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Dan O'Dowd Part 2 + Michigan Controversy and Clippers Fallout · Rosters to Rings Podcast

0:02
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Rosters to Rings. Alongside co-host Chet West,
0:06
Speaker 1: I am Thad Levine. We're picking up our conversation with
0:09
Speaker 1: Dan O'Dowd, a longtime storied executive in the game. Additionally,
0:14
Speaker 1: you can hear Dan as one of the foremost analysts
0:17
Speaker 1: on Major League Baseball Network. A good friend, my first boss,
0:20
Speaker 1: and one of the most creative minds baseball has ever seen.
0:23
Speaker 1: Here we are with Dan O'Dowd.
0:25
Speaker 2: We hear constantly that an organization is good at player development. Dan,
0:29
Speaker 2: you were recently on record as saying the Baltimore Orioles
0:33
Speaker 2: are not doing well with player development right now. Probably
0:36
Speaker 2: couldn't agree more with you with some of the young
0:38
Speaker 2: players we've seen come through that system over the last
0:39
Speaker 2: couple of years and kind of hit some sort of
0:42
Speaker 2: a plateau. All right. What does that actually mean to
0:48
Speaker 2: be good at player development? Two organizations draft a player,
0:51
Speaker 2: similar talent. Why does one consistently turn them into a
0:55
Speaker 2: productive ballplayer while the other doesn't? What's happening there?
0:58
Speaker 3: Good, I'll give you my spiel here. To me, there's
1:02
Speaker 3: three buckets of players. There's an impact player, contributor, and
1:05
Speaker 3: a value player. Impact player, self-explanatory, they're your all-star, they're
1:09
Speaker 3: your aircraft carriers. Your contributors are guys that are your
1:12
Speaker 3: solid everyday major league players. And your value players are
1:15
Speaker 3: the players that create value in the organization from a
1:18
Speaker 3: development standpoint in some way, shape, or form. Okay, your
1:23
Speaker 3: job in player development, very simply, is to take the
1:28
Speaker 3: value players and make them contributors, take the contributor players,
1:33
Speaker 3: make them impact players, and make sure your impact players
1:36
Speaker 3: don't go back to being contributors. You do that in
1:40
Speaker 3: a very, very complex but simple way. Every single player
1:46
Speaker 3: has blessings and baggage within your organization. Every scout that
1:50
Speaker 3: brings a player into your organization has seen something within
1:52
Speaker 3: that player that makes him good. Your job is to
1:58
Speaker 3: take those gifts in conjunction with the player and develop
2:01
Speaker 3: a player plan that turns that player into the very
2:05
Speaker 3: best player that can be up to whatever that ability is.
2:11
Speaker 3: What's happened now in the game is that the player
2:16
Speaker 3: development systems are overloaded with guys that they teach through data.
2:24
Speaker 3: So there's a difference between training and development. Training is
2:30
Speaker 3: you take a player and you say, you need to
2:33
Speaker 3: throw your foreseemer, you need to hold this way to
2:35
Speaker 3: get this vertical run. You need to do this on
2:39
Speaker 3: your exit velocity to be able to get to be
2:42
Speaker 3: a more proficient home run hitter. They do no development
2:46
Speaker 3: at all because development gets done inside out. You cannot
2:52
Speaker 3: develop a player unless you have a transformational relationship with
2:57
Speaker 3: that player. Player development today is done through transactional relationships.
3:05
Speaker 3: So no one digs in on the interpersonal human analytical
3:09
Speaker 3: part of the player. that the data and the technology
3:13
Speaker 3: has taken over staff people that would take Thad Levine
3:17
Speaker 3: at an A-level, find out all the baggage that Thad
3:21
Speaker 3: is carrying, the fears he's carrying, how he was raised,
3:25
Speaker 3: his life experiences, dig in on each one of those,
3:30
Speaker 3: So the training aspect of his game can be done
3:34
Speaker 3: to the fullest because now he's created this kind of
3:37
Speaker 3: relationship with Thad that is so transformational. Thad knows that
3:43
Speaker 3: Chet loves him whether he's a good player or whether
3:46
Speaker 3: he stinks. That does not go on in a bad organization.
3:53
Speaker 2: It sounds like a very psychological approach to player development.
3:56
Speaker 3: Oh, but it is.
3:57
Speaker 2: I don't know how many people think of it that way.
3:59
Speaker 3: The game of baseball is so mental. Every physical move
4:04
Speaker 3: you do in a weight room, every athletic you move
4:08
Speaker 3: on a baseball field is all tied to something mentally
4:12
Speaker 3: that's going to allow that player to take that skill
4:14
Speaker 3: and flourish with it or take that skill and diminish
4:17
Speaker 3: with it. And yet we have flooded player development systems
4:21
Speaker 3: with people that have no idea how to do that.
4:24
Speaker 3: That's the greatest competitive advantage that actually exists in the
4:27
Speaker 3: game today. If someone would take it and do it.
4:30
Speaker 1: Dan, I think the last two points you make, you
4:32
Speaker 1: made tie together very well. And it's this is we
4:35
Speaker 1: have so much information in the game. We have these
4:37
Speaker 1: wonderful resources, but I've always felt like we should ground
4:40
Speaker 1: our decisions with those information, but we have to make
4:43
Speaker 1: the decisions humanly. And by that you referenced that if,
4:46
Speaker 1: The manager isn't making the lineup. He's a dead man walking.
4:50
Speaker 1: I think it somewhat applies to the minor league coach here,
4:53
Speaker 1: which is– No manager.
4:54
Speaker 3: Is making lineups anymore in.
4:56
Speaker 1: The minor league level. If the minor league guy is
4:58
Speaker 1: just coaching off of the data, they're missing the mark
5:02
Speaker 1: on connecting to the guy's heart. They're driven off of
5:04
Speaker 1: connecting to their head, not to their heart. If your
5:06
Speaker 1: scouting director on the front line doesn't get to make
5:10
Speaker 1: front line decisions, he gets emasculated in the room. I
5:13
Speaker 1: think it's using that data, but then it's allowing your
5:15
Speaker 1: frontline people the empowerment and the respect and the equity
5:19
Speaker 1: to ultimately use that information to make the best human-based
5:23
Speaker 1: decisions on the frontline.
5:25
Speaker 3: Very well said, Pat. So I said fear is prevalent
5:28
Speaker 3: in our game, the problem with emotion, the most forceful,
5:31
Speaker 3: powerful emotion in our game is love. If a player
5:34
Speaker 3: knows that you love them, truly love them. I'd want
5:40
Speaker 3: our kids in player development, the ones that don't play
5:42
Speaker 3: in the big leagues, 15 years from now when they're
5:44
Speaker 3: getting married to invite all of us to their wedding.
5:48
Speaker 3: Like they know that we transform their life and it's
5:52
Speaker 3: unbelievable how good they become. So if your sole motive
5:55
Speaker 3: to do this is just, I just want to win
5:57
Speaker 3: more games at the big league level, I'll give you
6:00
Speaker 3: a real life example of this that's playing out at
6:02
Speaker 3: the big league level. Dubon with the Braves. Okay, it's
6:08
Speaker 3: his fourth organization. He's been looked at only as a
6:12
Speaker 3: utility player. Never been given a chance to play. So
6:15
Speaker 3: what does Walt Weiss do? What is what Pat Murphy does?
6:18
Speaker 3: He calls him in and says, I want to learn
6:21
Speaker 3: everything about you. I'm going to find everything that's held
6:25
Speaker 3: you back in your career, whatever you're afraid of. And
6:27
Speaker 3: you know what? You're going to play for me because
6:30
Speaker 3: I believe in your ability. You're going to be one
6:32
Speaker 3: of our best players here. And how's the guy play?
6:36
Speaker 3: Pat Murphy does this with every single one of his players.
6:38
Speaker 3: This is not rocket science. Why organizations don't do this
6:43
Speaker 3: because it's hard work, it's exhausting, and they don't put
6:47
Speaker 3: people in place that know how to do this. And
6:50
Speaker 3: so like, just all you have to do is talk
6:55
Speaker 3: to somebody in the oral organization right now and say,
6:59
Speaker 3: has anybody been transformational in your life right now? The
7:02
Speaker 3: answer is going to be no. Very simply, the answer
7:04
Speaker 3: is going to be no.
7:05
Speaker 1: It sounds simple, Dan. I think we've flooded the game
7:07
Speaker 1: with people with exceptional IQ, and we've lost the sense
7:11
Speaker 1: of EQ, and the balance is vital to what you're
7:14
Speaker 1: trying to achieve. Stick with us. One more break. We're
7:17
Speaker 1: going to come back and talk to Dan about the
7:19
Speaker 1: CBA and what the future of Major League Baseball looks
7:22
Speaker 1: like on Rosters to Rings.
7:33
Speaker 2: Welcome back to rosters to rings. We're going to touch
7:36
Speaker 2: on the CBA, Dan. Um, dad and I have been
7:38
Speaker 2: talking about this for the past couple of weeks, uh,
7:41
Speaker 2: with various guests and everybody's got an opinion depending on
7:44
Speaker 2: which side of the game you're in. Uh, you've lived
7:48
Speaker 2: through multiple rounds of labor negotiations.
7:50
Speaker 3: Yeah. This would be four.
7:51
Speaker 2: Yeah. Okay. And you'd look at the, you know, the
7:54
Speaker 2: positions of the league and the players and how concerned
7:56
Speaker 2: should baseball fans be about the possibility of a lockout
8:01
Speaker 2: or games being lost in 2027? I Is it going
8:04
Speaker 2: to be a bit?
8:04
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, the one thing I'll say is that,
8:06
Speaker 3: you know, I'm always hesitant to talk about things that
8:08
Speaker 3: I'm not in the middle of. So I'm only can
8:11
Speaker 3: talk about things like an outsider looking in that's got
8:13
Speaker 3: history in the game. And Thad knows this very, very well.
8:18
Speaker 3: To get deals done, you have to respect the other
8:21
Speaker 3: side's opinions. I didn't say you have to trust the
8:25
Speaker 3: other side, but you have to respect the other side.
