The Knicks (and a Crowded East) With Zach Lowe, Plus Anthony Jeselnik on Book Clubs, Roasts, and Stand-Up Comedy in 2026

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Zach Lowe to discuss the Knicks and the Eastern Conference. Then, Anthony Jeselnik joins the pod to talk about his new book club podcast, before talking about his career as a comedian, and much more! (0:00) Intro (2:17) The Knicks and the East with Zach Lowe (01:06:36) Anthony Jeselnik on book clubs, roasts, and stand-up comedy Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Zach Lowe and Anthony Jeselnik Producers: Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Chris Wohlers Catch Anthony Jeselnik on the "Wrath of Man" tour: https://anthonyjeselnik.com/tour Download Uber Eats and order now. http://ubereats.com The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines. 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?

  This episode is brought to you by PayPal. The holiday rush is coming and you can get ahead of it with PayPal. Shop your favorite online stores with PayPal this season like eBay for collectibles, Fanatics for teen gear, Walmart for tech. Check out the flexibility to pay now or pay later and split your payments with Pay in four with no interest, no late fees. Shop now with PayPal. Paying for subject to approval. Learn more at paypal.com slash paying for PayPal, Inc., NMLS 910457.

• 0:39Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. We are also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network where I put up a new episode of the Rewatchables on Monday night. We did Law Abiding Citizen, a movie that I never expected would be on the Rewatchables and yet I kept getting sucked into it and so did Van Lathan and we decided to podcast about it. So that went up on Monday night, really fun one, actually. Craig Corlbeck joined us as well. Coming up on this podcast, Zach Lowe is in town. We had lunch. We said, fuck it, let's turn on the mics. Let's turn on the cameras. Let's go. So we talked about basketball for an hour and then Anthony Jeselnik, who has a new podcast coming with us at the end of the month, Jeselnik Book Club, which has been a YouTube series

• 1:21Bill Simmons?

  for him that we are now bringing to the Ringer and Spotify as well. And that's launching at the end of the month. And if you wanted to see him, by the way, he's doing standup all over the place. Go to anthonyjeselnik.com and see where the tour dates are. He's even going to be in Portchester and Philly this week. So yeah, if there's not a nor'easter. All right, so we're gonna take a break. We're gonna bring in Pearl Jam and then my friend Zach Lowe. The Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by FanDuel. The NFL is here and it's the most rewarding season ever on FanDuel with the all time FanDuel Rewards Club. Every eligible bet can earn you points. Win or lose, you still get points.

• 2:05Bill Simmons?

  The more points, the bigger the rewards you can unlock. Head to FanDuel.com/BS to start earning with FanDuel Rewards Club. 21 plus select states or 18 plus DC or Wyoming. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER, call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut.

• 2:51Bill Simmons?

  Zach Lowe's in town. We're taping this on a Monday afternoon. You were just here. We had lunch. I was like, we have, we're near the studio. We should just tape something. And then we were like, what should we record? What do we do? So we have an idea, but I did dawn on me as we were eating lunch. I have known you now for 15 years, dating back to the kind of heading into the 2011 season when we tried to hire you for Grantland for year one. And I didn't remember what happened, but you ended up staying at SI.

• 3:21Speaker 01

  I chickened out is what happened.

• 3:22Bill Simmons?

  Something got screwed up.

• 3:23Speaker 01

  No, nothing got screwed up. I chickened out. No, it's chickened out.

• 3:25Bill Simmons?

  You chickened out?

• 3:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's chickened out.

• 3:27Bill Simmons?

  I thought we screwed it up.

• 3:28Speaker 01

  I was like, this is this new thing. It's, is it gonna work? Sports Illustrated is this like hallowed brand or like just a very backwards way of looking at, it's not spotting the trends. I didn't spot the trends very well.

• 3:40Bill Simmons?

  Interesting, because for this whole time, I felt like we effed it up. And then a year passed and I was like, that's it. That was our one chance.

• 3:47Speaker 01

  It's not your fault.

• 3:48Bill Simmons?

  They're gonna figure out how good he is.

• 3:50Speaker 01

  It's not your fault, Bill.

• 3:50Bill Simmons?

  We stayed in contact and then the next, the next summer, that was it. And we worked together for the last three years there. But I'm trying to remember, what were, what were the things I told you? What, like the, I'm trying to remember the advice I gave you other than don't make yourself crazy. Cause the big thing was you were writing like, you were writing like two, three times a day?

• 4:10Speaker 01

  Oh, at SI?

• 4:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 4:12Speaker 01

  I, I think your advice was like, so you're talking advice to like?

• 4:16Bill Simmons?

  No, I was like, all right, here's what I think can happen.

• 4:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think you, you were big on just you're writing too much. You're trapped in this blog cycle, like when blogs were a thing. That was what I was doing.

• 4:27Bill Simmons?

  I caught it, the hamster wheel.

• 4:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, and you need to get out and meet people and like spend more time doing that and less time just churning out every bit of content possible. Cause that's the only way you're gonna write things that are truly meaningful or, you know? Then your other advice after that was start a podcast. And I said, no, I don't want to start a podcast. And it turned out to be.

• 4:48Bill Simmons?

  You didn't listen to me on that for like a year.

• 4:50Speaker 01

  I don't think it was a year. I think Jacob, Jacoby intervened and was like, he's not gonna drop this.

• 4:55Bill Simmons?

  He's very persuasive.

• 4:57Speaker 01

  You just need to do the podcast.

• 4:58Bill Simmons?

  I think once we came up with the name, you got more excited.

• 5:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:01Bill Simmons?

  The Low Post.

• 5:02Speaker 01

  It's a great name.

• 5:03Bill Simmons?

  Now, I remember the hamster wheel thing, because I remember reading you back then and you had all these great ideas and then you would have to move on to the next thing two hours later. And I'd been in a little bit of a similar situation when I was on my own.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:15Bill Simmons?

  So I was like, all right, what if he's just concentrating on three of these ideas a week? But then the other thing was like, go, go meet everybody you can. Like we sent you to that one All-Star Weekend where not to write and you were like, I don't have to write anything?

• 5:28Speaker 01

  It was great.

• 5:28Bill Simmons?

  Don't write anything.

• 5:29Speaker 01

  I vividly, there was in Houston, Texas.

• 5:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 5:32Speaker 01

  I, not only did I go, I filled in for you, because you were supposed to do the BS pod with a bunch of players that they were gonna bring in like one by one. LaMarcus Aldridge is the one I remember.

• 5:43Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 5:43Speaker 01

  And you like, you like got delayed and much like today, you just sprung on me at the last minute like, hey, you're doing this in my stead. And I was like, wait, what's happening? LaMarcus Aldridge is coming on and like it was.

• 5:55Bill Simmons?

  I forgot about that. Yeah, you had a bunch of players.

• 5:57Speaker 01

  And we were all, me, you, I wish I could remember the full cast. Jacoby was definitely there. We were all at a bar in Houston at one of the fancy hotels where everybody was.

• 6:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 6:06Speaker 01

  And that, and like there were rumors that Jordan had been there earlier in the night.

• 6:09Bill Simmons?

  That was the four seasons.

• 6:10Speaker 01

  It was okay. I didn't want to, you know, Jordan and Oakley had been in the bar at some point. And that's the first time I laid eyes on Worldwide West. He came into the bar, said hello to people and left. And it was like this ghost had come in and just like vanished through the wall. And I, I was like, wait, that was Worldwide West? Yeah, it was a fun All-Star.

• 6:30Bill Simmons?

  Worldwide West, now a world champion. He's world champion Wide West.

• 6:34Speaker 01

  It's crazy, crazy.

• 6:36Bill Simmons?

  I don't know what happens with that, because I wonder how long those guys stay there now.

• 6:41Speaker 01

  I think it's a fair question and one many in the league are wondering.

• 6:43Bill Simmons?

  Wes and Leon, they kind of did what they said they were gonna do. They took over in 2020. They've been there six years.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  Gerson left. I'm still trying to figure out exactly what happened there.

• 6:51Bill Simmons?

  Wes is, I'm gonna say 63, 64 range.

• 6:55Speaker 01

  Looks great. He's, he's that old, he looks great.

• 6:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I, nobody has any idea how old he is, but I think he's around there. And I think Leon's probably around the same age. And they did what they set out to do. And that's, you know, what is that? How many, what's the shelf life for that team? Two years as a contender?

• 7:12Speaker 01

  I, why is it just two? They're not old.

• 7:15Bill Simmons?

  You know why it's, I would say two? Because I've been thinking a lot about this, because I was doing a lot of historical, I was working on, I don't know what I'm gonna do with a second book of basketball or what the hell I'm gonna do.

• 7:25Speaker 01

  Whoa.

• 7:26Bill Simmons?

  What fingers will work or do it as a pod. It's been my summer project, been working on stuff. And I became really fascinated by that Warriors five-year run and how much it took out of them and all the stuff that they've said about it since and how, you know, they basically played six seasons in five and they played 100 games a year and they barely made it through the fifth season and literally broke down as the playoffs were going in the fifth season. And then you think about what happened with the Celtics recently, where that was probably a four-year run. But if, even if you go back to 2020 in the bubble where they made the conference finals, they suck in 21, finals in 22, conference finals 23, finals 24, and then they run out of gas.

• 8:08Bill Simmons?

  And I just wonder, the NBA is like, if it's a four-year run now?

• 8:12Speaker 01

  Could be. And they gotta pay everybody, right? You've, you said like what's?

• 8:15Bill Simmons?

  The salary cap too, yeah.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  What's left for Leon to do? One thing is like pay Jalen Brunson what Jalen Brunson has expected and earned. Cat's up for an extension now. I do have a feeling all of those guys, like Ananobi's up for an extension pretty soon. Hart's up for an extension now. I think they have realized like there is some value, there is some enormous value in being a hero in New York City and this team works. And I bet, I bet they'll all take, other than Brunson, who has already done his part taking less, I could see them all being like, you know what? That's fair. We'll accept that, you know, we'll, whatever, to stay, to stay together.

• 8:51Bill Simmons?

  Towns is making like 58 million a year.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's a $61 million player option for next year, I think. So that could break them apart. But I do, I was actually talking about this with somebody last night over dinner, like, does it matter at all that they just cruised through like playoff year number one as, that wasn't their first playoff year together, but that long playoff run number one almost after the conference finals year, that it was not like a 24-game slog of overtimes and crunch times to win the title? Like the, the middle two rounds of the playoffs were like just in it, out, blowouts, all that stuff. I don't know how much that matters, but there's a little less tread than some of those runs.

• 9:30Bill Simmons?

  I, I think about, as one of the many things I defend Duncan with as he's about to get dismissed historically as a top 10 guy and I have him seventh.

• 9:39Speaker 01

  No, there's no, who is doing the dismissing?

• 9:41Bill Simmons?

  It's, it's already happened.

• 9:43Speaker 01

  Well, who's going over him? Who's vaulting over him?

• 9:45Bill Simmons?

  Because there's a bunch of people now in their twenties and thirties who didn't see him play, who weren't there.

• 9:50Speaker 01

  Look, man.

• 9:50Bill Simmons?

  And who are just looking at basketball reference and be like, he was only 20 and 11.

• 9:54Speaker 01

  So who?

• 9:54Bill Simmons?

  How was he better than Kobe?

• 9:56Speaker 01

  So who's retiring that's gonna jump into the top 10? LeBron, obviously, but leave that aside. But like Durant is not better than Tim Duncan career-wise. Steph's not better than Tim Duncan.

• 10:05Bill Simmons?

  Some of the people that are already there are passing Tim Duncan. Like I think Kobe now, the consensus is Kobe's better than Tim Duncan. I know, we can't, we can't do this. But Jerry West, like whatever. But going back to the Miles point.

• 10:18Speaker 01

  Just no.

• 10:19Bill Simmons?

  But think about the Miles Duncan had where 02, 03, and this, but you know, he's, he's back-to-back MVP, 03, I think they played.

• 10:30Bill Simmons?

  Was it 03 or 05 where they played the most playoff games possible? They played like 27 or something?

• 10:35Speaker 01

  I should have, I should know this because I just went back and researched all these championship teams.

• 10:38Bill Simmons?

  But that 03 season, he played over 4,000 minutes. He was like 3,100 regular season minutes and I think 1,100 something playoff minutes. And then they also, he did the 04 Olympics. So he went from

• 10:50Speaker 01

  Didn't go great.

• 10:51Bill Simmons?

  In 04, they lost, I think in the Western Finals with the, on the Derek Fisher thing. 05, they make the finals, they do it. 06, they lose to Dirk. 07, they go all the way. And then they kind of started, you know, they, they cratered there for a couple of years. But you go back and you look at that five year window and all the miles it put on him. Like, he was never the same after that.

• 11:11Speaker 01

  No.

• 11:11Bill Simmons?

  He was basically on one leg from that point since.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  But also still really good all the way toward the end, basically. Yeah, I, look, if you and I are just gonna have to do one Tim Duncan was amazing episode every year. If that's the price that everyone must pay for him to remain a top 10 player. Like, it's just indisputable that he's a top 10 player.

• 11:30Bill Simmons?

  Durability, consistency and unselfishness about your stats.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  Don't make us do it, America, because we will do it. We'll do it.

• 11:39Bill Simmons?

  But he didn't, like, they'd win, all I cared is that they won. He didn't care if he had like 18 and nine.

• 11:46Bill Simmons?

  Ever. He didn't care if he had shots. And he's the, he was the backbone of that whole era. But anyway, like, I was thinking about that. So when you go back to the Knicks, like, they have, this is three straight, basically pretty long runs.

• 12:00Speaker 01

  Conference Finals, championship.

• 12:02Bill Simmons?

  Conference Finals, right? Weren't they conference finals two years in a row? Oh, second round conference finals.

• 12:05Speaker 01

  Tips before they shitcanned him helped break the streak.

• 12:08Bill Simmons?

  Right. So if there's two years left, that's a four year run. By the time that's over, the guys are in their early 30s. And I think it becomes less realistic according to NBA history. So, two years here.

• 12:19Speaker 01

  I'll tell you, as a Connecticut resident, New York, I, I, I like to say New York City adjacent. I mean, just to prove the significance of what happened. I feel like I've spent my entire summer talking about the Knicks. Every single person in my life in Connecticut still wants to know about the Knicks. Were you really at game four? What was it like at game four?

• 12:39Bill Simmons?

  What was the tip like?

• 12:40Speaker 01

  What was the city like? Where, where, where were you? What was the vantage point for OGN and Obie's tip? Every, it's just nonstop.

• 12:46Bill Simmons?

  I had a, a Jets fan, friend of mine, Mark Samino, who's also like a lifelong Knicks fan. And he was texting me after the Jets game because the Jets had their typical terrible collapse with bad clock management, the whole thing. And he's like, before the events of June 13th, 2026, I would have been really upset today. But now I don't really care. So now, now it's a date. It's June 20. The Red Sox date was October 27, 2004. And June 13th is now the Knicks.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  That's the year, that's the day they win the World Series.

• 13:18Bill Simmons?

  That's the day we won the World Series. The Roberts deal was, I think, the 19th.

• 13:23Bill Simmons?

  I think we won on the 27th. Yeah. I'm old now, I can't remember dates. But yeah, June 13th is gonna be the day. So we look at the Knicks, one of the things we thought about is

• 13:33Speaker 01

  Oh, we're working now? We're gonna work now?

• 13:34Bill Simmons?

  No, it's a, it's a little work. Just like, I still think the Knicks, to me, I wouldn't say prohibitive favorites, but they are my, you hate when I bet my life. They are easily my bet my life team in the East. I think unless they have injuries, I would expect them to be back. I don't know why they wouldn't be.

• 13:52Speaker 01

  Uh, injuries, wear and tear, backup center situation, not quite what it was. I think they, you know, they snuck in those last week, like, all the guys that they signed for, like, non-guaranteed training camp deals. There were good players like Bruce Brown. They'll, they'll add another guy who helps them get through the season, but they'll miss Mitchell Robinson. But I agree with you. Like, I'll pick the, I'm good, as of now, I'm picking the Knicks to make the finals.

• 14:16Bill Simmons?

  What you said before about what it meant to the city and all that stuff. Like Brunson's hosting Saturday Live this week.

• 14:22Speaker 01

  Crazy, crazy.

• 14:24Bill Simmons?

  What were the odds of that? What, six years ago? What were the odds of the Knicks winning a title versus Jalen Brunson hosting Saturday Live? I think, I think that had to have been higher.

• 14:34Speaker 01

  How many teammates, over, under three and a half Knicks teammates appear on the show?

• 14:39Bill Simmons?

  But they, they, I mean, if Towns

• 14:41Speaker 01

  You think it's everybody?

• 14:41Bill Simmons?

  If Towns isn't involved in the show, he might actually crash the show and have to be removed by security.

• 14:46Speaker 01

  The one no brainer is Hart is coming on within 90 seconds. Josh Hart will be on within 90 seconds. I think

• 14:52Bill Simmons?

  I think Hart and Bridges together, right? Because that's like the Villanova.

• 14:56Speaker 01

  I think as a New Yorker, like a true blue New Yorker, you have to have Alvarado on the show. He's gotta be, he's gotta appear. And so now we're already up to like five guys. I can't wait. It's a lot of pressure on Jalen Brunson. This is, he's out of his comfort zone. There's been athletes who've gone on and kind of bombed. And there's been athletes who've gone on like Peyton Manning, kind of changed his whole post-playing career by like, oh, he's kind of funny.

• 15:16Bill Simmons?

  There was something interesting that happened at the US Open when, uh, Shelton won to make, I think, the finals. I think it was the semifinals when

• 15:24Speaker 01

  He beat Tiago.

• 15:24Bill Simmons?

  He beat Big Foe. And they're just doing the interview after and he's like, yeah, man, I was looking around the stands and like, Jalen Brunson's here. And he talked about it, like, it was like Jalen Brunson is now like Frank Sinatra or Leo DiCaprio. But, but he is. I think that's what happened. I think out of, like, beyond winning the title and now being, in my opinion, one of the 50 greatest players we've ever had because of what he did and the burden that he had. Like, I think he's on that level.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  15?

• 15:52Bill Simmons?

  50.

• 15:53Speaker 01

  I was gonna say.

• 15:54Bill Simmons?

  No, not 50.

• 15:55Speaker 01

  I, uh, so you're a good person for this. I just said this on my pod last week. I don't know if any player's fame level has increased more in one, two minute span than OGN and Obie's ever in the history of sports. OGN and Obie went from like, like, well-known NBA, like, everyone thought he was a good 3 and D guy. NBA nerds all knew him. He's like world famous now. He's on shows, he's

• 16:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I was gonna say football, where you have like the random David Tyree has the helmet catch. Because it's easier to have like a famous Malcolm Butler.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:28Bill Simmons?

  But it, it's almost like the spinoff of that question is somebody that was already doing really well, but wasn't a famous celebrity. But then became a famous celebrity because of a sports moment.

• 16:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:40Bill Simmons?

  I think.

• 16:41Speaker 01

  He's probably more famous than he wants to be now.

• 16:45Bill Simmons?

  It's also crazy, I mean, there are so many crazy things about the Knicks thing, but the hypothetical OG Ananobe. And we have all these NBA players and we always talk about upside downside and ceiling basement. And Ananobe was always like, well, if he's healthy and he can carry big minutes, like, there's no better ring. And it was always the if, yeah, but, and then not only does he, um, he was probably their best player for the first part of the playoffs.

• 17:09Speaker 01

  He was, he was incredible start to finish, had one

• 17:12Bill Simmons?

  And they made the, probably the second greatest play in the history of the league on the tip.

• 17:17Speaker 01

  What's number one?

• 17:18Bill Simmons?

  I still think the Ray Allen shot's the greatest. If you actually, and we've discussed this before, but if you go back and look at, I think he's the only one in the history of the league that makes that shot. He's backpedaling, he knows what the moment is instantly, and he's practiced it for whatever reason, because he's an OCD maniac his entire life of like, if I'm ever in this situation where my team gets a rebound and I have to get a shot off, I will backpedal these seven steps and be able to release and I won't step on the line. I don't think anyone else could have done it.

• 17:46Speaker 01

  This is a good pod one day when we're prepared, is the greatest, greatest. Or, I mean, people have done the, like, the biggest momentum swinging plays in terms of championship odds. Ananobe would be right. I think I did this on my pod, actually. I think Ananobe was was second in terms of like, single play that swung the odds of an NBA Finals, not game, not game seven.

• 18:06Bill Simmons?

  We did this, I think.

• 18:07Speaker 01

  And it was, the only one that was bigger was Ori's shot in 2005 Spurs Pistons, game five, where Sheed inexplicably abandons him after he's the inbound passer and he makes a game-winning three.

• 18:19Bill Simmons?

  Wasn't just that, didn't he have like, I think he had like 21 of their last 35 points or some crazy

• 18:24Speaker 01

  He like, lost his mind. Um, big shot Bob, Hall of Famer, you put him in the Hall of Fame?

• 18:30Bill Simmons?

  Not only did I put, not only would I put him in the Hall of Fame, um, he, when I did my pyramid in 09, I had him like 83rd. Because I think he's unquestionably the greatest role player of all time. When you look at all the different things he did, even if you go back and you look at, for some reason, some Kings fans sent me a long email because they were upset that I had the Clippers as the most incompetent franchise in the history of the NBA.

• 18:56Speaker 01

  Or they wanted their team to be vilified.

• 18:58Bill Simmons?

  It was like, what else do we have to do to get that, to get that? Like, it's like, just go back and look at the box score from game six and game seven in, in 02. How do we not have this title? And for some reason, I went back and Basketball Reference, they have all this stuff now that they didn't have when I did my book. Break it down by the quarter.

• 19:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:16Bill Simmons?

  By the half, so you can go and you can watch. So I went and I looked at the second half of game six of how many fouls the, the Kings had. I think they had like 24 fouls and the, and the Lakers shot like 34 free throws, just in the second half.

• 19:31Speaker 01

  I think it was, there's a, the number in the fourth quarter of, of free throws is astonishing. I mean, I go back and I read Jonathan Abrams' Malice in the Palace piece from Grantland like once every two years. Or not Malice in the Palace, he wrote the Kings, the Kings Lakers, oral history. I just did the Malice in the Palace one last week.

• 19:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 19:47Speaker 01

  Uh, and I rewatched like the fourth quarter now and then, just, I love those Kings teams so much. And that was, it was

• 19:55Bill Simmons?

  You know what the reality was? It's, it's, to me, I feel the same way about them as I did with the 94 Knicks. Like, ultimately, like, your biggest moment of the season. And it's just not incapable enough fans. Like, like, the Knicks, that 94 Knicks team really came down to John Starks had to make a shot. And none of the Knicks fans really 100% trusted him.

• 20:14Speaker 01

  Well, the Kings

• 20:15Bill Simmons?

  Same with those Kings. It was like Doug Christie. It was Turkalu who wasn't totally ready yet. It was Chris Webber who wanted no part of the situation.

• 20:23Speaker 01

  Peja infamously has an air ball in overtime.

• 20:25Bill Simmons?

  They just, they weren't, they didn't have the one guy who's like, Mike Bibby was kind of their only, I got this guy, but they needed the second one.

• 20:32Speaker 01

  And he also got elbowed by Kobe in the face.

• 20:35Bill Simmons?

  Got elbowed by Kobe.

• 20:36Speaker 01

  Allegedly fouled Kobe.

• 20:37Bill Simmons?

  Right. Kobe took him out. Kobe guarded him down the stretch of one of those games too. But, um,

• 20:43Speaker 01

  You go back and watch Shaq and Kobe in 2001 in particular, but any of those three P years. And they have games where it's like, how did anyone ever beat this team? Like, they were just, particularly in 01, when basically nobody beat them ever when they tried.

• 20:56Bill Simmons?

  It's so weird even to watch the spacing from back then.

