2026 NFL QB Rankings, the Villain Dodgers, MLB Trade Deadline Lessons, and SummerSlam 2026 With Mina Kimes, Billy Gil, Anthony Dabbundo, and David Shoemaker

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Mina Kimes to preview the NFL season before giving their QB rankings. Then, Billy Gil and Anthony Dabbundo hop on to react to the MLB trade deadline. Finally, David Shoemaker joins to react to SummerSlam Night 2, discuss WWE on ESPN, and talk about his new Hulk Hogan book, ‘Why Hulk Hogan Matters.’ (0:00) Intro (2:51) 2026 NFL QB rankings with Mina Kimes (01:12:28) MLB trade deadline reactions with Billy Gil and Anthony Dabbundo (02:08:23) SummerSlam, WWE on ESPN, and Hulk Hogan with David Shoemaker Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Mina Kimes, Billy Gil, Anthony Dabbundo, and David Shoemaker Producers: Chia Hao Tat and Eduardo Ocampo SAP GROW. AI cloud ERP for any size business. Put ChatGPT to work on your most ambitious ideas and projects. Get started at https://ChatGPT.com by selecting Work mode. Available on Plus and Pro plans 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/payingfor. PayPal, Inc., NMLS 910457.

• 0:39Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by The Ringer Podcast Network. I put up a new rewatchables on Monday. We did Karate Kid Part Two. Is it Karate Kid Two or Karate Kid Part Two? I can't even remember. Me and Kyle Brandt had a fantastic time. And as I said before, we really had to do this just to pave the way for Karate Kid Three, so you can check that out. We have a lot of good movies coming up for the rest of this month, and I think we're doing two episodes next week. It's looking like The Italian Job and About Last Night, the Rob Lowe, Demi Moore About Last Night. So that's on Netflix. Italian Job is on every streamer, so you can go check those out. But I think those are gonna be the next two, and they're both gonna be next week.

• 1:21Bill Simmons?

  We have an absolutely loaded podcast coming up for you. I wanted to do quarterbacks with Mina Kimes. I meant to do it last week, but we're doing it this week. I wanted to go through all my QB point system and a lot of good quarterback questions tying into the 2026 NFL season. So this is like the first real summer pod. We're moving into NFL mode. I'm in Week Four of prep, feeling good. After that, Billy Gill, Anthony DiBundo, we wanted to talk about the baseball trade deadline and one of the weirdest pennant races ever. Even my dog's barking about it in both leagues. And all the ramifications of that, I've announced a soccer team. I announced my soccer team on that, and we talked about a whole bunch of goofy stuff.

• 2:03Bill Simmons?

  And then last but not least, David Shoemaker has a new book out about Hulk Hogan that you should get. But we talked about SummerSlam last weekend and the new Hulk Hogan book and how we're feeling about how weird the Hulksters' last 20 years were and why he wrote the book. So that is all next. We're gonna take a break, Pearl Jam, and then Mina Kimes. This episode is brought to you by SAP. Hello, midsize business. We see your big ambitions, but how do you achieve the wins you want when your technology is holding you back? Hmm, I wonder. Well, how about SAP Grow? It's built to grow with your business no matter its size.

• 2:45Bill Simmons?

  With AI embedded at its core, working across every system, all ready to go from day one so you can hit the ground running. Bring it with SAP Grow, AI Cloud ERP for any size business.

• 3:25Bill Simmons?

  All right, our friend Mina Kimes is here. She's done a lot of Ringer stuff lately. She was on the Hitch rewatchables. She was on the Fantasy Football Show as they finished their rankings of the hot QBs. I guess Jalen Hurts just ran away with this, wasn't even close?

• 3:39Speaker 01

  Well, spoiler alert, because some folks might not have listened to it. Although I feel like at this point, anyone other than Hurts would have been a big upset. He has the crown, he has Jimmy G's crown. It was easy, it was not controversial. There was really no debate about it, kind of like Patrick Mahomes circa 2020. We were all just like, yeah, so that's fine.

• 3:56Bill Simmons?

  It's time.

• 3:57Speaker 01

  But number two was divisive.

• 4:00Bill Simmons?

  Contentious? Who was number two? Who won?

• 4:03Speaker 01

  Okay, I guess I'll, spoiler alert, don't get mad if you haven't listened to it. Josh Allen over Joe Burrow. I was surprised.

• 4:11Bill Simmons?

  Interesting. I'll have to listen to it. I'm sure I'll have thoughts at some point. This is a great topic, though, because one of my theories with quarterbacks, which we're about to talk to, talk about, quarterbacks charisma. A lot of times, they're handsome, they're just the coolest guy in the room, and it feels like part of the job. I try to rank the quarterbacks every year, which we're gonna go through, and I asked you to go through this with me, because I have this weird point system that I rank the teams with. And in the point system, quarterbacks go from one point to nine. It's the only position that's even over five because they're that important. But I had some, before we go through the rankings, I had some quarterback questions for you, in no particular order.

• 4:53Bill Simmons?

  The QB you're buying for 2026, even as everyone else or most people are selling, the guy you just can't quit.

• 5:03Speaker 01

  This is an easy one for me, I think, because I feel like everybody's overreacting to the postseason. Not Drake May, because I don't think anyone with an actual brain is selling Drake May. CJ Stroud, I think people have gotten way too low on. Mike Sando just put out his quarterback tiers, which is great. Everybody should take it out every year. He surveys, you know, coaches around the league. Stroud was like 21, I think, below 42-year-old Aaron Rodgers. And I understand that it was one of the more dismal playoff performances, not just one game, right? A couple of games. But if you go back to actually the regular season, and not only look statistically, Stroud

• 5:45Speaker 01

  during the regular season was like a nine through 12th ranked quarterback in most metrics.

• 5:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 5:50Speaker 01

  But then if you really dig into it, his circumstances were atrocious. Zero run game, offensive line was as bad as it's been. The offense was completely hamstrung by the lack of an offensive line, injuries constantly, skill players in the postseason, no Nico Collins, play caller kind of still finding his legs. So I

• 6:11Bill Simmons?

  Young receivers.

• 6:12Speaker 01

  Young receivers, kind of an incomplete group, missing tight end. So I just think he's gotten way too much flack, mainly because I feel like the postseason overreaction and then people saying, well, he's not as good as he was that rookie season and kind of hanging on to that.

• 6:27Bill Simmons?

  He's the one I struggled with the most, where to put him, for all the reasons. And we talked about this on your pod, because I'm really bullish on Houston, especially the continuity on defense. But you got, when I look at why a quarterback had a bad season, usually it's like, did your offensive line fall apart? Was your play caller a little shaky? Did you have a run game? What was up with your receivers? He was like 0 for 4. I mean, they had the worst run game in the league.

• 6:53Speaker 01

  Horrible.

• 6:53Bill Simmons?

  I like Montgomery. I don't think he's a superstar, but Montgomery is at least better. Their receivers are gonna be a year older. Tank Del was awesome for them. We'll see if he can come back from one of the worst of the injuries of all time. Offensive line is still, it's a little better, but it's not, I wouldn't put it, it's probably a bottom six or seven offensive line still, so that would be the question. And then it seems like people love piling on him. Like, you've been that, that video last week of him walking in, it got like 12 million views and everybody's making their

• 7:23Speaker 01

  He's wearing a backpack.

• 7:24Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, and it was like, look at this guy, no swag at all. So, I don't know, I always try to put myself in January if something happened, like something good, like the Texans being really good and CJ Stroud just being good, and we're looking back and we're like, oh yeah, we should have seen that. So I'm open to it. With that said, he was awful last year. So to me, he's, to me, he's the highest ceiling basement guy. His building is like 40 stories, and you can get me to the 35th floor in his building, or you can bring me down to like the bottom 10 floors, and I don't know where he's gonna land.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  It's a little bit of a risky buy for me because of everything you said. Like, they remade the offensive line again. Okay, it's different, it should be better. And I do think, like Braden Smith, they had, there's competent players, maybe Urseryan left the left side a little bit better, but it's, like you said, it's not, it's probably still a bottom of the league, bottom half at least, unit. So the idea that he's gonna be in like these dramatically better circumstances, I am a little apprehensive of. I just think people are way too low. And I think kind of we do that generally with postseason.

• 8:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 8:28Speaker 01

  Like, I've seen that with Bryce Young a little bit, who was awesome in that Rams playoff game after being really up and down over the regular season, and everyone just keeps referencing that one game. I feel like generally, and I know this is a hot topic for you with New England, everybody only remembers the last two games they saw.

• 8:45Bill Simmons?

  Or have just complete amnesia, like we do with Justin Herbert, where he's terrible in the playoffs, and it's nine months later, it's like, did he make the playoffs last year? I don't remember. Give me the QB that we are collectively most likely to quit on in 2026. Last year was Kyler Murray.

• 9:02Speaker 01

  Okay, most likely to go last year.

• 9:05Bill Simmons?

  We're all just like, we're out.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  We're completely out. Um, I mean, there's a lot of options here. The Atlanta ones, I think. This could be it for Tua.

• 9:15Bill Simmons?

  I feel like I've already quit on him.

• 9:16Speaker 01

  Okay, we're already out on Tua. Okay, so you want like somebody who's a little bit divisive. Um, I.

• 9:21Bill Simmons?

  I could give you some candidates.

• 9:23Speaker 01

  Okay, give me the candidates. I'll pull up my list.

• 9:28Bill Simmons?

  Well, there's the, there's Malik Wilson on Miami.

• 9:31Speaker 01

  Oh, Willis, yeah.

• 9:32Bill Simmons?

  I'm sorry, Malik Willis, Willis on Miami.

• 9:34Speaker 01

  He's in such a horrible situation.

• 9:36Bill Simmons?

  Right, but there was, the stats were crazy for him last year.

• 9:39Speaker 01

  I know.

• 9:40Bill Simmons?

  It was like, oh my God, they might've gotten a sleeper and we might decide after four games, ugh. Jackson Dart.

• 9:47Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 9:47Bill Simmons?

  I think it's one where I, I feel like there's, there's a lot of, uh, hot air coming behind him, but I'm not sure. He earned any of it and I could also see him just getting hurt in three games because he runs around like a maniac. Daniel Jones would be another one who really hasn't been good his whole career and then had two good months before he got hurt, basically. But you look at his stats and, I don't know, plus coming off a major injury and then here's the one I was really looking at is, is Daniels. Like if Daniels, if he stinks again this year, he's hurt or is brittle, like if he has another brittle Daniel season, do we just be like, whoa, this is RG3 all over again?

• 10:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I think you did something wise, which is most of those quarterbacks you picked are in kind of iffy situations.

• 10:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 10:35Speaker 01

  And so they're not going to be buoyed necessarily by their surrounding cast. I mean, Jones, you could argue is the best, but Alec Pierce, they're, they chose him to be the wide receiver one, let Pittman walk, he's hurt. I mean, it sounds like he's going to be back early in the season, but.

• 10:49Bill Simmons?

  60% as much as Zay Flowers. I mean, he makes a ton of money.

• 10:54Speaker 01

  I like Zay Flowers.

• 10:55Bill Simmons?

  That's a $35 million a year.

• 10:57Speaker 01

  That's just how much, like, what did I say? 35 is the new 25. Ask Leo.

• 11:02Bill Simmons?

  That's an insane contract. Uh, the only other one we could mention is Jalen Hurts, who I feel like people are really ready to

• 11:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:10Bill Simmons?

  toss aside as an elite quarterback, like this, like if it doesn't work out this year after the AJ Brown trade.

• 11:17Speaker 01

  Well, he'll always have the Ringer hot quarterback rating.

• 11:20Bill Simmons?

  He has the hot quarterback title, maybe he's got nothing else to play for.

• 11:23Speaker 01

  Um, okay, well, you gave me a bunch of good names. I, I think Daniels is one to monitor because I am a little apprehensive of that situation. Like Terry McLaurin's your wide receiver one after that major lack of wide receiver depth. I think the offensive line is pretty good, but new play caller, first time.

• 11:42Bill Simmons?

  Below average running backs, could we say? Average, below average, somewhere, somewhere in that mix.

• 11:47Speaker 01

  I like Bill, but, but you know, the offense, when they talk about it, it's not totally clear to me how it's all going to come together. It's so different from the Cliff Kingsbury offense. It's more of the Ben Johnson style under center, you know, condensed formation. So I, I just kind of think it might be a little bit, there might be a little bit of growing pains there. Um, Jones is an odd one because Daniel Jones. All offseason, I've been hearing, ah, he came back week one, they did the contract and I'm thinking Achilles. Like every quarterback we've seen has come back from this injury, it's taken forever.

• 12:18Bill Simmons?

  It's a two-year injury.

• 12:19Speaker 01

  Uh, but those guys were old and he's young and athletic and everybody's saying he looks the same. So I guess the science has evolved. Um, the one thing I'll say about him is I was just pulling his numbers because I was doing an AFC South preview. You mentioned like two months and that's an important distinction because he was like the best quarterback in football for eight weeks, but then if you split it and look at the like five games, it started to really go off the tracks a bit. So I think that's one where I, I do think he's absolutely a competent starting quarterback, but I do think probably what we saw in the first two months of the season wasn't, you know, what we're going to see moving forward.

• 12:56Bill Simmons?

  QB that you personally, Mina Kimes, make the most excuses for?

• 13:03Speaker 01

  Everybody knows is Lamar.

• 13:05Bill Simmons?

  Still. I just, so we planned on doing this two days ago and I didn't know the Sando thing was coming out today. And there was some interesting, the Lamar section in that piece was, was pretty interesting where people are basically like, this, this is the fork in the road year for him as a superstar because his running stats are way down. And if, if he's just not going to move around in the same way, then, then are you a top five QB anymore?

• 13:32Speaker 01

  I think, well, I, okay, so there's a good distinction. I, I actually thought there was a little bit of nuance to some of the comments I read where someone said, he's still a very good pocket passer. So I think we've moved past the idea, at least anyone who should be taken seriously, that Lamar Jackson has to have, you know, a very strong rushing component to his game and to otherwise he's not a very good passer. I think the question is, is he an elite, like top three guy without that? And I think that's actually a fair debate to have in the, because of the way his rushing ability changes the way defenses play him and opens up opportunities. And I think that's completely fair, but I would also counter

• 14:15Speaker 01

  his wide receiver one is five foot nine. I know I just defended him.

• 14:18Bill Simmons?

  $35 million, eh?

• 14:20Speaker 01

  Uh, five foot nine also feels generous. I looked that up. I was like, really? Five foot nine? I don't know. I might have to get a picture next to him next time in Baltimore for reference. Um.

• 14:28Bill Simmons?

  Oh, as you know, I love nothing more than heights with athletes and actors. This is a true passion.

• 14:35Speaker 01

  A truther? Are you?

• 14:36Bill Simmons?

  No, I love it. There's nothing, I love any, any famous person. I love trying to stand next to to get a real feel. And there's some people like they're, like Affleck doesn't, Affleck's tall. He doesn't lie about it.

• 14:47Speaker 01

  Well, but, okay, you know, I'm sneaky tall.

• 14:50Bill Simmons?

  I know, you're, you're in the sneaky tall All-Stars. It's the Chuck Klosterman All-Stars.

• 14:54Speaker 01

  It's because of the perspective, right? Because I work with six foot five and six foot six guys or whatever. So everybody thinks I'm short.

• 15:00Bill Simmons?

  Another one, you think Steve Nash is like five, five, five. Yeah.

• 15:04Speaker 01

  I, I mentioned this to the Ringer, the fantasy guys, Brock Purdy is not like, in real life, if you met him on the street, you'd say that's a tall man.

• 15:12Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 15:12Speaker 01

  But because he plays in the NFL, he looks tiny. He's six foot two, right? I think.

• 15:16Bill Simmons?

  Kyrie Irving's like this too, where he might even be like a half inch taller than me, but he plays point guard and you can think of him as a little guy and he's just not.

• 15:24Speaker 01

  I will say, I think Zay Flowers is actually just really.

• 15:28Bill Simmons?

  He might be five eight. So Lamar is still your guy?

• 15:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I just think, yes, the body of work at this point, the unique skill set, the throwing ability. I've seen so many games where he's just been so electric as a passer. The one where he went toe to toe with Matthew Stafford lives rent free in my mind because those quarterbacks kind of remind me of each other with their throwing styles.

• 15:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 15:50Speaker 01

  And I just think, um, you know, I'm all like, I, I, I, so while I do feel it, whether he has diminished rushing ability is worth discussing. It's pertinent. We saw that last year. He was not as willing to run and also had a lot of trouble avoiding sacks. That matters, but I do think he was a little banged up and I think he'll be fine.

• 16:11Bill Simmons?

  The question is, is that just two years now, a little banged up every year or a lot banged up or?

• 16:16Speaker 01

  I mean, I think it's fair. I think it's why him and Joe Burrow are in a different tier from Mahomes and Allen for right now, the injuries.

• 16:25Bill Simmons?

  Do you think there will be a QB resurrection this year? Along the lines of Sam Darnold, Baker Mayfield and Jared Goff in the past?

• 16:33Speaker 01

  And eight weeks of Daniel Jones.

• 16:34Bill Simmons?

  And the eight weeks of Daniel Jones and the likely suspect candidate here is Kyler Murray and the Minnesota Vikings.

• 16:41Speaker 01

  Yes, he is the most most likely one. Uh, I don't really, there's no one else who really jumped out to me as a contender other than Kyler. Uh, it sounds like he's winning the job in camp. I know it's been a little bit up and down. That's another one where I think it could look a little bit iffy early on as him and Kevin O'Connell kind of feel each other out. But the thing about Kyler, and you know this, is like even in his like quote down years and everything that's happened since, you know, his like, I think 2020 was when he was being talked about as a QB candidate. He's been statistically an average quarterback since then. There's been times where he's been higher, he's been inconsistent, but it all nets out to like

• 17:25Speaker 01

  average. And that's such an obvious improvement from what they had last year.

• 17:30Bill Simmons?

  J.J. McCarthy, we're zooming with him every day, going through the offense, getting ready for next season? That's my favorite.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  The Sando had a quote about McCarthy. He had some brutal quotes. I think the quote was, playing football looks hard for him, was one of the defensive coaches said, which was maybe the meanest quote.

• 17:50Bill Simmons?

  It was a really tough hit for all the Michigan people I know.

• 17:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:53Bill Simmons?

  Cause all of them were like, you out of anyone will love J.J. McCarthy. He's got it. He's got the intangibility. He passes all the things you talk about. And then he came at it and was just brutal.

• 18:04Speaker 01

  Michigan fans, low key, like the most tribal college football. They follow their guys into the NFL and stick with them, I found. Um, but yeah, Kyler's a good one. I, I think I'm really interested in seeing like where the deep ball went with Kyler because you remember when he was younger, like it was so good early in his career and then that kind of went away, but I think some of that had to do with the wide receivers or lack thereof. This is an offense in Arizona that ran through McBride, the tight end. So I'm curious to see, also Justin Jefferson, who I maintain like maybe the, one of the most psychologically impressive performances of the 2025 season was him not losing his mind over the course of the year. Um, great leader.

• 18:42Bill Simmons?

  That should be an award, the Larry Fitzgerald Award for, I'm just completely screwed by this quarterback situation, but I'm going to be a pro.

• 18:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, it's, I mean, especially given like the nature of the wide receiver position and the stereotypes around it, to see him like week after week, just and he wasn't perfect. He had some drops and whatnot, but I think he deserves a ton of credit. And it, I'm interested in seeing if like Kyler can kind of get the deep ball back with Addison Jefferson.

• 19:07Bill Simmons?

  I'm completely out. Just so, just say no.

• 19:10Speaker 01

  You're completely out on Kyler? You don't think, no chance?

• 19:13Bill Simmons?

  I just think he's at best a 500 quarterback. I just don't see it.

• 19:17Speaker 01

  But this was a team that was 500 last year with J.J. McCarthy.

• 19:20Bill Simmons?

  I, I just don't see it.

• 19:23Bill Simmons?

  Your top four bleakest quarterback situations in order from most bleakest to fourth bleakest. What is the worst quarterback situation? I can give you the options.

• 19:36Speaker 01

  Easy, easy one for one.

• 19:38Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 19:39Speaker 01

  Malik Willis.

• 19:40Bill Simmons?

  Just no offensive line, no, no receivers and.

• 19:43Speaker 01

  The line actually improved a little bit, but I would love to go like to a man on the street in any city outside of Miami.

• 19:51Bill Simmons?

  With the receivers?

• 19:52Speaker 01

  For, in Miami. And ask people to name two Miami Dolphins receivers.

• 19:58Bill Simmons?

  Billy Gil's coming on after you. I'm going to ask him if he can name the wide receiver crew. Probably can't.

• 20:04Speaker 01

  It's insane. Um, it makes me wonder and it's so weird, Bill, because like. I think everything they're doing kind of makes sense, right? Like, they ripped it up, rebuilding, they bring in the entire Green Bay, Halfley and the GM. Everybody gets it, except Malik Willis. I feel like they signed him to like a middle-class quarterback contract and then immediately traded Jalen Waddle. Like, it just didn't really make sense to me. Like, if I'm him and this is my shot to be a starter, why not? I don't know, Atlanta? There just feels, maybe.

• 20:39Bill Simmons?

  I would've gone to Atlanta.

• 20:40Speaker 01

  Arizona, Atlanta, yeah. I just don't, I just don't get it.

• 20:45Bill Simmons?

  But maybe they offered twice as much money as everybody else. I, listen, I agree with you that Miami finally did the right thing. But I also can't congratulate a team for audubling after one of the worst contracts of all time, which was the Tua contract, which made no sense when it was happening. It was a complete disaster. It turned out even worse than everyone thought. And now you're like, okay, now we got it. Now, now we've got our shit together. It's like, do you? You, you just did the Tua thing two years ago, when he was already on like six concussions. All right, so you have Miami one, who's two?

• 21:20Speaker 01

  Uh, I'm tempted by, they're not, Raiders fans aren't gonna like this, but.

• 21:25Bill Simmons?

  Raiders? Wow.

• 21:27Speaker 01

  Name their wide receiver one.

• 21:31Speaker 01

  It's tough. Yes, I know, the answer is Brock Bowers. But like, at a certain point, you also need wide receivers. And then there's the thing about the Raiders, like.

• 21:39Bill Simmons?

  A bunch of tight ends.

• 21:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:42Bill Simmons?

  Lots of tight ends to throw to, a lot of short ones over the middle.

• 21:47Speaker 01

  How would you stack the Raiders offensive line last year?

• 21:50Bill Simmons?

  Isn't it, it's, it's better this year. I think that's one of, there's like five offensive lines that definitely got better and they're one of the five.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  They signed Linderbaum, they gave back Quot Miller, but the right side is the same, it seems.

• 22:02Bill Simmons?

  But last year, they couldn't block at all, so they're at least better than that.

• 22:05Speaker 01

  So I'm apprehensive of the entire right side of that offensive line and the receiving group.

• 22:09Bill Simmons?

  Now, you're going Raiders two?

• 22:12Speaker 01

  Real, I mean.

• 22:13Bill Simmons?

  I'm shocked that you have anybody over. I had Atlanta as the single worst situation.

• 22:17Speaker 01

  Drake London, Bijon Robinson?

• 22:20Bill Simmons?

