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Welcome to the Big Sui, presented by DraftKings.

Why are you listening to this show? The podcast that seems very similar to the other Dan Lebitard podcast. I'm sorry. I'm not going to apologize for that. In fact, the only difference seems to be this imaging. I have been tempted in restaurants just walking past tables to grab somebody's fries if they're just there. That hasn't happened to you guys? I've done it. And now, here's the Marching Man to nowhere, Fatface and the Habitual Liar.

Today's episode is sponsored by DraftKings. Stay tuned because you'll hear more about DraftKings and all it has to offer throughout the show. Draftkings, the Crown is yours.

All right, Lucy, your sister called you a very interesting word or name.

Yes. So this week was National Sisters Day, Am I? Yeah, I didn't post anything for her. She didn't really post anything for me either, but whatever. And she texted me and she said, Hey, it was National Sisters Day this week, and you didn't post anything for me. You're a cornbread whore. I was, Whoa. Okay. Hey, hold up. I had never been called that before. I don't think I've heard anyone been called that before. So I texted Kay. I said, Hey, girl, what does cornbread whore mean? And she said, You. I know. I was like, damn, I can't come back from that one. And I I was thinking, I was like, Man, these days, people send mean shit to us online all the time, but it's very basic. You're a, you're ugly, or whatever, blah, blah, blah. I enjoyed being called a cornbread whore a little bit. That doesn't give you guys permission to call me that, listeners. But I miss the days of creative insults. One time someone tweeted at me and they were like, You're a whole wheat bitch.

I don't know what the food term thing is.

I think it's better than white bread.

Yeah. Holy bitch. I was like, You know what? And that was years ago, and I still think about it all the I'm like, You know what? I'm not even mad you called me that. I'm honestly honored. I was wondering if you guys have any names you've been called that's just like, That's creative as hell and you can't be mad about it.

That I can say on here?

Well, it is Max, but it's also a family show. So give us a PG 13 version.

I've been called Sasquatch Headass.

I love the term headass.

This is like the looks like contest that we do on the Levitard show, right? They're creative insults. They're very mean because they're making fun of what you look like, but they're sometimes very creative and funny.

That's what makes them good. That's why, like Lucy said, when we get insults online, it's not like it hurts my feelings. It's just like, Oh. Be more creative. Do it in a way that I haven't heard it before. Give me something new here. I once got called by... Well, not once. I got called by Shaq this a lot of times. He would just start singing A-Rab Bunny every time I'd walk into a room. Every single time.

That's problematic.

No, it's not problematic, man. It's Shaq. Come on. It's Shaq. Yeah, exactly. Sure. Every time.

It looks like a duck.

Jeremy, you're a theater kid, man. I feel like you have to have caught it.

Yeah, I'm not going to say a lot of the words that have been thrown my way. Other than those that I won't say, my personal favorite is just when I've been called Jew.

That's a really good one. Hold on. Was it a Hispanic speaker that was talking about Jew? Hey, Jew over there. Jew. Hey, Jew. You got to be very good.

No. Unfortunately, this was a confrontation on a basketball court.

In your face?

Oh, wow. Yeah, someone just...

We're just flustered and we're scanning for an insult and landed all the hell out.

They called me an effing Jew, and I was like, Whoa, you don't even know I'm Jewish.

That's crazy.

Two things. One- By the way, it wouldn't have been offended if they knew I was Jewish. Number one, crazy that that was a wild guess, and it landed. Yeah, right? Two, now I know where Dan doesn't go to you. What? I was like, What? Jeremy should be more involved. Jeremy, you got something here.

No, Jew. Jesus. That's it. That's why Chuck doesn't say it.

That was so weird when he spelled it out. J-e-w. I'm like, I didn't think this was bad until you started spelling it out.

Also, it's not like they're dogs or something. If you spell it, they won't know what you're talking about.

If you put Jewish before anything, it's going to sound like it's an anti-Semitic trope. If you say Jewish basketball.

You're like, wait, Jewish deli with a word.

I think it's putting the in front of...

I'm going to tell you this, Jewish, fine. Jew feels a little uncomfortable.

