at safety. They've been very active this offseason in adding Darius Slay and Jalen Ramsey. I think it gives them options in the secondary Pat about how they want to go about doing this. Obviously Joey Porter Jr. Also is there. They've got a ton of defensive backs right now and it always felt to me like Pittsburgh was the most likely destination. It never felt like the Rams or the Chargers were going to be able to do their part financially to make a trade like this happen. The Steelers not only made it happen, but gave Jalen Ramsey a raise for this coming season. So that tells you how much they wanted him. They've been talking about him all along. It becomes a very complicated trade here certainly for the time of the year that we're in the last day of June, you get a trade like this that involves two players who have been three time all pro selections and you see make it Fitzpatrick on that initial list of Steelers start. Well, he was a part of the deal. They Steelers wanted John Smith to reunite him with Arthur Smith. They get him in this package as well. And I, I mean to me it says yes, Pittsburgh is going all in spending whatever it takes. They go and get Aaron Rodgers, they go and get Jalen Ramsey and John Smith. It has been a very unconventional Steelers like off season with all the players that they've added, including DK Metcalf. This is like a remade roster. The one question I have in all of this now is and we haven't talked about it a whole lot, what about TJ White? Yeah, everybody just has assumed rightfully that the two Sides will figure it out, but I don't think they're very close right now, and I don't think that he's particularly pleased. Now, it could change just like that, and they could figure out a way to get it done. But you know what? They just gave Johnny Smith more money. They just gave Jalen Ramsey more money. They haven't given T.J. watt more money. And you just wonder how that's going to play out here in the coming weeks. Again, he's such a part of team, you cannot imagine him not being there. But you would think that this situation would be settled by now, and it's not.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, I agree. Shafter and I would like to let everybody know that if you were to go back and watch the tape, I would ask on a very regular basis, hey, if everything's good, why is TJ not there? You know, if everything's just going to be a okay, why does he feel obligated to take $170,000 fine of missing mandatory minicamp? If everything was okay, you would think a guy who's a staple and a pillar of the team would have been there. I'm not saying there's any issues, but I just asked the question on a regular basis because like everybody else is saying they think a deal is going to get done. I think TJ not going is him saying, is it? I don't know if a deal is going to get done. And now let's get back to the point of what you said there about paying Jalen more money and Johnnu more money. Caboli put this tweet up here. Caboli said, well, he's been told the Steelers view John Smith as a tight end, a slot wide receiver and a fullback. They will use them in a very hybrid way in Arthur Smith's offense, and they see Jalen Ramsey as an outside corner, slot corner, and he can take some snaps at safety, says Mark Caboli. With that being said, if you're going to utilize the shit out of them, you would obviously want to pay them more. I thought a lot of people didn't want Jalen because they didn't want to pick up the entirety of the contract. Do we know if they've picked up all the money from both these contracts or the Miami Dolphins having to pay any bills?

[Shams Charania]

Yeah, I don't know the full breakdown of that. There have been a lot of missed calls in this flurry of activity, and I don't have the full answer to that at this particular time. Yeah, I can tell you. So it was a very Surreal scene, right? I've never been to Oakmont. I get invited. I'm in your backyard here in Plum, Pennsylvania.

[Pat McAfee]

Hell, yeah.

[Shams Charania]

And I walk into the locker room, and the only thing I want to see was, where did Windham Clark kick in that locker? Is it still here? Right. So I took a picture of it. I could send it over. We could put it up. It's still there, and some of the members want to fix it. I'm like, you can't fix that. So I walk in, I see the locker, and right when I walk in, I see Neil Shipley, the great former amateur golfer who's on tour, and he's incredible. Like, I've watched Neil Shipley all the time, and I'm talking to Neil Shipley, and I get to trade that Jalen's going down, and I go to post. Know what I learned about Oakmont? The men's locker room. No WI Fi because I was posting for a few minutes and it wasn't going through, and then went running out, running out to go post it. So there's no WI fi in the men's. You're not missing anything there. But this place is pretty magical. So the trades all come down. Whole flurry of activity again. The Steelers have stepped up, and they're paying all these guys right now, except T.J. watt. I mean, that's really the deal right now. And Miami. Miami's made a lot of changes here with a lot of team captains that are no longer there in Miami. So it becomes very interesting for them as well. Big change you're not expecting here in late June.

[Pat McAfee]

Claus Campbell, also not there. Obviously. We talked about. That was like the beginning of this entire thing whenever Gumpy was losing his mind.

[Connor]

Go ahead, Comment Armstead. I forget if that he was mentioned. He's one of their captains, too. I think someone tweeted it was 4 of their 5 captains or 3 of their 5 captains are gone.

[Pat McAfee]

Interesting to see how it goes. Jalen Ramsey is now the fourth Dolphins Cow. You. You actually tweeted a chef. Yeah. Okay.

[Cal Raleigh]

Smart.

[Pat McAfee]

But last season, no longer on the team in 2025. Armstead, Calais Campbell and David Long. Go ahead, Debo.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah, I believe Tyreek Hill was a captain last year, too, and I don't think he'll be a captain going into this year. I think he said he's got to earn that respect back with the team. What is the relationship right now with Tyreek Hill and the Miami Dolphins?

[Shams Charania]

The way I understand it, I think people are counting on him bouncing back, having a big season. He's got a lot to prove. I'm sure with all the money going around to wide receivers, he's going to want to get paid again. I think Tyree Kill has a chance to really bounce back and have a big time kind of year. I think that's what people in the organization are expecting out of him this upcoming season. It'll be up to him to do that. But again, a lot of changes around him and they're counting on Tyree Kill to come through.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, so the only thing we're really thinking about here or trying to figure out is if Miami's paying any of Jalen's salary. Right. That is still potentially a piece of information. We don't know.

[Shams Charania]

I would think that they're paying something. I would think that they're paying something. I mean, you know, I think Jalen gets more money out of this and I think they had a finagle. I can't imagine that the Steelers took on the entire contract and gave him a raise. That that would not be, in my mind, something that's practical, I don't think. But again, you have to see how it played out.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. And Omar Khan, Mike Tomlin, you're in. I mean, you might go visit him. Down you go down to upmc. Are they done in this whole department? Obviously TJ Watt lingering. And do you think this is going to be the new norm for the Pittsburgh Steelers? Well.

[Shams Charania]

Well, this is not what they've done and I think that they have to be done because there really is no other priority other than TG Watt and this team. There has not been a team in the league the last couple of years that has inquired about and checked into more wide receivers than the Pittsburgh Steelers. And I think that's what we're seeing here with John Smith being viewed as a weapon because they wanted somebody else to step forward. They're expecting that Calvin Austin's going to be their number two wide receiver. From what I understand. Roman Wilson, the former second round draft pick from Michigan, has looked strong during OTAs for whatever that's worth. And now you get a guy like John who Smith to mix in with DK Metcalf, Calvin Austin, Roman Wilson, Robert woods. And I think that they feel like this guy can be shifted all around. Arthur Smith knows how to use him. It's the third different franchise that Arthur Smith has worked with. John Smith, they were together in Tennessee, they were together in Atlanta, and now they'll be together in Pittsburgh again, I think, you know, they got Aaron coming in at quarterback and when you're doing that, you're trying to do everything you can to give him one last run in what looks like is his last season. So they seem to be all in with that one lingering issue that's outstanding right now.

[Pat McAfee]

There is slay missing from the graphic that was on us, not on dirty. You put this together. Thing looks filthy. But also Pittsburgh people got to be like this, Pittsburgh's place to be. Been fucking saying it for years. Excited for all these people, all these guys to get to learn about the Pittsburgh football culture, too. Like the what it's going to be like to be a Pittsburgh Steeler and learn the building. Going to be great to have them in the city. You talk about wide receivers and the Steelers snooping around on them. There's one big name at wide receiver position that there's still a convo about before you tee off at Oakmont, and I assume shoot at 250. I think.

[Shams Charania]

I think you might be generous. You might be back to 75.

[Ty Schmidt]

Shefty. Last time we talked to you, we. We mentioned how Terry McLaurin and Washington are pretty far apart on his, you know, new contract. He's not happy about that. Has there been any progress with that whole situation, or do you have any kind of update there?

[Shams Charania]

That's a tough one. I know there isn't. There's no update, which is the update. And that's the problem. The problem is with this particular situation, I think Terry McLaurin is going to argue that we've seen other wide receivers who his numbers are comparable to, like Jamar Chase and t. Higgins and D.K. metcalfe get paid over $30 million a year this offseason. And I think the commanders then can say yes. But Mike Evans, who also has had comparable numbers, is at $24 million. So there really is quite a difference and a gap between what both sides would want. They have not made any progress. I would think that we'll see if there are any teams that decide to come snooping around Terry McLaurin to see if they could try to pry loose Terry McClaurin, who, by the way, I cannot envision the commanders moving on from, no matter how disgruntled he may be. Again, it's sort of like T.J. watt. You can't imagine that these two sides, as far apart as they are today, wouldn't be able to somehow find a way to bridge their differences and figure out a solution. But today, McLaurin and the commanders are not close. Watt and the Steelers are not close. And those will be Two of the storylines that we are tracking as we get ready for training camp.

[Pat McAfee]

Couple great players. We'd love to see them play for the Indianapolis Colts at quite a discounted rate and welcome them to our city.

[Shams Charania]

Pat, every team in the league would love to see Terry McLaurin or T.J. watt playing in their city. Everybody, not as much.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay.

[Shams Charania]

Okay.

[Pat McAfee]

You're right. Yeah. Yeah.

[Shams Charania]

Indianapolis wants it more than the other cities.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. JW Marriott. We'll put a picture of both of them.

[Ty Schmidt]

That's right.

[Pat McAfee]

It looks cool. They would have to play at quite a discounted rate, I would say. It would certainly be a year to prove it, but we'd love to have them. All right, Chef D, good luck out there, man. How is your game? How was your game? Terrible.

[Shams Charania]

I was walking down with Neil Shipley. I'm like, what will you shoot today? He goes about a 70, give or take a few strokes either way. 67 if I'm playing well. 73.

[Pat McAfee]

There he is. Hey.

[Shams Charania]

Come on, big dog.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, how you doing, man? Good to see you, dude.

[Shams Charania]

Yeah, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

You can't.

[Shams Charania]

You can't. I got my earbuds in, so otherwise.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, hey, Chef, will you translate for us? Hey, will you tell him that we think he looks good and it's great to see him. Great hair.

[Shams Charania]

They think you look great, and they love your hair. They think I should be growing my hair the same way you have yours?

[Pat McAfee]

I didn't say that. She. All right, good luck out there.

[Shams Charania]

He's shooting at 67 today. I'm shooting about 167.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, can you ask him how similar it is to when the US Open was there? How it is today? Like, how you're going to play on.

[Shams Charania]

It first, Is it similar to the way the U.S. open was when they play here now or not close. The rough is a little shorter.

[Pat McAfee]

He says, okay. And ask him, how do I become a member at that place? I just got to pay the fee. I got to get invited, you know?

[Shams Charania]

You know what? I was actually going to talk to people, but I. I don't want to overstep. My Pat wants to know what he has to do to get out here and play around.

[AJ Hawk]

Gotta be a member.

[Evan Fox]

This is all.

[Shams Charania]

We gotta get that done. We're gonna work on that, Pat, I'm here two days. Okay. And by the way, are you staying there? Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

See, that's what I'm talking about. It'd be. That would be. If I could.

[Ty Schmidt]

There it is.

[Pat McAfee]

I need to become a member. But that.

[Connor]

That's the dream. Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

I've never even been there.

[Shams Charania]

I've never used a huge shout out to Joe Schmidt and Steven Eisenberg. Who invited that? I don't know what I'm doing.

[Pat McAfee]

Like, Heisenberg and Schmidt, the boys.

[Connor]

Come on now. Can you.

[Shams Charania]

Can you come out? I'm like, sure. I got nothing going on. Like, there's nothing gonna happen in the NFL. It's not like there's gonna be three players traded in the morning. Then I go to Oakmont. It's not like I'm gonna walk into the locker room and see Neil Shipley. It's not like I'm gonna be admiring Windham.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, what up, dude?

[Shams Charania]

Look at this guy.

[Pat McAfee]

How we doing, dude? Hey, how's Michigan doing? How we looking?

[Shams Charania]

He wants to know, how's Michigan doing?

[Mackenzie]

Great. He's.

[Shams Charania]

He's everybody's ass.

[Pat McAfee]

That's Wink, defense coordinator from Michigan, obviously. Formerly the Baltimore Ravens and the New York Giants.

[Shams Charania]

He's in my foursome today, too.

[AJ Hawk]

That's Oak Mall, baby.

[Pat McAfee]

That's one of the greatest minds in the history of ball right there. That guy also grade A. Good time Haver. Yeah, great. A. All right. We appreciate the hell out of you, Chef. For good luck, ladies and gentlemen, I'm Chef. Good. Wink Martindale is the guy.

[Ty Schmidt]

How about that?

[Connor]

What a cameo.

[Pat McAfee]

Wink loves the show. He loved the pod, too. Speaking of.

[Connor]

Yeah, wait, I remember that.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

When are you guys bringing season two back? Good question.

[AJ Hawk]

Two of what?

[Connor]

There's been the.

[Pat McAfee]

Paul.

[AJ Hawk]

Oh, I think that's one of those. One of those things where you thought something existed, but it actually never.

[Connor]

This isn't the moon landing, Tony.

[Pat McAfee]

The Mandela. What? You remember a different.

[AJ Hawk]

Like, Shaq being in Kazam? The pod never existed, so what could.

[Ty Schmidt]

Tony, come on. We. Listen, we've been in the writers room the last, I don't know, eight months, just hammering out episode after episode after episode after episode. So we're. We're getting close. We're getting close. It's one of those things where we really don't want to release it until it's perfect.

[Pat McAfee]

That writer strike really slowed things down. That was five years ago.

[Connor]

Yeah. It's still affecting us today.

[Pat McAfee]

YouTube TV. I heard they were trying to reach out to the pod. Yeah, I bet they were. Is that what you guys need, Mr. Kim?

[Ty Schmidt]

Preliminary discussions? Exactly. So it's. There's just a lot of stuff going on.

[Pat McAfee]

A lot of people tell me. It's me. It's. This is a hot. Just so you. Foxy. Will you please. Yeah. Oh, yeah. 100 this is not us. We're the biggest party acts you guys got, bro. Since day one.

[Connor]

It's Mr. Kim, man. Look, you mentioned him there and I know he doesn't like to be talked about, but Mr. Kim, there's a few things that we thought he would love. Mr. Kim didn't love them, so we had to go back to the drawing board. But now we are almost at the point where Mr. Kim has given us the okay.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, I'm excited for you guys to deal with Mr. Kim and to meet Mr. Kim someday.

[Connor]

Well, I mean, look, he's a tough son of a to get a hold of.

[Pat McAfee]

I know you get the pods got different representation. I understand you guys been through a couple of these and it feels like Mr. Kim's the right one for you guys.

[Connor]

I think he is the one.

[Pat McAfee]

Have we heard an episode of the pod since Mr. Kim has come around? He might. No, not at all. No, he. He might. He's trying to bury.

[Darius J. Butler]

He might not be.

[Pat McAfee]

That's what as a Pontiac, you're fellow huge podiatry, foxy Pontiac. Biggest Pontiac on earth. No, you're not bigger than me, brother. I guarantee I am. All right. Anyways, we miss your show.

[Connor]

We miss it too, man.

[Pat McAfee]

YouTube TV is looking at it and wondering. And they're also. They try to get avid sports fans to feel more at ease.

[Ty Schmidt]

Okay.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, you look a little uptight. Relax.

[Connor]

Okay, fine.

[Pat McAfee]

They know that you want access, all right? Fuck it. They have access to all their favorite sports and live TV. YouTube TV is the greatest. YouTube TV, obviously, the developers of the quad box, they're the people that said, you know what? This is what everybody's going to want eventually anyways. How are you able to keep up with all the sports happening at one time? What if you happen to have 11 games on in the same time slot? What if you happen to have 10 games on at the same time? What if there's multiple sports taking place, NHL, NBA happening at the same time? And my favorite show, yeah, YouTube TV says you should be able to watch it all. And then when one one goes to commercial, go ahead and just bop over to the other one. Or bop up to the top right quadrant. Or how about this top left, leave it there, listen to one particular thing like Red Zone, and then have three other games on happening at the same time. YouTube TV said, let's go ahead and give you an assist, an alley oop, if you will. So shout out to YouTube TV and whenever you hit that QR code, 2 months 59, 99, it's a great deal. Great deal.

[Connor]

Gaming clutch, actually. Last night during the PGA Playoff in the start of the United States men's soccer game. Could have both of those on at the same time.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. The soccer game for the men's. Don't look now. We got a team.

[Connor]

We do now.

[Pat McAfee]

LeBron James might be leaving the Lakers. That's big news.

[Connor]

What quote's the quote?

[Darius J. Butler]

What are you talking about?

[Pat McAfee]

It's a possibility.

[Darius J. Butler]

He just opted in.

[Pat McAfee]

He opted in. Then he said, what's the future look like? And then, you know, Sean Sharania saying, hey, he just won the wood. They're looking to see what the Lakers do. They want to win championship. Want to win championship. Makes sense. What does that mean? We'll talk to Sean Sharanya in about 35 minutes or so. Can't wait to get the latest on that. Feels like LeBron's gonna be a Laker, right?

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah.

[Connor]

I don't know.

[Pat McAfee]

Sure. We shall find out what Seam says. And do we know at this exact moment when you talk about most craziest offseason ever? LeBron being a part of it, Giannis being a part of it. When will moves be made? Kevin Durant already traded. I mean, these are legends of the NBA. We'll talk to Seams in a bit. The United States men's soccer team, though. Good. Yeah. We got a team all the way back.

[Connor]

Tough.

[Pat McAfee]

We got a real team.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yes.

[Pat McAfee]

We got dogs. And we got a coach that looks in the camera and says, what do you want from me? I love everything about it.

[Ty Schmidt]

I feel like such a dickhead for ever questioning Pete Ponchettino. I do. After watching that yesterday. Not only just what he's wearing, too, he's got the suit, but he's like, you know, I'm gonna be casual. I'm not gonna wear a tie. He's got just the black tee under it. I mean, we got the guy, he.

[Pat McAfee]

Was talking to America right there. Exactly. Saying, come on. Yeah, yeah, let's go. We got a team. You know, a lot of the stars aren't playing in this Gold cup. And we just beat Costa Rica. We're moving into the semifinals. Hey, is Canada the Canada, huh? I saw they were in the quarterfinals of the Gold cup as well.

[Cal Raleigh]

Really?

[Pat McAfee]

No, I lost in a shootout. Oh, you guys lost? Well, we won a shootout because we got a guy named Matt Freeze, who's six foot four out of Harvard. He got his hand. He blocked three out of six penalty shots last night. Got his hand on five out of six, I do believe. Yeah. We're talking about an absolute dog. This guy's a specimen. Now this is his first time playing goalie for us in a full time rate because the Gold cup, because the stars aren't playing or whatever. Who's our normal goalie? Guys, really good. Turner. Turner. Okay, so Turner, very good. Great player. Freeze, though, is getting an opportunity here and he was taking advantage of it, making the most of it. Watching him. He knew exactly where they were going. This wasn't guess, this wasn't luck. He was reading the out of these people. He was. He had him dialed in. And even the one, the ones that they scored, he was near. It just so happened to go in there. This guy was locked in. We got a dude in Matt. Freeze. We got a coach. I believe in Paunch. Yeah. And I think we're finding the right team, kind of leading in the World Cup. We got dogs.

[Connor]

Yes.

[Pat McAfee]

Our guys are dogs. They wasn't a lot. There's a lot of flopping from the Costa Rica side. Sure, a lot of flopping going on. But our guys running. Our guys got moxie. I feel good about our team representing our country going ahead.

[Connor]

Yeah. These last two weeks, I feel like, at least me personally, I've just been hating on the United States men's soccer team and kind of started watching last night strictly because, you know, it was like a hate watch event for me. But by halftime, they won me over. Like the way they play. You mentioned the style. Like they weren't really flopping. It seemed like they were talking shit to both Costa Rica and the refs sometimes when they disagreed with the call and Poncho. Every time they showed Ponch, it seemed like he was getting the boys going, saying something, hyping people up. I'm all in. I got my poncho on for good, baby. It's raining right now.

[Pat McAfee]

At the end of the game, actually at the end of full time, yeah. Straight into penalties is crazy. Ball gets hit down the sideline. Punch in his sport code because he's trying to steal it. One touch, boom, right to our guy to do a throw in. Blow it dead. It was like this dude's on the sideline, ball comes over, over, boom. I'm like, I love this. And the type of team he wants. He's like, we, we got a lot of good players, but we need fighters. Is basically what he said coming in. We need to find guys. It's like we might have a squad now. With that being said, let's not get too excited.

[Connor]

That's a good point.

[Pat McAfee]

If we Win this Gold cup though and we are once again the concave Kings. This could be hard not to get a full on patriotism if you know what I'm saying.

[Ty Schmidt]

If we win the Gold Cup, I think you have to, you have to just admit, admit that we are the favorites to win the world. Yes, I think, I think it's just, it is what it is. And you know, we were kind of saying, hey, all of our best guys aren't playing. This is probably exactly what they needed. Like we needed some of those like guys confidence. Yeah, exactly like guys who we are going to need in order to, to win the World Cup. And they played unbelievable or they have so far.

[Pat McAfee]

I heard a commentary say that some of the big names are gone. So some of these younger guys have a chance to peacock a little bit because it's their team and they're getting the confidence at the right time. Now we were afforded the opportunity to debut a special exclusive trailer from Netflix. Answer the phone. And Brad sounds like he's out of breath. You know, he's. Jared. Jared, you know, oh, thank God we got you on the phone. You know, we're so excited to have you here. We're so excited.

[Mackenzie]

When we got the opportunity to land.

[Connor]

Him, it was a no brainer because.