  I'm just talking about their quarterbacks are Tua and Penix.

• 22:23Speaker 01

  Oh, I thought you, I thought you were asking me to rank like the situation that the quarterback is in.

• 22:27Bill Simmons?

  Oh, my bad.

• 22:28Speaker 01

  I completely misunderstood.

• 22:29Bill Simmons?

  I didn't clarify that enough.

• 22:30Speaker 01

  I'm so sorry, okay.

• 22:31Bill Simmons?

  No, that's fine. I, I like that, I like that, the way you did it is almost a better question.

• 22:39Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you're right, because Atlanta has a ton of skill guys, but they have the worst actual quarterback skill guys.

• 22:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, if I was, if I was ranking actual quarterback situations, it would've been Cleveland with a bullet.

• 22:48Bill Simmons?

  So you'd have Cleveland over Atlanta?

• 22:50Speaker 01

  Uh, yes, yes. Dude. Last time we saw Deshaun Watson play.

• 22:57Bill Simmons?

  I just think Sanders is gonna win the job. I don't think we'll see Deshaun. I think, I honestly, I honestly think I would rather have Sanders than either of the Atlanta guys. I don't think Penix can play three games in a row. And I don't think Tua can either. And I, I don't know who the third string quarterback is, but I, I would bet that he plays more games than both of those guys.

• 23:17Speaker 01

  I think it's Cooper Rush, if, I might be wrong.

• 23:19Bill Simmons?

  I think Cooper Rush will play the most games of the Falcons. Tua's just, Tua has like four starts left in his NFL career, max. There's no way, he's, takes one more hit, his career's over.

• 23:30Speaker 01

  All right, well, when healthy, I would take both Tua and Penix over the Browns quarterback.

• 23:35Bill Simmons?

  But to win healthy is like not happening.

• 23:36Speaker 01

  No, it's fair, it's totally fair. And I want, and I want to go back to what I said, the Dolphins fans, if I'm actually ranking quarterbacks, I like Malik Willis. I just hate his situation. I think he's.

• 23:45Bill Simmons?

  Well, that's a good one, though. So you think the two worst situations are Miami?

• 23:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:50Bill Simmons?

  And who'd you have for the second one?

• 23:51Speaker 01

  I, I picked Vegas, maybe that's too harsh.

• 23:54Bill Simmons?

  I, but you still have Bowers for 1,500 yards.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  Dude, outside of him, it is rough.

• 24:00Bill Simmons?

  Are we sure Pittsburgh isn't one of the worst situations for QB? What's good about their situation?

• 24:06Speaker 01

  Uh, I think Metcalf, Pittman, and then whatever, who's the wide receiver, three, Bernard or whoever, is pretty good. I think the offensive line is decent, the interior is really good, kind of figure out the tackle position.

• 24:19Bill Simmons?

  Running game?

• 24:20Speaker 01

  Good run game, I think it's a good run game. I think, um, tight ends are good.

• 24:24Bill Simmons?

  You like that more than Tennessee?

• 24:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, 100%.

• 24:29Bill Simmons?

  Do you like it more than Arizona?

• 24:32Speaker 01

  Um, yes, because of the offensive line. But Arizona's not bad, although Arizona randomly has like every running back on earth.

• 24:42Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it was weird when they were, the coach was touting, uh, James Connor. It's like, you guys just spent the third pick on a running back. What is James Connor, James Connor, what's he doing in this?

• 24:53Speaker 01

  I don't understand. I think Arizona, the offensive line could be better, but they were pretty bad last year.

• 24:57Bill Simmons?

  So my bottom three, just for actual quarterbacks, situations. The only ones that got a minus two for me, where in the team rankings, you actually get negative points, were Cleveland, the Jets, and Atlanta.

• 25:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:09Bill Simmons?

  Your guy, Gino, I, I'm sorry, he was a minus, he has to be a minus two unless we see something different. But I didn't have any other minus, minus ones. That was it. All right, I have one more question and then we'll take a break and go to the rankings.

• 25:25Bill Simmons?

  This is really important. Eduardo, get ready to cut this.

• 25:29Speaker 01

  Oh, Eduardo, get ready to cut this, okay.

• 25:32Bill Simmons?

  No, cut this for a social clip.

• 25:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know, I understand.

• 25:37Bill Simmons?

  Has Jordan Love replaced Justin Herbert as the football nerd king of the quarterback position? Has this finally, has, has this been a subtle shift that we didn't acknowledge, but it's happened?

• 25:52Speaker 01

  I feel like I'm walking into a trap, like you laid an elaborate, like, sauce style.

• 25:57Bill Simmons?

  I did, I did, there's no way out.

• 25:59Speaker 01

  Because you already know, I love Jordan Love. And the way you set that question up is, makes it look like I'm falling for it.

• 26:13Speaker 01

  But yeah, he's, he's a really good quarterback. And he has this like reputation as being this incredibly irresponsible interception machine.

• 26:26Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 26:27Speaker 01

  That's not substantiated by reality. And I think, and the nerds of all, we, we had a quorum, we got together.

• 26:36Bill Simmons?

  QB Nerder Palooza?

• 26:38Speaker 01

  We had a, we had a, we had a little summit in the offseason to discuss, first, we did our, our giant Justin Herbert presentation and everybody, you know, had major, put up slides about how we can defend him this year, now that the circumstances are better.

• 26:51Bill Simmons?

  Somebody was sobbing at the podium about, he lost both of his tackles. He lost both of them.

• 26:58Speaker 01

  Ruiz had to take like a five-minute break.

• 27:02Speaker 01

  But Jordan Love, and this was widely discussed at the summit.

• 27:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 27:06Speaker 01

  Like, actually not a high interception rate. I believe bottom 10 or something in football, I posted this at one point. The problem is that when he does turn it over, it looks so unbelievably goofy.

• 27:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 27:21Speaker 01

  That it sticks in people's minds and has a disproportionate impact on like the public imagination that makes people think he turns it over all the time.

• 27:32Bill Simmons?

  So you're, you're talking about the concept of loud turnovers.

• 27:36Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 27:37Bill Simmons?

  So in basketball, I always called this the 90-10 guy, where everybody's 90% really good at basketball, but they're gonna be 10% not that good at stuff. And when it's somebody like Russell Westbrook, you really notice the 10%. And Love is a 10, that Love 10% for whatever reason seems just the worst.

• 27:57Speaker 01

  He's also like the anti-Westbrook in that all of his rate stats are unbelievable. Like, when you go back and you look at everything, and I know everyone's always arguing about which quarterback stats matter. And my answer to that is, it doesn't, you can literally take any quarterback stat, DVOA, EPA, QBR, passer rate, whatever you want. He is like top five or better in all of them. Like, he, he is both from the film, you talk about the film nerds, the film nerds and the stat nerds both love him because he's been so good.

• 28:28Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 28:29Speaker 01

  And yet, people talk about him like he's, I don't even, I think like they kind of talk about him like he's like late-stage Brett Favre or something.

• 28:38Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they don't take him seriously.

• 28:39Speaker 01

  It doesn't make sense to me.

• 28:40Bill Simmons?

  Well, so last year, what, loses Kraft, the wide receivers are, you know, Watson gets hurt every year, but in general, like, the wide receivers were a mess.

• 28:52Bill Simmons?

  Top four pressure rate against him? So all these QB stats, you can go, you can overrate any of them. I think pressure rate's a really good stat. It just tells you what quarterback was under duress the most. He was in the top four. And EPA, I mean, you have all these different ones, but his EPA was 0.24 per play, it was like in the top four.

• 29:13Bill Simmons?

  I, here's how I would, this is why I think he took the title from Herbert.

• 29:17Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 29:17Bill Simmons?

  I think, I think the nerd community is scolding us the most about Love. And I think scolding is a huge part of this. Where people are like, you don't understand.

• 29:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:29Bill Simmons?

  You guys are wrong. This guy's really good and here's some things you have to.

• 29:33Speaker 01

  I feel like you're inadvertently right now making some profound political commentary.

• 29:39Speaker 01

  And why we might be in the situation that we're in, but I'm gonna put that to the side. Um, okay, so, teach me how to be a Jordan Love enthusiast in a way that doesn't alienate the everyman. Because I want to, I want to be better. I want to, I want to defend him in a way that's not annoying to people.

• 29:57Bill Simmons?

  So here, here's the thing. This is just like, you almost have to go overboard with the, look, either follow the NFL or you don't. If you don't see the Jordan Love thing, I can't help you, because he's that good. And if you're gonna say he's not, then enjoy your Sundays, watch five games at once, eat chicken, chicken fingers, have beers with your buddies, and don't actually watch the games, because that, because that's where you are, if you don't see it.

• 30:26Speaker 01

  You're, you're veering dangerously close to watch the tape, which people don't, don't like.

• 30:30Bill Simmons?

  But he has tape and stats, and.

• 30:32Speaker 01

  Look at you backing into being a Love defender.

• 30:35Bill Simmons?

  I am a Love defender. To me, Love has a better case than Herbert, because at least we've seen him play well in the playoffs. Like, he's, he had a really awesome playoff win, Herbert does not.

• 30:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:45Bill Simmons?

  We've seen Herbert fall apart in the playoffs and Love has not, as, I don't think has. I always feel like he's in the mix.

• 30:52Speaker 01

  Hey, let me ask you a question. Are any of his receivers better than Jay Flowers?

• 30:57Bill Simmons?

  Well, I think Kraft was a top four tight end before he got hurt.

• 31:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:01Bill Simmons?

  I thought he was always open and he looked like Gronkish to me. He's not, obviously not Gronk.

• 31:07Speaker 01

  Receivers.

• 31:09Bill Simmons?

  I like Golden. I don't know what happened with him last year. I had him on two fantasy teams, wondering why they weren't throwing it to him. Maybe he's not good, but where they drafted him and what they wanted from him feels like he's the key swing guy for them this year.

• 31:24Speaker 01

  They have a lot of guys I like. Like I think Watson's good when he's healthy.

• 31:27Bill Simmons?

  When he plays.

• 31:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think Golden has potential. Reed is a fun piece, but at the point I'm making, and I think this is another thing we can add to our Jordan Love public service announcement that we're putting together here is like, we just made fun of Baltimore for their wide receiver one being, you know, amena-sized.

• 31:45Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 31:45Speaker 01

  He would be easily the best receiver in Green Bay. So like, why doesn't Jordan Love get some credit for that as well? He ain't throwing a Pukunakua and Jamar Chase and JSN, you know? So I, I, I just feel, I mean, I'm like, I have his numbers too. He's top three against the blitz, top three on third down, top three on third and long. Like what, what does it take? What does it take? I don't know.

• 32:10Bill Simmons?

  He's won the title. It's official. All right. We're gonna take a break. We're gonna go through the rankings. This episode is brought to you by ChatGPT. Imagine you're running a professional sports team. Nice. That'd be a dream, mine. Imagine the player contract report is due today. Not so nice. You've got performance notes from the coaching staff. You got a salary spreadsheet from your analyst, three rounds of back and forth emails with the agent, and all of it is scattered absolutely everywhere. Well, that's where ChatGPT work comes in. It's a new way to use ChatGPT for bigger multi-step projects. Give ChatGPT work access to your apps and files and can create real work documents, for instance, spreadsheets, slides, structured reports.

• 32:55Bill Simmons?

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• 33:23Speaker 01

  All right.

• 33:23Bill Simmons?

  Highest you can get is nine points at the QB position and it can only be one person, the alpha, and then we go down. And I have for the alpha, the second year in a row, Josh Allen as my nine pointer.

• 33:35Bill Simmons?

  12 plus rushing TDs each year for the last three.

• 33:41Bill Simmons?

  I don't need to do his stats. The playoff win is the one thing that people are gonna point to. And I gotta say, like, I don't think he choked in the playoffs last year, but it wasn't, not a choke.

• 33:50Speaker 01

  Not great, not great in Denver.

• 33:51Bill Simmons?

  It wasn't great for the Allen thing and like Sando did his QB tiers and had Mahomes in the one spot, which we'll talk about in a second. To me,

• 33:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:00Bill Simmons?

  Allen is clearly still the best quarterback in the league, at least if we're just in regular season only. And if we're gonna go into who do you want for one game, that's a different category. Do you think DJ Moore changes anything?

• 34:12Speaker 01

  I do.

• 34:13Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 34:13Speaker 01

  And that's not me saying DJ Moore is 2021 DJ Moore, or that he's gonna suddenly become a top 10 receiver in the NFL, but they just have such, had such a lack of receiving option. Who could win on the boundary, who could beat man coverage, who can even threaten man coverage in any way. So if even, DJ Moore is even like a top 20 receiver, I do think that makes things a lot easier for Buffalo.

• 34:35Bill Simmons?

  Would you be scared if you were a Buffalo fan that the Bears fans were ready to drive him to the airport?

• 34:41Speaker 01

  I would be more mad about the deal. Like my objection to that was less trading for DJ Moore and more what they gave up for him and the contract part of it, which I thought would, didn't make a ton of sense.

• 34:50Bill Simmons?

  Two teams where he, didn't seem like it went totally perfect behind the scenes or with everybody. They like, two teams that seemed like they were pretty happy to move on, which I think to me is a red flag. We'll see. I mean, the, the new coach, who is a little more offense oriented, maybe that helps, but I don't know. Josh is just, he's the scariest guy to go against. He's the scariest guy to bet against, and I don't think that's changed. So I have him at the top. Do you agree with that or no? Would you have Mahomes there?

• 35:20Speaker 01

  No, I think that's fair. I also think Josh Allen just doesn't get hurt. Like I,

• 35:25Bill Simmons?

  No, that matters. Durability matters. I keep saying this.

• 35:28Speaker 01

  It's, I mean, he is literally like a linebacker up there. And the fact that he's become unbelievably accurate and smart on top of that is ridiculous. Um, I think when you compare him to Mahomes, it's a little tricky for me because even though I, I know I just said, uh, the Bills don't have a receiver who can be man coverage. They've had such a great offensive line and such a dominant run game and Mahomes is, we'll talk about him, been in such crappy circumstances. So it's kinda hard, you know, to compare, but I do think it's fair to put Allen there now.

• 36:00Bill Simmons?

  Top seven favorite celebrity relationship for you?

• 36:04Speaker 01

  Uh, we had a long aside about this, cause you know, both him and Herbert dating or married to Popstar, or Herbert's not got married yet. Uh, and I, I made the argument that I think the big part of the reason why Allen rose so high in the ranking, their fantasy guys rankings is because he's such a wife guy, which women love.

• 36:23Bill Simmons?

  Good couple pictures of them too. Yeah.

• 36:25Speaker 01

  There was a clip of him like tearing up, talking about their baby daughter that went around. Can't have better publicity than that.

• 36:33Bill Simmons?

  Next category is the, uh, the Blues. These are eight pointers. And I have five, and I'm gonna do them in the order I have them.

• 36:43Speaker 01

  It's brave.

• 36:44Bill Simmons?

  Stafford, I have second. I don't have Mahomes second, and I'll explain why. I, I wanna watch, is it okay if we watch a couple of games with him with the repaired ACL? Just see how it looks. Can I just, can I just see like two games before I move, start moving him up the ladder? Um, especially somebody who has to, in big games, when I don't love their receivers and neither do you, Kelsey's just got married. He's in his mid 30s. Over and over again, when they play somebody good, he has to use.

• 37:15Speaker 01

  I mean, it's the fact that Kelsey just got married.

• 37:17Bill Simmons?

  Well, I don't know. I don't know if he's, his eyes on the prize. He just had a wedding of 1,200 people. 1,200 person wedding. I don't know if he cares about the season.

• 37:25Speaker 01

  Almost all of these guys are married.

• 37:27Bill Simmons?

  Um, but it's just a big wedding. I don't know. I don't know where his head's at.

• 37:34Bill Simmons?

  But if Mahomes has to use his legs to save games and quarters for them.

• 37:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, more relevant. Very relevant.

• 37:40Bill Simmons?

  I don't know if he can. I just wanna see it. So I have him third. Stafford stats-wise was ridiculous and,

• 37:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:48Bill Simmons?

  you know?

• 37:51Speaker 01

  All right, let me pause and ask you a question.

• 37:52Bill Simmons?

  Best year since 21, and the question for me with him, 38 years old.

• 37:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:58Bill Simmons?

  Was that the peak?

• 38:00Speaker 01

  I got a question for you.

• 38:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 38:02Speaker 01

  Those two quarterbacks, if you switch their circumstances this year.

• 38:07Bill Simmons?

  It'd be terrible for Stafford. Yeah. Well, that's why I think, I think by week four, Mahomes flips.

• 38:12Speaker 01

  Imagine Mahomes behind the Rams offensive line with the Rams run game, Sean McVay, Pukunakua, Devante Adams. Like, what would that look like?

• 38:21Bill Simmons?

  That's fair. So you would have Mahomes second?

• 38:23Speaker 01

  No, not necessarily. I would. I would, yes. But, and, and Stafford, amazing. I don't think it's crazy. He's, I would probably put him third right now.

• 38:33Bill Simmons?

  Can I give you a, maybe you, this is good for you. I went on your pod and I was saying, I thought Seattle had the most talented team, which apparently was like a hot take.

• 38:42Speaker 01

  Dude.

• 38:43Bill Simmons?

  Cause the Seahawks fans were like, finally, somebody else said it other than us. They were like delighted.

• 38:48Speaker 01

  There's like no Seahawks, barely any in the NFL 100, which I know is an absurd sentence to use that as some kind of, it is the players though. Devon Witherspoon, who's like, best DB, didn't crack the 100.

• 39:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but that, do you take that top 100 list seriously? Cause I do not. I did my rankings and Seattle had a 38 points, which was the highest I've ever done in four years.

• 39:11Speaker 01

  On a daily NFL show and it's July.

• 39:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I get it. Okay. I, I just, if he's not on it, what list is that?

• 39:19Speaker 01

  I know, it's ridiculous.

• 39:20Bill Simmons?

  And Cooper, Cooper was, I think, I saw today, he was like 45th. Does anybody think Cooper's jeans better than Witherspoon? At least it's like even.

• 39:31Speaker 01

  Pretty awesome. Yeah, no, but I mean, 45 and not being on the list is crazy. Yeah.

• 39:35Bill Simmons?

  Um, anyway, I made, I looked this up. I did some research for this pod.

• 39:39Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 39:40Bill Simmons?

  QBs, 38 years or older, 38 plus QBs.

• 39:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:46Bill Simmons?

  10 wins, 4,000 yards, 25 TDs, 7 yards per attempt. Seem solid numbers for a high end QB, right? 4,025, 7. It's only happened nine times.

• 40:02Bill Simmons?

  Six of the guys were Tom Brady, Brett Favre in 09, Manning in 14 on Denver, and Rogers, 21 on Green Bay. So Stafford, just putting up those numbers would be the 10th time it's ever happened at that age. 4,025 and 7, which isn't even remotely close to what he did last year. It was 4707, 46 TDs. And it just, I just wonder, he's had a lot of wear and tear, a lot of injuries, knee stuff, back stuff. I don't know.

• 40:33Speaker 01

  I think he will be fine. His arm strength has not diminished at all, clearly. However, that Rams offensive line is not deep. And if they were to lose one of those tackles and potentially a suspension might be, you know, on the left side for one of them, that's when I start worrying about Matthew Stafford.

• 40:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 40:53Speaker 01

  Because that's where the age starts to show, the pressure.

• 40:56Bill Simmons?

  Well, and when you have a top heavy team, it's tough to

• 40:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:59Bill Simmons?

  be good everywhere too. We'll see. Uh, anyway, Mahomes third. His peak year is now four years ago. 5,250 yards, 41 touchdowns and 8.1 yards per attempt. And I guess the question is, was, was that the peak? Will he reach those heights ever again? He's in his 30s now.

• 41:23Speaker 01

  I don't think he will unless they actually find a wide receiver one. That's.

• 41:30Bill Simmons?

  Do they have a single wide receiver you completely trust?

• 41:33Speaker 01

  No.

• 41:35Bill Simmons?

  Do you have a wide receiver you partially trust?

• 41:39Speaker 01

  I trust Rashi Rice against zone coverage. But that's such a like, I think he's, he's a totally useful receiver. I think.

• 41:48Bill Simmons?

  I trust him out of football field.

• 41:51Speaker 01

  Yes, specifically zone coverage between the two lines. Uh, I do not, I know, I talked, like, I talked about how the Bills and like man coverage, you'd have everyone could win. Well, now they have D J Moore, who at least is like competent.

• 42:03Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 42:03Speaker 01

  I don't see that in Kansas City. So I, I also like they, the Kelsey thing, I mean, he's Hall of Fame player.

• 42:11Bill Simmons?

  Just got married.

• 42:12Speaker 01

  Just got married.

• 42:13Bill Simmons?

  Big 1,200 person wedding at Madison Square Garden.

• 42:15Speaker 01

  Doesn't that mean though, that's now, now that's off his mind and he's, his mind is clear, the wedding's over. I, that's how I felt after I got married. I was like, oh, I never have to think about that again.

• 42:24Bill Simmons?

  Football, football has a life or death element to it that you kind of have to throw yourself into. You know, sometimes these guys, who knows? I, the thing I wrote down from Holmes. Brady had this after he tore the ACL in 08. And then nine and 10, they didn't make the Super Bowl either of those years and he kind of moved and he's still statistically was great. But it felt like he needed like a second prime to start and then it finally started in 11 where he had like his second run. So the question with Mahomes is, is there going to be a second run? Or was it just that amazing first peak that was historic and all that, but that's going to be where we landed? Like, almost like a Pujols thing.

• 43:05Speaker 01

  It's the circumstances that'll determine it for me and we can do the analog with Brady and what.

• 43:10Bill Simmons?

  Well, what happened? They drafted the two tight ends in 11, in, in 10, and that led to the second prime.

• 43:17Speaker 01

  The two Titans.

• 43:18Bill Simmons?

  Well, the one, the second one was good for a couple of years.

• 43:21Speaker 01

  That's funny the way you talk about it.

• 43:22Bill Simmons?

  It turned into a multiple murderer.

• 43:24Speaker 01

  Uh, no, but like, uh, the, the thing, right? So it feels like Kansas City, there needs to be a total refresh. I think Andy Reid and the brain trust there. There needs to be some evolution on that offense, particularly the run game, particularly because of the injury. And I'm not just talking about, I'm specifically talking about this season. You talked about, let's see Mahomes on the ACL. His ability to run was so important. Obviously it's always been important and it's always been especially important in the postseason. But earlier I mentioned like they can't, they don't have anyone who can beat man coverage. They did have one person, his name was Patrick Mahomes, because deep defense would turn their back to him and he would just take off on third down. If you can't do that, if your defense, you're not afraid of that anymore.

• 44:07Speaker 01

  And they don't have any receivers who you're scared of playing man. You're golden. So I just, and he was like, they're leading, so they messed along the run game this off season. But that's something like, I feel like everything around him has to get better for a second golden age to happen.

• 44:23Bill Simmons?

  They missed a couple of picks too, over the last couple of years, which is always bad. You miss, you miss first or second rounders. And this is what happened with Brady down the stretch where it was like, they just missed some drafts and you can't recover from that.

• 44:37Bill Simmons?

