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We have you covered every which way, but Sunday football's happening. This is weird. Our week away. We have the schedule for next week. Rosillo is going to be on Sunday night. And then Cousins sound, our new guest, the lines on Tuesday. So stay tuned for that. Coming up on this podcast in one second, we're talking to Andre Iguodala, bringing in Bakari Sellers and Ben Lathan. Then I had a few things to say about Tom Seaver.

So that is the agenda. I want to talk about basketball really quickly here at the top. So it's Thursday night. I was going to put this up earlier, but I needed two hours to recover from a devastating Celltex was just devastating. They had a chance to sweep them. They're better than Toronto. And now it's two one. Toronto has left. Toronto throws the kitchen sink at the Celtics. They play Lowry forty six minutes. He's got five fouls most of the fourth quarter VanVleet plays I think 43 minutes.

They're just running those guys on the ground because they know the moment they come out they're not going to be able to score too smart. It's exactly what Coach Bud didn't do with Milwaukee. The first two games where he's playing Giannis like it's January and meanwhile they're down to nothing in the series Nick Nurses like I can't survive without Lowry and VanVleet out there rides them totally works and yet somehow the Celtics still go ahead with zero point five seconds left. Great play by Kemba And now it looks like the Celtics are headed for a sweep Brad Stevens brings Toco fallen to guard the inbounds pass.

I will never understand that one. Nothing I hate more than an ice cold guy coming on the court. I always feel like it's a bad omen. I can't explain as much as I love Taco and they have a defensive lapse miscommunication. All of a sudden Örjan and OBIS wide open in the corner somehow takes a three and half a second and instead of up three oh with the chance to be Kruzan seven in the playoff bubble, the Celtics let the Raptors back into it.

Now, they didn't really play that well today. There they other than Kemba, nobody was making shots. They kept Lin Toronto hang around Toronto really, really, really threw everything they had into that game today though and barely won.

So if you look at silver linings for the Celtics, they still haven't played like a great game in this series. Toronto did everything they could and barely, barely, barely by a miracle shot, were able to avoid going down three. And I think the biggest thing is, you know, S.A.M. has just stunk. And, you know, they think they seem like they think he can post up Jaylen Brown. He just can't they can't can get him going.

They can lock him. So all their offense is coming from these two guards. And I think as the series goes along, especially once we get to a Game six, game seven, if it gets there, you know, the tendency of that as the guards, the legs start to go and it just becomes harder and harder for them to create offense. But that backcourt was tremendous today. And, you know, the Celtics, they're up for a couple of times there with like a minute and a half minute left, bad possessions.

And then it still felt like they were going to steal. Still a game there. But, man, to let Toronto off the hook, just brutal. So that was one thing that happened since the last time we had a podcast. The other one is we had a Game seven with Houston and Oklahoma City. And it was one of those games where there are really no winners other than Lou Dort, who ended up being being the guy who got his shot blocked with the season on the line at the end.

But he was kept them in that game. Chris Paul Johnathan Sharks wrote a really good piece on the wringer about the last twelve years of Chris Paul. And just over and over again, even though he carries himself like his this guy's the alpha dog. We talked about it being house on Tuesday night, the game, the Game six performance. He had these deciding games, these huge moments. He just doesn't have a huge, huge positive resume in these situations.

And obviously, neither does James Harden it hard to make that block at the end. But this was another head scratching hard in performance where he talked afterwards, like, I'm going to get my shot to fall. It's like, well, when when has your shot fallen in a big game? Because I because I'm hard pressed to remember the time. I don't know whether the moment is.

Becomes too big for him or he tries to do too much or what happens, but he just couldn't get it going as usual. Sorry to say sorry, it's going to be a dick, but as usual, couldn't get it going in a must win game. And the Rockets were still able to pull it out. But with the Chris Paul thing, it's interesting.

I was thinking after that Shakspeare, we've seen these small guys in playoff games over and over again not being able to get over the hump. And there's been. You know, a variety of reasons, right, Iverson, the closest he came was he made the finals in 2001 and was able to play one game. But other than that, his playoff resume was was just not good. I mean, over and over again, just getting knocked out pretty early, usually round one.

Steve Nash was another one two time MVP when he got to the playoffs. It just becomes harder and harder for a guard to become. The dominant guy on a team that wins four straight rounds, they take a bigger punishment. Defenses can, you know, either collapse on them or if they're distributer, like Nashua's kind of force him to try to score too much and take away the passing out. That's things like that. But if you go on through, even going back to Bob Cousy in the 50s before Bill Russell showed up or Bob Cousy was the best guard in the league, the first great guard in the history of the league and could never get over the hump until Bill Russell showed up.

This is why I value Isaiah Thomas so much historically. And this is, you know, as as advanced stats and all the stuff people start using. The numbers to judge guys because they didn't see them and they weren't there not to be and I was their guy, but I think the thing that made us is so special was what a closer he was for his size. It was so unusual.

For a small guy who's six one, he's my he's probably my height. Over and over and over again, he could close big games and and was just you were just terrified of him late, he could always get a shot. He usually made the right play with the rare exception of the bird still in 1987. But but that's that's why I hold him in such high esteem. And that's why the stats, you know, when you're talking about Isaiah and his place in history and people like Chris Paul is the best point guard of all time.

Isaiah, to me, is still the best little guy I've ever seen, and the reason is he could have averaged twenty seven to twenty nine a game if he wanted to. I think any game, any situation you wanted from him, he would have been able to deliver it. If you wanted him to have a 21 Iverson season, he could have had it.

He understood pretty early on to use his skills, his playmaking, all the things that made a team win to get everybody involved and then take over in a manner that he understood that bounce better than anybody. And I think Chris Paul is the logical successor to that. Chris Paul is a guy. Is just everybody is is probably better off if it's the right kind of basketball situation where he's going to just make everybody around him better. You saw it in OKC this year.

But that closer thing with him, which he was able to do in Game six, in which he did really well during the regular season in the playoffs, just hasn't been there consistently. And there's so many who go through his his his postseason history. 2014 and 15, I think, are the biggest black marks against him. Twenty eighteen. He gets hurt against the Warriors, but he just never, never really had that as a moment where Isaiah, that team should have won three straight titles.

I think they would have won in 88 if Assad and sprained his ankle. They win in 89. They went in 90. And he was out of anybody able to find that balance between running a team, getting everyone involved and then taking over when it matters. And, you know, I think I had I had him when I wrote my book. I think I had him like twenty two or something like that. The pyramid is probably dropped a couple spots since just because some guys jumped him.

But what I think about like the best pure point guards of all time. I still have to start with Isaiah. I don't care about the PR and the efficiency, the true shooting and all this, not to sound like a fucking dinosaur, but I just think people didn't value stats like that back then. And honestly, the efficiency, nobody had efficiency like that back then. What Isaiah brought to the table was he could do all of these different things that so many of these other great point guards were able to do.

Nash, Jason Kidd, Chris Paul, Gary Payton, you name it, but could also close and could be the best guy on a back to back championship team. That matters, I know he had some great players in that team, you know, Rodman was on their Laimbeer, Vinnie Johnson. Mahorn for the first one, Mark McGwire, but that was his team and, you know, his place in history, even though our stance doesn't get the Olympic team, things like that, not to turn this into Isaiah a monologue, but I think when I look back at Chris Paul historically, some day the stats are going to look fantastic.

By every single metric. He was awesome. But yet the playoff thing, it matters, I'm sorry, it just does it matters that in the last two minutes of that game seven. Yet again, he he couldn't make those one or two plays that swung the game, and if anything like that last play. You the they basically they're daring him to drive into a bunch of people, which he does, then he whips the ball off Gilgeous Alexander, who then gets it, and then he just kind of recedes from the play.

He needed it is my point. He really, really needed that moment, you know, now he's thirty five years old. We've never seen a guard his size really succeed past this age. And I think that was probably his last chance. And it would have been an amazing story for him to stick it to the Rockets, the team that traded him. I look, I still think he's one of the best thirty, thirty five players ever. But if you're asking me who's on my all time list, who I have, what would I rather have, Isaiah Thomas or Chris Paul for one series?

I just would rather have Isaiah Thomas. I was there for it. The guy was a killer. And. When he missed, you were shocked. So so for the little guy championship belt, for me, it's still Isaiah and Chris Paul, you could throw all the stats at me that you want, but. But disappointing that he was never able to get over the hump. Now heartens in a situation where had they lost that game, that would have been catastrophic.

But now he's going to this Laker series that are the huge underdogs in a weird way, it's a good situation for him. No pressure at all. They're supposed to lose. They have this weird, goofy team with no center broken or, you know, Davis is going to get 40 points a game. LeBron, though, as soon as he goes by one person, it's going to be a layup line for him and. You know, in a roundabout way, it's kind of a nice spot for her on the spot that he has been great at over and over again over the course of his career was a spot like Game seven the other night.

They're the favorites. The world comes crashing down. If they lose and you kind of look to your guy and you're like, hey, man, if you want to have one of those thirty nine point games where he hit nine threes, like tonight's The Night, I think about Steph Curry last year in that Houston series When They Lose Durant. And and it really seems like the title is the the the the back to back to back is teetering and he stinks in the first half rallies and has that incredible second half best game of his career, most important game anyway.

And Harden just needs one of those. And honestly, Chris Paul needs one, two. And you know, it's unfair to just say because of these seven games, you weren't as great as this guy. But I think the difference is. You really find out who's great when there's just an incredible amount of pressure and the highest tax possible, and unfortunately that's basketball, that sports, it just is. So we'll see how James Hardie does with not a lot of pressure on them this round.

But I was bummed for Chris Paul because I really do like watching him. It's frustrating that he just couldn't have a moment. And I think if you go back, you think like that. Spurs series, when the Spurs, the defending champs, the Clippers beat him and he was great. That series, he had a really nice seven game series against the Young Warriors team. Before they won the titles, he went toe to toe with the Spurs, took them to seven.

But for the most part, it's been disappointing. And I don't I don't totally blame him. I think it's really hard in NBA history has shown over the last 70 years, if if you're six foot one or under a point guard is your best player, it's just it's hard to win four straight rounds. It's hard for them physically. It's the science, the geometry of the game, just for whatever reason, makes that really hard. And we even saw with Daimler recently where the bubble MVP goes to the goes to round one and gets a really good team.

And in the last three games, there's just little guys, just harder it's a harder road. So when I think about Isaiah, people always ask, well, you you have a great Isaiah.

Look at the numbers. He wasn't even that good of a three point shooter.

Well, nobody was in the 80s, but that's why I quote unquote over it. Isaiah, that dude was a fucking killer and he won two straight titles and he should have had three. And in any big game, he was there. He was shown up and he was going to be either the best player in the court or the second best player in the court, and that's who he was. So he still has the title for me. All right.

We have a lot to get to first, our friends from project.

All right, before the playoffs, I told you guys on this podcast, Miami, and the clips, 40 to one odds to meet in the finals. That was my big bet. I thought everyone was sleeping on this Miami team. I know as a Celtics fan, I do not like the matchup for the Celtics. You just have this weird team of all these guys, different skills, very malleable. Andre Iguodala, you were just sitting at home until, what, late January, hoping for a good playoff situation?

This is the best possible playoff situation.

I was I was doing more than sitting at home. But I understand what you mean. You know, I just was. You know, I was trying to get a good gauge of a good situation for myself and what I wanted to do the next year, sure to. And just it was always the team that was on the radar. You know, it's funny. I read this book when within about six, seven years ago, I don't even know I came across the book, but I had a pretty good idea of what it was about and the organization that built there since ninety five.

And it came like all of a sudden it was like really fast how things develop, but it just, you know, things like that. We stay patient, they come about and try to take advantage of a unique situation. So try and take advantage of it right now.

Did you feel like you were in. Proper game shape, 90 percent, 80 percent like, how do you even gauge that when you're not able to be in an NBA season? When I was pretty funny.

You know, the teams the culture here is pretty big on body fat. And when you be in top conditioning shape and I came in, I've been working on a lot. That's something I do just on a regular. And I tell people all the time, regardless of whatever I decide to retire, I'm probably lighter. I'll be just as good a shape. I'll still be fit. It's just kind of the genes that I've been blessed with. But before my body fat and I was around six percent body fat, maybe five and a half.

And I suppose I know how much time you need. I'm like, I haven't played a game since the final, so give me some time a week or two. Maybe we'll see. I my body fat. And he was like, oh, you're ready to go suit up next game. It was pretty funny. How do you rate it?

When did you when did you know this was a contender? Because I really started to feel in the bubble before the playoffs that I was like, man, this team, especially for like a team like Milwaukee, the way they can always have three shooters on the floor, all the guys that could throw Giannis. This seems like a problem but it didn't seem like it seemed like the nerdy basketball fans saw but not everybody saw. When did you know.

