Latest / The Mark Belling Podcast / Mark Belling Podcast #175: Regardless of your position of AI and data centers, one thing is becoming very clear: the buildout of these centers is producing a massive American economic boom that will enrich many in the middle class. On the other hand, the affordability crisis is real and David Crowley's insane level of taxing will make it worse if he gets to run the whole state. And, the continuing slide of Nike is the ultimate example of Go Woke, Go Broke.

Transcript

Mark Belling Podcast #175: Regardless of your position of AI and data centers, one thing is becoming very clear: the buildout of these centers is producing a massive American economic boom that will enrich many in the middle class. On the other hand, the affordability crisis is real and David Crowley's insane level of taxing will make it worse if he gets to run the whole state. And, the continuing slide of Nike is the ultimate example of Go Woke, Go Broke. · The Mark Belling Podcast

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  Speaker 2: On yesterday's podcast, I highlighted one of what I consider
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  Speaker 2: to be the biggest unspoken issues in the governor's race,
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  Speaker 2: and that is the issue of crime. One of the
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  Speaker 2: powers of a governor in Wisconsin is every single judicial vacancy,
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  Speaker 2: circuit court, state court of appeals, state supreme court, every
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  Speaker 2: time there's a vacancy, the governor fills the vacancy by appointment.
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  Speaker 2: So if you have a law and order governor, that
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  Speaker 2: means you can expect that almost every new judge that
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  Speaker 2: comes onto the bench by appointment would be a law
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  Speaker 2: and order appointee if That governor chooses somebody with his ideology,
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  Speaker 2: and by the converse, we've had eight years of a
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  Speaker 2: liberal governor, and that's meant eight years of appointing very,
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: very liberal judges. There are numerous other issues, obviously. Let's
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: go back to the debates that we've had over school funding,
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  Speaker 2: the school aid formula which screws the suburbs, and just
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: on and on in Wisconsin taxation. Yet, to watch the
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  Speaker 2: ads on TV... The only issue that matters in the
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  Speaker 2: governor's election is data centers. Both sides are just hammering
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  Speaker 2: away as to who's more of a whore for the
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  Speaker 2: data center industry. I want to examine another component of
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  Speaker 2: that issue here at the beginning of the program. Without
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  Speaker 2: regard to your attitudes on artificial intelligence, data centers, Trump's
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  Speaker 2: calling it all superintelligence, space exploration, driverless cars, the whole
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  Speaker 2: future of a society that requires us to come up
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  Speaker 2: with a higher level of high tech than high tech.
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  Speaker 2: With our regard to your attitudes as to whether or
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  Speaker 2: not it's a good thing or a bad thing, what
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  Speaker 2: is clear is that it's going to happen. All of
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  Speaker 2: this stuff is going to happen. And I've come to
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  Speaker 2: the conclusion that part of it is very good. I think,
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: and I've argued this with regard to the internet and
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  Speaker 2: every other technological advancement we've had, all of these things
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  Speaker 2: are neither good nor bad. They have equally bad parts
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  Speaker 2: and equally good parts. Almost everything that happens can be abused,
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  Speaker 2: it has negative consequences to it, and also has incredible
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  Speaker 2: number of positive consequences. Just using as an example, the internet.
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  Speaker 2: We clearly know what the downsides are. The addiction that
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  Speaker 2: so many people have had to pornography and the unhealthy
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  Speaker 2: views that people have with regard to human sexuality, given
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  Speaker 2: that so much porn is out there available for free.
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  Speaker 2: The number of people who are just addicted to social media,
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  Speaker 2: those are the downsides. The upside, we have so much
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  Speaker 2: more access to information than we ever had before, and
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  Speaker 2: so many of the things that we do are easier
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  Speaker 2: to do now. Remember how cumbersome it was to just
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  Speaker 2: mail a bill? Write on a check, lick the thing, stamp,
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  Speaker 2: find the mailbox, remember not to lose the bill? You
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: get the bill online, and in a lot of cases,
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  Speaker 2: it's just automatically deducted from your account, or you had
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  Speaker 2: two clicks and it's done. So the same is going
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  Speaker 2: to be true with regard to the explosion in technology,
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: but there's a component of this, and it's economic, that
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  Speaker 2: I think that many people are underestimating what the impact
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  Speaker 2: is going to be, and that's going to be topic
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  Speaker 2: number one on today's podcast. When it comes to shipping, packaging,
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  Speaker 2: industrial supplies, and equipment, many suppliers offer endless aisles of product.
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  Speaker 2: and often use in their own business. Experience the Uline
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  Speaker 2: difference today. Visit Uline.com. Now we know where Trump stands
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  Speaker 2: on all of this. First of all, I think that
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  Speaker 2: almost every issue that we have, Trump sees through the
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  Speaker 2: lens of China. Trump is determined that AI and other
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  Speaker 2: advancements in technology happen here and are manufactured here. He
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  Speaker 2: does not want China to take over this industry. So
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  Speaker 2: he's becoming a cheerleader for it. I'm going to start
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  Speaker 2: with a quote from Trump, which will allow me then
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  Speaker 2: to get into the actual topic. Following the historic White
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  Speaker 2: House accord on superintelligence, that's the term Trump uses, where
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  Speaker 2: the world's most important technology companies came together and confirmed
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  Speaker 2: their responsibilities to the American people, I am announcing the
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  Speaker 2: formation of the superintelligence force tasked with coordinating the efforts
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  Speaker 2: of the federal government to ensure that that America continues
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  Speaker 2: to lead the world in superintelligence, which many say is
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  Speaker 2: bigger than the industrial revolution and the internet, and will
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  Speaker 2: protect the interests and improve the lives of all Americans.
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  Speaker 2: The superintelligence force will coordinate the federal government's engagement with consumers,
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  Speaker 2: public interest groups, religious organizations, critical infrastructure providers, and superintelligence companies,
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  Speaker 2: and will be led by Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton,
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  Speaker 2: Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission Andrew Ferguson, Undersecretary of
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  Speaker 2: War for Research and Engineering and Chief Technology Officer Emil Michael,
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  Speaker 2: and Director of the Office of Personnel Management Scott Cooper,
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  Speaker 2: and will report to the President of the United States, me,
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  Speaker 2: and Chief of Staff Susie Wiles. I use this as
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  Speaker 2: a backdrop to share with you an extraordinary story that
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  Speaker 2: I read on Forbes.com. Some of the numbers that are
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  Speaker 2: in this story are extraordinary. What Forbes is reporting on
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  Speaker 2: here is not whether or not we ought to have
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  Speaker 2: data centers and not whether or not This is a
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  Speaker 2: good thing or a bad thing. They're reporting on the
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  Speaker 2: economic revolution that is occurring because of it. When you
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  Speaker 2: hear about companies, for example, spending billions, when money is spent,
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  Speaker 2: let's suppose I told you I went last night and
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  Speaker 2: spent $ 130 on and then blank. That blank is going
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  Speaker 2: to be the people who got the money. Before I
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  Speaker 2: get into the piece, I want to comment on a
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  Speaker 2: term that was mocked during the Reagan era. Reagan was
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  Speaker 2: a supply-sider, which critics turned into trickle-down economics. This idea
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  Speaker 2: that all this activity occurs in the top of the
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  Speaker 2: economy and somehow it's going to trickle down to the masses. Well,
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  Speaker 2: I believe that's actually how the economy works. The wealthiest
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  Speaker 2: people attract wealth, and because they're the wealthiest people, they
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  Speaker 2: keep more of it. But when wealthy people engage in
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  Speaker 2: economic activity, whether you use a verb loaded like trickle
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  Speaker 2: or use a more neutral term like spread, it does
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  Speaker 2: spread to the rest of the economy. A vibrant America
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  Speaker 2: requires the turning over of money. If all of us
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  Speaker 2: have a lot of money and none of us ever
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  Speaker 2: spend or invest any of it, our economy is totally stagnant.
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  Speaker 2: A vibrant economy with lots of people getting pay raises,
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  Speaker 2: people finding work, companies hiring new employees, et cetera, occurs
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  Speaker 2: when money is changing hands and people are spending money.
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  Speaker 2: With regard to the data centers, I believe it not
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  Speaker 2: only does trickle down. The trickle is the really inappropriate word.
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  Speaker 2: It's almost like a hailstorm of money coming down. Let
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  Speaker 2: me quote from Forbes. The U.S. is racing toward an
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  Speaker 2: infrastructure boom that could cost upwards of $ 10 trillion and
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  Speaker 2: surpass the railroad mania of the late 1800s by as
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  Speaker 2: early as 2027. Here's where all the money is being
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  Speaker 2: spent on land, power, water, and cement. And who stands
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  Speaker 2: to benefit? And then they write, Despite fears of rogue
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  Speaker 2: AI agents and increased political pushback by local communities and politicians,
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  Speaker 2: the U.S. is plowing ahead in a data center construction
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  Speaker 2: frenzy that's unprecedented in its scale. Depending on who you ask,
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  Speaker 2: estimates of the total cost of the build-out range— from
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  Speaker 2: $ 2. 8 trillion by 2030 to $ 10. 3 trillion by 2032 in
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  Speaker 2: the U.S. alone. Those figures could be even conservative, with
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  Speaker 2: giants OpenAI and Anthropic revealing more about their spending plans
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  Speaker 2: as they prepare to go public in the coming months.
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  Speaker 2: A leaked copy of Anthropic's prospectus revealed the firm expects
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  Speaker 2: to spend $ 518 billion on AI infrastructure over the next decade. Yet,
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  Speaker 2: we're still in the early innings of what could become
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  Speaker 2: a new industrial revolution. According to economists at Goldman Sachs, U.S.
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  Speaker 2: investment on AI will rise from 1.8% of GDP this
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  Speaker 2: year to 2.8% in 2028. Let me interject. That means 3%
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  Speaker 2: of all economic activity in this country will be money
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  Speaker 2: that is being spent on AI. Quote, That's roughly the
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  Speaker 2: same share of our economy as the federal defense budget.
