It’s a Football Friday on 2 Pros and a Cup of Joe, should be happy for a Game 7, but are burned out. Aaron Rodgers talks with Mark “Stink” Schlereth about the failed experiment that was his time in New York. Tom Brady swayed the Raiders away from signing Sam Darnold in the offseason. Plus, Producer Lee vs a pack of coyotes and much more!
This is the best of two pros and a couple. Joe with LaVar Aarings had rating win and Jonas Knox on Box fours Radio.
We've got ourselves a game seven left over in the NBA with the NBA Finals, will see a game seven. After the Indiana Pacers rose from the ashes last night and said, you know what, LeVar Arrington, we're gonna I'm not gonna let you shovel during on us just yet. We're going out there and we're going to put on a show. And they had a willing participant in the whole matter because the Oklahoma City Thunder looked awful, looked awful turning the ball over, and that game was a complete wipeout almost from start to finish. And so we get ourselves a game seven, and the man of the hour, Tyrese Halliburton. People wondering whether or not he was going to come back and whether or not he was going to be ready to go. He spoke following the game about the Pacers heading to Game seven.
It's about the margins, like it's about taking care of the ball and rebounding. Those are the most important things, you know.
You gotta control the controller balls and let.
The cards fall where they may. You know, it's a one game series now, and man, we believe you know, we got a lot of faith in this group. So take care of my bodies. Get ready at the Game seven NBA Finals. What more can you ask for it?
And now as it stands, right now, the Oklahoma City Thunder are eight and a half point favorites in Game seven. Gut feeling, do you like OKC minus the eight and a half or you're taking the points with the Indiana Pacers.
I'm gonna take the points with the Pacers. I agree, I'm gonna take the points with.
It's a one game situation. You could see something crazy happen, like SGA gets into foul trouble early and they've got to sit them for a couple of minutes because they can't.
Run the risk.
And then Indiana goes on a run and next thing you know, they're trailing. And then maybe he can't be as aggressive going to the hole because he's already got three four Just like now you've left everything for chance, Like now you've opened up the door just a little bit for Indiana. That a bounce goes here, a missque happens here, and now Indiana's got a real shot to win this thing. There's a real possibility now to where if you're Oklahoma City, you just don't turn the ball over last night. You know you've got a compromise player in Tyrese Halliburton. Now he didn't get stretched out. It wasn't like they had to play him until the final whistle because they were trying to win a tight game. He didn't have to play a whole bunch of minutes. He's got a few days rest, or at least a couple of days rest until that time. And now he gets ready to go, and you try and go on the road and do what you've already done in the series before, which is win in Oklahoma City. To me, everything's on the table in this game, and I'm just hoping it's tight down the stretch because if it's if it's close down the stretch, I feel like, okay, see, you might play a little bit tighter. Just knowing they were supposed to win. Nobody gave Indiana chance. When we were talking about this series from the get go, I think you and I were on the same page, going, man, this isn't gonna be the wipeout everybody thinks it's gonna be Nobody gave Indiana chance, and yet here we are in a Game seven.
And the NBA has to be super pumped up in a static about it because now you can't say this was a lopsided final. You can't say that this was no parody. And so you look at both of these teams, and they are teams that could be good for years to come because of how young some of these guys are on these teams. But I think the the ultimate to me, the ultimate storyline here is that it is a Game seven and in that they have really, in a lot of ways, wrapped the storyline around Tyrese Haliburton, and I find it to be kind of curious and strange for the simple fact that it was a lot of things, a lot of other elements outside of Halliburton that was the reason why that game went the way that it went. I think it's commendable that he got out there, you know, banged up. But if you're looking at who the catalysts of all of this was, I would say in this game, it's the coach. The coach was the catalyst of this game because the strategy. I believe that they executed against the OKC thunder was sound. You know, you came into the topic talking about they played. You know, OKAC was careless with the bull and you know, they did things that kind of you would say again, SGA even said at his own admission that they sucked. But when you take a look at it, if you're breaking it down, did they suck because they just played bad? Or were they forced into the scenarios and the situations that played out? And I think you got to take your hat off to the coaching staff because the way they played defense against Oklahoma, it really limited them in the opportunities and the options that they had. And they also took advantage of a deep bench, a very deep bench, which is interesting because OKC took advantage of their bench too. I think there was only one player on OKC that didn't score. Everybody else got points in the game. I just think that this last game now sets the stage where you don't know if David or Goliath is going to win the fight. You just don't know. And that's the best scenario that the NBA could have ever hoped or wished for in a finals that didn't boast like what we would consider to be the biggest names or the biggest brands in the game, the biggest markets and the most historic and you know, recognized franchises. That isn't what you had.