When I got to the team and I was seeing little spurts of what we can do. The name Duncan Robinson has become more and more of a household name, but I hadn't really seen him play and I had a chance to practice against him. So I start seeing him and I saw the work ethic of Tyler Yero and I was like, whoa, you know, just kids, this is different. You know, you can see guys who are really talented and you see those kids who just have a knack for just wanting to be really good.

And you really have a joy in working hard, which is a very rare trait, especially nowadays with the way to a US kind of disrupt the game is our earning and earning as much as they used to. But he's one of those guys, aren't you? And then playing with or knowing what he's been able to do. And then Jimmy was kind of in and out early on when I got there. But just seeing it here and there, there.

JONES Like, it's just all the all up and down the lineup. You just see so many different things. I always knew Bam! Adebayo was this good? Yeah, because Livingston had been telling me about him for about two years. He's like, yo, this is kidney bam out of value in Miami. He's the DJ. So I always kept an eye on him. And then when I got to see him, I feel like he's superstar level.

Yeah. So that's the interesting thing is we never played together as a complete unit before covid before the season was shut down. Right. We always had like eighty percent of the team where they would be Cumi was out or was out or I don't think there was any game. But Tyler, he was out for unemployed at one game with him before we shut down was the last game against Charlotte, so we never played with a complete unit. Meyers Leonard was out the entire time, so I just saw so many different lineups like you've been talking about, like we got to do some special because I can see it here and there.

We just haven't been able to put a complete team up to Tyler here.

I thing hurts my feelings, you know, about the coin flip, right? I do not know about the coin flip Celtics in Miami last draft, they tie for the thirteenth pick coin flip a coin flip.

I do remember that it should have been like leading ESPN.

It should've been shown it live on ABC. Celltex lose. They get fourteen Miami and then he's dropping, you know he's going to get like somewhere between ten and thirteen and he's sitting there at thirteen just like please don't take him twenty years old. But I there's a fearlessness to him and I think your whole team has that. I would describe it other than the lineup, the how malleable you guys can basically play handle any type of situation. There's a fearlessness and there's a toughness.

And I thought that really surfaced in especially game one. Milwaukee was ready for it because there's a loose ball. You guys were getting it. There is a rebound. You guys are getting a hand on it. There was just an intensity that you could see them trying to adjust to it. I thought they adjusted better in game two. But you've been on tough teams before. I would say that, you know, obviously the worst that was one of the hallmarks.

But from a playoff toughness standpoint, doesn't that have to be there? You win a title without that. I don't think you have to have it in the teams that you know. I definitely think if you finish first in the regular season, you have access to it, to you. So, again, we had a tough install, but historically, you go back and you look at Pat Riley's teams, he's just injected into the DNA of wherever he that you go back to the Lakers teams, you go you definitely go to the next teams.

That's all they were about. Oh, yeah. That was the epitome of the Knicks, you know, in the early 90s. And you saw it once. He got to Miami Prosequi and Alonzo Mourning. You got some pretty tough lineups out there. The Damali, Tim Hardaway, PJ Browns, you got some greedy guys. So it was always been in a DNA. Udonis Haslem is going to everything his career with the team, the last 18, 17, 17, 18 years.

You to say Wade was like that, too, when they took 15. And it's as tough as anybody. Right?

Right. But I mean, people people don't even see that Dwayne in ways game. But that's something that was just there from the beginning. You know, you saw him as a rookie in the first round and him going after people and him what he did a second round against Indiana this year. You just kind of see that in guys and, you know, they call it that. That's a heat guy. They identify those guys early on. And then even if you're not on the team, they're identified.

And those guys, other teams that they go up against potential acquisitions, looking to you, just that heat Kool-Aid, you chug that they cleanse the Warriors Kool-Aid out of your system. They put the Heat Kool-Aid right in there.

And just pay close attention to you. Look at teams like the San Antonio Spurs, the same thing. They do the same thing. And then I know a little secret about them. It's like this one particular player that they're looking for to that that doesn't quite fit the mold. It fits the mold. I know what that player is. So, you know, it does seem to have longevity with success. They've built a great culture and there's certain things to look for, certain intangibles they're looking for and they can make the most of it and make great teams around it.

And that happens in football, too. I think the Ravens and the Patriots are like that. There's specific types of players, and when they get them, they're like, oh, that makes sense. If that's a guy job. And my name is definitely that. Was there a specific moment where you're like, holy shit, we could actually win the title with this team?

I don't think it was a specific moment, I think it was just gradually happening. Yeah, because even the first championship I won with the Warriors, like I didn't it wasn't like, oh, we're going we've got a chance to win a championship. Like, I honestly didn't know that we were going to win a championship until J.R. start stop making threes right like now. And he keeps making threes and is like he missed the last one. And we throw the ball in areas like it's like, holy shit.

Like we're about to win the right. You kind of like felt it throughout the year, but it was like you don't know until you actually do it. It's like that's the incredible thing about winning your first championship is like you don't know it was real until it actually happens. So this team is like little things happening here and there. And it's like, OK, OK. And then for me is just identifying. That boy, like, OK, what are we missing?

What can another team exploit? It's like the old war. You try to find your weakness before your opponent does. OK, who I know was an area of attack, a team to try on this and then how do we defend that or how do we shield that? So that's really been you know, that's really kind of been my calling card later stages of my career, just trying to fill that void and then make a team pay for trying to exploit it.

It's the ideal 20/20 blueprint because you can make threes so you're never out of a game. You can defend wings, interchangeable multiple guys. You never don't have somebody who can guard wings, which is it's impossible to really succeed now in this day and age without these things. And then you guys are tough. But the Butler piece, nobody was sure, including myself, like I was feel like you need a superstar to win a title. The other pieces, like these superstars at one level below.

What was the biggest misconception you had before you played with him that you were surprised by? I don't think I really had any misconceptions about how you compete against a person in a certain guise, you develop a respect for just how hard they play and just the way to cheat. And I don't want to compare him to the cops. Got the thing where people think he may rub his opponent the wrong way. Yeah, it was competitiveness. So people have an issue with CP because he wants to win.

Yeah, I always tell people like I mean, I wouldn't want it I wouldn't want to coach a different type of player. Like, that's the kind of guy I want to coach a guy that's going like, you know, like if there's a game said we got to get a win. Who's the guy you're looking for? And not to every anyone who's ever had issue with KPM, like you're picking him in a game seven and they all say, damn, you're right, I got no, I'm right.

Like, this guy's you know, I talk about. You know, we're kind of like the a new era has. Baby, the really talented kids and superstardom and the fame and all these things that come with the game as is, is they don't work as hard for not saying they're not working hard, but they don't have to go through those mental grind. They don't have they don't have to work as hard for it. They don't have to go through anyone doubting them.

They don't have to go through. There's a team that they can't get over the hump and people wonder why they now they get to the point. It's like, well, why can't this guy have success in the playoffs? So why can't this guy get deeper into the playoffs or things like that? But their superstar goes like you go all the down the line, all the way back to Detroit. And LeBron had to go through the mud to get it, like he really had to earn it.

And I talked about a lot of wins in my ear. All those guys had to like Paul Pierce. He had to go through the mud and get it like Kobe had to Utah was kicking his butt. He had to go out and he had to get it to get it through the mud, like the game. I'm hoping the game doesn't change too much. We know where we're giving these guys passes or they're going to the line too many times and it's like they're not really struggling to get.

Over at home, which every great player has has gotten over and back to the point, somebody like Jimmy, he's one of those guys that has been through too much. He's been through some really tough series. Yeah. He's been on some teams where the the cohesion may not have been there, but he's just trying to figure his way through it. And he's just got to a great situation now where he's got you know, he's got some kid right next to him and they don't have any fear.

They want that pressure. They want the heat for lack of a better word. They want that. They want all the smoke is what we call it. They want all that. It comes with going through tough times and having to get over or get a game through the mud to to win a playoff game seven to a game to get one of them will want to see. You know, it's kind of like a desperation game for them. You've got to get that win or series even and be able to pull it out.

Says a lot about the guys that are around him, says a lot about him. And it just always kind of like the culture that the team had. So they've been able to go. Yeah, it's an old school playoff team because they take game two is a good example, right, inspirationally for Milwaukee. I can't say you guys played amazing, you know, even you look at the points a bunch of guys scored, but there was no, you know, you know, like the Celtics snuck out game two against Toronto because Tatum was amazing.

Marcus made five threes in the fourth. Nobody else played well, but they gutted it out because they're good defensively and they were able to get two guys going. You guys can win these games where it's like, who's the best player? I'm not even sure, you know, which I think for in a especially as you go deeper in the playoffs, those teams are really tough because Milwaukee, they had the best player in the league, the two time MVP.

And it's like you could just keep throwing so many guys at him, including yourself, today. I got to say, I wasn't expecting you to defend Giannis as much as you've defended him those first two games. But you know different strategy.

Well I think it's just know the Swiss Army knife. It's almost like you need to have, you have to have now in order to go deep into the playoffs to try to make a run at it. We have a couple of guys. Those guys you talked about it all the way down and on Jimmy Jae Crowder. So don't throw your Bam Adebayo following him. But you know, you talk about a guy, we have to talk basketball, we don't get it, we can throw him in and he'll be ready to go.

And we got a guy no one's ever heard of, Stanford, Stanford kid Casey acappella. I don't even know his last name yet. Yeah. Except my fellow Nigerian brother. But he's been kind of like the Yoni's in our scout team. And you talk about somebody coming full speed, full force. That's, you know, six, eight can handle a rock and full force. And he's strong and he's wiry. We were laughing and joking about shoot him up one day.

So we just got a lot of different, like you said, pieces. We can simulate a lot of different things, which in turn, in turn enables us to switch up how we want to play the game. We can go outside and go inside. We can throw a defense lineup out there with the offensive line about there. We're very dynamic in our combination of minus. Last thing on on the honest thing, you've guarded LeBron at its peak, you've guarded Yoni's close to his peak.

Are those the two best athletes you've ever tried to defend or would you put somebody else in that conversation? I'm just talking athletic specimen, super duper coordinated explosiveness, strong, like just every single checkmark is a ten out of ten.

Bronze, probably the top. Because his IQ is athleticism is superb and him being one of the he might be one of the best passes of all time. You put some money of the athletic IQ being able to. Put the ball in spots for teammates, you wouldn't imagine him being baseline and a poster behind the back pass behind them in the opposite corner on the money, then he can see that's just next level. So LeBron. But I think one guy, people tend to forget about his car.

I had to guard Vince in his prime. He was in Jersey and. I knew Vince as like this ultra athletic guy, but I didn't realize his shooting capabilities and seeing him shoot from half court like it was just a regular jump shot and like, you know, we call him Katie makes when the ball goes into the back of the back room, straight down, like it just hit straight down. You have the rebound, you in the basket.

And he had those from half court. I'm like, whoa, this is a different type of guy. And then I came in an era where there was a lot of that was it wasn't three pointers.

It was a mileposts for wings, isolation, Stackhouse, the Stackhouse game, Stackhouse game. And you would get embarrassed like you almost had to hate guys because you had to go with that mentality because a guy will get 40 if he could. Yeah. In that early two thousands there. So just you know, and then he was now in the game is a little bit more open, is not as physical. So, you know, you're not able to play golf as Block will back in.

We were bumping guys and you still had guys going over your finish and crazy dunks, you know, is one of those guys and yeah, it's one of those guys. You know, you have some pretty athletic players backing your coach, Steve Kerr.

We were talking on this podcast about Kawhi versus Pippen as because I was that Pippen when I was growing up and in my twenties, that's the best perimeter defender I've ever seen.

And then some of the stuff I was in the last five years as a coach, as you know, I think on that level and Kerr quickly jumped in is like so Dre, Jay has to be in that conversation with those two guys. So if that's three, who's the fourth and that Mount Rushmore for you?

Oh. Oh, that's a great question, because it's got to be somebody who can guard guys of different sizes, who has the athleticism and the defensive IQ and the hands, I would say would be the the package. Or maybe it's just three, maybe we haven't had the fourth guy yet. Now we have a guy I just got to put my I got to put my thinking cap on. That's a tough one. All right.

You don't answer. Now, I'm here to throw tough questions at you. I have to answer in five minutes.

Can you tell me what the last couple of weeks were like in the bubble? I know you were heavily involved last week with, you know, once the Bucs boycotted that game in the ballroom and two hundred and fifty people in there, all that stuff. You were one of the lead voices. You're one of the respected veteran stars in the league. What was your role there in that day? And when it came up when you came out of that that night, did you think there could be basketball?

Oh, that was interesting. Interesting times, but I remember doing an interview and I was like, it's really been like thought provoking. It was like a breath of fresh air and I enjoyed it. Maybe I could you enjoy that. And I always say how many times we get that many NBA players in a room at the same time, as always, labor negotiations and there's a fear the checks might stop coming in. And everybody rushes in really quickly on the flight and everyone gets to New York.