See, that's what I'm saying. That's what Charles Barker was saying.

A Jew deli does feel different. Yeah, it does. We are. If you call it the Jew deli, it's that point.

We are toeing a line. I'm giving you permission. Don't worry about it. On behalf of the Jewish Delegation, or the Jew Delegation.

The Jew Delegation. The Jew Delegation.

Let's find me a way out of this. Oh, Jessica, surely you have something creative you've been called.

I don't have anything good. People are not creative when they insult me.

Does that make you feel a little let down?

Yes, it does.

It's like, I don't have the smart people hating me.

I called a nine before.

If you would like to creatively insult Jess, would you like to give out your handle? Go ahead and send her.

My Venmo is Jessica-Smitana. That's where David Samson sent me $1 when I won the bet.

I did that once where I was like, Oh, yeah, if you want to send me something mean, send it to my Venmo And all these people started requesting money from me and ended up backfiring so bad.

Why would you say that? You're going to get so many foot-foot headlines on your Venmo.

You guys are doing it wrong. You don't put out your Venmo. You put out your cameo, @DarthaMean. Request me anytime. I will respond within five days. Don't worry. Birthdays, celebrations, bar mitzvahs, bat mitzvahs, funerals, whatever it is. Choose.

Is cameo still going strong? I never ended up joining because I saw him. I sensed a plateau.

A plateau? Amanda Binds just joined. Oh, she did.

A plateau? You know what I'm going to do right now? I'm going to do a cameo live on air. See, it's this easy, ladies and gentlemen.

He's doing both parts, Dan and Studio Gotts today. Ladies and gentlemen, Amina Hassen.

It's Max's birthday, everyone. And this comes from ravine.

Happy birthday, Max.

What's something special about Max you want Amina Hassen to know? Max is a big supporter of you and the show. As a diehard Wizards fan, he wants to know whether there's any hope for the franchise. He's also a big nick cage fan. Oh, okay. Are there any poorly rated gonzo cage performances that are must watch cinema? Thanks. This is what I'm going to do. Mike, I want you to answer the nick cage part. Tony, I want you to answer the Wizards part. And let's see, Jessica, I want you to do the show like, Oh, the show loves you stuff. All right?

We're here, you didn't go to me this time. Yeah. I wonder why.

What's his last name? You're on the bench. All right. Are we ready? Is everyone ready to do this?

I guess. I forget the nick cage question, so I'll just do an impression. Okay.

All right, here we go. Hey, Max. Happy birthday. It's... Hold on. It's tricky.

It's a hit. Cameo at Sunday, Tony. Yeah, record.

All right, let me Take two. Okay, here we go. Three. We ready? Okay, here we go. Three, two, one. Hey, Max. Happy birthday. As a huge treat, I'm going to answer all these questions for you, but I'm going to have the people of the Lebitard show do it for you. This is awesome. All right, so we're going to start with Mike Ryan, who's going to give you a great nick cage impersonation. Mike, take it away.

Hot.

That's it. That's all he's got for you. Okay, now we got Tony, who's going to answer your Wizards question. Tony.

Buddy, Elvin Hayes is not walking through that door. Neither is Wes uncelled. Wizards are done.

And finally, Jessica, thank him for liking the show.

Thank you for being such a big fan. I don't think you can hear this because the sound is coming through Amine's headphones, but we really appreciate you.

Incredible. So, Max, you got literally zero answers to any of this, but you got me holding my phone shakily. But I appreciate you because- Someone just Venmoed me a dollar.

Really?

It's live.

Okay. Happy birthday, Max. See, ladies and gentlemen, that easy. Cameo.

Outsourcing your work to us. The stew got to strong. And he didn't even hear it.

He didn't even hear it. I'll send another one later.

Don't worry. Can I get something off my chest that I wanted to talk about since yesterday?

College football playoff?

Not It's not College Football Playoff, College Football 25. We talk plenty of the College Football Playoff, but I, like a lot of people my age that have maybe pseudo-retired from the gaming lifestyle.

Explain what College Football 25 is for the people that don't know.