I mean you mentioned Rick Carlisle. If it comes down to coaching and experience, in Game seven, overwhelmingly favors Rick Carlisle won an NBA title in twenty eleven with the MAVs, was the coach there. He's obviously a champion as a player way back in the eighties when he was with Boston. But he's been doing this a long time. He's coached a lot of playoff games. And you can tell that we've talked about this before in other sports to where you know, did he lose the locker room. You can tell that locker room has full faith in him because they could have easily walked.
Out last night.
Maybe you know who knows just looked at the situation and been like, hey, we'll do our best, but if it gets tight, then we're gonna No.
They didn't.
They came out. They were overwhelmingly the better team. The fact that they're able to stay in games as opposed to mailing it in, and all those comebacks they had in previous series and all the big shots and all that. Like, Rick Carlisle's done a masterful job with the team, and he's been speaking about this team even going back to last year to where it look when they got swept in the Eastern Conference Finals by the Celtics. Anybody who watched that series realized and that was a lot closer than people want to give Indiana credit for. They lost a close game early in the series, a game they probably should have won, and then Boston ultimately ran with it. Rick Carlisle had that team bounce back this year. They were a much better team down the stretch of the seas, they got on a roll. They're a problem and so if it comes down to a couple of things coaching wise late in that game, you gotta favor the guy who's got the experience, and that would be Rick Carlisle. You have to at this point.
I think it's great reasoning, it sound reasoning, and I think that that could be an advantage that Indiana has going into the game. Obviously it's been made mention of in the show and probably a ton of times that it is a home game for OKC. So there's the idea having the friendly confines of being at home. But if I were to say, coming out of last name A last night's game, the probability of OKC recovering from the game last night, I don't know that it's a high percentage because it's the way Indiana played the game last night. It's like it was a moment to grab an unexpected momentum. It's almost like it's almost like if you you same boat is running the two hundred meters and and okay, see is you same boat? And they get out there and they know that they're superior physically to everybody else that's in the field, and you're running and at some point you're like, oh, I got this, like I'm gonna win. And you're rounding that corner for the last one hundred meters of the race, and somebody comes in your periphery and they're they're they're going so fast and they're eating up so much so much track and and so much distance that you can't even really comprehend or measure why it's happening. And before you know it, they done ran up on you and you don't have the ability to be able to hold them off. And I just wonder if that happened last evening, because if you're talking about saving your best effort, you gotta believe the pacers saved their best effort for last night to keep the series alive. Is it a situation where Usain sees it and can adjust to it and still win the race even though you lost the lead that you had or is it one of those things where you couldn't you couldn't match it when the kick came in. The kick was too good, that got in front of you, and now you couldn't you couldn't finish the race. That is this a situation where okay, see can't finish the race?
Isn't that kind of what happened with Shador and the cops, Like he was.
Trying to get away, But I don't know if that last kick, if he was trying to get away, they would have arrested him, I would assume. But with that being said, I don't know, because there is a girlfriend that that's out there. She's right beside him, but they're not right beside each other. Their park on the side of the road. Now she's getting warning, he's getting a citation. I don't know that this is the perfect comparable to what's going on in the NBA playoffs.
Here's what I would say. Look, I think we all agree Game seven in the in the NBA Playoffs, in the NBA Finals is exactly what everybody wants. It's going to be featured on Sunday Night, and it's going to be the ratings are going to be great. Everyone's going to be enthralled by Game seven. I could almost assure you that Steven A. Smith's not going to be playing back a rat or whatever he was playing on his phone while that.