[Mackenzie]

I had an idea what we were.

[Evan Fox]

Going to start going through and I.

[Mackenzie]

Knew how resilient he was and just.

[Evan Fox]

Thought that he'd be a good fit.

[Mackenzie]

For the journey we're about to take.

[Pat McAfee]

You know, Dan gets on the phone and says the same thing. You know, we can't believe we were able to get this done and we can't wait to see you.

[Mackenzie]

I remember the call and I remember my excitement and I just, I wanted to make sure he understood how excited we were, how excited I was. You're going to be part of the foundation. You're going to, we're going to build this from the ground up. You're going to be a huge part of this and you're ours. Like you belong with us. We're gonna be tied to the hip.

[Pat McAfee]

It kind of brought me from this moment of like picking up the pieces to like reinvigorated with this energy of like, oh, like this is what it feels like to truly be wanted and to have, you know, these guys behind you. And I hadn't felt that in quite some time. I was going to dinner with my friends that night. I remember you called me and, and you told me the news. I remember you were like, will you come with me? And I was like, yeah, Detroit. I Don't even know. Like I didn't even know I'd never been to Michigan. I didn't hesitate. But I also did not know what.

[Connor]

I was getting myself into in a.

[Pat McAfee]

Good way and a bad way. I can't imagine like having stayed in LA that whole time. A lot of people saw it as like I was being cast away or I was being sent to my career to die. And I think, I think, you know, a lot of people in my former organization may have thought that as well. For me, I saw it as what an incredible opportunity to be somewhere that has never won and has never been to the top of the mountain. And how incredible would it be if we're able to build this thing into a winner?

[Mackenzie]

I mean, that's my guy, you know, that's my quarterback. Every head coach has got a quarterback. If you want to have success, you better have a quarterback. And I got one. Jared Goff.

[Pat McAfee]

To be able to be with a.

[Mackenzie]

Head coach who's a first time head.

[Pat McAfee]

Coach and a GM who's a first time GM and be able to be the first decision they made when they got here and prove them right. And you know, how great of an opportunity is that. Sorry, I'm trying not to cry, but it's been so incredible to build with them. But that moment of hearing that on the phone, knowing that the opportunity that I, that I had here was, was special. Hell yeah, it was. And it certainly turned out to be the executive producer of that show and about a thousand others. Two time super bowl champion and hall of Famer and fresh out of the manning passing Academy's 29th year, ladies and gentlemen, Peyton Manning. Hey, obviously we just watched that together here and it was a beautiful kind of retelling or recapping of how Jared Goff got to Detroit because we all remember it from the outside looking in. Sean McVay was in Mexico, Matthew Stafford was there. They were having a good time. Jared Goff got his ass kicked out of town. He was a third string quarterback, I believe for the Rams. At the very end of that whole thing. Seeing his story, his side and how Detroit views it is beautiful. Is there a lot of that this season on quarterback or what should we expect from Burrow Goff and then Cousins again?

[Mackenzie]

You know, Pat, this is our third year doing quarterback or doing the Netflix kind of follow doc series. We did quarterback the first year, we did receiver the next. Now we're back with quarterback. And I think when all these quarterbacks sign up, look, I tell them, hey, we want the football, we Want to go behind the ropes a little bit. We do not want to be a distraction. And all of them, from the home Holmes to Joe to Kirk and to Jared, they all end up giving us more than we ask of them. Right? I mean, look, we wanted to follow Jared Goff this season. We weren't asking him to recap that tough moment of getting traded from the Rams, but he wanted to talk about it and he wanted to talk about how he got to Detroit and kind of what that meant to him. So we were glad to be there to hear all that because he really hasn't told told that story. And I think you'll hear a lot of that from all three of the quarterbacks. Things that you haven't seen that you haven't heard before. I think it kind of speaks to how comfortable they are with Omaha and NFL Films and Netflix following them around. I think the best thing, Pat, is that nobody really knows that we're following them all year. This is not a camera in the cafeteria with Joe Burrow. Everybody's like, oh, look at Joe. He's got this, you know, camera with them the whole time. NFL Films, Omaha, Netflix, we just kind of blend in, and we just want to be kind of a fly on the wall and to take the viewer behind the ropes of what it's like to play quarterback. And you'll see Jared Goff and Ben Johnson designing these really cool plays that Detroit had that maybe Caleb Williams might have now in Chicago. But cool plays and where they get the idea, you'll see just how cool, calm and cool Joe Burrow is all the time. I don't think he sweats the entire season. Even when he's playing against the Ravens, he's that calm and cool. And you'll see Kirk Cousins handle an incredibly tough situation with incredible grace, and you'll come out pulling for him once again like he did in season one. So that's what I'm excited about this season for quarterback.

[Pat McAfee]

I mean, three very different stories throughout the season. You know, the Detroit Lions don't number one seed in the nfc. They battle through so many injuries, too. I'm excited to see the leadership behind the scenes whenever that whole situation. Bruce, the Cincinnati Bengals had the year that they had, and obviously they had an entire offseason, the way it's gone. And then Kirk Cousins with the Pennock situation. I mean, what a wild chance to experience life as an NFL quarterback. You continue to blaze trails, brother. We can't wait to catch up with that. July 8th Quarterback. Premieres on Netflix. Thank you for getting us through the summer. We will thank you in advance for that. Let's talk about a summer tradition for the last 29 years, Manning passing Academy. Obviously you're fresh out of the most recent one. How was the weekend down there? A lot of people saying it looked like maybe you boozed a little bit the night before this photo.

[Mackenzie]

Part of playing quarterback is having a few Bud Lights on an off night. But you're at the 8 o' clock staff meeting the next morning, right? If you're going to, if you're going to soar with the Eagle, as my dad said, if you're going to hoop with the Owls, you got to soar with the Eagles. So it's kind of a good sign for a quarterback if you're there at that 8 o' clock meeting. We had perfect attendance at every 8 o' clock. Love that. Love that hasn't always been the case in years past certain quarterbacks. And maybe, maybe that was a good sign that maybe they weren't, weren't ready to play quarterback. But another great year. Look, we had almost 1500 campers and then we had 47 college quarterbacks. We had over 120 top high school coaches and former NFL coaches or small college coaches from around the country. That's our staff. We're trying to make these entering 8th graders through entering 12th graders. Quarterbacks, receivers, tight ends, running backs, better high school football players. Pat, that is our goal. If they all go on to play college in the NFL, that's great. But our goal is to make them better high school players. And most of the college camps now, Pat, they aren't really doing that as much anymore. Right. They're kind of recruiting camps. They're running 40s, they're running vertical jumps. And I get that they're trying to decide who they're going to recruit. We like teaching the basic fundamentals of playing quarterback. And it's fun time for me to be with my dad, my two brothers Cooper and Eli, my nephews Arch and Hyde were there, my brother, my son Marshall attended the camp. So it's certainly a family affair as well.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, I posted that photo, obviously was posted from Manning Pass Academy of your entire crew there. Not, not your kid, but this. And I was just like, this family has done so much for football legitimately. And I texted your dad this, I said, hey, I just want to say thank you to you and your family for the amount of commitment to our sport that you have done. You have tried to showcase our sport in every single fashion that you Possibly could since retirement, let alone all that you gave while you were playing. Eli, the same way. Archie, the same exact way. And now it's Arch season, baby. That's what. That's what the world is kind of waiting for. And so I want to say thank you to the Mannings. Legit. You guys are committed to ball, like committed to ball. And we appreciate the hell out of that.

[Mackenzie]

Now on the passing, to me, when I was playing, and I think all these college guys felt the same way. Arch, Garrett Nussmeier, like I said, all the other quarterbacks, it's just a great reminder of how great the game is and how lucky we are to be playing or to be involved with it. When you're out there in Thibodeau, Louisiana, it's 96 degrees, we're in three a day practices, and you don't hear one high school kid complain about how hot it is. Matter of fact, we tell them, hey, go back to your dorm room, get a nap in between practices. They're all outside the dorm throwing. They're always asking questions to the quarterbacks, hey, tell me how to help with my spiral. Tell me how to help. Which, by the way, I can't help with that. Tell me how to help with my three step or five step drop. So it's just a great reminder of, you know, what a great game it is. And so it comes at the perfect time every year, late June, right before teams are going back to training camp, going back to, you know, summer workouts. And to me, that's the best part about it.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, kid, you can throw a duck pretty good too, you know, you know, you want. You go to a couple Super Bowls with a duck throw. D. Worry about that D. Bud has a question about the MPA.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah. So 29 years, awesome. 1500 campers over, I guess the last three decades. How much have the campers changed? I guess with the questions and the things, the game has changed so much in between the lines, but even outside the lines with nil and all these different things that they're dealing with at an early age, how much has that changed over the years?

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, it's a great question. And you know, Tyler Schuck, who was a counselor for two years, he was at Louisville, Texas Tech, Oregon. He came back to the camp. Now he's the Saints first round draft choice, which is very rare. We don't really ask current NFL quarterbacks to come because, you know, this is their vacation time. And Tyler came back and wanted to share his knowledge with the college counselors. And with the high school athletes. And he just said, look, because he's lived in this nil world. Keep the main thing. The main thing, go out and have fun your senior year in high school, your senior year in college. Don't worry about all of the outside noise and distractions, especially if you want to go play at the next level. You got to make the main thing the main thing. So that's easier said than done because people are pulling on them. They have different commitments, different directions. But I thought that was great advice. You still got to go out there and work in the offseason. You got to go out there and perform on Friday nights, on Saturday afternoons. So we were certainly concerned a couple years ago with nil with the Portal. Would that affect the attendance of our camp from our high school kids, from our college players? It hasn't. People still come down and want to ask questions. Jon Gruden was there. He was given the NFL. He was giving the college players some advice. He did a clinic for our high school coaches, which was awesome. You can imagine how animated he is. And so it's been able to kind of maintain the reason we started the camp. And it's hard to believe we're coming up on 30 years next year.

[Pat McAfee]

I saw Coach Gruden got an Archie Manning jersey. I believe he want crazy. You believe this, man? Yeah, it was. That was a cool moment. I love how much Gruden's giving back to ball as well. Let's talk about the quarterback position as a whole. Go ahead, Connor.

[Connor]

Yeah, Peyton, you just kind of mentioned how part of a quarterback's duties are having a couple bud lights with the boys, you know, the night before, but then still showing up at the 8am meeting and, you know, being a leader, showing up and standing up for your teammates, of course those things as well are important as a qb. But for you off the field, when it comes to being a quarterback, what are kind of the most important traits you need to have? Just as you know, of course a player, but just a teammate in general.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah. Look to me, when I watch an NFL or college game and I see a quarterback drop back and throw a deep, go route down the sideline and maybe the corner is there and the free safety is over there. I watch how the receiver fights for the ball. Does he go up and go up and make the catch amongst two defenders? Does he tackle the defensive back? Because there's no way I'm going to let my quarterback get this pass intercepted. It's going to be incomplete. Pass interference. No way. It's going to be an interception. And that tells me how much that receiver respects his quarterback, that he's going to fight for him, right? Sometimes you don't see that. Sometimes you see the receiver kind of go, hey, I don't really. I don't really care if it's intercepted and it's double covered. He shouldn't be throwing it anyway. I want to see him fighting for the quarterback, and that's up to the quarterback to get those guys fighting for him. By the way he handles them in practice, how he handles, you know, himself in the locker room, is he a guy that these linemen want to fight and block for, these receivers want to go up and get the ball for? So it's not always with the rah rah pep talk, per se. You don't have to give a speech every day as a quarterback, but you better be there on time, you better stay late, you better be tough. You better be, you know, in the conditioning front of the line, right? You're not going to be the fastest or bench press the most, but you better be kind of setting the example in the conditioning, endurance aspect of it. And I think all those things go into being a good quarterback and your teammates follow.

[Pat McAfee]

I told the story the other day about first punt period when I was with the Colts. You know, it's normal, special team, especially punt period. Everybody kind of clears the field because, you know, balls are about to get tossed out there. And while I'm sitting back for the first snap, I'm with the Indianapolis Colts. Holy shit. I'm in the NFL and playing a position I don't really understand. I've never really been an NFL punter. I'm watching you and the other quarterbacks run gassers across the field on the other end, full pads, helmet on, everything like that. And that was a consistent. It's like everybody else kind of off the field. You're out there doing sprints now. Clyde Christensen told me, well, it's the only time we can get the field right. Right? Like, that's only. And it's like. But also, that is quite a statement. Like, hey, listen, you can get shit done right now. I think everything you did had purpose and meaning, and that's why it was an honor to be your teammate. With that being said, I know you've tried to stay out of the way. So is Eli. I'm here to answer all questions. Let's talk about Arch. Okay? I'm excited for him. No offense to you. Okay. No offense to you or to Eli. Feels like he has a chance to have what you have, have what Eli has, and then also feels like he's got what your dad. Your dad had a little bit more of all these things coming together, plus him understanding what a quarterback should be like in the locker room. I think he was at a Wingo cookout just like two weeks ago. Obviously, this hit the Internet, went crazy. It's like this makes sense for how a quarterback, especially a Manning led quarterback, would operate. You invited me down to a golf outing and had some beers and learned about me and my family and talked to my dad, invited my dad to something. It's like very much a part of the Manning way of leading is like being a good teammate, being in, I want to say, investing in relationship. How do you feel about Arch now that it's about to be his time? Like, hey, we're here now. This is Arch season for Texas. How do you feel and has he reached out to you or Eli much through it all?

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, you know, Pat, look, Eli and I are his uncles. We try to be there as a resource for them. But, you know, Cooper has done a great job with Arch and they've handled, you know, all the different things that have kind of come their way in the right way and. And I'm excited to watch Arch play. He's been very patient. I thought he threw the ball really well at the camp. He and Garret Dustmeyer, in kind of our three throwing exhibitions, really threw the ball well. All the quarterbacks threw it well. It's impressive. I mean, they make throws that I wouldn't even think about making. I mean, Arch made a throw the other day that I'd have to hit the cutoff man in order to get the ball to the actual receiver and nuss fire Norris for South Carolina, I mean, it's impressive all the way around. But look, he's been patient. You know, it's been well documented. The fact that he's, you know, been there two years. I'm such a believer in mastering the system that you're in. And when you have new coordinators every single year in the NFL or college, that's just frustrating to me. I was lucky, you know, Tom Moore, Pat was there my entire 14 years. 14 year career. Belichick gave Brady some different coordinators, Charlie Weiss, McDaniels, O' Brien, but it was the same system, right. Nick Saban makes his quarterbacks. Our new coordinators learn his system, so does Kirby. And so the fact that Sarkeesian calls the plays and Arch has been there two years already. Is going to know the system. That's going to be a huge advantage for him. And I'm looking forward to seeing him get out there on the field. He's worked real hard. I love seeing him go into that camp for his teammate. That's being a good teammate. That's being a good wingman. And I'm excited to get down there and watch a few games this year in Austin.

[Pat McAfee]

I love the moxie he's got to the breaking of chains after running somebody. And I think he got concussed. I mean, you don't have to give us anything. I think he got concussed in the Ohio State.

[Mackenzie]

That. The moxie. I mean, that was. That was his dad. I mean, Cooper was a cocky wide receiver that was open every time in the hustle, as you can imagine. I think my sophomore year in high school, I was quarter. Cooper was a senior. I think I completed 120 pass that year. I threw 90 of them to my brother. Okay. And he would have liked all 120. I mean, he did not care about his teammates or his friends. I think. I think that. I think that little swagger comes from his dad, and that's good to see. Look, Archie's got to be his own person, and he can move. Yeah. My dad's sort of speed. Sort of skipped a generation, skipped me and Eli. And I think Arch. Arch has that, which helps him. But I still think with all quarterbacks, I mean. I mean, we got to be able to throw from the pocket first and throw it on time and. And not take, you know, a lot of hits. That's what we talked about to all of them. Hey, know your system, know your answers. But then when it's time to make a play, go out there and make a play with your legs. But so I think he understands that.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, I love everything about him. I do. The way he's handled this, the way everybody has handled the entire process. I was excited for him to get in the game last year.

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, now we're in Arch. I was pushing hard. A little bit too big of a platform at this stage for me to be doing that. Caused some shit, had to back off. I don't want to start any problems with anybody, but watching Arch. I think I met Arch when he was just a little boy over at Eli's apartment back in the day. And he was like, always had moxie. And now we're watching him do his thing. I'm like, we want that guy. And there's a lot of teams saying, hey, let's not be scared to lose a lot of games this year. Maybe next year we can get Arch on our team. Now there's a quarterback situation brewing here in Indianapolis. Go ahead, Ty.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, Peyton, I don't know if you've ever actually been in a quarterback competition in your entire life, so maybe you don't, you know, have as good of an answer for this. But when you look at what's going on with the Colts, Anthony Richardson, obviously they draft him high. They want him to be the guy of the future. And it's kind of, you know, there's been glimpses, but he's getting hurt a lot. And then Danny Dimes comes in this off season and, you know, with a chance to kind of reclaim his career. I guess when you have an actual quarterback competition like that and a guy like Anthony Richardson's hurt and he can't really take the reps, but he needs a lot of the reps. Like, what is a way that you can actually get ahead? Because I think you were a guy who never wanted to, you know, succeed any reps to anyone else, like, so. So in that situation, like, how would both of those guys get ahead? Because at this point, we still really have no idea who's going to be the quarterback.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, look, I know all those quarterbacks. You know, speaking of the Manning Pass Academy, Anthony came, Daniel came, Rodney Leonard came. So you get to know all of them, you pull for all of them. And look, I think competition can be good. I know that's what Shane and Chris are looking for to. For this competition to push both those guys. And hopefully whoever comes out as the starter is opening the season with a little swag and a little bit of edge because he just want a tough quarterback competition. Certainly with Anthony being. Being injured, you know, that's tough. Right? That's frustrating. I know he wants to be out there today, you know, throwing with his receivers and a little bit of a test of patience there. And obviously by him being injured, that gives Daniel more repetitions. I mean, the toughest thing when you're in a quarterback competition, it's tough for the receivers as well, is who do you really get good timing with if you're only throwing 50% of the routes with each guy? Right. I know receivers would prefer to have one guy as the starter and get the reps with that guy. So, you know, we'll see how it shakes out through training camp. I think it's a healthy situation for the Colts and I think whoever comes out of that is going to be. Going to be ready to go Week 1 against the Dolphins where we're honoring, honoring Jim Ursett going into the ring of honor. I'll be at that game, Pat. So I'm pulling for both guys. I want to see Anthony get back there and get healthy. As, you know, long season, sometimes it takes more than one quarterback to play the entire season, so. But I'm excited for Daniel getting this opportunity. He deserves it. And like I said, I hope Anthony gets back out there help healthy and has a shot as well.

[Pat McAfee]

I ran into dimes downtown. He's huge. Did not know that he was as large of a human as he is and obviously he's very mobile. And Anthony Richardson, you talk about cutoff man. I mean he made like three of those throws last year where he just back foot 70 yards. Obviously the talent is there. Hopefully it's able to come together. Our last question. We appreciate you so much for your time here from Pittsburgh. Steelers fan who's flying high, high right now. AP tone.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah, I am flying very high with getting Jalen Ramsey today, which is just huge, huge news. Feels like the Steelers are going all in. But my question for you, Peyton, is after the Steelers got Aaron Rodgers, I immediately thought you going to the Denver Broncos winning the super bowl there, Tom Brady going to the Bucks winning a Super bowl there, how do you feel about Aaron going to the Steelers? And what exactly does a 20 year NFL vet quarterback who's won, you know, four NFL MVPs bring to a young offense?

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, look, I'm excited for Aaron, so it's a good opportunity. I saw Arthur Smith earlier this, this spring and you know, they were still trying to kind of figure out what they were, what they were trying to do. But, you know, he certainly acknowledged that Aaron was a possibility and he was excited about that possibility. So I think when your offensive coordinator is excited about it, that's a good thing. You've heard Aaron talk about, you know, that he and Arthur, you can tell they've already had quite a bit of dialogue on, you know, trying to get on the, on the same page and make that system work for both of them. But look, there's no substitute for experience and what Aaron can do to help help these receivers. And you wouldn't think that would take a lot of time, you know, you know, for them to kind of get on the same page just because Aaron's played with so many guys and kind of knows how to make those adjustments. I think, you know, the whole team needs to do their part as well. Right. Defense needs to, needs to be the Pittsburgh Steelers and put Aaron in some tough situations and probably not expecting him to go out there and score 40 each week. But I'm looking forward to seeing it. You know, look, it's a big change. I know Aaron did it with the jets and, you know, and, you know, maybe got hurt and whatnot and wasn't maybe what he was hoping for. So hopefully this is a good chapter for him and can finish strong if it is his last year. And, you know, I know Tom just talked about going down to Tampa and that was exciting. It was kind of new, right? Going to a new school, and I felt that way when I went to Denver. So it can be kind of invigorating for a quarterback. So hopefully Aaron kind of takes that energy and goes out there and plays really well this year.

[Pat McAfee]

We're going to a new school. All right, let's pick up. Let's go to a new school over there. A little, little old school in Pittsburgh for the. The Steelers. Jalen Ramsey got signed, traded this morning. So that literally just happened. So feels like 30 million on DK Metcalf. They're going to have to pay TJ Watt, figure that whole thing out. It's like, is this the year for the Pittsburgh Steelers? We shall see. It's been an honor to interview you and Elvis Presley, brother. And you. I don't know if it made the cut or not, but I've seen the clip of you being Elvis Presley Saturday Live. You're a huge King fan, right? I mean, you're a fan of the King.

[Mackenzie]

I love him. I love him. He was a football fan, Pat. He loved it. I mean, he, he was a Browns fan. He was a Steelers fan. He used to request, like, NFL highlights sent down there to Graceland. He always had kind of his entourage. They were playing pickup football games. And so that's what I've kind of learned about Elvis. Not only do I love his music, he loved football as well, so would have loved to have met him and yeah, have lots of Elvis memorabilia here in my house.