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  Speaker 2: The railroad boom represented about 2.4% of American GDP between
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  Speaker 2: 1880 and 1890. If AI spending reaches the 2.8% of
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  Speaker 2: GDP predicted by Goldman Sachs, it will outstrip the railroad
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  Speaker 2: boom in its economic footprint by next year. And that
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  Speaker 2: could be a conservative estimate. A recent study from Columbia
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  Speaker 2: Business School economist Stin Van Nuenberg puts that number even
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  Speaker 2: higher at 3.6% of GDP by 2032. The advent of
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  Speaker 2: railroads in the 1800s ushered in the Gilded Age, elevating
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  Speaker 2: the area's first industrial barons to unimaginable levels of wealth.
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  Speaker 2: Let me interject. Why was the railroad boom such a
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  Speaker 2: big thing? Well, not only the construction of all the
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  Speaker 2: railroads in which we had to lay down all of
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  Speaker 2: that track and build all of the railroad... engines and
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  Speaker 2: so on, but it allowed the mass transport of heavy goods.
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  Speaker 2: So the steel barons got really, really rich because it
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  Speaker 2: was real easy to send the steel from one part
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  Speaker 2: of the United States to another. By being able to
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  Speaker 2: ship out all of these goods and ship them all
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  Speaker 2: over the United States by rail, it allowed companies that
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  Speaker 2: were involved in the manufacture of the stuff being shipped
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  Speaker 2: to become the area's super rich tycoons. Back to the piece.
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  Speaker 2: When Forbes published its first ever ranking of the country's
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  Speaker 2: richest people in 1918, five of the 30 richest made
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  Speaker 2: their marks in railroads. Another seven, including John D. Rockefeller
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  Speaker 2: and Andrew Carnegie, provided the oil and steel to build
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  Speaker 2: the rails and keep the trains moving. Now the AI
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  Speaker 2: boom is minting dozens of new billionaires and boosting the
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  Speaker 2: fortunes of tech titans, To dizzying heights, Elon Musk briefly
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  Speaker 2: became a trillionaire after the IPO of SpaceX, which despite
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  Speaker 2: its name, spends significantly more on AI than it does
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  Speaker 2: on rockets. Today, 11 of the 30 richest Americans have
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  Speaker 2: fortunes rooted in companies central to the AI economy, including
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  Speaker 2: Nvidia's Jensen Wang and Google's Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
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  Speaker 2: The build-out is also reliant on mountains of debt to
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  Speaker 2: finance it. According to credit intelligence platform Atrium, data center
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  Speaker 2: developers have already raised at least $ 1. 3 trillion in debt.
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  Speaker 2: Who loses money when things die on the vine? Asks
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: Ryan Alfred, Atrium CEO and co-founder, adding that he's seen
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  Speaker 2: projections that data center lending could balloon to as much
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  Speaker 2: as $ 10 trillion. Even small changes could have a knock-on
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  Speaker 2: effect if firms find themselves no longer needing or not
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  Speaker 2: having the resources for the data center capacity they've leased
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  Speaker 2: or built. So this goes on. And the first component
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  Speaker 2: of this is simply the amount of money that these
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  Speaker 2: companies are spending. Now, one of the debates with regard
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  Speaker 2: to the stocks of these companies that people are having is,
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  Speaker 2: you know, when Anthropic goes public, is it a good
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  Speaker 2: stock or not? Certainly their sales are going to be massive,
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  Speaker 2: but will they be enough to service this incredible debt
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  Speaker 2: because they're borrowing so much money to do it? That's
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: the first part of this. The second part is, the
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  Speaker 2: people that are making the money off of this that
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  Speaker 2: are involved in running these companies, the winners are going
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: to be clearly billionaires and there probably will be a
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  Speaker 2: lot more trillionaires like Musk. To me, though, the point
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  Speaker 2: of this story and the thing that we need to
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  Speaker 2: think about is when they're spending all of this money,
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  Speaker 2: where does it go? And this is where I think
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  Speaker 2: this part of AI and data centers is undeniably, not
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: just good, but spectacular for the United States. Back to
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  Speaker 2: the story. AI firms and developers need to keep raising
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  Speaker 2: cash to pay for data centers that are getting increasingly larger,
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  Speaker 2: more energy hungry, and more expensive. But even the cost
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: estimates vary significantly. Per Construction Giant Clayco, which is part
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  Speaker 2: of the team's building billions of dollars worth of data
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  Speaker 2: centers for the likes of Oracle CoreWeave, a typical 40
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: megawatt data center enough to power Burlington, Vermont, costs some
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  Speaker 2: $ 500 million to build. Let's talk just about the power.
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  Speaker 2: How do you build a power plant? A. Lots of
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: construction workers. Lots of cement. Lots of steel. It's an
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: incredibly labor-intensive process. And then the manufacture of all of
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: the things that goes into the construction of a power
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  Speaker 2: plant creates jobs for all of the companies that make
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: all of that. That's just the power plant part of this.
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  Speaker 2: Now let's take a look at some of these images
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  Speaker 2: we've seen of some of the super data centers that
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: are being built. Let's just start with cement. I don't
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: even know particularly how you buy stock and profit off
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: of cement. Maybe I need to find out about that.
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  Speaker 2: But we have certainly seen that cement in terms of
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: high-rise office buildings in the United States is in no
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: demand at all. Office towers are emptier because of work
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  Speaker 2: at home and changes in the economy and so on.
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  Speaker 2: This is creating a brand new boom for construction and
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: all of the construction materials that are out there. And
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: when all of those construction companies get hired and all
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: of those cement companies get hired and all of those
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: steel mills get hired to provide all of this stuff,
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: they're going to hire people who will end up making
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: lots of money. And what do they do when they
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: make lots of money? Likely spend it. Now, I think
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: the disconnect in our economy that I've been talking about
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: on my program for years is going to be even
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: more dramatic. I frankly don't see how all of this
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: spending is going to accrue to the pocketbook of a
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: social sciences major unless they get a job lobbying against
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: the data centers. The demand for skilled labor is, I think,
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: going to be much greater in 20 years than now.
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: And we already see there's a tremendous shortage of the
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: number of people who work in skilled labor. Let's just
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: talk about plumbing. All these data centers that are going
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: to have all these employees are going to have a
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: whole lot of toilets and they're going to have a
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: whole lot of pipes because of the need for water,
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: the water infrastructure in these plants, incredible amounts of construction
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: on it. And then imagine the servicing of it. Imagine
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: the number of electricians that will be required to operate
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: these centers and, for that matter, construct them. The materials
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: that are going to be used to build and then
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: to operate the data centers are constantly going to have
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: to be brought in by rail or, more likely, truck.
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: When we hear these numbers about the incredible amount of
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: expenditure that private companies are doing, The thing that I
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: think people need to focus on is that means that
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: money is going to be spent largely within our own
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: economy if the construction and the centers are here. If
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: they're in Mexico or they're in China, we get none
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: of that. One of the arguments that's made on spending
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: a lot of money to attract tourism is is that
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: the money that tourists spend sprinkle all over the economy.
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: I've been a dissenter on that issue, as you know.
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: I think it does not spread across the economy. I
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: think it dumps in certain sectors of the economy. You
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: own a hotel or a motel or a restaurant or
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: a catering company, you do really well off of it.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: But for the vast majority of people, if some big
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: convention comes to town, you don't make an extra penny
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: at all. Oh, if you're driving for Uber, you're probably
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: going to get a few extra rides. And if the
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: people come to the convention, go to your restaurant, you're
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: going to do more business there. But if you live
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: seven miles away and you're not involved in any of
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: those fields, doesn't mean a doggone thing for you. Because
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: the benefits of tourism are concentrated on the fields in
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: which tourists spend their money. Massive spending is on incredible
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: construction and a brand new enormous demand for skilled labor
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: is transformative to America. Whatever percentage of people in the
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: United States right now that are electricians, I just think
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: that percentage is going to be higher in 15 years. Well,
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: a lot of people simply don't have the aptitude to
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: work in high tech like me. There are all sorts
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: of jobs that are associated with people who work to
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: support high tech. Imagine the budget analysts. Now let's imagine
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: all the clerical and the support staff affiliated with this.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: I always think about healthcare, hospitals. Healthcare is one of
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: the huge employers that we have in the United States.
