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Sean O'Connell Show - Full POD 10-1-26 · The Sean O'Connell Show

0:14
Speaker 1: Happy Thursday, everybody. Welcome to the Sean O'Connell Show again.
0:30
Speaker 2: Utah's number one sports talk, a Thursday edition of the show.
0:35
Speaker 2: We march towards another weekend of college football, a Opening
0:41
Speaker 2: night for the Utah Mammoth, which for me is the
0:44
Speaker 2: number one draw in sports right now, at least on
0:48
Speaker 2: this Thursday. The NFL Thursday night game has some local
0:52
Speaker 2: interest in it. An old divisional rivalry that we don't
0:58
Speaker 2: probably talk about enough. But Spencer Fano back on the
1:03
Speaker 2: field for the Cleveland Browns. The text line is always open, 877-353-0700.
1:13
Speaker 2: Happy to hear from you anytime that we can. Please
1:16
Speaker 2: text us, call us, let us know what you think.
1:19
Speaker 2: I put a question out on Twitter yesterday that we
1:22
Speaker 2: never really got to on the show, so I'm going
1:25
Speaker 2: to talk about that a little bit today.
1:27
Speaker 3: You get to wait.
1:27
Speaker 2: I asked Dan Sorensen this, and I'm asking you all
1:30
Speaker 2: out there listening. If you get to wave a magic
1:34
Speaker 2: wand over this Utah football team during the bye week,
1:37
Speaker 2: and you get to change any one thing, you get
1:39
Speaker 2: to fix any one thing, you get to do one
1:41
Speaker 2: thing that would improve this team or help this team,
1:48
Speaker 2: or maybe you don't want to improve or help this
1:52
Speaker 2: team because you think that they're perfect.
1:53
Speaker 3: As they are. What is your bye week adjustment?
1:57
Speaker 2: How do you win the bye week if you're in
1:59
Speaker 2: charge of Utah football?
2:04
Speaker 3: 877-353-0700.
2:04
Speaker 2: I'll get to some of the responses I got on
2:06
Speaker 2: Twitter yesterday.
2:07
Speaker 3: And, of course, want to hear from you on that
2:10
Speaker 3: question today.
2:13
Speaker 2: Eric Weddle is going to join us. Tom Callahan is
2:16
Speaker 2: going to join us. Gordy Chiesa is expected today. Maybe,
2:25
Speaker 2: maybe we'll get all those guys involved on the show today.
2:30
Speaker 3: And, you know, we're here.
2:31
Speaker 2: We're doing our thing. Utah football, of course, is off
2:39
Speaker 2: in the bye week. The UFC is in town. We
2:45
Speaker 2: had an interesting situation where a guy I know, he's
2:51
Speaker 2: actually one of our former PFL champs. He fought in
2:53
Speaker 2: the UFC also. He's cornering someone who's on the card.
2:57
Speaker 2: And that guy, he played in the NFL. He's the
3:05
Speaker 2: all-time leading tackler in Florida international football history. His name
3:14
Speaker 2: is Anthony Wint. Now he's fighting in the UFC. He's undefeated.
3:16
Speaker 2: He's a prospect on the rise. And Morgan Scali had
3:21
Speaker 2: him go speak with the University of Utah football team
3:24
Speaker 2: last night, or yesterday, I should say, which is kind
3:27
Speaker 2: of cool that the Utah football players get to, you know,
3:33
Speaker 2: touch on a little bit of the combat sports world.
3:36
Speaker 2: I imagine there will be several players in attendance when
3:38
Speaker 2: the UFC sets down at the Delta Center on Saturday night.
3:43
Speaker 2: Of course, that is not set up. The floor tonight
3:46
Speaker 2: is set up. The ice is down. They're playing hockey
3:51
Speaker 2: at the Delta Center tonight. Chicago Blackhawks in town, and
3:56
Speaker 2: we'll discuss all of it here on the Sean O'Connell Show.
4:05
Speaker 3: I'm putting James in a bad spot.
4:07
Speaker 2: He's trying to scramble to make everything work, but we're
4:12
Speaker 2: going to get the show together today, and we're going
4:14
Speaker 2: to talk to you at 877-353-7000. zero 700, your thoughts
4:20
Speaker 2: on how you fix anything that you think is wrong
4:22
Speaker 2: with this Utah football team, the magic spell, the potion
4:25
Speaker 2: you would feed to these players during the bi-week to
4:28
Speaker 2: make sure that they are prepped for a championship run.
4:32
Speaker 3: And by the way, depending on what sports book.
4:36
Speaker 2: You pay attention to, if you pay attention to any
4:37
Speaker 2: sports books, the S and P plus the FBI, all
4:42
Speaker 2: of these things, these different metrics that are used to
4:46
Speaker 2: set expectations for, for college football, there are some who
4:51
Speaker 2: believe that now Utah, there are some things that are
4:54
Speaker 2: pointing towards Utah football being not the favorite, but a
5:01
Speaker 2: championship favorite in the Big 12 Conference. And I know
5:06
Speaker 2: that there was a decent number of people that thought
5:10
Speaker 2: that might be the case, that thought that might be a.
5:13
Speaker 3: Possibility.
5:15
Speaker 2: For the University of Utah, I think that these first
5:17
Speaker 2: four games and the offensive numbers and the defensive numbers
5:21
Speaker 2: and the fact that you're top three in the conference
5:24
Speaker 2: in both of those things and the fact that there's
5:25
Speaker 2: some vulnerabilities being shown by Texas Tech right now, I.
5:30
Speaker 3: Think that.
5:32
Speaker 2: There are a lot of people that were not part
5:35
Speaker 2: of that hardcore, hyper-optimistic segment of the fan base that
5:41
Speaker 2: are now starting to believe a little bit more. I
5:46
Speaker 2: didn't think you'd experience any bumps or bruises or hiccups
5:52
Speaker 2: to this juncture of the season. But I have told you,
5:55
Speaker 2: and I still stand by this, that there are going
5:57
Speaker 2: to be some things during the debut season of Morgan
6:01
Speaker 2: Scali as the head coach where we look and we say,
6:04
Speaker 2: all right, that is something that is to be expected.
6:09
Speaker 3: That is a problem we might have been able to anticipate.
6:14
Speaker 2: And if not, fine. I would love to be wrong
6:17
Speaker 2: about that. That is a wonderful thing to be incorrect about.
6:25
Speaker 2: So 877-353-0700, tell me the wand you're waving, what are
6:30
Speaker 2: you fixing if there is something to fix in the
6:33
Speaker 2: bye week?
6:38
Speaker 3: A couple of the responses that we got yesterday....
6:42
Speaker 2: Urgency in the third quarter regardless of score. Now, I
6:45
Speaker 2: hope I didn't lead too many witnesses on that front
6:48
Speaker 2: because a couple days ago we talked about, you know,
6:52
Speaker 2: the trend of third quarter lackadaisical. That's too wordy of
7:00
Speaker 2: a way to say it. The third quarter slowdown for
7:05
Speaker 2: this Utah football team. And how you fix that is, again,
7:10
Speaker 2: way above my pay grade. recognizing it, acknowledging that it
7:14
Speaker 2: is potentially a trend is, of course, a first step
7:17
Speaker 2: that you take. But if it's not obvious, if there's
7:24
Speaker 2: nothing that is particularly backward or if there's nothing that
7:29
Speaker 2: is particularly problematic, then what do you do?
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Speaker 3: How do you change it?
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Speaker 2: If it's something that the players themselves can get to
7:38
Speaker 2: the bottom of, if it's something that the coaches with
7:44
Speaker 2: the play calling, they've got all their data, right? They're
7:48
Speaker 2: plugging everything in to their algorithms and their computers and
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Speaker 2: their metrics and the numbers that matter most to the
7:56
Speaker 2: coaching staff and the expected success rates and things like that.
8:00
Speaker 2: And they're looking at it and they're saying, okay, how
8:04
Speaker 2: much of this is execution? How much of this is fatigue?
8:07
Speaker 2: How much of this is play calling? How much of
8:09
Speaker 2: this is coaching? You just have to give credit to
8:11
Speaker 2: the opposition. The third quarter stuff we talked about a
8:15
Speaker 2: little bit. Wave your wand and fix a thing or
8:19
Speaker 2: maybe multiple things about this Utah football team and prep
8:22
Speaker 2: them for the stretch run, the final two-thirds of the
8:28
Speaker 2: regular season, the tougher part of the schedule. Irish Ute
8:34
Speaker 2: on Twitter said, Need to get more production from the
8:37
Speaker 2: defensive ends. We don't have that one dog, Dimmick, Anai, Orchard, Kruger.
8:41
Speaker 2: I think John Henry Daly deserved to be in that conversation.
8:45
Speaker 2: That can make things happen. And that is a place that, again,
8:49
Speaker 2: we've talked about this on the show, and I've pointed
8:51
Speaker 2: out that as an issue that I don't like. And
8:55
Speaker 2: depending on who you talk to, we have guests on
8:57
Speaker 2: the show that will say, oh, sacks are not the
8:59
Speaker 2: end of the world. You don't need sacks as a
9:03
Speaker 2: stat to– to have an effective defense.
9:10
Speaker 3: And, and right now.
9:12
Speaker 2: The Utah football defense is incredibly effective. They're the number,
9:16
Speaker 2: they're the number one graded defensive backfield in the conference
9:20
Speaker 2: and in the country, according to, I think it's, I
9:24
Speaker 2: think it was pro football focus, which like we, we
9:30
Speaker 2: didn't really discuss a ton of that. I think Nate
9:34
Speaker 2: Richie's playing above the level. We expected Nate Richie to
9:37
Speaker 2: play at this year. Not that there wasn't optimism for him,
9:40
Speaker 2: but I think that Nate Ritchie has been really dang good.
9:44
Speaker 2: And anything that might have been an issue with his
9:46
Speaker 2: gameplay in the past is not showing itself this year.
9:50
Speaker 2: There have been a couple of dropped picks that would
9:54
Speaker 2: make this somehow even higher graded defensive backfield. Pressure and
10:01
Speaker 2: sack rate does lend itself to more success on the
10:05
Speaker 2: back end as well. And that's something that we look
10:09
Speaker 2: at in the Big 12 Conference and nobody is really
10:13
Speaker 2: killing it in the sacks category right now.
10:17
Speaker 3: Right now, Baylor... leads the conference. Well, they're tied with Arizona.
10:22
Speaker 2: They both have 15 sacks, averaging just under four sacks
10:28
Speaker 2: a game. Utah is currently fourth in the conference at 2.75
10:31
Speaker 2: sacks a game, 11 sacks through four games. And again,
10:37
Speaker 2: those sacks have not come from the defensive end position. Now,
10:40
Speaker 2: pressures and hurries and QB hits have come from that position.
10:45
Speaker 3: So it's kind of like, Maybe we need to.
10:48
Speaker 2: Look at this the way that we look at touchdowns.
10:52
Speaker 2: We don't have to have one guy scoring all the touchdowns.
10:55
Speaker 2: It doesn't have to be, I need more way. Sean
10:56
Speaker 2: Parker touchdowns. It's I need more touchdowns in past years
11:03
Speaker 2: of Utah football. We have looked at it and said,
11:05
Speaker 2: where's the wide receiving core with the touchdown production, your
11:08
Speaker 2: tight ends.
11:09
Speaker 3: Are doing great.
11:09
Speaker 2: You're running backs are doing great. Where's the wide receivers
11:11
Speaker 2: when it comes to the piling up yardage and touchdowns.
11:14
Speaker 2: And I think offensively, it makes more sense. The reason
11:20
Speaker 2: why I and some of you, I think, have an
11:22
Speaker 2: issue with the lack of finish rate in that defensive
11:29
Speaker 2: end position room is that even though you're fourth most
11:32
Speaker 2: productive in the conference when it comes to actually getting
11:35
Speaker 2: the quarterback to the ground before the ball's out of
11:37
Speaker 2: his hand, not having it come from the defensive line position,
11:42
Speaker 2: not having it come from the defensive end position, and
11:44
Speaker 2: your interior D linemen have generated a few, but not
11:47
Speaker 2: having it come from the traditional spot is an indicator
11:51
Speaker 2: that you're having to manufacture it, you're having to blitz it,
11:54
Speaker 2: you're having to stunt it, you're having to do it
11:57
Speaker 2: in a way that potentially can be schemed against. There's
12:03
Speaker 2: not really an effective way for an offense to get
12:08
Speaker 2: around the idea that your guys are just going to
12:10
Speaker 2: win up front. If you're able to get pressure and
12:15
Speaker 2: sacks and hurries and most importantly, sacks, with a four-man rush,
12:20
Speaker 2: or even better, a three-man rush, but a four-man rush
12:23
Speaker 2: is the realistic goal here, then what is an offensive
12:32
Speaker 2: coordinator supposed to do to scheme around that? What are
12:34
Speaker 2: they going to say? What are they going to do? Oh,
12:38
Speaker 2: hey guys, we just, well, I know what they do.
12:45
Speaker 2: They leave a running back in to chip and help
12:48
Speaker 2: in pass protection. The tight end or the extra offensive
12:53
Speaker 2: lineman that you bring in, then robbing yourself of an
12:56
Speaker 2: extra pass catching option. But the tight end on the
12:59
Speaker 2: line of scrimmage has to stay in help for even
13:02
Speaker 2: the briefest of seconds.
13:05
Speaker 3: He's got to chip. He's got to throw a block.
13:07
Speaker 2: He's got to put a hip on somebody at least
13:09
Speaker 2: before he gets out into his route. And now it's
13:12
Speaker 2: a slower developing play and your defense is at An
13:17
Speaker 2: advantage because your defensive ends, and I'm talking about Ethan
13:20
Speaker 2: Day and Paul Fitzgerald and Cash Dillon and Lance Holtzclaw.
13:24
Speaker 2: I'm talking about those guys just winning their individual matchups.
13:30
Speaker 3: Create a situation that.
13:33
Speaker 2: If you're Aaron Roderick on November 7th, you're not able
13:37
Speaker 2: to say, okay, third down predictability here.
13:40
Speaker 3: Cyrus Polu is going to be in the game. He's
13:43
Speaker 3: going to be blitzing, though.
13:45
Speaker 4: Or....
13:47
Speaker 2: We're going to get Elijah Ellis on the end of
13:49
Speaker 2: this formation, and he's going to walk up on the
13:51
Speaker 2: line of scrimmage. The tendency they have here is they
13:54
Speaker 2: want to create pressure on this down, and so I'm
13:57
Speaker 2: going to run a route right behind that into the
13:59
Speaker 2: space that that guy is vacating, and we're going to
14:01
Speaker 2: try to exploit that. And it doesn't have to turn
14:06
Speaker 2: into a touchdown, but it can be a first down.
14:08
Speaker 3: It can be a drive extender.
14:09
Speaker 2: You don't get to do that if you're an offensive
14:12
Speaker 2: coordinator and you're The linebackers get to stay wherever the
14:16
Speaker 2: linebackers need to stay. Your defensive backs don't have to
14:19
Speaker 2: creep up and cheat and blitz off the edge because
14:25
Speaker 2: the guys who don't have any other duties, who don't
14:28
Speaker 2: have any pass coverage duties, are just terrorizing the quarterback.
14:34
Speaker 2: And to be fair to the individuals that are playing
14:36
Speaker 2: these positions right now at the University of Utah, it's
14:38
Speaker 2: not that they're ineffectual. It's that they're just not quite
14:42
Speaker 2: there in the finishing category. A hurry and a pressure
14:47
Speaker 2: are both meaningful stats. They don't have the same effect
14:54
Speaker 2: as a sack does. And anyone who tells you that
14:56
Speaker 2: sacks are overrated is probably on some level excusing the
15:03
Speaker 2: fact that they're not generating enough sacks. They might be
15:07
Speaker 2: overrated in that the average fan understanding of the importance
15:13
Speaker 2: of sacks could be relative to what they actually do,
15:18
Speaker 2: but there's no real world in which you don't want
15:23
Speaker 2: them and that you don't want them to come from
15:26
Speaker 2: the guys whose job it is to get them. Kate
15:31
Speaker 2: on the text line says to me, what seems like
15:36
Speaker 2: could be the issue with our third quarter offense is
15:38
Speaker 2: we try to take too big of bites and When
15:43
Speaker 2: we're not moving the ball like it should, it seems
15:44
Speaker 2: like we have, when we're not moving the ball like
15:48
Speaker 2: we should, it seems like since we have a comfortable lead,
15:50
Speaker 2: we try to take deep shots and one or two
15:53
Speaker 2: don't connect and all of a sudden you're behind the sticks.
15:56
Speaker 2: I think we just need to stay consistent. Let Way
15:58
Speaker 2: Sean do his thing and stay ahead of the sticks.
16:01
Speaker 2: And when you're ahead of the sticks, you can take
16:03
Speaker 2: those shots. I know we seem pretty split 50-50 run pass,
16:07
Speaker 2: but it does seem like the times we're tripping up
16:10
Speaker 2: more is when we're throwing the ball. That's probably a
16:13
Speaker 2: fair observation. And this is something we're going to learn
16:19
Speaker 2: as we get more and more time under Morgan Scali
16:22
Speaker 2: as the head coach and you get more and more
16:24
Speaker 2: information about the way that Kevin McGiven wants to do things.
16:29
Speaker 3: Because....
16:33
Speaker 2: The tendencies and the patterns of play calling obviously the
16:37
Speaker 2: playbook is Kevin McGivens, but the aggressiveness is something that
16:42
Speaker 2: Morgan Scali has to, whether he's a hundred percent influencing,
16:46
Speaker 2: he's definitely got to sign off on some of that.
16:48
Speaker 4: Right?
16:49
Speaker 2: So as their game planning during the week, if it's
16:53
Speaker 2: we're up two scores already, if we can take a
16:56
Speaker 2: big chunk here and we can get another big chunk
16:59
Speaker 2: of on.
17:00
Speaker 3: The sixth play of this drive. And then we're.
17:02
Speaker 2: Guaranteeing ourself red zone offense. And that's been pretty good
17:06
Speaker 2: this year. So now we're, we're getting another touchdown on
17:09
Speaker 2: this drive and it's going to take us eight plays
17:12
Speaker 2: instead of 14. Now we've demoralized the opposition. Now we've
17:18
Speaker 2: taken their legs out from under them. Now we've just
17:20
Speaker 2: absolutely killed whatever they hoped they had going.
17:24
Speaker 3: And now the game is ours.
17:26
Speaker 4: Okay.
17:26
Speaker 2: Like if that's, your step on the throat mentality as
17:30
Speaker 2: a coach, nobody is going to be sad that that's
17:34
Speaker 2: what you want to do with this football team. However,
17:38
Speaker 2: the reality between what you want to do and what
17:40
Speaker 2: you're capable of doing in some of these third quarters
17:43
Speaker 2: might be an issue that has to be addressed as
17:45
Speaker 2: the season progresses. And again, I want to be very,
17:49
Speaker 2: very careful about having too many of these conversations when
17:54
Speaker 2: this is a 4-0 football team. When Kevin McGibbon has
17:58
Speaker 2: given us one of the most exciting dynamic offenses that
18:02
Speaker 2: Utah football has ever had, and that is not hyperbole.
18:06
Speaker 2: The creativity we have seen, I think that his creativity
18:10
Speaker 2: so far, and bless you personnel for being able to
18:13
Speaker 2: execute some of this stuff, and for the creativity. Devin Dampier,
18:18
Speaker 2: Bert Ficklin dynamic for existing the way it does so
18:21
Speaker 2: that you don't have to choose one or the other.
18:24
Speaker 2: And you didn't have to in the off season decide,
18:26
Speaker 2: you know what, we're going to pay this guy and
18:27
Speaker 2: we're just going to realize that the other guy's gone.
18:29
Speaker 2: We're going to have to watch him play in for
18:31
Speaker 2: Arizona state. We're going to have to watch him play
18:33
Speaker 2: in for whoever.
18:34
Speaker 4: Right.
18:35
Speaker 3: And it probably would have been Arizona state if we're
18:36
Speaker 3: being honest.
18:40
Speaker 2: Like this team is in a really, really, really good
18:43
Speaker 2: spot right now because of Morgan Scali, because of Kevin McGiven.
18:46
Speaker 2: So I want to make sure that we are mindful
18:49
Speaker 2: of that, that you're tuning into the home of the
18:50
Speaker 2: Utes and you're, and you're saying, you're not saying, Hey,
18:55
Speaker 2: why are we complaining? We're not complaining. We're just playing
18:58
Speaker 2: in hypotheticals here. We're waving magic wands. We're, we're aspiring
19:03
Speaker 2: now for perfection because we're, we're achieving something that's really
19:06
Speaker 2: solid at the very least.
19:08
Speaker 3: It might be great.
19:10
Speaker 2: Is at least good, might be great, and is giving
19:14
Speaker 2: you some vision, some ideas that this season could be truly,
19:17
Speaker 2: truly special. So if your goal now is that, and
19:20
Speaker 2: you can put some lipstick on one thing, or you
19:25
Speaker 2: can polish up one thing, or you can make one
19:27
Speaker 2: thing slightly better, what is it?
19:29
Speaker 3: What is it that you're choosing in the bye week?
19:32
Speaker 2: And to be realistic, and to make sure that we're
19:35
Speaker 2: staying clear, I think that most of what you can
19:39
Speaker 2: correct in a bi-week is bumps and bruises getting healed
19:43
Speaker 2: up and recognizing some of your own patterns and trying
19:49
Speaker 2: to break those patterns. I think those are the most
19:51
Speaker 2: effective changes you can make in a bi-week in college football,
19:56
Speaker 2: whether that's in week three or more fortuitously in like
19:59
Speaker 2: a week six or a week seven, when your team
20:02
Speaker 2: probably needs a bi-week, right? BYU had a super early
20:05
Speaker 2: bi-week last week. Utah gets a bi-week one week later,
20:10
Speaker 2: which is better, but not like super significantly better. We
20:14
Speaker 2: all wish that you could do it in week six
20:17
Speaker 2: or in week seven and then hit the home stretch,
20:21
Speaker 2: having that one week of rest and, and healing, whatever
20:24
Speaker 2: the bumps and bruises that accumulated were. I think that
20:26
Speaker 2: the most realistic and effective change and one that can
20:30
Speaker 2: be waived in a bi-week is that you have a
20:34
Speaker 2: little extra time for film study and You have a
20:37
Speaker 2: little extra time to look at what you yourself have
20:41
Speaker 2: been doing that inflicts wounds upon your game plan or
20:44
Speaker 2: upon your execution or upon your personnel.
20:49
Speaker 3: And I think that this coaching staff, by.
20:50
Speaker 2: The way, is excellent at self-scouting and self-evaluation. Morgan Scali
20:58
Speaker 2: is a radical ownership and accountability type guy. And when
21:04
Speaker 2: he's got the time... And when his coaching staff has
21:08
Speaker 2: the time, I know that they are doing an internal audit,
21:13
Speaker 2: and maybe he's got some methods where they audit one another,
21:17
Speaker 2: where he says, all right, Colton Swan, I want you
21:20
Speaker 2: watching all of Kevin McGiven's tape during this bye week,
21:23
Speaker 2: and I want you telling me how you would stop it.
21:28
Speaker 2: I know we just did that during camp, but I
21:30
Speaker 2: want you to do it again now that we're in
21:31
Speaker 2: live competition and we're four games deep.
21:33
Speaker 3: And maybe you got Kevin McGiven doing the same thing.
21:36
Speaker 2: All right, now that we've shown these patterns and we've
21:41
Speaker 2: established some of these trends, how are you going to
21:44
Speaker 2: try to guess right as a play caller to beat
21:47
Speaker 2: Colton Swan's defense? And if there's a pattern that you
21:50
Speaker 2: can expose, and realistically, it's like your GAs and your
21:54
Speaker 2: video guys that are probably pointing some of this out
21:58
Speaker 2: and auditing some of this and saying, hey, turns out, coach,
22:01
Speaker 2: that every third and medium defense We're running a play
22:05
Speaker 2: where we throw the ball six yards beyond the sticks.
22:09
Speaker 2: Is that really setting us up for the top level
22:12
Speaker 2: of success that we could achieve?
22:14
Speaker 3: And in that case, you might say, oh, how about this?
22:17
Speaker 2: How about we shorten those throws and make those more
22:20
Speaker 2: manageable and make that an attempt to get just to
22:24
Speaker 2: the sticks and beyond? Again, these are all hypotheticals I'm
22:26
Speaker 2: throwing out here. Darius on the text line says with
22:31
Speaker 2: this offense, we need to install a little giants annexation
22:36
Speaker 2: of Puerto Rico. The annexation of Puerto Rico from the
22:43
Speaker 2: little giants. One of the iconic plays in film.
22:46
Speaker 3: I don't know.
22:47
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess with this offense, you can run
22:48
Speaker 2: anything you want. Utah football is in a really, really
22:56
Speaker 2: good spot right now. How do you get them into
22:59
Speaker 2: an elite spot? How do you get them into a
23:01
Speaker 2: great spot with something that you're integrating or fixing or
23:05
Speaker 2: altering or tweaking or polishing during the bi-week 8, 7, 7, 3, 5, 3, 0,
23:12
Speaker 2: 700 at real OC sports. Alpha on the Twitter says we,
23:18
Speaker 2: I would fix coming out flat after halftime. Uh, Chris
23:22
Speaker 2: Keller going big picture, uh, and saying more NIL money
23:26
Speaker 2: or a larger stadium. I actually don't think you need
23:30
Speaker 2: a larger stadium. I think Rice Eccles is in the
23:33
Speaker 2: Goldilocks zone. I think it's perfect right now. I think
23:36
Speaker 2: that if you inflate that thing to like 70,000, you're
23:40
Speaker 2: going to have too many games where there's open seats
23:43
Speaker 2: showing in the corners. I think right in that 50,000 range,
23:47
Speaker 2: tickets are at a premium. If you buy them, you
23:53
Speaker 2: value them. Most of the time you get there, the
23:56
Speaker 2: only tweak and alteration on the stadium that I would
24:01
Speaker 2: even be welcoming at this point is putting a tunnel over.
24:07
Speaker 2: What is that central campus drive that goes onto the
24:10
Speaker 2: field house, which by the way, used to exist. I
24:12
Speaker 2: don't know if you've seen the old, the old photos
24:15
Speaker 2: that it used to be that they used to have
24:17
Speaker 2: like a tunnel structure over that on the, the top
24:20
Speaker 2: end of what I think was rice stadium at the time.
24:23
Speaker 3: Anyway, Tell me what you would fix if you can
24:26
Speaker 3: fix something. So hold on.
24:29
Speaker 5: You're saying, because it's railroad tracks now for tracks that's
24:33
Speaker 5: between the stadium and the field house.
24:35
Speaker 3: And a road. Oh, yeah, narrow road. That's true. Narrow road,
24:39
Speaker 3: one lane each way. That's true. So you've got the
24:41
Speaker 3: road and the tracks, so a tunnel there. Yeah.
24:47
Speaker 2: And then you build a bleacher up over onto the
24:48
Speaker 2: roof of the field house, where right now it just
24:50
Speaker 2: says Utah. Shout out to Keith Van Horn, who helped
24:53
Speaker 2: spearhead the fundraising project. to get that thing done, Utah
24:56
Speaker 2: on the roof, put Utah on the roof. Looks really great.