Even if you get that many guys. So that was a beautiful thing to see. It was very emotional. It was tough because people to understand, you know. We have to shoulder a lot of the responsibilities to right a lot of the wrongs that have been done to our people in the spotlight spent on us legally and historically, athletes have been punished for speaking out on social injustices that happen within our communities. We all know the history of that, specifically Muhammad Ali and the Jim Browns and Tommie Smith.

So it's been you always trying to. As an athlete, you always get. The juggling of how do you perform and capitalize financially on your career, but at the same time stand for something, it's like Michael Jordan, you want to be Muhammad Ali, and there's pressure from the media. There's pressure from your agency or your management team because they want you to check every single box, because in their mind is not necessarily what impact you really have is just the economic value that you can create for yourself, for them, too.

So there's a lot that goes into it. And then you've got friends and family members. I don't know if I've ever seen so many proposals and so many things to take to Congress or the Senate to get laws changed. And I'm like, you know, I'm not an expert. And we always talk about this. We're not politicians and we're not coming from a political standpoint. Know, like I said before, as a human, it's it's a human agenda, as a human organization.

And when you're seeing people just like you being treated the way that we've been treated and this is something new for us, we've always seen this. But it seems as if we're told you made it out and you've escaped, that you've been blessed and you've created all this work for yourself. Leave it alone. That's another hard thing to swallow, knowing that you can make a difference. So all those things coming into place within like four or five hours and it's like make a decision, you know, I mean, I'm a some of the board of a publicly traded company and we have a quarterly board meetings and it takes hours upon hours and days and days and weeks to make a decision and resolutions and have an agenda.

All these did all these things going in place and everyone saying, OK, this happened. You shut it down right now. What other company or what the CEO says, I'm not going to work today because there's this issue. There's there's different ways to go about it. And for us, just trying to come up with the best way and trying to be proactive and trying to be about action is just a line that goes into us. I was really proud of us for the way we handled it, the way we might have had a disagreement, but we were able to say, let's take a nice, relaxed, clear our minds, get some rest, come back and have another discussion about it, and then have another discussion.

We know with our governorship and the commissioner on the task force or things that goals we have in mind moving forward, things that are immediate action and things that are going to be put into action as we continue to get further into the agenda. So it was a lot made. It wasn't much sleep, having a lot of conversations, a lot of text know just trying to shuffle through so many ideas that so many people wanted to. I think their head was in the right place in terms of how they help but not understanding like you're one of two hundred people with know with a PowerPoint presentation on what to do.

It also seemed like you had some rightfully so genuinely discouraged people who felt like they had made real sacrifices to go on the bubble. And there are going to be all these good things that came out of it. You're using your platform and then all of a sudden you're back to square one after take a break. And it's like, well, why are we here? That seem to be just watching this happen? Sitting here in California, that seemed to be the recurring theme is like, well, why are we here?

Why are we doing this?

Well, this is a tenuous situation. I think we it and correct me if I'm wrong, it is about it's been about 30 police shootings since then, you know, and I think what we trying to understand is no one is going to happen. And. Trying to put something together where sooner than later there's something in place where we can address them right away and we don't have to shut down soon, something happens. Yeah, OK. You haven't shut down this.

Haven't shut down. I mean, we we've never exist. We would we can't exist that way because the system is set up for our people to be oppressed, systematic oppression. And it goes all the way back to, you know, I don't want to be a historian, but it was always all the way back to slavery. And slave catchers were the first form of law enforcement or a police call it. And there's been this vicious cycle of politicians when they're given a campaign.

So the fear tactic of getting a large group of people to think that figure is the way to get votes and to get put in place and seen in the Reagan administration. You've seen it around the freedom fighters in the Black Panther Party, in the counterintelligence program. All those things have been put in place as a way to keep a class of people, people to be fearful of them and to keep them in the lower class. So it's just something that the African-American community have to continue to grow.

That's why I work economics in the back of my jersey. You know, it's all about the minority communities or a lot of the communities. They have a system in place where they can help the people, whether it be with loans, growing businesses, public school funding in these areas are well funded. You see a lot of suburbs don't have private schools because they're public schools. Simply our private schools are funded. Well, they have state of the art facilities, whether it be for theater, arts, sports programs, all those things put into place.

But for us, you know, with the redlining keeping us out and, you know, we're dealing with the bare minimum, we haven't been able to create a group economics where we're investing in our own communities and our own and our own property and where we have the highest spending dollar out of all communities in the world. We have the strong spending, consumer spending, yet our money is at least recycled within our own community. So a lot of that is dealing with systematic oppression and people understand that.

So when we address it, people think we're attacking a particular race or we aren't being American, but is just trying to get people to understand how does education. Because me personally, I had to go on seeking myself, the public school and teach me any of this, you know, so it's just another another one of the struggles of being an African-American who has some type of knowledge, not all the knowledge, but some type of knowledge of what's occurred historically in the country and in trying to spread to other players and juggling so many other things.

This is very complex. I call it a mean cocktail, just so many things thrown into to kind of throw you off.

Well, think about the league you walked into was the two thousand four, yes, 2004, the Suns, the defense pass you you go right before prototypic, the Suns trade the pick.

You could have been you could have been on the seven seconds or less suns. So they said they basically sold the pick. Yeah, it was tough. Yeah. The league you walked into, which that was the first time the salaries had really skyrocketed. And and then watching the league of of. As a league where the especially the older stars really cared about like, hey, we can be more than basketball players, but now you have the Jaylen Brown generation coming in who are walking in right away being like, let's change stuff now.

I mean, that's got to make you guys feel great. Yeah, yeah, Jaelynn, I'm a huge fan of Jaylon and. You know, teaching the guys about leverage, teaching the guys about, you know. And I'm trying to find the correct way to put this, and it's like, you know, your way out your first couple of years because the window of opportunity is very small and you have to you have to maximize your earning potential as well.

Like I say, it is that juggling act. So you kind of have to silence yourself for a year or two and just kind of play the politics, learn the game and take it all in while you're developing your game so that define yourself and who you are and create value for yourself as your own entity, as a basketball player. And then from there, now you're gaining some power, you gain some leverage, you're able to speak out on things and you're growing as a person.

You're maturing. Twenty to twenty three. You don't have a clue. But you can go out there and you can start molding yourself and not depending on others to to mold you. And you see that happen a lot with a lot of the management and agencies. You're trying to mold players, you know, whether it be through Instagram or whatever. So whatever the vanity plate at the moment, now it's tech investments or a player investing in some product that's an athletic product and having ownership of the company and competitiveness and then the Instagram thing and how you interact with fans.

You know, a lot of shoe deals are done now, not just based on how good of a basketball player you are, but your impressions, the impressions you have to social media. And I think there's a false sense of security within the area as well. So we got to be very careful. That's why I'm really proud of a guy like Jaylen Brown who has a sense of self know what he stands for. And it's more than just the fame and fortune.

He's been an amazing sceptic to root for. I'll tell you this just in case you play Boston next round. Tatum, they don't believe this guy, and poor Tatum and Brown, they can't shoot threes at all and really bad athletes like they have this reputation for being athletic, but I don't see it. So I you know, I would just take it easy on those guys because they're not a problem at all.

Marcus Smart is one of those guys who I'm thinking of going back to school. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, Scottie Kawhi, I won't I won't say myself. I really give myself any credit as being good. I'm just OK as a basketball player. But I got my fourth guy. Marcus, you're going to be surprised he's not Marcus, but Marcus close. I've seen this guy, gosh, Steph Curry, very well, Steph still scored, but is the best I've ever seen anybody and I've seen this guy go Arcady and when I see him go Arcady for 40 minutes, I see.

Well, but I knew because we were teammates. Yeah. Jrue Holiday. Oh, yeah, Jrue Holiday should have been a defensive player to year two or three times, you should be first team defensive player every single year, but he'll never get that the household name credit. Like I said before, it's kind of like not taking anything with me. Honestly, I don't want to do that because he's not solidified who he is, but I'm starting to get afraid of that.

We're handing out superstardom. The guy that got it through the mud and through holidays, that guy took out DAIM in a playoff series.

I really like was was in his jersey and we said, I'm with you.

So we saw Dan Schumacher and he was in a bubble. And you saw Drew just go back and look at that tape and look what you have a reality check out old team because he had to go to.

Quick break to talk about Fandor, we are teaming up with Fanda again this football season and we've got something new this time around all season long. You can play the Free Ringer mega contest on Fandor. Here's how it works. Pick five NFL games against the spread, including one double down. Pick a shout out to Gus Ramsey, who created the double down. Get one point for every correct pick. And two, if you hate your double down, pick Fandor, add up your score every week.

You finish in the top one hundred on the season long leaderboard. And guess what happens? You make the playoffs and you compete for a share of twenty five thousand dollars. It's that simple. I do not know what my picks are going to be this week. You're going to have to wait for guest lines with Cousin Sal on Tuesday because I actually have not looked at the lines yet. I try to stay true. Sal cheats. He's looked at every line.

He's going to pretend, oh my God, I didn't realize the JAG. I am not a cheater like Sallas. I have not looked at the lines yet. I'm not going to look at the lines until we do get science. When we do, I will give you at least my double down pick on Tuesday. And I play the Ringer Mega contest for free every week only on Fandor. Again, it's free. Go to Phantom Dotcom Mega contest to make your picks today.

Once again, that is Fanjul dotcom mega contest. I bet you can't beat me. Back to Andre Iguodala.

I have you over time.

Do you have three minutes to talk golf before you go? Oh, you know, I got all the time in World will go. First of all, are you playing golf in the bubble? I played a little bit, not as much as I would like a shot eighty one day on a tough course, 80. It was a tough course and I doubled 18 because I decided I couldn't I couldn't hit a straight tee shot. I've been falling all day in and I hope hooked.

I'll get in a hazard and I've got to double. It was easy. Seventy eight should have been easy. Seventy nine and I dealt with it. I was pissed, but I took 80 because I haven't been able to work on my game. So I but that I was, I was happy to be um.

Well I mean I'm personally, I don't think anyone over six four should ever shoot Nadie because I just don't the, the moving parts and the talk, it just seems like such a high degree of difficulty. So I'm I'm really impressed even by the 80 that you were upset about curry you better than him. Who wins when you play?

Well, people I don't think people understand, like there's like different levels of it, like. You can compare me to a three point shot like it's not a it's not even close, right? Yeah, in terms of us shooting threes, it's the same thing in golf. Like it's not close. Who who has the edge? You. Him? No, like, he can really play on tour. Oh, you really think that? I know for sure.

He's playing a Coimbatore now is Web.com Tour back then but he's played on a tour. He should have made the cut. I think it's second year. Yeah. One battle. And that's why you missed the cut. He would have made the cut against guys who was doing it for the seat.

He is the craziest hand eye coordination of any basketball player I've seen other than maybe bird like just these two guys, that there's just something different going on. So the fact that he would be great at golf is like not checking to me.

Not as good. Like I mean, like he was he may not have made the cut. He didn't finish Linzess for sure, but he was shooting even or under par through that two rounds on a like a legit Cameron champ. He was like playing with him and doing the same group. Like, think about that one steps right there. But this guy, like, he wasn't like training for it. Like, I remember the day before we played together and I took him to my course back in college and he had two balls.

He was like, I just need to talk to balls every time. I need to figure out what ball I mean, use them like this. Is your practice like, insane? He's got it. He's good. He's good. I think that's one handicap.

And you're like you're like a big, big, big, big fan of the tour.

Yeah, I got I'm in I'm in a fantasy league. Fantasy league. Yeah. I'm basically fantasy too.

Or now it's like nine of us in the group and and maybe more, maybe twelve now and is one and done. So you pick one golfer every tournament, you only get to pick one guy per season.

Oh. So it's almost like Survivor. That's a good one. Right. So whatever your purse is that we testimony that hit that guy's purse goes into your pocket and then your percentage of the entire purse at the end of the year, that's how much you get it apart because everyone was in like five hundred bucks is like the most you can lose the five hundred and the most you can win is spot on.

So it's like so you have like let's see, it's like John Rahm this weekend, but that's the only time you could take them.

Well, the US Open and the Masters got pushed back, push back. So we still have those two tournaments that those are only two tournaments that we don't do easily because it's the is the playoff finale. And then that person is too complex and crazy to put into this plan. So we don't add this week, but we do every other week. So last week I had Jay and Scottie Sheffler because October we picked two guys a week, but normally it's just one guy.

We on the majors, we pick two guys every major and the fifth major. Yeah, the players, the players, the players. We pick two guys, two, and then you have the golden pick. So if you get golden picks or one time of year, you pick a guy you call as Michael and whatever that guys makes is his double.

So whatever he makes you w o a double down guy, that's great.

Yeah. Yeah. But if your guy gets cut the zero dollars. So you have to be ready to go on like what you guys played well and which parts of the season, like I know Roy plays really well, like late in the season, so I'm picking him for the Masters. And then you got to know, like, Brooks only plays in in the majors. So you pick them in a major he's a really good double down guy because he'll be a good top 10 in the major.