• 20:59Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 21:00Bill Simmons?

  And I don't even know how you compare eras anymore. I almost feel like, I feel like basketball kind of has to end with the 2010 Finals. And then there's like this new version of it that comes the year after. And it's like this, it's almost like movies where movies have these different eras. Where it's like silent films and then black and white. And then like in the early 70s, the modern movies come in and just feel different. You watch the stuff from, I don't know, pick, pick any Finals.

• 21:29Speaker 01

  It does look different. Two bigs who can't shoot on the court almost all the time.

• 21:33Bill Simmons?

  The 86 Celtics in game four, for some reason, this was on one of the socials. I was like, okay, I'll watch the last three minutes of this. And they had Walton and McHale and Bird. And I think they had a fourth forward out there with the guard and they're just all crammed in. And McHale is getting double teamed. Nobody is spacing it, but Bird actually spaces it. And hits a three. And he has so much, like, nobody's within five feet of him. And it's just like, how did they not realize that that's what you should do? And that would have gotten Kevin McHale or whatever. But we didn't really realize it till like 2013.

• 22:08Speaker 01

  Daryl Morey, unemployed, unemployed GM. Daryl Morey was like, you know what's, you know what's a big deal? Three is 50% more than two. I think we should do that.

• 22:16Bill Simmons?

  You know what else is good spacing?

• 22:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:19Bill Simmons?

  I wonder who, who gets credit for the spacing?

• 22:23Bill Simmons?

  I wonder who figured that out the best.

• 22:24Speaker 01

  I mean, you gotta give D'Antoni a lot of credit.

• 22:26Bill Simmons?

  Maybe the 09 Magic?

• 22:28Speaker 01

  You're going team wise, yeah. Stan Van Gundy was ahead of his time.

• 22:30Bill Simmons?

  Different teams that probably figured out, because they really spaced it out around Dwight. And then they would shoot more threes, but then they would also have the mismatch of Dwight against whoever trying to get the rebound.

• 22:40Speaker 01

  I think the most tactically underrated coach in NBA history is Rick Adelman. Uh, like in terms of spacing, inverting the floor, using his bigs as passers from the elbows. Like he was, I'm glad he got his due and he got in the Hall of Fame. I had been advocating for him to be in the Hall of Fame for like 10 years before he got in. I, I think he's also deserves a lot of credit. I don't know why we're talking about this.

• 23:01Bill Simmons?

  This is what, we just thought we'd turn the mics on and go, well, we were talking about the Knicks.

• 23:05Speaker 01

  I could do movie reviews if you want. I just watched a bunch of scary movies.

• 23:08Bill Simmons?

  Well, you said, why are you on a scary movie run?

• 23:10Speaker 01

  My wife was out of town. Like, I gotta watch all these movies before she comes back. She can't tolerate them. Obsession, I'll just do one word reviews. Obsession, fine. It follows, liked it follows.

• 23:22Bill Simmons?

  It follows is good.

• 23:23Speaker 01

  Scared me a little bit.

• 23:24Bill Simmons?

  Good gimmick too, for just to talk about in life.

• 23:26Speaker 01

  The Invitation, have you seen The Invitation?

• 23:29Bill Simmons?

  Who's in that?

• 23:30Speaker 01

  Uh, no one that I know. It's the dinner party.

• 23:34Bill Simmons?

  Yes.

• 23:34Speaker 01

  It's a dinner party. It's a dinner party. I, I don't think I've ever been so uncomfortable for two straight hours in my entire life as I was watching The Invitation. I mean that in a very good way.

• 23:43Bill Simmons?

  Did you see The Invite?

• 23:45Speaker 01

  That's new, right?

• 23:46Bill Simmons?

  Olivia Wilde, Seth Rogen, Ed Norton.

• 23:48Speaker 01

  No, I have not seen that.

• 23:49Bill Simmons?

  Penelope Cruz.

• 23:51Speaker 01

  I, I should do that one.

• 23:52Bill Simmons?

  I don't know if your wife would like it. She's got very.

• 23:54Speaker 01

  Plane?

• 23:55Bill Simmons?

  Very, no, she's got.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  No plane movie? Or too good to watch on a plane?

• 23:59Bill Simmons?

  It's like a dialogue. Oh, that's a good plane movie, yeah. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. I want to talk about Thursday nights because Thursday night football got even better with FanDuel. Well, how did that happen? With early win, a fast start could be all you need to win big for Falcons versus Packers. Just bet the money line. If your team jumps out to a seven point lead at any point in the game, you'll win instantly. I would do this with the Packers. Uh, whether your team scores in the opening drive, builds an early touchdown lead, whatever you want, whoever you picked, you could be celebrating before the game's even over. Seven, nothing, you're done. Check out FanDuel's early win for Falcons versus Packers, do the Packers, in the FanDuel app.

• 24:42Bill Simmons?

  Just another reason why this is your most rewarding season ever on FanDuel. 21 plus select states or 18 plus DC or Wyoming. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER or call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Look, it's right here. It's football season. You can now get BOGO deals every single week on game day favorites like wings, pizza, fries, snacks. I like all those things. Uh, my Sunday routine, because I know I have the podcast, uh, at night, I go a little healthier on the Sundays.

• 25:24Bill Simmons?

  You know, it's not something I would normally do, but when I know I have this, I want my brain to be working right. Usually, you should try to find the best possible salad place, maybe a deli that has some, some soup and like a wrap. And I know, I'm old, I can't, I can't do it like I used to, but that's what works for me. Whatever works for you, do it on Uber Eats. Basically, whatever game day calls for, you can get almost, almost anything on Uber Eats with deals every week. Uber Eats, official on-demand food delivery partner of the NFL. And you can order now. For alcohol, you must be of legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. All right, one due Eastern Conference quick?

• 26:07Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're into this. So Knicks at the top.

• 26:11Bill Simmons?

  We should mention, you, me and House are gonna do over unders.

• 26:14Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 26:15Bill Simmons?

  House is coming out to LA. You can't come, but you're gonna be in the TV. We're gonna make it work.

• 26:18Speaker 01

  We're gonna make it work. I appreciate your flexibility.

• 26:21Bill Simmons?

  These aren't futures. Like, we're saving all the future talk. The que, I had two questions for you.

• 26:26Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 26:28Bill Simmons?

  The first one is, it feels like we have 11 playoff teams in the East, but there's only eight playoff spots. And I'm giving Knicks, 76ers, Celtics, Raptors, Pistons. This is in order of the odds to win the conference. Cavs, Miami, Orlando, and then Indiana, Atlanta, Charlotte.

• 26:44Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 26:45Bill Simmons?

  Three of those teams will not make the playoffs.

• 26:49Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 26:49Bill Simmons?

  So if you had to lean.

• 26:51Speaker 01

  Who's not making it?

• 26:53Bill Simmons?

  If you had to lean right now, and neither of us are nearly done with our prep and the season doesn't start for a month. But we're, so this is more like a, like a leans.

• 27:02Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:04Bill Simmons?

  Where would you lean for your three that you don't think are making it?

• 27:07Speaker 01

  I'm X-ing Charlotte out right away. And the odds suggest that we should, they're way below. There's a big gap between them and then Atlanta and Indiana above them.

• 27:16Bill Simmons?

  I was surprised by the over under for them, but maybe I shouldn't have been. I think it's 39.

• 27:20Speaker 01

  For sure, you thought it would be higher?

• 27:23Bill Simmons?

  I mean, that team was, last year was, would they finish the last two thirds of the season? They were like 37 and 19 or some, some crazy?

• 27:31Speaker 01

  Both ends of the floor somehow.

• 27:32Bill Simmons?

  Pretty dramatic drop off, but I guess it would be LaMelo based.

• 27:35Speaker 01

  And, you know, I, LaMelo, they got a lot of youth, they got a lot of depth. I think they're gonna be a good team. Like, don't get me wrong, I just put them number one. We ranked of the seven playoff, seven teams that have not won a playoff series in the 2020s. I ranked them number one as like the team I most like to be the GM of. But I don't, I think in this field, I'm a little lower on Atlanta, I think, than the over unders and the lines are. I, I just think they have a lot of questions to answer about. Was their defense, that was a top five defense for the last like 40 games of the season? Was that a real thing? Or was that a product of like a little bit of luck and a lot of scheduling? Is that real?

• 28:15Speaker 01

  And if it wasn't real, do they have to play a bunch of their shaky to non-shooters more together? Because they're their best defensive players? What does that do to their offense? They have like very little size. I'm a little, I'm a little worried about Atlanta, so I'll take, I'll take Atlanta, Charlotte.

• 28:29Bill Simmons?

  They also, they took the lottery pick, who we have no idea if he's gonna help them out at all this year.

• 28:33Speaker 01

  Which is fine, they're playing the long game. Atlanta's sitting there like just watching.

• 28:36Bill Simmons?

  I don't think they care if they're good this year.

• 28:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think, I completely agree. They're playing the long game. They're like, we had a ton of assets. Uh, well, maybe some of these other teams will make panic trades to try to get into the playoffs.

• 28:46Bill Simmons?

  They never got involved in Yanis, right?

• 28:48Speaker 01

  And we'll be the last man standing whenever the next big thing that actually fits us comes through.

• 28:53Bill Simmons?

  Improbable stuff happened last year, like Alexander Walker just turning into a 20-point scorer. I don't know if that was real or not, but we'll find out once and for all.

• 29:01Speaker 01

  I mean, I, I love Nikhil, he was making like crazy threes.

• 29:06Bill Simmons?

  He was like making A-list scoring shots.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  Like off the dribble, corner threes with hands in his faces, like that, the hands in his face.

• 29:12Bill Simmons?

  It probably was real, I just kinda wanna say it again.

• 29:15Speaker 01

  He's real, I think he's.

• 29:16Bill Simmons?

  Let's say it a second time. So, so we have the same first two. I had the most questions about those two and so does FanDuel and so does, uh, the betting public. Cause they are not in the top nine. So who's your third then? Go ahead, just say it. I know, I know who you're worried about.

• 29:33Speaker 01

  This, it, it's hard. I'm gonna say.

• 29:38Speaker 01

  Oh, boy.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  Oh, boy.

• 29:41Bill Simmons?

  So it's, is it, can, is it fair to say it's down between Miami, Orlando and Indiana?

• 29:47Speaker 01

  I would, I would put more teams in the list.

• 29:50Bill Simmons?

  Put more? Would you put Detroit in there?

• 29:51Speaker 01

  I think someone, no, I think Detroit, well, we gotta see what happens with Dern. Like, the fact that they did a Sar Thompson before Dern and on a timetable like where, like, I don't know if Dern was even close last year when he was in a Sar's boat of like going into your fourth year versus now he's done with his fourth year. That's an interesting one. I still expect that deal to get the.

• 30:10Bill Simmons?

  It was interesting that Thompson's, one got 50 million more than the other.

• 30:13Speaker 01

  Well, Amen, Amen has been better. I mean, Amen averaged 18 points a game last year.

• 30:17Bill Simmons?

  But I wonder if that, I wonder what that's like with the brothers. Obviously, they're twin brothers, they're on each other's team.

• 30:21Speaker 01

  You know, it would be, you know, I would hope, I would hope that it would be like, we just got almost $400 million guaranteed to us. Like, we're good, should we buy a house together?

• 30:30Bill Simmons?

  Well, you only have one kid, I have two. I was trying to figure out how I'd manage the egos of that with, those were my two kids. And it's like, Amen got 205, Osar got 155.

• 30:43Speaker 01

  Maybe they can do like, didn't the Morris twins just have one big, they just had like one bank account? Or like one, they, they, they considered it as like, we collectively made whatever amount of money?

• 30:52Bill Simmons?

  You guys made $360 million guaranteed.

• 30:55Speaker 01

  Share it.

• 30:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you guys are good.

• 30:57Speaker 01

  But this is what, anyway, uh, I will say, I, I do think one of these teams toward the top seven is going to underperform because of injuries or randomness. The safe pick is Orlando. I will say Orlando for now. I just have enough questions about their offense and just the sort of, it makes me nervous when teams are going into a season knowing, like, if this doesn't work, someone is getting traded. Like, just the financial reality is someone's getting traded. And so I, I, I'm a little nervous about that, but I also think Orlando.

• 31:30Bill Simmons?

  New coach.

• 31:30Speaker 01

  I, I think he's a good coach. I think Sean Smith is a good coach. I also think Orlando, I've said this before, it's like being slept on as a top six candidate. So I guess I'm speaking out of both sides of my mouth. I don't know, but if you're forcing me to pick, I pick, I'm picking Orlando. I think Detroit has too much like built-in infrastructure to fall that far.

• 31:47Bill Simmons?

  I don't understand the Dern thing at all. It, it like, it feels like a real stalemate on what each side thinks the person is worth. But I think if you ask the general consensus of people who are smart, who follow the league like us, I would say it's a huge mistake to pay any center $40 million and up a year unless it's Jokic or somebody like on that level.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  So what would you do?

• 32:16Bill Simmons?

  I like, I don't know, the Sacramento thing, Sacramento loves me.

• 32:20Speaker 01

  I love, that's, that's become one of my favorite, you know.

• 32:24Bill Simmons?

  They, they, they're winking at me again.

• 32:26Speaker 01

  These reports, it's like, why do I have to take what these agents are telling me, hook, line and sinker? Like, just for the scoop, like, just to say, he's got max offers already out there, like, okay, maybe, maybe he does, I don't know, like, fine, who cares?

• 32:41Bill Simmons?

  This is like the classic Daryl Morey move of, where in this case, he did have the max offer with Harden.

• 32:49Bill Simmons?

  Where the teams, it's like, oh, you know Harden's agent, it's like, yeah, okay, so he's stuck at four for 50, and it's like, Hughes with us, that's five for 80, no question. We'd ma, we'd max him out, and now you plant that in the agent's ear, and he's like, I mean, Houston would pay us that, and now you're, so I feel like teams are, teams are seeding that.

• 33:09Speaker 01

  Let's game it out, like, let's, let's go back like two months to, to pretend like there's a little, or, a month and a half to pretend that there's a little more like flexibility among the other 29 teams, who now have their rosters mostly filled, etc. You could pay Jalen, earn 40 million dollars a year, which it seems like is gonna happen, because even the reports of them being apart are like, they're now just like 10 million apart over five years.

• 33:34Bill Simmons?

  They're at 190 and he's at 40 a year, so yeah.

• 33:37Speaker 01

  You're basically there.

• 33:38Bill Simmons?

  They'll figure that out.

• 33:38Speaker 01

  Uh, B, dare him to take the qualifying offer, I think the deadline for that is October 1st, where he has to take it, or not.

• 33:46Bill Simmons?

  You know why I'm rooting against that?

• 33:48Speaker 01

  Why?

• 33:49Bill Simmons?

  Because I want Cooper Flag to be the first person ever to do that.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  Okay, you know, you're really, you're open about this.

• 33:56Speaker 01

  Because he's from New England, that's it, and he's a Celtics fan, you're just that soft, just soft-hearted?

• 34:01Bill Simmons?

  He's from New England?

• 34:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:03Bill Simmons?

  That's what, how you're gonna phrase it?

• 34:05Speaker 01

  From Maine.

• 34:06Bill Simmons?

  First of all, his family is the first family of Maine, like, screw the Bushes and Ken and Bugport, it's the Flags now.

• 34:13Speaker 01

  Okay, I didn't, I didn't know you were this passionate about Maine.

• 34:16Bill Simmons?

  86 Celtic fans on my level, playing on the way to practice DVDs of the 86 Celtic games, this is like, the Celtics family.

• 34:26Speaker 01

  You just got legitimately upset at me, I think.

• 34:29Bill Simmons?

  I just like, this is, this would be like if my son was, was Cooper Flag. It'd be like, yeah, we'll see what happens with that Dallas qualifying offer.

• 34:37Speaker 01

  If your son were.

• 34:38Bill Simmons?

  The moment I could get him to the Celtics.

• 34:39Speaker 01

  If your son were Cooper Flag, you'd already be investigated by, by Wachtel, Lipton, Rosenthal, and Katz.

• 34:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I'd be Uncle Dennis.

• 34:46Speaker 01

  It's like, the deal.

• 34:47Bill Simmons?

  I'd be Fatherville.

• 34:48Speaker 01

  There'd be a paper trail of like you emailing, just unsolicited emails to Brad Stevens, being like, just telling you, Brad, like, I know you're not gonna reply to this email, but.

• 34:57Bill Simmons?

  Pablo's texting me, hey, it's Pablo Torre, can we talk?

• 35:00Speaker 01

  We'll come for the minimum.

• 35:03Bill Simmons?

  Listen, man, it's, don't count us out, don't count us out with Cooper.

• 35:07Speaker 01

  Would you sign and trade Durin, would that be your move?

• 35:10Bill Simmons?

  I would, I would, I don't, I think once, when you're paying your center in this, whatever this salary cap system is, over 40 million dollars a year, on top of Thompson and Cade, I don't, you're not winning the title with that.

• 35:22Speaker 01

  So Thompson taking.

• 35:23Bill Simmons?

  Those are your moves, that's your team.

• 35:25Speaker 01

  So Thompson taking a deal, I don't have, you sprung this on me, it's on my laptop, but it, it's a percentage of the salary cap where it's like viable for the three of them to get paid, if they get Durin at like 40, or 38, or 37.

• 35:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, no, it all makes sense financially, but.

• 35:40Speaker 01

  Flexibility.

• 35:41Bill Simmons?

  But what's your team at that point?

• 35:42Speaker 01

  So, okay, so, here's the counter, and I get, I get what you're saying, and I think it's actually maybe the smartest course to take, I don't know, but you do need a center, like, you need some center long-term to pair with Cade.

• 35:57Bill Simmons?

  And, and he, he pairs with them about as well as you're gonna get, but.

• 36:01Speaker 01

  The playoffs were not good.

• 36:02Bill Simmons?

  Not for 42 million a year.

• 36:05Speaker 01

  He's either 22 or barely 23.

• 36:07Bill Simmons?

  He's almost 23.

• 36:10Speaker 01

  And Cade.

• 36:11Bill Simmons?

  And he's gotten, and he's gotten better.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  And Cade loves him, like, they're very close.

• 36:14Bill Simmons?

  He's gotten better, he's worked on stuff, he's improved every year.

• 36:18Speaker 01

  So I just think like, again, it might be the right move, right, because you trade him, flashback two months ago, you trade him, you get, let's just make it up, a decent player, three first-round picks in a swap, something like that, then you have to then parlay, it's like the Celtics with the Jalen Brown, Paul George trades, like, it's the next move that is gonna define whether the controversial move is the right move or not, and so you have to actually make the next move, and it's, I think harder, I think a lot of GMs would be risk averse and say like, I don't know if I can make that next move and get me something that fits at least as well as this, which, yeah, the playoffs are ugly, we won 60 games last year.

• 36:58Bill Simmons?

  I don't know if anyone's winning a title paying a non-impact center, he's an impact center, but you know what I mean, like a superstar.

• 37:05Speaker 01

  In the playoffs, he wasn't, I mean, let's be honest, he wasn't.

• 37:09Bill Simmons?

  The other thing is, Shingun is like 30?

• 37:12Speaker 01

  A year?

• 37:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, something like that.

• 37:14Speaker 01

  It's a little more than that, I think, no, it is about, it is about that, yeah.

• 37:16Bill Simmons?

  30, low 30s, I just think that's the price for the non-Jokic centers, for me.

• 37:22Speaker 01

  Would you, who would you rather have for the next five years, Shingun or Durin?

• 37:26Bill Simmons?

  If I were them and I could flip Durin for Shingun, I would think about it, because I'd, I'd just rather, I feel like they're at the same level and I'm just saving money. I, I would, if I ran a team, I would be so obsessed with this cap and how to do this correctly, because one mistake, you're setback for three years.

• 37:43Speaker 01

  Because Shingun is like, they're not really similar players, but just in terms of like,

• 37:47Bill Simmons?

  Not at all.

• 37:48Speaker 01

  The percentage of the cap that has now been devoted to them by young, up and coming teams, although Houston is like half young, half not, is somewhat similar, and they both have these sort of like, Shingun is not really a three-point shooter, although he's dabbled, Durin is not at all.

• 38:03Bill Simmons?

  Well, Shingun is a rough defender.

• 38:05Speaker 01

  Shingun is not a rim protector, Durin, that's the, that's the wild card, is Durin's defense, can he become a top five defensive center, a top six defensive center in the NBA, Shingun will never be.

• 38:16Bill Simmons?

  Aren't there complicated, uh, advanced stats on that with Durin?

• 38:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's, his numbers are all over the place, like, some of his rim protection numbers trend well, some don't, I think he's just okay right now in totality, but the body type and just the athleticism is so enticing in a way that Shingun will never have, but Shingun also like as a passer, as a post-up threat is on a completely different level.

• 38:39Bill Simmons?

  And it's also, I mean, Shingun didn't play with a point guard last year, I'm pretty sure point guards matter still, that's one of my working theories in 2026.

• 38:47Speaker 01

  It's one of your great, it's one of your great theories, but, so, this is what, we were talking about the East and who's falling out, right?

• 38:53Bill Simmons?

  Well, wait a second, one last thing on Shingun.

• 39:00Bill Simmons?

  Trying to think of him and Cade together.

• 39:03Bill Simmons?

  See, the one thing with Durin, I thought, I really felt like he gave them a lot of their fuck you last year in a good way. But he, you know, he really, it's just a badass game to game, really, really competitive, and I do think that was a big part of why they won 60 games.

• 39:16Speaker 01

  He's super physical.

• 39:18Bill Simmons?

  I just don't understand what happened to him in the playoffs, and I almost wish he could, like, even if he gave a press conference and he's like, I put so much pressure on myself with this new contract coming that I cratered in the playoffs, and that was what happened, I'd be like, okay, it's an acceptable explanation.

• 39:32Speaker 01

  He's so young that I'm willing to just be like, the pressure of the moment, teams scheming for him a little bit more, like, in that first-round series against Orlando, Orlando's just entire game plan was, we're taking him out of the series, we're taking the Cade-Durin pick and roll out of the series, we're switching everything, we don't care who that leaves on Cade, if it's an unfavorable matchup, we're just not letting him roll to the basket unimpeded, and I think that just fucked with him.

• 39:56Bill Simmons?

  Who was the team that was kinda undercutting him on the alley-oops?

• 40:00Speaker 01

  Probably Orlando, I mean, yeah, because they were going under screens on Cade and trying to switch underneath Durin to prevent him from.

• 40:07Bill Simmons?

  They were basically trying to make him, yeah, it was Orlando, they're trying to make him just think about it as he was going up in the air, and it did seem like it fucked with them a little bit.

• 40:17Speaker 01

  And they still made it to game seven of the second round against the Nuggets.

• 40:21Bill Simmons?

  The reality is, they're gonna pay him, it'll, they'll, they'll get, he'll be one, between 195 and 200, they'll probably settle in the middle.

• 40:27Speaker 01

  I've been like 98% certain that, like, every podcast I do, I'm like, look, he's gonna sign with the Pistons, the closer this gets, the more I'm like, maybe something funky is actually gonna happen, I don't know, I still expect them to pay him, I think you're right.

• 40:37Bill Simmons?

  If they could get Sabonis and like,

• 40:40Speaker 01

  They don't want Sabonis.

• 40:41Bill Simmons?

  Future Kings pick, no, I'm just trying to think of, but then that just sets you back for where you are now, and then Cade's like, I love playing with that guy, why'd you trade him?

• 40:48Speaker 01

  Sabonis is good, Sabonis is good, I just don't, I don't think.

• 40:51Bill Simmons?

  As you know, I would have traded for him already.

• 40:54Speaker 01

  Sabonis?

• 40:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, not for Detroit, but just, Sabonis has been out there in the front of the store with the 50% off sign for seven months. And it's like, Sabonis rebounds, you can run offense through him, he's played in big games, he has some deficiencies and he's a little overpaid, but there's only, I think, two years left on the deal.