8:29
Speaker 3: It seems very clear to me that there is That
8:32
Speaker 3: is very, very lacking. And so where that lacks, you
8:37
Speaker 3: usually don't have the empathy to understand where the other
8:41
Speaker 3: side is coming from to try to resolve what you're
8:47
Speaker 3: presenting and what issues it causes them. If those steps
8:51
Speaker 3: don't take place, I don't know how you get to
8:55
Speaker 3: a deal. Because if you say on one hand, I
9:01
Speaker 3: want a salary cap, and you expound on why you
9:06
Speaker 3: want a salary cap, and I can also do that
9:08
Speaker 3: and why I think it's good for the game, but
9:11
Speaker 3: if you don't solve the problems of what the salary
9:14
Speaker 3: cap creates within the body of the union, well, then
9:20
Speaker 3: you're not listening what their empathy is. Conversely, if you're
9:24
Speaker 3: the union and you want A, B, C, and D,
9:26
Speaker 3: and you don't have empathy to what the owners are
9:29
Speaker 3: trying to solve, you know, how they operate their businesses,
9:34
Speaker 3: you know, then you're not going to get what you
9:35
Speaker 3: want either. A good deal is when you both understand
9:38
Speaker 3: the positions and you're willing to try to figure out
9:41
Speaker 3: a way to solve the problems each positions create.
9:46
Speaker 1: Dan, I think that's exceptionally well said. It's hard to
9:49
Speaker 1: sit on the sidelines watching this and feel as if
9:52
Speaker 1: there is enough of that empathy, the willingness to listen,
9:56
Speaker 1: the willingness to care enough about the other side and
9:59
Speaker 1: to hunt those opportunities to have it be a win-win negotiation.
10:03
Speaker 1: It feels a little bit more like a vanquish the foe.
10:05
Speaker 1: There's so much vitriol in the public eye. I'm a
10:09
Speaker 1: little bit encouraged that they seem to be talking more
10:13
Speaker 1: than they did previously in terms of earlier in the process.
10:18
Speaker 1: I also have been somewhat encouraged by what some of
10:20
Speaker 1: the union is presenting. I feel like they've always done
10:23
Speaker 1: an incredible job of taking care of their, their highest earners.
10:27
Speaker 1: It feels as if they're shifting their attention a little
10:29
Speaker 1: bit more towards the middle to, you know, early earners.
10:33
Speaker 1: And I think that's good for the game. Hopefully that
10:36
Speaker 1: is something that will prevail because I think there's, there's
10:39
Speaker 1: elements of both sides that have to be positive for
10:42
Speaker 1: the game. But what I know is not positive for
10:44
Speaker 1: the game is the notion of, that we're going to
10:45
Speaker 1: mudsling in the press. We're going to wait till the
10:48
Speaker 1: absolute last moment. We're going to threaten the fans and
10:50
Speaker 1: the owners and the players that they're not going to
10:52
Speaker 1: be able to earn money and play or watch the
10:54
Speaker 1: game of baseball. There's only so many times you can
10:57
Speaker 1: do that to a fan base. We've fallen behind football
11:00
Speaker 1: by far. We're falling behind the NBA. There are other
11:03
Speaker 1: sports leagues out there that are just passing us by.
11:06
Speaker 1: We have a good thing going right now. I'm hopeful
11:09
Speaker 1: that cooler heads will prevail. But it starts with the
11:12
Speaker 1: word that you used, which is empathy and a genuine
11:15
Speaker 1: care to try to arrive at an outcome that is
11:17
Speaker 1: positive for everyone in the game, not just one side
11:20
Speaker 1: or the other.
11:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think somebody really has to be the overseer
11:25
Speaker 3: of what's best interest in the game of baseball. But, hey,
11:27
Speaker 3: I get it. I mean, both positions seemed intractable, you know,
11:31
Speaker 3: maybe because I've been on Labor's side. But, I mean,
11:33
Speaker 3: I work for owners. So, I mean, I probably have
11:35
Speaker 3: a better feel for owners and personalities as anybody in
11:39
Speaker 3: the game. if I was running the union and obviously
11:42
Speaker 3: they'd never had me doing that, but I would use
11:46
Speaker 3: the opportunity to see how much I could gain for
11:50
Speaker 3: my constituents underneath the cap. You know, what's the highest
11:55
Speaker 3: I could get the floor to? Could I eliminate salary
11:58
Speaker 3: arbitration and replace it with fixed dollars, guaranteed dollars? So
12:01
Speaker 3: if you tender and you're a three plus, you're going
12:03
Speaker 3: to make, you know, five, six million a year. If
12:06
Speaker 3: you're a four plus, you're going to make 12 million
12:08
Speaker 3: a year. If you're a five plus, you're going to
12:09
Speaker 3: make 18 million, whatever the numbers would be. Can I
12:12
Speaker 3: get my zero to one guys up to $ 2 million
12:15
Speaker 3: a year? I mean, I've always found that if a
12:18
Speaker 3: side is desperate to get something done, there's an opportunity
12:23
Speaker 3: to create a win-win underneath the skies. For an example,
12:28
Speaker 3: One of the pushbacks that I've read was the best
12:31
Speaker 3: players in the game have to be able to be
12:34
Speaker 3: paid what they're worth.
12:35
Speaker 2: On the open market.
12:36
Speaker 3: Okay. So how many fall into that category every year
12:40
Speaker 3: as a free agent?
12:42
Speaker 1: A handful at best.
12:43
Speaker 4: Yeah.
12:44
Speaker 3: Maybe not.
12:46
Speaker 1: Somewhere between zero and three to four, probably.
12:49
Speaker 3: So do you create a way within a cap system
12:53
Speaker 3: that you create a carve-out? to where the percentage of that,
12:58
Speaker 3: say in a cap system, hypothetically, Juan Soto doesn't make,
13:03
Speaker 3: or Michael Kalituk, they don't make 60, they make 50. Well,
13:06
Speaker 3: is 20% or some percentage of that number, you'd have
13:09
Speaker 3: to run the numbers to determine this way more accurately
13:12
Speaker 3: than me, does the percentage of that payroll doesn't count
13:15
Speaker 3: towards that signing club's cap? Because that player has achieved
13:20
Speaker 3: at a level that puts him in a unique class.
13:23
Speaker 3: And you could do that for all the arbitration years too.
13:26
Speaker 3: So like my point being, I don't know if that's
13:28
Speaker 3: the right answer. The point being is if you honestly
13:33
Speaker 3: can just sit down intelligently and say, okay, you don't
13:37
Speaker 3: want to cap Y. Okay, can we work together to
13:42
Speaker 3: solve those issues within a cap that still gives us
13:46
Speaker 3: some restraint so we shrink the payroll discrepancies that needs
13:51
Speaker 3: the game. And by the way, you're going to get
13:52
Speaker 3: a minimum payroll. So some of these clubs that don't
13:55
Speaker 3: even spend to 150 million, you're going to have to
13:58
Speaker 3: spend it on players. It just seems to me that
14:01
Speaker 3: there's creative, rational ways to resolve the differences. But if
14:04
Speaker 3: you don't respect the other side and you don't feel
14:07
Speaker 3: like you're going to get anywhere, then you won't even
14:09
Speaker 3: get to a point to have those discussions.
14:11
Speaker 1: Dan, it feels to me like so much of this
14:13
Speaker 1: is debated in the public relations messaging and I couldn't
14:18
Speaker 1: agree with you more. They're so fixated on this notion
14:20
Speaker 1: of a ceiling. If I would take the union side
14:24
Speaker 1: and I would say, Hey, all the owners talk about
14:26
Speaker 1: is parody in the game.
14:27
Speaker 2: Okay, great.
14:28
Speaker 1: Let's both embrace parody. We'll give you a ceiling. We're
14:32
Speaker 1: going to have an extremely high floor. Now we're shifting
14:35
Speaker 1: it back to you to tell us why you're not
14:37
Speaker 1: willing to pay for the floor in the name of parody.
14:40
Speaker 1: And now also, and I think it shifts back to
14:42
Speaker 1: the owners and now they look unreasonable and, And now
14:45
Speaker 1: it's a debate between the billionaires and the millionaires. And
14:47
Speaker 1: I don't think the billionaires will ever look great in
14:49
Speaker 1: that debate. But I would.
14:51
Speaker 2: Embrace this notion of parity.
14:53
Speaker 3: I think the owners would do that. I think they
14:55
Speaker 3: would put a very high floor in there. Obviously, grandfathered
14:57
Speaker 3: in over a period of time. And that may force
14:59
Speaker 3: some ownership groups in a very compromising position of what
15:02
Speaker 3: they're going to do moving forward. But I just feel
15:05
Speaker 3: like I'm perplexed on the position the union is taking.
15:11
Speaker 3: And it's not because I'm pro-union or pro-labor or pro-management
15:16
Speaker 3: at this case. It just seems to me there's an
15:18
Speaker 3: incredible opportunity within this space now to create something for 90%
15:22
Speaker 3: of the players that's significantly better than the current system.
15:27
Speaker 2: You seem to be understanding of the need for a cap,
15:32
Speaker 2: very understanding of the need for a floor. Do we
15:34
Speaker 2: have this competitive imbalance right now? Is this something that's
15:40
Speaker 2: actually out there happening? You've been with clubs that didn't
15:43
Speaker 2: have the financial resources.
15:46
Speaker 3: I think sports are so unpredictable. The two best records
15:49
Speaker 3: in the league this year are the Tampa Bay Rays
15:51
Speaker 3: and the Milwaukee Brewers. I think it's got a $ 125
15:55
Speaker 3: million payroll. The Rays, I think, is under $ 100 million,
15:57
Speaker 3: somewhere in that area. I think where the competitive imbalance
16:03
Speaker 3: gnaws at me is that if Kyle Tucker is a
16:10
Speaker 3: 90 OPS plus player this year, the Dodgers should feel
16:16
Speaker 3: the pain of that. If Blake Snell and Glass now
16:21
Speaker 3: get hurt, the Dodgers should feel the pain of that. Basically,
16:26
Speaker 3: what their payrolls allow them to do is create two
16:29
Speaker 3: totally different teams. And so they... They just shut down
16:35
Speaker 3: their best, most talented players pitching-wise until they need them
16:40
Speaker 3: to make sure that they can use them when the
16:43
Speaker 3: games mean the most. And they've done a great job
16:45
Speaker 3: of scouting development, too. I mean, I don't want to
16:47
Speaker 3: take anything of that away, but it's like I want
16:52
Speaker 3: James Tibbs, who's tearing up AAA, to have to play
16:55
Speaker 3: in the big leagues. I can't just leave him in
16:58
Speaker 3: AAA because they've signed Kyle Tucker for $ 60 million. And
17:03
Speaker 3: I think that's the imbalance that's not fair in the game.