[Pat McAfee]

He's a dog. Elvis was an absolute dog. Have people seen the clip? Has that. Was that a public one? I don't remember you being.

[Mackenzie]

Remember, it didn't make the cut and it was kind of. It was, you know, it's a dress rehearsal you do before Saturday Night Live, which is awesome. You get to go out there and kind of test jokes and see what's going to be funny. I wish I could have done a dress rehearsal before a few football games, Pat. Like, ooh, I'm not gonna make that throw. That's not going to work out. I'll, you know, fix that in the real thing. So I did an Elvis skit in the dress rehearsal. Did not make the final cut. I don't think I pulled off Love Me Tender as well as Lorne Michaels wanted me to.

[Pat McAfee]

I think you did. I've seen the clip. That one, that's first ballot. This one is a first ballot. Hopefully one day Omaha will let that thing eat. Congrats on all the success. Have a great summer, brother.

[Mackenzie]

Thanks, Pat. Thanks.

[Pat McAfee]

Fellow ladies and gentlemen, Peyton Manning. We appreciate Peyton joining us. Earlier today, the news of the Jalen Ramsey trade happened. During our conversation with Peyton Manning. We did not even know about the Minka Fitzpatrick news or the John O. Smith at that particular time because the way the trade was rolled out this morning was wild. Heads up. Jalen Ramsey's going to the Pittsburgh Steelers. That's because Jalen Ramsey breaks his own news. Put out a highlight video that was awesome. Talking about how tough Pittsburgh is basically and how traditional and how historic the franchise is and how he's joining the team. That's how he broke the news. So everybody's like, holy hell, Jalen Ramsey's going to the Steelers. And then the insiders got their chance to get there. Then we hear makeup. Fitzpatrick's, John Smith's going. Two late round picks. Who's paying for all this? Who's doing what? Wow, the Steelers are all in. That was this morning while we were talking to Peyton Manning. It's been a great day to be an NFL fan. Is it a great day to be a Dolphins fan? I think Dolphins fans are saying, yeah.

[Darius J. Butler]

Sure, we got Minko.

[Ty Schmidt]

Bet it's warm.

[Pat McAfee]

It is. Great uniforms. Yeah. Cool coach, really good offense. Tyreek Hill still there. Do they have enough players? We shall see. With a Venmo debit card, you can Venmo more than just your friends. You can use your balance in so many ways. You can Venmo everything.

[Adam Schefter]

Need gas?

[Pat McAfee]

You can Venmo this. How about snacks? You can Venmo that. Your favorite band's merch. You can Venmo this or their next show. You can Venmo that. Visit Venmo me debit to learn more. The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bancorp bank and a pursuant to license. My MasterCard International Incorporated card may be used everywhere. Mastercard is accepted. Venmo purchase return restrictions apply. Finding a new job is stressful, but with indeed it doesn't have to be. Just fill out your indeed profile with Your skills, experience and desired salary. The more you fill out, the better your matches will be. And hearing from hiring managers will be two times more likely. Relax. That's your indeed profile. Sending opportunities your way. Indeed. The world can work better. Begins now. Sports are happening in a big way, obviously. Massive breaking news from basically every major sport. The MLB has Cal Rawley Big Dumper competing in its home run Derby. Congratulations to them and big thanks to big dump joining us in about 28 minutes or so to chit chat about a historic catching season he is having for the current number two team in the AL west, the Seattle Mariners.

[Ty Schmidt]

Well done. I'm doing a baseball.

[Pat McAfee]

I am doing the baseball. I like what the baseball is doing. I like the superstars that are coming to fruition. I like the names that we have playing very well. Aaron Judge is doing stuff that's outrageous. Shohei Otani threw his fastest pitch 102 miles an hour the other night. 102. Nine year NFL vet Darius J. Butler.

[Darius J. Butler]

So. So we're rounding up like we were talking.

[Ty Schmidt]

You always do.

[Connor]

Hold on.

[Ty Schmidt]

Okay. If it's, if it's higher than 0.5.

[Darius J. Butler]

You round up jet passing.

[Pat McAfee]

Did a little. Well, let's. Yeah, well actually he said it's 101.7 miles an hour and then he actually put out the number of pitches that have been thrown this year. 160 pitchers have been thrown harder than 101.7, which is the exact velocity. Okay. On the stadium. They don't go to points. They just rounded up over five. It's going up under five. It's going down. That is the hardest pitch of his MLB career. Ohani. Ohtani did hit 102 miles an hour. World Baseball Classic, funny enough against Vinnie Pasquantino as well. And obviously they had another moment there. So maybe Shohei Ohtani is going to do full time pitching as well. Even though all the baseball people. Let's go to the toxic table at Bossy Connor at Ty Schmidt. 102 miles an hour. 101.7 miles an hour.

[Ty Schmidt]

Now you can say 102. Let's not do that.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. Is he doing well? And I think it was another no hitter, I believe.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, he threw two innings this time. I mean it's really, it's just risk, reward. Because obviously like he's got unbelievable stuff so he could do it. It's just the risk of injury is, is definitely there. But if he's going out and pumping 102 early and often and not, you know, giving up any hits like the. The Dodgers need starting pitching right now very, very badly.

[AJ Hawk]

I don't love that Shohei hates Italians. I'm just gonna say that.

[Pat McAfee]

Whoa. Oh.

[AJ Hawk]

I mean, his two fastest pitches are against Vinnie.

[Pat McAfee]

Like, jacks them up. Jacked up. And sees him, he gets all that discrimination.

[Ty Schmidt]

Actually did quote tweet that he's like, what the. What is this guy doing?

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, so maybe there is a chance that his respect level for Pisanos is at a level where he feels like he has to throw harder. Or, you know, maybe he just happened to catch it a couple of times. 163 pitches. That's not a lot of pitches in the grand scheme of a baseball season, right?

[Ty Schmidt]

No, no. But I mean, I. I'd be interested to see how many of those 163 pitches how many guys that came from. Because that would really tell us, you know, like, oh, how many guys are really throwing that hard? Because if it's only a handful of guys, then Shohei is clearly in rarefied.

[Pat McAfee]

Air and, you know, start spreading the news. I'm leaving today. I wanna be a part of it. New York Mets. Okay, what's going on? The Pirates just smacking them around. That's what we've been saying about this Pirates team. We've been saying since they got their new super duper manager guy salty ball. Boom. They've been playing a little gritty baseball, brother. They just annihilated a team that's paying a guy 750 million bucks. We have never in the history of the Pirates paid an entire team $750 million. And the fact that we are doing this. Are the Pirates hot? Don't look now. Are the Hundo boys about to make a run in the playoffs? Are the Pittsburgh Pirates about to be bucking all around playoffs up there?

[Ty Schmidt]

I mean, I think you would have to argue. Argue that they're incredibly hot by far. Exactly. I mean, the Mets are a good baseball team. They've been in quite the schneide as of late. But hey, listen, you, you. You beat anyone in the MLB 30 to 4 over a three game series. Yeah. I. I'd say you are playing some salty ball.

[Pat McAfee]

And maybe if the Buckers win this entire thing.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah, the whole damn thing.

[Pat McAfee]

The whole damn thing. What they call them? Penance?

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

That's the whole thing. Or.

[Ty Schmidt]

No, no, that would be winning the nl, which would be sweet.

[Darius J. Butler]

Start, start, start there.

[Pat McAfee]

We'd like to get that pennant.

[Ty Schmidt]

Let's start with winning the wild card game.

[Darius J. Butler]

Okay. Boom.

[Pat McAfee]

What do you get for winning a wild Card game. You get a pennant.

[Connor]

No, no, no.

[Ty Schmidt]

You just get into the next round of the day.

[Pat McAfee]

Different.

[AJ Hawk]

Different in Pittsburgh. They will talk about that game for the next 10 years. Because that's what happened last time.

[Pat McAfee]

You're damn right we're still talking about it. Paul Skeens actually mentioned it going into the season. He believes in a boys in the change room. The clubhouse. In the clubhouse obviously all these words really good. And they carry over to other stuff. So that's why it's so easy to kind of do it all. The the thing that would be the best if they were to win the super pennants and the wild cards and the whole damn thing. Yep. Cheryl might take Tim back. Yeah, there's a chance there might be a way for Tim to get Cheryl back. Who on the bucko board out there say listen Cheryl, I know you're at this game. Okay. Please. I didn't mean kiss your sister like that. Screwed up signed Tim. Cheryl knew exactly what he was talking about. That was for an audience of one right there. Maybe two. Cuz Jesus Christ could be looking down sure. And appreciating Tim's apology in a very public place. But I think Cheryl might be gone for good. Tim. I think there's a chance Tim needs to maybe turn his attention to Cheryl's sister and or other fish in the sea and be a better person. I, I, I think that is something for Tim to think about.

[Darius J. Butler]

I would say go outside the family. You know leave the sister. He may a mistake. You know everybody.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah but if you're in the family at least you understand how they kind of operate.

[Darius J. Butler]

I don't know how y' all get.

[Pat McAfee]

Clearly got a little chemistry out there.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah, you got it. I don't think it's no coming back for Cheryl. She's, she's out of there now. Understandably so. I mean it's a lot of fishing to see sister. Was it, was it dark or in did he think are they I need more content.

[Pat McAfee]

If I know Tim and we do. I think we've met Tim a few times. Tim had 1012 beers.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, sure.

[Pat McAfee]

Maybe a couple shots. A long long week. Okay. Enjoying the out of the night that was happening.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Walks in. Well we do you. You know, you were pretty beautiful.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

And then he just happens to fall face first into who he thought was maybe Cheryl.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah.

[Darius J. Butler]

Smoocher.

[Connor]

Get some of that sugar.

[AJ Hawk]

I was thinking he probably had like 10 like you said 1012 icy lights after a long work week. He was down at Donny Iris concert down Station scare. Cheryl went to the bathroom. Donnie played one of his romance songs. Yeah, Job.

[Pat McAfee]

And he said, it gotta happen. Sucks face.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yep.

[Darius J. Butler]

Hey, for every there's a chance Tim.

[Pat McAfee]

And Cheryl's sister and Cheryl will say, we're at a Baca's game. Sure. Pittsburgh Pirates. And they got a big time win. It was during one of these runs.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Zambelli fireworks go off. Cheryl has to go puke. Maybe Tim says, look how beautiful these fireworks are. Should kiss.

[Darius J. Butler]

Kiss cam.

[Pat McAfee]

They suck face. Maybe on the kiss cam. Yeah, maybe on a kiss cam him. That's what Pittsburgh love's all about for Tim and Cheryl.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

And I think if the buckos were to win a super pennant. Cheryl get back there. The fact that that's real, also magic. Awesome.

[AJ Hawk]

Oh, you think? It's like an Angels in the outfield situation where he said, tell you what, Angels win the pennant, I'll come back and be your dad. Cheryl says, pirate Buckos win the pennant, I'll come back, be your.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. The only way it's going to happen, Tim, is if the Pirates win the World Series. And then this is what it's all about.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

For Tim, the boys in the clubhouse. Good luck. Joining us now from a different sport. I don't know if he has any inside information on Tim or Cheryl. We will certainly try to get it from him. Senior NBA Insider for espn. The handsome Sham Sharania, ladies and gentlemen, that's AJ Hawk. Aj, do we have.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah, do we have Shams? But Cheryl.

[Adam Schefter]

Oh, man. I'm like, damn, I look totally different today. Jesus. I look different.

[Pat McAfee]

Similar, though. Similar, though, you know, similar.

[Adam Schefter]

The whole AJ's got, got the clean face. He's always, he's always clean. He always looks the same. You know, the consistency is important.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, I think you are the exact same human have been since we met. Literally same exact look. Even had that same background. Remember the spaceship background? Now he's just big time on espn. Anyways, aj, great to see you, brother. Sean, thank you for joining us. I, I, I heard via your shit. Both an article and a tweet that LeBron James has opted in to his player decision contract for 52 million bucks. Congrats to him. That's a lot of money. Way to go. And then we also, I believe, continue to read on to this entire thing, that they're evaluating the Lakers and they understand that there's not a few years left. Here's the exact quote. LeBron wants to compete for a championship. He knows the Lakers are building for the future. He understands that, but he values a realistic chance of winning it all. We are very appreciative of the partnership that we've had for eight years with Jeanie Buss, who now has sold the team, and Rob Pelinka and consider the Lakers as a critical part of his career. We understand the difficulty in winning now while preparing for the future. We do want to evaluate what's best for LeBron at this stage in his life and career. He wants to make every season he has left count, and the Lakers understand that and are supportive and want what's best for him. Okay, so there's a lot that said there, but basically, after reading it, I found myself thinking, oh, he's doing the same thing as, like, what Giannis is doing. Is that an accurate depiction of what's going on with these two superstars? And how real is any of the conversation about Lakers and LeBron splitting?

[Adam Schefter]

Potentially similar situation in terms of, like, both players are evaluating, seeing what moves are made. Both players want to compete for a championship, want to win a championship, but I think dissimilar in this way. LeBron James is 40 years old. He's going to be 41 years old in December. He knows whether it's one season left, two seasons left, his time in the NBA is nearing its end. And obviously, as Rich Paul made clear in his comments to me yesterday, they are prioritizing, trying to compete in a, quote, unquote, realistic way to win a championship. And behind the curtains of all that, what you can see is LeBron James where he's at in his career. He's got one, maybe two years left in his career. He wants to end his career on his terms to an extent. He wants to finish, you know, and end.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, he froze up. Don't talk about him. Oh, oh, no. Yeah, we lost you there a little bit. You were about to say he wants to.

[Adam Schefter]

He wants to end, clearly. He wants to end his career on his terms, his way, as far as competing for a championship, trying to realistically have a chance to win a championship. And I think in those comments that we saw from Rich Paul and understanding that the Lakers are moving younger, they're. They're moving toward the future and prioritizing Luka Doncic really, as they should. And from what I gather, LeBron James understands where the Lakers are at in their. In their position as far as Luka Doncic is the face of this franchise for the next five to 10 years, that's who's going to be the face. And so he understands that they're prioritizing that. I don't think he's really asking for them to like change their ways or like bring him back into the fold as the face of the franchise or give him, give him an extension. He's, you know, I think a lot of people can see there what, what's going on. And so he wants to finish at the highest level in his career, play at the highest level. And whether that's in la, whether that's going elsewhere. I mean, clearly that depending on how the Lakers free agency period goes, what they're able to do in free agency, obviously they want a center. They're dealing with Dorian Finney Smith, he opted out of his player option at $50.4 million. If they lose him, what wing do they get to replace him? So what moves did the Lakers make in the offseason where LeBron James looks at it and is like, you know what? My best chance to win a championship is right here. And I think those are hard conversations they're going to have next week, the week after that, and at some point in July for real.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. Those quotes came from Rich Paul, who's obviously agent, entrepreneur, maybe the greatest hustler in the history of the United States of America. I saw some clips of him talking to Matt Ishbia Chit chatting about what could happen in the draft, him making some calls that ended with come on, Maliwak ending up with the Phoenix Suns. So I mean, Rich Paul obviously legend. And whenever he says something, there's obviously a reason behind it and a meaning we would assume, especially if you're reporting it at this exact time and Giannis doing the same thing. I think this is kind of a normal thing in the NBA. Did we expect this from LeBron this type of. In his Luca, not, you know, how's Luca feel about all this stuff.

[Adam Schefter]

Luka Dodges was made aware. Him and his, his circle were made aware before this came out. But what, what I would say is it is unusual to an extent because I mean, players have options all the time. I mean, you're either going to opt in and you're working toward a trade or you're, you know, set in your situation or you're opting out and you're a legitimate free agent in this situation. LeBron James at 52.6 million dollar player option, of course he's going to opt into that. When you look at the marketplace, there are only a couple teams with Mac with the true max salary space, and that's Brooklyn. Charlotte's got some money, Detroit's got some money. But there's not, you know, are those teams really LeBron James teams? Probably not. And so LeBron James had really one choice and that was to opt in and from there evaluate what the best fit is. And listen, we know he's going to play 23 NBA seasons, that much we know. We don't know if he's going to play more than one more season. That's still something I'm sure he, he, his family, they've all got to decide. But the one thing we do know now is that he's evaluating how he wants to finish his career, where he wants to finish his career. Is it going to be in la? And again, the Lakers have this upcoming week, the next two weeks, there's free agency, there's trades. This is a very busy moment. And Rob Polinka, the president of Bass operations, he just got Luka Dodgy in February. That's a trade obviously that's going to go down in the history books. So clearly he's, he's not, he's not, he's not immune to wheeling and dealing. This is what he does. But again, these next two weeks, we'll see what happens.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, the thought of who's. Yeah, I mean, debug's got a follow up there.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

You talked about the money thing. Would that be if he was to opt out, then it becomes a free agent, then those people would have to pay.

[Adam Schefter]

Well, that's the thing. If you opt out of $52.6 million and there's only three teams with, with that type of salary cap space. Right. You're not, you're probably not going to go to those three teams after that. You're just looking at mid level exception type deals and that's around 15 million a year. So you know, the people that are like, oh, if you wanted to just leave, I mean, yeah, you, I mean to opt out and then sign for 15 minutes, I mean sacrificing 40 million, I mean, yeah, that'd be an interesting.

[Pat McAfee]

Business from somebody that's a very business.

[Adam Schefter]

Person, any business savvy person doing that. But yeah, who knows?

[Darius J. Butler]

You mentioned Brooklyn and Detroit. There are those the only, I guess, realistic options for. Even if you could, could move players, I saw people saying Cleveland, but they would have to do too much. Been in the second apron. So are, are those the only two realistic spot landing spots potentially for LeBron?

[Adam Schefter]

I mean, we don't know how it's going to play out, but in the event or in a scenario where it does lead to him on, you know, in Free agency. I mean, at that point, he could. I mean, it could be really anything. It could be a minimum, it could be a exception. I think that becomes secondary.

[Cal Raleigh]

Right.

[Adam Schefter]

Like, at that point, if. Once the. If there is a resolution, it's about just figuring out what spot.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. He already tweeted about wanting to be a pacer, so I don't know what we're talking about. He already said, I want to play with Tyrese Hallibur. He said anybody would. And he was obviously a part of anybody.

[Darius J. Butler]

So this is Miami.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't. I don't know. Because chocolate chip cookies have actually been pre. Wait till he tries the chocolate chip cookies out here. I mean, if. If LeBron James is moving, obviously, that would be a huge ordeal, and we would all be pumped up that are in sports media, forced to talk about sports every single day. We would be very thankful for that type of thing.

[Adam Schefter]

The one thing, though, that makes this interesting is this is really pat. Like a partnership, right?

[Shams Charania]

Like the.

[Adam Schefter]

The Lakers, LeBron James, they've been together for seven, eight seasons now, and he won a championship there. He won two conference finals there.

[Pat McAfee]

He.

[Adam Schefter]

I mean, before he got there, they weren't. They weren't a playoff team. He gets there, obviously. They get Anthony Davis, they become a perennial contender year after year. So that partnership, that relationship, that's why these conversations, that's why you have open, direct dialogue between both sides. Jeanie Buss, Bob Pelinka, Rich Paul. From an agent level, from a representative level, LeBron James himself. I mean, just. I mean, just at the. At the draft, like, the Lakers just drafted a due Thoreau, a big man in the second round. They moved up to go draft him. That's a clutch wars client. So, like, just because of whatever is going down here or what, what the statements are that. That we're seeing, and LeBron James clearly wants to finish his career on his own terms and wants to make the best decision for himself, just like the Lakers are making the best decisions for themselves. Like those both can be true. While the two sides can conduct business together.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, I'll be excited to see how it all works out. That would be huge. If Giannis moves. Is there any update on Giannis?

[Adam Schefter]

Well, Giannis is going to continue to observe.

[Pat McAfee]

If there's no updates, to say there's no updates.

[Adam Schefter]

There's no updates. Exactly where it's been the last couple weeks.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, that's an. Okay, so Giannis is exactly where it's at. It's going to continue to monitor the moves that are made and now LeBron is in the monitoring camp as well. Sure. And then if that whole thing was to go, the most craziest offseason of all time would certainly take place. Now, you talked about the Lakers or we just talked about LeBron watching the Lakers. Go ahead, Ty.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, Shams, you mentioned the Lakers needing a center. And then we just saw, I think it was last night that deandre Ayton and the Blazers have, you know, agreed to buyout. So he's going to become a free agent. Is this someone that the Lakers will be targeting big time? And if not him, I would imagine that the Lakers need to do something pretty soon here. Right. If you're thinking that, hey, LeBron might be out of town if we don't start doing something here soon.

[Adam Schefter]

Ties this surprised everyone in the NBA when Deandre Ayton got bought out. He had about 35 million left on his deal, and so he gets a buyout. This is a former number one overall pick. He's a stat seven straight years of 10 points, 10 rebounds a game. He's one of four players to do that for seven of the last seasons. He's a guy that was, that was a top three player on the Suns finals team in 2021. So the guy can play and from my understanding is him. His reps, they went to the Blazers, talked about how he wanted, wants to be in a winning situation. The fact that the Blazers have four or five centers on their roster, young players, they're clearly transitioning more toward their young centers. And they just decided, listen, a buyout is probably the best route for both sides. Give both sides a fresh opportunity. So now he's in the marketplace. That throws a massive wrinkle into not only the Lakers at center, but other teams at Center. So DeAndre Ayton immediately moves to the forefront. But then you have Brook Lopez, you have Clint Capella, Al Horford, so those four center free agents, suddenly you're looking at a center crop that's going to be very, very active. This is a, this is a pretty big time center class we're seeing right now. So I, I would expect the Lakers to look into all those players once free agency starts tonight. You know, deandre Ayton doesn't clear waivers until Wednesday, so that'll take a little bit more time. But the Lakers will be shoring up meetings from my understanding, with other available free agent centers tonight and into the next couple of days.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, so there's a lot of moves potentially about to take place and about to happen. Big names, potentially Rolling out of town in a lot of different towns. The apron talk has really become, I think, a driver or a motivator for teams to make more moves, especially to big contracts. Connor has a question for you.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah.

