Latest / Rosters to Rings Podcast / Labor Talks and Title Runs with New Co-Host Chet West

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Labor Talks and Title Runs with New Co-Host Chet West · Rosters to Rings Podcast

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to Roster to Rings. I am your host,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Dad Levine. Over the last three weeks, we've not recorded
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: an episode, but we have invested meaninglyy to refine Roster
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: to Rings and bring the best possible show we can
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: for the listeners. The inspiration from the show has always
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: been to peel back McCurtain and take listeners into the
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: biggest decisions gms make the experiences that they have and
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: the incredible people that they meet along the way, and
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: based on exceptional feedback from the listeners, and thank you
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: so much for those of you who shared your thoughts,
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: we're going to return to our original co host format
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: so that in addition to continuing to bring some incredible,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: dynamic guests to the show, we can dive deeper into
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: assessing the most pressing sports topics of the day from
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: the general manager's perspective. So it is with great pleasure
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: that I introduced co host Chet West, a graduate of
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Western Michigan University with a degree in Communications and Media studies.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: Chet will bring some professionalism to our op over here.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Chet's a close friend and a diehard sports fan. When
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: I started evaluating potential co hosts without hesitation, I arrived
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: at the conclusion that Chet would bring the most value
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: to the show. Over my career, I've had countless times
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: that I've been post questions by members of the media,
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: But the best way that I can explain Chet's talents
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: is that when I spend time with Chet, unlike some
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: of his professional media counterparts, he always asks questions that
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: fans would most want answered, and if I ever respond
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: with a superficial GM response, Chet is not shy about
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: holding my feet to the fire.
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: To be fair, it's typically over a glass of wine.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Through thoughtful questions, insightful perspectives, and an unbridled sports fanaticism
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: and knowledge, Chet will elevate our conversations and truly represent
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the heartbeat of our listeners. Chet, Welcome to Roster storrings.
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: Well, Fad, that was an introduction. I'm literally here to
• 1:52
  Speaker 3: bring down the property value a little bit. That's about
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: it on this show. You've done an incredible job of
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: the last year and a half, and to be quite honest,
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: I don't think anybody's ever spent that much wind introducing
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: me before. Thank you. I'm glad to be here. I've
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: been keeping in touch with this show since its inception.
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: Probably before that, we'd had conversations about what you would
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: be doing here and what we would be trying to
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: accomplish on this show. And I'm just happy to try
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: and possibly pull that curtain back a little more for
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: the fans out there. Now. We aren't going to have
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: two gms going back and forth. You're going to have
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: to deal with me. So if I smell something that's off,
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: I'm coming at you a little bit with it. I'm
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: going to make you explain it. And hey, fans, if
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: that doesn't explain it, just read between the lines. You
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: probably know there's something fishy going on.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: Well, Chet, I have no doubt that you're going to
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: bring cocktail Chet to the airways every single week. It's
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: going to be awesome.
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: Check.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: We're not going to let you off the hot seat.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: Everybody comes on the show shares their sports origin story.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Can you share with us your sports origin passion story?
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah? So I've played just about every sport you can play.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: It's from youth growing up into my high school years
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: into my adult years. I am what you would call
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: a jack of all and a master of none. I
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: can look passable for about five minutes at just about
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: any sport, but when you get down to brass tacks
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: and you want to see actual skill, I tend to
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: fall on my face to one degree or another. So
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: that's kind of where I started. I was four or
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: five years old. Dad put hockey skates on me. I
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: got flat feet. I sat on the back of the goal.
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: I cried for most of it. That led me to
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: playing soccer, which led me to playing baseball, football, basketball,
• 3:38
  Speaker 3: The whole time watching sports Saturdays Sundays in front of
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: the television set. Went into you know, high school, playing
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: a few varsity sports here and there again, probably saw
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: more of the bench in the field for most of
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: that time. Get into college, get into broadcasting, get my
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: first crack at possibly broadcasting, and into Pendant League baseball game.
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: What do I do? I get on the air and
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: I try to sound like my favorite announcers from the past.
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: I don't know if you know what that sounds like.
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: But the one instruction most people will give you is
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: be yourself. Be yourself on the air. I'm sorry, but
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: like trying to sound like Ernie Harwell for me not
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: a good idea. The Georgia Peach, didn't you know, the
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: whole Southern accent didn't quite work. My producer looked at
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: me and he's like, what are you thinking? And I said,
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: I don't think this is for me. So that was
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: my broadcasting career in a nutshell. And now here we are, I'm,
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: you know, halfway through life and finding out that, well
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: we're gonna do podcasts. This is crazy. I'm glad to
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: be here. I hope to pull that curtain back and
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: give the fans a little bit of a look into
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: what's going on that. We got a huge list of
• 4:53
  Speaker 3: stuff to talk about out there. The sports world is
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: is a busy, busy place to be these we got
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: a finals, NBA Finals, and we've got the NHL Finals.
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: We got crazy stuff going on in college football. It
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: seems like every day of the week. We've got the
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: World Cup, and we've got stuff going on in your
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: and I think my favorite sport baseball. So why don't
• 5:16
  Speaker 3: we kick some things off here a little conversation about
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: the CBA. And I want you to talk to me,
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: fad like, I'm a baseball fan and not a labor lawyer.
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: Can you kind of break down what is the CBA?
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: Why do fans hear about it so much? When there's
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: a lockout or a pending negotiation about to happen, what's
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: really going on?
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, Ched, it's a great question because I
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: think we talk a lot about it, but we don't
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: really talk about the foundational elements of it. So the
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: Collective Bargaining Agreement is negotiated between the union who represents
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: the players, and the Commissioner's Office, who represents the owners
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: slash the teams, and it's a document that governs the
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: rules and regulations of the sports, and it's across all
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: major league sports and in baseball. It lasts five years typically,
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: is the agreement, and it is expiring this December. Every
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: time the agreement is expiring, there seems to be posturing
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: and threats on both sides that maybe this is the
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: year that we're going to have a lockout. And over
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: the course of my career, I've been very fortunate that
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: we really never have had to have a lockout. There's
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: always been threats, there never actually has been a lockout.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: But just to give a little history here, Chet, because
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: this was something when I started my baseball career, I
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: was hitted to documents. One was the Major League Rules
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: and two was the book the Lords of the Realm
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: and The Lords of the Realm is a book by
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: John Hellier and it really speaks to the history of
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: collective bargaining in Major League Baseball. So it wasn't until
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: nineteen sixty six that the Players Association, that the Players
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: Union was formed, and it was under the direction of
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: executive director Marvin and Marvin Miller is documented throughout the
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: book as somebody who was fighting for the rights of
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: the players. And it all started with the rights of
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: free agency. So this is before years in my time,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: probably before most of our listeners times, but certainly our parents' time.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: You got to root for the same players for their
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: whole career because the team owned their rights in perpetuity. Well,
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: they decided that that wasn't fair and that wasn't reasonable.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: So that's really what kicked off the start of the union,
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: and that was with guys like Kurt Flood who wanted
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: to become a free agent test the waters see if
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: he could earn more money going elsewhere. It seems crazy
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: in today's day and age with professional athletes and how
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: much they're making, but a lot of these guys had
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: second jobs because they just weren't getting paid that much
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: to play professional sports. Well, the Union addressed that, and
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: it interressed very swiftly. Marvin Miller has ascended to be
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: one of the most influential people and probably the history
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: of baseball as a result of being the initial executive director.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: There really haven't been a ton of executive directors'. Marvin
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: Miller took over in nineteen sixty six. Ken Moffatt was
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: in it for one year. Donald Fear is the guy
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: that chet you and I probably grew up with as
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: a commissioner of baseball during when we became fans as
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: kids and into our teenage in twenties, and then it
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: was taken over by a gentleman by the name of
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: Mike Wiener. So when I started my career, Donald Fear
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: was towards the end of his tenure. He yielded control
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: to a gentleman by the name of Mike Wiener, who,
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: in my opinion, was one of the most impressive people
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: I've ever been around in the game. And I think
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: the perception is that everyone who works on the club
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: side has always had odds with the people who are
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: in the Union, and certainly the executive director Mike Wiener
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: was exceptionally intelligent, he was very diplomatic. He loved the
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: game of baseball. He always wore Chuck Taylors. That was
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: his trademark. And unfortunately he passed away at a very
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: young age due to a brain tumor, and the game
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: really got worse as a result of that. Because he
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: was a consensus builder and he worked very well with
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: the Commission Office. So under his watch, I think the
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: game was making great strides. He yields to Tony Clark
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: upon his passing, and now Tony Clark has yielded to
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: Bruce Meyer, who is ultimately going to be negotiating on
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: behalf of the union. He did in the last negotiation,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: he will again this time. And what started as a
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: very small operation in nineteen sixty six has now grown
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: to be the strongest union in all of professional sports.