17:07
Speaker 3: That should be tightened up and put to bed. Now,
17:10
Speaker 3: they're the only team that's really... I think the Mets
17:12
Speaker 3: have learned you can't spend into oblivion and win. So
17:17
Speaker 3: I think it's starting to self-correct themselves. But I think
17:20
Speaker 3: this train is so far down the line with a
17:23
Speaker 3: strong group of owners that we need a cap. I just...
17:27
Speaker 3: Can't imagine the life of me then coming off of
17:29
Speaker 3: that under any reasons.
17:32
Speaker 1: Well, Dan, you know, it's remarkable how different our game
17:35
Speaker 1: is regular season versus the postseason. And just to compare
17:39
Speaker 1: for a minute the Milwaukee Brewers and the Dodgers, who
17:41
Speaker 1: are two of the best teams in the National League
17:43
Speaker 1: without a question, the Milwaukee Brewers won the season series
17:48
Speaker 1: against the Dodgers. They beat them 4-3. They have scored
17:51
Speaker 1: more runs than the Dodgers. They've given up fewer runs
17:54
Speaker 1: than the Dodgers. And they're three games ahead of the
17:56
Speaker 1: Dodgers today. And according to fan graphs, which is usually
17:59
Speaker 1: relatively accurate, the Dodgers have twice the percentage chance to
18:03
Speaker 1: win the World Series than the Milwaukee Brewers do. They're
18:06
Speaker 1: leading the major leagues at 23% chance that the Brewers
18:09
Speaker 1: are second at 11. And they have all those advantages.
18:12
Speaker 1: It just goes to show the postseason is a whole
18:14
Speaker 1: different animal. And all those pitchers you just said that
18:17
Speaker 1: have been injured, They're going to be towing the rubber,
18:19
Speaker 1: throwing their 58th inning or 92nd inning. And Jacob Mizorowski
18:24
Speaker 1: will be throwing his 211th inning. And it just matters
18:27
Speaker 1: in the playoffs when you have a fresh pitching staff
18:29
Speaker 1: and you have the experience the Dodgers have and the
18:31
Speaker 1: talent they have. It's an entirely different line of team
18:35
Speaker 1: that's going to show up there. And that's when talent matters.
18:39
Speaker 1: And you're not playing all 26 players per se. You're
18:41
Speaker 1: playing your best, you know, whatever we want to say,
18:43
Speaker 1: 18 to 20. And their best 18 to 20 is
18:45
Speaker 1: the best money can buy.
18:48
Speaker 3: Couldn't have said it better. So if they lose Otani,
18:54
Speaker 3: they're going to run out Yamamoto, Snell, Glasnow, and Skubal.
19:01
Speaker 3: Skubal will be higher up. So it's like if the
19:06
Speaker 3: Brewers lose Mizorowski, they're not going to beat the Dodgers.
19:13
Speaker 3: And that's the difference.
19:14
Speaker 2: Well, that's just it. They can lose the greatest player ever.
19:17
Speaker 2: of our generation or possibly of all time and still
19:20
Speaker 2: compete and win, still win the World Series.
19:22
Speaker 4: Correct.
19:23
Speaker 2: And that's where I.
19:23
Speaker 3: Think the imbalance, I think that's where it's unfair. They're
19:27
Speaker 3: talking about capping scouting and development costs and what you
19:31
Speaker 3: can spend in, you know, all these different areas. I
19:34
Speaker 3: don't know if I would go that far because I
19:35
Speaker 3: think it's nice to see clubs have competitive advantage and
19:39
Speaker 3: see what they do with it. I You know, I
19:40
Speaker 3: don't want to make everything so uniform that we lose
19:43
Speaker 3: the creativity and problem solving that some of the best
19:45
Speaker 3: clubs in the game have a chance to do.
19:48
Speaker 2: Based on what we talked about here today, if you
19:50
Speaker 2: cap scouting, you cap player development, you're doing a disservice
19:53
Speaker 2: to the actual players themselves at that point.
19:56
Speaker 3: I think what's going to continue to happen is they're
19:58
Speaker 3: going to see the minor league system continue to shrink.
20:01
Speaker 3: In fact, it's crazy how this is going to sound.
20:03
Speaker 3: I see independent baseball playing such a crucial role in
20:05
Speaker 3: our sport over the next five to ten years because
20:10
Speaker 3: I mean, if we go down to a draft that's
20:13
Speaker 3: five rounds, 10 rounds, you're going to lose another minor
20:17
Speaker 3: league affiliate. All those kids are going to need to
20:19
Speaker 3: play somewhere, and we may see independent leagues taking over
20:24
Speaker 3: a significant development arm from teams.
20:27
Speaker 2: This sets us up for a pretty good question I
20:29
Speaker 2: got here. I'm curious as a fan, and I've constantly
20:33
Speaker 2: kind of had the battles with friends of mine who
20:34
Speaker 2: are sports fans, and they're on the baseball bandwagon, but
20:37
Speaker 2: then they kind of get off of it or they
20:39
Speaker 2: kind of, you know, they're like, I just can't, can't
20:41
Speaker 2: stay interested.
20:42
Speaker 1: What?
20:43
Speaker 2: And, and I think about this with the young kids too, is,
20:46
Speaker 2: you know, looking at the ahead of the next decade,
20:48
Speaker 2: what's the next major structural or technological change that the
20:53
Speaker 2: sport needs to make to kind of capture that next
20:55
Speaker 2: generation of baseball fans, keep people interested. starting with not
20:58
Speaker 2: having an extended strike or. Yeah.
21:01
Speaker 3: Um, personally, I think the quality of play would be
21:04
Speaker 3: exceptionally better if every Monday during the season was off
21:08
Speaker 3: and you shrunk the schedule down to 144 games. Um,
21:13
Speaker 3: you didn't play night. You had, you had to play
21:15
Speaker 3: a Tuesday night game, um, for rest and recovery purposes,
21:18
Speaker 3: unless it was a national holiday and you had to
21:20
Speaker 3: play a Sunday day game, unless it's the, you know,
21:24
Speaker 3: now the Peacock game of the week. Um, I would
21:27
Speaker 3: think that the pitch clock timing can come down even
21:30
Speaker 3: further from what it's at to speed the game up
21:33
Speaker 3: that much further. Since I'm so educated in virtual reality,
21:37
Speaker 3: I think we can start to bring virtual reality experiences
21:40
Speaker 3: into the ballpark for fans. If I was going to
21:43
Speaker 3: build a new ballpark from scratch, every single seat would
21:47
Speaker 3: have a virtual reality aspect to it. So you can
21:50
Speaker 3: actually see the game from behind home plate. You can
21:53
Speaker 3: participate in it. I think you're going to be able
21:55
Speaker 3: to manage along with the manager during the game, which
21:59
Speaker 3: is going to be crazy for the manager. But I
22:01
Speaker 3: think it just creates a way for the fans to
22:03
Speaker 3: become more and more engaged. And I think technology in
22:09
Speaker 3: the ballpark is going to create a better viewing experience
22:13
Speaker 3: and overall experience for the fan to want them to
22:18
Speaker 3: come back more and more to.
22:19
Speaker 2: Watch a game. as a fan, I think the pitch
22:21
Speaker 2: clock was a stroke of genius. I love it.
22:23
Speaker 3: I think it's one of the best things the commissioner
22:24
Speaker 3: did tremendous.
22:26
Speaker 2: He's definitely what's, what kind of advice would you give
22:29
Speaker 2: the commissioner going into the collective bargaining? What would you
22:31
Speaker 2: tell him?
22:33
Speaker 3: Well, he doesn't need advice from me. I think he's
22:35
Speaker 3: got the toughest job in all sports. He's got 30
22:38
Speaker 3: individual egos that he has to manage and a player
22:41
Speaker 3: union that, um, it's helped Ben on getting what they want. Just,
22:44
Speaker 3: you know, not to be emotional, take the emotion out
22:47
Speaker 3: of the problem. I mean, he's a labor attorney. He's
22:49
Speaker 3: done this for years. you know, just not to be
22:52
Speaker 3: emotional and just keep in grinding your way through to
22:55
Speaker 3: getting something done. Because I think once the collective bargaining
22:58
Speaker 3: agreement is done, I think we're going to see expansion
23:00
Speaker 3: by two teams within our game. And so it's going
23:02
Speaker 3: to be more job opportunities for players. And I think
23:05
Speaker 3: there'll be in markets that'll create more excitement for the
23:08
Speaker 3: game because that initial outburst of love for the fans
23:11
Speaker 3: will be ever present and, you know, be flocking to
23:14
Speaker 3: see games. So anyway, so that would be only advice
23:18
Speaker 3: I can give him. He doesn't want advice from me
23:20
Speaker 3: on this, probably not worthy of it.
23:23
Speaker 1: Dan, you know, one of the biggest issues in the
23:25
Speaker 1: game right now is the injuries and the injuries specifically
23:27
Speaker 1: to pitching. You mentioned the giving every Monday off. They
23:32
Speaker 1: do that in Japan, just so the listeners know, and
23:34
Speaker 1: they play six days a week and they always have
23:36
Speaker 1: Mondays off. And I don't know if it's exactly the reason,
23:40
Speaker 1: but they have far fewer arm issues. And then almost
23:43
Speaker 1: every pitcher that we bring over from Japan ultimately has
23:46
Speaker 1: Tommy John. So I think there's something to be said
23:48
Speaker 1: for that. That is important. Dan, specifically, Dr. Chris Camp,
23:53
Speaker 1: who is the head of medical operations for the Minnesota Twins,
23:56
Speaker 1: a good friend of mine, he also is the head
23:58
Speaker 1: of orthopedics for the Mayo Clinic. He said that baseball
24:02
Speaker 1: is on a collision course where there's two truisms that
24:05
Speaker 1: are acting at odds with each other. One is that
24:07
Speaker 1: the harder you throw, the more hitters you're going to
24:09
Speaker 1: get out, but also the harder you throw, the more
24:12
Speaker 1: likely you are to get hurt. What do you think
24:14
Speaker 1: we need to do as a sport to try to
24:17
Speaker 1: protect some of our most valued assets, and that is
24:20
Speaker 1: our starting pitching.