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: And I think a majority of people who work in
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: healthcare are not doctors or nurses. They're the people that
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: do everything else. So when you see companies willing to
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: spend this much money, that may not be a wise
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: decision for the company that does it. And I suspect
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: some will flop and some will thrive. Three names from
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: the year 2000. Following three companies, all were booming at
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: that time. Yahoo, AOL, and Amazon. Yahoo is one of
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: the bigger zeros right now in the American tech world.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: AOL barely exists. Primarily just a mail service. And Amazon
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: owns the world. So you don't know which ones of
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: these companies that are spending all of this money are
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: going to go bust. or simply be taken over only
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: worth a shell of what their prospects were, and the
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: others are the next Amazon, or the next Google, or
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: the next Meta. We don't know the answer to that,
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: but what we do know is this. All of the
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: money that they all spend, the ones that spend the
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: money and it doesn't do anything for them, and the
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: ones that spend the money that makes them even wealthier
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: and more dominant, that money is going to be spent
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: all throughout our entire economies. Now, before I sound like
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: the bluebird of happiness here, there are clearly downsides associated
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: with this. I have the same concerns that everybody else
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: has about rogue AI and a less humanized society and
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: the people who aren't involved even in an ancillary fashion
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: in all of these developments and that they're just going
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: to become dumber and dumber and dumber as they don't
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: use their heads to think at all or reason anything
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: out as AI does everything for them. The society of
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: haves and have-nots may become even greater as certain tasks
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: are no longer needed because AI is able to do
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: them and technology is able to do them. And the
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: people that are involved in fields... in which, as we
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: were referring earlier, are over-degraded and underemployed, it will be
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: even greater for them. Clearly, the people who have tech
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: knowledge and can design and work within these systems, they're
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: in great shape. But other, the other, the one that
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: I think is really big is all of the people
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: that will work in the fields that will benefit from
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: being affiliated in this area. you have a 12 or
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: 13 year old kid. I just would be doing everything
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: in my power to try to make that kid interested
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: in whether it's as simple as playing with Legos or
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: learning how to use power tools, get them to think
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: about machinery and tech and building and skills and all
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: of this stuff. Because it seems to me that the
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: demands in these areas are going to be enormous. And
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: When they talk about the new industrial revolution, if indeed
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: we're going to replace many existing industries with other brand
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: new ones, I'd sure want to be somebody who was
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: employable in those brand new ones. The next part of this,
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: where they're located. I use the example all the time
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: of the paper mill because the first seven years of
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: my life, I lived across the river from the stinkiest
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: paper mill known to man. We then moved to the
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: good part of Kekona, two miles away. It's now the
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: slums of Kekona, but at the time, it was the
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: good part. That's the way you can tell that you're old.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: You move into a house, you know, like in the
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: middle of the 1960s, and it's brand new, and you
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: drive past the same house right now, and you realize,
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: it's an old house! In Wisconsin... The communities that thrived
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: were the mill towns, the factory towns. It's the greatest
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: thing to have them because there were big job providers
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: and then there were all of the other businesses that
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: made money because the factory was there. But it wasn't
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: real attractive to live right next to the factory, although
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: people were certainly not as freaked then as they are now. Likewise,
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: the data centers. If you live in a community that's six,
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: if you live six miles away from a data center,
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: I think that you're going to be an incredibly thriving community.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: If you're involved in the home construction business, you're going
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: to be doing nothing but building houses. You're going to
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: be talking about incredible boom towns and tremendous amounts of wealth,
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: extremely high income jobs that are coming in there. But boy,
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: oh boy, if you live three quarters of a mile away,
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: you're never going to have any peace and quiet in
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: your life and you're going to see traffic out the
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: wazoo and you're going to be living in a community
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: that's just overrun by and an area that's just overrun
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: and crawling with people. So I certainly get why somebody
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: wouldn't want to live right across the street from a
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: data center. But I also understand that if you live
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: in a region that doesn't have any of this, you're
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: probably staring at about 100 years of a depressed community
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: because this is going to be the guts of our economy.
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: the technology and the servicing of it, it's pretty much
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: going to be where all of it goes. Now, some
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: of it I'm skeptical of. I'm skeptical of whether or
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: not we're going to go to mass driverless cars. I'm
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: just skeptical of that. But let's imagine we do. They're
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: still all going to be manufactured by somebody. And the
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: laying outs of the streets and the putting together of
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: the grids and all of that will all be patrolled
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: and controlled by somebody. And all of the people who
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: get to sit in the seat of the car and
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: do work rather than drive the car for the 45
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: minutes that they're in there are going to become more
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: productive people. If you don't have any connection with any
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: of that, though, you're not going to benefit at all.
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: So I think one of the things that's driving fear
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: and opposition to this is that people believe that they
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: will be deemed irrelevant because of it. And my answer
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: to that is, You're not going to stop the fact
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: that it's going to happen. The only thing that you
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: control is whether or not the stuff is going to
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: be here. If we have high tech and have data centers,
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: but none of them are here, we get none of
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: the benefits and all of the downsides. At least if
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: they're here, we get the economic benefits of all of
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: the economic activity and construction and operational that occurs because
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: it's here. Back to the Forbes piece. And this is
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: where the numbers just blow me away. On a larger scale,
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: McKinsey estimates that nearly two-thirds of the cost of data
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: centers come from GPU servers and data storage to the
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: tune of $ 4. 4 trillion on a global level through 2030.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: They estimate $ 1. 3 trillion will be spent on electrical and
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: mechanical equipment. Do we have any mechanical manufacturers around here? Yeah,
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: we do. I'm guessing, I don't know who's doing what
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: in all of this, but I'm guessing that say, you know,
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: Rockwell might do really well under this and the Johnson
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: Controls might do really well. And anybody who makes refrigeration equipment,
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: you know, the cooling, the cooling thing, what do they
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: call them? The big coolers that keep these high-tech pieces
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: of equipment cool. What a boom for those companies. Well,
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: people work in those industries. A lot of them. will
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: be spent on electrical and mechanical input, power generation, and
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: network infrastructure, with an additional $ 1 trillion needed for labor,
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: real estate, construction, and land acquisition. Trillions of dollars worth
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: of land, cement, electricity, and water are hard to put
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: into perspective. As of 2024, data centers consume more power
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: than the entire state of Ohio. By 2030, they're expected
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: to need as much as what Texas uses today. Over
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: the next four years, they could eat up near another
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: 457 terawatt hours of electricity, enough to power California for
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: nearly two years. The problem facing many data center development
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: is the capacity just doesn't exist yet. Firms that already
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: have access to power, including a host of former Bitcoin
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: miners that have transitioned their mining operations to data centers,
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: they now lease out to AI firms that benefited from
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: that shortage. Private companies are spending tens of billions of
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: dollars on electrical power, all in an effort to keep
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: up with the insatiable land for data centers. All right,
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: let's imagine you're 26 years old. And your field of
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: expertise is your skilled employee in heavy construction that makes
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: stuff like power plants. You're employed for the next 40 years.
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: Probably can't use drugs because companies that do stuff like
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: that drug test. But what a future that is. So
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: certainly I think we can stare at a lot of
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: people and see what they've done with their lives and
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: what their degrees are and their lack of interest and
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: the lack of work and the lack of motivation and
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: they're rather sitting on their ass all day than doing
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: anything else. You got no future. But if you've got
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: skills at all that are going to be dealing with
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: the transformation of our economy into this, you're going to thrive.
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: You're going to have an incredibly high quality of life.
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: You're like the person who in 1937 learned how to
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: manufacture cars and got to work in the automobile industry
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: before that build out. The firms building the cables that
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: move all the electricity are benefiting too. Southwire, the privately
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: held cable manufacturer owned by Georgia's Richards family, posted a
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: record $ 9. 7 billion in revenue last year thanks to rising
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: copper prices and greater demand from data centers. America is vast,
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: but so is the amount of land and cement needed
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: for the build-out. As of last year, data centers currently
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: took up slightly more land than the island of Manhattan.
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: By 2030, they're expected to eat up more than the
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: entire District of Columbia. That may seem small given the
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: country's size, but developers are snapping up as much land
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: as they can get so they can be prepared several
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: years down the road. Let me interject. I think that
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: this means a tremendous boom for farmers because their land
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: is going to become more valuable, and also, as there
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: are going to be less land available for the production
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: of crops... more profit for those farmers, and unfortunately for
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: the consumer, perhaps higher prices. As land goes out of
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: a low dollar value item like creation of food into
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: a high dollar item like the creation and storage of data.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: Even if the land is available, securing the labor to
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: build the facilities is another major bottleneck. Labor is just
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: a real pinch point because you just can't crank out
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: more skilled electricians, said Marknick. There's also an issue when
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: it comes to key electrical components such as generators where
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: delivery times have slipped from 12 weeks a few years
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: ago to nearly two years ago today. Again, you heard
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: the point with regard to electrician. If you've got a
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: kid with any inclination at all, again, you have to
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: be really stupid or really screwed up or really doped
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: up on drugs to go into the electrical field right
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: now and not thrive for the next 40 years. Do
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: you have any electrical aptitude? It's about what I am too.
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: It's just amazingly certain. Some people just can look at
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: a system of wires and understand schematically how that's supposed
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: to be put together and can figure out the best
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: way to design electricity and what the load is for
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: certain lines. And for others of us, we're just oblivious.
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: Massive amounts of cement are also necessary to mix into
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: concrete to build the hulking data center structure. One beneficiary
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: has been Tennessee-based SRM Concrete, which is pouring concrete for
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: 13 data centers for hyperscalers, including Meta Oracle and Google,
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: helping the firm grow and vaulting founder Mike Hollingshead to
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: a $ 7. 2 billion fortune. Think about that. The guy owns
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: a cement company and he's worth $ 7. 2 billion. There's nothing
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: lower tech than cement. But why is the guy making
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: the billions? Because of high tech. Because in order to
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: have all of this high tech, we still need backward
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: last century stuff like cement and copper and steel. I've
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: made enough on this point. The point that I'm trying
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: to make here is if you look at the world
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: with unbiased eyes and see the positives and negatives of things,
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: One of the things that I think is undeniably going
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: to happen in our future, even if we screw this
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: up and more of the data centers are in China
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: than in the United States, there's still going to be
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: so much economic activity to replace the stuff that's going
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: to be rendered obsolete because of the changes in our economy.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: One other story that I want to deal with here
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: that comes from The business world is Nike. There was
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: a time not long ago that Nike was as big
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: a consumer brand as McDonald's. I mean, Nike's logo, that swoosh.
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: What percentage of Americans see that swoosh and they don't
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: know what it is? It's got to be less than 10%.
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: It's just associated with Nike's. Nike's became like Kleenex. People
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: wouldn't even refer to their sneakers anymore as sneakers. They'd
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: refer to them as their Nike's. Nike has been number
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: one forever and ever and ever to the point that
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: nobody even knows who was number two. But for the
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: last nine years, Nike's stock has been sliding. Its share
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: of the market, both in the United States and globally,
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: continues to decline. Nike has gone through four CEOs in
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: the last 10 years, and every one of them has
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: a plan to revive and turn around Nike. How did
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: Nike screw this up? There's a guy, I don't remember
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: his name, but he's really popular on YouTube. He does
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: these videos in which he walks around and he'll take
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: a business, either a consumer business or just, he's done
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: one on Wendy's. He'll take a business that was once
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: extremely successful and and is simply imploding and falling apart,
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: and he does kind of a walkthrough, almost like a
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: forensic study, on all of the mistakes they made and
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: the things that they did wrong and how they didn't
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: keep up with current trends, and so on. The media
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: is never going to figure out Nike's problem. But for
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: anybody who's conservative... It's very easy to figure out. Nike
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: made the decision about 10 years ago to be really edgy.