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: So like I get, that's a great synopsis. I get it.
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: I do hear these guys' names every time we come
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: around to this bargaining. All of a sudden, you know,
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: the Bruce Myers of the world'll become the superstars of
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: this whole thing, And we hear his name one hundred
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: times a week. And now we've got we're starting to
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: hear these names pop up again of these people, the
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: big players in this whole negotiation, because we've been given
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: some initial offers. Now, as a fan, I look at
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: this stuff. I cannot stand. I feel like we're just
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: setting guardrails. We're setting the left rail, we're setting the
• 9:58
  Speaker 3: right rail, and the negotiation we're not going to end
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: up on hopefully too far over to one side or
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: the other of the road. I'm looking at what the
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: Union has come out with there you know that I
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: can give you the list here. On May twenty seventh,
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: they came out with the Competitive Integrity Tax serves as
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: a soft payroll floor of one hundred and fifty million.
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: So that's the floor we keep hearing about this floor concept.
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: We want teams to spend at least one fifty million,
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: is what they're saying. Significant increase to the CBT, also
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: known as the luxury tax. That's what's in baseball right now.
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: That's the top threshold, right So that's kind of this
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: soft ceiling, I guess, and it sits at two forty four.
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: They wanted to go up to three hundred million with
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: real escalations, and then they want to meaningfully address the
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: rank and file player kind of the this is this is
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: the first time we've started hearing about the rank and file,
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: kind of the middle tier to lower tier roster filler
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: type player. Maybe the guy that's just a little above
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: war zero war is is are we trying to take
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: care of these guys that are when the player that
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: wins above replacement, like at a point five to one
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: war that are just taking a spot? Is that what
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: this means?
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah? And should I. I think the point you're making
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: is really profound, because in my experience, this is not
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: a group that they have historically really tried to service. Sure,
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: they try to raise the minor the major league minimum
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: every year to a certain amount, and that by definition
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: does service the entry level player to a certain degree.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: They're trying to do it demonstratively through this and I
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: think one thing that they've always done is they've always
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: believed in like trickle down economics. But in this case,
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: they're now starting to address the rank and file. But
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: let's take a break. We'll get to this more on
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: the other side here on rosters to ranks.
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: Welcome back, everybody. So we're talking about the CBA. We're
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: talking about the negotiations from the union in the league.
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: We talked a little about what the union was looking
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: at there. Now, let's look at what the league is
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: kind of propositioning here for their right guard guard rail.
• 12:15
  Speaker 3: They've got a hard salary cap, ceiling two hundred and
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: forty five point three, and a floor. They are offering
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: a floor of one seventy one point two. Okay, so
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: we've got the floor, we've got the ceiling. This is
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: where the league sees the salaries kind of landing in
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: between for all teams. There's a fifty to fifty revenue split,
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: mirroring the NFL, NBA, NHL. Okay, I like that centralization
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: of TV revenue and ending local TV blackout. I love that.
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: I don't think there's a baseball fan out there who's
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: gonna sit and look at something like this and say yeah.
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: I mean, I get more complaints from friends of mine
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: in various cities that watch baseball. They're saying, I can't
• 12:54
  Speaker 3: watch my team tonight on the MLB package because they're
• 12:57
  Speaker 3: at home and they're on local broadcaster. I can't watch
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: my local broadcast, or I have to watch the local broadcast,
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: which I don't want to watch because my team is
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: in town, and I normally get to see them on
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: with their broadcast partners. That rubs me the wrong way.
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: Anytime the Tigers come to Minnesota to play, I have
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: to listen to the Minnesota broadcasters. I want the Tigers broadcasters.
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: I want Bennetty, I want that crew. What do you overall, fad,
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: where are we? What is the reality here? I mean,
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: the seems like the players are trying to get everything
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: in a you know, box of candy, and the league,
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: I don't know. Some of the stuff seems reasonable from
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: the league to me, and as a fan, I don't
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: really want to give into owners that easily. What are
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: your thoughts?
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: So so Chet, I'm always going to go glass half
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: full when it comes to these things. So I do
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: want to just, you know, readdress the point you made initially,
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: which I think is maybe one of the most important ones,
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: which is the union's reinvestment in the dare I say,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: the middle class of baseball such as it is for
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: a long time in the game, and no one's trying
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: for these guys, but just these are the realities. There
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: were more players making less than a million dollars and
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: more players making more than ten million than there were
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: guys making between one and ten million. I think this
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: at least the proposal that the union has put forth
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: is meant to try to address that. They're going to
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: pour somewhere between fifty to one hundred and eighty more
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: million dollars into that kind of middle class. This is
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: something they've never really been that attentive to. They always
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: believed in trickle down economics, where if you've got the
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: highest guys paid the most, the rest of it would
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: take care of itself. And I think they now realize
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: that just wasn't representing the rank and file to the
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: best of their ability. They're now trying to circle back
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: and doing that. I think the second thing you said,
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: which is so profoundly positive for the fans is the
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: sense of ending the blackouts and having a centralization of
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: a distribution of the TV revenue. This is the most
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: effective way to level the playing field in baseball. Just
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: as a point of reference for the listeners out there,
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: the Angelos Dodgers have the highest revenue from television. It's
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: close to three hundred and thirty million dollars a year,
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: so before the season starts, their astronomical payroll is almost
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: entirely paid off. Now what's made even more confounding is
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: most of the other teams are having to share some
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: of those revenues that they get in TV. Well, the
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: Dodgers have a carve out when the mc courts sold
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: the team, they were able to do it, so only
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: eighty four million dollars of that is then subject to
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: collective bargaining I am sorry to being shared throughout the league.