Game is going Solitaire.
Solitaire, Hey, he won't even be playing That could be the the the iPhone version of Clue, all right, he who cares about Colonel Mustard. Steven A is going to be locked in on the Pacers and the Thunder for Game seven in the NBA Finals. But I'd like to point this out. It's taking a little bit too long. The NBA playoffs started before Easter. What the f are we doing? Like literally, like why is.
It so long?
It's just too much?
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
Like no, yeah, just the playoffs.
The playoffs.
Okay, enought LeVar but.
Said, like you're talking about NBA Q the playoffs bad my bad, My bad, my bad.
The playing tournaments started April fifteenth. It shouldn't take this long, Like we're almost in fourth of July, and this is But it's the most interesting.
It's the most interesting part of the season. But you could have gotten here the end season tournament not so much. Nice. Try the regular season not so much. No, try, the playoffs is the most it's the most entertaining. It's the most interesting aspect of the season.
So dragon, you could have gotten here longer, or you could have gotten here quicker.
It's just it on out. I mean, the amount of days in between, like, Okay, they won yesterday, play tomorrow, thank you tomorrow. Yes, they don't want to do they didn't want to do that. They want to they want to max it out. For what max it out?
I know, how Like you're not competing against anything right now really for the most part. I mean, there's there's soccer tournaments going on, there's baseball, there's all that. There's you're not so what do you Why are you trying to space this out even more to create discussion.
Duration of time? You know, duration of time, that's all this is.
But this is the problem. This is why if every round is a seven game series, and you've got to play in tournament. It drags on and on and on, Like.
I mean, that's a long ass playoff. It's no doubt about it. If you were long ass playoffs.
If I were to tell you Eastern Day, you're you're on, You're unwrapping a Cadbury egg, and I'd be like, by the way, these games they won't be over until late June. You'd be like, yeah, whatever, No, no, no, seriously, We've now talked about Joey Chestnut returning for the Hot Dog Eating Contest in the time that it's taken the NBA to finish their effing playoffs. Get it together, state it up, making a five game series. One, wrap it up between let's go, I'm to wrap it up. Come on, man, let's go.
End of the segment, wrap it up.
Under lay.
We ain't gonna stop. Take that, Take that, Take that. Oh oh, I bet.
Be sure to catch live editions of Two Pros and a Cup of Joe with Brady Quinn, LeVar Arrington and Jonas Knox weekdays. It's six am Eastern, three am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
By the way, I know we were we were kind of giving Lee to Lapar executive producer, a hard time last hour. It should be pointed out that we're lucky to have him here today because he was nearly eaten alive by a pack of coyotes.
Uh straight pack that he.
Sent over video evidence.
Lee like twenty of them mother lovers.
Lee's hanging out in his car at a pack of five coyotes roll up to him.
Lee what like?
So this was actually, uh coyotes like booze that much. Lorena actually with the assist, saved me on this one. I was giving her a ride to the Burbank Airport and she was parked behind me, and she's and.
I was like, the way they talk about each other is so crazy. Bro, Got they don't end up married.
Got, Well, she just she texted me, or actually she called me. We were in separate cars, and she says, you should probably look up. Look up, and there's there's a coyote look at me right in the face.
But why would you be looking down.
I was on my car, I was on my phone, as everyone does. No, it was no as you can see in the video, I said you we were all we were both parked part in the neighborhood, and I was, uh, you know, I was there before she was. I was just on my phone waiting for it so that I could give her a ride to the airport.
How does she know to tell you to get your head out.
Yeah, she pulled up behind me and she said, uh, look up.
So you guys are like Shador and his girlfriend.
Getting sound and it sounds just as incongruent as that story, I guess. I was, yeah, look up and see all these coyotes from behind, like you would not make it in a horror flick. Lee, you just taking a guess.
Which, by the way, that is a big safety uh tip to everyone out there. They always say, don't stop.
Uh.
People are getting targeted who are on their phones in their cars because everyone just sits in their car looks at their phone and stuff like that.