24:59
Speaker 2: It actually, it looks so good and it belongs there
25:03
Speaker 2: so intuitively that I can't remember what it looked like before.
25:08
Speaker 4: Yeah.
25:08
Speaker 3: That's a good sign.
25:09
Speaker 2: When you're talking about an addition to a stadium or
25:12
Speaker 2: to your home or to your yard, when you just
25:15
Speaker 2: completely forget how it used to be because the new
25:19
Speaker 2: version is that much better.
25:20
Speaker 4: Yeah.
25:21
Speaker 3: That's a good sign. So shout out to everyone who
25:23
Speaker 3: helped make that thing happen.
25:24
Speaker 5: You could make the seats, black seats, some red seats,
25:28
Speaker 5: and they spell Utah. You can make the seats spell
25:31
Speaker 5: Utah when they're empty. And you could say, if you're
25:35
Speaker 5: sitting in those seats, got to color coordinate. Your clothes
25:39
Speaker 5: have to match the color of your seat.
25:40
Speaker 4: Yeah.
25:41
Speaker 3: And then it would look, it would spell out Utah.
25:43
Speaker 3: Or opposite, either way. You know how sweet that would be?
25:46
Speaker 3: That would actually be awesome.
25:47
Speaker 5: That should be the Keith Van Horn corollary of what
25:50
Speaker 5: you're talking about. That, hey, for Keith Van Horn and
25:54
Speaker 5: everyone else's sake that was involved in that.
25:56
Speaker 2: These are the rules for these bleachers. Make them season tickets.
25:59
Speaker 2: And if you're in the van horn seats, your clothing
26:02
Speaker 2: matches the seat.
26:03
Speaker 4: Yeah.
26:03
Speaker 3: And you become part of the stadium decor. That's wonderful.
26:07
Speaker 3: That's a unique thing. We just gave you another one.
26:10
Speaker 3: You're welcome.
26:11
Speaker 2: Crimson brand partners here on the Sean O'Connell show.
26:14
Speaker 3: We just gave you another thing that you can sell.
26:16
Speaker 3: You're welcome.
26:17
Speaker 5: We, you, if you, if you'd like to, you can
26:20
Speaker 5: give us a little bit of that revenue. When you
26:22
Speaker 5: do sell it, just if you'd like to.
26:24
Speaker 3: Are they in the business of sharing with us now?
26:25
Speaker 3: That'd be great.
26:27
Speaker 5: If you don't want to, I guess we'll just have
26:30
Speaker 5: to accept that and understand. Should we do the thing
26:32
Speaker 5: that Spence does every day on his show?
26:34
Speaker 3: Look at the camera.
26:35
Speaker 6: Paul.
26:36
Speaker 5: Paul Kirk, look at me. This is my daily demands.
26:39
Speaker 5: He gives daily demands to Paul Kirk. Are those our
26:42
Speaker 5: daily demands?
26:43
Speaker 3: I think that's a little unfair. Paul is in charge
26:47
Speaker 3: of that. He's a powerful man.
26:49
Speaker 2: I don't know if he's powerful enough to get new
26:51
Speaker 2: construction done over UTA tracks and a government-owned road.
26:58
Speaker 5: Yeah, we do know that Paul Kirk, head of communications
27:01
Speaker 5: for Utah Athletics, we do know that he's a daily
27:05
Speaker 5: listener to the show, though. So shout out to you, Paul.
27:07
Speaker 5: And if you can, put in a good word for
27:12
Speaker 5: at least getting those done. The revenue thing, we don't expect.
27:15
Speaker 5: But at least getting that done. that'd be sweet.
27:20
Speaker 2: So shout out for the, the great tweet from whoever
27:24
Speaker 2: that was. I've scrolled past your name now because you
27:27
Speaker 2: got me thinking about stadium improvements when I don't think
27:30
Speaker 2: this stadium needs to be improved at all.
27:32
Speaker 4: Yeah.
27:33
Speaker 5: I feel like after the red zone was made, which
27:37
Speaker 5: has been such a great addition. That's another thing that's
27:40
Speaker 5: felt like it's been there forever and it's only been
27:42
Speaker 5: a few years, right? Oh, see like after that was
27:45
Speaker 5: put in, it kind of feels like, okay, we're, I
27:48
Speaker 5: don't know that there's anything that needs to be done
27:51
Speaker 5: to the stadium, but it's a good, it's always good
27:56
Speaker 5: to think of what could be done. And your bleacher
27:59
Speaker 5: seats on the field house is a great idea. What
28:02
Speaker 5: they're doing, what they're debuting the Holy war game on
28:04
Speaker 5: November 7th with the field.
28:06
Speaker 2: So the field level, the alchemy field boxes are sweet
28:09
Speaker 2: end zone.
28:09
Speaker 3: You know, we talked.
28:11
Speaker 2: About these yesterday and I, I looked a little bit
28:14
Speaker 2: more at the releases and some of the graphics and
28:17
Speaker 2: the Guys, if you enjoy the end zone vantage point,
28:23
Speaker 2: which not everyone does, but if you enjoy that kind
28:25
Speaker 2: of like, I feel I'm almost in the game type
28:29
Speaker 2: of vantage point, those seats are going to be really,
28:32
Speaker 2: really hard to beat because it's unlimited drinks, unlimited food,
28:37
Speaker 2: kind of like in the south end zone.
28:39
Speaker 3: They put monitors... on.
28:42
Speaker 2: The seats on the little desk in front of the
28:44
Speaker 2: seat so that you get to watch replays and you
28:47
Speaker 2: get to have kind of your own little like television experience,
28:50
Speaker 2: which is something that they're doing a really good job
28:55
Speaker 2: of in arenas now because the television product is so
28:58
Speaker 2: good at home that it's hard to incentivize yourself. If
29:03
Speaker 2: I don't get to hear as much, I don't get
29:04
Speaker 2: to see the replays as closely. I'm not getting every
29:07
Speaker 2: angle when I'm there in the stadium. Is it a
29:09
Speaker 2: better experience for the live thing?
29:11
Speaker 7: Yeah.
29:11
Speaker 2: I mean, I still think so, but there are a
29:13
Speaker 2: lot of people, they want like the full story of
29:15
Speaker 2: the game as told by 13 cameras and a broadcast
29:19
Speaker 2: crew and that kind of thing. Now, at least with
29:22
Speaker 2: VIP seating, they're bringing some of that into the actual
29:24
Speaker 2: stadium experience.
29:25
Speaker 3: They're doing that with these end zone seats.
29:28
Speaker 5: They've had them in the Delta center over the years
29:30
Speaker 5: in the, where Bowler and the broadcast team used to be.
29:34
Speaker 5: They've now sold those and they've still got all those
29:37
Speaker 5: monitors that they had for media. that, that were working
29:41
Speaker 5: in that area, area, not you and me media, but
29:43
Speaker 5: people at part of broadcast teams and stuff. So like, yeah.
29:47
Speaker 5: This is something that they're doing in arenas and stadiums
29:51
Speaker 5: across the country, and I think that it probably does
29:53
Speaker 5: enhance the fan experience.
29:54
Speaker 2: And those north end zone seats, we were kind of speculating.
29:58
Speaker 2: I'm like, okay, there's not a ton of room down there,
30:00
Speaker 2: so how big is the seating area? You are, based
30:06
Speaker 2: on the renderings, you are now sitting where the end
30:10
Speaker 2: zone photographer people used to be.
30:13
Speaker 3: As of this week.
30:16
Speaker 2: That's where the guys in the yellow or the white
30:19
Speaker 2: photo vests, that's where they're going to be.
30:22
Speaker 5: That's where those seats are. Oh, wow. So the photogs
30:27
Speaker 5: won't be able to be there anymore?
30:29
Speaker 3: I mean, maybe they will. In that end zone? Or
30:31
Speaker 3: it'll just be like right up against the wall there?
30:33
Speaker 2: They're going to have to tightrope it and just be
30:35
Speaker 2: like standing literally in front of the people. But those
30:37
Speaker 2: seats are close, man. They're like really, really close, which
30:41
Speaker 2: is kind of cool. So Porter Larson likes to tell
30:44
Speaker 2: this story. And you you've told this story, too, about being.
30:48
Speaker 5: In the end zone where Cam Rising ran in the
30:51
Speaker 5: famous two point conversion to beat USC.
30:53
Speaker 9: Yes.
30:54
Speaker 5: And Porter Larson's story is he Cam basically ran into
30:59
Speaker 5: him and broke our ESPN 700 microphone that he had
31:03
Speaker 5: on on hand.
31:06
Speaker 3: That's like.
31:07
Speaker 5: That's where those seats are going to be, right? That's
31:09
Speaker 5: where the, the wall is going to, so you could
31:12
Speaker 5: be close enough for a, for a Utah football player
31:15
Speaker 5: or an opposing player to run into the wall where
31:17
Speaker 5: you're sitting.
31:19
Speaker 8: Yeah.
31:20
Speaker 3: All right.
31:21
Speaker 2: I mean, if anything, it's going to become a problem
31:24
Speaker 2: for players because they're going to end up running into
31:27
Speaker 2: like a waist high wall out of the back of
31:30
Speaker 2: the North end zone.
31:30
Speaker 5: They look like a baseball player trying to catch a
31:33
Speaker 5: foul ball over the dugout railing.
31:35
Speaker 2: Maybe, um, We're getting, we're getting too many ideas now
31:39
Speaker 2: based on my complete hypothetical of the color coordinated seats.
31:44
Speaker 2: If season ticket holders are going to be color coordinated,
31:46
Speaker 2: I think t-shirts should be included with your season tickets.
31:49
Speaker 9: Yeah.
31:50
Speaker 3: Okay.
31:50
Speaker 5: Surely they could afford to throw some cheap t-shirts in
31:53
Speaker 5: those seats with the color coordination.
31:55
Speaker 2: That's from Spencer says, uh, if I'm fixing anything, I'm
31:58
Speaker 2: waving my wand and giving Arkansas a win over a
32:00
Speaker 2: and M and Utah state a win over Boise, uh,
32:03
Speaker 2: to make Utah's schedule seem tougher.
32:05
Speaker 4: Let's go.
32:06
Speaker 3: That's thinking outside the box.
32:08
Speaker 2: Spencer, another 500 James Peterson bonus points for you. That's
32:12
Speaker 2: like four days in a row. Spencer has given us
32:14
Speaker 2: elite elite tech. He has tooth.
32:17
Speaker 3: Does that mean he has 2000 James Peterson bonus points?
32:20
Speaker 2: You can cash those in for some, you can.
32:26
Speaker 3: Cash them in someday. Yep.
32:28
Speaker 5: We'll figure it out there. They're roughly the value of
32:31
Speaker 5: a shrewd buck. So So yeah, think of the possibilities.
32:35
Speaker 3: All right. We're going to take a quick one here.
32:38
Speaker 2: Gordy Chiazza is going to join us on the other side.
32:40
Speaker 2: He'll be on the phone instead of in studio. That's
32:43
Speaker 2: my bad, everybody. It's the Sean O'Connell show on ESPN
32:46
Speaker 2: 700 and.
32:46
Speaker 3: 92 on FM.
32:50
Speaker 10: Peace out.
32:50
Speaker 7: Let's get the latest on the Utah Jazz with former
32:53
Speaker 7: Jazz assistant coach Gordy Chiesa. He's forgotten more about the
32:57
Speaker 7: NBA than any of us will ever know.
32:58
Speaker 10: Let's not get crazy.
33:00
Speaker 7: Come for the Hoops Talk. Stay for his list of
33:02
Speaker 7: the day.
33:03
Speaker 10: My list today.
33:04
Speaker 7: Here's OC with basketball savant Gordy Chiesa on the Sean
33:08
Speaker 7: O'Connell Show.
33:23
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Sean O'Connell Show.
33:25
Speaker 2: Welcome back to our resident NBA guru, Gordy Chiesa, longtime
33:29
Speaker 2: assistant coach in the association. He's forgotten more about basketball
33:34
Speaker 2: than you or I will ever know.
33:36
Speaker 3: Gordy, welcome back. How are you?
33:38
Speaker 11: Sean, I'm doing well. Thank you.
33:41
Speaker 2: So I was just reading this article from Shams Charania
33:45
Speaker 2: about how the bids for the new Las Vegas expansion
33:50
Speaker 2: in the NBA, there's three ownership groups that are kind
33:53
Speaker 2: of vying for the rights to be the expansion owners.
33:58
Speaker 2: And the numbers they're reporting are even higher than the
34:01
Speaker 2: ones we speculated on.
34:02
Speaker 3: $ 12 to.
34:03
Speaker 2: $ 13 billion for a franchise.
34:07
Speaker 3: And a new arena.
34:07
Speaker 2: And it's It's, of course, some big-money players here that
34:13
Speaker 2: are leading the charge in all these three different competing groups. Gordy,
34:18
Speaker 2: which one of these are you part of? Which one
34:19
Speaker 2: of these did you lend your billions of dollars to?
34:22
Speaker 11: No, the answer is none. However, you and I said
34:26
Speaker 11: recently back in the summertime, we said roughly $ 9 billion
34:29
Speaker 11: to $ 10 billion. So just think about it. Billions of dollars.
34:35
Speaker 11: Used to be millionaires that owned teams. Now it's billionaires.
34:39
Speaker 11: And usually speaking, it's also not one person. It's a
34:43
Speaker 11: group of people. That's how much the franchise has run out.
34:46
Speaker 11: So let's put it in context. An expansion team will
34:49
Speaker 11: be much harder as far as owning a team. Recently,
34:56
Speaker 11: the Lakers went for $ 12. 5 billion. So an expansion team
35:00
Speaker 11: with a new arena and startup costs will cost more
35:05
Speaker 11: than the Lakers, one of the most premier franchises in
35:09
Speaker 11: the NBA. That's how much it costs to own a team.
35:14
Speaker 3: That's wild to me. And look, I get it.
35:17
Speaker 2: You get to touch down in a new market and
35:21
Speaker 2: there's a lot of lucrative possibilities that come with that,
35:24
Speaker 2: but Why does it make business sense for a brand-new franchise,
35:30
Speaker 2: an expansion franchise, to be more valuable, to be more
35:33
Speaker 2: costly than the Lakers? Or, I guess, I mean, this
35:36
Speaker 2: would put them up there with, like, what the Knicks
35:38
Speaker 2: are probably valued at.
35:40
Speaker 8: Correct.
35:40
Speaker 11: The Knickerbockers, world champion. No one really knows because it's
35:45
Speaker 11: midtown Manhattan. Also, the Knicks own the owner, the own
35:49
Speaker 11: Messler Garden. And so the Knicks, I'm just guesstimating, Sean,
35:53
Speaker 11: be worth– I'm pausing like showing $ 25 billion.
36:02
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, I, the thing is that these numbers,
36:05
Speaker 2: this funny money, this monopoly stuff used to be so
36:08
Speaker 2: pie in the sky when, when, when I was a
36:11
Speaker 2: kid and franchises were selling for a hundred million dollars
36:14
Speaker 2: and people would kind of laugh and like, okay, wow.
36:17
Speaker 2: And then they crossed the billion dollar threshold and now
36:20
Speaker 2: you can't buy a franchise for a billion dollars. You
36:23
Speaker 2: can't get Like, NHL franchises have been historically the cheapest
36:28
Speaker 2: ones in pro sports, and now you can't get an
36:30
Speaker 2: NHL franchise.
36:31
Speaker 3: For a billion dollars.
36:33
Speaker 2: So the inflation and the escalation of pricing in these
36:38
Speaker 2: pro sports is one of the fastest-growing assets you can find.
36:43
Speaker 4: Very much.
36:44
Speaker 11: And what is an NFL team worth?
36:46
Speaker 4: Yikes.
36:47
Speaker 11: Because you can see the NFL, when it used to
36:51
Speaker 11: be owned by family people, Now it's not because it's
36:55
Speaker 11: so much. And again, that's the power of television. So
36:59
Speaker 11: much is tied up into live programming where we know
37:04
Speaker 11: the NFL rules and the NBA is a close second.
37:08
Speaker 11: Now the playoffs start in baseball, the postseason, which is
37:11
Speaker 11: exciting time. And I'm sure soccer is trying to catch up.
37:15
Speaker 11: And so is hockey. And that's a consumer. They want
37:19
Speaker 11: live programming now. And that's why some of these franchises,
37:22
Speaker 11: let's put it in context, though. So for the listeners,
37:25
Speaker 11: is that Sean and I are talking about a franchise for, say,
37:28
Speaker 11: the New Vegas team, which will come in the 28-29
37:32
Speaker 11: season in the NBA. The expansion fee is roughly, Sean,
37:37
Speaker 11: I'm assuming, they haven't said it yet, between $ 900, 000 to
37:42
Speaker 11: $ 1 billion for the expansion fee, which goes to the
37:46
Speaker 11: other NBA owners. When the Jazz became a franchise in
37:52
Speaker 11: New Orleans in the 1974-75 season, the expansion fee was $ 6. 35 million. $ 6. 35 million.
38:03
Speaker 11: Now it's going to cost roughly a billion dollars just
38:07
Speaker 11: to be part of the club.
38:09
Speaker 2: And look, if you want to get into professional sports ownership,
38:13
Speaker 2: it's one of those things you probably got to do
38:15
Speaker 2: it now before... did prices get even more ridiculous because
38:20
Speaker 2: you just mentioned, well, what about these NFL franchises? There've been,
38:23
Speaker 2: there's been three NFL franchises sold in the last four years.
38:28
Speaker 2: The Broncos cost 4.65 billion in 2022. And then the
38:33
Speaker 2: very next year, the Washington commanders were sold for 6.05 billion.
38:38
Speaker 2: So that's a $ 1. 4 billion increase in one year. And
38:44
Speaker 2: then after winning the Super Bowl, the Seattle Seahawks were
38:47
Speaker 2: sold to the Coastal family for $ 9.
38:49
Speaker 3: 6 billion.
38:51
Speaker 2: So a 50% increase from the last previous sale, $ 9. 6
38:58
Speaker 2: billion for the defending Super Bowl champs. And if you
39:01
Speaker 2: continue with that trend, then the next NFL team sold
39:05
Speaker 2: would have to be, you know, 10 or 11 billion.
39:08
Speaker 2: And then the next one after that would be 13 billion.
39:11
Speaker 2: So if you, if you're in that category, you're, you're
39:13
Speaker 2: in that place where you can play in these waters,
39:16
Speaker 2: even you might be outpriced sooner than later.
39:20
Speaker 8: Very much.
39:20
Speaker 11: So it's a fascinating time in professional sports, but it's
39:25
Speaker 11: all about the fans and still, Sean, the competition. Now,
39:29
Speaker 11: speaking of competition in the NBA, training camp is right
39:33
Speaker 11: now in full force. And in every training camp, the
39:39
Speaker 11: number of players in it, the max number is 21.
39:42
Speaker 11: So you can have 21 guys in jazz practice this morning,
39:46
Speaker 11: which started at 10 o'clock in game two. And all
39:49
Speaker 11: those 21 players, they're under some sort of contract, either
39:53
Speaker 11: NBA guaranteed contract, a two-way contract, or make a team deal.
39:59
Speaker 11: So you cannot be in an NBA training camp without
40:03
Speaker 11: being under some sort of contract. Now, just for the discussion,
40:08
Speaker 11: let's put it in context. If you're a person that's
40:12
Speaker 11: on a non-guaranteed contract, if you last with the team
40:17
Speaker 11: through the preseason through January 10th, 2027, which is the
40:24
Speaker 11: guaranteed date for contracts for a full season, the lowest
40:28
Speaker 11: you get paid this year in the NBA is $ 1. 357 million. $ 1. 357
40:37
Speaker 11: million for a guy that was undrafted or played in Europe, fight, fight,
40:42
Speaker 11: and claw to make a roster. That would be the
40:44
Speaker 11: lowest you get paid in the NBA this year. So
40:46
Speaker 11: that's a whole bunch of money, to say the least.
40:50
Speaker 2: So when we're talking about the guys that are just
40:52
Speaker 2: trying to make a roster, right, in other sports, you
40:56
Speaker 2: do everything you're asked. You play special teams in football.
40:59
Speaker 2: You carry the bags in baseball, whatever it is, right?
41:02
Speaker 2: What's the equivalent of that in the NBA?
41:04
Speaker 9: Okay.
41:06
Speaker 11: Well, the standing also is that the rookies carry the bags.
41:10
Speaker 11: It helps out the, uh, the curtain people and they
41:12
Speaker 11: get all the, uh, menial jobs as far as in
41:15
Speaker 11: a fun way is with the, in a locker room.
41:18
Speaker 11: So that's the equivalent of it. That rookies are treated
41:21
Speaker 11: as rookies, even star rookies. So he, AJ, the dancer
41:25
Speaker 11: of the Washington wizards, he'll be treated as a rookie,
41:28
Speaker 11: even though he's a very talented guy. And so it
41:30
Speaker 11: was Cooper flag last year. So it's almost like, um,
41:33
Speaker 11: An initiation period of being a rookie in pro sports. Now,
41:38
Speaker 11: that's off the court, but on the court, when you're
41:40
Speaker 11: a rookie, if you can play, you can help a
41:42
Speaker 11: team win. People gravitate towards you and are respectful of
41:46
Speaker 11: your ability. Now, how do you make a team? So
41:49
Speaker 11: if I was counseling people, which I once did in
41:52
Speaker 11: the NBA for over 20 years, is that if you're
41:56
Speaker 11: an NBA hopeful, to make a team, this is what
41:59
Speaker 11: you should be. Low-maintenance persona. One, two, first player on
42:07
Speaker 11: the practice floor and the last to leave. Three, offensively
42:12
Speaker 11: be trusted. Four, urgently defend. Five, frequently pass. And six,
42:21
Speaker 11: make open shots. So if you want to make an
42:25
Speaker 11: NBA roster with your talent that the Lord gave you,
42:30
Speaker 11: those six things will help you make a roster because
42:35
Speaker 11: the coaches all value what I just said.
42:40
Speaker 2: Who are those guys for the Utah Jazz that are
42:43
Speaker 2: on the bubble that you think will be doing all
42:46
Speaker 2: the things right and end up on the opening day roster?
42:50
Speaker 11: Okay, the answer is probably none because the Jazz right now,
42:55
Speaker 11: the Jazz have right now under contract 14 players on
42:59
Speaker 11: the standing contracts and then three On a two-way contract,
43:03
Speaker 11: which he gets paid this year on a two-way contract,
43:05
Speaker 11: it's $ 678, 000 and change. And so the only guy I
43:11
Speaker 11: think that possibly could go from a two-way into a
43:14
Speaker 11: standard would be this guy named Blake Henson, who played
43:17
Speaker 11: last year for the Jazz, who's a knockdown shooter and
43:20
Speaker 11: does compete hard. So what you want to do if
43:22
Speaker 11: you're in a training camp, it's not your team only
43:27
Speaker 11: that you're trying to make. You're trying to make also
43:29
Speaker 11: the other 29 teams. So everyone's in full force as
43:32
Speaker 11: far as the scouts are out there watching every NBA
43:36
Speaker 11: game and you're trying to attract the eye of someone.
43:40
Speaker 11: Here's the problem, Sean. In yesteryear, just for the discussion
43:45
Speaker 11: right now, you should play between six to eight preseason games.
43:50
Speaker 11: In this generation, it's only four. So, for example, in
43:53
Speaker 11: jazz basketball, they're only playing four preseason games, and that's
43:57
Speaker 11: the norm, either four or five now. And so if
44:01
Speaker 11: you're a player and one of those guys trying to
44:03
Speaker 11: make a team, hey, I wish it was eight because
44:06
Speaker 11: I want to play versus only playing in practice where
44:10
Speaker 11: the coaches on that team see you perform, but not
44:13
Speaker 11: the other teams, the 29 other teams. Yeah, they saw
44:17
Speaker 11: you play in college. They saw you play in summer league,
44:20
Speaker 11: but now you're an NBA player. competition. And it is
44:23
Speaker 11: one more look right now that the scouts are looking
44:26
Speaker 11: at you and maybe someone got hurt in practice and
44:28
Speaker 11: they think that you could help their team as far
44:30
Speaker 11: as making the roster. So I'm all for more games
44:33
Speaker 11: in preseason, not for the starters. I'm talking for guys,
44:37
Speaker 11: usually the eighth, ninth, 10th, 11th, 12th man, or guys
44:41
Speaker 11: trying to make the roster.
44:43
Speaker 3: Gordy, what's your list today?
44:46
Speaker 11: Sean, my list today is right on point about The
44:49
Speaker 11: all-time leaders in most seasons played. We thought of making
44:53
Speaker 11: a roster. I cut it off at 20 years, so
44:57
Speaker 11: it's really a short list. So, Sean, think about playing
45:00
Speaker 11: 20 years or more in the NBA with the rigors
45:04
Speaker 11: on your body and the mental focus. Hit some common
45:08
Speaker 11: traits of these guys that did this. One, durability. Two,
45:13
Speaker 11: competitive junkies. Three, enjoy being a member of a team. Four,
45:20
Speaker 11: love of the game. And five, as the decades moved on,
45:25
Speaker 11: they adjusted their offensive game from only airborne to more
45:29
Speaker 11: gravity plays. So as the years go on, for all
45:33
Speaker 11: their time, you go more on the ground plays versus what?
45:38
Speaker 11: Airborne totally.
45:39
Speaker 7: Here we go.
45:39
Speaker 11: With 20 years already in the NBA, 20 years these
45:45
Speaker 11: guys played, they are Kyle Lowry, Judonis Haslam, Jamal Crawford,
45:53
Speaker 11: Kobe Bryant, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. They all played 20 years
45:58
Speaker 11: with 21 years credit service. These guys played are Chris Paul,
46:04
Speaker 11: Dirk Nowitzki, Kevin Garnett, Robert Parrish, and Kevin Willis. with
46:13
Speaker 11: 22 years credited service in the NBA. His nickname shown
46:16
Speaker 11: was half man, half amazing, Vince Carter, with 22 years,
46:21
Speaker 11: and the number one player in the history of basketball.
46:24
Speaker 11: He has credited right now 23 years, but it'll be
46:28
Speaker 11: 24 years when he played the first game this year,
46:31
Speaker 11: when he plays for the Philadelphia 76ers, is LeBron James. So, listen,
46:37
Speaker 11: that is so few people that play 20 years or more,
46:40
Speaker 11: and LeBron leads the pack. Mainstay's coming, minus got a
46:44
Speaker 11: bit of injury for LeBron. He's going to try to
46:46
Speaker 11: play 25 years, meaning this year, coming up, and next year.
46:49
Speaker 11: Just quickly, two notes. 19 years credit, let's give a
46:53
Speaker 11: shout-out to two Jazz players. With 19 years credit service,
46:57
Speaker 11: they are John Stockton, John played in 1,504 games. But Sean,
47:04
Speaker 11: after 19 years in the NBA, he played 17 times
47:08
Speaker 11: every game in that season. And Carl Malone played 19
47:13
Speaker 11: years also, 18 years with the Jazz, and one year
47:17
Speaker 11: with the Lakers. Carl played in 1,476 games. So it's
47:22
Speaker 11: hard to do that you've got to take care of
47:25
Speaker 11: your body, have also old school luck, and also the
47:29
Speaker 11: mental focus that you enjoy being on a team. That's Sean.