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: So the rest of it is beyond touch. So they
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: not only have more revenue than all of us, but
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: it's being shared less evenly across. So now if we
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: level those playing fields, we're not going to perfectly nail
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: the NFL where you have parody across the league, or
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: the NBA, which just crowned their eighth distinct winner in
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: eight years. But the league does believe that they're going
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: to be able to create a lot more parody than
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: current exists.
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: I get a little, so I want your visceral reaction
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: to this. You're in a bar, you're having a cocktail,
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: You're on one of your many travels, You're in your
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: hotel bar, sitting there by yourself. Guy walks and sits
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: five chairs down from you. ESPN's on and all of
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: this news comes out in some flood on ESPN, and
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: the guy sits there, Oh, you know, billionaire owners, and
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: I want to hear about them, you know, I don't
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: want to hear about this. Pay the players, pay them.
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: What's your visceral reaction as a front office guy, you
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: hear something like that, do you kind of sit there
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: and think like, this guy's a fool, like, oh gosh,
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: this is or are you? Do you sit there and say, yeah,
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: I get it, But there's a happy medium somewhere.
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: Well, so I think that's exactly a fair response. It's
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: you know, so what I think is actually happening is
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: historically there's such caustic relations between the union and the
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: Commissioner's Office that this is how I envision things happening.
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: I don't know this literally does happen this way. But
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: the union makes their initial offer. You said it was
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: on May twenty seventh. The Commissioner's Office receives it, and
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: they say two things. One is, they say they're grossly
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: offended by it and this is terrible. And then secondarily
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: they say, well, somebody actually read this and summarize it
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: for me. But there's such a lack there's such a
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: lack of trust and equity and respect that they're the
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: first thing they do is they feel like they have
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: to categorically reject it. And you know, it's not so
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: far afield from the state of affairs politically in the
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: United States right now.
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: That's just sure.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: There's no room.
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: You've got to take a side.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: There's no room for the centrist. So for that fan
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: who you said seems outraged by what's going on, I
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: think that's what they've been conditioned to do. The Commissioner's
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: office pr which I think is sound, is that they're
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: trying to represent the teams and the players and they
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: want parity. They want to be able to present to
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: all the fans across Major League Baseball cities your team
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: has a bona fide chance of winning. The Union is
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: countering with the pr of how can you possibly sympathize
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: with the billionaires? We're representing the millionaire and I'm not
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: sure that perfectly lands with you know, blue collar Americans
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: who are are huge fans.
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: I think it's people that are, Yeah, there are people
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: that are saying, you know, the players get paid enough,
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: they still are out there. It used to seem like
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: it used to be more at one point in time,
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: but it seems more so now that it's just anger
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: towards the billionaire owners and open your open your pocketbook
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: and pay the people. It'll be interesting to see where
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: this goes. I do you have any other thoughts here?
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: Is there anything we should be looking out for? Well?
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: So so Chould.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: I think the other thing that we shouldn't gloss over
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: is they're talking. You know, this may there's may be
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: a small win. But last time there was collective bargaining
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: five years ago. I think the union made an offer
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: right around the same time, right around May. The Commissioner's
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: office I don't think responded till about August or September
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: because they didn't think that the initial offer by the
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: union was worthy of responding to. So I think the
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: fact that the average fan is getting to read what's
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: in these agreements, I think smart on both sides, like
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: let's let's let's let them know publicly what's going on,
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: rather than just being exposed to the history onics on
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: both sides of both sides like slinging mud at each other.
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: They're actually at least discussing some of these deal points
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: that you and I are talking about here. The other
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: thing I think is worth noting. You mentioned the floor
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: the union proposed at one fifty that the Commissioner's office
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: has actually countered at one seventy one, which I think
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: is a little bit misleading because baked into that is
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: a twenty three million dollars per team expense on benefits,
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: so you look at that as closer to one forty eight.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: But one forty eight versus one fifty, that actually seems
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: like they're close to agreeing on what affair.
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: They're close to where a floor should be, right right,
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: I'm all for a floor. We gotta have a floor.
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: I love that idea. Now, one other thing, and I'm
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: curious about this, And I had somebody ask me this
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: the other day who's not a huge baseball fan, but
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: they were curious about it. Is there any chance that
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: the players could strike before this season's over if we
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: don't get any headway, Could they walk out? Could the
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: owners go the other way them out? Would we see
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: possibly no end to this season if things don't start progressing.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: I think there's always a possibility of that, But I
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: think the current agreement governs through December intentionally so that
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: it will not interfere whatsoever with the season, sure, and
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: I think they'd know that there's a golden goose here
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: and the season has been really compelling so far, and
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: quite frankly, for the Commissioner's office, they're seeing more parody.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: If the season were to end today, there would be
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: more diversification in the playoffs than we've seen in years,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: which is wonderful for the game.
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: Of your top five teams as far as salary out there,
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: of your top five spenders, I mean, you got the
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: Mets in last place. You know you've got the bottom team,
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: the Indians, Guardians. Excuse me, the Guardians coming into the
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: season had a sixty five million dollars payroll. They had
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: the lowest payroll in baseball, and they're tied for first
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: place right now. So I don't I mean, I don't
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: know that spending a ton of money always equates to
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: winning in baseball. It may the cream may rise the
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: top by the end of the season, yep. Right, But
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: I'm sure you've been involved in this from a roster
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: construction standpoint, and you've said it's not always about how
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: much you spend, it's who you get.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: I think that's absolutely right. I think that What the
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: math tells us is over the last twenty years, twelve
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: teams make the playoff every year that's expanded from ten,
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: but sixty eight percent of those playoff berths go to
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: the top twelve payroll teams. So, you know, the way
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: you look at it is like give or take. You know,
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: that leaves and in any given season three ish spots
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: for non top twelve payroll teams. That's just not enough
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: because where that then nets out is a little bit
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: over ninety percent of World Series winners over a long
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: time rise and have come from the top tier payrolls,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: the top fifteen payrolls. And the league is seeing what's
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: going on in the NBA. The league is seeing what's
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: going on in the NFL. And it's not that they're
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: against I think having dynasties. I don't think that's inherently bad.
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: I just think they want to, like every fan base
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: should know, if their organization is run and run well,
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: they have a bona fide chance of winning. And I
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: think they're concerned right now that the feedback they're getting
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: from fans is that they just don't feel that way.