24:21
Speaker 3: Well, I think you have to incentivize. Players respond to incentives.
24:27
Speaker 3: So I think you have to incentivize innings pitched for
24:30
Speaker 3: starting pitchers in a way you've never done before. Because
24:34
Speaker 3: then I think that creates the mechanism for pitchers to
24:37
Speaker 3: dial it back down and to bring in the context of,
24:41
Speaker 3: I don't have to throw this hard. I mean, I
24:43
Speaker 3: think Paul Skeens this year is a perfect example. He's
24:45
Speaker 3: trying to transform into that. It hasn't been an easy
24:48
Speaker 3: process for him, but I think he knows it's not
24:50
Speaker 3: sustainable if he continues to try to pitch at the
24:53
Speaker 3: effort level and velocity that he was pitching at. But
24:56
Speaker 3: I think if you incentivize getting paid based upon game
25:02
Speaker 3: start and innings pitch where you do that in a
25:04
Speaker 3: normal performance package of paid, but making it part of it.
25:09
Speaker 3: Number two, I think we really, really have to bring in.
25:12
Speaker 3: There are so many ways now to measure efficiencies in deliveries.
25:17
Speaker 3: I think clubs really have to start spending resources and
25:20
Speaker 3: understanding how does Nolan Ryan throw as hard as he did?
25:25
Speaker 3: And in reality, he got hurt at the end, but
25:28
Speaker 3: for the most part, never get hurt. And so I
25:33
Speaker 3: don't think we're going to get a world where guys
25:35
Speaker 3: are not going to throw as hard because it's in
25:39
Speaker 3: the ecosystem now of the game. You don't get recruited
25:42
Speaker 3: unless your spin rate is X and your velocity is Y.
25:45
Speaker 3: So kids aren't going to go to college unless they
25:47
Speaker 3: can do that. So I think it's more along how
25:49
Speaker 3: do we protect our pitchers within the context of guys
25:52
Speaker 3: throwing hard and trying to get them to dial down hard,
25:55
Speaker 3: hard they throw on. Justin Owendorf, I don't know if
25:58
Speaker 3: you know him. You should follow him on LinkedIn. He
26:01
Speaker 3: does a tremendous job of really educating people on how
26:05
Speaker 3: this can transpire way smarter than me. And I do
26:10
Speaker 3: believe that there's a way to do this, but I
26:12
Speaker 3: think it's going to take the club's investment into this
26:15
Speaker 3: to make this happen.
26:16
Speaker 1: Well, it's a burgeoning field in the game right now,
26:18
Speaker 1: this whole concept of biomechanics. We're all diving into it,
26:22
Speaker 1: but we're all not necessarily perfectly informed as to how
26:25
Speaker 1: to use it and to maximize it. The teams that
26:28
Speaker 1: do that will figure that out. You mentioned Nolan Ryan twice.
26:31
Speaker 1: I have to tell a quick story about Nolan Ryan.
26:33
Speaker 1: I got a chance to work with him in Texas.
26:35
Speaker 1: He was the team president when I was the assistant
26:37
Speaker 1: GM there. We made the playoffs in 2010. He threw
26:40
Speaker 1: out the first pitch of our first home game. He
26:43
Speaker 1: was wearing a suit he threw to Jim Sundberg, Dan,
26:46
Speaker 1: who you'll know well. The listeners may not remember Jim Sundberg.
26:49
Speaker 1: He was a– I don't know. He must have had
26:51
Speaker 1: eight or nine gold gloves as a catcher.
26:54
Speaker 3: Oh, yeah, great catcher.
26:56
Speaker 1: Nolan, I don't know how old he was. I would
26:57
Speaker 1: never say anything to his face, but I'm guessing he
27:00
Speaker 1: was in his mid-60s. He threw like an 84-mile-an-hour pitch.
27:03
Speaker 1: Jim Sundberg tries to catch it. He stands up. He
27:06
Speaker 1: had split his suit pants from his waistline all the
27:10
Speaker 1: way to the leg, had to like shuffle off the
27:12
Speaker 1: field showing the entire stadium, which was packed at that time,
27:16
Speaker 1: his colored boxers or something. It was remarkable. So even
27:20
Speaker 1: in his mid-60s, Nolan could still uncork one.
27:23
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, it just shows you it can be done, though.
27:25
Speaker 3: He had the perfect biomechanical livery. So I think if
27:28
Speaker 3: it's being taught appropriately at a young age, I think
27:32
Speaker 3: it can be accomplished. I just think baseball has to
27:33
Speaker 3: put a lot of effort behind to make that happen.
27:35
Speaker 1: Dan, we mentioned at the outset of this, I think
27:39
Speaker 1: legacies in the game are often we talk about rings
27:41
Speaker 1: and championships. One, I would like to talk about lives impacted.
27:45
Speaker 1: And we talked about the fact that you launched the
27:47
Speaker 1: career's 15 general managers in your stops with Cleveland and
27:52
Speaker 1: with Colorado. And I just wanted to share a few
27:55
Speaker 1: comments from some of those guys about you before we
27:58
Speaker 1: let you run.
27:58
Speaker 2: Oh, Josh.
28:00
Speaker 1: Oh, no, I know. Here we go. So buckle up.
28:02
Speaker 1: It's not too many. Josh Burns. Dan is exceptionally creative,
28:07
Speaker 1: tirelessly seeking to understand our competitive issues better and always
28:11
Speaker 1: trying to solve them. Jerry DePoto. So much of how
28:14
Speaker 1: I think about roster building are lessons learned from Dan.
28:17
Speaker 1: relying on scouting, player development, and a never-dying belief in
28:21
Speaker 1: young players. Matt Klintak, who was an intern with us, Dan,
28:25
Speaker 1: for one year in Colorado. Dan was very inclusive and
28:29
Speaker 1: always made me feel like a valued member of the team.
28:32
Speaker 1: He's been a mentor to me and many others over
28:34
Speaker 1: the years. He should be proud of the number of
28:36
Speaker 1: people he has inspired. John Daniels, also an intern with
28:40
Speaker 1: us in Colorado. Dan shaped my career and my life.
28:44
Speaker 1: He allowed me to sit in on meetings I had
28:46
Speaker 1: no business being in. gave me access to discussions and
28:49
Speaker 1: personnel that were the equivalent of a doctorate program. And
28:54
Speaker 1: then I just wanted to say, Dan, for my part,
28:56
Speaker 1: I want to thank you for giving me a shot
28:57
Speaker 1: to pursue my dream. But more than that, you taught
29:00
Speaker 1: me the foundational skills that have positioned me to thrive
29:03
Speaker 1: in an industry that I absolutely love. You created a
29:06
Speaker 1: competitive environment where you consistently challenged us at levels beyond
29:11
Speaker 1: our current capabilities and You gave us the best resources
29:14
Speaker 1: to achieve and then held us extremely accountable to excel.
29:18
Speaker 1: You created a culture of total immersion. You exposed us
29:22
Speaker 1: to every facet of the business. And as a result,
29:25
Speaker 1: we learned at such an accelerated rate. You held us
29:28
Speaker 1: to an extremely high standard of excellence while setting the
29:31
Speaker 1: example of being a great father and a great husband.
29:35
Speaker 1: It is for all those reasons that you've launched 15
29:37
Speaker 1: of your mentees on a GM trajectory. And for that,
29:41
Speaker 1: on behalf of all of them, I wanted to say
29:42
Speaker 1: thank you to you.
29:43
Speaker 2: Yeah. Wow.
29:44
Speaker 3: It sounds like a eulogy, Chet.
29:45
Speaker 2: I mean, I think they're, I think I'm, you know.
29:49
Speaker 1: Hey, if you can attend your funeral before you die,
29:51
Speaker 1: it's a great, great opportunity.
29:52
Speaker 2: Well, you know, this is a wonderful exercise, isn't it?
29:55
Speaker 3: You know, on a personal note, that does mean a lot.
29:57
Speaker 3: I mean, I've been through a lot. I I just
29:59
Speaker 3: got finished my last cancer treatment two weeks ago. It'll
30:04
Speaker 3: be two weeks from tomorrow, two weeks back. And this
30:09
Speaker 3: whole year for me has been one of a swing
30:12
Speaker 3: of emotions. And so those kinds of comments, I think
30:15
Speaker 3: mean more to me now than they did prior to this,
30:18
Speaker 3: because I have felt my own mortality going through this
30:21
Speaker 3: in ways that, you know, you don't, you don't unless
30:24
Speaker 3: you get something like this. And so I really appreciate that, that,
30:27
Speaker 3: you know, I, you know, I, I love the people
30:29
Speaker 3: that I worked with. And, you know, and I loved
30:33
Speaker 3: you in particular because you are such an authentic, authentic
30:37
Speaker 3: human being. And you, I was like the reality optimist.
30:42
Speaker 3: My wife calls me the reality pessimist. And Thad was
30:46
Speaker 3: always so positive. He always, his energy level bought good
30:52
Speaker 3: to my darkness. And because at times my EQ was
30:55
Speaker 3: not very high And so I really, really appreciate it.
30:59
Speaker 3: I was sad when Thad left. I was very happy
31:01
Speaker 3: for him. It was a wonderful opportunity that John Daniels
31:04
Speaker 3: got in Texas with John Hart. But man, I was
31:07
Speaker 3: crushed when Thad left because we just never replaced him
31:11
Speaker 3: in Colorado with his personality. It's a tough place. And
31:14
Speaker 3: Thad made the place a little easier because he was
31:17
Speaker 3: always like, you know, we're going to figure this out
31:19
Speaker 3: type thing.
31:19
Speaker 2: When days I didn't know we were going to figure
31:22
Speaker 2: it out. So I appreciate that, Thad. Well, that was
31:24
Speaker 2: a fantastic interview. Thad and Dan, thanks for your time.
31:28
Speaker 2: You guys, it was great hearing some of those stories.