• 41:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:14Bill Simmons?

  Like, I thought the Clippers should have gotten him.

• 41:17Speaker 01

  Clippers, it was gonna be interesting to see once this all settles down, and particularly like once the season starts and teams, teams start going different directions than they anticipated, who's worse than, who's better?

• 41:28Bill Simmons?

  And they have other expirings.

• 41:29Speaker 01

  And they've got the expirings, they're like, fuck it, we'll take Anthony Davis, we'll take whoever, like, I'm just, we'll take Sabonis, we'll take whatever, whatever, we'll, we'll, we'll extend him, because what else are we gonna do?

• 41:39Bill Simmons?

  You didn't report this.

• 41:41Speaker 01

  No.

• 41:42Bill Simmons?

  Anthony Davis and the Wizards have delayed their extension talks. That was reported a couple days ago.

• 41:49Speaker 01

  Was it really? I missed that.

• 41:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I read that on the ticker.

• 41:51Speaker 01

  Can you delay the things that are already delayed? Is there like a delay on top of a delay?

• 41:55Bill Simmons?

  What we found out is, something can be delayed that had no chance of happening, was my interpretation of that.

• 42:02Speaker 01

  It's like when your flight is delayed two hours, but I've, I'm, I'm gonna say I'm not above going up to the counter and, if I'm at the gate and being like, just level with me.

• 42:12Bill Simmons?

  Just be, yeah, just be a nice guy.

• 42:13Speaker 01

  Is this like a fake two hours, or is this like a?

• 42:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, like, should I go get a beer and a burger? Like, what are we talking?

• 42:19Speaker 01

  Should I prepare to get a car ride home? Like, what's happening here? What's really happening?

• 42:22Bill Simmons?

  Did we ever figure out why Dallas traded Anthony Davis? Why'd they trade him? He's, it seems like he immediately had more value than for what they traded him for, from the moment they traded him, why not just keep him and wait for the summer?

• 42:35Speaker 01

  Right, where they got two crappy picks, they got.

• 42:37Bill Simmons?

  They had nothing, they had fucking beyond the poo poo platter, it was like yesterday's poo poo platter that was in the freezer.

• 42:43Speaker 01

  I think, they did get a couple assets, like some tradable goodies, whatever, then they got,

• 42:48Bill Simmons?

  It's a terrible trade.

• 42:49Speaker 01

  They got off a guy who doesn't play and wants 55 million dollars to whatever million dollars a year.

• 42:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but they didn't have to pay, it's not like they were forced to pay him that.

• 42:58Speaker 01

  Look, I agree.

• 42:58Bill Simmons?

  I would have kept him for the summer and waited for somebody like Golden State to be like, shit, we might be able to get LeBron if we also get Davis.

• 43:04Speaker 01

  It's, it's a good point, it's a good point, I think it was a, we've just gotta turn the page.

• 43:09Bill Simmons?

  Last couple of years are almost making me wonder if Dallas doesn't know what they're doing.

• 43:13Speaker 01

  They have, they have a new regime now, so.

• 43:16Bill Simmons?

  All right, so you have Orlando as your third playoff team?

• 43:18Speaker 01

  Third missed, missed the playoffs, if I, if I had to pick, but I'm not, I don't feel confident about that. I feel confident in Charlotte and I feel pretty confident in Atlanta, I don't feel confident in Orlando, that's the line for me.

• 43:30Bill Simmons?

  I think I would take Miami as the third team.

• 43:35Bill Simmons?

  I don't really love the stuff they did this summer. And right as I was like, I don't really love what you did this summer, other than getting Giannis. Then they did the Pelle Larson extension and I was like, man, you did. The Jovic one last year, that was awful. I don't know who they thought they were bidding against for that contract. That was, I still haven't seen him play three games in a row that I liked. But then the Larson, who I liked Larson last year. I just don't know in this market where things have gone, who's getting these contracts? These are contracts we were handing out 10 years ago. Why are you paying people 15, 16, 17 million with this new market where every summer now there's going to be guys available? Like Anthony Simons for six.

• 44:20Bill Simmons?

  Why are you paying 16 and why are you locking yourself in a, you're not winning the title? I just don't get shit like that.

• 44:27Speaker 01

  Is this like a reverse, reverse jinx where you're so scared of Miami and the zombie heat that you're trying to bury them early?

• 44:33Bill Simmons?

  Not scared of Miami at all.

• 44:35Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 44:35Bill Simmons?

  Really not. I don't, I don't, nobody's been able to explain to me how Bam Adebayo and Giannis are going to successfully play offense together. Still waiting to see somebody break that down.

• 44:45Speaker 01

  On Pelle Larson.

• 44:48Speaker 01

  I think he was going to start before they got Klay.

• 44:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 44:52Speaker 01

  They love him in a way that I don't think they ever have loved Jovic, like they really believe in him. And yet I was still surprised at the deal. Like would that, I, I just thought if they could get him for 11, 12 million a year, maybe, but like at basically the mid level. I was a little surprised. I think he'll.

• 45:11Bill Simmons?

  It would have been a good game show if like we just did a Zoom and you called me and like, Pelle Larson extension's in, any guesses? And I would have been like.

• 45:19Bill Simmons?

  Three for 25? Higher.

• 45:23Bill Simmons?

  Three for 29? Higher. We just would have been going for like an hour. It would be like, three for 50? Higher. Like what?

• 45:31Speaker 01

  Four for 60. Yeah. I mean, look, the Heat.

• 45:36Speaker 01

  Giannis and Bam, they do overlap a lot. It's the number one question on their team. How is this going to work? The number two question is they have acquired a lot of shooting, but none of it is pull up shooting really. I think they're going to struggle in that sense. I just trust.

• 45:48Bill Simmons?

  Who's playing defense on this team?

• 45:50Speaker 01

  Giannis, Bam, Davion Mitchell.

• 45:53Bill Simmons?

  Who's guarding Jason Tatum?

• 45:54Speaker 01

  Andrew Wiggins.

• 45:55Bill Simmons?

  Andrew Wiggins. Okay.

• 45:56Speaker 01

  So, and a little bit of Bam, I think, because Bam and Giannis allow you to do so much defensively. Like they'll play some zone.

• 46:02Bill Simmons?

  Andrew Wiggins did guard Jason Tatum really about four years ago.

• 46:04Speaker 01

  I mean.

• 46:06Bill Simmons?

  So Giannis, Bam, Andrew Wiggins.

• 46:08Speaker 01

  Davion Mitchell.

• 46:09Bill Simmons?

  Mitchell and Pelle Larson. That's my crunch time five with maybe Klay Thompson in there.

• 46:13Speaker 01

  Could be, could be Klay. They, they have a lot of guys.

• 46:15Bill Simmons?

  That's, welcome to the play in.

• 46:17Speaker 01

  Well, look, they have been, they, they generally thrive in the play in. So if you're asking me like, if you're just asking me who's making the playoffs, they can get in through the play in too.

• 46:25Bill Simmons?

  Now, if you told me I was getting 75 Giannis games, you have my attention.

• 46:31Speaker 01

  65?

• 46:34Bill Simmons?

  What would you put like?

• 46:36Speaker 01

  60.

• 46:37Bill Simmons?

  You refuse to bet your life.

• 46:38Speaker 01

  60, 60 would be like.

• 46:39Bill Simmons?

  I gave you over under 59 and a half, you'd go over?

• 46:42Speaker 01

  I would go over.

• 46:47Bill Simmons?

  So it's going to be around 60.

• 46:48Speaker 01

  Pina and I had the over under, I don't know if you saw this of how many, um, they clipped it on Instagram of how many. The over under and how many games Phillies projected starting five plays in the regular season.

• 47:00Bill Simmons?

  And 25?

• 47:01Speaker 01

  And I think I said the over under 22 and a half.

• 47:03Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 47:04Speaker 01

  You would go over?

• 47:10Bill Simmons?

  So. Embiid's 39 games?

• 47:13Speaker 01

  It's right there. Like it might be under.

• 47:15Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's under.

• 47:17Bill Simmons?

  It is that the Philly thing will be fun because there's like four different Philly teams all happening at the same time. We'll have your like, we don't have Embiid tonight, team. That we don't have LeBron tonight, team. We don't have Embiid or LeBron. We might not have Jalen Brown tonight. It will just, it'll just, every night they'll keep us on our toes. I'm going to enjoy it.

• 47:34Speaker 01

  I think Boston, Philly, and maybe Cleveland have a little bit more. This could go wrong volatility to them than is being talked about. I think they're all.

• 47:48Bill Simmons?

  Boston, it's already been factored in.

• 47:49Speaker 01

  The most likely outcome is that they're all about good and meet expectations. I just feel, I mean, the downside for Philly is obvious, right? Just like injuries, chemistry, whatever. I just, I'm fascinated by the Cavs and like Peyton Watson, how that's going to work offensively. Do they have enough depth? Is this, is this Harden, Mitchell, Allen Mobley? Is that really a big four that's taking you where you want to be? And yeah, I know they read the conference finals. It was a pretty unconvincing run to the conference finals and they got shellacked once they got there.

• 48:21Bill Simmons?

  Listen, it's really hard to make the final four. Like we, we downed them on it because it was so bad.

• 48:27Speaker 01

  I mean.

• 48:28Bill Simmons?

  When they got there, but it's still, it's a 30 team league.

• 48:30Speaker 01

  That's okay. Wow. I didn't expect this.

• 48:32Bill Simmons?

  No, I'm just like, I, I find it's like your 2019 Blazers that you love.

• 48:36Speaker 01

  I did like that team.

• 48:37Bill Simmons?

  But like you make the final four, that's not nothing. You win two playoff series.

• 48:40Speaker 01

  It's not, it's not nothing.

• 48:41Bill Simmons?

  And they should have won game one and they completely fell apart and then the Atkinson quote happened and all of a sudden their season was over.

• 48:48Speaker 01

  I did feel bad making fun of the Atkinson quote again on Twitter last week when I said. At that point, the Mets had a better run differential than every team in the American League last year. So analytically, they were a playoff team. I felt a little bit bad. It is that bad of a quote though.

• 49:04Bill Simmons?

  It's going to outlive him.

• 49:07Bill Simmons?

  It's going to be in our lives for the next 50 years and I'll probably be dead when it's still going.

• 49:11Speaker 01

  Most shocking, so you reminded me of Cleveland game one. Knicks comeback against Cleveland in game one. Most.

• 49:18Bill Simmons?

  But that wasn't shocking because none of us stopped watching.

• 49:21Speaker 01

  I'm going to make, I'm going to make you rank the shock or surprise factor of the three landmark Knicks fourth quarter comebacks.

• 49:29Bill Simmons?

  Well, I was going to say the Neesmith game was more shocking than all of them.

• 49:32Speaker 01

  That's the, so I argue with my Knicks fans.

• 49:34Bill Simmons?

  That game was like legitimately over.

• 49:36Speaker 01

  They all are obsessed with the Ananobi game. Like it was one of the greatest games there have been at, incredible comeback. I just don't.

• 49:43Bill Simmons?

  You never gave up on it.

• 49:44Speaker 01

  It's the most shocking, the Halliburton Neesmith game. Is still more shocking to me than.

• 49:50Bill Simmons?

  We probably have to decide what that game's called. I think it's probably the Neesmith game. Because Halliburton's had a bunch of different games, right? Neesmith.

• 49:58Speaker 01

  Halliburton, that was the greatest run of clutch shot making maybe in the history of the NBA in one playoff run.

• 50:03Bill Simmons?

  I'm so excited to have him back and I like that it's. You know, the Tatum thing was, was weird last year where he came back and they put all these big minutes on him and I think they made a huge mistake and said that at the time. The Halliburton's got a good 18 months here.

• 50:16Speaker 01

  We haven't talked about them, but they're down in this, in this group with Orlando.

• 50:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they had the 10 best odds. To me, they're a playoff team. I'd be shocked if, I think Zubats is such a game changer for them. And I, he wasn't as good last year as he was two years ago, but they've never had anybody like that.

• 50:31Speaker 01

  So when I talk to people around the league about like, all right, so what is the, why are the numbers low in Indiana? Like give me, give me the Indiana can't get it back argument.

• 50:41Bill Simmons?

  It's Halliburton.

• 50:42Speaker 01

  It's Halliburton. We don't know what he's going to look like. It's, it'll take Zubats and Siakam some time to figure out to fit together with like, without a spacing five, like Miles.

• 50:51Bill Simmons?

  See, I don't agree with that because I, I feel like Siakam plays, there's some Kawhi similarities who Zubats played with, right? He's played with six eights going forwards who have the ball at the top and. You know, I don't know. I feel like he's going to, he's a smart player.

• 51:06Speaker 01

  I, and so is Pascal. And the one I hear more than any of that is people are really worried about their depth. Like TJ McConnell lost a little bit of a step or half step last year. And then it's like Oubre, Toppin, Jay Huff, maybe Jaris Walker, maybe Ben Shepard.

• 51:23Bill Simmons?

  Why maybe Jaris Walker?

• 51:24Speaker 01

  Well, just like who's in the rotation. Like if you gotta go nine deep, who's, who?

• 51:28Bill Simmons?

  I like Ben Shepard. I like all those guys.

• 51:30Speaker 01

  The Kelly Oubre signing was a shot across the bow at Ben Shepard and Jaris Walker. Like, hey, if you can't play like this guy at least comes in and does what Kelly Oubre does.

• 51:37Bill Simmons?

  Was really good in this uptick series, like guarded both wings.

• 51:41Speaker 01

  I'm higher on their depth than most, than the skeptics are. Like I think Oubre is solid. I think Obi Toppin fits them like a glove. They'll play him at the five some if the Huff thing doesn't work out. McConnell not like McConnell was so essential to their finals run as just like a come off the bench and fuck the game up guy that. Him losing a little bit of juice last year is worrisome.

• 52:03Bill Simmons?

  Or he's listening to this podcast right now in the weight room going, I'll show these fucking guys. The best season I've ever had.

• 52:11Bill Simmons?

  Toronto seems to have, for them to have the fourth best odds was, was the other thing that jumped out to me for the East. They're, they're plus eight 50. And, uh. I just think it's putting a lot of stock in Kawhi, who's at 35 and who. You know, has pretty checkered 2020s from a playoff standpoint, from a durability standpoint, availability standpoint.

• 52:32Speaker 01

  But this is, so, oh yeah, you're talking about win the East.

• 52:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I'm just like that. Just looking at the, at all of them, that one jumped out at me too. Like they're the fourth best odds?

• 52:41Speaker 01

  I'm very high on the Raptors as a regular season team. I just don't know why anyone would expect Kawhi to be able to get through. You're talking three.

• 52:50Bill Simmons?

  To play eight months.

• 52:51Speaker 01

  Three playoff series.

• 52:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 52:53Speaker 01

  After a functional regular season, when again, I will repeat it until the proverbial Cavs come home. He has not finished a second round playoff series since 2020. It's not completed one. The Clippers competed in several of them. He was either injured for them or got injured in them, got injured in the first round.

• 53:09Bill Simmons?

  He won two playoff series in seven years.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  Three. Well, he won. You're right. He won two. Yeah.

• 53:14Bill Simmons?

  He wasn't there for.

• 53:15Speaker 01

  The Utah, the second half of the Utah series.

• 53:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 53:19Speaker 01

  So I just like, I would love the idea of the Raptors making the finals. I just don't think Kawhi will play three playoff rounds without getting injured or I would bet against it.

• 53:27Bill Simmons?

  Celtics tidbit?

• 53:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:30Bill Simmons?

  Hugos and Shireman?

• 53:33Bill Simmons?

  Phenomenal shape.

• 53:36Bill Simmons?

  Entire organization has been stunned by the work they put in over the summer.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  I like, I like.

• 53:42Bill Simmons?

  From my mouth to God's ears.

• 53:44Speaker 01

  So now I'm picturing like Celtics HQ, we had the practice facility where all the offices are.

• 53:49Bill Simmons?

  You know who doesn't have baby fat anymore? Hugo.

• 53:51Speaker 01

  I, this is what I, I'm picturing them just walking around, like Mike Zeran runs into Brad Stevens like, Brad, see Hugo today with his shirt off, looking great, looking great. This is all they're talking about.

• 54:01Bill Simmons?

  No, I think this happened.

• 54:02Speaker 01

  Oh, but did you see Baylor? Like he, he's benching a little bit more. Like I was watching him in the weight room. He was grunting, like just forget Derrick White and Jason Tatum and Mitchell Robinson. Like just, we're obsessed with our sixth and seventh or seventh and eighth guys.

• 54:17Bill Simmons?

  Also, Paul George, Mike Conley, vets. Good locker room guys. Mitchell Robinson, vet.

• 54:26Bill Simmons?

  Some adults. Nice mix.

• 54:29Speaker 01

  I, look, I think they're, they're gonna win a lot of regular season games.

• 54:33Bill Simmons?

  It is funny now, more and more stuff's coming out where, why they did that trade. At least we know why they did the trade.

• 54:39Speaker 01

  Well, what, what more came out?

• 54:41Bill Simmons?

  It's just they thought they ran their course with those two guys and, and that was that. And they hit the wall and, and they did want to do this now instead of a year from now.

• 54:51Bill Simmons?

  And that it wasn't sustainable.

• 54:54Speaker 01

  I, I mean, you will never forget the trade. You were getting a colonoscopy.

• 55:01Bill Simmons?

  Well, I found out from my wife.

• 55:04Speaker 01

  Delightful experience. Well, if people haven't got their colonoscopies, you get, you get, I, I loved every minute of it. I walked out and the doctor was like, you need to come back in seven to 10 years or whatever it is, five to seven years.

• 55:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, like, I'll come back next year.

• 55:15Speaker 01

  I was like, I'll come back in three.

• 55:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you tell me when.

• 55:17Speaker 01

  If you think it's safer, I'll come back in three. You know, I, great rest. I got a cookie and some juice afterwards. I didn't even find the prep that bad. I, I kind of enjoyed the prep as like a mental challenge, physical challenge.

• 55:29Bill Simmons?

  I liked the prep and I, I would do it again.

• 55:32Speaker 01

  And he was like, settle down. You don't need to come back in three years. All right, but if you change your mind, you know where to reach me.

• 55:39Bill Simmons?

  So, out of the two of us, whose fingers are more likely to work this year?

• 55:44Speaker 01

  I, I mean, I think it's, your fingers are.

• 55:47Bill Simmons?

  I'm like a plus 500, you're like minus 350.

• 55:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, you need, you need to, it's been so long. You're like one of those guys who's been in a, like, in a frozen sleep in space for 12 years. And you wake, you wake up out of the pod and you're like, what's happening?

• 56:03Bill Simmons?

  I'm like, I was, what was the movie I watched where they, oh, the Aliens? We did, we did re-watch those Aliens. She woke up and it's 55 years later. That would be me writing.

• 56:12Speaker 01

  Might be.

• 56:13Bill Simmons?

  So what happens? I turn the document on and then?

• 56:15Speaker 01

  Might be the most scared I've ever been watching a movie. Sleepover, middle school, aliens. I was like.

• 56:22Bill Simmons?

  Last hour.

• 56:23Speaker 01

  I was legitimately terrified. I think the first two Aliens, each of them are masterpiece movies. And I like being scared. I like the sensation of being scared. That was one where I went over to the other side of like, I like being scared, I like being scared, I like being scared. I'm ready for this movie to be over because I'm too scared.

• 56:40Bill Simmons?

  You know, at the UCLA game on Saturday, I met the future of UCLA basketball. Who is the best 17-year-old in the world. This kid they got, the Serbian.

• 56:51Speaker 01

  Okay. Oh, the guy who's making like 6 million dollars or something.

• 56:54Bill Simmons?

  Two-year NIL deal. I don't know if you've watched this. I'm just, I'm gonna be the first person to tell you this. This is gonna be your favorite player five years from now.

• 57:02Speaker 01

  Right.

• 57:02Bill Simmons?

  Six foot nine, just going, going, going, but passer. But like little Luka, but like honestly, like a little Magic Johnson-y with the way he goes. But it's like, and I asked him, I was, because I asked if he had played with Jokic before. And he said, no, I haven't gotten a chance to play with him yet. But I was like.

• 57:24Speaker 01

  Oh, you met him, met him?

• 57:25Bill Simmons?

  I met him, met him. Like I talked to him. And I, and he was like, he hadn't played with him yet, but he really wants to. He's been in America for like five year, five weeks. But I was like, I watched your YouTube clips. It's clear Jokic is tripled down to your generation in Serbia. It's like, oh yeah. So we might have all of these, the second generation Jokic from Serbia, all of these kids who are gonna be playing like the 86 Celtics.

• 57:48Speaker 01

  Well, someone has to shoot at some point.

• 57:50Bill Simmons?

  Right. But yeah, this will be your favorite player.

• 57:53Speaker 01

  You didn't answer your own question, did you?

• 57:54Bill Simmons?

  For what?

• 57:55Speaker 01

  Like what three teams are you not, are, are out of the playoffs?

• 57:58Bill Simmons?

  Well, I have two of them. I have Charlotte and Atlanta I agree with.

• 58:00Speaker 01

  You answered Miami. You're, wow, so we need.

• 58:01Bill Simmons?

  I would lean more toward Miami. It's Miami, Orlando. It's one of the Florida teams. And I would lean toward Miami because I don't trust Giannis to play 70 games.

• 58:10Bill Simmons?

  And that team was a 500 team last year who lost, you know, some key people in what turned out to be a really terrible trade for Milwaukee. I saw a video of Jeme Hakez couldn't bring his dog into a restaurant in Milwaukee.

• 58:24Speaker 01

  You're really.

• 58:25Bill Simmons?

  Different, different times. He was, he was living his life in Miami, now he's in Wisconsin.

• 58:30Speaker 01

  Speaking of dogs, here's something that happened to me in Los Angeles at my hotel.

• 58:33Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 58:34Speaker 01

  Never seen this before. Guy staying at the hotel, I was in the gym, went to gym, workout this morning. Crowded gym in LA. It was like, there's eight people in a hotel gym. That's pretty crowded.

• 58:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 58:44Speaker 01

  Guy brings his dog. Never seen that before. Dogs just, and it's like a big dog. It was not like a little puppy.

• 58:50Bill Simmons?

  You know I love dogs, but LA is out of control with dogs.

• 58:51Speaker 01

  So he's, he's in the gym, walking around. The dog's just meandering around the gym while the guy's on the treadmill. And so I, I go to the elliptical machine because this is my old man workout day. I'm gonna do the elliptical. The dog is sleeping underneath one of the pedals of the elliptical machine. So that if I press down, I'm gonna like smush the dog. And I'm like, what's, what? I'm not sure what my social, like what I'm supposed to do here. Do I get the guy and be like?

• 59:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you get the guy. That's a bad job by the guy.

• 59:21Speaker 01

  So what I did was I just got on the machine, hoping the dog would wake up and move.

• 59:25Bill Simmons?

  And jump out.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  And he did. He just woke up. But I'd never, I, I've never had to, I'm almost 50 years old and it was a social situation that I had never been in before.

• 59:33Bill Simmons?

  People bring their dogs in the grocery stores here.

• 59:37Speaker 01

  I mean, you see that in New York sometimes.

• 59:38Bill Simmons?

  I'm, I love dogs. I'm against that.

• 59:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:41Bill Simmons?

  Dogs shouldn't be where food and drinks are and.

• 59:45Speaker 01

  Dog in the gym was a new one for me.

• 59:46Bill Simmons?

  Dog in the gym's interesting. Yeah.

• 59:49Speaker 01

  Why do we talk, oh, so Miami?

• 59:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 59:52Speaker 01

  I just, I guess I just trust Giannis plus Bam plus Spo, plus they're pretty deep, plus.

• 59:57Bill Simmons?

  Plus 90-year-old Pat Riley.