47:34
Speaker 11: That's my list of today.
47:37
Speaker 2: That's Gordy Chiesa, our resident NBA guru. Conversations with the
47:41
Speaker 2: legend brought to you by Aladdin Industries, your Utah V-Lux dealer. Gordy,
47:46
Speaker 2: always appreciate your.
47:47
Speaker 8: Time, sir.
47:48
Speaker 3: Thanks for hopping on.
47:49
Speaker 11: Thanks, Sean.
47:50
Speaker 4: Stay well.
47:50
Speaker 11: Bye now.
47:52
Speaker 2: Great stuff from Gordy Chiesa. We got Eric Wendell joining
47:55
Speaker 2: us here in about 10 minutes. We'll take a quick one.
47:58
Speaker 2: We'll come back. A Thursday night football preview. Classic AFC
48:03
Speaker 2: North game. And weirdly, unexpectedly, inexplicably, a battle for first place,
48:09
Speaker 2: at least for now.
48:10
Speaker 3: In that division. That's next on the Sean O'Connell Show,
48:14
Speaker 3: ESPN 700, 92.1 FM.
48:27
Speaker 7: You're tuned to the Sean O'Connell Show from the Murdoch
48:30
Speaker 7: Chevrolet studio of ESPN 700 and 92.1 FM.
48:40
Speaker 2: Steelers-Browns Thursday night football matchup. Let's be honest, when the
48:48
Speaker 2: NFL put the schedule together and they were talking about
48:51
Speaker 2: Thursday night with Amazon Prime, there were not super high
48:55
Speaker 2: expectations for either of these franchises. I think everyone's probably
48:59
Speaker 2: pleasantly surprised right now, at least on the broadcast, that
49:03
Speaker 2: this is a meaningful game, at least for now in
49:06
Speaker 2: the NFL season. As they head into week four, the
49:09
Speaker 2: Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Falcons, lost to the Patriots, beat
49:12
Speaker 2: the Bengals. They're looking to go 2-0 so far in
49:15
Speaker 2: division play. And the Cleveland Browns, the fighting Spencer Fano,
49:20
Speaker 2: they lost week one to the Jaguars. They beat the Buccaneers.
49:24
Speaker 2: They beat the Panthers. And so they're looking to get
49:27
Speaker 2: their first division win of the year. Look, it's, I don't,
49:33
Speaker 2: have a rooting interest for either of these teams. I
49:35
Speaker 2: don't follow what either of these teams are doing on
49:39
Speaker 2: like a daily basis, but dare I say the Browns
49:45
Speaker 2: are starting to get interesting, not just because of the
49:48
Speaker 2: quarterback drama, not just because of the situation in that
49:51
Speaker 2: quarterback room. But when you look at the way that
49:53
Speaker 2: they have drafted and the way that they have managed personnel,
49:56
Speaker 2: which of course historically has been embarrassingly bad for them,
50:01
Speaker 2: with the exception of everything except a couple of really
50:04
Speaker 2: good offensive linemen in the last two decades. They've just
50:07
Speaker 2: been really, really embarrassing in the personnel department. But I
50:13
Speaker 2: like this roster. I can't believe I'm saying it. I
50:16
Speaker 2: hate the uniforms. I've never really even been to the city,
50:20
Speaker 2: but the sports fans annoy me. The Deshaun Watson story
50:26
Speaker 2: is creepy and weird. Shador Sanders is the least likable
50:30
Speaker 2: person that I've ever come across in my time covering sports. However,
50:36
Speaker 2: like Casey Concepcion, Jerry Judy, Harold Fannin Jr., Quinshawn Judkins,
50:42
Speaker 2: Spencer Fano, of course, they've done a really good job
50:46
Speaker 2: with roster construction. And it might be time to say
50:50
Speaker 2: that the Cleveland Browns are starting to figure it out
50:55
Speaker 2: now that I don't think they're figuring it out at
50:58
Speaker 2: the most important position in all of team sports, the
51:00
Speaker 2: most important position in all football. That, that is too
51:04
Speaker 2: active a discussion and a controversy from week to week,
51:08
Speaker 2: but this ain't the year for the Browns. So do
51:12
Speaker 2: they start to like, let's say they win tonight and
51:16
Speaker 2: let's say that they end up, we get to like
51:19
Speaker 2: week eight and the Browns are a 500 team is
51:24
Speaker 2: Cleveland going to say, hold on a minute. we need
51:27
Speaker 2: to suck more than this so that we can get
51:29
Speaker 2: a better draft pick or is Deshaun Watson or Shador
51:33
Speaker 2: Sanders or some combination of those playing well enough that
51:38
Speaker 2: now you're starting to be like, okay, maybe we have
51:42
Speaker 2: the future of our franchise.
51:45
Speaker 3: Taking snaps for us already.
51:46
Speaker 2: Maybe the redemption story of Deshaun Watson is something that we're,
51:51
Speaker 2: we're actually hoping to see come to pass, or maybe
51:54
Speaker 2: I'm not going to say Shador, Like when Deshaun Watson
51:59
Speaker 2: was at Clemson, I was like, this is the best
52:02
Speaker 2: player in college football.
52:03
Speaker 5: He was so good and so fun to watch.
52:06
Speaker 8: Yeah.
52:06
Speaker 2: Even his years with, with the Texans. And I thought
52:10
Speaker 2: that it was going to be a no brainer and
52:11
Speaker 2: easy transition. He was going to be a great successful
52:14
Speaker 2: quarterback in the NFL. And there were, there were times
52:17
Speaker 2: where it looked like that. And then you get his
52:20
Speaker 2: off the field controversy, which is the something that look,
52:24
Speaker 2: we can't just, this is a family show and I
52:27
Speaker 2: don't like to say things when people have their kids
52:30
Speaker 2: in the car.
52:31
Speaker 7: Right.
52:31
Speaker 2: But like the sexual malfeasance, the impropriety type stuff in
52:38
Speaker 2: not just in sports, but in American culture in general,
52:41
Speaker 2: we need to be a lot more diligent on and
52:44
Speaker 2: a lot more punitive toward when it comes to, especially
52:48
Speaker 2: men who are in like powerful positions, it's just gross
52:52
Speaker 2: and terrible.
52:53
Speaker 3: And how.
52:55
Speaker 2: How easily we just say like, oh yeah, it's like,
52:58
Speaker 2: we'll forget about that.
53:00
Speaker 5: He made a mistake. Like he just threw a touchdown.
53:02
Speaker 5: So everything's good. Like that's really what it is with quarterbacks.
53:06
Speaker 5: It seems like in particular. People were booing Deshaun Watson
53:11
Speaker 5: up until now because he's been terrible.
53:14
Speaker 3: Not because they don't like him as a person, not
53:16
Speaker 3: because they hate him. I think that's part of.
53:17
Speaker 5: It too, but they decided that, yeah, it's okay to
53:23
Speaker 5: let him hear it because he's also terrible. It's like,
53:26
Speaker 5: just keep letting him hear it if that's how you
53:28
Speaker 5: feel about it. But I also get that, hey, I'm
53:31
Speaker 5: cheering for my football team and he did a good
53:33
Speaker 5: thing for my football team, whatever.
53:36
Speaker 3: But yeah, it is.
53:38
Speaker 5: That's what makes this Browns team hard to root for
53:41
Speaker 5: in addition to what you said about Shador Sanders.
53:44
Speaker 3: Oddly, both of them at the quarterback position, right?
53:47
Speaker 5: But like everything else, almost everything else about this Browns team,
53:50
Speaker 5: especially for us here in Utah, if you're a Utes
53:52
Speaker 5: fan in particular, because you got Spencer Fano and you
53:56
Speaker 5: want him to do well as a top 10 pick,
53:58
Speaker 5: like this makes Cleveland a fun team to root for.
54:02
Speaker 5: You just kind of got to. hold your nose at
54:05
Speaker 5: Deshaun Watson, maybe playing.
54:07
Speaker 2: And look, if you're looking at the opposite side of
54:09
Speaker 2: this matchup, a lot of people hold their nose at
54:12
Speaker 2: the Aaron Rogers portion of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
54:15
Speaker 3: Cause like he's kind of other reasons, but yeah.
54:18
Speaker 2: Look for a lot less, I think a lot less
54:21
Speaker 2: important reasons just annoying. Jalen, Jalen Warren has deep roots here, right?
54:26
Speaker 2: Like Jalen, you should be rooting for his success. I
54:29
Speaker 2: know that there are a lot of DK Metcalf fans
54:33
Speaker 2: In this market, there's a lot of guys that played
54:36
Speaker 2: for this team or that play for this team now
54:38
Speaker 2: that we watched in college, either as mostly as members
54:42
Speaker 2: of opposing Pac-12 teams and Mountain West Conference teams. But again,
54:47
Speaker 2: the Pittsburgh Steelers roster is sort of the older, interesting
54:51
Speaker 2: version of that. the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Cleveland Browns, not
54:55
Speaker 2: the Cavaliers, the Cleveland Browns, because it's like, oh, okay.
54:58
Speaker 2: These are a bunch of kind of like guys that
55:00
Speaker 2: might be a little past their prime, but they're playing
55:02
Speaker 2: good football right now. And they have their quarterback situation
55:06
Speaker 2: figured out whether you like the guy or not.
55:08
Speaker 3: Aaron Rogers could still play the position.
55:10
Speaker 5: And almost 300 yards passing in the win over the
55:12
Speaker 5: Bengals last week. He did have a pick, but he
55:14
Speaker 5: threw three touchdowns. Like he, he had a long pass,
55:17
Speaker 5: which was the thing that everyone was criticizing it. last
55:21
Speaker 5: year for is like, he can't throw the deep ball anymore.
55:23
Speaker 5: He had a 47 yard pass against the, against the Bengals.
55:26
Speaker 5: So like he seems to be figuring out this set,
55:29
Speaker 5: figuring it out this second go around with Mike McCarthy.
55:33
Speaker 2: So we'll see, we'll see how it plays out. But
55:35
Speaker 2: that Thursday night football game tonight in the AFC North,
55:39
Speaker 2: that is actually a lot more meaningful that a lot
55:42
Speaker 2: of people thought it was going to be, especially on
55:43
Speaker 2: the Brown side of the equation. A winner will be
55:47
Speaker 2: at least for now holding on to first place.
55:50
Speaker 5: In the AFC North. I didn't look at all of
55:52
Speaker 5: the standings. I know that these two and the Bengals
55:55
Speaker 5: are tied for first. Are the Ravens also 2-1? The
55:58
Speaker 5: Ravens are 2-1. So everyone's tied for first right now.
56:03
Speaker 5: So it'll be for tonight. They'll have sole possession in
56:06
Speaker 5: first place, and then we'll see what the Bengals and
56:08
Speaker 5: Ravens do.
56:09
Speaker 3: The Ravens have the Titans, so they're probably getting a win.
56:13
Speaker 3: They're probably going to hold on. That's non-divisional, right?
56:15
Speaker 2: So this is a game that counts for double because
56:17
Speaker 2: it is a divisional game. The Cincinnati Bengals are playing
56:20
Speaker 2: against the Jaguars this weekend.
56:23
Speaker 4: Okay.
56:23
Speaker 5: So it could end up with just a two-team tie
56:27
Speaker 5: for first place realistically, maybe a three-team tie by the
56:31
Speaker 5: end of the weekend.
56:32
Speaker 2: But the tie only– because this is a divisional game,
56:36
Speaker 2: it counts as two wins.
56:36
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's true. So it's like a– yeah. The winner
56:40
Speaker 5: tonight will have the advantage there. Real quick, I have
56:46
Speaker 5: to bring this up. I remember, I think it was
56:48
Speaker 5: last season, maybe it was the season before, Bill Cowher
56:51
Speaker 5: was on with Dan Patrick, and Dan asked him, like,
56:54
Speaker 5: where did the Ravens-Steelers, because it really, this Ravens-Steelers rivalry
56:59
Speaker 5: really began when Bill Cowher was still coaching the Pittsburgh Steelers, right?
57:05
Speaker 3: Early 2000s.
57:06
Speaker 5: He goes, where did this how did this come about
57:10
Speaker 5: Raven Steelers, this, this great NFL rivalry. And he said,
57:13
Speaker 5: I just, in my head, they just never stopped being
57:17
Speaker 5: the Browns and the, and he basically conveyed that message
57:22
Speaker 5: to the teams. Like, Hey, these, we hate these guys.
57:25
Speaker 5: It doesn't matter. They're in Baltimore now. They're still the Browns.
57:27
Speaker 5: We still hate them. So that just gives you an
57:30
Speaker 5: insight into what this rivalry that's going to be played tonight.
57:34
Speaker 10: Used to be.
57:35
Speaker 5: It used to be the AFC North rivalry. Now that's,
57:38
Speaker 5: that's Raven Steelers. So I, that's another reason why I'm,
57:43
Speaker 5: I'm pulling for the Browns is because I want a
57:45
Speaker 5: great rivalry to be back.
57:46
Speaker 2: It's funny that the Steelers Ravens rivalry for at least
57:50
Speaker 2: some people is just the Steelers Browns rivalry. And now
57:54
Speaker 2: there is a Steelers Browns rivalry and they're just like, Oh,
57:57
Speaker 2: which one of these do I hate more? And it's
58:00
Speaker 2: probably the originals because obviously that took on its own
58:03
Speaker 2: life and both teams were good at the same time.
58:06
Speaker 2: And I think the general sort of consensus when it
58:11
Speaker 2: comes to rivalries is the more competitive they are, the
58:14
Speaker 2: better they are rivalries. Even when your team is like
58:17
Speaker 2: destroying the other team over and over and over again,
58:19
Speaker 2: and it's your rival because of the history of it.
58:22
Speaker 2: Like you have to acknowledge that it's more fun when
58:25
Speaker 2: there's at least doubt about who's going to win. If,
58:28
Speaker 2: If we're talking about the Steelers and the Browns, there
58:30
Speaker 2: was a decade-plus where it was just like, yeah, the
58:32
Speaker 2: Browns aren't going to win this.
58:33
Speaker 5: Yeah, even a regular season game, it's like the Steelers
58:37
Speaker 5: are going to win. I think Ben Roethlisberger went undefeated
58:39
Speaker 5: against the Browns in his career, if I'm not mistaken.
58:42
Speaker 3: All right, we've.
58:43
Speaker 2: Got to take a break so we can get to
58:45
Speaker 2: Eric Weddle, at least close to on time.
58:47
Speaker 3: He's next. It's the Sean O'Connell Show on ESPN 700
58:50
Speaker 3: and 92.1 FM.
58:56
Speaker 7: You're listening to The Sean O'Connell Show from the Murdoch
58:59
Speaker 7: Hyundai Studio of ESPN 792.1 FM.
59:11
Speaker 2: Season puck drops tonight, 7 30 PM against the.
59:17
Speaker 3: Chicago black Hawks.
59:18
Speaker 2: We'll be talking about it a lot. As the season progresses,
59:21
Speaker 2: I put a poll question up about who do you
59:23
Speaker 2: think starting from today, who wins a league championship first,
59:28
Speaker 2: Utah football. And I'm talking about NCAA football championship, the
59:32
Speaker 2: big one, right? Utah football, Utah jazz, Utah mammoth, or
59:38
Speaker 2: the as yet twinkle in the Miller family. I major
59:43
Speaker 2: league baseball team that we think is coming to the
59:45
Speaker 2: state of Utah. Eventually these are lofty goals. Who wins
59:48
Speaker 2: one first? Right now we're talking Utah football. We're talking
59:52
Speaker 2: NFL football and we're bringing in the best guy to
59:54
Speaker 2: do it on both fronts. That of course is the
59:57
Speaker 2: Utah football legend, the Superbowl champion, the head coach of
1:00:00
Speaker 2: the Rancho Bernardo Broncos, Eric Weddle.
1:00:04
Speaker 3: What's up legend.
1:00:06
Speaker 8: What is the word? Are we, are we living good?
1:00:10
Speaker 4: Always being great.
1:00:11
Speaker 2: Always. It's a beautiful day here in salt Lake city.
1:00:14
Speaker 3: Perfect temperature, blue skies, hockey tonight.
1:00:19
Speaker 2: And, you know, a bi-week for Utah football, which if
1:00:22
Speaker 2: I'm being honest, I don't love, right? We get into
1:00:24
Speaker 2: this rhythm for the season and then you're like, ah, crap,
1:00:26
Speaker 2: there's no game this week. But I guess, you know,
1:00:30
Speaker 2: we'll spend it watching general conference instead or something. As
1:00:35
Speaker 2: a player, how did you approach bi-weeks? Did you enjoy bi-weeks?
1:00:40
Speaker 2: Is it something that you didn't like because it got
1:00:43
Speaker 2: you out.
1:00:43
Speaker 3: Of that rhythm I just mentioned? What's your thought on
1:00:46
Speaker 3: the bi-week as a player?
1:00:49
Speaker 6: Oh, shoot.
1:00:49
Speaker 8: Like, bi-week during college was like a normal week. So
1:00:58
Speaker 8: I think back in the day we got like Friday, Saturday,
1:01:01
Speaker 8: Sunday off.
1:01:02
Speaker 4: But it was like a work week.
1:01:04
Speaker 8: And then for the guys that didn't get to play
1:01:06
Speaker 8: or young guys, like you were, it was like scrimmage
1:01:11
Speaker 8: every day.
1:01:13
Speaker 4: Which was good.
1:01:13
Speaker 8: Like you gotta, you gotta get the work in and develop.
1:01:16
Speaker 8: And then in the NFL, it was awesome because it
1:01:19
Speaker 8: was like, we're, we're barely, we're, we're just recovering from our,
1:01:24
Speaker 8: from the bodies and getting, getting healthy and kind of
1:01:27
Speaker 8: getting recharged. So I always look forward to it. Cause
1:01:31
Speaker 8: then it gave me an opportunity to go like go
1:01:34
Speaker 8: somewhere on the weekend, go.
1:01:35
Speaker 4: To a game.
1:01:36
Speaker 8: Like a lot of times I'd come out, come back
1:01:38
Speaker 8: to see the Utah game and, or go home where Baltimore, though,
1:01:43
Speaker 8: that weekend was always a time that we'd come back
1:01:44
Speaker 8: to California.
1:01:45
Speaker 4: So I enjoyed it.
1:01:47
Speaker 8: And I think it was always much needed for the body.
1:01:50
Speaker 4: And then for just to recharge.
1:01:56
Speaker 2: This Utah football team, we we've been talking about, you know,
1:01:59
Speaker 2: kind of for the bi-week, if you can change something,
1:02:02
Speaker 2: if you can alter something, you can adjust something, you
1:02:05
Speaker 2: can fix something.
1:02:07
Speaker 3: In the bi-week, what would it be?
1:02:08
Speaker 2: Well, first of all, I want to make sure that
1:02:11
Speaker 2: everybody knows I'm talking, we're being real nitpicky here.
1:02:13
Speaker 3: Cause this is a good team. This is a four
1:02:15
Speaker 3: and O team.
1:02:16
Speaker 2: You don't have to reinvent the wheel here, but if
1:02:18
Speaker 2: there's something you have seen or have not seen from
1:02:21
Speaker 2: this team, Eric, that you want to coming out of
1:02:23
Speaker 2: the bi-week, what Morgan Scali calls you and says, Hey,
1:02:26
Speaker 2: what do I need to fix before we get back
1:02:28
Speaker 2: to action against Kansas?
1:02:30
Speaker 3: Is there something on the top of your mind?
1:02:32
Speaker 6: Wow.
1:02:34
Speaker 8: Uh, you know, after four weeks, there's always, like you said,
1:02:41
Speaker 8: little things to work on. And I, and I'm not
1:02:43
Speaker 8: really in tune with like, you know, how efficient are
1:02:47
Speaker 8: we on third downs, red zone offense, you know, the
1:02:54
Speaker 8: efficiency on first and second town creating big plays.
1:02:57
Speaker 4: I know that that's.
1:02:59
Speaker 8: Going around of, how many times I'm throwing deeper and
1:03:02
Speaker 8: then completing. So it's really looking at like the big
1:03:06
Speaker 8: picture and overall, you know, team-wise, culture-wise.
1:03:12
Speaker 4: Maybe doing something fun with them.
1:03:14
Speaker 8: I would probably do something of that nature, but off
1:03:19
Speaker 8: the top of my head, honestly, it would just be
1:03:22
Speaker 8: the techniques and fundamentals and the little details of just
1:03:25
Speaker 8: playing football. So I would most likely just focus on
1:03:31
Speaker 8: being tackling better, blocking better, being more fundamentally sound on
1:03:37
Speaker 8: what we're being asked to do, like almost going back
1:03:39
Speaker 8: to the basics of each position group and really honing
1:03:43
Speaker 8: in on those coaching points and less on scheme work.
1:03:50
Speaker 4: You know, the scheme is.
1:03:52
Speaker 8: Worked out for the coaches getting ready for next week's
1:03:55
Speaker 8: game and adding different wrinkles in and understanding where we
1:03:59
Speaker 8: need to get better at So that would be just
1:04:03
Speaker 8: from a coach's perspective now is more emphasizing the little
1:04:06
Speaker 8: details and the techniques and fundamentals that the boys are
1:04:09
Speaker 8: being asked to do.
1:04:11
Speaker 2: I've been complaining really since week one about the defensive
1:04:15
Speaker 2: ends having a hard time finishing. They're getting there, they're pressuring,
1:04:19
Speaker 2: they're hurrying, they're getting some hits, but we're still waiting
1:04:23
Speaker 2: for defensive ends to be productive enough and to generate sacks.
1:04:26
Speaker 2: And I've asked you some version of this question, probably
1:04:28
Speaker 2: 50 times in the past, but playing in the backend,
1:04:32
Speaker 2: playing defensive back and, you know, knowing when a quarterback
1:04:37
Speaker 2: has to throw off schedule or when a quarterback has
1:04:39
Speaker 2: to throw on the run because he's flushed out of
1:04:41
Speaker 2: the pocket or whatever, how crucial to what you do
1:04:46
Speaker 2: on the backend is that pass rush, especially if you
1:04:49
Speaker 2: can get it with four guys with your base rush.
1:04:53
Speaker 4: Well, it's huge.
1:04:54
Speaker 8: And I think the game is a little bit different
1:04:57
Speaker 8: in that aspect of how you call certain situations like
1:05:02
Speaker 8: third and long, you know, third and medium per se. Like,
1:05:06
Speaker 8: you know, in the NFL, the ball is going to
1:05:10
Speaker 8: come out with it. You just have an internal clock
1:05:13
Speaker 8: to Because one, these quarterbacks don't want to get hit
1:05:15
Speaker 8: to the coordinators. Don't want to get their quarterbacks hit three,
1:05:19
Speaker 8: your quarterback goes down, your season's done. So there's so
1:05:22
Speaker 8: much riding on that position where in college, it's just,
1:05:27
Speaker 8: you get these athletes and you get these guys that
1:05:30
Speaker 8: can run around and make guys miss. And that's, it's
1:05:33
Speaker 8: just like a different kind of mindset.
1:05:36
Speaker 4: And you have to be a little bit more understanding.
1:05:39
Speaker 8: Like those things, the ball's not always going to come out.
1:05:42
Speaker 8: Like it's, quarterbacks are so regimented to hit the third,
1:05:45
Speaker 8: to hit that third stop, third step. And if it's
1:05:48
Speaker 8: not there, you get one hitch and then the ball's out, right? Like,
1:05:52
Speaker 8: and you really train yourself and the routes and everything
1:05:54
Speaker 8: goes with it. So the defender, you're, you're, you have
1:05:57
Speaker 8: an internal clock and you're really eliminate and anticipate and
1:06:01
Speaker 8: really like jumping routes, knowing the timing of where you're
1:06:05
Speaker 8: at on the field and the timing of the play.
1:06:08
Speaker 8: So you have to be wary of that as a
1:06:12
Speaker 8: defensive back. and in college is much different. Like third downs,
1:06:17
Speaker 8: you play coverage. And a lot of times, like we're
1:06:20
Speaker 8: not getting there because of the, you know, we, you
1:06:25
Speaker 8: don't necessarily have those edge rushers that are the elite
1:06:28
Speaker 8: of the lead that if you leave them one-on-one, they're
1:06:30
Speaker 8: probably going to win. So for our, for our defensive end,
1:06:34
Speaker 8: you just gotta keep working on like facts come in
1:06:36
Speaker 8: bunches and any time the coverage with it and then
1:06:39
Speaker 8: the pressure package. So I don't know.
1:06:42
Speaker 4: I think it's, I think it's.
1:06:45
Speaker 8: Something that, you know, when you bring that up, I
1:06:47
Speaker 8: think it's something that they could work on, and I
1:06:49
Speaker 8: think it's something that.
1:06:51
Speaker 4: They'll get better at.
1:06:52
Speaker 3: Again, I'm being real nitpicky here.
1:06:54
Speaker 2: If you have to manufacture your pressure with, you know,
1:06:58
Speaker 2: a blitzing linebacker or you've got to creep a corner
1:07:01
Speaker 2: in to come off the edge or whatever else, and
1:07:05
Speaker 2: that shows on film, and now an opposing offensive coordinator
1:07:09
Speaker 2: is able to, you know, predict that or is able to,
1:07:13
Speaker 2: try to work with his quarterback to recognize it and say,
1:07:16
Speaker 2: all right, you're going to throw into that empty space
1:07:19
Speaker 2: that is being created by the blitzer. You quarterbacked the
1:07:23
Speaker 2: defense so many times to.
1:07:27
Speaker 3: Counter move the counter move, right?
1:07:28
Speaker 2: So how effective can you be comparatively if you have
1:07:33
Speaker 2: to manufacture pressure other ways and make sure that you
1:07:37
Speaker 2: don't leave those gaps, those vacancies that a good offensive coordinator,
1:07:42
Speaker 2: a good quarterback are going to recognize are.
1:07:44
Speaker 3: Going to exploit.
1:07:46
Speaker 9: Yeah.
1:07:46
Speaker 8: I mean, that's tying in the disguise and the movement
1:07:49
Speaker 8: with the, with the brush, with the blitz and then
1:07:53
Speaker 8: understanding like you don't just blitz the blitz.
1:07:55
Speaker 4: Right.
1:07:56
Speaker 8: So if you're trying to manipulate one, the ID and
1:08:00
Speaker 8: make the manipulate the rules of pass pro, right? Like
1:08:04
Speaker 8: you can by your front and by your alignment of
1:08:07
Speaker 8: your linebackers who are mugged up in there or in
1:08:10
Speaker 8: line in the B gap or on the edge, you
1:08:12
Speaker 8: can basically determine how they're going to, how they're going
1:08:17
Speaker 8: to block you.
1:08:17
Speaker 4: From an offense perspective.
1:08:19
Speaker 8: Are they going to go three man zone and man
1:08:22
Speaker 8: ID the other way with the back? Are they going
1:08:23
Speaker 8: to go four man side? Are they going to go
1:08:25
Speaker 8: a full slide with the Y and the H coming back?
1:08:28
Speaker 4: Like you can know that.
1:08:29
Speaker 8: So then you build your pressure package off of that.
1:08:31
Speaker 8: So you're going to get free runners, right? Like, if
1:08:34
Speaker 8: you're blitzing just a blitz, which in most cases are
1:08:37
Speaker 8: not like they do, do this work. But in most cases,
1:08:41
Speaker 8: you want to make sure that.