It's a college football game, produced by EA Sports. It has been gone for over a decade. And since it disappeared, people have been lamenting its absence, missing it, playing the oldest version of it.

Thanks, Eto Banan.

Yeah, Eto Banan, who got some players paid. They got about a grand for the course of a decade. I saw the spin like, whoa, the payouts were a grand. But that was also over the span of a decade. If you break it down, it's like $100 a year that they got for being in the game. I was actually fearing that people would come out and say, This is an insult, this NIL deal. But so far, I think the number has landed all right. $600 in full scope. It's the largest NIL deal ever, and they'll have additional NIL deals for people that want to promote the game on their social channels. But I think this is going to be fascinating to watch because the people that are really into this have not really played video games since the last incarnation. And as someone that has maybe dipped his toe in the waters a little bit, guys, the game has changed. First off, do not line up outside of a Best Buy at midnight thinking that this game will be there. Best Buy is no longer carry physical inventory. What? I do think that this game will set a modern era record for physical copies.

Can I wait at borders?

Because no one knows that you can just download the games. Also, look, here's what NCAA football fans want in a game, the simulation experience. We want to be able to sim for hours, make it... If I play a football game in a day, it's probably too much. I just want to spend 30 minutes phone calls with parents and build my prestige the old-fashioned way. But what you're going to run into is there's this whole player pack phenomenon that EA latched on to about eight years ago, and it's terrible. Don't give a shit about Ultimate Team. My day is not made by being forced to open a Foster Muro card. I don't like that stuff. I just want to sim. So do me a favor, EA. Make the game for the people that are actually going to go out and buy this because it's meant a lot to a lot of people of a certain age. I've had this release calendared for over two years. You move the release on me. I have a babysitter for the full first week of release. It It will affect my marriage. So please don't disappoint us by making some newfangled player pack ultimate team.

We just want the old game with updated names. That's all we want.

I don't think I've ever played in CAA football.

What? You're missing out. You're missing out.

Two Americas. This is going to be the least productive summer in the history of the Dan Levatard show. For sure. When this game comes out, we are all going to be taking unlimited BT.

Tony show, 24 hours stream.

Get ready to hear about Sam Houston State's amazing march to the CFP.

Dan Levatard. All these high-paid analysts, I don't want to mention names, TNT, ESPM. Oh, yeah. They're not going to make it. Even if they win in If they lose in Miami- I need to calm you down. I need to calm you down. That's right. If they lose in Miami, they don't got a chance in Boston. Oh, they are going to have their ass, you know what, in Boston. Stugats. They were wrong. Are they going to lose their job? No. Are they going to get a cutting plate? No. What are they going to do? Keep predicting what is the obvious. They're going to say, Oh, the Nuggets are going to win. Oh, Denver, the altitude. You know what? They are not going to win at all. This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugats. Buddy, come on.

Great song. Hey, thank you very much.

Nice choice. How about that?

I'll take all of that you got.

That was Letterman, right?

Yeah, that was Letterman. Him going to a band like that was akin to Carson telling a comedian to come up on the stage.

When Letterman gives it up for you, you know you've earned it. That guy is not trying to be effusive.

All right, we'll start here. It may be sports. All right, Amin did what he said. He's off to catch a flight, but that's okay. Pablo Tori, host of Pablo Tori Finds Out, is with us to bring this show home. We had a little bit of a break, and we've watching a ton of live performances. We went down a bit of a rabbit hole on YouTube because my wife... I bought her a shirt, and it was a targeted IG ad, and she didn't get the reference. It was a shirt that simply read something along the lines of, I can't stop thinking about the 1997 performance of Silver Spring, where Stevie Nicks stares a hole through Lindsay Buckingham. And I showed her this video, and I had to explain to her the whole lore. And it was cool to watch someone experience it for the first time. We just did that for Tony over here. Tony, your takeaway on the 1997 performance of Silver Springs by Fleetwood Mac.

Mick is wearing what I would imagine Robin hood to be wearing. He's wearing a shirt that has stringed things that he would tie. That or a sailor somewhere in Greece.

Robin hood meets Captain Lou Albano. Right.

Yeah. Electric performance, I got to say from everybody in the Fleetwood Mac band. It was great.