[Connor]

You called the Celtics kind of having to change their lineup because of the looming contract situation. And it feels like now the Mavericks are kind of entering into that realm, if you will, between Clay and Kyrie and AD and now Cooper Flagg, of course, and a couple other guys on that team that are kind of warranting more money. Gafford, they gave $60 million. Could you make the argument that this year is kind of the only year we'll see the Mavericks with this kind of lineup? Do you think they're kind of already looking forward and seeing what they're going to have to inevitably do because of how terribly set up the CBA is with this second apron bullshit? Or do you see how maybe it changes and the Mavericks are able to retain everybody because it feels like the worst possible thing you can do is have a bunch of good players on your team now.

[Adam Schefter]

So basically the Mavericks, from my valuation and how I've evaluated their structure, right now they're out of the second apron. They're essentially a tax paying, first apron type team and there aren't any contracts really that they're bringing in right now or that they're signing. You know, the fact that KYRIE Irving took three years, 119, that has now allowed them to use their five point, I think $4 million taxpayer mid level exception. You know, they're going to look at starting, you know, starting caliber point guards, d' Angelo Russell, Chris Paul, Malcolm Brogdon. Those are conversations that are going to go on tonight to go get those players. So they, they've actually been able to keep, you know, their, their salary numbers low now again until Cooper Flag hits in a few years when he's going to be a potential max contract, then we're having a different conversation. But this year, and really the next two, they're well positioned to stay out of the second April. And that means if they want to keep their group together, they can. Now, obviously they could make changes as well, but they have actually, the way they've, they've lined it up this year in the next two, they're, they're looking like they're going to be out of that vaunted second April.

[Pat McAfee]

There is a lot of shit to talk about in the NBA in there. Oh yeah, listen to second apron.

[Adam Schefter]

You heard a lot of deals. There were a lot of deals yesterday Popping off, Pat. And we're not even going yet up to something. Season.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, there was a lot of options.

[Adam Schefter]

Five hours away, baby.

[Pat McAfee]

I mean, this is yesterday. I just saw massive numbers with players decided to. Yeah, I guess I'll take 45 million. Yeah. Player decided to. Yeah, that sounds good. To 32 million a year. There was a bunch of those yesterday that were kind of popping off Sunday. That was where the LeBron James opt in. And then the conversation around that really, really all began. And then free agency tonight. We should expect a lot more is what you're saying. It sounds like there's going to be.

[Adam Schefter]

Some big deals tonight, Pat. There's gonna be some big deals tonight, Pat.

[Pat McAfee]

That was good. That was. Oh, you're pretty, you're. You're eager.

[Darius J. Butler]

Big, big ones.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. How big? We talk about you talking most craziest big. Yeah, you know, better be.

[Adam Schefter]

No, no, not yet. Not yet, not yet.

[Connor]

Because people, people were very, very underwhelmed with the Nas Reed contract. That was highway robbery. That was not most craziest off season type material.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't know. I saw a Minnesota Timberwolf sign Nas reed to a five year, 125 million dollar contract to stay with the franchise, including a player option. Congratulations. Congratulations.

[Connor]

He was kind of the guy.

[Adam Schefter]

That's a big deal. Then Julius Randle gets three years, $100 million. So that is actually really big for the Minnesota Timberwolves. You bring back Julius Randall, you bring back Nasri. Those are two big free agents. They want to keep that core together around Anthony Edwards. Rudy Gobert's back, obviously Jaden McDaniels. But the one guy though that the Minnesota Timberwolves are going to lose though. Nikhil Alexander, Walker Shay Gils, Alexander's cousin. He played some great defense all throughout the playoffs. Was a big factor on both ends of the floor, three point shooting. But my feel right now is that he will be departing the Timberwolves. He'll go somewhere else on a pretty big contract as well.

[Pat McAfee]

Good luck to him. I hope everybody gets all the money that they've earned through hard work. And what the current CBA is with the NBA, where a lot of people get a lot of money. One guy who's supposed to get a lot of money is no longer in the middle of getting a lot of money. It seems like. AP Tone has a question for you.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah, Shams, all those contracts are good news. You shared some bad news yesterday about Malik Beasley. He's being investigated by the USDA's office for potential gambling. You Know, in game stuff like that. This has happened in the NBA couple times the last few years, but he is definitely the biggest name, the best player that it's happened with. What do we know as of, as of recently with Malik Beasley?

[Adam Schefter]

As of right now, it's an active investigation and it centers around allegations around the 2023-24 NBA season. So it wasn't this past season, but the 202324 season. And it's around gambling on NBA games, prop bets, things of that sort. We don't know how vast and how big this could get. I will say though it is important to say his attorney, Steve Haney gave me a quote. He said, an investigation is not a charge. Malik is afforded the same right, the presumption of innocence as anyone else under the U.S. constitution. He has not been charged with anything as of right now. But the facts also are this. The Pistons and Malik, busy, from my understanding, they were set to reach an agreement on a three year, $42 million deal to bring him back to the Pistons. He had an unbelievable year for the Pistons last year. He was an unbelievable leader for the Pistons. He fit so well around Cade Cunningham in the, in that backcourt. He had the second most made threes of any player in the NBA behind Anthony Edwards. And so that deal was pretty much on track. That deal is no longer, as of right now, it is on complete pause. I mean, his entire really free agent market right now is frozen because of this investigation. And so for this to happen on the eve of free agency to one of the top free agents, one of the best shooters in the NBA, there's a ton of uncertainty around this situation. Again, he has not been charged yet. This is a very active federal investigation.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. So thank you for that information. And hopefully if he's found innocent, inevitably or not pressed with any charges, hopefully this deal will still be available for him or he'll be able to get it somewhere else. Obviously we will be, will have journalistic ethics and we will cover it if he is found to not be guilty of this. Because getting covered of this basically makes everybody's natural opinion to go, well, there's a reason that a DA's office is doing this that is just people's natural reaction. So if he is innocent and there's no charges pressed against him, I hope all this money and I hope the conversation is brought up that he didn't do anything wrong. Now if he did, we just saw John Tay Porter, what, two years ago, I believe because of an investigation, get a lifetime ban on Prop betting I believe. And then Terry Rozier I believe had an investigation but then that thing disappeared. So hopefully he has been cleared and if that is the case, hopefully know that and we can tell the world about it.

[Adam Schefter]

It's happened in football as of right now is it has been cleared. I mean he finished the season with Miami.

[Pat McAfee]

There's.

[Adam Schefter]

There's really nothing really active as of right now with him.

[Pat McAfee]

That's good news.

[Adam Schefter]

The NBA did. NBA spokesman Mike Bass did give a statement to me yesterday. He said that the league is cooperating with the federal prosecutors. So the league essentially, I mean this is a federal matter now. Like this is. This is in the hands of the courts now.

[Pat McAfee]

So would that mean it's a big enough amount of money that it's federal, that it would be some sort of scheming, some conning, some how. Why would it be? Is this the same as John Taylor Porters as well?

[Adam Schefter]

I mean to my knowledge it's the same kind of district area in New York. I again don't know how vast how big this one is in comparison to johntay Porter. But the league has said at this point their measure is to work and cooperate with federal authorities.

[Pat McAfee]

Interesting. That's a big deal because I mean a lot of people point out to hear the hypocrisy of us because we talk about sports in sports betting is such a just a natural part of conversation now in sport. And obviously a lot of people are benefiting from it, us included. We will not say that we are not a company that is certainly benefited greatly from the sports gambling shots. FanDuel by the way. Yeah, change all of our lives, change everything. And obviously es ESPN BET now is with espn. The difference is that whenever you're competing in the sport if you were to do what we do as retired athletes, which is why our message is always like hey, when you retire it's going to be there. Just wait. It's going to be there and it's going to be awesome and you're going to be able to get better at it actually because you're going to be able to actually focus on it as opposed to have somebody have leverage over you for the rest of your life with what's happening now. So it's like I understand there could be some hypocrisy. See also the games have to keep their integrity. That Tim Donahue stuff still makes people think that the game is a work. I mean that is like the biggest part of all these leagues is has to people have to think that this isn't a work. People have to believe that their team can win and that they can just out effort, not execute. So that's why as former players, I think it's a bad idea to have gambling and I think it should be stern punishments. Like a lot of people try to like, like say, well compared to this, you're getting this like lifetime ban and they're letting this. It's like. Because that would it up for everybody. Like everybody in every league. Everybody in the league, every person, every family, it just, it ruins everything. So I hope that what they're saying or alleging and I saw some videos. Oh yeah, I saw some videos on X. Few are not true about Malik Beasley. And I hope this doesn't become a big thing because we'll lose our leagues.

[Connor]

Yeah, can't have that.

[Pat McAfee]

Can't. Can't have. Can't. Can't lose our leagues. You know what I mean?

[Adam Schefter]

This, this Pat though, this does have from a perspective of, of basketball and free agent. Like, I'm, I'm, I'm an NBA insider. My job is to break news. This Malik Beasley situation had a direct impact on free agency. He was one of the best players in free agency. He has an impact on the Pistons. He has an impact on like at least four or five other free agents like this. The domino effect that has come from this is, is, is a lot bigger than just a normal person realizes. Like it impacted who Detroit's now going to go after in free agency, what other teams are like. It has a trickle down effect. So that's why the timing of this was, was probably, you know, why. Why it was what it was. But I mean, yeah, I mean in the case of, of what could have been for Malik, dizzy versus what it is, it's not, you know, it's not the most ideal.

[Pat McAfee]

All right, we move on. Good luck, Malik. We hope you didn't do anything. If you did though, they're gonna find out.

[Connor]

Yeah, no doubt.

[Pat McAfee]

They have you. They know exactly where you're at right now. If you stop to pee for longer than 35 seconds, they're going to send you a message on your watch saying, are you all right? I mean, they know. They know everything. They know everything. Go ahead, aj. Ah, you're muted.

[Ty Schmidt]

This moron's muted.

[Connor]

You muted your mic and forgot to unmute.

[Evan Fox]

No, I was. It was actually.

[Pat McAfee]

You guide me now.

[Adam Schefter]

Yeah, yeah, I got you.

[Evan Fox]

It was through FaceTime. It was a FaceTime situation. Shams Don Steely, the next head coach in the New York Knicks is that True.

[Adam Schefter]

That is not something that has come at my desk. The Knicks, to my knowledge.

[Darius J. Butler]

Don goes.

[Adam Schefter]

I go again. It's not something that has hit my desk as of yet. But listen, the Knicks are going through their process.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Adam Schefter]

I'm sure they're talking to several candidates. James Borrego, Taylor Jenkins, Mike Brown, Mike Inori. Those are the known interviews so far that I have.

[Pat McAfee]

I will say this. I watch Coach Jenny for the Pacers kick ass through this entire playoff series. She is awesome. I also learned about her story. I think she's a single mom as well. Her daughter has kind of grown up around the teams that she has coached. She's great for the Pacers. In Dawn Staley, obviously, basketball. G. Everybody likes Don Staley. Good luck. That'd be a huge play. That'd be a huge. That'd be the most craziest offseason ever.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Yes. And we. Obviously very celebratory in all of it. All right. Charms. We appreciate the hell out of you for joining us, man. Good luck figuring out federal nations good luck hours. Okay. Yeah. Four more hours for free agency. But you're also going to be in the middle of some federal investigation stuff with Malik Beasley. Good luck with those things coming across your desk. You know, we're going to need you kind of figuring all this shit out.

[Adam Schefter]

I'm bobbing and weaving. I'm doing it all, baby.

[Pat McAfee]

Do you remember when he was down at City hall in New York where the Kyrie Irving stuff was going on?

[Connor]

Yep.

[Pat McAfee]

My sources tell me at City hall is what he said. Straight face. It was unbelievable. You're the man, ladies and gentlemen. Shamshiran. That's real.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, he was.

[Pat McAfee]

He would come on our show and be. My sources at New York City hall are telling me, yada, yada, yada. And it was like, what a piece of information. There Kyrie was in the middle.

[Connor]

That was crazy.

[Pat McAfee]

Kyrie could go as a spectator, remember? He could. He could get the seat right next to the Knicks bench up.

[Darius J. Butler]

So stupid.

[Pat McAfee]

Could basically sit on.

[Connor]

And he did.

[Pat McAfee]

The Knicks bench, and he did. And it became a big story. Could not be a part of the Knicks organization, though, because of, you know, he would. He wouldn't get the. The shot. Oh, I'm sorry. The net. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Geez. That's 100 on me in Brooklyn, in New York.

[Ty Schmidt]

Knicks on the mind. We're just talking about, you know, hey.

[Pat McAfee]

What if Don Staley is the head coach?

[Ty Schmidt]

That would be. You're right. That would be most craziest off season ever. Territory that, that would be such a massive swing.

[Pat McAfee]

That would be huge.

[Adam Schefter]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Then what if they bring in LeBron to the Knicks? So all they were talking because, you know that creepy video was released.

[Ty Schmidt]

Very creepy.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't like that.

[Ty Schmidt]

That was in New York. Maybe not.

[Connor]

I thought, I thought it was.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, I thought it was in New York.

[Pat McAfee]

That was weird. Did you see this, aj?

[Evan Fox]

I don't think so, no.

[Pat McAfee]

We are not going to run it because it's a creepy video, but a lot of people just spread it and it was a creepy video. LeBron at dinner, like sitting a couple seats.

[Evan Fox]

Oh, yeah, yeah, I saw that.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Evan Fox]

Whoever recorded like a Benihana.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, it was like a Benihana situation. And you would have thought that LeBron at a Benihana would have the entire thing for him and team.

[Connor]

Exactly.

[Pat McAfee]

Feels like maybe he didn't. I don't know. Just the way the video came off. So this one Guy is recording LeBron at Beni Hana. Holy shit, I'm eating. I'm eating. Benny Hana with LeBron. He turns to the chef, obviously, because show's going on and then. And in the background overheard LeBron saying he might retire, play one year and he likes New York and his wife wants him to retire and all this shit. So like then that just spreads, you know, and that's a background conversation in a video of a guy who didn't appear to be with him, but nonetheless. But everybody started pushing that and it's like he said something about New York before Andy started spreading. He loves Madison Square Garden.

[Connor]

Uh huh.

[Ty Schmidt]

He does.

[Evan Fox]

It would make some sense. It would make some sense.

[Connor]

It definitely, definitely what? Ants in the East. The whole conversation about the east right now with Tyrese and Tatum.

[Pat McAfee]

What if LeBron's player coach over there for the New York Knicks.

[Darius J. Butler]

Nothing, nothing happens by accident. Jackson with LeBron.

[Evan Fox]

All right.

[Darius J. Butler]

This hasn't happened for 23 years. A conversation at dinner. It was weird.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, you're saying, you're saying that was a work.

[Darius J. Butler]

You know, maybe, maybe, maybe it's a work.

[Connor]

He's the best worker in the game.

[Darius J. Butler]

Braun would have the entire Bena. He would sit down.

[Connor]

It was a double date, though. But, but it was a double date. It was with Kevin Love and Kevin Love's wife. Now what if Kevin Love's wife.

[Darius J. Butler]

Close circle. No, that's close.

[Connor]

No, no, I know, but that's what I'm saying. Like if, if, if LeBron or Savannah calls and they're like, hey, the Jameses are coming through tonight. Obviously they're Going to. Okay, fine. But if Kevin Love's wife.

[AJ Hawk]

Kevin Love can get a private.

[Connor]

We don't know, since this is in New York, this might be K. Love's, you know, home base. Like, oh, K. Love's coming back through with his wife. Let's go. It's a double date night. We'll put him at the cool table with all of our other.

[Pat McAfee]

We need the full Benny Holness. Yeah, okay, I understand what you're saying. Might not have been possible. Might have been a last second decision. Whatever the case, I didn't like that people were spreading that video. No, I didn't. I didn't.

[Connor]

It's got to be against the law.

[Pat McAfee]

I almost. I almost commented on one of the very big accounts was like, hey, some real creep here. There's some real, you know, recorder.

[Connor]

Without knowing.

[Pat McAfee]

I guess paparazzis have kind of made it a business in of itself, but.

[Ty Schmidt]

It'S like, yeah, but paparazzi is like, they know, you know, like, for the most part, like, they're taking pictures. Adam, like, this guy is trying to be coy, like, not doing it, but he's picking up the audio.

[Pat McAfee]

To be clear. LeBron's got to know that.

[Ty Schmidt]

True.

[Pat McAfee]

I've been at dinner with some people and we are very much in the middle of a restaurant and people are just saying stuff. And I'm like, hey, oh, yeah, I've been there. What do we.

[Evan Fox]

Everybody can hear you right now, bud. That happens all the time.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't want to sound like a narcissistic prick right now, okay? But the moment that we walked in here, everybody knew we were in here, okay? Because probably nowadays, whenever we go out, it is like a fucking full group rolls in. Everybody as soon as we walk into, everywhere we go. And if we sit down in the middle of a. A public area, oh, very quiet all of a sudden, you know, and then all of a sudden it's like, oh, everybody in here is listening to our entire conversation right now. Let's understand that. Not everybody understands that people are very loud sound like LeBron loud talker.

[Mackenzie]

And that was public.

[Darius J. Butler]

And I mean, him and Kate, you.

[Cal Raleigh]

Can'T be doing that.

[Darius J. Butler]

You're not going anywhere.

[Pat McAfee]

Exactly. No chance.

[Darius J. Butler]

You know, so he know.

[Cal Raleigh]

I don't.

[Darius J. Butler]

I don't know. It was creepy. The video was creepy. But. But I mean, I'm sure LeBron's not, you know, stressing about that bit. You know, this is.

[Pat McAfee]

Was it hibachi table? Yeah, yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

It's easy to get carried away there.

[Pat McAfee]

You get excited you get captivated by what's going on.

[Evan Fox]

The saki, peeing in the guy.

[Pat McAfee]

How about poo poo hat? What a play. How about one of that pine, pine, Pine shrimps?

[AJ Hawk]

That's a good point, Dick.

[Pat McAfee]

They make us dance. Little socky guy. Hey.

[Ty Schmidt]

Everybody goes crazy.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, my God. I was a Hibachi fan, obviously. Obviously.

[Ty Schmidt]

It's great.

[Pat McAfee]

I'm getting a full show here.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

And then if somebody messed up, obviously, we got a full on. Ho, ho, ho.

[Ty Schmidt]

Go back to the beginning.

[Pat McAfee]

Let's restart that thing. Start the period over. Let's go back to the show. Ladies and gentlemen, speaking of the show, there's a man who is in the show who is doing something that no person in the history of his position has done. He's a catcher, which obviously I grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, so I. Jason Kendall.

[Ty Schmidt]

Sure.

[AJ Hawk]

The catcher.

[Pat McAfee]

I understand everything about it. But the catcher position, obviously involved in every single pitch, crouched over. You know, obviously you would hope that they'd be great on the offensive side of the ball, but you don't know if they expect that they are going to be the best in the entire league. Ladies and gentlemen, joining us now from the Seattle Mariners, we're the number two team in the AL west, affectionately known by many as Big Dumper, Cal Rowley.

[Cal Raleigh]

How are we doing, guys?

[Pat McAfee]

Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for joining us. Can I please say congratulations on a phenomenal everything that you have going on right now? We put up all the records, and also, I believe all star voting is taking place right now. This is phase two, which is not phase one. Even though he had a huge lead in phase one because of the performance that he's had thus far. Phase two, everything's wiped clean. You got to revote, okay? You got to revote. Only one hashtag vote could be used per person. You got to go to Mariners.comvote to get this man into the All Star Game, which obviously you have earned it and deserved it with your performance thus far. Let's talk about your performance thus far. We have learned about you because it's the greatest nickname I've ever heard about in sports. Big Dumper. Now, we were told by Jet Passing that your mom maybe doesn't love Big Dumper. So we started saying Big Thumper a little bit, you know, because it's in the ballpark, but it's more so thumping a ball or doing that. Does your mom hate Big Dumper? How do you feel about Big Dumper? The nickname?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. I mean, it's not the one not the one you write up, right. As far as nicknames go. But now my mom's learned, she's. She's. She's learned to love it, so she's all good with it. I think it's great. Everybody here in Seattle loves it. And it's like I said, I said it a few times. The more fans now they're wearing big dumper jerseys than they are Raleigh jersey. So it's, it's become like a little fan favorite.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, so we can say big dumper and sleep soundly at night not knowing we're not.

[Cal Raleigh]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay.

[Cal Raleigh]

You're good.

[Pat McAfee]

Ladies and gentlemen, Big fucking thumper. All right, let's get to it. What you're doing at the catcher position is obviously historic. Have you always been a catcher? When have you always been a big bat? And why aren't catchers always known for hitting dingers? I'd watch Jason Kendall walk up there, no gloves, massive jaw, and obviously he would do his thing. But the catching position, it feels like what you were doing, it is being talked about as historic, legendary anomaly like stuff. Why is that? As a whole cow for a baseball idiot like myself?

[Cal Raleigh]

Well, yeah, I mean, catchers glove first position, right? So, you know, their job is really to play good defense, take care of the pitching staff, run a. Run a good game, you know, hope. Hope the pitchers get through, really. It's kind of their job. So in the back kind of comes secondary and everybody really knows that, that. So it's a, it's almost a plus if catchers can hit sometimes. So, you know, it's just, it's a tough position. You know, you're. You're constantly squatted down. You're. It's a lot of wear and tear on the knees and the body and you know, there's some built it off days there and you've seen some teams just go with a full platoon style, you know, catching system. So you want to keep guys fresh and you, you don't see as many, you know, main. Main starter, starting catchers anymore. So. Yeah, it's just, it's a tough position on the body and mentally. And I'd say that's probably why you don't see as many catchers, you know, put up the offensive numbers that you see some of the, you know, Aaron Judges and Shohei Ohtani's.

[Pat McAfee]

That's why Big dump's old school.

[Connor]

It's different.

[Pat McAfee]

You know what I mean? Big Dumps, an old school catcher out there. How old are you dumping?