People are going out. Oh that That's one of my big pet peeves that people will pull up to a house and just still be scrolling on their phone. Like I can understand if you're listening to something on the rate like a lot of you know, this show does that for a lot of people. They want they want to listen to the end of a segment so bad that they're willing to sit in their car and listen to the end of it. But there's some people who just pull up and will just continue to scan on their phone. Get out of the car, just do it inside. What do you got better Wi Fi? And you're in your civic get out and just go inside. Why are you hanging out in your car unless you know you're you're you're doing some shenanigans, which that teach their own. But Lee's just minding his own business and he's got five coyotes rolling up a.
You know, maybe that's what the coyotes wanted in all the fun.
It depends on who you are, you know, but there's been Yeah, maybe, but it does you know, beg the question. You know, there was that thing that was popular a few weeks ago where it was can one hundred men kill a gorilla? A silver back gorilla? Can one lead to lap kill five coyotes?
Easy done? All you gotta do is take out the first one and then they're scattered.
Yeah, I don't know, man, Oh give me a chance.
Is considered to be a pack Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I don't know. You probably get some good licks off on them, like you know, a couple of kicks here and there. But if they keep, if they if they pack you out, that's going to be a hard one for you to win because they're gonna they're gonna bite you up pretty good. No, I have confidence in myself.
My question would be, would I be able to defend because I got two little dogs that I let into the front yard?
Oh those are still yeah, those are sacrificed for the Yeah, cause yeah, exactly?
Can I can I defend?
How I defend two dogs that gets a pack of coyotes?
No, because you can't defend yourself. Lee, That's what I'm trying to tell you. I know you could be confident you but five coyotes and they didn't. They weren't small, No, they were healthy too. There were a couple of them that were pretty big.
Welly, send the video out on social media so people can see why you nearly were eating alive.
By the odies, A couple of them bad boys was pretty big, man. I just don't one or two. Yes, you can defend yourself. Five that's too many.
Bro, By the way, what a story?
So how do you go?
Five coyotes got him?
He was drinking.
He was drinking out of a flask at eight fifteen in the morning, and five coyotes rolled up and took it from him and then ate him alive.
I got out after this video and confronted one of them. They didn't do anyth they didn't like. Skywa fronted one of them. Well, they're they're you know, they're flighty. You know, they're more like foxes than they are like wolves. Like they're not They're not going to you know, they're not going to engage you unless they felt like they needed to engage, Like if they were hungry, like hungry hungry, they might, they might pack you out. You gotta be carried. Don't be taking that light bro.
By the way, I thought I thought coyotes were just a California thing.
They're in every state, They're everywhere.
They're everywhere everywhere, So everybody's got a problem, especially when the weather gets warmer, because they don't want to take their animals out during the day, so they'll take them on walks at night, and the coyotes just lurk and they're just waiting for something small somebody to be dilly daling on their phone. Leash gets away from them and next thing you know that coyotes chewing on your poodle.
That's how that works. So there you go. Good luck to all the poodles and puppies out there.
Man, So you got to get a get a real dog.
You don't have those problems unless it's a skunk. But it is.
The show does not have great luck. Raccoon Craft and Brady's pool. LaVar got skunk, League got attacked by coyotes.
Me and mister Sticks got skunked. He got it bad. It was all in his mouth. He put that stink in that my my baby's he put it in my dog's mouth. Pause your mouth.
Wait, we do have Uh. Lee has sent out the tweet. I believe it at Lee to lap is where they can find that. That is your social media so U so you can see for yourself why Lee nearly was eaten by coyotes. All right, So, uh, speaking of issues, the New York Jets had some issues over the past couple of years, and uh, the quarter the quarterback with the New York Jets, Aaron Rodgers, apparently was vocal about these issues.
Uh.
He and Mark schlare Fox Sports One host are friends and Mark Schlareth was talking about a situation Rogers was venting about in New York on his Stinking Truth podcast, Let's take a listen.
One thing that Aaron and I had a conversation about when he was with the Jets was how abysmal their running game was and how schematically it made no sense. And I brought up the conversation. I started the conversation, and then Aaron went on for about a twenty five minute.
Diet dribe on just their run game.
