NBA Insider on Betting Scandal, Chauncey Billups Poker Games, & Next Star Traded

YERRR – the boys sat down with Shams Charania and got way deeper than just trade deadlines and Woj bombs. From gambling scandals to mafia whispers, Shams breaks down the wild reality of being the NBA’s top insider. All that and more on this week’s episode of FLAGRANT. INDULGE. 0:00 Intro 00:30 Starts in 2024 + “Personal reasons” 3:28 Damon Jones connection 4:14 2 different scandals 5:31 Shams is top insider + His approach 7:33 Pulling their salaries + Klutch hoodie 8:50 Gambling in sports + Terry Rozier allegations 14:43 This isn’t abnormal + Damon Jones allegations 18:53 It’s murkier now + Prop bets are problematic 24:36 How did Mafia get to these players? 26:21 Pro poker players knew it was rigged 30:07 Protecting sources + “Burning Bridges” 33:48 Little scoop mid podcast 34:44 Shams asked for tips? Rudy Gobert scoop 39:09 Craziest thing people have said 40:23 Shams keeps it basketball 42:50 NBA Bubble + REPORT THE FACTS 46:30 People giving tips 50:28 Andrew could hoop + Beating Jay Williams 52:39 Where does Shams get his scoops? 53:43 Shams’ jumper + Dunking ON 55:38 Shams journey to becoming an insider 59:02 Kay Adams + I’m so work focused 1:02:56 The Rizz God + Matchmaking 1:05:31 Info from side chick? 1:08:23 Luka Doncic Scoop confirmed in 7 mins 1:13:01 Nico genuinely believe AD was better 1:18:32 Next superstar to move? Giannis? 1:20:34 Player has the most info? Having to post at anytime 1:23:34 Which referee was most corrupt? 1:25:31 Screentime + Kawhi Leonard allegations 1:34:04 Can this hurt the NBA? Sending a message 1:37:54 Non-NBA insider information 1:39:41 Someone else breaking your scoop 1:41:58 Why can’t Ja do the guns? 1:44:14 Michael Jordan gambling? Barkley mouth kiss 1:46:00 Which era does Shams want to cover? 1:46:53 Moves to lock out for - Giannis, Trae + LeBron 1:49:35 Dwight is straight? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, the HouseMajorityPac.com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. A dark night, a quiet house. But inside, danger was lurking.

• 0:33Speaker 01

  Oh, we have Xfinity Shield. Its built-in Wi-Fi feature detects movement without cameras.

• 0:38Speaker 00

  What she didn't know is that online, there lurked an even bigger...

• 0:42Speaker 01

  Xfinity Cyber Secure protects us from digital threats, too.

• 0:45Speaker 02

  I should have stuck to rom-coms.

• 0:47Speaker 03

  What if protecting your home and devices could be drama-free? Introducing Xfinity Shield. Visit Xfinity.com/shield to learn more. Xfinity: Imagine That. Restrictions apply. Not available in all areas. Xfinity Internet and compatible equipment required.

• 0:59Speaker 04

  Hello, everybody, and welcome to Flagrant. Today, we're joined by the League Legends. Okay, more scoops than a basket, Rob.

• 1:08Speaker 05

  Let's go.

• 1:09Speaker 04

  Jobs is in the building, everybody.

• 1:12Speaker 05

  Let's get it, let's get it.

• 1:13Speaker 04

  My brother, thank you so much for being here. We're excited. Now, tell us how the mob has infiltrated the NBA.

• 1:20Speaker 05

  I don't want to go there yet.

• 1:21Speaker 04

  No, too soon, too soon, too soon.

• 1:23Speaker 05

  No, no, but like... Let's get there, we'll get there. I'm more just... Slowly but surely.

• 1:26Speaker 04

  I more just want to understand, like...

• 1:28Speaker 05

  It's an insane story.

• 1:29Speaker 04

  Yeah, like, can you at least break down, like, what people are saying? What the idea is? Obviously, I've done some research, too, whatever. But like, I'm curious, what is the allegation?

• 1:39Speaker 05

  So, let's go back to 2024. Jontay Porter.

• 1:43Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:44Speaker 05

  Two-way contract on the Toronto Raptors. He essentially gets charged... First, he gets... He was on investigation. Then he gets banned. And then he gets formally charged with essentially gambling. But, you know, it's different names in the FBI world. It's like wire fraud, laundering.

• 2:03Speaker 04

  It's gambling, bro. Shaving points.

• 2:04Speaker 05

  It's... Yeah, exactly, it's that. But basically, it was a group of, like, a handful of people. People essentially, it's a network of people with him. They were basically getting information whether he was gonna sub himself out. Yeah. So then they just go all in on the unders and they're putting like hundreds of thousands of dollars like. Yeah. You look back on it and you're like, if the sports books or people saw like three, four people are going like hundreds of thousands of dollars in. Doesn't it make it so obvious, but these people did it? Yeah. Obviously, once it happened, the sports books, they pick it up like this.

• 2:38Speaker 05

  They flag it immediately. They flag it immediately. So. And the league flags it. So the moment that happens, the league basically, at the time, I'll never forget it, they listed him out as personal reasons. Yeah. And at the time, everyone started to hear, it was because he's being investigated for gambling essentially on his games or giving insider information. And that was a first of its kind. That had never happened before. Those same people there, they get charged everything with the FBI, with the feds. Those are the mob guys you're saying. No, these are, these are, these are the betters. Oh. These are the betters. And are they his buddies or are they, cause I thought at that time he was kinda like. He was texting with them, there were threads on it. I think, I think it was like Discord channels, like they did it in a, in a way that like,

• 3:23Speaker 05

  it ended up getting out there and people would see the messages and it's like, you could have done that smarter if you were gonna do it. But basically, it's a group of these four or five people and once they get charged, what happens? When these people get charged by the feds? Someone snitches. Eastern District of New York. So those four or five people lead to, after a year and a half later, last week, thirty-four new arrests. Wow. But it's all from that origin. Oh, because they start snitching on other people involved. I'm not saying, I'm not saying the S-word. I'm saying they're cooperating. See, the last week I'm, I'm doing TV, I'm just like, you know, the feds are waiting to see who these thirty-four people are gonna cooperate. Right. On. Right.

• 4:02Speaker 05

  What they can cooperate with. So off of those handful of people, you multiply it by six, you end up with what we got last week, which is thirty plus. Wow. But that also includes what we saw with the poker, the illegal poker scandal. So it's two different scandals right now. And those people are not connected, the poker people?

• 4:20Speaker 04

  And the gambling people.

• 4:20Speaker 05

  There's three or four people that are connected with both. They're involved on both fronts.

• 4:25Speaker 04

  And that's why the FBI is going is there like a whole Rico.

• 4:28Speaker 05

  Including Damon Jones, we'll get there. So basically, there's two separate cases.

• 4:33Speaker 04

  Assistant coach of the Lakers for anybody.

• 4:34Speaker 05

  Yeah, Damon Jones, former NBA player.

• 4:37Speaker 04

  Yes, teammate of LeBron.

• 4:38Speaker 05

  Teammate of LeBron famously. I mean, they played several years together in Cleveland. That was the most time he'd spent on one team. Other than that, he was a journeyman player, but he spent a lot of time in Cleveland. He was really close to LeBron with Shaquille O'Neal, like the list goes on and on and on. And then he was a coach in Cleveland unofficially on the Lakers 22, 20, 23.

• 4:57Speaker 04

  Filed bankruptcy a few times.

• 4:59Speaker 05

  A few times, yeah, he's.

• 5:00Speaker 04

  Sent a couple of text messages.

• 5:02Speaker 05

  Essentially, he's been living in Vegas, you know, for the last several years.

• 5:06Speaker 04

  As someone who doesn't gamble would do.

• 5:08Speaker 05

  Doesn't gamble, doesn't gamble at all. Good foods, good food. The Aria, you know, the wind, go back and forth. So basically, there's two different scandals right now. So one is this illegal poker rigging scandal that includes Damon Jones, that includes Chauncey Billups, but it also is being led and fronted by mafia, mafia members and mob members. And that is the Italian mob. I think what Kash Patel, Kash Patel said on it in his press conference was essentially like four of the five big Italian, you know, mob families, mafia families. I assume Italian are involved here.

• 5:46Speaker 04

  So racist. So racist.

• 5:50Speaker 05

  And so that is the backdrop. So those individuals are basically Damon Jones, Chauncey Billups, or the face cards is what they called it. So they're the celebrities that are being essentially thrown and flaunted. To the fish is what they called it. The people that are supposed to go there and then lose their money because they're being played because there's these X-rays. There's these, there's these different sunglasses where you can see the cards. That's sick, by the way. That's insane.

• 6:18Speaker 04

  Clever. So, so now that we've like.

• 6:20Speaker 05

  That's one part of the scandal.

• 6:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, we're just wetting everybody's beak right now.

• 6:23Speaker 05

  We're not even, we're not even at the Terry Rozier of it all, but go on.

• 6:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're just wetting beaks. We're just wetting beaks right now because I want people to understand who you are and why you have perspective on all this stuff. Okay, so. You are the top insider in the NBA right now. Which means that you have access to probably the most information that nobody else has access to. You get paid the big bucks.

• 6:48Speaker 05

  Big bucks.

• 6:48Speaker 04

  Okay, the big bucks.

• 6:49Speaker 05

  Boss Woj about him, retired Woj.

• 6:51Speaker 04

  Yeah, you had, you had to put him down. And he had a little salty ass message when he retired. Did you see that?

• 6:55Speaker 05

  No, I didn't see that. What did?

• 6:59Speaker 05

  I have a lot of love for him.

• 7:01Speaker 04

  I hope he can have the career I had, or something like that.

• 7:04Speaker 05

  We worked together for two plus years, nothing but respect for him.

• 7:07Speaker 04

  He gave you the Trump. I wish him well.

• 7:10Speaker 05

  I, I hope I can have the career he had. Oh, this guy's a politician. I like this guy. Two, two plus years we worked together. No, we were together at Yahoo Sports. We went from talking. And then he took his shit. Every five minutes. Damn. To competitors. So every, you know, that's competition, baby. That's how I view it. That's what happens in competition.

• 7:26Speaker 04

  Yeah, so I get it. Okay, but you are, and I think a lot, I don't know if people know this, but like you guys are the, the insiders are the highest paid people in, uh, entertainment, maybe outside of like a Stephen A. Smith or something like that, but what you have is incredibly valuable and the networks understand that. So these relationships you have are incredibly valuable. So even talking about something like this, probably terrifying for a guy like you.

• 7:48Speaker 05

  For sure, but it's like, I just stick to the facts. As long as I stick to the facts.

• 7:52Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 7:52Speaker 05

  And I stick to like every side, every, every side of the, of the, of the, of the equation is being accounted for. I mean, that's my job. That's how I go to sleep at night and not feel like I, I handle the, the worst is when you feel like you handle things the wrong way or didn't show someone's side or you treated someone, you know, unfairly. Cause that's not the job. The job is, there's a lot of hard conversations I have every day. I mean, half the job is just deciding when is the time to report something. Am I, have I, you know, reached out to the, as many people as I can on this? Do I have enough sources on this?

• 8:22Speaker 04

  Right.

• 8:23Speaker 05

  That's like literally all the job is. Like right now I'm sitting on four or five different things. I'm just deciding when is the right time.

• 8:29Speaker 04

  Drop that.

• 8:30Speaker 05

  This is the right time. Light this episode up, right now. Give us one. I should drop something today, earlier before I got here. The NBA pulling Chauncey Billups and Terry Rozier salaries. Terry Rozier's making 26.6 million dollars. Chauncey Billups is making 7 million dollars a season. 33 million dollars, being pulled, frozen, they're not gonna see the money. The only way Terry Rozier sees the money is if he's innocent. After a year of this, or two years, or three, however long this goes. Chauncey Billups, if this goes the full year, he's not gonna see any of his money.

• 9:01Speaker 04

  And the investigation is gonna go wild.

• 9:03Speaker 05

  It's gonna go wild.

• 9:04Speaker 04

  And he knows it's serious, that's why he showed up in the clutch hoodie.

• 9:11Speaker 05

  I'm really surprised if that's, if that's, cuz you think about it. You're getting picked up at 6:00 in the morning, right? Yeah, you gotta have on your clutch sports hoodie. That's probably the first thing he grabbed. He's walking. That's what I would grab. That's what I would grab if I was Chauncey. I ain't going down alone, bro. Rich, I ain't going down alone. I know where the bodies are buried. Or he knows who to call. Or he knows a nice hoodie when he sees one.

• 9:37Speaker 04

  It's a great hoodie, it makes, it's a great fabric. High quality. Do you have any stuff? Not yet, I'm not in enough trouble. I'm not involved in the gambling ring.

• 9:48Speaker 05

  Hope not.

• 9:49Speaker 04

  I hope not. I think there's an interesting thing, though, about, um, about what has happened with gambling that has made this more possible for players. Like, David Stern, I think, never wanted gambling involved in the NBA, as far as I was my understanding.

• 10:04Speaker 05

  Initially, that was his take, and then once Adam Silver started, you know, I, I think, speaking about how can we regulate it, legalize gambling is good for the game, and then now the NBA, I think they've been at the forefront of this.

• 10:17Speaker 04

  Right.

• 10:17Speaker 05

  As far as partnering with legalized gambling, but listen, the NFL has partnerships.

• 10:21Speaker 04

  No, no, I'm not, I'm not being critical. I think that the reason why, and there is like, you know, some wisdom that would say like, not, not being associated with the gambling creates a little bit of separation from things like this happening.

• 10:33Speaker 05

  Well, JB Bickerstaff, the Pistons coach, he said not all money is good money. So there is that, that school.

• 10:38Speaker 04

  So there, so some of these people, now. The other argument is people are gonna do it anyway. So like, they're gonna do it some guy that's wearing a leather jacket in the back of an alley, or they're gonna do it, you know, online, some professional thing, whatever. The point that I'm trying to make is, the game has changed in a way, the game of gambling, in that you can do all these like, prop bets.

• 10:56Speaker 05

  Those are the killers.

• 10:57Speaker 04

  And this is, because before, you had to actively throw a game. You had to make sure your team lost. Now you've just gotta make sure you get less than eight rebounds. And it's easy to get less than eight rebounds, or less than six assists, when you just sub yourself out because your toe hurts. So you get your little four assists, your team might be up by 10, you go, okay, my team's not gonna lose, I'm not gonna negatively impact my teammates, and I know that I haven't gotten, I'm not gonna cover the spread, and then my boys, or the mafia, whoever it is, can make a bunch of money and nobody gets hurt. At least imagine that.

• 11:31Speaker 05

  The under on points, I just pass. It's like the most charitable way to do it. Now I'm giving you the open buckets.

• 11:36Speaker 04

  But what I would, what I would say is that certain people are like, paid to score. So you really need to remove yourself from the game in order to not hit those props. Would that be a fair description?

• 11:44Speaker 05

  100%, but that's why you think about the Terry Rozier situation in 2023. How, so we already talked about Chauncey Billups. His, the FBI alleges that he knowingly participated in rigging illegal mafia-led poker games. That's one situation. The other situation is Terry Rozier, that started in 2023. Same characters as the Jontay Porter situation in 2024. That allegation is that he told his friend, a guy named De Niro, uh, which means money, right?

• 12:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, it does.

• 12:16Speaker 05

  I, I didn't, I failed out of Spanish.

• 12:19Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 12:19Speaker 05

  It's Italian. I think senior year.

• 12:21Speaker 04

  Italian mob.

• 12:23Speaker 05

  So De Niro.

• 12:24Speaker 04

  White people.

• 12:26Speaker 05

  De Niro over here, he, I guess, as, as the allegation goes, he gets the information from Terry Rozier that, hey, like, you know, the Charlotte Hornets, at this point in the season, March, I think it was March 23, 2023, they're, we all know where the Charlotte Hornets are at, at that point of the year. They're probably ending up shutting it down, they're, they're playing for a lottery, lottery. How the story goes, he tells his boy.

• 12:49Speaker 04

  Tanking is what.

• 12:50Speaker 05

  Tanking, tanking, tanking is the two word. Actually, tanking is the word they used in the indictment, so actually I'm allowed to use it. Tanking.

• 12:55Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 12:56Speaker 05

  He tells his boy De Niro, I'm shutting it down tonight, I'm just gonna play a couple minutes, and I'm out.

• 13:01Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 13:02Speaker 05

  The story goes, then his boy tells like other members of this same network of a handful of people, they all bet hundreds of thousands of dollars on the unders, they all win. But again, when this happens, it gets flagged immediately. And when it happens, the NBA launches its own investigation. The NBA can do one, few things. They can take his phone, which they did. They can interview him, which they did. Then they can ask to talk to other relevant people on the team, get medical records, see if was he really hurt, whatever. They find out he was, there's nothing on his phone that implicates him. Alright, cool, they let him play. The FBI meanwhile is investigating the hell out of this. They're talking to his boy De Niro probably, they're talking to all those other friends.

• 13:42Speaker 05

  And they come up with the assertion that Terry Rozier was in on it. That these guys, De Niro, these other guys allegedly went to his house with hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash from the winnings and gave it to him. That's in the allegations. Damn, but you're making 26 million, like. He's making 26 million dollars, he had just signed a four-year, 97 million dollar.

• 14:09Speaker 04

  I think what a lot of people don't realize is how many NBA players are degenerate gamblers. Degenerate gamblers, like constantly gambling, non-stop.

• 14:17Speaker 05

  You hear this about golf too a lot, Phil Mickelson, there's rumors.