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: At the very time that Colin Kaepernick divided the country
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: by taking a knee during the national anthem, Nike hired
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: him to be their spokesperson. Nike wanted Kaepernick as their image.
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: They wanted to tell the world That this guy who's
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: bucking America, this guy who's willing to challenge the status quo,
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: this guy who thinks that patriotism is not something to
• 37:25
  Speaker 2: be embraced, that's what we want you to think of
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: when you think of Nike. That Nike was cutting edge.
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: Nike was rebellious. I mean, when you think about it,
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: here's this big American corporation run by a billionaire that's
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: making all of its shoes using gas. essentially slave labor
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: in China, trying to fashion itself as the rebellious guy
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: that stands up against the big guy. They are the
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: big guy. But this was the image that they created.
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: And they doubled down on it. And they tripled down
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: on it. Their embrace of trans athletes. They were one
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: of the first companies to use Dylan Mulvaney as a spokesperson. Again,
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: cutting edge, cutting edge, cutting edge, cutting edge, cutting edge,
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: cutting edge. And over time, what's happened is a whole
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: lot of people don't want to associate with that brand.
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: There are some people who don't like Kraepernick. There are
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: people who don't like Dylan Mulvaney. And there are a
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: lot of people that are patriotic. And let's face it,
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of other sneakers that have incredibly great
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: features as well as Nikes. Nike became big how? What
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: was the biggest decision, in terms of all of the
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: things that, you know, back when I was a kid,
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: Nike didn't exist. Then Nike became the dominant athletic wear maker,
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: not just shoes, but anything in sports apparel and equipment
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: and so on. What was the biggest decision that they
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: made to catapult them? I think it was when they
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: hooked up with Michael Jordan. The Air Jordan shoe, I mean,
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: they just call them Airs. The Jordan component with regard
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: to those shoes made that company. And there isn't an
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: athlete or a public figure in America that is more
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: mainstream and widely liked than Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan isn't
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: controversial in anything. Michael Jordan is never political on one
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: side or the other. Michael Jordan isn't a polarizing figure.
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: Michael Jordan figured out how to market himself in a
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: way in which his brand was one that put a
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: But then Nike got too smart for its own good
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: and decided that rather than being likable, like Michael Jordan,
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: we're going to be edgy because people like edgy. Well,
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: half the country likes edgy, but the other half doesn't.
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: In one of these iterations, Nike is probably going to
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: embrace all-out patriotism and Their marketing campaign will almost seem
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: like something from MAGA. It may by then be too little,
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: too late. I always talk about cliches and why a
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: cliche becomes a cliche. If it wasn't true, it wouldn't
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: become a cliche. The reason people say it all the
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: time is because it generally holds. And one of the
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: truest cliches of all time is, go woke, go broke.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: You're listening to the Mark Belling Podcast. This is the
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: Mark Belling Podcast. I want to highlight a story just
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: briefly here. The Treasury Department, that scholarship program that President
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: Trump created that states can opt in on, it's the
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: one that gives you a $ 3, 400 full credit on your
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: taxes if you make a donation for a scholarship to
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: a student in elementary or high school. It's $ 3, 400, and
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: the student then and the family can use it for
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: whatever school they want to use it to. Leftists don't
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: like the idea because the cost of public schools isn't
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: very high. They fear that the $ 3, 400 is mostly going
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: to be used by families who are able to take
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: their kid out of a public school and into a
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: private school. And in truth, it probably is going to
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: work out mostly that way. So Tony Evers has refused
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: to opt into the program, meaning nobody in Wisconsin can
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: get the $ 3, 400 for their kid, and anybody who donates
• 41:44
  Speaker 2: to the program... isn't going to get the credit. A
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: credit is not a deduction. If I make a charitable deduction,
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: that's knocked off of my income and I pay tax
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: on the lower amount. The credit is, you get the
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: whole thing back. It's a full dollar for dollar credit.
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: The treasury department this week announced that for dual filers,
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: in other words, for a married couple filing a joint return,
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: that you can double the credit. that if they both
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: put it in, both can get the credit, meaning they
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: can kick in $ 6, 800 and get $ 6, 800 back, and all
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: of that money goes to a student to pursue elementary
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: or high school education. It is extraordinary that the lefties
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: who keep screaming for more money for the schools hate
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: this more money for the schools. And the reason they
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: hate it is they just reason, That with that kind
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: of money, there's no way that the parent can spend
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: it all in a public school. They're just going to
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: go to a private school. Now, the money can be
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: spent for a public school, but what you can't do
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: is take the grant, take the voucher that you get
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: and pocket some of it. In other words, if the
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: tuition is less than $ 3, 400, you don't get to keep it.
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: All of it has to go toward the tuition, the
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: cost of attending one of the schools. And since most
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: public schools don't charge you that much money, it is
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: presumed that the majority of the people who tap into
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: this are going to use it to go to a
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: private school that they otherwise would not be able to afford.
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: So the taxpayers in other states, married couples are going
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: to be able to get the double credit, $ 6, 800 back,
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: whereas we in Wisconsin are going to get nothing because
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: Tony Evers refuses to participate or cooperate in the program.
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: He always described himself as the education governor. He's not.
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: He's the anti-education governor. If he was the true education governor,
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: he would support parents who want to send their kids
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: without regard to the school they're going to, but in particular,
• 43:41
  Speaker 2: encourage them to go to better schools than the kind
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: of dumps that allow fake substitute teachers to wander around
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: and teach classes for two hours without even knowing that
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: the person is actually somebody with mental issues. Let me
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: move to another story. This story is from Heartland. Heartland,
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: not to be confused with Hartford. Heartland is in the
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: Lake Country in Waukesha County. It's very close to where
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: Arrowhead High School is. Very nice, pleasant community and kind
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: of the hub of the Lake Country. The board in
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: Heartland is planning to create a $ 17. 5 million tax increment
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: financing district for the development of a hotel in downtown Heartland.
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: If you've been paying attention to me on these issues,
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: I'm opposed to all of these types of TIF districts.
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: The developer says that without the TIF district, they aren't
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: going to be able to do the project because the
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: site requires lots of improvement. They want to take a
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: parcel of land in downtown Heartland that needs a lot
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: of infrastructure work before you can begin construction. And the
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: developer says the cost of the infrastructure work would be
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: so great that it would add to the cost of
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: building the hotel that we could never make enough money
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: off the hotel to pay off the construction bonds. So
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: what Heartland is offering to do is give them the
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: money for the infrastructure improvement. The way a tax increment
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: district works is the community involved spends the money on
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: whatever part of the project needs to be done. And
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: the money is paid back by the developer in lieu
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: of property taxes. So whatever property taxes this hotel would
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: be assessed will not go to the city of Heartland
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: for the Fire and Police Department, and it will not
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: go to the Arrowhead School District or the Heartland Elementary District.
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: None of it will go to that. It will all
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: simply go back to pay for the improvements for the
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: project that is there. I'm not against all TIF districts.
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: I think that there are places for some of them.
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: But I think Wisconsin is way over tipped. And one
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: of the reasons that our property taxes are so high
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: is that you've got all these businesses all over the
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: state of Wisconsin that their property value is exploding, but
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: none of the money is going to the schools or
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: the police or fire. You've got these referendums going on
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: all over southeastern Wisconsin for fire protection services. Why do
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: they have to raise property taxes for this? And the
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: answer is much of the community is tipped, meaning you've
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: got property developers in there that their property taxes don't
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: go to support the community. Same thing, the schools. In
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: this instance, what's the public benefit to the people of
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: Heartland of a hotel? Let me explain something really basic
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: about hotels. The people who stay there don't live in
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: the community. The only time I'm aware of that somebody
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: who lives in a community stays at a hotel in
• 46:40
  Speaker 2: a community is when their wife kicks them out. Isn't
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: that basically it? Or maybe they're doing construction or something
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: and they're renovating your kitchen and you got to stay
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: in the hotel for a few days. Or there's a
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: power outage and you go down to the hotel. Other
• 46:54
  Speaker 2: than that, a hotel is a benefit to the people
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: who visit the community. So if Heartland doesn't have a
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: hotel in downtown Heartland, how does downtown Heartland suffer? There is,
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: I think, just zero benefit to the community, but you're
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: going to expend all of this on something. Okay, it
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: creates a handful of jobs, but it is then going
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: to occupy prime real estate without contributing to the benefit
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: of the community since the entirety of the property tax
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: increase is simply going to go to pay for the
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: improvements that benefit the hotel for being there. If the
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: hotel developer can't make the project work without financing, it
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: means it's not a workable project. Heartland's booming. My guess
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: is that eventually somebody will take advantage of that property.
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: And if you need to do a TIF district to
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: do it, I think it needs to be something that
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: will provide excellent jobs, high paying jobs. It'd be a
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: major contributor to the community. Not yet another hotel. On
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: the issue of affordability. It is extraordinary to me that
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: the Democratic Party is trying to talk out of both
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: sides of its mouth so aggressively on the affordability issue.
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: How do you claim that you're going to be the
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: party that tackles affordability when the candidate that you are
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: putting up for governor is perhaps the biggest taxer of
• 48:34
  Speaker 2: any candidate for Wisconsin governor in history? Understand Crowley's track record.
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: Crowley has raised property taxes in six of the seven
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: years he's been Milwaukee County Executive. Crowley right now is
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: pushing for a renovation of the Milwaukee County Courthouse in
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: the hundreds of millions of dollars. Crowley championed for and
• 48:55
  Speaker 2: got a doubling of his county sales tax. And Crowley,
• 49:00
  Speaker 2: despite swimming in all of this money, is spending it
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: so fast that his budget is in a massive deficit.
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: I think if the Democrats had done what they normally
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: do and organized themselves before this election, they would have
• 49:31
  Speaker 2: realized that an executive, either a mayor or a county
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: executive from Milwaukee County, the highest tax county in the state,
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: is not the right candidate for this time. Obviously, Crowley
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: has a track record that Republicans can exploit. And while
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: the media may not want to cover it, Crowley's track
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: record is there. He can run all the ads that
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: he wants, that he cuts taxes. The record is he
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: raised property taxes six of the seven years that he
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: was in place, but most importantly, doubled the county sales tax,
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: the most regressive tax that we have that hits every
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: resident of the county hard. And despite all of this,
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: he still has a massive deficit because of his inability
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: to control government spending at all. What an imperfect messenger
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: when they are trying at the same time to champion affordability.