  The Walker thing. Getting Kenneth Walker, having a real running back, the running back stats were really, really putrid last year. I mean, some of the worst advanced stats for them. Anyway. So I have Mahomes third, but I'm ready to move him second as soon as I see him run around. I have Drake May fourth, which I think people would think is high. He made the Super Bowl last year and had crazy stats.

• 44:59Speaker 01

  Wait, you have Drake May over Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson?

• 45:02Bill Simmons?

  I'm going to explain why in a second.

• 45:04Speaker 01

  I'm a Drake May guy. You're testing me. Okay.

• 45:08Bill Simmons?

  Meaning you know what I like? Results.

• 45:12Bill Simmons?

  Drake May went 17 and four last year. And he had crazy stats. It's not like it was like some sort of fluke thing. And they added A J Brown, who was either the seventh, eighth, ninth, or 10th best receiver in the league. They added Dobbs. They improved the offensive line. Why isn't he a top five QB again? I, I, why isn't he a safer bet than Lamar Jackson? Who's like six years older than him.

• 45:36Speaker 01

  Because Lamar's done it for seven years.

• 45:38Bill Simmons?

  I just watched Drake May do it last year.

• 45:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was one year, dude. Tell that to the Texans fans. I'm, I, I, I'm all in on Drake. I mean, I have taken my slings and arrows for my MVP vote, which I will still stand on and defend. But like, I, I don't think you can credibly, after just one season, rank him above those guys.

• 45:58Bill Simmons?

  I just did it.

• 45:58Speaker 01

  He's, okay, all right. I love him. I think he's so good, but.

• 46:03Bill Simmons?

  Lamar, 349 yards rushing last year in 13 games. He's never been under 50 yards a game.

• 46:13Bill Simmons?

  Rushing until last year.

• 46:14Speaker 01

  He was injured.

• 46:15Bill Simmons?

  EPA per play last year, 0.07, just slightly better than Jackson Dart, Mason Rudolph.

• 46:22Speaker 01

  You need to take away your EPA privileges.

• 46:25Bill Simmons?

  Three playoff wins career, which is the same as Drake May had last year. He's 30 years old.

• 46:32Bill Simmons?

  And, uh, I don't know. I would just rather have Drake May. I'm just telling you as a Patriot fan.

• 46:36Speaker 01

  I think, oh, dude, if we're talking about building like from ground up.

• 46:41Bill Simmons?

  I'm saying for this year, if it's one year only, I'd rather have Drake May.

• 46:43Speaker 01

  I'm saying if it was more than one year only, I would absolutely take Drake May.

• 46:46Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 46:47Speaker 01

  But I'm not going to take him for one year only over the two time, should have been three time MVP.

• 46:53Bill Simmons?

  You know what? If Malley Rubin's watching and listening to this? I don't care. Um, and I had Burrow last in this group. So I had, I had five in this group. Here's the thing with Joe Burrow that I don't love. So I have basically Stafford, Mahomes, May, Jackson and Burrow.

• 47:09Speaker 01

  So not Lamar for all the reasons.

• 47:11Bill Simmons?

  No, Lamar I just had in there.

• 47:12Speaker 01

  Oh, so sorry. So Jackson, Jackson.

• 47:14Bill Simmons?

  I have Lamar fifth and May fourth, Burrow sixth.

• 47:17Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 47:17Bill Simmons?

  Um, Burrow's played three seasons and three half seasons and he hasn't won a playoff game since 2022.

• 47:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:24Bill Simmons?

  I think that kind of matters. And I don't know if his offensive line, it's allegedly a little bit better. Who knows?

• 47:31Speaker 01

  I maintain it's better.

• 47:32Bill Simmons?

  Their schedule is super easy. Everybody loves them. There's been a lot of action on their over and.

• 47:41Bill Simmons?

  I don't know. He's had a lot of wear and tear already. He's had some real injuries, not like fluky dumb injuries, like real injuries. And I just kind of want to see it.

• 47:50Speaker 01

  I think the injury thing is where you got to start. It's the most credible reason to doubt both him and Jackson, but more him. He's been hurt more.

• 47:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 47:58Speaker 01

  Which sometimes I feel like is not talked about in the same way. Um, and it's a good reflection of how like. Getting injured doesn't, it, it, it's not necessarily correlated to, you know, being. I think sometimes people say the dual threat quarterbacks, you'll get injured a lot. It's like, actually your, your pocket passer here. I know he has scrambling ability. Joe Burrow.

• 48:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 48:17Speaker 01

  Had some pretty weird injuries along the way.

• 48:21Speaker 01

  You know, when he's been on the field, I think top four or five, four is probably top four is where I would put him. But he also, again, to go back to circumstances, has been in pretty damn good circumstances. I mean, he's probably got the best one, two punch receiver in the NFL. I do think the offensive line has gotten better. So I, I think that's fair. I think Burrow versus Jackson. Is a debate most people have. I'm higher on Lamar personally, but I think you could argue both ways.

• 48:52Bill Simmons?

  Let's see it.

• 48:55Bill Simmons?

  It's all set up for him this year. The two easiest schedules in the league are Cleveland and Cincinnati.

• 49:02Bill Simmons?

  And if he, if he's a 10 win quarterback and can stay healthy this year, I don't understand how he wouldn't win 10 games with the talent he has. All right. Next category is the light blue. We can move through these fast. Prescott. Who I guess I have as my seventh best quarterback, year 11 for him. He's got two playoff wins total.

• 49:22Bill Simmons?

  I think he's, has the mantle right now of would I rather have this guy as my fantasy QB or my real QB? We have this from time to time.

• 49:30Speaker 01

  You, you wouldn't want him as your real QB? I mean.

• 49:33Bill Simmons?

  If I'm trying to win the Super Bowl.

• 49:36Speaker 01

  We have him seventh. That's pretty high.

• 49:38Bill Simmons?

  I know. I know.

• 49:41Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 49:43Bill Simmons?

  I'm just saying. Is his legacy going to be fantasy? He wants people some fantasy titles or he actually wins some NFL playoff games?

• 49:52Speaker 01

  It's funny how. He used to be like the most divisive quarterback in the NFL.

• 49:58Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he struggled. He, he kicked everyone away.

• 50:01Speaker 01

  Yeah. He, remember like Prescott.

• 50:03Bill Simmons?

  Why don't you guys cover the Dallas Cowboys more?

• 50:07Bill Simmons?

  Every time I turn his pin on, they're not talking about the Cowboys at all. I don't understand.

• 50:10Speaker 01

  You know what? I'm on NFL Live today and we have zero Cowboy segments. So touche. Yeah.

• 50:16Bill Simmons?

  Did it.

• 50:17Speaker 01

  Starting with the Ravens, Zay Flowers. Um.

• 50:21Speaker 01

  I, but it is funny, right? That he now, everyone just kind of accepts that he's in this tier that you have him in. Like everybody accepts that he's in that, I would say six to nine range, six to eight.

• 50:30Bill Simmons?

  And yet if we got to a playoff game and he was like a three and a half point favorite at home, I'd be nervous to bet on him.

• 50:36Speaker 01

  I wouldn't be nervous because of him.

• 50:39Bill Simmons?

  I have love right after him for all the reasons we talked about.

• 50:42Speaker 01

  Love it.

• 50:43Bill Simmons?

  And then, uh, Herbert is the last person in this group. The playoff stuff is horrific. I really thought, I, he was a noble season by him last year though, with, with how bad the line was. Noble.

• 50:55Speaker 01

  And yet not noble enough for you to have him over.

• 50:57Bill Simmons?

  He's just running for his life. The question for him, and I think this goes for Burrow too, is.

• 51:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:03Bill Simmons?

  Can you take too many hits?

• 51:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:05Bill Simmons?

  Can you, can you run for your life too much? Is there residual damage from it?

• 51:10Speaker 01

  Okay, that's a fair, speaking on behalf of the greater Justin Herbert supporters, film nerds, Alliance, I, I feel I'm qualified to be the emissary. That's a fair criticism. I think, because I get worried about, I actually have a little theory that I've been banding around, which is when these quarterbacks have these meltdowns in the postseason, him, he was awful in that game, Stroud.

• 51:35Bill Simmons?

  Awful.

• 51:36Speaker 01

  I sometimes feel, and honestly, like, nay, at the end, to a lesser, to something.

• 51:42Bill Simmons?

  He was terrible.

• 51:43Speaker 01

  He was bad. I do feel like there's something to be said about the accumulation of those hits and bad offensive line play, building and building and building, and then a quarterback just kind of imploding at the end of the year. Like, there's only so long you can shoulder a terrible offensive line. And I kind of think, and that's why, I genuinely believe that's why those quarterbacks, and so some of the other quarterbacks, like, end up being the worst at the end. It's because of, like you said, the accumulation of all.

• 52:13Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you're talking about, it could be during a season, it could also be a career. Like, when I was a little kid, we had Jim Punkt, who was the first pick in the draft, and just got the shit kicked out of him for six years. Ended up getting traded to San Francisco, waived, and then took like two years to recover, and then went to the Raiders and actually won a Super Bowl, but, you know.

• 52:34Speaker 01

  It's hard. It's, I mean, his line, it's not even just that they allowed him a lot of pressure, it's the way they allowed pressure, which was like, right up the middle. It felt like a jailbreak, every other play.

• 52:46Bill Simmons?

  Well, I have good news. I had them in, I had them in the top eight for offensive lines. Now that they have their tackles back.

• 52:54Speaker 01

  Their guys back?

• 52:54Bill Simmons?

  Both of their guys are back. And they spent, they spent money on it, too. I, I think their line is actually, then the McDaniel piece, he's the one that I could see, I think he's the stealth MVP, but.

• 53:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:05Bill Simmons?

  There's a lot of, a lot of signs.

• 53:07Speaker 01

  Have you considered, though, that he's planning a wedding during the season? Did you factor?

• 53:12Bill Simmons?

  When is the wedding?

• 53:14Speaker 01

  I don't know. After the season, I presume.

• 53:16Bill Simmons?

  I don't like it.

• 53:16Speaker 01

  But maybe it's gonna be, it might be on his mind.

• 53:18Bill Simmons?

  I don't like it.

• 53:21Bill Simmons?

  He's preparing for like the Patriots game, and his fiance is like, oh, my mom is being such a jerk, she wants us to invite my uncle.

• 53:32Bill Simmons?

  Anyway.

• 53:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think you're totally stealth MVP. I totally agree with that.

• 53:35Bill Simmons?

  So, seven pointers, Prescott, Love, and Herbert. And that.

• 53:38Speaker 01

  I like it.

• 53:38Bill Simmons?

  That actually is our top nine.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  I like it.

• 53:41Bill Simmons?

  Which leads to the next question, because now we're in the Reds, which are five pointers. And I have Darnold, Goff, Purdy, and Caleb Williams in this group.

• 53:51Speaker 01

  Darnold, Goff, Purdy, and Caleb Williams, in that order?

• 53:55Bill Simmons?

  So, that was the tentative order. My question for you, because one of these guys, I think, is clearly the 10th best quarterback in the league, because I think the top nine is pretty set.

• 54:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think that's good.

• 54:07Bill Simmons?

  Who is the 10th best quarterback in the league? I can offer you Darnold, Goff, Purdy, or Caleb Williams, with six fourth quarter comebacks, and, uh, pretty, pretty kind of basic stats, except for like how good he is when his back's to the wall.

• 54:24Speaker 01

  I would throw in another quarterback into this group. Why would, I would put Stroud for consideration, but I understand some hesitation.

• 54:31Bill Simmons?

  We're not even close to getting this Stroud yet.

• 54:33Speaker 01

  I would put Trevor Lawrence in this group, personally, and I, as someone who just went back and rewatched Trevor Lawrence for a podcast.

• 54:40Bill Simmons?

  So, I had him, I had Trevor Lawrence as a four pointer, and my question for you is gonna be, do you believe in 2026 last eight games Trevor Lawrence? Or what we saw in the playoff game, Trevor Lawrence?

• 54:52Speaker 01

  I, well, he wasn't even that bad, first of all. I believe in it because circumstances stay the same, for the most part.

• 55:00Bill Simmons?

  Okay. So, you want me to move him up a point? You want me, you want to make him a five pointer? Okay, I'm gonna listen to you.

• 55:05Speaker 01

  I think he was so awesome.

• 55:06Bill Simmons?

  I agree with you, I just didn't know if it was.

• 55:08Speaker 01

  Go back and watch some of those, the, I mean, okay, so, but of the guys you mentioned, I'm gonna parse this out. One year, if it was multiple years, I would put Caleb there, but it's one year.

• 55:21Bill Simmons?

  It's not multiple years, it's this season.

• 55:23Speaker 01

  I'm putting Jared, I would put Jared Goff there, personally.

• 55:26Bill Simmons?

  Okay.

• 55:28Speaker 01

  I've, Jared Goff is one of those quarterbacks where my estimation has grown over time. Uh, and I think he's gotten better over time, so that's a big part of it. I feel that, like, the Lions, obviously, incredible skill players, you know, we all know that. I do feel like a little bit lost last year was an appreciation of some of the struggles of that offensive line and what he was dealing with. Um, and we, and that's, that's partially, that's his sensitivity, like, that he is much better kept clean, all quarterbacks are, but the immobile ones, shall we say, are more. But I just think he's, his toughness and his ability to keep that offense, that passing game going with some pretty bad line play, maybe was a little bit slept on.

• 56:07Bill Simmons?

  His stats are really good. Like, his last three years, per 17 games, would be 4,634 TDs, eight yards a pass.

• 56:16Speaker 01

  Even last year without Ben Johnson, by the way, he still was good.

• 56:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, the question with him is always, all right, if he didn't have elite skill guys, where are we? Right?

• 56:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:25Bill Simmons?

  He's got Gibbs, he's got Laporta, got St. Brown.

• 56:28Speaker 01

  I think everyone you mentioned, though, right? Purdy, Darnold.

• 56:32Bill Simmons?

  I think he has the best skill guys out of all these guys in this group.

• 56:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:35Bill Simmons?

  All right, so Goff, I still have Darnold, I had him 10th, but I'm happy to move him to 11. 28 wins, plus Super Bowl, and he was 31 and 7 the last two years. We don't have to talk about him, you've talked about him enough, but, um, Purdy is, Purdy's my guy that I defend. I talked about this on your pod. I just like Purdy. Like, when Mac Jones was pretty good for the 49ers, people were like, see, Purdy, ah, it could be anybody. And it's like, I just don't agree. I think Purdy's good.

• 57:05Bill Simmons?

  Question for him is the receivers, and then, um, the electric, whatever the fuck that thing is.

• 57:11Speaker 01

  They lost in a, Pierce all, like, I.

• 57:13Bill Simmons?

  Just taking things out.

• 57:14Speaker 01

  I, I don't know what you do with this point.

• 57:19Bill Simmons?

  So.

• 57:19Speaker 01

  It's crazy.

• 57:20Bill Simmons?

  This, I'm a big believer in July and August, setting a tone for shoving a team one direction or the other. I have not liked, but, I think the Shannon and Carr accident is like just a terrible thing to happen before the season, for a variety of reasons, but it's just a weird, kind of strange variable to put in versus what you have with some other teams who are like, yeah, things are going great, we're happy about this and this, and you have the Niners who are dealing with all the, I don't know, I just.

• 57:48Speaker 01

  I was so, I was so high on the Niners, like, offseason, moves they made.

• 57:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 57:52Speaker 01

  When we did our power hour, I was like, look at this roster. And then you take a step back, and you're like, wait, all of these skill players are either older, coming off an injury, or have, almost all of them have injury history. So, why am I, like, I felt like hubris to assume, this is before Pierce all got hurt, that they would all be fine, so I, I don't feel.

• 58:12Bill Simmons?

  At some point, it ends for Evans. This is becoming unrealistic for the number one, kind of a, somewhere between a one and a two receiver, depending on how healthy he is, but at some point, you can't, he's hitting his mid 30s, which is.

• 58:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:26Bill Simmons?

  Um.

• 58:27Speaker 01

  But, yeah.

• 58:28Bill Simmons?

  Caleb, so I think out of Caleb, he's the one I could see jumping to a seven or maybe even an eight this season, if he's just awesome, but maybe he's a year away. I like him, though, I really feel like he really won me over last year. And he's a good example of, like, sometimes you just need a good coach and good people around you. Like, I think there's another version of his career where he's just basically like a more talented Kyler Murray, and it never happens, but I, I don't know, I, he kind of won me over, and then we talked about Lawrence, so. All right, that's the five. Then we move into the light Reds, where I do not have CJ Stroud. These are all four pointers. Jalen, Jalen Hurts, Baker Mayfield, Jaden Daniels, and Bo Nix.

• 59:14Bill Simmons?

  Question for Hurts, would you bet on this being a resurgence year, or a holy shit, we gotta get out of this contract year by like December? Where does this go?

• 59:23Speaker 01

  I'm more positive than we gotta get out of the contracts. I am, I do fear that it might take a minute to look good, though, because it's just, you know, such a new offense.

• 59:35Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 59:35Speaker 01

  In Philadelphia, and I do worry that the criticism is gonna be so intense those first few weeks, if it doesn't look great immediately.

• 59:44Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 59:44Speaker 01

  Um, I, this has been a tough one for me, because, you know, I talked about Daniels, like, I kind of just want to see him in it before I come to any conclusions, because, again, you know, when you talked with Eagles fans about the fact that Hurts doesn't really throw over the middle of the field, and he struggled against certain zone looks and that, they'll say, well, you know, the scheme was so bad. And the scheme was bad, so they're not wrong, but also, you kind of want to see him do it, throw with anticipation, maybe make some riskier throws. So, I, I, I'm a little apprehensive of it, but I'm never gonna be fully out on him, because he does have like a really legitimate and unique skill set. Like, he throws a beautiful go ball, he's a really good athlete, I wish he ran more, but.

• 1:00:22Bill Simmons?

  And, and he's won, he actually won a Super Bowl. My question with him, that I can't, and he's 57 and 25 as a starter, by the way. My question with him is, why do they seem like they're hiding stuff with him? Like, that.

• 1:00:35Speaker 01

  What do you mean?

• 1:00:36Bill Simmons?

  Like, I always thought the pace of play that they played with, where they just very deliberate, like, they're trying to shorten the game, you know? And they, they kind of talked about it, they're like, yeah, we think we have better parts than everybody else, we want to shorten the game, that shortens the variance, and it's like, eh.

• 1:00:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:54Bill Simmons?

  I don't know, it feels, feels like you're hiding Hurts a little bit, like, you don't want him to have 10 cracks.

• 1:01:00Speaker 01

  I would defend him by saying, I think they were hiding the offense as a whole last year. Like, they knew that the offense was a disaster by their standards.

• 1:01:09Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but they, they had a top five or six line, they had Barkley, they had two really good receivers, they had Goddard, like, what are they hiding? Why are they, why do they think their offense isn't good?

• 1:01:18Speaker 01

  Because it was bad. I mean, the run game was awful, the line was hurt, to be fair.

• 1:01:22Bill Simmons?

  Doesn't make sense.

• 1:01:23Speaker 01

  No, I know, I'm just saying, like.

• 1:01:24Bill Simmons?

  Wasn't like a Patriots line, though.

• 1:01:26Speaker 01

  I know. But I think that they were very aware of how bad the offense was, and that they would, they had to win games with their defense, which, by the way, remains awesome, so.

• 1:01:36Bill Simmons?

  Not great.

• 1:01:38Bill Simmons?

  Mayfield, I feel like should be a five, but his body is just so banged up. And this feels like a make or break year for him. I know they were doing the basically short term deal, which is what they did. He's played 120 games as a starter. He's 58 and 62. When he's healthy, though, he's really good. I just, he's a, he's a smaller guy and I just wonder this is who he's going to be every year. By the end of last year, he had like four different injuries.

• 1:02:03Speaker 01

  He was injured. He was, I think they put too much on my shoulders last year. Like the run game was bad. Their offensive line was also really banged up. And I think if they want to get things back to 2024, they need to calm things down, bring down the depth of target, get the run game going again, play action. He is a quarterback you can absolutely win with. I think though, whether he's like a quarterback you win a lot of games because of is probably what's holding them back from doing the long-term deal too.

• 1:02:29Bill Simmons?

  And can you keep him healthy? And then Bo next, who knows?

• 1:02:33Bill Simmons?

  Why did they game manage with them so much? There's like, why were they always behind? Why were they always scrambling in fourth quarters to? You know, why, why, why were they basically a 10-minute team offensively? He's got way better weapons this year and should be better, but I have no idea. But I, I think he's a four because they won games with him. All right, going to the twos quickly.

• 1:02:52Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:02:53Bill Simmons?

  The pink, the pink chippers. I have CJ Stroud, Daniel Jones, Jackson Dart, Tyler Shuck and Bryce Young. And I'm happy to move any of those back and make them zero pointers instead of two pointers. Is there anyone who does not belong in that group?

• 1:03:10Speaker 01

  Doesn't belong in that group. Um.

• 1:03:13Bill Simmons?

  Stroud, Jones, Dart, Shuck and Bryce Young. You could talk me into Dart the most because we just haven't seen him play.

• 1:03:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:21Bill Simmons?

  Two months in a row.

• 1:03:22Speaker 01

  I thought, so I've gone back and rewatched all the rookie quarterbacks. I thought Tyler Shuck was the best of them.

• 1:03:28Bill Simmons?

  I loved him. You could have talked me in right now into making him a four-pointer. I fucking love that guy.

• 1:03:32Speaker 01

  Dude, you came on my pod and you were like touting him and you were like, yeah, and valet. And I kind of was like.

• 1:03:37Bill Simmons?

  Valet got hurt.

• 1:03:38Speaker 01

  Valet. I was like giggling. And then when I went back to watch the Saints, I was like, oh my God. There was a game in like week.

• 1:03:44Bill Simmons?

  Valet was a stud for three weeks.

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  My family was like the best receiver in football. Um. No Cam Ward consideration here?

• 1:03:54Bill Simmons?

  Not yet.

• 1:03:55Speaker 01

  Horrible, horrible situation.

• 1:03:56Bill Simmons?

  Not yet.

• 1:03:57Speaker 01

  I mean, just abysmal last year.

• 1:03:59Bill Simmons?

  I'm ready to entertain it after I watch a couple of games, but I think for now he's got to be a zero.

• 1:04:03Speaker 01

  I felt like watching him, it reminded me of watching the different quarterbacks in some ways, but Caleb Williams' rookie season, where there was something there, some really exciting plays, needed to learn how to play on time in bad situation. And then Caleb Williams got Ben Johnson. And then I look at Tennessee and I'm like, okay, well you got Brian Daboll, it's better. But is it? And it's not, it's not, he didn't get the like Chicago glow up. So I, I don't know if we're going to see the same.

• 1:04:25Bill Simmons?

  And they drafted Tate.

• 1:04:27Speaker 01

  Who I like.

• 1:04:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I think he was last year's, well, would have been a good two-minute Twitter video of all of his great throws. Like Cam Ward was a problem. And he's just had like, what, like 10 incredible throws and that was really.

• 1:04:43Speaker 01

  He was like weirdly unbelievable against Seattle and Kansas City.

• 1:04:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, there's something there. I'm, I'm in on Cam Ward. I just think for the exercise of this year.

• 1:04:52Speaker 01

  No, I get it.

• 1:04:53Bill Simmons?