31:30
Speaker 2: When we come back on the other side of the break,
31:33
Speaker 2: we're going to do one of our favorite things, listeners' questions,
31:36
Speaker 2: when we return on Rosters to Rings. Welcome back to
31:48
Speaker 2: Rosters to Rings. We get to do listeners' questions today,
31:52
Speaker 2: one of our favorite segments on the show. And to
31:55
Speaker 2: do this, we're going to bring in our producer, Jason.
31:57
Speaker 2: He's got some questions for us. Jason, what do you
32:00
Speaker 2: have for us today?
32:00
Speaker 4: Well, guys, you know, college football never ceases to amaze,
32:06
Speaker 4: I think, even in week one. We start probably with
32:10
Speaker 4: something we're going to talk about all season long. So,
32:13
Speaker 4: Jen Storgensen with the question to chat. And Thad... But
32:20
Speaker 4: we'll start with Chet. What do you guys make of
32:22
Speaker 4: the unbelievable ending between Michigan and Western Michigan? Was putting
32:26
Speaker 4: one second back on the clock actually the correct call?
32:30
Speaker 4: Or did Western Michigan just get robbed of one of
32:33
Speaker 4: the biggest wins in their history? And let's start with
32:37
Speaker 4: the guy wearing a Western Michigan sweatshirt. Chet.
32:42
Speaker 2: So Western Michigan alum. Might be a slight rooting interest here.
32:46
Speaker 2: I may have some bias. But we won't let that
32:49
Speaker 2: get in the way. I think the entire country might
32:51
Speaker 2: be on my side to some degree or another, as
32:53
Speaker 2: long as you're not wearing maize and blue. I'll just
32:58
Speaker 2: set the table. So Western goes into the University of Michigan.
33:02
Speaker 2: Michigan is ranked 16th, first game of the college football season.
33:05
Speaker 2: This happens quite often, actually. Western will either play Michigan
33:09
Speaker 2: State or Michigan as a first game of the season
33:11
Speaker 2: to kick things off. We usually go in, get our
33:14
Speaker 2: butts handed to us. go home with about a 42
33:17
Speaker 2: to 10 loss or something along those lines, maybe get
33:21
Speaker 2: a player or two injured. We usually just try to
33:23
Speaker 2: come out of these things healthy. All right. And for
33:25
Speaker 2: a Western fan, it's kind of, oh, here we go again.
33:28
Speaker 2: We'll collect our million and a half dollar payday and
33:30
Speaker 2: we'll walk away from this thing. But this time, this
33:34
Speaker 2: time things were different. It's always, you always have that
33:37
Speaker 2: glimmer of hope before you go into Ann Arbor. You
33:40
Speaker 2: think maybe just this time we can give them a
33:42
Speaker 2: good fight and take them down to the end and
33:44
Speaker 2: really scare them. So I'm watching this game the other
33:47
Speaker 2: night and as this thing's peeling along, we are hanging
33:50
Speaker 2: in there. I mean, Michigan comes out, scores a touchdown
33:53
Speaker 2: in the opening minutes and I'm like, ah, it's going
33:54
Speaker 2: to be the same thing all over again. My wife
33:57
Speaker 2: kind of looking at me like, why are you watching this?
33:59
Speaker 2: This happens all the time. At any rate, the evening
34:02
Speaker 2: keeps picking up and our offense looks effective and our
34:06
Speaker 2: defense looks even more effective. And, you know, this wasn't
34:11
Speaker 2: simply just hanging around due to a lucky play or something. Like,
34:15
Speaker 2: We legitimately Western Michigan legitimately controlled large portions of this
34:19
Speaker 2: football game. Time of possession numbers that what do you
34:22
Speaker 2: think those time of possession numbers look like?
34:25
Speaker 1: Favorable to Western Michigan.
34:26
Speaker 2: Favorable by double. They had 40 minutes of possession. Michigan
34:30
Speaker 2: had 19 minutes and 52 seconds.
34:32
Speaker 1: Which that's got to be a huge proxy for the
34:35
Speaker 1: team who outplayed the other team.
34:37
Speaker 2: Unbelievable. Right. And then turnovers. Who do you think won
34:40
Speaker 2: the turnover battle?
34:41
Speaker 1: I'm going to go with Western Michigan, Chad.
34:43
Speaker 2: They did. They didn't have any turnovers that Michigan had
34:46
Speaker 2: three turnovers in this game. Western Michigan had zero and
34:49
Speaker 2: total plays from scrimmage. Western Michigan had 67 to Michigan's
34:53
Speaker 2: 48 Western led 12, seven, as we all know, who
34:58
Speaker 2: watched the sports news with 38 seconds remaining. I would
35:02
Speaker 2: say at about the minute and 52nd mark, my wife
35:06
Speaker 2: looks over at me and she says, and I'm, I'm,
35:09
Speaker 2: you know, clutching everything around me. I can't believe this
35:11
Speaker 2: is happening. We are killing the clock. Michigan is burning timeouts.
35:17
Speaker 2: This could happen. We needed a touchdown. We didn't get
35:21
Speaker 2: the touchdown. We got our fourth field goal of the
35:23
Speaker 2: game from some kid we signed out of some junior
35:27
Speaker 2: college in California that was kicking his first field goals
35:31
Speaker 2: in college football at the FBS level. And here he
35:35
Speaker 2: gets to do it in Ann Arbor at Michigan Stadium
35:37
Speaker 2: for 100,000 screaming fans or however many showed up for
35:39
Speaker 2: this one. We're seconds away and about a minute 50 left.
35:45
Speaker 2: My wife asked me, she goes, honey, how much are they?
35:48
Speaker 2: How much is this kid from Michigan getting this quarterback
35:51
Speaker 2: in his NIL deal? I says about about three million
35:54
Speaker 2: dollars a year. He's on a $ 12 million four-year deal.
35:58
Speaker 2: She goes, you really think they're going to let you
36:00
Speaker 2: guys win? You really think they're going to do that?
36:03
Speaker 2: You're such a sucker. This always happens. Anyway, everybody knows
36:08
Speaker 2: what happens here, all right? Things get strange. Bryce Underwood
36:14
Speaker 2: makes a completion down the middle of the field to
36:16
Speaker 2: the Western Michigan 47-yard line. Nine seconds are left. The
36:20
Speaker 2: clocks get synced up at that nine seconds. They had
36:23
Speaker 2: to move the chain, stop the clock. Everything is synced, right?
36:27
Speaker 2: Everything that we see is synced. We got clocks on
36:30
Speaker 2: the score on NBC's little score graphic. We got the time,
36:35
Speaker 2: the clock, the camera image of the clock in the stadium.
36:38
Speaker 2: Everything's ready to go. They throw up a Hail Mary.
36:43
Speaker 2: It takes up all nine seconds, all nine seconds as
36:46
Speaker 2: far as I'm concerned. As a matter of fact, it
36:47
Speaker 2: took Bryce Underwood six seconds to release the thing just
36:51
Speaker 2: to get it downfield. And he throws it out of
36:52
Speaker 2: the back of the end zone. Western celebrates. Michigan players
36:56
Speaker 2: appear to believe they've lost. Even Underwood later acknowledged that
36:58
Speaker 2: he saw the zeros and thought the game was over.
37:01
Speaker 2: Except we found an extra second then. Where do you
37:05
Speaker 2: think they unearthed that extra second then?
37:08
Speaker 1: Was that from the replay clock, Chet?
37:11
Speaker 2: It was from something called the Big Ten replay clock.
37:17
Speaker 2: It is a third clock.
37:18
Speaker 1: Oh, I'm sorry, the Big Ten replay clock.
37:19
Speaker 2: Yes, the Big Ten replay clock. It isn't the graphic
37:23
Speaker 2: on NBC screen. It isn't the clock in the stadium.
37:25
Speaker 2: It is another clock that has the real time on it,
37:29
Speaker 2: the official time on it, apparently. And it's governed by
37:33
Speaker 2: the Big Ten replay crew. To feel robbed, I mean, look,
37:39
Speaker 2: Western's taking the high road on this thing, okay? They
37:42
Speaker 2: have gone above and beyond in saying, look, we're not
37:45
Speaker 2: victims here. There were a bunch of other things we
37:48
Speaker 2: could have done to win that game. We lost. We
37:51
Speaker 2: move on. We play another game. I believe the MAC
37:54
Speaker 2: conference has now, the Mid-American Conference has now gone and
38:00
Speaker 2: asked the NCAA for some sort of review. They've pitched
38:03
Speaker 2: their complaint and now we're getting a review of it
38:06
Speaker 2: or something. I don't know what will come of this.
38:09
Speaker 2: I have multiple questions here. Michigan, on the ensuing one
38:13
Speaker 2: second they get back, they found a second, they found
38:16
Speaker 2: them a second. Of course, they air the ball out,
38:19
Speaker 2: complete the Hail Mary, It's, it's, you know, another, it's
38:23
Speaker 2: a Michigan miracle. They're calling it at least in Ann Arbor.
38:26
Speaker 2: They call it that, uh, fans storm the field, which
38:31
Speaker 2: if you ever thought, have I ever thought Michigan fans
38:33
Speaker 2: would storm the field beating Western Michigan? I would have
38:36
Speaker 2: been beside myself just with that thought alone, first and foremost.
38:41
Speaker 2: But here we are. I am, I am in disbelief.
38:44
Speaker 2: I am. When they found that second, I looked at
38:47
Speaker 2: my wife and she goes, I told you. And I
38:49
Speaker 2: just went, oh, God, how does that happen? At any rate,
38:54
Speaker 2: it was heartbreaking. At the same time, it was awesome
38:57
Speaker 2: to see that team fight. They went in there for
39:00
Speaker 2: 27.5 point underdogs. I mean, Thad, this does bring up
39:06
Speaker 2: an interesting problem here. What we see on television, it's
39:12
Speaker 2: telling a little bit different story in a situation like
39:15
Speaker 2: this than what's going on behind the scenes. Is this
39:17
Speaker 2: what fans... Should expect when they're watching a game that
39:23
Speaker 2: we have some other clock somewhere that could potentially add
39:27
Speaker 2: an extra second. I mean, a second's not that fast, right?
39:33
Speaker 2: It seems like with all the technology we have, we
39:35
Speaker 2: should be able to see the exact time as fans
39:38
Speaker 2: on the clock that is left on the field.