• 59:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, but like, so that, all right, so we have enough faith in the Knicks, obviously. Celtics, pretty proven track record of Missoula ball, winning a lot of games.

• 1:00:08Bill Simmons?

  Philly.

• 1:00:09Speaker 01

  Detroit, I'm just, I'm gonna skip Philly for a second. Detroit, me personally, like they won enough games last year by being tough and nasty and.

• 1:00:18Bill Simmons?

  It would be one of the most dramatic fall offs, non-injury of, of the history of the league.

• 1:00:22Speaker 01

  I think their over-under is like 48 and a half or something. We're not gonna spoil it, but like, I just think by giving a shit about every game to the degree that they do, it's hard for me to see them falling out of the top six. Cleveland has enough raw talent that despite what concerns I might have fit-wise, I feel like that's enough of a regular season floor. Toronto, we talked about.

• 1:00:42Bill Simmons?

  Cleveland not winning 45 games would be shocking. Now, the question is if this was, what was that year with, when Phoenix didn't make it? When they were like 48 and 34?

• 1:00:49Speaker 01

  The year they tried to tank and won 48 games.

• 1:00:51Bill Simmons?

  With Dragic and Isaiah?

• 1:00:53Speaker 01

  All the boy, all the point guards together.

• 1:00:54Bill Simmons?

  2014.

• 1:00:56Speaker 01

  Philly, I just, I can't wait to see it. Because what if Embiid plays 30 games? And LeBron plays 45 games and suffers a hamstring injury and is old? Like there's some downside potential with Philly. Like now Jalen is a, is a good, Jalen and Maxey is, is a pretty stable floor. I guess that's what the numbers are betting on.

• 1:01:18Bill Simmons?

  And second year VJ.

• 1:01:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, during the Pat Steelers game yesterday, there TJ, uh, JJ Watt was talking about Rogers.

• 1:01:27Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:01:27Bill Simmons?

  And he was saying how Rogers wasn't 100% last year because he hurt his back doing squats. And he was like, yeah, the whole year, his back just wasn't right. But you know, he's old and, and I was thinking like, that's, LeBron's gonna be what, 41 this year?

• 1:01:42Speaker 01

  He's already 41.

• 1:01:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, so he'll be 42.

• 1:01:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, New Year's Eve, isn't his birthday New Year's Eve?

• 1:01:46Bill Simmons?

  42. That's the problem when you get old is you have little injuries like that. And even if you're Superman like he is, you know, they don't, you just, it's like, oh, my hamstring hurts. And then it just hurts for like a month and a half. So we'll see. I, Embiid to me,

• 1:02:05Bill Simmons?

  this is the, I mean, out of all the make or breaks, this is it. Like if you can't get a full season out of him this year, then it's never gonna happen again.

• 1:02:12Speaker 01

  But, but you gotta redefine full season though. Full season's gotta be like.

• 1:02:16Bill Simmons?

  I'm saying like if he can't play, he's played, I looked it up. He's played over 2,000 minutes twice.

• 1:02:23Speaker 01

  But I mean, I just expect, I would be wildly happy as a basketball fan if he played 55 regular season games.

• 1:02:30Bill Simmons?

  Why not just play him once a week?

• 1:02:33Speaker 01

  Fine, whatever. I don't know, whatever it takes.

• 1:02:34Bill Simmons?

  The problem is when he gets in a groove, he wants to keep playing and they can't kind of stop, they can't kind of stop him from himself. You know? And that's always been the issue with it. Okay, they should be like, it should always be like, come from a position of strength. Just sit out. We had, wait till the Friday game and that's how you're gonna have to handle him. I don't think they will. And then LeBron, I think is gonna have a huge F-U on his shoulder this year. Because there were certain, the Lakers didn't want him since February. Like I, anyone who thinks there's any other answer other than that, you're fooling yourselves. And just look at some of the stuff even Lucas said.

• 1:03:08Speaker 01

  Lakers on his own bullshit.

• 1:03:09Bill Simmons?

  Anyone who believes that. But it was also interesting that like San Antonio.

• 1:03:16Bill Simmons?

  I don't know.

• 1:03:17Speaker 02

  I never got the San Antonio one. You have to sell me on that one. If I'm San Antonio, I'm like, we just made the finals already.

• 1:03:25Speaker 02

  I just.

• 1:03:26Bill Simmons?

  Would you rather have LeBron James or Tobias Harris for one year? So you're telling me you'd rather have Tobias Harris?

• 1:03:32Speaker 02

  There, I just, there's a lot that comes with LeBron. I gotta really change the way my whole team plays. If I get LeBron.

• 1:03:40Bill Simmons?

  Do you?

• 1:03:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:03:43Speaker 02

  I mean, not all the time like it was.

• 1:03:45Bill Simmons?

  Did you watch their last four minutes of all their playoff games last year? Like, I kinda felt like they needed somebody like LeBron.

• 1:03:51Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. And he had some nice last four minutes against Houston in particular, when everyone else was injured or Reeves was just coming back.

• 1:03:58Bill Simmons?

  I don't know. I just. I thought, I really liked that the most for everybody. I get why Wemby, I'm sure, wants to make his own way in his own career and probably wants no part of the circus that comes with LeBron.

• 1:04:09Speaker 02

  See, I would have.

• 1:04:10Bill Simmons?

  Maybe LeBron wouldn't have wanted it either.

• 1:04:11Speaker 02

  I would have ranked them behind, among good teams, behind Minnesota and Denver as like the most fun, sensible LeBron.

• 1:04:19Bill Simmons?

  He's not living in Minnesota.

• 1:04:20Speaker 02

  Was he living in San Antonio? He just respects the franchise that much? Maybe he does. I mean, Rich Paul angled De'Aaron Fox there.

• 1:04:28Bill Simmons?

  Well, the one thing we learned from, I can't believe we're talking about LeBron. The one thing we learned from, the one thing we learned from this Philly thing is it was the decision he thought he could make to try to win the title.

• 1:04:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:39Bill Simmons?

  I don't think there's any other reason he went there. It's not like, oh, I've always wanted to play for the Sixers. But that's something, listen, he was going to Cleveland. I don't know what happened. I can't wait for the story. There's something, something happened.

• 1:04:51Speaker 02

  Unlike, and to your point about Minnesota and Denver, he is, gets to live in New York City. Playing for the Sixers. So there's like, it's not even.

• 1:04:59Bill Simmons?

  Maybe he'll like Philly.

• 1:05:00Speaker 02

  And House has talked a lot about the golf quality in Philly, but he's not even gonna live there. He's gonna live, I mean, she's gonna live everywhere, I'm sure, but.

• 1:05:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. This is all leading to House playing with golf with LeBron somehow.

• 1:05:11Speaker 02

  I, who knows?

• 1:05:12Bill Simmons?

  Can't rule him out. Can't ever rule out House with golf. Um, all right. You have a podcast. People are gonna hear this on Tuesday. You'll be doing a podcast that is also going up on Tuesday.

• 1:05:20Speaker 02

  All Western Conference with Rob Mahoney.

• 1:05:22Bill Simmons?

  And then you'll be back. We're gonna do, uh, over unders both conferences. I think October 12th, 13th range.

• 1:05:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:05:30Bill Simmons?

  Is what we're looking at.

• 1:05:31Speaker 02

  I'm the defending champion.

• 1:05:32Bill Simmons?

  A week before the season. I felt, uh, the season's starting on, uh, the 20th this year and I felt like, I forget when we did it last year, but.

• 1:05:39Speaker 02

  Too early. We did it too early.

• 1:05:40Bill Simmons?

  We did it too early. I think this is.

• 1:05:41Speaker 02

  Things happened.

• 1:05:42Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I think this is gonna be better for us. All right, Zach Logan, good to see you.

• 1:05:45Speaker 02

  Always fun.

• 1:05:47Bill Simmons?

  Hey, FanDuel is making this your most rewarding season ever. And what does that mean? Well, boosts, promos, teasers, new rewards club, teaser recommendations from the Ringer 107 crew. We got a bunch of stuff and we're gonna have some fun. We're gonna compare different betting scenarios and pick, which is more rewarding within each scenario. Here's what they laid out for me. Two teams, six point teaser, or hitting an underdog parlay. I mean, I, hitting the underdog parlay, especially like if you had the Raiders last week or, uh, the Saints. That's the best because you're taking a flyer on it, but it's also you put some brains and some thought into it.

• 1:06:27Bill Simmons?

  Winning a bet on a last play defensive TD or a hail mary. Hail mary is obviously the winner. There's nothing more fun than winning on a hail mary, other than maybe a last second half court shot. Win your favorite over under futures or correctly predict the exact order of the NFC South. Well, the NFC South is impossible to predict. Nobody's ever done it. So I would say winning your favorite over under futures, cause it's actually realistic. Using rewards club, profit boost tokens, or game intelligence. Trick question. FanDuel provides all of them, so you don't have to choose. You get all of those things. So every week, check the FanDuel app to see what's waiting for you. And make it. I'm telling you, it's gonna be your most rewarding season ever.

• 1:07:10Bill Simmons?

  Anthony Jeselnik is here. It's been a while for us.

• 1:07:12Speaker 02

  It has been a few years.

• 1:07:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. I'm always available for you when you want a podcast, but you're a busy guy going around.

• 1:07:18Speaker 02

  That.

• 1:07:18Bill Simmons?

  Now you have a new, new thing that's coming to the Ringer that you've been doing for a while.

• 1:07:22Speaker 02

  I do. Um, we, I'm excited that we can finally announce it.

• 1:07:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's been negotiated for the last three and a half years.

• 1:07:27Speaker 02

  Yes, it took a while. I mean, I just started Jeselnik Book Club in January. And I thought maybe I'll do it for a year and then see if I wanna take it somewhere. And then you guys came knocking fast.

• 1:07:38Bill Simmons?

  Tired.

• 1:07:38Speaker 02

  You guys knew we had to get in there early and, uh, and now, uh, September 30th, it'll be on the Ringer.

• 1:07:45Bill Simmons?

  Coming on.

• 1:07:46Speaker 02

  And weekly.

• 1:07:47Bill Simmons?

  Weekly.

• 1:07:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:48Bill Simmons?

  That was, we really had to twist your arm a couple of times.

• 1:07:51Speaker 02

  I didn't know. I mean, I've been doing it in my living room, trying to get people to read books and was prepared for failure. Trying to get guys to read books. And my audience is 85% men. I'm like, I'm prepared for failure. Like, no one watches. And then it took off and just kept getting bigger.

• 1:08:06Bill Simmons?

  What was the first one you did?

• 1:08:07Speaker 02

  The first one I did was Jim Thompson's The Getaway.

• 1:08:10Bill Simmons?

  Right. And people loved it.

• 1:08:12Speaker 02

  People loved it, cause it has a crazy ending.

• 1:08:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:14Speaker 02

  They liked hearing me talk about it. And when I was talking about it, I was like, oh, I enjoy this. I'm good at this. And then I interviewed an author. I got my friend of mine, Isaac Fitzgerald, at, uh, Skylight Books to promote his book. And it was so easy and fun and funny that I thought, oh, I can do this every week. And then I committed. So not only am I gonna be doing the book club, getting guys to read a book a month. We'll be talking about new releases, getting in guests. We've already got some, we, we managed to find and get Greg Rosenthal for the first.

• 1:08:47Bill Simmons?

  How'd you get him? You flying him in from Burbank?

• 1:08:50Speaker 02

  We had to go through a bunch of people.

• 1:08:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:51Speaker 02

  But, uh, eventually his wife relented and let him come on the pod.

• 1:08:55Bill Simmons?

  That's one of my favorite things. That's like your lifelong friend.

• 1:08:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 1:08:59Bill Simmons?

  This random other and it, who for some reason has never worked for the Ringer, even though we all know each other.

• 1:09:04Speaker 02

  He'll be here one day.

• 1:09:05Bill Simmons?

  One day. We're waiting. We have a seat ready for him.

• 1:09:07Speaker 02

  He's the last employee left at NFL Network. Like, the dead last guy. Everyone else is either at ESPN or gone.

• 1:09:13Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:09:14Speaker 02

  But one day we'll get him here. Now that I'm here, I can bring him in.

• 1:09:17Bill Simmons?

  That's, this is it. You're the gateway drug to Greg Rosenthal.

• 1:09:20Speaker 02

  Exactly. Exactly. We've got a bunch of like celebrity guests, fun guests. I think it's just gonna be a fun hang, whether you've read the book or not. That's the thing that surprised me about the book club is people would be like, I haven't read this book yet. But listening to Anthony talk about it made me wanna read it.

• 1:09:33Bill Simmons?

  So do you think people listen to it? But haven't read the book yet?

• 1:09:37Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm. It's like when you would watch Siskel and Ebert back in the day. You haven't seen the movies yet. They're having, they're not even out yet. But by, based on how they talk about it, it makes you wanna see it. Even though I had described the whole book, you know, I'm spoiling things, but I think that's okay if the book is, is great.

• 1:09:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, cause we had that with rewatchables, where people will tell me, they'll listen to the episode and then they'll decide if they wanna watch the movie. If I had, if they hadn't seen it, I'm like, we're like deep diving this movie. You're just listening to the episode, raw dogging it basically, without

• 1:10:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:10:07Bill Simmons?

  knowing the act, what's happening in the movie?

• 1:10:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, but if they see people, if they see people passionate, they just wanna hang out and listen to people talk about things.

• 1:10:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:15Speaker 02

  And with social media now, where like podcasting, everything, I think people just wanna feel smart. You know, it used to be about like influencers and you wanna talk, and people wanted to hear you talk about money and talk about like the inside baseball stuff. And now they just wanna feel smart. So they wanna feel like they watched the movie.

• 1:10:31Bill Simmons?

  Or pretend they're smart.

• 1:10:32Speaker 02

  Pretend they're smart, sure. But I think people wanna, like, watch a book, a book club, I think now is something that couldn't have happened a few years ago, uh, here at the Ringer. But now, you know, you've seen what happens with, with movies today, TV today. I think it's all about books now. I think books are the new frontier.

• 1:10:48Bill Simmons?

  I noticed, what was that one, and this is the one you would do in the book club, but that one that came out, the book like nine months ago, the lady in the Hamptons who was getting divorced out of nowhere?

• 1:10:56Speaker 02

  The Stranger?

• 1:10:57Bill Simmons?

  And it became, like with my wife and her friends, it was all they talked about for three weeks was this book. And everybody had read it or had an opinion of it. And one person knew a friend of hers was friends of hers in high school. And, and I was just like, Jesus, books? We're still doing this?

• 1:11:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:15Bill Simmons?

  It's happening.

• 1:11:16Speaker 02

  When something hits the zeitgeist now, now that I'm weekly, I would do The Stranger now. And I have to, we, we just, we came up with a bit, the, uh, the Ringer versus whatever we'll end up calling it, where somebody on your staff.

• 1:11:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:26Speaker 02

  And I didn't know the staff. Like, I've never seen a podcast in my life, you know, so I was coming in here fresh. This is the most attractive staff I've ever been a part of.

• 1:11:34Bill Simmons?

  We're trying.

• 1:11:35Speaker 02

  We got in a Zoom with like 20 people and I was the ugly one. And I could not believe it. But I told, I said to staff, you know, put out, put out a challenge, challenged me. I'm reading fucking Dungeon Crawler Carl right now, which I never thought I would read. But I'm gonna talk about, uh, with one of your staff members, I, I think Mallory, I wanna say.

• 1:11:53Bill Simmons?

  Oh, my God.

• 1:11:53Speaker 02

  Maybe I'm wrong, but.

• 1:11:54Bill Simmons?

  That'll be the longest podcast you've ever done.

• 1:11:56Speaker 02

  No, we'll see. I can keep, I can keep, I can cut someone off if I need to.

• 1:12:00Bill Simmons?

  She's, she's three hours, ready to roll every time. Yeah, we love her. I've been working with her for 14 years.

• 1:12:05Speaker 02

  Well, she was down to read that book and I'm, I'm halfway through it. Now, something I would never read, but I just want to talk about what people are reading. You know, getting guys to read it all.

• 1:12:14Bill Simmons?

  But you're talking fiction.

• 1:12:16Speaker 02

  Mostly.

• 1:12:17Bill Simmons?

  Primarily.

• 1:12:18Speaker 02

  Primarily, yes. Unless something really hits. Like, I was thinking of you the other day. I was reading about Daryl Dawkins autobiography.

• 1:12:24Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 1:12:25Speaker 02

  That is like the most.

• 1:12:25Bill Simmons?

  Autobiography? Even I don't have that.

• 1:12:27Speaker 02

  Autobiography, I think, believe it's an autobiography and it's insane. And I was like, oh, that's, maybe that's how I get Bill on the show. Is you read Daryl Dawkins autobiography and we talk about it.

• 1:12:37Bill Simmons?

  So you would have to recommend it to me or vice versa?

• 1:12:40Speaker 02

  I think we just have to agree in advance, whereas other people, I'm like, challenge me. I forget, one of the guy's names gave me like a list of five books and says, if you wanna read one of these, I'll come on and talk about that. Cause your staff is great. I wanna mix it up with the Ringer staff.

• 1:12:53Bill Simmons?

  Well, you have a 250-page limit, though.

• 1:12:56Speaker 02

  For my book club, the year one is 250 pages. I think this month's book, we'll be doing, uh, our first episode at the Ringer is The Glass Hotel. It's like 300, but it's a quick read. You know, there are some books, there's a 250-page book that takes you a month because it's so dense and the language is different that I'm trying to pick good writers.

• 1:13:15Bill Simmons?

  So you're not doing David Foster Wallace Infinite Jest?

• 1:13:18Speaker 02

  No, I would never. I've read that book.

• 1:13:20Bill Simmons?

  Eight, eight, 10, something like that?

• 1:13:22Speaker 02

  And then there's a fucking, then there's a, like an index you have to go to.

• 1:13:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:26Speaker 02

  To read the book and, which is impossible. But I, you know how, like, if you're ever in a car and someone is like, hey, take your phone and put some music on? And you're terrified that you're gonna be judged by what you put on.

• 1:13:37Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:13:38Speaker 02

  I feel that when I'm recommending books for the book club. That like, this has to be something that I love and I think people are going to respond to.

• 1:13:44Bill Simmons?

  And what, like, what are the genres that feel like they suck you in the most?

• 1:13:49Speaker 02

  I mean, it's, it's about the writing more than anything else, because I've had books that, I've had a crime thriller. I've had like a book about like a memoir of divorce, you know, like a fictional memoir. But it's just the writing is great and I fly through it. You know, that, I keep talking about the sense of accomplishment you feel when you finish a book versus binging a TV show. You know, or finishing a video game. I mean, these are all great art forms.

• 1:14:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:12Speaker 02

  But you don't walk out of the Odyssey feeling like you've accomplished something. But if you finish a book, you feel like, oh, I did something with my time. That I'm kind of competing with doom scrolling more than TV and movies and sports, you know?

• 1:14:25Bill Simmons?

  Like, one of the things I thought was interesting about you is you said your favorite writer that you'd read was Joan Didion. And I was like, oh, he's like, he's really in this.

• 1:14:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, she, I mean, she's the best.

• 1:14:36Bill Simmons?

  Cut.

• 1:14:37Speaker 02

  Well, one of, I mean, one of my favorites when I was growing up was Bret Easton Ellis.

• 1:14:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:40Speaker 02

  His favorite was Joan Didion. It's like, yeah, once you get into it. And reading 12 books a year is the goal, you know, for Justin McBook Club. But I'm hoping that by reading 12 books, it makes you want to read more. And the more you read, the more you enjoy reading. It's like working out, you know, it's hard at first. Your muscles are sore, but once you get into it. You know, you get those endorphins going that you want to read different kinds of books. You don't love every book you watch, like you don't love every movie you watch. But you enjoy seeing movies and you get this education as you go. You know, it's like a Tarantino-esque, like I see with the reference there. I see what they're talking about now because I have this education of film.

• 1:15:18Bill Simmons?

  Well, one of my ideas for you, because as we were trying to figure out how to do weekly, like you have to have some easy ones, some layups.

• 1:15:24Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:15:25Bill Simmons?

  And I definitely wanted you to do at least one, like 90s comedy autobiography. Or 80s or just something where.

• 1:15:33Speaker 02

  But I think.

• 1:15:34Bill Simmons?

  I didn't even know what it would be.

• 1:15:35Speaker 02

  I think all of the, when you'd said they wrote these back before the internet.

• 1:15:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:40Speaker 02

  But it was also a book where like the book tour would be talking about.

• 1:15:44Bill Simmons?

  The crazy things that were in there. Yeah.

• 1:15:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:15:46Bill Simmons?

  But we didn't have the screenshot era. Cause I think there's like a distinct before and after with the biographies. And the autobiographies from like basically pre 2010 post. You can see in the magazine features too.

• 1:15:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:16:00Bill Simmons?

  People would say crazy shit.

• 1:16:01Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:16:02Bill Simmons?

  And it would be like, you might see it and you might tell like your, your wife or whoever like, whoa, did you see what? This guy said in GQ and then they would go away.

• 1:16:11Speaker 02

  But they would even do that on the, I mean, yeah, there's like the John Wayne Playboy interview.

• 1:16:15Bill Simmons?

  The Playboy interviews are nuts. I was telling you how I was been reading all these Playboy interviews and I'm saying these directors are just. Torpedoing actors, they're torpedoing other directors and you're like, oh my God.

• 1:16:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:16:25Bill Simmons?

  Anyone did this? Now we have Tom Cruise saying nothing for an hour.

• 1:16:28Speaker 02

  I know. I mean, I miss the days of, uh, of Sean Connery admitting to beating every woman he's ever dated to, uh, like on a TV interview. Yeah. And being totally cool with it.

• 1:16:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. He's like, look, you know?

• 1:16:41Speaker 02

  Was, uh, was great.

• 1:16:42Bill Simmons?

  You can't make an omelet without breaking some eggs.

• 1:16:44Speaker 02

  Autobiographies aren't as much fun for me as the unauthorized biography after they die. When you can just go to town.

• 1:16:52Bill Simmons?

  Who was the one who did that? Kitty Kelly?

• 1:16:54Speaker 02

  Kitty Kelly?

• 1:16:55Bill Simmons?

  I think that was her name. She would do like, somebody would die and she would have the unauthorized right after.

• 1:17:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:17:00Bill Simmons?

  And it was always like, you're getting all your sources from like the valet.

• 1:17:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:17:05Bill Simmons?

  And like somebody who was her maid for two years and it, I wouldn't say it was the best collection of people.

• 1:17:11Speaker 02

  You want warts and all. I just want the warts to be quite honest, but now like everyone makes their own documentary. They produce their, and it's like at the end, it's like, now I have an animal shelter and you're like, I don't care about this, you know? You want to make yourself look good. There's always one thing they want to correct in the record. That I hate those documentaries. I want to see something that's, that's brutal, but even better. Is it now is the fictionalized version, like that, there's this book. It came out a couple of weeks ago called Life of M by Rachel Cusk. And Rachel Cusk is like up there with Joan Didion for me as one of the greatest writers of all time. And she wrote this book, it's like about Natalie Portman. Like it, she doesn't say Natalie Portman.

• 1:17:49Bill Simmons?

  I read about this.

• 1:17:50Speaker 02

  Natalie Portman. And it, that is like under 200 pages. And it is a character assassination in like a.

• 1:17:57Bill Simmons?

  But didn't Natalie Portman know she was doing it or like participated a little bit in the beginning and then backed out?

• 1:18:02Speaker 02

  In the novel, it's like they become friends. They both live in Paris. And it's like, I would love to do a, uh, your biography. And she's like, great, that would be great. And then sees the project at the end and is like, I hate this. And that's the end of the book. We don't know what's fiction and what's not. She never says, I'm actually friends with her. This is based on her, but it is her. And it's wonderful to read. I know critics haven't been as kind to it, but I loved it.

