A Basketball Movie Character Draft LIVE From Austin, Texas, With Shea Serrano, Chris Ryan, and Sean Fennessey

It's a Grantland reunion! The Ringer's Bill Simmons is LIVE in Austin, Texas, and he is joined by Shea Serrano, Chris Ryan, and Sean Fennessey to hit a myriad of topics before drafting a basketball team of movie characters. Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Shea Serrano, Chris Ryan, and Sean Fennessey Producers: Kyle Crichton, Chia Hao Tat, and Steve Ceruti The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Order Michelob ULTRA today, available on Doordash! ENJOY RESPONSIBLY © 2025 ANHEUSER-BUSCH, MICHELOB ULTRA® LIGHT BEER, ST. LOUIS, MO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Bill Simmons?

  It's the Bill Simmons Podcast presented by FanDuel. The NBA season hitting full stride, don't foul out on your chance to win with America's number one sportsbook. Bet on fun markets like live quarter player props and part lists. Plus enjoy our new NBA player prop pages, your one stop shop for player props that include FanDuel's exclusive performance trends. Tracking the last five games for top markets, they even do that. The app is safe, secure and easy to use. When you win, you'll get paid instantly. So download the app today. Bet with FanDuel, official partner of the NBA. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Listen to the end of this episode for additional details.

• 0:45Bill Simmons?

  Must be 21 plus and present in select states. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Hey, this is weird. I'm in Austin, Texas. It's freezing cold. We have a Grantland reunion, it's coming up next. All right, quick break. This episode is brought to you by Fire TV. You ever sit down, ready to watch the game, only to search and scroll endlessly? If so, you need Fire TV. It shows you are live games from your favorite teams all in one place, right on the home screen. No more searching, just sit down and turn on Fire TV. Separate subscriptions may be required. Feature and content availability may vary. We're also brought to you by The Ringer Podcast Network. Don't forget about the rewatchables, we did Wayne's World this week. Don't forget about the Prestige TV Podcast, we're doing White Lotus and Severance, covered

• 1:30Bill Simmons?

  all of it. I'm there on Sunday nights as well. My Sunday night podcast with Priscilla is coming back this Sunday, I think, I hope. Hopefully, hopefully Priscilla knows, we'll have to tell them. Anyway, what you're about to listen to is me and Sean Fantasy and Chris Ryan and Shay Serrano going to Austin, Texas, where for some reason it's 30 degrees, was not on the agenda for me. But we're here anyway, and we put together a big show at the Paramount Theater. There was 1,100 people, apparently that are coming to this. I'm taping this before the show. I hope it goes well. Wish us luck. Let's bring your Pearl to you.

• 2:46Bill Simmons?

  Why the fuck is it so cold?

• 2:49Bill Simmons?

  What the hell? We could've gone to Chicago or Winnipeg. Thanks to Michelob Ultra for sponsoring this. We're so happy to be here. We love being in Austin. I'm gonna introduce... You guys don't know who's here tonight, right? No. First up,

• 3:07Bill Simmons?

  the prince of Philadelphia, Chris Ryan.

• 3:20Bill Simmons?

  Next up,

• 3:23Bill Simmons?

  the self-proclaimed king of Letterboxd, Sean Fennessey.

• 3:36Bill Simmons?

  And last but not least, from the heart of Texas, the one, the only, Shay Serrano.

• 3:55Bill Simmons?

  It's a grand land reunion, everybody. How you feeling, Shay? I feel fantastic. I feel so good. Sean went to a DVD store for like two hours today. What store was that, Sean?

• 4:06Speaker 01

  I went to Waterloo Records. Shout out Waterloo.

• 4:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 4:10Speaker 01

  And I spent $184 on Blu-rays. We almost died on the way there and back, yeah. It was fucking cold.

• 4:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, what is up, Austin? So I was here for the Dallas Super Bowl in Texas. When was that, like 2010? And it snowed like an inch and nobody could get anywhere because they had no snowplows. And that was when I realized, oh yeah, Texas doesn't do well with cold weather. We are gonna do a bunch of stuff with you guys today. We have a big, fun, crazy draft in the second part of this podcast. But we're gonna start... We're gonna do a hodgepodge thing. Let's start with All-Star Weekend, because it just happened. Sure.

• 4:50Bill Simmons?

  Boom.

• 4:50Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 4:52Bill Simmons?

  Tough beat. Second lowest ratings ever. Shay, is this some cost? Can it be fixed?

• 4:57Speaker 02

  It can be fixed. And I'm gonna tell you how it's gonna be fixed. There's a, there's a man. A seven foot five man in San Antonio.

• 5:08Speaker 02

  And he's going to save it. What's gonna happen is the same thing that we saw happen with the in-season tournament, where LeBron said, hey, guess what? I care about this. And then everybody else went, okay, cool. We care about it too.

• 5:19Bill Simmons?

  So that's Wimby.

• 5:20Speaker 02

  That's gonna happen with Wimby. He's gonna.

• 5:22Speaker 03

  There's another seven foot five guy in San Antonio. He's gonna take it over.

• 5:25Bill Simmons?

  I didn't know, I didn't know there was another one coming.

• 5:27Speaker 02

  Right now, the guy, Joker is the guy. And he is like, I don't care about any of this at all. I don't, I don't care one single percent. So everybody else falls in line. When Wimby's the guy, he's gonna care. And they're all gonna care.

• 5:39Bill Simmons?

  CR, what'd you think of my idea that we split the game up? And the Sunday game is just guys from the top five seeds. And they play for home court advantage in the finals.

• 5:48Speaker 03

  I liked it to the extent, but it's really gonna have to just convince these guys to wanna play more basketball and to play more hard basketball. I was thinking about this. I just think that this is probably entering the Pro Bowl zone, where you just gotta move it to the end of the season, after the season. And just be like, you guys wanna play? We'll have like seven foot rims. You can do somersaults. You know, like whatever. We can get trampolines out there. Like, it could be like basketball. But I don't know about like the mid-season, after Luca gets traded, let's all stop, go to this place and, and pretend like we care about this game.

• 6:20Bill Simmons?

  Sean, do you, Van thought that it might have culturally expired, which has happened a few times in our lifetime. Specifically with some actors too.

• 6:31Speaker 01

  Like who?

• 6:32Bill Simmons?

  I don't know, who have culturally expired.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  Like Kevin Spacey?

• 6:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, well, that's the.

• 6:40Speaker 03

  That was good. Under two minutes.

• 6:42Bill Simmons?

  That was nice.

• 6:43Speaker 02

  I knew he'd come up.

• 6:44Speaker 01

  I was in San Francisco this past weekend and did, I had tickets to the event and did not go to any of the events, which is not a good sign, obviously. So I, okay, I'll pitch you my idea.

• 6:55Bill Simmons?

  Let's hear it.

• 6:56Speaker 01

  I think they should scrap the game. I think they should scrap the dunk contest. I think they should scrap the three-point shooting contest.

• 7:02Speaker 02

  That's everything.

• 7:03Speaker 01

  Scrap the futures game.

• 7:05Speaker 03

  What about the skills competition?

• 7:06Speaker 01

  So I think that they should only do the skills competition.

• 7:11Speaker 01

  But for two full days, I'm not kidding. And make it like an insane double dare obstacle course.

• 7:17Bill Simmons?

  Oh, like American Gladiators, CrossFit, okay.

• 7:20Speaker 01

  But the winning team, and I was inspired by Wemby and CP3, should automatically get home court advantage throughout the playoffs. So there's like real stakes. So you'd have these guys like during practice during the season, like really working on throwing the ball through that round circle or whatever. And all the stuff they have to do there. And this is like the skills competition.

• 7:41Speaker 03

  You could win like seven games in the regular season and they get the one seed?

• 7:45Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 7:45Speaker 03

  I like that.

• 7:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. You could be like the play in team at number 10, but you got home court games.

• 7:49Speaker 03

  That would work for the Sixers.

• 7:51Speaker 02

  I, for a number of years, I have told everybody that I met that Sean Finacy is one of the smartest people I've ever met in my life. I changed my mind right now. It's a horrible idea. It's the worst idea I've ever heard.

• 8:02Speaker 01

  No, no bad ideas in a brainstorm.

• 8:05Bill Simmons?

  Well, the fact that we're coming up with ideas like this tells you how grim it is for All-Star Weekend.

• 8:10Speaker 03

  I had an idea. I wanted to bounce off you for this because I was thinking about, because if you say Pro Bowl and you're like, make the NBA more like the NFL. Why doesn't the NBA do bye weeks for teams, but never take an All-Star break? It wasn't this like, the All-Star Weekend always happens at a time where football's over. You want basketball, like you want important basketball games. Like, why not just give the Bucks 10 days off, but then bring them back and have it all work? So that teams have bye weeks throughout the season.

• 8:35Bill Simmons?

  Isn't that what they're trying to do with Joel Embiid?

• 8:38Speaker 03

  That was a Joel Embiid joke. You guys didn't hear it because of the mic, but yeah. That is what they're trying to do with Joel Embiid.

• 8:46Bill Simmons?

  Shay, how would David Stern have handled the NBA in 2025? I think about this a lot. It's a, he's like the angry grandparent you had that you were like, oh, man.

• 8:56Speaker 02

  He would have been so mad.

• 8:57Bill Simmons?

  I hate grandpa. He's so annoying. And then you kind of miss him.

• 8:59Speaker 02

  Yeah. He, he would have cussed out everybody. It would have been some private meeting in a cafeteria and they all would have been sitting at cafeteria tables. And he'd just been like, guys, what the fuck is going on? What are you doing? That's all that would have happened.

• 9:13Bill Simmons?

  Do you miss Stern, Finacy?

• 9:16Speaker 01

  I miss the idea of the power that he represented. I also love the idea of him like firing Nico Harrison, you know, like he would have just done that. This guy is out of the paint. And he would have done something like that, so I missed that.

• 9:32Bill Simmons?

  Do, do people in Austin, so do you lean toward the Spurs? Or like, what's that? Okay.

• 9:40Bill Simmons?

  So, when the Mavericks...

• 9:44Speaker 03

  So you guys are just Luca fans?

• 9:45Bill Simmons?

  Wait, so, so when the Mavericks traded Luca, you guys are just laughing your asses off? Yeah. What was your reaction, Che?

• 9:54Speaker 02

  That was the first time I ever felt bad for Dallas Mavericks fans. Like, I've laughed at every single horrible thing that has ever happened. When they lost to the Warriors, the We Believe Warriors, number one seed, belly laughed at them. When they had their championship stolen by the Miami Heat in 2006, belly laughed at them. And then when I saw this, I felt like sadness. Genuine sadness.

• 10:17Bill Simmons?

  Cause you're a man of the people.

• 10:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, like, what do...

• 10:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 10:20Speaker 02

  2011.

• 10:23Bill Simmons?

  What was your reaction when you heard the trades here? I never had you...

• 10:27Speaker 01

  Is Dirk here?

• 10:28Bill Simmons?

  Only people I didn't have on a podcast.

• 10:30Speaker 03

  Was, was me. My reaction was, I was coming out of the movie Companion, and was just like utterly shocked, couldn't believe it. My favorite thing about it since it's happened is definitely that the Mavericks keep finding executives to do profiles where they're like, "I underestimated the crowd reaction to this." Like, Rick Welts just did one. I was like, "Rick Welts works for the Mavericks?" And they're just like pushing these guys out on the ice floe to get shot with arrows like every other day. It's amazing. Nico's doing a good job getting other people involved.

• 11:06Bill Simmons?

  Have you been, I know you're a student of journalism, Sean, have you been following some of these features with the Mavs? How they've been trying to... We weren't actually gonna give Luca the max extension. People didn't realize, cause we're idiots. So we weren't gonna do that.

• 11:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. I, I think that they shouldn't talk, which is not good for journalism, obviously. I think that everyone should be held accountable for their actions. I did have an idea for ownership groups, though, which is I think if you're gonna buy a team, you should have to pass like an NBA literacy test, like when you become an American citizen and you have to learn about like, who wrote the Declaration of Independence? You should have to know the history of the game.

• 11:43Bill Simmons?

  So Patrick Dumont?

• 11:44Speaker 01

  Well, I'm not gonna name any names.

• 11:46Bill Simmons?

  Just be like, "What year did the ABA and NBA merge?" And he's like, "Ah, 1988."

• 11:52Speaker 03

  I kinda like having, I like having crazy owners back, though. Don't you?

• 11:56Bill Simmons?

  Well, I like, I like the fact that we always seem to have six to eight terrible run teams. That's great for us for content, but the, the real thing that's interesting is the Lakers are villainous again. Cause they pull out this trade and then they trade for Mark Williams. And then they just void the trade. They're like, we don't like, this hasn't happened in like two decades.

• 12:19Speaker 03

  And Mark Williams is like, I'm healthy. I'm fine.

• 12:22Bill Simmons?

  No, actually, no thanks. Like, and then the trade deadline passed. Charlotte couldn't trade him. But like, if somebody did this in your fantasy league, it would be the angriest chain of emails ever. And people would stop talking. It's like, Bob's not invited to Gary's wedding now.

• 12:38Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Oh, it's because of the Mark Williams trade. Yeah. Yeah, that's what happened. They, they seriously, they haven't voided a trade in 15 years yet.

• 12:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 12:49Bill Simmons?

  And apparently when you make a trade, you send the team the fit, the, the medicals and they can look at them. So I think they just said, fuck it. We don't want this guy.

• 12:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's all that it was.

• 12:59Speaker 03

  I swear to God, if the Lakers get some crazy deal for a center over the summer that they were like saving the, the spot for, or the, the trade assets for, I'm gonna lose it.

• 13:07Bill Simmons?

  Are you guys on my side that more people knew about this trade than everyone's letting on? Cause I think like a lot of people knew and then they're all like, we didn't know. Found out last second.

• 13:18Speaker 03

  So that when Rich Paul was like, I had no idea. I found out like a few minutes.

• 13:22Bill Simmons?

  No offense to him. I don't believe it. I think both coaches knew. I think, I think Anthony Davis knew. I think the agent knew. Like he had to waive the no trade clause. I'm just never gonna believe it. They're never gonna convince me. I think LeBron knew.

• 13:34Speaker 01

  What about, but Luca had no idea?

• 13:35Bill Simmons?

  I think Luca was the only one that didn't know.

• 13:39Speaker 03

  Luca was like, I just got an awesome $15 million house in the greater Dallas area.

• 13:44Bill Simmons?

  The Mavericks were like, yeah, he didn't know because he was out there getting fucking drunk. And eating like fried chicken. Lazy motherfucker.

• 13:53Speaker 03

  He's like binging Netflix.

• 13:55Bill Simmons?

  So Shay, the Luka Doncic movie, when they make it, is it a TV movie, like a Ryan Murphy type of movie? Is it a sports movie? Is it a dark, seedy drama that Sean would really like and do multiple big picture episodes of? Or is it a heist movie?