  And I had, I had to have, I had nine quarterbacks that were zero or minus two. Because I feel like if you're getting, if you, if you don't have, if you're in the bottom 25% of the position with your quarterbacks, I can't give you points. Anyway, CJ Stroud. Here's the thing with CJ. I know. And he might be a four or five pointer by the end of the year. Here's the thing. We talked about this when I did your pod. This is the best defense in the league. There's a real case that they could just run through and the, and. If he could just, can he drive the car 58 miles an hour on the highway? I don't even need you to go 60. Just keep it straight.

• 1:05:33Bill Simmons?

  And you're going to have the lead. Your defense is gonna, you're gonna be up 10, nothing, 13, nothing. It's a little like the Seahawks in a lot of the games last year where.

• 1:05:42Speaker 01

  For the entire second half of the Seahawks season.

• 1:05:44Bill Simmons?

  13, three, 14, zero. You're, just don't screw it up. And I think he'll gain confidence as the year goes along because of how good the defense is.

• 1:05:52Speaker 01

  So my hope is that he doesn't come back from the playoff disaster with too much of a just drive the car mentality. Like I don't want him to be too conservative. You know what I mean? Because of the like every.

• 1:06:05Bill Simmons?

  So you want him in the carpool lane every once in a while, just airing it out.

• 1:06:09Speaker 01

  Nico Collins, man. And he throws like a beautiful deep ball. Like I just think. He has to find that balance. I mean, the postseason was insane, but I don't, he's not a game manager quarterback. I really don't think he is. Like I, I feel.

• 1:06:24Bill Simmons?

  So you think he's a hitter? He's like a three-point shooter in basketball. Like he's.

• 1:06:28Speaker 01

  I think he can be consistent. I think if I was ranking him, where do you have him? 20?

• 1:06:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:34Speaker 01

  25 or something?

• 1:06:35Bill Simmons?

  No, I had him higher than that.

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  Okay, sorry. So I would put him in, personally, he's in my like 12 to 15 range.

• 1:06:43Bill Simmons?

  Wow. So you've really.

• 1:06:43Speaker 01

  I'm high on him. I think he's really talented.

• 1:06:45Bill Simmons?

  This is good. I like this. So you, you dumped Herbert for love and CJ Stroud is now, CJ Stroud is now your rescue QB.

• 1:06:54Speaker 01

  He is my rescue. That's a great.

• 1:06:56Bill Simmons?

  I've adopted CJ Stroud.

• 1:06:58Speaker 01

  I love that. Yes, I will.

• 1:06:59Bill Simmons?

  I'm CJ Stroud's foster mom.

• 1:07:01Speaker 01

  We need to post one of those videos where there's like a time lapse video of like.

• 1:07:06Bill Simmons?

  CJ Stroud.

• 1:07:07Speaker 01

  He giving him a bat. That's weird.

• 1:07:12Bill Simmons?

  Daniel Jones. I don't know.

• 1:07:15Speaker 01

  That's a hard one with the injury.

• 1:07:16Bill Simmons?

  Jackson Dart, who knows? Bryce Young, is he a two or a zero for you?

• 1:07:20Speaker 01

  Man, I don't know. I hate, I, I hate talking about, I don't hate talking about the Panthers. But they were such a psychotic team last year, right? Like he would get it up for the Rams more than once.

• 1:07:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:35Speaker 01

  And then look abysmal against divisional opponents. And I don't know where the truth is.

• 1:07:41Bill Simmons?

  Maybe the worst guy to bet on or against game to game last year. You just like fucking potluck.

• 1:07:46Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:07:48Bill Simmons?

  There was a lot of buzz about him in the training camp. Now I should mention the Panthers training camp. It's like they moved that thing outside the San Francisco practice field that moved to Carolina. They've already had like five injuries.

• 1:08:00Speaker 01

  Horrible vibes.

• 1:08:00Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, horrible vibes. That's, they are on my bad vibes list along with San Francisco so far. Okay. And then for the zeros, Cousins, Mendoza, Kyler. I have Rogers as a zero. I, I think he can fool you a couple of games, but. I just think over the course of 17 games, I, I don't see it. Could he go nine and eight and sneak in the playoffs? Sure. Malik Willis, Cam Ward, Brissette, who had the successful hold then, congrats to him. I have them all as zero. I don't, I can't give points for any of those. And then the minus twos were Watson, Sanders, Geno Smith, and then Tua Penix were the three.

• 1:08:39Speaker 01

  Someone on Sando's thing had Rogers as a tier one quarterback.

• 1:08:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, there were just games where he couldn't physically do anything.

• 1:08:48Speaker 01

  I, I just, the funny thing about him is like, I feel like he's, he actually still can throw it downfield at times or, and make difficult, like seam throws and whatnot. He just so clearly doesn't want to get hit. So that's why, you know, the average of the target is like, right, lowest in football.

• 1:09:04Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:05Speaker 01

  He's gonna, he's either gonna dirt it or throw it away. If pressure's coming and it's just so, it just affects the entire offense. I do think they've improved the circumstances around him, but I think you're, that's fair. I, like I told you, I'm higher on Ward. Willis is a bummer because if he was in a better situation, I would, I could make an argument for him, but it's, it's hard.

• 1:09:25Bill Simmons?

  The Rogers thing, anytime they went against a good defense, it just felt like they just played up on the line, knowing that he wanted to get rid of the ball in two seconds or less. It was a little like the two on Dolphins. And there was no plan B if he couldn't find the, and it was so frustrating. Like I remember the Pats lost to them. And it's like, just, he's just gonna get rid of the ball in a second. Like.

• 1:09:45Speaker 01

  I know.

• 1:09:46Bill Simmons?

  Just.

• 1:09:46Speaker 01

  He's got to tackle. Literally when we were at Steelers games last year, I'd be like, just somebody tackle. And if they played, it was, if they played defenses that were bad at tackling, they could move the ball. If they played defenses that were good at tackling, it was nothing. And that was pretty much it.

• 1:09:58Bill Simmons?

  Who's your favorite backup QB before we go?

• 1:10:01Speaker 01

  Like the best?

• 1:10:02Bill Simmons?

  Who's your favorite?

• 1:10:04Bill Simmons?

  Who's your like, I've been quietly stockpiling stock on this guy just in case. Mine is Davis Mills.

• 1:10:11Speaker 01

  I can't do that. Um, I mean, I know, I'm not using this to detract from Purdy because I do think there's a difference, but Mac Jones was legitimately quite good last year when he played.

• 1:10:21Bill Simmons?

  That's fair.

• 1:10:21Speaker 01

  It, I, were you like emotionally?

• 1:10:23Bill Simmons?

  I still have bad feelings about Mac.

• 1:10:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was gonna say, like, did, have you gotten over it?

• 1:10:27Bill Simmons?

  Listen.

• 1:10:27Speaker 01

  Are you ready to root for his success?

• 1:10:29Bill Simmons?

  I always root for Mac, but it's just, it's, listen, this is the problem with this position is you can be in the wrong situation. And it's like going to the wrong high school in an eighties movie. It just can just go horribly from day one, or you can be in an awesome situation and everything's, everything's peachy.

• 1:10:49Speaker 01

  The funny thing with the Niners, like, I mean, it was Kyle, like, they were losing guys, too, when Mac was out there, but it didn't matter because Shanahan's so good. I think you're right. That's one of the sneaky biggest things to my, is like, how's Shanahan this season? Because he's such, such a difference maker for them. Um,

• 1:11:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that's a bummer.

• 1:11:08Speaker 01

  Mac, Mac is my choice. Is there someone you like better? Do you have a backup crush?

• 1:11:12Bill Simmons?

  Mine, David, I've always been a Davis Mills supporter.

• 1:11:17Speaker 01

  Sticking your neck out for Davis?

• 1:11:20Bill Simmons?

  There's still, I, I still have some Tyler Huntley stock. I know he's bounced around and had some swings, but I don't know. There's, there's, there's been, he's had moments where I always wonder what would happen.

• 1:11:31Speaker 01

  Does Mendoza count as a backup right now? Cause I like him.

• 1:11:34Bill Simmons?

  When do we see, when do we see Mendoza?

• 1:11:37Speaker 01

  Sooner rather than.

• 1:11:38Bill Simmons?

  You think it's gonna be like a Drake May thing?

• 1:11:40Speaker 01

  I saw, Drake May thing, it's literally every first round quarterback.

• 1:11:43Bill Simmons?

  Drake May was like, yeah, we don't know. And then it was like week four or five.

• 1:11:46Speaker 01

  Every time. When does that not happen?

• 1:11:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:49Speaker 01

  Right? Like, I, I just.

• 1:11:51Bill Simmons?

  I think Mendoza would be a plus two. I think he'll be better.

• 1:11:54Speaker 01

  I like him.

• 1:11:55Bill Simmons?

  Better, um, coming out of the gate because he's older and, you know, smart guy. All right, Mina Kimes. Are you doing Rams preseason games?

• 1:12:04Speaker 01

  Not doing the Rams preseason. I am traveling some for, now that we're with NFL Network. I'm on the, boots on the ground. I'm actually going to Seattle on Friday. Speaking of backups, I'll see, there's some Jalen Milrow hype, so I'll evaluate that firsthand.

• 1:12:19Bill Simmons?

  Like him.

• 1:12:20Speaker 01

  Um, but I've done, you, you came on my pod for the Power Hour. People should check that out. It was really fun. Got the Simmons bump.

• 1:12:28Bill Simmons?

  Ah, Simmons bump.

• 1:12:30Speaker 01

  A real legit, it's, it looks, you can see it in the little charts. Uh, Mina Kimes show featuring Lenny. We're wrapping up our division previews and then we start, start our season coverage. And then also, yeah, check out the quarterback spanking, even though we spoiled it for you. Sorry.

• 1:12:43Bill Simmons?

  I was trying to do a rewatchables in Seattle because I love Seattle and just the theaters are taken for like three years. I don't know what's going on there.

• 1:12:50Speaker 01

  They do a lot of.

• 1:12:51Bill Simmons?

  Hey, Seattle, we tried, we tried to do a rewatchables, but you, you have nothing available ever. So, sorry.

• 1:12:57Speaker 01

  Make it happen, someone.

• 1:12:58Bill Simmons?

  All right. Good to see you, Mina. Thank you.

• 1:13:00Speaker 01

  I'll see you soon.

• 1:13:02Speaker 02

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• 1:14:26Bill Simmons?

  All right, we're gonna talk baseball. Billy Gil is here. Anthony Dabbundo is here. Before we start, Billy Gil just talked, uh, football with Mina for an hour. She claims that if you went on the street in Miami and asked people to name three wide receivers in the plans for the Dolphins, people wouldn't be able to do it. So I figured you're right here. Can you name three Dolphins receivers who might have 30 catches this year?

• 1:14:52Speaker 06

  Oh, who might have 30 catches? I was just trying to name three Dolphins wide receivers. Uh.

• 1:14:56Bill Simmons?

  Can you name three Dolphins wide receivers?

• 1:14:58Speaker 06

  Malik Washington is on the Dolphins still, right? Uh, Tutu Atwell, right? Didn't they just sign him?

• 1:15:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they have Tutu. You're right.

• 1:15:07Speaker 06

  All right. Oh.

• 1:15:12Speaker 06

  Oh, man.

• 1:15:13Bill Simmons?

  It's this, Dabbundo, this is amazing. They have completely shorted the wide receiver position in an attempt to get the number one pick.

• 1:15:20Speaker 06

  Well, here's the thing.

• 1:15:21Speaker 07

  I only know because I did AFC East prep first this year.

• 1:15:25Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:15:25Speaker 07

  And we're coming in on Friday on the gambling show.

• 1:15:26Bill Simmons?

  Who's the third one? Give me the third one.

• 1:15:28Speaker 07

  Malik Washington's on the, on the Dolphins.

• 1:15:30Bill Simmons?

  He said him already. That's two.

• 1:15:32Speaker 07

  Oh, you said him?

• 1:15:32Bill Simmons?

  Tutu Atwell.

• 1:15:33Speaker 07

  Tolbert?

• 1:15:35Bill Simmons?

  Tolbert? Jalen Tolbert?

• 1:15:37Speaker 07

  Yes, Jalen Tolbert.

• 1:15:38Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah, Dolphins.

• 1:15:39Bill Simmons?

  Billy's getting his book, he's getting the book out.

• 1:15:42Speaker 06

  My Warren Sharp here that I've been doing Steelers research earlier today.

• 1:15:47Bill Simmons?

  Jalen Tolbert, okay. All right, we're talking, uh, we're talking baseball. Trade deadline yesterday. Um, this is the farewell baseball season until it comes back in 2031.

• 1:15:59Bill Simmons?

  Are the Dodgers ruining baseball? I have thoughts on this, but this has been the big topic since the Scoobal trade. That this is now unfair and we almost have to have a lockout to, to regroup after this. Dabbundo, you think no?

• 1:16:14Speaker 07

  I do think no. I think we've all gotten a little bit out of control here. I mean, if you want to argue that the Dodgers have certain advantages that could be legislated out, I would probably agree with that. But why? Because they traded some prospects for Tarek Scoobal? Other, other teams had opportunities to do that. And if your argument is that they're ruining the competitive balance of baseball, did we not watch the last two playoffs? Like, even though they were seen as the best team, they were the three seed in the playoffs last year. They had to win a wild card series. They won a toss-up series with Philly. They needed a miraculous comeback to win the World Series. Two years ago, they were down 2-1 and had to pitch a bullpen game in game four

• 1:16:54Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:16:54Speaker 07

  against San Diego because they had no pitching. And right now, I understand in hypotheticals, they might have the best playoff rotation of all time. But right now, Otani's not pitching, Glasnow's not pitching, Snell's not pitching, and they're starting Eric Lauer, you know, regularly. So it's not like they didn't have a need. And I understand why.

• 1:17:14Bill Simmons?

  And my team just swept them.

• 1:17:16Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:17:16Speaker 07

  Right? They've lost four in a row since they broke the sport. It's crazy.

• 1:17:20Bill Simmons?

  Billy, my thing with baseball, it's not like basketball where it's like, oh, we signed this guy to a max deal and the guy's usually good. He's one of the top 40 guys in the league. In baseball, like, the Mets have been spending money like crazy and it doesn't matter at all. And a lot of times you get these dudes and they're somewhere between 28 and 32. You give them a ton of money and their careers already peaked. So I'm.

• 1:17:41Speaker 06

  Well, I mean, it's kind of what's happened with Kyle Tucker this year, right? Like, he is not worth like 60 million or whatever annual average.

• 1:17:47Bill Simmons?

  It's not kind of. He got booed at the game I went to on Saturday.

• 1:17:50Speaker 06

  Well, I, listen, Dodgers fans have no right to boo anything, okay? Like, the, the idea that they think that they should be upset about anything and they should be entitled to boo people is absolutely insane. Because what is his, what is his salary actually, right? Cause like, his is also like prolonged, so it's not 60 million they're paying. They're probably paying like $2 million. Like, he's fine for a $2 million a year player. And to answer your question that you didn't ask me, yes, they're ruining baseball. Yeah.

• 1:18:14Bill Simmons?

  So you're, so you're, and you're in Florida where the Marlins have, you know, you did win two World Series, but you're also, you've been sellers a lot. Then you've been buyers, then you've been sellers again. But so you hate this. You're in the same league with them, too.

• 1:18:28Speaker 06

  Well, I mean, so I hated the Yankees and I thought the Yankees ruined baseball growing up as a child because they would always go again, whatever free agent was out there. And it was like, okay, this is not fun. This is not fair. They can just do whatever they want, right? They didn't actually ruin baseball. I mean, they went on their run. They had their dynasty there in the middle. And then it kind of just all fell apart when George went away and Cashman hasn't really been able to figure things out. And the Yankees aren't really the Yankees they were when I was growing up. Like, the Dodgers have now become the new Yankees, but the Dodgers. The problem with the Dodgers is that they don't really have a weakness that we can find in terms of like how they're running their organization. Because they have a great farm system. They have all of the money in the world.

• 1:19:13Speaker 06

  They can throw the money at people, but if it doesn't work out, then they could just trade away pieces and they're still loaded and they can go out and get more people. Analytically, they're looking ahead of other teams. Like, they just, there's no way around it. And I don't know if you guys have seen this. So like, one of the things that's been going around is because we're trying to figure out like, well, how are the Dodgers doing? Clearly, they're cheating one way or another. Junlee had this video that he put out in the offseason that was detailing what an advantage the Dodgers have with their TV deal that other organizations don't. Because it went, it goes back to the McCourt like bankruptcy of the Dodgers. So Dodgers declared bankruptcy. They then had agreed to sell the team. And they reached a deal with Major League Baseball because they had declared bankruptcy,

• 1:19:56Speaker 06

  where instead of paying the, you know, standard like 33% of revenue sharing from their TV deal, they would only pay around 10%. And that would be for the duration of their TV contract. So they ended up signing a massive TV deal that was something like $8 billion over 25 years or something. So instead of paying, you know, the 33% of that, which would amount to like 95 to $100 million a year, they end up paying closer to $30 million. So they're already having $60 million that they would not-

• 1:20:25Bill Simmons?

  Just goes to Kyle Tucker.

• 1:20:26Speaker 06

  Yeah, well, it goes to Kyle Tucker and they'll pay him that in like 2040 or something. And here's the problem.

• 1:20:31Bill Simmons?

  Well, but they also have the Japan money too, because they're, they're basically like a double team. They have a whole Japan fan base and a California fan base.

• 1:20:39Speaker 06

  This is going to collapse at some point, right? Like, it would be in like 2039, 2040, where now their TV deal runs out, they have to have a new deal, they're gonna go to the 33% instead of the 10%. So they lose that extra 66 million. And then, by the way, I think this season have like 55% of their salaries deferred. They're gonna be paying all of these guys, like 2035 to 2040. And at a certain point, if there is a lockout this year, which everyone will blame the Dodgers for, if there's a lockout and then there's a salary cap imposed, which I don't see how they're actually gonna do that, even though people want that. But if they do in fact impose a salary cap, this will blow up in the Dodgers' face at some point in time, because they're gonna owe all of these people, all of this money. And I don't know how they're gonna be able to keep up with this.

• 1:21:24Speaker 06

  Because when Otani retires, which, you know, is way down the road, then unless they have like a pipeline where they keep bringing in Japanese talent, there's this increased interest in Japan. I mean, it is, it is possible.

• 1:21:35Bill Simmons?

  But they become the team you go to if you're an awesome Japanese player.

• 1:21:38Speaker 06

  But we thought that about the Mariners, you know, 15 years ago when Ichiro was there, right? And it didn't actually end up panning out that way. Like, Ichiro was kind of like this unique guy. And then when Otani went to the Angels, we thought like, oh, wow, this is gonna be great for the Angels. But it's the Angels, so they mismanaged that situation entirely, including not getting anything for him and just letting him walk away, like, down the street to his, you know, cross town team. It, it's, I, I don't know if we're gonna get to the Angels. I don't understand the Angels as an organization.

• 1:22:06Bill Simmons?

  We're gonna get to them later. I'm gonna give you my take.

• 1:22:08Speaker 07

  They're old too.

• 1:22:10Bill Simmons?

  The Dodgers.

• 1:22:11Speaker 07

  Yeah, they're old now.

• 1:22:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, I mean, so my, here's my take. I don't mind it. I like having super teams. We see it in soccer too. I think a lot of the times it doesn't work out. I think the only sport where it can really be damaging is if we had this in the NBA, which we briefly had and they put in all the second apron stuff. But I think half the time, these deals are too long. You end up getting a guy who has all this pressure on him, who's all of a sudden making this crazy amount of money and he goes sideways. Like, Tucker, even like the Mookie trade, which is the worst trade of my lifetime. Mookie has, how many years left to bundle? Like, seven, six, seven on his deal?

• 1:22:51Speaker 07

  And- Quite a few.

• 1:22:53Bill Simmons?

  And he's not, he hasn't played well for like a year and a half, right? And they're, they're paying him 30 million, 35 million down the road. But I, in general, I like having the team you have to beat. Where it's like, here's the superpower, we have to take them down. This was the Yankees in the 2000s. And by the way, they didn't win until 2009. I think in baseball, you can beat these teams. So I'm okay with it. I like complaining about it.

• 1:23:17Speaker 06

  The thing that's not fun though, is that they're so smart and they have the young talent that they can kind of just plug in. Or whenever they have a hole, if it doesn't work out, like Kyle Tucker didn't work out and he got booed and what? It doesn't matter. Like, they'll still be favorites to make it to the World Series. Mookie, by the way, is under contract with the Dodgers until 2032. Like, he becomes a free agent in 2033. So there's still like seven years, six, seven years of Mookie left.

• 1:23:42Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:23:42Speaker 06

  Is Mookie a Dodgers Hall of Famer or a Red Sox Hall of Famer?

• 1:23:46Speaker 07

  Dodgers.

• 1:23:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, he's one more, he's one more World Series with the Dodgers.

• 1:23:51Speaker 07

  Three now, maybe four. Mookie's 33, Muncy's 35, Teoscar's 33, Otani's 31, Freddie 36.

• 1:24:00Bill Simmons?

  By the way, really fun team to go see in person. Where it's just like, every guy that comes in, they're like, hey, that guy. Oh, that, you know? And when we, I went Saturday night, but when, when the Red Sox swept them, it felt like a real achievement. It's like, yeah, we've, the Saturday night game, which the Red Sox kind of tried to throw away, because they, they thought that was the game they're gonna get smoked. And then all of a sudden, because Contreras was out, and they beat them and it felt like a real achievement. Next question. The, uh, the Adley trade the Red Sox made, where you have this guy you're trading for, and they gave up a bunch of prospects. There's some debate about how great those prospects actually were. There was only one guy and Keith Law's top 50.

• 1:24:42Bill Simmons?

  But, um, you're trading for a guy who you have for this year and then next year, and then he's a free agent. But there might not be a next year. So you're trading all this stuff for a guy, it might be two months, and then next year might not even happen. Would you, Dabbundo, would you even have gone all in on these guys when you don't know if next season's even happening?

• 1:25:05Speaker 07

  Uh, I talked to a couple of front office people. They said that that led to a lot more controllable guys getting dealt this offseason, with this trade deadline, rather. Because they felt that those medium-term deals might not have the kind of value they normally would have, and thus they were more likely to move them. And I think that was especially the case with Rutschman, where, one, he's already kind of getting pressed out for playing time with Basio coming up and maybe being better. Two, he hasn't been very healthy the last few years and he's played through injury and missed time. And three, like, did he want to re-sign with the Orioles, even if there was baseball next year? I'm not so sure. So, like, I understand why Orioles fans are upset, and I wrote about this for The Ringer, like, it feels like they're asking us to trust the prospects again and, and pushing the can down the road.

• 1:25:50Speaker 07

  But I'm not sure what Adley's actual value was to Baltimore anymore, but I think it's very clear what his value is to Boston.

• 1:25:56Bill Simmons?

  Well, he's, but if he's healthy, he's a top-five catcher, which was the single worst part of the team. Billy, what happens, the Marlins have done this a few times, the rebuild, but then it's another, the rebuild's supposed to pay off and it doesn't, so now you're in the re-rebuild? What do we call this?