1:08:42
Speaker 4: You're building your pressure package.
1:08:44
Speaker 8: So you're getting to the quarterback. Cause if not, then
1:08:47
Speaker 8: you might as well play coverage and then deal with it.
1:08:49
Speaker 8: Then cause now you got an extra.
1:08:50
Speaker 4: Guy or maybe you have two extra guys.
1:08:52
Speaker 8: And then on top of that, you can also add
1:08:54
Speaker 8: in Sims where, you know, we got linebackers.
1:08:57
Speaker 4: That are freaking good.
1:08:59
Speaker 8: So building in simulated rushes where you could play there,
1:09:04
Speaker 8: you know, five under two D you could play, you
1:09:07
Speaker 8: can play a normal four into three D because you
1:09:09
Speaker 8: can roll coverage where the corner is now playing a
1:09:11
Speaker 8: cloud and then roll the safety over the top, like
1:09:15
Speaker 8: different things like that, where you're blitzing a linebacker, but
1:09:18
Speaker 8: dropping an end, and now you're getting one-on-one with the back,
1:09:22
Speaker 8: which in the league, if you get one-on-one with the back,
1:09:24
Speaker 8: that's a 100% win for the defense because that linebacker
1:09:28
Speaker 8: is going to beast that running back every time. So
1:09:31
Speaker 8: then adding those types of things in the order, now
1:09:33
Speaker 8: you're still having seven guys in coverage, but you're now
1:09:36
Speaker 8: getting a rush. You're getting a one-on-one with the back,
1:09:40
Speaker 8: which is always a great opportunity for the defense.
1:09:43
Speaker 2: Eric Weddle is our guest here talking all things Utah
1:09:46
Speaker 2: football for now on the Sean O'Connell Show. How many
1:09:50
Speaker 2: times in your career did you have an interception taken
1:09:53
Speaker 2: away from you by a replay by a referee saying
1:09:58
Speaker 2: it wasn't a catch? We saw that happen to Rabbit
1:10:00
Speaker 2: Evans this last week, and it was egregious. I thought
1:10:03
Speaker 2: that the replay was going to correct it, and then
1:10:06
Speaker 2: it didn't correct it. And look, he did a great
1:10:09
Speaker 2: job of just continuing to play and continuing to excel
1:10:12
Speaker 2: and all that kind of stuff.
1:10:14
Speaker 3: I'm petty, man.
1:10:15
Speaker 2: I would be finding that referee's address. I'd be like,
1:10:17
Speaker 2: I needed that interception. Why did you do this to me?
1:10:20
Speaker 2: How many times has that happened to you in your career?
1:10:23
Speaker 4: Oh, man.
1:10:25
Speaker 8: Over a replay or.
1:10:26
Speaker 2: Well, just where you're like, that was a pick and
1:10:29
Speaker 2: they didn't give you credit for the pick.
1:10:31
Speaker 8: Yeah, well, I've had numerous where they gave you a bogus, like,
1:10:35
Speaker 8: holding call or... a PI call that never happened. That
1:10:42
Speaker 8: wasn't for me. It was like another player during the play.
1:10:45
Speaker 8: .
1:10:52
Speaker 2: .
1:10:54
Speaker 3: .
1:11:00
Speaker 2: .
1:11:02
Speaker 8: Speaker 2, last drive. And then three plays later,
1:11:05
Speaker 8: they went 40 yard touchdown. Our season was done Speaker.
1:11:08
Speaker 10: 0, terrible.
1:11:09
Speaker 2: I remember that play so distinctly because it was a
1:11:12
Speaker 2: phantom defensive hold or, and.
1:11:17
Speaker 8: It was just standing at 10 yards and the receiver
1:11:20
Speaker 8: ran through them and they both fell and they called
1:11:22
Speaker 8: them a whole holding. I was like, what are we doing?
1:11:28
Speaker 8: I mean, like, just like, just like the one in
1:11:31
Speaker 8: the Rams game. I mean, the same, same, like how
1:11:36
Speaker 8: just in my, in my thought process of it all,
1:11:38
Speaker 8: like rest, rest of a hard-on job. My, my issue is,
1:11:42
Speaker 8: is why not the judge, the side judge that was
1:11:45
Speaker 8: in front of the play who sees it clearly not
1:11:49
Speaker 8: meet with that ref and say, all right, what'd you see?
1:11:51
Speaker 8: Here's what I saw. I don't think it was PI.
1:11:54
Speaker 4: Let's pick it up. Right.
1:11:55
Speaker 8: Like the back judge obviously threw it and maybe he
1:11:58
Speaker 8: saw whatever he saw, but is clear as day. So
1:12:02
Speaker 8: in rabbit's case, like I, the, the announcers were saying,
1:12:06
Speaker 8: this is a pig. They don't get a call. And
1:12:09
Speaker 8: then of course the Fox, whoever the old ref is
1:12:12
Speaker 8: that just comes on there, gets paid hundreds of thousands
1:12:15
Speaker 8: of dollars to come on for 20 seconds.
1:12:17
Speaker 4: I need to get that job.
1:12:23
Speaker 2: .
1:12:26
Speaker 8: And half the time
1:12:30
Speaker 8: you're just siding with the rest because you're an old breath.
1:12:32
Speaker 3: That's right.
1:12:33
Speaker 8: And so, yeah, that was, there've been some, definitely some
1:12:38
Speaker 8: calls out there so far this season. You're just like, well,
1:12:42
Speaker 8: especially at the NFL, like, you don't know if you're
1:12:44
Speaker 8: Patrick or Holmes and you get touched with a pinky,
1:12:47
Speaker 8: you're getting a rough in the pastor every time, even
1:12:51
Speaker 8: though the dude does exactly what the textbook says of
1:12:53
Speaker 8: hitting hands up, falling off and still get it where
1:12:57
Speaker 8: it's like, Where are we going? Do we want to
1:13:00
Speaker 8: make this game unwatchable? Because sometimes it is.
1:13:04
Speaker 2: As a defensive player, you were in the league for
1:13:09
Speaker 2: the near two decades of when a lot of this
1:13:12
Speaker 2: stuff was really being put into place to favor quarterback play,
1:13:16
Speaker 2: to explode offensive numbers and things like that. And you
1:13:20
Speaker 2: hear guys, defensive players especially, say like, hey, are we
1:13:24
Speaker 2: still playing football?
1:13:25
Speaker 3: What am I allowed to do? What am I not
1:13:26
Speaker 3: allowed to do?
1:13:28
Speaker 2: How big a part of the discussion is that in
1:13:30
Speaker 2: your film room, in your locker room, when you're going
1:13:33
Speaker 2: up against, especially the chiefs or especially when it was
1:13:36
Speaker 2: Tom Brady or whatever, when you feel like these are
1:13:38
Speaker 2: the players, the league is going to protect, we have
1:13:41
Speaker 2: to alter the way we play against them. Is it
1:13:43
Speaker 2: something that actually goes into a game plan?
1:13:47
Speaker 8: He actually, it does how to tackle. how to tackle
1:13:52
Speaker 8: certain guys. What, what are the rules?
1:13:54
Speaker 4: Like we, we have days where we have the rules.
1:13:57
Speaker 8: Officials come in, they explain the rules. Then we get
1:14:00
Speaker 8: in these, like not arguments, but we're just, and they're,
1:14:03
Speaker 8: they're like, in most cases, the rest are on our side.
1:14:06
Speaker 8: So it's just like, Hey, this is, this is what
1:14:09
Speaker 8: we're being told.
1:14:10
Speaker 4: This is how we have to call it. This is
1:14:12
Speaker 4: how you have to do it.
1:14:13
Speaker 8: And like, so it's a good back and forth conversation.
1:14:16
Speaker 4: But the other day, it's like, it's.
1:14:17
Speaker 8: Like, Hey, do I agree with, what SC did after
1:14:23
Speaker 8: the play of with the Dante Moore.
1:14:26
Speaker 4: Of course not.
1:14:27
Speaker 8: Like I don't, I would, the kid would be kicked
1:14:29
Speaker 8: off my team if they act like that.
1:14:31
Speaker 4: Right.
1:14:31
Speaker 8: And I don't, you know, get into specifics. Maybe it
1:14:34
Speaker 8: was other things, but the way you acted, but really
1:14:37
Speaker 8: the play of is not a dirty play. And it's
1:14:41
Speaker 8: not like an egregious, like the dude is already committed
1:14:45
Speaker 8: to tackling Dante Moore. Hey, Dante Moore, you need to
1:14:48
Speaker 8: slide earlier, right? You need to slide earlier or like
1:14:52
Speaker 8: real court, like not real quarterbacks or players, but if
1:14:56
Speaker 8: quarterbacks just started going first and actually like understand how
1:14:59
Speaker 8: to take hits and run the football, you're not going
1:15:02
Speaker 8: to get hurt. How many times have we seen.
1:15:04
Speaker 4: That exact case?
1:15:05
Speaker 8: Or their head hits the ground because they're sliding, like,
1:15:09
Speaker 8: quit sliding. Or if you're going to slide, slide five
1:15:12
Speaker 8: yards early so you're not going to get your head
1:15:15
Speaker 8: knocked off because these dudes are coming, and we're not–
1:15:18
Speaker 8: we cannot stop in that situation. Like, the only way
1:15:22
Speaker 8: to be able to stop is you're a safety like
1:15:25
Speaker 8: I was, and I knew these guys were going to slide, right?
1:15:28
Speaker 8: But linebackers aren't thinking like that. Like, and they don't
1:15:31
Speaker 8: have enough time and space to really gauge the runner
1:15:35
Speaker 8: and gauge when he's going to start to lighten up.
1:15:38
Speaker 8: You can feel it as a tackler. These other guys,
1:15:41
Speaker 8: it's too much. You're just chancing it. Unfortunately, he got hurt,
1:15:46
Speaker 8: but to say that was a dirty hit, that's just
1:15:49
Speaker 8: people not knowing ever played football.
1:15:53
Speaker 2: Is it time to accept the fact that Jim Harbaugh
1:15:57
Speaker 2: is not a great NFL coach? He might not be
1:16:01
Speaker 2: a great college coach either. He's good at the weird
1:16:04
Speaker 2: sign stealing and stuff like that. But the Chargers are
1:16:08
Speaker 2: off to a disastrous start. High expectations this year. His
1:16:12
Speaker 2: welcome wore out in San Francisco after not too long.
1:16:15
Speaker 2: Is it time to just accept the fact that maybe
1:16:17
Speaker 2: the NFL is not where Jim Harbaugh needs to be coaching?
1:16:22
Speaker 8: It's pretty interesting.
1:16:24
Speaker 4: I don't really have.
1:16:28
Speaker 8: Really a pinpoint answer why.
1:16:30
Speaker 4: The only thing that.
1:16:33
Speaker 8: History has told us as he has good turnarounds. And
1:16:37
Speaker 8: then over time it, it putters out and then he
1:16:40
Speaker 8: leaves or he loses. And so I don't know, like
1:16:44
Speaker 8: I've talked to a few guys and they all, they
1:16:46
Speaker 8: all like them. They think he's a little corny at times,
1:16:49
Speaker 8: but they like, they think he's real. I think he's genuine.
1:16:51
Speaker 8: I think he's like, that's just, that's just Jim Harbaugh.
1:16:54
Speaker 8: Like he just does just weird things, but I don't
1:16:58
Speaker 8: know why they are so bad. I don't think they've,
1:17:03
Speaker 8: it's kind of been known over the years.
1:17:05
Speaker 4: Like they've missed on.
1:17:07
Speaker 8: Some guys on the perimeter. Herbert makes a lot of
1:17:10
Speaker 8: these guys better than what they are. The offensive line
1:17:12
Speaker 8: has been an influx. Like when you have your two
1:17:15
Speaker 8: first round guys hurt or not playing last year. And
1:17:18
Speaker 8: then this year there, I don't know.
1:17:21
Speaker 4: I haven't really watched many games.
1:17:23
Speaker 8: To really like say what the issues are, but to
1:17:26
Speaker 8: be all in three and looking at that schedule and
1:17:29
Speaker 8: potentially being all in nine, like you're not going to
1:17:31
Speaker 8: be favored in the next, six games, I don't know
1:17:34
Speaker 8: how they recover. And then what do they do moving forward?
1:17:37
Speaker 8: It's just, it's just, it's just unfortunate, but I don't, man,
1:17:44
Speaker 8: it shouldn't, it shouldn't be happening, honestly. But when you
1:17:47
Speaker 8: got like first round picks that can't catch the ball
1:17:50
Speaker 8: and they should have never been picked. I think that
1:17:52
Speaker 8: was Telesco's last year. Like that was one of many
1:17:56
Speaker 8: blown draft picks. That sets you back. And then how
1:18:00
Speaker 8: do they keep trotting that guy out on the field?
1:18:02
Speaker 8: Like when you think about their perimeter athlete players, like who,
1:18:07
Speaker 8: who's going to go win some one-on-ones for you. If
1:18:11
Speaker 8: you're relying on lad McConkie, like that's, that's, that's pretty
1:18:15
Speaker 8: good as like a third guy.
1:18:17
Speaker 4: But not as a number one in the NFL.
1:18:21
Speaker 2: Lad McConkie catching strays here on the Sean O'Connell show.
1:18:25
Speaker 3: Poor guy. You love to see it.
1:18:27
Speaker 8: Speaker 0 7, I'm just saying, who's the, who's another
1:18:29
Speaker 8: guy that John, the Jenkins, Junkins, the first TCU.
1:18:33
Speaker 4: Guy is awful.
1:18:33
Speaker 8: I've already said that. I don't even know who else
1:18:35
Speaker 8: they have, right?
1:18:36
Speaker 4: Like who, who else is their players?
1:18:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, they, they don't.
1:18:40
Speaker 2: I mean, when you, when you're talking about weapons, weapons
1:18:42
Speaker 2: on the edge, and by the way, everybody's on the
1:18:46
Speaker 2: injury report right now, which may or may not be normal.
1:18:50
Speaker 4: Yeah.
1:18:50
Speaker 3: You're, you're, you're in a bad spot right now. If
1:18:54
Speaker 3: you're a charger fan and.
1:18:55
Speaker 8: Speaker 4 and listen, I root for all small white receivers.
1:19:01
Speaker 8: There's not a lot, a lot of us. So it's
1:19:03
Speaker 8: not anything against them. It says you're, we need you
1:19:06
Speaker 8: as a number three. We don't need you as a
1:19:07
Speaker 8: number one.
1:19:10
Speaker 3: Speaker 2, are the Raiders legit?
1:19:15
Speaker 8: I mean, what, what, what comes to as legit?
1:19:18
Speaker 2: Like they're a playoff team. That's going to win a
1:19:22
Speaker 2: playoff game. Potentially Speaker 3, we're talking about playoffs, not
1:19:27
Speaker 2: a game.
1:19:28
Speaker 3: Yes, her.
1:19:31
Speaker 8: Little shout out.
1:19:32
Speaker 4: To her members for all you and the listeners that
1:19:34
Speaker 4: don't know. All I can say is this.
1:19:38
Speaker 8: I don't know if they're legit or not. I just
1:19:40
Speaker 8: love when you see a guy who has the it factor, culture, togetherness, team,
1:19:49
Speaker 8: like what Kubiak has done there. Like, you can just
1:19:55
Speaker 8: see it. You see guys that play hard for certain coaches,
1:19:58
Speaker 8: and you get up there and you, like, hear them speak.
1:20:02
Speaker 4: It's like, ugh.
1:20:03
Speaker 8: This guy knows what he's doing. You could say the
1:20:05
Speaker 8: same thing about Bob Chesney at UCLA, right? Like look
1:20:09
Speaker 8: what he's done. He's transformed UCLA back to being a
1:20:12
Speaker 8: respectable program in four games, but you know, really six
1:20:16
Speaker 8: months of being on the job. It's just like some
1:20:19
Speaker 8: coaches have it. So I appreciate that. Are they going
1:20:23
Speaker 8: to be like playoff team? I don't know. Like, Well,
1:20:26
Speaker 8: that'll work itself out. But, man, it's awesome to see, like,
1:20:30
Speaker 8: a team playing together, connected, united. Like, you could say
1:20:34
Speaker 8: the same thing about Morgan. Like, Morgan's a great coach.
1:20:37
Speaker 8: Morgan is top-notch, right, of knowing the game. But what
1:20:42
Speaker 8: I think is his best quality is he is a igniter.
1:20:46
Speaker 8: He brings others with him. He has a vision and
1:20:49
Speaker 8: a culture, and he unites people, right? He brings people together.
1:20:52
Speaker 8: And it shows. And we've talked about this in the offseason.
1:20:58
Speaker 8: He just has that it factor. So you can go
1:21:00
Speaker 8: down the line of guys that have it and don't.
1:21:05
Speaker 8: So are the Raiders for real right now? They're for real?
1:21:08
Speaker 4: So the answer is yes.
1:21:12
Speaker 2: Eric Weddle for another minute or two here on the
1:21:15
Speaker 2: Sean O'Connell show, talking all things football.
1:21:19
Speaker 3: I got to ask you this.
1:21:20
Speaker 2: If you, Morgan Scali had, there's a UFC event in
1:21:25
Speaker 2: Salt Lake City this weekend. And Morgan Scali had a
1:21:29
Speaker 2: former NFL player. He was a great at South Florida
1:21:33
Speaker 2: or Florida International. He's the all-time leading tackler from Florida International.
1:21:37
Speaker 2: Tried it in the NFL. Didn't work out for him
1:21:39
Speaker 2: in the NFL. He's an undefeated MMA fighter now. You
1:21:42
Speaker 2: have to have one of your former teammates, college or pro,
1:21:45
Speaker 2: win a UFC fight for you. It can't be me
1:21:48
Speaker 2: because I think I'm the only former teammate of yours
1:21:50
Speaker 2: who actually did win a UFC fight. But it's somebody
1:21:53
Speaker 2: who hasn't actually ended up fighting. If you've got to
1:21:55
Speaker 2: pick one of those guys to go win you a fight,
1:21:57
Speaker 2: who are you picking?
1:22:06
Speaker 8: Well.
1:22:10
Speaker 8: You kind of think of like, all right, who's a
1:22:13
Speaker 8: lot of these guys can fight, but can they really fight?
1:22:16
Speaker 8: That's up in the air. And you think of like
1:22:20
Speaker 8: just some nasty tough dudes, but that in UFC, like
1:22:23
Speaker 8: that doesn't matter. Uh, I don't know. Like the first
1:22:27
Speaker 8: thing that pops in my mind is Tony Jefferson. Cause
1:22:29
Speaker 8: he grew up boxing and, or Tom Zbikowski, uh, Speaker 0.
1:22:36
Speaker 2: 1 of those guys is the answer. Zbikowski had some
1:22:39
Speaker 2: pro boxing matches.
1:22:40
Speaker 9: Yeah.
1:22:40
Speaker 8: He, he had plenty of professional bouts and then went
1:22:43
Speaker 8: the pro route after he was done playing. So I
1:22:46
Speaker 8: don't think it really like matured like he would have
1:22:50
Speaker 8: if he just would have not played NFL. But I
1:22:52
Speaker 8: think one of those two would give us the best
1:22:55
Speaker 8: shot of making it a respectable fight for more than
1:22:58
Speaker 8: a minute or two.
1:22:58
Speaker 2: Speaker 3 0 Yeah, I would go with Zbikowski. He,
1:23:02
Speaker 2: he finished his Professional boxing career, 8-0 with five knockouts.
1:23:10
Speaker 2: And he had over 100 amateur bouts.
1:23:13
Speaker 4: Yeah, he knows how to take a punch.
1:23:14
Speaker 8: His face is calloused a little bit, not like UFC,
1:23:17
Speaker 8: but he knows a little bit of what that world is.
1:23:23
Speaker 8: And so he would probably be a guy.
1:23:27
Speaker 2: Teach him how to defend a takedown and he's probably
1:23:28
Speaker 2: going to win. That's a good shout. That's a good
1:23:31
Speaker 2: call by you. All right. Who is it this week?
1:23:34
Speaker 2: You got Del Norte for your burner, your Rancho Bernardo Broncos.
1:23:39
Speaker 3: How much do we hate Del Norte?
1:23:41
Speaker 8: Well, it's a, it's going to be a great game.
1:23:45
Speaker 8: We don't hate anybody.
1:23:47
Speaker 3: We like us that are supporting you, not you. You're classy.
1:23:51
Speaker 8: We don't, we don't, we dislike, we don't hate.
1:23:54
Speaker 4: Yeah.
1:23:57
Speaker 8: Like this is going to be, it's going to be
1:23:59
Speaker 8: a great game at our place.
1:24:01
Speaker 4: We, uh, you know, we're all.
1:24:04
Speaker 8: Black and you need to make blackout game.
1:24:06
Speaker 4: So a lot of fun stuff, a lot, a lot
1:24:08
Speaker 4: will be riding on it.
1:24:10
Speaker 8: Uh, as the season goes on league, this is a
1:24:12
Speaker 8: league game, uh, positioning and playoffs will be, will be
1:24:16
Speaker 8: big for this. And so, and a little birdie told
1:24:21
Speaker 8: me that a Utah coach is going to come down and, and, uh, check.
1:24:25
Speaker 4: Our gauge this week.
1:24:26
Speaker 8: So it's pretty cool to have a coach come down and, uh,
1:24:31
Speaker 8: on their bye week. They could be anywhere.
1:24:32
Speaker 4: So we don't take that lightly. Wow.
1:24:35
Speaker 3: I like that. That's good. That's good to hear.
1:24:38
Speaker 2: The Del Norte Nighthawks, by the way, they are four
1:24:43
Speaker 2: and one, two, four and one team squaring off.
1:24:48
Speaker 3: It'll be a big one at Rancho Bernardo. A good
1:24:51
Speaker 3: luck with that.
1:24:52
Speaker 2: Tell whoever that mysterious Utah coaches, tell them that we
1:24:57
Speaker 2: said hello and we'll chat again next week.
1:24:59
Speaker 3: Appreciate you, my guy.
1:25:01
Speaker 8: You got it.
1:25:02
Speaker 4: I'll, I'll unveil who it is next week's show. Perfect.
1:25:06
Speaker 3: That's wonderful.
1:25:08
Speaker 4: You got it. Love you, bro. Love you, dude.
1:25:10
Speaker 2: That's Eric Weddle, the Utah football legend by week for Utah.
1:25:16
Speaker 2: We talked about this. It is a big, big, big
1:25:19
Speaker 2: recruiting week. The coaches get out on the road. They
1:25:22
Speaker 2: show up to these guys' hometowns. They show up at
1:25:24
Speaker 2: their games.
1:25:27
Speaker 3: It would be amazing.
1:25:29
Speaker 2: If they said the assistant off, I go check out
1:25:31
Speaker 2: your safety.
1:25:32
Speaker 5: Hey, well, Gorky here, what I'm here to check out
1:25:40
Speaker 5: your son.
1:25:41
Speaker 3: He's a safety, right?
1:25:42
Speaker 4: Like, yeah.
1:25:42
Speaker 3: Why are you here?
1:25:43
Speaker 2: He might be playing quarterback and safety, but what could
1:25:48
Speaker 2: he be as a guard? I think we can confidently say,
1:25:52
Speaker 2: I think we.
1:25:53
Speaker 3: Put 150 more pounds on him here. Now here's a
1:25:56
Speaker 3: real question, right? Who do you want to send?
1:26:01
Speaker 2: If you're, if you're wanting to maximize gauge Weddle coming
1:26:07
Speaker 2: to the university of Utah.
1:26:08
Speaker 3: All right.
1:26:09
Speaker 2: And this is, this applies to every recruit that Utah
1:26:13
Speaker 2: is talking to and talking about, but he's the one,
1:26:15
Speaker 2: he is the jewel of the class of the 28
1:26:19
Speaker 2: class that people want to see.
1:26:20
Speaker 4: Right?
1:26:20
Speaker 3: So who would you actually send now?
1:26:24
Speaker 2: The low hanging fruit answer is, well, you go Morgan
1:26:26
Speaker 2: Scali because he's the head coach. And it's the most
1:26:30
Speaker 2: meaningful thing if the head coach shows up.
1:26:32
Speaker 4: Right.
1:26:33
Speaker 2: But that's old hat for gauge. Weddle gauge has no
1:26:37
Speaker 2: Morgan literally since he was born. He's been around Morgan,
1:26:42
Speaker 2: no exaggeration a hundred times. So I think that he
1:26:48
Speaker 2: probably already has a good sense of, do I like Morgan?
1:26:50
Speaker 2: Can I play for Morgan? Do I want to be around?
1:26:52
Speaker 2: Like I don't think Morgan is a question in Gage
1:26:56
Speaker 2: Weddle's mind. This is, by the way, I don't have
1:26:59
Speaker 2: insider knowledge on this. This is not information coming from
1:27:02
Speaker 2: any Weddle person. I'm playing hypotheticals here.
1:27:08
Speaker 3: Colton Swan. nose gauge through the recruiting process.
1:27:13
Speaker 5: He'd be on obviously the defensive coordinator is a big wig.
1:27:18
Speaker 3: He's your defensive coordinator.
1:27:19
Speaker 2: If you're, if you're trying to really like send the
1:27:22
Speaker 2: message to the kid and have it communicated like this,
1:27:25
Speaker 2: I'm going to be your coach. I'm going to be
1:27:27
Speaker 2: the guy. Or do you send his position coach? Do
1:27:30
Speaker 2: you send coach Odom who also coached dad?
1:27:34
Speaker 8: Right.
1:27:35
Speaker 2: Like there's an obvious connection there, but there's been a
1:27:38
Speaker 2: lot fewer rendezvous over the lifetime of this young player.
1:27:42
Speaker 3: So that's someone he doesn't actually know.
1:27:44
Speaker 2: Do you surrender for, do you, for me, do you
1:27:47
Speaker 2: send the guy who can talk his way into or
1:27:50
Speaker 2: out of any room?
1:27:51
Speaker 3: Sharif Shaw. We're thinking of the exact same person.
1:27:53
Speaker 5: I'm like, and, and that's not, not a position coach,
1:27:56
Speaker 5: but he's a position coach adjacent.
1:27:58
Speaker 3: He's the cornerbacks coach.
1:27:59
Speaker 5: He can certainly give him information as to how they
1:28:03
Speaker 5: plan on using him as a DB.
1:28:06
Speaker 3: And by the way, who's to say that gauge doesn't
1:28:09
Speaker 3: end up playing corner ever.
1:28:10
Speaker 4: Yeah.
1:28:11
Speaker 8: Right.
1:28:11
Speaker 3: Like his dad did. His dad played boundary. His dad
1:28:16
Speaker 3: played nickel.
1:28:18
Speaker 2: His dad played safety punter quarterback in the wildcat formations, right?
1:28:23
Speaker 2: Like that's the vision for gauge is that they Not
1:28:28
Speaker 2: to be reductive, but they want him to be just
1:28:30
Speaker 2: like Eric was. He's that versatile an athlete. He's an
1:28:33
Speaker 2: incredible football player. So who do you send if you're.
1:28:37
Speaker 3: Just like, I want I want.
1:28:38
Speaker 2: You to get to know everybody. I want you to
1:28:41
Speaker 2: know the whole family vibe here and okay. Brechterfield go
1:28:44
Speaker 2: out there.