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I would tend to agree with you. I
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: think there's stuff in both sides of this agreement that
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: I like, there's stuff at the you know, ending the
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: TV blackout. Nobody's going to fight against that. I don't
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: think that I can tell now. And paying some of
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: these players that are more than middle rung players, getting
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: them some money, that's there's nothing debatable about that. I
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: think that's probably something that should be done to one
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: degree or the other. And look, how long what do
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: you think we're looking at here? Is this going to
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: go through the end of the season.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: So I think the big touch points are these is
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: the things that the union really wants to address. And
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: I think for those people who have time to do
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: the reading MLB trade rumor, Zach Scott has a two
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: part essay that he has submitted there which is really
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: worth reading. I think that's very valuable reading. But you know,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: one of the things that the Union has always found
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: to disconnect is currently when the larger market teams share
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: some of the revenues with the smaller market teams, there's
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: really been very limited accountability for that money to be
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: invested back on the field. And so then there's the
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: perception that the Yankees buy and large the kind of
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: anecdote is that they've effectively paid the Miami Marlins payroll
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: over the last ten years. Sure, so I think there
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: has to be more accountability. I think that's where both
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: sides are acknowledging. The floor is almost as important as
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: any concept around the ceiling. And as we've discussed in
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: previous episodes on rosters rings, if you move the floor
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: up enough, there actually will be more money for players
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: that will be required to be spent. Even if you
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: do impose a ceiling. I think then when it comes
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: to the ceiling, it's probably going to be some degree
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: of semantics. They tried to have a luxury tax that
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: was going to affect a ceiling. It hasn't. They probably
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: need to come up with something a little bit more
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: restrictive than they currently have. But the Union is put
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: their foot in the ground and they said if there
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: is a there's a salary cap, they are not going
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: to accept the deal. They think it's tantamount to collusion.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: So to answer your question a little bit circuitously here, chet,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: I think if the union side continues to read offers
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: that has the word salary cap and it's hard, I
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: think they're going to feel obligated to reject those. If
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: we start referring to that differently, defining it differently, but
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: having it affect a similar outcome, we may be able
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: to progress in these conversations. And then I think the
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: last thing that the union sees as a disconnect on
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: behalf of their players is when a team like San
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: Diego sells for three point nine billion dollars. There just
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: is nothing that the player sees in that and says,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: the owners are not making enough money to be able
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: to pay us more money. So, yes, the organizations are
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: taking annual losses in the name of these big windfalls
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: down the road. That doesn't land with the players because
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: the players aren't necessarily getting to share in those windfalls
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: down the road. I'm curious to read the details on
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: the fifty to fifty revenue split that you hear happens
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: in the NBA and the NFL, where if more revenue
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: is driven and by the league as a whole, the
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: players get to participate in that. That doesn't necessarily translate
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: into getting paid if the franchise sells, But if the
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: values of all these franchise are going up, the players
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: sure should get a piece of that as well.
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: I'm going to guess that salary cap is probably the
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: biggest sticking point right now. You don't want to be
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: Bruce meyring me the guy that gives up the salary
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: cap in baseball. That's probably not something that he wants
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: on his tombstone or his legacy. So that's probably a
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: tough one. The rest of it. I love the floor
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: and I love the rest of it. So we'll see.
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: I bet that cap is we'll keep things going for
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: a while lier.
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: And I think should I think the thing that people
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: are going to spend a lot of time is talking
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: about that that cap at the top end or the ceiling.
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: I think the floor is as important for us to
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: focus on because absence of really figuring out how to
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: centralize the television revenues. They're a number of organizations you
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: named a few of them that are in playoff position.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: You know, Cleveland, Tampa, and Milwaukee. They can't afford the
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: floor at one hundred and fifty to one hundred and
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: seventy million dollars. So without some additional significant revenue sharing,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: the floor will be as problematic to some of those
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: owners as the ceiling or the cap will be. For
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: Bruce Meyer to ultimately agree to.
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: Do you think there's ever a chance MLB will take
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: over the broadcasting. Do you think they'll have a deal
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: like NFL and NBA have their own packages.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: I think that's part of Robman for the Commissioner's plan
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: is the best way to centralize it is to do it.
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: And you said it earlier, so that you, as a
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: fan of the Detroit Tigers, can sign up, and I
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: know you're a Cubs fan as well, you can sign
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: up literally for I want the Tigers games, I want
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: the Cubs games, and I want the Twins. And then
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: you get that package, right, and it tells you exactly
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: what the price associated with that is. You can get
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: the whole package, or you can go all l cart.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: I think his vision is let's make it as creative
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: and as accessible to our fans as possible. Whereas right now,
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: as you mentioned, it's sometimes it's a real challenge for
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: diehard fans to actually dial into their team's games on
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: a nightly basis.
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: Well, I've recommended the MLB package to a number of
• 27:06
  Speaker 3: friends and they get it, and they're cutting the cord
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: so they don't get local broadcast to their team. And
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: the first question I get is chat, I sign up
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: to this thing and I can't even watch my hometown
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: team on it because it's blacked out. And I look
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: at him like, oh yeah, they black out the hometown team.
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: I thought you knew that you're gonna have to find
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: a way to get the local broadcasts. They look at
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: me like I'm crazy, Like why would I want this thing? Well,
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: you can see all the other teams, right, But then
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: I think about it. I watch two teams on there.
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: I mean, I'd much rather go all a card. Now,
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: the MLB package is not one of the most expensive
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: things in the world, and the NFL package is far
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: more expensive for a season of NFL and I only
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: watch one team on their two teams maybe, so I
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: think that there's some work to do there, and I
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: think that'll benefit fans quite a bit.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: I think what we should do for the listeners is
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: let's bring an agent into this conversation, and I think
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: they may be pleasantly surprised to hear the agent's perspective
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: is not that far misaligned with your perspective as a fan.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: My expect as somebody who's worked on the club side,
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: we're all fans fundamentally, and we're trying for the veteran
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: of the game. I think that would be a very
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: interesting expansion of this conversation. Let's do it a couple
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: of months from now when we have a few more
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: offers exchanged and we have more.
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: To talk about. I'm in. I'm in. That sounds great,
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: so so check one.
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: One thing is that I wanted to just bounce off
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: of you from a fans perspective and just share some
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: of the the insights I have of building rosters. Is
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: this is this concept of what we just witnessed in
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: the NBA, which is it was an incredible run by
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: the New York Knicks and tremendous credit due to them,
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: But one of the narratives we heard in the finals
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: was the younger, upstart Spurs getting out played by the
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: more veteran New York Knicks, And just what were your
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: thoughts around that?
• 28:50
  Speaker 3: Well, first and foremost, I watched most of this. I've
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: become a basketball fan over the last couple of years.
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: A family member of the place in the NBA now
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: so kind of followed him for a while. I've become
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: a fan of, you know, the San Antonio Spurs, specifically
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: as that was where he was playing for a bit,
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: and so I've watched some of these players kind of
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: come up through from their rookie year on and it
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: was pretty excited to see him get to the finals.
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: So I thought it was kind of cool that the
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: Knicks got there too. And it's been a little while
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: for that fan base. But we saw some interesting things
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: happen in these finals, and it does point possibly to
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: experience and leadership on the court. I mean, you've got
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: a team that led in every game, every game by
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: over ten points at one point in each game. The
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: Spurs led by fourteen in game one, they lost. They
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: led by twelve points at one point in Game two,
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: they lost. They led by twelve in Game three. They
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: pulled that one out, And I would almost say they
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: pulled it out due to the fact that the Knicks
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: just couldn't pull things together in that game for one reason,
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: or though it might have been might have been nerves
• 29:54
  Speaker 3: coming back to MSG for a finals game after being
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: away for almost thirty years. And then they led by
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: twenty nine in Game four. The meltdown of sorts that
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: we all saw, I mean, people went to bed. People
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: thought this one was a two to two series and
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: you know, we're going back to San Antonio tide and
• 30:11
  Speaker 3: lo and behold the Knicks pull off one of the
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: single greatest comebacks and finals history, if not the greatest.