• 14:12Speaker 02

  It's like Margin Call.

• 14:13Bill Simmons?

  Margin Call.

• 14:16Speaker 02

  Just a bunch of late night, whatever is happening in a whatever. That's all that it is.

• 14:21Bill Simmons?

  You like that, would you, you want to walk through the heist movie with Luka Doncic, with Palenka's Neil McCauley?

• 14:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, he kind of dresses like Neil McCauley a little bit. Maybe a slightly tighter slack.

• 14:30Bill Simmons?

  Do you think he has a condo with no furniture in it?

• 14:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, because Genie's never let him feel comfortable enough to buy furniture. I do like the idea of it being a Ryan Murphy FX series, but I would want the same cast as, as the Aaron Hernandez show. Like, just put them in.

• 14:48Speaker 03

  Get Norbert Leo Butts to play Patrick Dumont, you know?

• 14:53Bill Simmons?

  What do you think, Fantasy?

• 14:54Speaker 01

  I think this is the chance to finally get Oliver Stone back where he belongs.

• 14:58Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 14:59Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah.

• 15:00Speaker 01

  And I think that we have yet to see the way we can conspiracy theorize about what's happened here. But I think he should do it entirely in the register of The Doors, where it's just like Nico Harrison is just tripping on LSD the whole time. He like microdoses every morning and he's like, yeah, Luca should go. Like, just losing his mind.

• 15:19Speaker 03

  But if they do it-

• 15:20Speaker 01

  See the Native American guy in the desert. It would be great.

• 15:23Speaker 03

  If they do it like JFK, that means you get to play Donald Sutherland. Who benefited?

• 15:28Bill Simmons?

  That sounds great. What you're laying out though, because then Cuban, maybe Cuban's like, because he's bitter that he sold the team. So he wants them to destroy the team and he's like, he's like drugging Nico Harrison. Yeah, this is like-

• 15:42Speaker 03

  This is getting dark.

• 15:42Bill Simmons?

  It's like traffic.

• 15:44Speaker 03

  That would be great.

• 15:47Bill Simmons?

  Kevin Durant. You guys like Kevin Durant, right?

• 15:52Bill Simmons?

  He loves Austin. KD's a little bit of a nomad. You know, starts out in OKC, nine years there, goes to Golden State, goes to Brooklyn, goes to Phoenix, almost gets traded in the deadline. And yet, I think we all like him. I always feel like I'm like a KD defender. You saw the clip this week with, uh, from the new Netflix series about the Olympics. And KD just starts crying. He loves basketball so much. Like, I really think he's one of the most genuine athletes that we have, but also takes a ton of shit. Shay, what do you want his next five years to look like?

• 16:25Speaker 02

  I would, I wouldn't mind him-

• 16:26Bill Simmons?

  If you could direct his next five years, what would it be?

• 16:28Speaker 02

  I wouldn't mind him spending two years in San Antonio. That would be pretty- That would be great.

• 16:33Speaker 03

  Maybe the two last prime years, right?

• 16:35Speaker 02

  You mean the last two, last two good years, and then the last three years, they bring the Sonics back, it's time for the league to expand. And then he goes back there. I think that would be really cool.

• 16:45Bill Simmons?

  So, two years, like Wemby's first, I can't believe he's in the finals this young. He's only 22.

• 16:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:52Bill Simmons?

  And he's part of that with De'Aaron Fox. I like that. What do you think, Shay?

• 16:55Speaker 01

  I think he should make a sequel to the Disney original film Thunderstruck.

• 17:00Bill Simmons?

  Thunderstruck 2?

• 17:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, Phoenix Rising. Just keep following that story a little bit. You know, he messed up. He should have signed with the New York Knicks, but he was a coward. So, screw him.

• 17:11Bill Simmons?

  I, I actually, oh, you lost the crowd. It's 30 degrees outside. We can't intagrenize them.

• 17:19Speaker 01

  I love New Texas.

• 17:20Bill Simmons?

  I actually think even KD would admit Nets over Knicks was a mistake.

• 17:24Speaker 03

  Yeah. I'd like him to go to Boston and then

• 17:31Speaker 03

  orchestrate-

• 17:32Bill Simmons?

  I don't like this.

• 17:33Speaker 03

  A trade for Kyrie Irving to come back to Boston with him.

• 17:38Speaker 03

  And then maybe orchestrate a trade for James Harden to come back.

• 17:42Speaker 01

  Tatum and Brown for KD.

• 17:44Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 17:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:46Bill Simmons?

  I think the San Antonio thing would be great because I, KD really does have genuine affection for University of Texas, even though he was only here one year. But the way he talks about it, it'd be cool.

• 17:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:57Bill Simmons?

  Hour drive, back and forth.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  He would be instantly beloved in San Antonio.

• 18:02Bill Simmons?

  Which is what he needs.

• 18:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, he does.

• 18:04Bill Simmons?

  Because you don't want to be the guy who played for 25 years and everyone's like, ah. Like, like Vince Carter.

• 18:13Bill Simmons?

  Vince Carter got retired by Toronto.

• 18:15Speaker 03

  Yeah, he's like got a retirement ceremony every week.

• 18:18Bill Simmons?

  And it's like, you played for the Nets for four years to retire.

• 18:21Speaker 03

  Wasn't there like a 15 minute honorarium to him during the dunk contest or something? Like, yeah, that was weird.

• 18:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it really feels like we're pushing.

• 18:27Speaker 03

  He's still alive.

• 18:31Bill Simmons?

  Then he came out and it was like, I thought he was dead.

• 18:34Speaker 03

  Vince Carter's at SNL 50 like, ah, it's all right.

• 18:38Bill Simmons?

  It feels like there's a lot of rehabilitation stuff with retired stars whose careers didn't turn out perfectly, like Carmelo's another one. And then Dwight Howard's like, I'd like to figure out how to do this, but I'm, I'm too much of a mess. I can't. But in general, it's, it's funny how like we hear way more about Carmelo and way more about Vince Carter now than Tim Duncan, who's one of the best seven players of all time. But it's, it's kind of in one way, it's Tim Duncan's fault because he doesn't do like the post-career, look at me, look at me. Remember, like he just doesn't, he doesn't care.

• 19:13Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:13Bill Simmons?

  But now nobody talks about him.

• 19:15Speaker 02

  Well, I, I think that's by design though. That's like, there's nothing he wants less than to be part of a conversation.

• 19:20Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 19:20Speaker 02

  So he's, so he's doing great.

• 19:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 19:23Speaker 02

  He came in, won five titles, got the fuck out.

• 19:27Speaker 03

  Is he coaching? He's coaching now, right?

• 19:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, he might pop in and coach a little bit, but that's the point that we're making.

• 19:33Speaker 03

  Who knows? He's like John Wick. No, no.

• 19:36Speaker 02

  Hunched over so you don't notice him.

• 19:38Bill Simmons?

  Tim Duncan's at a bar and somebody's like, yeah, Carmelo was better than Tim Duncan. He overhears like, I don't care. I won five titles.

• 19:44Speaker 02

  He doesn't, he doesn't.

• 19:45Bill Simmons?

  Carmelo could have this one. I kicked his ass all the time.

• 19:49Speaker 02

  This episode is brought to you by Mikloob Ultra. Mikloob Ultra, a superior light beer and the ultimate trophy. Win or lose, you're bound to enjoy the ride with a good beer in hand. Mikloob Ultra, crisp, refreshing, only 95 calories.

• 20:03Bill Simmons?

  A superior light beer. No matter the game, sport or season, superior is worth playing for. Always be prepared for a win and order Michelob Ultra today. Available on DoorDash, by the way. Enjoy responsibly. 2025 Anheuser-Busch Michelob Ultra Light Beer. St. Louis, Missouri. Must be 21 plus to order alcohol. Alcohol available only in select markets. Shay, where do you stand on ex-player podcasts? Have we hit peak crazy yet? Or are there two years left to go? Cause you know the hoop's hype now and every day it's some guy who made the All-Star team once, who's like, I was toe to toe with LeBron for five years there. And you're like, what team are you on? What? How far do we go with this?

• 20:44Bill Simmons?

  I think, I think Jeff Teague is the perfect podcaster. He's as good as- I like that one. I'll defend Jeff Teague. Yeah. He's great. Yeah. We're, we're at the exact right level now. One more and it all falls apart. Don't go anymore. What do you think, Shay?

• 21:00Speaker 01

  I hope Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart pod forever. I'm really enjoying that show.

• 21:04Bill Simmons?

  That's a good pod.

• 21:04Speaker 01

  It's them just shitting on each other for 45 minutes. You're the biggest loser.

• 21:10Speaker 03

  What are you gonna do if Leon Rose trades Josh Hart? Like, and that podcast gets broken up?

• 21:15Speaker 01

  Hire an assassin to kill Leon Rose. I'm not sure. I, I don't listen to a lot of those shows, if I'm being honest, but I do respect that they are currently working very hard to eliminate shows like this. That they're like, we have been observing your strategy of hot takerie and we can do better. We, just like we can dunk better than you, we can also hot take better than you. And that's kind of what each new show that comes along knows it goes, needs to go to a higher level.

• 21:43Bill Simmons?

  So do you listen to that next podcast?

• 21:46Speaker 01

  Sometimes, yeah.

• 21:48Bill Simmons?

  You're like, these are my guys?

• 21:50Speaker 01

  I have an emotional relationship with these men who don't know who I am.

• 21:55Bill Simmons?

  Chris, does Embiid have a podcast? He does once a month?

• 22:00Speaker 03

  Does Embiid have a podcast? No.

• 22:01Bill Simmons?

  Just like, once a month, he does it?

• 22:03Speaker 03

  Paul George, did you guys know that? I found this stat. Apparently, he's recorded 19 podcast episodes as a member of the Sixers and scored two points in his last game as a member of the Sixers before the All-Star break? It's kind of a bummer, yeah. Turns out, that's why he was available. You know, like...

• 22:24Bill Simmons?

  Do you want to walk us through where?

• 22:25Speaker 03

  Where I'm at?

• 22:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Where you at?

• 22:28Speaker 03

  It's pretty dark, you know? It's like...

• 22:32Speaker 03

  I kind of do, man. That's why I'm wearing this fucking thunder hat, you know? Like, it's just pretty brutal. Like, I think maxi is the thing that's made me most sad because he's obviously so bummed out by this that, like, even his effervescence is dimming. The Embiid thing is, I don't know, man. I don't know. I don't think he's ever going to be what we thought he was going to be.

• 22:53Bill Simmons?

  I remember this, the 2019 Celtics. The year was the year after the NBA Finals.

• 22:58Speaker 03

  Just to make it about you? We can't talk about me for a minute?

• 23:04Bill Simmons?

  No, when you know something's wrong with a season and you're like, maybe this will be the game, it turns around and then it doesn't. And then by December, January, you're just kind of like, oh, this is going to be one of the... It's like every Jets season for Sean. But it was just like...

• 23:19Speaker 03

  That's cool.

• 23:19Bill Simmons?

  I'm sorry, that was a call for it. I apologize.

• 23:22Speaker 01

  We were talking about the Sixers.

• 23:23Bill Simmons?

  Well, but where you know it's not going to come back, but then you're stuck with the season.

• 23:28Speaker 01

  Come back from what?

• 23:30Speaker 02

  I would like to know what's the, like, furthest away from basketball. Somebody has said something to you and then you win. It reminds me of the 2019 Celtics.

• 23:40Bill Simmons?

  Let me think.

• 23:44Bill Simmons?

  So we go politics?

• 23:45Speaker 02

  It could be, it could be like, oh, Bill, my father, my father passed away, Bill. You know, the 2008 Celtics.

• 23:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's like, let me trade to Kyrie.

• 23:53Speaker 03

  We thought Gordon Hayward was going to pass away that night.

• 23:58Speaker 03

  You know what?

• 24:00Speaker 03

  Eventually Brad Stevens.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. About Iran-Contra, you know, with that affair. Well, at that time, we know Larry Bird was going for 26, 9 and 7.

• 24:11Bill Simmons?

  Were you sad to see Aaron Rodgers go?

• 24:14Speaker 01

  Sad to see Aaron Rodgers go?

• 24:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 24:20Speaker 01

  No. No, I honestly hope he goes to hell.

• 24:30Bill Simmons?

  Least favorite athlete ever?

• 24:32Speaker 03

  That's just what legacy media wants you to believe, man.

• 24:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 24:36Speaker 01

  My favorite thing ever, no one here cares about the new Jets regime, so I'm sorry, but the story that they were like, "You can come back if you don't go on McAfee," and he was like, "No dice," tells you everything you need to know about that guy.

• 24:49Speaker 02

  I liked when they did the Hard Knocks series and you were like, "Wow, Aaron Rodgers is in this," and then they got to one episode and he talked about aliens for two minutes.

• 24:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:57Speaker 02

  And you're like, "Oh, that's why he did it, because they told him he could do this."

• 25:05Bill Simmons?

  Who, we were talking about this earlier, who is the number one celebrity or athlete that's attached to Austin, where Austin goes?

• 25:16Speaker 02

  Is it Glenn Powell or McConaughey?

• 25:18Bill Simmons?

  Alright, so it's Powell and McConaughey in the finals, right?

• 25:22Speaker 03

  Do those guys have beef? Do those guys have a little tension? We picking that up? They're buds, alright.

• 25:28Speaker 01

  They're buds, okay.

• 25:29Bill Simmons?

  Alright.

• 25:34Speaker 03

  Thank you Lance for coming tonight, yeah.

• 25:36Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. I'll tell you, that reminded me of the 2019 Tigers.

• 25:42Bill Simmons?

  Alright, so, let's go, I'll give you McConaughey and Powell, so who says McConaughey?

• 25:51Bill Simmons?

  Who says Glenn Powell?

• 25:54Bill Simmons?

  Alright, McConaughey, Jesus.

• 25:55Speaker 01

  Done deal.

• 25:56Bill Simmons?

  There you go. Wow.

• 25:57Speaker 02

  They did not like Chris.

• 25:58Bill Simmons?

  McConaughey's really figured it out.

• 26:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 26:01Bill Simmons?

  Because he goes to all the, he goes to a lot of the Texas games too.

• 26:04Speaker 03

  He's like, like an assistant coach now, yeah.

• 26:09Bill Simmons?

  See, our, scale of 1 to 20, how genuine is Bradley Cooper's Eagles fandom, would you say? 1 to 20, I'll give you.

• 26:19Speaker 03

  I'm gonna go 19, just because it feels super recent. Like, I'm sure it's genuine, but like, I don't recall him being a part of the Eagles before 2017.

• 26:31Speaker 03

  She's more recent. She was like on a late night show talking about loving the Giants like five years ago. So it's just cool. Like you can, you can love who you want to love, but like that's, she just switched around on the NFC.

• 26:44Speaker 01

  Can I love the Eagles? Like is that on the board for me?

• 26:46Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 26:46Speaker 01

  Okay, cool.

• 26:47Speaker 03

  Water's warm.