• 14:20Speaker 04

  They're on the flights, it's gambling, non-stop, like.

• 14:23Speaker 05

  Games on flights. That happens.

• 14:26Speaker 06

  Right, you're not gambling for the money, you're gambling for the thrill of gambling.

• 14:29Speaker 05

  It's through the competition. It's the other way around, competition.

• 14:32Speaker 04

  I mean, I heard with Terry, they didn't actually catch him because they waited for him to do it a second time. So with Jontay, they flagged the first one because these like crazy bets that came in on something that's kind of obscure. And they're like, ooh, we think it's, there's something up here. And then he did it again.

• 14:50Speaker 05

  Jontay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 14:51Speaker 04

  So the second time, they're like, it's confirmed. So I've heard with Terry, they did it the first time and they were essentially waiting for him to do it again, but it never came.

• 14:58Speaker 05

  There's only one example. There's only one example. Now, how did they get to the point of like two and a half years of like investigating him and then we're putting him in cuffs? It's because of all, they clearly feel like they have enough evidence. From his friend, from those other people in the network. So there's a group of guys, if you go back and read the, if you read the indictments, dozens of pages. This guy named Eric, this guy named Shane, there's all these guys that allegedly are the network. So this guy, De Niro, tells Eric, Eric tells Shane, then Shane tells Marvus or whoever, like, they're just going around and they're sharing this information, this inside information, and they're gambling in a way. Now Terry Rozier's perspective is, I'm just, and this is the other issue that the NBA has.

• 15:41Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 15:41Speaker 05

  And I, I know, I think you might know where I'm going with this. Players in the league, this is like not abnormal. They tell their boys and these people around them all the time.

• 15:51Speaker 04

  So the idea that they're complicit.

• 15:53Speaker 05

  Like LeBron, so the other part is LeBron James. So Damon Jones is another guy, but he was involved in both. He was doing the poker and he was doing, and his was more flagrant. They have text messages.

• 16:04Speaker 04

  Just broke.

• 16:06Speaker 05

  You said it.

• 16:07Speaker 04

  He's hanging around, he's broke, he's hanging around rich people and that shit gotta be painful.

• 16:10Speaker 05

  You said it. I didn't say anything. I didn't.

• 16:12Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:12Speaker 05

  So what if you.

• 16:13Speaker 04

  I'm not gonna deny that. What if you knew the big man wasn't playing because he told you in the shoot around?

• 16:18Speaker 05

  There were texts where Damon Jones is telling these same network of people, like, yo, put the, you know, put the house on Milwaukee, make sure your guy D. Jones eats too. Essentially is what he said.

• 16:27Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:28Speaker 05

  But he, again, how is he giving that information?

• 16:31Speaker 04

  Or a big player isn't playing for the Lakers, put the house on Milwaukee. So he doesn't explicitly say, but we know.

• 16:37Speaker 05

  But then later that day LeBron James gets declared out with an ankle injury and that's who the player he was referring, and that's the guy who he was with in LA that season.

• 16:46Speaker 04

  The question is, is, and I'm not trying to like.

• 16:49Speaker 05

  It is a problem for the league, but again, how do you, how do you jurisdiction that? How do you legislate that?

• 16:54Speaker 04

  It's gonna seem like I'm running defense for LeBron here and I'm really not, but like, the, the point I'm trying to say is like, is LeBron gonna risk a billion dollar empire so Damon Jones can make 15 grand? Right? Like it's, it's cheaper for him to just give Damon Jones money. We gave him an assistant coaching job.

• 17:12Speaker 05

  See, that's what I'm asking about this Terry Rozier thing. Like if your boy wants money, just give him, if he wants to make a hundred grand, but it's like then, then what I get response with. He didn't know he was taking that information to sell it to a network of gamblers.

• 17:27Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 17:27Speaker 05

  So how many players in the league today do that?

• 17:30Speaker 04

  I think a lot. A lot of guys give information to people around them. So real quick before, so it's like, it's not, the idea is, are they giving information so their boys can make money? Or are they simply having a conversation about what happens in their life? Innocently, and then that guy takes that information, which isn't inside information. Think about this, think about like this, Al. You just, okay, go, go.

• 17:52Mark Gagnon?

  So I can see that point of view, but how do you know ahead of time that you're gonna get injured? Cause they're going out with injuries.

• 18:00Speaker 04

  No, there is no, no, no. That's different than LeBron's there.

• 18:03Speaker 05

  So LeBron James situation, he's right though, like LeBron James essentially like, in this example, as it's alleged, before the public knew that he was gonna be out with an ankle injury, Damon Jones tells a group of betters, yo, LeBron's out, bet on Milwaukee for this game, he's out. And then six hours later, he comes out.

• 18:19Mark Gagnon?

  More with Terry.

• 18:20Speaker 05

  For Rozier, it has happened where players are going into the game and like, they're gonna play this game and then they're out. You know, like this is the game, I know of at least a few examples off the top of my head where I'm like, this guy's gonna play this game and he's gonna have to have surgery. You know, I'm not, you know, there's nothing I'm doing with that information, I'm a reporter. So if they tell their camp that, it's like, now it's like, are players gonna program themselves differently? Like, do I not tell my best friend? Do I just leave it to just telling my trainer and my agent?

• 18:51Speaker 04

  And are you gonna impose punitive damages on players for sharing information? Like with your, even your trainer, can you tell your trainer ankle hurts? Because your trainer could tell his boy, yo, put everything on, I looked at his ankle. You have to tell your trainer.

• 19:06Speaker 05

  It is different though. It is different and it does look a little different. And again, the FBI is alleging that Terry Rozier was in on it. Like, let's be clear here, the FBI is fully alleging that he was in on it.

• 19:16Speaker 04

  Right.

• 19:16Speaker 05

  That he was getting the proceeds of the winnings.

• 19:20Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:20Speaker 05

  Terry Rozier's like, yo, I just said it to him just as a friend. What he did with the information, that's on him.

• 19:26Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:26Speaker 05

  Which again, that does happen all the time. If all these players had people around them that were just betting with the information, we'd be seeing this all over the league.

• 19:34Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:35Speaker 05

  But I think a lot, I think we've had a couple of bad apples, I think the NBA's had a couple of bad apples. And now from here. What more can be unearthed? I think the fact that it gone from like a handful of these guys in 2024 to are at over 30, it's already multiplied by six.

• 19:51Speaker 04

  Also, check it. We're talking about like mob guys who put crazy money on these prop bets. How many of like your friends just put 5K down?

• 20:02Speaker 05

  Fifty, fifty bucks.

• 20:03Speaker 04

  You fifty bucks and you just made some quick money. How many of your friends like you knew LeBron is gonna be out because he was hobbling around. So it's the janitor who was cleaning up the floor. All of a sudden goes, hey, I bet you 100 that the Lakers lose today. Like this information has always swirled around. There's just a way to make crazy amounts of money on it. So.

• 20:23Speaker 08

  Now you're doing illegal things within legal parameters also. Before it was all illegal.

• 20:27Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 20:27Speaker 08

  Now gambling is legal. We're just doing illegal things with it and it's just a little bit murkier.

• 20:31Speaker 04

  And it's like, who's doing the illegal thing? Like it's not illegal for a player to say how they feel to their friends. Or do you make that illegal?

• 20:38Speaker 05

  But if the friend takes that information and then puts the house down. In in the words of, I guess that that text said that. And then and then you also tell a network of gamblers?

• 20:49Speaker 04

  Oh, that's fucked up.

• 20:50Speaker 05

  Betters, yeah.

• 20:50Speaker 04

  No, I'm saying that's fucked up, but I'm like, how much can we blame the players? Like if Terry's getting a, if Terry's getting a scrape. Like, do we literally tell the players, you're not allowed to talk to anybody during the season? You're not allowed to have conversations with people?

• 21:02Speaker 08

  That's not realistic.

• 21:03Speaker 04

  Exactly. So it's like if LeBron's LeBron's kids know if his fucking ankle is fucked up. All it takes is one of them being like, man, did you see dad hobbling around? Then his friend tells somebody.

• 21:14Speaker 08

  Yeah, his friend comes over, sees LeBron hobbling around, says, you know what?

• 21:18Speaker 05

  So do you just get rid of prop bets? Again, I I will say this, I didn't really start gaining the nitty gritty of betting until last week when I knew I had to talk on TV about this. I know what the under, I don't know what any of this meant, but it seems to me like.

• 21:29Speaker 08

  Sure you didn't. Where you can get that nice ass jacket?

• 21:34Speaker 05

  It's the big bucks, my guy.

• 21:38Speaker 05

  What was paid for?

• 21:41Mark Gagnon?

  Could you explain prop bets?

• 21:42Speaker 05

  I don't, I don't gamble at all. What is a prop?

• 21:44Speaker 04

  We just, we were explaining before, it was basically betting like,

• 21:47Speaker 05

  It's the unders, right?

• 21:48Speaker 04

  You're getting under eight rebounds.

• 21:51Speaker 05

  Or overs.

• 21:51Speaker 04

  Over six assists.

• 21:52Speaker 05

  So they're like, like the minors.

• 21:54Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's not like winner losing the game.

• 21:56Speaker 05

  Got it, got it.

• 21:56Speaker 04

  Like if you, and that's where like a lot of guys will go, you know, that, that's where like, if a guy's purposely missing shots, or in baseball, they're like purposely, I don't know, like creating errors or something like that.

• 22:07Speaker 05

  Striking out.

• 22:08Speaker 04

  Ah, this is weird. Striking out is almost understandable because it's so hard to hit a fucking baseball, but with basketball, these prop bets, like, anybody can go, okay, what am I at, seven rebounds? Watch me get six rebounds and nobody will even notice. And the second I get six, I can pull myself out of the game. That's the thing. We can't force players to play. So at any point in time, they can just say, I'm hurt. And then they're a hundred million dollar investment from a franchise. They go, well, don't play him because we don't want to hurt him more.

• 22:34Speaker 05

  Well, the fact that it's regulated through the sports books, if someone places a crazy bet on a super niche weird thing, it's gonna get flagged.

• 22:40Speaker 04

  They're gonna pick it up.

• 22:41Speaker 05

  But what if you? What is that amount that gets flagged? Yeah, exactly. What if it's a thousand bucks? Well, they just have to have a threshold. They, they probably, but, but this is the other thing.

• 22:48Speaker 04

  That's how I would pay my side bitches.

• 22:51Speaker 05

  Just, just know the number that gets flagged and just bet one dollar on that. Just a little over. Yeah, I mean, the NBA, that's the thing that the NBA and these sports books are, are, I know they're having conversations right now, they have to figure out, how do you better regulate and deal with these, I think specifically the prop bets is the big issue? Like I've heard some people say, just eliminate them, like take it off the board.

• 23:12Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 23:13Speaker 05

  You know, but they need to figure out, how do you do that? And how do you do it in a way that it's really regulating this process? Cause the, these sports books are picking it up. Like if a group of like six people are going like, you know, I, I, I don't know the number, but if they're going all in on one specific thing, and it's like very niche and it's weird.

• 23:31Speaker 04

  Five hundred K on three, on assists.

• 23:32Speaker 05

  The one thing that they have done, I think they've, they've removed like two ways. I think they're either in the process of gonna remove the two ways. Two-way players. So it's not like standard contracts, but two-way players. I think that might be a first step, because you're thinking about it. Who's really betting on two-way players? That's what Jontay Porter was, he was a two-way player.

• 23:49Speaker 04

  That's great, because it also there.

• 23:50Speaker 08

  The idea is you're making so much money as an NBA player that you wouldn't risk it Terry Rozier on making a couple bucks gambling.

• 23:58Speaker 05

  But a two-way player was making 300, 400, 500K.

• 24:01Speaker 08

  They need that.

• 24:01Speaker 05

  That might be a thing, but they need to figure that part out. And the other thing that I know the league is trying to figure out is injury reporting. So injury reporting essentially guys will be listed doubtful, then questionable, then they'll, then they'll play. Or some guys might be listed doubtful or out and then they'll suddenly play or the, or the reverse. They'll be out and then they'll play and that'll, you know, mess up.

• 24:20Speaker 08

  What's tricky for the gambling companies, you make so much on prop bets. So I'm cutting a huge revenue stream because some people fix it. That's, I gotta lose all this money. Cause some bad actors and then the NBA, you know what I mean? How do you, what is the dollar amount? If we let that leak, then you're going to see a bunch of bets right under that threshold. Now do we flag that? You have to keep that number internal as well. You can't tell anybody what the threshold is. You gotta keep that quiet and then we just watch.

• 24:44Mark Gagnon?

  And the prop bets are fun. Like it makes you want to watch throughout the game. Cause before when you just bet on the outcome, then it's like, ah, whatever. I'll just wait and see who like wins.

• 24:52Speaker 08

  Dude, in the Super Bowl, what color is the Gatorade? What's the fucking color? How long is the national anthem gonna go? These are bets that everybody gets in on.

• 25:00Speaker 05

  So again, I don't know the solution, but I know for sure the NBA has got somewhat of, of a, I mean, they're, they're in their own words, this is a dire problem. There's a dire risk that comes with the gambling. And so they're, they're really trying to get on the same page with the sports books and trying to figure out how do they come up with the right measures? Because that's what this is, is like, because people were able to bet on these two-way players with the Jontay Porter thing, that's why that popped off. And so is there like a threshold of player you just eliminate from, from those prop bets? Do you just leave it to the upper class of players? I don't, I don't know what the solution is, but that's on, you know, the league's gotta figure that out.

• 25:36Speaker 08

  Sorry, and you might not know this, I would love if you'd even just speculate, how does the mafia get involved? Like how does the mafia get to Chauncey Billups? How does that whole thing happen?

• 25:47Speaker 05

  So that's the illegal poker games. So, and those games are like, I think it was like, I think what Cash Patel said was 11, 11 states. It was, the stuff was moving around. So you talk about there, there were games in New York, games in Vegas, games in LA, games, I mean, all these different states and.

• 26:05Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I think what they did is they made a connection with Chauncey Billups. Damon Jones and Chauncey Billups, uh, they have a relationship, like going back, uh, to their playing days, coaching days. Ty Lou too, like all those guys. There's a network of- Paul Pierce, Ty- Ty Lou too religious to get caught up in this.

• 26:22Speaker 05

  Essentially, there's a face card. They call it, uh, there's a, they call it a face card, right? Yeah. Yikes. Where, see, but there's different things showing up and playing and knowing. But if you show up- What the FBI is saying- You could be the mark. The FBI is alleging, see, think about it from this perspective. If Chauncey Billups shows up and plays, but has no idea that this game is being run by the mafia- Yeah. And that he's being used as a face card. What if he just got presented a deal, appearance fee of $50,000, show up, play this poker with these bunch of random people? Bring your friends, I'll give you $10,000 for your friend you bring. They don't know it's rigged. And you leave. And he has no idea. Was he winning every, go, go. But what the FBI is alleging- Yeah.

• 27:04Speaker 05

  Is that he was in on it, that he knew everything was going on, and that he was purposefully going about cheating the game and cheating, you know, the fish as they called it. Yeah. That's the allegations. Now, the FBI's gonna have to prove that in court, Chauncey Billups' camp and Rozier's camp for that, that matter. They made it clear they're innocent. You saw that professional poker player that came out? He came out two years prior. So was it one of those things- Yeah. So let's say, let's say in the world Chauncey Billups is innocent. Yeah. So- Can you say what the professional poker player said, real quick? He said that he was told, essentially, I'm paraphrasing, paraphrasing here. He was told about these poker games- Yeah. For, for multiple times, but he knew that it was a rigged game, that it was a cheat game. Yeah.

• 27:47Speaker 05

  And he bypassed participating multiple times. Oh, yeah, that's the guy right here. Oh, here it is. Watch it. And then he went on McAfee's show too and basically gave the whole breakdown. Oh, no way, recently? But like two years prior? So, so everyone in the poker world knew that these games were fixed? Hmm. I mean- Who wants to play poker with Chauncey Billups that bad? I love Chauncey Billups, dude. I love Chauncey. He's a Hall of Famer. I love him. Hall of Famer. They about to strip that shit.

• 28:14Speaker 04

  That's gone.

• 28:15Speaker 09

  It's all built around Chauncey Billups, but I, I had some friends who went and played it both in LA and in Vegas. And it obviously like was for sure confirmed to be cheated. Like people who clearly didn't even understand the rules of No Limit Hold'em are just like jamming hundreds of big blinds in with like a gutty.

• 28:36Speaker 04

  What are big blinds?

• 28:37Speaker 09

  And then just drilling it. Only the pros are losing. Well, it's tough too whenever you're dealing with somebody like high profile like that because.

• 28:45Speaker 04

  There's a little blind.

• 28:46Speaker 09

  Uh, they carry a lot of weight and hold a lot of power. So all you can do is like kind of unite together and threaten to publicly out him or restore him in some sort of capacity.

• 28:57Speaker 04

  So there's a big blind and little blind in No Limit Poker and Hold'em Poker. So basically it's uh, two players have to put money out on the table. Before cards even come. Before cards drop. Blind. And then what you can do is other people can match the big blind if they want to see the cards that come out later. Remember on the river, you ever watched poker where you see them fold the three cards out? And everybody shares those cards in the middle. So if you see your cards and you see everybody else's cards, because that's how the glasses work. Basically you know the hand that everybody has, not the full hand, but you know at that point. So what you would do is like bet tons of money on the blind. Like you would match the blind and then you would maybe raise it because you know that you have pocket aces and everybody else has shit. Yeah.

• 29:38Speaker 04

  So you have a lot of confidence and what he's saying.