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: If Crowley becomes the governor, he is going to press
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: to get rid of every one of the spending limits
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: that's placed on local municipalities and school districts in Wisconsin
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: because his track record is to spend money. We know
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: that he likes taxes. There's a picture of him smiling
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: and cutting a cake the day the legislature approved doubling
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: the Milwaukee County sales tax. related note here. There's a local,
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: if you don't like him, you call him a crank.
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: If you really don't like him, call him a pain
• 50:59
  Speaker 2: in the ass. And if you do like him, call
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: him a rabble road. So the guy's name is Orville Seamer.
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: He's been around for a long time. He goes back to,
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: he first became big during the time in which we
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: had the Milwaukee County board recall when there was the
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: outrage over Tom Amon and the pension scandal. He was
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: involved in creating citizens for a responsible government. One of
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: the things that Orville does is he makes a lot
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: of open records requests. Like I say, if you're in
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: local government, he's a pain in the butt because he's
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: requesting records all the time. He shared with me a
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: problem that he's having right now with getting records to
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley's office. And he sent me
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: the paper trail. In late August, Seamer requested, and I'll
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: admit he's requesting a lot of records, but none of
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: the requests have been fulfilled. And my guess is that
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: none of them will be fulfilled until after the elections.
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: And I think it's because of some of the things
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: that he requested, and I'm going to read from his request. One,
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: provide any email communication sent, received, and deleted files that
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: deal with or reference in any way the potential sales
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: tax increase that was being negotiated with the state of Wisconsin.
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: And then he puts in the time frame. I know
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: why Seamer's requesting this, and I know why Crowley's office
• 52:15
  Speaker 2: is not following the law on releasing the records. It's
• 52:18
  Speaker 2: because you know damn well That there's correspondence between Crowley
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: and state officials in Madison in which he's begging for
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: this tax increase. And having a document with him in
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: his own words begging to raise taxes is not anything
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: Crowley wants to kick out. The fact, the problem for
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: them is we have an open records law. And they're
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: claiming that in their own defense, they're claiming, well, you're
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: asking for a lot of record. It takes time to
• 52:42
  Speaker 2: do this. I've made records requests myself. One of the
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: advantages that we now have with emails being digitally stored
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: is you can retrieve emails on a certain subject by
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: simply putting it, for example, if I put into my
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: email file a search for and then put in the word, say,
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: Milwaukee Brewers, all of the emails that I've retained that
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: I've sent or received or retained and saved with Milwaukee
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: Brewers will instantly pop up. The amount of time that
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: this would take would be minimal. And in terms of
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: copying costs, there are none because you can electronically transmit them.
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: You can simply forward the emails to the requester or
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: put them all on a memory drive. I think the
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: Crowley campaign is trying its hardest to keep any discussion
• 53:28
  Speaker 2: away from taxes because, as I say, we all know
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: that one of the reasons lefties are supporting Crowley is
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: that they believe he's going to get rid of Act
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: 10 and he's going to dramatically increase funding for the
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: schools and everything else because he's a big spending Milwaukee liberal.
• 53:41
  Speaker 2: That's not a message that resonates with swing voters that
• 53:44
  Speaker 2: are just on this issue of affordability. So what you
• 53:48
  Speaker 2: have here in the Democratic candidate is at a time
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: that affordability is like their big message. They're running a
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: candidate who, as I say, I can't think of a
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: candidate who has run for governor of Wisconsin who had
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: a bigger record of championing tax increases than David Crowley.
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: You could say that some of the Democrats who came
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: from the state assembly or state senate, perhaps would be
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: in that position. But the most you can get for
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: them is voting for things. Crowley issues budgets. And Crowley
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: also was the recipient, the only county in the entire
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: state of Wisconsin who's been able to double its sales
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: tax since the sales tax was initiated. And they got
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: the money because Crowley demanded it. You're listening to the
• 54:36
  Speaker 2: Mark Belling Podcast. This is the Mark Belling Podcast, and
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: it is time, as it always is, on the tail
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: end of the Thursday podcast for our weekly football preview
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: and our point spread picks. And in the interest of
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: full disclosure, I'd like to tell the audience that we're
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: recording this particular segment on Wednesday. So if we say
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: anything that's outdated by the time that you hear it,
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: that was the time that we recorded. We're joining by
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: Mike Burlett of American Sports Analysts in Madison. Their website
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: is asawins.com. It's really early in the week, and it's
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: probably even closer to last week. Anything you'd like to
• 55:16
  Speaker 2: share with us about ASA and what might be going
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: on this weekend?
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: Sure. First of all, last week had a good college week.
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: We went 5-1 last week in college. NFL wasn't quite
• 55:25
  Speaker 3: as good, excuse me, 2-3 overall. But for the season, Mark,
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: right now we're 20-11 in college and 14-9 in the NFL,
• 55:31
  Speaker 3: so 34-20 overall. Oh, that's terrible. Having a solid season.
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: That is very good.
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: We're having a good season overall. Check our website on Fridays.
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: That's the best way to do it right now, especially
• 55:45
  Speaker 3: since we're recording on Wednesday. Just check it Friday. We'll
• 55:48
  Speaker 3: have a big game in college and probably the NFL
• 55:50
  Speaker 3: as well.
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: We've got some big games to talk about this week,
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: so we're just going to preview four games. We always
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: start in college football. The Badgers, by the way, for
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: those of you who don't follow it closely, they're off
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: this week. We're not going to spend any time talking
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: about it, but I made the bold statement after they
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: came from behind to beat Penn State that Wisconsin is back.
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: And I just think they underlined and emphasized that by
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: a total domination of Michigan State last week. But anyway,
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: Wisconsin has their bye this week. So let's focus on
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: two other games. There are two really interesting games. The
• 56:25
  Speaker 2: first one is from the SEC. Georgia plays Alabama. For
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: the last 10 years, this has been the big game
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: in the SEC. Most of that was during the time
• 56:35
  Speaker 2: that Saban was at Alabama, in which they're winning national
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: championships right and left. And then Kirby Smart and Georgia
• 56:41
  Speaker 2: kind of displaced them, and they started winning national championships
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: right and left. Well, Saban is gone. We're in the
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: third year of Caleb DeBoer. I think Caleb DeBoer. It's Caleb,
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: isn't it? Or Kalen. Kalen, yeah. Kalen DeBoer. And there
• 56:58
  Speaker 2: have been some people who are wondering if he was
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: the right fit for Alabama. It's early in the season,
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: but boy, they are killing teams. And Alabama at home
• 57:09
  Speaker 2: is actually right now favored in that game by about
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: a point or a point and a half. It's hard,
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: I think, early in the season, especially when both of
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: the teams have mostly played weaker football teams. Are there
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: numbers that you look at to compare this and While
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: Alabama's at home, that's one of the reasons they're favored.
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: Are they now the equal of Georgia, and does the
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: Boer really have them back?
• 57:35
  Speaker 3: I think Alabama's one of the eight or nine teams
• 57:38
  Speaker 3: that can definitely win the national championship this year. I
• 57:41
  Speaker 3: think Georgia is as well. This line opened, Georgia was
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: favored when this line opened at one and a half,
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: and it slipped Alabama favored by one and a half.
• 57:49
  Speaker 3: The key thing to keep an eye on this game
• 57:52
  Speaker 3: is there's a chance this game gets postponed, by the way.
• 57:56
  Speaker 3: The weather down there with the tropical storm is supposed
• 57:58
  Speaker 3: to be really bad at game time. They're talking heavy
• 58:00
  Speaker 3: rain and up to 50-mile-an-hour wind gusts.
• 58:02
  Speaker 2: Oh, really?
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, depending on the track and timing and all that.
• 58:06
  Speaker 3: And you can see from the total, the total opened
• 58:08
  Speaker 3: around 56. It's down to 52. They've got a total
• 58:12
  Speaker 3: of 52 and a team in Alabama that averages 50
• 58:16
  Speaker 3: points a game themselves so far this season. So that's
• 58:19
  Speaker 3: an interesting thing. dynamic there. They're both 5-0, top 10 teams.
• 58:24
  Speaker 3: They split last year. Alabama won in the regular season.
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: Georgia blew them out in the SEC championship game, but
• 58:29
  Speaker 3: Alabama still has won 10 of the last 12 meetings.
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: The Dawgs, 15-6 against the spread in the last 21.
• 58:36
  Speaker 3: That dates back to 1984. You normally get high-scoring games.
• 58:40
  Speaker 3: These teams, Mark, are both 5-0 to the over this season,
• 58:44
  Speaker 3: and that makes sense because Alabama averages 50 points a
• 58:46
  Speaker 3: game themselves, but with the weather, this is a game
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: we're staying away from. I think I think these two
• 58:51
  Speaker 3: teams are really close. Georgia may be a slight bit
• 58:55
  Speaker 3: better power rating than ours, but we'll find out a
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: lot this weekend. But with the weather as bad as
• 59:00
  Speaker 3: it is, maybe we won't find it out.
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: What do you think of the two quarterbacks? I think
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: this is Alabama's best quarterback Yeah. You know, since the,
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: since the Saban era.
• 59:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree.
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: I agree.
• 59:11
  Speaker 3: He's better than, you know, Simpson was their quarterback last year.
• 59:14
  Speaker 3: He got drafted in the first round and then this
• 59:16
  Speaker 3: kid's better. Um, I have no doubt. I, that's why they're,
• 59:20
  Speaker 3: that's why their offense is so good this year. He's,
• 59:23
  Speaker 3: he has a lot to do with it. He can run,
• 59:25
  Speaker 3: he can throw, he's awfully good.
• 59:26
  Speaker 2: I'm forgetting Georgia's quarterback's name.
• 59:28
  Speaker 3: Um, His name is, he's been there for three or
• 59:32
  Speaker 3: four years. Yeah, he is.