• 1:26:12Speaker 06

  I mean, this is called my life as a baseball fan. So this is how it works, is you go out, you get these guys, you develop them, it doesn't end up working out. So then you say, you know what, these pieces just don't fit together, but like, we're, like, trust us, we're gonna, we're gonna really make it right this next time around. And then it just becomes like an endless cycle where you kind of trust them. And then, what in my lifetime, what happens is then the, you know, owner eventually sells the team, makes a giant profit, they leave, the new owner comes in and says, you know what, none of this is gonna work out, trust us, we're new to town, we're gonna fix this situation. And then they end up going and they end up trading people. Do you guys think, to go back to your question that you asked about the trades and, you

• 1:26:54Speaker 06

  know, whether it's worth it or not, do you think there's teams that made trades taking on contracts, thinking, you know what, maybe I don't have to worry about this contract next year. Like, I could be taking on money that I may not have to pay if there is a lockout. And it led to teams thinking like, let's be overly aggressive. Because this felt like a very aggressive trade deadline compared to past years, where teams were going for it. Or teams were saying, you know what? I think the weirder part, where the team's kind of like right on the fringes there of like the third wild card spot, they're like, ah, I'm not going for it anymore. Like, I'm gonna just take some prospects, we're two games out, three games out, it's not worth it.

• 1:27:29Bill Simmons?

  That was the Luis Castillo trade. Because on paper, and I, we're in first place in our AL Cooper League, so Castillo was one of the 40 pitchers we've been studying, like, Castillo's kind of washed. And he was making, you know, I think he was making like 22 million this year or next year. They actually, the Mariners got a prospect back, got them to dump, got them to take the entire contract. It's like, that's crazy, you're taking two years of Castillo. But then, like what Billy said, eh, maybe you're taking two months of Castillo, right? And there might not be baseball next year, and then you're not paying anything.

• 1:28:04Speaker 06

  Well, for the White Sox fans too, I think that trade was more like, look, we're, we're going for it. Even though like, Luis Castillo is not gonna probably be a different-

• 1:28:12Bill Simmons?

  He would not have been on my list.

• 1:28:14Speaker 06

  Oh, I mean, he's been on my fantasy team and it's been a disaster. But like, he's a guy that's a name, so it's kind of like, if you're a White Sox fan, you're going through all these years of hell as a White Sox fan, you're like, wow, like, this is a guy that they're getting. Like, I'd recognize this name, he was good once, maybe, you know, a change of scenery will do it for him.

• 1:28:31Bill Simmons?

  Right. I, uh, I like the Adley trade, but the prospect of a lockout followed by-

• 1:28:40Bill Simmons?

  Having to give him like a crazy amount of money after the lockout. It's a little concerning.

• 1:28:44Speaker 07

  But I feel like you've got to push chips in though.

• 1:28:47Bill Simmons?

  We have to.

• 1:28:48Speaker 07

  Look at the American League right now.

• 1:28:49Bill Simmons?

  We have to. This was going to be my next question. The Red Sox could go from being the worst team in the American League to being the AL champs in a four month span. Right now on FanDuel, they have the third best odds to win the AL. They're six to one. By the way, the Yankees are the favorite at plus two 20.

• 1:29:06Bill Simmons?

  We might not see Aaron Judge again this year. This has been the elephant in the fucking room. Right? And then the way they talk about it's like, no, no, it's, it's progressing. It's like all this like Goobly Duke where they're like, it's this, yeah, he's, it should be good. He's progressing well. He's got like a major rib injury and he's a six foot seven guy who weighs 280 pounds. And I don't, I don't think we're going to see him again. Do you, Dabbundo?

• 1:29:32Speaker 07

  Jacko doesn't either. He was tweeting about it.

• 1:29:34Bill Simmons?

  Jacko does not. Jacko is convinced that they're lying about this. They're hiding. He's more hurt than, than they're thinking on that. I mean, the Yankees still have the three starters or those guys are back now and that's still the scariest thing in the American League is those three guys in a row in a playoff series.

• 1:29:50Speaker 07

  But they're bottom 10 in, in offense. Judge got hurt.

• 1:29:53Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:29:53Speaker 07

  And they didn't push any chips in, right? Every player that they went for, they didn't do the bullpen upgrades, which you normally would do if you were pushing in for this year.

• 1:30:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:01Speaker 07

  They got two players who are going to be on the roster next year with Garcia and Ramos. It, it felt like a little bit of a, let's not burn our prospects chasing 2026. If we don't know that Aaron Judge is going to be back, maybe he's back for the playoffs, but how healthy is he, right? In theory, he'd have missed four months by then.

• 1:30:19Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:30:19Speaker 07

  He hasn't done any baseball activities. So I, I, I think the Yankees actions speak a whole lot louder than their words.

• 1:30:25Speaker 06

  You weren't, you weren't excited about Luis Garcia Jr.'s homerun yesterday? Earning his pinstripes, first game.

• 1:30:31Speaker 07

  I actually slacked Ben Glickman and then five minutes later, the bullpen gave up five runs.

• 1:30:35Bill Simmons?

  That was one of the games of the year. They were, they were down six, nothing, came back, took seven, six lead, and then gave up seven runs in an inning. And the same pitcher got lit up.

• 1:30:46Speaker 07

  The pitcher right after, they sent him back down to AAA.

• 1:30:48Bill Simmons?

  He was terrible. Um, this Yankees red, so the Red Sox, the thing flipped when they swept the Yankees at the end of June. Right? And then Contreras got into it, the Nationals, and all of a sudden it's going. I will say this, because this Red Sox thing has made no sense as it's happening. And I've actually been watching the entire time as this has been happening and I, it doesn't, I was even, I went with, I took my wife to the Dodger game and I'm like, yeah, this guy Monastario, like he'll have a big hit during this game. I have no explanation for it. This guy's 29 and it's got like a 190 batting average career. But their bullpen's really good and they, they got, uh, the Giants lefty, which they finally gave up on Marcelo Meyer, which, um, I think Red Sox fans had already given up.

• 1:31:33Bill Simmons?

  But this, this Red Sox, they have this bullpen now that if they can just get to like the sixth, seventh inning, they did this against the Dodgers. They can just keep bringing guys out that hold the lead if they have a one run lead. I'm, I'm actually, Billy, I'm, I'm, I'm weirdly optimistic.

• 1:31:50Speaker 06

  I was going to ask if you still feel the way you once felt about the Red Sox, especially like with the Yankees. Like, do you still hate the Yankees the same way?

• 1:31:59Bill Simmons?

  Just with every bone in my body.

• 1:32:01Speaker 06

  Really?

• 1:32:02Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Like I had the Yankees on, I have the three TVs. I always had the Yankees on a TV to root, hoping they lose and hoping, like yesterday was a dream. Just this guy's just getting bombed. They leave him out. The crowd's going nuts. Another guy comes up, another two run homer. It was awesome, but, um, I do think.

• 1:32:20Speaker 07

  It matters too, Bill. You got the wild card race here.

• 1:32:23Bill Simmons?

  Well, here, this is.

• 1:32:24Speaker 07

  Maybe a division race.

• 1:32:25Bill Simmons?

  This is one of the questions I had for you. Like, who do you like in the American League? I know you, I know you guys are both nationally guys, but you go through and like the White Sox are plus nine 50? To win the pennant?

• 1:32:38Speaker 07

  No.

• 1:32:39Bill Simmons?

  Texas is 16 to one? And probably.

• 1:32:42Speaker 07

  They tried to sell.

• 1:32:43Bill Simmons?

  Right. Cleveland's 11 to one. Seattle's eight to one. That like, everybody thought they might completely gut the team. Really, it's a three team race with a wild card that might come out of nowhere between Seattle, Houston, young White Sox. Cleveland kind of dabbled around the edges. I don't know about them and Texas, but if you had to pick a team, Dabbundo, who would be the out of nowhere team in August and September?

• 1:33:07Speaker 07

  It's still Seattle. If you base off Priors, all my Seattle buddies have given up. They were, they, they kind of soft sold with Castillo, but again, I thought they were just dumping salary there. And then they, they have prospects that can call up. Your guy, Cade is in the waiting to probably come out of the bullpen and potentially save their, their middle relief in the playoffs because they're really shorthanded there. This offense, I mean, it's, it's like looking around at Josh Naylor. Hey, man, you going to hit anytime soon? Uh, Cal Raleigh, you going to do something at some point this season?

• 1:33:35Bill Simmons?

  All time flip season. Although he had him this week.

• 1:33:39Speaker 07

  That's the team. And the way the bracket sets up, Tampa Bay, whoever wins the division is going to be the one seed. Then four, five is going to be the other two, Boston, New York, probably. So they're on, going to be on one half of the bracket. So you have, one of the winners of the West or the Central has to be in the ALCS and I'm not sure any of them are any good. I mean, again, Texas tried to trade DeGrom. DeGrom said no. The White Sox feel like a year early. They've had a great season, but I don't think their, their bullpen is, is competitive long-term in a playoff series. It's like Cleveland, maybe, because they've done it before.

• 1:34:12Bill Simmons?

  They have an ace and a closer, Cleveland at least.

• 1:34:16Speaker 07

  So I don't like anybody except maybe Seattle.

• 1:34:18Bill Simmons?

  I had Seattle too. I was surprised the odds were that high. The Cade piece is a wild card. Cade's having like one of the great minor league seasons in the history of baseball. He, Keith Law made him the number one prospect on his revised list last week. And he said, it was the first time he's ever had a pitcher first, which seems notable. And he's going to come in, I think August 15th. He's on our keeper team. We really need him. And it seems like they're just going to use him as that, this guy that will come up every once in a while in the playoffs. The young phenom guy who doesn't start, but has these big innings, like, you know, and, and just is in the mix. And it seems like they're saving it for that, but they still have to actually get to the playoffs. Billy, is it, is it fair to be scared of Texas, even though they're 16 to one?

• 1:35:02Speaker 07

  Um.

• 1:35:03Bill Simmons?

  Like they're bad. They've had some injuries. They have a, I think they play 12 of their next 19 at home. Texas in August is always a nightmare. They have a Valdez, they have DeGrom. Like I, I, I still have my eye on them as like a sleeper.

• 1:35:16Speaker 06

  I mean, it's hard to trust them when they have a minus 40 run differential. You know what I mean? Like, I guess things could turn around, but they're only a couple of games out of the wild card. But not that run differential is, you know, end all be all, but it is kind of telling. It's like, if you're that much of a, of a difference, how much of this is kind of like, you've been getting lucky here that you're in the position that you're in? You know what I mean? Like, if you go down, you look at a team like the Tigers, Tigers are plus 63. They're only a half game behind them, but there's so many teams. I mean, the AL really, like you were saying, has a couple of teams at the top. And then it's somewhat wide open the rest of the way. And it's going to kind of be like, who wants it more? You see what Skip Schumacher did the other day? By the way, since we're talking about Texas, manager of the Texas Rangers.

• 1:36:00Speaker 06

  He was going out there, it was a game against the Astros on Sunday and it was the seventh inning. They ran out of challenges, so they couldn't, you know, challenge the strike zone anymore. Goes out, starts arguing with the umpire, but it's the seventh inning. Take me out to the ballgame, happens, whatever. Then God bless America starts.

• 1:36:16Bill Simmons?

  Oh.

• 1:36:16Speaker 06

  So Skip Schumacher and the umpire both, you know, turn, take off their caps respectfully, sit through God bless America. Then they go, turn back around, put the hats back on and go right back at it. Got him tossed out of the game immediately after.

• 1:36:29Bill Simmons?

  That's awesome.

• 1:36:30Speaker 06

  I love baseball, man. How in baseball can these things happen?

• 1:36:33Speaker 07

  Yeah, I took, the Phillies wanted to walk off ABS last night. It was great.

• 1:36:37Speaker 06

  Ooh.

• 1:36:37Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 1:36:38Bill Simmons?

  I took my wife Saturday. We hadn't been to a baseball game in a couple of years and we did the take me out to the ballgame. First of all, she had a great time. It was a great date. Um, but to take me out to the ballgame and she was just like, is this the best tradition in any sport?

• 1:36:53Speaker 06

  Does she do the one, two, three, strikes you're out?

• 1:36:56Bill Simmons?

  No, we did.

• 1:36:56Speaker 06

  With the hands?

• 1:36:57Bill Simmons?

  We do the, we do, we yelled Red Sox when it's a, and it's, we root, root, root for the, for the Dodgers. We, we yelled Red Sox.

• 1:37:05Speaker 06

  Red Sox, yeah.

• 1:37:06Bill Simmons?

  She did not do the hand for the one, two, three. But I was wondering, does basketball need this? Could there be at the six minute timeout? Could there be something that unites the crowd?

• 1:37:19Speaker 06

  They need like their own unique song?

• 1:37:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, something.

• 1:37:22Speaker 06

  Let's see.

• 1:37:22Bill Simmons?

  Could something happen there?

• 1:37:24Speaker 07

  It has to be more organic though.

• 1:37:26Bill Simmons?

  Right before crunch time, just something, I guess not.

• 1:37:30Speaker 07

  I think it's better if it's team specific. Like we saw this with the World Cup even, like certain teams had their songs or their moves or their, the, the drumming or the rowing or the singing.

• 1:37:38Bill Simmons?

  Wonderwall was revived.

• 1:37:40Speaker 07

  Right.

• 1:37:41Bill Simmons?

  By the way, I really missed the World Cup. It was like a real void. The, the next like, when there weren't games every day, it was, it was like withdrawal almost.

• 1:37:51Speaker 07

  I'm, I'm getting an MLS bill. Knowing it for the first time in like 10 years. I'm, I'm, I've been locked in the Union of One, Three in a Row. Trying to, trying to fill the void somehow.

• 1:37:59Bill Simmons?

  I don't see this thing. Um, I've, I've made a decision on the Premier League, by the way, because I am getting back this year. Yeah. I'm going to announce now or should I save this? Uh, I'm going to go back to Tottenham.

• 1:38:11Speaker 07

  Let's go.

• 1:38:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Yeah. I had my, my buddy, David Nyman, who lives out here is a huge Tottenham fan. And he sent me, he's, and he's like a very nice, like gentle, congenial guy, never gets mad. He sent me a long text. He's like, what the fuck? You can't switch teams. You picked a team. You have to come back. Like, we'll watch games. This will be great. And I was like, all right. So I'm, I'm, I'm doing some, uh, I'll, I'll be leaning on you, Dabbundo, but I'm doing some recon. I'm, I, I, I will be going back. This is my official announcement, Billy. I will be returning to Tottenham Hotspur.

• 1:38:48Speaker 06

  Honored to have been here for this.

• 1:38:49Speaker 07

  Sound the alarms, baby. It's celebration time. We, the first biggest problem is they don't have any stars right now. Like they need another star to kind of galvanize around. It was, it was Kane, it was Son, it was Deli. Now it's like, I don't know, Richarlison and, uh.

• 1:39:02Bill Simmons?

  Well, they need me this year. They need some, some star power. They need more celebrity fans. Who else do we have? Who are the celebrity fans right now?

• 1:39:10Speaker 07

  Uh, Steve Nash.

• 1:39:12Bill Simmons?

  Dabbundo.

• 1:39:12Speaker 07

  Adele.

• 1:39:14Bill Simmons?

  Steve Nash still into it? Adele?

• 1:39:15Speaker 07

  I think he is.

• 1:39:16Bill Simmons?

  Adele, like a real fan or a fake fan?

• 1:39:19Speaker 07

  That, that's up for interpretation.

• 1:39:21Speaker 06

  I know someone could ask.

• 1:39:22Bill Simmons?

  Who?

• 1:39:24Speaker 06

  Rich.

• 1:39:27Bill Simmons?

  I could ask Rich. I'll ask him. Does Adele still care? I mean, she she lives here now, right? Anyway, I'm back.

• 1:39:32Speaker 06

  What's their what's their coach situation? You guys happy with the coach, Billy? You want to bring in a coach of your own? Now that you go to Tottenham and say, you know what, like, I have my eye on soccer situation. I got some pull here as a celebrity fan. I'm going to save this organization and bring in a coach.

• 1:39:46Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. Who do I suggest, the bundle?

• 1:39:48Speaker 07

  Who's my guy?

• 1:39:48Speaker 07

  Sorry, the the coach that Tottenham fans would want back has just signed a four year extension.

• 1:39:53Speaker 06

  Nah.

• 1:39:53Speaker 07

  The US men's national team. So we are.

• 1:39:55Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I saw that.

• 1:39:56Speaker 07

  Pochettino was our guy for many years. Now we have Dzerbi. He's an he's a very intense Italian man. He doesn't take shit from anybody. He's been known to accost his players in training and that has run him out of a couple of jobs in the past. But he's he's a damn good coach. So we're happy about that.

• 1:40:12Speaker 06

  National jobs are like full time jobs. Like you can't go coach, you know, like in the NBA, like you can't coach another team.

• 1:40:18Bill Simmons?

  I I agree. I thought that was weird. I don't know how that's his only thing that he does. Like, what does he do for the next year?

• 1:40:23Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:40:24Bill Simmons?

  Just looks at under 17 footage?

• 1:40:27Speaker 06

  That's weird.

• 1:40:28Speaker 07

  They're supposed to like travel around to see the players in person. It's like a it's like when you want to take a vacation, but you still want to get paid lots of money. You go coach an international game. And so we've actually seen a lot more of the club guys, especially since there's fewer top club jobs open. They just were like, oh, yeah, I'll go coach Brazil, or I'll go coach England, or I'll go coach the USA, for example. Now Poch has signed on for four more years.

• 1:40:52Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it was it's funny going through the entire World Cup and getting excited about America. And be like, ah, and then it gets to like the last few games and the skill level is so dramatically better. It's like, oh, my God. What were we thinking? Like, Spain, Spain's connecting on 58 passes in a row. It's like, what were we even thinking? We had a chance against anybody.

• 1:41:13Speaker 06

  Why aren't we good as a country at soccer? Like, why can't we be better?

• 1:41:17Speaker 07

  The Chinese Communist Revolution, Billy Gil. I get it.

• 1:41:21Speaker 06

  All right.

• 1:41:21Bill Simmons?

  No, that's that's what Chuck Close was. That was history. I got a great email that I really want to dive into at some point for real.

• 1:41:30Bill Simmons?

  And I I can't remember who sent it, but I'll I'll give them credit when we do it about, do we designate one of the 50 states? As a soccer only state? All they have is soccer. And like, if you're good at soccer, you actually so it's like, South Dakota. It's just like, we've designated South Dakota as our soccer state. And that's it. There's no other sports. You can't play basketball. You can't play football. All you have to do is play soccer from day one. And do we? And then that becomes like our little mini country within the United States. That's soccer. Billy's, I can see Billy's wheels turning on this.

• 1:42:02Speaker 06

  I mean, I'm kind of wondering what like the ramifications might be for like, you know what? Also, no schooling. It's just soccer in this state. Like, this is what you're gonna learn. There'd have to be a lot of money like thrown at at them, right? Or do they not have a choice? Like, there's just no option. You literally can't play any sport.

• 1:42:18Bill Simmons?

  I I don't think it's a not a choice. No, no, it'd be soccer only. But you could do it with a small state, too. Like, you just pick. Rhode Island would be tough because the weather. But you could go smaller state and just be like Rhode Island or Maine or Delaware. One of those. But but I.

• 1:42:36Speaker 07

  So we're sending kids there or are we bringing them up through there?

• 1:42:39Speaker 06

  Yeah, this is getting problematic.

• 1:42:41Bill Simmons?

  No, we're families. It's like hockey. Families are moving there. It's like in in Canada, how the people move to different cities. But I thought as a half baked idea, I thought it was tremendous. Back to baseball.

• 1:42:55Speaker 06

  We must.

• 1:42:56Speaker 07

  What a tangent. That was great.

• 1:42:57Bill Simmons?

  Well, I had one more big baseball thing for you. Because you you talked about this in in the piece you wrote for The Ringer, De Bundo. There's like five, five playoff teams in the NL. And you could see their odds for Fanduel to win the pennant. The Dodgers are minus 115, goes all the way through. It's Milwaukee, Atlanta, Chicago, Phillies 10 to 1. And then the six best odds are San Diego 35 to 1. So we have a five team race, basically, in the National League. Is that just where we're going to end up? Or is there going to be an out of nowhere team?

• 1:43:27Speaker 07

  No, I think that's very much where we are. And that's what I I think that kind of informed the deadline. It's like, you know, I know Billy is is persona non grata on Marlins Twitter now because he's not happy with the team.

• 1:43:37Bill Simmons?

  Is that true?

• 1:43:38Speaker 06

  I upset Marlins Twitter because I wanted their manager Clayton McCullough to be fired after he took out Yuri Perez during a perfect game. It was a whole thing. I I really, really upset them because this is like, right when they were, you know, getting hot on their nice, you know, month of June, where they were kind of showing everyone like, wow, this is like the real team. Everybody ignored the first couple of months of like, June, that's that's the real team. Then there was a 12 game losing streak that like, you know, kind of derailed that whole thing. But like, in the process to getting 10 games over 500, which is not common accomplishment down here for the Miami Marlins, particularly at that point in the season. I was very upset at the idea of pulling Yuri Perez during an attempted perfect game.

• 1:44:19Bill Simmons?

  How many pitches?

• 1:44:21Speaker 06

  He had 92 pitches, but their whole thing was it was his third start back from injury, but it was a leg injury. And I have lived my existence as a Marlins fan with the excuse making of, we need to save these arms for October. Knowing full well, October is not guaranteed for the Marlins and like longevity of these players' career. As bad as this may sound, is not of my utmost concern. Like, I don't really care if they have a long and healthy prosperous career that will get them traded to another team. I would like to see a no hitter or a perfect game. This is why I hate Don Mattingly and De Bundo. I I'm sure you love Donny baseball because he's come in.

• 1:45:04Speaker 07

  No, no, no, no.

• 1:45:04Speaker 06

  Really? You hate Don Mattingly?

• 1:45:07Speaker 07

  I don't think I've ever disliked a Phillies manager because I like dislike Don Mattingly's managerial of the Philadelphia Phillies right now.

• 1:45:13Speaker 06

  Really?

• 1:45:14Speaker 07

  Still feels the same way. We've discussed this on the Philly special. He, I mean, it's like a reverse Nepo. His son is the GM sort of. It's a very weird power situation.

• 1:45:25Speaker 06

  Yeah. Hold on a second. He came in and he completely turned around your season.

• 1:45:31Speaker 07

  They conveniently fired Rob Thompson the day before Zach Wheeler came back from injury and has pitched like a Cy Young and, you know, all the players started playing better. I I think that would have happened with or without the great Donny baseball.

• 1:45:43Bill Simmons?

  You know what the? I was gonna say the Red Sox manager, Tracy, who took over for Cora. And he's like a scramble for runs guy, which we haven't had forever. Like, somebody will double and he'll he'll bunt the guy over like we're like a suicide squeeze threat now.

• 1:45:58Speaker 06

  Small ball's back, Bill.

• 1:45:59Bill Simmons?

  It's really fucking fun because.

• 1:46:01Speaker 06

  I love it.

• 1:46:02Bill Simmons?

  Cora was very holier than thou about all that. And and this guy will just be like, we're butting people over. We we've won games with like sacrifice. You three sacrifice bunts in, you know, the last four innings. And it's really fun. It's it's energetic. I enjoy it.