• 29:40Speaker 04

  You're going all in. But not even all in, but he, what he's saying is like, they were betting in ways that you don't really understand the game. Because like if you did have a great hand, you would probably slow play it to make you think you were gonna win. Yeah. You know what I mean? But like, the guys were so bad that it actually convinced the good poker players to be like, nah, that was pure luck. There's no way. Yeah. Yeah. Crazy. Oh my god. So again.

• 30:05Speaker 05

  There's two different, you know, the FBI has got to prove it, but they're alleging that Chauncey Billups was in on it. That he knew that this game was being cheat and um.

• 30:13Speaker 04

  I mean, what is the argument for him not?

• 30:15Speaker 05

  Connected to the mafia and how the mafia is involved in all this. I mean, obviously, they're, they're fronting this. They're, they're the leaders in this. They're, I assume profiting, gaining some profit from all of this, uh, taking money from all these people and then paying upfront to Damon Jones and Chauncey Billups. To, now again, why are these people coming to, I, I can't answer that. Why are these people coming to play with Damon Jones and Chauncey Billups? I don't know.

• 30:37Speaker 04

  Yeah. Well, I guess there's some people that are like, they love playing poker and I guess you can, you know, play with an NBA player like.

• 30:44Speaker 05

  But then there are a group of people that did show up and would just be there, stand there, like Kevin Garnett was, to my understanding, he showed up to a game thinking it was a, a, a party that he was invited to, but it was poker and I guess he doesn't play poker, so he just left. So how many of those guys did that? But like, are you involved in that?

• 31:04Mark Gagnon?

  You get a lot of insider information. Do you ever have to protect certain people because they tend to give you a lot of insider information?

• 31:12Speaker 05

  Yeah, be honest, bro.

• 31:13Mark Gagnon?

  Players that maybe know how to play poker.

• 31:15Speaker 05

  Clutch, bro. Clutch, bro.

• 31:17Speaker 04

  Where's your hoodie?

• 31:18Speaker 05

  No, yeah, I know you got a hoodie, bro. So, so for me, I, I, my job is information, period. So like, whether it's about this person or that person, I think at this point, I think I've built a reputation that I'm gonna have to do my job. Now, the one thing I try to always do with any type of information that I have, whether it's league-related, player-related, team-related, like, I'm going to reach out. I'm gonna do all the reach outs necessary. Like, I'm not just gonna put it out without you knowing that it's coming out, unless, I mean, I really have to. Like, if it's bang, bang, the guy's getting arrested and I know it and I don't have the, the time to reach out to whoever it is from whatever team or player representative, like, I'm gonna do my job. I gotta do it. Um, but, no, I mean, I, I think, I think I have a job to do. I'm always gonna do it to the best of my ability.

• 32:03Speaker 05

  I don't look at it as protecting or not protecting. I think about it, how do I do it responsibly? How do I do it fairly and accurately?

• 32:09Speaker 04

  But might, might they not give you information with the, like, over and over again with the idea implied? Or say explicitly that like you are if some shit comes bad about my guy. Maybe keep that quiet because we keep feeding you information.

• 32:22Speaker 05

  Well, I think the relationship allows for context and for me to like, listen to that side, that other side. But I think at this point, I've reported on so much positive, negative and in between. I think everyone has just realized that like, I'm going to do my job.

• 32:37Speaker 04

  Have there been situations where you burned a bridge or somebody got pissed off at you or whatever?

• 32:42Speaker 05

  I mean, there's hard conversations every day that I have to have. You know, if there's something I'm reporting that someone doesn't want to report, I mean, that's a hard conversation. If there's something that, you know, if I have the truth of a story and the other side is like, no, no, no, that's not what it is, but I know that's what it is. I'm going to stand on it. I mean, it happened last year with Jimmy Butler. I don't know how much you guys followed the Jimmy Butler situation.

• 33:04Speaker 04

  Which?

• 33:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, the one when he was trying to get out of Miami, when he did eventually get out of Miami. So there was a period of weeks where I reported, he was open in trade talks.

• 33:14Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 33:14Speaker 05

  He was open to leaving. These are teams he wants to go to. Pat Riley came out with a statement and said, we're not trading Jimmy Butler.

• 33:21Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 33:22Speaker 05

  Like, but again, that's his perspective. So if I called the Heat and they said, we're not trading him. But I know where this is at. I know the truth on this.

• 33:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 33:30Speaker 05

  Either I'm going to trust my sourcing, which I did. I take their, their position in the context. I'm sure in our ESPN news story, we put this is what Pat Riley said.

• 33:39Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 33:40Speaker 05

  But I'm standing on the truth. So to answer your question, long story short, like there's always going to be those conversations to make sure I get the perspective in the context. But I don't look at it as protecting, it's not protecting. I think I'm protecting someone if I'm giving like, if I'm writing a bad story. Let's say I'm writing a story that I know is bad toward you, right? Let's say like, I'm going to call you before that story comes out. I'll get your perspective, but like, and then it's on me to figure out how do I want to handle it? You know, do I, do I want to add your perspective and stuff?

• 34:07Speaker 04

  Do you ever have people like, what I would do is if I was in the league is I would call you and I would feed you information to shape a narrative before another one could take hold. You know, I'd be like, oh, this is, this is what happened. I'm gonna give this to you right now. And now we're getting ahead of the narrative. So how do you defend against that?

• 34:26Speaker 05

  I mean, I feel like that does, that has to happen eventually, whether it's at any level of this, whether you're reporting on a player or a team, whatever. What I try to do to combat situations like that or deal with situations like that is like, I have to get every perspective. So if I'm getting a perspective about a certain team or a player or a situation, you know, like league issues are different though, right? Like if you're, if, um, can I, can we pause here?

• 34:51Speaker 04

  Yeah, go.

• 34:53Speaker 05

  Yo, I'm in a podcast, taping something urgent.

• 34:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, they, yeah, they just texted me too.

• 35:03Speaker 05

  What is it? It's just the appeal?

• 35:06Speaker 05

  Uh, yeah, that's fine. Okay.

• 35:10Mark Gagnon?

  Wow. So I heard, right. So LeBron is retiring after this year?

• 35:15Mark Gagnon?

  I just heard that.

• 35:17Speaker 04

  So what was that?

• 35:18Speaker 05

  He's locked in. Give him a second.

• 35:21Speaker 04

  All right, tweeted. And we're back?

• 35:23Speaker 05

  Yeah, we're back. What was the question?

• 35:25Speaker 04

  I forget what the question is, but, uh,

• 35:27Speaker 05

  We're back. So basically the NBA, the players' union is, is going to appeal and challenge the NBA's decision to take Terry Rozier's pay while he's on this.

• 35:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, they gotta fight for the players naturally. Okay. All right. So here's the thing. We've learned so far that people with access to information,

• 35:51Speaker 04

  close to players can, are targets of corrupt individuals trying to make money. Have you ever been targeted by the mafia?

• 36:00Speaker 05

  Never.

• 36:01Speaker 04

  Never. They never tried to like cozy up or not even the mafia, like degenerate gamblers. They're never like, yo, give me something. Never?

• 36:08Speaker 05

  I mean, you'll have the occasional person that like, yo, man, is this guy playing? Yo, where's this guy going?

• 36:12Speaker 04

  I feel like you must get that every day, jokingly at least.

• 36:17Speaker 05

  Where's this? The one I really get a lot is where's this guy going? Is this guy gonna ask for a trade?

• 36:22Mark Gagnon?

  Oh, because we're gonna ask you that.

• 36:23Speaker 05

  Uh, yeah, we'll get there. Yeah. Where's this guy going? Or like, I usually. The thing that I get most is like trades signings like if if like LeBron like LeBron next year is a free agent. The question I'll get in the lead up, where's LeBron going, where's LeBron going? Like that's what I get. People don't necessarily ask me. Is this guy sitting or is this guy not playing?

• 36:42Speaker 04

  Information.

• 36:42Speaker 05

  Yeah, like, but maybe that, you know, that's a good thing. Hopefully this podcast doesn't start that.

• 36:46Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 36:47Speaker 05

  I feel like I am pretty good though at like just smiling and like laughing and like moving on about my day. I don't.

• 36:53Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 36:54Speaker 05

  Cause I my job, like you'll read it on my Twitter if I have something or you'll read on my Twitter. Like I'm not gonna give you my information now. Like that's not gonna happen.

• 37:00Speaker 04

  Well, that's a good question. Has there ever been something that was like so potentially destructive to a player or the league? Where? You couldn't release it?

• 37:12Speaker 05

  That I haven't? That I never did?

• 37:17Speaker 05

  No, because. Everything that I've got that like if I felt like it rose to the level of like, yo, this is a big deal. I have to do the job. I mean, I'm doing the job. So I it's 10 times out of 10, I'm doing the job.

• 37:26Speaker 04

  Have you ever had people pressure you though? Like agents and shit?

• 37:29Speaker 05

  Don't do this.

• 37:30Speaker 04

  Hey, please don't do it. We'll we'll give you another piece of information or we'll give you another leak over here if you don't release this.

• 37:35Speaker 05

  I mean, those types of trade offs, I feel like the tit for tat, that happens all the time. But at the end of the day. If I feel like I need to report it. Like whether I'm reporting it in an hour or I'm reporting it in a day, like I'm reporting it.

• 37:48Speaker 04

  So you might give them 24 hours?

• 37:50Speaker 05

  You might give them time. Like, I'll give you a great example.

• 37:53Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 37:54Speaker 05

  Rudy Gobert testing positive for COVID. Now think about that. Think about the impact that had on the league. Think about the impact that had in real time. That what occurred after that and. Like I sat on that for like an hour and a half, you know, like because not only internally.

• 38:09Speaker 04

  Who told you?

• 38:10Speaker 05

  I can't say that. At the Athletic, we had, I was working at the Athletic at the time. We had a group of lawyers and like this is the first time COVID had been reported on in sports. Like an hour or two later, like I think Tom Hanks tested positive with his wife.

• 38:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 38:22Speaker 05

  And and like it had just started trickling. And then Rudy Gobert hit and it was like. Boom, shut it down. Yeah, like I was on CNN that next night, that night, the next day. I was on CNN like a dozen times that year just because the intersection of like social justice, health. But like I had to sit on that not only internally for lawyers, but like it was such a sensitive thing with player, team, league, like all of that combined. Dude, the US economy crashed the next day. Those two, Tom Hanks and then Rudy Gobert, it went from, I dropped like 8,000 points. Everything shut down. But at the end of the day, this is how I look at it. They're not always gonna like it, but they're gonna respect it. Right.

• 39:06Speaker 05

  And that's how I move and I feel like at the end of the day, like relationships are the biggest form of currency for me, like that's the biggest thing that I. Have you ever been threatened with a relationship? Are they ever like, if you release this, then don't ever come to us for a leak. We're going to somebody else. We're going to some young, new kid.

• 39:23Speaker 05

  You get that, but at the end of the day, you gotta stand on business. But then those same people you still interact with.

• 39:29Speaker 05

  Have you ever gotten a negative response where like you call someone up, you're like, hey, I need to get your side and they just cuss you out? But that's happened plenty of times. Really? That's happened plenty. But again, it's, I view it as part of it. Right. If you're not willing to have hard conversations, like the one thing about me, I feel like I'm very accessible. Like you can always reach me. I'm always gonna answer. Like I'm here for the, for the hard conversations. Now, the, the people that I reach out to that don't want to have those hard conversations, I'm a reporter, I'm gonna do the job. They don't want those hard conversations. I do. Right. So, I mean, I, I feel like if, if you're doing this job at a high, high level and you're not having those hard conversations, I think you're, you're not, either you're not doing the job at a high level or you're not doing the job the right way. Without specific names, what's the craziest thing someone said to you on the phone?

• 40:13Speaker 05

  Um. That's fun. Oh my. Yeah. Say that one. That's fun. Whatever one just came to your head, right there, say that one. Right there. I'll just say, you know, threats of physical violence are always up there, but. I haven't been assaulted yet.

• 40:30Speaker 04

  Who are you? Someone was like, if you release this, I'm gonna beat the shit out of you.

• 40:34Speaker 05

  Yeah, but like, again, people in the state of where they're at, anything can come out of their mouth.

• 40:40Speaker 04

  Got it, got it. So they're just acting emotionally.

• 40:42Speaker 05

  Yeah, but like, again, I'm someone that I feel like people who know me, who are gonna end up watching this, I think of myself as a pretty like, easygoing, like, I'm not an emotional state of mind person that like, everything you say, I'm gonna like, take to heart, and then I'm gonna like, come on the defensive and I'm gonna like, I know how it is, especially with news that's like, negative. If you're a, if you're a team person, I'm reporting about a coach or something happened, or if I'm talking to an agent and something happens with the player, like, and if it's negative and you don't want it out there, like, I understand. Like, I'm putting myself in their shoes, and I'm here for the conversations. I understand any sense of emotion people are feeling.

• 41:23Mark Gagnon?

  Are there any topics you stay away from? Cause we had Stephen A. here, and he was like, he'll get scoops about personal stuff, but he never takes any personal information to the air.

• 41:32Speaker 05

  Yeah, I feel like, I keep it basketball. Like, if it impacts basketball, like, of a player having a birth of a child, or if a player like, you know, having a, you know,

• 41:44Speaker 04

  Out of wedlock.

• 41:45Speaker 05

  Like, having a scandal, like, that I know I'm gonna have to report on, that's gonna, like, if a guy misses a game, or misses on-court stuff because of that, that's when I have to touch on it. But, for me, I stay away from,

• 41:58Speaker 04

  Like, a cheating scandal's not something you're interested in.

• 42:00Speaker 05

  Yeah, no. The most TMZ I've gone is the Yume Yudoka situation, when that was going on.

• 42:06Speaker 04

  That was wild. Unbelievable. Kneel along.

• 42:08Speaker 05

  And, and, you know, I got the proper confirmations, the report about the relationship he had internally, um, with the staffer, the improper relationship that he had, and that, you know, ended up leading to his ouster in Boston. Now, he's in Houston, by the way. Amazing, doing amazing job in Houston.

• 42:25Speaker 04

  He's a great coach, dude.

• 42:26Speaker 05

  He's one of the top coaches in the NBA. Just got a massive new extension this offseason.

• 42:30Speaker 04

  Keep your wife away.

• 42:31Speaker 05

  He's beloved.

• 42:32Speaker 04

  Keep your wife away, though.

• 42:33Speaker 05

  He's a beloved.

• 42:33Speaker 04

  Was he cracking someone's wife? Right? It was somebody's wife he was cracking. A player's wife? Allegedly?

• 42:40Speaker 05

  I don't know, but I don't think it was a player's wife.

• 42:42Speaker 04

  It wasn't a player's wife?

• 42:43Speaker 05

  No, no, no. Staff member.

• 42:44Speaker 04

  But that, oh, a staff member's wife. Yeah, he was using his staff member.

• 42:49Speaker 05

  Peace out.

• 42:50Speaker 04

  What was the bubble like, man?

• 42:52Speaker 05

  The bubble was wild.

• 42:52Speaker 04

  There were shorties in there?

• 42:53Speaker 05

  There were.

• 42:54Speaker 04

  How'd they sneak the shorties in there? Like, that's what we need to know. Were they making them work? Did they have to clean the rooms or something?

• 43:00Speaker 05

  I, I, I didn't see any.

• 43:02Speaker 04

  You didn't see any girls? There was no shorties in the bubble?

• 43:05Speaker 05

  No, I saw, I saw none.

• 43:06Speaker 04

  You saw none?

• 43:07Speaker 05

  None, zero.

• 43:08Speaker 04

  Oh, wow.

• 43:09Speaker 05

  The only thing I saw were meals being delivered outside my room when I was in quarantine.

• 43:12Speaker 04

  Female or male?

• 43:14Speaker 05

  I couldn't even tell. You can't leave the room until the food is already there. You hear the, you know, you hear it fall.

• 43:21Speaker 04

  I mean, these are, these are alpha, alpha, alpha males, full of testosterone. You can't have balls that. Inflated. Inflated, you know what I mean? For real. They, they need to, they need to let it out. They need to let loose. They didn't just have some come in for like a week or two stint just to drain them. They needed to deflate them. They needed to deflate them. They must've set a few in there just to deflate them. They must've. There must've been something.

• 43:47Speaker 05

  I don't know about that one. I don't know about that one. I, I, I didn't see any. Now, they might not have wanted to wander where I was at, the hotel area I was at.

• 43:55Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 43:55Speaker 05

  It's probably the stayaway zone.

• 43:57Speaker 04

  Fair enough, fair enough.

• 43:58Speaker 05

  The only thing I saw with the players was there, there was a restaurant a lot of guys would go to.

• 44:02Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 44:02Speaker 05

  The center of like a lake. And then you would see guys like Anthony Davis and LeBron like riding bikes.

• 44:08Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 44:08Speaker 05

  Across.

• 44:09Speaker 04

  To the restaurant by the lake.

• 44:11Speaker 05

  Yeah, to the restaurant by the lake. So maybe the restaurant by the lake was the big date spot.

• 44:14Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 44:15Speaker 05

  Media couldn't go in.

• 44:16Speaker 04

  Was it even a lake or just women dripping on the ground? Alligators, alligators. Oh, there was alligators in there too? Wow.

• 44:25Speaker 05

  Shark, shark.

• 44:28Speaker 04

  Wide jaws.

• 44:32Speaker 04

  You ever seen an alligator chomp down or something, man? They'd never let go. Yeah. They'd never let go. That's true. They'd never let go, man. It's crazy in the bubble.

• 44:41Speaker 05

  You see, I'm just feeding code over here.