1:28:45
Speaker 3: Let's go.
1:28:45
Speaker 5: I mean, I don't know why you don't send Gerky.
1:28:49
Speaker 5: If that's what we're talking about here, let's get to
1:28:51
Speaker 5: know everybody.
1:28:52
Speaker 3: Okay.
1:28:53
Speaker 2: When Eric comes on next week, he's going to say, yeah,
1:28:55
Speaker 2: Morgan Scali was at the game. I think that's probably
1:28:57
Speaker 2: what he's going to say. Cause that's like, That's like the.
1:29:00
Speaker 5: Big feature, but also like the head coach doesn't have to,
1:29:04
Speaker 5: he's not the safeties coach anymore. He's not the defensive
1:29:06
Speaker 5: coordinator anymore. He doesn't have to go on these, these
1:29:09
Speaker 5: recruiting trips.
1:29:10
Speaker 2: Well, and he also like, that's not in, that's not
1:29:14
Speaker 2: a question in my opinion. That's not a question in the,
1:29:18
Speaker 2: the mind of Weddle the younger. Could I play for
1:29:20
Speaker 2: Morgan Scali? He knows he could play for Morgan Scali.
1:29:23
Speaker 2: He knows he gets along with Morgan Scali. He knows
1:29:25
Speaker 2: his dad gets along with Morgan Scali. He knows his
1:29:27
Speaker 2: mom gets along with Morgan Scali. He knows that he
1:29:29
Speaker 2: likes the Morgan Scali culture. I would maybe be more
1:29:33
Speaker 2: curious because I'm getting like, it's coming down to it.
1:29:37
Speaker 2: I think that he's probably going to commit before his
1:29:39
Speaker 2: senior year.
1:29:41
Speaker 5: I wonder if he was going to commit on Eric
1:29:42
Speaker 5: Weddle day, the Arkansas game, but that didn't happen.
1:29:46
Speaker 2: Well, the right thing to do is to not because
1:29:49
Speaker 2: let his dad have his own day. But I think that,
1:29:53
Speaker 2: you know, they're probably not going to want to draw
1:29:54
Speaker 2: this process out all that much longer. And there's other
1:29:59
Speaker 2: teams make like Cal made a really strong push. They
1:30:01
Speaker 2: went and visited a Cal made Cal made a really
1:30:03
Speaker 2: strong push. BYU is making an incredibly strong push. Georgia
1:30:08
Speaker 2: is making a big push. Ohio state wants him, right?
1:30:11
Speaker 2: So how do you beat that out? You have to
1:30:14
Speaker 2: be able to sit down and you have to be
1:30:15
Speaker 2: able to have the conversations about what it's actually going
1:30:18
Speaker 2: to look like. Do you actually get along with me?
1:30:21
Speaker 2: Are you and I actually on the same page as
1:30:23
Speaker 2: your defensive coordinator, as your position coach, as a guy, like,
1:30:27
Speaker 2: I think it's going to be Morgan, but you know what?
1:30:30
Speaker 2: Why not send all of them? If you really want
1:30:32
Speaker 2: the dude.
1:30:33
Speaker 8: Yeah.
1:30:33
Speaker 3: Send maybe Morgan Odom.
1:30:37
Speaker 2: And Sharif saw Shaw and they go like, they go
1:30:40
Speaker 2: from the game to a rodeo.
1:30:42
Speaker 4: Oh yeah.
1:30:44
Speaker 2: And Colton's one Colton Swan does like make it like
1:30:48
Speaker 2: he's just like schedules.
1:30:48
Speaker 3: He enters a calf roping event in California.
1:30:52
Speaker 2: If I can, if I can rope this calf or
1:30:54
Speaker 2: I can wrestle this steer you're committing tomorrow deal.
1:30:59
Speaker 5: Colton sounds like a guy that would say rassle. He
1:31:03
Speaker 5: seems like that kind of guy. He is that kind
1:31:05
Speaker 5: of guy. He's that kind of guy.
1:31:06
Speaker 3: We're way over time.
1:31:07
Speaker 5: Or Swanee as your guy. Who's the offensive lineman who
1:31:11
Speaker 5: called in?
1:31:12
Speaker 3: Shout out. Weber State. David Hale. David Hale. As Dave
1:31:18
Speaker 3: Hale likes to call him, Swanee.
1:31:20
Speaker 4: Yeah.
1:31:21
Speaker 3: Shout out to you, Dave. Shout out to Hale. I
1:31:23
Speaker 3: hope you're listening again today. And everyone down here in
1:31:26
Speaker 3: Weber State South.
1:31:29
Speaker 2: All right, we got a PGA Tour leaderboard update for
1:31:31
Speaker 2: you in the Daily Dump. That's coming next. It's the
1:31:34
Speaker 2: Sean O'Connell Show on ESPN 700, 92.1 FM.
1:31:37
Speaker 7: And Utah's number one sports talk, ESPN 700 and 92.1 FM.
1:31:42
Speaker 10: Brought to you by Valley Plumbing, Heating, and Cooling.
1:31:45
Speaker 7: Just look for the truck with the duck.
1:31:51
Speaker 2: The PGA tour is in Utah time for a PGA
1:31:54
Speaker 2: tour leaderboard update from the bank of Utah championship at
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Speaker 2: black desert resort down in Ivins. This is brought to
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1:32:51
Speaker 2: this is very special to you because this is your,
1:32:54
Speaker 2: this is my home.
1:32:54
Speaker 3: This is your home. Not not as is your home.
1:32:57
Speaker 5: Technically not Ivan's, but say George Southern Utah.
1:33:01
Speaker 3: We'll I'll do, we'll call it, we'll call it the hometown.
1:33:04
Speaker 2: This is one of those, this is one of those
1:33:05
Speaker 2: things where like, you know, you're not claiming to be
1:33:09
Speaker 2: Samoan or Tongan.
1:33:10
Speaker 3: You're, you're Polynesian right now. Exactly.
1:33:13
Speaker 5: And there's no rival high school in Ivan's to a
1:33:16
Speaker 5: cons out there, but they don't, they don't participate in
1:33:19
Speaker 5: the region athletics, uh, down there. So I don't have
1:33:22
Speaker 5: any problems saying Ivan's is, is part of the hometown. Um,
1:33:28
Speaker 5: but yeah, isn't it just incredible to see the lava
1:33:31
Speaker 5: rock and the red rock of snow Canyon state park
1:33:34
Speaker 5: and the surrounding areas on, It's on ESPN Plus today.
1:33:39
Speaker 3: It'll be on the weekend.
1:33:40
Speaker 5: It'll be on national TV, but it feels national TV-ish,
1:33:45
Speaker 5: seen it on our TV screen here in the studio.
1:33:47
Speaker 3: It makes my heart happy as a proud St. Georgian, St. Georgite.
1:33:54
Speaker 3: I don't know how to say the leader's name. Well,
1:33:56
Speaker 3: you better figure it out. This is your tournament.
1:33:59
Speaker 5: Sudarshan Yelamaraju is tied for the lead at seven under.
1:34:05
Speaker 3: He's Canadian. I guarantee that's exactly how his mom says it. Yeah,
1:34:09
Speaker 3: shout out to you. Sooty, for short. His friends call
1:34:12
Speaker 3: him Sooty.
1:34:14
Speaker 5: David Lipski, Stephen Fisk, also tied at the top of
1:34:18
Speaker 5: the leaderboard. All those guys still in progress, so time
1:34:22
Speaker 5: to come down or improve their score. Doug Gimm, Stephen Yeager,
1:34:29
Speaker 5: and our U-Pot, Zach Blair, tied for second, one shot
1:34:34
Speaker 5: off the lead. or tied for fourth, excuse me, one
1:34:38
Speaker 5: shot off the lead. Also, John Vanderlaan, which is a
1:34:40
Speaker 5: great golf name, with Lawn at the end there. They're
1:34:45
Speaker 5: all tied there, one shot off the lead at six under.
1:34:48
Speaker 5: Gim is done for the day, but the other guys,
1:34:50
Speaker 5: including our guy Zach Blair, are still in progress on
1:34:54
Speaker 5: their back nine. And then James is near the top
1:34:58
Speaker 5: of the leaderboard. I'm near the top of the leaderboard, OC.
1:35:00
Speaker 5: Ben James, actually. He's tied for fifth, or tied for eighth,
1:35:05
Speaker 5: excuse me, five under, two shots off the lead. He's
1:35:08
Speaker 5: also Jackson Subers in there, Kevin Yu. Oh, and another U-Pot,
1:35:12
Speaker 5: Patrick Fishburne just pulled into a tie for eighth to
1:35:16
Speaker 5: round out the top ten at five under. That's your
1:35:20
Speaker 5: PGA Tour leaderboard update brought to you by Uintah Golf
1:35:23
Speaker 5: from the Bank of Utah Championship at Black Desert Resort
1:35:27
Speaker 5: here in the great state of Utah. By the way,
1:35:29
Speaker 5: Tony Finau, he tees off about a half hour from now.
1:35:32
Speaker 5: He is playing in this tournament, and he tees off
1:35:35
Speaker 5: in about a half hour.
1:35:37
Speaker 2: Good to see Tony Finau back. He's been pretty inactive
1:35:40
Speaker 2: this year on the PGA Tour. Pseudo-retirement was talked about
1:35:44
Speaker 2: with Tony Finau.
1:35:46
Speaker 5: He's struggled in the events that he's played, too, which
1:35:48
Speaker 5: is one of the reasons why he is playing today,
1:35:51
Speaker 5: because he needs more points to stay and keep that
1:35:54
Speaker 5: PGA Tour status, I believe.
1:35:55
Speaker 3: So this is big for him. All right, we're going
1:35:59
Speaker 3: to try to stay on clock here.
1:36:00
Speaker 2: That is your daily dump slash your PGA Tour leaderboard update.
1:36:04
Speaker 2: Valley plumbing, heating, and cooling, they've got it all for you,
1:36:07
Speaker 2: including big-time excavation plumbing jobs. You need a sewer line replaced.
1:36:12
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1:36:18
Speaker 3: Don't try to do that yourself. The truck with the duck,
1:36:21
Speaker 3: that's where it's at.
1:36:22
Speaker 2: Lots left to get to, including Tom Callahan to talk
1:36:25
Speaker 2: Utah Mammoth. Their season begins tonight. The Sean O'Connell Show
1:36:29
Speaker 2: on ESPN 700, 92.1 FM. We don't need no education.
1:36:31
Speaker 2: We don't need no thought.
1:36:41
Speaker 10: Control.
1:36:44
Speaker 7: This is the Sean O'Connell Show, your home of the
1:36:47
Speaker 7: best insight of your youths. Let's get back to OC
1:36:50
Speaker 7: from the Murdoch Chevrolet studio of ESPN 700 at 92.1 FM.
1:36:59
Speaker 9: Welcome back to the Sean O'Connell.
1:37:03
Speaker 3: Show, ESPN 700, 92.1 FM. College football this weekend, including tonight.
1:37:22
Speaker 2: Western Kentucky at New Mexico state, North Texas at Tulsa.
1:37:27
Speaker 2: I know that with the Utah mammoth being an action tonight,
1:37:30
Speaker 2: you've already got appointment viewing. You're going to check out
1:37:33
Speaker 2: local sports, but during commercials, if you're not in attendance,
1:37:37
Speaker 2: you might want to flip over to that Tulsa golden
1:37:39
Speaker 2: hurricane game, figure out If you can try to figure
1:37:43
Speaker 2: out how good Tulsa actually is still unbeaten, right?
1:37:46
Speaker 3: No, they lost. They lost Arkansas.
1:37:49
Speaker 4: Okay.
1:37:49
Speaker 2: They lost 34 to six to Arkansas, which is really
1:37:53
Speaker 2: confusing because this team beat Oklahoma state in week one,
1:37:57
Speaker 2: Oklahoma state is now a ranked team. And a lot
1:38:01
Speaker 2: of people think, you know, has a great shot at
1:38:04
Speaker 2: making it to the conference championship game. I'm not that
1:38:07
Speaker 2: high on Oklahoma state right now, but their win over
1:38:09
Speaker 2: Oregon shows that when they're at their best, They're capable
1:38:13
Speaker 2: of beating just about anybody. They beat Oregon 24 to 10.
1:38:16
Speaker 2: They actually struggled a little bit on the road against
1:38:18
Speaker 2: Sam Houston, but got the win there. They killed east
1:38:22
Speaker 2: Texas a and M and that's what that game is for.
1:38:24
Speaker 2: And then they lost to a really bad Arkansas team
1:38:27
Speaker 2: on the road, but maybe we need to start giving
1:38:30
Speaker 2: Arkansas a little more credit question mark.
1:38:33
Speaker 3: Probably not.
1:38:34
Speaker 5: I mean, the sec definitely means more than conference USA
1:38:39
Speaker 5: to be fair.
1:38:39
Speaker 3: I can say that to be fair to Arkansas.
1:38:43
Speaker 2: And I can't believe I'm saying this because I thought
1:38:45
Speaker 2: that they looked awful. against the university of Utah. They're
1:38:49
Speaker 2: two and two right now. And the, and the two
1:38:51
Speaker 2: losses that we've seen Arkansas sustain are in back-to-back weeks
1:38:56
Speaker 2: against Utah at rice Eccles stadium.
1:38:58
Speaker 3: Right. And then against Georgia.
1:39:03
Speaker 6: Yeah.
1:39:04
Speaker 5: And the two top 15 teams, Georgia's second ranked team
1:39:07
Speaker 5: in the country.
1:39:08
Speaker 2: Those, those two games are both set up for not
1:39:13
Speaker 2: a lot of success for Arkansas, Utah early in the
1:39:16
Speaker 2: season on the road.
1:39:18
Speaker 3: I mean, come on.
1:39:20
Speaker 2: We knew that Arkansas wasn't going to win that game.
1:39:22
Speaker 2: By the way, they went in very similar fashion, similar scores,
1:39:25
Speaker 2: 43-10 to Utah, 45-17 to Georgia. So maybe all we
1:39:30
Speaker 2: actually know about Arkansas right now is that they look
1:39:33
Speaker 2: bad against top 15 teams.
1:39:36
Speaker 3: And then they beat North Alabama and they beat Tulsa.
1:39:40
Speaker 2: We'll find out more about Arkansas, I guess, when they're
1:39:42
Speaker 2: on the road against A & M this week.
1:39:44
Speaker 3: And then they've got Tennessee after that. I thought.
1:39:48
Speaker 5: I thought Tulsa was going to secondarily carry the flag
1:39:51
Speaker 5: for the big 12 and by beating Arkansas, you know
1:39:54
Speaker 5: what I mean? Like, Hey, look how strong the big
1:39:57
Speaker 5: 12 is at a group of six team that beat
1:40:00
Speaker 5: one of the best big 12 teams also beat Arkansas.
1:40:03
Speaker 3: Didn't happen. So I don't know.
1:40:07
Speaker 2: Who we're supposed to blame for something like this. As
1:40:09
Speaker 2: we head into a college football weekend last weekend, thankfully
1:40:13
Speaker 2: it didn't become a storyline in the game. Devin Dampier
1:40:17
Speaker 2: came in and he did his dishing with dev interview
1:40:19
Speaker 2: and you could hear in his voice, he was stuffy.
1:40:22
Speaker 3: He was, you know, a little, little horse and maybe.
1:40:25
Speaker 5: Maybe the same cold or whatever that all the rest
1:40:28
Speaker 5: of us have had.
1:40:29
Speaker 2: He was like, when he came in, usually we, you know,
1:40:33
Speaker 2: give him a little bro hug or whatever. He's like, nah, man,
1:40:36
Speaker 2: just the fist bump. He's like, I'm sick. I don't
1:40:37
Speaker 2: want to do it to you. And I was like,
1:40:39
Speaker 2: oh dang. And you could tell it wasn't like this
1:40:42
Speaker 2: kind of sick that makes you weak. It was just
1:40:44
Speaker 2: kind of the, oh, this is annoying. And I, I'm
1:40:46
Speaker 2: stuffy and I can't breathe or whatever. But he also
1:40:48
Speaker 2: said that like a bunch of guys on the team
1:40:51
Speaker 2: were dealing with it. Like a large number. And that
1:40:53
Speaker 2: is the nature of your proximity in college football. You're
1:40:58
Speaker 2: in the locker room together. You're making actual physical contact
1:41:02
Speaker 2: with one another in practice. The same is true with
1:41:05
Speaker 2: the lifts. You're, you know, you're working out together.
1:41:09
Speaker 10: Everyone's breathing.
1:41:10
Speaker 2: Everyone else is exhaust in your coffin. And like, You
1:41:14
Speaker 2: spread the germs when you're on a team. If something
1:41:17
Speaker 2: hits somebody on the team, it's going to hit multiple
1:41:19
Speaker 2: people on the team.
1:41:20
Speaker 3: Utah had that last week. Hopefully it's gone.
1:41:22
Speaker 2: Now that you're in the bi-week San Diego state is
1:41:25
Speaker 2: dealing with an outbreak of their own, but it's not
1:41:27
Speaker 2: like the common cold.
1:41:29
Speaker 3: It is mumps.
1:41:31
Speaker 8: Ooh.
1:41:33
Speaker 2: Now, a lot of you out there are just like,
1:41:34
Speaker 2: what the bleep is mumps.
1:41:36
Speaker 3: Exactly. It's the big, you get it. It's a big goiters, right?
1:41:41
Speaker 3: You get it.
1:41:43
Speaker 2: You get a vaccine against mumps when you're a little kid.
1:41:48
Speaker 2: When you're young, if you're so inclined. You get puffy
1:41:51
Speaker 2: cheeks and a tender jaw. Yeah, you do have to
1:41:53
Speaker 2: say that now. Fever, headache, muscle aches and tiredness, loss
1:41:57
Speaker 2: of appetite.
1:41:58
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a terrible thing to be getting when you're
1:42:01
Speaker 5: in college. Anytime that you're an adult or whatever. By
1:42:06
Speaker 5: the way, I have to say this since we're talking
1:42:08
Speaker 5: about the mumps. You into Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I do love
1:42:12
Speaker 5: me some Brooklyn Nine-Nine. That's probably the best episode. The
1:42:16
Speaker 5: Mumps episode is probably the best. And there's so many
1:42:19
Speaker 5: good episodes of that show. The Mumps episode is probably
1:42:22
Speaker 5: the best show and one of the funniest in television history.
1:42:26
Speaker 2: So your parotid gland swells up and makes it look
1:42:30
Speaker 2: like you have a lopsided face, like a big cheek
1:42:34
Speaker 2: and neck area.
1:42:36
Speaker 3: Yeah. So, by the way, putting on a helmet.
1:42:40
Speaker 2: over your swollen parotid gland would be excruciating, would really suck.
1:42:45
Speaker 2: So San Diego State dealing with an outbreak of the
1:42:48
Speaker 2: mumps that is apparently, as of whenever they put out
1:42:53
Speaker 2: this headline, 14 players have it. The initial availability report
1:43:00
Speaker 2: that they put out on Wednesday included three dozen players,
1:43:03
Speaker 2: 17 listed as doubtful.
1:43:05
Speaker 10: Oh my gosh.
1:43:08
Speaker 3: Because they can't get their helmet on. is the main thing, probably.
1:43:12
Speaker 2: So, by the way, they've been really good with injury,
1:43:15
Speaker 2: but they've got some mumps going on, man.
1:43:19
Speaker 3: Balthazar's a thirsty, you know what.
1:43:24
Speaker 2: Shout out to whatever, you know, Victorian doctor named the
1:43:29
Speaker 2: condition mumps, by the way, because they looked at somebody
1:43:34
Speaker 2: who had this big swollen face. Like, goodness gracious.
1:43:39
Speaker 3: You've got some lumps on your face. But they're not
1:43:42
Speaker 3: regular lumps. They're mumps. And that stuck. It just was
1:43:47
Speaker 3: mumps for the rest of forever.
1:43:49
Speaker 5: No, I like to think that it was the infected person,
1:43:51
Speaker 5: the unfortunate infected person, looking in the mirror and going,
1:43:56
Speaker 5: saying lumps, but it came out mumps.
1:43:58
Speaker 3: What's that on your face? A mump.
1:44:02
Speaker 2: What a wonderful name for this condition. And they're like, oh, yes,
1:44:06
Speaker 2: we're going to call it that from now on. And
1:44:08
Speaker 2: it stuck, and it worked, and now... That's what we're
1:44:10
Speaker 2: all calling it. And we always will.
1:44:12
Speaker 5: I thought I was following you. I'm just quoting that
1:44:15
Speaker 5: episode now from Brooklyn.
1:44:17
Speaker 3: That's too obscure. It's too obscure. Rewatch it. And when
1:44:24
Speaker 3: that line hits, I guarantee you will not stop laughing.
1:44:30
Speaker 2: Crazy stuff. Mumps back in college football. Another interesting thing
1:44:37
Speaker 2: in the college football world. I don't know if you
1:44:38
Speaker 2: guys saw this. Um, the university of Tennessee, because of
1:44:45
Speaker 2: apparently this was like a by-product of the presidential visit
1:44:50
Speaker 2: at Neyland stadium. And they were, they wanted to allow
1:44:54
Speaker 2: access early. So people could get in early so that
1:44:57
Speaker 2: the security wouldn't have as much to block and show
1:45:01
Speaker 2: like right around kickoff time when the president was expected
1:45:03
Speaker 2: to show up.
1:45:04
Speaker 5: So they, they seem that they learned from the Knicks game.
1:45:07
Speaker 5: Is what it would seem.
1:45:09
Speaker 4: Seemingly.
1:45:09
Speaker 3: Based on that.
1:45:10
Speaker 2: So apparently everyone loved it so much that they're going
1:45:15
Speaker 2: to do something called a happy hour for the next,
1:45:20
Speaker 2: I guess, for the foreseeable future. Three hours before kickoff,
1:45:26
Speaker 2: they open the gates. And beer and concessions in that
1:45:33
Speaker 2: happy hour, the first hour, so three hours before the
1:45:37
Speaker 2: the game actually kicks off. You can go into the stadium.
1:45:41
Speaker 2: You can take your seat. You can go get concessions
1:45:44
Speaker 2: and beer and concessions are 50% off during.
1:45:47
Speaker 3: That happy hour. Oh my gosh.
1:45:49
Speaker 2: So Tennessee is creating a promotion at their games now
1:45:54
Speaker 2: where they are basically encouraging everyone to go into the
1:45:57
Speaker 2: stadium and get lit on discounted beer.
1:46:01
Speaker 10: Before three hours.
1:46:03
Speaker 2: Before The game actually kicks off.
1:46:05
Speaker 5: My question is, what are they going to do about
1:46:08
Speaker 5: the empty tailgate in the parking lot? Because I'm sure
1:46:14
Speaker 5: there's lots of people who tailgate in Knoxville who don't
1:46:18
Speaker 5: have tickets to the game.
1:46:19
Speaker 3: I'm sure that's a thing.
1:46:20
Speaker 5: But, like, I'm sure a lot of these people that
1:46:24
Speaker 5: have tickets that normally tailgate are like, I don't need to.
1:46:28
Speaker 3: Everything's basically free. I can pregame in the stadium.
1:46:34
Speaker 2: So the university offered half price on all concessions, including beer,
1:46:40
Speaker 2: which is normally between $ 10 and $ 16 per serving for
1:46:44
Speaker 2: the first hour after gates open. And it was the
1:46:46
Speaker 2: best concessions day ever at the university of Tennessee. So
1:46:53
Speaker 2: they're just sticking with it. By the way, you know
1:46:56
Speaker 2: who the athletic director is at Tennessee?
1:46:59
Speaker 4: I do not.
1:47:00
Speaker 2: Danny white. Oh, Danny white. formerly a coach executive with
1:47:06
Speaker 2: the Utah blaze. Oh, shout out.
1:47:10
Speaker 5: Pro football legend, Utah pro football legend, Danny white.
1:47:16
Speaker 2: So if you have season tickets or any kind of
1:47:19
Speaker 2: ticket in Knoxville, get there three hours early, head in
1:47:23
Speaker 2: and gorge yourself on churros, pretzels, nachos, hot dogs for
1:47:29
Speaker 2: half off. Uh, that goes for the beer as well.
1:47:32
Speaker 2: This is going to make for a raucous game day atmosphere.
1:47:35
Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh, yes. All right.
1:47:38
Speaker 2: Speaking of raucous game day atmospheres, let's talk about what
1:47:41
Speaker 2: we expect tonight at the Delta Center. Tom Callahan to
1:47:44
Speaker 2: talk a little Utah Mammoth on the Sean O'Connell Show.
1:47:47
Speaker 3: ESPN 700 and 92.1 FM.
1:47:53
Speaker 7: You're listening to The Sean O'Connell Show, your source for
1:47:57
Speaker 7: the best youth football coverage. Here's O.C. from the Murdoch
1:48:00
Speaker 7: Hyundai Studio of ESPN 700 at 92.1 FM.
1:48:21
Speaker 3: Welcome back to the Sean O'Connell Show. Reminder for all of.
1:48:24
Speaker 2: You looking to go to UFC 332 at the Delta
1:48:27
Speaker 2: Center on Saturday night. You can head to Dave &
1:48:30
Speaker 2: Buster's at the Gateway tonight or tomorrow. Anytime ahead of
1:48:35
Speaker 2: Friday night's raffle, they're going to raffle off a chance
1:48:38
Speaker 2: to win tickets for the UFC 332 event, which, of course,
1:48:42
Speaker 2: will take place on Saturday. No purchase is necessary. But
1:48:46
Speaker 2: if you don't win the tickets, head back down to
1:48:48
Speaker 2: Dave & Buster's watch all the fights at the gateway,
1:48:51
Speaker 2: play the games in between. They also have a UFC pass.
1:48:55
Speaker 2: You can buy it. David Buster's a UFC membership where
1:48:58
Speaker 2: you pay 50 bucks. You get a UFC collectible power card.
1:49:02
Speaker 2: That's preloaded with $ 35 for games and 50% off games
1:49:08
Speaker 2: and 20% off food and beverages during every UFC fight event.
1:49:11
Speaker 2: So get it for this one, go back for the
1:49:14
Speaker 2: next one and the next one and the next one,
1:49:15
Speaker 2: take advantage of the discounts and, Dave and Buster's at
1:49:18
Speaker 2: the Gateway in downtown Salt Lake City. UFC 332, fight
1:49:22
Speaker 2: night done right by your friends over at Dave and Buster's.
1:49:24
Speaker 2: The raffle will happen Friday night, so get down there beforehand.
1:49:28
Speaker 2: In fact, here's a good idea for you. You're coming
1:49:31
Speaker 2: downtown for the Mammoth game tonight, season opener. Head over
1:49:36
Speaker 2: to Dave and Buster's, put your name in the raffle,
1:49:38
Speaker 2: walk back over to the Delta Center and watch the
1:49:42
Speaker 2: Mammoth beat up on the Chicago Blackhawks. Joining us to
1:49:45
Speaker 2: talk about that, Friend of the program, Mammoth Insider, Tom Callahan.
1:49:51
Speaker 2: Welcome back, Tom Callahan.
1:49:53
Speaker 8: How are you?
1:49:54
Speaker 6: Oh, my goodness. It has been a minute, hasn't it?
1:49:57
Speaker 6: Thanks for having me back.
