Kap & J. Hood
8/6 9 AM: Ryan Poles
Hour 3: Kap & J. Hood was live for Bears Training Camp, Bears General Manager Ryan Poles joined Kap & J. Hood to discuss the latest on the Bears and more, the White Sox made history ties American League record losing 21 in a row, Hard Knocks featuring the Chicago Bears debut tonight on HBO and the Kap & J. Hood Cut Of The Day.
- Duration:
- 44m
- Broadcast on:
- 06 Aug 2024
- Audio Format:
- mp3
[MUSIC PLAYING] Captain J.A.V.E., live from training camp on ESPN Chicago. Live coverage of training camp is presented by Hard Rock Casino Northern Indiana and is brought to you in part by the Chicago Land and Northwest Indiana Chevy dealers. Menzel Swings and Misses and the A's send the White Sox to their 21st consecutive loss that ties the AL marks set by the 88 Orioles. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, history of the wrong kind. We welcome you into the Captain J.A.V.E. Morning Show on ESPN 1,000 and streaming on the ESPN Chicago app with David Kaplan, Jonathan Hood with you. We've got Shay, we've got Eric, we've got Jay Moore, we have Sean, and we've got you here on this Tuesday morning. Thank you so much for being with us as we broadcast live from House Hall and Lake Forest with open phone lines for you. 312-332-ESPN-33237-776. Our phone will be going to watch our show on YouTube as well. YouTube.com, look for ESPN Chicago on YouTube. Hit that subscribe button. Same thing is on Twitch, twitch.tv/ESP1,000 Chicago. And yes, Captain, it happened right here on the home of the White Sox, ESPN 1,000. Len Casper, Darren Jackson on the call, and Sleepy Oakland at the Coliseum. The Chicago White Sox have now lost 21 games in a row, on the road to 24, whether it's day games or night games, or the league games, or the league games, whether it's home or away, whether it's 80 degrees or warmer or under 80 degrees. Son of your cloudy, non-division games, all of it, they are last, immediately baseball and all of it. This is what happens when you are the worst. You look at that roster, you look at the organization, and this is why I'm telling you. This will take a long time to get over. Not just this season, but to be a contender again, Cap. It is, I don't care who tells you that this can be a quick fix. It's not. When you're this bad, you don't turn around quickly unless you spend money and the Sox are just not gonna be doing that. This is who they are. Monor league system, major league system, manager, way of playing, all of it, is just at the bottom, the very worst in major league baseball. Yeah, and they do have pitching. That's the thing that's so hard to find. They have some pitching coming through their system. They've made a lot of deals. Now they have got to get impact bats. You know, we think the Cubs offense struggles. I was doing some numbers at the break. The Cubs have scored zero or one runs 21 times this season. The Mariners who are in first place have scored zero or one runs 24 times this season. But when you have solid starting pitching, you are at least competitive. Like the Mariners have had their bullpen was better early. Their closer didn't blow 20 saves or 21 saves. So they are a playoff caliber team. They may not get there, they may, but the White Sox, where's that offense coming from? I would love to play what Silvie and Watto played yesterday. The cut where Jerry talks about the core a year ago. It's almost a year to the day of the cut where Jerry said that we have the core here to get this thing turned on. Get this thing turned around quickly. What core? There is no core there. That's the problem. No, there is no core. Absolutely not. And again, we have seen teams with talent on it. I went through the 88 Orioles with you because that's the last time we saw a team that lost 21 games in a row. And they started the season that way. They fired Ripken, the old man Ripken. And they had talent on a cap, but they still couldn't get over the hump in 88. But this team here, man, can you don't have any cornerstones? And some are listening to us say, well, what is Lewis Robert? Lewis Robert is a ball player that has potential to being a star. Well, the point is, is that on this team, he's like everybody else. He's part of the issue with this team. And so this is where you are. Yeah, it's just so embarrassing. And again, I said this to you earlier. You have got to come out and address your fan base. You have to. Come out and just say, okay, folks, the trade deadline has come and gone. Here's where we're at. I'm the owner. This is on me. We let you down. And I want to apologize for that and for putting you all through this. And I am giving Chris, Chris gets the best I can do to try and help him get this thing fixed. Period. It's not going to be easy. Yes, it's been painful. It's horrible. And I will wear it. Nobody says it. Nope. They just twist in the wind like a ship with on an anchor. Just keep floating out there. As a fan, you like to have answers. Like, I'm a White Sox fan. It's the most important team to me in town, as you well know, Cap. It's the most important team to me in town, the Chicago White Sox. When you're a South Sider and you grow up watching the team and going to old Kamiskey, it never leaves you. Yeah, we talk a lot about the bears because the bears galvanize the city, it brings everyone together. But when you've gone through summers and going to old Kamiskey and watching the White Sox, and again, there