Yeah, and then we then-What a review.

That's actually the nicest thing he's ever said.

Yeah, on the whole show. All of the Macs killed it. The mix and the Macs, all of them.

Then we went-In the Fleetwood. About 20 years in the future, and we saw a Future Islands performance on Letterman, which we onboarded you on. That was also a very cool pop culture moment in time for indie rock kids because Letterman got it right right away because the performance blew so many people away. It was so different from especially what that audience was watching at the time. Tony, your review of Future Islands, Letterman performance.

Good dancing by the guy. Just said that he dances like she dances. I thought the entire time, instead of him dancing, I saw Jess dancing, and then I was like, Kind of weird. The song was cool for you guys, I thought, for sure. I saw a lot of guys and girls dancing in here. I probably would have skipped to the next song, but it is what it is.

I do love those seminal live performances that stop everybody in their tracks, and right then and there, you know. This one may surprise you, but it's a reference that Dane will occasionally make it. What started the Latin explosion was this performance by Ricky Martin of the Cup of Life at the Grammys that I'm telling you is one of the most electric goddamn performances you'll ever see, and it totally changed the sound of pop music at the time. Pablo, is there a live performance that you consider a game changer?

Man, a lot of my playlist of live performances is so over indexed now on Tiny Desk, the NPR Tiny Desk concerts, which I think is taking the mantle from the late night show. Like, Konan, Letterman, they had this real cred because they used to break bands that were not mainstream to your point, Mike. And now it feels like NPR is doing a not just of that, but of like, let's get this rapper in here to do an acoust. I mean, T-Pane on Tiny Desk, to me, was revelatory on a couple of levels for that reason.

So was Juvi, too, though. When Juvi came in and they did all that, that was incredible. I just saw the Jeezy one, and then it took me back. Jeezy has so many bangers. I went down to Spotify and his place. I was like, oh, banger, banger, banger, banger all the way down. But those tiny desk things not only bring you into new people that you wouldn't maybe have thought of. Pablo, I know you know him because you've had him on the But Action Bronson is an incredible lyrics, he's an incredible musician. I love that one. And there's so many people that don't know about Action, where it's like, if you've been following his career throughout all of his mixtapes, all of his albums, he's got a new one coming up, by the way. I know you've been seeing that on social. But For people to never see him and then see him perform the way that he does, it's like, Oh, wow, I'm a fan now.

Yeah. I want you guys, actually, Mike. I feel like we're hitting on a solutions-oriented concept here. Why can't there be a shipping container desk? Why can't you guys invite bands in to the container? Why can't we just plagiarize NPR and do this in Miami?

Well, that's not really where our company cut its teeth, but we can figure something out. I want to shoehorn one of my tiny desk takes in because I do also love that series, and I discovered so many bands through there. Jack White's Now Wife put something on our IG stories way back in the day of Idols, this band that I positively love. I'm wearing out their album that just dropped. It's called Tank. But if you watch their Tiny Desk performance, the intensity that just vibrates off the screen there, I could not get enough. I've worn that video out, and they turned out to be one of my favorite bands after just seeing them for the first time on Tiny Desk.

What's the capsule summary on the whole incest thing with Meg and Jack White? What do we do with that? Where did we leave that?

Well, yeah. What? That's actually interesting that you said that because- Yes, it is. The White Stripes, you didn't know this about the White Stripes? No. You know that Meg and Jack were married at one point. You know that they were married at one point. They're related? When they burst on the scene, it was still infancy stages of the Internet than you know now. So the story was they were brother and sister, and the Internet found out after they had already become a hit, the Internet found out that, oh, these people that actually look alike and you believe to be brother and sister. No, they're not brother and sister.

They really They do look alike.

I found out today that they're not brother and sister. Really? Right now in this moment.

Well, you nodded your head silently that they were married at one point.

No, I was really confused by what was happening with the incest conversation.

So they were married, divorced, continue on with the band, and were still very close.

They should have done a smoochy reveal on Letterman. Shocked America.

But the internet discovered that they had actually been married, and it was this wild moment in time.