1:49:58
Speaker 2: I appreciate you giving us some time again, host of
1:50:02
Speaker 2: Locked on Mammoth, and obviously a lot to talk about.
1:50:05
Speaker 3: With this team.
1:50:07
Speaker 2: Really interesting off-season moves, including an announcement just a couple
1:50:12
Speaker 2: of days ago of the opening day roster where Daniil
1:50:15
Speaker 2: Boot and Dmitry Simishev, some of the young stars that
1:50:18
Speaker 2: started to make their mark last year, are going to
1:50:21
Speaker 2: be with the big club, For game one, I think
1:50:25
Speaker 2: this was kind of anticipated and expected within the halls
1:50:28
Speaker 2: of that building and with a lot of the fan base.
1:50:31
Speaker 2: But I wanted to start there with those two young
1:50:33
Speaker 2: guys being added to the mix. What kind of impact
1:50:37
Speaker 2: should they have on this season, especially in these early goings?
1:50:41
Speaker 6: Boy, it's exciting right now in Mammoth Land. And I
1:50:44
Speaker 6: know we'll talk about a bunch of the other stuff later,
1:50:46
Speaker 6: but the evolution of both Boot and Simishev is highly anticipated.
1:50:52
Speaker 6: We've been waiting for this for a while. Last year,
1:50:54
Speaker 6: I think there was a lot of hope that it
1:50:55
Speaker 6: could be last season that they made the jump full-time
1:50:59
Speaker 6: to the NHL. Never quite what worked out for either
1:51:01
Speaker 6: one of them. They both played in the high twenties
1:51:04
Speaker 6: as far as games, but didn't really find that full-time role.
1:51:08
Speaker 6: And especially Simishev, I think they were excited to have
1:51:12
Speaker 6: him on that opening day roster last year. But things just,
1:51:16
Speaker 6: It didn't quite go that way.
1:51:17
Speaker 4: Okay.
1:51:17
Speaker 6: So, you know, they get extended time in Tucson, their
1:51:20
Speaker 6: development continues. And I think this year in the preseason,
1:51:24
Speaker 6: we really saw that both players have made significant strides
1:51:29
Speaker 6: in their developments. You know, another year of North American pro,
1:51:33
Speaker 6: which is essential for guys coming over from playing in
1:51:35
Speaker 6: the KHL, which they both did really, I think helped
1:51:39
Speaker 6: their game. And now they appear to be NHL ready
1:51:42
Speaker 6: on a full-time basis.
1:51:45
Speaker 2: Another new newcomer on this roster and a big acquisition.
1:51:50
Speaker 2: Trochek comes in and it looks like he's going to
1:51:53
Speaker 2: be paired. They've already figured out the lines and things
1:51:55
Speaker 2: like that. Do you like where the initial vision for
1:52:00
Speaker 2: Vincent Trochek and his ability to contribute seems to lie
1:52:03
Speaker 2: with Coach Baer?
1:52:05
Speaker 6: What's really cool about Vincent Trocek is that he has
1:52:09
Speaker 6: the ability to plug in in so many different places
1:52:13
Speaker 6: and make an impact up and down the lineup. And we, we,
1:52:17
Speaker 6: all summer long over locked on mammoth about where he
1:52:20
Speaker 6: could slot in because there were so many options. Do
1:52:23
Speaker 6: you keep the top line intact from last year or
1:52:26
Speaker 6: do you start moving pieces around? Do you try him
1:52:30
Speaker 6: at center? Do you put them on the wing? There
1:52:33
Speaker 6: are a lot of places he could go. What were
1:52:35
Speaker 6: some of the other players coming in like Anders Lee?
1:52:37
Speaker 6: What was his impact going to be? But starting him
1:52:39
Speaker 6: on the top line, putting him in a place where
1:52:41
Speaker 6: he can maybe try to establish some chemistry like he
1:52:44
Speaker 6: used to have at the Rangers with Chris Crider. Those
1:52:47
Speaker 6: two were just unbelievable together. And I think that putting
1:52:51
Speaker 6: him on a line with Schmaltz and Keller, at least
1:52:54
Speaker 6: to start the season, you now have both Schmaltz and
1:52:57
Speaker 6: Trochek who can take draws. So you can have a
1:53:01
Speaker 6: very good chance of starting with the puck. Trochek was
1:53:03
Speaker 6: great in the face off circle, but which Utah has
1:53:06
Speaker 6: not been great in the soft circle the last couple
1:53:08
Speaker 6: of years, makes them better there. I really like it.
1:53:11
Speaker 6: I think if you're giving your top line the chance
1:53:14
Speaker 6: to start with the puck more often than not, that's amazing.
1:53:17
Speaker 6: And Trochek's going to create a little more space for
1:53:19
Speaker 6: those guys. Clayton Keller, I am not shy at saying
1:53:23
Speaker 6: he's got to crack at 100 points this year. And
1:53:25
Speaker 6: if this line really comes together, that's going to be
1:53:27
Speaker 6: a big reason why.
1:53:29
Speaker 3: Let's talk about the captain.
1:53:31
Speaker 2: Last year, for some very understandable reasons, there was some inconsistencies,
1:53:36
Speaker 2: and there's an expectation that this whole team is going
1:53:41
Speaker 2: to be better this year than they were last year,
1:53:43
Speaker 2: and they were pretty good last year. Feels like it's
1:53:46
Speaker 2: got to start with the captain from a sort of
1:53:50
Speaker 2: microcosm level. What does he need to do better as
1:53:53
Speaker 2: an individual in order to lead the charge on this
1:53:56
Speaker 2: team improving?
1:53:58
Speaker 6: I feel like Clayton Keller is still very underrated and
1:54:01
Speaker 6: really the national hockey media just really doesn't pay attention
1:54:06
Speaker 6: to him or, or for that matter, Utah, as much
1:54:09
Speaker 6: as they should. Now, last year you talked about there
1:54:11
Speaker 6: were some extenuating circumstances, and he was dealing with a
1:54:15
Speaker 6: lot personally off the ice. So, yes, I can understand
1:54:19
Speaker 6: things like that can affect your level of play, and
1:54:24
Speaker 6: it's tough. And I would never want to guess what
1:54:27
Speaker 6: he had to deal with and how he just personally
1:54:30
Speaker 6: dealt with it. I think coming back in this year,
1:54:32
Speaker 6: he's got a chance to be refocused, was 90 points
1:54:35
Speaker 6: two years ago. And that's why I say 100 points
1:54:38
Speaker 6: is not out of reach this year, especially with the
1:54:40
Speaker 6: addition of Trocek onto that line. But the thing that
1:54:43
Speaker 6: Clayton Keller doesn't have to do anymore, and this is
1:54:46
Speaker 6: what will make the difference for him, he doesn't really
1:54:49
Speaker 6: have to do it all himself. And I think at
1:54:51
Speaker 6: times last year, even with Gunther and Cooley and Kraus
1:54:55
Speaker 6: and those guys around him, I felt like at times
1:54:57
Speaker 6: he put a lot of pressure on himself to have
1:55:00
Speaker 6: to do it himself. This year, instead of Utah having
1:55:02
Speaker 6: a really good top six, I believe they have a
1:55:04
Speaker 6: good top nine, meaning their first three lines can all
1:55:08
Speaker 6: do some damage. They are much deeper than they were.
1:55:11
Speaker 6: And so that's going to take some of that pressure
1:55:14
Speaker 6: off of Clayton Keller to be able to produce and,
1:55:16
Speaker 6: I think, free him up to play a better brand
1:55:19
Speaker 6: of hockey.
1:55:22
Speaker 3: I put the poll question out today.
1:55:24
Speaker 2: Who's going to be the leading goal scorer for this
1:55:26
Speaker 2: Mammoth squad starting hopefully tonight? And, you know, they've got
1:55:32
Speaker 2: high expectations for Cooley, for Gunther. We saw Schmaltz have
1:55:36
Speaker 2: kind of a goal scoring explosion. It's always nice to
1:55:39
Speaker 2: see the captain get involved there, although he doesn't have
1:55:41
Speaker 2: to score a ton of goals to be effective. If
1:55:44
Speaker 2: I'm asking you that same question, how are you answering.
1:55:47
Speaker 3: The poll today?
1:55:49
Speaker 6: Dylan Gunther is my goal scoring leader. Clayton Keller is
1:55:53
Speaker 6: my leading point getter. But I think that Gunther has
1:55:57
Speaker 6: a chance to challenge for 50 goals this year. I
1:56:00
Speaker 6: really believe coming off his 40 last year, he's going
1:56:04
Speaker 6: to get more power play time. And now there's more
1:56:06
Speaker 6: talent to distribute pucks on that power play. I think
1:56:09
Speaker 6: the power play will be better this year and should
1:56:13
Speaker 6: be top third of the league. It's going to need
1:56:16
Speaker 6: some time to come together because there are so many
1:56:18
Speaker 6: new parts and pieces to it. But I really expect
1:56:21
Speaker 6: that he is going to be not only the goal
1:56:23
Speaker 6: scoring leader for this team, but I think he's a
1:56:25
Speaker 6: player who's got future captain written all over him. I
1:56:29
Speaker 6: really like gone through the way he carries himself on
1:56:31
Speaker 6: the ice, the way he inserts himself into, you know,
1:56:34
Speaker 6: the little nose to nose post whistle scrums. I like
1:56:39
Speaker 6: a lot about his game and I think he's going
1:56:42
Speaker 6: to be the guy that, you know, really is able
1:56:44
Speaker 6: to lead this team. But yeah, as far as putting
1:56:46
Speaker 6: actual pucks in the net for sure, mark it down.
1:56:49
Speaker 6: He's my guy.
1:56:53
Speaker 2: We've talked over the last couple of years, I guess,
1:56:56
Speaker 2: about the physicality, the defensive presence, the blue line, and
1:57:01
Speaker 2: what they are adding or what they're not adding enough
1:57:04
Speaker 2: of to this team. You talk to Bill Armstrong, you
1:57:08
Speaker 2: talk to Coach Baer, and they want this to be
1:57:11
Speaker 2: a team that can beat you up. The philosophy and
1:57:16
Speaker 2: the personnel haven't always matched up, and there's There's not
1:57:19
Speaker 2: a ton of fresh faces on that blue line, but
1:57:22
Speaker 2: what is your expectation of the defense this year?
1:57:27
Speaker 6: It will be interesting. Without Sean Dursey, we get a
1:57:30
Speaker 6: first look at a full season of Mackenzie Wiegert, who
1:57:33
Speaker 6: I think does fit that physical description. He's a guy
1:57:39
Speaker 6: who I think can make an 84-game impact. And, you know,
1:57:43
Speaker 6: provided everybody stays healthy, of course, which is the caveat.
1:57:47
Speaker 6: I really like the second D pair of Schmidt and Marino.
1:57:50
Speaker 6: I think those guys are just quietly go about doing
1:57:53
Speaker 6: their jobs and they do their jobs very well. They
1:57:55
Speaker 6: shut down a lot of, you know, highly skilled forwards
1:57:59
Speaker 6: on the other team. Really, to me, the interesting question
1:58:02
Speaker 6: on this team is going to be the five, six.
1:58:05
Speaker 6: Right now they're carrying seven defensemen. I think Nick DeSimone
1:58:08
Speaker 6: has been one of the best pickups that this team
1:58:11
Speaker 6: has acquired since they moved to Utah Simashev coming into
1:58:15
Speaker 6: his own now this year is going to be a
1:58:17
Speaker 6: guy who I'm looking on to make a mark and
1:58:19
Speaker 6: one person we haven't talked a lot about and we're
1:58:22
Speaker 6: even guilty of it on the show but he's easy
1:58:24
Speaker 6: to overlook unfortunately is Andrew Peek Pete comes over from
1:58:27
Speaker 6: Boston on a one-year, $ 1 million essentially prove-it contract, can
1:58:32
Speaker 6: be a bigger, more physical defenseman, has NHL experience, I
1:58:37
Speaker 6: think can make that impact and play those physical minutes
1:58:41
Speaker 6: for the Utah Mammoth on nights he does draw into
1:58:44
Speaker 6: the lineup. And maybe he can work his way into
1:58:48
Speaker 6: an everyday role because I really do think it is
1:58:49
Speaker 6: that three-way battle to see who's going to be 5'6
1:58:52
Speaker 6: every single night. And between DeSimone and Pete, Those two
1:58:57
Speaker 6: are probably the ones who rotate the most. I don't
1:58:59
Speaker 6: think Simishev gets a lot of nights off this year.
1:59:01
Speaker 6: So I really think he could be the dark horse
1:59:06
Speaker 6: to impress and help them be even more physical.
1:59:09
Speaker 2: With some of the off-season acquisitions, some of the new names,
1:59:13
Speaker 2: are special teams going to change at all in your mind?
1:59:16
Speaker 6: Power play definitely will. Power play, you're adding a Trocek,
1:59:21
Speaker 6: you're adding a Lee. Anders Lee is another guy who...
1:59:25
Speaker 6: could easily slot in on a second unit. He does
1:59:27
Speaker 6: not mind going to the front of the net and
1:59:29
Speaker 6: just being an absolute pain. He's even going to get
1:59:32
Speaker 6: the second-line minutes along with Gunther and Cooley five-on-five that
1:59:36
Speaker 6: I think is going to give those guys, speaking of which,
1:59:38
Speaker 6: more space, just like Trocek will generate space on his unit.
1:59:42
Speaker 6: And that's with Lawson Kraus now sliding down to the
1:59:44
Speaker 6: third line, and Kraus is a tough cookie too, and
1:59:47
Speaker 6: he's a guy who can do that. So, yeah, it's
1:59:49
Speaker 6: going to take a little while to gel, but those
1:59:51
Speaker 6: new forwards on the power play is very exciting, plus
1:59:53
Speaker 6: Daniil Booth. if he can kind of get it going
1:59:57
Speaker 6: and find some scoring touch, he will earn more and
1:59:59
Speaker 6: more power play time as well. So I think that
2:00:02
Speaker 6: that's going to be absolutely huge. And then as far
2:00:04
Speaker 6: as the penalty kill goes, I expect, again, those bottom
2:00:07
Speaker 6: three D we talked about, they're going to try to
2:00:09
Speaker 6: eat some PK minutes. Obviously they're going to run Schmidt
2:00:12
Speaker 6: and Marino out there a lot for that situation as well. So,
2:00:16
Speaker 6: you know, I don't know that it's going to change
2:00:18
Speaker 6: on the PK so much as it's, you know, just
2:00:20
Speaker 6: going to be, hey, we have to not only keep
2:00:23
Speaker 6: up the hard work, but improve the way we're doing
2:00:25
Speaker 6: things and limit the breakdowns that last year could be
2:00:28
Speaker 6: a little frustrating.
2:00:30
Speaker 2: Tom Callahan, Mammoth Insiders, our guest here on the Sean
2:00:33
Speaker 2: O'Connell Show. You've probably already heard a lot of Tom
2:00:36
Speaker 2: as the host of Mammoth Daily. We're locked on, Mammoth,
2:00:41
Speaker 2: excuse me. we're looking at a season now where the
2:00:44
Speaker 2: expectations are incredibly high because of what happened last year.
2:00:48
Speaker 2: And because of our just kind of like new found
2:00:53
Speaker 2: optimism as an NHL fan base, that it's still very
2:00:56
Speaker 2: fresh for there's been an upward trajectory since this team
2:01:00
Speaker 2: became part of our sports community. And the expectation is
2:01:03
Speaker 2: that that trajectory is going to continue, but coaches and
2:01:07
Speaker 2: players will tell you, look, getting there as hard, staying
2:01:10
Speaker 2: there is even harder and, Getting further and further into
2:01:12
Speaker 2: these playoffs is even harder. Last year, it was playoffs
2:01:15
Speaker 2: or bust. They checked that box. It felt like you're
2:01:18
Speaker 2: playing with house money, and you're out after the first round.
2:01:22
Speaker 2: What's the best way to lay out expectations this year, Tom?
2:01:27
Speaker 6: I think this year, the continuation of the evolution is
2:01:30
Speaker 6: winning a series and making an impact in the next series.
2:01:36
Speaker 6: It's time for this team. Regular season benchmark is to
2:01:39
Speaker 6: not be the wild card. It is to be one
2:01:42
Speaker 6: of the top three teams in the central division.
2:01:45
Speaker 10: It is doable.
2:01:46
Speaker 6: Is Colorado a powerhouse again? Yeah, but Utah has played
2:01:50
Speaker 6: Colorado well and they play them close. And if they
2:01:52
Speaker 6: can continue to do that and now do it with
2:01:54
Speaker 6: a better roster, I think they can steal some points
2:01:57
Speaker 6: from that series. We have a lot of question marks
2:02:00
Speaker 6: in the Central. Chicago, St. Louis, Winnipeg, all question marks. Dallas,
2:02:06
Speaker 6: to me, is still a bit of a question mark
2:02:07
Speaker 6: as well because the Stars had some off-season turbulence. And
2:02:13
Speaker 6: I'm not quite sure why, because we haven't heard a
2:02:15
Speaker 6: lot externally about it, but there were a few players
2:02:18
Speaker 6: who wanted to leave. Not all of them did, but
2:02:21
Speaker 6: to me, I kind of wonder what the undercurrent is
2:02:23
Speaker 6: there that we're not hearing. And then Minnesota, of course,
2:02:25
Speaker 6: is going to be very good, but Utah's in a
2:02:28
Speaker 6: spot where, yeah, finishing in the top three of the
2:02:30
Speaker 6: central regular season would be a nice bar. I will
2:02:34
Speaker 6: absolutely put it there. And then winning that first round
2:02:37
Speaker 6: playoff series, making an impact in the second one. Hey, remember,
2:02:41
Speaker 6: They were a couple of double overtime coin flips away
2:02:45
Speaker 6: from eliminating an eventual Stanley cup finalist. It was closer
2:02:48
Speaker 6: than people seem to remember through the lens of time,
2:02:51
Speaker 6: just because Vegas made the final, but Utah gave them
2:02:54
Speaker 6: a really good run for their money.
2:02:55
Speaker 3: They absolutely did.
2:02:56
Speaker 2: I mean, a couple of things go differently, an extra
2:02:59
Speaker 2: 90 seconds, or you play better for an extra 90
2:03:01
Speaker 2: seconds and you're up three one. I mean, there's, there's
2:03:03
Speaker 2: a lot of things that could have gone differently in
2:03:05
Speaker 2: that series, but I think we accept those as kind
2:03:07
Speaker 2: of growing pains of a young franchise and and whatnot
2:03:11
Speaker 2: and and look there's the front office is sort of
2:03:16
Speaker 2: made their statements and said all right bears our guy
2:03:18
Speaker 2: an extension that goes with that uh... they've given contracts
2:03:24
Speaker 2: and which are now very team friendly contracts to what
2:03:27
Speaker 2: I think we can consider the core of this team.
2:03:30
Speaker 2: And it feels like the vision is coming into shape
2:03:33
Speaker 2: pretty nicely, maybe even a little bit ahead of schedule
2:03:37
Speaker 2: to stay on that schedule. You needed to actually figure
2:03:40
Speaker 2: out something in the backup goaltending space. Did they address
2:03:44
Speaker 2: that in a way that makes sense to you, Tom?
2:03:47
Speaker 6: I think bringing in Sebastian Kosa, it's interesting talking to my,
2:03:50
Speaker 6: my friends that I know in and around the Detroit
2:03:52
Speaker 6: market and that team, they, they were kind of a
2:03:56
Speaker 6: mixed bag on the reviews. Some of them are real,
2:03:58
Speaker 6: real high on them. Couldn't understand why Detroit suddenly kind
2:04:02
Speaker 6: of just really gave up on them. Literally after really
2:04:06
Speaker 6: one and three quarter good seasons, he had an abysmal
2:04:10
Speaker 6: March in the American hockey league and just never got
2:04:14
Speaker 6: his net back. So that happened. And there's other reasons
2:04:20
Speaker 6: probably internally that Detroit said, all right, well, we have
2:04:23
Speaker 6: yet another young goaltender. Maybe it's time we move on.
2:04:25
Speaker 6: And so they did. He ends up in Utah. he's
2:04:28
Speaker 6: very motivated in Utah to prove that he is an
2:04:31
Speaker 6: NHL goaltender. This being his first real kick at the can,
2:04:35
Speaker 6: I expect there'll be a little bit of inconsistency in
2:04:37
Speaker 6: his game, but I really like what I saw in
2:04:39
Speaker 6: the preseason. I think he's very motivated to do well.
2:04:43
Speaker 6: I think so far he's, he's handled the workload that
2:04:46
Speaker 6: he's been given and look poised, look pretty solid positionally.
2:04:50
Speaker 6: And I think he really is going to challenge veg
2:04:53
Speaker 6: for that number one role in as the season goes on,
2:04:56
Speaker 6: the only question of course, and we talk about this
2:04:58
Speaker 6: every year is how much is Andre tourney gonna run
2:05:03
Speaker 6: his number one goaltender. And, you know, I'm not the
2:05:06
Speaker 6: only one saying this, even the national guys kind of
2:05:08
Speaker 6: are like, Hey, it'd be nice if, you know, veg
2:05:11
Speaker 6: didn't play quite so many games. He might be a
2:05:14
Speaker 6: little fresher down the stretch and into the playoffs, but
2:05:16
Speaker 6: that's just not been the MO. So I don't know if,
2:05:21
Speaker 6: And I can't explain to you why, but I would
2:05:22
Speaker 6: really like to see Kosa be able to help manage
2:05:25
Speaker 6: that workload and change that equation a little bit because
2:05:28
Speaker 6: I think that will lead them to more playoff success.
2:05:33
Speaker 2: I just alluded to the team-friendly nature of some of
2:05:35
Speaker 2: these contracts. And as we've looked at some of the
2:05:38
Speaker 2: other guys around the league getting extended, some of the
2:05:40
Speaker 2: other young rising stars getting extended for, I mean, quite frankly,
2:05:45
Speaker 2: just a higher price point. What kind of grade should
2:05:49
Speaker 2: we be giving the front office for the Utah Mammoth
2:05:52
Speaker 2: and for Bill Armstrong getting guys like Schmaltz done and
2:05:56
Speaker 2: Cooley especially and Gunther especially, some of the young core
2:06:00
Speaker 2: at a team-friendly value?
2:06:03
Speaker 6: It almost looks like they had a crystal hockey puck
2:06:05
Speaker 6: in some cases. They, I mean, they looked into the future,
2:06:09
Speaker 6: knew that there was going to be a lot of
2:06:10
Speaker 6: money available. The cap would rise. And I mean, we
2:06:15
Speaker 6: just heard projections for a couple of seasons down the
2:06:17
Speaker 6: road of the cap going up yet again by another
2:06:20
Speaker 6: $ 10 million or so. It's kind of crazy. It's almost
2:06:24
Speaker 6: monopoly money at this point. So the fact that GM
2:06:27
Speaker 6: Bill Armstrong was able to get what at the time
2:06:30
Speaker 6: you're like, okay, well, this is, probably manageable to spread
2:06:34
Speaker 6: the wealth among these players the way he's doing it,
2:06:36
Speaker 6: but you hope it doesn't bite you. When they were
2:06:39
Speaker 6: able to unload JJ Paterka's contract and move him, that
2:06:44
Speaker 6: money became available. Then they were able to kind of
2:06:46
Speaker 6: really set themselves up for the next couple of seasons.
2:06:51
Speaker 6: I really like where this team's at. I think he's
2:06:53
Speaker 6: done a great job managing the payroll and, you know,
2:06:57
Speaker 6: seeing and believing in, look, when you draft and develop
2:07:00
Speaker 6: a guy, everybody likes their own draft picks, but they've
2:07:04
Speaker 6: come to fruition. That's the other reason why when you
2:07:07
Speaker 6: invest in your own players and you say, Hey, we're
2:07:09
Speaker 6: going to commit to you. We want you to commit
2:07:11
Speaker 6: to us. Here's the dollars. Here's the years. And then
2:07:15
Speaker 6: it pans out and it's panned out now three or
2:07:17
Speaker 6: four different times and you look really smart. And that's
2:07:22
Speaker 6: what Utah has been able to do is draft and develop. Well,
2:07:25
Speaker 6: turn those entry-level contracts into very nice paydays for those players.
2:07:29
Speaker 6: But thankfully I will see all of this before this
2:07:33
Speaker 6: incredible zaniness we're seeing now 16 and $ 20 million. This
2:07:39
Speaker 6: is crazy. The next time all this comes around, I mean,
2:07:42
Speaker 6: Clayton Keller is gotta be like in his chops right now,
2:07:45
Speaker 6: because when he comes due, oh my goodness, Yes.
2:07:49
Speaker 2: That's a, that is one of the things that's so
2:07:52
Speaker 2: funny about contracts in sports.
2:07:55
Speaker 3: It's great. If you're the guy right now, it's even better.
2:07:57
Speaker 2: If you're the guy a year from now or two
2:07:59
Speaker 2: years from now, because those numbers are going to get bigger.
2:08:02
Speaker 3: It's pretty crazy to see.
2:08:03
Speaker 9: Yes.
2:08:05
Speaker 2: Were you surprised to see Iginla, Dan Oye, any of
2:08:09
Speaker 2: the young cats that impressed with their development not make
2:08:14
Speaker 2: the roster, not make the opening night roster?
2:08:18
Speaker 6: I was pulling for TJ again, let it make it.
2:08:20
Speaker 6: I really was. I would have loved to see him
2:08:23
Speaker 6: in a mammoth uniform for opening night, but I also
2:08:27
Speaker 6: understand why he's not. And you know, one of the
2:08:30
Speaker 6: players we haven't talked about was Chris Tana getting waved.
2:08:34
Speaker 6: I think this is the message for the, the Utah
2:08:38
Speaker 6: fan base is that your team got a lot better
2:08:42
Speaker 6: this summer. And you're going to see it on the ice.
2:08:46
Speaker 6: But the other way you know is that, yes, you
2:08:49
Speaker 6: had two essentially rookies graduating, not technical rookies, but Simishev
2:08:53
Speaker 6: and Boot. graduate to the NHL now on what we
2:08:56
Speaker 6: hope is a full-time basis. The fact that all of
2:08:58
Speaker 6: those young prospects are in Tucson and we'll be playing
2:09:02
Speaker 6: in the American hockey league. That's how good and how
2:09:05
Speaker 6: deep this franchise has become. So yeah, I was rooting
2:09:08
Speaker 6: for him. I wanted to see him make it, but
2:09:10
Speaker 6: I understand why he didn't. And I think that that
2:09:14
Speaker 6: core now being able to grow together and improve together
2:09:18
Speaker 6: in the American hockey league. And quite frankly, I expect
2:09:21
Speaker 6: that team to be really darn good this year. That
2:09:25
Speaker 6: now extends the window because the window opens really fully
2:09:29
Speaker 6: this year for Utah to become a Stanley Cup contender. Now,
2:09:33
Speaker 6: instead of the window being open for three years or
2:09:36
Speaker 6: four years, if those players learn to win together and
2:09:39
Speaker 6: they come up together, the window becomes five and six
2:09:42
Speaker 6: and seven years because that is now your second core
2:09:46
Speaker 6: that is going to follow the one that's here now.
2:09:51
Speaker 3: Who are this year's biggest risers in the NHL?