If he's right. If he's. I'm worried about I think there's some knee thing going on with him. You're right.

I should text him. I've got a Cricklewood like I got like five guys. We regularly talk. Don't talk.

Oh, man. That's an advantage for the fantasy league. Yeah. And then three of them. I don't have so many fantasy league questions, though. I learn that they don't really like talking about golf as much. I just like talking about golf. Justin Thomas. Yeah. Who he could be. He can win it all. He's one of the guys that can win this weekend. And Brooks doesn't like talking about golf much. He just know like shooting this shit.

So who's who's winning the US Open?

The US opens in the East Coast right now. It's in New York, New York and the US Open. He's got a chance, man, just in time as John around spirally well. John Roberts been like the breakout, almost like Damilola in the bubble before the playoffs. He's always been good, though.

He's only like he's like twenty six. Everybody was waiting for him to have the year he's having right now. It was it was coming.

The thing about him, he's like six three, six four. He's like two thirty and he's solid two. And he doesn't have a crazy swing. So it's like longevity is going to be good for him. Yeah. And then he's he can put it, you can see, you can put it what he did last week. Well he figured out up here a little too. You get too bad. I mean he had a bad shot. It would take about four, three holes.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think he's got a good car. You got to ask about what basketball players he.

Oh, that's a good one to say, Jimmy. Jimmy Carter, Jimmy, Jimmy got this meeting we like he can't play unless he eats something like he has to find something to eat. It's like, you know, you know, it's like an enemy or something. Yeah. He has foes like Jimmy. You know, I love the anger, but let's just try to calm let's try to control the anger where it doesn't drain you as much with Jimmy.

Jimmy has been amazing. You know, he got no one here, though, John, from day one in the world. He's been lights up. Yeah, he's good. He's got it to if you end up making the next round and then playing the Celtics, that they end up making the next round. The Celtics, you just say super nice things about Jimmy for like the three days leading up, just everybody paid tribute to what a great player is and what an honor it is to be in a series against him.

Just try to diffuse the anger so it's not bad anybody.

But he'll say that they're patronising him and he'll be really mad at who do you think's the best golfer in the world right now? Would you say, Brooks, if you if your life depended on determine who do you have? My favorite my favorite golf is Rory. I'm a Roy guy, if everyone was playing their best golf. I'm going to Rory, the most talented golfer is probably DG. I agree, just like on another level, deejay's Tracy McGrady.

He's got all he's got all the things you would ever want in a play. I don't know, like a T-Mac, never. I couldn't get over the hump in the playoffs for a long time when he can get the first round. But D.J. has a major under his belt. That's true. Very fair. But D.J. doesn't have a face like he should have. He should have a FedEx under his belt. Joe, it seems like the sleeping giant in these tournaments that the other players are just kind of waiting for him to get involved as well, because they're saying he was like when deejay's going like that, I'll stay out of the way and just trying to add to a bank account, like I'm just trying to get a second or third, like, I don't care because I think the golf has worked the best out of all the bubble sports.

But the basketball has been way up there. I forgot to ask you what it's like to play with that fence, because you've probably hasn't had that happen since you were like in eighth grade.

Right now you have the world championships when you play in the world championships or the Olympics World Championships more so has that. Back in 2010, we went to Turkey. Istanbul was like the most fun. I was Katie's coming out party. That was probably the most fun I had playing basketball. And then like the feeding games, the playoff or the seeding games to get to the medal rounds. Yeah, it was similar to the bubble now very similar with the lights.

And there wasn't that many fans and there were a few. But they pipe in the south and they were a lot of fun, though. So it was kind of like you playing like a stage, you know, when it's on TV. And we played at Radio City Music Hall too, getting ready to go overseas to play in it. So we had a similar vibe to soak me, play basketball in college and many different tournaments. You can play pretty much anywhere.

I kind of love it.

Do you get to watch the other games or. No, um, I, I'm going to be honest right now. I mean, I like went say I don't really watch basketball that much. I watch it, I'll watch it as work, so if I know it was a match up, I don't have any future. I was a student. Yes, I'm watching, like, tennis season. And obviously I'm watching, like, what the next round could be.

So I'm keeping up to date on that. And then there's like one or two guys I really like. So I watch them sometimes.

Well, don't watch any of the games. Just listen to what I said. They can't shoot threes, not athletic at all. They the other guys get tired in the fourth quarter. Tatum just wears down.

He's got nothing more smart. Marcus Smart. Five threes. I'm watching. I'm watching him closely. He has a huge large print on the game that people don't see. Those are the guys I like a lot too, because it kind of reminds me of myself a little bit easier. I forgot to ask about your ankles, your ankles. OK, I assume decent.

It'll be where it needs to be when it needs to be better. That's a good answer.

When you're when you're at that age you're at now and you have an injury like that, what's the recovery time versus like when you're twenty two. Twenty two. I was back in the game like Luka because I got my ankle sprain up. I'll see you in game four. He's fine. You'll be fine.

But as you get older, it's not really the ankle. It was something that was hurting from the ankle and it was like, you like that and you know how it works. Too soon as it happened. I'm like, I'm not hurting right now. But in about two minutes, I hope it doesn't blow up. And this is going to happen. You know, all the pain to shoot you in the back. It was like I just happened.

Like, I know what the answer is going to say before it says it. I've been through it so many times.

Korver apologize to you. Send your text.

I'm really sorry that we were teammates so I know we were teammates and then he was a big help to his name. Has it been said in terms of own the ballroom, the ballroom. He, he was being help to me and we had a lot of discussions too. And he was on the board about the executive committee with the union. So we've been doing a lot of work together. So kind my guy.

That feels tough because I think two thirds of the time it is completely one hundred percent unintentional. The guy's just trying to block a shot. Yes. Omnitech but I think they start to it was great to talk to you. I hope you do more of these down the road as maybe a little golf podcast or something.

If you ever want to come off our golf podcast, just tell me, Anders Lane, he has is he has a great he's built a great golf community, is called the Random Golf Club, as well as like a lot of golf clothing. And we talk a lot and he's telling me to do it, too. So we'll see how easy it is.

You just turn your computer on, you got a zoom, you ready to go?

But but, you know, it has to be very relatable to a large audience. It's like tech, the tech world. You start small scale out, so you've got to find a way to make to get a large listening base just for golf, because you can get your your base. But is it large enough to get a Bill Simmons type of deal? No, you have to have a bunch of static. Five years would have ten years would have got that right.

You have to have that would have to have like five, six pieces to it. OK, so I wouldn't know what to expect. Like I might get a U.S. Open preview one day. I might get you talking about what's going on with the tech stocks. I might get you with some investor.

Does that bad today if it was going to happen? You knew that was one of my stocks. I hit by like twenty eight percent to. But I'm staying in that. Now's the time to buy it. I'll tell everyone that we see stocks get hit five, ten percent. Bye bye bye. What's going on? People say, oh, it's the opposite when it's when it shoots up and everybody's happy. That's what you said. When everything looks to be gloom and bleak as we really this could be part of your podcast.

Thanks for everything you did last week. Thanks for thanks for all the enjoyable basketball over the years. I really enjoyed watching you play, especially, I thought, that 270 Warriors team. Either first or second best team I've ever seen in person, the 86 sets up that that would be the other one. I know everything about Scottie Pippen. I know everything there is to know about Scott. He's got his my favorite players in the world. I don't know if I've seen a person taking out Kevin Durant and I just leave it at their.

I mean, you guys were like one hundred and twenty a game and you could get stops and anytime you're down 10, you could come back in a minute and a half. So I don't know.

Oh, yeah. Being down eight when a minute was like, yeah, yeah.

That was really good. All right. Great to see you. Thanks for coming up. Thanks for having me. Appreciate you forever. I always enjoyed a good conversation. So thanks for the. Appreciate it.

Take care. Thank you. Take it easy on the Celtics. Try.

All right, we're bringing in Bakari Sellers and bin Laden in one second. First, during this time, is social distancing connected with friends over a beer today might look a little bit different is the original light beer. Miller Lite has always been there to bring people together through Miller time. And right now it's a world we can't always be with people. Maybe it's a Zemko.

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And if you don't know their podcast, Makarios, the Bakari Sellers podcast, which has been awesome band, is hosting Higher Learning with Rachel Lindsey as well as the are way down the hall where I actually went out last week. Anyway, here they are. All right, since the last time this guy was on the best podcast, he launched his own podcast, the Bakari Sellers podcast, another best podcast, and he is trailing me, but gaining on me in the standings of most in-house recording fuckups, forgetting a record, I lead the ringer.

I think I have like nine. But you've three already. In five already. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have three already. And we're we're just getting started. My goal is to not catch you forever. I want to be number two. I just can't, I can't help it.

I can't help myself. Oh my God. Oh my God. Natha cameo. I know he just have zoom. Hey Van Lathan. They just stare as well. Does he just pop up and everybody show like this. Is this, is he the is he the podcast Angel. A Dark Angel of the Year.

I can't find the Dark Angel Ranger podcast amily. Wow.

That's my new nickname. What's up y'all doing?

We were talking about all the things that have changed since Boukhari was last on my podcast, including we have a VP who I think you predicted. I did. You were right. You said it was that was that ever not going to happen or was it always a lock that it was going to happen?

So I believe that Vice President Biden, in his heart of hearts, wanted Senator Harris for a long period of time.

But I'm also very cognizant that there were some people who wanted to give him choices. And so, you know, we had big Gretsch, who was a great governor, Gretchen Whitmer, the great state of Michigan. We had Susan Rice, former NSA probably will be the next secretary of state who were in the final running. But at the end of the day, you know, the familiarity with the family was was Kamala Harris. And I speak to my daughter to go down a rabbit hole.

But about, you know, a year ago, September 1st, my daughter had her liver transplant. And this past week we were at Duke shout out to Duke University, their medical team, for her one year biopsy. That went extremely well. You know, her liver was perfect. We're just we're thanking God every day for that. But the way when we were my wife was on the way to the hospital to take Sady, the first person to text me at six fifteen in the morning was Kamala Harris.

I mean, that's just the type of person she is. And so I'm really happy for, you know, it's just this is a fun time. This is going to be whatever the polls say. This is going to be an extremely close election, extremely close election. We don't have blowout elections in this country anymore. The difference between this election and past elections is that not many people are undecided. Shout out to the one person in one of the most recent national polls who said they had never heard of Donald Trump, that one black woman who, when the question was asked, she had never heard of Donald Trump.

I wish I could be her. So it's got to be close. But but here we are. We're ready to rock and roll for sixty seven days. That was like when they were doing the O.J. trial jury and they found like eight people who didn't know who O.J. Simpson was.

Some people we we. Are we doing then, Van?

What you don't know is that me and Bill are doing a show dedicated to O.J. Simpson theories, I really believe. Yeah, you did. You did you forget about that already, Bill? Because I'm I'm been research. I as soon as basketball is over and it doesn't come back for like five months as they figure out whatever the hell the next season is, I'm ready to do all kinds of weird shit, including that I'm so ready for the O.J. part.

I have something to say to the ringer audience here. There's no such thing as a political rumor that you hear from Bakari Sellers. If Bakari Sellers has a hunch, if Bakari Sellers, if he has a hunch, he knows Bookit Bakari like Bakari is. He's not just in these rooms. He's he is these rooms. He's on the wall. He's the plaster. He's the light fixtures. If you hear from the car, like if there was betting on this, he'd be like Ace from Casino.

Like, he is never going to lose. If you if you hear from the he knows when he was telling you guys he was doing the whole thing, he knew what was car.

You knew, you know, like the world of these little glass walls of political rumors because he knows his tweets are better than mine.

By the by the way, shout out to Scottie Pippen for the best tweet of twenty twenty. I don't know if you all saw that recently, but Scottie Pippen just flamed Richard Jefferson. But I digress. I will say that I, I know I know a lot of things that are going on in this arena and but back to what we were talking about real quick. I firmly believe Van to fill you in, that O.J. Simpson son had a lot to do with this.

I brought this up to Jeffrey Toobin.

I want to save this for the O.J. pod. Yes, I am. I'm giving away free stuff here.

But what, you think O.J. Simpson's son killed Nicole and Ron? I'm not I'm not getting sued on this.

So that's what I. So I'm not going to but but I do think I do think there's some alternate theories that we have to examine. And I want to have a part with Jeffrey Toobin. And Bill Simmons and myself, so we can go down some of these rabbit holes to get to the bottom of this. Wow, I can't think of a better way.

I would want to spend my time. I was completely obsessed with this trial. And then when it came back a second time with the Ezra Dach and then with that awesome effec show, I went right back in. So I'm always ready. I think it was sobering for a lot of people because I remember when we you know, back in the day, here's the thing about it. We didn't want to believe that O.J. was guilty, at least the community that come from the south of Baton Rouge.

When the dock came out, we had the benefit at the time, some people had had kids.