hasn't been a lot of smiles over there, over the years. But when you do have a winning ball club, it's like, yeah, you know what? We're on their way. The Sox are not on their way. It's the easiest, but in Vegas, by the way, that's just because they're losing, but even if you just want to look at it like this, the White Sox are old and 55 this season when trailing after six innings. Old and 55. Not one come from behind. Not one, brother. So that just shows you the talent. Like I said, if I'm the owner, there's no way that I can tolerate this. There's no way that I can wake up every morning because every time you wake up, you want to be able to accomplish something. You want to win the day. You don't go into the day saying, ah, ah, what a wonderful day. Here's a day to lose. I'm going to lose today. Who wakes up as a loser, right? You don't wake up and say, I want to be a loser. You know, so that's the whole thing. Let's go back to Jerry Reinsdorf though, because he had something to say about this before. This is last year, this is last year when Jerry fired Rick and Kenny. And here's Jerry in one of his rare media appearances. - Well, I don't want to make predictions, but in this division and with the core of talent that we have, I would hope and I expect that the next year will be a lot better than this year. But you know, how much better? I don't know, but look at the core of this team and we can get them all on the field. And one of the things that we're doing this year, it's a little different. Every year we send players home with a plan. This is what you've got to do. What we're going to add this year is we're going to police these plans. We're going to make sure that the players are following their plans. So when they come to the spring training, they're ready, we're not going to take their word that they're doing what they're supposed to be doing. So given the division and given that we have a really good core of players, I want to expect next year will be better. - Okay. A, who's that core? B, we're going to police these players. And Iloi looked no better than he did a year ago. Mancata got hurt running the first base. Luis Roberts having a historically bad year for him. You entered a season where we had Jim Bodenah two weeks ago. He said, I looked at this team in spring training and I went, you don't have one guy that has thrown 180 innings in a season. Not one. You're done. That's a 110, 120 loss team right now. Well, if he's sitting in a MLB network studio, former GM, trained I, looks it goes 110, 120. What are you doing? - Right. But not getting turned anytime soon now because of that, along with that. Again, there's no hope. Even for a fan that sees his team in last place a lot or sees his team underachieve, you say, well, there's light at the end of the tunnel. It's like this Bears team. We saw the three wins, we saw the seven wins said, well, at least there's light at the end of the tunnel. We believe that they're going in the right direction. With this White Sox team, tell me the direction. Other than the darkness. There is no direction, Cap. - Correct. When I first said that, you thought I was doing radio with you. I thought I was just joking around. When you see tip from the tip to the bottom of everything with this organization, it just tells me they're not going anywhere anytime soon. They're just not. And to hear Jerry Reinsorff, by the way, to hear that soundbite just reminds me of something. Now, listen, everybody should have expectations. He expected for the White Sox to be able to have a turn. He says, I expect them to do that. You know what bothers him in that soundbite? He's bothered by the amount of games that Alloy and Mankada missed. - Correct. - And Robert. - Correct. - That he's bothered by that. - And rightly so. - That's what he's talking about because ultimately that comment was on Alloy and I would say Mankada. Because clearly he got some kind of report from the medical staff that says, well, you know, they go to Arizona or they go to the Dominican Republic or they go to Florida and we send them on this journey to make sure that they're healthy and they're not doing what they're supposed to do. They're not, they're not stronger. They look the same. And so I'm sure that bothered Jerry. But if it bothers you, then why are they on the ball club? - I told you last year in last year's off season, I said, cap, yeah, get rid of some of these popular players. Do you remember me saying that? Yeah, get rid of some of these guys. Like Alloy and Mankada, I did not want them to be on the roster this upcoming season 'cause I knew the team was gonna be bad. But again, why have the same anchor on that ship that's kept you down all this time with all the injuries? I didn't want those guys to be back here. I knew that the Sox were gonna go through a bad spell. I didn't know it was gonna be this bad. But the bottom line is, is that I told you last year, those guys were underachievers, trade them someplace else. And by the way, it's funny to note that with Alloy being traded, have you seen what he's done with Baltimore lately? - It was four for his first six. Now they were all singles. - Yes. - Not like he's hitting home runs, yes. But four for six, he's playing in games that matter. That's a team going to the postseason that truly believes they can win the World Series. - It didn't take him a wheelchair to go from home plate to first base like you did