• 1:46:18Speaker 07

  There's more variance in baseball now. Ben Lernburg wrote about this, like Brewers have broken clutch hitting. Tampa Bay like invested in a bunch of dudes who hit the ball really hard, but on the ground or line drives, not homers.

• 1:46:29Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:46:29Speaker 07

  And it's worked for them. And like, you know, you got the Red Sox doing this. So there there is more. There is more variance. The Phillies just traded for a haul for Luis Ariz, who never strikes out.

• 1:46:38Bill Simmons?

  Billy, what would be your strategy? Would you be a all line drives guy? Would you be a home runs and strikeouts GM? What would you be?

• 1:46:45Speaker 06

  I I like small ball. I like the stolen base. I think it's fun. Like, I like the idea of a triple. Or, you know, like, something happens and whoa, could we get an inside the park homerun here? Like, the home runs and the strikeouts, like, they're fine, right? But like, I like the it. It's kind of like instant gratification with the homerun. Like, you immediately have that feeling and then it's gone. Where like a stolen base, like a triple, or, you know, you have a team that you know, like, anything can happen here. Like, this guy is going to be like a demon on the base paths. I like that kind of baseball. That's why I don't understand why, like, why do games go beyond the 10th inning when you start with a runner on second base? With no outs, like, it's very easy. Just move him over, bunt him over, sacrifice fly, and you score a run.

• 1:47:27Speaker 06

  But we have games going beyond the 10th all the time because there's no like, they said, just stop teaching small ball. And it's coming back now, thankfully. But we had like a generation of people who are just discovering that you can steal bases and bunt people over. It's incredible.

• 1:47:41Bill Simmons?

  You also had people when they're bunting, looked like they had never attempted a bunt in their entire life. And this felt like it was like for 15 years. Just people would be like, yeah, it's second and first no outs. They're going to bunt them more. And the guy would be like holding the bat like it's like a broomstick.

• 1:47:57Speaker 06

  Well, I mean, with the shifts, you would have like everybody on one side of the field. And it's like, you literally just have to put it down, the third baseline. And you could hit a double here. And and nope, sure enough, you hit like right into the shift. And then if there is a bunt now, we have the opposite where no one knows how to field a bunt. So like, if you're gonna bunt it, you're probably gonna get on because they haven't been teaching people.

• 1:48:16Bill Simmons?

  Freddie Freeman's the only one who knows how to do a bunt anymore.

• 1:48:20Speaker 06

  Do you hate the Ariz deal, De Bundo?

• 1:48:23Speaker 07

  I'm very lukewarm on it.

• 1:48:24Speaker 06

  Really?

• 1:48:24Bill Simmons?

  Well, they moved Bryce Harper to the outfield. So for comedy sake, it's gonna be amazing.

• 1:48:30Speaker 07

  It's literally, it's like, all right, what position do you want to play now? You'll play third, play first, play right field. Ariz adds on base value to a team that's 28th in on base percentage. So like, that's exciting. I'm I'm excited to watch him hit. He's like annoying to play against and fun to have on your team. He's gotten better defensively, but like you said, you know, Bryce Harper hasn't played outfield in five years. He got injured last time he played the outfield. It's why he stopped playing the outfield.

• 1:48:54Bill Simmons?

  This is the Aaron Judge problem, too.

• 1:48:56Speaker 07

  Yeah. And he wasn't a good outfielder in 2021, and I don't think he's going to be a very good one in 2026. And some of the metrics already say the Phillies are the worst defense in the league.

• 1:49:05Bill Simmons?

  I think I can't wait.

• 1:49:06Speaker 07

  Again, you got a manager.

• 1:49:08Bill Simmons?

  They might get a TV for me. I I can't wait to watch them play defense.

• 1:49:12Speaker 06

  I went down an Ariz rabbit hole yesterday for you, De Bundo, but I wanted to save it to talk to you today. Because I don't like, what is this guy's deal that no team wants him? He's about to win. He potentially could win if he keeps his average up. His fourth batting title for his fourth different team. Like, he just is constantly moved because all he does is get on base, and that's essentially it. I was like, how in the history of baseball, how many people do you think have won four batting titles that are not in the Hall of Fame? Do you? Do you know off the top of your head? You wouldn't know that.

• 1:49:44Bill Simmons?

  No, I

• 1:49:45Speaker 07

  I would be amazed if there were any.

• 1:49:46Bill Simmons?

  I used to know things like this. How many have won four batting titles for four teams?

• 1:49:51Speaker 06

  I don't think that anyone has.

• 1:49:53Bill Simmons?

  That has to be a record.

• 1:49:54Speaker 06

  So there's one guy that has three batting titles that is not in the Hall of Fame. And that's Pete Rose, but I don't think it has anything to do with his play. And then there's a guy that has four batting titles, not in the, Pete Rose?

• 1:50:05Bill Simmons?

  Fuck yeah. All these guys should be in. This is ridiculous. What's the point of the Hall of Fame? I say this all the time.

• 1:50:10Speaker 07

  You're washing the history, you're washing the history of baseball here by not including.

• 1:50:13Speaker 06

  They're in there, please come on.

• 1:50:14Bill Simmons?

  Put like, make his plaque like.

• 1:50:16Speaker 07

  Separate wing.

• 1:50:17Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, make his plaque, put on the plaque what he did. Like, we want our kids to learn about the past. Pretend he didn't happen.

• 1:50:24Speaker 06

  Like, he's in there. He just doesn't have the plaque. I like the punishment. I'm very unpopular on this situation. But like, the fact that like, I know this eats at Barry Bonds and I know this eats at Roger Clemens, like, I kinda like it.

• 1:50:35Bill Simmons?

  Why can't we put it, why can't we have like a basement and it's not nice? And the lighting's not good. You're like going in a dungeon. Yeah, that's what I want.

• 1:50:43Speaker 07

  Cheaters.

• 1:50:44Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:44Speaker 06

  Wait a minute.

• 1:50:45Speaker 07

  And gamblers.

• 1:50:45Speaker 06

  I have an idea. What if we put up their plaques like in an infirmary? You know what I mean? Like if somewhere inside the Hall of Fame, there's like a first aid station where you can go and you can get like all the drugs or whatever. And then in there, there's like a whole wall with like the Palmeros and the Maguires and everyone. But like, you have to go into like a place where they're gonna sell you drugs or give you like medications.

• 1:51:08Bill Simmons?

  Can I go one step further? Put them in the bathrooms. There's like 15 guys, there's 15 bathrooms, each bathroom, there's just like the Barry Bonds plaque next to where you dry your hands.

• 1:51:18Speaker 06

  But like, in the bathroom or like, would you put a plaque like as a urinal?

• 1:51:22Bill Simmons?

  In the toilet?

• 1:51:22Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:51:23Bill Simmons?

  Over the urinal?

• 1:51:24Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. No, no, like in the urinal, like the urinal cake thing that catches it. So it doesn't like splash back. It's like all of Barry Bonds stats or whatever, you know? I think there's something here.

• 1:51:35Bill Simmons?

  Listen, Barry Bonds is the best left fielder I've ever seen in person. I can't believe he's not in the Hall of Fame. It was unbelievable.

• 1:51:40Speaker 06

  It bothers him. It's, look, he, he cheated, right? Like, we know he cheated. He did it. He got the stats, which is what he wanted. He got the money, which he was gonna get anyways. Why not take this little thing from him, knowing that it's just gonna drive him crazy that he can't go in there? Like Pete Rose, Pete Rose is obviously like an extreme situation because like, it was literally all he cared about. And then he died. So it's like, he's never gonna see this now.

• 1:52:01Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:01Speaker 06

  And then immediately after, we're like, you know what? Maybe it's time for Pete. It's like, ah, guys. This doesn't mean anything to Pete anymore. Like, he's gone. He's not gonna be there signing autographs anymore. Anyways, back to what I was telling you. There's one guy that has four batting titles, not in the Hall of Fame. It's this guy, Bill Mad Dog Madlock. Do you know him?

• 1:52:18Bill Simmons?

  Oh yeah, the Cubs. Yeah.

• 1:52:19Speaker 06

  So he wins four batting titles. He has a career 300 average.

• 1:52:23Bill Simmons?

  He was good.

• 1:52:24Speaker 06

  He has World Series that he won with the Pirates. He didn't even get 5% of the Hall of Fame vote and was gone off the ballot after one year. Because apparently he was so difficult with the media and he was such a jerk to like umpires that I guess they sent him this point. I mean, he has over 2,000 hits, but it was like 1,800 games. So it's not the best, but in a baseball season now where you have like five guys hitting over 300, the idea that you have a career 300 hitter with four batting titles that didn't even make the second year ballot in the Hall of Fame is crazy. In 1996, so 93 was when he was up, they, they, he didn't make it past. In 96, the like Veterans Committee or whatever, the Baseball Writers Association,

• 1:53:07Speaker 06

  they got together and petitioned for him and like three other guys, including Larry Boa, who didn't make a second year after a second year of, of election. They wanted to put like five guys back on the ballot who hadn't gotten the 5%. They approved it. Then the ballot came out and they changed their mind. They just left them off the ballot. So they said, you know what? We approve this, but no, we're not gonna ever vote you into the Hall of Fame.

• 1:53:30Bill Simmons?

  Garvey's the biggest miss for me. When I was a kid, Garvey was the best first baseman for like a decade. I don't understand how he's not in.

• 1:53:38Speaker 06

  Well, Don Mattingly's not in either, right? He's another guy.

• 1:53:40Bill Simmons?

  He didn't, his peak was, he had the great peak, but his career, I don't think was long enough. I had another topic for you guys. I watched four Red Sox games when they played the A's in Sacramento.

• 1:53:51Speaker 06

  I love that.

• 1:53:52Bill Simmons?

  I kinda loved it.

• 1:53:53Speaker 06

  I love Sacramento and I love, I love.

• 1:53:55Bill Simmons?

  It was really fun.

• 1:53:56Speaker 06

  I love when they played in Las Vegas and everything was flying out. Like that stadium was.

• 1:54:01Bill Simmons?

  There was parts of the, parts of the outfield where the ball would fly out and then other parts where you had no chance and it, it just, it felt like more, it felt like honestly like a double A game. It was crazy to watch on TV on like a, you know, a nice widescreen TV in HD and it was like, it seemed like people were at like the park and not like at a baseball game.

• 1:54:22Speaker 06

  When they would hit the homerun, it would be so like hilariously over the fence. That it's like, yeah, like this ball just went 480 feet somehow and it went two parking lots over.

• 1:54:32Bill Simmons?

  It kept you on your toes every single at bat. Cause he was like, literally anybody could hit a homerun. But I don't know. I kind of, I kind of enjoyed the vibe.

• 1:54:40Speaker 07

  The other funny thing is where the clubhouses are located.

• 1:54:43Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:44Speaker 07

  Is different from a normal like major league setup. So last year when Kotze got thrown out of a game, he had to do like the walk of shame down the third base line. So he like milked the walk. He's like walking super slowly because he just wants to make his point clear that he shouldn't have gotten thrown out. And then he, you know, he went, he veered off down the left field line, I guess where the, the, the medical, the clubhouse is. It was so funny.

• 1:55:05Bill Simmons?

  It was such a weird series, cause we had, we traded for Curtis Mead. And then he got hit the second time he went up on the, he had like a suit of armor on. It was, it was like three inches of his body where a ball could have actually hit his flesh and somehow ends up breaking the wrist. So it turned into the Aaron Rodgers Jets game of Aaron Rodgers coming out with the flag and getting, that was it. He's gone. That was our, one of our big trade deadline moves.

• 1:55:30Speaker 06

  The, the Sacramento crowds are also kinda great, cause they're not really invested. Like, they're going out and they really like it.

• 1:55:37Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they're hanging.

• 1:55:37Speaker 06

  The A's mean nothing to them. So they're going out there just to have fun. The perfect game that I was telling you about, Yuri Perez, that I upset Marlins Twitter. So they take him out of the game. This is in Sacramento. The A's fan or the road team that's being no hit and, and hasn't even gotten on base is just letting the Marlins manager have it for the rest of the game. They're all in unison, just chanting shame at him over and over again. So the game's going on and you just hear chants of shame, shame, shame. And they're like pointing at him and he's like on the top step. Eventually he's like, I gotta like get back in the dugout here. But they were letting him have it for three straight innings, cause they are just there to have a good time as long as they have baseball there.

• 1:56:18Bill Simmons?

  I like it. I think it's been a bit, Sacramento probably shouldn't have a major league baseball team, but I do like when cities get a cameo for a year. Like, yeah, here's what it's like. Uh, I don't know who the next team would be, but I think the Vegas thing's gonna be bizarre.

• 1:56:32Speaker 07

  It is gonna be weird. I don't think, like, it's not like football or it's a destination or like basketball even where it could be a destination or hockey where they have their own team. Like baseball, like, you know, of all the places to travel to go watch your baseball team, are you gonna pick Vegas?

• 1:56:46Speaker 06

  There's too many games, like for even the tourists.

• 1:56:49Speaker 07

  Field advantage at all. It'll be like a road tourism environment. And then like, yeah, in the middle of June, who's going to Vegas to watch their team play the A's?

• 1:56:59Bill Simmons?

  All right. So before we go,

• 1:57:03Bill Simmons?

  is there an out of nowhere team these last seven weeks?

• 1:57:07Bill Simmons?

  I know we, we talked about a couple of candidates. You know it's gonna happen. It's August 4th. We know somebody's gonna get hot. So who is it?

• 1:57:16Bill Simmons?

  And it could be either league. My guess would be the NL, just cause the NL has the top five and then everybody else and everybody else seems suspicious to me.

• 1:57:26Speaker 07

  I don't think, what you're saying, like come out of nowhere and do what? To like win the?

• 1:57:29Bill Simmons?

  Just to make a run and be like, what's going on with these guys? It always happens. I don't know if they'll win the pennant, but somebody throwing their hat in the rain that we're not expecting.

• 1:57:39Speaker 07

  I mean, the crazy case would be that Detroit's only two and a half games out.

• 1:57:44Bill Simmons?

  A little Scoobal, Scoobal Ewing theory?

• 1:57:47Speaker 07

  And they, metrically, like they are underrated. They've got a bunch of younger players coming through that have, that have popped for them of late. They, you know, there was a little bit of malaise early in the season and I do wonder how much of it was related to the fact that the clubhouse was just kinda pissed off that Scoobal didn't get paid. And they were pissed at ownership and pissed at kinda the inability to negotiate this situation. So just getting him out of the picture, of course it hurts their pitching staff, but just getting him out of the picture helped them. Now, you know, you, you, you're not dealing with a ton of starting pitching anymore, but we've seen Detroit do this before. Two years ago.

• 1:58:21Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:21Speaker 07

  They were dead, dead in the water and got hot and managed to, to pitch their way into the playoffs. Uh, it wouldn't be shocking, just because I just don't really believe in any of the teams in the American League Central.

• 1:58:32Bill Simmons?

  Honestly, I would have kept them. I think for what they got, because you get, if he leaves as a free agent, you get draft picks and it's okay. It's not, not getting to top 60 prospects, but at least you get something. But then it, it gives you a chance for, I don't know, for some sort of playoff run. Plus you know, next year's gonna be a lockout anyway. So I don't know. If I was running the Tigers, I would have kept them.

• 1:58:58Speaker 06

  I mean, it's two and a half that they're out too. It's not, they have to jump like five teams right now to get into a playoff spot because everyone's so tight. But like, you did kind of punt on the whole Scoobal thing. And, and like, we haven't talked about it, but doing it two days before the deadline was weird. Like, the whole, like, I, I know that we don't want to say that the Dodgers have ruined baseball, but like, something's fishy here with that situation because now he goes to the Dodgers and now they're already probably starting the contract negotiation situation. And I wondered how much, like, he, do you think he's motivated with the impending idea of a lockout

• 1:59:39Speaker 06

  with a salary cap to let me extend before this season's over and just get a ton of money before there isn't a ton of money to be gotten? So like, I'm happy to be going to the Dodgers. I would have wanted to go there anyways. They'll have a lot of money they can give me. Like, let's do this either like during the season or right after the season and let's not risk the idea of I can't get paid. Because the problem with the salary cap is the salary floor. Like, in my thoughts, everybody says, I guess it's gonna be great. All of the bad teams and they're gonna have to spend $150 million. But what ends up happening is the bad teams end up spending that money in the dumbest way possible. And you get people who should-

• 2:00:17Bill Simmons?

  It happened in the NBA. Remember 10 years ago, the cap spike and all of a sudden Portland and the Nats, all they, like Alan Crabbs making $71 million for four years? Yeah, we saw this.

• 2:00:28Speaker 06

  You guys having no business making the money that they're making, just getting thrown money because they're the free agent at the time. And the team that's bad, that's not gonna reach the salary floor, is afraid of getting, you know, like a slap on the wrist or whatever from the league. So they just throw dumb money at players just to get over the floor.

• 2:00:44Bill Simmons?

  You're almost better off not spending the money, right?

• 2:00:47Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:00:47Bill Simmons?

  You're almost better like, yeah, penalize me versus me having to go get Luol Deng. So you said it was fishy that he went to the Dodgers. To me it's-

• 2:00:59Speaker 07

  There is a weird angle there too.

• 2:01:00Bill Simmons?

  No, but to me, it's beyond fishy. I, I think the rest of the league just assumed he's signing, he's signing with the Dodgers. This way, like, to me, it reminded me of the Yanis situation where Yanis said, I'm either going to Boston or Miami. Other teams could have traded for Yanis, but he had already said, I'm, I want to go to these two teams. I think Scoobal was just, I'm going to the Dodgers. Like, you can trade for me, but you'd be renting me, basically.

• 2:01:22Speaker 06

  He must have made it known.

• 2:01:23Speaker 07

  But teams have traded for rentals before. I mean, the Rays and the Brewers are the two teams everybody is kind of pointing the ire at and saying-

• 2:01:29Bill Simmons?

  Well, so the Brewers were the team that felt like they should have gone after him. Yeah.

• 2:01:33Speaker 07

  You know, teams have traded for rentals. The Dodgers just paid two, two and a half prospect, two, three prospects to get him early, right? To get him for one more playoff run. Why didn't Milwaukee do this? Why didn't Tampa do this? The conspiracy that I am open to is from a pure politics angle, it feels very rare that, like, the, the, the negotiation politics, not, you know, politics, politics. From a pure negotiation angle, like, the fan, fans are very split and very angry about this. And a lot of them are gonna side with the owners because they're mad at the big bad Dodgers. So there is a, a theory of like, if you're the owner of the Rays or the owner of the Brewers and you want a salary-

• 2:02:07Speaker 06

  Thrilled that this happened.

• 2:02:08Speaker 07

  You're thrilled. Everybody's pissed the Dodgers. It's like, yeah, yeah, get mad at them. So we can try to get a salary cap, which is what all of them probably want, because they get to cap the earnings of their labor, which is ideal in an environment where you have, you know, the billionaires fighting against the millionaire players. So that, I am open and sympathetic to the idea that not everybody loses from the Dodgers being seen as this unbeatable behemoth, even if they're not.

• 2:02:33Bill Simmons?

  I'll tell you this. First of all, it's so much more fun to go to baseball games now. I just can't, it can't be said strongly enough that you're just in and out in two and a half, two hours, 45, and you're not just sitting there watching somebody grab his groin and step out of the batter's box and-

• 2:02:51Speaker 06

  They have a song you could sing. I mean, it's great.

• 2:02:52Bill Simmons?

  Good thing. And like, it's just, it's so much more fun to go. With that said, if they do have a lockout and baseball disappears, it is just not gonna, like, when this happened in 1981, this was, I was, I was 11. It was catastrophic. Like, we didn't have nearly enough other stuff to do. So just taking baseball away, even in 94 when it happened and it was awful, there was slightly more stuff to do. Now there's so much that, I just think people move on to different things. And, you know, it could go away for a year and it'd be terrible, but I don't think it would have the same impact that it did 40 years ago. I just don't.

• 2:03:30Speaker 06

  But does that then benefit the players? Because like, the owners are gonna be the ones that are gonna be more incentivized. Like, we cannot have this be a prolonged lockout and lose kind of the momentum that the sport has had the past couple of seasons.

• 2:03:42Bill Simmons?

  It's the other way though, because for the owners, and these are all the people that buy teams now, and we're seeing it in basketball and football right now especially, they're all these rich dudes. These teams are assets to them. They're not, they don't have a connection to the city or the fanbase. They're, these things they buy the same way they would buy companies or whatever. And if they could hold the asset for a year, not have to spend any money, they get to write off all this stupid shit for it, try to break the players a little bit and get a cap, like, they're gonna, they're gonna do that. They're not gonna care about the fans. I don't, I don't feel like these professional sports teams care about the relationship with fans in the same way that they used to.

• 2:04:19Speaker 07

  It's not just fans. I mean, think about how much of the local economy is, is, you know, between stadium workers to-

• 2:04:25Bill Simmons?

  Right. It's devastating.

• 2:04:26Speaker 07

  Teen employees, to the, the, the fact that it's, you know, smaller US cities around the country have 80 plus events every year that are guaranteed, that provide local broadcast rights, local TV. Like, it goes way beyond billionaires. You know, like, the one thing you'll say is like, oh, you're choosing the billionaires over the millionaires when you side with the owners, which is true. And like, I'm pro labor, but there's labor beyond just the millionaire players that go into the entire baseball ecosystem. And people kind of leave them out of the mess. Like, they're not the ones that are actually the most impacted out of anybody. You know, if Bryce Harper doesn't get paid next year, he'll live. But like, if stadium employee number 326 loses their job, you know, you're talking about massive ramifications.

• 2:05:05Bill Simmons?

  Well, and you'd, also, you think about all the bars around the stadium, all the restaurants, all the stores that are around there. Yeah, you're, you're decimating these different locations.

• 2:05:15Speaker 06

  Well, and then people will have to turn to the Savannah Bananas and we can't have that be something that takes Major League Baseball.

• 2:05:20Bill Simmons?

  I, I will make that my mission in life to make people, I feel like I had a little bit of an impact on pickleball because it feels like people, you know, just a tiny bit. If, if I helped in any way, great, but people are down on pickleball now, which I'm delighted by. The Savannah Bananas are next.

• 2:05:38Speaker 07

  I don't know about that, Bill. Anecdotally, pickleball is alive and well.

• 2:05:42Speaker 06

  What are your biggest, like, pop culture, like, places where you have kind of flexed your muscles? So you got the, you got the UCLA coach fired, or hired, I should say. Yeah, you got the UCLA coach hired.

• 2:05:54Bill Simmons?

  I mean, that's, that's gonna be my legacy.

• 2:05:56Speaker 06

  Yeah. You've, well, hold on. You've contributed in your mind to the downfall of pickleball also.

• 2:06:01Bill Simmons?

  No, just small, just a small contribution. Just, just a little, if I was able to help in any way, great. I think people are annoyed by pickleball now.

• 2:06:10Speaker 06

  Just takes a little cut and all of a sudden the reflecting pool is green, you know? You just need a little thing to kind of get the ball rolling downhill.

• 2:06:17Bill Simmons?