• 44:43Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's it. We're just, we're just guys hanging. We didn't see anything. He won't tell us what he heard. He won't tell us what he noticed.

• 44:48Speaker 05

  I heard a lot of stuff in the bubble. I heard a lot of stuff in the bubble.

• 44:51Speaker 04

  What'd you hear?

• 44:52Speaker 05

  I mean, my first week there, the players boycotted. There was a boycott. Remember when the players boycotted the games? We're talking about.

• 44:58Speaker 04

  No, no, no, no. But why do you think there was boycott?

• 45:01Speaker 05

  Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 45:02Speaker 04

  They sent in the OnlyFans and all of a sudden they wanted to play basketball again.

• 45:07Speaker 05

  No, no.

• 45:08Speaker 04

  They were the OnlyFans there.

• 45:09Speaker 05

  At that point, you gotta leave. You gotta leave.

• 45:10Speaker 04

  You gotta leave. What do you mean?

• 45:11Speaker 05

  I'm saying if, if they actually did bring them in. You know, you give them a little excursion.

• 45:16Speaker 04

  Wait, how, you could take them out? You could, you could get out of the bubble? I thought you can't get out of the bubble?

• 45:21Speaker 05

  You can't get out of the bubble.

• 45:22Speaker 04

  You can't get out of the bubble.

• 45:22Speaker 05

  No one got out of the bubble.

• 45:23Speaker 04

  But they had, there had to be people that got into the bubble. You sneak them in as like a cafeteria employee.

• 45:28Speaker 05

  I didn't see that happen.

• 45:29Speaker 04

  No, I know you didn't.

• 45:30Speaker 08

  Did you notice that the staff was like inordinately hot?

• 45:32Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 45:33Speaker 08

  Like, the cleaning lady?

• 45:35Speaker 05

  Barely. There's barely any people there.

• 45:38Speaker 04

  There's just some dogs in there.

• 45:39Speaker 05

  So if they did it, if they did it, it was...

• 45:42Speaker 04

  They went back. That was vintage.

• 45:43Speaker 05

  I didn't see anything.

• 45:44Speaker 04

  When they used to have to work for it.

• 45:45Speaker 08

  What happened to reporting the facts, Shannon? What happened to reporting the facts?

• 45:51Speaker 05

  If I don't see it, I don't see it. If I don't see it, I don't see it.

• 45:55Speaker 08

  You don't see most of the stories you report on. You hear from sources.

• 45:58Speaker 05

  I didn't get any sources on that.

• 45:59Speaker 04

  That's a...

• 46:00Speaker 05

  But maybe they know I'm not seeking that.

• 46:02Speaker 04

  That's, that's, listen, that's, now, listen. It's like jail in there. Were the gay players popular?

• 46:10Speaker 05

  It's a great question. That's a great question. I, I mean, you gotta think about it.

• 46:15Speaker 04

  I mean, were they... Were they throwing that thing in a circle?

• 46:22Speaker 04

  You gotta drink water.

• 46:27Speaker 05

  These are, these are some hot topics.

• 46:29Speaker 04

  I mean, how many, are your DMs just constantly like, I saw this person here? Like, are there people trying to...

• 46:36Speaker 05

  People trying to give me tips on stories?

• 46:38Speaker 04

  Is that, is that common?

• 46:40Speaker 05

  I mean, I would say sometimes, fun fact, my brother actually runs my, my, my public Instagram.

• 46:46Speaker 04

  No.

• 46:47Speaker 05

  Keeping it family, brown shit. I love that. That's what's up. Keeping it in the family. That's the only guy I trust.

• 46:50Speaker 04

  Yeah. Was that who we met just out there?

• 46:53Speaker 05

  No, no, no, my, my little brother.

• 46:55Speaker 08

  No, that was just another Indian guy. That's Indian, he Pakistani, that was an Indian dude.

• 46:59Speaker 04

  Oh, my lord.

• 47:03Speaker 08

  No, I'm just telling you, they're not related at all.

• 47:05Speaker 04

  But I know, I didn't know that he was Indian and, you know. But, uh, okay, so you're not related to that guy at all?

• 47:10Speaker 05

  No, I'm not related to him, but my brother Marsh is my Instagram.

• 47:13Speaker 04

  I was about to say.

• 47:13Speaker 05

  Handles that. I don't see any DMs.

• 47:15Speaker 04

  Cause you absorbed the fuck out of the good-looking jeans if that was the case.

• 47:20Speaker 04

  I got him handsome, bro. I'm joking, my boy. The guy's like 6'4", big 6'4", beautiful beard. He's very handsome. Come on in here. Curly hair. Get your ass in here, we in the bubble, baby.

• 47:32Speaker 04

  You gotta sneak him in, dude. Sneak him in here. No, that's your PR guy. That's the ESPN PR guy. Oh, that's ESPN PR? Yes. What's his name? Uh, Rons. Rons? Yeah, he's getting a shout out. Yo, Rons, shout out you, Rons. Rons is a legend. I heard you was cleaning up in the bubble, my boy. Was he down in the bubble? I didn't see him down there. You didn't see much. You didn't see much of nothing down there. I saw what I needed to see. I like that. I saw the games. Yeah, yeah. Got to the show. I heard you hooped. I did hoop back in the day. I did hoop back in the day. Yeah, yeah. You got some NBA ties. You know, I do have some NBA ties and you know that I beat, um, Jay Williams in, in the 101 game.

• 48:12Speaker 04

  Wow. Did you not know this? I saw some footage. This is a thing of, of legends. This is, this is OG stuff. This, I let him, I, I let him think that the game was gonna be close. Yeah. And then when it came down to it. It was 101 to 7 or something, he got spotted 6. I didn't ask for 6. But they spotted you 6, so you did you really win? He said, I gave you 6 points. I was like, that's the dumbest thing you've ever done outside of getting on a motorcycle. Oh, shit. I think I, I remember this. I remember this. I do remember this.

• 48:40Speaker 04

  So, but. You just gotta go to the ends. Oh, that's a young Schultz. Yeah, look at my boy, me! Let's go. Okay, look, he bounced the ball off my head, tries to pull up on me, not gonna happen. Got the rebound. Okay, so, I pull up, obviously missed on purpose, rebound! Rebound! I'm amazed you got that rebound out of him. Come on, bro, he's not gonna box me out. Okay, look at me go right at the ankle. I'm going right at the ankle. I said, "See ya!" Oh, my god. No, you put the move on him for real. And then? He recovered, to be honest. He did recover fast as shit, he's amazing athlete. Did you make this? Of course I made it. Oh, it was. But that was your only point. You only needed 1 point. I only scored the amount that I need. It was 6, he got 6 in a row? He tried to beat you on that, that. Yeah.

• 49:25Speaker 04

  Oh, that was disrespectful. Yeah, he tried to embarrass me. That's what he gets. But I don't lose. I've never lost a game 1 on 1. We gotta play next time. Oh, do you hoop? I can hoop, I can hoop. Can you really hoop? There's some footage of me shooting. He looks like he can hoop. Hold on, did you ever play with the NBA team in the city? No.

• 49:40Speaker 05

  Not like an actual NBA team, like the, the league team that plays in like the, what's it called?

• 49:45Speaker 04

  Suburb, suburb. I played, I played, I played, uh, middle school, high school.

• 49:49Speaker 05

  No, no, no. I'm saying like the NBA association plays in a league in the city. But you live in, no, no, no.

• 49:55Speaker 04

  Chicago.

• 49:56Speaker 05

  I live in suburbs of Chicago, but I never, no, I didn't play in that.

• 49:58Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 49:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, no.

• 50:00Speaker 04

  Alright, alright.

• 50:01Speaker 05

  But there's, there's, there's footage of my jumper.

• 50:03Speaker 04

  Hold on, hold on, let's, let's get, let's get some footage of this jumper.

• 50:05Speaker 05

  I want you to rate this jumper. There's gotta be some footage.

• 50:07Mark Gagnon?

  Alright, while you're pulling it up, what's the hierarchy of like, where you get most of your scoops? Is it coming from players, execs, friends of players?

• 50:15Speaker 05

  Man, I say this to people, everyone. Like, anyone you can think of that's associated with the league. Like, sometimes, my favorite is when people guess. Like, when I break something, people are gonna guess, where did you get this from? Cause they have no idea.

• 50:28Mark Gagnon?

  Okay.

• 50:28Speaker 05

  I mean, it could be anywhere. Think about the areas, right? League, team, players, anyone else around any of those areas, basically.

• 50:37Speaker 04

  You ever cause problems? You ever cause problems on a team?

• 50:40Mark Gagnon?

  Yeah.

• 50:41Speaker 04

  Because, like, you leaked information and people are like, who the fuck is the leak? And do they come to you like, yo, you need to tell us who the leak is, cause you shouldn't know this?

• 50:49Speaker 05

  I have been asked that, but it's always hypothetically, cause they know I'll never say.

• 50:55Speaker 04

  So what is the way that they ask? How, how do they?

• 50:57Speaker 05

  I know you won't say.

• 50:58Speaker 04

  But?

• 50:59Speaker 05

  But, and it's like, you answered that. I won't say.

• 51:02Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 51:03Speaker 05

  Yeah, what do they think you have?

• 51:05Mark Gagnon?

  You ever get wined and dined? Does anyone ever take you out and like, maybe give you a little gift for Christmas or something?

• 51:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, you got, you got the clutch hoodie. That's your jumper right there?

• 51:14Speaker 05

  That's my jumper, but there's more footage, man.

• 51:17Mark Gagnon?

  He's truly the worst at Goon.

• 51:19Speaker 05

  Oh, here's one, here's one.

• 51:20Speaker 04

  Okay!

• 51:21Speaker 05

  No, it's a, look at that!

• 51:23Speaker 04

  Hey, that's not bad!

• 51:24Mark Gagnon?

  With wide shoulders too, damn.

• 51:26Speaker 04

  Yeah!

• 51:26Speaker 05

  No, no.

• 51:27Mark Gagnon?

  Come on.

• 51:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, you little transformer.

• 51:29Speaker 05

  There's more, there's more, there's gotta be more. Oh no, this ain't it.

• 51:33Speaker 04

  What's this one?

• 51:34Speaker 05

  Oh, actually there is, yeah, yeah. That was with, uh, a man in Asar Thompson.

• 51:39Speaker 04

  Oh wow. What WNBA player you think you'd beat 101?

• 51:42Speaker 05

  WNBA. I think they would all, I think, I think I would get cooked by any professional athlete.

• 51:49Speaker 04

  After seeing me beat a professional athlete?

• 51:51Speaker 05

  I think I could beat you though.

• 51:53Speaker 04

  But I beat an NBA player.

• 51:55Speaker 05

  Can I, can I tell you something?

• 51:56Speaker 04

  He spotted you six points.

• 51:57Speaker 05

  Can I tell you something?

• 51:57Speaker 04

  He was the number, but he, he wanted to do that.

• 51:59Speaker 05

  He was the number one pick. He was the number one pick.

• 52:01Speaker 04

  And he was maybe one of the best.

• 52:02Speaker 05

  He's 41, it's over. He's almost 42. His ankle is fucked, it's over.

• 52:06Speaker 04

  But I would.

• 52:07Speaker 05

  I feel like you still got it though. No, when we were in our late twenties. I played with him, he was nice, he was nice.

• 52:11Speaker 04

  If I needed, if I needed, what I didn't do on Jay, cause I felt like it would be too disrespectful, I didn't want to dunk on him. But if it was. No, I didn't want to dunk on him.

• 52:19Speaker 05

  Cause you dunked back in the day.

• 52:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 52:20Speaker 05

  I saw him dunk on a kid, 5'3".

• 52:22Speaker 04

  On him.

• 52:23Speaker 05

  Left hand though.

• 52:24Speaker 04

  On him.

• 52:25Speaker 05

  Oh.

• 52:25Speaker 04

  On is different than just having a clear lane.

• 52:28Speaker 05

  It's different.

• 52:29Speaker 04

  So I'm saying, so Jay, if I, what am I gonna do, humiliate him? I kept the game close out of respect for him. This is a person that I like and respect, a good guy.

• 52:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 52:39Speaker 04

  So I keep.

• 52:40Speaker 05

  And then you never talk, you never shut up. Oh, there's footage of you dunking.

• 52:43Speaker 04

  Now, this is me old, guys, this is me old, oh, with the left, oh, that's light, it's just easy.

• 52:49Speaker 05

  Oh, and you, and you got post video? Looking at the camera, hey man, you see this? Got the towel around his neck.

• 52:58Speaker 05

  Oh, man. This is me dunking on a Saturday. Oh, look at this, come on, man, what a.

• 53:02Speaker 04

  Did you think?

• 53:03Speaker 05

  You had a different flow back then.

• 53:04Speaker 04

  Back in the day was crazy. Propecia did wonders for me. Okay, so did you always think that you were gonna be the insider? You thought you were gonna be like a, um, just like a, what is it called? Like an op ed journalist talking about the game? When, when does this happen where you go, I'm the information, do people like talking to me and?

• 53:20Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I think it, it, it came kind of on accident, but it also came like, I love like news. So I love like the trades, signings, free agency, like all that stuff. I grew up like being obsessed with, you know, at the time, you know, growing up in Chicago, you're like, who are the Bulls gonna trade for, who are they gonna sign?

• 53:35Speaker 04

  Of course, yeah.

• 53:36Speaker 05

  What's gonna happen here, what's gonna happen there? What's going on in this locker room? When is this coach getting fired? When is this coach getting hired? Dude, the decision, when LeBron almost went to Chicago, I'm doing the math, you were like 18 at the time. That was, that, that was a big time for me though, cause I think that's when, I think I started Twitter then. Like, I started to like really get involved with like trying to pay attention to what's going on and with these teams and where's this player going? And I think player movement, team decisions, things like that, I started getting obsessed with. And so I played, then once I got cut in high school, it's like, all right, I have to, if I'm gonna stay around the NBA, I have to do something. Uh, whether it's being an agent, whether it's being on the team side, whether it's writing, whether it was, you know. Anything I wanted to do, because as Akash knows.

• 54:18Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 54:18Speaker 05

  Akash knows. You know, for me, it's like lawyer, doctor, accountant. Like, that's what I think my mom really wanted me to do. My mom really wanted me to get into healthcare.

• 54:33Speaker 04

  He's like a beauty. I've heard this one since like high school. This is actually from a video. This is not a 9/11 joke. He's a pilot, great.

• 54:43Speaker 08

  You haven't seen this?

• 54:45Speaker 04

  No, oh my god, you gotta bring this up.

• 54:47Speaker 05

  I'm like, damn, I've heard this since high school.

• 54:49Speaker 04

  You're so much less racist once you see the video. This is a...

• 54:52Speaker 06

  It's a Pakistani school.

• 54:54Speaker 04

  It's a Pakistani school, and it's the kids are coming up and saying what they want to be when they're older. So each kid has their own thing.

• 55:00Speaker 05

  I always wanted to be an NBA player. So for me, that was like my number one thing. Then once I realized I couldn't do it.

• 55:06Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 55:06Speaker 05

  It's figuring out how can I stay close to the game?

• 55:08Speaker 04

  How can you be around the game?

• 55:09Speaker 05

  So my sophomore year of high school, my English teacher goes, "You should just write. You're really good at writing, and you love basketball. Combine both passions." That's what I did.

• 55:18Speaker 04

  Oh, wow.

• 55:18Speaker 05

  Then you write for the school newspaper, then you write for a Bulls blog, then you write for another website, realgm.com. I don't...

• 55:24Speaker 04

  I know, realgm.com.

• 55:25Speaker 05

  You have to be like nitty gritty NBA basketball fan. You know what realgm.com is? Like, it's a rumor site. I used to be obsessed with it. And I would just like refresh all day, that and Hoops Hype. And just like follow everything. And I was obsessed with that.

• 55:40Speaker 04

  These are the years before Twitter, when we actually had to go to like websites to get information.

• 55:43Speaker 05

  This is like 20... This is between 2008 to like 2014.

• 55:49Speaker 04

  All right, here we go. Go back to the beginning of it.

• 55:51Speaker 05

  Yeah, I haven't seen this.

• 55:51Speaker 04

  I cannot believe, as a Pakistani man.

• 55:53Speaker 05

  I haven't seen this.

• 55:54Speaker 04

  You haven't seen this.

• 56:14Speaker 05

  How many times have you seen this?

• 56:16Speaker 04

  Dude, brown people love this one. My wife and I quote this all the time.

• 56:19Speaker 05

  I haven't seen this.

• 56:20Speaker 04

  So that's what "I want to be pilot" is. You've never heard that?

• 56:23Speaker 05

  No. See, I'm like NBA.

• 56:26Speaker 04

  We're beyond racism, okay?

• 56:27Speaker 05

  I'm NBA.

• 56:28Speaker 04

  I'm like NBA.

• 56:29Speaker 08

  Yeah, he's all NBA memes.

• 56:31Speaker 05

  Oh, God.

• 56:32Speaker 08

  All right, let me ask you another Brown question. I love Brown love, I do. But I have to ask, what's up with you and Kay Adams?

• 56:38Speaker 05

  Great friend.

• 56:39Speaker 08

  Oh, this was.

• 56:40Speaker 05

  I think, I think we're great on TV. I worked with her.

• 56:43Speaker 08

  Great chemistry. She be giving you rhythm.

• 56:46Speaker 05

  On TV.

• 56:47Speaker 04

  She does throw you some rhythm, bro. Ain't no lie.

• 56:49Speaker 08

  I don't blame her.