• 30:17
  Speaker 3: And then of course Game five, they were up by sixteen,
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: and I literally looked at my wife, who's also taken
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: to watching these games. They said, hey, I ain't They're
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: gonna blow this. Watch and they did, and that Nicks
• 30:28
  Speaker 3: came back won it in San Antonio, which there were
• 30:31
  Speaker 3: so many New York fans there it almost felt like
• 30:33
  Speaker 3: a split crowd. Anyways, what does this lead to? How
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: important do you find experience when you're building a championship roster?
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: What are your thoughts on this?
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: Well, I've really seen on both sides of this throughout
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: my career, and I'll share a few examples, but you know,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: when you broach this topic, I did a little homework
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: on this, and it's subtleties. But the Spurs had the
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: eighth youngest roster by definite in terms of playing time
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: of how they allocated their playing time. The Knicks were
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: the seventeenth, so you know, a little bit more veteran
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: for sure, And you know, I always harken back to
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: this quote from Michael Wilbon that says, you can't win
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: a championship before your heart is broken. This Furst certainly
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: had not had their heart broken. They certainly have now
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: had their heart broken. But the Knicks in the last
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: couple of years have fallen short of their dreams. They
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: knew what it took to get back to these places.
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: I thought it was interesting that when you look at
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: the two youngest rosters in the game, it's Oklahoma City
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: and Detroit. During the course of the regular season, they
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: garner the number one seeds in their respective conferences, but
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: they've also both got ousted in the playoffs, one even
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: before the conference finals. I don't know what that says
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: other than maybe, you know, the youth movement to get
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: through the slog of the eighty two game season is helpful,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: but then you rely a little bit more on the
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: experience once you get into the playoff setting. I then
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: look at the head coaches here chet and I think
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: think Mitch Johnson sounds like he's an extremely talented head coach.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: He's also thirty nine years old, you know, and it's
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: his first year as a head coach, and he's been
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: the Spurs organization, which is one of the best in
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: the game. But he's cutting his teeth and chat. Let's
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: take a break now. But when we come back on
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: the other side, let's talk about Mike Brown, the coach
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: of the Knicks, in his experience and how that played
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: into them winning a championship. We'll see you on the
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: other side here at Rosters to Ring. Welcome back to
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: Roster Springs. We're talking here about the importance of experience
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: in building a championship roster and taking a deeper dive
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: into the San Antonio Spurs and their youth versus the
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: experience and the experience and the coaching staff of the
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: New York Knicks. Mike Brown is fifty six years old
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: to Mitch Johnson's thirty nine. Where Mitch Johnson had one
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: plus years of head coaching experience with the Spurs, Mike
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: Brown has had eleven head coaching years and it started
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: back in nineteen ninety seven. So I do wonder if
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: that also played a role here, you know, and I
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: look back to Major League Baseball. There was a time
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: chet which was so unique about the twenty years leading
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: up to twenty nineteen when the Washington Nationals won the
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: World Series with Davey Martinez as their head coach, and
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: certainly what we've seen on the Dave Roberts with the Dodgers.
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: Prior to the previous twenty years, Bob Brenley with the
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: Arizona Diamondbacks was the only World Series manager who won
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: a World Series on his first team when he was
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: in his first stint as a manager. Everyone else, all
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: nineteen other guys in that twenty year period were at
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: least managing their second or third team. And I think
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: it just speaks to how much you learn. It's not
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: only the players on the court. It's not only the
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: players on the field, it's the coaching staff, because, believe
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: it or not, we all focus on what's going on
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: on the field in the court, but things speed up
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: sometimes for these coaches as well.
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: It certainly, I mean, basketball is a little bit different sport,
• 34:09
  Speaker 3: right You've got five guys on the floor, okay, and
• 34:12
  Speaker 3: a lot of it's a The game has a flow
• 34:15
  Speaker 3: that really doesn't stop back and forth, back and forth.
• 34:18
  Speaker 3: So in football or in baseball, you see coaches inserting
• 34:21
  Speaker 3: themselves from a leadership standpoint a little more. In basketball,
• 34:24
  Speaker 3: you know, they can call a time out, they can
• 34:26
  Speaker 3: give direction, but really a lot of the leadership comes
• 34:28
  Speaker 3: from the floor general, right, the person running the floor.
• 34:31
  Speaker 3: And I think when we saw the Knicks and we
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: saw the Spurs, the Knicks had that guy. The Knicks
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: had that guy not in an emotional not so much
• 34:40
  Speaker 3: a get in your face and dress you down if
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: you did something wrong, but you know, Jaylen Bronson kind
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: of had an energy and a level he was playing at,
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: and the rest of the team sort of answered that.
• 34:52
  Speaker 3: I felt like when the Spurs got in trouble or
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: got flustered, there wasn't anybody there to really pick him
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: up out of that. So this leads kind of to
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: my first question. But can experience in the finals, or
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: experience in a championship run when you're playing the really
• 35:07
  Speaker 3: good teams, can experience be borrowed another It's like, can
• 35:10
  Speaker 3: you take two or three veterans and teach a young
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: roster how to win? Or does everybody have to go
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: through the pain, like you just said, of getting there,
• 35:21
  Speaker 3: feeling it and getting bounced out and having their heart broken.
• 35:25
  Speaker 3: You know, Wemby had this quote, it's been a hell
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: of a year in terms of experience. I don't think
• 35:30
  Speaker 3: we could have learned more and gained more experience in
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: one playoff run and in one season and personally in
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: eighteen months. This is the biggest lesson in my life,
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: the biggest learning moment. I can't tell you exactly what
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: the lesson is, but we're learning from that. I'm learning
• 35:45
  Speaker 3: more than any other time in my life. But you
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: can't really tell you what the lesson is right now.
• 35:50
  Speaker 3: He may learn it years down the road. Who knows
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: and be able to answer that question, But can these guys,
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: Can a veteran, two or three veterans on a roster
• 35:59
  Speaker 3: come in and teach these guys how to win or
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: do the guys have to experience the pain? Really?
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, So I think it's a great question. So you know,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: one of the leaders on this team and one of
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: the players that they brought in of great experience intentionally
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: was was Harrison Barnes, and he's played in a lot
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: of postseason games and at the wire. The reality though,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: was in this series he was primarily on the bench.
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: He did not see the court too often. So I
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: think kind of an adjunct to your question, Chet is
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: can you have a small group of veterans share this
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: experience with people when they're not really playing. And I
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: think my answer to that is no. I do think
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: Harrison Barnes probably did everything in his capability to express
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: to these guys what it was going to be like
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: to play, you know, on the big stage, as defined
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: as in the finals and also in New York, which
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: is in.