  I think the, the one thing that I feel like I actually really helped was Friday Night Lights, weirdly, the, the TV show. I think it was gonna get canceled and I wrote this ESPN, the magazine piece about it. And they decided not to cancel it. And Peter Berg, and I don't know if this is true enough, but Peter Berg, the creator of the show, like genuinely believes that the column saved the show. So who knows if that's true, but I'll take that one. We, we never would have had Landry and, and Tyra accidentally kill the guy outside the bar. You know, the show just would have been gone. I don't know if you guys watched that show. Dabbundo doesn't seem like he did.

• 2:06:55Speaker 06

  Do you know when you're-

• 2:06:55Speaker 07

  I've never watched it start to finish. I've seen episodes.

• 2:06:57Bill Simmons?

  Just watch season one. It's great.

• 2:06:59Speaker 06

  Do you know the impact that you're gonna have when you do these things? Or do you just like, find out after the fact? Like, when you go to sit down, the Friday Night Lights, and you're like, you know what? This is gonna do it. And you sit down, you say, this is how we saved the show? Or it just happens after?

• 2:07:12Bill Simmons?

  That was literally, the column was, I need to help save the show. This is the best show on TV. That was 1,200 words of me playing like, please, please watch this show. Yeah. So, so what is my new, what's my new thing now? The Savannah Bananas.

• 2:07:27Speaker 06

  Yeah, you gotta stop the Savannah Bananas from taking over Major League Baseball's, you know, if, if they go into a lockout, all the attention will go to the bananas.

• 2:07:35Bill Simmons?

  It's really, it's really one of the dumbest things.

• 2:07:36Speaker 07

  I was at a bar the other night and I was tempted to ask the bar to just put something else on because it was on. But I literally went through the guide and I was like, there's nothing else that I could even recommend right now. Like, the Phillies weren't playing. I was like, man, this is, this is dark. Not the Banana Ball.

• 2:07:51Bill Simmons?

  I will say ESPN feels like it's reverting back to the 1980s with some of the stuff they're showing. They've had, they had the pillow fight championships last weekend. I don't know if you guys saw-

• 2:08:00Speaker 07

  Well, this is the summer, this is summer programming.

• 2:08:02Speaker 06

  There's like, flag football on the other day.

• 2:08:04Bill Simmons?

  Flag football, our friend Kyle Brandt was, was the color guy in the flag football-

• 2:08:09Speaker 06

  Really?

• 2:08:09Bill Simmons?

  Under 18 championships. But it feels like, I don't know whether they lost rights to different stuff, but it feels like they're definitely throwing stuff against the wall lately.

• 2:08:18Speaker 07

  What's the basketball league with the trampolines?

• 2:08:21Bill Simmons?

  Slam ball.

• 2:08:21Speaker 06

  Slam ball?

• 2:08:22Speaker 07

  Slam ball. That was on last summer and my buddies and I were at the bar, like, kind of getting into it for a second. Yeah.

• 2:08:26Speaker 06

  It's back?

• 2:08:27Bill Simmons?

  My question for any sport is, my question with all of these things is, will Dabbundo bet on it? Will Dabbundo and Sal actually think about wagering on this? That's when you know you've arrived. I don't see that with the Savannah Bananas.

• 2:08:39Speaker 07

  Saturday night, I was in an airport delay in Dallas for two and a half hours getting home from Montana. And my friend and I sat down and there was USL, which is second division, American soccer on. And it was Louisville versus Tampa Bay. And Louisville was up 3-0 at the half. And Tampa Bay had this crazy comeback. They won 5-4. And I will say, I did check to see if they had betting odds up. They did not. So there were no wagers placed. But it was, it was a curiosity thing. But yeah, I have never bet on slam ball, never bet on pickleball.

• 2:09:11Bill Simmons?

  This is the dark days of gambling, August.

• 2:09:13Speaker 07

  No. Yeah, I take some time off. It's nice.

• 2:09:15Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, because we have no- No golf majors yet. The FedEx playoffs is here. All the tennis stuff is done. There's just

• 2:09:24Speaker 07

  US Open's coming up.

• 2:09:25Bill Simmons?

  US Open's coming up. No, but I mean, for right now, there's nothing.

• 2:09:29Speaker 07

  Yeah, there's some.

• 2:09:31Bill Simmons?

  Preseason football, which is like preseason football is a clear indication whether you have a gambling problem or not.

• 2:09:37Speaker 07

  Well, you see, Bill, the sharp people will tell you that's where they find their big edges.

• 2:09:40Bill Simmons?

  Exactly. That's just proved my point.

• 2:09:43Speaker 07

  A lot of work and it's payoff has never been clear to me.

• 2:09:46Bill Simmons?

  Even I don't bet preseason football. Like, that's like, that's like a next level thing. Um, all right, guys, this is fun. Baseball. I'm actually paying attention and watching and I care. So we'll do, we'll have to do this again. Billy Gale, how's college football tailgate going?

• 2:10:01Speaker 06

  Ah, we're gearing up. We're a couple of weeks away, right? We're like less than a month at this point before we have actual games going on. So.

• 2:10:07Bill Simmons?

  Exciting stuff.

• 2:10:08Speaker 06

  Exciting times.

• 2:10:09Bill Simmons?

  The Bundo, we'll talk more about Tottenham.

• 2:10:13Speaker 07

  Come on you Spurs, Bill. Come on you Spurs. We are 12, 17 days till the opener.

• 2:10:18Bill Simmons?

  All right. Thanks, guys. Good to see you.

• 2:10:21Speaker 02

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• 2:11:15Bill Simmons?

  All right, my friend David Shoemaker is here. We've been working together for literally 15 years, since year one Grantland, all the way through the Ringer. Um, did you go to SummerSlam last week? You must have.

• 2:11:26Speaker 06

  I didn't go. I didn't go. It was my first one I missed in a while, but I've been moving and doing all this kind of stuff and, you know.

• 2:11:31Bill Simmons?

  No Minneapolis for you?

• 2:11:33Speaker 06

  Yeah. I spent a couple of summers in Minneapolis growing up, so I don't, I'm not anti Minneapolis, but it probably, I heard it was one of the most fun SummerSlams in a while in terms of just, you know, the hanging out and the vibe and stuff. So, yeah, I wish I'd been there, but I didn't go this year.

• 2:11:47Bill Simmons?

  Did we definitely need a two-night SummerSlam? Just curious. Is that a thing that needed to happen?

• 2:11:56Speaker 06

  I appreciate the shorter shows, you know, like each night. I appreciate that my, like, seven-year-old can stay up and watch the main event, you know, and it not be three in the morning or whatever, when it finally drags out, because they were getting to a point. Some of those WrestleManias before they went to two nights were just slog.

• 2:12:11Bill Simmons?

  The New York one was the longest one. I, I actually think I might still be there with my son.

• 2:12:16Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 2:12:17Bill Simmons?

  I think, I don't know if we've ever left. I think we entered the seventh circle of hell.

• 2:12:20Speaker 06

  And they, well, and they had like four really dramatic main events in a row at the end. So like, and they were all long. The big thing this year is there was just a ton of ads and the matches weren't that long. And, and if you were just there for the wrestling, you know, it was a nice fast-moving show or whatever, but, um, there is just a lot of other content. They could have fit it all into one night. I don't know if they could have fit all the ads into one night, but they could have fit the content. And there were a couple of matches, like, I'm a big Dan Housen fan, but that Dan Housen Dom match would have worked a lot better as like the third to last match in a, in a really long show, you know, kind of the popcorn match. As opposed to it sort of trying to hold its own. So anyway, they, they could have done with maybe a little less time.

• 2:13:02Bill Simmons?

  I, uh, I zoomed through both of them after the fact, after they happened, and the ads were an issue. Which I get, we all have ads, like, but it was just different than the old pay-per-view experience of just being able to rip through it. But the, the one I cared about the most was the Lesnar match, which was, you know, in the, on the first night and one of the, you know, I, I thought was the.

• 2:13:24Speaker 06

  It was the main event, yeah.

• 2:13:25Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I thought it was the single most compelling storyline. Like, how many times can Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns have to have some sort of reckoning? This was like a clear torch pass to have a new guy and this whole legacy of, you know, going back to Andre the Giant, and Undertaker, Lesnar, now Obafemi, like, the, the big unstoppable force. So it feels like they finally found that, right?

• 2:13:52Speaker 06

  It does. I mean, I was going through the list myself and, I mean, it's, there's a little bit of a, you know, blurry line between the, the next big thing, monster edition, and just sort of the next big thing, you know, like, where do you put Diesel in this conversation, I guess? But like, you know, you can definitely put Sid Vicious in that category.

• 2:14:09Bill Simmons?

  Oh, that's a good one. Diesel's good too, by the way.

• 2:14:12Speaker 06

  Yeah, when Drew McIntyre debuted, this was his gimmick. He was the next big, he was the chosen one, you know, he was Vince's thing, but he was really slight. Like, he wasn't the same Drew McIntyre he is today.

• 2:14:21Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:14:22Speaker 06

  But, but it's been, you know, and you can put a little bit of Bobby Lashley, a little bit of Randy Orton, a little bit of even John Cena, Roman Reigns, you know, those guys are in that category as like, we have our eye on you. We know, like, you know, contract negotiations be damned, we're going to say out loud that you're our next star, you know? Um, and it's, it's a really, it's a huge moment, you know, like, I've known Obafemi to talk to him, to say hey to him since his NXT days, obviously. And, um, and he's just a really great dude, man. I mean, just really, he's like, he's a true believer. He's the exact kind of guy you'd want in that spot. And it's really amazing to see how quick his rise has been and how justified it's felt.

• 2:15:01Bill Simmons?

  Well, and from a real-life standpoint, six foot five? Six-four?

• 2:15:07Speaker 06

  He's a big dude.

• 2:15:08Bill Simmons?

  Six-six?

• 2:15:10Speaker 06

  Uh, yeah, he's probably six, he's probably six, like legit six-five. Like, he was, he was, you know, noticeably bigger than me, and that's not usually the case when I'm hanging out with wrestlers.

• 2:15:18Bill Simmons?

  Well, in wrestling, he's seven foot three, seven foot two.

• 2:15:21Speaker 06

  Exactly.

• 2:15:22Bill Simmons?

  Seven foot two, 500 pounds.

• 2:15:24Speaker 06

  I said that the NBA agents should send their players just to go hang out with wrestlers all the time during the pre-draft stuff, because according to the, according to the tape, they're all like seven and a half feet tall now, but.

• 2:15:34Bill Simmons?

  What, Hogan was six-six, six-five?

• 2:15:39Speaker 06

  Sure. Hogan in his prime was probably a legit six-five, six-six. I mean, he was a really, really big guy. Um, and by the time that, you know, I interviewed him on Cheap Heat back at Grantland by the, and certainly by the time that we interviewed him for the Vince doc, he was, he was declining in size a little bit. He got a lot of, had both hip surgeries, I think both hips replaced a couple of times, and I think some back stuff too. I mean, he, and, and that's just, you know, and just general shrinkage. You know, he had, he had come down quite a bit.

• 2:16:08Bill Simmons?

  Andre was listed at seven-four, was probably like six-ten, six-eleven at his peak. And then, pre, after like the vertebrae started going on him, he probably ended up at around six-seven. But.

• 2:16:20Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:16:20Bill Simmons?

  But the big show, probably six-nine, six-ten?

• 2:16:26Speaker 06

  And he's keeping it together for the most part. A lot of these big guys have leg, have, have not just knee surgeries, but like Kevin Nash just had a corrective leg situation a couple of years ago. He got a lot of like blood patlet, plat, whatever, like shot up into his knee in Mexico. He's a whole new man. I mean, obviously Andre turned down some surgeries that could have prolonged his life.

• 2:16:44Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:16:44Speaker 06

  Pretty significantly along the way. So, I mean, and that's a medical condition as opposed to, well, I think Big Show has it a little bit, but, but there's a lot more you can do to keep the, keep going. You know, to like stop from curving over or whatever.

• 2:16:57Bill Simmons?

  The more fun is when they try to anoint the next giant unstoppable guy, but the guy's terrible, like Giant Gonzalez.

• 2:17:05Speaker 06

  Oh, my God. There, I mean, even all the way up to like, I was Vladimir Kozlov, like, there's so many just like weird gigantic, like scary dudes who we just thought were going to be, but, you know, during the Hulk Hogan era, there were so many feuds. It was just Hogan versus a monster, and you had to keep finding people who looked physically imposing next to a guy who was already the biggest dude, you know, in the business, all, you know, one of the biggest dudes in the business. So, yeah, there were a lot of, he, I think Hulk Hogan is responsible for skewing the, the size charts for, for a whole generation.

• 2:17:37Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:17:38Speaker 06

  You know, you're like, in any other promotion, Hogan, a guy of Hogan's size would have been the heel, and they would have kept the five-ten guy that they were calling six-one as the hero, you know, and, and it, but it, but it all got thrown.

• 2:17:48Bill Simmons?

  Well, that was the irony, is Hogan was one of the best, like, when Hogan was heel, he was one of the best heels ever. Big John Stud was kind of the underrated one from that whole era. He did two different runs. It was, he was, but he, he was legitimate. Like, if you saw him in person, he seemed like a legitimate six-ten, six-eleven.

• 2:18:07Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think with a lot of these dudes, it's, you get the impression of their size, even in person, even if, even if the size is fake. Like John Cena and Stone Cold Steve Austin, I'm probably an inch taller than both of them, but both of them feel twice as big as me in person. You know, and, and, and, you know, Giant Gonzalez, I'm sure did not feel like as tall as he was. He's a very wispy seven footer.

• 2:18:31Bill Simmons?

  And then you got like the CM Punk guys who are like shockingly not as big as you'd think they are.

• 2:18:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, but Punk is also tall. I mean, like, he strikes you as tall in person, too. He's been, he's gotten into crazy good shape over the past, you know, several years or whatever. But yeah, it's just that it's when you've just carried around all that muscle forever and then it just sort of congeals into asphalt as you become an old man, you know? Those guys are like, I don't think, I think I could work out for five years and not be able to pick up Steve Austin off the ground. You know, he's just, he just, the guys like that are just so intimidating.

• 2:19:05Bill Simmons?

  Where WWE is, it's, this is right after the hot streak, which has happened a few times in history where it's like, we had this incredible run, everything's going great. And then it's like, it's right after you're still sustaining it, but you kind of know it's not the same. And it feels like a little bit of a lull right now.

• 2:19:24Speaker 06

  Right. So I wrote my book, Why Hulk Hogan Matters. I have to wave it around. That's my job. But this is, but, but Hogan was the, like, for people of our generation, Hogan was the original apex, right? It was that the rock and wrestling, the Hulkamania era was so big. And at the time, it seemed like it'll be like this forever. But of course, we know now what every wrestling promoter prior to Hogan knew very well, which is wrestling's incredibly cyclical, right? And it's about, it's like, it's like boxing where you gotta have the right fight, but it's just, it's a broader, almost like, it's hard, it's inexplicable, you know? It just goes up and down and up and down. And I think that for, if you're running a wrestling company, the real, I mean, there's basically like two knobs that you can control.

• 2:20:03Speaker 06

  One is delay gratification, put it off as long as you can. The way Cody Rhodes lost his first WrestleMania match against Roman Reigns, right?

• 2:20:10Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:20:10Speaker 06

  And two is just keep, try to drag out the top for as long as you can. That's why we had Hogan, Andre at WrestleMania, and then Hogan and Andre again at the first SummerSlam. You know, they found ways to keep the thing going and going and going.

• 2:20:22Bill Simmons?

  Well, then they made Macho Man the champ, but Hogan was still the biggest draw.

• 2:20:27Speaker 06

  Yeah, that's.

• 2:20:28Bill Simmons?

  Ultimate Warrior comes in, get him. They did the squash matches with Andre the Giant all over the place to build him up. But yeah, by 91, they kind of ran out of moves.

• 2:20:40Speaker 06

  They, yeah, there's not, there's only so much you could do. And so right now, yeah, I think we're in the post-peak from the moment that we were all saying, I can't believe it's this big again with Roman Reigns and Cody Rhodes relatively new to WWE and CM Punk, very new to WWE. That was the real peak. And then, and, and I'm sure that, I guarantee like, you know, the folks at the TKO headquarters are not saying, well, we all know it's a cycle. But you know, they're, they're saying, how do we stay this big forever? How do we get bigger?

• 2:21:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:21:08Speaker 06

  It's just now, you're kind of riding the wave and it's really, it's gonna be interesting to see like how far it goes down and how far and how quickly it can start going back up. It's not in a bad spot right now at all, but I think it's, I think it's notable that we had CM Punk versus Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns versus Seth Rollins at SummerSlam. These are two like rest, quote unquote WrestleMania matches and they're just saying, let's just put it all out there and let's see what we can do.

• 2:21:33Bill Simmons?

  They also very smartly are, are picking weekends better now. Like this last SummerSlam weekend, nothing's going on, right? You can really kind of own ESPN, who, when I was there and I'm doing running diaries and they, I think I was the only wrestling coverage they had in the mid 2000s. Now they're doing three hour pregame shows before night one of SummerSlam. It was on ESPN proper, the, the, the number one ESPN for three straight hours leading up to the pay-per-view. So I, obviously happy that wrestling is getting more mainstream coverage is we both, this has been a big part of our lives, less a part of mine lately.

• 2:22:13Bill Simmons?

  But it's weird when it's on ESPN. I cannot get used to it. I just, I just, it's just weird.

• 2:22:22Speaker 06

  You used to watch like the, like the old world-class stuff and AWA stuff on ESPN News or whatever, like, like decades ago, right? Like that was the last, that was the last.

• 2:22:30Bill Simmons?

  That was on ESPN One. It was AWA, yeah, 84, 85, yeah.

• 2:22:37Speaker 06

  So I mean, that was, that was the last time and it never, it never, so it never really felt out of place to me, but I get everybody saying, I can't believe it. I mean, you know, when I talk about media stuff on Press Box with Brian, it's all in the context of everything being a show, right? It's all, it's all like, like every, everything filmed in a studio, sports or news or whatever, it's all kayfabe, you know? It's all, we're all doing a job here, you know?

• 2:22:59Bill Simmons?

  Well, it's funny, they're using the ESPN's infrastructure, the way they talk about like the NFL. And we're watching like Joe Tessitore with our old friend Rosenberg and it's like, what would this mean to Roman Reigns? And it's honestly like watching NFL Live. It's just weird.

• 2:23:14Speaker 06

  Well, and you have Lee, I mean, you have, you have an army of former ESPN producers running WWE's, you know, production wing now, which is, which has predated their ESPN relationship, right? So for the past several years, fans like me have been watching saying, oh, now that's a college football camera angle. Or like, that's a, that's a pregame thing they would have only done on real sports, you know? And then these things start trickling in. And so now it's all sort of the same thing. But you're right, when it's like, you're watching ESPN and the weirdest part is that it doesn't seem totally out of place just because the production is so high. You know, and, and, and, and also it's just like, you see these wrestlers just wandering in and out of the set of like, get up and first take. Like there's so much weird synchronicity that are like synergy that like, it's, it's almost hard to process.

• 2:23:57Speaker 06

  I mean, when you were there, you remember that people that were in the highest seats of power, who would have just quit over WWE being, a WWE story being on the homepage of the website, you know? And now it's just seamless. It's, it's all part of the product.

• 2:24:12Bill Simmons?

  It was a great opportunity for us 15 years ago, right? When, when we were covering wrestling and really throwing ourselves into it, there was nothing else going on. So do you?

• 2:24:22Speaker 06

  I remember, I remember very well, the first time we talked at Grantland and you, and you called me on the phone and we were just like, what does a wrestling column look like? Like, like we didn't know what the, what the world would want, you know, or like what, what could even happen? And so, you know, we've come a long way, I guess.

• 2:24:39Bill Simmons?

  So do you think the ESPN thing's helped? Or it's neutral?

• 2:24:42Speaker 06

  I think, I think it's helpful. I think, oh, I think more than anything, it's, it's thrown a lot of these questions into stark relief. You know, it's like now every single insider-y wrestling conversation is like trying to read tea leaves about how excited ESPN is and, or, or unexcited, or how pleased or unpleasant they are with the numbers they got last month. I think if it weren't ESPN, it probably wouldn't feel quite as dire every time new numbers come in or whatever. But you know, the, acquiring WWE is an interesting move for ESPN. I think it's worthwhile, but it's always been very transactional. All of their various, you know, over the top, you know, homes, it's always been, you know, they had the WWE Network. And then when they went to Peacock, it was like, because Peacock, because the Olympics got canceled, you know, because of COVID.

• 2:25:27Speaker 06

  And suddenly Peacock was like, how do we get more like built-in subscribers? And WWE, WWE at that point came with like 1.5 million, like diehard fans that would follow it anywhere, you know?

• 2:25:36Bill Simmons?

  Same for Netflix.

• 2:25:37Speaker 06

  The way it always goes.

• 2:25:37Bill Simmons?

  Monday nights, Netflix, we're doing live. This is a good fit for us. Yeah, they're always in the right place at the right time.

• 2:25:44Speaker 06

  But, but I think that actually in terms of just like, like the synchronicity affecting the bottom line, like does the ESPN WWE partnership like make, like increase WWE's numbers in any sort of crazy way? We haven't really seen evidence of that so far. I think it's.

• 2:26:00Bill Simmons?

  I think the audience is always the audience. Yeah, that's why I said neutral. I just think the audience just moves to wherever the product is and that's it.

• 2:26:07Speaker 06

  Now, I think if, if the product, you know, if something, if, if it catches fire again, if, if the cycle, you know, goes back up quicker than maybe we would guess, I think it being on ESPN is a huge help just because people know where ESPN is, right? They're like, they're, they're more likely to, potential fans are more likely to stumble across it, you know, in places like ESPN and even Netflix, than just being on TV, like in the old.

• 2:26:30Bill Simmons?

  The biggest thing they need to figure out with Obafemi is,

• 2:26:35Bill Simmons?

  if you're gonna be the good guy, unstoppable guy,

• 2:26:40Bill Simmons?

  that's really hard to pull off.

• 2:26:42Speaker 06

  So hard. It's incredibly hard.

• 2:26:44Bill Simmons?

  It's way easier to be. Yeah, it's way easier to be the, I'm actually, there's a darkness to me. I'm a bad guy and that I'm a bad guy who is unstoppable. And you just keep throwing these baby faces at me and I'm just gonna keep nailing them. And I wonder long-term how they play that with him.

• 2:27:02Speaker 06

  I think you, you see this in the way he's been booked already. They had him win the King of the Ring Tournament because he was the most deserving, I guess, in terms of what people thought backstage. But the winner is supposed to get a title shot at SummerSlam and they just had to say, yeah, forget about that stipulation. Let's have him fight Brock Lesnar instead. I mean, the Brock match is a bigger match.

• 2:27:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:20Speaker 06

  But I think, I think the distance from now till at least WrestleMania, the entire booking strategy has to be keep Obafemi away from the title. Right? Because it's, it's, because you're right, it's hard. Once he gets the belt, you know, I mean, the Undertaker got that title run early in his career when he won from Hogan, you know, and Tuesday in Texas or what, and you know, lost it back immediately. Sorry. And, and, but that wasn't, that, in the Hogan era, it was really hard for someone to feel anointed, you know? Now this is a real anointing, you know?

• 2:27:52Bill Simmons?

  Well, you also, if he's the biggest attraction you have or potentially going to be that, you don't necessarily need to give him the title anyway.