• 1:18:27Bill Simmons?

  I'm going to read it this weekend now. I'm, you got me excited about it.

• 1:18:30Speaker 02

  You will fly through it. Like that's the book, that's a, what I'm really looking for is that book that you just. Start and you can't believe how fast you tore through it.

• 1:18:37Bill Simmons?

  So.

• 1:18:38Speaker 02

  Are you a Kindle guy or are you a?

• 1:18:39Bill Simmons?

  So I, this is a sad story because I don't think. I read so, I mean, my whole library is just all books, like books I actually read. And I think it's the biggest reason I've ever been successful is I just read, I was an only child. I read everything. And, uh, I have to read everything on the iPad now. The, the reality is I need to, I have bad eyesight. I need to get my eyes fixed.

• 1:19:00Speaker 02

  Put the phone off.

• 1:19:01Bill Simmons?

  As I've gotten older, the books, the print.

• 1:19:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:19:03Bill Simmons?

  Unless I have like perfect light. So I read on the iPad and I, and I don't, and I, what ends up happening is you end up reading faster or zooming through or like. I, I don't think it's the same experience. So the, what really has to happen is I gotta get my eyes fixed.

• 1:19:17Speaker 02

  I, I love the Kindle. I feel like I'm a reading machine. You can, you can, uh, highlight things and go back to them if you want.

• 1:19:23Bill Simmons?

  Totally.

• 1:19:23Speaker 02

  And I'll buy the physical copy to have on the shelf. I like physical. I get a lot of advanced physical copies, but the Kindle's great.

• 1:19:29Bill Simmons?

  Kindle, I do, I do Apple books, whatever that on the iPad.

• 1:19:32Speaker 02

  I think the iPad's worse because you get the blue light, the Kindle's got that white light.

• 1:19:37Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:19:37Speaker 02

  It's warm and it doesn't hurt your eyes. Cause my eyes are going too.

• 1:19:40Bill Simmons?

  I changed the light on it, made it a little better.

• 1:19:43Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:19:43Bill Simmons?

  The Apple books though, they'll do like, uh, they'll have sales. They'll have books that'll just be like 199, 299, but they'll be like real books. I'm like, all right, I, I'm fine. And, uh, and I saw my own book on there once for 299.

• 1:19:58Speaker 02

  Ooh.

• 1:19:59Bill Simmons?

  No, I was, I, the book came out 17 years ago.

• 1:20:01Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:20:02Bill Simmons?

  I was like, I'm kind of excited it's on there. I hope this will make somebody buy it.

• 1:20:06Speaker 02

  See, I have real money. I'm a touring comedian, so I can afford full price books.

• 1:20:10Bill Simmons?

  I get the full price books too. I'm just saying like, books, like I don't want to spend $20 and then I don't know if I'm going to read it, but it's like 199 or I'd check it out.

• 1:20:18Speaker 02

  I have a lot of books I've bought on the Kindle and that I never touch. Because I'm just, I read about it. The copywriter does a lot of heavy lifting for me. Cause there's so few books for guys now.

• 1:20:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:28Speaker 02

  Everything is the woman on the fucking train. Or the woman who found out her husband's having an affair that when I see a book that's written for men. Whether it's by a woman or not, uh, I buy that book and then sometimes I just don't get to it. Something else gets, excites me. I get excited by new books because there's a hype there. You know, I compare it to watching Saturday Night Live, like as it airs, as opposed to watching it a couple of days later. You lose something when you're not watching it live. They're reading it the week of is fun for me.

• 1:20:56Bill Simmons?

  I used to get, I mean, I buy so many books on Amazon. I, I've had Amazon since like 1998.

• 1:21:01Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:21:02Bill Simmons?

  And one of the reasons I love buying the books was. I knew when they'd come, I'd read them because I ended up buying it. Versus in a bookstore, you can talk yourself out of it. But when you're like buying them online and be like, I'll get that, I'll get that one too. But now I have it. All right. I gotta read it.

• 1:21:16Speaker 02

  That was how I knew the book club was taking off was not just the video count, but Amazon was selling out. I would announce the book and Amazon was like.

• 1:21:23Bill Simmons?

  Your book influencer.

• 1:21:23Speaker 02

  It'll be like, in four weeks you'll get it. But I partnered with a place called bookshop.org. It's like the anti Amazon. And they were like, we guarantee, we'll get them to reprint. These books that you're picking. So I'm picking books that are three or four years old.

• 1:21:36Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:37Speaker 02

  Like we'll, we'll make sure we have hundreds of copies so that we don't sell out because Amazon was like, we can't keep up.

• 1:21:42Bill Simmons?

  Cause the other ones, Abe Books is the other one. That's, they have the older books.

• 1:21:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:21:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:21:47Bill Simmons?

  Um, there's good, but there's like five or six of these sites. I think the Barnes and Noble one does good with, uh, they have a bunch of, uh, bunch of inventory.

• 1:21:57Speaker 02

  They're cool. I don't go on the site, but I do enjoy going to a Barnes and Noble now.

• 1:22:01Bill Simmons?

  We have a great one in the Grove.

• 1:22:02Speaker 02

  It is great. It is great.

• 1:22:03Bill Simmons?

  Four floors?

• 1:22:04Speaker 02

  Uh, my first job in LA was working at a Borders Books on La Cienega. I worked there for like three months before they fired me with cause. Uh, I was a terrible employee, but I loved working that bookstore.

• 1:22:14Bill Simmons?

  What were you doing? Insulting their customers?

• 1:22:16Speaker 02

  I, my job was to be, uh, the, the security guy. So I had to help customers, but it was also like stop people from stealing and everyone stole. They, they allowed homeless people to come in and read books.

• 1:22:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:28Speaker 02

  So it was mostly wrangling them, but my job was just so boring that like, if you see someone stealing something, let them. Don't stop them. I'm like, I don't have anything to stop them with.

• 1:22:36Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:22:36Speaker 02

  But I was just, I got so bored that it became clear, this guy doesn't want to be here anymore. And, uh, and they got me out of there.

• 1:22:43Bill Simmons?

  We had a great bookstore in Coolidge Corner in Brookline, which is right next to Boston. Um, Brookline Booksmith.

• 1:22:49Speaker 02

  Is it still there?

• 1:22:50Bill Simmons?

  Still there. Um, all, so many of these ones are gone. Like there's a couple in LA that, um, there was one on Sunset that actually just got hit by the water flood.

• 1:23:00Speaker 02

  Not Book Soup?

• 1:23:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:02Speaker 02

  Book Soup got hit?

• 1:23:02Bill Simmons?

  It got hit and I, I don't even, I'm not positive it's reopened yet, but there's not a ton of them in LA.

• 1:23:07Speaker 02

  No, there's, there's, there's a few and they're good ones. Skylight Books is great. Last Bookstore, both locations are really cool. But Book Soup was my jam.

• 1:23:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:16Speaker 02

  But in the past, since the pandemic, the pandemic almost helped books. You would think it would shut bookstores down.

• 1:23:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:22Speaker 02

  But this book, this place, bookshop.org I partnered with said that since they've started, because they give part of their proceeds to help local bookstores.

• 1:23:29Bill Simmons?

  Nice.

• 1:23:29Speaker 02

  More bookstores have opened than have closed every year since the pandemic. And that used to not be the case. They were getting shut down by Amazon, uh, and Barnes and Noble's kind of putting more money into it. I like when you walk in and see what the employees have written on cards. Like what they think is good, then that like gets me to.

• 1:23:45Bill Simmons?

  We don't have that anymore. It's really like, cause video stars are gone.

• 1:23:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:23:49Bill Simmons?

  So, book recommendations. I didn't even know. What else would you find where it'd be like, Johnny really loves this William Goldman book?

• 1:23:56Speaker 02

  I tell you what you do is you subscribe to Justin and the Book Club on The Ringer. And I'm gonna give you, I'm gonna tell you exactly what's up. Uh, every week, if you want new books, if you want old books, if you're like, hey, I love this, what else is like this? That's the big thing with a book is you find something you love and you're like, what is the author of anything else or what is in the same vein? That, uh, that's been good.

• 1:24:16Bill Simmons?

  You can do some mailbag stuff potentially?

• 1:24:19Speaker 02

  I love mailbags. I mean, at the end of it, book club, people will ask about the actual book. And then there are questions like, how do you read on a Kindle? You know, do you like the percentage on the corner? Do you like, you know, how do you juggle multiple books or audiobooks okay? People get insecure about their reading because they don't know what's okay. Like, uh, people who forget the book they just read.

• 1:24:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:38Speaker 02

  You know, I read fifty to a hundred books a year. I can't remember most of them by the end of the year. That's okay. Just the actual art of reading or the act of reading, letting your, letting words come into your head is the point. It's okay to forget everything. People who review books for the New York Times say they forget everything. And that's just natural. That doesn't mean you're not reading well.

• 1:24:58Bill Simmons?

  Well, your brain's like a nightclub. You gotta, you have a capacity. You gotta kick some stuff out.

• 1:25:03Speaker 02

  So if a book stays with you, that means it really, it really hits you in the heart and the head because it's okay to forget.

• 1:25:07Bill Simmons?

  I had a lot of weird things with books, like, cause I would read, I read everything like through college and then I stopped reading fiction as much when I was really trying to get my sports column going because I was trying to like figure out my style. And my brain's a little spongy, so if I'm reading like a certain writer, it'll like mess with the writing. And so I stopped reading, I basically stopped reading fiction like in the mid nineties. And I really gravitated toward nonfiction stuff.

• 1:25:35Speaker 02

  All sports stuff or just any nonfiction?

• 1:25:36Bill Simmons?

  Collections, sports and I really love sports and TV movies and, uh, and some like real life stuff like, yeah, I would go in phases. Like I, like I had a Watergate phase in nineteen ninety-two. And I read every Watergate book that was possible to get or like JFK assassination, stuff like that. But for the most part, like any sports book, anything about movies, anything with essays, I always liked like the different collections of essays, but,

• 1:26:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:26:01Bill Simmons?

  Um, so I, so I'm complete opposite of you. I was always nonfiction and you were more of the fiction side.

• 1:26:06Speaker 02

  I just, getting sucked into a story and liking the character and it's like the empathy you get, you walk a mile in someone's shoes.

• 1:26:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:12Speaker 02

  You know, someone who is completely different from me, you feel like you were them. If you watch John Wick, you're sitting in the theater and you kind of feel like John Wick. Read a book starring John Wick, like you are John Wick and that, that to me is more valuable than nonfiction. I'm not trying to knock nonfiction, uh, but I,

• 1:26:28Bill Simmons?

  No, I think everybody, whatever works for people, as long as you're reading.

• 1:26:32Speaker 02

  A lot of guys just think fiction is like not serious or it's a waste of time. And I think it, I think it could not be less of a ca, the case of it being a waste of time. I think you're getting, gaining empathy. And you're getting information. Most of the things I've learned have been from reading novels. But, uh, in nonfiction, I forget these facts, you know, I forget. And a lot of it's in Celsius, you know, which I can't handle. So I, uh, I like, I like fiction over nonfiction, but I, I think I'm sure we'll have some nonfiction in there. I've got Andy Richter coming on.

• 1:27:01Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 1:27:02Speaker 02

  So he wrote a book about the making of the movie Elf. And so we're gonna have him on and just see, see what happens. Yeah. I mean, you've seen Elf, right?

• 1:27:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I liked Elf.

• 1:27:10Speaker 02

  I have not seen Elf.

• 1:27:12Bill Simmons?

  Really?

• 1:27:12Speaker 02

  I swear to God.

• 1:27:13Bill Simmons?

  It's kind of been the Christmas rotate, Christmas rotation now.

• 1:27:16Speaker 02

  It is, but I'm not like, you're not gonna believe this. I'm not the biggest Christmas guy. Uh, my birthday is two day, uh, three days before Christmas, so I'm always been kind of mad at Jesus. And so I have, I've avoided most Christmas movies. I don't like, I don't like the heartstrings.

• 1:27:29Bill Simmons?

  Jesus is only five foot one. That was a story that was going around this week.

• 1:27:33Speaker 02

  I, I mean, I definitely heard he sucked the basketball. Like he was terrible.

• 1:27:37Bill Simmons?

  Seems short.

• 1:27:38Speaker 02

  And people, Christians seem really into finding out more facts about Jesus. They wanna know what color he was. What was his height?

• 1:27:44Bill Simmons?

  Now, now we know he's literally five foot one.

• 1:27:47Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm. Um, I did, where did you hear that?

• 1:27:49Bill Simmons?

  It was, it was passed around on one of my text threads.

• 1:27:52Speaker 02

  Jesus was the, uh, the short king of Nazareth.

• 1:27:54Bill Simmons?

  Five foot one, a hundred and ten, but this is, you know, a gajillion years ago.

• 1:27:56Speaker 02

  A hundred and ten, they weighed him?

• 1:27:58Bill Simmons?

  Apparently they had scales back then.

• 1:28:00Speaker 02

  Oh my God. Yeah. I mean, I, that must've been good news for the carpenter who made the crucifix. You know, like, don't worry, he's only five foot one.

• 1:28:08Bill Simmons?

  This will go fast. Um, I used to read a lot of collections and stuff.

• 1:28:14Speaker 02

  Like short story collections?

• 1:28:15Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, short story collections and also like magazine, but my favorite was, uh, I had all the short story page, but my, my single favorite writer is Raymond Carver.

• 1:28:24Speaker 02

  Raymond Carver is amazing, a master.

• 1:28:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:26Speaker 02

  Uh, everything by him is fantastic.

• 1:28:29Bill Simmons?

  So when Shortcuts, the movie came out, that was like a collision of different worlds for me.

• 1:28:33Speaker 02

  I was psyched and then I was let down by it. I thought it like didn't really capture him, you know? You know what I love? Did you ever do this? When I was a kid, I wasn't allowed to see rated R movies for a while, when I was like a little kid. I was a big reader early on. But I could get the novelization. I loved the novel, like I read the novelization of Jaws, The Revenge. And in the, and the novelization, it's amazing. The shark kills fucking everybody. And in the movie, he kills like three people. And they bring one of them back to life in the director's cut because the Jamaicans got mad. Uh, but the novelizations of like Predator was awesome. The, and they would do, I don't think they still do them. Tarantino did one after, um, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. He's got a new one coming out for, about like a Cliff Booth that I can't wait to read.

• 1:29:16Bill Simmons?

  It's coming out in December, yeah.

• 1:29:18Speaker 02

  The movie is, but then he's writing a novelization where, uh, I think just a continued story. I don't know if he even wrote the script for it.

• 1:29:23Bill Simmons?

  No, he wrote, I think he wrote a fictionalized book about Cliff Booth.

• 1:29:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:27Bill Simmons?

  That I think he's timing toward when that movie comes out. Yeah.

• 1:29:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'll definitely read that.

• 1:29:32Bill Simmons?

  One of the things I was doing, it was just a boredom thing during COVID and then I kind of kept going with it, but I was, you know, we've done, at this point, we've done like four hundred and fifty rewatchable movies, but a lot of them were movies that came out of a book. So I was like, oh, this will be fun to get the books for different rewatchable movies. And now I have like a hundred of these books and you forget like how much movie IP came from. And the easy ones to remember like Jaws, Godfather, Shining, but

• 1:29:57Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:29:58Bill Simmons?

  there's a shitload of other movies that just started as either a short story or a book.

• 1:30:03Speaker 02

  But a lot of times the movie, I don't think the book is always better. Like The Godfather, the book is insane. Like it's got that subplot about like the woman with the, like the vagina is too big. Yeah. But like, what, like if they put that in the movie, it would've been amazing. The closest I can think to the book is as good as the movie and they're both masterpieces is No Country for Old Men. When I remember seeing that movie in New York, the day it came out, being obsessed with it. Like, I can't wait. I'm gonna see it right away. Buying the book to fly to LA and reading it on the flight because it's a short book. And then seeing the movie again when I landed. And like the combination of the two in your head, like there were lines of dialogue I thought were in the movie that were just in the book, that it's the perfect. If you read Fight Club.

• 1:30:42Bill Simmons?

  It's very low, that's very, Fight Club's another one.

• 1:30:44Speaker 02

  It's like, it almost fills in the blanks of the movie that it can really help to read the book afterwards. And I think they're both e- equally valid and, uh, important.

• 1:30:52Bill Simmons?

  Godfather's funny because there is that whole, there's all this extra stuff that they, when they were making the movie, they must've been like, uh.

• 1:30:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:30:59Bill Simmons?

  Stay away.

• 1:31:00Speaker 02

  The book Jaws has like a lot of local politics. A lot. We were like, this is not nearly as fun. Yeah. A lot of the mayor.

• 1:31:08Bill Simmons?

  Trying to figure shit out.

• 1:31:09Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:31:09Bill Simmons?

  Amityville Horror was a good book.

• 1:31:11Speaker 02

  I haven't read that one.

• 1:31:11Bill Simmons?

  There were some good seventies, eighties ones, like, you know, Shining was obviously amazing, but,

• 1:31:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:31:16Bill Simmons?

  but like Shawshank Redemption was, um, what are they called? Like those half books?

• 1:31:21Speaker 02

  A short story?

• 1:31:22Bill Simmons?

  It was like more than a short story. Yeah, it was like a novella.

• 1:31:24Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. Stephen King, I mean, doesn't miss. I, I'm still fascinated by the fact that he hates The Shining. He hates the movie and won't give it up.

• 1:31:33Bill Simmons?

  He ba, he, but there was some sort of contractual thing where he wasn't allowed to criticize it anymore.

• 1:31:38Speaker 02

  Really?

• 1:31:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. I think there was, he was so critical of it. I think something happened where they were like,

• 1:31:44Speaker 02

  I mean, they missed the boat. I mean, that, that, it's over, but you read the book and I can see having read the book.

• 1:31:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, because Kubrick just did his own thing with it. He, he pushed back. They made a different version of the kind of a Stephen King blessed.

• 1:31:58Speaker 02

  The one with the guy from Wings as, as Jack Nicholson. Yeah. Yeah.

• 1:32:02Bill Simmons?

  Maybe not the same chops as Nicholson.

• 1:32:04Speaker 02

  Yeah. No. And comparing the two was rough. Uh, did not, did not enjoy that, but the book is great. The book is great.

• 1:32:12Bill Simmons?

  So are authors starting to try to butter you up now?

• 1:32:15Speaker 02

  I think, I think it's about to, once this gets released, uh, I think it's gonna come in, but we've had no problem getting guests.

• 1:32:23Bill Simmons?

  But no, but this is like, we think you're gonna love this book. Like you're now in the feelings hurting.

• 1:32:29Speaker 02

  I've gotten a lot of that. I've gotten a lot of like, I self-published this. It sounds like it would be good for you.

• 1:32:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:34Speaker 02

  Cause guys are having a hard time getting published with books for guys. I'm hoping I can change that. But I, if people reach out to me, it's dead in the water. If you reach out to my manager, you kind of know what you're doing. And I'll usually take that book. But the hard part about,

• 1:32:49Bill Simmons?

  You like finding your own.

• 1:32:51Speaker 02

  I like finding my own, sure, but I'm now, I'm deep enough that I know an author, like I've got a guy coming on who wrote a book called The Art of Fielding. Have you ever read that?

• 1:32:59Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:33:00Speaker 02

  Amazing book. He's got a new one coming out.

• 1:33:03Bill Simmons?

  I read that book.

• 1:33:03Speaker 02

  It's with an H.

• 1:33:04Bill Simmons?

  Chad Harbach, something like that?

• 1:33:05Speaker 02

  Chad Harbach. He's coming on this. He's already gonna be a guest.

• 1:33:08Bill Simmons?

  That was one of the last fiction books I read.

• 1:33:10Speaker 02

  It's an incredible, it was an easy recommendation to people. It's six hundred pages, but it's great.

• 1:33:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:14Speaker 02

  He's got a new one called The Brightness and he's gonna come on and talk about that. So if I know the author, it's an easy like, yes, give this to me. And they have a thing, what your staff told me about it called NetGalley. Where I just wrote, like, I'm the book reviewer for The Ringer. And I request books in advance and I get it right to my Kindle. And so that has changed the game.

• 1:33:32Bill Simmons?

  Oh, it's like screeners for TV. Yeah.

• 1:33:35Speaker 02

  I don't ever wanna be trashing books on the show. You know, I wanna read things that I love and tell people to love them too. Uh, and just get people, get people reading. But Chad Harbach, I'm really excited about. The hard thing is that we're in LA. And most writers are in New York.

• 1:33:49Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:50Speaker 02

  So it's like, hey, I'd love to come on. I'd love to do a Zoom. And in the beginning, we wanna keep it in the studio. I think there's a tension to being in the same room as me versus being on a Zoom. Uh, that I,

• 1:34:00Bill Simmons?

  I don't, I used to do, I used to interview everybody in the pre-COVID and post-COVID. It's just,

• 1:34:07Speaker 02

  Post-COVID's way different.

• 1:34:08Bill Simmons?

  I just don't like the Zoom interviews. I don't think it's the same and it's harder to control. It's harder to connect with people.

• 1:34:13Speaker 02

  It's easy to just sit there and smile.

• 1:34:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:15Speaker 02

  You know, when you're really like face to face, you have to think about things. There's a pressure there. So especially in the beginning, we're going to, uh, we're gonna keep it in the studio and have people come to us. But I've been surprised at people who are willing to come out here to talk to us. We've got this woman named Paula Boomer. Wrote one of my favorite books of last year called, um, oh, fuck, what was it called?

• 1:34:37Bill Simmons?

  Paula Boomer.

• 1:34:38Speaker 02

  Paula Boomer wrote this amazing book and it's basically like, like a different take on American Psycho. American Psycho as a loser. And the guy's just a total piece of shit that you hate him the entire book and cannot wait for him to get his comeuppance. And I loved it. It's like a furious book. It was in my top 10 and no one else's top 10. And she's like, I'll, I'll fly to you to come and we'll talk about, uh, we'll talk about.

• 1:35:00Bill Simmons?

  I mean, they probably, the book company should probably send these people here. It's gonna probably help the book.

• 1:35:05Speaker 02

  I think that's what's gonna end up happening. Cause I'm the only guy doing this. There's a lot of women doing it. Uh, Reese Witherspoon's making a ton of money. Cause she buys the rights to the book before she has it in her book.

• 1:35:15Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I don't like that.

• 1:35:16Speaker 02

  Or they hold up the book and that's it. Or they do the thing, if you see it on like TikTok, where they hold the books backwards. And like, these five books changed my life and they talk to you for 20 minutes and then they show you what the books are. I hate that. Like you're gonna know upfront what we're talking about and I'm gonna make you excited to read the book as excited as I am to have read the book.

• 1:35:34Bill Simmons?

  My 21 year old daughter reads a lot of, uh, the kind of books you would expect her to read that get made into Amazon.

• 1:35:41Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:35:41Bill Simmons?

  Like eight episode shows and movies and those kind of things.

• 1:35:45Speaker 02

  Like young adult or like?

• 1:35:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, like, like those YA, like somebody is vacationing in Martha's Vineyard with her uncle and there's a murder and, you know, those kinds of things. And she reads all of those and she always knows from the book when it's gonna, oh, this will end up being a movie. And I do think they look at that. There is like a market for that. But what's interesting is when it's like, this is like trying to turn Zodiac into a book is like a whole.

• 1:36:09Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:36:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, into a movie, I mean, is a whole different thing.

• 1:36:13Speaker 02

  I mean, I grew up and like, I read a lot of Hardy Boys Case Files. It was like a modern day take on the Hardy Boys. There was, I like, I love those things. I'm sure you read Matt Christopher when you were a kid.

• 1:36:23Bill Simmons?

  I had every Hardy Boys book. I had the old blue hard covers.

• 1:36:27Speaker 02

  I had a bunch of those, but those were kind of like corny even by the time we were kids. Hardy Boys Case Files was like, they were like at a Comic Con, you know, solving a murder. And it was, wait, the, the, the blue books, they'd be like, who stole the candle? Like that kind of shit. But this was like, someone got killed.