• 56:50Speaker 05

  You know, I, I've, I've really enjoyed working with, like, you know, her on TV. It's been fun.

• 56:56Speaker 04

  I mean, you powered through that unbelievably.

• 56:57Speaker 05

  That was really good.

• 56:58Speaker 04

  I mean, that was phenomenal. That was amazing political answers right there. That's professional, because you both work, you know, at the company.

• 57:04Speaker 05

  But like, we work together.

• 57:04Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 57:05Speaker 05

  We work together. We had to do.

• 57:06Speaker 04

  No, there's no such thing as workplace romance that's ever in the history of the world.

• 57:09Speaker 05

  But she's actually like, genuinely a good friend. Good, great friend.

• 57:12Speaker 04

  So, nothing, nothing else going on?

• 57:14Speaker 05

  No, no, no.

• 57:15Speaker 04

  But if, if there was a time in the future where you guys weren't both working at the same organization, you know?

• 57:21Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, for me, I'm so work focused.

• 57:24Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. My whole day.

• 57:27Speaker 05

  I'm sorry, Kay. I'm sorry, Kay. My whole days are just absorbed by this, what I'm doing on a daily basis. And so.

• 57:35Speaker 08

  She's a very, a beautiful woman. I don't mean that in a disrespectful way.

• 57:39Speaker 05

  Talented too. Super talented.

• 57:40Speaker 08

  Yeah, funny.

• 57:40Speaker 05

  And her ability to like.

• 57:41Speaker 08

  Charismatic.

• 57:42Speaker 05

  See, for me, I'm a very, the stuff that I talk about is really serious. I feel like I could be very serious at different points. Like, her, Pat McAfee, they do a great job of bringing personality. You got, like, doing this podcast, brings a different personality out.

• 57:53Speaker 04

  Right.

• 57:53Speaker 05

  Maybe people don't see all the time.

• 57:54Speaker 04

  So, she brings out the, the joy in you, brings the light out of you.

• 57:58Speaker 05

  Yeah. She's, her, Pat McAfee do a great job of that.

• 58:00Speaker 04

  Yeah. But also just her as well. Yeah, you don't need to throw Pat in there. Pat really got nothing to do with it, if you ask me. Yeah, you did that. Pat's actually a whole different sport, really, so like.

• 58:09Speaker 05

  No, but similar.

• 58:10Speaker 08

  No, not.

• 58:11Speaker 05

  No, no.

• 58:12Speaker 08

  I'm not gonna talk about it, bro. I can't see a similarity between Kay Adams and Pat McAfee.

• 58:17Speaker 05

  Not at all. I've never even thought of them in the same way.

• 58:19Speaker 04

  It's, it's different zones.

• 58:20Speaker 05

  Maybe they both don't wear sleeves?

• 58:21Speaker 04

  It's different zones. Different chromosomes, you mean?

• 58:23Speaker 05

  It's different zones. But. Different sides of my personality are able to be unlocked on both.

• 58:30Speaker 08

  Okay.

• 58:31Speaker 05

  If that makes sense.

• 58:32Speaker 04

  Which side is unlocked with K? The libido?

• 58:34Speaker 08

  What are you trying to say?

• 58:35Speaker 06

  You gotta flip it on him. You gotta go on the offensive.

• 58:37Speaker 08

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 58:39Speaker 05

  I need help. I need help.

• 58:41Speaker 06

  You guys seem to like this girl a lot. Do you guys have like a crush on her or something?

• 58:43Speaker 04

  Yeah, you got a crush on this white woman?

• 58:45Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 58:46Speaker 04

  No, dude, I'm married.

• 58:47Speaker 05

  Hold on, I'm married.

• 58:48Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 58:49Speaker 05

  Hey, you got a ring on. You just said she's hot.

• 58:51Speaker 08

  I'm very little in my life. I've never had milk in my life, but some of these girls is ice cream.

• 59:03Speaker 04

  He is the scoop, man.

• 59:06Speaker 05

  I'm not involved in this. I'm not involved in ice cream scoop.

• 59:09Speaker 04

  There's nothing wrong with a scoop, bro.

• 59:10Speaker 08

  I'm happily married. You're not.

• 59:13Speaker 05

  Starts with a scoop.

• 59:13Speaker 08

  As far as I know, I don't see the ring.

• 59:14Speaker 05

  Starts with a scoop.

• 59:15Speaker 04

  So what's your favorite? So you stick with ice cream?

• 59:18Speaker 08

  Brown girls. I'm a brown, I'm a brown man, but I just objectively noticed you can't call some of them milk. They transcend that.

• 59:23Speaker 05

  They transcend it.

• 59:24Speaker 06

  Vanilla scoops.

• 59:25Speaker 04

  The vanilla scoops.

• 59:26Speaker 08

  Yeah.

• 59:26Speaker 04

  But you could turn that shit into a sundae.

• 59:28Speaker 08

  You could be the caramel topping. That mean? With some nuts on it.

• 59:34Speaker 05

  I got nothing there, but. She's a great friend, great person. I think we made, we have, when we were working together, made great TV.

• 59:42Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's fun. Well, that's good, man. I look forward to more of that in the future.

• 59:46Speaker 05

  Yeah, it'll be fun.

• 59:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, it would definitely be.

• 59:48Speaker 08

  Jokes aside, was that weird seeing the internet take that whole thing into, it was like a thing for like a couple of months.

• 59:53Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, people, people love good TV, you know? I think people love good TV. I would say, I would say people love great TV.

• 1:00:03Speaker 08

  That wasn't even a tough one. That wasn't even a gotcha.

• 1:00:07Speaker 05

  I know, I'm saying people love great TV. I think that's why.

• 1:00:09Speaker 08

  They, they, they coupled you guys.

• 1:00:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, they, they created a romantic connection that obviously was never there.

• 1:00:16Speaker 08

  What was it? It was not Sham God. It was something about his, uh... The Rizz, Rizz Master, some shit like that.

• 1:00:22Speaker 05

  What was it? You know what he's talking about.

• 1:00:23Speaker 08

  Yeah, what was the nickname? What was the moniker they gave you?

• 1:00:25Speaker 05

  It's what the people said.

• 1:00:26Speaker 08

  Yeah, what did the people say?

• 1:00:27Speaker 05

  Our guys are gonna find it.

• 1:00:28Speaker 08

  It's horrible.

• 1:00:30Speaker 05

  Rizz God.

• 1:00:31Speaker 08

  Rizz God, there it was.

• 1:00:32Speaker 05

  Rizz God.

• 1:00:33Speaker 08

  People would call you that? That's crazy.

• 1:00:34Speaker 05

  Rizz God.

• 1:00:35Speaker 08

  For no reason.

• 1:00:36Speaker 05

  The crazy part is, I don't really, people that know me, like, I don't really have, you know, I don't have game like that.

• 1:00:41Speaker 08

  That's what every Rizz God says. Every Rizz God says.

• 1:00:46Speaker 05

  That was my move too, like, damn, I don't got no game. I'm honestly, like, I'm a shy person.

• 1:00:52Speaker 08

  You're just shy. Big dicked.

• 1:00:57Speaker 05

  I'm like, I'm like the Kasha over here.

• 1:00:59Speaker 08

  No, no, you're not. I ain't big dicked.

• 1:01:04Speaker 08

  I'm married.

• 1:01:07Speaker 05

  We're all trying to be where you're at, man. Married.

• 1:01:09Speaker 08

  I'm trying to get you, I'm trying to do your rishter right now.

• 1:01:12Speaker 05

  Set it up.

• 1:01:13Speaker 08

  With this little scoop of ice cream.

• 1:01:17Speaker 05

  You're stuck on the vanilla, man. We're talking about sundaes over here.

• 1:01:20Speaker 08

  I'm not, I would love, if you got with a brown girl, I'd be so happy. Wait, what do you mean, why sundaes? Cause it got a banana in it?

• 1:01:28Speaker 08

  Hey, if you get with a brown woman, I'd be, I'd be very thrilled. I'll try to set you up with one. What you looking for? You wanna get smiley girl? Is that important to you?

• 1:01:36Speaker 05

  Man, listen, right now, work is important to me. I like that. You gotta focus on work.

• 1:01:41Speaker 08

  Let me call your mom, we'll set this shit up real quick, cause I'm tired of your politicking. Don't you have, doesn't your mom want you to get, you know, meet a nice lady?

• 1:01:50Speaker 05

  I mean, my mom wants me to focus on, on work.

• 1:01:53Speaker 08

  Oh, really? No, she doesn't. You're 31, don't lie to me.

• 1:01:55Speaker 05

  No, no, because, because this is the thing, when you're, when you're around your family, they see what this is like more than anyone. And so they know, like, how much I care for it, my passion for it, the time, um, and I think, you know, growing up, it was like, alright, if, you know, doctor, lawyer, accountant, anything in the medical field, that would be amazing. But once I found this, and, you know, my mom knows how passionate I am about it, she's like, spend all the time you want on this, and like, make it your number one thing.

• 1:02:22Speaker 08

  Let me tell you why I know you're lying. This is a personal story.

• 1:02:24Speaker 05

  It's facts.

• 1:02:24Speaker 08

  My mom went to, my mom went to the hospital, she had to get like a neuroscan or some, I'm freaking out, I'm in New York, I, I'm doing something, filming something, I can't get back to see her. I start crying on the phone with her, I'm like, I need you in my life, I can't lose you. I'm 31 years old, exactly as old as you are right now, and she goes, oh god, get a girlfriend. That's what she said to me. She was like, I'm not, shut up. She was like, stop wasting everybody's time. So I know brown moms. Your mom is not like, hey, you're 31, stay focused on your career. She's like, give me a grand baby.

• 1:02:56Speaker 05

  Sometimes, but most of the time, it's focus on the job.

• 1:03:00Speaker 04

  I like that. Yeah.

• 1:03:01Speaker 06

  Have you ever gotten information from a wife, or a girlfriend, or an ex-girlfriend?

• 1:03:06Speaker 08

  Oh, and you handsome, they're probably giving it up.

• 1:03:09Speaker 04

  Ooh, a side chick upset.

• 1:03:11Speaker 08

  That's good.

• 1:03:12Speaker 04

  No, a side chick that's upset.

• 1:03:15Speaker 05

  I mean, listen, I'll just say, I, every, every area, every domain you could think of.

• 1:03:21Speaker 08

  That's a yes.

• 1:03:22Speaker 04

  You've been honey potted?

• 1:03:23Speaker 05

  Any domain you can think of.

• 1:03:25Speaker 04

  You've been honey potted?

• 1:03:27Speaker 05

  Probably gotten information from any domain you can think of.

• 1:03:30Speaker 04

  Did you stuff dick?

• 1:03:32Speaker 05

  Jesus.

• 1:03:32Speaker 04

  No, you can't ask that. Hold on. No, cuz he.

• 1:03:39Speaker 04

  That's not illegal.

• 1:03:41Speaker 05

  That's not illegal. Illegal about that.

• 1:03:45Speaker 04

  That's so unprofessional. This guy has a real job.

• 1:03:47Speaker 05

  No, I know, but that's not illegal.

• 1:03:51Speaker 05

  But it's not illegal to do that.

• 1:03:53Speaker 04

  To do what?

• 1:03:54Speaker 05

  There's no law in America that says to do that.

• 1:03:56Speaker 04

  To do what?

• 1:03:57Speaker 05

  Stuff coping mouths with dick.

• 1:04:01Speaker 05

  But in all seriousness, like, that's not illegal. If they were gonna do that, if they were trying to bribe you with that.

• 1:04:05Speaker 04

  I apologize, but it hit you.

• 1:04:07Speaker 05

  No, no, no, no.

• 1:04:08Speaker 04

  Yo, but, but.

• 1:04:09Speaker 05

  Any domain you can think of.

• 1:04:11Speaker 04

  You can't ask that, bro. What's wrong with you guys?

• 1:04:13Speaker 05

  For, for real.

• 1:04:14Speaker 04

  Did a girl try to hot pocket you?

• 1:04:17Speaker 05

  What does that mean?

• 1:04:18Speaker 04

  The hot pocket.

• 1:04:19Speaker 05

  For what?

• 1:04:22Speaker 05

  What are you, what, come on, you know.

• 1:04:24Speaker 04

  What is a hot pocket?

• 1:04:25Speaker 05

  The hot pocket. But in this context, I'm trying to understand.

• 1:04:28Speaker 08

  Oh, you're about to.

• 1:04:32Speaker 04

  A girl wants you to put a story out about like a, a player that she like really just doesn't like, you know? Because maybe they had like an amazing, uh, uh, few sexual intercoursees.

• 1:04:43Speaker 05

  But why is that a story for me?

• 1:04:44Speaker 04

  But she's like, I want you to say that he's a bad guy.

• 1:04:47Speaker 05

  And you're like, I'm not.

• 1:04:49Speaker 04

  Yeah, you say that. Why is that a story for me? And then she's like, well, what, how do I make it a story for you?

• 1:04:54Speaker 08

  Maybe, maybe she told him, or he told her, she's disgruntled, he's disgruntled with his team, he wants out, he's beefing with his teammate, and she wants to give that information to him.

• 1:05:03Speaker 05

  If that were to happen, now that's a, that's a, that's what we call a tip to a story potentially.

• 1:05:07Speaker 04

  Now, did you give her a tip?

• 1:05:08Speaker 05

  No, no, no, I can't do that.

• 1:05:11Speaker 08

  I just sent him off for that.

• 1:05:14Speaker 08

  Can I be honest, I've been on the opposite end of this, there's nothing you could say that he can't flip.

• 1:05:19Speaker 05

  Yeah, I know.

• 1:05:20Speaker 08

  He's like a jujitsu master of sexual healing.

• 1:05:23Speaker 04

  But, alright, what about all the Achilles injuries?

• 1:05:26Speaker 05

  It's a lot. A lot of Achilles injuries.

• 1:05:28Speaker 04

  What do we think that's about?

• 1:05:29Speaker 05

  I think the NBA's doing a, doing a, doing a report about that.

• 1:05:31Speaker 04

  Oh, really?

• 1:05:32Speaker 05

  Looking into, so we have Jason Tatum, Damian Lillard, Tyrese Halliburton, and the Kyrie Irving is ACL, but he's gonna be out, you're Mavericks, he's gonna miss some time.

• 1:05:41Speaker 08

  It's brutal. How does Nico Harrison still have a fucking job? Please explain this to me. And how upset, you know, the city of Dallas is...

• 1:05:49Speaker 04

  I mean, he broke the news.

• 1:05:49Speaker 05

  I'm, I'm well aware.

• 1:05:50Speaker 08

  You broke the team, yeah, you broke the, I truly believe if...

• 1:05:53Speaker 05

  Have your producer, here's a fun exercise for you guys, have the producer pull up that tweet.

• 1:05:59Speaker 04

  Pull up that tweet.

• 1:06:00Speaker 08

  He's not gonna...

• 1:06:00Speaker 04

  That's just the exercise, see if you can pull it up.

• 1:06:04Speaker 05

  I want you to see, it's still jarring to me, how, how much, like, I knew it was a big deal when it happened, but how big it became, like, globally.

• 1:06:13Speaker 08

  People outside of Dallas don't understand how much we loved Luca, we didn't need him to win yet. We were like, we'll take time, because we, we worked out with Dirk, and we felt like we got it again, and it was awesome. So, trading him, truly, they would've lost the team if they didn't get Cooper Flagg. I truly believe the lottery was rigged for that reason, because the Mavs would've left.

• 1:06:30Speaker 04

  110.7 million?

• 1:06:34Speaker 05

  Holy shit.

• 1:06:35Speaker 04

  Views.

• 1:06:36Speaker 08

  Damn.

• 1:06:37Speaker 04

  How long did you have this information before you...

• 1:06:40Speaker 05

  Seven minutes.

• 1:06:42Speaker 04

  You got seven minutes to confirm that it was truthful?

• 1:06:44Speaker 05

  Five different sources. So, I got a heads up.

• 1:06:47Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 1:06:47Speaker 05

  First heads up, Maxie Kleber, uh, first heads up, Markeith Morris is being traded to the Lakers. Second heads up, Markeith, Markeith Morris being traded Lakers. Second heads up, Maxie Kleber being traded Lakers. I'm like, what is, what is going on? Then I get another source, three-team deal, Lakers, Mavs, Jazz.

• 1:07:06Speaker 05

  Jalen Huchafino is going to Utah. I'm like, what is this three-team deal? These are a bunch of, you know, guys that are on contracts that are... Like, are they just trading small salaries for small salaries? And then the fourth person tells me, Luka Doncic for Anthony Davis. These are all the parts.

• 1:07:25Speaker 04

  Fifth person?

• 1:07:26Speaker 05

  The whole deal. I got the whole deal. And I'm like, am I being catfished right now?

• 1:07:32Speaker 04

  That's what I'm trying to understand.

• 1:07:33Speaker 05

  Is this person's phone hacked? I gotta call this person. Call them. Hear their voice. It's real. I'm like, holy... And like, my hands are literally shaking. I'm like sweating. Mind you, the context of this, it's like 11 central time. I'm in Chicago. The Lakers had just beaten the Knicks by a lot in New York at the Garden on a Saturday night. My hair was all down, my glasses on. I was getting ready to shut it down for the night. And I'm just like, my hands are trembling. Like, I'm just like, this is unbelievable. I called the fifth person. Actually, I called someone else. The phone didn't even ring. It wouldn't even go. So I'm like, this person's definitely dealing with this right now. I called another person. The person picks up.

• 1:08:18Speaker 05

  I'm like, there's no way this shit is fucking real. And the person goes, yeah, it's real. Next thing you know, that's that. Seven minutes.