Did they perform the 1997 version of Silver Springs at each other?

Meg does not have that vibe. Meg and Stevie Nicks, in terms of intensity, it's like... Polar opposites. It's like Dick Vermeer, Mario Cristobal. It's just a huge difference.

This is the second time you've named Rock Dick Vermeer in two weeks.

People need to know that Dick Vermeer was a player's coach and was emotional. It was weird out of that position. I mean, he was a very successful head coach. He went many years without a job just because what's this? And now everyone's that archetype. Pablo, I want to get into the polls with Tony because they're corporately sponsored. While he pulls up some polls, why don't you tell the fine folks what you got going on if Pablo Torre finds out?

Well, today we have an episode That is actually, I think, something that is not what you expect from an episode about guns. I'm going to tease it that way because guys, I've gotten self-conscious about how I show up here and I promote my wearers, and I'm so proud of my wearers. People are like, Why don't you do show? I'm trying to just hang, and I realized as soon as I say the word gun, it's like, this guy. I promise you, it's good. It's not what you think. Can I share a text instead from Chris Cody that I got at 11:52 PM last night?

By all means.

I don't know. I'm catching up on your guys's life this week. I'm out of the loop because of the before mentioned gun episode I was doing. But what I got from Chris Cody at 11:52 PM last night was this, I'm in and why, and that was it.

Wait, Wait, what? It's a mistext.

No, I don't know.

What time did you receive this?

11:52 PM, out of nowhere. That's amazing.

He wanted to let you know he was there so that you wouldn't feel bad if he posted something to his Instagram, but he also didn't want to invite you to do something.

Yeah, I'm confused. Is there a backstory here? Chris is obviously not on the show today.

No. So he sprung this New York trip on folks. Certainly sprung it on me. I'm not supposed to be here today, but I am. It's cool. No resentment at all. I know from his IG stories that... Because that seems like a... Maybe I'm doing a Chris Cody thing. That seems like a drunk text when it comes in, when there's so vague. A hundred %. It Because he was out. Look at his story. Yeah, but he was also at Hamilton.

But then he went to a jazz bar.

Yeah, but the guy went that long at Hamilton?

Chris got super horny at Hamilton and hit me with a U up at midnight, basically.

Tony, Let's read the polls for the week. They're presented by the new season of the Peacock Original, The Traitors, streaming now with new episodes Thursday at 9:00 PM Eastern, only on Peacock. What are the polls?

First one up, did you like the movie, Limitless?

I love Limitless.

58% of the audience said yes.

I'm so mad. I missed the Limitless conversation. Did you guys talk about the part where he drinks his own blood off of the floor and sucks it up with his mouth?

No, we missed that one actually.

We did the Soulburn show weeks ago.

I was just about to make the same joke. Damn.

A more iconic shrug, Michael Jordan versus the Blazers or the Last Dance Security Guard playing Marbles. 69% of the audience says Last Dance Security Guard.

Hell, yeah. Nice. Good take by us.

Deserved.

Which did you watch? Reggie and Candice Parker or Draymon Green, Chuck and Taylor Rookes? 59% of the audience said the alt cast with Draymon, Chuck, and Taylor.

My favorite pastime now is just following to personal's IG account and seeing how many of my guy friends are liking every post.

Oh, I love Mike. One of my favorite pastimes is to go through, and of course, I'm doing this anthropologically and not because I myself am on there super horny. I'm on there looking to see who likes this thing, and I just keep track. Just cataloging people we're up to.

Mental note there. Are $200 tennis shoes affordable? See, I don't like the way that this poll was worded because tennis shoes, what are we doing?

We should have written sneakers. When I think tennis shoes, I think New Balance. New Balance had a banner here.

They did. But also when I think of tennis shoes, I think of somebody at the Villages playing tennis with old ass tennis shoes.

I don't know why I'm on the Villages algo, but have you ever seen that?

I got one of those-I'm from the Villages.

I have sex with everybody.

I think I know why.

Is that what the Villages vibe is?

It's like retirement- It's VD capital.

It's a huge VD capital.

Really? Yeah. Yeah.

If you're a urologist, like mecca for urologist is moving to the villages.