with the White Sox. He's actually upright in running to first base healthy. That's the difference. He actually is healthy and actually getting the job done for the Orioles. - New watch, the off season. They will say goodbye to Moncata. I think he has options left. I don't think he has a guaranteed year. But I think he will be gone. They'll probably trade crochet. They might trade Robert. It's gonna look radically different. - And as bad, and as bad. - I don't think you can lose 120 plus again. I can't believe that. I cannot believe that. - You don't believe this season? - No, but they're gonna enter a season where they're gonna have more pitching, I believe. I believe. Good young pitching. They've got some. But they'll go out and spend more than they've ever spent. That doesn't mean you're gonna be good. It means you might at least stabilize it from being historically bad. - If you're a free agent, you're not coming here. So you'll have more of the same. More Nikki Lopez and more Tommy Fams and guys like that. You're not getting difference maker. Like, you're pitching might be better, but what are you getting offensively? It's still gonna be bad. It's still gonna be raggedy. It is. I want you to think about this. Like, I agree with you that there's pitching, like Colson Montgomery, some of these. Those guys are on the way, right? But what are you doing offensively one through nine on a daily basis? Who's gonna be the difference maker there? - They'll have to overpay in certain areas to get a couple of bats in there. They will have to. I mean. - I wouldn't play here. Would you? - If you're a free agent. - And nobody thought Pudge would play in Detroit, though, either. Or Maglio, for that matter. - Right. - If you're willing to write the check, you'll get guys to play. - You will get guys. - Yeah, that ownership is better than this one. How about that? - Certainly, but it took them 119 lost season to get there. - I'm saying, in Detroit, I would say what Detroit has done versus what Jerry Reiser was doing with the White Sox, I would take Detroit all day. I would say, well, there's at least a plan there. - Well, he did it. But I think he bought that team in '96, '97, and they were historically bad under his ownership until they got to the 113 losses. And a switch clicked. Oh, we actually have to compete. So my hope this whole time on the road to '24 has been that this level of embarrassment will flip a switch. - That's for somebody, an ownership. - That's my point. They're not gonna have a payroll of $200 million, but they will go out and spend a little bit. They will. - Having said that, Shay, here's the difference between the Tigers and the White Sox. The highest paid player for the Detroit Tigers is who? - Javier Baez. - All right. And Ben attendees for the White Sox. - Yeah, two of the worst players in baseball. - My point is is that the Tigers will be willing to spend that money like that. - But at White Sox. - But we're talking about '03, right? - '03 Tigers. - They spent nothing. - Right. And then at '04, they went out and they did make some moves. - Bobby Dickinson and dead people. And then they went and signed Pudge and Maglio and they added via the minor league system. They had pitching. Verlander was in the system. The White Sox have pitching. Noah Schultz is in the system. You just find free agents who will take your money and spend too much on them. - The Tigers were embarrassed. This owner does not care about being embarrassed. - Well. - There's a difference. - No fun. - Give up is what I would tell them. - It is. He's 88 and stuck in his ways. Illich was at the end. - If there's no chance of flipping the switch, then that tells the fan base everything you need to know and give up is what I would tell you. - 3-1-2-3-3-2-E-S-P-N-3-3-2-3-7-7-6-0-4 number. Ryan Polls, a general manager for the Chicago Bears. Skills to join us here at House Hall at 9-30. Captain Jay Hood, weekday morning 7-10. (upbeat music) - Follow Chicago's home for sports on Twitch at ESPN 1000 Chicago. Captain Jay Hood are back on Chicago's home for sports. ESPN Chicago. - Captain Jay Hood on the ESPN 1000 and streaming on the ESPN Chicago app. Thanks so much for being with us here on this Tuesday as we broadcast live from House Hall and Lake Forest. - So to come, we'll hear from Ryan Polls, a general manager for the Chicago Bears, getting his thoughts about hard knocks taking place tonight and we've got a special broadcast for hard knocks for our listeners and viewers. - Yes, we will have a post-game hard knocks show on our YouTube channel. Brought to you by our great partners at Dr. Pepper and excited that I'll have another reason to drink one of my coconut zero sugar, Dr. Pepper's, right on camera. Hoodie, you got it, right, do you like coconut? - Sure. - I'm gonna bring you some. Did you like your shit? I bought hoodie at two pounds of sugar snap peas at the farmers market in Wisconsin. Did you cook them yet? - Not yet, no. - They're so good, so healthy. - Yes. - You can, as Danny said, you can eat them raw. Just rinse them off, clip the ends a little bit. Bam, delicious, so good for you. - The oil is always very good too, right? The oil on top of it. Well, I cook them in a little olive oil, a little sea salt, a little black pepper. That's all you need. Oh, the best. But we will have our post-game tonight, and I know I'm gonna dial in. You're gonna dial in. Shay's gonna dial in. It's gonna be a lot of fun. To see our bears on the screen, and as they wrote, Jason Leisure wrote, that their bears edition of hard knocks hits the air Tuesday, but stars and stories that might surprise you. Like stuff that you don't know. Like they talk to the woman who's in charge of the whole thing. Shannon Furman said she tries to have her crew stay incognito. They're wearing blue and orange, so they blend in, and they just have to boom right over the top. What? That's great stuff. 