• 1:08:28Speaker 04

  Whoa. The fourth person that you get on the phone and actually hear it from, are you convinced by them in that moment?

• 1:08:36Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:08:37Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:08:37Speaker 05

  I know they're not, they're not pulling my tail.

• 1:08:40Speaker 04

  And there's no, and again, I'm not asking sources, but like, they've never led you astray in the past.

• 1:08:44Speaker 05

  No, no, no.

• 1:08:44Speaker 04

  This is something that you can trust.

• 1:08:45Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 1:08:46Speaker 04

  Because if you go out with this and then it ends up not happening, I'm sure you're considering how that makes you look.

• 1:08:51Speaker 05

  Is that why your hand is trembling? Yeah, about everything. It's that, it's, is this all accurate? Making sure it's all accurate? And then, this is something like, very minor on the, like, getting... Like, I have no typo in this. I just, I, like, it's like, I think it's probably my most perfect tweet. Because I made sure, this is the one tweet you can't have a typo in. Like, you can't get a detail wrong. You can't have... First, you know, 2029 first round pick, but it's really 2026 first round pick.

• 1:09:20Speaker 08

  Yeah.

• 1:09:20Speaker 05

  Like, every detail has to be right, because you know it's gonna be a big deal. And I didn't think it would be this big.

• 1:09:24Speaker 08

  I swear to God, I'm getting PTSD looking at this.

• 1:09:27Speaker 05

  Look at, I'm sorry for doing that.

• 1:09:28Speaker 08

  Look at the first reply. Nico, fucking loser.

• 1:09:31Speaker 05

  Bro, I had to check 10 times to see if this was a real account. Yeah, my phone blew up because everyone thought I got hacked, or it was fake, or that my safety was, was under concern. Uh, so my phone was blowing up, my phone. I'd never had that many calls. And it's one of those things where it's like continuous calls, right?

• 1:09:51Speaker 08

  Are you answering any, or do you just shut it down?

• 1:09:53Speaker 05

  I answered like five, five people. One was like the late night SportsCenter guy, because I'm like, I know, I know why he, you know, he wants to make sure it's real. He needs to make sure it's real, so we can cover it. Couple other people. I think I picked up Stephen A's call, Pat McAfee's call, two other people, and then, yeah, that night was wild.

• 1:10:10Speaker 08

  Do you sleep, sorry, sorry, do you sleep at all that night?

• 1:10:12Speaker 05

  I slept like one and a half hours.

• 1:10:13Speaker 08

  Okay, so you stay up throughout the night?

• 1:10:15Speaker 05

  I stayed up till like, I had a SportsCenter hit at like 6:00 in the morning. I think I slept till like 4:00, got up at like 5:15, did my SportsCenter hit, and the day was on and popping. What's funny is I had a 7:00 AM flight to Bristol for the trade deadline. I'm like, alright, I'm gonna be covering Jimmy Butler, De'Aaron Fox getting traded this week. And yeah.

• 1:10:31Speaker 08

  I need to know how this happened, as a fan.

• 1:10:33Speaker 05

  Okay, okay.

• 1:10:34Speaker 08

  What's going on, what's with Nico? Why does he do this? It can't possibly be he thought they made this, this made them a better team. It cannot possibly be that.

• 1:10:40Speaker 05

  He genuinely believed that Anthony Davis-

• 1:10:43Speaker 08

  Who we call street clothes as a nickname.

• 1:10:45Speaker 05

  Was a, is a better championship fit, better for their culture and defense. Like, again, this is in real time, back then. This is what he believed. Now, he might still believe this, and I don't think anyone's gone up and asked, do you still believe this? But as of, you know, even training camp, this is what they believed. Anthony Davis being a better fit to a championship-quality team than Luka Doncic, and whatever concerns they had about Luka. So you go out and make this trade. Now, again, on face, Anthony Davis above 30, you have Luka Doncic, who at the time of the trade, 25, All-NBA for four, five straight years.

• 1:11:18Speaker 08

  It's the worst trade in sports history.

• 1:11:19Speaker 05

  Anthony Davis is, is, you know, Anthony Davis is a top 75 player. He's an All-NBA All-Star, he's a Hall of Fame player in his own right. Luka Doncic is obviously Luka Doncic.

• 1:11:29Speaker 08

  I can barely watch sports anymore.

• 1:11:31Speaker 05

  I hear that a lot from people in Dallas. I hear that a lot from people in Dallas. But how does Nico Harrison, I think your question was how does Nico Harrison have a job? I mean, the reality is, the roster he's built when healthy, the Mavs, Nico Harrison, that ownership Patrick Dumont, the new owner there, they believe it's a championship quality roster. If they stay healthy. And if I grow seven inches. See, it's not my place to say whether it was a right or wrong trade. I, even when it happened, I saw why Dallas did it. Again, does that justify it? Now, if you're asking me, do the vast majority of people I speak to? No, I'm saying, do you think it's a good trade? I mean, for, it's not on me to decide. That's not my place.

• 1:12:14Speaker 05

  Your opinion. Your opinion. What are you, you can't give a opinion? I think on face, of course, when you trade a guy like Luka Doncic, I just look at it from a position of, he's 25 years old. I mean, you can build for the next 10 years. You can, you can build around him. But again, time will tell on this. Is that because you're a journalist? You're not really, you don't like to give your opinion? It's not my place, but it's also like, my job is to take perspectives and information, insight, and present it in the most responsible and fair way. Like Nico Harrison and the Mavericks had their reasons, even at an ownership level. They had their reasons to make this trade. They felt it was going to lead them to a championship. But again, the Lakers, since this trade, they lost in the first round.

• 1:12:59Speaker 05

  The Mavericks, they lost in the first round, right? No, they didn't. They lost in the play-in tournament. They, yeah. So they lost in the play-in tournament. So I'm not saying neither side has, we don't know what's happened, but the goal is to win a championship, right? So I'm just saying like this, let's say the Mavericks this year or next year win a championship, and the Lakers don't. So are we going to say this trade was a success? Yeah, sure. We can speak in impossibilities all we want to.

• 1:13:21Speaker 08

  The show. Who do you think is the next NBA superstar to get traded? Because Giannis, I thought would be the one, but he's at like 99% on calls. He's staying in Milwaukee. So I just checked that a little bit just to see, because I just want somebody to share my misery.

• 1:13:34Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think, I think the next guy to keep, I mean, next couple guys to keep it on probably are Giannis still. I think you have to monitor that situation. Big win for them against the Knicks, your Knicks. There was like a two-week period with the Knicks. What was that about? Your Knicks. I mean, your Knicks. But why did you say it like that? Because they got, did you see the score last night? Well, why are we even talking about old shit? Happened 24 hours ago.

• 1:13:59Speaker 04

  I'm just saying.

• 1:13:59Speaker 06

  It was in the way game.

• 1:14:00Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:14:02Speaker 06

  When we in the garden, we take care of it.

• 1:14:03Speaker 04

  Yeah, there was other things going on. We have to give a false sense of security.

• 1:14:06Speaker 05

  Who won? What was the score? There was a two week period where the Knicks.

• 1:14:09Speaker 06

  Wasn't good.

• 1:14:10Speaker 05

  Knew that Giannis and Cooper wanted to play there.

• 1:14:12Speaker 04

  How did the Knicks?

• 1:14:13Speaker 05

  And so did the Bucks.

• 1:14:14Speaker 04

  How did the Knicks fuck that up?

• 1:14:16Speaker 05

  Wow.

• 1:14:17Speaker 04

  How we fucked that up?

• 1:14:18Speaker 05

  Two week period where they knew, they had conversations, offers were made.

• 1:14:21Speaker 04

  What did, what did we have to offer? What did they want? Did they want JB?

• 1:14:26Speaker 05

  No. You probably want the, I don't even think it got to a point. I think it's like, make the best offers you have.

• 1:14:32Speaker 04

  Ands? What did they offer?

• 1:14:34Speaker 05

  Offers were made.

• 1:14:36Speaker 04

  Can you tell us what they?

• 1:14:37Speaker 05

  Not, not.

• 1:14:38Speaker 04

  It's not out there in the world?

• 1:14:39Speaker 05

  Bridges?

• 1:14:39Speaker 04

  Can you give me an allegedly?

• 1:14:40Speaker 05

  Bridges was not eligible to be traded at the time. Cause it's not the extension. Bridges would be, if they want to run that back, Bridges would be, that'd be a piece.

• 1:14:48Speaker 06

  Oh gosh, can you angle your mic up towards you?

• 1:14:50Speaker 05

  Sir. Cat, cat was offered. I think you have to keep it on Giannis still. I think the first 20, 25 games, I mean, they, they're off to a great start. I think they're three and one Milwaukee is. We'll see how they do this year. How they do in the playoffs. Uh, his, the, next year, he's going to be entering the last year of their deal, of his deal. And in the NBA, everyone knows that's the point you have the most leverage. So, how far they go, how far they don't go, that could impact where he's at. And potentially 20, 25 games in, we'll see. But right now they're off to a great start as we see right there.

• 1:15:22Speaker 04

  Who's got?

• 1:15:23Speaker 05

  You know, they beat the shit out of the Knicks last night? Fuck you.

• 1:15:25Speaker 04

  Who's got the, who's got the, the best scoops? Which player, active player? Has the most information? Meaning like other players confide in them and they're just a source for everything. They really know what's going on in the league. Who is that? Who's the you in the league?

• 1:15:43Speaker 05

  I don't know.

• 1:15:44Speaker 04

  Man, get out of here.

• 1:15:45Speaker 05

  I don't know. I don't. He won't say. I don't talk to whoever that is. I need to, I need to find out. That's a good question. I gotta get on that hunt.

• 1:15:51Speaker 06

  What's the craziest place you've ever had to step out of? In order to post something or get some.

• 1:15:56Speaker 05

  Man, I've been everywhere.

• 1:15:57Speaker 06

  You ever been like a funeral? Been at like your mom's birthday? Something crazy where you're like, hey, this is a bad look, but I need to take this.

• 1:16:04Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, that's, yeah, funeral will be tough. Funeral will be tough.

• 1:16:09Speaker 06

  But?

• 1:16:10Speaker 04

  No, he would step out. He ain't gonna be more dead.

• 1:16:13Speaker 05

  I would, I would, I would step out for just about anything.

• 1:16:17Speaker 06

  But have you? Have you had to step?

• 1:16:19Speaker 05

  I think religious gatherings, uh, I, I would say definitely birthdays, family birthdays.

• 1:16:25Speaker 04

  What about a date?

• 1:16:27Speaker 05

  All the time.

• 1:16:28Speaker 04

  You ever?

• 1:16:29Speaker 05

  I have. Like, but like, but like, no, let's say, let's say you're, you're hanging out with family or you're hanging out with a girl you might be seeing or whatever. Like, there are always gonna be moments where you might have to step out for a call or, you know, whatever, and it's, is that person understanding? Like, all those different factors.

• 1:16:46Speaker 04

  Have you had a girl that's not understanding it about it?

• 1:16:48Speaker 05

  I think people in life, you've run into friends that aren't understanding, right?

• 1:16:52Speaker 04

  But that's why, like, maybe dating somebody that's also involved in sports might be good because they would understand your priorities and like what you do for a living better than people outside of the game.

• 1:17:01Speaker 05

  Something you guys can talk about later at work. It's possible, never know.

• 1:17:03Speaker 06

  Have you ever had to stop mid-session?

• 1:17:07Speaker 04

  You ever have to pull your thang out? Tweet?

• 1:17:11Speaker 06

  Cause that's dedication to the game.

• 1:17:12Speaker 04

  That is dedication to the game.

• 1:17:13Speaker 05

  I'll just say this, I've had to step out of the shower plenty times.

• 1:17:17Speaker 06

  With whom?

• 1:17:19Speaker 05

  I've had to, I've had to pause workouts, all kinds of workouts. I've had to pause, his biceps, triceps, lumbar.

• 1:17:32Speaker 05

  Like, class was the toughest for me, though. When I, when I went to, that was the hardest part, you know, you, the example you gave and the other examples I gave, like, those are, they're tough to do, like, if you're at a, your mom's birthday or sister's birthday, like, you don't wanna leave, you know, during the celebration, they're blowing out the candles, the cake, and you're having to step out because you have to take a call, like, about a buyout of a player. Like, you think about that in grand scheme, like, that's tough. But, um, class was the worst, like, when I was, when I had to, when I was in, in, in college, I would literally leave classes, like, 40-minute classes, and I'm leaving for like 30 minutes, 35 minutes, and I'm coming back at the end of class and the teacher's looking at me, cause at the time, she didn't know what I was doing, they don't, no one

• 1:18:15Speaker 05

  knows, everyone probably looked at me like I was insane. What is this guy doing? This guy, which is weird, he must have issues. Or, must have issues.

• 1:18:23Speaker 04

  Or he's on his way to greatness. Which referee is the most corrupt?

• 1:18:28Speaker 04

  If you had to guess, which one would you point to?

• 1:18:32Speaker 05

  Whatever ref was doing the one, the game that you were playing against Jay, that's the ref.

• 1:18:39Speaker 05

  That's the ref.

• 1:18:40Speaker 04

  Cause he let Jay get away with the taunting?

• 1:18:42Speaker 05

  He let Jay get away with, no, no, no, he let Jay foul you too much.

• 1:18:46Speaker 04

  I agree.

• 1:18:47Speaker 05

  Like, I think, the fact that it got to 6-6 was an issue.

• 1:18:51Speaker 04

  Yeah. It's embarrassing for me.

• 1:18:53Speaker 05

  Yeah, you weren't getting it.

• 1:18:54Speaker 04

  I wasn't getting any calls. You should've gone to the line. I should've gone to the line, dude. I 100% believe that. I think that you're right.

• 1:19:01Speaker 05

  Do you want to play over/under on his screen time? Yes. Oh, we gotta do that. Did I answer your Nico question? I'm not saying it's right or wrong, I, cause, listen, I get that from Dallas people.

• 1:19:11Speaker 08

  There's a video that people were upset about where some guy saw Nico out to dinner with his family. He goes, Nico, shakes his hand, he goes, everybody still fucking hates you. And then walks off and people were like, how could you do that to a guy who's at dinner with his? And everybody from Dallas was like, do that shit again. Do that shit again and again.

• 1:19:27Speaker 05

  You can't go anywhere apparently.

• 1:19:29Speaker 08

  Fuck that guy, yo. And what about them getting the Lotto pick? Well, I think that was rigged. He'll never admit it, but I truly think they were gonna lose Dallas.

• 1:19:36Speaker 04

  Was that rigged?

• 1:19:37Speaker 08

  Yeah.

• 1:19:37Speaker 04

  Was that rigged? Can we do that?

• 1:19:39Speaker 05

  It's so hard to rig. I'm, I've seen it. I've, I know what, I know how it's...

• 1:19:44Speaker 04

  It doesn't mean it's impossible.

• 1:19:45Speaker 08

  Yeah, that wasn't... That wasn't a full sentence.

• 1:19:48Speaker 04

  Alright, what about Kawhi? What about Kawhi?

• 1:19:50Speaker 08

  Oh, that's fun.

• 1:19:51Speaker 04

  What's up with Kawhi and his uncle?

• 1:19:54Speaker 05

  It's last week.

• 1:19:55Speaker 04

  Damn.

• 1:19:56Speaker 05

  God damn.

• 1:19:57Speaker 04

  How many hours?

• 1:19:58Speaker 05

  No, no, no, no. Oh, guess, guess, guess. I'm guessing 12 and a half.

• 1:20:02Speaker 04

  I saw. That was, that's crazy.

• 1:20:04Speaker 05

  12 is my guess.

• 1:20:05Speaker 04

  That's crazy.

• 1:20:07Speaker 08

  16 and a half.

• 1:20:09Speaker 05

  And 10 of them were just on Snapchat. That's crazy.

• 1:20:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, who you Snapchatting?

• 1:20:15Speaker 05

  I was like, wait, is that accurate? Maybe it might be. Hold on, let's, let's go to...

• 1:20:19Speaker 04

  Kawhi. Give us the real about Kawhi.

• 1:20:21Speaker 05

  Hold on, I'll, I'll give you this. I'll give you this.

• 1:20:23Speaker 04

  Alright, what do you, what do you got?

• 1:20:24Speaker 05

  Let's go... Let's go the two day span of the arrests. Can you guess what the screen time was for those days?

• 1:20:31Speaker 04

  This is over two days.

• 1:20:32Speaker 05

  Wednesday and Thursday.

• 1:20:34Speaker 04

  I mean, I saw, like, I, I, I, I think it has to be.

• 1:20:37Speaker 05

  If he's pushing 16 on a regular day.

• 1:20:39Speaker 04

  That's what I'm saying. It has to be 40 hours.

• 1:20:40Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's 40 hours, my guess.

• 1:20:42Speaker 04

  Has to be 40 hours.

• 1:20:42Speaker 05

  Per day? Per day, 20 hours.

• 1:20:44Speaker 04

  Oh, oh, 20 hours.

• 1:20:44Speaker 05

  He said 20. It's actually less. Wednesday?

• 1:20:47Speaker 04

  17 hours and 15 minutes.

• 1:20:49Speaker 05

  Oh, that's a light day. How do you live a life, dude?

• 1:20:51Speaker 04

  Thursday was a wild day, so this was Thursday.

• 1:20:53Speaker 05

  Yeah, he really might be focused on work. 18 and a half, yeah. No, but how do you focus on life? Like, yeah. See, see, now, now, now you guys understand? You guys are asking all these.

• 1:21:03Speaker 04

  No, we get it.