I asked Aaron about it, just about the run game in general. I said, Man, this is like, it's really bad, and he went on this diet drive just about you know, the dysfunction of what we're trying to accomplish and all these different things.
And so apparently Rogers, even while in the mix there in New York, was not happy about some of the the decision making, some of the ideas on how to how to fix the run game, so on and so forth. And just the more that you hear about this time in New York for Rogers and everybody involved, the more you realize that was just an awful idea, Like that was an awful idea. His chance to succeed in New York ended four plays.
Into the season.
When he first got there, it was over because then everybody's timeline was off.
He was out for the year.
It was going to take him into the very next year to try and get back to full health. And by that time there had already been a coaching change and all sorts of crap going on with the Jets. That moment when he went down with the injury, it was a wrap they were never going to get. You needed everything to be perfect, You needed the timing for everybody to be perfect. With a coach potentially on the hot seat and a quarterback this late in his career, and four plays into the season, the timing got thrown off and it was a mess ever since then. It was never going to work after that.
Who was that making the quote talking about it, Markschlairth, Mark Sting. I just you know, for me, I always think when when bad mouthing of an organization or of a quarterback, excuse me, a coach, whatever it may be, when that comes out after they've left, I just find it to be disingenuous. I find it to be convenient, and it doesn't hit the same. It just doesn't. If you had these these feelings, and you had these these conclusions and these thoughts, then let it out, let it be made known, because after the fact, it's late. There's no reason to give us, you know, that type of information and and that have to be disseminated because conclusions have already been been written, they've already been been drawn that it's already happened. So I just feel like the Aaron Rodgers experiment in New York did not work and it's over. Like what happens next? Does Justin Fields make this New York Jets better a better team? Does Aaron Rodgers make the Pittsburgh Steelers a better team? Again? This is why the National Football League is the greatest reality TV show that has ever existed. Oh, we put Aaron Rodgers in one of the biggest media markets in the country, in the world, and it didn't work out. But you know what, Hey, let's put them in a different media market. Let's see if it works out in Pittsburgh. Oh, now we can cross reference and bring that back and wrap it into New York City. Oh, we brought in Justin Fields from Pittsburgh. He didn't get it done in Pittsburgh. Let's take him out of that market. Let's put them in New York. Now we got a cross referencing of stories. How did this work? One side may do better, one side may do worse. One player may do better, one player may do worse. Both players may stink, both players might be great. No matter how this all plays out, the storyline still exists to be able to write them in a very entertaining way, which is why the NFL continues to win.
Do you think because the way Mark Schlaer kind of laid it out was he reached out to Rogers and noticed that there was some questionable decisions as far as their scheming goes with the offensive line, and then Rogers went on to vent about what it is that they were doing. I just so, I don't know if it was necessarily Rogers airing out the organization so much. I think he did a lot of that on the Pat McAfee show.
And he's about to say he has aired him out. Yeah, that's not that won't be anything anything new, but go ahead.
I just.
Like we've seen this before to where like when the cole tired Jeff Saturday, it was like, wow, this could be cool. We were on the air. I think that was our first year in the show together when the Colt tired Jeff Saturday, and it was like, well, let's see how this works. Let's see how this works, because this is a bold, different approach. It doesn't feel like it's gonna work, but let's just see. And they win the first game and you're thinking to yourself, man, maybe the Colts knew something. And then upon further review, the idea was preposterous. It just didn't like it just it just didn't like it was never gonna work because the timing of everything, like you're you're asking a guy to walk off a TV set and take over a team that he hasn't been around, Like it was never gonna work. But it didn't take until afterwards where all of your initial thoughts were confirmed. And when Rogers joined the Jets. I think I speak for a lot of people where it was Okay, it's Rogers, it's the Jets. We've seen this with Farv. It didn't work with him, It's never seemingly worked with any quarterback with the Jets. But let's give it a shot. And literally running out with the American flag on Monday Night Football and four plays later it was over. He was he was after that and you know this from going through the Achilles injury. When did he look close to himself? Even last year?