400 hours of film for this episode, boiled down to a one hour show. 400 hours. This will be much better than the Giants one. There's no question about that. I agree. There was an expose on the Giants, how inept that organization was. Just wide open, just nonsense. This will be a lot better, I think. I agree. We'll see more of Eber Flus than we've ever seen before, more than likely. Ryan Polls, a lot of Caleb Williams. Maybe the signing of Williams and the Dunes, the official. Oh, no question they'll have that in there, but I'm excited Ryan's gonna be here in five minutes, and he's gonna be in with us. I truly believe Ryan is excited by this, because it's gonna send a message to the rest of the league, and I'd love to hear answers. Blank's being done different at Hallis Hall. South Side, and Jay is with us here on Captain Jay Hood. Jay, good morning. - Hey, Captain Jay, man. How y'all doing? Happy Tuesday. - What's up, buddy? - Yeah, this week get better. But the question I have for both of y'all since everybody won Caleb to throw for 4,000 yards. And I heard this offense is gonna lean on the run a little bit more. How many passes, how many passes attempt should Caleb have a game to reach that stat? - Well, it depends how each game plays out. Every game is different. I remember listening, and thanks for your call. I remember when the 49ers won the NFC title game to get to the Super Bowl, where they ended up losing Kyle Shanahan, he ran, he threw, I think eight passes, with Jimmy Garabo, eight. And he's like this passing guru. And they asked him after him, coach, eight pass attempts. He said, we were running the ball and it was working. Why would I change? That's what a good coach does. - I'm so unbothered by the amount of yards that is gonna be thrown by Caleb Williams. I just want the Bears to win. If it does take eight passes and a whole bunch of rounds, whatever it takes, I just want him to develop. First of all, stay healthy. Him to develop and for the Bears to win. That's where it comes down to. I don't have any bets or any side wagers on the amount of yards that Caleb Williams is gonna throw. Because, again, I'm armed with the knowledge to know that for rookie quarterbacks, no matter how great they were in college, there's still a learning curve. Again, that's perspective. I could be the over the top fan and say, like that guy's gonna be 5,000 yards, he's gonna have 50 touchdowns. They're like, okay. He's still gonna be able to work with a new offensive coordinator, Waldron. He's got weapons on the offensive line. He's got to be able to learn. When you're a rookie, you're learning on the fly. Like the rest of these rookies around here. But, again, I don't care what the numbers are. I just want the Bears to get to the playoffs. I want them to be on the road. The road to 24 for the White Sox, right? The road to the playoffs into the Super Bowl as the Bears chase greatness. - Totally agree. - Chase greatness. That's what they're doing. That is exactly what they are doing. - 3, 1, 2, 3, 3, 2, ESPN is our telephone number. - Let's go back to the phone lines, Rob and Sugarland, Texas, listening on the ESP in Chicago app. Hey, Rob, good morning. - Good morning, gentlemen. So to me, it seems like Jerry's willing to spend on the Bulls, they just spend on the wrong people. Why doesn't he do the same with the White Sox? And I'm mistaken. What they like 12th and payroll last year, the Bulls? Why is he treating differently? Championship rings that he's living 30 years ago? - First of all, they lead the NBA in attendance. They're number one in attendance. That's A, B, the TV deals in the NBA, dwarf what Major League Baseball is getting. It just signed a $77 billion TV contract of all the different networks for the NBA. The money that comes from foreign sources, from China and others is massive. And the way you have a salary cap in the NBA with slotting of salaries is totally different than baseball. - And just quickly, I got my nice little Sunday ticket bill today, $481 in some change. Does that allow me to watch Hard Knocks? Or do I still have to have HBO to watch Hard Knocks? - It's exclusive to HBO Max. - So, SOL. (laughing) - Well, you got YouTube TV though, right? - No, I just get the subscription. - Just the subscription. - You can buy it standalone. - Got it. - Funny ticket you can buy standalone, so. - Okay, thanks gentlemen, have a great day. - All right, Rob, thanks very much for the phone call. 312-332-ESPN-332-3776, Shay. - It's just also a fallacy a little bit. - The fallacy is that you're putting that on. - Yeah, my bet. It's also a fallacy a little bit that Jerry treats the Bulls differently than he treats the, like yes, does he spend more money on the Bulls? Yes, but he's gone into the tax one time with that team and that is not acceptable either. He's not treating any of the teams like a professional organization, that's not happening. So, to say that he treats the Bulls differently