• 1:36:42Bill Simmons?

  There'd be like a scary monkey on the front.

• 1:36:44Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:36:44Bill Simmons?

  Matt Christopher was, I always felt like he, the best sports younger person writer was Alfred Sloane. Who did, uh, he did a couple of great ones, including Jake. We ended up doing, we did a 30 for 30 short about him.

• 1:36:56Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:36:57Bill Simmons?

  Um, and then Matt Christopher was kind of like the volume version of Alfred Sloane.

• 1:37:01Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:37:01Bill Simmons?

  And those guys both nailed that genre. I read all of those.

• 1:37:05Speaker 02

  Nailed it.

• 1:37:05Bill Simmons?

  Cause there was, I'm a kid from the seventies. Like there were, there were no books. There were, there were no books geared toward me.

• 1:37:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:37:12Bill Simmons?

  So any book that was, you would eat them up.

• 1:37:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:37:14Bill Simmons?

  Now I think they have a million of them now.

• 1:37:16Speaker 02

  A million of them.

• 1:37:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:37:17Bill Simmons?

  But some of the old ones kind of hold up.

• 1:37:19Speaker 02

  I think so. I met Christopher, I remember when Matt Christopher won, where it was like a kid gets kidnapped and forced to play on like a junior hockey team. And being like, what the fuck is going on? Like, I thought this was gonna be, you know, I remember like the kid who only hit home runs. But the getting kidnapped and going to a hockey team where Christopher Pike was a big one for me as a kid. There were like horror books. That were in between like the, what was the spooky one that like R.L. Stine had like literally horror for kids.

• 1:37:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:47Speaker 02

  And this was like horror for teenagers. Where we're still like moralistic, but terrifying that I, uh, I loved, I love stuff like that.

• 1:37:54Bill Simmons?

  I really want people to read more. I think it's getting tougher and tougher because of all the different ways to do something other than reading. Combined with, um, it's harder to find stuff on, with websites and Google changed their algorithm.

• 1:38:08Speaker 02

  Yes. The internet's made it tough.

• 1:38:09Bill Simmons?

  It's harder to sustain some of these bigger pieces. Like I, like when we launched Grantland, that was kind of like the last real wave of, of really people getting behind like big, high platform journalism. Big pieces, big essays, big thing pieces.

• 1:38:23Speaker 02

  And it was free. You could just go on and look at it. I think people want to take control. I think people just don't know what books to read. You walk into a bookstore, you're overwhelmed. I'm just gonna try to be like here.

• 1:38:34Bill Simmons?

  You're overwhelmed unless it's like Bobby really likes da, da, da. And they have those little like the blue colored things with the wrecks.

• 1:38:41Speaker 02

  Yeah. Sometimes you can't, you can't even trust those.

• 1:38:43Bill Simmons?

  Better than all those guys. Fuck those guys.

• 1:38:45Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I've got some, I've had some weird pics. I've had some pics, people are like, I can't believe you recommended this insane book, but I like insane books.

• 1:38:52Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:38:52Speaker 02

  Have you ever, have you seen the movie The Coffee Table?

• 1:38:56Bill Simmons?

  Who's in it?

• 1:38:56Speaker 02

  It's a Spanish horror film that came out a couple of years ago.

• 1:38:59Bill Simmons?

  Uh-uh.

• 1:39:00Speaker 02

  It's about, I'm gonna spoil it for you. It's about a guy brings the baby home. They just have a baby, brings a baby home. He accidentally drops the baby on the coff- this coffee table. Baby dies. And the rest of the movie is him trying to hide this from his wife and family as they come home. And they're like, where's the baby? Like it's a horror comedy. Because everyone's like laughing and just they're excited about this. And it's the most terrifying, horrifying movie I've ever seen. And I watched it with the biggest grin, just like, how did this get made? How did they get money in Spain to make this film?

• 1:39:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:30Speaker 02

  With books, you don't need a budget. Like you can do anything with your imagination. I think film, especially with like AI and the studios consolidating, that film has gotten worse. You've got to play to the masses, whereas books can play to the individual. And I'm just trying to find, if you're an individual who likes me, who likes The Ringer, I can find the books that will flip your switch.

• 1:39:51Bill Simmons?

  One thing that's definitely happened over the last 15 years is I think there's a sameness to a lot of the internet writing that, from a stylistic standpoint. Um, if you go back, I used to do this test, especially when we were trying to figure out Grantland. Like if you hide somebody's byline, could you tell who the writer is? Right? And back 15, 16 years ago, uh, if you did that, you'd be like, oh, I know who that is. Oh, I know that's, and I think it's a lot harder now, whereas in books, I think people have a lot more time, space and kind of the freedom to just be like, here's my style or here's the way I'm gonna write it.

• 1:40:25Speaker 02

  Yeah. The algorithm rewards imitation. You know, they call the, the, whatever the dead internet theory is, it's just like, you just do the same thing. You look at like Instagram, you can start doom scrolling. It's the same joke told by different people with no shame. That with books, you have to be at least have some original idea. And book critics aren't always right. You know, I think they're compromised in a lot of cases that it's like, this is just what I like, you know, and you have to trust me. And I think people, people do. I've been setting this up for years. Like I didn't just decide I'm gonna just start a book club. Cause I knew it could be, it come off as corny, trying too hard. Like, oh, he's trying to jump on a trend. Like for a year before I started the book club, I picked a new book every Tuesday.

• 1:41:07Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:07Speaker 02

  Like the one book for guys, but like, but from the copyrighters I read and read it in a week and reviewed it. Just so that my top 10 list at the end of the year would be thorough. And that took off. And then I said, okay, let's do the book club now. Now that I have bona fides, anyone can hold up a book and say, this is what we're reading this month. They never hear about it again. But we're going in depth. We're for real.

• 1:41:28Bill Simmons?

  I think you should brand it differently than a top 10 list. It should be like a top 13 list or a top 11 list.

• 1:41:34Speaker 02

  It's my top, it's my top 10 books of the year. Not like the top 10 books of the year. It's mine. And my, mine is very specific. Compared to what the New York Times would say. It's just like what, what, at the end of the year, when I look through all the books I've read. It'll be like 50, 60 books. What do I remember? What has stayed with me? What's haunted me?

• 1:41:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but this is, I say, I like this because I think most of the time when people do lists like this, they're very conscious of what people will say about the list.

• 1:42:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, I got a lot of, you only have three women. You only have like, and it's like, I'm just picking, every book, when you open it up, looks exactly the same.

• 1:42:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:11Speaker 02

  Doesn't matter who wrote it, you know, what their gender is, what their race is. Every book looks the same and that's what I'm going by. That, uh, that I don't, I don't pay any attention to that. But I think people would be annoyed if I did.

• 1:42:22Bill Simmons?

  I don't either. I, I did at the end of last year, I did this list of my fif- the first 25 years of the century. There were all these lists about different movies. So I did a list of my 50 movies I watched the most times in the 21st century. So I was like, not proud of this list. This is just a list we're going down. And the number 16 was Limitless. And I was doing it with the, with the Chris and Sean and I was going down the list and I got to, and it's like, look, I, I, I can't control the list. This is just, this is what the heart wanted. I've just watched Limitless a bunch of times. I'm sorry.

• 1:42:57Speaker 02

  The book was better. The book, I saw, I read the book right when it came out. Yes. Yeah, we, that was based on a book. Limitless is where he takes the pills to make himself a genius.

• 1:43:06Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:43:06Speaker 02

  Yeah. The book is incredible. The book, the movie sells out at the end.

• 1:43:10Bill Simmons?

  I made the book for my collection.

• 1:43:12Speaker 02

  At the, at the end of the movie, he's like, I weaned myself off magically and now I'm still a genius. The book is not like that. The book ends badly. Uh, but the book is great.

• 1:43:22Bill Simmons?

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• 1:44:05Bill Simmons?

  everybody did a run on quarterbacks and there was none left. And yet Bryce Young, uh, incredibly reliable uh, as a fantasy quarterback. Who'd have thunk? He's been better than Drake May. He's been, um, way better than basically everybody in the league, um, except for Josh Allen, who's been the best guy. Anyway, uh, somebody like him has been awesome. I liked what I saw from Tyler Ward and DeShawn and Devon Bailey over the weekend. Um, Ashton Gente has been pretty fun if you like the Raiders. Anyway, these players had it in the bag as soon as they stepped on the field. And with Uber Eats, you can have almost, almost anything in your bag and on your doorstep. Enjoy game day deals every week all season long. For alcohol,

• 1:44:47Bill Simmons?

  you must be of legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. You said something interesting in one of the interviews you did, um, that you felt like there was a shelf life with being a stand-up. And that you were very aware of, you know, there's a finish line here. How long have you been doing stand-up?

• 1:45:08Speaker 02

  It's almost 25 years now. Yeah.

• 1:45:10Bill Simmons?

  When did you feel like you were good at it?

• 1:45:13Speaker 02

  I would say.

• 1:45:16Speaker 02

  I mean, good versus great, like, I thought I was good, maybe six or seven. I knew I was different enough that people were paying attention.

• 1:45:24Bill Simmons?

  Like six, seven years in?

• 1:45:26Speaker 02

  I came from the alternative comedy scene, so like to get attention there and to do well consistently. And then starting going on the road and it was after the Trump roast, when I was selling out clubs and people were coming to see me. I was like, oh, I've got my own thing and I'm delivering on the promise.

• 1:45:42Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:45:42Speaker 02

  And then nowadays, you have to put out a special every couple of years. So I would just tour everything and then when I ran out of places to tour, I'd do the special. And then by probably the third or fourth special, I was like, oh, I keep doing this. I knew that I was great.

• 1:45:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:45:57Speaker 02

  And then you start to see, people are like, when are you gonna do something different? And it's like, I'm not. I like what I do so much. I wanna go joke, joke, joke and try to make you think I'm going one way, go the other. That's what I get off on in stand up.

• 1:46:11Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:46:11Speaker 02

  But the idea of going up there and being like, let me tell you about my life now, like sucks to me. If I went and saw Steven Wright and he was like, I'm gonna tell you the story of my childhood, I'd be furious. I'd be furious. I want Steven Wright to tell jokes.

• 1:46:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:24Speaker 02

  So I think there's a shelf life on, I think for certain comics, don't, it's some, certain comics age better than others. You know, I think Nate Bargatze is gonna age incredibly well. Sebastian Maniscalco has aged very well, but there's some that have not. And I don't know how well my thing ages. And you say a lot of athletes retire because of the preseason, you know, because of training camp, not because of the games.

• 1:46:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:46Speaker 02

  That I think I'll, maybe I'll finish an hour and be like, I don't wanna write another hour. You know, maybe I wanna write a book next time. Uh, and if that's as satisfying to me as writing these jokes, then I'll keep doing that, but.

• 1:46:59Bill Simmons?

  That's what all the athletes say. It's not, they could still do it. I forget who told me that. Somebody put it the best. Wasn't Peyton Manning, I can't remember, but somebody was just explaining like, I could still do it.

• 1:47:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:47:12Bill Simmons?

  But it's the off season and getting up in fucking mid-August.

• 1:47:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:47:17Bill Simmons?

  And knowing that I have to wake up at 5:30 in the morning to get my body ready for four hours for a game that is three. I just didn't wanna do that anymore.

• 1:47:25Speaker 02

  And I, I'd hate to be a bad comedian who's just trading off the reputation. I'm on tour, I just started a theater tour last weekend with my newest hour. I did clubs for six months out in theaters and I love this hour. I think it's a, a return to form. I called my last hour my pandemic hour. It was like, let me throw this together. It was like, I wanna go out for 20 years and I'm gonna figure it out and get it done. And this time I really took my time and put out the best hour I possibly could. And I love this hour. I've got some of my best jokes I've ever written. But after this, like, maybe that's it. And I might do a Tosh, where Daniel Tosh hasn't put out a special in 15 years. He just has the hour. And whenever he feels like touring, he just goes out and tours for a little while.

• 1:48:07Speaker 02

  That, that sounds nice to me. Like Leno never put out a special. He just had the hour. Seinfeld hasn't done one in years.

• 1:48:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:14Speaker 02

  But just to have an hour, that if somebody wants me to come out and do a casino or a festival, I have it. But we'll see what the special market looks like in a couple of years. But I'm doing every other weekend, one show a night, cause I'm getting old. And those two show nights, you know, three cities a weekend were starting to, starting to fuck me up. That, that I think I can give my best to the audience if I'm doing one show a night.

• 1:48:36Bill Simmons?

  What's the process of getting the show ready? Like when you're starting from scratch, how many months are we talking?

• 1:48:41Speaker 02

  I mean, it depends. I came, I came up pretty quickly with this one, just because I, I felt like there was a fire under me. I was, uh, I was, I was happy with the last special, but not as happy as I was with the one before it. And I was just like, let me kinda get back to basics.

• 1:48:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:57Speaker 02

  And just write, like, I've got 70 jokes in my act right now. I wrote 1,400 jokes to get those 70. And then was just hitting the improv.

• 1:49:05Bill Simmons?

  Trial and error.

• 1:49:06Speaker 02

  Trying them out, yeah, putting them together. And the hour came together pretty quickly and then I went into comedy clubs and felt like I don't really need to do a year of clubs. Six months will be enough and then go to theaters and just kinda save myself.

• 1:49:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, cause I, I stopped writing, I don't know, eight years ago, but it was really the, the process. That I, I didn't feel like I could commit to the process in the way that I could stay at the level that I wanted to stay at.

• 1:49:30Speaker 02

  Was it like staring at a blank word document and hitting those first, like, you felt like you're repeating yourself kinda thing?

• 1:49:36Bill Simmons?

  Wasn't even a repeating myself, it was, it was almost like what we were talking about with athletes. Like the sitting down and the process of it, unless I was doing it day after day after day. I almost like, I was compared to like golf, where people can, you can go out and play golf once a week and you'll be okay. But to actually be good at golf, you gotta play every day. And I always looked at like, the best stretches I ever had as a writer were always when I was writing all the time. And it was, I was consumed by it. It was all I was doing. And the busier I got and the more stuff I was doing, it just, I felt, I don't, I don't feel like it's something you can do as one of the four or five things you're doing. I didn't, I didn't wanna get in that position.

• 1:50:15Speaker 02

  I get that. I mean, I think that's one of the reasons I think I was as good as, as stand up as I became was because I never got into acting.

• 1:50:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:21Speaker 02

  You know, I never got, I never wrote a screenplay. I was just like, this is gonna be my thing and I've gotta commit to it cause I have nothing else. But if you have something else, stand up is so hard, it's easy to gravitate towards the easier thing.

• 1:50:32Bill Simmons?

  But you're on a set for three months and you got, and then, and then somebody wants you to write a book and you're doing that. And then it's like, oh shit, I gotta do my, and that's when it falls apart.

• 1:50:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, but doing this, I mean, I'm, I'll be 48 in December.

• 1:50:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:45Speaker 02

  Like, I think the 50s might be my book writing time, uh, if it works out that way. And, but if I think of one joke after this hour is done, then I've gotta write an hour just to, to do that joke.

• 1:50:56Bill Simmons?

  It felt like we hit a run with comedy where, um, the kinda stuff that makes you and I laugh probably. Um, everyone, you couldn't, there was a meanness factor that had to be toned down for a little bit. And then it came back post-COVID. And now I feel like it's back, but it can only be in different form. So I'm sure you're navigating that constantly when you're in these clubs.

• 1:51:17Speaker 02

  Oh, definitely. I have to kind of answer, I was like, I always compare myself to, you watch Deadwood, right?

• 1:51:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, in the past, yeah.

• 1:51:24Speaker 02

  Like Deadwood, in the beginning, Al Swearengen is the villain for the first like three episodes.

• 1:51:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:28Speaker 02

  He's the guy who runs the town and then just worse people keep showing up. And then he's the good guy by the end of it, just because of everyone around him. And that's how I feel in comedy.

• 1:51:36Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:36Speaker 02

  That like, I started out as this villain, like this character on stage. And then like real kinda awful people started showing up and I was like, oh, I hate this. That I think at post-COVID, there was a lot of that. There was a lot of, you know, the comedy used to be a lot of like, I'm a piece of shit and here's why. And now it's like, that times 100. And it's not as clever, it's not a character. It's like what they really believe and they're kinda playing into that audience. I felt like I had to constantly kinda prune my audience. I didn't want the toxic part of it. I wanted to get rid of those people and respect the people that I'm entertaining. The people who buy tickets for my show. And sometimes you have to tell people to fuck off. Uh, and that's not the easiest thing to do, but when you have a big audience, I don't mind losing some people, uh, just so I don't have the assholes.

• 1:52:19Bill Simmons?

  The ro, we had that whole roast era in the 2000s and the beginning of 2010s, which was one of the best ways to even discover a new comic, right?

• 1:52:28Speaker 02

  It's definitely how I got discovered, it's how Whitney Cummings got discovered, you know, Jeff Ross built a career off of it. Uh, Gerardo, that was like his whole thing, Lampinelli.

• 1:52:35Bill Simmons?

  I'm not gonna do roasts anymore, Jeff Russ.

• 1:52:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:52:38Bill Simmons?

  2006.

• 1:52:40Speaker 02

  See, see.

• 1:52:40Bill Simmons?

  I gotta, I gotta pivot.

• 1:52:42Speaker 02

  See you in six months, Jeff. Like, that's, that's great.

• 1:52:44Bill Simmons?

  We still make fun of him about that.

• 1:52:46Speaker 02

  I mean, he's still, he's still the greatest.

• 1:52:48Bill Simmons?

  He, he went the other, he's still, yeah, he's, I think pound for pound, he's been probably, he's killed the most times that arose.

• 1:52:55Speaker 02

  He found the right way to do it in order to keep doing it, whereas I can only do three, Whitney did three. You know, most people did three and got out and moved on. Gerardo was miserable at the end, like doing those things.

• 1:53:05Bill Simmons?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:53:06Speaker 02

  Hated them, uh, that I think.

• 1:53:08Bill Simmons?

  Lisa Lampinelli did a couple of them.

• 1:53:09Speaker 02

  She did like three or four and then like really wanted to get away from it. Like it's, it's not that fun after the first couple, but Jeff found a way to make it fun.

• 1:53:16Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:17Speaker 02

  For him and for everybody else.

• 1:53:18Bill Simmons?

  Well, now it feels like they can't happen without him.

• 1:53:20Speaker 02

  No, I think he, he signed some contract that they can't do it without him.

• 1:53:23Bill Simmons?

  He's just, even if you're, if we tried to have one right now, I think he would just barge through the wall.

• 1:53:28Speaker 02

  Like the Kool-Aid man, like it would just be like, I heard you doing a roast.

• 1:53:32Bill Simmons?

  I heard.

• 1:53:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, but the Netflix ones, I feel like have killed it even more because they don't edit them. They, those things need to be edited. Comedy Central did everyone a service by editing those down and changing things around.

• 1:53:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I went to, I went to the, Jimmy did, uh, when I was working for Kimmel, he did, let's say Pamela Anderson or Courtney Love, one of them. Pamela Anderson, maybe.

• 1:53:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, Courtney Love was there, yeah.

• 1:53:53Bill Simmons?

  And it's a long day and it's, it drags, people bomb. And you didn't feel it as much in the Brady one, but I thought the Kevin Hart one, you really felt like this is what happens when you know to edit these things.

• 1:54:06Speaker 02

  I don't know. I mean, they must have asked so many people before they got to Kevin Hart, because Kevin Hart's been being roasted his whole career, it's his thing. The what are you going to say? And then getting people, they, and people don't wanna do it when it's live. It's hard to get to the celebrity that you could get on Comedy Central, cause they knew they'd be protected in some way.

• 1:54:24Bill Simmons?

  I thought they were dead after the Chevy Chase one, cause that one was actually depressing and I'm sure it was more, I'm sure it was more depressing, the unedited version. You didn't, you weren't involved in that one, were you?

• 1:54:33Speaker 02

  No, no, but when I got, when I did Trump, I was like, I wanna watch these all. And they were like, good luck finding Chevy Chase, we burned that copy. And I found it on YouTube, but it was incredible because it was like a, a killer lineup of comics who were just unknown, like Todd Barry.

• 1:54:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:48Speaker 02

  Roasting and no one knew Chevy Chase. So that's why, what made it tough.

• 1:54:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he had like no friends there.

• 1:54:53Speaker 02

  No, nobody wanted to. And that's the hard thing, even when they get someone where they think they're gonna get your friends.

• 1:54:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:58Speaker 02

  Like they got Rob Lowe and he's like, I'm gonna get you Amy Poehler, I'm gonna get you Chris Pratt. And they can't because they're like, we're not doing this.

• 1:55:04Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:55:05Speaker 02

  Like, we don't wanna sit up here and have people take shots at us. But it's, I think with the live, you really need hungry comics who want to prove themselves. And they really want the celebrities. And the celebrity's like, why am I gonna sit here and let some comics try to make their bones, you know?

• 1:55:20Bill Simmons?

  That's how I met Kimmel, because he did a. They remember Shaq had those roasts in like the early 2000s?

• 1:55:26Speaker 02

  I remember a couple Shaq ones. I mean, there was like some brutal ones on that thing, that Jamie Foxx.

• 1:55:31Bill Simmons?

  So that was the one, I wrote a piece about that. And I think Jimmy was on that one or one of the other ones. And I was writing about how funny Jimmy was and he just reached out to me and that's all I got to know. But yeah, the Jeff Ross, Jeff Ross, that was, I think, I think the highlight of his career at the, at the Emmett, Emmett Smith roast. Which was the same one as the Jamie Foxx.

• 1:55:51Speaker 02

  He's told me so many stories about that Emmett Smith roast that are incredible.

• 1:55:54Bill Simmons?

  It's a legendary roast. I would highly encourage people to go watch it.

• 1:55:57Speaker 02

  Do, Kimmel did like the roast of Carson Daly on, when MTV tried to do a roast. And the audience just didn't understand what a roast was.

• 1:56:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they were like 15 year olds.

• 1:56:07Speaker 02

  They would boo everything. That every comic could be like, it's a roast. Why are you, why are you so upset?

• 1:56:11Bill Simmons?

  What is, what's your, what do you think is the best standup special of all time? Anything you did excluded?

• 1:56:17Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 1:56:18Bill Simmons?

  After year five?

• 1:56:19Speaker 02

  For me, it's gotta be Bring the Pain, Chris Rock. You know, I've seen some great ones, like Steven Wright's HBO special is probably the one I've watched the most, but Bring the Pain has everything. There was a, a great documentary about Bring the Pain. W. Kamau Bell did this for like AMC. Like you have to buy it on iTunes, but it's worth it. And it literally, it's, he's talking to Ava DuVernay. He's talking to, talks to Chris and it's about like building that. Like Chris Rock, HBO at one point was like, we need to get, uh, we want some black comedians on HBO.

• 1:56:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:51Speaker 02

  And they paid three guys, I think it was Chris Rock, Greer Barnes and like someone else, like a hundred thousand to do a special, do a half hour. And Chris took the hundred grand. The other guys were like great, showed up, did their set. Chris bought a backdrop. It was like CR. Bought the rights to In Living Colors, Cult of Personality.

• 1:57:10Bill Simmons?

  He's from the Eddie Murphy generation though. He knew how to do it. He was basically doing his Delirious.

• 1:57:14Speaker 02

  He won a Cable ACE Award for that. And then HBO offered him an hour. He goes to DC, opens with Marion Barry jokes. Like he really went at it. That like, if you, it'll give you a new appreciation for that special.

• 1:57:26Bill Simmons?

  I watched, I watched all the Chris Rock ones, um, like a year ago, cause they're just all on HBO Max and you can find all of these.

• 1:57:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:57:34Bill Simmons?