• 26:48Bill Simmons?

  Shay, who's your favorite celebrity attached to a team celebrity? Let's go with, let's go with.

• 26:55Speaker 02

  Does San Antonio have one?

• 26:56Bill Simmons?

  Danny Trejo.

• 26:57Speaker 02

  Yeah. They play like during Spurs games, a Danny Trejo clip of him being like, "Hey, let's fucking go."

• 27:08Bill Simmons?

  Did they really?

• 27:08Speaker 02

  Yeah. That's like a real thing.

• 27:10Bill Simmons?

  That's a really good one. I like that one. How about you, Sean?

• 27:13Speaker 03

  Every, before every game is like, "Neel."

• 27:18Bill Simmons?

  Come on. Uh, what about you, Sean?

• 27:21Speaker 01

  Favorite celebrity fan of one of my teams?

• 27:23Bill Simmons?

  Of a tied to a team, any team. The one you feel is the most genuine.

• 27:27Speaker 01

  I mean, Jack and the Lakers is the realest shit ever.

• 27:30Speaker 03

  Not Larry David and the Jets?

• 27:32Bill Simmons?

  No, he abandoned the Jets.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  No, Larry David quit the Jets.

• 27:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he quit the Jets.

• 27:35Speaker 01

  Once again, smartest guy of all time.

• 27:39Bill Simmons?

  Couple more quickies. If, uh, speaking of Austin, if Austin tried to steal the Spurs from San Antonio, would it cause a civil war in Texas?

• 27:52Speaker 02

  There would be, there would be 2 million Mexicans outside of the Moody Center. Mad as hell.

• 28:00Bill Simmons?

  That's never happening.

• 28:02Speaker 02

  Never happening.

• 28:04Bill Simmons?

  Where is the Serena they're playing tomorrow? It's a nice one, right?

• 28:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, who knows? It doesn't matter. We're.

• 28:09Bill Simmons?

  Look at Shay, Shay's on.

• 28:10Speaker 02

  No, I'm kidding.

• 28:11Bill Simmons?

  He doesn't like this.

• 28:12Speaker 02

  I like, I like, I like Austin a lot. It's one of like the 10 best cities in Texas. Easily, top 10, no question.

• 28:24Bill Simmons?

  Sean, who's winning Best Picture at the Oscars? I had that on my list.

• 28:28Speaker 01

  Uh, Enora.

• 28:31Speaker 01

  Which-

• 28:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, Nora gang?

• 28:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, hell yeah, thank you.

• 28:35Bill Simmons?

  Cause it did the DGA, PGA, WGA, whatever the hell, that triple crown?

• 28:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, you nailed it, brother.

• 28:42Speaker 01

  The, in August, we were texting about the, no, in September, we were texting about the Oscars. And I was like, I think it's Enora, cause there's like, nothing else going on. And you were like, no chance.

• 28:52Bill Simmons?

  Well, there's a lot of sex in that movie.

• 28:54Speaker 01

  There is, there is. What did you think about it?

• 28:56Bill Simmons?

  And a lot of old people that vote for the Oscars.

• 28:58Speaker 01

  Did you like those scenes?

• 29:04Bill Simmons?

  I thought they were very well done.

• 29:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, very tasteful, very tasteful.

• 29:09Bill Simmons?

  Very tasteful.

• 29:10Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:10Bill Simmons?

  I thought for the character, it made a lot of sense.

• 29:12Speaker 01

  It did, it did. Really strong writing.

• 29:15Bill Simmons?

  So the last movie that did those three, but then didn't win Best Picture was Crash?

• 29:19Speaker 01

  It was Crash, yeah. Well, Brokeback Mountain won those three awards in 2005.

• 29:23Bill Simmons?

  Oh yeah, Brokeback Mountain won the three and didn't get the last one.

• 29:25Speaker 01

  And then Crash won on Oscar night, which is the first time I gouged my eyes out and then had reconstructive surgery.

• 29:31Bill Simmons?

  So Enora, what if it's not Enora, who is it?

• 29:33Speaker 03

  Bill, how many times have you seen The Brutalist in theaters?

• 29:37Bill Simmons?

  So...

• 29:42Bill Simmons?

  Three and a half hours is a long time.

• 29:43Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:44Speaker 01

  What was the name of the Netflix true crime doc you were telling us about backstage?

• 29:47Speaker 03

  Didn't you watch eight episodes of Gabby Petito today?

• 29:50Speaker 01

  How long, Gabby Petito?

• 29:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so Netflix has this new documentary.

• 29:56Bill Simmons?

  This girl is a vlogger and, uh, and just a lot of vlogging footage. And, uh, and I got sucked in, three episodes. Guess what? She didn't make it.

• 30:06Speaker 01

  Was it rough, was it roughly three and a half hours?

• 30:10Bill Simmons?

  Uh, it was like two and a half.

• 30:12Speaker 03

  So you, Brutalist is too long, but a nine hour Celtics documentary is just right.

• 30:18Bill Simmons?

  Could have been longer. These true crime things, I love when the guys, the killers make the same mistake every time. Like they, this guy in, in the new one, he, once somebody is dead, they take the phone and they send texts back and forth. Like the police aren't gonna figure that out. These people are so stupid. Anyway.

• 30:41Bill Simmons?

  Wait, what were we talking about?

• 30:43Speaker 03

  I actually do want to keep teasing this out of how you'd fix murder.

• 30:46Bill Simmons?

  Oh, Brutalist. No, so I watched a combined 14 minutes of Wicked, Emilio Perez, and The Brutalist. I just, they send me all the screeners. I, sometimes I'm like, I don't know if I'm gonna watch this. I'll watch three minutes, I'm like, I'm out. And then other ones, I'll keep going. I don't have time to watch 50 Oscar screeners, there's terrible basketball to watch. Like cornet talks on a Thursday, I got real shit to do.

• 31:15Bill Simmons?

  But I do want to watch The Brutalist, I just, that just feels like you gotta be in a mood, right?

• 31:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, a mood to enjoy something great.

• 31:23Bill Simmons?

  My wife liked it, I forgot to tell you.

• 31:25Speaker 03

  Did she?

• 31:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Did you like it, Shay?

• 31:28Speaker 01

  Shay, did you see The Brutalist?

• 31:29Speaker 02

  No. I did the same thing you did, I saw the runtime and I was like, I don't want to.

• 31:34Speaker 03

  It's intimidating. It's like 40 minutes longer than John Wick 4.

• 31:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's 40, that's a lot of time. And nobody's riding a horse with a sword?

• 31:44Speaker 03

  You wouldn't know!

• 31:45Speaker 02

  I'm out. I'm out.

• 31:47Speaker 01

  That's gonna be in The Brutalist 2.

• 31:49Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 31:49Speaker 02

  I'll watch that one.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  I'm excited about that.

• 31:51Speaker 02

  More movies should have that.

• 31:53Bill Simmons?

  I would, I would have you give your Oscar bets to everybody, but they can't bet here in Texas. What the hell, Texas? Boo! There's some FanDuel people here, they love this.

• 32:06Bill Simmons?

  Best actor, Chalamet?

• 32:07Speaker 01

  No.

• 32:09Bill Simmons?

  No?

• 32:09Speaker 01

  No.

• 32:10Speaker 02

  Really?

• 32:10Bill Simmons?

  What happened?

• 32:12Speaker 01

  He has not won a single precursor, so if he wins, it's gonna be really surprising.

• 32:17Speaker 03

  He's the people's champ, though. People love this kid.

• 32:21Bill Simmons?

  You know what? Better, better for the career if he doesn't win.

• 32:26Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 32:27Bill Simmons?

  It builds up, it gets a Leo thing going, it builds up.

• 32:29Speaker 01

  I think part of his campaign for this whole movie, where he's been doing non-traditional media, like Nardwar and doing photo ops with Karl-Anthony Towns, which I fully support, has been so that he maintains his cool without having to seem like he's glad handing every Academy member. I like it. Adrian Brody's gonna win, though.

• 32:46Bill Simmons?

  Who's winning best actress?

• 32:49Speaker 01

  Two weeks ago, I would have said Demi Moore, but now it feels like Mikey Madison. She won at BAFTA over the weekend.

• 32:54Bill Simmons?

  She has to win.

• 32:55Speaker 01

  I don't know. It feels like we'll find out on Sunday at the SAG Awards. That's when we'll figure it out.

• 33:00Bill Simmons?

  If Demi Moore didn't win for about last night, she's never winning.

• 33:02Speaker 03

  That's true. Yeah.

• 33:04Bill Simmons?

  So good in that movie.

• 33:05Speaker 01

  You thought for striptease.

• 33:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, I did. It's an underappreciated classic.

• 33:10Bill Simmons?

  Speaking of movies, Shay?

• 33:12Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 33:13Bill Simmons?

  Are we scared about Heat 2?

• 33:15Speaker 02

  I'm scared about it.

• 33:16Bill Simmons?

  There's been a lot of conversations in our circles. This is, sequels are tough, man. It's almost better off not happening than having one and then...

• 33:24Speaker 03

  We were just talking about Dena Thieves 2. We were talking about a bunch of twos recently.

• 33:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Twos are tough.

• 33:30Speaker 02

  I'm nervous, but I feel like you can't go into it expecting it to be bad if it's the guy, if it's Michael Mann making Heat. You know what I mean?

• 33:38Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 33:39Speaker 02

  Like, go into it expecting it to be good. Don't automatically be like, this fucking sucks. I can watch it and then go, that's fucking sucks.

• 33:44Speaker 03

  We should jump straight to, jump straight to Heat 3. Just skip 2.

• 33:48Speaker 02

  Skip 2.

• 33:49Speaker 03

  You avoid the two problems and then it's just like, just finish the trilogy without making 2.

• 33:53Bill Simmons?

  What's the most disappointing you've ever been in a sequel, Sean?

• 33:56Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 33:59Speaker 01

  I mean, Batman Forever sucked. That was tough. You know, we came off two Burton movies.

• 34:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 34:05Speaker 01

  And they're like, oh, mixing it up. Schumacher. Yeah, he's interesting. Lost Boys, I like that guy. The Client, I was a big fan of that film. Batman Forever is terrible. That was, that was tough. I mean, Godfather 3 is a famous one, but we've come all the way back around internationally.

• 34:18Speaker 03

  Oh, my gosh.

• 34:18Bill Simmons?

  International in the movie, eh?

• 34:22Speaker 03

  That guy's about to be right in the frame with Pope Francis. He's in the mix.

• 34:26Bill Simmons?

  What's your most disappointing sequel?

• 34:28Speaker 03

  I gotta admit, recency bias, but Gladiator 2 is a real bummer. It had all the guys in it. It had all my guys. And it just wasn't as good.

• 34:37Bill Simmons?

  Isn't Ridley Scott like 88?

• 34:39Speaker 01

  He's 84.

• 34:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, my guard was up.

• 34:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 34:42Bill Simmons?

  What about you, Shay?

• 34:43Speaker 02

  I think I'm gonna go with Gladiator 2 also.

• 34:45Bill Simmons?

  Really?

• 34:45Speaker 02

  The first Gladiator is a perfect movie. And you just, I was like, all it needs to be is like 70% of that. And it wasn't 70% of that.

• 34:54Bill Simmons?

  I have another 48 hours.

• 34:57Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 34:58Bill Simmons?

  Eddie was like 20 pounds overweight for some reason.

• 35:03Bill Simmons?

  I didn't, I didn't understand why Jack hates, why he was in jail for five more years and then they, and then they just fought the whole time. But then at the end, Kio ends up being the Iceman.

• 35:13Speaker 03

  It sucks.

• 35:14Bill Simmons?

  And it's like, what the hell? Cause then you, then it ruins how you watched the first movie. Where it's like, this guy was the Iceman the whole time? It was giving the, and it just like, it was like a Jedi mind trick. It really bothered me. None of you guys have even seen it. Uh, it ruined, I don't like when it ruins the movie before it with what they do with the sequel. When they go retroactively backwards and it fucks up like what was in your head already. Really annoyed me.

• 35:41Speaker 01

  You think that could happen to Heat 2? Where it would?

• 35:44Bill Simmons?

  That's what I don't want. I don't want my brain chemistry to get, I mean, we've seen Heat 430 times.

• 35:50Speaker 03

  That's, that's definitely affected our brain chemistry.

• 35:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 35:55Bill Simmons?

  Shay, uh, you were early on the WNBA.

• 35:58Speaker 02

  Yeah. Well, I was early for guys.

• 36:02Bill Simmons?

  No, you were early.

• 36:03Speaker 02

  It was like 2018, it had been around a while.

• 36:05Speaker 01

  You were the first player in the WNBA.

• 36:08Bill Simmons?

  And now we're at the point with Katelyn Clark.

• 36:11Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 36:14Bill Simmons?

  Would you say she's the, the biggest under 30 basketball star we have? Or would you go with somebody else?

• 36:18Speaker 02

  Like on the planet?

• 36:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 36:21Speaker 02

  I think, I mean, it's her, it's Wimby and maybe Anthony Edwards in that conversation. But Angel Reese is coming up quick. Like she's, like she's, she's playing a smart game. Like.

• 36:31Bill Simmons?

  She's playing the personality game.

• 36:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's very charming and she knows how to turn it on. But yeah, Katelyn just has like this gravity about her that I think puts her right now a little bit above everybody else. It's unreal.

• 36:44Bill Simmons?

  What do you think?

• 36:46Speaker 01

  It pains me to say this because I don't know that he's the most charismatic person in the world, but you know, Jason Tatum is like really.

• 36:54Speaker 02

  Holy shit.

• 36:55Speaker 01

  Famous and successful. And I'm not kissing up to you because honestly.

• 36:59Speaker 03

  Are you trying to get a raise? What is going on?

• 37:01Speaker 01

  He can follow Aaron Rodgers to hell, honestly. I don't, I don't want anything good for him. But I, I like the premise of the question, but you know, first of all, Jason Tatum, he's only like 21. He's got that going for him.

• 37:13Bill Simmons?

  26.

• 37:14Speaker 03

  Is it actually Ja?

• 37:16Bill Simmons?

  I don't, Ja doesn't play. I mean Ja plays, he just misses games left and right.

• 37:20Speaker 03

  But kids love him. Like, like, like younger generations love Ja.

• 37:23Bill Simmons?

  Shay's, Shay's not gonna like this, but he's gonna respect it. Tatum's got Tim Duncanitis.

• 37:28Speaker 02

  He does, yeah. He, when you watched him on the starting five doc, and that was my favorite part of the doc is like you didn't learn-

• 37:33Speaker 03

  Are we supposed to be talking about Katelyn Clark?

• 37:35Speaker 02

  Anything about him.

• 37:36Bill Simmons?

  We're, we're gonna circle back.

• 37:37Speaker 02

  You didn't learn anything about him. And I said, I, I miss that. I miss that in basketball players when all I know about them is what they do on the basketball court and that's it. Like, he gives you- Yeah, but that's why he's not more popular than Katelyn Clark. Like, what's the Jason Tatum like thing or the commercial or what? Like, he doesn't have that magnetism that she has.