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: A good locker room speech, right, yeah, something along those lines.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: But when you don't have that presence on the court,
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: like as you mentioned, keep in mind, Jalen Brunson is
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: the star of the Knicks, Victor Wemby Yama is the
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: star of the Spurs. One guy is a veteran, the
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: other guy is a a younger player. One guy is
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: a point guard. He has the ball in his hands
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: at all time. The other guy is typically playing off
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: the ball. So I think the benefit there is so
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: dramatically to the Knicks in terms of you've got your
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: more steady veteran and he's got the ball in his hands,
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: whereas you've got your younger player who everyone's looking to,
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: but he doesn't have the ball in his hands. And thought,
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: I thought the commentary from Harrison Barnes was an interesting
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: juxtaposition against the youthful commentary that you just expressed from Wemby,
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: who's not He's looking at this thoughtfully, but a little
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: bit with the sense of like, I'm sure I'll learn
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: something at some point and I'll apply it to the
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: rest of my career. Well, Harrison Barnes gives the other perspective,
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: which is this may be the end of my career,
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: and he says the pain of losing in the finals,
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: and ultimately you have to accept that there's no guarantee
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: that this group will ever have the opportunity to achieve that.
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: I'm sure he's thinking of him. So he says that
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: some players in this room may be able to get
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: back to the finals, some players in this room may
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: be able to win a championship. I think accepting what
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: this moment has been where we come to as a team,
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: and hopefully as guys continue on in their careers, whether
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: it's five, ten, or fifteen years down the road, they'll
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: use this as a reference point. He's giving a perspective.
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: If these are the bookend perspective, one guy is at
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: the front end of his career, the other day is
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: at the back end, yep.
• 38:27
  Speaker 3: And that's fascinating and I'm wondering in basketball, you know,
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: I think about leadership in a roster. You have basketball,
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: you have baseball. You've got a guy who may not
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: be playing, but is sitting in the dugout and providing
• 38:38
  Speaker 3: that leadership, that energy that you know, he can sit
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: there and coach guys up and walk them through they're
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: at bat that they're about to take, or talk to
• 38:47
  Speaker 3: them about what they did wrong in the field. Basketball,
• 38:50
  Speaker 3: there's no time for that. You're not doing that in basketball.
• 38:53
  Speaker 3: What's on the floor is on the floor for you.
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: So that's a little different football. Similar to baseball. You've
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: got a bench, you got guys sitting around, you got
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: guys kind of coaching guys up, Whereas I just don't
• 39:01
  Speaker 3: see that happening. Some basketballs a little different kind of
• 39:04
  Speaker 3: lays it all out there and your inexperience seems to
• 39:07
  Speaker 3: show a little more than it does in other sports
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: to a degree. So I would say, you know, if
• 39:12
  Speaker 3: you ever had a situation like I look at Daron Fox.
• 39:15
  Speaker 3: He gets brought in huge contract. He has been absolutely
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: skewed of the last week or so, fairly or not
• 39:22
  Speaker 3: for his performance in the finals, but he did make
• 39:24
  Speaker 3: some mistakes. I mean here's a guy making two hundred
• 39:27
  Speaker 3: and twenty million dollars or something, a massive deal, the
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: Max deal. He comes down. You know, all you had
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: to do is eat the ball in one of the
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: in game four and they're tied to two. He doesn't
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: eat the ball, He goes for the layup, misses it,
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: Nicks get the ball back and win the game. So
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: you're looking at a guy like that, that's your point guard,
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: that's your max contract point guard. And he, I don't
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: want to say chokes, he just makes a bad decision
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: in the heat of the moment. Is that you know?
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: You look at Darren Fox again, not a vocal leader,
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: but I also know that's he's that tier two leader
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: either that kind of leads by example. It seems to
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: me the Spurs need a guy out there, like a
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: Bronson or somebody that can kind of elevate the energy
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: on the floor but also calm everybody down when the
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: moment needs it. An intelligent player can calm everybody down.
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: Do you ever look at that, like you know, baseball,
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: there's different types of leaders. Vocal in your face. They
• 40:26
  Speaker 3: want to as as our buddy Ron Washington says, get
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: some ass and then there's the other guys who just
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: lead by example. They do they do the things the
• 40:35
  Speaker 3: way they're supposed to be done, they do them right.
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: They earn respect through their results. Do you do you, ever,
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: when you look at roster building, do you see a
• 40:43
  Speaker 3: need for one over the other based on the personality
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: of a team?
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: Well, Chad, I think to kind of weave together a
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: few the points you made. You were talking about how
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: you were sitting next to your wife when they were
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: up sixteen and you said, I don't think they have
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: a big enough cushion. I think they're going to lose.
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: And I just will tell you it's one of the
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: most remarkable things about being a fanatic, which is you
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: know when your team is down, you know in baseball,
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: down a couple runs, and you're like, I think we're
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: going to win this game, and there's an amazing exhilaration.
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: We're not always right, but you energy energy right. You
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: can kind of sense when the other team hasn't put
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: you away, but also you can kind of sense when
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: you didn't take advantage of opportunities. Well, I'm telling you,
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: I think the players feel the same way, and so
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: I having spent so much time around these guys, not
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: literally dear in Fox, but I feel terrible when you
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: see him do something like that, and the minute he
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: did it, you're like, they're going to lose the game
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: and that's going to be the touchtone moment, and it's
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: horrible for him. And you see these moments when even
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: guys who are pressure tested, the game gets too big
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: for them. So I think it's too easy to say,
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: go get veteran guys. They'll be big in these moments.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: You don't truly know until those big moments arrive exactly
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: how those are going to respond. And I'm going to
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: share a personal story here. We played in twenty fifteen
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: and twenty sixteen. We played against the Toronto Blue Jays
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: as with the Texas Rangers. We were playing a series
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: in Toronto in the playoffs, and we had an inning
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: in which we were leading. Cole Hamil's was on the
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: mound and we made I believe four errors in the
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: inning and it wasn't just one player. I think we
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: may have been recorded for errors. It may have been more.
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: They may have been generous in only giving us four.
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: We lost the game. Things got crazy in the stadium.
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: It was extremely loud as it can be there, especially
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: with the roof closed. It became too big for some
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: of our players. The game ends, we lose the series,
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: and one of our players, who was responsible for multiple
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: errors in the inning, was extremely emotional and he had
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: to go talk to the media and answer all the
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: questions you just reference. You know, all this article were
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: written about dearon Fox. This guy was in the firing line.
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: We had to get him off the mat literally to
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: get him to have that conversation. And I only bring
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: that to like just to say these guys are paid
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: extremely well. They're exceptionally what they do. It is extremely
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: pressure packed and challenging to perform these moments. And until
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: you actually witness how guys are going to respond in
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: the biggest moments, I don't know that you can perfectly prognosticate.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: And as much as in our sports we are creating
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: these models to predict how you're going to perform. From
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: a talent standpoint, nobody has perfectly put their finger on
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: the pulse of what does it look like when the
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: game's on the line. And that's where guys like Jalen
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: Brunson just seem so unique and so special and chut
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: into sport you and I love. In baseball, it's how
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: do you perform with runners in scoring position. Some pundits
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: will say that's that's artificial. You just it's random. I say,
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: it's not. When you see guys.
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: No, when you see guys.
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: Who step up in those moments and they're at least
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: as good, if not better than they normally are. Because
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: most I think, on the.