  And, uh, I was that, like a dead sports time. And I always like to have stuff on when I'm working. So I just put them on and bring the, that, that one was so fucking good. Even 30 years later, it was like, oh my God.

• 1:57:46Speaker 02

  As a kid, we would watch it over and over again. Just put it on. I think there was a Kevin Hart special that became the new one for the gen, like that next generation. And I was at the Comedy Cellar. People were like, my kids just play video games with Kevin Hart's special playing on the side. And they just listened to that over and over again. But Bring the Pain to me was, and I've seen all the Carlin, you know, the Carlins were great. So HBO would only do Carlin specials. They have, they have, but.

• 1:58:10Bill Simmons?

  I always felt like he was like the generation before the generation of guys I cared about. Like that Delirious was the most important one for me as a kid, just cause watching somebody, watching Eddie do all, he was already on SNL, watching him do all these different voices and I, I just never seen anything like it.

• 1:58:26Speaker 02

  I was a Raw guy. I saw Raw a million times before I ever saw Delirious and I thought it was a letdown, but probably because I saw Raw first.

• 1:58:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Raw was the more polished version of it. Yeah.

• 1:58:35Speaker 02

  But, uh, but yeah, I don't think, I don't know what beats Bring the Pain. And Killing Him Softly, Dave Chappelle, like young Dave Chappelle was, was, uh, was pretty amazing, but nothing is like, has the fury and just nails it. Like everything just hits perfectly.

• 1:58:51Bill Simmons?

  I think Shane's thing that he did in Austin, that's like basically YouTube only.

• 1:58:55Speaker 02

  YouTube, I haven't seen YouTube. I saw the Netflix one.

• 1:58:57Bill Simmons?

  This was like four years ago or something. I think it was the one that kinda helped bring him back, but it's, he's doing a lot of Trump stuff and different stuff, but that one was pretty fun from like a just popping up on YouTube.

• 1:59:08Speaker 02

  Oh, he does Trump jokes?

• 1:59:09Bill Simmons?

  He did some Trump jokes.

• 1:59:10Speaker 02

  I didn't know that. Does he do impressions?

• 1:59:11Bill Simmons?

  He did some impressions too. Yeah.

• 1:59:13Speaker 02

  I think he's, I think Shane's the most interesting comic right now to see where he goes, what he does. I know he's doing a lot of movies now. I wish he didn't live in Austin, but, uh, I think he's a very interesting comic to watch.

• 1:59:25Bill Simmons?

  I thought it was the comedy center.

• 1:59:27Speaker 02

  The comedy mecca.

• 1:59:28Bill Simmons?

  Comedy mecca.

• 1:59:28Speaker 02

  I just think everyone's kinda the same. You know, I, he's more interesting in New York to me, uh, or LA. In LA, everyone's trying to be different. Uh, New York people are trying to separate themselves. When I lived in New York, everyone wanted to be Dave Attell. And just work on their jokes every, like every day and then go out at night and try them out. And now everybody wants to be Joe Rogan. And I think that's, uh, that's amiss, you know?

• 1:59:52Bill Simmons?

  I remember when I moved out here, um, and Jimmy was dating Sarah at that point. So she was like, and she was like in that, in all those circles. And I was shocked by how much everybody like revered Attell. As like, as like one of the guys.

• 2:00:07Speaker 02

  When you got to see him work every night in New York, I didn't understand it when I lived in LA and heard about him, but when I moved to New York, I was like, oh, I get it now. But in that LA, I was in, I started that.

• 2:00:16Bill Simmons?

  Do you like his weird show?

• 2:00:18Speaker 02

  Uh, um, Insomniac?

• 2:00:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:21Speaker 02

  I liked it a lot better than the porno one he did where he, where he watched like blurred porno with this voice.

• 2:00:26Bill Simmons?

  I watched a couple of those porno ones and I'm like, what's happening? Can somebody talk to him?

• 2:00:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:00:30Bill Simmons?

  Why are we doing that? And he would bring stars from the movie and it just felt like somebody's vice actually spilling into their, uh.

• 2:00:37Speaker 02

  That was, that was rough.

• 2:00:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:39Speaker 02

  But he's, I mean.

• 2:00:40Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that was yours. Sarah's like, basically that's your comedy class, right?

• 2:00:43Speaker 02

  Oh, I mean, she was above me. I looked up to her. I probably wouldn't, I'm not a comic if Sarah's not around.

• 2:00:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:49Speaker 02

  Because Sarah made standup comedy cool. Before that, you had to either be angry at the world.

• 2:00:54Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:54Speaker 02

  Or like a nerd, like you're like, oh, look at my haircut. And I wasn't gonna do that. But Sarah was like sexy and cool. And so I came around and it was like Patton Oswalt, Zach Galifianakis, Louis CK, Paul F. Tompkins, and they were all murderers. But all completely different. Like if you tried to be like any of them, you got called out on it.

• 2:01:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:14Speaker 02

  And Sarah was definitely one of the, the best of those, uh.

• 2:01:18Bill Simmons?

  I was always struck by the community of everybody too.

• 2:01:20Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:01:21Bill Simmons?

  Like she, you know, she, like Jimmy would have football on Sundays and like six of those people would come over. She was always popping around. She would leave and go do a set and come back. And it's like, oh, I just did a set. It's like.

• 2:01:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:01:32Bill Simmons?

  You were just, you were just here 20 minutes ago. Which is like, yeah, I just, almost like going to get like a cup of coffee or something.

• 2:01:38Speaker 02

  Yeah. She's almost like pathological. She, I mean, she's a comic like in her bones.

• 2:01:42Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Um, so what's the generation now? Like it feels like Shane has his own generation, right? Which I guess is like the Rogan.

• 2:01:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, Shane's like the generation below, but it's a lot of like, the generation almost got ruined by, when the pandemic kinda wiped out the, the alternative standup scene.

• 2:02:00Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:02:00Speaker 02

  Where like the really different people were just gone.

• 2:02:03Bill Simmons?

  Well, you asked two years where you couldn't even do them.

• 2:02:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. And so that just, every, any venue that did them, uh, was gone. A lot of them went into podcasting. People are like, I like you better on your podcast than I do on stage. So people have been prioritizing that in a way I think has been bad for standup. Good for them for making money, but bad for the art form. And a lot of them have gone into this like, trying to find the algorithm. Trying to be like the Matt Rife who blows up with crowd work. And they're just chasing trends. Was I think the comics that I always looked up to were like making the trends. You know, for a long, for like 10 years, people at open mics were trying to be me.

• 2:02:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:39Speaker 02

  You know, and they all failed. But the, uh, but now it's like, everyone's trying to kind of just get their clip to go viral and that instead of caring about the audience in front of you. That I don't know what happens to this next generation. I'm a little concerned. I think, I mean, the second comedy boom kind of, you would hope there would be innovation, but it was more about like cashing in.

• 2:02:59Bill Simmons?

  It's interesting, cause I've, I've watched a bunch of those Kill Tonys, cause me and my son both kind of enjoy it. It's like a train wreck.

• 2:03:05Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:03:06Bill Simmons?

  Um, I'm not sure ultimately how it's gonna set the tone, especially when it's on Netflix and it's, you know, pretty huge platform.

• 2:03:14Speaker 02

  Sure, but doing one minute.

• 2:03:16Bill Simmons?

  It's basically the Gong Show.

• 2:03:18Speaker 02

  Yes, very much so.

• 2:03:19Bill Simmons?

  For com, for comedians.

• 2:03:21Speaker 02

  But having your goal be to do one minute of comedy isn't gonna help you. I think, but there's guys like.

• 2:03:26Bill Simmons?

  Ended up on SNL.

• 2:03:27Speaker 02

  There's, sure. And but that guy, Cam Patterson.

• 2:03:30Bill Simmons?

  Probably would happen anyway.

• 2:03:31Speaker 02

  Exactly. He would have gotten there one way or another. But there's guys like Chris Fleming. Who's like, who was very different and has a rabid fanbase. John Marcos Sorese, very different, has a fanbase. Um, Rory Scoville's new special is amazing. The specials, people just started pumping them out where you could tell who got a two special deal. Because they would say, I've got a special ready. They'd be like, great, he's a two special deal. You need the next one in a year. And you can tell that they had a year to put it together. You know, it's like that sophomore slump in albums where it's like, oh, you just went up there to talk. You know, like what else can I do to fill this hour? And it gets bad.

• 2:04:06Bill Simmons?

  So it's like when the bands in the seventies and eighties, they would try to be getting out of their deal and they would just release an album.

• 2:04:12Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:04:13Bill Simmons?

  Just to get to the second one. Yeah.

• 2:04:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, crank out mixtapes.

• 2:04:15Bill Simmons?

  Gotta get, gotta get one more album to get out of my deal.

• 2:04:18Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I'm, I'm hoping that someone comes along and refreshes everything, but I, and I don't, I don't pay attention to a lot of it. I've tried to stay out of the comedy drama because I started a lot of it a few years ago. I was like, this is like. I had a joke about Rogan in my last special, that in the beginning of the tour, I have this, and the joke didn't change in three years, that I was touring it. And in the beginning, we're like laughing backstage, like Joe's gonna love this joke. And then by the three, time three years went by, things had changed. And the joke was exactly the same word for word, but it was now, it had carried this weight that it was a different thing. That I think, uh, I think the pandemic really fucked up a lot of people.

• 2:04:58Bill Simmons?

  Isn't that the point of standup comedy? For people to get snippy with each other?

• 2:05:02Speaker 02

  I think so.

• 2:05:02Bill Simmons?

  I thought that was, we have 60 year history of this.

• 2:05:04Speaker 02

  Not when you just go on like rotating podcasts, you know, that I was like, I'm sick of these podcasts. I'm sick of being asked how I write my jokes. I'm tired of this kind of carousel of, of podcasting and these like.

• 2:05:16Bill Simmons?

  Our thing's been different. This has been a unique, refreshing take on a podcast interview.

• 2:05:20Speaker 02

  That's why I'm here. That's why I got, that's why I got a fucking book club, man. As I was like, this will be different. And I, I'm, I'm excited to hang out with authors and not, uh, comedians, because it just got, it was fun for a while. The beginning of the comedy podcast era was like, how open can you be? How vulnerable, how vulnerable can you be? Can you talk about your addiction and your upbringing?

• 2:05:40Bill Simmons?

  You know, I took Jeff Ross's cherry.

• 2:05:43Speaker 02

  You did?

• 2:05:43Bill Simmons?

  I, his first podcast ever was at my house in like 2010.

• 2:05:47Speaker 02

  Really?

• 2:05:47Bill Simmons?

  And we, we went for like, I was getting a lot of, I was like basically a lot of people's first podcasts when I was at ESPN in 09, 2000. A lot of them didn't know what the format was, cause there weren't a lot of podcasts. Jeff came on, talked, did his whole thing. It was right after he got bounced by Dancing with the Stars. When Sal, Sal told him he was safe and then he wasn't.

• 2:06:07Speaker 02

  Was that the one? Cause I remember when you, I mean, that story is, is brutal.

• 2:06:11Bill Simmons?

  It's an all time story.

• 2:06:11Speaker 02

  All timer.

• 2:06:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:06:12Speaker 02

  Brutal for Jeff. But I remember you, there was a podcast, I don't know if it was that one or another one, where you told him to his face, looked him right in the eyes. And said, the best roaster of all time is Anthony Jeslin. And I remember listening to the clip and like, oh my God. That's such a harsh thing to say. And Jeff Ross goes, can't argue. And I was like, god damn.

• 2:06:31Bill Simmons?

  That definitely happened.

• 2:06:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:06:33Bill Simmons?

  I mean, you did have the championship belt there for a couple of years.

• 2:06:36Speaker 02

  I had a run. I had that. I had the, I had the, uh, the three, three run and then got out.

• 2:06:41Bill Simmons?

  I also was a big supporter of your show.

• 2:06:44Speaker 02

  The Jezzlinic Offensive?

• 2:06:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I liked it.

• 2:06:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think we did something different. It was hell to make.

• 2:06:49Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:06:49Speaker 02

  It was hell to make. And then I had a show called Good Talk. It was so fun to make and the pandemic killed it. We were a week away from filming season two, where I just sat across from a comic and we were goofy and silly.

• 2:06:59Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:07:00Speaker 02

  A little bit of information, but mostly just messing around. And, uh, and I love doing that. But hopefully this podcast will be more like, like Good Talk. But Jezzlinic Offensive was just, you had to rely on what was happening that week.

• 2:07:10Bill Simmons?

  I know, but that show was good. I also like Jeff's show. I thought there was this little funny era of these comedy cent, like right as Comedy Central was basically dying.

• 2:07:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:07:19Bill Simmons?

  But they were still trying to do a couple of things with comedians. And I thought some of those ideas were good.

• 2:07:23Speaker 02

  The burn was great. The burn almost ruined me because I appeared right after his show.

• 2:07:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:07:28Speaker 02

  It was like, if we'd combined those two into one show, we would have had something great. But we were kind of competing with each other. Uh, that was, uh, that was tough because we're friends. And he'd be like, hey, like, once his show ended, the season two, they never aired another episode. But they kept him under contract for a year while my air show was airing. And Jeff would see me and be like, don't make it too much like mine because they'll cancel me. And I'm like, I would love to take some of what you were doing, you know, and use it, but you, you really couldn't. They just had too much at once.

• 2:07:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:07:57Speaker 02

  That it became tough. Like Tosh would, would be like, hey, that bit was something I did eight years ago. And I'm like, motherfucker, I'm not watching your show. I don't watch Tosh.0. Like, I'm just trying to like, get through the week here. But when you had like Oscar Pistorius to talk about, it was the most fun show in the world to make. But if you, if you just had like Obama's new tax plan, it was like, what the fuck are we gonna talk about?

• 2:08:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, how are we gonna time this?

• 2:08:19Speaker 02

  It was, it was.

• 2:08:19Bill Simmons?

  I gave Jeff a joke a couple of weeks ago.

• 2:08:21Speaker 02

  You did?

• 2:08:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Well, you know, he always, you know how he does these, the rest in peace variations? After Dolly Parton died, I texted, rest in peace. He's like, could I have that?

• 2:08:34Speaker 02

  I like that he asks now instead of just taking it.

• 2:08:36Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, of course you could have that, Jeff.

• 2:08:38Speaker 02

  That's great.

• 2:08:38Bill Simmons?

  I think he, I think he took it. So wait, one last thing on the podcast thing, because I think this is an interesting topic.

• 2:08:43Speaker 02

  True.

• 2:08:44Bill Simmons?

  Not your podcast, but you were talking about it's easier to do a comedy podcast than it is to go on the road. And just, you're staying at some weird hotel and you're bouncing around. You might have a shitty crowd versus like you could just be in your apartment or your house and just doing a pod. So you think that's gonna hurt comedy?

• 2:09:04Speaker 02

  I think it hurts stand up as an art form. I think it's good for comedians because they're just pumped directly into the listeners' ears where they watch every week and they become committed.

• 2:09:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:09:14Speaker 02

  They're like, I watch this every week. I love this guy and I will defend him to the death. Just because they're committed with their time.

• 2:09:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:09:20Speaker 02

  And sometimes their money, if they're like Patreon fans, that they'll never turn on anybody. No matter how bad the joke is, and they'll pay money. Good money to see you in a theater where you haven't been working it out. You just show up at the theater and it's like, well, I've been listening to this guy for free. I'm gonna pay 60 bucks, 100 bucks. And then they walk out being like, I wasn't like, I prefer him on the podcast.

• 2:09:40Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:09:40Speaker 02

  I think people would just transition full time and like maybe eventually give up that theater money as these, it's getting harder to go on the road because of, you know, the economy and ticket prices going up, uh, competition for these theaters. But I think podcasting is the future.

• 2:09:54Bill Simmons?

  The podcasts are, the actual live podcasts are hurting the competition for the theaters.

• 2:09:59Speaker 02

  Or with standup. Podcasts.

• 2:10:00Bill Simmons?

  Because by the way, there's no theaters.

• 2:10:02Speaker 02

  No.

• 2:10:03Bill Simmons?

  These theaters are all made for, you know, bands in 1974.

• 2:10:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, but they're still fun. I mean, it's still.

• 2:10:10Bill Simmons?

  Like with the Wiltern here and a couple of the other ones. So seeing it, basically between like, you get down to 200, 300, you could go all the way up to like 1600.

• 2:10:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:10:19Bill Simmons?

  But there's, I wouldn't say there's a lot of state of the art ones these days.

• 2:10:22Speaker 02

  No, I like, I like the Wiltern a lot. That's where I played last year. I've done the Wilshire E. Bell, which doesn't have fucking air conditioning. It's so old. Uh, but I like the Wiltern more. Um, Largo's still fun. It's like a small little theater. But I think just comedy got greedy and that they didn't want to do a small intimate show. They didn't want to go, podcasting became a way to go do comedy clubs without having to do morning radio. And then it became a way to avoid comedy clubs entirely.

• 2:10:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:10:47Speaker 02

  And there was something to grinding it out in a comedy club before you got to a theater.

• 2:10:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:10:51Speaker 02

  That made sure that hour was great. And I think people don't need a great hour anymore. They just need a reputation from their podcast. So all the podcast fans show up just to see that guy, just to see the celebrity. And the hour doesn't have to be that good. And not until they do a special. When people see it and they're like, what the fuck is this?

• 2:11:08Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:11:08Speaker 02

  Because when you're out on stage, everyone's going nuts because they love you from the podcast.

• 2:11:11Bill Simmons?

  It's like the equivalent of watching, um, I don't know, Steph Curry just do a shoot around versus playing in a game.

• 2:11:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:11:18Bill Simmons?

  Like, I got to watch Steph Curry shoot some threes.

• 2:11:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:11:21Bill Simmons?

  But not actually play in a basketball game.

• 2:11:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:11:24Bill Simmons?

  It's an interesting time. I don't know where it goes. Cause in general, especially like, uh, I think people seem, especially post-COVID, there's, you're a little more self-conscious. Right?

• 2:11:34Speaker 02

  Definitely.

• 2:11:34Bill Simmons?

  Stuff can be on social media. You can get instant feedback that especially if you're like a growing writer, comedian, whatever, like you get this feedback early on. You're, you're not doing this. You're not used to it.

• 2:11:47Speaker 02

  Well, with podcasting, the clip people have come out. I don't know if they've, if they've like ruined you at all. I know like, it's important to put on clips.

• 2:11:54Bill Simmons?

  I, I, I just, it's, it's the tax for doing it. You know, you're gonna get nailed by 10 to 15 times a year.

• 2:12:00Speaker 02

  But you say one thing out of context and it's all of a sudden it becomes this clip and then like Jezzlinic versus, and you're like, what is happening? Why did this become a thing? And they get more views than even your podcast.

• 2:12:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, they use big verbs too. Be like, Jezzlinic eviscerates Joe Rogan.

• 2:12:16Speaker 02

  Destroys.

• 2:12:16Bill Simmons?

  Destroys.

• 2:12:17Speaker 02

  Ruins. It used to, and podcasting used to be like, no one's listening to this. Let's just talk.

• 2:12:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:21Speaker 02

  And then that kind of changed. And now that you have, bring the cameras into it, I think it's almost like going from like silent film to talkies.

• 2:12:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:28Speaker 02

  That the ugly people are gonna get fucking bounced out of this thing. Like, we're lucky. But some of these people are in trouble. And I think a lot of guys who blew up during the pod, during the, the COVID era of podcasting, who really were making money are so sick of it. Like would love to quit but can't. And I think you're gonna see some people break down.

• 2:12:47Bill Simmons?

  I sadly can't comment on this. There's a couple of people I would love to jump in on that point and be like, like blank, but I'm not going to.

• 2:12:55Speaker 02

  I've been on a couple.

• 2:12:56Bill Simmons?

  You know who they are?

• 2:12:57Speaker 02

  Yes. Where it's like, you're running out the string, you've already sold the advertising and you want to be doing anything else, but you are.

• 2:13:04Bill Simmons?

  You're an autopilot with vacant eyes.

• 2:13:06Speaker 02

  Yeah. It's like someone who was stuck on like a TV deal and they want to do movies, but they gotta keep showing up for this episodic thing.

• 2:13:12Bill Simmons?

  It's like Jason Segel in year nine of How I Met My Mother, just being like.

• 2:13:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:13:16Bill Simmons?

  Just get me out of this.

• 2:13:17Speaker 02

  So it'll be interesting to see. I mean, what, I just think technology's changing so much that podcasting has become so much more high tech. My last podcast, when I walked into these studios and you showed me around in the beginning of the negotiation, I couldn't fucking believe it. It felt like going from like basic cable to NBC. It was really just like, oh my God, like you have good lighting.

• 2:13:39Bill Simmons?

  You look at the stuff we did in 2020, and I always joke about this, but it honestly looks like we're in like a fucking bunker in, in Iraq.

• 2:13:48Speaker 02

  And that was the look.

• 2:13:49Bill Simmons?

  The camera's like pointing up. It's just pointing up at my chin, like through your nose and you can't, it's fuzzy.

• 2:13:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:13:56Bill Simmons?

  And I think what eventually people realized is, hey, it's not that hard. The equipment's also better now, but.

• 2:14:02Speaker 02

  So much better.

• 2:14:02Bill Simmons?

  It's not that hard to actually make this stuff nice.

• 2:14:04Speaker 02

  No.

• 2:14:05Bill Simmons?

  I think with you, with the LA piece of this, even though I know a lot of the book people aren't here, I do think if we can build this pod up to a certain level, they're gonna fly out the same way they would fly out to do Kimmel's show. Like the, the book companies will send them out to be on the show.

• 2:14:19Speaker 02

  Absolutely. I think once we get going, I think, I mean, the fact that I, if I announce a book for the book club, it sells out everywhere. I think it's a good sign. And when new, and I start doing newer books, people are gonna be like, book, guys just don't buy books. And if I can get guys to buy books, they will do anything. It's like when Passion of the Christ came out and became this huge movie because people who didn't go to the movies went to go see that movie.

• 2:14:41Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:14:42Speaker 02

  And if I can get people who do not buy books and do not read to buy books and read, then I think it would, I think it'll, it'll really change the industry.

• 2:14:49Bill Simmons?

  So 250 page limit for the most part.

• 2:14:52Speaker 02

  For now, next year I probably, I'll go three, 350 because people are getting better at it. But I'm picking books that are easy reads. I'm not getting anything that's too tough. I may have some more time. And again, people don't have to finish the book or read it. It's on, it's on YouTube or wherever, Spotify. So you can finish the book later and jump in. Within the weekly show, we'll be talking to authors about everything, you know, all kinds of different stuff, pop culture.

• 2:15:17Speaker 02

  I mean, this story, I know this, it's too late, but like, you know, I knew this was gonna be happening.

• 2:15:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:15:22Speaker 02

  And that story about the guy from The Price is Right on the airplane looking at a, uh, a child porn, uh, message board.

• 2:15:29Bill Simmons?

  I was so fascinated by that story.

• 2:15:31Speaker 02

  I'm so mad I'm not on the air right now to discuss this. Uh, cause that's, that is a, you should have brought a book on the plane situation for sure. Uh, that I, that I think.

• 2:15:41Bill Simmons?

  How flagrant did it have to be that multiple passengers noticed it?

• 2:15:46Speaker 02

  He was wearing.

• 2:15:47Bill Simmons?

  He was the opposite of discreet. It was like he was holding the laptop up.

• 2:15:51Speaker 02

  And he was wearing a The Price is Right jacket. Which is incredible, incredible to me that I'm like, I was so mad I couldn't discuss that story. That those things, I now I'm like noticing.

• 2:16:03Bill Simmons?

  So now you have this little extra little piece for the pod.

• 2:16:08Speaker 02

  I can't wait to get some like pretentious author on the show and ask him about the guy from The Price is Right. Looking at child porn on the airplane. Like it's gonna be, it's gonna be fun.

• 2:16:17Bill Simmons?