Some people have put themselves in different positions where they was like, oh, no, man like me, I got a lot of calls is like, yo, bro, you think O.J. might have done it?

I'm like, yeah, I think I think that's those are the odds that he actually did it. You know, it was just tough.

It's like a lot of people came to Jesus when that when that thirty four thirty came up.

The DNA is tough twenty years later because we didn't really understand it in the mid nineties.

Yeah, but we also have to look at we have to look at there is a there's a huge first of all, California in California, trials in California law are vastly different. There's a nexus between O.J. and and Michael Jackson and the way people reacted to it and the cult following of it. And Rodney King, all of those things kind of play a role in this in this really perverse way that we as individuals look at justice. We're far down somewhere we probably don't need to be.

But I will tell you that I am I am interested to talk about it because I think that there are a lot of that was the while and that that miniseries was just was just special. And to be able to my relationship with Jeffrey Toobin, where I'm able to ask him off the wall questions, there's nobody who knows more about this than Jeffrey. So he's going to be phenomenal if we can make that happen.

All right. So we're heading we're heading toward the six month anniversary of when the pandemic really kicked in. Everything started to get shut down. And then we passed the three month anniversary of the George Foy, the the when the protests started, all that stuff. Where where are we? As we head past Labor Day here and into September and into football season and toward the election, where are we? Are we in a better place than we were three months ago?

I think we're not I think America is having trouble reconciling things. I think that the the Blake incident was a reminder that these things aren't. This wasn't a reflection of a bad time. In the history of our country, this wasn't an unlucky period where you had reality, Bryan Taylor Mod Arbitrary and then George Floyd all in that period, right?

It wasn't because we were all sitting at home like there's a systemic problem that exists in this country and there's not going to be any corporate platitudes that are going to get out, get us out of it. They're not going to be any Instagram movements that are going to get us out of it. There's not going to be anything except for a very sobering look at the fabric of our society that's going to get us out of this perpetual cyclical dehumanization of black folks.

And I think that a lot of things that were done over the past six weeks, they were done with good and full hearts by people, but they were done to make themselves feel better in a lot of ways. And look, there's a little bit of that in everything that somebody does. When you go out and you volunteer at a soup kitchen or something like that, you're doing it for the people. But you also want to feel like you're a good person and you're adding to the light in the world.

There's nothing wrong with that.

But I think there are people all over that are still living with the same realities. And this is going to keep coming back until we deal with it.

So I think Jacob Blake, a reason why we saw the response to it is because it took the wind out of a lot of people's sails and reiterated that we're at the beginning of changing this. This is the start and it's going to take a lot of real work moving forward. So I just hope everybody is ready to roll up their sleeves.

Yeah, I think that I think that when you look at it in the context that you laid it out, Bill, and I'll push back on the framing of the question, because for many of us is not just a three month period or a six month period since a pandemic of George Floyd. It is a, you know, decades long, centuries long period of institutional racism and oppression and systemic injustice. And so we don't look at it in those three or six month periods.

The way that I evaluated it is over the totality of this time. You know, what was sobering for me was when I was sitting on TV covering the funeral of John Lewis as he was crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge for the last time. And I was just thinking about how I believe that was a Sunday morning, the Saturday before would have been Emmett Till's birthday and Emmett Till and Joe Biden and Donald Trump are all within two or three years of each other in terms of age.

If Emmett Till was still alive, I mean, he could be running for president right now, right?

It's it's so the nexus of trauma and pain. And when you ask you asked a very good question with a question that you're asking is one that's rooted in simplicity, but it's necessary to answer, which is how far have we come? Right. That's when you ask people that question. They're like, oh, that's a simple last question, but it's a very complicated, nuanced question to answer. And so I think that we I don't as Van said, I don't want to disrespect or, you know, Bloomberg just gave one hundred million dollars to the four historically black college and university medical schools.

That's going to help create that many more black folk in the medical profession. When you talk about the investment in covid research, etc.. So I think that we've made progress, but we still have so far to go. And to answer your question directly. I think that while we are at a standstill when it comes to what justice reform and criminal justice reform should be from our elected officials, whether or not a state, local or or federally, I do believe that some people are beginning to have some sense of empathy, which is what we've been missing for so long, because before you can get the policy change as people, I'm not trying to say we're going to change hearts or minds, but you at least have to be more empathetic.

And that's what I believe we're getting towards now. And I think the death of George Floyd and the gruesome nature thereof and the inhumane nature thereof has rocked this country and has catapulted in the right direction. You know, I think one of the most interesting things about the last three months specifically is the education aspect of it. And I know it's been for me, I feel like I'm a pretty well-read guy. I feel like I know a lot about a lot of different things, and I learned so much just over the last three months, things that maybe I had taken for granted, things that I thought I knew and I didn't know and like I had to rely on last week when we were talking about, you know, when the NBA players just to use them as an example and they're trying to force change, what does that look like?

And I think all of us are now seeing that it's not like this big giant overreaching policy that that everybody could just grab onto. It's actually way more localized than I think I understood in any capacity three months ago. And like when you talk about, all right, how can the NBA teams make a difference? It's not the league collectively. It's actually the teams in their different cities. Right. And making a real impact. Do you feel like that at least has changed from an educational standpoint?

People are starting to get now? It's it's localized impact as much as it is a national impact.

I think the important thing about the education is that people are open hearted to being educated. So there's not a book that you could read that would tell you about my life experience in South Baton Rouge, Louisiana. But when I tell you about my life experience of sort of growing up in South Baton Rouge, Louisiana, if you approach what I'm trying to articulate with you, with privilege and you tell me about the racism or the police brutality that I've never experienced or how it was in my mind, or how well did you just try to do it this way?

Or what about this? Or does this happen in other places? Or what might have been in the guy's mind when you don't give me the benefit of the doubt of the truth of my experience, when you stay in your silo and you try to push me back into mine, that we cannot move forward.

So I think what's happened what's happened recently is that people have been have begun to realize that the truth is being articulated to them. People are fed up, people are angry, people are beaten down, they're discouraged and they're not making it up. It's not in their heads. And it's not just happening to them. It happened to their parents. It's happening to the other people that they know that live in these neighborhoods and it's happening. And if we don't stop it, it'll happen to their children as well.

And I think when you start that conversation of saying, OK, here, tell me what's going on and I'll listen to you, I'll believe you and I'll try to get on the same page as you. It empowers that person to give you the fullness of who they are. And that's incredibly important, because when I'm standing at a place and I'm looking some guy in the eye and I'm saying, yo, this is real fam, this is the way that it goes.

And they're saying now, no, no. Well, then I start to look at that person as an enemy to my truth, and then we can't go anywhere. So the first thing that's kind of broken down is the conversation is being had back and forth. And I think people are at least at least they're feigning that they're down to talk, which is what Bekar was saying. The empathy portion of this is very important. It's not enough. It's not even it doesn't even begin to be enough.

But we got to be humans first and then we can start dealing with some of these systems that aren't working for so many Americans.

That really, by the way, when we capitalize on the people that grew up in communities where I'm from, you're going to see a better country.

You're going to see a more productive country with people that that that are that are contributing to the economy more. Right. That are could contribute to a political process more. You're going to see America flourish in ways it hasn't before. So it's good for everyone. But you have to believe in the merit of those people and it was happening to them. What's going on in their neighborhoods? What do you think, because I know you said the word merit and I get you and I would say about the word merit for humanity, like on the on the very basic level, this is a conversation about giving people the benefit of their humanity.

Right. And. I was I did a I did a podcast the other day with Cedric Maxwell and one of I did know Louisiana, I didn't know how Dopey was 1981 finals MVP for. Yeah, yeah.

By the way, when he introduces himself, he reminds you of that. So when he sent me a demo to get me on the show, he was like, you know, this former NBA player, MVP. I was like, OK, I know I know who you are, by the way. And he was talking about he was talking about his son being a lifeguard in the first black lifeguard that was in Atlantic Beach and how there was a 100 yard fence in the middle of the fucking ocean.

A 100 yard fence to separate the blacks from the whites when this I mean, and we're talking about somebody who is maybe not minivan's contemporary, but you're pretty old, Bill. So it's like your contemporary, right. So so like this is this is that guy a couple of little shot.

Little shot. I like that because I get a little jealous. No, no, no.

You got to what you realize when you on cable TV, you got to hit people suddenly with the smile.

Yeah, right. Make sure they're awake. Make sure they are awake.

That's right. Before you cut somebody, you always say my good, my good friend, such and such and you cut them. But no.

And you just I remind people all the time that this isn't like generations upon generations upon generations away. This is something that's right here, something for us to confront. But I just. I firmly believe in Van may say that I'm having maybe not Van, but there are people who may be listening. But I mean, you go way too much faith in white folk. Which there may be some something there, but my my I believe in what Abraham Lincoln called the better angels of our nature.

Right. So I think that right now, although you see the polls and I'm a big poll watcher, you see the polls dwindling for Black Lives Matter. Right, in terms of the approval thereof. But you saw the polls skyrocket for NBA strikes and NBA protests.

I just firmly believe that there are enough good people that when educated, we can begin to change. But the willingness has to not be on me and van. The willingness has to be on Bill Simmons, if that makes sense.

What is the election cycle have to do with all of this? Because we were under eight weeks now. All right.

Let's let me explain. I mean, imagine, imagine, imagine. There were two. Ideological juxtaposition is like one hundred and eighty eighty degree difference, and I got to dump a billion dollars worth of advertisement down your throat from each one of them. That would make you crazy, right? That's where we are, we're at the brink of this country going utterly insane because of the dollars that are being spent. The number one story we lost over a thousand people yesterday covid the number one story this week on Facebook.

Do you have any idea what it may be? I hesitate to ask it's Nancy Pelosi getting her Dominican blowout in San Francisco, where there are covid regulations that prevent people from getting their hair done. That's the number one story. You know, we talked about this before with Ben Shapiro and others. And but they're just so there is just so much that this election cycle is just pulling us further and further apart in what we all do.

What all three of us are guilty of, and Craig is as well, you can't see Craig, but he has this little weird stubble on his face. What we're all what we're all guilty of is retreating to our silos. And what happens is we only get news from and reinforce news that we want to hear from our friends. We no longer meet people and have conversations about different ideologies, which is why we are so vastly apart today.

Hmm, a couple of things. Number one, I thought you said Cedric Richmond, by the way, said I was like I said, I'm not from not that you not I was going to let you have it because I didn't know. Well, thought you were Thomas. Scalia, Thomas. Right. Right. Yeah, I'm talking about Cedric Maxwell. Maxwell.

OK, first of all, no. OK, so there's a couple of things that No. One.

I I agree with you in terms of getting information from all over places or talking to different people, that has happened on a personal level because so many so much of the information that you get in certain places is completely useless, wrong and propaganda, like there are certain news organizations not to talk about them where all they do is lie. And so that that. So if you're an halfway intelligent person, you can't go to your news to those places because you're not going to get facts that are actual facts that are actually actionable because they're just lies are coming.

Secondly, I'd say this. I don't think that you have. Too much faith in white people, I couldn't say that, but I would want to know why you have the faith that you do have, not specifically white people, but in the those people that Abraham Lincoln discussed, because since Abraham Lincoln made since he spoke about that, it's been it's been a little bit over a hundred years.

Right. But like almost 200 years since he's had that. And I'm watching videos today of black people getting lit out by states that sponsor terrorism. And you ask us a legitimate question. And, you know, my answer is simple because I refuse to lose hope and lose faith. Now I see what my eyes see. Right. And I. I understand what my what my heart and mind understand, however. And this is a very this is this is.

This is an interesting approach to take, but I just feel as if when we came into this country, we were stripped of absolutely everything. All we had was hope and faith. That's all we had when black folk came here. That's that's that's it. Right. And and right now, I just feel is that there is a time where we're at a precipice. And I'm not necessarily giving the benefit of the doubt, but I'm extremely hopeful and I'm extremely faithful.

And I believe that if there are if there are good people with good hearts, then we can finally turn the corner, because I refuse to believe that. I refuse to believe the antithesis of that.

Right. Hmm. If it well, OK, I'll just say this last thing I'll say about that, I don't I don't think that people are bad or good. I think they're blank. And I and I'll explain what I mean by that. America friend capitalism in a specific way, capitalism became a verb, meaning you have had this discussion. I know. No, but here's the thing.

Capitalism and capitalism became a virtue. Capitalism is not good or bad. It's like anything else. What it's used for can be good or bad. People are not good or bad. They are blank. They will go where they are dragged. And if people are dragged in a way by a system that supports the exploitation of people, they'll go there. If people are dragged to a system or pushed in the realm of a system that is more equitable and equal for everyone, they'll go there.

But it's the people who are controlling the systems, hope and faith. Has been around for black people for a long time. We need to develop some other virtues, confirmation that you do it in absence. Right.

So, so, so, so I'm saying all of this. So everything that we're talking about, I agree with you and I have lost faith in humanity.