• 59:33
  Speaker 2: And to me, he's more of a technocrat quarterback. George
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: has had a lot of those. Quarterbacks that are really good,
• 59:39
  Speaker 2: but they're not superstars. I've lost his name right now.
• 59:45
  Speaker 3: He's more of a game manager.
• 59:46
  Speaker 2: That's what I was kind of referring to. That's a
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: better term. I said technocrat. That's the type of quarterback
• 59:51
  Speaker 2: that I perceive him as. And I wish I was
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: remembering his name here. Do you think Alabama has the
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: edge of quarterback? Yes, I do.
• 59:57
  Speaker 3: Gunnar Stockman's his name.
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: He's more of a veteran, but if I had to
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 3: take one of the two, I'm taking the Alabama kid
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: for sure. And I think Alabama has an edge at
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 3: quarterback in this one for sure.
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: But you said the weather. So if that's the case,
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 2: the weather could be a factor anywhere across the southeast.
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: It's only Wednesday, as I say. I was not aware
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: that that storm system is tracking right into that part
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: of the country. But if that game has to be postponed,
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 2: probably other ones would be as well. Next game we
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 2: want to talk about is in the Big Ten end.
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 2: As games go, I find this one really interesting. Indiana
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: is at Nebraska. Some history here. Wisconsin and Nebraska made
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: radical changes in their coaching program situation the same time,
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 2: the same year that Wisconsin went outside the program and
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: hired a big-name coach in Fickle from Cincinnati. Nebraska, which
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 2: has been stumbling around with coaches like Scott Frost, who
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: was a bad fit, They went out and they hired
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 2: a failed NFL coach who was an outstanding college coach.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 2: Matt Rule succeeded at Temple and was great at Baylor.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 2: And both coaches came in at the same time. And
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: I remember there was debate, who got the better of
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 2: the deal? Is Fickle or Rule the bigger catch? And
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: with both of them, Neither team really got dramatically good
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: until this year. This is the year Wisconsin has turned around.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: And I think this is the year Nebraska has turned around.
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: In fact, I think Wisconsin and Nebraska are both really
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 2: dead even teams right now. Nebraska's unbeaten. They haven't played
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: a lot of teams. Indiana's the team that won the
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: national championship last year. They started a little slowly last
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: year before they really kicked it in. This is the
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: real test, I think, of where Nebraska is as a program.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: Are they back at the top of the Big Ten,
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: or are they just better than they were? The game's
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: in Nebraska. Indiana's favored by eight. I don't know what
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 2: I think about the game, but I think after they
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: play it, I will have learned a lot.
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I agree. I've got a feeling on this
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 3: game that I'll get to here. Um, this line started
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 3: with Indiana up around nine and a half, 10 dropped
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 3: to seven, went back to seven and a half. And
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 3: now there's some eight. So it's kind of jumping around.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: That means there's really mixed opinions.
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 3: And the interesting thing about this game, Mark, is if
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 3: this game would have been played the first game of
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 3: the season, Indiana would have been favored by more than
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 3: 10 points in this game. So now you're getting them.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 3: Around seven, I like Indiana in this game. I really do.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 3: I'm not sold on it. I see this every year
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 3: with Nebraska, literally every year. Last year, they started five
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 3: and one. Started playing good teams, two and five the
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 3: rest of the way. Two years ago, they started five
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: and one. Started playing better teams, two and five the
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: rest of the way. They've played Ohio, Bowling Green, North Dakota,
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 3: Michigan State, and Maryland. Those are their five wins. Four
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 3: of them came at home, and Michigan State and Maryland
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 3: are two of the three worst teams in the Big
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 3: Ten right now.
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: But they did slaughter. I mean, I will say they
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: killed both of them. On the other hand, Maryland is... Boy,
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 2: that Coach Loxley. I mean, it might be this. He's
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: going to be fired. It's just a question of when
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 2: UCLA killed them as well. But Nebraska did kill both
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: of those teams. Indiana, are they... Is Indiana as good
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 2: as they were last year? I don't think they are.
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: I mean... The quarterback was a difference maker last year.
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: Somebody's going to beat them. I don't know that it's
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: this weekend.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 3: But.
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: You think Indiana is the dominant team here. I just
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: wonder if Nebraska at home all pumped up that this
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: is finally the week that somebody figures out a way
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: to beat Cignetti.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think that's happening. Not this week. Indiana
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 3: might lose at some point. I don't think they're as
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 3: good as they were last year either. They just don't.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 3: They played an easy schedule as well. but I trust
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 3: them way more than I trust Nebraska. In fact, Nebraska
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 3: has an underdog at home since 2015, so more than
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 3: 10 years. They've played 21 home underdog games. They've covered
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 3: seven of those, and they never pull up. So they're
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 3: 2-19 in those games straight up as a home dog.
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 3: I just don't trust them. And you mentioned last week
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 3: they beat Maryland bad. That game was really deceiving. Maryland
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 3: was ahead 23-14 going in to score a touchdown against
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 3: late in the first half to possibly go up 30-14
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: and threw an 85-yard pick-six.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: Those plays always turn games around, always.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 3: That completely turned the game. I trust Indiana here. I
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 3: like Indiana to win this game by more than seven.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 3: If they don't, Nebraska's really good.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: Let's go to the NFL. Bears-Packers. The Bears are favored
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: by three. The game is in Green Bay. The Bears
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: don't have their quarterback, but looked awfully good last week
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: without him. The Packers managed to beat Tampa and look
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: terrible while doing it. The Packers, who are so beaten up,
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: lost another great player, Edgerin Cooper, with, I just hate
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: the Achilles injury. I mean, it just makes, I feel
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: sore saying those words. I mean, I can imagine having
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: a knee injury and walking around with a cast and
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: all of that. The Achilles, I mean, that's the connection
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: of your leg to your foot and It's hard to
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 2: recover from. It's painful. I feel badly for Cooper, who's
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 2: a great player. So the Packers keep sustaining these losses.
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: The offensive line stinks. I'll be honest with you. My
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 2: pick last week, which I won by half a point,
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: was going against Green Bay. I was prepared to go
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 2: against them as well here. The reason I'm not taking
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 2: Chicago is I've got a game I like better, but
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 2: I think the Bears are clearly better than Green Bay.
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: I don't think home field matters as much as it
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: used to in the NFL. And even without Caleb Williams,
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 2: I think the Bears win. Yet the line's not seven
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: or anything. It's only three, which means people think that
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: these teams are close enough. I don't. What do you think?
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so the interesting part is it was the first
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 3: time since 2006 that the Bears are favored at Green Bay.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 3: If you go all the way back to 1995, they've
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 3: been favored twice at Green Bay. That's it.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 2: For the last 40 years, they've beaten Green Bay like
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: only three times. I just think, unfortunately, I hope it's short-term,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: but unfortunately, the Green Bay dominance of Chicago has slipped.
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: I think the Bears are a way better team right now.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: I agree.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 3: The Bears are better, and they're favored by three with
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 3: their backup quarterback playing on top of that. LaFleur's had
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 3: really good success against the Bears, 11-4 against the spread.
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 3: That's the best spread record of any Packer coach ever,
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 3: but they've had good teams up until this point. Their
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 3: offensive line was a little bit better last week. They
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 3: had a couple new guys in there, but let's face it,
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 3: they struggled to be a Tampa team that was 0-3
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 3: coming in and had a rookie quarterback starting the first game.
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 3: So that was not an impressive win by any means.
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 3: The one thing to watch about the Bears, Mark, as
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 3: I've been digging into their stats throughout this year, they've
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 3: got a Their time of possession edge with the Bears,
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 3: and this is because of their running game, and I'll
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 3: get to that in just a second. They average 37
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 3: minutes per game with the ball. Their opponents average 23
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 3: minutes a game, so plus 14 on the time of possession,
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 3: which would be the best mark of all time if
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 3: they continue this. That would be hard to do. They
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 3: average 75 offensive plays a game. They're Their opponents average
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 3: 48 plays a game. So they're plus 27 plays per game.
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 3: It's hard to beat a team when they're averaging 27
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 3: more offensive plays per game. And that's because of their rushing, right?
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 3: They're number one in the NFL in rushing. They control
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 3: the clock. Green Bay's last. Green Bay's last in rushing
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 3: yards per game, rushing yards per carry, rushing first downs,
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 3: yards after contact, explosive rushing plays. They're last in all
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 3: of those. I agree. I would lean toward Chicago in
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 3: this game. I just don't trust Green Bay. I think
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 3: Green Bay might be one of the worst and maybe
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 3: even worse than that teams in the NFL right now.
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 2: I sadly agree with you on that. And the injury
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 2: thing can't be overstated. I mean, they still have major–
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 2: and it's getting worse. I mean, I know at some
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 2: point Parsons is going to be back, but they're losing
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 2: two guys each week prior to that point. And, you know,
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 2: we're also at the finger-pointing stage in Green Bay. Is
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 2: it LaFleur's fault? Is it Godekunst's fault? Is it policy's
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 2: fault for not resolving who's in charge over there? I
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 2: think everybody thinks there's going to be a house cleaning
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: at the end of the year unless they turn this
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 2: thing around, which is hard to imagine. Now, if they
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 2: do get Josh Jacobs back, if the new guys they
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: put into the offensive line can start gelling as a unit,
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 2: they still have talent on the defense, but those are if, if, if,
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 2: and if, and I don't see it happening. The other
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 2: marquee game in the NFL this weekend is from the
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 2: NFC West. I'd say two of the top five teams
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 2: in the NFL are playing. The 49ers are at the Seahawks.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 2: The 49ers have just looked good all year. They started
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: the season with that win in Australia against the Rams.
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 2: They had a pretty dominant win last week against Denver.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 2: And Seattle just keeps winning. The Seahawks are favored. I
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: believe San Francisco is going to beat them straight up. Again,
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 2: not going to be my play, but it's one that
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 2: I like a lot. I just think the 49ers are
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 2: a better team this year than the Super Bowl champion Seahawks.
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 2: What do you think about the game?