  What was that conversation with the stewardess like too? Like, hey, 3A.

• 2:16:23Speaker 02

  I'm sure it's like.

• 2:16:23Bill Simmons?

  3B.

• 2:16:25Speaker 02

  I'm sure it's like kicking someone out of a comic club with that. Like, we were just laughing, you know, like, I'm not, I'm just looking at child porn. I'm not bothering anybody, you know?

• 2:16:33Bill Simmons?

  He was like, I'm in the, I'm doing research. That's always a good one.

• 2:16:35Speaker 02

  I love when they say that. I can't, the guy from.

• 2:16:37Bill Simmons?

  What are you researching?

• 2:16:38Speaker 02

  The guy from The Who who got off, was it Pete Townsend?

• 2:16:41Bill Simmons?

  Pete Townsend, that was.

• 2:16:41Speaker 02

  Who's like, I'm researching a book and everyone's like, that book never came out. And you think you gotta write that book then? You're committed to finishing that book. You gotta. That he never, he never did. He got off, he got off scot-free.

• 2:16:53Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Um, yeah, there's weird shit that's gonna happen every week. I'm trying to imagine you with some fiction author be like, yo, what about that Price is Right?

• 2:17:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, that might be a segment we just do every time. We'll get it sponsored. We'll get it sponsored by The Price is Right and, uh, and then do it every week.

• 2:17:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, I'm looking forward to this. I can't wait to come on. I'm gonna really try to figure out.

• 2:17:16Speaker 02

  We're gonna, we'll find out the right book for you and I would love to have you on.

• 2:17:19Bill Simmons?

  The one I was thinking was this Wilt Chamberlain autobiography that he wrote in the mid seventies.

• 2:17:24Speaker 02

  Where he claims a hundred thousand women or whatever?

• 2:17:26Bill Simmons?

  No, it's not that one. It's the earlier one. It's about his life on the road and how he's misunderstood and it's got weird tidbits about him getting blown by stewardesses and first class and. It's kind of amazing and he's mad at everybody. It's like your classic, I'm misunderstood, I'm better than you thought I was, but it's like pretty revealing.

• 2:17:46Speaker 02

  I'm into it.

• 2:17:46Bill Simmons?

  About seventies celebrities, but that was one I thought you might like. It might be too long.

• 2:17:50Speaker 02

  I know, I love, I mean, one of the best sports books I've ever read was like about three bricks shy of a load.

• 2:17:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, Roy Blunt Jr.

• 2:17:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, was like an amazing, all this behind the scenes, uh, stuff on the, that I love, I love books like that. So you find the right book and you.

• 2:18:05Bill Simmons?

  Alright, so that, that, that's helpful. I have a couple of good ideas for this, cause we could do, um, The Last Shot by Darcy Frye.

• 2:18:11Speaker 02

  I haven't read that, yeah.

• 2:18:13Bill Simmons?

  I have, there's like thirty great sports books, so I'll, I'll figure out a good one.

• 2:18:18Speaker 02

  I wanna be challenged and I wanna try to get, just get people, get people, get the ball rolling on people reading again, on guys reading again and whatever I have to do, do that. I like, I'm, I'm much more willing to talk about books than I am about comedy these days. So it's, it's gonna be a, uh, it's gonna be a fun time.

• 2:18:35Bill Simmons?

  Alright, so we're launching what day?

• 2:18:36Speaker 02

  September thirtieth. That's a Wednesday. That's the, like, the book club will be the end of every month and then every Wednesday will be the normal book club, but we've already got, we're booked through December. People are excited to be on this and we're gonna have some fun guests, uh, starting with Rosenthal and, uh, and I'm, I'm looking forward to that one already.

• 2:18:54Bill Simmons?

  I can't believe you booked him during the NFL season.

• 2:18:56Speaker 02

  Uh, he, I mean, he's doing, we're coming in, he's coming in early.

• 2:18:59Bill Simmons?

  Film on the cover six.

• 2:19:00Speaker 02

  He's got a hard out on me.

• 2:19:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:19:02Speaker 02

  Ten thirty to noon hard out, like, okay, okay, big timer. But he's doing like eight episodes a week over there.

• 2:19:08Bill Simmons?

  When did you become friends with him?

• 2:19:10Speaker 02

  Soph, uh, the end of, uh, my freshman year at Tulane and then we became best friends sophomore year.

• 2:19:16Bill Simmons?

  Football related or other stuff?

• 2:19:17Speaker 02

  No, we were in the same fraternity. We were just in different dorms, same year and we were just the two funny guys. And then he started taking life seriously and I stayed funny, but we both, I think because we were both successful in what we wanted to do.

• 2:19:30Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:19:30Speaker 02

  Like, we were roommates when he decided to leave LA and go try sports writing and I was fully supportive when no one else was. Everyone else was like, stay in LA. When you try to leave LA, no, everybody tries to keep you here, cause they don't wanna think that they should leave LA. And I was like, do what's best for you.

• 2:19:44Bill Simmons?

  It is true. It ends up like it's a funhouse mayor.

• 2:19:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:19:47Bill Simmons?

  It's like, if he's leaving, does that mean I should leave?

• 2:19:49Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I was like, no, dude, this is a great idea. Go, fully supported him and, uh.

• 2:19:55Bill Simmons?

  Did you ever have your, I almost left LA moment?

• 2:19:58Speaker 02

  No, no. I was like, because the only thing more embarrassing than telling people I was a comedian, when you're a nobody.

• 2:20:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:05Speaker 02

  Was saying I used to do stand-up comedy. So I was like, I'm going to ride this.

• 2:20:09Bill Simmons?

  Former stand-up comedy.

• 2:20:10Speaker 02

  If I have, if I have to.

• 2:20:12Bill Simmons?

  Stuck with it.

• 2:20:12Speaker 02

  I will never say a former. And then things just happened that weren't like an overnight success, but like I would have a good show at Largo. You know, in front of that hip crowd, opening for Sarah Silverman and think, I can't quit. Like, I'm, I was dumb enough to think it was right around the corner for ten years. You know, but I never thought about, uh, quitting stand-up.

• 2:20:31Bill Simmons?

  But you never got sucked into the movie side, though?

• 2:20:33Speaker 02

  No, I mean, I would have had auditions, but I was terrible at them. Like, stand-up ruins you as an actor.

• 2:20:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:38Speaker 02

  Because as an actor, you have to listen and I'm not listening to shit.

• 2:20:41Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:20:42Speaker 02

  I'm just waiting to assume, say my lines. I've done some acting here and there. Somebody wrote a part for me, I'd be happy to do it. But, uh, the heartbreaker for me was Danny McBride wrote a role, he was like, I'm writing a role for you on Eastbound and Down. And Eastbound and Down, I was like, this is the greatest TV show I've ever seen in my life. And he was like, season three, we're gonna have a Russian, uh, pitcher. He was like, my rival, can you do a Russian accent?

• 2:21:06Bill Simmons?

  Oh, no.

• 2:21:06Speaker 02

  And I was like, what do I do? And one of my actor friends was like, you always say yes. Whatever they, if they ask if you can ride a horse, yes. And then you figure it out. And so I was like, yes, I can do a Russian accent. And then the audition comes and it became clear that I could not do a Russian accent. And they got Ike Berenholz to do it.

• 2:21:22Bill Simmons?

  Hmm.

• 2:21:22Speaker 02

  Who was amazing, better than I ever would have been. But that was like, oh, I would have loved to have been on the show and then I couldn't watch it after that. I couldn't watch the show anymore. And then I, I've had auditions where they've said, that was great, can you do it faster? And I say no.

• 2:21:37Bill Simmons?

  See, you would have been great in This is the End.

• 2:21:40Speaker 02

  I could, I could have shown up in This is the End.

• 2:21:42Bill Simmons?

  Absolutely shown up and done a scene, cut Michael Cera's head off, whatever it took.

• 2:21:47Speaker 02

  I always wanted to play the villain, like Craig Kilborn in, uh.

• 2:21:51Bill Simmons?

  Old School.

• 2:21:52Speaker 02

  In Old School, yes. I wanted to do that. And they always wanted me to play like the cute guy.

• 2:21:56Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:21:57Speaker 02

  But I think maybe, uh, if they ever make comedy movies again, they bring me in as the villain and I would love to do that.

• 2:22:02Bill Simmons?

  Well, when you were getting all these chances, it was right after Dane Cook tried to be an actor and that didn't go well.

• 2:22:08Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:22:08Bill Simmons?

  And that was probably a cautionary tale for, probably scared a whole generation of comics off. Cause he was in like a few rom-coms.

• 2:22:16Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. He rom-commed it up and then he got, became an action star.

• 2:22:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:22:20Speaker 02

  And that was, that was terrifying for everyone.

• 2:22:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:22:22Speaker 02

  But yeah, I never, it was never, I never thought I'd be an action star. Uh, but I thought.

• 2:22:27Bill Simmons?

  There's a documentary about him now.

• 2:22:29Speaker 02

  Coming out the end of the month, I can't fucking wait.

• 2:22:30Bill Simmons?

  How he lost his, he got built by his brother?

• 2:22:34Speaker 02

  His brother took all his money. His brother took all of it.

• 2:22:36Bill Simmons?

  Never knew that story. Brutal.

• 2:22:38Speaker 02

  Like twenty, thirty million? Yeah. And then he tried to go get it all back with a big arena tour, charging double his ticket prices and didn't have the material and then lost all his fans. Like, lost everything because of that. And it's his documentary, I'm sure they do not cover it, but it's the first thing I've ever been excited to watch of Dane Cook's, I'll tell you that. Put that in the clip.

• 2:22:59Bill Simmons?

  I, I did, uh, what was that show he had on HBO when he traveled in the van with the other comics?

• 2:23:05Speaker 02

  Torgasm.

• 2:23:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that, I kinda hate watched that in the mid two thousands.

• 2:23:08Speaker 02

  Everyone hate watched it. In his defense, it was supposed to be a DVD extra.

• 2:23:13Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 2:23:13Speaker 02

  And when he signed the deal with HBO, they're like, we'll make it a TV show. But there's a part in there where he reads a letter to himself that he wrote when he was eight years old. And weeps tears, actual tears, reading the letter. And I had a meeting with HBO as I'm like blowing up, I'd done Aspen Comedy Festival.

• 2:23:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:23:29Speaker 02

  And I meet with this woman at HBO and she's like, you're my favorite comedian. I love you. And I'll tell you why. She's like, I saw you do a Dane Cook impression online where you made fun of him. And I, she's like, I hate Dane Cook. We signed this deal with him. I argued against it. And I had to be the one to edit Torgasm. And it was the worst, like, six months of my life. And I put one scene in there that HBO fought me on, but I was like, it has to be in there. I hate him so much, I have to put this in. And I go, can I guess? Was it the reading the letter to himself? And she's like, yes. It was the letter to him that, uh, that I will always have fans at HBO for, for that.

• 2:24:02Bill Simmons?

  One of my passions is, um, the guy who did Entourage being furious about the, the Jeremy Piven, Adrian Grenier commercial.

• 2:24:12Speaker 02

  Uh-huh.

• 2:24:12Bill Simmons?

  But pretending he wasn't mad about it and now he's really mad about it. And now HBO had to do a cease and desist. I don't know if you've been following this.

• 2:24:18Speaker 02

  No, I just saw it. I haven't seen the commercial, but I believe that they would do that. I mean, Jeremy Piven's doing stand-up now.

• 2:24:25Bill Simmons?

  I'm aware. I follow him on Instagram.

• 2:24:28Speaker 02

  Why do you follow him on Instagram?

• 2:24:29Bill Simmons?

  I don't know. I don't know why, to find out that he's doing stand-up.

• 2:24:35Speaker 02

  It's, it's, uh.

• 2:24:36Bill Simmons?

  Has any actor ever made the transition to stand-up?

• 2:24:39Speaker 02

  Not on purpose. I mean, you do it because you have nothing else. Like Chris Catan went into stand-up.

• 2:24:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:24:45Speaker 02

  Um, and I lived in the same building as him and I was just terrified he would recognize me, but he never did. Uh, and then Jeremy Piven. But most of them. And Piven would say he did it for a charity event and caught the bug. It's like, it's not a fucking bug, man.

• 2:24:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, this is like.

• 2:24:58Speaker 02

  People wanna see you.

• 2:24:59Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:24:59Speaker 02

  But that's a meet and greet. That's people who wanna meet Ari from, from Entourage.

• 2:25:04Bill Simmons?

  Well, the, the, I mean, anytime they've tried to have actors play comedians in a movie. Never a hundred percent where Seth Rogen probably came the closest when in Funny People. I really like Funny People. But I thought he was okay on stage.

• 2:25:18Speaker 02

  Funny People was a letdown. He was, he was good in Funny People. I think the best one from like having watched them all and done the reading like there's nothing worse than the movie Lenny where Dustin Hoffman plays Lenny Bruce is brutal.

• 2:25:31Bill Simmons?

  It's really bad.

• 2:25:31Speaker 02

  Um, but I think Tom Hanks, Tom Hanks in Punchline was, uh, was really good.

• 2:25:36Bill Simmons?

  You think he was the best?

• 2:25:37Speaker 02

  I think.

• 2:25:38Bill Simmons?

  But unfortunately Sally Field was bad.

• 2:25:40Speaker 02

  Sally Field was rough in that. But that was the eighties standup though at the time. But I, I, I've seen arguments that Tom Hanks should have won his first Oscar for Punchline.

• 2:25:49Bill Simmons?

  I'm going deep dive, but there was a comedian in the movie Fame.

• 2:25:53Speaker 02

  I've seen Fame was shot in Pittsburgh. I've seen Fame. I only remember the dance and I remember Lou.

• 2:25:58Bill Simmons?

  Irene Cara.

• 2:25:59Speaker 02

  I remember the chef from Mr. Rogers was in the movie.

• 2:26:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but the guy who was the standup in Fame was really, really bad standup.

• 2:26:06Speaker 02

  I would believe it.

• 2:26:07Bill Simmons?

  I think he's probably the bottom of the barrel for them trying to do standup in movie, but it's, it's so hard to do. People try to avoid it for the most part.

• 2:26:15Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:26:15Bill Simmons?

  Cause you can't just like have that rhythm, but Hank did a good job of it.

• 2:26:19Speaker 02

  You know what someone told me is that you see the TV show Barry, HBO.

• 2:26:23Bill Simmons?

  Hater? Yeah, yeah.

• 2:26:24Speaker 02

  Great show. Great. It was originally supposed to be him trying to get into standup comedy. And I would have, but they were like, there's too many with Louis and all these.

• 2:26:32Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:26:33Speaker 02

  Comedy now, but I would have loved to have seen that version of it. I think the version they came up with was great, but him trying to do standup comedy instead of being an actor would have been, uh, would have been wonderful.

• 2:26:44Bill Simmons?

  Do you notice like how like Seinfeld's still doing stuff?

• 2:26:49Speaker 02

  He works, he's in shape. He's like 70 something and he's in shape.

• 2:26:53Bill Simmons?

  And really cares about, and I, and I was asking one of his friends about like, how is, like Seinfeld has, why is he doing anything? Like he's made and he's like, he just loves writing jokes. It's like, he's never gonna not love doing that.

• 2:27:06Speaker 02

  Yeah. He likes being backstage. He likes being told you got 10 minutes.

• 2:27:09Bill Simmons?

  I really liked his documentary. I thought the comedian documentary I thought was excellent.

• 2:27:12Speaker 02

  That movie changed my life. When I say like 25 years, it's 25 years from October 16th, 2002, when I saw that movie in theaters.

• 2:27:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:19Speaker 02

  I know the day it was playing near me and I went and saw it at noon and told me how to do it. You know, just go to open mics and fail. If Jerry Seinfeld can fail over and over again to build the hour, what's your problem? And I tell people all the time and eventually too bad like with Harvey Weinstein, that movie's gone. Unless you own the DVD.

• 2:27:38Bill Simmons?

  It's gone?

• 2:27:39Speaker 02

  It's gone.

• 2:27:40Bill Simmons?

  Really?

• 2:27:40Speaker 02

  Netflix had it for a little bit when they had a deal with Seinfeld and then it went away. Another one scene's in jail. Like you'll never, it'll never stream again. You can't buy it on Apple movies. It's like, maybe it's on Roku or some shit. But you have to own the Blu-ray or the DVD. But that movie is, that tells you everything you need to know. I think about standup.

• 2:27:57Bill Simmons?

  Great one. Um, and then Leno is still at the Hermosa Magic Club, whatever the hell that's called on Sundays.

• 2:28:03Speaker 02

  I see him at the improv now and again. I see him at watch events. We both end up at the same watch things and he, Leno is still in the mix. Like Leno knows, he watches YouTube videos. I walked up to him like, I was on your show 10 years ago. He's like, I saw your clip yesterday. Like you're, like you're doing great. Like he's really, he's still with it and, uh, in there. He says he just goes to these small towns where they have one theater that fits the whole town. And he just goes there. Everyone comes out. He has a great show.

• 2:28:30Bill Simmons?

  He's like a hero to the town and then he's out.

• 2:28:32Speaker 02

  Yeah. But he just loves performing. He just wants to do that. Yeah.

• 2:28:36Bill Simmons?

  Interesting. Everybody, it's hard for them to walk away. Even Letterman's still. I had him on my podcast a few months ago, but he's still doing that interview show for Netflix. Like he, he could go away. He doesn't want to.

• 2:28:46Speaker 02

  No, he regrets ever leaving, uh, the Late Show. I mean, there's something to being important. And when you are the show, you are important. People treat you differently.

• 2:28:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:28:55Speaker 02

  People care when you get there. They send a car for you, you know, that I think when that goes away, that's tough for some people. Yeah. Some people just want to like be left alone. Uh, but that's, those are usually like, uh, drug and alcohol people. But the sober people want that to feel important.

• 2:29:10Bill Simmons?

  And one other person, now this is like one of my weird deep dive internet fascinations I did recently. Johnny Carson quit, he ends the show, ends the Tonight Show. He only has one other IMDB credit after it, and it was going on Letterman's show to pretend to do a top 10 list like a couple of years later. He's gone. He doesn't do anything. Nobody sees him again. He's just like in Malibu playing tennis and smoking cigarettes. He wanted no part of anything.

• 2:29:36Speaker 02

  And they'd announced that deal when he left that he's gonna do specials once a year and all this stuff.

• 2:29:40Bill Simmons?

  Gone. He's one of the only ones and he was healthy for a while after. I know he probably had lung cancer eventually.

• 2:29:46Speaker 02

  I read that, that book his lawyer wrote.

• 2:29:48Bill Simmons?

  I read it too.

• 2:29:49Speaker 02

  And it's the saddest fucking thing. I mean, every marriage he had was, his mom sounded brutal. I mean, he just, I think he had some demons. But I think he was, I think he was enjoying his, uh, his drinks.

• 2:29:59Bill Simmons?

  He's been a big winner from the social media clip era of they'll have old Carson stuff with him and Ed from the seventies where Ed's just blitzed. And they're just openly talking about it. It's like, how is this on TV?

• 2:30:13Speaker 02

  I know.

• 2:30:13Bill Simmons?

  And just like, Ed, long lunch today. It's like, ah, yes.

• 2:30:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:30:18Bill Simmons?

  The other one that's the, I mean, the biggest winner has been Norm.

• 2:30:21Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:30:21Bill Simmons?

  I feel like Norm has actually, and there's a documentary coming out about him soon that I heard was great, but, um, I think these little short clips have helped Norm. I think, I think he's more relevant now than, than he's ever been.

• 2:30:35Speaker 02

  For sure. And I think a lot of it is like those clips on Conan, he didn't do a lot of specials.

• 2:30:39Bill Simmons?

  No.

• 2:30:40Speaker 02

  He did a few towards the end and he would badmouth. He'd be like, that was the worst, the special would come out and he would be like, that's the worst special, that's the worst show of the whole tour.

• 2:30:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:30:48Speaker 02

  Uh, but he, he'd sit on the couch with Conan, with Letterman and just be brilliant.

• 2:30:53Bill Simmons?

  He was always like one of those people, like the better, whoever's in the room, if they were better, he'd be better. Like, cause he had, he had that, his own podcast for a while. That the clips will come out of them would be great, but if you actually watched it, it was pretty, pretty long and you know, all over the place, pretty sprawling, but then there would be a couple of good nuggets in there. But when he would go on Conan, he would kill.

• 2:31:14Speaker 02

  Yeah. You gave him five minutes and he was the master, but you give him an hour and he's gonna fuck around for 55 minutes. Yeah.

• 2:31:21Bill Simmons?

  What was the, he did, were you at the roast, the famous roast he did when he did tell jokes?

• 2:31:24Speaker 02

  No, it was pre- roast, but I knew people who were there and they were like, he bombed.

• 2:31:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:31:30Speaker 02

  The comics were laughing, but the audience was furious.

• 2:31:32Bill Simmons?

  Know what was going on. Yeah.

• 2:31:33Speaker 02

  Furious. And then they sweeten it. It's like amazing, but the comics were legitimately laughing. But a lot of those, some of those like most famous roast sets are people bombing. And then they sweeten it up. Comedy Central really did people a service by fixing up some, uh, some rough sets that were like genius, but just weren't appreciated by the audience. And that audience is drunk as fuck. I don't know how they do it on the Netflix one, but in the Comedy Central one, everyone's just got bottles of wine already on the table.

• 2:32:01Bill Simmons?

  And it's a four and a half hour night. Just throwing down the Chardonnay or whatever the fuck they put on there.

• 2:32:08Speaker 02

  I got heckled by this woman, I forget her name. She used to be married to Clint Eastwood.

• 2:32:13Bill Simmons?

  Sandra Locke?

• 2:32:14Speaker 02

  I don't know. You have, I'd see a picture. She had like kind of red, short hair. Uh, she was in Unforgiven.

• 2:32:20Bill Simmons?

  Francis Farmer.

• 2:32:22Speaker 02

  It may have been Francis Farmer.

• 2:32:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:32:24Speaker 02

  And she heckles the shit out of me for a John Ritter joke. And I can't see her. I don't know what's happening, but she's bombed and just screaming at me for like the rest of my set. Screaming and no one does anything. And afterwards I'm like, what happened? And people are like, oh, it was her right back there. She would like, I'm friends with John Ritter. How dare you? It wasn't even like mean to John Ritter.

• 2:32:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:32:47Speaker 02

  It was just like mentioning his dad.

• 2:32:48Bill Simmons?

  Like his name was brought up.

• 2:32:49Speaker 02

  Yeah. And screamed for 10 minutes while I finished my set. Even Roseanne is like, what's this bitch doing? I guess she was friends with Roseanne and I walked past her in a restaurant like six months ago and I wanted to stop and be like, do you remember me? Fuck you. But she seemed like she was having a good time. I was like, I'll, I'll let it go. Yeah. Those were, those were the days when you could, those things could happen.

• 2:33:09Bill Simmons?

  Book Club, end of September.

• 2:33:11Speaker 02

  Jesselneck Book Club, September 30th kickoff on the ringer. People have been waiting for this. People have been waiting.

• 2:33:17Bill Simmons?

  I'm pumped.

• 2:33:17Speaker 02

  Together.

• 2:33:18Bill Simmons?

  Good to see you.

• 2:33:19Speaker 02

  Good to see you.

• 2:33:19Bill Simmons?

  Thanks for coming up.

• 2:33:20Speaker 02

  Thanks for having me.

• 2:33:22Bill Simmons?

  All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Chris and Eduardo and Gahow. Thanks to Jesselneck and Zach Lowe as well. I'm going to be back on this feed on Thursday with, uh, an action packed, all kinds of stuff on Thursday. I'm gonna go big. I'm gonna go like a two and a half, three hour pod on, uh, on Thursday. Don't forget about the rewatchables with Law Abiding Citizen as well, and I will see you later in the week. Go Prince.

• 2:34:05Bill Simmons?

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