I think I think I think people want to be in the best situation that they want to be in. But I think it's very easy to convince them that the situation that harms others around them is the best situation to be in.

And for black people here in America, we have to develop thick and thin, thick skin to communicate our real experience in this country, which has been exploitation for as long as we've been here. Now, if America's un if America is uncomfortable with having that decision, that that conversation, I'll really know what to say to them. But that's the real of it.

And that doesn't mean that you have to feel bad about it, but you have about what happened in the past.

But you would certainly have to feel bad about what you allow to happen in the future. That's all I ask. You'll have to if you if you're white and you listen to me, I'm I walk around feeling bad that you're white, you know. But I'm telling you right now that there is a a back and forth a Push-Pull in this country where your privilege and your access to things. Directly, directly influences my inability to access those things, and I'm asking you, are you comfortable with that?

And it's yes or no. And if it's no, we got a big problem like that, that that's all I'm saying. And I don't think I think if the shoe were on the other foot, if it would be if if we live in a society where those things look different, you have to have the same conversations.

And so that's all. Yeah. So by then these next eight weeks. Running for president. Competing against Donald Trump. What is the balance for him, BOKHARI, Between? The the theme that he hit pretty hard during the Democratic convention of I've had two families that got broken and I fixed them. And now this country is a big family that's broken and I want to fix them, so he's got that the language to that the way he did that I thought was smart.

But then you also have this other piece where you're running for an election, you're trying to undermine the other candidate, which is this is the easiest candidate we've ever had to undermine. What is the balance between being positive and being negative if you're him?

The balance that Joe Biden has to walk is one unlike any other candidate has had to walk in recent history. This is this is different. This is just. I mean, this is a unique circumstance, Joe Biden. Joe Biden right now has to do two things, and they're not diametrically opposed, although people attempt to make them be. There is a theory by my good white friends on the left who we got to go out and win every suburban white person we can find, every college educated white person, man every day went missing.

You remember the grizzly bear moms or whatever they would call Sarah Palin to like the soccer mom?

Yeah, yeah. Soccer moms and the hockey moms. And we got to go win all of them, right? In every college educated white man, we got to give them a reason to. So that's a theory. And I mean, I'm a I am not an either or I'm a both and guys. So. Yeah, but I mean, again, there were also a large swath.

There were there were four point four million people who voted. For Barack Obama in 2012, who did not vote, it's not that he didn't vote for Hillary, they just didn't vote at all in 2016, over a third of those were black. So, I mean, if we just do simple math and say if if if Joe Biden goes out and gets a quarter of those people. I don't I'm a lawyer, so all I do is count by third, so let's let's let's do a third, by the way.

So that's about four hundred thousand people, right? 500000 people that you win the race that way. Right. The unique thing and this is more this is more when we get here on the show herion, who does this type stuff in his sleep? This is more in the weeds. If Joe Biden only wins the popular vote by one or two points, there's a likelihood he would lose the Electoral College. A high likelihood. Yeah. Yeah. In fact, he's probably only I think I think I saw it's only a 40, 46 percent chance he'll actually win the Electoral College.

The more he gets to three and four points, five and six points, the greater it is that he'll have a chance to win this. This race literally boils down. Literally boils down to Florida, Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia, not a big fan of Georgia being a swing state. That's about like Texas being a swing state. But I hear you, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, that's where the election is won and lost. And every poll that you see has him the fundamentals of the race.

He is immensely stronger than where Hillary Clinton was and where you have fewer, fewer undecideds. So he's trying to thread that needle of. Giving black folk a reason to come out and vote and. Telling White. Independents and people in the middle of the middle of the country that I'm not a threat, you know, and so it's a really it's a really unique dance. He's he's trying to play but one to this point, he's been highly successful.

And the unique thing about Donald Trump and why in the most nonpartisan statement I can make is that Donald Trump will go out and be on message, like he will hit a message for our he can give an hour and a half speech on message. Now he may sweat and in a little platform boots he where he may trip walking up a ramp.

Right. But it's going to be on point and it's going to have Republicans and everybody else. And this is why we're voting for and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And in the next morning, he'll step on that message. And the man has no I mean, he is Donald Trump is Dion Waiters. I mean, he will go out and give you absolutely whatever you need, but then he just has absolutely no discipline.

He'll be popping gummies on an airplane across the country and then yell, if if I'm Dion Waiters, the next time I see because I put your hands like, yo, yo, if I'm Deol waiters run them all out, Dehghan, stall them out.

The lack of discipline.

Donald Trump, the only person who only person I can take that to.

Is beyond latest to feel that in your back down in Orlando, did you feel that dog? Did you feel that your back?

Well, I don't have me on a Zoome call with LeBron apologizing because I'm just telling you that.

But the lack of discipline there, man, is like it's ridiculous. And so that that is a political scientist analysis of Donald Trump, not a partisan one at all.

He then is is the bigger threat people voting for Trump and supporting Trump or people who are voting for Trump because they hate the left so much? This is the way they get their revenge. I think those things are starting to become one and the same, because I think I think Donald Trump's reason for voting for him now is hatred of what he's deemed the radical left, I think. Whereas when Trump first came in, he ran on some things that those things were grotesque.

But he hasn't really run on anything, or at least from what I've heard, other than, hey, if you don't elect me, the country is going to become a radical left cesspool. You're going to have antifa in every Starbucks. You're going to have people, you know, rolling down the street. You're going to see all of these scary black people come to the suburbs, all of these scary white kids who are out there on the street with the black kids.

You know, in your local elementary school. I haven't heard very much because really, to be honest with you, there's not much else to run on because it is a thousand a day, a day from covid. The economy is in a terrible place, our sort of reputation internationally. He can't run on that. The he's he's fractured the intelligence community. He's taken apart very vital parts of what Americans thought that they were right.

He has his stock market in UFOs. Yeah, but then I'm not on about UFO intelligence to you. Right. Which I know we're not.

But but we do know that just recently let the pilots noted that they saw somebody with kind of jetpack. Yes. So I don't rule it out.

Bill, is that Bill was still out.

There was a jetpack outright.

Right. So so, you know, so I think that's I think he ran on fear the first time, but he also ran on, I guess, giving money back to the middle of America and the border wall and all of those things like that. The border wall is a natural.

And the Clintons thing was a big piece of it, like they were going to do the Clintons again, don't you?

I mean I mean but that's when I talk about the fundamentals of the race, right? We're talking about the electorate. We're talking about the candidates. The fundamentals of the race in 2016 were different. You had the two most unpopular people in the history of the country, by the way. I love Hillary. She Hillary is one of my homies. And for those people listening, we did have Hillary Clinton on the Bakari Sellers podcast site and saw that.

So, you know, we we I just you know, that's different. I mean, Joe Biden, his Uncle Joe, I mean, he's he's well liked. I mean, there he went. He's got some red in his ledger, though. He went he's got some red in his legit.

Oh, there's no question. But he does have since nineteen ninety one being vilified by the right as being something that he or she is not. So I agree with you, I mean I've even pushed him on his past. I mean we're not saying that she's perfect or being good on every issue by any stretch, but you don't have the unpopularity factor that you have today.

And I mean that you that you had in 2016 and now they're just so many people whose minds are made up. That's why this is so. Bill, let me just tell you what's going to what. Let me not tell you what's going to happen, but let me tell you what is the where you are the worst. He knows when you say he going to happen, I believe I believe you know the answer.

Let me just tell you what people fear. What people fear is this is called a red meraj.

And you start to hear about it more and more. But the Red Mirage is that on Election Day, because Democrats don't really turn out on Election Day with the same fervor and velocity that Republicans do. They vote early, they vote by mail, but on Election Day, you have a map that looks as if and I'm not going to say he won, but it looks as if Donald Trump is the leader and Donald Trump declares victory. But when all the ballots are counted, because the most amazing thing about this discussion is that you have certain states like Florida, like North Carolina, Georgia, who are able to count ballots before Election Day, but Wisconsin, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, they can't start counting their early ballots until Election Day.

So it's a very good chance that you will have a president like Donald Trump who has no guardrails, declaring that he won when in all honesty, all the ballots haven't been counted. And that's one of the larger fears that most people on the left have. That makes sense. Is this the last time we have an election with two choices? No, I mean, no, I mean fundamentally built on a two party system. That's the funniest that's the biggest red herring ever.

People always like, let's go out and start our own party.

OK, cool. I mean, that's not it just doesn't it doesn't. It's like the NFL. That's what the Green Party is. The Green Party's. The Zephyr like. It never it never works. That is, go compete against the NFL if you want to. But it just won't. It won't be a thing. But you said earlier, though, these two sides are so far apart now, it would seem like if there was ever a time in history for a third party to be like, hey, where the side that's not with either these two sides come this way.

Yeah, but it's not completely unrealistic. Yeah, but it's like starting a league without Tom Brady, starting a league without LeBron James, starting a league without any athletes at all, like you're not just going to drive up the middle without having that caliber of dollar in talent. It's just so hard to do. I mean, maybe maybe the rock will prove me wrong. Maybe in a year we'll run this back and say car was full of shit. I doubt it, but maybe.

And so I just don't believe that that is not something that will happen. And I think that I am a strong believer in somebody who wants to tear down systems and reimagine them. Within the boundaries, Van, is somebody who thinks outside of the boundaries, which is why we get along so well and we push each other to be better. And I just think that within these boundaries, you have to make the Republican Party in the Democratic Party better than they are and better than they have been.

What do you think? Well, obviously I disagree, but I think and and I think it's interesting that we're taught that competition is great everywhere except in politics. Right. So competition in economics is what saves you. But in politics, we should kind of not have that right.

We should have a situation where we are perpetually reforming to different sides that really we have to come to to come to the realization that there could be a point if this republic, if this empire or whatever this is, is the last for hundreds and hundreds of years that we is, there's a chance that we outgrow the two party system, that the American electorate becomes so diverse not just in ethnicity and culture, but in thinking that the old way just doesn't work anymore.

Do I know if we're there now? No, I don't know. But what I do know is that people are asking questions of their government that they've never really asked before and they're not asking these questions based upon who's popular, who's unpopular. They're asking these questions based upon whether or not these structures or systems work. You know, we talk about the the the income inequality. We talk about political power. We talk about all of these things and Americans, black, white, red and green all over the country, like the people in the Appalachians, don't know that they're the people in Baton Rouge.

They don't get it. All the kids there to have Mountain Dew mouth. Right, that are in in the Appalachians, they don't get that. They're the people in Baton Rouge. They don't understand it. They don't understand it. They don't have an economic say in their government. They don't get that. They don't have that. Even some of the guys that they might support politically don't have their best interests at heart. They don't understand. Amazon is not in their town.

They don't get it.

The question is. As things change in the country, what do Americans want? Can the Democrats deliver on that as presently constituted? Can the Republicans Democrats deliver on that as presently constituted? Right.

And is there enough willingness to reform inside of those two parties? All right, to bring them to a point where Americans feel empowered by them. But why, Bill, why should this bill if I was on TV with them right now, I would be like, OK, but you believe in AOC, right? Sure, EOC is a part of the new burgeoning portion of the left braschi, you got Rucci, you got Ianna, you got you got this whole you got the whole new squad.

You got Corie Bush. You've got all of these individuals, you know, I'm a fan of of of a Kim Jefferys cetera.

So you do have the party that's adapting to that.

So, I mean, maybe this but what happens if the party doesn't move left enough of those people? What happens if, like, what happens if because remember now, once again, even in this election, the Democrats and the electorate had a choice between Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden, they chose once again, what happens if the party and the structures inside of the party don't move left enough for elites, but don't lose will have to be on it.

But we got to be 100. Who chose who chose Joe Biden and not Bernie Sanders. The base of the party chose Joe Biden and not Bernie Sanders. Black. Sure, my mom and black women in particular. But I'm just saying that I hear you. But I'm saying that for every AFSC on the left, there's a Dan Crenshaw on the right and is not I'm not a fan. I agree with Dan, but I'm not a I'm not a fan of him politically by any stretch.

Right. I'm fascinated by that. May be a better word, fascinated by him. And so you have these competing iterations of what each party will be.

And all I'm saying is that in the realm, in going back to your original comment and what Bill's question was in the space of competition. Sure. I just don't think there is an organism out there. Will it happen in the future? Maybe. But there ain't a whole lot out there right now to compete with those two. That's like telling me that there's another league that will compete with the NFL. You can't tell me that there's one that exists.

You can't tell me where they'll get their talent from. You can't tell me what day they'll play on. You can't tell me the purpose for them being there. So, I mean, like there is there has to be that. And I just don't think that exists right now. Will it ever happen maybe. Once again, all I'm saying is that the evolution of the American political mind, like the kids and I'm talking to the kids and I'm talking to on both sides of this, they're disillusioned.