• 37:55Speaker 03

  Right.

• 37:55Speaker 02

  You know?

• 37:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, uh, sure.

• 37:58Speaker 02

  I care about insurance because of Katelyn Clark. She was like in an insurance commercial and I was like, I should, I should get renters insurance, I think.

• 38:10Bill Simmons?

  Luca? I just don't understand that the, when they say Tatum's boring, I don't, I don't really know what that means in the context of the NBA now.

• 38:20Speaker 02

  It means that they're frustrated, that they can't beat him.

• 38:22Bill Simmons?

  Is he not like doing enough Instagram videos? Like, what's boring?

• 38:25Speaker 02

  Yeah. We were talking about Kevin Durant earlier. He's the only player who has like improved his image because of social media or making himself available. He's the only guy who knows how to do it. Everybody else is bad at it.

• 38:36Bill Simmons?

  Well, it comes down to like authenticity, right?

• 38:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:39Bill Simmons?

  So KD, whether you like him, don't like him, bitch about the Warriors decision, whatever, like, he really seems like who he is. Like, he's the most authentic of, I think, all these guys. Tatum's pretty authentic. He's just, you know, he plays basketball, works out.

• 38:56Speaker 03

  Inspiring.

• 38:56Bill Simmons?

  Loves his son.

• 38:57Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 38:58Bill Simmons?

  I don't know. CR, what's your answer?

• 39:02Speaker 03

  Uh, is Katelyn Clark the most popular basketball player under 30? I mean, she's, she's definitely like appointment television, right? Like, if she's going off, people are gonna be like, we gotta turn this on, you gotta turn this on. How many basketball players? What was that? Bronny? Yeah, definitely. Those, those G League games? Me and, me and all the fellas? Just watching some G League?

• 39:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 39:24Bill Simmons?

  Bronny's the best thing that's ever happened to go into a Laker game, because if it's a blowout, everyone stays for Bronny. You could just leave and get your car. It's like, this is great, I'm outta here.

• 39:35Speaker 03

  Do you think it would have been funny if LeBron had backed out of the All-Star game and inserted Bronny in his place?

• 39:41Speaker 02

  That would have been cool.

• 39:43Speaker 03

  He should just start doing stuff like that.

• 39:45Bill Simmons?

  Would you have been surprised?

• 39:46Speaker 03

  Adam Silver would be like, "What can I do? I don't have nothing, no power here."

• 39:50Bill Simmons?

  Before we get to the big thing we're doing, uh, who's winning the finals?

• 39:55Speaker 02

  I think it-

• 39:56Bill Simmons?

  Give us, give us a pick. Give us a finals pick, a matchup and a winner.

• 40:00Speaker 02

  I still think, I still think Boston wins. I don't, I don't see anybody that's beating them, but they're gonna beat OKC in five.

• 40:09Speaker 02

  Sadly. What do you got, Sean?

• 40:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think, I think it's Boston. It is really painful. Shut up.

• 40:19Speaker 01

  It's really painful knowing, having a, like rooting for a great team and knowing that they're what I want them to be, but knowing that they're still just like one inch below a couple of other teams. That's painful. You've been there before. You've never been there.

• 40:34Speaker 03

  You just won the Super Bowl, I'm fine.

• 40:37Bill Simmons?

  What do you have, CR?

• 40:38Speaker 03

  The Mavs. Yeah.

• 40:41Speaker 03

  Mavs in six over, uh, Boston. Derek Lively makes a great comeback. No, I think it's the Thunder. I think the Thunder are like historically good. Thunder over Celtics.

• 40:51Speaker 01

  Did you, what's your, what's your pick, Bill?

• 40:53Bill Simmons?

  I mean, I'm sticking with Celtics, OKC, cause it was the preseason. I think Cleveland's really good. I, I actually think that, uh, they've somehow become underrated and undervalued. The Hunter trade was great.

• 41:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 41:04Bill Simmons?

  They're gonna have home court every round for the first three.

• 41:07Speaker 03

  How you, how you feeling about second row Joe these days?

• 41:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, first of all, we call him Coach Joe.

• 41:13Speaker 03

  Yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean to disrespect him. I don't know where I got that.

• 41:17Bill Simmons?

  My dad's, my dad's getting a little gamey with him lately. Um, hasn't really liked some of the subs. He's come home complaining a couple of times, but, uh, he's fine. It's a hunger thing with them. It's, we just saw with the Eagles and the Chiefs, like- We always forget the hunger piece with sports where the Chiefs, they're complaining. It's like, oh, the Super Bowl, we do this every year. And the Eagles are like, I'll fucking kill five small children to win this one game, you know? And at some point, the hunger piece is a real thing. And then you're playing like Cleveland or OKC, these teams that have never been there and you won last year. It's that little extra something. That's the part that worries me, I think. This episode is brought to you by Expedia. You know how at the end of the season, your team goes to Cancun? Sometimes earlier than expected?

• 42:02Bill Simmons?

  Sometimes after blowing a 3-1 series lead? But what if you went to Cancun? With Expedia, save up to 30% when you bundle and save. You can book the flight or the hotel now, then book the rest later. In all fairness, though, hopefully, your team doesn't go to Cancun. One, two, three, Cancun. Or if they do, you go with them. Expedia, the one place you go to go places. Sign in to save, savings vary. This episode is brought to you by WeatherTech. Whether it's a pumpkin spice coffee that goes splat in your seat, or a weekend tailgate that leaves your trunk full of gear and who knows what? You're gonna want WeatherTech in your vehicle. Whether you call it fall, autumn, or spooky season, whether the mess is your fault, the kids, the dogs, or the weather's fault, you're gonna want WeatherTech. For American-made floor liners and a cargo liner that laugh in the face of fall weather, visit weatherTech.com today.

• 42:47Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. And whether it's a flea flicker or a tush push, you need a plan that fits your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you. So they can help personalize coverage for your life and for your budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. All right, it's time. So you guys don't know what we're about to do. The lamest and most overused gimmick at a live show is to do a draft of something. And we're gonna do that anyway. But we have a twist. We are going to draft.

• 43:27Bill Simmons?

  Sports movie characters who play basketball. And we're going to make a team out of them. And the catch is going to be for the two assistant coaches, the GM and the owner, are going to be from heist movies. And we're gonna build our team. And I swear, this is all gonna make sense.

• 43:49Speaker 03

  We're gonna be here for like, two and a half hours, by the way.

• 43:54Bill Simmons?

  We're picking a starting five, a six man, a bench player who has to be a real bench player. It can't just be like, a starter who's coming off the bench. We're gonna pick a basketball movie coach. So it's like, Coach Carter, those type of things. And then two assistants from a heist movie. A GM from a heist movie and an owner from a heist movie.

• 44:12Speaker 02

  So much stuff.

• 44:14Speaker 01

  This is gonna be very long.

• 44:17Bill Simmons?

  It's not gonna be that long. Shay, you have the first picks, since you drove an hour to come here.

• 44:20Speaker 02

  Alright. Wait, I have notes. Let me get my notes.

• 44:22Speaker 03

  We flew like, four hours. Why does he get the whole drone?

• 44:30Speaker 02

  Alright, I got the first pick. Let me pick, I'm gonna pick this guy because automatically, my team is gonna be better than everybody else's if I have this character. And I don't think he's on anybody else's list anyway, but I'm gonna get him. I'm gonna pick Elliot Richards from the movie Bedazzled. Is anybody familiar with Elliot Richards?

• 44:47Speaker 03

  That's great!

• 44:48Speaker 02

  In Bedazzled, Brendan Fraser, Elizabeth Hurley, she plays the devil. He plays a guy who's asking for wishes. At one point, he wishes to be an NBA player. And she's like, poof, you're an NBA player. The hook, every wish he makes, he get, there's like, a bad part. With the NBA player, he has a really small penis. So then he's like, never mind, I don't wanna do this anymore. But, he's an NBA player for one game, and in the game he plays, he has 104 points, 45 rebounds, 32 assists, 37 steals, 28 blocks. He's 7'6", and he shoots 100% from 3.

• 45:26Speaker 03

  Wow.

• 45:27Speaker 02

  You can't, this is Shaq and Steph Curry mushed together.

• 45:32Speaker 03

  Nice. Foundational piece.

• 45:35Bill Simmons?

  So, you're taking him as a center?

• 45:38Speaker 02

  I'm taking him as a center. Yeah, big men are at a premium in a fictional basketball player.

• 45:44Speaker 01

  Stretch five, though. But not downstairs.

• 45:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 45:52Bill Simmons?

  By the way, I forgot to say, three rules for this. No cartoon characters, Space Jam's out. No.

• 46:00Speaker 02

  See, a lot of Lola Bunny fans.

• 46:02Bill Simmons?

  How dare you groan at our dumb rules that we made up five minutes ago? No NBA players as themselves.

• 46:09Speaker 03

  I thought we each get one.

• 46:10Bill Simmons?

  Except with one exception. If you want, but it can't just be like, I take whoever, Jason White Chocolate Williams, because he was in Eddie playing Jason White Chocolate Williams.

• 46:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 46:20Bill Simmons?

  And then.

• 46:21Speaker 03

  Well, you can, but that's just the only one you can take.

• 46:24Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 46:24Speaker 03

  Right, okay.

• 46:25Bill Simmons?

  And that's it. And nobody from Celtic Pride, because that movie sucked, but not allowed to do that. And we'll go Stank Fashion. Sean, you're up.

• 46:34Speaker 01

  Shoot. I didn't have Brendan Fraser's character from Bedazzled on the board.

• 46:39Bill Simmons?

  He's gonna fire Scout in the department.

• 46:41Speaker 01

  That's a tough one.

• 46:44Speaker 01

  Well, the first name I wrote down is Jesus Shuttlesworth from He Got Game. Which has the added benefit of being a great movie. And you know, honestly, there are not a lot of great basketball movies, which you realize when you're going through this, a lot of great basketball characters. But Jesus was loosely modeled on a LeBron-esque figure, somebody who could come.

• 47:04Bill Simmons?

  Supposedly Stephon Marbury.

• 47:06Speaker 01

  Could save, could save the game.

• 47:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 47:08Speaker 01

  Memorably played by Ray Allen in the movie. And he had it all.

• 47:13Speaker 01

  He had incredible range, handle, good defender, good team guy. His teammates loved him. He had a lot of fun at Big State on his trip there.

• 47:24Speaker 01

  So he seems like an obvious centerpiece of my team.

• 47:28Speaker 03

  Yeah, good pick.

• 47:29Speaker 01

  So Jesus.

• 47:30Bill Simmons?

  You know, it's really, we did He Got Game, I can't remember when, for rewatchables. I just, Ray Allen was just such a one-on-one with his basketball style. Like, I just miss, I wish there was somebody like him now, but it's even fun to watch him in that movie, just like, his shot, the way he carried himself, the whole thing. CR, you're up.

• 47:48Speaker 03

  I'll take Neon Bordeaux from Blue Chips as my center. Shaq, only red flag is that he got 520 on the SATs.

• 47:58Speaker 03

  And misspelled his own name, but.

• 48:01Speaker 01

  Culturally biased.

• 48:01Speaker 03

  I think once we get him into our program and we just get, let our culture loose on him, it'll work and I get my big man. So I'm really excited.

• 48:09Bill Simmons?

  So I thought he was gonna be the first pick.

• 48:12Speaker 03

  Me too.

• 48:13Bill Simmons?

  Because.

• 48:13Speaker 03

  But then I didn't know Shay was gonna pick first. I could've told you he wouldn't.

• 48:18Bill Simmons?

  He's dominant in Blue Chips. It's Young Shaq.

• 48:21Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 48:22Bill Simmons?

  Skinny Shaq. Uh, how do we feel about Blue Chips?

• 48:25Speaker 02

  I'm pro Blue Chips. Great movie.

• 48:27Bill Simmons?

  It's one of those movies that I was disappointed by for like 15 years. And then around 2009, I was like, this movie's fucking awesome.

• 48:34Speaker 02

  It's the, it's the best basketball we've ever seen in a movie. Cause they just let the camera down here and just followed.

• 48:40Bill Simmons?

  And they had all the best guys from 92, 93. They're just running like real games.

• 48:46Speaker 03

  I forgot that Patino coaches Western Texas.

• 48:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 48:49Speaker 03

  In that movie. Yeah.

• 48:51Bill Simmons?

  Alright, I guess I'm up.

• 48:52Speaker 03

  With two picks.

• 48:54Bill Simmons?

  So there's a lot of guys left on the board that I like. And I, I'm taking an owner pick out of the gate.

• 49:01Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 49:01Bill Simmons?

  I'm sorry, a GM pick. Uh, I'm taking Neil McCauley from Heat.

• 49:06Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 49:07Bill Simmons?

  I have to have him. He's gotta be on my team. Why you so unsure what I do, lady? I really feel like, uh, you know, he's methodical. Little Sam Presti-ish.

• 49:21Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 49:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:22Bill Simmons?

  It's like you call Neil McCauley and you're like, we, we need Paul George, cause that's how we're gonna get Kawhi Leonard. Neil McCauley would hold out for SGA in the six first rounders.

• 49:32Speaker 01

  But what is his version of going back for Wingrove?

• 49:36Bill Simmons?

  It's a good question.

• 49:37Speaker 01

  Panic trading Chet, you know, you don't wanna do that.

• 49:39Bill Simmons?

  But that's why, that's why I'm here. Because that's where you talk Neil out of like, don't, no dude, we won the Paul George trade. Don't go after Wingrove.

• 49:47Speaker 03

  If Pelinka calls Neil McCauley for Luka, does he go, there's a dead man on the other end of this phone?

• 49:53Speaker 02

  So the guy that you want running your team.

• 49:56Bill Simmons?

  My GM.

• 49:57Speaker 02

  Is, his whole team dies.

• 50:00Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 50:01Speaker 02

  Except for one, who's holed up somewhere. He dies.

• 50:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 50:05Speaker 02

  And the only rule that he ever says he has, immediately breaks the first time it comes into play. That's like the guy running your team.

• 50:13Bill Simmons?

  I was really impressed with some of his heists.

• 50:17Bill Simmons?

  Put in the, put in the stuff on the, you know, what are those things called? The things that break the tires?

• 50:22Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 50:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Not only the ambulance, but then putting that across the way they, I don't know. I just like how it is.

• 50:28Speaker 02

  He's got the job, alright.

• 50:30Bill Simmons?

  Alright, my other pick. So, I mean, this is a layup, but Fish That Saves Pittsburgh. Julius Erving plays Moses Guthrie.

• 50:41Bill Simmons?

  And it's right, his knee, he still has his knees, I'd say. It's like right after the ABA-NBA merger. And he's just crushing it in real life. He's in the movie. There's a playground scene where he takes a girl on a date.

• 50:55Speaker 02

  That's the best.