and it has things differently with, no, he doesn't. He's not going into the tax there. He didn't go into the tax with the White Sox when they were competitive. He spent enough money that the payroll looked good, but it was all like long-term, smaller money deals on prospect-type guys, Makata, Alloy, Robert, go out and pay Lance Lin. When you've never given out a hundred million dollar contract in baseball and you won't go into the luxury tax in the NBA, then you're not serious as an owner. That's it. - I cannot disagree with what you're saying. We've played ad nauseam, the guy from Golden State. Our job is to simply win championships. I don't care what the rules are, find a way. That's it. And he spends accordingly. Now, they're gonna have to rebuild in Golden State. They're getting older. We don't have Clay Thompson's no longer there. Draymond is starting the age. Steph's gonna get older. I get it all. But that dude has put his money out there and said, I got one standard. We win or I find people that will. - Period. - Our job is to win championships, period. And I'm gonna expect that. We're gonna expect that this year, next year, three years from now, five years from now. That's just, you know, there's no point in doing this if you're not trying to win the championship. We're gonna win no matter what. I don't care what the rules are. We are gonna figure out a way to do it. That's what good organizations do. They figure out a way to win the game. And our game is to win games and to win championships. - Joe Lakeup. - Joe Lakeup, the owner at Golden State, that does not mean they're gonna win every championship. That does not mean they're immune from having a bad season. But guess what? He's going to die trying to win all the time. And that's all I ask. Like, if I ran a team, I would want to talk to my fan base and tell them, folks, I'm in this to win. That does not mean that I can buy 15 Shohei Otanis and seven Mookie bets. That's unrealistic. But within, to the best of my ability, we're gonna try to win, period. - All right, three, one, two, three, three, two, ESPN, three, two, three, seven, seven, six is our telephone number. When we return, this upcoming half hour, we'll hear from Ryan Pace, the general manager, Pauls. Is it? Pace is coming on, isn't he? - Pauls. - Okay, Pauls is coming on. - Ryan Pauls will be with us here in the studio. - Is it Ryan Pace coming in? - It's a fine on Zetterman, actually. (laughing) - Ryan Pauls will be in studio with us shortly. - I was told that Pace is gonna be here. - No. - Is that, no? (laughing) - In here. (laughing) What are you doing here? - Yeah. - It says right here. Just reading, I'm just reading what it says here. Now, Pauls is gonna be with us when he's done with his meetings. He's gonna join us here this upcoming half hour. - Yeah, he'd be walking in shortly. - All right, we're broadcasting live from House Hall of Lake Forest. It's The Cap and Jhood Morning Show. (rock music) - Follow Chicago's home for sports on Twitter at ESPN1000. Cap and Jhood are back. - On ESPN Chicago, Chicago's home for sports. (rock music) - It's Cap and Jhood Morning Show on ESPN1000 and streaming on ESPN Chicago, after we broadcast live from House Hall, here in Lake Forest, with you until 10 o'clock. Then Mike Greenberg comes in at 10 followed by Carmine Yurko and Wadlon Silly, both shows. Broadcasting live from House Hall like we are. Then Blackin' of Dallas, 6.30 to 8 into exciting White Sox baseball, they take on the A's, 8 o'clock pregame right here on the exciting home of the Chicago White Sox, ESPN1000. - Cups were good last night. They scored exactly zero runs for the 21st time this year, one or fewer runs. Seattle, who at least is like a playoff caliber team. 24 times they've scored one or zero runs. But when you combine one or zero runs 21 times, at 21 Blown saves, 15 of which you've gone on to lose. Guess what? That's why you're where you're at. Dead last, dead. As Robert De Niro would say, dead, dead, absolutely. - I think our guest is right out in the hall and that door's gonna open in like 10 seconds. I think I saw Ryan's pulse right out there. - He does Ryan's pulse, right? - Yes. - Okay, just checking. - That's not what I was told. I was told someone else is coming in. - Don't say that to him. (laughing) - I thought that I could talk to you and the audience about before that door opens. - Yeah. - So. - This game's everyone comes in. The show is produced properly. - Perfectly. - Yeah, Tabor's doing a great job. - With a chase here. - With a chase here as well. - Chase. - Yeah, Zetterman walked in, everything hit the fan. - Yeah. - Zetterman walks in, he's the boss, and he writes on the old two. - Yes. - And also a Chevy Reed, he does that as well. - Yeah, he takes the Chevy Reed, and then Chase, like... - Jay Moore, go to another spot 'cause I don't know where the Chevy Reed is. - Danny. - I have the lineup for Carmen Herco for the show coming up at noon. - Apparently at 1202 they'll talk about Bunker, the chief's kicker, meaning the richest kicker in history. - What about that? - I mean, listen, whoever is the best in Cornerstone players, they deserve to be able to get paid. - And did you hear how he celebrated? He let his wife do the dishes last night. - That's terrible. - You're terrible, but that's terrible. - Jay's not even listening to us. - No, I'm here. And I heard what you said. - I mean, terrible. - Yeah, that dude's