Man.

We say gym shoes in Chicago.

Well, sneakers is probably what we should have said there. I don't know who wrote that poll? All good. Are $200 tennis shoes affordable?

It's a damn-ass question.

90% of the audience said no. Okay. What's worse, a ruptured testicle or a fractured testicle?

Good question. Either way, we'll be able to see them with the new MLB pants.

And 88% of the audience said a ruptured testicle would be worse, which I agree. Are there professional players in any sport who play without underwear?

We're about to find out.

78% of the audience said yes.

Does a jockstrap count as underwear?

No.

To the front, yeah. But it's like a mullet. It's like underwear mullet, right? It's like party in the front.

Leggings count, right?

Business in front, party in the back. Track and field athletes probably don't wear undies.

No. I do leggings. I don't wear underwear underneath my legs.

That would be crazy. No, that's crazy.

A lot of bunching up there. A jockstrap. I have a voicemail inbox on Paul P. Torre finds out, you can call it. We got a voicemail today about jock straps, asking why they were invented. Why is it, as Tony put it to paraphrase him, why is it business in the front and the villages in the back? What's the deal with that? I don't know. I've never worn a jock strap, so open investigation.

It feels weird when you put it on because you're like, I'm used to He's having coverage everywhere when I put something on, but this is like, everything is exposed out back.

Kind of weird. I feel like I'm in a swing. Yeah.

Last one here. Latrell Sprewell. What do you think of him? Multitime All-Star, choked as coach or rims?

Oh.

Only one right answer. It's rims. But the audience got it wrong. Choked his coach at 69%.

Yeah. I also think and once.

Oh, spinners. Come on.

Spinners, of course. Of course.

Yeah. The sprees were, in terms of discount tennis shoes. The sprees were pretty amazing.

On the list of shoes that are constructed with no regard for how to clean it if stuff gets into them. Oh, you were done. Oh, yeah. My God.

But were they affordable?

Back in the day, they were like 70 bucks, I think.

Well, it was not affordable.

What's affordable anymore? What are we doing?

We'll come back with Pablo Ettore, maybe get into sports of the modern day with him next.

Don Levatard.

All of of us who were watching college football elevated everything the weekend was because we missed football in general so very much.

You didn't watch the ending of UTEP Jacksonville State.

It was awesome. A daisy. Boom.

Stugat It's such a lane for you. Just everything in college football is awesome. Any single thing that happens, she gets deliriously happy about.

Don't you miss viewing sports through that prism, though? I'm envious of Lucy.

I wish that I could still be happy.

This is the Dan Levatard show with the Stugats.

Did you see the Ricky Martin, the interview he gave this week? The feet? Yeah, the feet thing. Guess not what's the feet thing.

No, I haven't.

We haven't talked about it.

I haven't. What's the feet thing?

Ricky Martin. A quote from GQ magazine. I love feet. I have a foot thing. I love foot massages, and I would kiss your feet like crazy for hours. But we all have something.

I don't really have something. Should I have something?

I like a pretty face. Don't call me crazy. You dog. I'm a sucker for a pretty face.

You're a face guy? Yeah, big face guy. You have a face fetish?

I think so. I mean, I'm also attracted to intellect and a certain charisma. But face first. But face. You got to have a face. I got to have a face. I got to have a face for me. It's the face for me. All right, I'll count us in. Five, four, three, two. You can keep that. One. Honorable mention, Creed's Thanksgiving halftime performance.

That can't be honorable mention, Mike. That makes a metal stand. I'm sorry, that makes a metal stand. But in the moment, it really wasn't as weird.

As it is now? What do you mean by that?

What jersey did he wear in that performance?

The guy flying his own personalized Scotstab- His own.

Yeah, I have. So Kyle Bryant swagger jacked me because I had customized before it was a thing for Thanksgiving, a number 11 Scott Stapp jersey. It's still hanging up in my closet. But Kyle Bryant beat me, too, and I wore one, the exact same plan that I had on a Good Morning Football broadcast. So now it just looks like I'm copying him.

Wow. Did Michael Parsons choose number 11 because of Scott Stapp? Wow.