I mean, yeah, I was geeking out was going to come back this season? I watch I'm so excited for this again, you and c If anybody can do, it's going to be Aaron Rodgers. He's coming back. Did you hear that he's coming back? He was on the field before the game warming up. Is he going to suit out?
And now that you look back on it, now that I'm taking, like taking a step back, and I'm hearing him vent to Mark Schlaret about the run game and all these other I just realized, Man, that was it. I remember where I was watching it when he went down with the injury. I remember thinking to myself, Oh God, there's no way it's going to be over this quick, but then thinking, well, maybe he'll come back that year, and maybe it'll be a bounce back year the year after. It's like, no, the timeline got thrown off completely. You needed everything to be perfect. You had the coach on the hot seat, You had an organization who was desperate, You had an owner who was desperate. You had a quarterback who wanted to prove people wrong and move away from his previous organization and do what the guy who preceded him did in Brett Farbe, but do it differently. And four plays in Gone, all but Gone, I completely wiped out.
And it makes me.
Feel dumb that I was thinking this entire time while Rogers is in New York like no, no, no, but maybe but and it just dysfunction after dysfunction. It was just it was never gonna work. The parents crazy.
It is so like this is like a one sided rant going on right now, right like we're talking about it from Aaron Rodgers' perspective. Imagine how you felt if we're the New York Jet. Oh my god, like you got some nerve to be talking about our your frustrations about us? What about us? Aaron Rogers, You ever stopped to think about the pain and heartache you caused us. Take some cotton dorm responsibility over yourself. It's just like your mother, lover.
It's like two hot heads dating each other. Like you got two hot heads dating each other's where'd you guys meet at a bar drinking? Oh well, yeah, everything will be fine and they get married. It's a shotgun wedding, they get married, and then you know, five six months later, Oh yeah, it didn't work out.
No way, you don't don't have your wedding ring on.
Oh you don't say, it's like, what's going on here?
How's the missus what?
That's why, that's why I truly believe that Rogers in Pittsburgh will be better than Rogers in New York, just because that situation was never gonna work, like, it was never gonna happen.
Well, let's be clear here, Mike Tomlin knows he needs to have a good year. There's no I mean, there's no mistaken. He doesn't need a crystal ball or somebody to tell him. He knows going into this he needs to have a good year. Rogers feels the same way, maybe doesn't feel as much of a sense of urgency as it applies to what he needs to do, just based off of the fact he's already had a first ballot Hall of Famer career, but he's still playing, which means that he still feels like there's something to prove. And so you take that and you add in the element of Mike Tomlin seemingly having a very very strong, domineering type of personality and the way he runs his team and how this thing is all, you know, kind of constructed in Pittsburgh. It just appears that Aaron Rodgers, while he will continue to still be a lightning rod and still be a major topic of conversation from the media, it just seems like this would be the right place where a coach can handle the type of person and the type of elements that come along with Aaron Rodgers being on your team, and that could pay dividends for both the team and for the player. But it could also end very very bad. I mean, it also has the potential of crashing and burning very badly as well. So again, it's it's it's reality television, and it's must see TV. I know I'm gonna be locked in.
Oh, I can't wait.
I'm gonna be locked I can't wait.
And it's also kind of leading to what you're saying. It's two entities who've been through a lot of crap the past couple of years, dealt with a lot of crap, and they're probably like, look, can we just play ball? Like I just want to play ball. I just I want to go out. I want to play ball. I want to have an understanding of what it is that we're doing, and I don't want to deal with all the chaos like that's it. That And and I think that's probably good news for the Steelers who are probably hoping for some good news, and you get justin fields week one. It's great good for the NFL.
Be sure to catch live editions of Two Pros and a Cup of Joe with Brady Quinn, LeVar Errington, and Jonas Knox weekdays at six am Eastern, three am Pacific.
So there is maybe a little bit of a problem going on in Seattle.
Now.