• 44:03
  Speaker 3: Off chance it could be random, but I think more
• 44:06
  Speaker 3: than more often than not, certain guys come through in
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: those moments. I mean, we've seen it in the past.
• 44:12
  Speaker 3: I'm sure somebody's gonna ask me for some statistic or
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: something that I need to call out to back that up.
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: But I can guarantee you can think of players who
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: are clutched from your past because they did it more
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: than once, and you can think of players that were
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: never clutch from your past. And I think that's kind
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: of what builds the legacy of the player, right. I mean,
• 44:31
  Speaker 3: Brunson's building his legacy with that performance. Daron Fox, unfortunately,
• 44:35
  Speaker 3: is probably degrading his legacy a little at that performance.
• 44:38
  Speaker 3: But I bet nobody wants to get back to the
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: finals more than Daron Fox at this point, so.
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: Well, well, Jenna, I want to bring up a player
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: that is true to your heart in David Ross. You
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: talked about the baseball equivalent of Harrison Barnes. I think
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: David Ross is that type of guy. In twenty sixteen,
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: when the Chicago Cubs break the streak and they win
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: the World Series, what was so noteworthy to me is
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: as a fan of the game, not a fan of
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: the Cubs, you're a fan of the Cubs, was how
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: every player from Hovey Baias to Zoberist to to Rizzo
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: to Bryant all said something about David Ross in their
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: postgame interview, and you're looking at it, it's like David
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: Ross says at the end.
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: Of a backup catcher, backup.
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: He's a backup catcher on this team. Yet he was
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: the guy who probably did exactly what you said, which is,
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: before these guys went up on big at bats, he
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: pulled him aside, he whispered some some you know, greatness
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: in their ears, and they felt a little bit more
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: confident when they went up there. He contextualized the pressure
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: in those moments and was their lightning rod and got
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: credit for it. So I think he's the example of
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: how that does work in baseball, and I'm not sure
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: it does work in the NBA when you're not participating
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: on the court.
• 45:44
  Speaker 3: Jason Hayward with the incredible rain delay speech. Right, guy
• 45:47
  Speaker 3: did nothing all season long, but here apparently he gives
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: some incredible speech in the locker room, fires up the troops,
• 45:52
  Speaker 3: they go out and win the game, win the World Series.
• 45:55
  Speaker 3: So yeah, like I say, I think baseball provides something
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: more for that bench leader or that veteran leader that
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: maybe isn't contributing as much on the field, but can
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: contribute on the bench a little more. Whereas basketball, I
• 46:06
  Speaker 3: don't believe that that is the case.
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: Che Cha. One of the things that really struck me
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: was in twenty twenty three with the Twins, we clinched
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: a playoff berth and you know, there's celebration going on
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: in the clubhouse and everyone's having a good time. There's
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: champagne spring and bud Bud's flowing and all that stuff.
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: And I just took a moment to look in the
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: room and two players really struck me. One was Sunny
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: Gray and Sonny Gray was you know, our number one
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: or number two startered depending on how you looked at him.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: He was more mature. He was very thoughtful, he was
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: taking it all in. He was a little bit emotional
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: in the moment, and when I asked him what was
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: going on in his head, he said, I just don't
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: know if I was ever going to get back to
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: the playoffs. I'm back. I want to cherish every moment.
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: On the other side of the clubhouse was Edward Julian.
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: Edward came up in August of that year and lit
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: the league on fire. He was a dominant player. But
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: he is literally six to seven weeks into his career
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: and he's happy as a pig. And you know what,
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: because he thinks this is gonna happen every year, So
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: he has no perspective that this could get taken away
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: from him. So in the same clubhouse, sometimes you have
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: such dramatically different reactions to the opportunity to win. So
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: sometimes I think there is something to be said for
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: the more experienced guys understand the gravity of the moment
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: because they may never get back there, so they're either
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: going to play with some urgency or they're gonna play
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: with a lot of tension. The younger guy doesn't have
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: that perspective, so sometimes it swallows them up, but oftentimes
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: they just let it. They play with their hair on fire.
• 47:41
  Speaker 3: That goes back to that Harrison Barnes quote from the end.
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: You know that that just recycles that whole line of thinking.
• 47:47
  Speaker 3: I get it. The veterans kind of know what's what's
• 47:50
  Speaker 3: at stake, what happened, what just went on, and they
• 47:53
  Speaker 3: kind of have that, you know, the experience tells them
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: you may not get back here. I got two stats
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: for you. I think it's gonna eat us into our
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: final segment. Okay, this is going to be interesting. Spurs
• 48:03
  Speaker 3: had a ninety nine percent chance of winning Game four
• 48:06
  Speaker 3: entering the second half. Entering the second half of that
• 48:09
  Speaker 3: Game four, if you had bet on the Knicks, it
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: would have paid out fourteen to one. Did you have
• 48:14
  Speaker 3: any money on this that? I?
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: Uh, you know that that could lead into a different
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: segment about betting on sports. But I am dissuaded from
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: betting on baseball for sure, and so I as a result,
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: outside of our our local fantasy football league sched, I
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: tend not to bet on it. But you know, and
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: that's just the gut wrenching thing, right is you know
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: this is this is silly to say but when it
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: says it's ninety nine percent chance to win, that also
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: means there's a one percent chance you're going to lose one.
• 48:43
  Speaker 3: And I can I live this, and if I'm betting
• 48:45
  Speaker 3: on it, I'm probably gonna land in that one percent,
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: right Quite, That's usually how it works out for me.
• 48:50
  Speaker 3: We'll be right back. We're going to take on some
• 48:52
  Speaker 3: listener questions.
• 48:53
  Speaker 4: Stay with us, folks, Welcome back to Rosters, to Rings.
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: We're leaning into one of our favorite segments. It is
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: listener questions with producer Jason Gentlemen.
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: Fad, welcome back. Congratulations on season two chat. Pretty solid performance.
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: I think first time out, Fad. The draft picks looking
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: like maybe it might payoff. But you know, we'll see
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: how it goes here. So welcome to the show. Though, Chet,
• 49:31
  Speaker 2: appreciate you lending your voice. I do love the idea
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: of bringing an agent on. I also like the idea of,
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: you know, wherever the collective bargaining agreement is with the fans,
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: because at eighteen fifty for a beer at Dodger Stadium,
• 49:45
  Speaker 2: man like, this is just getting stupid.
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: They have them out of a vending machine for crying
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: out loud. From what I understand.