• 50:56Bill Simmons?

  Starts dunking for her with slow motion with like romantic music.

• 51:00Speaker 02

  Best.

• 51:01Bill Simmons?

  And, uh, it's just lights out, tour de force.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  Women love that, by the way.

• 51:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 51:07Speaker 02

  They love it.

• 51:07Bill Simmons?

  Well, that, it started 50 years of people doing that on dates. Anyway, he's on my team too. So there you go. Uh, Shay, is it, no, Chris, you're up.

• 51:16Speaker 03

  Oh, we're gonna go.

• 51:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, we're going back. We're snake drafting.

• 51:19Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 51:22Speaker 03

  I think I'll take Billy Hoyle from White Man Can't Jump.

• 51:26Bill Simmons?

  I like it. I like it.

• 51:27Speaker 03

  It's a little bit of a debate as to whether Billy or Sidney are, who's better? You know, I know that like the.

• 51:33Speaker 01

  Played right into my hands.

• 51:36Speaker 03

  But I think, uh, Billy just has that sense of fashion, that flair, that big game appetite. I love it. I would say that, so go ahead.

• 51:47Speaker 01

  So, it was, it's because he's white?

• 51:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's why.

• 51:53Speaker 01

  Billy Hoyle, great character, very inspiring to a young me, but also a complete fiction. The idea of that guy bawling out on the Venice Courts, absolute nonsense. Sidney Dean would have broken his ankles 100 times out of 100.

• 52:06Speaker 02

  I've seen videos of the professor on that same court doing that same stuff, just.

• 52:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was AI, what you were watching.

• 52:14Bill Simmons?

  Woody was, Woody as Billy Hoyle, very Austin Reeves-ish. We watch Austin Reeves now, that kind of herky-jerky crossover.

• 52:23Speaker 03

  And if he hadn't had the distraction of Rosie Perez being on Jeopardy, who knows what he could have achieved, you know? Or just the distraction of Rosie Perez in general.

• 52:32Speaker 01

  The Snooki brothers, right? That was kind of an issue for.

• 52:35Bill Simmons?

  CR, do you see Neon Boudot and Billy Hoyle running a lot of pick and roll or high screen stuff?

• 52:40Speaker 03

  We have to see how my backcourt fills out, Bill, but thank you for asking.

• 52:43Bill Simmons?

  Sean, what do you got?

• 52:45Speaker 01

  I'll just take Sidney Dean, so nobody else can take him. We can close out. White Men Can't Jump right here. Unless you want to take some of the guys they were bawling against.

• 52:52Speaker 02

  People know what he's picking.

• 52:55Speaker 01

  I just think Sidney Dean and Jesus in my backcourt, we've got a lot of speed, power. We're gonna be really hard to defend at the rim. We've got range. I'm feeling good about my backcourt so far. Also, I had my eye on Neil just to make you mad, but you jumped the line, so.

• 53:10Bill Simmons?

  I'm gonna make the crowd mad. I didn't think Wesley Snipes was good at basketball. I never bought the high dribble. Lot of this.

• 53:23Speaker 03

  A lot of his stuff is in slow-mo.

• 53:24Bill Simmons?

  And then when we did the research for rewatchables, it was like he had never really played basketball and they had to put him through like a basketball clinic and I was like, I fucking knew it. Whereas like Woody, you could just see like he had the flow to him. So, anyway, congrats, Sean, great pick.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  I feel like Giannis didn't pick up a basketball until he was like 15. Kind of a similar situation. Quick study.

• 53:47Bill Simmons?

  Shay, you have two picks. I'm on the edge of my seat.

• 53:49Speaker 02

  I have two picks. All right. You don't know how we're gonna defend that backcourt? I'm gonna tell you how we're gonna defend that backcourt. Number one, we still have Elliott Richards, who's seven foot six. But give me Wood Harris from above the rim.

• 54:02Speaker 03

  Oh my God, you're going with Wood first?

• 54:04Speaker 02

  I want, I want, I want Wood Harris because I want a guy who, if he's gonna lose, he's fucking shooting up the court. This is a man who takes winning and losing very seriously. Okay. That's how we defend. They go like, we can't beat. No, it's Wayne Martin. We got, let's lose this game because he's got a fucking Uzi in his Adidas bag. And I don't want to deal with that.

• 54:23Bill Simmons?

  So you have Wood as a, as a forward?

• 54:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Small forward.

• 54:28Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 54:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:29Bill Simmons?

  And what do you have for your other pick?

• 54:31Speaker 02

  I need a point guard and I, I need a, a person who can get the ball around. I need a proven champion. I need somebody with a little bit of bloodlust. Give me Monica Wright from Love and Basketball. That's what I need. I was rewatching it recently. That's a good basketball movie. It is. Right? There's a part in it early on where the first time we meet her, she's a little girl, the little girl version of her. And she walks up to the boys, they're all playing, it's three boys, and she's like, hey, can I play? She's got a hat on and they're like, oh yeah, sure. And she takes the hat off. Oh my God, it's a girl, whatever. Becomes a whole thing. They're like talking shit about her and then immediately, immediately she fucking starts putting them in the blender. Just bucket after bucket after bucket. And then she's going up for one bucket. Quincy has gotten fed up. He shoves her in the back.

• 55:14Speaker 02

  She falls to the ground. Her face drags on the floor. She picks it up. It's covered in blood. And then we cut to her in the house, cleaning it, and she's fucking smiling. I'm like, hell yeah. That's a hooper. That's the only person who can play point guard on a team with a guy with an Uzi in his Adidas bag. That's who I need. I'm feeling real good about my team right now.

• 55:36Bill Simmons?

  Well, you went for toughness.

• 55:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 55:38Bill Simmons?

  Wood Harris, Bud McCall, a seven foot six guy who played one game. Who do you have, Sean?

• 55:44Speaker 01

  Uh, I'll also be selecting a stretch five, another incredible athlete with a gift we've not seen before. I'll be taking Sandy Lyle from Along Came Polly as portrayed by Philip Seymour Hoffman.

• 56:01Bill Simmons?

  I'm putting him in your bench spot.

• 56:02Speaker 01

  Okay. Well, I don't know what you mean by that because raindrop.

• 56:08Bill Simmons?

  I had him on my board. What do you have, CR?

• 56:11Speaker 03

  Uh, isn't it your turn?

• 56:15Bill Simmons?

  No, it's it.

• 56:16Speaker 03

  I picked.

• 56:17Bill Simmons?

  No, you're you're doing two now.

• 56:19Speaker 03

  All right, uh.

• 56:22Speaker 03

  It's isn't it his? He hasn't picked in a while, right?

• 56:26Bill Simmons?

  Did I screw this up?

• 56:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, you went this way, then we went that way.

• 56:30Bill Simmons?

  Oh, after.

• 56:31Speaker 03

  You picked two, then you went back to me. Then we went this way, then you went.

• 56:36Speaker 02

  This is going great.

• 56:37Speaker 03

  It's your turn. It's your turn.

• 56:42Speaker 01

  No, it's.

• 56:48Bill Simmons?

  Fantasy Fantasy's third pick was what?

• 56:52Speaker 03

  He just.

• 56:53Bill Simmons?

  Did you make a third pick?

• 56:53Speaker 01

  I just took Sandy Lyle, yeah.

• 56:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so you have three.

• 56:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, we're doing this correctly.

• 56:58Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 56:59Speaker 01

  You go and then Bill goes two and then you go back.

• 57:00Speaker 03

  My turn. My turn.

• 57:04Speaker 01

  Kyle, cut this out of the pod.

• 57:06Speaker 03

  I can't believe this is still.

• 57:07Bill Simmons?

  Kyle, cut this. No, you go and then I go.

• 57:09Speaker 03

  Kyle, turn the fucking TikTok camera on.

• 57:14Speaker 03

  Uh, I'm taking Jimmy Chitwood from Hoosiers.

• 57:18Speaker 01

  Another white guy.

• 57:20Bill Simmons?

  Great pick.

• 57:20Speaker 03

  It works for the Lakers. It works for Team Chris. It's fine. Uh, Clutch just absolutely nails. He's mostly been playing on farmland for most of his life. So I feel like when we get him into a modern sports science program, who knows what he could do?

• 57:38Bill Simmons?

  It's a great pick. He did quit on his team.

• 57:41Speaker 03

  And came back.

• 57:42Bill Simmons?

  He did come back.

• 57:44Bill Simmons?

  All right, that's a good pick. He was on my board.

• 57:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, no shit. I bet he was on your board.

• 57:50Bill Simmons?

  Now, this is I'm going with guys who were awesome in real life when they were making the movie, which brings me to Hustler from Fast Break, a movie that none of you have ever seen.

• 58:00Bill Simmons?

  Fast Break, movie that came out in 1979. Bernard King plays Hustler, who's like a pool guy who ended up not going to college, but he was an All-American. And if you watch Fast Break, it's just Bernard King just being amazing. So I'm putting him with Dr. J. And I'm kicking ass with those two guys. Plus, I have a team of Moses Guthrie, Hustler, and Neil McCauley as my GM. I'm feeling great. So there's two. And then I'm so excited this guy's on the board. I need a center. He's a little undersized. In Teen Wolf.

• 58:36Speaker 03

  You can't make him your center? Are you serious?

• 58:39Bill Simmons?

  I'm not taking Teen Wolf.

• 58:40Speaker 03

  Oh, okay.

• 58:41Speaker 02

  No, I'm taking Big Body.

• 58:42Bill Simmons?

  If you've watched Teen Wolf enough, number 45, white guy.

• 58:48Bill Simmons?

  Teen Wolf, you know, he turned into a wolf than he did in the last game. He got all the praise, the school rallied around him, they're selling merch.

• 58:56Speaker 01

  Teen Wolf, are we sure he's good?

• 58:58Bill Simmons?

  No, well, he was great. Number 45 is just fucking carrying them. You watch that movie, he's protecting the rim, he's rebounding, he's doing everything. It's like heroic to watch. I don't know what his name was, and I don't even know if he was in the credits, but if you watch, he's like 15, 12, and 5 in the final game.

• 59:17Speaker 03

  This is an iconic draft from you.

• 59:19Bill Simmons?

  So, I'm going number 45. On Teen Wolf. As my fourth pick.

• 59:30Bill Simmons?

  Chris, you're up.

• 59:31Speaker 03

  I'm up again?

• 59:32Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 59:33Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 59:35Speaker 03

  I'll take Shea from Above the Rim. Our advanced analytics team loves this. 40 points in 2 minutes.

• 59:43Speaker 02

  He's 14 for 14 from the field.

• 59:45Speaker 03

  Yeah, just like bombing away from 3 way before 3 and D was a thing, so, Mori Ball.

• 59:51Speaker 02

  In corduroy pants.

• 59:52Speaker 03

  I know, he was still in his work clothes. Imagine if he was wearing shorts. This guy's wilt.

• 59:57Bill Simmons?

  You know, now, if they did Above the Rim now, those would be all 3s.

• 1:00:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:01Speaker 03

  There was a couple of 3s in there, though, wasn't there?

• 1:00:04Speaker 02

  He had 10 3s.

• 1:00:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:00:05Speaker 02

  In that game. 10 for 10.

• 1:00:07Bill Simmons?

  I thought he was just taking like 17 footers.

• 1:00:09Speaker 03

  No, no, no, go back and watch the tape, man, come on.

• 1:00:11Speaker 02

  We studied it.

• 1:00:12Speaker 03

  Get on second spectrum.

• 1:00:13Bill Simmons?

  He was money from the top of the key.

• 1:00:15Speaker 03

  So I have Shea from Above the Rim.

• 1:00:16Bill Simmons?

  I like that, that's a really good pick. And he goes in with your team of quitters. Jimmy Choo would quit. Shea quit. Neon tried to quit. Billy Ollie tried to quit his relationship. You're up, Sean.

• 1:00:31Speaker 01

  I'm gonna take a more recent vintage of player. And the most recent great basketball movie, Hustle, starring Adam Sandler.

• 1:00:39Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I like this.

• 1:00:40Speaker 01

  And I'll take Beau Cruz, as portrayed by Juancho Hernangomez.

• 1:00:45Bill Simmons?

  He's on the board, great pick.

• 1:00:46Speaker 01

  Juancho, need a big man, obviously a bit of an unknown coming overseas. Really needed a strong voice and advocate for his game. And frankly, we need his size on our squad.

• 1:00:56Bill Simmons?

  Need size, unselfish?

• 1:00:57Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:00:58Bill Simmons?

  I thought you were gonna go Edwards there. Shit, Shay has 2 picks.

• 1:01:02Speaker 02

  I got 2. Jimmy Chitwood, great pick, very clutch. There's only been one player ever in fictional basketball who was more clutch than Jimmy, and it's Snake Plissken from Escape from L.A.

• 1:01:17Speaker 02

  He's in the full-court torture chamber of death. He's gotta hit five shots before the 10-second clock goes... Whatever, it ends with him throwing a full court.

• 1:01:28Bill Simmons?

  Just in the second one, right?

• 1:01:29Speaker 02

  Yeah. Throwing a full-court shot. The first... Let me explain what happens.

• 1:01:34Bill Simmons?

  No, start from the beginning of Escape. Yeah.

• 1:01:36Speaker 02

  They have a basketball court with guys with guns all around it. They've captured Snake, they have him in the basketball court. The guy in charge, some whatever, bad guy, tells him, "Hey, you gotta score 10 points. I'm gonna put 10 seconds on the shot clock. You get the ball at half-court. Every time you score, the clock resets itself. And if you don't score 10 points before the clock resets itself, or if you miss a shot, we're gonna shoot you and you're gonna die." So the first one, he makes a layup, easy, but he bobbles it a little bit, so he doesn't get all the way down. So the second shot, he has to shoot like a 15-footer. Now he's gotta shoot a three-pointer. And then his last two shots, he has to shoot from half-court, fucking drills it, and then full-court with his life on the line. With one eye. He's got one eye.

• 1:02:21Speaker 02

  And he fucking drills it. It's as clutch as it gets.

• 1:02:26Speaker 01

  What'd you think of Kurt Russell's shooting form?

• 1:02:29Speaker 02

  He's 100% from the field, dude. I don't care what it looks like. I don't care. Fucking Shawn Marion that bitch up there, I don't care. Let that thing go.

• 1:02:38Bill Simmons?

  He is so cool. He's just such a cool guy, too.

• 1:02:41Speaker 02

  Such a cool guy, great.

• 1:02:43Bill Simmons?

  That's once. And he came by himself. It was 10:00 in the morning, he was wearing a leather jacket, it was 78 degrees outside, and he stunk of cigarettes. And I was just like, "You're fucking awesome, man."

• 1:02:55Bill Simmons?

  Sean, you're up.

• 1:02:58Speaker 02

  Wait, I got one more.

• 1:02:59Bill Simmons?

  Oh, you were up, sorry.