a different kid. - Bunker. - Yeah. - Bunker. - Yeah. - He's paid handsomely. - Yes. - Matthew Judon I think is a topic that we have to discuss as well. - Correct, because Matthew Judon's gonna be available. Now Ryan can't obviously comment on a player on another team, but we'll get Albert hopefully tomorrow. He's got something up. By the way, Albert's in the news. Sounds like he might be not only staying at SI, but might be joining Amazon to be on their Thursday night football coverage as their lead insider. So we've got like a big time guy who joins us every week. So those negotiations are going off. That gets done, Albert Breer Thursday night football. - Super cool. - Don't know why he's not on the recap. - So, he's too pissy. (laughing) - What do you mean? - It's too expensive. - All I'm telling you is that that's a spot, man. There's a lot of places you can get your bears info and your NFL info. Everyone's gonna be talking about the bears though. People are interested in the story of the Chicago Bears. - Agree. But Matthew Judon said he had a spat with Gerard Mayo, the new head coach, and he and the GM got into it. And look, that team's gonna be horrible, horrible. They're trying to trade for Brandon IU because he's young. It would be a piece you could build with. But if Matthew Judon does get moved, there are people that like Albert Breer said, he'd be a great fit in Chicago. That depends on the old line. You can't spend on everything. So I'd love to hear what Ryan Polls has to say when he enters our studio. - There's something to be said, Cap, also about development of your young players. Like you and I, every offseason, you look at certain veterans that you gotta pick him up, pick him up. You wanna make sure you get all this, make sure there's no stones unturned. I get that. However, sometimes you have young players that you have to develop. That's the reason why that you bring in young players or you bring them in in the draft is because you wanna develop them into stars. You can't cover everything. He's tried, but you can't cover everything. - There's our guy. - If you're the Chicago Bears. - A hundred percent. You can't buy everything. You cannot. - So that's what it comes down to. It's the Captain J. Hood Morning Show on ESPN 1000 and we are streaming on the ESPN Chicago app. Please be joined by the general manager of the Chicago Bears Ryan Polls. He joins us here on Captain J. Hood. Ryan, good to see you again. How are you? - I'm doing great. I'm doing great. How you guys doing? - How's life? - Life is good. We're in the middle of camp, had the early start with the Hall of Fame game, which has been really big for our team in terms of preparation, but especially for a rookie quarterback to get extra snaps, extra few weeks. So it's been good. - In terms of the old line being a little banged up, you've had some guys. Is that a concern at all? Do you look outside? You're building to see what's out there. How do you address that? - Yeah, you always, I mean, you want your guys healthy all the time. I've learned early in just front office work that having guys pop in and out, it's not the worst thing sometimes, just because you get to work the different combinations, because during the season, you're going to have those things pop up and guys are going to have to be ready to come in, so you can really get to see what your depth looks like. But obviously you would love the front five to be there all the time to continue to build that chemistry. But we've been able to work some different combinations through that, which again should help us as we go through the season. - Is that a concern then for Saturday or Caleb's going to be out there and he's going to have to adjust? - Yeah, there's probably going to have to be some adjustments, but I think there's a strong chance that we've got a pretty healthy alarm when we get to this weekend. - Ryan, how unique or different could the offense look with Coach Waldron at the helm? - Yeah. The one thing I really appreciate about Coach Waldron is this communication skills. He is a true teacher and educator of football, and you can see that everyone knows we're very, very fast, too, everyone knows where to line up. And then the beautiful thing about him, and we knew this to the interview process too, the ability to adapt and adjust based on the players that he has. Together information and say, okay, he might be struggling with this right now. Let's make sure he's playing fast and boil it down to doing this because he does it really, really well. So I love his mind and how he educates and adapts to his players. - You had told me a great story that Caleb is like, he's ball, man. Like the narrative that came from that narrative so didn't exist. And so I was reading and hearing. He's on his iPad, he's going through it, he's texting your quarterback coach, Kerry Joseph, like at 11.30 at night, he's like, dude, go to bed, please. I'm in bed already, we'll talk about this tomorrow. How do you bring that out, but also, dude, you gotta clear your mind this a long season? - Yeah, and Shane and Fluse have done a really good job having those conversations with him and creating. When you wanna be a lead at something, there's no such thing as balance, but taking some time to rest and recover, give your mind some clarity so you can come back stronger than when you started, especially on those off days too. But they've been doing a good job, he's