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: I know, I know, and they try to pass off
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: at twenty four. But you know, if you're from the Midwest,
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: of beer's a beer. So anyway, we'll tackle that at
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: next time. But I did want to ask you guys
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: and check, you know, feel free to weigh in behavior
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: at the end of a game by the fans. How
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: much of a responsibility this is, Mike from Dallas, you know,
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: no doubt from that area, take it a look at this,
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: but much how much responsibility does the team have and
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: does the GM weigh in on this type of stuff
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: to try to calm this stuff down? Or is this
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: really the city's issue? And you know what I mean,
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: you kind of stick to what stays on the court.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: You know, I think this actually strikes a chord. I'll
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: share personal experience. In twenty ten, I was with the
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: Texas Rangers. We were playing the San Francisco Giants in
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: the World Series. We played the first two games in
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: San Francisco, and sadly they didn't go exactly as we
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: had hoped. But when you leave the stadium as a
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: team and you're heading to the airport, you all get
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: into two nice luxury buses and so the players are
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: in one bus, the staff in front office folks in
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: another one. Well, the fans of the San Francisco Giants
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: figured out where our buses were, and they flanked the
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: player's bus and started trying to rocket back and forth,
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: so much so that we had to get out and
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: we had to call security, and then we ultimately had
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: a police escort outset out of the city and into
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: the airport because there was genuine concern as to the
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: well being of the players. And so I can say
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: unequivocally to the listener in Dallas that you never want
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: to have to deal with this. As an executive, you do,
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: oftentimes have to deal with this. I referenced a game
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: earlier in Toronto where we had kind of pandemonium going
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: on in the field. There was a lot of other
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: emotions expressed in that game. The front office guys from
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: the Texas Rangers were sitting about eight rows behind our dugout.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: I was there. A security officer came up to us
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: in about the eighth inning and said, you guys need
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: to get out of the stadium. We can no longer
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: protect you. They're like ten rows behind us set our
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: family section, and somebody had already cold cocked one of
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: our players of wives brothers, and they said, they know
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: who you guys are. You guys need to get out
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: of the stadium. So we ended up watching the eighth
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: and ninth ending of that game underneath the stadium in
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: our clubhouse because they didn't think they could protect us.
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: And so these things do happen. We've talked about this
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: previously on the show. When fans cross lines and threaten players,
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: threaten executives, coaches, referees, it's going too far. And these
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: are sports. It's fun functionally, it's entertainment, and we understand
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: your fanaticism sometimes gets a little bit off the chain,
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: but I do think when executives have to focus their
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: attention more on the transgressions and the protection of the
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: fans and the protection of the player, we've really lost
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: our way in sports.
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: Well, it really doesn't. I mean, let's look at it
• 53:05
  Speaker 3: this way. From the fans standpoint, it really makes your
• 53:09
  Speaker 3: fan base, your city, and your team look bad. I've
• 53:14
  Speaker 3: never understood how throwing and you saw Wemby coming into
• 53:17
  Speaker 3: his hotel and Knicks fans are throwing stuff at him
• 53:21
  Speaker 3: from you know, and they're out in the crowd They're
• 53:23
  Speaker 3: not showing their face here. They're not walking up to
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: them and saying something to his face. They're throwing garbage
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: at him from forty feet away. Well, how that looks
• 53:33
  Speaker 3: at the Bush League? First of all, there's other things
• 53:35
  Speaker 3: I'd love to call it, but it makes your city
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: look bad. It makes your team look bad. And generally,
• 53:41
  Speaker 3: as fans of a team, don't we want our team
• 53:43
  Speaker 3: to look good. Don't we want our city to come
• 53:45
  Speaker 3: across as civil? And I mean, you go out and
• 53:49
  Speaker 3: have your fun, but you don't have to threaten people.
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: Well, and I take it as a step further. You
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: know who takes note of that is the players. And
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: so when the players have a changed and become a
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: hun free agent, they're not rushing to go to those markets.
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: You know, another view of the same question on a
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: little bit of a different spectrum. But I do want
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: to just ask your opinion of this. Chet is. One
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: thing that I was noteworthy about the finals was just
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: how much the A listers from New York dominated this
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: silver screen here. And I thought at some points like,
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: isn't it about the players and the fact that all
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: of these people, and it was, you know, it was
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: really cool to see all those people court side. But
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: I did wonder about the actual average fan who used
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: to have those court side seats, who now can't afford them.
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: But also when did it stop becoming about the players?
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: They hadn't won a championship in fifty three years.
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: I thought some of the same stuff that. But I
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: also noticed they had interviewed a few of the players
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: about this, and they were feeding off. They loved it.
• 54:47
  Speaker 3: They had made comments like I look up in the
• 54:49
  Speaker 3: crowd and I got, you know, Taylor Swift over here.
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: I got Ben Stiller over here. He's like, this is incredible.
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: It's an atmosphere is incredibly surrounded by greatness at court side,
• 54:57
  Speaker 3: and I'm out playing the game that I love and
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: and so I don't know that it really affected them
• 55:03
  Speaker 3: in that much of a negative way. I do wonder, though,
• 55:06
  Speaker 3: I mean, I don't know if you saw this, but
• 55:08
  Speaker 3: there is a there's some sort of a strange hierarchy
• 55:11
  Speaker 3: to those court side seats and how people get them.
• 55:14
  Speaker 3: And you can be famous and get bounced like you're
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: gonna have somebody else trump you and you're gone. I mean,
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: I'm sorry, I don't think I'm ever gonna sit courtside
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: in a finals game. To be quite honest with you,
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: that's just not in the cards for me. But if
• 55:26
  Speaker 3: I was a listy enough and I got my court
• 55:30
  Speaker 3: side seat ready, I'm going to the finals game two, baby,
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: and all of a sudden, my agent to whoever calls
• 55:36
  Speaker 3: me and says, hey, we got bad news. You're up
• 55:38
  Speaker 3: in two hundred level. Taylor Swift needs that seat and
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: she just bounced you. I wouldn't be very happy, I'll
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: tell you that right now. And nothing against Taylor Swift,
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: lover music, lover work, but it's that seems really I
• 55:52
  Speaker 3: don't know. It seems a little, a little like you're
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: battling and the Lord of the Flies for the front
• 55:58
  Speaker 3: row there or something. At any rate, I don't think
• 56:00
  Speaker 3: the players care that much. I think they love it.
• 56:02
  Speaker 3: I think they like it. I think they like looking
• 56:04
  Speaker 3: up and seeing Spike Lee, you know, high five of
• 56:06
  Speaker 3: them and stuff like that. I do wonder are we
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: getting the real New York appeal there? Maybe we are
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: with the celebrities, you know.
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I agree with you. I think it added
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: to the spectacle. It also added to the intensity's games,
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: and I think it were on the Spurs like just
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: the magnitude.
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: Of the people around.
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: For my money, I feel like Tracy Morgan was the cutoff,
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: Like he should be allowed to go hug people on
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: the court if you're below Tracy Morgan on the pecking order.
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's some guys I saw. There are a few
• 56:34
  Speaker 3: guys I saw there are court side, and I'm like,
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: how didn't they get bounced out? Yeah? Somebody else better there. Yeah,
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: that's in the I'm not gonna call any names. No,
• 56:41
  Speaker 3: you know, there are a few people people.
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: Who are in like the fourth version of CSI that
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: only airs at two am later or later like that.
• 56:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. Probably don't get court side. Probably shouldn't get
• 56:50
  Speaker 3: court side.
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: Well, chet, I wanted to say thank you so much
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: for coming on. This has been awesome.
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: I really appreciate it.
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: You delivered across the board and for the listeners out there,
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: thank you. Thank you so much for your feedback. Hopefully
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: we're delivering what you guys would like, and please join
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: us this Thursday and every Thursday on Rosters to rates