• 1:03:00Speaker 02

  My last pick. I need a wild card. I need a guy who's gonna do something nobody else is gonna do. Give me David from Prometheus, the android.

• 1:03:08Speaker 03

  You fucking stole that from me, man!

• 1:03:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, see? There's one scene where he's playing basketball. He's riding a bicycle and shooting.

• 1:03:18Speaker 03

  He's shooting threes, hookshot!

• 1:03:21Speaker 02

  On the bike, drilling it.

• 1:03:23Speaker 03

  And you know what the best thing about David is? You don't have to worry about load management.

• 1:03:26Speaker 02

  You don't have to worry about load management. He's an android.

• 1:03:29Speaker 03

  Guy gets his head cut off, comes back to work the next day.

• 1:03:31Speaker 02

  This is an unbeatable team.

• 1:03:32Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:03:33Bill Simmons?

  So, is that a forward or a guard?

• 1:03:36Speaker 02

  That's a guard. That's my shooting guard.

• 1:03:40Bill Simmons?

  Android guy, okay.

• 1:03:44Speaker 02

  That's my five.

• 1:03:45Bill Simmons?

  Wow, it's quite a team you got.

• 1:03:46Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:03:46Bill Simmons?

  Bedazzled guy, Wood Harris, Monna McCall, android, and snake pluskin on Shay's team right now.

• 1:03:53Speaker 02

  I'm going 82-0.

• 1:03:59Speaker 02

  What do you got, Sean?

• 1:04:01Speaker 01

  I've got an incredibly flexible roster, but I need an owner.

• 1:04:04Speaker 02

  My man is stressed.

• 1:04:05Speaker 01

  Somebody who I can really trust. Somebody who's got big ideas, who knows how to continue building out a front office. No Nikos in this business. So, I'm going Joe Cabot from Reservoir Dogs as my owner.

• 1:04:21Speaker 01

  You know, we know how he knows how to put a job together. We know he's just a mean bastard.

• 1:04:26Speaker 03

  Is this owner or GM?

• 1:04:27Speaker 01

  He's owner.

• 1:04:28Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:04:29Speaker 01

  And he also loves his nepo baby son, gave him a job in the front office.

• 1:04:36Speaker 01

  Which is very owner behavior. And I'm just really excited about what we're gonna do together. And also, he loves colors, so he's gonna be great with uniforms.

• 1:04:44Speaker 03

  Nice job.

• 1:04:45Bill Simmons?

  That's a really nice pick.

• 1:04:46Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 1:04:47Bill Simmons?

  What do you, CR?

• 1:04:49Speaker 03

  Alright, so I have Shea, I've got Chitwood, I've got Hoyle, and I've got Neon.

• 1:04:54Bill Simmons?

  It's a great team.

• 1:04:56Speaker 03

  For...

• 1:04:58Bill Simmons?

  Not enough balls for that team.

• 1:04:59Speaker 03

  I think I need a glue guy, I need a deep bench guy who's gonna keep everybody loose. So I'm gonna go with Jim Carroll from Basketball Diaries, played by Leonardo DiCaprio. I love the idea of him getting Jimmy Chitwood into heroin.

• 1:05:16Speaker 03

  You know, just to mix it up.

• 1:05:18Bill Simmons?

  Sixth man?

• 1:05:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, deep bench. Another white guy. I'm sorry about that.

• 1:05:27Speaker 01

  By accident.

• 1:05:30Bill Simmons?

  This is D E I. This is what everybody says.

• 1:05:32Speaker 03

  Well, I was gonna draft David. That's right. I feel somehow emboldened. I don't know why.

• 1:05:42Speaker 03

  That's a good laugh, Phil.

• 1:05:45Bill Simmons?

  I have two picks. This is a big part of the draft for me. I need a guard. Right now, I have number 45 from Team Wolf at center. Moses Guthrie, Hustler, and Neil McCauley is my GM. And I'm going to take Butch McCray from Blue Chips. Keeping my philosophy of real-life basketball players playing characters. This is Penny Hardaway. He had not ended up on Orlando yet, and I just want to tell you, because this was over 30 years ago. Them drafting Penny Hardaway to play with Shaq, but they were both in a movie together. Might have been the single coolest thing in 1993. I think that's why they drafted him. That hit all my interest points at the same time. Anyway, so we'll take him.

• 1:06:28Bill Simmons?

  And then, I can't believe he's still on the board. I think I'm gonna use him as my bench guy. But Fletch during the dream sequence.

• 1:06:40Bill Simmons?

  Fletch with the Afro. You know, it's not a long scene, but you can see there's a lot going on there. He's just a force. The other team didn't know what was happening, so Fletch with the Afro is my bench guy. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Excitement is in the air. That's right. It's the start of NBA season. I can't wait to get together with friends, share some Michelob Ultras, and watch Tip Off. Plus, as the official beer sponsor of the NBA, Michelob Ultra is getting you closer to the action with experiences that make you feel like you're courtside to actual courtside tickets. Enter now for a chance to win at michelobultra.com/courtside.

• 1:07:19Bill Simmons?

  Michelob Ultra Courtside 26 to 27. No purchase necessary. Open in U.S. residents 21+. Begins on October 1st, 2026. Ends on June 30th, 2027. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry. Entry deadlines, prizes, and details. This episode is brought to you by ServiceNow. Look, I already have my dream job. I run the ringer, argue with Chris Ryan, AKA CR. But even dream jobs have not so dreamy parts. You know, the work that slows you down never seems to go away. That's where ServiceNow's AI specialists come in. They're like digital teammates who actually do the job, start to finish. No handoffs, no homework. That means more time for the work that actually matters, which for me is talking about whether the 86 Celtics can beat the 96 Bulls,

• 1:08:03Bill Simmons?

  which they could. To learn how to put AI to work for people, visit servicenow.com. What do you got, CR?

• 1:08:10Speaker 03

  I'll take Tupac from Above the Rim as my coach.

• 1:08:14Bill Simmons?

  Oh, Birdie. Birdie.

• 1:08:16Speaker 03

  Interesting motivational techniques, communication style. And I just think that this is a team of guys, like you've mentioned, quitters. And perhaps Tupac will motivate them to do otherwise.

• 1:08:29Bill Simmons?

  Little razor blade.

• 1:08:30Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  Trying to balance out all that white.

• 1:08:33Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's right. That's right.

• 1:08:37Speaker 03

  So I have two.

• 1:08:39Bill Simmons?

  Now Sean's up.

• 1:08:40Speaker 03

  Now Sean's got?

• 1:08:41Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Lot of guys left.

• 1:08:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm gonna take, I'm gonna, I'm gonna slide Shuttlesworth to the three.

• 1:08:51Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 1:08:52Speaker 01

  And I'm gonna take Uncle Drew in the cinematic masterpiece, Uncle Drew. Story of Kyrie Irving, which is a film I've not seen.

• 1:09:02Speaker 01

  But I have seen that commercial and that old man can ball out. So that's, he'll be bringing it up for us.

• 1:09:12Bill Simmons?

  So you're getting a little smaller.

• 1:09:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. Trying to counter all that, all the white guys.

• 1:09:16Bill Simmons?

  Shay, you got two?

• 1:09:18Speaker 02

  I got two for my sixth man in my deep bench. Sixth man, not a sixth man at all. He's a sixth dog. Give me Air Bud.

• 1:09:29Speaker 02

  A champion.

• 1:09:32Speaker 02

  The greatest winner in sports movie history. Championship in basketball. He plays volleyball, championship in volleyball. Plays soccer, championship in soccer. Baseball, fucking played baseball and won a championship. That kid's a winner. Give me Air Bud.

• 1:09:50Bill Simmons?

  It's a movie that only makes sense when you have a kid.

• 1:09:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:55Bill Simmons?

  Cause it came out, I was like, this is the fucking stupidest thing ever. And then you have. Like a five-year-old and they're like, what is, it's like Gone with the Wind.

• 1:10:04Bill Simmons?

  This is the greatest cinematic achievement anyone's made. A dog scoring baskets.

• 1:10:09Speaker 03

  Gone with the Wind is a weirdly popular movie in my locker room, actually.

• 1:10:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, right.

• 1:10:23Speaker 03

  Billy and Chip, which is like, I love this part.

• 1:10:28Speaker 02

  For my deep bench, wait, are we allowed to pick TV as well or is it only movies?

• 1:10:32Bill Simmons?

  No, movies. Don't try to cheat. You already took the bedazzled guy.

• 1:10:37Speaker 01

  You have a dog on your team, for Christ's sake.

• 1:10:39Speaker 02

  I was gonna go, I was gonna grab Jim from the office, because he's a fucking monster. But if I can't have him, then I need, I need a deep bench person. Give me Spaceman from Sunset Park. Does anybody remember?

• 1:10:51Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:10:52Speaker 02

  A young Terrence Howard.

• 1:10:53Speaker 03

  Yeah, Terrence Howard.

• 1:10:54Speaker 02

  Right? Rhea Perlman's coaching this, this inner-city team. They're getting beat real bad in a game. She's yelling at him at halftime. And he plays the crazy kid on the team that nobody talks to. And she's screaming at him. And she's like, is there anybody in here who's not afraid to play this other team? And then they all look at him and they just go, no, no, no, no, no. And then it cuts to him diving after loose balls and taking charges and crashing into people and smiling. And it's just great. It's a great moment. I need a guy coming off the bench, running into people. Give me Spaceman.

• 1:11:25Bill Simmons?

  I just want to say, we've known each other a long time. And you had seven player spots. You not taking Timo Cruz from Coach Carter is the most shocking moment of my year so far.

• 1:11:36Speaker 02

  I don't need him. I don't need him.

• 1:11:38Bill Simmons?

  I just can't believe it.

• 1:11:39Speaker 02

  He can't do anything better than the guys on my team. Can't do it. I tell you what, Coach Carter would not have sent Bedazzled home.

• 1:11:49Speaker 02

  I'll tell you that. I'll tell you that.

• 1:11:53Bill Simmons?

  Sean, what do you got?

• 1:11:58Speaker 01

  Tough one. Got Uncle Drew, lock that down. Jesus Shuttlesworth, Sidney Dean. We're closing out the Blue Chips triumvirate. I need a, I need a stretch four. So I'm going with Ricky Rowe. The, the real pride of Indiana, who is the horniest, greediest dickhead in the history of basketball movies, but who has an incredible stroke as portrayed by Matt Novar, and I'm referring, of course, to his bed game.

• 1:12:24Speaker 03

  Yeah. Why are you staring right at me when you're saying that?

• 1:12:29Speaker 01

  When I think Ricky Rowe, I think CR. And so we're gonna be playing seven seconds or less, Phoenix Suns style. That's what I'm thinking.

• 1:12:38Bill Simmons?

  I like it. CR?

• 1:12:41Speaker 03

  Uh.

• 1:12:50Speaker 03

  Would that go over well if I did that? Uh, let's think about it for a second. I'm for my owner. I've been thinking about this a lot, from a heist film. I'm gonna go with Krista from the town, played by Blake Lively.

• 1:13:05Speaker 03

  I just think Blake Lively in the owner's box is box office. That's just absolutely amazing content. And do I get a second pick here or is just one? Okay. I have no idea what the order is anymore.

• 1:13:17Bill Simmons?

  You only pick once.

• 1:13:17Speaker 03

  Okay, I'll take Blake Lively as my owner.

• 1:13:21Bill Simmons?

  So you're taking Krista from the town?

• 1:13:23Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:13:24Bill Simmons?

  Shines mom?

• 1:13:25Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:13:28Speaker 03

  Shines mom?

• 1:13:34Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 1:13:35Speaker 01

  And who, who's, who's, who's Shines dad?

• 1:13:38Speaker 03

  I think it's supposed to be, the implication is it might be Doug, right?

• 1:13:41Speaker 01

  But I, it's gonna be Russillo.

• 1:13:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:48Bill Simmons?

  I can't believe somebody threw out the Ed Norton. My scouts did look at the two-hand dunk. His real name was Derek Vineyard. I'm not taking him. Team chemistry was too risky.

• 1:13:57Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:13:59Bill Simmons?

  Just didn't seem like a great move.

• 1:14:01Speaker 02

  When I got to Austin, I went to Kirk's house. I was hanging out with Kirk and he was trying to convince me to take Derek. He was like, "The advanced analytics say you should take the Nazi."

• 1:14:09Bill Simmons?

  He was unbelievable.

• 1:14:10Speaker 02

  He's like, "It's worth the risk. It's worth the risk." I don't think it is, Kirk.

• 1:14:13Speaker 03

  It's worth the risk? That's what guys were saying to Nico Harrison. It's worth the risk, you know?

• 1:14:20Bill Simmons?

  Kirk showing you his shot chart?

• 1:14:23Speaker 02

  His shots are in the shape of a swastika?

• 1:14:27Speaker 02

  On the shot chart?

• 1:14:37Speaker 02

  I could not make that joke.

• 1:14:42Bill Simmons?

  I'm taking, as my owner, Danny Oshin.

• 1:14:47Speaker 02

  There you go.

• 1:14:48Speaker 03

  Interesting.

• 1:14:49Speaker 02

  There you go.

• 1:14:50Bill Simmons?

  Handsome. Good at his job. He'll represent us well. I think the fans will like him. And he's got a Rob Pelinka kind of vibe to him. Could see him talking Nico Harrison in a "Give Me Way to Farm."

• 1:15:04Speaker 03

  I have some questions about Neil reporting to Danny.

• 1:15:09Bill Simmons?

  That's one of the reasons we have Danny.

• 1:15:11Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:15:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:14Bill Simmons?

  And then for one of my assistant coaches,

• 1:15:19Bill Simmons?

  I'm just gonna lock him down. Also from Heat.

• 1:15:26Bill Simmons?

  Michael Choretto.

• 1:15:29Bill Simmons?

  Played by Tom Sizemore. I just feel like you need him every once in a while for that. For me, the action is the juice. Like, you just need him in the room for the big moments. So he's on there too. I got him. Sorry, CR.

• 1:15:42Speaker 03

  That's okay.

• 1:15:45Speaker 03

  Just one pick or two picks now? You get five picks.

• 1:15:48Speaker 02

  Five picks.

• 1:15:49Bill Simmons?

  You always have one pick.

• 1:15:51Speaker 03

  All right, for my assistant coach, I'm gonna do Rusty from Ocean's Eleven. Just absolute, like, when the coach yells at you, when Tupac's done yelling at them, Rusty will just be like, "Sorry, guys, don't worry about it." He's not really gonna kill ya after the game. So, yeah, I'll go with Rusty for assistant coach.

• 1:16:10Bill Simmons?

  I like it. Sean?

• 1:16:12Speaker 01

  For my coach, I'll be taking Jack Cunningham from the Wayback, because we know that Jack knows how to fight the good fight and inspire. And we need to find a way to beat 7'6 Brendan Fraser somehow, so I feel like he could really draw up some interesting plays for our 7-seconds-or-less offense.

• 1:16:32Bill Simmons?

  How do you see Jack working with Sandy Lyle on your team?