Even the younger people a little younger than me, they're disillusioned. And movements in this country are what shape this country. And I think the ideas of Americans have to shape America, get the their political structures. But we'll see. You never know. Bucchi, what's your biggest fear for the next eight weeks? I'm not going to tell you my biggest fear, but I'll tell you my second my second biggest fear is. You know, you mean in terms of let me just say for you that heading toward the election, my second biggest fear is one, that it ties into that.

But I just fear the the flu will meet. Coronavirus in a way that we're not prepared for. Did you did you see the latest report by the Big Ten doctor who stated that 30 to 35 percent of their the players who contracted covid-19 have hydrogen with the hard element is, Mike, my mind ever might have carnitas or something like.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And so while people even those individuals who are quote unquote healthy, who don't have symptoms, this virus is still so very deadly that it affects different parts of your bodies and attacks different different organs in ways they don't know. So my biggest fear in the election is that we have a flu, which, by the way, I just got my flu shot. So particularly everybody go out there and get your flu shot and black man in particular, get your colonoscopy, because if cancer kills Black Panther to kill your ass, too.

And so I just want people to understand that if this flu meets this pandemic, then people are going to be really hesitant to mask up and go vote. And it can cause a very real impediment to I mean, I'm not talking about Georgia just illegally throwing 200000 people off the voting rolls, which they just did. I'm not even talking about the limiting the absentee ballots. I'm just talking about people who usually go out and vote saying that I'm not going to die and risk my health to go out and do it, which is real.

And that's that's probably one of my larger fears.

The other fear that I have is a very real fear that I don't really I know that Donald Trump is a little bit less is a little bit looser with protocol. I know Joe Biden is very loose with protocol, and I don't want either one of them to get sick between now and then, over the next eight weeks. They are both of an age where I don't know what the fallout would be from either one of those things. And so I just want both of them to stay as healthy as possible.

What about you then?

I am I'm scared of it all. I'll be honest with you. It's hard for me to step back and not see the sharp decline in America happening before our eyes. And it it's chilling. So the reason the reason I would say for people to go out and vote and be a part of the change that needs to happen in November is because, you know, a lot of times you talk to brothers and sisters in the community and they go, no matter who's in that White House who's ever been in the state capital, I don't see any difference in my life right now.

I would say to these people that this my people back in Baton Rouge, where do you want there to be a community? Do you want the opportunity to change things that are going on? Do you want there to be an America? I assure people that doesn't have to be one study of world history's empires break apart all the time. You're fighting for the soul of your country right now. It feel like you are, but you are. Look around you.

It's all fallen apart in a very real way. covid covid really pulled the masks down. It pulled the veil down, exposed a lot of things that weren't working. So I'm telling people to get involved.

My fear is that the message isn't being given to them that desperately.

Like, it seems like I am like, you know, Stuart Little, I'm not, you know what I mean? Not Stuart Little. Who's the Chicken Little. It seems like I'm Chicken Little. The sky is falling. I'm not. I'm looking at how things are going. I'm looking at things that look like civil war in Portland. You know, I'm looking at people antagonizing each other, basically standing off. This is not Jack Kemp versus this is not Jack Kemp and Bob Dole versus the Clintons and Newt Gingrich for the Contract of America.

This is your side on this side of the line. My side on this side of the line say, yo, do some, do so do something so people can get life like. Look at that. And understand whether or not the guy in the White House right now is for it or against it, whether or not he is being a beacon of a guiding light, at least to get America back to some sort of civility where we can discuss these problems and have a chance at it.

If you think that that's the guy, I'll vote for him. But I'd ask you, what the fuck is wrong with you if you think that that's the guy? Like, I am afraid that we're in the in times of the country. And I think right now, the only way to make sure that we're not and this is not me being a shill for the left, this is not I'm an independent is to change who's at the top. Because fear is the weapon there.

And look, I'm sure you have people on the other side that feel differently about it, but I don't see the other side saying, hey, you got a gun, go out and shoot people up. You're cool. I don't the president hasn't hasn't denounced won't speak on Rittenhouse. The kid who murdered three people over it is weird. So so the thing is, like, even if you think in your heart of heart, of hearts that that kid is some sort of perverted patriot that went out and did something, even if you you know that we cannot exist in a point where people are taking up guns, taking them across state lines and shooting at other Americans, we can't have that.

You can't want that. But it feels like they do. That's what I'm worried about.

So I think that when you when you think about voting, when you think about getting active, when you think about being a part of all this stuff, think about whether or not you want your country at all flaws and all imperfect at all. Do you want America because you might need to vote like America depended on. I mean, this got heavy. Yeah, you know how much time is left? Five minutes. Got five, six, seven minutes.

Yeah. All right, let's let's cheer up, we can end on a on a more cheerful note. Then do your pitch for the wire. Oh, my God, you guys are going to love this. I have an idea. Bill, I have the best idea. So I watched the Breaking Bad movie, right? I watched the Breaking Bad movie and the Breaking Bad movie, I can't remember was called El Camino or something like that.

Surprisingly good man, Jemele Hill right now or shall I say Jemele Hill and I, she's a much bigger star that she drives a Maserati. We are doing the best Rottweiler Rewash podcast in history.

It's called Way Down in the Hole, Mondays and Wednesdays here on the Random. We're doing the wire rewash, we have just come to the end of season three, we are only going to see Avon Barksdale one more time in The Wire. This character that we've all come to love, this guy who has so many things going on, Avon Barksdale gone. What happened to Avon? Ask myself. Breaking Bad movie. Give us the answer to what happened to Jessie.

This is my idea. The movie is called Avon's Home A Requiem for a Kingpin. All right, think about it. Avon goes away. Let's say he goes away to do the probation that he get. He got on the case with the guns, which Trinko gave them up and all of that stuff.

Then while he's inside, he does he tries to pull another Hot Shots deal to get them out. But this time he gets closer to give them more time. What I want to know is what is Baltimore like when Avon Barksdale, the former king, has to come home? All right.

We get to catch up with all of our old wives favorites. What is Bub's doing? What is McNulty doing? Where are all these people? But specifically, we get to we get to look at at themes like recidivism, like how how hard it is for your guy to get acclimated to society. Avons honey, he's horny. He looks around the corner, he takes these stringer. Right, Stringer's death. He's Hornet like Michael Corleone was haunting in Godfather three by the fact that he had Fredo killed.

It's the same thing. He's trying to repair his relationship with his sister, who's now the only person he has he has to live with. While she believes that he has something to do with killing her son, this is a big deal where his book is bunk. OK, where's Lance? Did he even survive this heart disease? You know, so the whole deal is the whole thing to me is this is what happens to a man when he comes home.

Is he doing black interviews about how he was a kingpin back in the day? All of that stuff. I'm telling you, this could be an HBO event that could come.

What is it? But but how does it in. Where you left out is is the biggest boxing promoter in the United States, cutey is made good. Now, what he's doing right now is the only way for boxing. Yes. What we saw when Avon what could he have to go to Avon? Now, guess what? Avon has to go borrow money from Cutty, right. Who remembers the same thing? Also, what happens when happens at like what does Avon go back to the top of the dope game?

Is he back to being a he doesn't want to right away, but then doesn't happen. He has run for mayor.

He gets for all. But we're also talking about Baltimore. We're talking about a post Freddie Gray, Baltimore. People are trying to get Avon, not only Freddie Gray, but a post post.

Martin O'Malley, too, because the whole deal is just fantastic. And by the way, here's the one thing about the HBO guys that might not want to make this movie. They've got to make it. You have to make this movie.

Think about where The Wire fanbase was at the end of the series to where it is now, 12 years later, 12 years later, you take this, you make this movie, you dominate. Why I down would man put this on the bringeth thing. Would I know you want to do it. Well, that's my man shot out where I would want to do it. I know that Andre Royalle, my man, all of these guys I know they do come back and do the last movie.

You left out a key part of the pitch, which is does he want to get back in the game? But it's one last job. Come on. What are we doing now, we we're we're doing this one thing he's going to do, but, you know, it's going to be the gateway to him actually getting back in the game. It's just one thing. So he's got a call on it. So we call it a favor with him.

He's got to do it.

I would watch this because I still think that I still think the two greatest shows of all time are The Wire and The Sopranos. But I think that The Sopranos ending makes it number two behind The Wire.

Oh, are you downgrading it? I like that. Yes, we down.

I really thought it when Van told me this idea and I got super excited, I was like, I do my podcast, but we hadn't tested it on another live human being. I got to be honest, I wanted more from Boukhari. I thought I thought it'd be more exciting.

I just I'm like, I'm not Avon's back. Yeah, cool. I'm interested.

I couldn't care less that we're not going to do it. Like, feel just. Yeah, I'm just trying to see I'm trying to see where it goes like what's the job. Like he gives back and like we talk about recidivism. By the way, I'm Jake. Does he not somebody off. I mean to say it doesn't happen with the El Camino joint, just he ended up getting away. We all tell the ending he doesn't have to go anywhere.

But this is about Avon being back on the street, getting used to not being on the top and trying to put the pieces of his life together to go out and live life as a regular thing.

I think that him putting his life back together is decently boring, him putting his empire back together.

Yeah, that is not what I want to see Avon go back to jail. This is what I'm talking about right here. No, I don't want to see.

I was the guy that was trying to make a good movie. You know what I did a lifetime. Put it on Lifetime and you have a good time with it, OK?

It'll be it'll be just fine. If you wanted to go on HBO or Amazon Prime or something, let the man rebuild his empire.

Let him come up, but let him is it isn't the whole point of the Avon character, which we discussed on your iPod last week, he says, like to stringer your blood runs green, my blood runs red. It's about the action. It's about the power. It's about control on the corners. I don't see that going away for him. He's not going to come out of jail and be like, oh, I'm a different person.

If Israel wants no more jealous fifteen years, I don't care. He is who he is.

He and I go. So I mean, so what is he supposed to be when he comes out though, like he's gotta go and teach.

Yo, is he good at school. Person is is, is Freeway Rick Ross still dealing drugs is is a fight.

We're not gonna sit here and start snitching on people on this show. And I'm saying these guys aren't. I'm saying they're doing different stuff. They changed. Yeah, I hear you.

But this is a movie, right? Have you seen the freeway? Have you seen the freeway? Rick Ross movie it now. OK, exactly. So we're making a movie, right. So. Right.

They kind of got no right. It's not kind. So yeah, it's yes it is. Here's my passion.

We got to have a Takashi's six nine character in this because what he needs to see is when he gets out to has blown up on the streets is contrary to who he was that really never heard it. I'm sure you have it right now is its antithesis to who Avon wants to be. And let me help you flesh this out. Me and you will get some Jamison to sit around and we'll make this out. Are they a sponsor of any of our shows yet?

So if not, we need them. We need to reach out to them. But we're going to sit around the three of us and we are going to make this a hit. This would be after me and Bill do our OJ special Hypercar Epigraphy, Rice's movie.

You know what Avon's going to come out and do? Be a political organizer for Joe Biden. No, no, no, no. He's going to see what he's going to do. He's going to he's going to own he's going to own the mayor of Baltimore.

Because what Avon is going to realize is when he was back there, that the true power was political power. So he's going to come out. He's going to be making donations. He's going to be making all these donations to these city officials, etc. She's trying to game different. He's going to make sure that what's required to get that stringer gets it's going to be. I have two predictions.

One is that a car is going to be texting you at like two in the morning, his time tonight being like, hey, man, I can't stop thinking about the way I have said this to Avon's home is just a killer title at home that I can see the poster, The Wire, Avants on the window.

I mean, it sounds I know it sounds like sounds like that goes on Disney. Plus, we'll come up with a different name to Disney.

Plus talking about you just hating on me now. Hey, hey. The Wire. Avon's home. That's dope. Everybody call it.

Let's just call it. Let's just call it The Wire. A movie. My no my theory with all this stuff is if I saw that ad for. Would I give it a chance and if there is an ad and it was like the wire Avants on my back when as with the well also the first 10 minutes during this during this time, like all of these movies are 699 and they're streaming on demand.

Right. You know, you you still have the movies like what are they in theaters now that come right here since nobody's going to the theaters, etc.. So. Right. I just it has a chance. I just think we got to flesh it out a little bit, though. I think the real max. Yeah. Cards, he's come round three of us from the three of us. Boukhari, you're doing debate podcast, we should mention.

We are doing debate podcast. I have my good friend coming on the show. I know that he has an interview and his wife with Tamron Hall is going to be dope. Coming up, Andrew Gillham is going to be my co-host on our debate podcast we're doing for debate podcast. So immediately after it's like the NBA finals, as soon as the debates are over three presidential starting September 29th and one vice presidential man, Andrew, I'm going to be chopping it up and telling you what happened, what to look for, how they messed up, how they could get better from two people who really debated.

It's going to be fun.

And then you still have higher learning. And on the wire, way down in the hole higher than this incredible podcast.

By the way, why are we down the hole? You're heading into the best seat. My favorite season in TV history, Season Four Seasons for Big Gas. Big, big guests on higher learning today. To Stacey Abrams on higher learning today. Who is it? Stacey Abrams. Oh, on higher learning today. So we'll like they'll be out on Friday. Big guests, big guest on Harlan.