2:09:57
Speaker 6: Well, that's a good one. It's kind of funny because
2:10:01
Speaker 6: you think about a lot of the teams that aren't
2:10:03
Speaker 6: coming up or the ones that might struggle or, you know,
2:10:06
Speaker 6: not do so well. I think Florida is going to
2:10:08
Speaker 6: be right back in front of everybody this year. They
2:10:10
Speaker 6: ended up with a, you know, a goaltending loss. switch
2:10:14
Speaker 6: that ended with Jacob Markstrom and they did get better.
2:10:17
Speaker 6: They dealt with a lot of injuries last year. I
2:10:19
Speaker 6: think Florida is right back in the Stanley cup contention
2:10:21
Speaker 6: this year. That's going to be a big one. I'm
2:10:25
Speaker 6: kind of curious and maybe a little, I'm not sure
2:10:29
Speaker 6: how I feel about the Toronto Maple Leafs, but they
2:10:32
Speaker 6: have a chance to do some damage in the East,
2:10:34
Speaker 6: in the West. It's interesting to say that you think
2:10:38
Speaker 6: Colorado is going to be a riser, but I think
2:10:39
Speaker 6: Colorado was so embarrassed by the way their season ended
2:10:42
Speaker 6: in the playoffs last year. They just fell apart. And
2:10:46
Speaker 6: I think that Colorado is actually going to be even
2:10:49
Speaker 6: more driven to be better. Minnesota is going to be better.
2:10:53
Speaker 6: And quite frankly, Utah, Utah is probably going to be
2:10:56
Speaker 6: the actual biggest riser in the West. I am extremely
2:10:59
Speaker 6: high on the mammoth this year coming into this season.
2:11:02
Speaker 6: I have very high expectations for them. So, I mean,
2:11:05
Speaker 6: I know it's the hometown team, but I'm telling you this,
2:11:09
Speaker 6: this is a great looking team heading into the year.
2:11:12
Speaker 2: If you had to look into your crystal hockey puck,
2:11:15
Speaker 2: how does the Winnipeg Connor Hellebuck impasse get resolved?
2:11:20
Speaker 4: Oh, boy.
2:11:22
Speaker 6: You know what? Kevin Shevelday off the GM of the
2:11:25
Speaker 6: Jets has shown in the past he's not in a
2:11:27
Speaker 6: hurry to do anything. I think he is more than
2:11:31
Speaker 6: happy to let Hellebuck start missing paychecks and get a
2:11:35
Speaker 6: little antsy about it. I don't think Hellebuck plays for
2:11:38
Speaker 6: the Jets again. I just don't think he does. The
2:11:41
Speaker 6: problem is it came out not too long ago that
2:11:46
Speaker 6: it was offered before Florida was picked up Markstrom, they
2:11:51
Speaker 6: offered two roster players, one of whom was Evan Rodriguez
2:11:54
Speaker 6: and two first round picks to Winnipeg for Hellebuck. And
2:11:58
Speaker 6: the Jets said no. So the Jets are looking for three,
2:12:03
Speaker 6: maybe four roster players, and they're not going to get that.
2:12:07
Speaker 6: And so this is where it depends who's going to
2:12:10
Speaker 6: be more stubborn. At some point, yes, Hellebuck's going to
2:12:14
Speaker 6: lose money. But the more he sits out, the lower
2:12:17
Speaker 6: that value gets to the rest of the league. But
2:12:20
Speaker 6: the Jets, if they're really dug in on three roster players,
2:12:23
Speaker 6: I don't see anybody giving them that for Connor Hellebach.
2:12:26
Speaker 6: I really don't. And so maybe this one's going to
2:12:30
Speaker 6: sit in faster for months.
2:12:34
Speaker 2: How serious do you think the Mammoth were in those
2:12:36
Speaker 2: conversations when they did happen?
2:12:38
Speaker 4: Pretty serious.
2:12:39
Speaker 6: I think they were absolutely in on it because the
2:12:41
Speaker 6: mammoth knew that. And I still feel like if they,
2:12:45
Speaker 6: if they brought in Connor Hellebuck as their number one
2:12:47
Speaker 6: goaltender right now, these guys catapult into probably our top
2:12:53
Speaker 6: six or eight Stanley cup favorites. Not that they don't
2:12:57
Speaker 6: have good goaltending, but I think they, if they had
2:13:02
Speaker 6: an absolute bonafide stud Vezina trophy winner, that you have
2:13:06
Speaker 6: to put them into the Stanley Cup conversation immediately. So
2:13:11
Speaker 6: if that were the case, and I think they know that,
2:13:15
Speaker 6: the Mammoth know that, if they were able to do
2:13:17
Speaker 6: that and make that move, they would. But at the
2:13:20
Speaker 6: end of the day, again, if the asking price was,
2:13:23
Speaker 6: you know, let's say not only a goaltender coming back
2:13:26
Speaker 6: and like veg or somebody like that. And then also
2:13:29
Speaker 6: they're asking for another two or three, you know, Forge
2:13:32
Speaker 6: defensemen who are NHL players right now. I can't justify
2:13:36
Speaker 6: that for the mammoth. I cannot take apart that much
2:13:40
Speaker 6: of the roster just to bring in Connor Hellebuck.
2:13:45
Speaker 2: Are you a believer that Connor Hellebuck will return to
2:13:48
Speaker 2: close to Vesna form if he's happier in a new situation?
2:13:53
Speaker 6: I think so. You know, one thing about Hellebuck that
2:13:56
Speaker 6: a lot of people didn't really realize and didn't recognize
2:14:00
Speaker 6: was that until last season, and a lot went wrong
2:14:03
Speaker 6: with the Jets last season, but two and three and
2:14:07
Speaker 6: four years before that, The Jets were among the best,
2:14:10
Speaker 6: if not the best, defensive teams in a lot of
2:14:13
Speaker 6: metrics in the entire NHL. As far as shots against,
2:14:16
Speaker 6: high-danger chances, all of these things that matter as far
2:14:20
Speaker 6: as letting the other team have good scoring opportunities, the Jets...
2:14:24
Speaker 6: shut those scoring opportunities down and did a real nice
2:14:28
Speaker 6: job of taking care of Hellebuck. And then Hellebuck gave
2:14:31
Speaker 6: them the saves they needed. That's why the Jets were competitive.
2:14:34
Speaker 6: And so I think if Hellebuck ends up on a
2:14:36
Speaker 6: team that knows how to play defense and can take
2:14:40
Speaker 6: care of, you know, the second or third chance opportunities,
2:14:43
Speaker 6: he's going to give you the first save. And that
2:14:46
Speaker 6: is really what you need out of your goaltender. And
2:14:47
Speaker 6: occasionally he's going to give you something spectacular, which I
2:14:51
Speaker 6: think you need to go deep into the playoffs. He's
2:14:54
Speaker 6: confident now that he's won a gold medal. He even
2:14:57
Speaker 6: feels like he's kind of shrugged that off of him
2:15:00
Speaker 6: where the old, oh, well, he can't win in a
2:15:02
Speaker 6: pressure situation. He just proved that. you know, on a
2:15:05
Speaker 6: world stage, he took team USA to a gold medal.
2:15:08
Speaker 6: So I really think that the yoke is off as
2:15:11
Speaker 6: far as that goes. If he's on a really, really
2:15:14
Speaker 6: good defensive team. I mean, you have to consider that
2:15:17
Speaker 6: even an average defensive team, but the jets were very
2:15:20
Speaker 6: good defensively last year. They were not, everything kind of
2:15:22
Speaker 6: went to, to hack on them all at the same time.
2:15:27
Speaker 2: Tom, I appreciate you joining us again today. I look
2:15:30
Speaker 2: forward to many, many more of these conversations because we.
2:15:34
Speaker 3: Hockey is back, baby. The long wait is over.
2:15:38
Speaker 6: Oh, we're so excited, OC. I appreciate it. Yeah, man,
2:15:40
Speaker 6: can't wait to drop the puck.
2:15:43
Speaker 2: We'll do that tonight at 7.30 against the Chicago Blackhawks.
2:15:48
Speaker 3: Big thanks to Tom.
2:15:49
Speaker 2: He'll be part of our hockey coverage right here on
2:15:52
Speaker 2: ESPN 700 and 92.1 FM. We will see you at
2:15:55
Speaker 2: the Delta Center tonight, at least hopefully, fingers crossed, you
2:15:59
Speaker 2: get a chance to be there.
2:16:02
Speaker 3: You got to give credit where it's due, Ryan Smith.
2:16:04
Speaker 3: Just sent out a tweet.
2:16:06
Speaker 2: He said, I know that tickets are hard to come
2:16:08
Speaker 2: by for the home opener, so I'm opening some up
2:16:11
Speaker 2: in my personal suite. He's giving away his own personal
2:16:14
Speaker 2: suite tickets again. This is something that he does for
2:16:18
Speaker 2: Mammoth Games, for Utah Jazz Games.
2:16:22
Speaker 3: Say what you will. Feel however you want to.
2:16:25
Speaker 2: This is not normal team owner behavior in professional sports.
2:16:29
Speaker 3: It does not happen here.
2:16:31
Speaker 2: In every market, it does not happen with every owner,
2:16:33
Speaker 2: with every owner's family, with every owner's wife. Owners, in
2:16:38
Speaker 2: a lot of cases, are exactly that. They are the
2:16:43
Speaker 2: stewards over these kingdoms, and they feel like they're the
2:16:46
Speaker 2: kings and the queens, and we are all the peasants.
2:16:50
Speaker 2: And they're happy to hear your adulation.
2:16:53
Speaker 3: They're happy to... get your adoration.
2:16:56
Speaker 2: They're happy for your golden trinkets being thrown their way.
2:17:01
Speaker 2: But in a lot of cases, they don't want to
2:17:03
Speaker 2: have to intermingle, right? They are the upper, upper, upper
2:17:07
Speaker 2: crust of our weirdly financially obsessed society and give.
2:17:12
Speaker 3: Credit where it's due.
2:17:13
Speaker 2: Ryan Smith and his family open up their own personal
2:17:16
Speaker 2: spaces to fans and who don't get to attend these
2:17:20
Speaker 2: games in other circumstances all that often.
2:17:23
Speaker 3: So it's pretty cool that he does it.
2:17:24
Speaker 5: And it, I think this means that Ryan will be
2:17:27
Speaker 5: sitting on the Ikea stools in the little empty area
2:17:32
Speaker 5: in the corner behind that still exist. If that, if
2:17:35
Speaker 5: that still exists with the renovation, he might've insisted that
2:17:40
Speaker 5: that stay there so that he has a spot to
2:17:42
Speaker 5: Sit when he gives away his box.
2:17:45
Speaker 3: I don't know.
2:17:45
Speaker 2: I've actually, I've watched enough of the videos to think
2:17:48
Speaker 2: I know what I'm looking at when I walk into
2:17:50
Speaker 2: the Delta Center tonight, but also I acknowledge that videos
2:17:54
Speaker 2: and pictures never do a place real justice. So I'm
2:17:58
Speaker 2: pumped to get in there and walk around and see
2:18:00
Speaker 2: what the new feel of the building is like. It's
2:18:03
Speaker 2: Twice now that they've pulled off some kind of renovation
2:18:06
Speaker 2: in short order.
2:18:07
Speaker 3: Yeah, me too.
2:18:08
Speaker 5: And by the way, Darren Swan, our resident BYU fan,
2:18:12
Speaker 5: we will both be there tonight at the Mammoth season opener.
2:18:16
Speaker 5: He says 90% of his family is coming too. So
2:18:20
Speaker 5: if you see us, say hi.
2:18:22
Speaker 2: Apologies to the 10% of the family that doesn't get
2:18:24
Speaker 2: to come.
2:18:25
Speaker 3: I know. It's rough.
2:18:26
Speaker 5: Maybe they're on a mission or something or they're out
2:18:30
Speaker 5: of town.
2:18:30
Speaker 4: I don't know.
2:18:32
Speaker 2: I put the poll question out about who you think
2:18:35
Speaker 2: is going to be the leading goal scorer for the
2:18:37
Speaker 2: Utah Mammoth this year. I'll give you your results so far.
2:18:41
Speaker 2: When we come back, it's the Sean O'Connell Show on
2:18:44
Speaker 2: ESPN 700 and 92.1 FM.
2:18:51
Speaker 7: You're tuned to the Sean O'Connell Show from the Murdoch
2:18:54
Speaker 7: Chevrolet studio of ESPN.
2:18:56
Speaker 3: 700 and 92.1 FM.
2:19:00
Speaker 9: I was working in the lab late one night when
2:19:03
Speaker 9: my eyes beheld an eerie sight. For my monster from
2:19:08
Speaker 9: his lab began to rise. And suddenly, to my surprise,
2:19:12
Speaker 9: he did the mash.
2:19:13
Speaker 3: He did the monster mash.
2:19:15
Speaker 10: The monster mash.
2:19:18
Speaker 9: It was a graveyard smash.
2:19:20
Speaker 8: He did the mash.
2:19:22
Speaker 10: It caught on in a flash.
2:19:23
Speaker 8: He did the mash.
2:19:26
Speaker 2: Little Halloween music because it's October 1st.
2:19:31
Speaker 3: It's a beautiful day.
2:19:32
Speaker 2: Feels more like late summer than it does early fall,
2:19:35
Speaker 2: but they're kind of the same thing. The spooky season
2:19:39
Speaker 2: is upon us. My Halloween decorations have already been up
2:19:42
Speaker 2: for a couple of weeks. Not because your boy likes
2:19:45
Speaker 2: to do that, but because I have four lovely ladies
2:19:50
Speaker 2: in the house that cannot get enough of Halloween season.
2:19:54
Speaker 4: So.
2:19:55
Speaker 2: That's where we're at. Welcome to it. I put a
2:19:58
Speaker 2: poll question out. The Utah Mammoth are starting their season tonight.
2:20:01
Speaker 2: Who's going to be the leading goal scorer for the
2:20:03
Speaker 2: Utah Mammoth this year? So far in the early returns
2:20:07
Speaker 2: on the poll, Dylan Gunther, 57%, Logan Cooley.
2:20:12
Speaker 3: 40% of the vote.
2:20:13
Speaker 2: Schmaltz getting nothing, even though he had a nice 33
2:20:17
Speaker 2: goals last year.
2:20:18
Speaker 3: Clayton Keller.
2:20:20
Speaker 2: getting 2.9% of the vote right now. So at Real
2:20:24
Speaker 2: OC Sports, if you want to participate in the poll question, 877-353-0700,
2:20:30
Speaker 2: anytime you want to weigh in on the text line,
2:20:33
Speaker 2: always love hearing from you. Utah Mammoth with high expectations
2:20:39
Speaker 2: from the fan base, certainly from the ownership, certainly, but
2:20:41
Speaker 2: also I think internally, these guys proved themselves last year that,
2:20:47
Speaker 2: you know, they are a team on the rise and,
2:20:49
Speaker 2: And it didn't feel like, and it doesn't still feel like,
2:20:53
Speaker 2: you've hit anything close to the ceiling. That, oh yeah,
2:20:58
Speaker 2: we maxed out, we got 90%, 95% of what this
2:21:02
Speaker 2: team is capable of, and it brought you into the playoffs,
2:21:05
Speaker 2: and then you fizzled out in those playoffs. It feels
2:21:07
Speaker 2: like this was the first foray into the top 70%
2:21:12
Speaker 2: of what the team can actually do, and there's plenty
2:21:15
Speaker 2: of gas left in this tank, especially with some of
2:21:17
Speaker 2: the off-season acquisitions.
2:21:19
Speaker 3: With Daniil Butin, Dmitry Simishev coming up.
2:21:22
Speaker 2: Tom Callahan, I think, is a little bit cooler on
2:21:25
Speaker 2: the COSA backup goalie addition than a lot of the
2:21:29
Speaker 2: other people that I've talked to. And maybe it's just
2:21:32
Speaker 2: because we're wishful thinking and hoping that Veggie doesn't have
2:21:36
Speaker 2: to carry the whole load himself. But I think that
2:21:39
Speaker 2: even competent backup goalie play is going to be a
2:21:42
Speaker 2: big game changer for this team when it comes to
2:21:45
Speaker 2: the standings and things like that.
2:21:47
Speaker 3: I expect the sharks to be really good.
2:21:49
Speaker 2: I expect some teams maybe to take a step back,
2:21:52
Speaker 2: but this mammoth team, and I liked what Tom said,
2:21:55
Speaker 2: even though he acknowledged there could be a little bit
2:21:57
Speaker 2: of Homerism in there. He said, look, this is the
2:21:59
Speaker 2: team that could take the most significant leap forward. And
2:22:02
Speaker 2: that of course is the hope in order to make
2:22:07
Speaker 2: it happen. You're going to need all the guys I
2:22:09
Speaker 2: put on that list to be active goal scorers. Also
2:22:15
Speaker 2: in the news, Utah men's basketball, the running Utes, getting
2:22:20
Speaker 2: back into the swing of things for their upcoming season.
2:22:23
Speaker 2: Little media day, media scrums happening yesterday. And Jackson Holcomb,
2:22:28
Speaker 2: who is a transfer from UVU, helped UVU win the
2:22:32
Speaker 2: WAC for the second straight year, was all WAC defensive team,
2:22:37
Speaker 2: first team all WAC, all conference team. He was on
2:22:42
Speaker 2: the AWAC all-freshman team two years ago. He was on
2:22:46
Speaker 2: the AWAC tournament team. He is the jewel of the
2:22:51
Speaker 2: transfer class, I think, with local interest here for the
2:22:55
Speaker 2: University of Utah.
2:22:57
Speaker 3: Jackson Holcomb.
2:23:00
Speaker 2: Had an interesting soundbite that James thought we needed to
2:23:03
Speaker 2: bring to the air.
2:23:05
Speaker 3: Well, this will be the first time I've heard it.
2:23:06
Speaker 3: Hit it, James.
2:23:08
Speaker 10: What excites you most about.
2:23:09
Speaker 9: Playing in the Big 12?
2:23:12
Speaker 12: The thing that excites me most is how many people
2:23:14
Speaker 12: doubt us. I'm excited to go out there.
2:23:16
Speaker 4: And prove people wrong.
2:23:22
Speaker 5: Speaking of that, there's probably some Utes fans in there
2:23:26
Speaker 5: that's doubted you guys because it's been a rough stretch
2:23:30
Speaker 5: for the program. What do you say to those guys
2:23:33
Speaker 5: about what might be different this year?
2:23:37
Speaker 12: I would say we look forward to proving you wrong.
2:23:41
Speaker 12: I love all my Utes fans. I can't wait for
2:23:43
Speaker 12: everybody to be back in the Huntsman Center. I understand
2:23:45
Speaker 12: we've got to earn that trust, but I can't wait
2:23:47
Speaker 12: to prove those people wrong.
2:23:52
Speaker 2: So an acknowledgement from Jackson Holcomb that you have to
2:23:56
Speaker 2: prove it, but you have to prove people wrong because
2:23:59
Speaker 2: there's a skepticism with Utah basketball that I think is eroding,
2:24:05
Speaker 2: but it's eroding gradually, right?
2:24:07
Speaker 3: Because....
2:24:09
Speaker 2: There was doubt as to whether or not this basketball
2:24:12
Speaker 2: program was ever going to be brought back to the
2:24:15
Speaker 2: front of priorities. And then we saw with the pursuit
2:24:19
Speaker 2: of an eventual hiring of Alex Jensen, that there was
2:24:23
Speaker 2: a significant commitment to the basketball program. In addition to
2:24:28
Speaker 2: everything that's already being layered on the football program and
2:24:32
Speaker 2: gymnastics and women's basketball, which has been on the rise
2:24:35
Speaker 2: over the years, There was a sort of reconcerted effort
2:24:39
Speaker 2: to get back to greatness eventually in Utah men's basketball.
2:24:45
Speaker 2: And look, we had Alex Jensen on the show several
2:24:47
Speaker 2: times last year. We had players on the show last year.
2:24:49
Speaker 2: There's an admission, there's an awareness in the team and
2:24:55
Speaker 2: in the locker room that this is going to be
2:24:57
Speaker 2: a tough slog. But it's going to take that mentality
2:25:00
Speaker 2: that Jackson Holcomb seems to be bringing with him that, look... I,
2:25:06
Speaker 2: all we can do is prove people wrong. I have
2:25:08
Speaker 2: been part of these sort of like, uh, not even turnarounds,
2:25:14
Speaker 2: but building processes where everyone's just like, that's not going
2:25:17
Speaker 2: to work.
2:25:17
Speaker 3: That's not going to work. That's not going to work.
2:25:20
Speaker 2: And you can get mad at them and you can
2:25:22
Speaker 2: tell them, no, shut up. And you can say any,
2:25:26
Speaker 2: you can make any intellectual point that you want. You
2:25:30
Speaker 2: can point to, well, look how good our transfers are. Oh, well,
2:25:32
Speaker 2: look how much money we're spending compared to what we
2:25:33
Speaker 2: used to spend. Whatever you want to say, you have
2:25:37
Speaker 2: to back up all the words said with prove it
2:25:40
Speaker 2: mentality and prove it execution. And that's what Jackson Holcomb
2:25:44
Speaker 2: is referring to. Go ahead and doubt. I'm excited to
2:25:48
Speaker 2: prove you wrong. And then he will be excited like
2:25:51
Speaker 2: they all will to welcome you back to the bandwagon
2:25:54
Speaker 2: and to fill up the Huntsman Center again. Alex Jensen says,
2:25:58
Speaker 2: in every conversation we had with him last year was
2:26:03
Speaker 2: far from shy about saying like, look, it sucks that
2:26:06
Speaker 2: this building is empty. When I was here, it was
2:26:08
Speaker 2: hard to get a seat. I hate seeing it like this.
2:26:11
Speaker 2: He's not being diplomatic about that. He's not giving you
2:26:13
Speaker 2: coach speak about that. He's like, yeah, we need more
2:26:16
Speaker 2: people here, but I also know we have to win
2:26:19
Speaker 2: to get more people here. So there's, there's an accountability
2:26:22
Speaker 2: in this basketball program where the they're pointing the finger
2:26:26
Speaker 2: at themselves. If we prove it, it'll fix the problem. Not, Hey,
2:26:31
Speaker 2: you fans need to show up. We're going to win.
2:26:33
Speaker 2: We're going to prove you wrong. And that's going to
2:26:36
Speaker 2: lend itself to success. And of course, winning more fans,
2:26:39
Speaker 2: more fans winning, better recruits, more winning. They are in
2:26:46
Speaker 2: the early stages still of a heavy.
2:26:49
Speaker 3: Heavy, heavy lift.
2:26:51
Speaker 4: Yeah.
2:26:51
Speaker 5: And I'll just say that, maybe I may have needed
2:26:56
Speaker 5: to phrase my question a little differently. Cause I was,
2:26:59
Speaker 5: someone else already asked about what's going to be like
2:27:02
Speaker 5: the big 12.
2:27:03
Speaker 3: He sent that message. We want to prove people wrong.
2:27:05
Speaker 5: I was hoping to elicit like, what are some tangible
2:27:09
Speaker 5: things that, you know, because he's part of the program
2:27:12
Speaker 5: that will be different this year that.
2:27:18
Speaker 3: Utes fans should know.
2:27:19
Speaker 4: Right.
2:27:20
Speaker 5: And he decided to double down and be like, I'm,
2:27:23
Speaker 5: What they should know is that we're going to prove
2:27:25
Speaker 5: you wrong, which I love that intensity. He did end
2:27:28
Speaker 5: up speaking to one of the things that I think
2:27:31
Speaker 5: Utes fans should be encouraged about, as did almost everyone
2:27:35
Speaker 5: else that I was there for.
2:27:37
Speaker 3: I was there for one part of the availability. Spence
2:27:39
Speaker 3: was there for the others.
2:27:40
Speaker 5: We've got all that posted on the website. The ones
2:27:43
Speaker 5: that I was present for, O.C., they all talked about
2:27:47
Speaker 5: how competitive the practices are. Jackson Holcomb even went as
2:27:50
Speaker 5: far as to say it feels like a sweet 16 game.
2:27:54
Speaker 5: That's how competitive things are when we scrimmage and practice
2:27:57
Speaker 5: and whatever. I'm going to say probably an exaggeration there. Well,
2:28:04
Speaker 5: that's fine. But I think that's a good sign that
2:28:07
Speaker 5: everyone is saying we are so competitive. Practices are so intense.
2:28:11
Speaker 5: The coaching staff is really competitive. That's the only way.
2:28:15
Speaker 5: that you go up the way that they need to
2:28:17
Speaker 5: in this program.
2:28:18
Speaker 2: It feels like it, it should be an easy thing,
2:28:21
Speaker 2: but I don't think it is anymore because of, first
2:28:24
Speaker 2: of all, there's a lot of rules associated with how
2:28:27
Speaker 2: much you can work people out. And you're so worried
2:28:30
Speaker 2: about not only injuries, but then you're worried about the
2:28:34
Speaker 2: conversation that comes on social media and other places after
2:28:38
Speaker 2: injuries and how you handle those injuries and stuff.
2:28:39
Speaker 3: There's a lot of coaches.
2:28:41
Speaker 2: I think that aspire to have a, grueling practices, but
2:28:46
Speaker 2: an execution maybe fall short of actually having grueling practices because,
2:28:50
Speaker 2: you know, you're worried or you're, you're trepidatious about, uh,
2:28:58
Speaker 2: you know what?
2:28:59
Speaker 3: We can't wear them out too much.
2:29:01
Speaker 2: I'm still a believer and you got to go about
2:29:03
Speaker 2: things in an intelligent way, but I'm still a believer
2:29:06
Speaker 2: that you should feel relief as a student athlete when
2:29:10
Speaker 2: it's time to compete and no longer time to practice.
2:29:15
Speaker 2: You should feel like I've already practiced much harder than
2:29:18
Speaker 2: this game is going to be. So the game is
2:29:20
Speaker 2: going to be the fun part. I get to go
2:29:22
Speaker 2: full speed. I get to hit full speed. I get
2:29:24
Speaker 2: to attack somebody who's wearing a different color. And more importantly,
2:29:28
Speaker 2: this is the fun part. I already put all of
2:29:32
Speaker 2: the disgusting practices and the gassers and the running line.
2:29:38
Speaker 3: To line to line to line to line to.
2:29:40
Speaker 2: Line and the dribbling drills. I already put that in
2:29:41
Speaker 2: the bank. And now it's time to make withdrawals from
2:29:44
Speaker 2: that bank. That's the whole point. So I hope we
2:29:49
Speaker 2: get that from everybody. I know that they're being a
2:29:52
Speaker 2: lot more careful about how the messaging goes with football practices,
2:29:56
Speaker 2: especially right now because of injury history and because of
2:29:58
Speaker 2: the perception that the previous tenure, the previous coach used
2:30:02
Speaker 2: to like grind people down to a stump and then
2:30:05
Speaker 2: complain about it.
2:30:06
Speaker 3: We would complain about it. He wouldn't.
2:30:08
Speaker 2: We would complain about it when he got to November
2:30:10
Speaker 2: and everyone was banged up. I think they're very careful
2:30:13
Speaker 2: about that right now with football. I don't need you
2:30:15
Speaker 2: to be careful about it with basketball yet. I want
2:30:17
Speaker 2: this team to go out there and at least.