• 1:16:37Speaker 01

  Well, I see some potential issues, but I'm excited to see what Jack can pull together.

• 1:16:42Bill Simmons?

  All right, Shay, you got two.

• 1:16:44Speaker 02

  All righty. I need a coach.

• 1:16:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you sure do.

• 1:16:48Speaker 02

  And I need a coach who can handle a devil-wish man, a guy with an Uzi, a point guard with bloodlust, an android, and a one-eyed mercenary.

• 1:16:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:59Speaker 02

  And there's only one guy we've seen in any movie who could, I think, handle that lineup. That's Coach Finstock from Teen Wolf.

• 1:17:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:08Speaker 02

  He's just sitting on a bench, one of his players turns into a werewolf, and he looks and he's like, "Fuck it." "Ball up top, baby."

• 1:17:21Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 1:17:22Speaker 02

  That's who I need coaching my team, so give me him.

• 1:17:25Bill Simmons?

  You know, just as an aside on Coach, because he was on my board. He was the one who had the three rules. Yeah. Always get 12 hours of sleep, never play cards with a guy who's got the first name as a city, and never go near a lady who has a dagger on her body. You stick with that, and everything else is cream cheese.

• 1:17:50Bill Simmons?

  An absolute legend. He was on my board.

• 1:17:53Speaker 02

  We're winning a championship. For my owner, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go the sort of same strategy you win. I need, I need a guy who pulled off the perfect heist. Give me Dalton Russell from Inside Man.

• 1:18:04Bill Simmons?

  Hmm.

• 1:18:05Speaker 02

  That's what I need. Nobody dies, he walks away a hero and very rich. Give me that guy. I want him running my stuff.

• 1:18:13Bill Simmons?

  All right, Sean, we're running out of spots. You have, you have two assistant spots, a GM spot.

• 1:18:19Speaker 02

  Oh no, that's Shay.

• 1:18:20Speaker 01

  I have a GM spot still.

• 1:18:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, you have a GM spot still.

• 1:18:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I'm gonna, I'm going double Affleck. I'm going Tom Redfly-Davis from Triple Frontier.

• 1:18:28Bill Simmons?

  Oh wow.

• 1:18:29Speaker 01

  Affleck will be reporting to Affleck in a never before seen doubling in a basketball characters movie draft.

• 1:18:38Speaker 02

  Great idea.

• 1:18:38Speaker 01

  And Redfly, of course, fails miserably at the end of Triple Frontier.

• 1:18:43Speaker 02

  Killed.

• 1:18:44Speaker 01

  Nevertheless, I trust him to run this franchise effectively to a championship.

• 1:18:48Bill Simmons?

  Can I ask the crowd?

• 1:18:50Speaker 02

  That's great.

• 1:18:51Bill Simmons?

  Where do you guys stand on Triple Frontier? Yeah, see, that's why it's on the list.

• 1:18:57Speaker 03

  It's excellent.

• 1:18:58Bill Simmons?

  It's excellent. It's on the rewatchables list.

• 1:19:00Speaker 02

  Affleck reporting to Affleck, I'm back around. Sean Finnis is the smartest person I've ever met. I'm back, I'm back.

• 1:19:06Bill Simmons?

  That's great. CR, do you think you have one pick or two right now?

• 1:19:10Speaker 03

  I think I have one.

• 1:19:15Speaker 03

  Don't flip it on me, I just didn't understand what you were doing.

• 1:19:18Bill Simmons?

  What do you got?

• 1:19:19Speaker 03

  Uh, what do I have left?

• 1:19:21Bill Simmons?

  You need a forward spot, a bench spot, an assistant coach and a GM.

• 1:19:25Speaker 03

  All right, for my bench spot, I'm gonna go Jackie Moon from Semi Pro.

• 1:19:30Speaker 03

  You never know when he could just light it up, like, just absolute great vibes guy.

• 1:19:35Speaker 01

  What race is he?

• 1:19:39Bill Simmons?

  So, you have Jimmy Chitwood, Billy Hoyle, Jim Carroll and Jackie Moon.

• 1:19:45Bill Simmons?

  Christmas franchises played in Utah.

• 1:19:49Speaker 03

  Or Boston, yeah.

• 1:19:56Bill Simmons?

  All right, so now I have two. I really need a coach, but you need a coach too, right? Oh, you took a coach. Who needs a coach?

• 1:20:05Speaker 01

  I did.

• 1:20:06Bill Simmons?

  Am I the only one that needs a coach?

• 1:20:07Speaker 03

  I have Tupac. He has Ben Affleck.

• 1:20:10Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah. All right. So I need one more assistant. I thought long and hard about Jim from the town, but I just feel like somebody would get murdered. That's probably a bad idea. But I really like this guy, and I think he's like a Tom Thibodeau 2008 type.

• 1:20:31Speaker 03

  I know exactly what you're gonna say.

• 1:20:33Bill Simmons?

  Who am I gonna say?

• 1:20:34Speaker 03

  Give her a little taste.

• 1:20:35Bill Simmons?

  No.

• 1:20:36Speaker 03

  Fergus from the town?

• 1:20:37Bill Simmons?

  The flower shop.

• 1:20:38Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:20:39Bill Simmons?

  No, I'm taking.

• 1:20:42Speaker 01

  He's like a Fangio of that movie, yeah.

• 1:20:44Bill Simmons?

  I'm taking Merriman from Dena Thieves. Good planner, takes his work seriously, family guy.

• 1:20:55Speaker 03

  Donnie planned that heist.

• 1:20:57Bill Simmons?

  Merriman, family guy.

• 1:20:58Speaker 03

  Yeah, but Donnie.

• 1:20:59Bill Simmons?

  I got family here, bro. Benihana, just trying to enjoy a nice silent dinner with his family. So I got Merriman, so that gives me... I have all my assistants. I do not... I'm not hiring my head coach yet. I still need a guard, and I still need a sixth man. And Teen Wolf is still on the board, and you know what? Not any longer! So I'm taking Teen Wolf. I'm gonna have Scott Howard and Teen Wolf. I get them both, and we'll just decide game to game if he's gonna be the human or the Teen Wolf. And maybe even during the game, he'll turn into Teen Wolf, but I think it'd be really hard to prepare for. So you just go in the game, you're like, is he gonna do the wolf thing today, or is

• 1:21:42Bill Simmons?

  it just gonna be, oh, he's just a 5'4" point guard that can't triple today? But the other team's gonna be on their toes, so I'm taking Teen Wolf. Chris, you're up again.

• 1:21:53Speaker 03

  All right, so I need a sixth man and an assistant coach?

• 1:21:57Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 1:22:06Speaker 03

  And can we do that breaking the-

• 1:22:08Bill Simmons?

  That would be, Edward, that would be funny for the social video they make where people are like, "What the fuck happened in Austin?"

• 1:22:16Speaker 03

  We can do the like NBA player playing themselves, just one pick.

• 1:22:21Bill Simmons?

  Do it.

• 1:22:21Speaker 03

  All right, LeBron from Trainwreck.

• 1:22:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:25Speaker 03

  Plays basketball. Why, boo, you guys really want me to take Norton?

• 1:22:30Bill Simmons?

  They wanted the-

• 1:22:30Speaker 03

  Sorry for just trying to put together a diverse locker room, Austin.

• 1:22:37Bill Simmons?

  You, you just entered a world of shit.

• 1:22:42Bill Simmons?

  Every, every December, he's gonna be talking about how he needs more help.

• 1:22:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, wait till-

• 1:22:47Bill Simmons?

  Like, "I don't know if Shea from above the rim is enough at forward." "Gotta get a better scorer."

• 1:22:53Speaker 03

  Wait till Kristoff from the Town Talk for five minutes.

• 1:22:58Speaker 03

  "Here's LeBron, here's some Percocet."

• 1:23:04Bill Simmons?

  All right, Fantasy, you're up and you need a-

• 1:23:08Speaker 01

  I need two assistants.

• 1:23:10Bill Simmons?

  And you need a center. I have you with three spots left.

• 1:23:13Speaker 01

  What about Juancho Hernangomez?

• 1:23:15Bill Simmons?

  I have him at a-

• 1:23:16Speaker 03

  You can have him at-

• 1:23:17Bill Simmons?

  I have him at forward. Do you have a center?

• 1:23:19Speaker 01

  Ricky Rowe is at four.

• 1:23:21Bill Simmons?

  He's, I have you as this-

• 1:23:22Speaker 01

  Juancho-

• 1:23:23Bill Simmons?

  Here's what I have for your team. Jesus Shuttlesworth, Bo Crews, Uncle Drew, Sidney Dean, Ricky Rowe, and Sandy Lyle as your six players.

• 1:23:31Speaker 01

  And Juancho Hernangomez, yeah, that's-

• 1:23:33Bill Simmons?

  That's Bo Crews.

• 1:23:34Speaker 01

  That's six guys, yeah.

• 1:23:36Bill Simmons?

  But you got, you can have a seventh.

• 1:23:37Speaker 01

  Okay, so I need one more player and two assistant coaches.

• 1:23:40Bill Simmons?

  Yes.

• 1:23:40Speaker 01

  Okay, I'll come back to the player because I have a good idea for that one. I'm not drafting Kazam, you dork.

• 1:23:49Speaker 01

  I-

• 1:23:52Speaker 01

  One of my assistants, I need like a live wire. I need a real mouthy guy. You don't totally know what he's gonna do.

• 1:23:59Bill Simmons?

  Wangrow?

• 1:24:00Speaker 01

  I'm going with Danny Sharp as portrayed by Jake Gyllenhaal in Ambulance.

• 1:24:07Speaker 03

  Deep pull. Good.

• 1:24:09Speaker 01

  Ambulance, which might be the best movie of the decade. And featuring an incredible performance by Gyllenhaal. And you know, sometimes you, there's a guy who's behind the guy. Who you're like, that guy's gonna get fired tonight because he keeps yelling at the best player.

• 1:24:24Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:24:24Speaker 01

  That's Danny Sharp from my team.

• 1:24:26Speaker 03

  Coked out, wearing a turtleneck.

• 1:24:28Bill Simmons?

  Shay, do you like Ambulance?

• 1:24:29Speaker 02

  I do like Ambulance, yeah.

• 1:24:31Bill Simmons?

  It just hasn't gotten me yet, but I know it will.

• 1:24:34Speaker 02

  It'll get you.

• 1:24:34Bill Simmons?

  It's just one of those things. I know it's gonna happen at some point, it just hasn't happened yet.

• 1:24:38Speaker 03

  Let us know.

• 1:24:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I'll let you know. I'll keep you, I'll keep you all posted. Shay, you got two.

• 1:24:42Speaker 02

  All right.

• 1:24:43Bill Simmons?

  So here's what, here's Shay's team.

• 1:24:45Speaker 02

  Oh, tell them.

• 1:24:46Bill Simmons?

  Benazil, Brendan Fraser, Snake Plissken, Wood Harris. What was his character, Mutah?

• 1:24:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't know, I just, he's just Wood Harris all the time.

• 1:24:54Bill Simmons?

  Monica McCall, Android Guy. What movie was that? Well, oh, Prometheus.

• 1:25:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:25:03Bill Simmons?

  Air Bud, Spaceman, Coach Finstock coaching, and Dalton Russell is the owner. So you need two assistants and a GM.

• 1:25:11Speaker 02

  All right.

• 1:25:13Speaker 02

  For my GM, I need somebody who's gonna outsmart everybody. And because of that, I'm gonna pick this person who she pulls off the coolest move in any heist movie that's ever been done. It's a small thing. It's in Set It Off. They break in to rob the bank, they're doing the, you know, everybody, put your hands down or whatever. They all get, all the customers get down on the floor, and then the undercover cop starts to pull his gun out. And then there's TT, was hiding with it, she was pretending like she was a customer because she knew somebody was gonna do that. She outsmarted them all. That's who I want running my team. Give me TT from Set It Off, she's a fucking genius.

• 1:25:48Bill Simmons?

  TT is her GM.

• 1:25:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, she's my GM. And then for my assistant coach, I think Chris was right, you, you picked the wrong person from Den of Thieves. Give me Donnie, give me the mastermind, that's who I want. I need a guy just, like the GM, I mean, the assistant should be the guy who leans over and is like, you should try this. And then that head coach tries it and it works out.

• 1:26:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's like the guy who came up with like, starting Draymond or whatever.

• 1:26:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:26:13Speaker 03

  Or Igudala.

• 1:26:14Speaker 02

  Like the, like the triangle with Phil Jackson.

• 1:26:16Bill Simmons?

  Did you just tell me that Ray Merriman was a bad pick?

• 1:26:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:26:19Bill Simmons?

  Did I hear you say those words?

• 1:26:20Speaker 02

  It's a great movie, that's a bad pick to, to run your team.

• 1:26:25Bill Simmons?

  It's an assistant, he's just there for the defense. Fantasy, what do you got?

• 1:26:30Speaker 01

  Well, I need another player and it would not be a ringer related movie draft without Tom Cruise. So I'm going with Brian Flanagan from Cocktail.

• 1:26:39Bill Simmons?

  Wow. It's a great pick.

• 1:26:42Speaker 02

  He gets buckets.

• 1:26:43Speaker 01

  Obviously, he's not guarded in that film. He's taking wide open free throws, barely making them. Barely looks like he's ever held a basketball before they shot that sequence. And yet, he looks amazing. So I'm going with Flanagan.

• 1:26:58Bill Simmons?

  $10 a shot, right?

• 1:26:59Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 1:27:00Bill Simmons?

  Well, where are you putting him? Cause you can't put him at forward because Tom Cruise is five foot eight.

• 1:27:06Speaker 01

  Is he?

• 1:27:07Bill Simmons?

  Is he guard? See, he's your sixth man.

• 1:27:11Speaker 01

  He's my sixth man, yeah.

• 1:27:12Bill Simmons?

  All right. That's a good pick. Thanks.

• 1:27:15Speaker 01

  I learned, I learned by watching you, Dad.

• 1:27:17Bill Simmons?

  See, Cocktail's a good example. They didn't make a Cocktail 2 and thank God. Cause Cocktail 1 didn't need a sequel and they would have fucked it up and it would have been like him owning the bar and then we would have had the memory of Cocktail 2.

• 1:27:31Speaker 02

  They would have called it Cocktails with an S on the end.

• 1:27:33Speaker 01

  Who should have played the hot, young bartender, though, that he, you know, brings under his wing?

• 1:27:37Bill Simmons?

  That he groomed?

• 1:27:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:43Bill Simmons?

  CR, you need an assistant and a GM.

• 1:27:45Speaker 03

  All right, for my assistant, I'm gonna go Shooter from Hoosiers to his hopper. I kinda like the amount of substance abuse happening on my team.

• 1:27:53Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:55Speaker 03

  Either these guys are gonna keep each other on the straight and narrow or we're gonna turn into transpotting.

• 1:28:01Bill Simmons?