I think it's a fair question. Pablo Tori should find out. Find out. Jeremy, you were talking before the show about Victor Wembenyama, who's really hijacked. Amazing. He's hijacked the conversation. I got to tell you, I've been right about the kid. How? Dead on. I told you this day would come, and I was fearful of this.

Is it that he broke basketball? Because there was a stretch there where you were saying he wasn't good and he was just tall.

They're losing a lot. They're not a good guy.

The only reason they're winning any games is because of everything that Victor Wembenyama does. He is one of the most unstoppable forces in basketball. At this point, I'm convinced that next year, he'll win Defensive Player of the Year. He won't win it this year because he's a rookie. But next year, he'll win Defensive Player of the Year. Basically, the year after that, moving forward, he'll be in the MVP conversation every year until he decides to retire. There's a stat here. Victor Wembenyama is the first player ever to have these numbers in a season. 150 plus blocks, 150 plus assists, and 75 plus threes. It's February.

I have another stat on Victor Wemenyama.

That's a really good segment idea. Jeez.

Since 2024 started, Victor Wemenyama He has 74 blocks in 22 games. He's averaging 3.2 blocks per game. He has more blocks than the entire Miami Heat team has since January first. Yeah, very tall. 68 blocks in 23 games for the Heat, 74 blocks in 23 games for Victor Wimpanyama.

Super tall guy doing super tall things.

But he's so talented, Mike. He is going to change basketball, and it might not be for the better, as you mentioned. No, he's going to destroy it. You don't like it.

The only thing saving the game of basketball- He's so dominant. The only thing that might potentially save the game of basketball is Liz Frank. She is our only hope. That's horrible.

I don't like that you said that.

She's our only hope. Pablo, where do you fall when it comes to this Victor Wimp and Yamma discussion? Because I was fatigued of it before it became a thing. And yeah, just dimensionally, he's a huge problem. He obviously is skilled. And credit to pop, he finally figured out how to play him. He was trying to do too much early on. And I think now he's found a groove, and he's doing some more of the exciting things, but he just really struggled to acclimate to just being tall. Just go be tall for a little bit. And they did alter their game a little bit. And now he's taking over games. It's not resulting in wins. But if he says he's healthy, no doubt he is going to be a force.

Yeah, look, I have PTSD from just big men getting injured. So the whole planter, fasciitis, Liz Frank thing is real. I am very glad to get to watch him now. I'm glad that his teammates, they're no longer ignoring him when he's rolling to the basket at 8 feet tall with an open lane, and they're giving him the ball now more, it seems. My favorite thing about Wemby, though, are how he is... He's a exotic where the very basic details about him have become part of his mythology. He goes to bed at 10:30 to read books, and he enjoys books. And this is part of how he is hailed as this new creature from outer space. For me, I enjoy the just dissonance of this guy's seams on NBA while also embodying the future of it. But I mostly am worried that he's going to snap in ACL. I'm in that camp, Mike.

Why wouldn't you assume that, just given the history of tall people and their feet in that sport, especially when someone is this tall, doing things that we don't typically see people this tall do. But he's been incredibly healthy throughout his very young career.

And he's been praised for the ways in which he's anticipated all of this. He's not naive to this. He's a trainer that has done these exercises, these stretching exercises. He's even doing yoga. Specifically because of all of these concerns. The fact that he has not gotten hurt yet, the fact that they've load managed him in this way, all speaks to that recognition. But I did a story once for Sports Illustrated about the afterlife of seven footers, and I hung out with a bunch of dudes seven feet tall and up. The actuarial chart on their lives, which is tragic, I won't be a bummer here and just name all the guys who've died that I interviewed or got brutally injured because of various medical maladies. But in terms of just the fact that you can't do this for very long, that's the part where Joel Embiid is absolutely figuring into the conversation. Because Wemby, look, what Wemby was supposed to be, is supposed to be, is what Joel Embiid was this season before he got hurt. And so I just hope that we get to get that.

It always goes back to the Sixers.

Nobody's doing it with blocks.