39:40
Speaker 1: Chet, as a friend, I want to just extend to
39:44
Speaker 1: all Western Michigan fans, this was a highway robbery. And
39:48
Speaker 1: to be deprived the chance to beat a storied franchise
39:51
Speaker 1: like Michigan, an in-state rival, a team that you had
39:55
Speaker 1: yet never beaten, I think, in the history of the matchup,
39:59
Speaker 1: or at least they were 0 for their last eight.
40:01
Speaker 2: Yes, it was now 0 for 9, yes.
40:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, 0 for 9, unfortunately, or at least until pending appeal.
40:06
Speaker 2: Pending appeal.
40:08
Speaker 1: So a few comments. One was Jason kind of aptly
40:12
Speaker 1: stated at the beginning that college sports never fails to entertain. Well,
40:17
Speaker 1: we walked into this weekend... with the LSU scandal on note.
40:22
Speaker 1: The fact that this is now totally.
40:24
Speaker 2: Oh, it's completely trumped it.
40:26
Speaker 3: Yep.
40:26
Speaker 1: Completely trumped it. And then forget about the fact that
40:29
Speaker 1: SMU and Florida State had their game delayed by an
40:32
Speaker 1: hour and 45 minutes last night due to a power
40:34
Speaker 1: outage in Tallahassee. But for those two stories, that would
40:38
Speaker 1: have been a big competitive conversation.
40:40
Speaker 2: Exactly.
40:41
Speaker 1: So the fact that this has dominated the media is significant.
40:44
Speaker 1: I think we can say... that sometimes the most torturous
40:48
Speaker 1: moments are the moments that galvanize fan bases. But you
40:51
Speaker 1: know what this fan base would have been more galvanized by? Winning.
40:54
Speaker 1: And I think reading the statement that John Steinbrecher, I
41:00
Speaker 1: hope I'm pronouncing that correctly, the commissioner of the MAC,
41:03
Speaker 1: when he appealed to the NCAA and the college playoff committee,
41:06
Speaker 1: he stated and he cited the rule that when there's
41:09
Speaker 1: controversy about clocks, the one that is supposed to reign
41:12
Speaker 1: supreme is the one in the stadium.
41:14
Speaker 2: That is true.
41:15
Speaker 1: Not the one that is off camera. And he said
41:17
Speaker 1: that that is exactly what they're appealing is the fact
41:20
Speaker 1: that the replay official is using the wrong clock to
41:24
Speaker 1: make the judgment.
41:25
Speaker 2: How do we know that clock is synced up properly?
41:28
Speaker 4: Right.
41:29
Speaker 1: And, you know, so I one corollary I think we
41:33
Speaker 1: saw in baseball and still sees to this day is
41:35
Speaker 1: the umpires would swear that the strike zone box that
41:38
Speaker 1: you see on TV is not consistent with the one
41:40
Speaker 1: that they were getting judged on. Now that we have ABS,
41:44
Speaker 1: that's been resolved. But the fact that technology is advancing
41:47
Speaker 1: faster than the human eye, in some cases, I'm not
41:51
Speaker 1: sure is perfectly advantageous to the fan experience. Once the
41:56
Speaker 1: clock hits triple zero, the fact that it's really triple
41:59
Speaker 1: zero with. 0006 seconds left, I don't think is a
42:04
Speaker 1: distinction that fans want to hear. It struck triple zero.
42:08
Speaker 1: The game was over. As you said, not only did
42:10
Speaker 1: the fans in the stadium believe it was over, the
42:12
Speaker 1: players on the field thought it was over. If everyone
42:15
Speaker 1: except for one person, and it's a replay official looking
42:18
Speaker 1: at a clock that is titled the Big Ten replay clock,
42:21
Speaker 1: I think we should let that walk away and allow
42:23
Speaker 1: for the team to triumph in this case when they
42:26
Speaker 1: outplayed the other team in every facet of the game.
42:29
Speaker 2: Even NBC's rules analyst, Terry McCauley, couldn't reconcile what viewers
42:33
Speaker 2: were seeing with the ruling. He was completely dumbfounded by
42:37
Speaker 2: what had happened. I will ask you this. If the
42:41
Speaker 2: tables were turned, And it was Western Michigan throwing up
42:44
Speaker 2: that last second Hail Mary down 12-7. And it went
42:48
Speaker 2: out of play. Do you think that the Big Ten
42:51
Speaker 2: replay crew is finding that extra second on the clock?
42:55
Speaker 1: So I hate to say this because none of us
42:59
Speaker 1: want to be conspiracy theorists. I do think there's some
43:03
Speaker 1: storylines that respective leagues try to support more than others.
43:08
Speaker 1: And so I don't think anyone's intentionally doing something that
43:11
Speaker 1: lacks integrity. But I do think as this gets scrutinized,
43:16
Speaker 1: the viability of a program like Michigan will be taken
43:21
Speaker 1: into consideration. Now, Chet, the other thing we haven't said
43:23
Speaker 1: here is the people who rank these teams have spoken.
43:28
Speaker 1: Despite a win, Michigan has fallen from 16 to out
43:31
Speaker 1: of the top 25, which I think historically maybe has
43:34
Speaker 1: only happened one time before when Kansas State got ousted
43:38
Speaker 1: despite the fact that they won. This is unprecedented. They
43:41
Speaker 1: dropped over nine spots on a win. So I think
43:44
Speaker 1: this is a little bit of a reconciliation that the
43:48
Speaker 1: people who get to vote on this have spoken, that
43:50
Speaker 1: they agree with you, that not only did Western Michigan
43:53
Speaker 1: outplay them, which is one facet, but they outright won
43:55
Speaker 1: that game. They're treating this as if Michigan lost.
43:58
Speaker 2: They are. They are treating it as if Michigan lost.
44:01
Speaker 2: And of some of the publications that do the top
44:04
Speaker 2: 100 rankings or rank all of Division I football, Western
44:07
Speaker 2: Michigan vaulted way up into the 30s in the rankings.
44:10
Speaker 2: So they definitely gave us credit, at least where that
44:13
Speaker 2: is a consideration.
44:16
Speaker 1: But Chet, the thing I look at is from a
44:18
Speaker 1: financial standpoint, if you're Western Michigan and you have a
44:22
Speaker 1: win against Michigan at your disposal, you're leading every pitch
44:26
Speaker 1: to a sponsor, to a booster, to a donor with
44:29
Speaker 1: we were the team that beat Michigan. You now don't
44:32
Speaker 1: get to say that, or you get to say it
44:33
Speaker 1: with a heavy asterisk. I just wonder like, Had they
44:37
Speaker 1: quantified how much money that may have cost the university?
44:41
Speaker 2: There was a social media post made by Darren Revell
44:45
Speaker 2: that said, with that decision and with this being a
44:48
Speaker 2: Western Michigan loss, that cost Western Michigan $ 25 million. Now,
44:54
Speaker 2: I don't know where he got that number, and I
44:56
Speaker 2: don't know how he calculated that, but it was up
45:00
Speaker 2: on next right after the game. One thing I'll tell
45:03
Speaker 2: you is if that is a significant for a school
45:06
Speaker 2: like Western Michigan, that is a significant amount of money.
45:10
Speaker 2: Western Michigan's entire NIL spend across all sports. Mind you,
45:14
Speaker 2: we have a national championship hockey team from two seasons
45:17
Speaker 2: ago who, you know, competes in the top five every year,
45:21
Speaker 2: top 10 easily for the last six, seven years. They
45:26
Speaker 2: are spending some NIL money. They only have about $ 8
45:29
Speaker 2: million towards NIL. total across their entire athletic department. Michigan
45:35
Speaker 2: has over 30 million on their football roster. So $ 25
45:41
Speaker 2: million to a school like Western Michigan is like breathing
45:44
Speaker 2: new life into an athletic program at that point.
45:46
Speaker 3: Yeah.
45:47
Speaker 1: And I guess time will tell as to how much
45:49
Speaker 1: it will cost. And as a point of reference, Darren
45:51
Speaker 1: Revell is a business analyst. So I don't know exactly
45:55
Speaker 1: where he's coming up from that number, but The audience
45:58
Speaker 1: should know it's not just whimsical. I'm sure he put
46:00
Speaker 1: a lot of thought into that number. Time will tell
46:03
Speaker 1: whether they are able to recoup some of that. I
46:05
Speaker 1: am glad to see that the pollsters have boosted Western
46:09
Speaker 1: Michigan up and have maybe penalized Michigan a little bit.
46:12
Speaker 1: Not clearly as if they won the game, but pretty
46:15
Speaker 1: close to that. That's not full recompense for Western Michigan,
46:19
Speaker 1: but at least it's something.
46:21
Speaker 4: Yep.
46:21
Speaker 2: But I'll wrap this whole thing up here with two thoughts. One,
46:26
Speaker 2: We do need to get some clarity as to what
46:28
Speaker 2: clock officiate. I mean, this shouldn't be the last time
46:31
Speaker 2: this ever happens. I think it's rarely, rarely ever happened
46:35
Speaker 2: like this in the past. Maybe twice in the past
46:40
Speaker 2: 20 years have we seen something where extra times have
46:43
Speaker 2: been put on a clock at this small a margin.
46:47
Speaker 2: And I could be wrong about that. Maybe I'm just
46:50
Speaker 2: projecting because of what I saw this past weekend. But
46:53
Speaker 2: on top of that, now players or teams are always
46:56
Speaker 2: going to ask, are you sure we don't have another
46:57
Speaker 2: second here? Do we not have one more second there?
47:00
Speaker 2: That was pretty close. You can't find that other second
47:02
Speaker 2: for us on this play. So there's an integrity issue here.
47:07
Speaker 2: And yeah, so I think there's integrity for the fans,
47:11
Speaker 2: integrity for the team. They want to know who's keeping
47:13
Speaker 2: track of this data. The other point I'll make is
47:16
Speaker 2: I love the fact that my alma mater has taken
47:18
Speaker 2: the stance they have. Their messaging has been on point.
47:21
Speaker 2: It has been perfect. They're not victims. They will keep fighting.