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Seattle's real banged up at running back, too. Their
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 3: top two running backs aren't going to play. They've been
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 3: trying to yank guys off that haven't been playing just
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 3: to have running backs in there. So that's not great
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 3: for them. Winner moves into first place. If the Niners win,
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 3: like you said, they'd have a two-game lead in the
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 3: best division, obviously. And I talked about this last week, Mark.
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 3: One really good indicator of how good a team is,
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 3: yards per play differentials. The top three in the whole
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 3: NFL continue to be the 49ers, Seattle, and the Rams,
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 3: all in the same division. If you look at the
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 3: odds to make the NFC playoffs, that tells you a lot, too.
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 3: All three of those teams have the three best odds
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 3: in the NFC to make the playoffs, and they're all
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 3: in the same division. So pretty good chance that those
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 3: three teams are going to make the playoffs. You talked
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 3: about San Francisco. For people that don't follow them real close,
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 3: they're having a really good year, and Brock Purdy is
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 3: having an outstanding year at quarterback. He was 20-1 to
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 3: win the MVP to start the season. Now he's 3-1.
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 3: Him and Josh Allen are the two leaders. That changes, obviously,
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 3: as we move forward, but he's been really, really good.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 3: These teams split last year during the regular season, each
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 3: winning on the other team's field, but in the playoffs,
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 3: Seattle won 41-6. In a blowout, that might give a
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 3: little extra oomph to San Francisco in this game. Tough
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 3: call for us. I think these teams are pretty close.
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 3: You're getting Seattle three, the three points at home. I
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 3: don't know if we'll use this game. I'd probably lean
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 3: a little bit San Francisco as well as you.
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 2: Okay, before we get into our picks, we're going to
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 2: do something a little bit different for a moment here.
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 2: I'm struggling to come up with the best way of
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: asking this question. So I'm just going to tell you
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 2: what the question is, the area of the question is.
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 2: It deals with what I think is the most impressive
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 2: single game record in NFL history. And by that, somebody
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 2: who did something at a higher level at that thing
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 2: that they did, more impressive than any other single game
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 2: record that's out there. And it's The number of passing
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 2: yards in an individual game. I'll have Jason. Jason, turn
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 2: your microphone on. You can take a guess at this. Mike,
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 2: take a guess. Which quarterback do you think holds the
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 2: record for throwing for the most yards in a single
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 2: game in NFL history?
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 3: Oh, wow.
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 2: Now, there's been a story about this, so maybe one
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 2: of you had seen it, but I doubt it because
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 2: it's kind of obscure. And a friend of mine tipped
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 2: me off. Take a guess as to who it is.
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 3: Is it an obvious guess?
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 2: I'm going to give you a hint in a moment. Obviously,
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 2: it's a quarterback in the NFL. It's not somebody that
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 2: neither of you would never have heard of. It's not like,
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: you know, somebody... It's not like Matt Flynn had that
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 2: great game for the Packers one year. It's not like
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 2: a Matt Flynn.
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 4: I'm going Joe Flacco.
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 2: He's saying Joe Flacco. Do you have a guess?
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'll go... I'll say... Let's go Kurt Warner with
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 3: the Rams when he had those good receivers.
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 2: Those are both good guesses. Now I'm going to bet
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 2: they're both right. I'm going to give you a hint.
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 2: He's somebody who went on to be a head coach
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 2: in the NFL. Now, for example, if you could say,
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 2: for example, to go way back in time, Sam Weish,
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 2: who was a head coach, but it's not him. But
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 2: I mean, if I was scrambling through my mind, I'd think, Boy,
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 2: I bet maybe Sam Weiss could have thrown for a
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 2: zillion yards at a game or something like that. There
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 2: aren't that many. Norm Van Brocklin. Norm Van Brocklin is
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 2: your guest. Do you have anything you want to try, Mike?
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 3: I'm stumped. You stumped me.
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 2: Well, Jason got it. Norm Van Brocklin. What I find
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 2: amazing about this is, you know, back in 1951, The
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 2: NFL in the 50s and 60s, first of all, there
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 2: were fewer plays per game because you never had a
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 2: hurry-up offense. Everybody huddled between plays. And in the NFL
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 2: in that era, usually you only passed on third down.
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 2: They ran on first and second down. Bart Starr had
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 2: games in which he'd throw 17 passes, 15 passes, 19 passes.
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 2: In the pass-happy league we're in right now, routinely there
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 2: are games in which a quarterback will throw 50 and
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 2: 55 passes. times. And just the, for example, if you
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: look at the overall yardage numbers, most passing yards in
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 2: a season, like the top 25 guys there are all
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: in the last 20 years, just because of the way
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 2: the game has changed. The thing that to me is
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 2: extraordinary about this is in 1951, Norm Van Brocklin, then
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 2: of the Rams, threw for 554 yards. Brady... Rodgers, Favre,
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 2: all these passing offenses, even high scoring games in overtime,
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 2: nobody's ever gotten to that number. I think that's just
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 2: staggering that you could have had a game in that era.
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 2: I mean, 554 yards, that's five times driving 100 yards downfield.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: I mean, you just don't get that many possessions to
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 2: be able to do it. Van Brocklin went on to
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 2: become the first head coach of the Minnesota Vikings when
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 2: they came into the league. And I think he coached
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 2: Atlanta later on as well. But he was a quarterback
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 2: for a couple of teams, including the Rams. So a
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 2: friend of mine sent me this thing and I was
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: just blown away. I did not know that. I think
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 2: the most impressive records in sports are the ones that
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 2: were set by somebody in an earlier era when they
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 2: didn't do that. For instance, for the longest time, Don
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 2: Hudson was the leading receiver in Packer history. And he
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 2: was a receiver at a time the teams were throwing
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 2: the ball five and 10 times a game. I think
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 2: he's finally been passed up, but he held that thing
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 2: for the longest time ever. And Babe Ruth's home run record.
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 2: I mean, the year Babe Ruth hit 60, I believe
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 2: the second highest home runs in the league was 29.
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 2: So the Van Brocklin record is still something. At some point,
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 2: somebody would pass that, but it's kind of stunning. You know,
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 2: Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, some of those games that far...
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 2: Quarterbacks throw into the 400s all the time. It's not
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 2: a weekly thing, but almost every major quarterback will have
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 2: a game in which they're into the four hundreds, but
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 2: nobody's ever gotten to Ben Brocklin.
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 2: Time for our football picks. And first of all, let's
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 2: recap selections from last weekend. Somehow every one of us
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 2: was right. I just, there we go. Jason just printed
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 2: out the results for me and I've managed to.
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 3: Lose them.
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 2: Here they are. Let's see who, who did what, um,
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 2: Jason's kicked out. Let's get rid of him, Mike. We
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 2: need to bring Paul back. Jason is now 4-1. He
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 2: had a really good pick with really good reasoning. The
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 2: same logic in a game before. He took Missouri over Florida.
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 2: Florida was coming off of a big upset win. They
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 2: went to Missouri and played, and Missouri was a 5.5-point underdog,
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 2: and Missouri slotted him 45-17. Mike had a really easy win, too.
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 2: He took Miami of Florida, 16.5-point favorite over Clemson. They
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 2: killed Clemson 41 to 13. I got my third win
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 2: in a row. Weasling went out. I took the Buccaneers
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: a three and a half point underdog against Green Bay
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 2: and the Packers won the game by only three. So
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 2: I got myself a win. So all of us managed
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 2: to come off of wins. Time to keep going with
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 2: some picks for this week. Jason, which game or games
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 2: do you want to hear the line on?
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 4: Recap for me, Mark, please. The Indiana and Nebraska line.
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 2: The Indiana, Nebraska line. Yeah, let's. And again, we're recording
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 2: this on Wednesday. For people who think that line is wrong,
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 2: it's changed. Right now it's 7.5. Indiana on the road
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 2: is favored by 7.5 at Nebraska.
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 4: I am going on the other side of this one.
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 4: I am going to take Nebraska plus the 7.5.
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 2: Mike doesn't agree with you. Tell me why you like Nebraska.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 4: Okay, so here's why I like Nebraska. Biggest game for
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 4: them in years. They're at home. This is a huge
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 4: look ahead for Indiana. They go to Ohio State at
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 4: home next week. So this could be a spot play
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 4: where they're looking ahead a little bit. And again, I
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 4: don't know if Nebraska's going to win. I'm not going
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 4: to go that far. But I love them getting 7.5.
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 4: You're getting more than a touchdown here. I do think
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 4: they keep the game close. I think the energy in
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 4: the stadium is going to be big in Lincoln. So
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 4: give me Nebraska at Memorial Stadium to cover the 7.5.
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 2: My whole thing is I just think Indiana's not going
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 2: to run the table two years in a row. They're
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 2: going to get a couple of losses that you weren't
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 2: going to expect. And maybe this week is one of them.
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 2: But Mike thinks that Indiana simply is a better team
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 2: in terms of personnel. Okay, since he discussed that, we
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 2: won't get more analysis there. Mike, which game or games
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 2: do you want to hear the line on?
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 3: Let's look at two college games. First one, I'll give
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 3: you the numbers. First one is 389-390, Hawaii-Arizona State.
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 2: Hawaii and Arizona State. That game is at Arizona State.
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: They're favored by 20.5. My recollection was people thought Hawaii
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 2: would be pretty good this year, and so far they're not.
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 2: I think they were expected to be. This is like
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 2: the fourth year for the coach there. I think they
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 2: were thought to be good, but they're not. Arizona State
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 2: by 20.5. That is a non-conference game, obviously.
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 3: The other one is 415, 416, Air Force, Northern Illinois.
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 2: Air Force. By the way, we didn't talk about it.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 2: last week. When the service academies play, they almost always
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 2: go under, and Air Force and Navy played to a
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 2: 14-9 game last week, and Navy's been all offense and
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 2: no defense all year, but the service academies played, and
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 2: once again, it was a low-scoring game. Air Force at
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 2: Northern Illinois. Air Force on the road. is favored by 7.5.