This is you know, there's just been some reports that have come out of you know, Seahawks mini camp and whatnot that maybe Sam Darnold has struggled a little bit, you know, you struggling again. This is you know, mini camp, these are OTAs, these are we're not even at training camp. And some people have said it hasn't looked all that great. He's trying to get adjusted to a new place, new system, new teammates, all of that. And then there was the report that came out from Mike Silver of The Athletic who said the following quote, the Seahawks pursuit of Sam Darnald snuck up on many nfl observers and proceeded in rapid fire fashion. While some believed the Las Vegas Raiders would try to sign Donald, minority owner Tom Brady, a seven times Super Bowl winning quarterback whose opinion held great Sway, was not in favor of that approach, according to a source familiar with the franchise's internal discussions. So basically, Man, the Raiders chose the player the Seahawks didn't want anymore, and the Seahawks chose the player the Raiders didn't want.
So if they were aware of this, I mean at least that who Tom Brady didn't want.
Look, we kind of throughout the question what's really the difference between Geno Smith and Sam Donald? And if you had to go by a body of work, who's done it more? Smith has done more, Totally agree, Totally agree, and.
You don't really know what you're going to get from Sam Donald because there's not enough of a sample size. And that's just reality. Great great one season run and really showed that being able to pull it together at the right time can lead to opportunities. But that does not necessarily mean that you've crossed the threshold of being you know what that what that positive season represented to the entirety of your career. He's got to he's got to go into Seattle knowing that if he you know, if what he hasn't done already isn't enough for him to be okay with himself as a career, he's he's got to put together at least one to two more seasons before you can He's got to put together this season. Let's start there, before you can say he is a legitimate good football player in the National Football League, like it's stamped because he was able to do it two years in a row. Anything after two years in a row, it's okay. They've established themselves and and this is the standard we've come to expect. This is the sample size. And now you've earned whatever it is that you get accolades wise, whatever the conversations are as it applies to your contract, whatever it may be, those are now conversations that are more comfortable to have versus feeling some type of trepidation as it applies to how you feel and how you say things about that player, in particular, in this case it's Sam Donald. You don't know what you're gonna get. Like as much as you may think you can put together the pieces and say this is the type of performances you're gonna get from Sam Donald in Seattle. Sam Donald might have been able to pull together one good season for a lot of good reasons. There's a lot of weapons where he just came from and a hell of a play caller. Does that mean that he can do it again? Maybe? Does it mean that he was able to leverage that to get a nice little payday? Absolutely? And I just wonder I.
Wonder if the fact that Tom Brady's the guy who basically said, nah, I don't think that's a good approach. I just wonder if that's because, look, it was early in Sam Donald's career, it was his rookie season. Brady played him a couple of times. I wonder if that there's either that that he sees and says that's not the right approach for us, or if his feeling is, Look, Sam Donald excelled last year for the most part because of what he had around him. He's not going to have that same supporting cast around him here. This doesn't make a lot of sense for us to go this direction and.
Smith. But but I will know.
But I think that there it. This would tell me, This would indicate to me that they believe more in Geno Smith's ability to lead that team and have success than they do Sam Donald's. Because the difference in the contracts is not you know, off the top of my head, I think it's right around the same. Like there's not there's not a huge difference in the money that's out there and.
The money I don't want it. Maybe Sam Darnold want it more, I don't. I don't know, this is what I do know. What I do know is that Geno Smith is going to face a very difficult season. He's going to to I mean, he's gonna he's gonna have a hard time having a successful season as it stands so far with what the Las Vegas Raiders are. Is it possible it's possible that that Seattle is personnel wise a better team right now than the Las Vegas Raiders. I mean, I don't know, maybe close in comp now. I will say this, the one thing that's really truly working against Geno Smith is the division that he's in. It's an unforgiving division, and if you're not up to snuff, it's going to show.
But wouldn't that lead also then to why maybe that was part of the thinking as well too, Who gives us a better shot in this gunslinger division? Sam Darnold or Gino Smith like that?