• 1:21:04Speaker 05

  Dating questions.

• 1:21:05Speaker 04

  It's not about that. It's not about this.

• 1:21:07Speaker 05

  It's about the work. It's about the grind. We're talking about dating? Talking about dating? Dating, dating. He's talking about mid-session. Come on, man.

• 1:21:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, you don't even worry about that. You don't even think about that.

• 1:21:17Speaker 05

  Okay, all right, so Kawhi Leonard. Um, what do you guys want to know?

• 1:21:21Speaker 04

  I want to know if he's asking for a little extra on top. I want to know if the unc is, is saying, listen, we know what the salary cap says that, you know, we can be paid, but we need a little more than that.

• 1:21:31Speaker 05

  So, that's the, the, there are allegations that that's what his, his camp has asked for. And that's been, that's been like, you know, there's always these things that circulate in the NBA community.

• 1:21:43Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:21:44Speaker 05

  And it's on my, on my job, can I confirm it? Is there, something like that is so nebulous because someone could mention it to someone.

• 1:21:52Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:21:53Speaker 05

  But, you know, I can, you know, someone can mention, you know, like, a player can mention to a team, like, hey, like, we need this to sign with you, but if the team says, no, we're not doing that, and if the player signs there anyway, like, what's the story? That this guy made the request? Sometimes it leaks, sometimes it doesn't. Didn't he, go on, go on. So my point is, there's, it's been in the nebulous for a while that, like, you know, Kawhi Leonard is a free agent in 2019 is going to sign with you. There's going to be these requests. The NBA did its own investigation. They found nothing. It's never been, never been.

• 1:22:25Speaker 04

  No way.

• 1:22:26Speaker 05

  It's never been on, you know, the record. There's nothing been something for him, but it's been in the space for a while.

• 1:22:31Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:22:32Speaker 05

  So there's, there are, you know, there's a reporting that came out that he had a deal with Aspiration, this company called Aspiration, that was also a sponsor of the Clippers at the time. The owner had invested in that company as well. And there was a side deal with Kawhi Leonard to be sponsored by the company. To be sponsored by the company, but that's, there's nothing, like legally, that's within your, like, that's fine. So there are deals that happen between companies and teams and their players.

• 1:23:05Speaker 04

  So the owner of a team can also own, let's say Adidas and then choose to have one of their athletes or one of their players be sponsored by Adidas.

• 1:23:13Speaker 05

  Well, they're not choosing, that company's choosing it technically, right?

• 1:23:16Speaker 04

  What if the owner is invested in that company?

• 1:23:18Speaker 05

  Well, that's the thing. That's the line that the NBA, so now the NBA is investigating all this.

• 1:23:22Speaker 04

  And is it even a real company? Didn't it like file for bankruptcy?

• 1:23:25Speaker 05

  That's what I'm saying. So there's a lot of, I mean, I don't have to, I mean, I don't have to hide it. There's a lot of shady things, a lot of corrupt things that happened with this company. So now the league, so there's a lot of circumstantial stuff, right? Like, you know, there's, there's gonna be a money that's put into the company, then the money might go, you know, at the same period. But again, if, if, if companies are paying and doing things bi-weekly and it just so happened they got money, you know, but overall, Steve Ballmer put in $131 million into this company. This company put in X amount of money into the Clippers. Kawhi Leonard, I think, saw between 10 and 20 million dollars out of a 28 million dollar deal.

• 1:24:08Speaker 05

  So if one plus one is supposed to equal two.

• 1:24:12Speaker 04

  Why is he putting so much money into this company?

• 1:24:14Speaker 05

  Steve Ballmer put in $131 million. Kawhi Leonard saw 10 to 20 million of that. So are those both correlated? Like, are they both tied together? That's what the NBA has to figure out. Is there hard evidence? Is there, or circumstantial evidence? Or is all of this combined? Is there a lack of transparency issues? Is there a lack of moral issue? I think that's all what the league is determining right now. And that investigation started about a month ago. So they're gonna be going through all these guys emails, text messages, all their files. That's the people that got in trouble already that are bankrupt. Steve Ballmer, Kawhi Leonard, his uncle, his entire camp.

• 1:24:55Speaker 04

  Is there precedent for this of what would happen possibly like Ballmer or Kawhi?

• 1:25:00Speaker 05

  So if the allegation is cap circumvention, I mean, it's suspension for ownership. You can void contracts. Whoa, you know, you can void. So this happened with Joe Smith. The Timberwolves.

• 1:25:12Speaker 04

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 1:25:13Speaker 05

  Glenn Taylor was suspended. Kevin McHale, the GM was suspended.

• 1:25:16Speaker 08

  They lost five first round draft picks, right?

• 1:25:17Speaker 05

  They lost a ton of first round picks. Joe Smith's contract got voided. And so, yeah, that's all potentially on the table, right? But with that situation, there was a paper trail. There was a signed sheet of, I think it was like on a, on a paper towel or something. It was like a napkin that they wrote the contract like, you know, after this, you know, we're gonna give you this max contract or whatever. Here, so far, there has not been proof of a paper trail. It's not like Steve Ballmer. There's proof of Steve Ballmer, someone with the Clippers saying, hey, sign Kawhi Leonard to this deal. This is what they have to do. The Clippers are alleging that this was all in the up and up. Like, we also got defrauded. Like, Steve believed in them. He invested in them.

• 1:26:00Speaker 05

  They invested in the Clippers. They were on our jersey patch. They asked to be connected to Kawhi Leonard, and we connected them to Kawhi Leonard. That happens throughout the league. Sponsors of teams ask for players all the time.

• 1:26:12Speaker 04

  Yeah, that makes sense.

• 1:26:13Speaker 05

  All the time. And so we'll see if there's gonna be enough of a paper trail.

• 1:26:16Speaker 04

  I mean, putting in a buck thirty and then just getting rinsed for it just seems peculiar. Like, this is a good businessman, you know?

• 1:26:25Speaker 08

  Also, it's a lot of money.

• 1:26:26Speaker 04

  That's a big investment.

• 1:26:27Speaker 08

  A lot of money to give to Kawhi off one hundred and thirty million.

• 1:26:30Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:26:31Speaker 05

  That's a lot of money. That's a lot of money. Do you, is that, is that, is that washing money? Like, I don't know. Like, what is that?

• 1:26:37Speaker 04

  That's the thing that just seems so odd about it. Like, to give Kawhi twenty, you gotta spend a hundred and ten?

• 1:26:44Speaker 05

  But does that sound right to you? I don't know.

• 1:26:46Speaker 04

  No, it doesn't. It doesn't at all. But it also, I don't feel like somebody like that would make that silly a business decision.

• 1:26:53Speaker 05

  Yeah, again, he's come out and he's said like, I got defrauded, like I got frauded. Like I got scammed. Like I was, I was a part of getting, uh, you know, defrauded out of my money.

• 1:27:04Speaker 04

  Yeah. Yeah, okay.

• 1:27:06Mark Gagnon?

  And you said these types of deals are common. Is this just a common way of getting around the salary cap?

• 1:27:13Speaker 05

  No, I mean, I said in this situation, it's common hearing that like, you know, people around Kawhi Leonard might have asked for this. It's been in the nebulous for a while. You know, obviously the NBA investigated, they didn't find anything. It's not like they're gonna come out and say, yeah, we asked for this from all these teams, from Toronto Lakers, the Clippers. Um, like this type of stuff, like getting stuff on the, on the books, like we're gonna pay this guy on a side deal. I think there's so much to lose. I don't hear about that as much. Now, the stuff that does happen a lot is like a player will get a sponsorship deal with the same, uh, sponsor of, of, of, of a team.

• 1:27:52Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:27:53Speaker 05

  Right? And like Mark Cuban, I, I talked to Mark Cuban all, you know.

• 1:27:56Speaker 04

  Yeah, he was defending, uh, Bulmer.

• 1:27:59Speaker 05

  And Mark Cuban told me there's been a lot of moments where like, when he was at his peak as an owner of popularity, like these companies would come to him and be like, hey, can we talk to this player? Can we talk to that player? And he will basically help set that up.

• 1:28:13Mark Gagnon?

  Hmm.

• 1:28:14Speaker 05

  And so is that like, but that's legal. So in this case, if this company aspiration went to the Clippers said, we want to meet with Kawhi Leonard and all they did was give the contact information. Now, again, is there a paper trail where there was, there was something more nefarious going on? That's what the NBA investigations trying to find out. But that's, I mean, there's so much at risk for these teams if they were to venture at that, at that realm. That's the cardinal sin of the NBA.

• 1:28:40Mark Gagnon?

  Hmm. Um, back to the gambling scandal. Do you think, because I don't think you can like undo what has been done unless you just take away prop betting, which I don't think the casino companies are gonna take away. Um, do you think people lose faith in the game and stop watching? Like, do you think it can actually hurt the league?

• 1:29:01Speaker 05

  I mean, I think the integrity of the league is very important. And if this becomes like more wide ranging, like if there's all these dots across the U.S. map where this is all popping up with this play, of course, it becomes a major issue. But right now, we've seen two examples of it. You know, one, the jury's still out, you know, he has, Terry Rozier has not gone through his trial yet. We don't know his, you know, what's he's going to be charged with. But I think, I think the integrity concern is real, like right now. And I think the league knows it. I think they even said in their release, like, this is a, this is, this is a dire state, you know, like trying to get to the bottom of how can they regulate legalized gambling?

• 1:29:42Speaker 04

  Yeah, they gotta figure something out. They gotta figure something out with that. Because it just feels so easy.

• 1:29:47Mark Gagnon?

  I just feel like you can't fix that. There's no way to fix that.

• 1:29:50Speaker 05

  I mean, again, unless you're getting rid of these prop bets, unless you're finding a way to tier system it, unless you're trying to get more, unless you're able to get more information accessible to the fans and the betting public.

• 1:30:01Speaker 06

  Do you think there's a publicity to this so that other players stop doing this? Or just do it smarter?

• 1:30:08Speaker 05

  I mean, I think the, I think the FBI doing it when they did it on opening week, I think that alone raises enough alarms to not only the league, but fans and just the sports world in general, that like raising this, the awareness of, of what this is. I think the timing of when that happened, I think that alone raises the awareness. I mean, this is in the hands of, of, of the, of the feds at this point. This is not, this is like this situation that's going on right now, this is not even in the NBA's hands per se.

• 1:30:40Speaker 06

  I mean, and this must be happening in other leagues, too. Like, I'm sure this is a shockwave to everyone.

• 1:30:45Speaker 05

  The NFL, there's been multiple players that have gotten suspended. So what the NFL does is they suspend players for, I believe it's a dozen, maybe you can pull it up, I think it's like a dozen, it's like half a dozen games. Players are getting suspended. Now, in the NBA, if you're caught in these activities, you're just banned. Jontay Porter was banned. Now, if Roz, if Rozier is found guilty in this, he's going to be banned. Obviously, there's a lot of other things he, you know, with him and Jontay Porter. But the NFL's had a few of these scandals and, and it's been a suspension.

• 1:31:18Speaker 04

  It's so weird that you would just suspend.

• 1:31:21Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:31:22Speaker 04

  Like, maybe one player in the NFL just has a six-game.

• 1:31:25Speaker 05

  Yeah, minimum of six games in indefinite ban.

• 1:31:29Speaker 08

  Oh, yeah, Jameson Williams, I forgot about that.

• 1:31:30Speaker 06

  So do you think the number of people that are implicated in this at the present moment will stay that number, or do you think it'll increase in the coming weeks?

• 1:31:37Speaker 05

  I, I think that the fact that we already went from five people initially to now 30-plus in the span of a year and a half.

• 1:31:46Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:31:46Speaker 05

  We have one more current player. We have, now again, these two situations, they're two different cases, right? One's a illegal gamble, illegal, yeah, one's an illegal gambling insider information case, the other is an illegal poker rigging case. Now, I think we're gonna get potentially more names in both, but the fact that it's already gone up six, I mean, multiply that six times in the span of a year and a half. Now you have 30 more people, how many more of these people are gonna cooperate?

• 1:32:17Speaker 08

  And our boy.

• 1:32:18Speaker 05

  Where are we gonna go?

• 1:32:18Speaker 08

  Gotta really distract from the fact that he's not doing anything on Epstein, so he's gonna drag this into investigation.

• 1:32:23Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 1:32:26Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:32:26Speaker 04

  Cash, we're saying.

• 1:32:27Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I, I, yeah, that's an interesting situation. I got a lot of tweets at me that day saying, why don't you release the list, the other list?

• 1:32:36Speaker 04

  Do you know who's on that list?

• 1:32:38Speaker 08

  I think they think you're who.

• 1:32:40Speaker 05

  You're Cash Patel.

• 1:32:42Speaker 06

  You can probably figure it out, though. You can probably get that list.

• 1:32:45Speaker 04

  Do you ever get insider shit about non-NBA stuff?

• 1:32:48Speaker 05

  I've, I've gotten, oh, oh, here we go. We got something.

• 1:32:52Speaker 04

  What do we got?

• 1:32:52Speaker 06

  Oh, wow.

• 1:32:54Speaker 04

  Oh, did you leak that? You were the first one?

• 1:32:58Speaker 05

  I mean, I don't know. Is that what the people say?

• 1:33:04Speaker 05

  I just know where I was when this happened. I was in the bubble.

• 1:33:07Speaker 04

  So you dropped that?

• 1:33:10Speaker 05

  I mean, it says that.

• 1:33:11Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:33:11Speaker 04

  Hold on, but are you, you don't reveal your sources with the NBA and that kind of stuff, but other rumors?

• 1:33:17Speaker 05

  Yeah, like. I would just say that year was an interesting year because sports and politics and social justice and health, it all intertwined and like, there were, there were all these boards. Sports board and this commission.

• 1:33:33Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:33:33Speaker 05

  And that was the most I think I've like rel- like delved into like the political world and like.

• 1:33:39Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:33:39Speaker 05

  Trying to reach out and email people and reach out to people and so.

• 1:33:43Speaker 06

  The way that you see sports media and like your role in it, does it affect how you see other media? Like looking at just like political news and stuff like that?

• 1:33:50Speaker 05

  No, I mean, I watch from afar. Like I'll, I'll watch everything from afar, see how like, you know, see how this person is reporting that. Like, like what's their methodology when they're trying to report this story? Again, you can't, not everything is apple, apples apples, right? It's like different in that, in that world, but um, I definitely pay attention to how they're sourcing it, how they're going about reporting it. You know, are they breaking it? Are people breaking it or are they just like, you know, just doing it when these people say it, say it publicly?

• 1:34:19Speaker 06

  Right.

• 1:34:19Speaker 05

  You know, like when there's an announcement publicly.

• 1:34:21Speaker 06

  Yeah, then you're not breaking anything. You're just kind of retweeting.

• 1:34:23Speaker 05

  So I'm, I'm like definitely like, just the competitor in me is like, oh, did this person break this? And I'm like, you know, as if I'm gonna like.

• 1:34:29Speaker 06

  The break is where you get off.

• 1:34:31Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:34:31Speaker 06

  Has there ever been a story that you got, that you sat on because you weren't sure and then someone else broke it? And you were like, oh man, I should have pulled trigger on it.

• 1:34:39Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, that, that happens, that happens all the time.

• 1:34:42Speaker 06

  Can you share a specific one?

• 1:34:47Speaker 05

  Honestly, it's, it's probably happened so much in the past, I don't even remember it.

• 1:34:50Speaker 06

  Is there a big one, like a big one where you, you were trying to confirm it and all of a sudden you saw it got posted?

• 1:34:59Speaker 05

  Think.

• 1:35:02Speaker 05

  Think about some of the biggest deals the last like 10 years and I'll tell you. LeBron going to Cleveland after leaving Miami. That was, that, that was announced. He announced that on SI.

• 1:35:13Speaker 06

  But people were saying that day he's gonna go to.

• 1:35:16Speaker 05

  Cleveland?

• 1:35:16Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:35:21Speaker 05

  I feel like I've been on a lot of it. I feel like I've been on a lot of it. I'll give you an example of one that like, you know, things that eat at me is like, if I'm on a family trip. And the like 20 minutes I'm spending not on my phone or if I'm, you know, let's say I'm at a dinner and I'm not on my phone. Or I'm in the water and I'm not on my phone and I miss news and that, that has happened before.

• 1:35:44Speaker 06

  What'd you miss?

• 1:35:45Speaker 05

  I don't know if I want to say it.

• 1:35:47Speaker 06

  Just say it.

• 1:35:48Speaker 05

  It's already out there.

• 1:35:49Speaker 06

  It's already, it already happened.

• 1:35:50Speaker 05

  That's your limitation? Yeah, it's been enough time.

• 1:35:51Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:35:52Speaker 05

  So Taylor Jenkins.

• 1:35:55Speaker 05

  Coach of the Grizzlies.

• 1:35:56Speaker 04

  Uh huh.

• 1:35:57Speaker 05

  Got fired.

• 1:35:58Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:35:58Speaker 05

  I was on a family trip, was away from my phone. Uh, for lunch and I think we were gone for like five, six days. And um, the, the 20 minutes I wasn't on my phone.

• 1:36:12Speaker 08

  You can miss that one, dude.

• 1:36:13Speaker 05

  Yeah. It was a big deal. There was three weeks left in the season. A coach getting fired that late in the year? To me, it's all a big deal. If it's big news, small, like you gotta treat everything with the same amount of, you know, if you're performing in Times Square.

• 1:36:27Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 1:36:28Speaker 05

  Or you're performing at the comedy club.

• 1:36:30Speaker 04

  Shout out Tommy Invincible, bro. Same thing. Every show is the most important one.