[Cal Raleigh]

I'm 28.

[Pat McAfee]

Did you guys have knee savers. Did you use those when you were growing up, the knee savers? Or did you hate those?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I think In Little League 1, 1 or 2 years, I had those built in, so I thought those were.

[Pat McAfee]

Supposed to save you guys. You guys weren't supposed to be as sore from crouching. I had to hold, you know, for like, field goals. I had to hold. That's one we do three times a game, four times a game. Maybe I would get up, you know, like that. That's how I would do it. You guys literally having to crouch the entire game. It's been something that I've been on 80 milligrams for. And I've actually thought, this dude is in a deep squat for three and a half, four hours. So the fact that you're able to get. Is there anything you do differently than other players to get your shit back activated, or is there anything you've changed your focus on to become a better hitter in this entire thing? Whenever it comes to taking care of your body? Big dumper, obviously, we're doing a lot of legs. We're a deep squat. That's why we got this massive ass. That's what we're doing around here. But is there things you have to do, you think, to make yourself handle all of that while also being good with a bat?

[Cal Raleigh]

I mean, yeah, you just. You learn over time. And I'd say once you get into pro ball, you, you know, you're starting to play, you know, 140 games and you get to big leagues, you play 162. So you just learn how to take care of yourself. And you do the right things in the off season as far as lifting goes. And then after a while, you know, you kind of just. You almost get used to it in a way, you know, just because you're doing it so much and you learn what your body needs and what it. What it doesn't need. And it's just one of those things you just gotta every day kind of be consistent with what you do. And I'd say the more often you could do that, the easier. Easier it becomes. I don't think it ever becomes easy, but, you know, there's. There's some days where you're feeling a little more than others, you know, day games or maybe a day after long, like, extra ending game, probably.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Because you guys are on tour for what, seven months straight or whatever. Squat buddy, come on, get down here. Go to a new city squat, brother. Need you to do that here in the middle of this Ballpark. Great views, though, from where you're at. Everybody's paying to be where you are, you know, a lot of money. Everybody's paying to be where you are. Pittsburgh is the best park you've ever been to. Yep.

[Cal Raleigh]

It's a pretty cool park. I'm not gonna lie. I liked playing there.

[Pat McAfee]

I assume that means you did well. Okay. AJ Has a question for you. Okay. Relax on boys. Jason.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Evan Fox]

Obviously, you're. You're a product of your own success, and you've been so successful you're getting intentionally walked, it seems like more and more as time goes. What do you. I guess, how do you attack at bats knowing that, hey, I'm. I may only get one or two good pitch to hit each game. Like, how does that change your. Your impact at the plate?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, I think it. Sometimes you can kind of mess with you a little bit, you know, get in your head as far as, like, oh, you know, are these guys going to pitch to me? Are they not going to pitch to me? But I've kind of found that, you know, the more you can just keep it the same and just have that same kind of approach every single time. And I, I think it's like. It's like if you're ready to go and you're prepared, then you don't. You don't have to worry about anything. You'll be fine. Like, you'll swing at the pitches you want to swing at, you'll take the ones you want to, and it's baseball, you know, sometimes you're going to chase, sometimes you're going to miss, and sometimes you're going to hit it. So you just got to be ready every single time and, and not expect, you know, to go up there and get walked, because that's when you kind of mess yourself up a little bit. I'd say.

[Pat McAfee]

So for you, hitting, whenever you bounce back and forth from either side of the plate, what are you. What are you looking at? Is it some pitchers that, you know that you're better on this side of the plate? Is it. Oh, right. Arms all. Sorry. Let's go ahead and make the left arm the lead arm. Like, why. What is the decision making process on why you're on either side of the plate?

[Cal Raleigh]

No, it's mainly just whatever. Whatever arm is on the mound. So if a righty's throwing him hitting lefty, the lefty's throwing them hidden righty. You know, it's kind of because of the breaking balls. You want breaking balls coming into you rather than going Away from you. So really the only pitch that I had to worry about at the end of the day is change ups, just going away from me. From. So that's the only one.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

That's kind of why switch hitters do it. They, you know, kind of helps out. You know, you don't have to face left on left, right on right, which is notoriously, you know, a little tougher for people to do because, you know, you got breaking balls, you got sinkers, you got things like that. Sweepers.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, all those things.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, we know the new fad, so that's great pitch. Yeah. But yeah, there's. I mean, there's some guys like Tommy Edmond in the league. He. He goes. Sometimes he'll go right on right, you know, depending on what type of pitcher's throwing. So it's. It's actually kind of interesting how he does it.

[Pat McAfee]

You ever bought back and forth in an at bat? Like, you know, I'm not seeing it.

[Shams Charania]

Good.

[Pat McAfee]

Let me go to the other side. Yeah. In the middle of the bat or not maybe every pitch. What do we see?

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, yeah, some Japanese high school player was bouncing back and forth.

[Pat McAfee]

And he also did this one too. I believe he crouched down, maybe small strike zone, back and forth. Yeah, it was a full show. I'm not saying you should make a mockery out of this thing, but do you. Have you ever bounced back and forth in and at bat?

[Cal Raleigh]

Never in a bat. I. I've switched mid at bat when they, they brought in a pitcher, like it was like a 21 count or something. They brought a new pitcher, so I switched the other side. But. But yeah, I mean, if you're switching back and forth the whole time, you're. You're probably not in a good place on the other side of the play.

[Pat McAfee]

Don't you think you should get a count for both of them? Yeah, you. They should have to strike out both of you. Yeah, that should be.

[Connor]

Oh, two. Switch it up. Oh.

[Pat McAfee]

So. All right, let's get to you having Monster Wood this year. Monster. Go ahead, Ty. Yeah, Cal.

[Ty Schmidt]

I think everyone who loves baseball is jacked up that you're going to be in the derby this year. But I'm just curious. There's always that kind of rumor, and I don't think it's ever been proven or disproven that once you get in the all the all star game, in the home run Derby specifically, it can kind of like up your swing for the second half of the season. I think you've gone six games in a row. Right now without a homer, which, you know, I mean, for your pace, this year has been crazy. But people already say, like, oh, you know, he's starting to lose it a little bit. Like, are you worried at all about your swing getting messed up in the derby just because it's so much different than what you do night in, night out? And also, how jacked up are you to have your dad pitching to you?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, first of all, I'm super excited to be doing it. You know, it's kind of one of those, like, dream come through, dream come true kind of things, you know? You know, as a kid, you always, you know, you find a fence somewhere and you pretend to play home run derby with your buddies. And, you know, getting my dad to throw to me, I'm gonna have my little brother, he's gonna be behind the plate catching for me. He's 15. So is he a catcher as well?

[Pat McAfee]

Your dad's a catcher, right? Former catcher. Is he a catcher?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, yeah, my dad was a catcher. My little brother, he's 15. He's a catcher.

[Pat McAfee]

Right now.

[Cal Raleigh]

He's playing the whole travel ball thing, and so he's pretty jacked up about it, too.

[Pat McAfee]

I would say the biggest asses in all the towns. The Raleigh family, when they walk in, probably all three catchers walking in, look out. Three. Three. I think your dad was also coach, too, right? I assume.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. Yeah. Dad was a coach and a catcher. And, yeah, my little brother, he's. He's kind of built just like me now. He's a little taller than me now, actually, which is crazy at 15, but. Oh, yeah, we're blessed. We're blessed from that side of the family. Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Amen, brother. Great for being a catcher and for hitting while having a lot of power. Power. Will you bounce back and forth in there? You might have, yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

I mean, I. I think I want to. I mean, I know right field's a little shorter, so lefty might be a little more primary, but.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, you'll be fresher though. Early rounds, boom. And then push into the later round. Going to righty. Haven't hit yet all night. Interesting.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. I mean, it'd be kind of cool, right?

[Connor]

Strategy.

[Pat McAfee]

It would, yeah. Two guys.

[Ty Schmidt]

Rushman did that a couple years ago in the derby. He didn't win it, but that was.

[Pat McAfee]

Was.

[Ty Schmidt]

That was the best part of the night. He was bouncing back and forth and just hitting bombs from the left side.

[Pat McAfee]

Could you imagine if they had graphics Dumper on your left, dumper on, big dumper. Sorry. It's not just a regular dumper. I am 100% apologetic for that. If you were to win a home run derby, could you imagine this season being outrageous? Dbut has a question for you.

[Darius J. Butler]

Coming into this season, did you know this was going to be a special season for you at the plate? Specifically, what was it? And that was, at what point did you know, okay, this is, this is. I'm in a groove right now. I'm really seeing it.

[Cal Raleigh]

No, not really. I mean, I actually had a pretty, pretty bad spring training in general. So it's. It's kind of funny how it goes sometimes. I. Yeah, I was just. I was trying to get ready for the season, like a, like a normal, normal year, and, you know, things started clicking, you know, early on and just kind of stayed the course, really. You know, I think when you play 162 games, it's. It's a lot. It's a lot mentally, it's a lot physically, and a lot can change. And throughout a season, you go through a lot of ups and downs, and when you go through those downs, you can't really kind of stray off the path. So I think that's the biggest difference for me this year is, you know, in the past, I've tried to change things or maybe try to make adjustments that weren't technically needed. And this year I've just really trusted the plan, what I've been trying to do. And I'd say that's probably the biggest difference for, for why I'm, you know, where I'm at right now.

[Pat McAfee]

Are you a little bit. Stitches? Superstitious? Medium? Statious. What. What type of statious level are we at?

[Cal Raleigh]

I'm not superstitious, but I am a little suspicious.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, I can see that. We're doing the same cleat, especially with all the gear that you have. I assume there's some sort of what goes on first when it goes on type shit. Do you have that or no?

[Cal Raleigh]

Oh, yeah. I mean, every, every. I'm pretty sure every ball player has their thing. You know, you, you wear, you hit a homer, you wear the same, same pair of socks, you know, same cup. You put everything on the same way. You know, cleats, the way you wear your pants, all the way down to what you ate the day before. If you had a breakfast sandwich, you're gonna eat the same breakfast sandwich. You know, it's coffee, same thing. So it's. I think every ball player is like that, though.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Respect. Yeah, I love it. I love that that's a part of Your sport. With how long you guys are on the road and how much failing happens, finding some success and happiness, I assume alongside of the is certainly something we're going to try to make the baseball gods continue to give to us. Now, a man has a question for you that was once the catcher for the number 24 team in the United States of America at Plum High School. As a member of the Mustangs, ladies and gentlemen, AP tone is.

[AJ Hawk]

That's true. Kyle. Respect everything that you do.

[Pat McAfee]

He never wore knee savers either.

[AJ Hawk]

I did not. But I did wear the goalie mask helmet instead of the old school helmet that you are rocking right now. I noticed that your off days from catching are not really off days because you're. You're DHing. I believe you've been in 82 of 83 games. Do you find it harder at the plate when you don't have to catch? Like getting catching gets you into the game, or do you hate games that you don't catch?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, earlier this year, I was actually. It was like the first month or so of me DHing, I think I was. I was really, really bad at it. You know, just because, you know when you're catching, you have so much activity going on, you're. You're worried about calling a game. You're back there, you know, framing, blocking, throwing people out, doing that whole thing, and you're so involved, you don't even really have time to think about hitting or anything else. And then. And then all of a sudden you're DHing and you're sitting on the bench. You're talking to pitchers who aren't playing and they're talking about, you know, God knows what.

[Pat McAfee]

Couldn't even fathom you baseball players, you're.

[Cal Raleigh]

Chewing seeds, you don't know what to do with yourself. And then you have to go hit. And then so sometimes you can throw you out of your rhythm a little bit. So it's a little funky. But, you know, I've kind of learned to find the right routine for that and the right mix in a way.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, when you're framing, is it a wrist action, finger action? What am I?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, a little more with the elbow there. Go out.

[Connor]

Nailed it.

[Cal Raleigh]

Pretty good.

[Pat McAfee]

That's what.

[Cal Raleigh]

Just a little. I got like a press. Yes, there you go.

[Pat McAfee]

Are you. Are you working the umps for strike zones? How's that go between you guys? Because I obviously see coaches get pissed. I see pitchers get pissed. You have to deal with them literally on your back the entire game. What are the relationships like with the Humps.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. I mean, each one's different, Right. You know, they have different personalities. Some are a lot more chatty. Some are not want to talk at all. Some are, you know, they. They want. They want to know if they think they got that right or not. So you kind of play the middleman a little bit. You know, you don't want to. You know, you're not getting on them all the time like, you see, you know, hitters and coaches and maybe pitchers sometimes, so. But you just got to keep them in check. You know, you got to make sure that, you know, you guys are on the same page, you're being respectful, and you just have a relationship with them. Just talk to them, really. You know, I think that's the biggest thing that's.

[Pat McAfee]

Especially as a hitter, it's like, let's. We want this guy to be my friend. Oh, yeah. Yeah. All these guys, and you're right there in it. I love you saying. Some guys ask if. If you thought it was a right call or not, you'll say, like, yo, yo, miss that. Hey, we can't be having that. Okay. Is that real? Is that real interaction? How regular is that?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, no, it's real. I mean, guys, you know, umpires all the time, you know, that, you know, they're getting graded just like we are. So, you know, they. They have their system of, you know, calling balls and strikes, and they want to get as many right as they can. And so, you know, a lot of the time they're just like, you know, you with me on that one? Or, you know, do you think that one was off? Or you think it was on a little bit and you just kind of have that back and forth all game. Like I said, usually things are always good when you. When you're just, you know, being up front and just talking to them and things start to go a little wiry when you start turning around, maybe. Maybe saying things you shouldn't say, but.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

Which sometimes that happens. You know, it's part of the game and people. There's money on the line and there's, you know, games online, wins and losses.

[Pat McAfee]

So careers, legacies. Yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

And get emotional. So, you know, sometimes it gets the best of people and tap and happened a few times. So.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, it's life's work, too. Like, hey, what you're doing is ruining an entire family, an entire life's work, a legacy, a career, let alone everything else. Football. It's hard for these refs because some of the calls are obviously so close when it comes to holding you guys, it's literally like that much. And then the catcher or the umpire, from what I've been told, I didn't play baseball growing up. My dad wouldn't let me hate the sport. Didn't like it, didn't like that he didn't like the sport. I think I probably would have been an okay baseball player, but nonetheless, I don't know shit about him. From Pittsburgh, the Pirates have been terrible. What I've learned is there's a lot of unwritten rules and I think like umpires have like their own strike zone. So like that little box that's on tv, it's like that's not always the strikes. The umpire might have a different strike. So it's like, well, why is the box on the fucking tv? Well, because this is still a human sport. They're not able to make it a robot yet. We shall see. The conversation continues with big dumper on YouTube, ESPN Plus, Disney plus and TikTok Live. We'll be back tomorrow. Goodbye. Okay, Dump, so I just had to call middle finger fastball to you there so you wouldn't talk. We just had to get off espn. Now we're going to continue, continue on digital. Okay, so we appreciate you hanging out and watching all that take place, but that is a real thing, right? These umps are working their own boxes. And as a guy who sees the pitch, do you know that maybe a little bit more of advantage in this thing?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. So I mean, it's kind of crazy. You know, they had a, you know, they had their own zone and the, what is the, you know, regulated strike zone. And last year and the year before, they had this 2 inch buffer zone inside and out of the zone, which was something that, you know, if they got, if they call a striker ball in that zone, they weren't going to be docked, you know, points or whatever for calling the wrong pitch. But this year they've shrunk it down to 0.75. And so now you're getting a lot, a lot of umpires calling a little smaller of a zone and being a little tighter because, you know, they want umpires to get all the calls.

[Pat McAfee]

Right?

[Cal Raleigh]

So, so, and as that's happened, you've seen a lot more ball calls. You're not seeing as many strikes. But in the past, you know, each umpire had their own zone. You know, it was, it was kind of, you know, special to them. And some people would give off the plate, some people would give up and some people give down, some people wouldn't give down. And it's just how it was. And there were a lot of unwritten rules. Like you said, you know, guys, you know, rookies, you know, you better be swinging. It wasn't like, it wasn't like, you know, there's this, this strike zone set strike zone where you had to get every call, right? They would, they would let you know, you know, as soon as you got to the league. It's, it's, you better be swinging. You're not gonna get any special treatment. You know, rookies are gonna, they're gonna have a little bigger of his own than the veteran guys are.

[Pat McAfee]

I love to hear that actually out of baseball, hey, you want to make it in this league, we're gonna need to see some action.

[Ty Schmidt]

Earn it.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. And I love.

[Connor]

Sweet rook.

[Pat McAfee]

I love it. I love that the umpires are like, yeah, that is a strike. Okay. And you're going to shut your fucking mouth or get out of my league. Okay. That's, I love that that was a thing because that is like baseball has that more than any other sport. I think rules wise, hockey has like unwritten rules. And it's like, we're going to handle this. Baseball, it's like, I mean if they get the signals, they get the signals. That's, that's, that's on you. I guess that's a big deal. Yes. I did my research and I thought about what I should ask a catcher in the MLB and what would be a good relevant question. They're trying to get your shit all the time right? These, they're trying to get your signals, your numbers, everything. Are we dancing? What is the. Do we do a couple of dummy calls? How do we. And who's relay? How, how does that whole process go for somebody that doesn't really know?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, so there used to be, you know, everybody used to do fingers, you know, obviously putting them down. But I think in 2022 they switched to the pitchcom, which is basically an earpiece. Kind of like in football, you know, the quarterbacks have. So now pitchers have an earpiece in there. Catchers have the, the remote and they're controlling and they're. You know, I hit the button and it says fastball or it's slider. So it's.

[Pat McAfee]

Is it your voice? Is it your voice in there? Here?

[Cal Raleigh]

Do you ever get like just some kind of random AI voice, you know?

[Connor]

Come on.

[Cal Raleigh]

I think it would be better if.

[AJ Hawk]

It was Morgan Freeman.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, we should put. Maybe, maybe you should be able to select who's giving it like when you're Driving. Okay.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

But people.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, people used to steal signs all the time because they would. You know, especially now with video and stuff, they would. They just have. They literally would hire somebody, be like, all right, what's this guy's signs? When he comes in the game, there's runner, second base. And they'd be like, all right, he used the second sign, shake the first. And teams would already know that. And then as soon as the guy gets in the game, they'd have their signs and they'd be relaying, you know, to the hitter. And that's what. It's what it kind of came to with all the cameras and stuff.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. And I heard garbage cans. You know, we heard about the garbage cans thing, but then I heard baseball. People be like. I mean, they kind of got it. Let's just move along. You know, it's like in the football. Whenever the Patriots got caught for whatever, all people in football were like, yeah, yeah, terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible. Let's move along. Let's move along. And it's like. Like a very interesting thing about the sport. Now you deal, obviously, with some of the most special people in the entire sports world. Go ahead, con man.

[Connor]

Yeah, big dumper. It feels as though most pitchers are lunatics. Head cases kind of walk to the beat of their own drum. There's stories about Zach Grinke being an absolute psychopath in the best possible way, though. Do you think that you have to kind of change how you call games and interactions with pitchers based on who's pitching? How does that kind of go for a catcher sometimes? Do you want to say something to a pitcher, but, you know, hey, nobody talks to this guy while he's pitching, so I can't really do that. What is kind of the communication, like, between a catcher and a pitcher in that relationship?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, you have. You have your pregame meeting pretty much every time with a starting pitcher. And, you know, the way I kind of like to phrase it is, you know, you go. Go over. It's like scouting reports and videos and, you know, you have a. You have a plan like you're in. You know, in football, you got your first 10 plays mapped out, and it's kind of how you do it the first time through the order you got to kind of map down. And then, you know, after that, you kind of go from there based off of what you're seeing. Some guys may be hot, some guys maybe not. And you might. Might have to change some things up. And each guy's different. Right. You know, we have 13 pitchers on staff. So it's 13 different personalities and so you got to learn how to deal with every single one of them. Some are like you said, like a little crazier, a little more psycho, little, you know, you know, take that pre workout Red Bull to the head and they're geeked out by the time they get in there. And some are a little more calm and a little more, you know, rational at the time. So it's just learning how to deal with those guys.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, I couldn't even fathom the amount of personalities that you have to keep focused and locked in. Good luck on all that. They're professionals too. It's act like adults out here. But in baseball it feels like there's more blow ups. You know, I love the, I love the kick in the dirt and the hole. I like that. I like the benches clearing too. I love the. Just the theatrics of it all. We're jogging in from center field.

[Cal Raleigh]

That's right.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. We're jogging in for center. Just so on film they know we were with the boys whenever there was an opportunity to fight. Now let's go back to what you said there about first 15 for football. Did you play football?

[Cal Raleigh]

I, I think I went to one practice and I banged it.

[Pat McAfee]

Smart dad. Catcher, you know, the whole time. Cal would have been a great. Yeah, hey, you would have been a thumper, dude. Fall back. Yeah, big dumper would have been a thumper. Okay, so first 15 for football is offense. Coordinators are trying to get an understanding of how the defense is going to react if we were to do this type of formation or this style of play. And can they stop this? Like if they can't stop this, we're going to go back to this. While you're going through the lineup for the first time, are you getting a sense of whether or not a guy is, let's say nervous, scared or is not seeing it on a particular day? And are you like trying to read body language and sounds or like aura almost while they're in there, while you're trying to call it, or do we have a system like this, what we throw, this what we throw, then this is what we're doing.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, you know your guy. So. So really you start off with your pitcher strengths and depending on the day, maybe the guy's throwing a little harder, maybe he's throwing a little slower. And based off of that, maybe you're seeing something different with him. Maybe he's locating, maybe he's not locating. Maybe he's landing in Secondaries, maybe he's not. So a lot of it starts with the pitcher. And then based off of that, especially if the guy's been around for a while, players will start doing scouting, porch. They'll set, you know, they, maybe they'll step off the play a little bit, maybe they'll scoot up on the play a little bit and it kind of tells you what they're looking for and, or maybe not looking for. So a lot that goes into it, like you said, with like body language and, and you know, you can kind of tell too, you know, if God takes an ugly swing or something, you know, maybe, maybe he's not seeing that pitch particularly well. And that's kind of how it goes.