• 2:27:59Speaker 06

  No, you don't. But, but it's, you know, it's just harder and harder to come up with reasons for him to go out and fight at Red, at big events when the title's not involved. So it's just a matter of, like I was saying before, it's delayed gratification or whatever, you know? You have to figure out a way to stretch it out.

• 2:28:14Bill Simmons?

  Here's what I would do. As you know, I'm an amateur WWE booker. I think he needs, I think he needs a little bit of a group. I think he needs to, like, I still feel like that four horsemen type of, type of thing. Like he needs unstoppable people around him where he's the leader of it. And then you could kind of flip him being a bad guy or he could be the guy, he wants this so badly. He wants to own WWE and be the power and these are his people. But now that his sidekicks are starting to push the envelope a little too hard. Is this who he wants to be? And like, I would go that direction. I like when somebody like him is flanked with other people.

• 2:28:53Speaker 06

  I agree. I mean, listen, you're kind of describing what Roman Reigns has figured out that worked over the past, you know, five years or whatever. So it's, but I think you're absolutely right. I mean, you said four horsemen. The worst legacy of the four horsemen is that anytime four wrestlers get together on screen, people say like, oh, it's like a new four horsemen, but not as good.

• 2:29:09Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:29:10Speaker 06

  Right? But like three, four, like four competent wrestlers being friends seem, is, should just be a renewable resource, right? You know, just like, let's put these guys together.

• 2:29:18Bill Simmons?

  It'd have to be somewhat genuine.

• 2:29:21Speaker 06

  Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I mean, listen, they sowed the seeds of him being a Paul Heyman guy last night. So, you know, maybe, you know, Heyman had the Dangerous Alliance. There's always opportunities.

• 2:29:32Bill Simmons?

  AEW?

• 2:29:34Bill Simmons?

  Just kinda over here now, is this a battle anymore or what's going on?

• 2:29:39Speaker 06

  I don't think it's a battle. I mean, I mean, it's a, it's a, it's a, I don't, I don't mean, listen, I don't know a lot of people that don't have, that choose not to watch one or the other because of time, but I, I'm sure that's a real thing for people. I don't really know what the battle would be. AEW has a really good product and they're, they're still doing things that WWE is not doing.

• 2:29:57Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:29:57Speaker 06

  And I, I mean, I just think that my, that, that, you know, the ceiling didn't quite come off the industry in the same way, but AEW is making a lot of money from Turner and, and, you know, I think their, their next contract negotiation will be interesting because they don't put it past WWE to try to somehow like get in between the two parties or, you know, whatever. But it, but that's more of a business thing. That's not about like content. I think AEW does really, really great stuff.

• 2:30:24Speaker 06

  And I, but I think that, that both companies kind of are where they are right now, you know, like I don't, people talk about ratings all the time. I really couldn't care less if like

• 2:30:33Bill Simmons?

  No, it's almost the feel.

• 2:30:34Speaker 06

  Worldwide beat AEW or like what, I mean, it does, it's just, it's, it's just a vibes thing. You're right.

• 2:30:40Bill Simmons?

  I watched, so I did watch the Reigns, um, the Reigns Rollins match. We watched that, Ben and I. I got, I wrote Ben into watching at least some of it. He's too cool for all this stuff now. Um, it'll, he'll, he'll circle back because this is what's happening. Age 24. Feel like he'll come back a little, but, um, I, you know, I did have Dean Ambrose in the back of my head as a, as the big surprise and I don't think I was alone. And the Shield coming back and, uh, but that didn't happen. There was no big, in the, in the two day SummerSlam, there was no big holy shit. Oh my God, this guy, it didn't happen, right?

• 2:31:22Speaker 06

  Uh, like crazy comebacks or whatever?

• 2:31:24Bill Simmons?

  Just like, oh, he's back or this guy's back or whoa, this guy.

• 2:31:28Speaker 06

  Raw last night, Raw last night, we had big cast. I think they saved that. I think the Raw after SummerSlam is now just, you know, biggest thing is the Raw after WrestleMania, but no, SummerSlam didn't have those moments. And I think that was because they wanted Reigns and Rollins to feel final, you know, to feel like, you know, like a real serious thing. And by the way, he had a post Reigns after he went and did like a, an interview outside the ring, just like he's a real, you know, like a real athlete would do, like a basketball player would do. Um, but they, but yeah, I mean, the Dean Ambrose thing, my, my co-host on the Masked Man Show, Kaz is, was, came, came away saying, there's no way they would have done that if they didn't think that Dean Ambrose might come back. Dean Ambrose, by the way, is wrestling under a different name, is Jon Moxley in AEW and seems very happy there.

• 2:32:09Bill Simmons?

  He's repeatedly said how happy he is there.

• 2:32:12Speaker 06

  He would never come back and all this kind of stuff. I mean, uh, you never say never in pro wrestling. Um, I don't think that what we saw at SummerSlam when they were winking at him, doing his moves, you know, doing all, referencing him vaguely on air. I, I, to me, that was less of a, you know, of, of WWE having a secret deal with him and, and probably more of a sort of long-term contract nego, long-term like wooing process, you know? It's just like, hey, just so you know, we haven't forgotten you. So if you ever want to come back to do, you know, WrestleMania 50 for like a billion dollars, we'll be here, you know? And, and I think that's always going to be on the table.

• 2:32:48Bill Simmons?

  A Shield or a Dean would be a big deal.

• 2:32:51Speaker 06

  It would be huge. It'd be absolutely enormous. Yeah.

• 2:32:53Bill Simmons?

  That's the biggest thing I feel like they could do. Um, all right. So, so why'd you write this Hulk Hogan book?

• 2:32:59Speaker 06

  So why Hulk Hogan matters? I mean, you, listen, you and I are, you know, are both writers who don't write a whole lot anymore. Um, but when I wrote about, I mean, obviously I've been writing about wrestling for two, 20 years and, and, and been writing about dead wrestlers from the very beginning, um, and, and sort of what the wrestlers mean to me when they die. And when I wrote Hulk Hogan's obituary, I was just sort of floored thinking like, well, it was a lot to get out, but it was also a lot to think like, this is the last time I'm ever going to write about Hulk Hogan. And so the idea came up to write a book. Our friends at Harper, um, Sean Desmond, who's edited a bunch of Ringer books,

• 2:33:37Speaker 06

  who was willing to take a shot on this and, and so just sort of cranked it out. Um, it was a lot of a, for me, it was like, like, I think for a lot of wrestling fans, there's so much that he did late in his life that I just hated, you know, that like really just killed me, but it killed me because of how much I loved him in the eighties, you know, how much he was, how meaningful he was to me. And, uh, you know, the title I think is deliberately a little bit of provocative, just like in the reverse way that Dead Wrestler of the Week was provocative back in the day, right? Like people saw the title and they thought I was going to be offensive. It's like, no, I'm talking about how much I love wrestlers. And this is why, and so why Hulk Hogan matters to me is both exploring why he's really meaningful to me and, you know,

• 2:34:19Speaker 06

  through much, so much of his career and, you know, kind of coming to grips with the, with everything that happened in his post wrestling life and, and, and what it means when like one of your idols can break your heart like that.

• 2:34:33Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, I went to that, it's the night before the fires, the first rot at, uh,

• 2:34:40Speaker 06

  On Netflix, yeah.

• 2:34:42Bill Simmons?

  And Hogan came out and the response from the crowd was like, one of the most shocking things I've ever been in an arena for. Couldn't believe it. Like people were fucking furious and booing him. He didn't know how to audible in the moment to it. And that old Hulk would have immediately been like, oh, I'm going to be, I, I guess I'll be a heel for this and just figure it out. And he was too old and couldn't, um, but was really like mostly despised. Now this is LA, like, you know, maybe that would happen every state, but then the fires happened the next day and it, and, you know, out here. But I just felt like that was such like a weirdly big deal that Hogan got treated like that. And, but that was where it had gotten to with the last 20 years of his life. People were just fucking out on him.

• 2:35:25Speaker 06

  Yeah. I mean, listen, he never, I, I think there's a lot of people who rightly believes he never really apologized for, you know, his racist, um, you know, video, the video of him saying racist stuff, whatever. And, and, um,

• 2:35:42Speaker 06

  you know, there was a point where he famously came back to have a talk with the locker room when WWE was letting him back in. And instead of saying, I'm sorry for what I said and I'm a changed man, he said, be careful of video cameras.

• 2:35:51Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:35:52Speaker 06

  Cause if they get, you know, just like the worst, the worst advice and the fans knew about it too, you know, so, cause all that stuff gets out. But I really think for me that the icing on the cake was him coming back on that episode of Raw and instead of saying, I love this business. I just want to wish you guys good luck. He said, buy my beer, right? The whole thing was like a promo for real American beer. And I think that was just, that was just the bridge too far. Jimmy Hart waving the flag behind him and you can't really audible a heel turn when you're like hawking your new alcohol endeavor, you know? You gotta stay, it was, it was really, really rough and, and, and it's crazy that it happened. It's crazy that nobody, him or WWE saw that coming, you know, and, and, uh, it's, it's just one of the most surreal experiences

• 2:36:35Speaker 06

  for a long time wrestling fan, and especially that being the last time you really saw it.

• 2:36:40Bill Simmons?

  Seriously, it was.

• 2:36:41Speaker 06

  Like that's, that's like the ultimate warrior who had just, I mean, almost as turbulent of out of the ring life, you know, who's not a great dude by a lot of estimations, came back when he got, you know, put in the Hall of Fame and the fans, myself included, went absolutely bonkers cheering for him. And then he passed away like the night after Raw, like it was right, it happened right away, but he went out on a high comparatively speaking. And, you know, Hogan's was, Hogan just got booed out of the arena, like, like literally.

• 2:37:07Bill Simmons?

  It's pretty tough in wrestling to turn a mass audience off with any behavior when the, there's been somebody shaking people over the years or behavior that people have abused.

• 2:37:18Speaker 06

  So many.

• 2:37:19Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's pretty, uh, well, going back to the eighties, I mean, we do these movies sometimes in the rewatchables, but that whole popcorn hero era. And I, to me, Hogan was right there with Stallone and Schwarzenegger.

• 2:37:32Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 2:37:32Bill Simmons?

  And, um, everything he stood for was also happening in the movies simultaneously.

• 2:37:38Speaker 06

  Yes, that's, it's funny because you, you know, he never reached the success and I write about that in the, in the book, but he, he never reached the success in Hollywood, obviously of Stallone and Schwarzenegger, despite being lumped in with them all the time. But, you know, looking back, Hogan was more of the, the American icon than the bigger stars were. I mean, he represented this country more, you know, as you look back and we've had these conversations for years, right? You look back and it's like, like, you know, the Reagan era or whatever. Hulk Hogan was the Reagan era. You know, Hulk Hogan was like everything that we aspired to be at that time.

• 2:38:13Bill Simmons?

  Well, and how full of shit everybody in the eighties were. It's like, take your vitamins and meanwhile, he was like doing more steroids than everybody. That was the eighties.

• 2:38:20Speaker 06

  But that's it. He's the most, he's the most quintessential American icon of that decade. So part of what I'm, when I was writing why Hulk Hogan matters, the thought process is like, am I just sad that he's not like me now? Or actually does he say more about me now than I want to admit, you know?

• 2:38:34Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:38:34Speaker 06

  Is he still what America is? Um, but yeah, I mean, honestly, that, that, that eighties, the popcorn movie era was just, it's incredible. I mean, you talk about rewatchables. There's like, there's never a time where you say no to a Schwarzenegger movie or, you know, an eighties Schwarzenegger movie or Stallone movie when they pop on.

• 2:38:51Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it was weird that Hogan never was able to put the puzzle piece together for a movie career because I think he was so big of a personality on the wrestling side. You couldn't kind of buy him playing a character where Schwarzenegger didn't matter.

• 2:39:06Speaker 06

  Yeah, Schwarzenegger. And the thing, the stunning thing is when you look at how bad Schwarzenegger was at acting in the beginning, like, could somebody not have held Hulk Hogan's hand through a movie like this or whatever?

• 2:39:16Bill Simmons?

  Well, but think about Thunder Lips is probably a better five-minute scene than any scene Schwarzenegger ever had in a movie, but Hogan couldn't figure it out.

• 2:39:25Speaker 06

  But here's, but here's the thing. I think Vince Senior, Vince's dad, who told Hogan he couldn't be in Rocky III.

• 2:39:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:39:32Speaker 06

  Was kinda right. I think wrestlers on the scale of Hulk Hogan, we just feel like we know them too well. And it's harder even than with an actor to see them play another role. I just, I just think there's a weird disconnect there that like, and that's part of what I came to why, you know, a lot of why Hulk Hogan, why wrestlers in general can affect you so, can affect me so much. It's because you feel like you know him. It's because you feel like even though he, I logically know he's playing a character, I feel like Hulk Hogan is like a figure in my life, you know, and, and it makes it hard for him to be, to be a movie star.

• 2:40:06Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's weird. This is happening in professional sports too, where there's guys that were, everybody idolized, who were some of the best people ever played, and then they just turned out to be pieces of shit. And it's like, well, how do you reconcile, like Pete Rose was the most famous baseball player when I was growing up. And then it's like, oh, he's actually a piece of shit. And it's like, well, what does that mean when the Reds won two World Series in a row and you just kinda have to move the pieces around your head. But it, it never feels great. And I think with Hogan, just, and it's not even just a racist and all of that side of it. He really seemed to be reviled by all the people behind the scenes for how selfish he was and how he always put himself over other guys.

• 2:40:50Speaker 06

  Yeah. I mean, listen, I always say that, that he, I mean, he was, for, for fans like me who were like on the internet during those days, like Hogan, stories about Hogan is how we learned about backstage politics.

• 2:41:01Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:41:02Speaker 06

  You know, all the weird stories about Hogan refused to do this job. At the same time, you had like Ric Flair refusing to do job, you know, like everybody refused to do jobs. But Hogan became like the icon of it.

• 2:41:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, he had the famous quote, "That's not gonna work for me, brother."

• 2:41:16Speaker 06

  That's what we say all the time. And when he, and, and yes, when he was doing the NWO, like he had a, he had a, a contract, I mean, a business contract that said he had creative control, right? I mean, that generally is a thumbs up, thumbs down. Part of me thinks that like, you know, people that had, the champions had had de facto creative control forever. You know, if back in the day, you just, I mean, you didn't have to show up, you know, like you wanna hold the belt, like, you know, you, you can do whatever you want. But, um, but I do think that things were moving too quickly in the, in the, in the Monday Night Wars era. And those sorts of like, "I'm not losing to that guy" happened, "That doesn't work for me, brother" was happening like 20 minutes before showtime.

• 2:41:51Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:41:52Speaker 06

  You know, and like they're live all the time. And so this becomes such a huge problem. And also when you're like, when you have that kind of power, you can't see the forest for the trees. You can talk about how, you know, that all you wanna do is make money and, and, and get, and build the business. But like, it's hard, you're, if you're the one making the calls, you can't, you can't tell. You can't tell what's working. You, you're always gonna be selfish.

• 2:42:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, it was, it was a LeBron-like career where you have the whole long peak, right? Which is the eighties and early nineties for Hogan. And then you have the NWO, heel turn, that whole thing, which I think is the greatest moment in the history of wrestling. In terms of impact, shock value, the crowd reaction, I, I just think that's number one. But then you have that last thing, which maybe for LeBron will be the Sixers if they win the title. But when Hogan has the great match against The Rock, and then finally ends up winning the title and has this one last kind of moment that I think seemed inconceivable. You're talking at that point, that's, that's almost a three-decade career of him being

• 2:42:54Bill Simmons?

  relevant. Um, which for wrestling is really unusual.

• 2:42:59Speaker 06

  If you, I mean, I don't disagree about the turn, about the heel turn. Uh, it's certainly, you know, a top two or three moment of, of our lifetimes. I mean, and, and could very easily be number one. Hogan versus The Rock, I mean, you wouldn't have to bend yourself too hard to say that's like the best wrestling match of all time. Now, it certainly wasn't the best like technical wrestling match by a long shot.

• 2:43:20Bill Simmons?

  And then him versus Andre is the biggest wrestling match.

• 2:43:23Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:43:24Bill Simmons?

  In terms of scope and everything.

• 2:43:26Speaker 06

  And yeah, in terms of what wrestling, pro wrestling can accomplish, um, you know, I mean, the fans were such a part of that, that, that Rock match. You know, I mean, that, that's, that is peak wrestling to me.

• 2:43:36Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:43:37Speaker 06

  You know, to have the fans that, that involved in it. And, and, um, yeah, I mean, he's, he's obviously one of one in terms of his impact on the business. And it's just crazy to think that like, you know, for the last decade of his life, he just wasn't really a part of it.

• 2:43:53Bill Simmons?

  Also, I don't think anyone ever held on to a receding hairline better than Hulk Hogan. Like to the, to the bitter end, he was like holding off the cliff dangling, just like, "I'm not gonna give up, brother."

• 2:44:06Speaker 06

  When they did the book cover, I was like, "Just make sure we get an angle that doesn't expose the hairline." Um, Bruce, Bruce Richards, you know, who's, who's an exec over at WWE, was their big producer for a while, said that they would spend like tens of thousands of dollars back in the eighties trying to find the camera angles that didn't show his bald spot. And so Vince realized how much money they were spending and he was like, "Stop doing that." But like, but it is, it is incredible, man. I mean, it is, you know, there was a, there were a couple of periods, I feel like in WCW where he had a hairpiece and it was like, it was, he was doing it for a movie, but he was also sort of like the Jason Alexander, like I'm also sort of trying this out for like the, the real life.

• 2:44:41Bill Simmons?

  He bandaned it. He really settled on the bandana, which I guess would have been super glued on there.

• 2:44:48Speaker 06

  Well, when he, when he, when he sued Gawker and put them out of business and that whole, that whole travesty happened, uh, you remember he, there was a whole thing about whether he could wear a bandana in court. And they eventually allowed him. They said like, "The black bandana is like the formal bandana." You know, that one was okay.

• 2:45:03Bill Simmons?

  It's like, "We know you're bald, dude. Just shave your head."

• 2:45:07Speaker 06

  Yeah, look, I'm not wearing my baseball cap for this, for this conversation. So if I can do it, Hogan can do it, man.

• 2:45:12Bill Simmons?

  Well, it was, it was quite a career though. There'll never be, certainly another one with the ups and downs that that one had. I will say, I mean, he's, we said this, you came on after he died. And there's just no question, he's by far the most significant wrestling figure in the history of the business. And doesn't mean he was the best wrestler. Doesn't mean he was the greatest champ, but he had the biggest impact. And that's just, it's kind of inarguable, right?

• 2:45:38Speaker 06

  Yeah. Yeah, it's absolutely true. I mean, we come from, from, from our generation, if you wanna like put our generations together, you know, there's some memory for people a little bit older than us of the, of the big names of like the East Coast, you know, of like the, you know, the, the big MSG icons before Hulk Hogan, but even before Backland. And, but, but really for, for, for our generation of fans, we get, we've got to see a lot of giant stars. And so it's tempting to be like, Stone Cold was bigger than Hogan, The Rock was bigger than Hogan, or like, you know, whatever. But in terms of just the lasting impact and the whole arc of the career, I mean, it's totally feasible that like wrestling might not exist the way it does today without The Rock or without Steve Austin.

• 2:46:20Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:46:20Speaker 06

  But to get, to get to them, Hulk Hogan was necessary, you know? And, and, and the heel turn was another huge thing. Heel Hogan, I think was really necessary for, for those, sometime, for those, you know, casual fans, because what he allowed, when he, when he turned heel and the casual fans were like, "Oh, like we're all in on the joke together." Like, "I wanna be, I like, I wanna..." Like, there, wrestlers, outsiders always think wrestling takes itself seriously and they, we don't, you know? And that, and, and so I think Hogan was great in the eighties because he was silly. Like, there was no way you could watch Hogan and say like, "Wrestling is real," you know? But that's what made it, that's part of what made it so accessible, you know? Because then everybody's like, "Oh, wrestling gets it." And I think there was a sort of reverse of that too, when he turned heel. He was just

• 2:47:04Speaker 06

  so, he changed everything, like, you know, two different times for pro wrestling.

• 2:47:09Bill Simmons?

  And he couldn't have a friend in wrestling because that friend was always gonna turn on him, usually in the ring with a clothesline to his back.

• 2:47:15Speaker 06

  I, I write about that in Why Hulk Hogan Matters. There's a whole chapter called Hogan The Bad Friend. He, it was Hogan's fault, man. All those guys stabbed him in the back.

• 2:47:22Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 2:47:22Speaker 06

  But if you go back and watch it, like Hogan was in the wrong every single time.

• 2:47:26Bill Simmons?

  The first one was Orndorf, which was shocking. But then it just kinda kept going and going and.

• 2:47:31Speaker 06

  Orndorf, Orndorf had a match with, that he wanted Hogan for his partner and he called Hogan and the assistant said Hogan can't come, he's lifting weights.

• 2:47:38Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 2:47:38Speaker 06

  Like that, "Come on, Hogan. Like get on the phone with your best friend, Paul Orndorff."

• 2:47:41Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, it's a little like Daniel-san in the Karate Kid series. Like, you look at it further away, it's like, maybe Hogan was the dick the whole time. Maybe all these people had the right to turn on him. I mean.

• 2:47:51Speaker 06

  And maybe that's why the heel turn worked, because we're just like, "Yes, thank you."

• 2:47:55Bill Simmons?

  Thank you. You finally embraced it.

• 2:47:56Speaker 06

  He's been a dick this whole time.

• 2:47:57Bill Simmons?

  He was definitely a little inappropriate with the macho man and, uh, Miss Elizabeth. No question.

• 2:48:01Speaker 06

  More than a little. Yeah.

• 2:48:03Bill Simmons?

  There was some blood on his hands. Anyway, all right. Name of the book, Why Hulk Hogan Matters.

• 2:48:08Speaker 06

  Why Hulk Hogan Matters.

• 2:48:09Bill Simmons?

  It is available everywhere. You can, you can get it on your, on your iPad. You can buy it in a bookstore. You can get it online, whatever you want. And you can listen to Shoemaker on the, uh, The Ring of Wrestling Show. How's Kaz doing?

• 2:48:21Speaker 06

  Kaz is great, man. Kaz is still in the Knicks afterglow, man. I mean, when he was there, he went to the Raw after, um, after the Knicks won and he had Jalen Brunson and Roman Reigns like hugging him and letting them hold the title, the trophy. So like, he's done. Like, he's done.

• 2:48:35Bill Simmons?

  Unbelievable.

• 2:48:37Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:48:37Bill Simmons?

  All right. Good luck with the book. Go buy it, everybody. Uh, thanks Shoemaker.

• 2:48:41Speaker 06

  Thank you, man. I'll talk to you soon.

• 2:48:44Bill Simmons?

  All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Shoemaker and Mina and Billy and Dabbundo and Gahal and Eduardo as always. Uh, remember Karate Kid 2 is up for rewatchables and we might be doing two next week. So you might wanna prep for Italian Job and About Last Night, 40 year anniversary of About Last Night. Uh, just an incredibly important eighties movie. Um, so that's all coming up. I don't think I'm gonna have another podcast this week unless something crazy happens. So I will see you again on Sunday.

• 2:49:35Bill Simmons?

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