a grinder, he's in early all the time, he's in late, takes care of his body, does extra work, and he wants more, more and more information all the time. And that's a challenge too, I think, that's where Shane's done a good job. Like, all right, I know you want more, but let's just slow it down a little bit and make sure we know this stuff really, really well. - Cap and Jay Hood with Ryan Polls right here on the Home of the Bears, he has been 1,000 and also on our YouTube channel. My partner and I have been battling back and forth by Caleb Williams in expectations for year number one. Cap says that he'd be disappointed if Caleb doesn't have 4,000 or more yards. How do you react to that? - I just wanna win. - Huh? - Yeah, so-- - My answer. - Yeah, I've actually thought about that a lot recently and expectations are expectations and this kid's not gonna back down from any of that. He's gonna give it everything he's got, but I think it's really important for us to get off the stat thing and really start thinking about winning football games around here. And I do believe all of that will come because I know how talented he is and the talent that he has around him. So we'll see what the numbers look like at the end, but to me, the number I'm worried about is the wins. - So you can hand in your Bears jersey if it's 3,9,9,9. - That'll be all. - Correct. - That'll be all for me. - That'll be all for me. In terms of hard docs, and I know George's position 'cause we've had him on where I don't wanna eat, I felt like the rest of the league needs to know blanks being done differently in Chicago. Like guys are gonna watch tonight on other teams and go, "Whoa, the facilities, the this, the culture." Like last week, I was told by somebody on your team, he said, "We have champagne, DJ Moore's getting an extension." He said, "You can't imagine the vibe in that room." That's what you've built. - Yeah. - Is it where you thought it would be this quickly? - It's faster, I think, when you're kinda planning, you're putting your plan together of how to build a team. You know, culture has talked about it a lot. You find out really, really quickly cultures people. And if you just keep loading up on the right type of people, all of that happens probably faster than what you think it would. So I think we've done a really good job of bringing the right type of people. You can feel the connection. I got, I got to give Flus a lot of credit too. He's been very intentional with the bonding that we do. And you can tell the guys love hanging out with each other. They share stories, life stories with each other. And through that, there's that connection. I think that's what's gonna allow us to be a very resilient team and a successful team and a team that has chemistry through the ups and downs. - What do you remember when you play as far as locker room vibe? What do you remember about that time? - It's just a brotherhood, guys that you trust that have your back, that you spent so much time together. You know, you gotta really love the locker to your right and to your left because the amount of time that you have. And you end up sharing life stories too. So yeah, I mean, that's a very special place. That's what I'm so fortunate to do. What I do now, it's certainly not playing but when we sit in the draft room and it has a locker room vibe to it and those relationships are strong. So I really like where this group is at. - I ask that question only because of your expertise being in the room, you looked at your time and said, I like to have that in the room for the Bears now. There's a correlation, right? - Absolutely. - Yeah, and there's a lot of different personalities. People come from all over, you know, different places. And there's gotta be a connection. And if you bring the right type of people, that connection can be really, really strong. - One of the coolest pieces of video that I watch was draft night. You're, the people here do such a good job of behind the scenes stuff. And there you are sitting there. The Giants are on the clock and you turned it. I think it's Ian. You go, they're taking it wrong. And he's like 77% we're getting them. Where do those numbers come from? And what's going through your mind when the voice, there was a lady's voice. Chicago, or New York takes neighbors. - Yeah. - What's going through your mind? - Yeah, you're going back to April on me. You know, first of all, my mind works that way because I always have to constantly worry about the alternative to what's planned B, C, and B. So if I just assume everything's gonna go right, I'll be caught off guard. I don't know, I don't like doing that. So I think the worst and then I can react. You know, if it's the perfect situation, I feel really good about it. But we have a really good analytics group. They've built unbelievable simulator for us to prep for the draft and I think I took, I probably did the draft 115, 120 times before we actually got to the draft, which was cool. So there's some percentages. They kind of work on historical numbers as well as what the numbers are for this year to kind of help us with the percentages to, it really just makes you feel good at the end of the day 'cause if 77% is wrong, what does it really matter? Does it, yeah, yeah. So this is your gonna be your first time on HBO, right? - Yeah. - Yeah, if you looked at it from that standpoint because now people have seen you in games, seen you