[Pat McAfee]

And how much are they looking at you? Are you scared to give anything away back there? Because I'll see you guys sometimes do a cool slide, you know, and I'm like, the batter does not see that. Is that a real tell or not a real tell? Or can you not be seen by batter?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, you don't want to set up too early because sometimes you might give away location or in a location might give away a pitch. So you gotta, you just, you know, stay honest because, you know, you got people from dugout, you got people on base who may be watching. And if you're setting up a certain way for a certain pitch every single time, that could maybe be a tell or something like that. So you got to keep people honest. And you know, there's always somebody looking for that, that extra advantage. You know, it's. It's usually somebody in the dugout or somebody on the base paths. And you know, sometimes all it takes is that one little thing that can make a difference in a game.

[Pat McAfee]

Have you seen dumper? He's got this cool slide. You know what else is coming with the slide? Curveball thing. Coming. Every time you see that big ass slide to the outside, just know what's coming. I love that you guys think about all these things because it's such an intimate in such a fine line of success and failure, even though failure comes on a regular basis. Not for you offensively, obviously, this year, Ty, is a question for you.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, Cal, obviously the power numbers have always been there with you, but I think the, the most impressive thing when looking at what you've done this year is your batting average is like 50 points higher than your career average. Do you feel like you've become a much more complex complete hitter this year and like, what was the work that went into it this off season? Because obviously, you know, like, if you make contact, you're always going to be hitting home runs, but I feel like you're hitting the ball to all fields incredibly well this year. And obviously, you're not just that guy who, hey, you know, he's either gonna homer, he's gonna strike out. Like, that's not the case anymore.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I think I. You know, first couple years in the big leagues, you know, obviously I knew I had the power. It was just, you know, finding a way to put bat on the ball a little more often. So I think it. I think it just comes with learning yourself and learning the league and learning, you know, certain type of pitchers and what you need to do against those guys, which you need to do against, you know, other guys. And, you know, also credit. You know, Justin Turner a little bit, too. You know, he helped me out a lot last year. He's with the Cubs now, and he's been around for a while, so he. He helped me a lot last year, you know, kind of learning, you know, how to approach certain guys and. But yeah, like I said, you just. Sometimes it takes a little while to learn the league and learn how they're going to pitch you and. And learn certain type of pitchers and what you need to do against those guys.

[Pat McAfee]

All right, dumper. I played baseball one time. I still don't know if I batted from the right side of the plate. I didn't know if I was a righty or a lefty. I batted in the game righty, but the lefty swing so much smoother. Maybe I was supposed to. Maybe I'm. Maybe I'm supposed to be both sides of play. That's a compliment. How many. How many of you guys are out there in the league right now?

[Cal Raleigh]

Not many.

[Pat McAfee]

It's a dying.

[Mackenzie]

How many?

[Evan Fox]

Not many power guys, though. Did anyone try to make you not a switch hitter because you're such a power hitter?

[Cal Raleigh]

I've always had people tell me different things. You know, they're like, I think you're righty. I think you're lefty. But no, you know, I was something I've always been stubborn about, and I was like, no, this is something I have to do. And I was always very committed to it.

[Pat McAfee]

I hit dongs, bro. I'm going to continue to hit dongs. Okay?

[Evan Fox]

Both sides.

[Pat McAfee]

Both sides of the plate. You roll a lefty out here, Righty me. God, you roll a righty lefty. Dumper, gone.

[Connor]

See you.

[Pat McAfee]

But it's not just dong or gone anymore. More. He's getting wood on moves like a freight train down that first baseline.

[Connor]

Imagine with a football.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, come on. One practice. Mike.

[Evan Fox]

Mike Allstott Jr. Oh, my God.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Especially. Yeah. All right, Cal, we'll vote for you. The. The voting's very stupid, I will say, but hey, has anybody got an All Star Game type thing right in any league? I don't think so. So we will play. Oh, actually NHL with the four nations becoming eight. Sorry. They got it right. Everybody else is chasing it. Home Run Derby. Always awesome. Big Dumper will be competing in it. And let's make sure we get them in the All Star game by going to mariners.com forward/vote boom. That's a wild request.

[Ty Schmidt]

Can you still do the hashtag vote Cal? Do we know.

[Connor]

I think.

[Ty Schmidt]

Is that still.

[Pat McAfee]

It's worth one vote per person.

[Connor]

Okay.

[Pat McAfee]

Only one time.

[Ty Schmidt]

Okay. Only got a couple days here, so maybe a couple of those.

[Pat McAfee]

And shouldn't we be able to say hashtag vote Dumper?

[Ty Schmidt]

Absolutely.

[Pat McAfee]

I mean, at 1,000, you should have been.

[Connor]

Should you just be in. If you lead the league in home runs.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yes.

[Pat McAfee]

Congratulations. You made the All Star Game. That's what they should say. Yeah. All right, well, we'll vote. We're voting for you.

[Connor]

Yeah, big time.

[Cal Raleigh]

I appreciate that.

[Pat McAfee]

Guys, we were trying to come to this. We want to let you know, the Home Run Derby. We're trying our best to come.

[Cal Raleigh]

You're gonna make it.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't know if there's enough space. That's a real thing. That's a real thing. I guess we've kind of gotten in here late to the game and all the spots have been taken up basically for everything, but Fosso is in the middle of trying to figure it out, so there's a chance. What I'm saying is we had wanted to come because we think the derby's awesome. Like, I'm ADD guy, so, like, yeah, that's fine. I fucking love it. You know, I love. Especially your dad's pitching to you, your brother's catching. There's, like, emotional. It's a. I think it's one of the best things in all of sports, the Home Run Dirt Derby, legitimately. So we had wanted to utilize ESPN's access to get to the derby. I guess we got in a little bit late, and now we're trying to figure it out, but we're trying to get there, man. We're big fans of the derby.

[Cal Raleigh]

Just do it like you do the. Like when the national championship, the playoffs or whatever. They did the. You guys did your own Little Pat McAfee, the broadcast live. Oh, let's do that. I'm sure you guys get more viewers, for sure.

[Ty Schmidt]

That would be fun.

[Pat McAfee]

But that being said, we need to get on. That would be awesome. That would be sweet. Put us in a little thing. Put us in a little thing out there.

[Evan Fox]

I mean, little cage. A little cage out there.

[Pat McAfee]

Absolutely.

[Cal Raleigh]

Put you in center field.

[Pat McAfee]

Yes.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, I need a glove, though.

[AJ Hawk]

They put us in the boj.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, we need a glove. We definitely need to.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah, but we don't need those kids out there.

[Pat McAfee]

Maybe m. Maybe mid out there with no glove, just running around. Face. Hey, I heard these baseballs, they're trying to screw you hitters. What's that all about? And why are they doing that? It's not a problem for you, obviously, leading the league in homers. But they're saying that the seams are bigger. What is that all about?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, they're saying there's a little bit of drag in the balls. There's the seams a little higher, which causes the ball go a little, you know, not as far. And, you know, you don't really think about it until you hit one right to the wall and you're like, damn.

[Pat McAfee]

It, that should have been gone.

[Cal Raleigh]

Okay, so, yeah, that's the. If that's the drag coming into play, then that one would be out. So.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, so three point shooters, they know if the hoop is off by a centimeter. Okay. They know if it's off by centimeter. For me, punting, soon as the ball was leaving my foot, I knew if it was a good ball or not. For you. Is there one? Because I saw a highlight of a guy. A couple guys with the. They were pitching this big scene ball thing. Even though I'm watching Shohei Aaron and you just take them out, they're like, hey, there's different balls this year. Guys think they're home, they're pimping these things. They're actually feeling as if it's home runs and then outfield are literally just backing up like 10ft and grabbing it and then throwing it in. Is there any time you've hit where you felt like it was gone and then it wasn't? Is that real?

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, I mean, that's real. I mean, all of it.

[Connor]

No way.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. I mean, sometimes, you know, sometimes you play places and you might have a little harder balls, and sometimes maybe not. And, you know, it's something that they're, you know, you're constantly trying to figure out, yeah, these balls, what's going on. Yeah. Sometimes the. The bigger market teams seems like they have harder balls.

[Mackenzie]

Whoa.

[Pat McAfee]

You don't know.

[Cal Raleigh]

I mean, there was that rumor going around a couple years ago, you know, when pool holes was trying to get to. I was at 700. Yeah, they were sending those. Sending him the harder balls. And you know baseball.

[Pat McAfee]

I love it. All this is possible in baseball. Everything you just said, I'm like, yeah, that would make. I would do the same if I was the league. Like the ump giving a bigger strike zone against rookies. I like that move. I like that. AK welcome to the show. Yeah, it's a show. I like that. Even though that's not. If they're sending harder balls for a chase, it's like, hey, it's within rules. Yeah, these are. These are all within the rules. But it is baseball. All of that. I would believe any rumor is believable, I think baseball.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah. Well, it's like. It's like one of those things, you know, somebody starts it and then it gets around and you don't even know if it's true at the end of the day. And it's one of those. Maybe it is, maybe it's not. Be a little bit of a conspiracy.

[Pat McAfee]

Connor, that has been proven that. That has never been a fair look.

[Connor]

I'm just saying that's why it was so believable. The jury's still out that no Jeff wearing an exoskeleton on his entire.

[Pat McAfee]

That's not true. Came out and said the investigation said that never happened. But with that being said, as soon as that made its way on the Internet, baseball people are like, makes sense. Yeah.

[Connor]

Remember he kept his shirt on after the walk off home run. He's like, don't take my jersey.

[Darius J. Butler]

He was shy.

[Connor]

It's because he had an exoskeleton on.

[Pat McAfee]

Anyways, it's all believable. You are unbelievable though, sir. We appreciate the hell out of you, man. Good luck the rest of the way and maybe we'll see you out the derby.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, it'd be great. Thanks for having me on, guys.

[Pat McAfee]

You're the man. Hashtag vote Cal. Remember, hashtag vote Dumper does not count as an all star. Vote for Cal Rawley.

[Connor]

And don't search that on X.

[AJ Hawk]

No, you shouldn't.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, there's probably a lot of dumpers. All right. But there's only one big dumper. Ladies and gentlemen, it's Cal Rawley. Congrats, dude. Have a good one. This episode is brought to you by Polestar. There's only one true way to experience the all electric luxury SUV Polestar 3. And that's to take a test drive. It can go from 0 to 60 in as little as 4.8 seconds with the dynamic handling of a sports car. But to truly understand how it commands the road, you need to be behind the wheel. Up to 350 miles of range. The 3D surround sound system by Bowers and Wilkins. It's all something you have to experience to believe. So book your Test drive for Polestar 3 [e-mail] Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. With the price of just about everything.

[Mackenzie]

Going up, we thought we'd bring our prices down.

[Pat McAfee]

So to help us, we brought in a reverse auctioneer, which is apparently a thing Mint Mobile Unlimited premium wireless. Everybody get 30, 30. Better get 30. Better get 20, 20, 20.

[Evan Fox]

Better get 20, 20.

[Shams Charania]

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[Pat McAfee]

Just 15 bucks a month. So give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment of 45 for 3 month plan equivalent to 15 per month required. New customer offer for first 3 months only. Speed slow after 35 gigabytes of network's busy. Taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com.

[Darius J. Butler]

I thought hashtags were banned.

[AJ Hawk]

On that from ads.

[Darius J. Butler]

Oh, only ads.

[Connor]

Yeah. Only ads.

[Darius J. Butler]

Okay.

[Connor]

They're not completely b.

[Pat McAfee]

They will always exist. You don't really need them, though, just because words. Because it's like. Okay. You've never run a contest. You've never had to search for something. Yeah. You've never, you know, experienced the thing of it. I love Big Dumper. Yeah.

[Connor]

Yeah, man, he's great.

[Pat McAfee]

Big Dumper knows the program too. For sure.

[Ty Schmidt]

Need to get him out of Seattle, but outside of that.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Oh, what?

[Ty Schmidt]

Short Porch.

[Pat McAfee]

Second in the AL West.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, I get it. Short Porch, Yankee Stadium. Big Dumper was made to be.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. Could you imagine the. The merch. Yeah. The big Dumper in the big city.

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, my God.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, my God.

[Ty Schmidt]

You can have his ass just be like a big apple.

[Pat McAfee]

The moon.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, exactly.

[Pat McAfee]

The moon looking over statue.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah. Writes itself. We'll revisit that in a couple years. I want him to, you know, continue doing what he's doing in Seattle right now.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. People watching from Seattle are like, hey, that gotta be for sure. Yeah, we got. We got a guy. We got a guy.

[Shams Charania]

Beautiful.

[Pat McAfee]

Beautiful ballpark, too. You've been right up there. Yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

Used to go every year to see the songs.

[Pat McAfee]

I went up there for that Seahawks game against the Niners. Beautiful. Hey, and then we're up there for University of Washington's college game. Day it is. Beautiful views up there. Beautiful vibes.

[Darius J. Butler]

How are the fans for the Mariner? We know the Seattle Seahawks fans die hard.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

They love the Mariners.

[Connor]

Seattle, they've had some good teams.

[Pat McAfee]

I think the Seahawks fans are like, what are we doing? Doing? I think the Seahawks fans are asking some questions. But who. Who stole them? The Bills and the Chargers, right?

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah. Packers too. Big time.

[Pat McAfee]

Stole the stadium.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yes. Football or Sunday Night Football.

[AJ Hawk]

Probably not Chargers, though.

[Darius J. Butler]

Not a Seahawks fans. We know.

[Pat McAfee]

Chargers guy.

[AJ Hawk]

They get their stadium stolen.

[Pat McAfee]

That's because Los Angeles. No.

[Ty Schmidt]

Marianne Doe.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, she's playing.

[AJ Hawk]

Super fan.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, she's a good super.

[Connor]

Oh, yeah.

[Evan Fox]

Wouldn't she on the show.

[Pat McAfee]

Show. Yes, she was on the show. I remember. Of course she would be on the show.

[Connor]

Great gift.

[AJ Hawk]

Why wouldn't she?

[Pat McAfee]

Somebody mentioned something to me the other day and I just thought to myself, I can't believe our show is a show. Hey, do you remember when. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's when I started watching. I was like, of course, of course.

[Evan Fox]

Dr. Drew. We had Dr. Drew on early on.

[Connor]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Hey, not only Dr. Drew.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Dr. Myron roll.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah. He was awesome.

[Darius J. Butler]

Brain duck.

[Pat McAfee]

He was great. Yeah. He. He.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Brain surgery.

[AJ Hawk]

A real doctor.

[Connor]

One of the greatest interviews.

[AJ Hawk]

People say he wasn't.

[Pat McAfee]

I think you could definitely take away from our. So we're a curious bunch.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Also Dr. Merl Hodge.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah. Dr. Merrill Hoges.

[Pat McAfee]

He's a mathematic. I forgot. Doctor of math.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Connor]

What's everyone about? Fractions.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Denominator's number that he's needed. Okay. You do all this. We need a little context.

[AJ Hawk]

Turns out he was right.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Check the tape.

[Darius J. Butler]

The science checked out.

[Pat McAfee]

Yep. Math.

[AJ Hawk]

Oh, the math.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

He was science.

[Connor]

Actually.

[Pat McAfee]

Science. Whole question.

[Connor]

Funny enough about the science.

[Pat McAfee]

A lot of that. There's a lot of science. The thing about it is it feels like there's always the complete opposite side that has the same thing that is arguing harder back. That's the.

[Evan Fox]

For everything. That's for everything.

[Pat McAfee]

Everything in your stats that legitimize every argument. Somehow I. I don't know how we've gotten to that point. That isn't necessarily what I was led to believe, I think whenever I learned about this shit. But then I'll start reading people that feel the exact opposite way that I feel about something. And I'm reading like, what they're saying, how passionately they're saying it. And then they're throwing in baba da ba ba ba ba. And I'm like, pretty good argument. You know, but then I'm like, well, wait a minute. And then I have fucking da, da, da, da, da. And it's like they have to respect my side. Nope, Completely wrong. It's like, I don't know. We've got to a point where there's so much information. Information, but not enough context, I guess would be kind of the way to describe it. Well, if you were to break it down, just flooded.

[Evan Fox]

Where you're flooded with so much information that how are you ever supposed to know what's right and what's not?

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Especially nowadays. Especially with what Gro can do.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Evan Fox]

That's why. Just do whatever you want. Just do whatever you want. Who cares? That's what I say.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. That's a good message.

[Cal Raleigh]

Great.

[Mackenzie]

Don't worry. Don't worry. Live your life.

[Pat McAfee]

Live your life. Live your life. That's what you were saying.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah, absolutely. No matter what you're saying, no matter what you think is gospel, you're going to have plenty of people that think the complete opposite. Like, cool. You're allowed to. I'm going to go about my way. Continue to do it.

[Pat McAfee]

They've had different life experiences. They've met different people, gone through different things. That's experiences. Obviously, I just doubled down on the same thing, but you get it. Might have a little different life. Is lacrosse happening?

[Connor]

Yeah, lacrosse is happening. I think it was actually prime time, 6:00pm on ESPN this past weekend.

[Pat McAfee]

What is this? PLO.

[Connor]

PLO.

[Evan Fox]

Saturday night, right? Yes, Saturday night.

[Connor]

PLL. Saturday night. Bingo.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. Your kids playing lacrosse, Are they watching lacrosse?

[Evan Fox]

Oh, yeah, they love it. Kavanaugh boys. They loved all those guys.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Okay, so those are people that have been on our show. Are you guys watching PLL Legit? I'm asking this question and somebody like.

[Evan Fox]

Not like, not like appointment TV. Hey, the game's on at 6. But the. When I see that the game is on, boom. We will lock in that.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. Because like the soccer world, whenever I was a kid, they're like, the more kids we have playing soccer, the more kids that watch soccer. That was kind of always like the. The thought I was a person that grew up in a household that I played soccer. We did not watch soccer though. So it was not like a. Should have. Probably should have. Would have been able to learn some things, you know, probably would have been a little bit more invested in leagues and stuff like that. But I wonder if lacrosse, like, because if they're having a boost, boom, youth wise, are those kids also watching lacrosse? And are we getting to a point where pll. And I'll tell you what, that nll. Yeah, I enjoy both of them can make it. They're two different sports, obviously. Does it get to a point where it's like actual needle mover? You know, because it could be. Live sports have become that in lacrosse. I mean. Yes. Has the chance to become that. Yeah.

[Connor]

I think the college game has typically always been the appointment TV for lacrosse. I feel like that is the one that's growing before the pll. I actually believe there is a little bit of controversy between the PLL in the NLL now with the new ESPN PLL deal. I'm not sure and I haven't confirmed this completely, but my source says have told me that there is kind of this looming decision to be made between the NLL and pll and for players that their seasons. Yeah. Might overlap in that there might be some sort of, hey, you kind of have to pick one or, you know, you kind of have to align yourself with either the NIL or the pll.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Connor]

I believe this actually just happened. One of the best players in the pll. Yeah, it's very dumb. I. I just learned about this last week when we were trying to obtain certain phone numbers and I was told that there are some things that might be coming down the pipe after, after this season between the NLL and PLL that are going to be very bad for the league if they can't figure it out. Because if you're to split, obviously the biggest thing for them is just, hey, all the best players are playing in one league or both leagues at certain times. And now all of a sudden there might be a situation where, oh, no, some. Some guys are going to go to.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't love that.

[Darius J. Butler]

PGA Live.

[Connor]

Yeah, it's very bad.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't love that at all, especially for a league. And maybe that this will change, change with the contract and everything like that. But if you can get money in your off season, you know, that's like. I'm learning about these Arena League boys soccer players. It's like what they're making for their seasons, their salaries. Okay, good amount of money. Not like comparative at all to any of the other leagues, but a good amount of money to live during that period of time. Live. I'm not saying like save money and, you know, investors in the future get.

[Ty Schmidt]

Groceries and be comfortable.

[Pat McAfee]

No, no, you're able to do that.

[Ty Schmidt]

Okay.

[Pat McAfee]

The guys at the top are during the league, but it's like you're getting an apartment. Thank God you're getting a grocery. Stipend. I believe. Thank God. And then the amount of money you're making is like good amount of money for that period of time, but you're not getting paid for any other time. So then these other tournaments that these guys are able to go to or these other leagues they're able to play in like supplement their income, I think. Women's basketball.

[Connor]

Wnba.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Wnb. And then they would go overseas during the off season to make more money. So it was like. So they could have like WNBA is doing it currently with this three on three league that Bruce the started down there arrival. So it's like the fact that if lacrosse does end up just becoming a one league only per player thing, it's like you don't get that double check. You know that double play that I was thinking that has probably been happening.

[Connor]

It would be awesome if they did like if the NLL and PLL joined. But if they stay split, that would be an absolute nightmare for like the growth of. Yeah, lacrosse.

[Ty Schmidt]

That'd be the biggest detriment to lacrosse ever because then you'd basically force kids growing up like, hey, you're either going to play box lacrosse or you're going to play this other style.

[Pat McAfee]

And the other style isn't in the Olympics.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Box across is indie Olympics. Right? The form of box lacrosse.

[Connor]

Yeah. Yeah. I'm not sure if it's exactly box with the boards, but the numbers I believe are the same for. For the Olympic game. But. But the thing is it'll just completely split. It'll be Canada. Because Canadians care about the nll. Like grow up watching it religiously. And then it'll be the plo. Americans.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh no. Oh no.

[Connor]

It'll be terrible.

[Darius J. Butler]

Do you think there are enough good players to have two good leagues or no?

[Connor]

Probably two good leagues. I think it just all depends on when it is. Like you could put. You could have the nll, could be all the greatest players in the world. But. But if it's aired between, you know, September and December, no one's going to watch because it's football season. Like there is that window after the NBA like right now when the PLL is. That's like ideal. But like the, the NLL season is at such a tough time where it's.