I want to talk to you about consumer power from sports fans in Europe, opposed to here in the United States, because sports fans in Europe have blown up billion-dollar deals, and they're doing this routinely. You can see European sports executives filled with envy at the American sports model because American sports executives tend to just trample the fan base, as we're watching right now with Nike/Fanatics uniforms that no one likes in Major League Base. They came out to zero fanfare and lots of poison, and they're still marching on ahead. And maybe there's going to be some changes because we see dicks and balls now. But over in Europe, German supporter bases have blown up a billion-dollar deal with very questionable funding. We saw what happened to the Super League two years ago where fans rose up and they stopped a huge deal from happening. I have a couple of theories as to why the American sports fans who may actually have this power and just haven't realized it, I have a couple of theories as to why there is such a difference. I'm curious if you have any.

Well, look, the obvious interpretation there is that demand for sports in America is inelastic, which is to say we're always going to want this. We see it as our escape from reality, which means that when bad things happen inside of our escape, we're not going to escape anywhere else. And so what's the closest thing? Mike, I ask you this question, actually, as we think through this. What's the closest we've come to a populist revolution when it comes to consumer power in sports? Because you're right, the Super League stuff was something that I have never seen.

I think Steve's being hired by Texas A&M.

Stop that shit in its tracks. People at Tennessee painting on that rock, right? Is college football where we go for that?

College football Well, the only comparison to what is referred to, probably unfairly, as hooliganism, the sports tribalism over in Europe, the closest thing to it, the regional identity that an athletic program has with its community, it's college football. We've seen boosters, also considering the dynamic that these aren't full capitalistic ventures, there's a whole student-athlete thing. We've seen boosters and fan bases rise up and say, No, don't want Greg Ciano as our head football coach, and they flex that power, and they've stopped things. They haven't stopped things nearly like Super League. For example, we were talking before the show, you said, Well, the Pac-12 is gone. I don't know if that's a West Coast thing, but there are certain deals in this country that sports fans don't like and haven't been able to stop. It just seems like we're all passengers in this expanded college football payoff thing. I don't know if we're just so accustomed to being broken by American sports as free market capitalism. Teams can leave communities. Whereas if Chelsea wants to move to another part of London, they can't. There are protections in place. They have to approve. They have to get approval from pitch founders that actually own the literal pitch that Chelsea plays on.

It's a totally different dynamic. And I wonder, it It seems the way that we're going is that Europe is going to end up being more like America. And it's a shame because oftentimes the fans are on the right side of these things.

Mike, let's just say it bluntly then about America. America doesn't have that dog in us. We don't want it at all. We're happy to eat what's served. I get why, right? The thing about a populace revolution, I presume, having not participated in one myself in that way, is that you need an example to follow. I think the presumption is it won't work. That's where Europe differs. They've shown that it does.

It's a shame because they'll blow up something that will totally fundamentally change a sport like Super League. You see, the notion of Super League is not going away. In fact, just a couple of months ago, they started trotting that back out. They're going to keep fine-tuning this thing until it finally lands and appear.

They're never going to give up on the thing that college football, by the way, is engineering simultaneously as they're trying to, in Europe, soft launch it again.

I feel like we are over generalizing a little bit about the cultural aspect because there have been major wins for labor in this country in the last year. There's also been some huge losses, but it is something that I think in the United States has been largely cyclical because you've seen different administrations, different industries really prosper, and then there's the backlash to it. Right now, we're in a really interesting time where you've seen the Writers Union, SAG, the UAW have these huge labor wins, but at the same time, President Biden not siding with the railroad workers last year. So it really is something that I think you can't really over generalize about Americans not having that dog in them, right? Like you said, we do feel really beaten down by the system that we operate in, but people are trying to fight back.

We have 30 seconds. I think we are going to find that dog in us. Unfortunately, it's just going to be to stop pants and baseball from continuing to be produced. You got 10 seconds here. Do you actually think Nike and Fanatics are going to pull these uniforms?

I think if people cared more about baseball, this would be such a bigger story. I think everyone's just hoping for people to not care that much about the sport whose pants are truly see through.

I think we just need a bigger penis.

America, we have that penis a lot bigger than you thought.