• 1:36:34Speaker 06

  Even the way he's describing it really shows his commitment to it.

• 1:36:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:36:37Speaker 06

  Cause that's not the way I thought you were gonna go.

• 1:36:38Speaker 05

  I had no clue.

• 1:36:39Speaker 06

  Sometimes you go on a family trip, man, and it heats me up that I missed a scoop. And I was like, that's not what I thought you were gonna say. You're gonna talk about the family part.

• 1:36:48Speaker 04

  What's up? Why, why can't Ja do the gun stuff, man? What's up with that?

• 1:36:51Speaker 05

  You mean the celebration?

• 1:36:52Speaker 04

  Yeah, like we used to be a country.

• 1:36:54Speaker 06

  Yeah. The grenade one's fire.

• 1:36:56Speaker 05

  I think, I think the history.

• 1:36:57Speaker 04

  Grenade is fire. I mean, he's not, he's not getting in trouble for that.

• 1:37:00Speaker 06

  Okay, good.

• 1:37:00Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:37:01Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause I like that.

• 1:37:02Speaker 05

  That's about, I think they have it in the video game too. I think they have that in 2K.

• 1:37:05Speaker 04

  Just.

• 1:37:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, they have, they have that in 2K.

• 1:37:07Speaker 04

  That's fire.

• 1:37:08Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:37:09Speaker 04

  We like guns in America. Why is it such a big deal?

• 1:37:11Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:37:12Speaker 05

  I mean, I think with him, it seems like it's the history, but it seems like he's in a great place.

• 1:37:16Speaker 04

  What is the history?

• 1:37:18Speaker 08

  Yeah, didn't he beat up like a 14 year old to play pickup with him?

• 1:37:22Speaker 06

  Allegedly.

• 1:37:22Speaker 05

  There were a couple of moments he got, this is a couple of years ago now, flashing a gun.

• 1:37:27Speaker 06

  Allegedly.

• 1:37:28Speaker 08

  Yeah, flashing a gun at the opposing team boss or some shit like that.

• 1:37:31Speaker 04

  Is that illegal to flash a gun? Is that illegal to do that?

• 1:37:34Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:37:35Speaker 04

  To brandish it?

• 1:37:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:37:38Speaker 08

  You knew the legal.

• 1:37:40Speaker 05

  It seems like everything is on the up and up.

• 1:37:42Speaker 06

  That one's called like garnishing.

• 1:37:44Speaker 04

  No, but like you can't.

• 1:37:45Speaker 08

  Oh yeah, look, I, I knew it was in.

• 1:37:46Speaker 05

  Can't garnish a weapon.

• 1:37:47Speaker 08

  That was right off the, off the dome, right?

• 1:37:49Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:37:49Speaker 06

  Boom.

• 1:37:50Speaker 04

  Fire, bro.

• 1:37:51Speaker 08

  Now that's great. That's where he stole it from.

• 1:37:52Speaker 06

  Exactly. I know you stole it.

• 1:37:54Speaker 04

  Hold on. So wait, he can't even just post that he has guns on Instagram?

• 1:38:00Speaker 05

  I don't think that would be something that that he would do right now. I don't think so.

• 1:38:07Speaker 04

  What if he got a deal with Smith and Wesson and then he was like a sponsored athlete by Smith and Wesson?

• 1:38:14Speaker 05

  Would you advise him to do that?

• 1:38:16Speaker 04

  I mean, it depends the bag.

• 1:38:18Speaker 05

  No.

• 1:38:18Speaker 04

  No? 250 million he's got with the Grizzlies. So he's good. Yeah. So he's good. He's real good. So then, yeah, get out there. Start bucking. I'm in I'm in defense of an American, a free American that has the right to, you know, show the shit that he bought. His right to flex. Why can't you garnish? Why can't you brandish? Why can't you do all that? I don't understand why that that's bad. It makes the league look bad. They're a bunch of gambling degenerates getting paid off by the Italian mob and this guy can't point a pistol in the air? When a stripper's not dancing fast enough? She was dancing slow.

• 1:38:56Speaker 05

  I mean, that goes that. I don't know. Did they have him in the bubble? I don't know.

• 1:39:02Speaker 04

  Bring it all the way back.

• 1:39:05Mark Gagnon?

  Michael Jordan, did he get suspended for gambling?

• 1:39:10Speaker 04

  Oh, great.

• 1:39:11Speaker 05

  This story, I was one years old when he retired.

• 1:39:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, but you're a Chicago boy. He retired in 94, right? 94, 95.

• 1:39:19Speaker 08

  I think, yeah, 94.

• 1:39:20Speaker 04

  94.

• 1:39:21Speaker 08

  Yeah, 93, 94, yeah.

• 1:39:22Mark Gagnon?

  You get the scoop, man. We want to know.

• 1:39:25Speaker 05

  I just know the whatever. If there is a alternative version of the story, I don't have that.

• 1:39:32Speaker 04

  So, so, so David Stern wasn't trying to, you know, impose some punitive measures?

• 1:39:38Speaker 05

  Now, listen, if I worked back then, if I was, let's say we flipped the years, I would have, I would have given you guys.

• 1:39:44Speaker 04

  You would have known.

• 1:39:44Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:39:45Speaker 04

  And you would have dropped it. But you think you would have got frozen out like Sports Illustrated did?

• 1:39:50Speaker 05

  If I had it confirmed, I would have dropped it.

• 1:39:52Speaker 04

  But then what if MJ never gave you anything again after that?

• 1:39:57Speaker 05

  I would have to do my job.

• 1:39:59Speaker 04

  Let me ask you a question. When Charles Barkley kissed that referee on the mouth.

• 1:40:05Speaker 04

  Why didn't you leak that?

• 1:40:08Speaker 05

  What was that? That was like 2007?

• 1:40:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:40:11Speaker 05

  I wasn't, I wasn't doing it.

• 1:40:12Speaker 04

  You weren't in the game?

• 1:40:13Speaker 05

  2007.

• 1:40:14Speaker 04

  But if you were in the game, would you have leaked like today there will be a sexual act on the court? Would you have, would you have leaked that?

• 1:40:21Speaker 05

  I think that was an endearing moment. That was a heartwarming moment. It was adorable.

• 1:40:25Speaker 04

  Charles is the GOAT. Charles is the GOAT.

• 1:40:27Speaker 05

  You got any Charles on the show?

• 1:40:28Speaker 08

  Another dream guest. I'm a dream guest. You got that connection?

• 1:40:30Speaker 05

  I thought Jimmy was a dream guest.

• 1:40:31Speaker 08

  He's a dream guest.

• 1:40:32Speaker 04

  Jimmy's also a dream guest.

• 1:40:33Speaker 05

  Charles might be.

• 1:40:34Speaker 08

  Probably Barack and Charles Barkley for me. I'm not even lying.

• 1:40:37Speaker 04

  To me, it's Charles.

• 1:40:38Speaker 08

  Yeah.

• 1:40:38Speaker 04

  To me, it's Charles, number one.

• 1:40:40Speaker 05

  And Shaq.

• 1:40:41Speaker 04

  Shaq can be cool, but Charles talks that shit, though. That's the thing. He got opinions on everything. Funny. Got that southern drawl. Everything just comes out smooth.

• 1:40:50Speaker 05

  What era would you want to cover in if it couldn't be right now?

• 1:40:52Speaker 06

  Ooh, that's a good question.

• 1:40:53Speaker 04

  Ooh.

• 1:40:54Speaker 05

  I mean, you always think about the 90s, but I'm, I'm born in this right now.

• 1:40:59Speaker 04

  When they let black people in.

• 1:41:03Speaker 04

  That would have been trying.

• 1:41:04Speaker 05

  I feel like right now.

• 1:41:06Speaker 04

  Let me tell you something.

• 1:41:06Speaker 05

  I feel like right now is the best time.

• 1:41:08Speaker 08

  You think they'd have let him cover shit?

• 1:41:09Speaker 05

  Right now is the best time.

• 1:41:10Speaker 04

  Nah, they probably wouldn't have given you any information back then. But that would have been scoops for days.

• 1:41:16Speaker 05

  I think right now is the best time.

• 1:41:18Speaker 04

  Yeah, because of access to media and like you have so much more power as an individual. Whereas before, as a reporter, they could probably leverage your job.

• 1:41:26Speaker 05

  They didn't have social media back then.

• 1:41:27Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 1:41:28Speaker 05

  I'm sure I got no, noticed because of Twitter.

• 1:41:31Speaker 06

  You would have had a newspaper or something. That game's about to get so much better.

• 1:41:36Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's like two day wait for news. You're like waiting 24 hours.

• 1:41:40Speaker 04

  Can't do it. Anyway, my boy, can you give us one thing before you leave? Give us, drop just one thing. I need, I need one scoop.

• 1:41:47Speaker 05

  Give us the look at Giannis.

• 1:41:49Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:41:49Speaker 05

  Trey Young. I think keep an eye on them.

• 1:41:51Speaker 04

  Trey?

• 1:41:52Speaker 05

  Keep an eye on him.

• 1:41:52Speaker 04

  Is Trey coming to New York?

• 1:41:53Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:41:54Speaker 05

  Trey didn't extend his contract in the, in the off season. He's got one year left. He's a free agent next summer.

• 1:42:00Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:42:01Speaker 05

  And he can hit free agency potentially if he opts out.

• 1:42:04Speaker 04

  Where do you think Trey's going?

• 1:42:06Speaker 05

  I mean, he could stay in Atlanta, but he's gonna have a market.

• 1:42:09Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:42:09Speaker 05

  We're talking about Trey Young here.

• 1:42:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:42:11Speaker 05

  Um, so Giannis, Trey Young, and then as the season goes on, there's always guys that'll pop up. And we, we still don't know where LeBron James is gonna be. Is he gonna finish his career with the Lakers? Or is he gonna be somewhere else? I think it's very much up in the air.

• 1:42:24Speaker 04

  You think he would change teams?

• 1:42:28Speaker 05

  I mean, I think that he, I, I, I'm not sure that he knows exactly how the end is gonna play out. Could it be with the Lakers? Sure. But he's a free agent at the end of the season. So if he's gonna continue to play, there's clearly a chance. He's somewhere else, potentially. Move your whole family, I mean. But again, he could, he could stay with the Lakers. I'm just saying. Yeah, but your wife and her friends and all the activities that they do.

• 1:42:58Speaker 04

  For the local rugby club.

• 1:42:59Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:43:00Speaker 04

  That was the worst of activities.

• 1:43:02Speaker 08

  You move your whole family to your wife's activities.

• 1:43:05Speaker 05

  It's pretty easy, bro. He can move pretty easily.

• 1:43:09Speaker 05

  I'm trying to think of any other, uh, player situations to monitor. Is there anything that you're gonna drop this week anyway, so you could just tell us? Nothing right now. Nothing?

• 1:43:20Speaker 06

  You would've dropped it already.

• 1:43:21Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah. I, I would, I would, I would hint to you something. What's the story you're working on? Yeah! Give us something you're working on. I mean, I'm definitely tracking this, this case. Yeah. Really heavy. But I don't know, I don't know when we're gonna have updates on it necessarily. Cause it's all on arraignments, charges, things like that. I mean, this, this'll play out over, over the next year.

• 1:43:42Speaker 06

  Will he be at the trial?

• 1:43:45Speaker 05

  No plans to do that right now, cause we don't know, also know the dates. We know the arraignment dates, though. Then? Late, late November and early December. Ooh, wow. For Billups and Rozier. So we're gonna see this soon? Yeah. This is gonna play out during the season. The arraignment. But still. So after you do the arraignment, how long until you start? I don't even really know what that shit is. Do we know? I don't know. I was acting like I knew what it was. You acted like it was a semen. Arraignment? I didn't know what it was. I thought arraignment is just the trial. I think arraignment is when they, when they, I think they tell you your, what. Oh, when they figure out what the charges are?

• 1:44:16Speaker 06

  Yeah. After several weeks to a year it could take between arraignment and trials. I have a crazy kinda like league conspiracy.

• 1:44:24Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 1:44:24Speaker 06

  Tell me if I'm crazy for this. But I've heard that Dwight Howard is actually straight.

• 1:44:30Speaker 04

  I have never even thought or think.

• 1:44:33Speaker 05

  You've never heard that?

• 1:44:34Speaker 04

  I don't venture into that, no.

• 1:44:37Speaker 05

  That's never even come across your radio?

• 1:44:40Speaker 04

  Hold on.

• 1:44:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:44:41Speaker 04

  What?

• 1:44:42Speaker 06

  People said he's actually this trade guy.

• 1:44:45Speaker 04

  No way.

• 1:44:46Speaker 06

  He loves women.

• 1:44:46Speaker 04

  What's your source on that?

• 1:44:47Speaker 06

  Dude, it's this local dude. Very, very local.

• 1:44:50Speaker 04

  I mean, you are from Orlando, so you would know.

• 1:44:53Speaker 06

  Extremely local.

• 1:44:54Speaker 04

  Is there any evidence to back this up? Any data?

• 1:44:57Speaker 05

  What was the question earlier? I don't venture into that.

• 1:45:00Speaker 04

  Into what?

• 1:45:00Speaker 05

  Personal side.

• 1:45:01Speaker 04

  Oh, the personal side.

• 1:45:02Speaker 06

  But it affects the game.

• 1:45:03Speaker 04

  It does affect the game. His back will be sore, there's all these different things it's gonna affect. He did have back surgeries when he was in Los Angeles, no? He was suffering from back injuries.

• 1:45:12Speaker 06

  Chemistry in the locker room.

• 1:45:14Speaker 04

  Chemistry in the locker room.

• 1:45:16Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's a, that's a... I mean, if he's got the source, he's the source, I guess.

• 1:45:21Speaker 06

  I'll tweet it.

• 1:45:22Speaker 04

  Yeah, you gotta send that out there and see what's going on.

• 1:45:26Speaker 05

  You're gonna get like five retweets on that. It might go viral.

• 1:45:29Speaker 06

  It might, it might.

• 1:45:30Speaker 05

  It might go viral.

• 1:45:31Speaker 04

  That shit would slap on Twitter. Yo, post that right now. Watch that. That would be your number one tweet ever, if you posted that right now.

• 1:45:39Speaker 05

  I don't, I don't, I think people would unfollow.

• 1:45:42Speaker 04

  Dwight Howard, breaking news Dwight Howard.

• 1:45:45Speaker 05

  He would lose credibility.

• 1:45:47Speaker 04

  Breaking news Dwight.

• 1:45:50Speaker 05

  I'm gonna let the local source get this.

• 1:45:52Speaker 04

  Fair enough. But if you did, Dwight Howard, breaking news Dwight Howard confirmed straight.

• 1:45:59Speaker 05

  I don't know how that would. You would get more calls about it. Hey, this is being true.

• 1:46:02Speaker 04

  Your phone would be blowing up. It would be blowing up.

• 1:46:05Speaker 05

  More than, more than, more than the Luca trade?

• 1:46:07Speaker 06

  More, way more, way more, dude.

• 1:46:10Speaker 04

  The Luca trade is believable.

• 1:46:13Speaker 05

  This guy. No, no, I'm losing this, I'm losing this, I'm losing this.

• 1:46:17Speaker 04

  Yo, we love you Dwight.

• 1:46:19Speaker 06

  Love you Dwight, for real, you're Superman. You're Superman to me.

• 1:46:22Speaker 04

  Damn right. Hey, listen.

• 1:46:24Speaker 06

  Superman.

• 1:46:24Speaker 04

  Yo, don't do that.

• 1:46:26Speaker 06

  That's literally Superman.

• 1:46:27Speaker 05

  Can we have fun as mature adults? Can we just have fun?

• 1:46:29Speaker 06

  His sexuality's none of your business.

• 1:46:31Speaker 04

  Yeah, let him do whatever he does. He got, he got mad kids, he gotta be a little. Gotta be a little straight.

• 1:46:36Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:46:37Speaker 04

  Okay? Shit.

• 1:46:38Speaker 06

  Shout out to Dwight, dude.

• 1:46:39Speaker 04

  Shout out to Dwight. We love you Dwight, listen, guys.

• 1:46:42Speaker 05

  First of all, thank you so much for being here.

• 1:46:44Speaker 04

  Appreciate you guys having me.

• 1:46:44Speaker 05

  I appreciate you.

• 1:46:45Speaker 04

  This is awesome. None of them. Thank you for all the students, man. Congratulations on everything you achieved. It's a very difficult position. There's really like one of you.

• 1:46:53Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:46:53Speaker 04

  You know, at a time. It's kind of a crazy. The Pope. It is like that.

• 1:46:58Speaker 05

  Yeah. It's a lot of response. I feel like I'm a servant to the audience. Like, I feel like it's a responsibility to deliver.

• 1:47:06Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:47:06Speaker 05

  And so, that's every day.

• 1:47:08Speaker 04

  You are a public servant in a lot of ways, bro.

• 1:47:10Speaker 05

  I feel like I'm, because the audience is, are the ones that drive this.

• 1:47:13Speaker 04

  And they need information.

• 1:47:14Speaker 05

  And they need to know what's going on.

• 1:47:16Speaker 04

  Facts.

• 1:47:17Speaker 05

  So it's my job every day to deliver accurate, honest, first information.

• 1:47:22Speaker 04

  Hmm. That's, this guy is media training.

• 1:47:25Speaker 05

  Real news.

• 1:47:26Speaker 04

  Masterful, right here. That right there was.

• 1:47:30Speaker 05

  Yeah, man? Yeah, sir.

• 1:47:33Speaker 04

  Peace, y'all.