2:30:20
Speaker 3: They're not going to win the conference. This is not
2:30:22
Speaker 3: a year.
2:30:23
Speaker 2: You have to establish a culture and a tone where
2:30:25
Speaker 2: it's like, alright, we might not be as big, strong, fast, talented,
2:30:31
Speaker 2: but we are going to be better conditioned.
2:30:33
Speaker 3: We are going to be a nightmare for you. We're
2:30:34
Speaker 3: going to out-hustle you.
2:30:36
Speaker 2: And you don't get to do that unless your practices
2:30:39
Speaker 2: have prepared you for it. And If Jackson Holcomb and
2:30:43
Speaker 2: anyone else is saying, like, these practices suck, these practices
2:30:46
Speaker 2: are hard, that is music to my ears. Utah basketball
2:30:52
Speaker 2: does not return to glory unless you return to the
2:30:55
Speaker 2: practices that brought you glory in the old days. And
2:30:59
Speaker 2: who's better to do that than Alex Jensen?
2:31:01
Speaker 5: Nobody.
2:31:02
Speaker 3: Who was the one who was not.
2:31:05
Speaker 2: not only a member of those teams, but as kind
2:31:07
Speaker 2: of a leader on those teams, spearheading that identity, that effort,
2:31:11
Speaker 2: that grit.
2:31:12
Speaker 3: That's what he was known for.
2:31:15
Speaker 5: I mean, there's a reason why, and I don't know
2:31:17
Speaker 5: this firsthand, a little bit too young to know those
2:31:20
Speaker 5: late 90s teams very well, but the stories that I've
2:31:24
Speaker 5: heard from people that were on those teams that followed
2:31:28
Speaker 5: those teams very closely, there's a reason why they all
2:31:31
Speaker 5: said he was Majerus' favorite. Because he embodied all of
2:31:34
Speaker 5: those things. And so, like you say, who better to
2:31:40
Speaker 5: return the team to Rick Majerus-like era of glory than
2:31:47
Speaker 5: the guy who was basically Rick Majerus' mindset personified on the.
2:31:51
Speaker 3: Court, right?
2:31:52
Speaker 2: When you start beating everybody up and they're miserable coming
2:31:57
Speaker 2: to the Huntsman Center and you've won 20 games again,
2:32:02
Speaker 2: Then you can start to complain if you're on this
2:32:04
Speaker 2: team about how practices are too hard. Right now, though,
2:32:06
Speaker 2: I want you to be like, oh my gosh, this
2:32:10
Speaker 2: is a nightmare. So that the game itself is your escape.
2:32:14
Speaker 2: It is your relief. And then hopefully it really does
2:32:18
Speaker 2: work this way. It's simple, but it's not. Where the
2:32:25
Speaker 2: confidence you have when you have overprepared and you have
2:32:27
Speaker 2: prepared harder than the next person. is sometimes enough to
2:32:31
Speaker 2: separate their talent from your talent. Not always, but sometimes.
2:32:35
Speaker 2: I think that's where Utah's at, so I'm happy to
2:32:37
Speaker 2: hear that from Alex Jensen's players.
2:32:39
Speaker 5: I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, O.C., that seemed
2:32:41
Speaker 5: to be, for all the talent that was on the
2:32:45
Speaker 5: 0-4 Utes team, Fiesta Bowl team, which obviously very talented team,
2:32:50
Speaker 5: that seemed to be the superpower, right? With the thing
2:32:53
Speaker 5: that took you guys maybe to the next, even a
2:32:55
Speaker 5: higher level than what the talent, what that immense talent
2:32:58
Speaker 5: could take you was... that urban Meyer ran some tough
2:33:02
Speaker 5: practices from what, from what you've told me and other
2:33:04
Speaker 5: people's have said. And it, I mean, did that, that
2:33:06
Speaker 5: gave you guys that kind of edge to be like,
2:33:08
Speaker 5: we will beat anybody. And you did that year.
2:33:11
Speaker 2: I have, I've had many conversations with former teammates about
2:33:16
Speaker 2: this and not former teammates like myself who were watching
2:33:19
Speaker 2: the former teammates actually on the field guys on the field,
2:33:22
Speaker 2: like the Bo Naga, he's in the Morgan Scallies and
2:33:25
Speaker 2: the Travis Latondris and John Madsen, like, and, and, to
2:33:29
Speaker 2: a man, every single person was like, well, I knew
2:33:33
Speaker 2: that I had paid more. I had paid more dues
2:33:36
Speaker 2: than the guy that I played against.
2:33:37
Speaker 3: I knew it. I knew it.
2:33:40
Speaker 2: And honestly, who, who gave Utah the toughest test that year?
2:33:44
Speaker 2: Another notoriously grueling place to play air force. That was
2:33:49
Speaker 2: the scariest game, right? That was probably the only, like
2:33:52
Speaker 2: all those like cadets were probably the only ones that
2:33:56
Speaker 2: had approached the level of, of Diligence, discipline, grueling work
2:34:02
Speaker 2: that Utah had that 2004 season. And yes, the guys
2:34:06
Speaker 2: that actually mattered were doing it even more so. So,
2:34:13
Speaker 2: last segment coming. It's the Sean O'Connell Show on ESPN 700, 92.1 FM.
2:34:16
Speaker 2: Light up our.
2:34:19
Speaker 8: Guns.
2:34:20
Speaker 2: Bring your friends out to those who do pretend.
2:34:26
Speaker 7: You're listening to The Sean O'Connell Show from the Murdoch
2:34:29
Speaker 7: Hyundai Studio of ESPN 700 and 92.1 FM.
2:34:48
Speaker 2: Final segment of the show brought to you by our
2:34:50
Speaker 2: friends at Advanced Window Products.
2:34:53
Speaker 4: 801-850-9100.
2:34:54
Speaker 2: $ 2, 500 off 10 windows or more. Utah Mammoth dropping the
2:34:57
Speaker 2: puck tonight. And the drive with Spence Checketts is coming
2:35:01
Speaker 2: up next.
2:35:02
Speaker 4: Hi, Spence.
2:35:05
Speaker 13: My tusks are so up. My tusks have never been
2:35:09
Speaker 13: more up.
2:35:10
Speaker 10: Are you ready?
2:35:11
Speaker 9: Yeah.
2:35:11
Speaker 3: My tusks are permanently up.
2:35:13
Speaker 10: Are you going to the game tonight?
2:35:14
Speaker 4: I am.
2:35:15
Speaker 8: Nice.
2:35:15
Speaker 3: As a fan, not on a press pass.
2:35:17
Speaker 10: All right.
2:35:18
Speaker 4: All right.
2:35:18
Speaker 10: So what are we expecting this year?
2:35:21
Speaker 3: Stanley Cup.
2:35:23
Speaker 10: To win it?
2:35:23
Speaker 9: Yes.
2:35:24
Speaker 10: To hoist it?
2:35:25
Speaker 3: Hoisting Lord Stanley's Cup. You know, it's interesting.
2:35:27
Speaker 10: This sport year over year is so wild.
2:35:31
Speaker 13: Like the Stanley Cup winner and the winner of the
2:35:34
Speaker 13: President's Trophy a year ago, neither even made the playoffs.
2:35:38
Speaker 13: I think of the 16 teams that made the playoffs
2:35:41
Speaker 13: two years ago, 10 of them made the playoffs last year.
2:35:44
Speaker 13: So hoisting the Stanley cup would be nice. Um, I
2:35:49
Speaker 13: don't know how realistic that is. You just in, in
2:35:53
Speaker 13: this sport, man, you just got to establish that you
2:35:55
Speaker 13: are a playoff team year over year over year. And
2:35:59
Speaker 13: every once in a while, a wild, you know, what
2:36:01
Speaker 13: was Vegas? The, was it, it was, was it their
2:36:04
Speaker 13: expansion year? They won the Stanley cup or was it
2:36:05
Speaker 13: the second year? Something like that. I mean, It made
2:36:08
Speaker 13: the finals their first year. So, you know, outliers do happen.
2:36:13
Speaker 13: You know, watching some of the preseason stuff, they're bigger
2:36:16
Speaker 13: and stronger, which is their main deal with Vegas last year.
2:36:20
Speaker 13: They just got pushed around. They've always had these dynamic, fast, young, skilled,
2:36:25
Speaker 13: attacking hockey players. They just need to battle more. And
2:36:30
Speaker 13: in order to do that, you know, you have to
2:36:32
Speaker 13: have bigger dudes. And it feels like they have a
2:36:34
Speaker 13: lot more experience and just bigger physical hockey players this year.
2:36:37
Speaker 13: And so I'm excited, man. I think there's a lot
2:36:41
Speaker 13: to like about this team.
2:36:43
Speaker 3: It's going to be a lot of fun.
2:36:44
Speaker 2: It is fun just to have another professional sports franchise
2:36:48
Speaker 2: and maybe another one in the pipeline. Well, two more
2:36:52
Speaker 2: in the pipeline because the UFL counts just like everyone
2:36:54
Speaker 2: else does. But, yeah, who knows what will happen in
2:36:57
Speaker 2: the next five, ten years. I also put a pie-in-the-sky
2:37:02
Speaker 2: poll question up. Who wins a league championship first?
2:37:08
Speaker 3: Jazz?
2:37:09
Speaker 4: Mammoth?
2:37:11
Speaker 2: The hypothetical Major League Baseball team that is not even
2:37:14
Speaker 2: officially here yet?
2:37:16
Speaker 10: Or who's going to own it?
2:37:18
Speaker 3: Or Utes winning a national championship in football?
2:37:23
Speaker 10: The Mammoth.
2:37:24
Speaker 13: The answer is so obviously the Mammoth. Like, almost easily
2:37:29
Speaker 13: the Mammoth.
2:37:29
Speaker 2: 47% saying Mammoth.
2:37:33
Speaker 10: Okay. I hate that we're here with the Jazz.
2:37:37
Speaker 13: The reality of the NBA these days is it's really,
2:37:41
Speaker 13: really difficult.
2:37:41
Speaker 10: You have to get, like, a Spurs tank draft.
2:37:45
Speaker 13: Take a Palooza, luck number one pick, Victor Weminyama type
2:37:49
Speaker 13: generational changing player to get this thing done.
2:37:51
Speaker 10: And it's not impossible.
2:37:54
Speaker 13: Like, I do think there's a lot to like about
2:37:56
Speaker 13: what the Jazz are going to be this year. But
2:37:58
Speaker 13: if you look around at prediction markets or projections, most
2:38:03
Speaker 13: people still believe they're the 10th or 11th best team
2:38:06
Speaker 13: in the West. I think they're a little bit better
2:38:07
Speaker 13: than that. But there are four or five teams in
2:38:10
Speaker 13: the West right now. that are better this season, and
2:38:14
Speaker 13: there are probably three or four that are better built
2:38:17
Speaker 13: for the long run. Now, look, injuries happen, right? I mean,
2:38:21
Speaker 13: Toronto never wins their championship. If Durant and Klay Thompson
2:38:25
Speaker 13: and Stephen Curry all don't have certain injuries of their
2:38:28
Speaker 13: own for the Golden State Warriors, you never know how
2:38:30
Speaker 13: the thing's going to turn out. And I do think
2:38:33
Speaker 13: there's a lot to like about Darren Peterson and Ace
2:38:35
Speaker 13: Bailey specifically, so maybe four or five years from now,
2:38:37
Speaker 13: we're looking at a spot.
2:38:40
Speaker 13: Where the jazz might be a top four team in
2:38:43
Speaker 13: the West, but San Antonio is not going anywhere anytime soon.
2:38:46
Speaker 10: Neither is Oklahoma city.
2:38:47
Speaker 13: You do like the LeBron James lives in Philly and
2:38:50
Speaker 13: Kawhi is in Toronto. The East is better than it's
2:38:53
Speaker 13: been in a while, but the West is kind of
2:38:54
Speaker 13: there to be had. I could see them finishing. I
2:38:58
Speaker 13: can see the jazz winning 42 games and finishing 10th,
2:39:01
Speaker 13: you know, ninth or 10th in the West and making
2:39:03
Speaker 13: the plan. But if the mammoth keep going in the
2:39:06
Speaker 13: direction they're going, it's not crazy to think they could
2:39:08
Speaker 13: be a legitimate Stanley cup contender in like two or
2:39:11
Speaker 13: three years. I don't know that they are this year,
2:39:13
Speaker 13: but they're on their way, man.
2:39:14
Speaker 10: They really are.
2:39:14
Speaker 3: I really think so.
2:39:15
Speaker 2: And they have something that is going to be already
2:39:18
Speaker 2: have something that's going to be hard for the jazz
2:39:20
Speaker 2: to ever achieve in that just the word of mouth
2:39:24
Speaker 2: and the NHL players talking to other NHL players, even
2:39:28
Speaker 2: at the Olympic and all-star level, like, yeah, you want
2:39:32
Speaker 2: to come be here.
2:39:33
Speaker 4: Yeah.
2:39:33
Speaker 2: We are well taken care of. It's a great community.
2:39:35
Speaker 2: It's an awesome place to live. And it's going to
2:39:38
Speaker 2: take a little bit more massaging, I think, for the
2:39:41
Speaker 2: Jazz to ever get that reputation in the NBA.
2:39:44
Speaker 13: Yeah, you hear a little bit more about it than
2:39:46
Speaker 13: you had prior to. I think there's been a lot...
2:39:48
Speaker 13: Like this new facility that the Smith Group has built
2:39:51
Speaker 13: is really, really cool. But in the NBA, it's more
2:39:58
Speaker 13: about your city than it is your facilities, right? So
2:40:03
Speaker 13: a lot of NBA players... have this idea about salt
2:40:07
Speaker 13: lake and if we're honest some of it is completely
2:40:09
Speaker 13: fair i believe our last census 3.5 percent of our
2:40:13
Speaker 13: city is african-american okay we just we're just a different
2:40:16
Speaker 13: spot you know with different demographics and geographical things you
2:40:20
Speaker 13: have to kind of keep it keep in mind and
2:40:22
Speaker 13: you travel all the time like the nightlife deal is
2:40:26
Speaker 13: a real thing I don't give a rip.
2:40:28
Speaker 10: I'm 48 years old.
2:40:29
Speaker 13: I don't need to be crushing bars at night and
2:40:32
Speaker 13: finding places to go hang out and get loose. It
2:40:34
Speaker 13: doesn't matter to me. But if you're a 22-year-old millionaire, single,
2:40:40
Speaker 13: with a penthouse downtown, the fact of the matter is
2:40:44
Speaker 13: Salt Lake might not offer the things you want for
2:40:48
Speaker 13: that particular lifestyle.
2:40:49
Speaker 3: That might be the problem. We don't have that many
2:40:50
Speaker 3: penthouses downtown.
2:40:52
Speaker 13: I feel like we have way too many penthouses downtown
2:40:54
Speaker 13: all of a sudden. Can I ask you about that shirt?
2:40:59
Speaker 13: I feel like it's hip. I feel like it's a
2:41:01
Speaker 13: cool shirt. I don't have a lot of hip, cool shirts.
2:41:05
Speaker 13: Did Kendall get that for you?
2:41:06
Speaker 8: No.
2:41:07
Speaker 2: This was a free shirt I got as part of
2:41:09
Speaker 2: a gift bag in the Fight World.
2:41:13
Speaker 4: Oh, okay.
2:41:13
Speaker 3: Sponsored gift bag.
2:41:14
Speaker 10: It looks like you went thrift shopping at a hip
2:41:18
Speaker 10: spot for a shirt.
2:41:19
Speaker 3: I wish that were the case.
2:41:20
Speaker 10: That's not something that really is in your repertoire.
2:41:23
Speaker 2: I actually think that my closet is at the point
2:41:26
Speaker 2: now where.
2:41:29
Speaker 2: Every single shirt that I have, I don't think this
2:41:33
Speaker 2: is an exaggeration. I think every single shirt that I
2:41:37
Speaker 2: have was either given to me for free from a
2:41:41
Speaker 2: fight sponsor or whatever, or was picked out by my wife.
2:41:45
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:41:46
Speaker 3: I don't think I own my own clothes anymore.
2:41:48
Speaker 13: What about your suits? You have copious amounts of suits.
2:41:50
Speaker 13: The suits, I still do the suits. Do you pay
2:41:53
Speaker 13: for your suits?
2:41:55
Speaker 4: No. What? What?
2:41:57
Speaker 10: Wait, how can I get it on the Sean O'Connell
2:41:59
Speaker 10: suit deal?
2:42:00
Speaker 3: You can't.
2:42:02
Speaker 10: That's a hard no.
2:42:04
Speaker 2: Actually, you know what? I could submit an invoice for
2:42:08
Speaker 2: you to have a suit.
2:42:11
Speaker 10: Okay, how do we do this?
2:42:11
Speaker 2: They're not checking the sizes when I say this is
2:42:14
Speaker 2: the suit.
2:42:14
Speaker 3: I have an allowance. A TV allowance. A wardrobe allowance.
2:42:19
Speaker 10: Okay, I'm going to.
2:42:21
Speaker 13: You send me the website where I can pick the
2:42:22
Speaker 13: suit and I'll send you my sizes and you'll submit
2:42:24
Speaker 13: the invoice and I get a new suit?
2:42:26
Speaker 4: Well.
2:42:26
Speaker 2: You have to, yeah, I guess that's what we're going
2:42:29
Speaker 2: to have to do. I'm going to have to commit
2:42:30
Speaker 2: fraud for you.
2:42:32
Speaker 10: Well, let's not do that.
2:42:33
Speaker 3: To have a nice suit.
2:42:34
Speaker 13: I'd like you to remain employed. Let's not do that.
2:42:38
Speaker 13: I'm in need of like two to three really nice
2:42:40
Speaker 13: new suits.
2:42:41
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah.
2:42:42
Speaker 13: Because the suits I have are either old or they
2:42:44
Speaker 13: don't fit me anymore. So I've got to figure that out.
2:42:47
Speaker 13: I think I've said this on the air before. For
2:42:49
Speaker 13: whatever reason, there's like two brands of suit that... off
2:42:54
Speaker 13: the rack fits me like it was bespoke.
2:42:56
Speaker 10: Oh really?
2:42:57
Speaker 2: There are 10,000 brands of suits that whenever I put
2:43:01
Speaker 2: them on off the rack, I, it looks like I've
2:43:03
Speaker 2: poured 10 pounds of, you know, what into a five
2:43:06
Speaker 2: pound bag. I just, but there's two brands where like
2:43:10
Speaker 2: their dummies, their mannequins are shaped exactly like me for
2:43:14
Speaker 2: some reason.
2:43:14
Speaker 10: Are you allowed to say the brands on air? I don't,
2:43:17
Speaker 10: I mean, I don't know what's going to happen.
2:43:19
Speaker 3: Well, I don't think Kenneth Cole is going to send
2:43:21
Speaker 3: us a cease and desist.
2:43:23
Speaker 10: We know you're listening, Kenneth Cole.
2:43:25
Speaker 3: Kenneth Cole, back off.
2:43:26
Speaker 8: Relax.
2:43:26
Speaker 3: This is a positive. We're actually giving you some love.
2:43:29
Speaker 3: I'm giving you a positive.
2:43:30
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah.
2:43:31
Speaker 2: And so the Kenneth Cole brand and the Nordstrom private
2:43:36
Speaker 2: label brand, those.
2:43:37
Speaker 3: Are the ones. They fit.
2:43:38
Speaker 13: You can just roll in there off the rack. You
2:43:40
Speaker 13: don't have to get it tailored. You just know you're
2:43:42
Speaker 13: walking out of the store with a suit that fits.
2:43:44
Speaker 8: Yeah.
2:43:44
Speaker 3: It's crazy.
2:43:45
Speaker 10: Are you a cufflink guy?
2:43:47
Speaker 8: No.
2:43:47
Speaker 10: I hate cufflinks.
2:43:48
Speaker 2: I like cufflinks in principle, but the execution of a
2:43:52
Speaker 2: cufflink and when you're having to.
2:43:54
Speaker 3: Actually put them on.
2:43:55
Speaker 4: It's impossible.
2:43:56
Speaker 3: I don't have that finger dexterity anymore.
2:43:59
Speaker 13: No, you need a partner, and I'm single. You have
2:44:01
Speaker 13: to have Kendall put your cufflinks on. I'm not going
2:44:04
Speaker 13: to knock on my neighbors.
2:44:06
Speaker 3: She won't, because cufflinks are tacky. I'm like, fine.
2:44:09
Speaker 10: I have an 82-year-old neighbor. She's very nice. Daphne. Hey, Daphne.
2:44:13
Speaker 3: Great name, by the way. Love that name.
2:44:15
Speaker 10: English lady. Daphne, will you put my cufflinks on?
2:44:17
Speaker 4: Yeah.
2:44:18
Speaker 10: I'm not going to do that.
2:44:19
Speaker 13: So if you can put cufflinks on like on the
2:44:22
Speaker 13: first try smoothly, that's a badass move because.
2:44:25
Speaker 10: I think it's impossible.
2:44:26
Speaker 3: You're James Bond.
2:44:27
Speaker 10: Yeah, it's amazing.
2:44:28
Speaker 4: Yeah.
2:44:28
Speaker 10: It's an amazing skill, which I don't have.
2:44:30
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're part of MI5.
2:44:32
Speaker 13: I'm an excellent tie-tire. Had to tie my own tie
2:44:37
Speaker 13: starting when I was 12 because you know the deal.
2:44:40
Speaker 10: We're passing the bread, doing the thing.
2:44:42
Speaker 9: Yes.
2:44:42
Speaker 10: Got to learn to tie the tie. So I can
2:44:44
Speaker 10: do that. Can you tie a bow tie?
2:44:47
Speaker 8: No.
2:44:48
Speaker 10: Neither can I. And I don't think anyone can.
2:44:49
Speaker 3: I have no interest in tying a bow tie.
2:44:51
Speaker 2: My older brother, his signature thing, he wears bow ties.
2:44:55
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:44:56
Speaker 2: He's a professor. He's a college professor. He wears bow ties.
2:45:00
Speaker 2: And I'm just like, that's lame.
2:45:03
Speaker 13: That tracks, because haven't you described him as very smart
2:45:06
Speaker 13: yet very annoying?
2:45:07
Speaker 9: Yes.
2:45:07
Speaker 10: With a bow tie.
2:45:08
Speaker 9: Yeah.
2:45:09
Speaker 4: That tracks.
2:45:09
Speaker 10: I don't know this man. I'm just basing it off
2:45:12
Speaker 10: of your description.
2:45:13
Speaker 3: Athletic build, good looking guy, bow tie.
2:45:17
Speaker 10: Huh yeah so is it like his thing is it's
2:45:20
Speaker 10: like his brain it's a.
2:45:21
Speaker 2: Signature thing and he wears like you know those like
2:45:24
Speaker 2: irish patty caps.
2:45:27
Speaker 13: Does he really he wears those he wears the irish
2:45:29
Speaker 13: like the cabbie hats yeah yeah the bow tie yeah
2:45:32
Speaker 13: and he's smart and like sweater vests and you like
2:45:36
Speaker 13: this person only if he wasn't your brother would you
2:45:39
Speaker 13: would you deal.
2:45:39
Speaker 2: With him yeah you would Because he's interesting and he's
2:45:43
Speaker 2: traveled the whole world, but it wouldn't be like, let's
2:45:46
Speaker 2: hang out all the time.
2:45:47
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:45:48
Speaker 3: It would be one of those kind of friendships.
2:45:49
Speaker 10: Do you have in-laws?
2:45:50
Speaker 4: I do.
2:45:51
Speaker 10: Do you like them?
2:45:52
Speaker 8: Yeah.
2:45:52
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:45:53
Speaker 13: I have one brother-in-law that if he was not my brother-in-law,
2:45:56
Speaker 13: I'd never, I don't know that I would ever even
2:45:58
Speaker 13: talk to him.
2:46:00
Speaker 2: So I have a brother-in-law who I married into the family.
2:46:04
Speaker 2: He also married into the family.
2:46:06
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:46:07
Speaker 3: Who's obnoxiously perfect as a human being.
2:46:11
Speaker 4: Uh-huh.
2:46:12
Speaker 3: Can't stand it. He's really cool.
2:46:14
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:46:14
Speaker 3: But I can't find myself, I can't like love him
2:46:17
Speaker 3: the way that I should.
2:46:18
Speaker 10: Because you're jealous.
2:46:19
Speaker 3: Because I'm just like, could you stop being so perfect?
2:46:22
Speaker 4: Yeah.
2:46:22
Speaker 8: Yep.
2:46:23
Speaker 3: It annoys the crap out of me.
2:46:25
Speaker 10: When you're traveling as a group, is he at least
2:46:27
Speaker 10: a good hang?
2:46:28
Speaker 9: Yes.
2:46:29
Speaker 4: Oh, 100%.
2:46:29
Speaker 2: See, that's huge. That's another problem though. It's just like,
2:46:32
Speaker 2: there's nothing to dislike about you. You're too perfect.
2:46:35
Speaker 4: Okay.
2:46:36
Speaker 3: And so like, by comparison, I have fallen. They liked
2:46:40
Speaker 3: me at first, right?
2:46:41
Speaker 4: Yeah.
2:46:42
Speaker 2: I have fallen completely off a cliff because it's like, well,
2:46:45
Speaker 2: you're not Jesse.
2:46:47
Speaker 10: There's probably something up with Jesse. No one's too perfect.
2:46:50
Speaker 13: The dudes that are too perfect behind the scenes, they've
2:46:53
Speaker 13: got a Cayman Islands bank account that they use to
2:46:56
Speaker 13: do untoward things.
2:46:58
Speaker 2: I would agree with you, except my other sister-in-law is
2:47:03
Speaker 2: like she could be in the FBI with her investigative skills.
2:47:06
Speaker 10: Oh, so she did her due diligence.
2:47:07
Speaker 3: She's dug.
2:47:08
Speaker 10: Okay.
2:47:09
Speaker 3: All right. She dug through it all.
2:47:10
Speaker 4: All right.
2:47:10
Speaker 7: There's nothing.
2:47:11
Speaker 4: All right.
2:47:12
Speaker 10: Well, shout out, Jesse.
2:47:13
Speaker 8: Yeah.
2:47:14
Speaker 3: Shout out, Jesse.
2:47:14
Speaker 13: You got to have a good hang in a family
2:47:17
Speaker 13: dynamic when you're both the in-laws, because if you don't.
2:47:19
Speaker 10: That makes it very problematic yeah that's where that's.
2:47:23
Speaker 2: Where the kids come in i was like hanging out
2:47:26
Speaker 2: with my kids and i'm just like you guys do
2:47:27
Speaker 2: your thing play your weird board game i'm gonna go
2:47:30
Speaker 2: hang out with the.
2:47:30
Speaker 13: Kids the kids are an excellent out when you become
2:47:34
Speaker 13: a parent it gives you an excellent excuse not to
2:47:36
Speaker 13: do the things you don't want to.
2:47:37
Speaker 3: Do correct Speaking of, I got to go pick up
2:47:39
Speaker 3: a kid.
2:47:39
Speaker 10: All right, Sean.
2:47:41
Speaker 3: Stay tuned for The Drive with Spence Check.
2:47:44
Speaker 2: I guess we'll do the Sean O'Connell show again tomorrow.
2:47:46
Speaker 2: ESPN 700, 92.1 FM.