[Pat McAfee]

Hard to care about. I just learned a lot about me. Who cares about the nll?

[Connor]

The Canadians.

[Pat McAfee]

And who cares about po.

[Connor]

Yeah, the United States.

[Pat McAfee]

Sure.

[Ty Schmidt]

PLL guy.

[Pat McAfee]

I didn't know I had any Canadian thoughts like that. Doug, go. I like double doubles. Don't get me wrong.

[Ty Schmidt]

Sure.

[Pat McAfee]

I love poutine. I think it's good. I'm not eating it every day. Toronto is a beautiful city. I got a chance to enjoy that place.

[Evan Fox]

Smooth cream.

[Darius J. Butler]

Ew.

[Pat McAfee]

Smooth, creamy. Exec Sidney Crosby, he's giving me a lot of happiness from Canada.

[AJ Hawk]

I would be too hard on yourself.

[Pat McAfee]

But I don't like to say that I have Canadian views also. You know, like, I. I don't. I don't want to say, no offense. Well, one Niagara Falls. I grew up there. Me and Nick, basically. You know, I love that place. Okay. I found myself naturally watching nll, thinking to myself, oh, that's more high paced. That's tougher. They're fighting each other. And a little bit more electrifying now. Pll. A lot of talent, a lot of conditioning, a lot of cardio. I respect it. So it feels like the Canadian version of the game is a little bit more.

[Evan Fox]

It's like soccer versus TST style. It's kind of how it is.

[Connor]

That's exactly right.

[Pat McAfee]

But the Canadian version is a little bit more. Did we expect that? I don't know.

[Connor]

They. They still fight in the plo. Actually, Kavanaugh got into one.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, I guess we should have with hockey. Right. Because they all.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Are the Canadians. It's a no. Not getting into it. You heard what big person said last week.

[Darius J. Butler]

The Dogs.

[Pat McAfee]

He's looking for what's in their wall. He did say that. I like the nlo. I like the PLO as well. Okay. I'm not getting. I respect the plo. I'll watch it. The nl, though.

[Evan Fox]

Well, yeah, just tight quarters, so.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Evan Fox]

And they fight all that.

[Pat McAfee]

It's just. It's a little.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah, it's definitely different.

[Connor]

We'll be interesting to see if the PLL changes to 6 on 6 after like the elite Olympics. Because if the Olympics is going to be kind of the goal, as a lacrosse player, then why wouldn't they change the. The game itself to what the Olympic games gonna be? Not college, but in the pros.

[Pat McAfee]

I mean, I thought about that a little bit. I had a conversation with somebody about when Canada wanted to kill me. You remember that time?

[Ty Schmidt]

Sure. Money in the bank.

[Pat McAfee]

Elimination.

[Ty Schmidt]

Elimination chambers.

[Pat McAfee]

Elimination chamber. Yeah. I'll never forget it. So, I mean, there was a lot of them, but we were up there in Toronto and me sitting around just as somebody that grew up in sport and Olympic sport. To soccer, like, hey, we are. The national anthem in sports is like a big deal. It either means we fucking won or something big's about to go Off. So like obviously have always felt that we are better than other countries like whenever we are. And that's strictly from a sports minded human being. Whenever we watch the Olympics and I think we've explained about this, we are tough to handle because we expect to win every gold medal and we are better than everybody and we won't beat everybody. That is the sports mindset. Whenever it happens. America bingo. So when that booing takes place, when that booing takes place and everything goes down after that, it's like I don't like, I don't like that at all. I don't like that all. And then I start getting attacked, you know, ba ba da ba ba ba ba. For good reason. Hey, you got passion for your country. I'm just letting you know I got some for mine as well. And if we're just going to judge off politicians decisions, I need to be well versed whenever it comes to the Olympics on who's playing who boo and who were allowed to boo and who were not allowed to boo during their national anthem and at all. But like Canada is a sick place.

[Connor]

No, it's not.

[Pat McAfee]

What?

[Connor]

Just not true. But, but I hear you.

[AJ Hawk]

And they've kind of fallen into line, so.

[Pat McAfee]

What do you mean?

[Darius J. Butler]

Toronto's nice.

[Ty Schmidt]

Toronto's very nice.

[Connor]

Really?

[Evan Fox]

Definitely nice.

[Pat McAfee]

The west coast is way nicer than Toronto. I grew up in a Niagara Falls area there. Okay. So I'm not even going to get into that. Montreal is north of Toronto.

[Ty Schmidt]

East coast.

[Pat McAfee]

I do believe he's talking about Saskatoon.

[Ty Schmidt]

Sure. Well, I get that.

[Pat McAfee]

And Victoria. Victoria and Vancouver, British Columbia, by far.

[Cal Raleigh]

The most beautiful in Canada.

[Pat McAfee]

Where'd Sydney Crosby come from? Ooh, other way.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah, he's on the east coast.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Connor]

He should be part of America. But if Indianapolis lower than Maine. If Indianapolis was in Canada, it'd be the greatest city in the country. Country, so.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, Indianapolis is a great city. Let's not, let's not get that. They have some laws up there that I wouldn't mind Indianapolis adopting for sure. You know, I wouldn't mind keep the taxis, but I would take the. I would take the couple of the vitamins laws. Yeah.

[Connor]

Unfortunately every damn near every state touching Canada has that. It's just Indiana.

[Pat McAfee]

Never going to.

[Connor]

Just never.

[Evan Fox]

Never really. What is it? Who's holding it up?

[Pat McAfee]

Who is?

[Connor]

I think there's a couple people.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Yeah. I think Lily is the biggest. Lily's like the biggest company in Indiana, you know. Oh. Pharmaceutical.

[Connor]

And it's the campuses and they give.

[Pat McAfee]

A lot of money to the City now, they probably feel obligated to do as such, but they give a lot to the city, to the state, to the politician. I mean, there is. Lily, is a very massive, massive.

[Evan Fox]

They're lobbying. They're lobbying hard in Indiana, you're saying.

[Pat McAfee]

I, I, we got cold beer on Sunday. Like, five years ago, you couldn't even get cold beer on a Sunday. You know, like that type of stuff. Maybe 10 years ago now, when I.

[Ty Schmidt]

First moved here, you couldn't get it.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. Wow. Yeah. Within the last seven years. So that's why we're saying. We just don't know. We think it's gonna be a tough fight, but we would pull for somebody if they were to get behind it and were, like, presentable stuff. Whenever they're at the gubernatorial debate.

[Ty Schmidt]

I was just going to say if we could somehow track down Bobby Rainwater and just kind of refine a couple of things. Hey, don't need a Hawaiian shirt during the.

[Pat McAfee]

Don't need your hair. Let's make it look at least presentable.

[Ty Schmidt]

A couple tweaks and we might be okay.

[Pat McAfee]

This guy was running for governor. He was big.

[Connor]

We loved him.

[Pat McAfee]

Legalization of marijuana. Okay. And we didn't. I hadn't seen him. I don't think we'd ever seen him. We had just seen the quotes. And then there was a. A gubernatorial debate that popped up, and it was like, watching this for sure. I have no idea how I got caught in it. And I got to see. He actually did a walk in. They did, like, entrances. Like, people would walk in, they'd sit in their little spots, and it was slotted, each three of them. He was the independent, so he was in the middle, and he literally walked in late. Hawaiian shirt, hair all over the place. Like, our guys got in the sh.

[Ty Schmidt]

It's like an AI. If you typed in, like, what does someone whose doobies look like exactly like.

[Pat McAfee]

Buddy, we got no chance with you out there. Come on. Yeah.

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

I think it was a lady. A dude.

[Connor]

Was it Sleeping Joe Dong?

[Pat McAfee]

I don't think he was governor ever. It was. Who's the most recent Governor Holcomb. Yeah. Who just. He got done. Yeah, he, he retired. He remember, he was, like, super into governing. Like, he really enjoyed governing. Every time I talked to him, he was like, we got 35 days left to really make an impact or whatever. And I was like, hey, lame duck, about to be on your way out. He's like, nope, that's not how I view it. I view it as we got 35 more days for him, like, he was like. He was like. I don't wanna say a robot, but he was exactly how you would hope that somebody that was in that world would be wearing cool shoes and everything like that. I think he was running for governor for the first time. Last governor kind of left, and it was like a chance to open. He was like, all right, we got a guy in here that wants. We can't wait to see him fucking turn that corner like Jerry Garcia.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, Grateful Dead concert.

[Pat McAfee]

Come on, bro. Come on. Joe Donnelly had no shot. Nobody will ever give us credit for that. That you let him know that was a pretty big deal. We broke news about two and a half months before election night that incumbent Joe Donnelly had no shot in this race. And nobody was listening. Listening. Nobody's. First big announcement of the night. Kind of a startler here. Incumbent Joe Donnelly has lost in a pretty decisive vote to start the entire. They called it, like 4pm yeah, maybe.

[Ty Schmidt]

Like, it was like while we were doing the show.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, it was still locked. And that's just because we're local here. We're watching these ads and it was like this guy was just getting beat down. I mean, every commercial break. Did you know Joe Donnelly slept through 14 out of the 15 meetings about baa ba ba ba? That's why we call him Sleeping Joe Donnelly. If you want a better snooze, vote for Sleeping Joe Donnelly. And then it popped up, and then there would be another one. Did you know that Joe Donnelly took 14 vacations to Mexico?

[Ty Schmidt]

Mexico, Joe.

[Pat McAfee]

He was there. He wasn't there when this was being discussed. That's why we call him Mexican Joe Donnelly. Every commercial.

[Evan Fox]

Did he have anyone, anything, Any rebuttals coming back?

[Pat McAfee]

We were coming on our show, like, hey, Joe Donnelly, fight back. Fight back, Joe. I'm learning a lot about you, Joe.

[Ty Schmidt]

Well, you remember we saw him in the airport and you were like, joe, I tried to tell you. He's like, ah, it. Don't worry about it.

[Pat McAfee]

Let's get a picture. He knew.

[Ty Schmidt]

He knew.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Ty Schmidt]

I mean, he just. You know, what. What can you do?

[Pat McAfee]

It was him and Frances in that.

[Connor]

Vlog of that trip after the Heisman of radio.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Heisman radio. That was cool. That was cool to get out there and meet all those people. Joe Donnelly, that guy. No shot. Leave our politics out of it. We tried to give Joe Donnelly a heads up every show.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Remember? It was every last night they debuted a new one. Did you know this guy? New piece of information. I learned so much about him. And it was. None of it was good. And then, like, he hopped in an RV one time for 15 seconds. He, I'm getting to work for you. And then shut the door of the RV and he drove away. Was like, I don't know if that's enough.

[Connor]

It is a joke.

[Evan Fox]

I don't know if that's enough.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't know.

[Connor]

Sorry, Joe.

[Pat McAfee]

He was. He was going to teach a class. I think whenever he went out there, he was. He. I think he understood what happened. Here's me and him meeting for the first time, me and Joe. All right. Nice to meet you, Joe. He was nice to us. I assume he tried his best, but I'll tell you, did he. His marketing department or whatever the case.

[Connor]

Is, it sounds like his competition just hit the nail on the head. He's like, fuck.

[Evan Fox]

That is what I.

[Pat McAfee]

No rebuttal.

[Connor]

Okay, well, yeah, I'm going back to Mexico. They're right.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Zito. Zito just told me. I do not remember this. So this would have to be a Zito. This is Zito. You could say this. What'd you say? He told us that he spent $300 million on ads against them. Yeah. Because we got into the full conversation in person. So anytime I run into somebody and if I remember that we had something, I will bring it up immediately. I will bring it up immediately. Just because it's going to be looming anyways. If I don't remember something happened with somebody, that's when, you know, like, I don't remember somebody saying something about somebody. And I show up, they hate me for what's being said. And I'm walking into. And I don't know. That's always something. That's tough. If I know there's something, then it's like, all right, let's just bring this up immediately. So I go, joe, literally, that's what I do. Joe, you had no shot. I don't know if you heard us. I did hear you. He did ask for a photo, and then I did a full on. So how does this work? How. How does this whole thing. He talks about how much money they raise, how they try to combat it, and yada, yada, yada. Then we learn a little bit about politics. Then he talked to us about he was going to be a professor somewhere. And I was like, well, was all that true? He goes, no, there's obviously. I'm like, okay, all right. It just happened. You're not Mexico or Sleepy Joe. He was maybe a little.

[Connor]

Get on a flight to Mexico City.

[Pat McAfee]

That's a wild world. All right, let's get out of here. What's happening tonight? Monday Night Raw, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Should be a great show. Should be a very good show, especially coming out of Night of Champions.

[AJ Hawk]

Sure.

[Connor]

Hell, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Early start, too. Six o' clock. Did you see what Cena did with Charles Robinson?

[Connor]

Yeah, that was sick.

[Mackenzie]

What?

[AJ Hawk]

Charles Robinson.

[Pat McAfee]

Charles Robinson is a legend.

[Connor]

Yeah. And. And he ate one. Like a legend, too.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. But the meme, obviously, of him sprinting out of WrestleMania is iconic. Sure. He's so athletic. He's been doing it for so long. He also oversees, I believe, the building of the rings every single day in every single arena. You're talking about. About Pillar. Legend of wrestling. One of the best wrestling. Oh, no, just a shoulder tackle.

[Evan Fox]

That's criminal.

[Connor]

You see his eyes get wide, like.

[Pat McAfee]

Oh, no. Oh, no. He saw. He saw it turn the corner. Yeah. And I think he was thinking, maybe this is an embrace, a hug, because we've been down so many roads together, you know? And then Seth freaking Rollins, he was threatening cash in. Seeing.

[Evan Fox]

I love watching him run.

[Darius J. Butler]

Time to go to work. Same leg, same shot. Shoulder.

[Connor]

All right, Stu.

[Pat McAfee]

Yep. That was a great tackle by John Cena.

[Ty Schmidt]

It was.

[Pat McAfee]

And John Cena did the handshake to punk Stu. Got the zoom in. It was a good show.

[Darius J. Butler]

It was.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Really good show. The. There was a lot of. I think Nia was using a kendo stick, something. There was a lot of. Oh, nyah. Went through a table, two tables. I think there was. Were. There was a lot of. Lot of carnage. We had some extreme. Yeah. Night of Champions and smackdown over there. Had a lot going on. All right, this is for Cal Rawley. Get voted in the All Star. Boom.

[Connor]

Done deal.

[Pat McAfee]

Hashtag, vote cow. Yep. If you want to add hashtag dumper, vote dumper. Yeah, sure. It's not gonna hurt. Vote big.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah, should count.

[Pat McAfee]

Vote big. Dumper should count. Yeah. Look who you say he comes from a long line of dumpers.

[Connor]

Yeah. Big ones.

[Pat McAfee]

His boys are gonna say, my father, my father's father, and my father's brother all play catcher.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

That's what dad played.

[Connor]

Grand dumper.

[Pat McAfee]

My great grand dumper. Yeah.

[Connor]

Yes.

[Pat McAfee]

He started the entire squad. That is a long time.

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, yeah.

[Evan Fox]

Just like, so long. It's so, like, grueling. I mean, how many games do they have? A. It's just such a different experience than anybody else playing DH or in the field. It really is.

[Ty Schmidt]

Like, Tone said, he doesn't really get days off either.

[Pat McAfee]

He's.

[Ty Schmidt]

He's played in Every game but one of the first half of the season. Like, it's crazy.

[Pat McAfee]

That's big, dumb football. That's right. It's for the All Star Game, bub. Worldwide. That's right. Oh, sorry, Dub. Oh, looks like he's not gonna make it. We need to vote a minute.

[Connor]

Give me that shit.

[Pat McAfee]

Universe trying to make it hard. He had a million vote lead over the person he is now battling against in phase one of the All Star voting. That all gets wiped clean. You've done nothing. Now it's phase two.

[Darius J. Butler]

So dumb.

[Pat McAfee]

So dumb. Speaking of All Star voting, you see Caitlin Clark.

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Captain broke the record again. Broke the record amount of votes. I think 1.4 million or something like that. Last year had 700,000 votes, her and three of her teammates. I believe four Indiana Fever players are amongst the top 10 in all star voting or whatever. I assume Sophie.

[Ty Schmidt]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Yep. I assume Sophie's going to make it. I assume Kelsey Mitchell.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Bucket it, Bucket. Hey, she's a player.

[Darius J. Butler]

She's nasty.

[Pat McAfee]

I assume Aaliyah Boston.

[Ty Schmidt]

She had a big night the other night when Caitlyn didn't play.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, here we go.

[Connor]

Cup final tomorrow.

[Pat McAfee]

What?

[Connor]

Tomorrow night.

[Pat McAfee]

You want to win the Commissioner Cup?

[Ty Schmidt]

Have to, too.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Because if they're having a cup, you should want to have it. No doubt. Especially in this new WNBA where CeCe is the show. She's getting hurt, though. I don't grow.

[Darius J. Butler]

Fully healthy.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't think. Was she ever. Do we think?

[Darius J. Butler]

I mean, you know, those growings, they linger.

[Pat McAfee]

It was hammy, though, right? First time? Or was it a groin?

[Cal Raleigh]

I don't know.

[Darius J. Butler]

I know it's growing currently. I'm not positive.

[Pat McAfee]

I think it was Hammy first, then groin. And I wonder if the two go hand in hand there.

[Evan Fox]

You know, sit her down for a month. Let her sit down for a month to get healthy.

[Pat McAfee]

I agree. Especially if the team's going to be able to win games. What about the Cup?

[AJ Hawk]

They got to make the playoffs.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, Fisher cup, she's not gonna be able to play anyways because she got. Is she coming back from his groin for the Commissioner Cup? I would like to win the Cup.

[Ty Schmidt]

They showed inside the locker room. The WNBA commission called to congratulate her on being the All Star Game cap captain, and she basically said, like, listen, Kathy, we're trying to get this dub in the Commissioner cup, so I think she's gonna play tomorrow night.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. I hope so, because when she's playing, it's great she came back from that Hammy first game, she had nine points in like 30 seconds or whatever. Pull up. She's a prop. Cal Raleigh, big dumper. He's framing those things. What am I doing?

[Evan Fox]

Wwa. Does the WNBA have open locker rooms? Like Cabole can't be going in there interviewing WNBA players, can he?

[Pat McAfee]

I don't think Caboli has no team in Pittsburgh.

[Ty Schmidt]

No credentials for that.

[Connor]

He's not allowed at WNBA games anymore.

[Pat McAfee]

So. Caitlin Clark. Caitlin Clark. We don't know if that's true. That is. We're not sure if that's true or not. Caitlin Clark did have a hamstring injury, and then now she has a left groin injury. So these are all, you know, these are all strains of things that's. That's. That those can hang on forever or those can heal. Yeah, it's kind of a question mark. Lingering. Lingering. I assume we need her help healthy for, you know, the playoff stretch.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah, big time.

[Darius J. Butler]

Three new teams, too, coming WBA next five years.

[Pat McAfee]

Who's that?

[Darius J. Butler]

Cleveland, Detroit and Philly. Philly.

[Pat McAfee]

I think those would be. I think those would be good.

[AJ Hawk]

WNBA towns 1 year after another.

[Pat McAfee]

And were they expansion draft or these new teams? Who. Who were we getting?

[Evan Fox]

Players do it like hockey.

[Pat McAfee]

The expansion draft for hockey.

[Evan Fox]

Did you see Indiana players?

[Pat McAfee]

Did you see that? That's huge.

[Evan Fox]

Play right in gamebridge.

[Pat McAfee]

Absolutely. I mean, there was news that four cities are potentially in the conversation for an expansion NHL team. New Orleans, obviously, a city that hosts a lot of things. Austin hosts a lot of things. Houston hosts a lot of things. You know what else hosts a lot of things? Indianapolis, Indiana, you know, as the infrastructure already in place for a hockey team to drop into Cambridge. Because there used to be hockey in Gainbridge, actually. Indianapolis, Indiana, Why not Indy getting an expansion NHL team? And with what you just said, AJ the expansion draft in the NHL, it allows for teams to get good quick because the NHL understands that if a team comes to a city, if it's a good team, that'll probably be better for success as opposed to if it's kind of a shite team. Nobody's really going to get on board. Expansion draft, every team in the league has to put up certain amount of players into a pool that you can pull from. And it might be guys that they're trying to get out of a contract with. It might be guys that are a little bit older in the tooth. It might be guys that are just available because you don't want any other guys. There's a chance to get some mega stars. Las Vegas Golden Knights are The most recent example of that. They were able to become the island of misfit toys and become a champion out there quickly. And obviously the Vegas Golden Knights brand became a very big one. And if Indianapolis gets a team that.

[AJ Hawk]

Would be spectacular, they should because those other cities don't give a about hockey.

[Connor]

So New Orleans, that's an assumption.

[Darius J. Butler]

Atlanta.

[AJ Hawk]

Atlanta already. Atlanta's already failed NHL a few times. New Orleans, that's a big hockey city.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, yeah.

[Connor]

Indy, especially after the show they just put on in the NBA Finals. It's like you got to got to look at that at least and be like show the rompus and the atmosphere and the fans like how much they really do ride and die for the Pacers. Like you should absolutely go to India. It's the center of the country too. It's not as if things aren't going, you know, up and up with Caitlyn and Tyree.

[Pat McAfee]

What's it now? 2 billion they said, I believe was the number for the franchise. That's just what you give and then you have to obviously build the team on top of that. So it's probably what a three and a half billion. 404 billion dollar operation. Yeah. In the arena if you're not already equipped. Yeah. Just gotta get a hold of four billion. Three and a half, four billion dollars.

[Darius J. Butler]

We already got the arena here.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, yeah. But build it. You don't ever feel like you are small, small bank at the pot at the table. You know, you want to be able to, want to be able to operate. Want to be able to be, you know, know you're not going to get leveraged out of because you don't have enough money. You know, you would want to start that venture with a good, good bankroll. Practice facility, entire thing. Practice. How do we spice up these games?

[Connor]

Yeah, a lot of different things.