I just think there's question marks on both of them, don't I agree that. I don't know that. To be honest with you, I don't know that there is a lesser evil between the situation. For the simple fact, all I'll say is, yes, Gino Smith has more experience, He's played more, he has a larger body of work, and he has done some pretty good things in Seattle. But with that being said, again, I still think that there are question marks in terms of is Geno Smith. I went and labeled Geno Smith a top tier quarterback that could take a team to the super Bowl, And whether that's fair or unfair, I'm just basing that off of what I've seen thus far in his career and whether it's the franchise that he started with being the reason why, whatever it is that has led to him being in the category he's in right now, He's not far removed from the same category as Sam Donald. And so to me, when you have these conversations like Tom Brady was out on Sam Donald and you were in on Geno Smith. You know what I mean, Like, damn, unless Geno Smith has a phenomenal year, a story like this pops back up and then you could sit there and be like, well, what does Tom Brady know about player decisions with as it applies to coming to a team, Because to me, when you start inserting Tom into the conversations as to what decisions were taking place and how decisions have been made, then now you got to ultimately judge him based off of the results that take place from hearing about what those decisions were.
Now, I would say this, and I've thrown out this idea before, but of course it was dismissed because you know, the disrespect that I'm shown on this show and at this network is just revolting. But I've mentioned that they should know, they shouldn't disrespect is good. They should know, they should know that there there needs to be one game on every NFL team schedule that's open for some switching out if you will, some some juggling.
If you will switch Hitt.
And not even from a standpoint of well it can be flexed out to this night or no, no, no, no, I mean an entirely different matchup. When these two moves were made, somebody should have stepped in and said, Raider Seahawks, get it somewhere on the schedule. Somewhere on the schedule.
We need this to happen.
We want storylines, we want juice. That's the NFL's next evolution in adjusting their schedule for entertainment purposes. Only if they want to do it. Now, these two teams are going to meet in the preseason, but it's the preseason game. I'd love to see Pete Carroll have his starters in until midway through the fourth quarter, just to see what happens. I would love to see that. But all of the backstory, now this added in that Tom Brady said no to Sam Donald, but they traded for Geno Smith. Sam Donald's now in Seattle. You've got Pete Carroll and Gino Smith, former Seahawks who are now in Las Vegas. The NFL needs to step in, get a pair of balls, and say, you know what, broadcasting partners, fan bases, you're going to need to have to wait.
A little bit.
We're going to open it up for one game on the schedule each year for each team that we decide after all the moves have been made where these teams are going to be meeting up and where they play, because I would love to see Raider Seahawks in the regular season. What do you think about that, Levarrington.
I mean, it's a creative way of being able to approach your matchups and you can get more. You know, I think the key to growing your audiences in this day and age is fan interaction, you know, the engagement and being able to engage in these types of conversations, holding polls, getting feedback, you know, them having creative input on different things such as this, like follow the storyline. They always say, follow the storyline, and if the storyline is giving you something like this, there's again I mean you were able to They were able to do that with Peyton and Tom Brady. Yeah, you know so, I mean I don't see there being any issue with with that being something that you would work to try to get to or to actually implement, where you can say, even if it's not a team that is in the division, you're supposed to play out of division, we still want to make this a game because the storyline connected to it is super compelling and it would deliver in terms of, you know, the build up to the game. Yeah, I mean I just think think it's it's I think it's Yeah. I think it's a good deal.
There's there's a lot. I mean, just think about what you can do in Cleveland. Like you could have the you could have the Browns face the highway patrol in like week three, you know if your door might be starting by then, so you can see that whole, you.
Know part, or just hold a scrimmage all together during training camp. Don't the don't the policemen. Don't they have uh, don't they have their own football teams? I believe, I believe they have football teams.
So Ohio State Troopers versus versus the Browns. Uh, the practice the practice team, the scout team. Fair enough, bam, all right, no whistles. You get two extra steps to the quarterback winner gets to pick the speed limit. All right, tenning's on the line. I mean people will watch that, as you telling me you would watch that. I'll be all in that or a w NBA game if they may. You got it, I'm taking I'm taking. Seeing if these cats is gonna win. Yes, I'm telling you, and for what is work, what it's work, I pay for that.
I go on pay per view to see if Cleveland's practiced, how cleve this practice squad did against the State Troopers.
I mean you mentioned the coverage that would get. I mean, everybody'd be there, Fox Barrett.
Everybody donate the proceeds to the State
Trooperswhere you go, Bam Barrett Sports