in the press box, but people will be able to spot you now from being that guy from HBO. What's the oddest spot that someone approached you to talk about to you about the Chicago Bears? - The oddest spot, probably at a urinal like at the airport. (laughing) - That's like a bro, give me a minute. (laughing) But no, and that's why I love Chicago. I mean, it's everywhere and you can feel the passion and love for the team and everyone's excited. And it feels good that the things that you're doing and the direction that you're going is seen by the fan base and they really like what's going on. So, yeah. - Do you get, hold on a second. Are you getting your spike leon by being able to talk about the things you want and don't want that directors cut? - I mean, 'cause you don't want it all out there. - Yeah, no, their relationship's been really good. This is the first week we've gone through, but they've been patient with us and it's coming together. I think it's gonna be good. - Jayla Johnson was ticked off at the podium the other day. This is bull, he's Matt. There's no doubt he's a top 100 player. Is it because you've got to win more games and then people will go, okay, we'll put him there. And is there someone in this camp that has surprised you? - Yeah, so I love, you know, Jaylen's wiring. He's a competitor. So that stuff does piss him off and that's great. And the beautiful thing about that and I love it as a GM. When you reward a guy, you pay him and you give him a pretty big extension and then you show up for training camp and he looks better in better shape. He looks faster, he practices harder. That's a big deal to me. So I love how Jaylen's approach to camp. Surprises, you know, I can't give away all my secrets here. Swift, the Under Swift has been outstanding. Not only is the player on the practice field and what he can do and how dynamic he is as a runner, but also in the past game, really good dude that has been awesome for our team. But you want to talk about what a worker this guy shows up and just grinds every day. - How about Mercedes influence? 'Cause I heard Tyson Bejidle, he's the most important guy on our team. - Yeah, yeah. No, he's a love Mercedes and what he brings from a leadership standpoint. You know, when we get our run fits on, he still has it and he's moving people around. I'll even jump to Keenan Allen has been outstanding as well. Again, even some of the dirty work, you know, for a guy that's been so successful, crack blocks. And I mean, the guy can move people. He's a big, big receiver. He's bigger than you think he is. But just the work that he's put into. So there's a bunch of guys, but those are the ones that kind of stand out. - What are you listening to lately to get yourself ready for the season because you always have to have a theme, right? And so what you're listening to might be the theme for the team. So what are you vibing on lately? - Nothing, nothing specifically right now. So I'm thinking that maybe you've listened to some Kendrick lately. - Kendrick? - Yeah, they not like us. Maybe that could be the theme for the Chicago Bears. Send that upstairs, by the way. That could be a little Taylor Swift, maybe. A little cruel summer. - Okay. - Something like that. - Yeah, I have to check that out. - I mean, it's gotta be more than football. I mean, in the weight room, are you in there silently doing weight? - Yeah. - Yeah. - I'm just a top 100 playlist guy, just throw it on and keep it moving, so. - Every team cap has to have a theme, right? I'm gonna have to find a musical theme to get this going. It can't just be NFL films are not correct. - By the way, how was Yankee Stadium? You and I were texting, what was that? - Yeah, so we went out there. Son was playing in Cooperstown, so we stopped in New York. Everybody that works for the Yankees got to me, Aaron Judge, my son's favorite player. It was really cool. This is in the history, looking at the monument park there, and the outfield was incredible. Got the whole Beirut's bat, which I thought was really cool, so. - Very amazing. - Yeah, there's a lot of good history there. - Well, best of luck, man. We're rooting for you. - Thank you so much. - Appreciate your friendship. - Absolutely. - Got it. - Thank you, Ryan Poles. - Chair manager for the Chicago Bears with us, right here on the Captain J. Hood Morning Show. You're on a yes, good 1,000. And of course, on our YouTube channel as well. - Chamberman. (upbeat rock music) - All right, we thank you for listening and calling in and being part of the program right here on the Captain J. Hood Morning Show on the yes, good 1,000. And streaming on the yes, being in Chicago. Our thanks to Eric and Shay. Our thanks to Sean and Jay Moore. And our thanks to Ryan Poles for joining us. You're on the program? - Yeah, super cool, man. To get to GM in here, and certainly sounds like Caleb Williams is playing on Saturday. - We're time-excited to watch. No matter the offensive line, he's going to get some snaps. Sounds like that'll be a great plan to see on Saturday. - That'll be cool. - Don't forget, tomorrow is a Waddle Wednesday if you're on the show. - Yep, Tommy Waddle will be with us in the morning and hopefully Albert. So we'll get some more intel and you and I are going to practice, so it'll be a lot of fun. - So for Cap, I'm Jay Hood. We'll talk to you tomorrow from House Hall. So long, everybody. - Take that. - From Lake Forest. [MUSIC PLAYING]