[Pat McAfee]

What's the environment? Players. We're going to have to pay players obviously now I know there's a cap. We got to do that. But like you always want to be able to also would love to be able to sell. You know, if you're going to do this dollar Hockey Dogs would like to be able to sell $2 beers in this entire thing. Make it a spectacle without having to worry about make money, make money make money to be able to continue to operate. So that's what I would think in my mind they would try to get 4 billion for that. And do they bid for expansion teams so that can get run up there or is it awarded to teams?

[Cal Raleigh]

I think they propose a bid to the league.

[Pat McAfee]

And it's the league.

[Ty Schmidt]

Like, the commissioner and the owners all.

[Pat McAfee]

Look at it and find what is the best fit. So it's like the city of Indianapolis would be the right one. You get the $2 billion expansion fee plus the build on team on top of that, as opposed to, hey, Houston just offered up $4 billion for this thing. Indianapolis only. Yeah.

[Ty Schmidt]

Now, there may be an ownership group.

[Cal Raleigh]

In those cities that says, hey, we.

[Pat McAfee]

Can also include this in our bid. We have.

[Cal Raleigh]

We can build our own arena. It's not going to cost anybody anything.

[Evan Fox]

Tax breaks, all that stuff they got to propose.

[Pat McAfee]

Definitely. I feel like a lot of people would want to get a team. Yeah. You know, especially.

[Connor]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Professional sports are the thing to spend money on the driver for a rating still. And also a good place to, you know, a lot of people flexing that they own teams.

[Cal Raleigh]

Oh, yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

You know what I mean? Sitting in suites, doing their things.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Some. Some owners even have press conferences. Mm. Just keep it moving. So I'll let, you know, my team here, my brand. This is what we're thinking. It'd be cool if they got it. How about Bezos just ran out that.

[Connor]

Whole city crazy for, like the last three weeks.

[Pat McAfee]

So what do you. I wonder. I mean, I'm assuming we'll get the number at some point or how it all happened. He had to have people go to every single business in the city, say, what is your daily rate to rent out, rent out every single place in the city. Right. That is basically how that would go about happening.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah. Now, I know a lot of those European cities, they just have a designated month off of the year. Like, they don't do business, but. Yes. I think I thought I heard it was 50 million.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, 50 million.

[Evan Fox]

But I'm just saying 50 to 100. I heard 50 to 100 just to throw the.

[AJ Hawk]

Like.

[Pat McAfee]

And how'd they get to that number? Like, there had to be some sort of money given he had to donate to.

[Evan Fox]

Didn't they donate to a lot of local things? They said to try to, you know, quiet everybody down because they were pissed off that he was, you know, disrupting things.

[Pat McAfee]

Things. Yeah. From. From what I've been told is there. It went off without a hit. It was. From what I've been told, it was a magical moment. I think from the pictures we're seeing. Yeah, I assume it would be. You spend $50 million on an entire city. Venice, everyone was there.

[AJ Hawk]

But, yeah, I've been to Europe times where, like, you go to a store and they're like, no, this is our off month.

[Darius J. Butler]

So that's awesome. Any other people here?

[Pat McAfee]

That's definitely not right now, though. This is the busiest time of year to be traveling. Traveling to Italy or anywhere in Europe. Tom Brady.

[Darius J. Butler]

Brady was there.

[Pat McAfee]

Brady was there, I think. Right?

[Connor]

Brady was there.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. I wonder how many football people.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah.

[Ty Schmidt]

Herbie Goodell there?

[Evan Fox]

Yeah, Herbie.

[Pat McAfee]

I would assume Roger Goodell was there.

[Evan Fox]

Herbie's Amazon. Yeah, Herbie should have been there.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. I wonder if Herbie has a relate. Is he there? Must be.

[Ty Schmidt]

Was Ben the ring bearer?

[Connor]

Oh, excuse Peter.

[Pat McAfee]

You know what I mean. You know what I respect. God damn it. Wow. Yeah.

[Connor]

Miss you, Ben.

[Pat McAfee]

You gotta get that cleared up before. Love you, Ben. Ben was awesome. Peter's. Peter's a doll. He is just. Yeah.

[Connor]

Except I hate how people have forgotten Ben already because of Peter.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, it does appear that that is what Ty did. But Ben was a great soul. We were lucky to know.

[Ty Schmidt]

Trying to honor him.

[Darius J. Butler]

Obviously he hasn't forgotten him.

[Ty Schmidt]

Thank you, Debug. Trying to honor the guy.

[Connor]

Oh, yeah. By getting his name wrong. Getting his face wrong.

[Pat McAfee]

In your mind, both these dogs are awesome. And there's also others that are awesome at the Herb Street Manor.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yep.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah.

[Connor]

The undesirable.

[Pat McAfee]

You see that photo? That was. No, they are not. They're just in waiting. Did you see the photo that was put up of Peter? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Ty Schmidt]

Maybe the best picture that's ever been taken.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. I think Peter's a okay going in the season. I think he's a mid season.

[AJ Hawk]

Jesus Christ took that photo.

[Pat McAfee]

If he had colors to one, that'd be Gatorade commercial. Yeah. And maybe Gatorade will use this as a commercial.

[Evan Fox]

We should.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, you should put a little drip off his tongue. Is that his tongue hanging? He is a tongue hanger. That is his tongue hanging. You could easily put Gatorade hanging off of that tongue.

[AJ Hawk]

Something to think about.

[Darius J. Butler]

That's not AI.

[Pat McAfee]

No the tongue.

[Darius J. Butler]

Just that picture.

[Pat McAfee]

No.

[Evan Fox]

He's almost looks like a drone.

[Pat McAfee]

Peter is a beautiful dog.

[Evan Fox]

Truly big head, huge head, huge paws.

[Pat McAfee]

Like, I think he's still growing. I think he's gonna be size of a arctic wolf whenever it's all said and done. So good boy, though. I mean, he is either 280 pounds.

[Evan Fox]

I heard he's gonna be.

[Pat McAfee]

There's a chance. I'm like, Herbie, where you get all these big dogs? He's got a breeder. Mystic man. Oh, he's got a certain breeder. I forget the name of the good I. I should do that.

[Evan Fox]

So they all related all this. Peter, Ben, everybody.

[Pat McAfee]

From the way it's in my head, I've never asked is it's just like this. Rolling hills of fields of golden retrievers. Just majestic dogs. Right in my head, that is how I think of this particular place. And every dog that I've seen come from there is kind of fits the bill. Yeah. All of Herbie's dogs are like beautiful coated. You know, they got the whole thing. All right. Congratulations to Aldrich Pottgeiter. Yep. Yeah. Fifth playoff hole. Five playoff holes. It was exhilarating. I did not get to watch all of the lead up to it. I didn't get to watch the entire build, the entire day. I just caught it. In the playoffs after Mackenzie went to bed, it looked like they had another hour or two of light too. And there was no end in sight. These boys were just kind of getting on, missing parts, drilling and tap in for par. Both of them got a birdie at one point on a par five. It was like these guys might play forever. Play forever. That's what I literally thought was going to happen. And then, you know, Paul Guyer takes it home. Rolling one home. He missed by about half an inch on the hole before to win it on an eagle putt. And then this one. Pure and true, center cup. He's from South Africa. His dad was there. Got a little bit emotional. He's 20 years old. He had. He was doing some with his driver that was turning some heads. This might be the next one. And the other guy that he took on there wasn't gray. Yeah, something like that. I don't know about the. What's going on there. You think, is this the next. Is this what makes me a better golfer?

[Evan Fox]

Texting is that's a sun thing.

[Pat McAfee]

If you.

[Evan Fox]

I've heard people talk about the sun like they. They're out in the sun so much or they had like some moles removed or something.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay. So that's a sun instead of having to wear long sleeves. Cuz long sleeves is hot. We would just wear this to keep it.

[Evan Fox]

Seems very uncomfortable, doesn't it?

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. And I thought it was long sleeves. And then I saw him bend over to pick it up and I saw his. The back of his tricep, a little hair popping out of his armpit. I'm like, he's got AI sleeves on right now, like in both of them. And I was like, okay, does this make this guy a better golfer? He's in play. Awful. And then I was worried what if one of those things just tightens up a little bit, you don't want that on a plug.

[Darius J. Butler]

Like a clip that he has on top.

[Pat McAfee]

I don't know.

[Connor]

That looks like a whoop band, probably.

[Evan Fox]

That's that whoop. Yeah. A lot of them wear whoop bands up on their arms.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Okay, so the sleeves are that. That's for sun purposes.

[Darius J. Butler]

Uv yeah.

[Connor]

Makes it a little better.

[Pat McAfee]

Okay, I like that. Okay, I'm with that. I thought it was for swagger, and I was like, I don't know if it's the right one.

[Connor]

This is.

[Pat McAfee]

It's for protection. Okay, I like that. I'm gonna start wearing this. I'm gonna start with. Yeah, yeah. Because my skin, very pale. I'm asking for it. I go out there. Are we golfing or not?

[Adam Schefter]

I think so today or not?

[Evan Fox]

Your putter come in. Where's the putter?

[Pat McAfee]

Great question.

[Ty Schmidt]

Great question.

[Pat McAfee]

I haven't even thought about that until.

[Evan Fox]

I mean, you're gonna make every single putt you take with that.

[Pat McAfee]

The unmissable. Thank you. That is exactly how I've been describing it in my head as well. One of those things will work out for me. You know, if it's the taller one, I'll do the. Lock it up on that, and then I'm just painting that some in there. I think we're gonna do the golf, get back into it. It's too good of a sport. Too good of a sport. It's the best. Too good of a time. And also, you hit one up here in the sim, and it's like, wait a minute, wait a minute.

[Connor]

This is nice.

[Pat McAfee]

Is this sim accurate to what the ball is going to do in real life? I don't know. Yes. Because this is seemingly going pretty straight here. And then I get out in real life, gone. It's like, all right, what's the difference here? Is it the open air? Is it the grass? Is it me? Is it the sim? Or is it just the sport in general? Is impossible.

[Ty Schmidt]

Sometimes you hit it about as good as you possibly could have, and you snap the driver in too, though that happens every once in a while, too.

[Pat McAfee]

So that was unbelievable what you did to Bruce Brown's driver. He was having a great round. Maybe the best he's ever hit. Hit his driver ever, any of his clubs, and you got a celebrity shot, and you snapped that right in half.

[Ty Schmidt]

I did. I put him in position A, though. And what'd he do? He. He went on to sink a, you know, 12 foot part putt.

[Pat McAfee]

Wow. That was Real. That was.

[Evan Fox]

Did you hit the ground or what? No, it just snapped.

[Darius J. Butler]

No, too strong routine.

[AJ Hawk]

Yes.

[Ty Schmidt]

Well, because I looked up, I was thinking at first like oh, I hope, hope I didn't smack the projector up here and up the simulator. No, I didn't. You know, I, I hit it about as square as I could. It was maybe the best drive I've ever hit in my life. And that some just snapped right in two.

[Pat McAfee]

There's afterwards.

[Evan Fox]

Oh man.

[Darius J. Butler]

Oh, up there.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, that's big Bob obviously because Bruce was having a phenomenal round. Just an absolutely phenomenal round. And then his driver gets snapped at about 25 cent percent down the shaft or so. But that driver is going to break regardless, Bruce. That's what I think we're trying to say. That thing had. That thing had a weak, weak top.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Have you continued to play good golf without your driver?

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, I'll be, I'll be.

[Cal Raleigh]

Well luckily we have two of those up there. So we, we had, we had one to spare luckily.

[Pat McAfee]

But I will say went out and played real golf.

[Cal Raleigh]

I was not nailing any 30 foot.

[Ty Schmidt]

Putts, I can tell you that much.

[Pat McAfee]

You are rolling it on that.

[Cal Raleigh]

That is a video game up there. If you, if you can just figure it out a little bit on the sim you, you can putt really well, but does not quite translate to.

[Pat McAfee]

To the course. Now with that being said, shout out to full swing. Fixing our simulator.

[Ty Schmidt]

Huge.

[Pat McAfee]

We had up here a simulator that was the worst in the history of simulators would, would legitimately let you do the entire setup to get to the Golf. Thank God. 15 minutes of this them get all the way to it and then it would only let you hit one or two balls. And then guess what it's doing anymore. It's not reading a ball or it's frozen on the last one. You could reset the computer, do the full setup again. Now we're 30 minutes into this. We've hit two balls and guess what it did again. Freeze again. Full swing. Said that is not how your simulator life should be. Got a new computer up there, got a new software up there. It has been awesome. This has been a treat to have actually work. And they did confirmed to us that we maybe had the worst simulator in the history of simulators which we wondered. So we are happy to know that that is the case. Do you remember how big of a pain in the ass this thing was, AJ?

[Evan Fox]

Oh yeah. I think I hid in there once or twice. And then ever since then you guys. Yeah. Said absolutely not. This thing Is. Is garbage.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. It was like one of those ones that you would try to create if you didn't have an actual simulator. Like. Okay. You know what I mean? Like, that's what it was like. It was just. And who knows if it's real? Real. So we would just hit into an open bay, basically up there. Now we get a chance to really do it. It's shout out to full swing. We're very grateful for you helping us out. Very grateful. All right, let's go do a day. It was a good Monday. Yeah.

[Darius J. Butler]

Monday.

[Pat McAfee]

Jalen Ramsey getting traded this morning. Crazy.

[Evan Fox]

AJ awesome. Good for him. Good for the Steelers.

[Pat McAfee]

They're going all in.

[Evan Fox]

Johnny Smith, though. Don't sleep on him. That dude. He is. They'll line him up everywhere.

[Pat McAfee]

I bet Marcaboli said that. Actually, Mark, he said his source is telling him tight end, slot wire, sear, you name it.

[Connor]

Fullback.

[Pat McAfee]

There's, like, everything. Yeah. Fullback. H back. We might have a quarterback.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Darius J. Butler]

With Jalen.

[Pat McAfee]

Jalen Ramsey could be anywhere. Outside, inside, in the backside.

[Cal Raleigh]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Up front. He might be playing D line.

[AJ Hawk]

Anywhere, maybe.

[Connor]

What if Jalen Ramsey might have to.

[Darius J. Butler]

30 T.J. oh, need to.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. Where's TJ?

[AJ Hawk]

Probably at his house.

[Pat McAfee]

G.C. shefter put out a tweet.

[AJ Hawk]

Yeah, the tweet that says Steelers ain't dealing.

[Pat McAfee]

Is that what he said?

[Connor]

They're not dealing with him. I thought it said.

[Pat McAfee]

Can we pull up that Schefter tweet that came out during the show? Sources. In recent weeks, multiple teams have been discussing whether they can trade for Steelers standout T.J. watt, who skipped the team's most recent minicamp. Pittsburgh hasn't shown any willingness to deal Watts so far, but he's unhappy with his contractual situation, and sources believe outside team interest is likely to increase given today's trade. There's no way you're able to pay TJ with everything you guys got going on. Plus, he reported that the Pittsburgh Steelers are picking up a big chunk, I believe is the way it was used, of the Jalen Ramsey contract. And they will be picking up a small portion of the Jalen Ramsey contract. That's $26.6 million. So there's a lot of money going there. A lot of money going to Johnny. And how do you pay TJ? There's still 20 some million available in cap space for the Pittsburgh Steelers.

[AJ Hawk]

There was 23 million, and that was before the details came out that the Dolphins were going to pay 7 million of the 26 million that came out from RAP. So, yeah, they got plenty of cap space. The TJ contract is not going to be a big deal at all. They're not paying any quarterbacks. So that's kind of a. Kind of a cool thing. And a NFL.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. It's like you got a rookie quarterback but instead you got a four time NFL MVP. Boom. Yeah.

[Connor]

And their quarterback plays the end. So T.J. watt would have to get the. The quarterback type contract.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. And then you have to deal with that for the next three, four years.

[AJ Hawk]

That's fine. Still don't have any other quarterbacks for pay.

[Pat McAfee]

Well, it could be Will hard.

[AJ Hawk]

He's gonna be making 600000 next three years.

[Pat McAfee]

Is that the actual number?

[AJ Hawk]

Well, Purdy was around that number and will was a 6 round pick picks or something earlier.

[Pat McAfee]

Those rookie contracts, quarterback contracts, so vital to a team right now. The Pittsburgh Steelers are saying now is our moment. Metcalf 30 million. Jaylen Ramsey 19 million. Johnu, what's he making?

[AJ Hawk]

12, I think.

[Pat McAfee]

12, 12 million.

[Darius J. Butler]

Brand new Steelers D slay.

[Pat McAfee]

This is a brand new Steelers down there. All right. If this goes in, they're winning Super Bowl.

[Connor]

Okay.

[Pat McAfee]

Boom.

[Cal Raleigh]

That.

[Connor]

Here we go.

[Pat McAfee]

Ooh. Wow. Wow. All right.

[Ty Schmidt]

Here we go, Steelers.

[Pat McAfee]

Here we go. Pittsburgh's winning the Super Bowl.

[Connor]

Here we go.

[Pat McAfee]

That's what the ball said right over there.

[Connor]

Here we go.

[Pat McAfee]

Aaron Rodgers and his cool fucking hair.

[Connor]

Here we go.

[Pat McAfee]

We signed guys we wouldn't sign before because it's this season. We're trying to win some more. Here we go Steelers. Here we go. Could be they're going all in. They're sick of people. The injuries being like we're done with the over 500 shit. We're sick of it. Fired an offensive coordinator in the middle of the season. Hadn't done that ever. Now they're pushing money in big in the free agency world. Trading for big names. Accomplished guys already. Guys that I assume Tomlin has been a big fan of throughout their entire career.

[Cal Raleigh]

Oh yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

All these guys are guys that Tomlin has come up to and said I'm gonna get you when you're old and cheap. He said that to everybody, I would assume. And Omar Khan obviously making it all happen. Good for the Steelers. It's kind of a shame we got guilt tripped into doing training camp Upper a show up at their training camp. But I guess we'll go.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Have to, I guess get to watch.

[Darius J. Butler]

Jalen Ramsey DK go one on one.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah, we've seen some tape of them in the past whenever NFC west opponents. Have you seen this Tape.

[Darius J. Butler]

I have not.

[Connor]

Not the greatest of friends.

[AJ Hawk]

Fierce competitors.

[Darius J. Butler]

Yeah, fierce competitors.

[Pat McAfee]

Geno Smith takes a shot late from Jalen Ramsey. I'm sure he didn't like that and probably told somebody about it. We'll talk more about that. Metcalf, though, goes finger in the face. What are you doing? What do you think this is, huh? He's defending his guy. I think everybody respects it. Jalen goes, whoa, whoa, whoa. Lost my bounds. That should be at least 15, maybe, maybe 20. That should be a 20 yard penalty in that. Did you see Geno this weekend?

[Evan Fox]

Yes, I loved it. Where was that? What was the situation?

[Pat McAfee]

Looks like this is flag football or.

[Evan Fox]

Seven on like seven on tournament.

[Pat McAfee]

Yeah. And his team. And I know there's a lot of guys that have teams and I know these tournaments get very, very competitive. I know these are also synonymous with camps, too. So I think there was a full development of football and I think a lot of these guys really care about how their camp and their team is doing. And Geno talking big shit to somebody that his team obviously just beat. What did this tell you?

[Connor]

This told me for the Patriots, who they play the Raiders, Week one. Got to be a little more careful about Gino now going forward. I don't want to piss him off. I don't want to say he's anything out of pocket because, well, he's either listening or he will hear it and he will respond. And I don't want to be the guy that causes Geno Smith to go up and down the sideline yelling. That's why they pay me the big bucks, because that scares me.

[Pat McAfee]

I mean, he's peacocking on somebody there. A.J. i haven't been to one of these tournaments I haven't got a chance to experience. It feels like this happened after our generation. I think it's awesome. I think more reps is good for all parties, especially with the way football is. But this type of intensity, you don't get to feel that that much. No. You know, like you don't get to feel that much like buy in and also want to let a know, you know, that doesn't. Those types of opportunities don't always just show up.

[Evan Fox]

AJ Yeah, I assume he's yelling at the other team's coaches or parents or any like. Yeah, obviously it looked like a spirited game that he came out on top.

[Pat McAfee]

So.

[Evan Fox]

Yeah, why not?

[Pat McAfee]

Cam Newton got in a fight in one of these, didn't he? Yeah. Yeah.

[Connor]

With like 10 dudes team that wasn't even dirty in the game though.

[Darius J. Butler]

Cam has Produced a lot of as far as his teams like produce a lot of NFL talent. But yeah, the, the talking is a lot of cash talking out there. A lot of people, other coaches you probably grew up with, you know, him talking, calling, you know he's a quarterback obviously calling plays. You know, big time plays. You know, motions testosterone happens.

[Pat McAfee]

Huge win, massive. Well if Gino is this locked in on that you're talking. Oh yeah. Chip Kelly calling a play. Yeah.

[Darius J. Butler]

Maybe Pete loves it.

[Evan Fox]

Pete loves it.

[Darius J. Butler]

Maybe Gino just call his own.

[Pat McAfee]

You're right. You're right.

[Ty Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Pat McAfee]

Is Chip Kelly asked for his place. I mean that is. He's pretty comfortable with these. All right, let's get the fuck out of here. What a time in sports. What a time. Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change their life. We're in this thing together. Thank you to sports for giving us shit to talk about every day. More specifically today. This is great. Today's. We need tomorrow to be like today. Yes. Free agency for the NBA starts this evening. There's going to be some big conversation. Remember Sean is all giddy about something big that's coming out. Team on three. Fuck. Team on me. Team on three. One, two, three. Team. Goodbye. In 1979, the first words spoken on ESPN weren't just an announcement. If you're a fan, they were a sports prophecy. What you'll see in the next minutes, hours and days to follow. Glad you're with us tonight.

[Adam Schefter]

May convince you you've gone to sports heaven.

[Pat McAfee]

And right now you're standing on the edge of tomorrow.

[Mackenzie]

This fall, the next era of ESPN begins.

[Pat McAfee]

Sports forever.