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 2: I hope you use that game because I don't think
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 2: either of those teams is very good, and I'd love
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 2: to hear who you think. Which game do you want?
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm going to use Northern Illinois plus 7.5.
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 2: You are going to take Northern Illinois. Is it because
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 2: of the letdown factor just playing the Service Academy rival?
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 3: There's a bunch of reasons, but that's part of it.
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 3: They played Navy last week, won 14-9. If you look
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 3: closer at the stats in that game, Air Force only
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 3: averaged 3.8 yards per play in that game and gave
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 3: up 5.3 yards per play. So they got out gained
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 3: by a yard and a half per play against a
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 3: Navy team that's not very good and is terrible on defense.
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 3: The other thing I like about, oh, more than one thing,
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 3: but Northern Illinois had last week off. So two weeks
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 3: to prepare for the military option team.
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a key because teams aren't used to playing that.
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 2: But when you have extra time to prepare for the
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 2: unique option that all three service academies run, I think
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 2: that's important.
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 3: Yep, very important. On top of that, Air Force lost
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 3: their quarterback last week. Toward the end of the game,
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 3: he's done for the season. He's top 20 nationally in rushing,
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 3: top 10 in rushing touchdowns. He's their leading passer and
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 3: their leading rusher, and he's done for the season. So
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 3: they've got another guy in there that has very little experience.
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 3: Northern Illinois coming off a bye, and they're 0-4, but
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 3: they played a top 30 strength of schedule. They played
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 3: at Arizona. They played at Iowa. They played at Georgia State,
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 3: whom people don't know about Georgia State, but Georgia State's
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 3: rolling teams in the Sun Belt Conference. And Northern Illinois
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 3: won the Georgia State in a loss, but they outgained
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 3: them by 100 yards in that game. Georgia State had
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 3: a 100-yard kickoff return. They kind of turned that game.
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 3: Their quarterback's playing better. I think NIU's getting better, and
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 3: Air Force is in a terrible spot right here. I
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 3: think NIU has a really good chance to win the game,
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 3: so I'll take the 7.5. And also....
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 2: This is actually a conference game. Northern Illinois, for reasons
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 2: I don't understand, left the Mid-American and joined the Mountain West.
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 2: The Mountain West needed to add teams because some of
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 2: their members went to join the old Pac-12 or Pac-10
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 2: or whatever it is right now. So Northern Illinois, which
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 2: forever has been in with Miami of Ohio and Ohio
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 2: and Toledo and Western Michigan and the MAC, is now
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 2: a member of of the Mountain West, which, I mean,
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 2: some of these conferences are just really stupid, and that's
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 2: another example of it, but it is actually a conference
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 2: game for those two teams.
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Mark, here's one for you. Northern Illinois is now
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 3: in the Mountain West, and Sacramento State is in the MAAC.
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 2: I think Sacramento State, which has just moved up to
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 2: Division I FCS, rather than go in, say, the Mountain West,
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 2: which would be logical because they're out there, they're in
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 2: the Mid-American... My comment on that is that's all well
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 2: and good for football, doing all that flying, but these
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: schools have competition in track and field and wrestling and
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 2: all these lesser sports. How do you justify Sacramento State for, say,
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 2: a volleyball game or one of the lesser sports they have,
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 2: getting on a plane and flying all the way to
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 2: Toledo rather than... It's just, it's all of college sports
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 2: is completely screwed up, and this is an example of it.
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 2: All right, as I said, I... Unfortunately, I think the
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 2: Bears are going to cover the three points against the Packers,
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 2: but I'm going to once again go back to old reliable.
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 2: They're not playing the Vikings who can't score this week,
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 2: so I'm going to look at the game between the
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 2: Bengals and the Dolphins. The Bengals are on the road
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 2: favored by seven at Miami, and I'm laying the seven
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 2: points with Cincinnati against Miami. I'm just going to stress
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 2: Miami is terrible. They have the worst offense in In
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 2: the National Football League, I have twice laid double digits
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 2: against them. This week, I only have to lay seven,
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 2: and I just think it's especially compelling. Last week, Miami
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 2: played Minnesota and lost 15-10, but the stat numbers are
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 2: as lopsided as anything I've seen in a long time.
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 2: Miami had eight first downs. They gained only 198 yards total. Well,
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 2: they held Minnesota there 3-36. The Vikings just don't have
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 2: an offense. They're an unbeaten team that's played a weak schedule.
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 2: Miami has no offensive line. They have no running game.
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 2: They have no receivers. And the quarterback, Malik Willis, is
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 2: in over his head. Now let's take Cincinnati, which is 2-2.
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 2: They lost last week to Jacksonville, but that was a
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 2: freak-out game where they were minus 2 in turnovers. The
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 2: Bengals out first down Jacksonville 26-19, and they outgained them 4-37.
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 2: to 323. Cincinnati scores on everybody, so they're going to
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 2: score on Minnesota. I just don't think Miami can score
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 2: on anyone. Their defense is terrible, so seven is a
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 2: reasonable number to lay. There's no home field advantage down
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 2: there in Miami at all. You can talk about the heat.
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: It's only going to be in the mid-80s. It's not
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 2: that much. I think Cincinnati is in a position where
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 2: they need a win. They had a misleading loss last
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 2: week to Jacksonville, and they're playing a Miami team that
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 2: I've Each week, I would say that they're going to
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 2: score 10 points or less because of the total lack
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: of offense down there. So with confidence, I'll lay exactly
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 2: one touchdown with Cincinnati over Miami. Any quick thoughts on
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 2: that game?
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I would agree. I mean, you talked about Miami's offense.
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 3: They threw for 85 yards last week. Willis threw for
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 3: 85 yards. They can't score. That's an inside-out handicap, we
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 3: call it, what you just did, where one team... lost,
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 3: but played pretty well and really outplayed the other team.
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 3: The other team covered, but got dominated in the stats.
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 3: And that usually can affect the line the next week.
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 3: And I agree. It should be more than what it is.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 3: I would take Cincinnati in that game as well.
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 2: You know, everybody talks about you shouldn't lay big favorites
• 1:24:59
  Speaker 2: on the NFL. Now, this isn't a double digit. My
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 2: just general observation of that, I don't have any stats.
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 2: it seems to me that big road favorites have been
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 2: over the last few years doing pretty well in the NFL. Is,
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 2: am I just, is that just bad observation or do
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 2: you have any numbers or have you picked up on
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 2: anything on that? It used to be toxic to lay
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 2: double digit favorites on the road in the NFL, but
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 2: it sure seems to me that quite a few of
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 2: them are covering over the years. This is not a
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 2: double digit favorite, but it's still a wide favorite.
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I think in recent years here, let me
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 3: see if I can find it for you quick. The, uh,
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 3: a road fair bigger road favorites have done fine in
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 3: the nfl and big favorites in general have actually done
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 3: well they've covered you know historically actually historically mark only
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 3: back to nineteen eighty it's only fifty two percent for
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 3: the underdogs of the double-digit underdog uh... in lately it's
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 3: been i was looking here yet it's more than 50%
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 3: as of the last five or six years with the road,
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 3: big road favorites. So you, you hit it on the
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 3: head here. Big road favorites have done much better.
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 2: Than they have. I mean, I think they just, they've
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 2: been telling everybody for years that they're sucker bets and
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 2: they aren't, they aren't anymore. I, I just think Miami
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 2: until they prove otherwise to play against team all the time.
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 2: And I didn't do it last week and they did
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 2: cover last week just because Minnesota can't, score, but every
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 2: time they play a team with a decent enough offense
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 2: in a good situation, I'd go against the Dolphins, who
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 2: people say that they're not the worst team in the league,
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 2: that Tennessee is worse. Tennessee plays Houston this week. They're
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 2: both 0-4, and I'm beginning to think that Houston's 0-4
• 1:26:39
  Speaker 2: isn't fluky, that Houston actually is the team that's had
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 2: the biggest drop-off in talent in the entire NFL. I
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 2: wouldn't be shocked if Tennessee... Gave them a game. I
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 2: think Miami is the worst team in the NFL, and
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 2: I think they're setting out to be the worst team
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 2: in the NFL, and they're doing everything in their power
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 2: to get the first pick of the draft. Is there
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 2: any discussion as to who that's going to be? Is
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 2: there a standout college player that everybody thinks would be
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 2: the number one pick right now? I don't think that
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 2: there really is.
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 3: Well, everyone's talking Jeremiah Smith, the wide receiver for Ohio State,
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 3: is literally... being tabbed as the best wide receiver, one
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 3: of the best wide receivers ever.
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 2: Well, Miami is the worst wide receivers in the NFL.
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 2: That would certainly be a fit for them.
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he's kind of the number one. There's some quarterbacks
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 3: out there, but he's kind of the number one guy
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 3: on most draft boards as far as pure talent goes.
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 3: It's going to depend on what they need. If Miami
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 3: gets it, maybe that's the guy because they've got Willis,
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 3: who I think is a decent quarterback.
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 2: Well, he's just a poor kid's head on his head.
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 2: He's just, there's no line. There's no receivers. He's running
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 2: for his life. And the one thing he can do
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 2: is run. And I've watched a little of the game
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 2: against Minnesota. He just panics because there's always a pass
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 2: rush and he's a good enough runner. He just won't
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 2: stay in the pocket because he knows they're going to
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 2: get to him eventually. And he looks downfield and nobody's
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 2: ever open. I mean, as you said, they threw for
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 2: 85 yards last week. Anyway, to recap the selections, we'll
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 2: talk to Mike again next week. That's Mike Burlett of
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 2: American Sports Analysts in Madison. ASA wins. Real quickly, recapping
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 2: the picks. Jason takes Nebraska to either lose by seven
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 2: or less to Indiana or beat them outright. Mike says
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 2: he's got also another seven and a half point underdog.
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 2: He's taking Northern Illinois, getting seven and a half against
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 2: the Air Force. And I'm going just the opposite. I'm
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 2: saying that Cincinnati beats the Dolphins by more than seven.
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 2: Next podcast will be Monday of next week. Talk to
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 2: you then.
• 1:28:40
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