47:24
Speaker 2: They will play on to the next game. And that
47:26
Speaker 2: is really what you want to hear. If the conference
47:30
Speaker 2: wants to go after the Big Ten, go ahead. That's
47:34
Speaker 2: great to see the conference kind of protect the school
47:37
Speaker 2: in that essence and say, hey, let us dirty ourselves
47:40
Speaker 2: in this whole mess. You guys keep going on and
47:42
Speaker 2: playing football for the rest of the season. You might
47:44
Speaker 2: have a pretty good season ahead of you. So I'm
47:45
Speaker 2: really proud of the way the Western Michigan leadership has
47:48
Speaker 2: handled it.
47:49
Speaker 1: Well, you know how they're conducting themselves? They're conducting themselves
47:51
Speaker 1: like winners. And that's exactly what they were.
47:53
Speaker 4: Yes.
47:54
Speaker 2: Winners and leaders, right?
47:55
Speaker 4: Well, let it be stated that from here on out,
47:59
Speaker 4: there's a new time zone, at least in Michigan, between
48:02
Speaker 4: Kalamazoo and Ann Arbor. And there's a one-second difference between
48:07
Speaker 4: the clocks in both of those places. So, all right,
48:10
Speaker 4: moving on. All right, with the NBA, on to more,
48:15
Speaker 4: even more fun sports craziness. NBA hammers the Clippers and
48:21
Speaker 4: Steve Ballmer over the Kawhi Leonard situation. Dad, I'm going
48:25
Speaker 4: to start this one out to you. How do you
48:27
Speaker 4: feel like these penalties really compare with what MLB did
48:32
Speaker 4: to the Astros in their scandal after the signed stealing
48:36
Speaker 4: that we all saw and talked about and went through
48:40
Speaker 4: ad nauseum?
48:41
Speaker 1: Well, certainly, I think like so many people, when I
48:44
Speaker 1: read the penalties levied to the Clippers, I was taken aback.
48:48
Speaker 1: It seemed like significant. And so it did inspire me
48:52
Speaker 1: to go back and look and remind myself exactly what
48:55
Speaker 1: was the penalty for the Houston Astros. Now, keep in mind,
48:59
Speaker 1: these are very broad strokes, so bear with me. The
49:01
Speaker 1: Clippers are effectively being penalized for circumventing the salary cap,
49:06
Speaker 1: generally speaking. That's what took place here. The Astros are
49:10
Speaker 1: being penalized for competitive integrity issues that impacted directly the
49:15
Speaker 1: World Series. I don't want to sound Pollyanna, but to me,
49:19
Speaker 1: what the Astros did seemed significantly more damning than what
49:23
Speaker 1: the Clippers did. And oh, by the way, when the
49:25
Speaker 1: Clippers were circumventing the salary cap, they didn't win. So,
49:29
Speaker 1: you know, as much as we just spent a lot
49:32
Speaker 1: of time talking about the Western Michigan game, that wouldn't
49:35
Speaker 1: have been a segment if somehow that last pass also
49:38
Speaker 1: flew out of the end zone. The fact that they
49:41
Speaker 1: end up losing the game is what makes that controversial.
49:44
Speaker 1: The fact that the Clippers did circumvent the salary cap
49:47
Speaker 1: but didn't actually win as a result, to me, also
49:49
Speaker 1: puts it less in the spotlight than what took place
49:52
Speaker 1: with Houston. But let's look at the penalties. The fines
49:55
Speaker 1: were different. The fine for Houston was $ 5 million. The
49:58
Speaker 1: fine for the Clippers was $ 30 million. Now, Major League
50:01
Speaker 1: Baseball will quickly respond by saying $ 5 million was the
50:04
Speaker 1: maximum that they could actually find So that was part
50:07
Speaker 1: of the collective bargaining agreement. They didn't have jurisdiction to
50:10
Speaker 1: fine greater than that. But I want to circle back
50:13
Speaker 1: to that point in a minute. But let's just go
50:14
Speaker 1: over the rest of the penalties first. Ownership in Houston's case,
50:19
Speaker 1: no penalty whatsoever. In Steve Ballmer's case, he is banned
50:23
Speaker 1: for one year from the stadium from participating in any
50:27
Speaker 1: Clippers business. The GM for the Astros got suspended for
50:31
Speaker 1: a year. The GM of the Clippers got suspended six
50:33
Speaker 1: months later. The reason was because he turned state's evidence
50:36
Speaker 1: and apparently he was very compliant with the investigation. The
50:40
Speaker 1: manager of the Astros at the time was A.J. Hinch.
50:44
Speaker 1: He got suspended for a year. The head coach of
50:46
Speaker 1: the Clippers was not involved in this and did not
50:48
Speaker 1: receive a suspension. The Astros also saw Alex Cora and
50:52
Speaker 1: Carlos Beltran receive one-year bans and they lost draft picks
50:56
Speaker 1: their first and second rounds for 2020 and 2021. For
51:00
Speaker 1: the Clippers, the team president gets banned for a year.
51:02
Speaker 1: She was complicit in participating in engineering and orchestrating some
51:06
Speaker 1: of these deals. And they lose five consecutive first round picks,
51:09
Speaker 1: which will spend 2029 to 2034. So when I look
51:14
Speaker 1: at these and I say, does the penalty fit the crime?
51:20
Speaker 1: It seems like it's incongruent here. I feel as if
51:23
Speaker 1: the Houston Astros, relatively speaking, got off easy for what transpired.
51:29
Speaker 1: The other thing of note in both these cases is
51:32
Speaker 1: Kawhi Leonard gets fined $ 700, 000. In Houston's case, no player
51:38
Speaker 1: received a penalty whatsoever. Now, part of the reason for
51:42
Speaker 1: that is to exact some of these penalties, the commissioner's
51:46
Speaker 1: office in both sports needs support from the players union.
51:50
Speaker 1: And the easiest way to not get support from the
51:52
Speaker 1: players union is to include the players in the fines
51:55
Speaker 1: and penalties. So by reducing the players penalties, they are
52:00
Speaker 1: heightening the chance that the unions will support the penalties
52:04
Speaker 1: that they're levying on the clubs and the owners. So
52:07
Speaker 1: that's the reason why, in Houston's case, they asked the
52:10
Speaker 1: players to give evidence and they gave them immunity in exchange.
52:16
Speaker 3: A.J.
52:16
Speaker 1: Hinch, suspended for a year, is now the Detroit Tigers
52:20
Speaker 1: manager and has done extremely well there. Alex Corder, suspended
52:23
Speaker 1: for a year, goes back to being the Red Sox manager,
52:26
Speaker 1: has earned somewhere around $ 25 million since that day. Carlos
52:30
Speaker 1: Beltran's really the only guy who hasn't returned, but all
52:32
Speaker 1: he's done since then is get inducted into the Hall
52:35
Speaker 1: of Fame. So these penalties are a little bit, I think, misaligned.
52:40
Speaker 1: And I think when I look at them from an
52:43
Speaker 1: executive's perspective, I've always felt if I told the audience
52:47
Speaker 1: the last 10 front office transgressions and the penalties, no
52:51
Speaker 1: one would be able to align the penalties with the
52:54
Speaker 1: transgressions accurately. And the reason is there's a decoder ring
52:58
Speaker 1: that you need And the decoder ring was how forthright
53:01
Speaker 1: and contrite were you with the commissioner? And if you
53:05
Speaker 1: were very accountable for your mistakes, very contrite, and were
53:09
Speaker 1: very compliant with all of his investigations, the penalties tend
53:13
Speaker 1: to go down. When you're indignant and sanctimonious, the penalties
53:17
Speaker 1: are extremely stiff. And so I look at this and
53:20
Speaker 1: see that Lawrence Frank gets his suspension only six months.
53:26
Speaker 1: Why is that? It seems like he complied. It seems
53:29
Speaker 1: as if one reflection I'd have, and I certainly don't
53:31
Speaker 1: know this factually, is did the rest of the Clippers
53:34
Speaker 1: not comply? Because this seems like an extremely stiff penalty
53:37
Speaker 1: relative to what they did, something that they claim a
53:41
Speaker 1: lot of other teams in the league are doing as well,
53:43
Speaker 1: and it just hasn't been uncovered.
53:45
Speaker 2: I think from a fan standpoint, Thad, that's what scares
53:48
Speaker 2: me the most about this, is how many other teams
53:51
Speaker 2: are doing this? And then is this a possibility that
53:55
Speaker 2: the MLB, looking at a salary cap, Could this happen
53:58
Speaker 2: in the MLB too? I mean, this is kind of
54:00
Speaker 2: what this reminds me of is paying players in college.
54:05
Speaker 2: This is how college players used to get money before
54:08
Speaker 2: NIL came along. You would grab a college football player
54:11
Speaker 2: or something, recruit them and say, Hey, we'll get you
54:13
Speaker 2: a job at the car dealership down the road and
54:15
Speaker 2: get you hourly pay there. And you don't have to
54:17
Speaker 2: go in, but you'll be on there. You'll be on
54:20
Speaker 2: their staff. And Oh, that's a huge booster of ours too.
54:22
Speaker 2: So they'll have no problem doing this. So I kind
54:25
Speaker 2: of feel like they're taking that old playbook out of
54:27
Speaker 2: the college system and the whole pay for play deal
54:30
Speaker 2: there and, and, and utilizing it in the NBA with their,
54:35
Speaker 2: with their connected companies to the teams. And I don't know,
54:39
Speaker 2: like we caught one team doing it. What's to catch
54:43
Speaker 2: the others from doing it. If you don't have a
54:45
Speaker 2: whistleblower somewhere.
54:47
Speaker 1: And, and, and Chad, I, I agree with you. And
54:49
Speaker 1: I feel as if I know enough to be a
54:51
Speaker 1: little bit dangerous. So bear with me, but, This seems
54:53
Speaker 1: like the tip of the spear in both cases. When
54:56
Speaker 1: you get to a point where you are so capricious
54:58
Speaker 1: about things that you're banging a trash can to notify
55:01
Speaker 1: your hitter of what pitch is coming, that means you
55:04
Speaker 1: don't think there's consequences for doing it. You're probably not
55:08
Speaker 1: being discreet or subtle. There are probably other people involved.