All right, great. It was good to see you guys. Thanks for having me. Thank you. I mean, eventually this is going to be the second best, best podcast.

So thank you for, you know, understanding roles.

Well, and we got to the O.J. thing way down the line to do that. The country stays in shape. Thanks, guys. Thank you.

Have a good piece. All right, going to talk about Tom in one second. First, let's talk about Tic-Tac. Music makes everything better, which is why it's at the core of Tic Tacs culture. Each time you open the app, you learn something new, whether it's a new hot song, new recipes, even words of encouragement. My daughter, Zoe, may be shoving her phone in my face saying Dad was in this song from 1984, I thought you played this for me once and then us having a 10 minute conversation about it, you're bound to find useful bits of information everywhere you look on Tic-Tac.

And if you happen to hear a catchy new song or two while you're there, well, that's pretty great to discover. More on Tic-Tac. One last thing before we go, Tom Seaver passed away on Wednesday. Seventy five years old, one of the best pitchers I ever saw, I have some Mets fans in my life. He was the guy for Mets fans. He was the ultimate hero, including for my buddy Gus, who I had known since I was in 10th grade, and his dad, who was my English teacher in eighth grade, my basketball at the ninth grade at Greenwich Country Day.

And and he was just the guy and. He intersected in my life in a crazy way. Which ended up being something I wrote about for page two the first year I was there in 2001 in a column called Do I Have Anything Left? And I was going to tweet this out, but I thought it'd be more fun if if I just read it, because, you know, this podcast has a big audience and it's just kind of a crazy story.

And I think you guys will enjoy it. So I'm going to read this right now. Here's that piece.

You probably don't remember Tom Seevers aborted comeback in 1987, but I remember probably because he hummed the fastball at my head. I will explain. Seiver was one year removed from playing in Boston, where he would have pitched in the World Series of his right knee, had and given out there in the 1986 pennant stretch. And you can drive yourself crazy thinking about these things. But please remember, a healthy Seiver would have started Game four of the World Series against the Mets.

And I will go to my grave believing that the crafty veteran would have submitted one of those flashbacks starts to make baseball so special. Maybe something of the seven innings forehead's to earned runs and six KS variety against his old Mets team in a chaotic Fenway crowd would have been rocking with every pitch and maybe, just maybe, the Red Sox would have captured the 1986 World Series with a healthy Tom Seaver pitching game four instead of our freaking nipper.

Nobody can convince me otherwise. Seiver probably felt the same way, and it probably not at him and even at 42 years old, with nothing else to prove. Three hundred and eleven career wins back on wins actually meant something. Thirty six hundred and forty strikeouts, three Cy Young Awards, one World Series ring, even the title of best pitcher of his generation. Seaver couldn't walk away from baseball. Not yet. Determined to end his career in New York, he spent all winter waiting for a phone call from the Yankees that never came and naturally everyone assumed the old man was finished.

But here's where fate intervened. At the beginning of spring training in 1987, the Mets suffered a crushing blow when Dwight Gooden submitted a dirty urine sample went to rehab. Suddenly, the light bulb over Sèvres head started flickering. And then David Cohn and Bobby Waheeda, they suffered a season, ending injuries. A man, the ball was officially beaming. Did Tom terrific have another season left in him, was the risk or the potential humiliation worth the reward?

A memorable final chapter to a Hall of Fame career in a nutshell. Did you have anything left? At the same time, Seiver is mulling over a secret comeback, he was involved in a business deal with the father of my buddy, Gus Ramsey, a long time friend of mine from Greenwich. And since Sivarasa lived in Greenwich and since the business deal brought him to Gus's house a few times, Seiver befriended Gus, a diehard Mets fan who was only 19 at the time.

And eventually, Seiver pop the following question. This actually happened. I brought my glove with me. Do you feel like throwing? And after prying his own tongue out of his throat, Gus answered, Yes. And he headed outside into his own front yard with one of the seven or eight greatest pitchers of all time for a friendly game of catch. And within 10 minutes, Seiver was working up a sweat. He was starting to put some mustard on the ball and five more minutes past, Gus could feel something in the air.

And given that Ceverha standing about 60 feet away, give or take a couple of feet, just simply squatted down like a catcher. Because it just felt right and keep it in mind, he was ripping off pitches and punctuated them with different questions, you can catch a curve ball, right, Pop? OK, if I throw a slider splat like your hands starting to hurt, you hit kapow. And as soon as he realized that Gus could catch everything and more importantly, that Gus was willing to remain in that squat for the next three to four years straight.

Sarah, stop talking, and he concentrated on his mechanics and they stayed there like that for ten more minutes. I could hear was the sound of the ball popping back and forth between two gloves and Seiver grunting with every pitch. And when it was over, Seiver dropped the bombshell. He confessed that he was considering a comeback with the Mets. He didn't want anyone to know now, yet he asked if Gus would have a problem catching him over the next week or so.

Clandestine testing of the waters, if you will. It needs to save gas quickly agreed before passing out with joy, here's how random this whole thing was. Pick your favorite athlete of all time, then imagine the entire sequence of aforementioned events somehow unfolding with you and that athlete. Seems unbelievable, right, couldn't happen, right? I'm telling you, this happened, so over the next few days, Gus's new 42 year old Hall of Fame playmate kept dropping by his house to play catch.

And I immediately started stocking. The house dropped by more frequently than the mailman, just hoping for one silver Saturday. No dice. Gus was on a break from college, but I was still attending high school. And Sèvres visits usually happened during the early afternoon when I was stuck in class. It just was not fair. And then one afternoon, right after I had gone home from school, Gus gave me the call. He's coming over right now.

I shattered the land speed record, getting there in time for Seevers arrival. He seemed friendly enough when we were introduced, despite the fact that I was staring at him with one of those holy crap and stop Sieber expressions on my face.

We made some small talk and then it happened.

Hey, Sieber asked me, why don't you grab a bag, come outside with us, you can pretend you're batter, I want to gauge what it's like to pitch with somebody standing there. Well, that's what he probably said. I can really remember is the hay part in the next 30 seconds, we're like a minor blackout. So we headed outside and I watch from the sidelines as Gus and Tom warmed up, they started out playing along to us, just firing the baseball back and forth like two outfielders between innings.

And eventually Gus Bonanos Crouch's Seiver kept throwing soft fastballs and loosening up. And then finally, Seiver barked out. All right, I'm ready. And it wasn't like he went from throwing 60 to 80 in two pitches, it was more of a slow, steady progression, almost like he was adding one mile an hour to every pitch and now his body started to get involved. The earlier throws had been all motion Iraq back, Iraq forward, a twist of the hips, a flick of the wrist.

But as motion slowly became more exaggerated and within minutes, he was bringing the ball over his head, rearing back, whipping forward, firing the ball with his left leg, swinging around for the finish in his right knee, inching closer and closer to the ground with every pitch, the Seiver trademark. Nobody had a better mechanics in him. Quick interjection. Witnessing this evolution in person was simply incredible. It was like seeing the birth of a child or something.

I'm not kidding. For whatever reason, we take athletes for granted.

We lose ourselves in the minutia of sports. We rarely take time to marvel at the day to day stuff. The little things like the way Robbie Alomar effortlessly starts a double play or the way Randy Moss finds that extra gear and breezes by an unsuspecting quarterback.

And it's not our fault. You watch enough games, you become immune to these things. But to see this 42 year old man around himself into pitching for him over a 15 minute span in my buddy's front yard, I'm telling you, it was amazing to watch one of those watershed moments in your formative years that you don't forget. Anyway, one, Sarah was ready for me. I ambled over and stood in my imaginary batter's box in front of Gus, who looked poised to lose control of his bowels at any moment.

The previous summer, Gus and I played a one hundred and sixty two games, simulated Major League Baseball season between the all time Mets and the all time Red Sox on my Apple Computer.

In a related story, both of us were single at the time and the stat version of the nineteen seventy three, Tom Seaver won our imaginary Cy Young Award and now nine months later he's pitching to us. Doesn't get any weirder than that. So I dug into the imaginary batter's box, unveiled my finest impersonation of Cali's dreamscapes stance, rigid posture that circling above my head. And I stood there as Seiver Chuck pitches past me. That's what every pitch sounded like.

It's like a yes in every pitch was accompanied by the barely audible groan from Seiver and the boss backing the Gustas. So it really sounded like this Splatt Sieber fastball, a split sweat Seiver slider, herse splat. And if we're only throwing fastballs, I probably could have got my bad. I want to, but believe me, I was dying to take one Reggie Jackson level cut. But the sliders and curveballs, they were different animal. The slider looked and sounded exactly like a fastball, only it suddenly and inexplicably darted down into the right.

I mean, how does anyone hit a slider? Yikes, see through two types of curve balls, the standard curve ball, which resembled a slow, fast ball heading straight for my head before it miraculously swerved across the imaginary plate and then the lollipop curve ball like the one through to Tony Perez in the seventy five World Series that Perez cruelly deposited on the MassPike side Red Sox fans.

I possess no illusions about hitting the standard curve ball, but the lollipop curve ball looked inviting as all hell. I felt like I could hit that one. I really did. During one stretch, he ripped off five or six and around by the last one, I felt like I had the lollipop curve timed and everything. I think I could hit that one. I yelled out to Sieber. Oh, really? He said, smiling. Why don't you dig in there and wait for it again?

So I did. Huh? Wait a second. That's coming up. That's good God, run for your lives black. He actually in that fastball about a foot over my head, but I got the message I would not be digging in for the lollipop curve ever again. Gus giggles I pulled my heart out of my stomach. Seiver smiled a thin smile, but a smile nonetheless. And he waited for Gus to toss the ball back to him. And after 20 more minutes, Seiver called it quits and everyone went on their merry way.

And as it turned out, Gus and Tom only played catch one more time before the Mets finally contacted Seiver, setting off a round of comeback talks that kicked off for real in June is a big deal in the Big Apple. At the time, Tom Terrific was coming home and of course, since Gus and I shared a secret all along. We held an enormous stake in the whole thing. Maybe that's why I heard so much when come back sputtered during his rehab stints for New York's triple-A club and Tidewater during his final simulated start, the Mets hitters gave him a bigger beating than Apollo Creed received in Rocky for.

A no name catcher named Barry Lyons even went six for six against him, six for six. Seiver abruptly called it quits, the following day was over, Guste donated his catcher's mitt to the clandestine comeback Hall of Fame. I had a lively Seaver, threw a fastball at my head, started telling my friends. And Tom Seaver had his answer. So why am I telling you this? I was thinking about Seiver last Sunday, David Cone graded his way through another six inning effort at Fenway Park.

The 11th straight time cone pitched past the fifth inning and yielded three runs or less. Red Sox fans didn't expect much from the 38 year old right after his disastrous 2000 campaign for the Yankees. Yarkoni has evolved into a clubhouse leader, a bona fide good luck charm. The Red Sox have won each of his last 11 starts, as well as a potential number two starter in the playoffs. And there are some eerie parallels between Cohen's revival and Sèvres aborted comeback 14 years before.

Both accomplished just about everything possible as a starting pitcher. Both peaked in the biggest city possible. Both enjoyed cups of coffee with the Red Sox in their latter years. Both waited for one last phone call for the Yankees that never came, and both felt the nagging need to return one final time. Not because of the money, not because of the situation, but because they needed to find the answer to one question. Do I have anything left? And invariably, you either find out the hard way by Bear Lion's Rock and you four six hits in a high school punk telling you, I think I can hit that, or you keep chugging along and you keep staving off father time and maybe even get in a groove, almost like a musician or writer.

And you tune out everything and you reach that elusive zone where everything falls into place. You're painting corners and you're keeping hitters off balance. You're playing on like the cello and you reach back for that extra for your fastball. You're somehow finding it. And even though you're on a ninety five pitch count, it feels like you could throw 300. That's what it feels like to be David Cohen right now, Alexeeva, 14 years ago, Cohen has something left in the gas tank.

He has something left, he has his answer, and in a memorable Red Sox season, four more twists and turns in a Jaggers novel. That's been the most pleasant surprise of all. Tony's back, so that was the piece I wrote about about time in 2001. It's been a story I've been telling people for the last however many years, almost 35 at this point. And and just it's one of those one of those things you never forget. Also, an incredible picture and a great ambassador for the Mets and.

Recipe's timesaver. All right, thanks to Spotify, thanks to Andre Iguodala, thanks to Van Lathan and Bakari Sellers. Don't forget to check their podcasts out. The new watchable Wednesday night we put up dangerous minds with Van and Chase around. If you missed that one, we have another new one coming up next Monday. Stay tuned for that. This podcast will be back on Sunday night, even though it's a three day weekend, because I'm sure there's going to be plenty of basketball and other stuff to talk about.

Enjoying the three day weekend.