  How do you feel about the coaches meeting with Bertie from Above the Rim, Rusty from Ocean's Eleven and Drunk Shooter? Game planning it out.

• 1:28:09Speaker 03

  I would love to be a part of that dinner out.

• 1:28:11Speaker 01

  That's Chris's culture. That's what she's building.

• 1:28:15Bill Simmons?

  All right, so I have two picks left and I need a coach. And I not taking Norman Dale because I've written about this, but if you watch Hoosiers, he's like secretly terrible. I don't know what he was doing. Like doesn't, almost doesn't design the last play of the game for Jimmy Chitwood.

• 1:28:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, he abandons him.

• 1:28:35Bill Simmons?

  Jimmy Chitwood was 20 for 21 in the game. He's like, alright, we're gonna do this instead. Not doing him. Pete Bell, I looked at for a while, but you know, he had a point shaving scandal on his team. I can't have that in my locker room. So I gotta go with my guy Gabe Kaplan in Fast Break. You can see when I do the podcast, you see the Fast Break poster behind. I love Gabe Kaplan. He was in Fast Break and Welcome Back Cotter at the same time, which has still never been approached in Hollywood history, Sean. Can you think of a twofer like that? I can't.

• 1:29:12Speaker 03

  It's like when Spielberg made Schindler's and Jurassic Park the same year.

• 1:29:16Bill Simmons?

  I mean, you said it, I didn't.

• 1:29:19Speaker 01

  I was gonna say Dune Part Two, a complete unknown, but you got me.

• 1:29:23Bill Simmons?

  Gabe Kaplan gets the job. He's gotta go to Las Vegas and he just cheats and gets all these people who shouldn't be in college. He does all these crazy things and he's my coach. I still need a sixth man, though, and it's not gonna be Ed Norton in American History X. Sorry to disappoint you guys. You know, man, there's some good ones left.

• 1:29:51Bill Simmons?

  Kyle Watson and Above the Rim, I'm gonna go with. You know, great value late in the thing. It was a little me first for the first, what, hour of the movie? Little, little like LaMelo on Charlotte, just getting his stats as the beam loses. And then slowly figured it out and became a team guy. Set up Shea, rode Shea in the final game.

• 1:30:13Speaker 01

  Like Schroder's arc, right? Where we're like, oh, little two, ball first, me, me, me. And now he's a good teammate.

• 1:30:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. So he's my sixth man. What do you got for your last pick, Chris?

• 1:30:22Speaker 03

  It's just one last sixth man or bench guy here for me.

• 1:30:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you, no, you need a GM.

• 1:30:32Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 1:30:33Bill Simmons?

  And I took Neil McCauley off the fucking board.

• 1:30:36Speaker 03

  I will be taking, this is the easiest one. I'll take Kelso from Heat. The guy who plans the whole robbery. The guy was just like, it's just out there. You just gotta go grab it. So, yeah, that's easy.

• 1:30:47Bill Simmons?

  Cause he invented the internet?

• 1:30:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:30:51Bill Simmons?

  Sean, last pick. You need an assistant coach.

• 1:30:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, easy one. I'm taking Bodie from Point Break.

• 1:31:00Speaker 03

  Is there basketball in Bodie in Point Break?

• 1:31:03Speaker 01

  No, it's a heist movie, bro.

• 1:31:04Speaker 03

  Oh, okay, yeah.

• 1:31:09Bill Simmons?

  You're super spun around tonight, Chris.

• 1:31:12Speaker 01

  It's Chris's first draft, everybody.

• 1:31:16Speaker 01

  Bodie rules, you know, does he live to tell the tale of his own success? Maybe not, but that's not really what we're thinking about when we've also got Danny Sharp from Ambulance coaching our team and Jack Cunningham, who obviously has a long history of substance abuse. So we're just, this is one last season for us. We're just trying to go out in a blaze of glory and I'm really excited about it.

• 1:31:38Bill Simmons?

  It's not a long-term project. Not trying to build anything here.

• 1:31:42Speaker 01

  Joe Cabot, we saw what happened to the last team he had. They all shot each other. So this could be complicated.

• 1:31:48Bill Simmons?

  Shay, you have the last pick and it's an assistant coach. And then I'm going to read everyone on the teams and the crowd can decide.

• 1:31:53Speaker 02

  All right. Well, you know what? I'm a sucker for a magic trick. I want a guy around who could do magic. Give me Jesse Eisenberg's character, J. Daniel Atlas from Now You See Me. High-pressure situation, we're in the playoffs and he's like, hey, check this out. Ta-da. Some sleight of hand magic in the finals.

• 1:32:12Bill Simmons?

  What movie was that?

• 1:32:14Speaker 02

  Now You See Me. I don't like the face that you made when I said that.

• 1:32:20Bill Simmons?

  It's a good movie.

• 1:32:21Speaker 03

  Yeah, lots to watch tonight, Bill. Now You See Me, Ambulance.

• 1:32:25Bill Simmons?

  Now You See Me was a movie that came out in the theater?

• 1:32:28Speaker 03

  Yeah. Yeah, it made like $300 million.

• 1:32:31Bill Simmons?

  It's a good movie.

• 1:32:32Speaker 01

  Is that not on the list for you? Now You See Me?

• 1:32:35Bill Simmons?

  So people who didn't get taken.

• 1:32:39Bill Simmons?

  Junior from Coach Carter did not get taken. The guy from the year up there did not get taken.

• 1:32:45Speaker 01

  Sala.

• 1:32:46Bill Simmons?

  Flatch from Hoosiers, who all he did was go through a trophy case, put a bandage on it and keep going, trying to rebound. He didn't go.

• 1:32:55Bill Simmons?

  We mentioned American History X guy.

• 1:32:59Bill Simmons?

  Louis Scott from Celtic Pride.

• 1:33:01Speaker 03

  Well, you forbid it.

• 1:33:02Bill Simmons?

  Nobody jumped on that.

• 1:33:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, you forbid that.

• 1:33:04Bill Simmons?

  Buddy from Hoosiers, who quit the team, came back and really like became a lockdown defender.

• 1:33:10Bill Simmons?

  Like shades of Dyson Daniels on the Hawks this year.

• 1:33:14Bill Simmons?

  Nobody took the Like Mike guy.

• 1:33:16Speaker 01

  Yeah. Calvin Cambridge.

• 1:33:17Bill Simmons?

  Calvin. Nobody took Andre 3000's character from Semi Pro, Clarence Withers.

• 1:33:22Speaker 01

  Yeah. Chris took Jackie Moon.

• 1:33:24Bill Simmons?

  I thought.

• 1:33:31Bill Simmons?

  Nobody took, uh, the kid from Finding Forrester.

• 1:33:34Speaker 01

  Yeah. Jamal Wallace.

• 1:33:36Bill Simmons?

  Liked his game. How about Odin James from Oh? Was he on anyone's board?

• 1:33:43Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:33:43Bill Simmons?

  But that's funny. Mackay Pfeiffer?

• 1:33:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, just as Billy Shakespeare imagined it. High school basketball player.

• 1:33:49Bill Simmons?

  This is a rough podcast for Eddie because there were no Eddie picks, including Stacy Patton, played by Malik Sealy.

• 1:33:56Speaker 03

  Would you have included Kevin Garnett from Uncut Gems as eligible?

• 1:34:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that could have been, that could have been a good pick. Um, nobody took Quincy McCall. You took his wife.

• 1:34:08Speaker 02

  Quincy was a bust.

• 1:34:10Bill Simmons?

  Strap from Hoosiers and Chubby from Teen Wolf were the big bench guys that I think, uh, were pretty shocked by. And then nobody took Jem. I guess nobody wanted Jem in the locker room. All right.

• 1:34:21Speaker 01

  Go ahead.

• 1:34:21Bill Simmons?

  So here are the teams and you guys can decide who won. Chris Ryan. Neon Boudot, LeBron from Trainwreck, Shea from Above the Rim, Jimmy Chitwood, Billy Hoyle, Jim Carroll from The Basketball Diaries, Jackie Moon, and a coaching staff of Birdie, Rusty, and Shooter.

• 1:34:44Bill Simmons?

  With Kelso as the GM and Krista from the town as the owner.

• 1:34:51Bill Simmons?

  Uh, so that's Chris's team. Fantasy has Bo Cruz at center, a little undersized. Jesus Shuttlesworth, Ricky Rowe, Uncle Drew, Sidney Dean. I missed, I brought somebody down twice.

• 1:35:04Speaker 01

  Uh, of course, Brian Flanagan from Cocktail.

• 1:35:06Bill Simmons?

  Brian Flanagan.

• 1:35:07Speaker 01

  And Sandy Lyle.

• 1:35:08Bill Simmons?

  And Sandy Lyle.

• 1:35:08Speaker 01

  From Long Island Poly. Not the strongest bench in the league, but.

• 1:35:11Bill Simmons?

  Weak bench.

• 1:35:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:35:14Bill Simmons?

  People want to get your guys in foul trouble and see if Brian Flanagan or Sandy Lyle.

• 1:35:17Speaker 03

  That's very tips of you.

• 1:35:18Speaker 01

  We, yeah, we don't second apron Jesus Shuttleworth's contract. It's an issue.

• 1:35:23Bill Simmons?

  Jack from the Wayback as your coach.

• 1:35:25Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:35:26Bill Simmons?

  Danny Sharp, Bodie is your assistants. Tom from Triple Frontier. So glad I got an ovation from the crowd. And then, uh, Joe Cabot as your owner. And then my team, little undersized with number 45 from Teen Wolf at center, but the guy's a fighter, man. I just believe in him. Moses Guthrie and Hustler, two real NBA players. Butch McCray at guard with Teen Wolf. That backcourt's amazing. I think FanDuel just made me the favorite. Kyle Watson coming off the bench with Fletch with an Afro. Gabe Kaplan, Merriman and Michael Choretto as my coaching staff. Neil McCollum is the GM and Danny Ocean as the owner. And then here's Shay.

• 1:36:10Bill Simmons?

  All right, so I didn't read the team. Bedazzled Brendan Fraser, Steak Plissken, Wood Harris, Monahan McCall, Android, Air Bud, Spaceman, Coach Finstock, Donnie, Eisenberg, TT from Setitoff and Dalton Russell.

• 1:36:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, baby.

• 1:36:27Bill Simmons?

  Is that our winner?

• 1:36:31Speaker 03

  I think we know who it is.

• 1:36:32Speaker 02

  I'm like, I'm like fucking R.C. Buford up here, baby.

• 1:36:37Bill Simmons?

  This feels like a hometown verdict. We never had a chance. He already said he was, he was gonna fight all you if you stole the Spurs from San Antonio. Now you're, now you're rooting for his team? All right. What was the most surprising pick for you, C.R.?

• 1:36:52Speaker 03

  Uh, like, probably, uh, the Android from Prometheus. Getting picked before I got to it.

• 1:37:03Bill Simmons?

  That's gonna wrap it up for us. C.R., what are you working on? You still podcasting?

• 1:37:08Speaker 03

  Just cranking out different stuff, yeah.

• 1:37:10Bill Simmons?

  Still doing, doing the watch?

• 1:37:11Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:37:11Bill Simmons?

  Oh, the wa- yeah, the watch? Okay.

• 1:37:13Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:37:14Speaker 01

  We're actually, I'm really excited. It's, like you know, Bill, we've been working on an eight-part narrative podcast series called Pod Slut: The Rise of Chris Ryan. It's about all the pods he does over the course of one week. It's like a follow doc.

• 1:37:26Bill Simmons?

  How many Ringer pods have you been on? Like, over 20? Cause we have like 40. Do you think you've been on half of them at this point?

• 1:37:32Speaker 03

  But this is the part of the behind the music where I'm like, I can do anything. But then Bill's like, we knew right then that Chris was over. Mountains of coke everywhere. It's like, no, put me on more pods.

• 1:37:48Bill Simmons?

  Sean Finacy, you got the Oscars coming up?

• 1:37:49Speaker 01

  Yes, sir.

• 1:37:51Bill Simmons?

  You excited? Scale of 1 to 10?

• 1:37:52Speaker 01

  No, it's, no. It's been going on for six months. I need it to end so I can go to the next thing. But it's okay.

• 1:37:58Bill Simmons?

  Ringing endorsement for the pod there?

• 1:38:01Speaker 01

  Thank you for listening.

• 1:38:05Bill Simmons?

  What do you got to plug Shay?

• 1:38:06Speaker 02

  I'm still co-hosting The Big Picture on the

• 1:38:12Speaker 02

  No, I'm doing, I'm doing the basketball podcast Six Trophies with our beloved Jason Concepcion every Wednesday. Still going.

• 1:38:21Bill Simmons?

  And there might be a book coming out at some point, maybe?

• 1:38:25Speaker 02

  I hope. I hope somebody will give me some money to write a book and I don't know.

• 1:38:28Speaker 03

  What are you doing Bill? She got cooking.

• 1:38:31Bill Simmons?

  What am I doing? I'm just getting ready for the playoffs, baby.

• 1:38:33Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:38:34Bill Simmons?

  We got, uh, the Celtics thing on HBO Celtics City, March 3rd. So, no, don't boo.

• 1:38:41Speaker 03

  It's a great achievement.

• 1:38:43Bill Simmons?

  It's an NBA doc as much as Celtics doc. I really think you guys will like it. So we got that coming. We got some good music box stuff coming as well.

• 1:38:50Speaker 03

  SG back on the Red Sox, Bregman? You excited?

• 1:38:56Bill Simmons?

  And USA, Canada, the most important sporting event of our lifetime tomorrow night.

• 1:39:02Bill Simmons?

  Thank you all for coming out. Thank you for the freezing cold weather and the pneumonia. And, uh, we love seeing you guys. Thank you.

• 1:39:17Bill Simmons?

  Alright, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Chris and Sean and Shay. Thanks to Kyle and Sarudy and Gahow. As always, don't forget you can watch this on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. You can also watch it on Spotify. Hopefully you're watching on Spotify right now. And I will see you on Sunday with Rosella.

• 1:39:59Bill Simmons?

  Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas Star Casino. Or 18 plus and present in DC. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Call 1-887-897777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplineMA.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 support in Massachusetts. Or call 1-8778-HOPE.

• 1:40:31Bill Simmons?

  NY or text HOPE NY in New York. This episode is brought to you by Searchlight Pictures Wild Horse 9. John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell, I like those guys, star in the sharp-witted comedy thriller from Academy Award winner Martin McDonagh. Writer-director of The Banshees of Inisherin and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Set in the 1970s, filmed on location on Easter Island, Malkovich and Rockwell play CIA agents Chris and Lee, who are caught in a dangerous game of secrets and survival. Also starring Steve Buscemi, another one of my guys. Parker Posey and Tom Waits. Wild Horse 9 is being hailed by critics as a revitalizing shot of pure entertainment and easily one of the best films of the year.

• 1:41:15Bill Simmons?

  Don't miss Wild Horse 9, only in theaters Friday. Get tickets now.