55:11
Speaker 1: When you get to a point where you are funneling
55:14
Speaker 1: the amount of funds that are being rumored to have
55:16
Speaker 1: been funneled to Kawhi Leonard, and you're doing it what
55:19
Speaker 1: seems to be relatively blatantly, I'm guessing a lot of
55:22
Speaker 1: other teams are doing it and doing it a little
55:23
Speaker 1: bit more discreetly than what you're doing. But if you
55:26
Speaker 1: get to the point where in both these instances you're
55:28
Speaker 1: being this brash and bold, it means you don't think
55:31
Speaker 1: there's a consequence. And I think that's where the leagues
55:34
Speaker 1: are coming down as stringently as they are. Because the
55:37
Speaker 1: same was said by Houston in the time. Part of
55:40
Speaker 1: their defense was, oh, you think we're the only team
55:42
Speaker 1: doing it? Just you wait. There are half a dozen
55:45
Speaker 1: other teams who are doing the exact same thing, and
55:47
Speaker 1: we're just trying to keep up with people. I think
55:49
Speaker 1: it was embarrassing to the leagues.
55:51
Speaker 2: Do you think there's a difference between the types of
55:54
Speaker 2: cheating here? I mean, both of them are a break
55:56
Speaker 2: in integrity. We seem to be talking a lot about
55:58
Speaker 2: integrity in sports today. But do you think there's a
56:01
Speaker 2: difference between the Clippers who are doing this, who are
56:06
Speaker 2: cheating the system kind of organizationally to improve their roster
56:10
Speaker 2: versus the Astros who did it on the field? The
56:13
Speaker 2: cheating occurred on the field. Is there a difference in
56:16
Speaker 2: your mind between those two things?
56:18
Speaker 1: I mean, hey, listen, I think you used the word cheating.
56:20
Speaker 1: It seems like they're both cheating, which inherently is wrong.
56:24
Speaker 1: But I agree with your account. I feel as if
56:28
Speaker 1: the integrity of the NBA wasn't really impugned at the
56:31
Speaker 1: level that the integrity of Major League Baseball was. And
56:35
Speaker 1: we saw it on the biggest stage. Unequivocally, it enhanced
56:40
Speaker 1: their chances of winning the World Series significantly. And for that,
56:43
Speaker 1: the owner paid $ 5 million. And not to sound flippant,
56:47
Speaker 1: but I would imagine every owner of every major sports
56:50
Speaker 1: franchise would pay $ 5 million today for a World Series
56:53
Speaker 1: championship or the equivalent.
56:55
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure they would. I'm pretty sure they would.
56:57
Speaker 2: They're paying more than that for guys who don't even
56:59
Speaker 2: throw a pitch in a game. So why not? I mean,
57:02
Speaker 2: that doesn't seem like a huge penalty. But what about,
57:06
Speaker 2: so the other side of this would be, the fans
57:11
Speaker 2: of the Clippers are hurt. They're probably penalized the most.
57:14
Speaker 2: The Clippers lose five first round picks. That's not just
57:17
Speaker 2: a talent that they're missing out on there. They're missing
57:20
Speaker 2: out on an asset that that team can use to trade.
57:23
Speaker 2: They no longer can build their team by trading away
57:27
Speaker 2: draft picks.
57:28
Speaker 1: And further to that point, the fans are hurt. I'm
57:32
Speaker 1: not sure, who knows, Steve Ballmer, $ 30 million hurts everybody.
57:36
Speaker 1: It hurts him probably less than most of us. But
57:40
Speaker 1: But it is the fans who get hurt the most.
57:42
Speaker 1: And the person who gets hurt the least is Kawhi Leonard,
57:44
Speaker 1: who made all this money through his contract and the
57:47
Speaker 1: additional money.
57:48
Speaker 2: A $ 700, 000 pittance, as they would say here.
57:51
Speaker 1: Right. And here he is going on in his career.
57:53
Speaker 1: And I don't know to what extent he was taken
57:55
Speaker 1: advantage of. And he was told, hey, this is totally
57:58
Speaker 1: on the up and up. And he may have no
57:59
Speaker 1: idea that he was doing something that had some improprieties
58:03
Speaker 1: associated with it. But I assure you, the Houston Astro
58:06
Speaker 1: guys did.
58:07
Speaker 2: You might ask a few questions if you're Kawhi Leonard, right?
58:10
Speaker 2: But at the same time, you might be like, well,
58:11
Speaker 2: this is just how it's done. This is how we
58:13
Speaker 2: get around some of this stuff. I make some more money.
58:15
Speaker 2: I mean, you don't hate the player, hate the game, right? Right.
58:18
Speaker 1: And it was brokered through his uncle, who was his
58:20
Speaker 1: business partner and who he had delegated all these decisions to.
58:25
Speaker 1: What I'm not clear about, Chet, is with the money
58:28
Speaker 1: they funneled to him, were they able to sign an
58:30
Speaker 1: additional player who actually made them better or are they
58:33
Speaker 1: just paying him more money?
58:34
Speaker 2: Which is another reason.
58:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, which is another reason why I'm not sure really
58:38
Speaker 1: impugned the integrity of the competition.
58:41
Speaker 2: Well, they didn't win, right? I mean, it didn't do
58:43
Speaker 2: any good.
58:44
Speaker 1: And it maybe didn't give them additional assets. And for
58:47
Speaker 1: that reason, I feel like it's the worst thing in
58:50
Speaker 1: sports is when you're impugning the integrity of the competition
58:54
Speaker 1: on the field. I think the Houston Astros unequivocally did that.
58:58
Speaker 1: I'm less clear as to whether the Clippers did it.
59:00
Speaker 1: And for that reason, I think it's a bigger transgression.
59:02
Speaker 4: Do you think in this age of astronomical valuation for
59:07
Speaker 4: teams and billionaires. entering in, is this like the right
59:12
Speaker 4: kind of punishment? Because financially, a financial punishment does nothing
59:16
Speaker 4: as you alluded to that. But this type of punishment
59:19
Speaker 4: maybe is the right way for people who have that
59:23
Speaker 4: much money. I kind of look at it a little
59:25
Speaker 4: bit that way. And that was a great question from Michael.
59:28
Speaker 4: in San Diego, but love to hear your guys' view
59:30
Speaker 4: on how do you punish a billionaire in this game?
59:33
Speaker 2: And how do you suspend the president and the owner exactly?
59:36
Speaker 2: What are you suspending them from?
59:37
Speaker 1: Well, I think they're formally banned from the facility.
59:41
Speaker 2: The facility?
59:42
Speaker 1: And from doing any business, which to your point, Chet,
59:45
Speaker 1: in today's day and age, We're all doing business from
59:48
Speaker 1: different ports of call. I'm not sure how restrictive that
59:51
Speaker 1: technically is.
59:52
Speaker 2: I mean, they couldn't catch them doing this with Kawhi
59:54
Speaker 2: and all the money. How are they going to catch
59:56
Speaker 2: them if they meddle in the business at all? I mean,
59:57
Speaker 2: that's going to be a tough one to chase down.
59:59
Speaker 1: And Jason, I think one point you just made there,
1:00:03
Speaker 1: which I think is challenging because I think you have
1:00:06
Speaker 1: to get the unions involved to really suspend. I think
1:00:10
Speaker 1: if you voided a player's contract when this happened, I
1:00:13
Speaker 1: don't think players would participate in this thing. So right now, unfortunately,
1:00:18
Speaker 1: the person who benefited probably the most from this is
1:00:20
Speaker 1: the player who got penalized, which is the equivalent of
1:00:24
Speaker 1: a little bit of a slap on the wrist. I
1:00:26
Speaker 1: think if you wanted to stop this, you void a contract,
1:00:29
Speaker 1: you suspend a player for the year, and I would
1:00:31
Speaker 1: imagine no player is going to cross that line again.
1:00:33
Speaker 1: If the same thing happened in Houston, where all those players'
1:00:36
Speaker 1: contracts got voided who participated, they wouldn't do it again.
1:00:40
Speaker 1: And so I think And I don't really know how
1:00:42
Speaker 1: you get there because the leagues want to act expeditiously.
1:00:46
Speaker 1: They want to do the right thing. But they know
1:00:49
Speaker 1: that based upon the strength of the unions, relative to
1:00:52
Speaker 1: the strength of the commissioners, they have to work hand
1:00:55
Speaker 1: in glove with the unions. And the unions are just
1:00:57
Speaker 1: not going to allow that to happen. But I think
1:00:59
Speaker 1: that would be the biggest deterrent from any of these
1:01:01
Speaker 1: sorts of actions happening in the future.
1:01:04
Speaker 2: You're putting all of the impetus on honesty on the
1:01:06
Speaker 2: player in that scenario if you're going to rip the
1:01:09
Speaker 2: player's contract up. And, and that's, I just don't think
1:01:13
Speaker 2: you're going to get a union. Like you're saying to
1:01:16
Speaker 2: agree to that, they're going to say, you know, why,
1:01:18
Speaker 2: why should it just be the player that has to
1:01:20
Speaker 2: deter this type of behavior or be the one to
1:01:22
Speaker 2: say no.
1:01:24
Speaker 1: Right. And, and, and I, you know, I look at
1:01:26
Speaker 1: things and I, I, and I've spent my whole career
1:01:28
Speaker 1: kind of weighing this question, which is how far are
1:01:31
Speaker 1: you prepared to go to win? And the answer for
1:01:34
Speaker 1: some people is as far as it takes. And the
1:01:36
Speaker 1: answer should be something short of that. And in these instances,
1:01:39
Speaker 1: I think that was pushed. People have to understand there
1:01:43
Speaker 1: is a black and there is a white. It isn't
1:01:45
Speaker 1: all shades of gray. But for those people who do
1:01:48
Speaker 1: feel as if it's all shades of gray, they start
1:01:50
Speaker 1: leaking into the opaque black. And I think that's where
1:01:53
Speaker 1: both of these franchises found themselves in these circumstances. And
1:01:57
Speaker 1: the leagues are trying to illuminate. You're actually in the black.
1:01:59
Speaker 1: You're no longer in the gray. Wonderful conversation with Dan O'Dowd.
1:02:03
Speaker 1: Thanks for sticking with us through both parts and a
1:02:06
Speaker 1: spirited conversation about sports controversies today. Thank you for joining us.
1:02:11
Speaker 1: And join us every Thursday on Rosters to Rings.