(upbeat music) - Band Morning Show 4-7-5-9 and the Band Band on his friend, gunning, those were the dulcid tones of Brian Windhorse of ESPN on Scott Van Pelt's post-game ESPN sports center show. - Spicy. - He's bringing it. - Yeah. - Brian Windhorse does bring it. - Take Smith, if you will. - Just like one of the best emerging sports media stars over the last decade, so obviously, like it's been happening for a while here. You chronicle LeBron James' early career in Cleveland. - Yeah. - But that was good. He hit all the right notes after the Mavericks go down three games to none of the NBA finals of the Boston Celtics yesterday. - Yeah, not to turn the start of the show into a media discussion, but it has been very interesting to watch Windhorse for lack of a better term, untether himself from LeBron and be a little freer in this regard because, I mean, let's just be honest about it. It's like how he made his bones was access journalism to LeBron and that didn't come with being never critical, but we understand how that part of the business works. It is awesome to see him kind of untethered and just a meme machine now. Honestly, what growth? - Why would that be? - Yeah, he has stroking his beard. - I like the two fingers looking very impressed with something I can tell you. Who knows? It's the best thing about memes. - Who knows what that's in regard to? Could be anything. - Anywho, so it sucks that it doesn't look like we're gonna get an NBA finals and this is gonna go down as one of the worst NBA playoffs in recent memory. Like, what did we have? We had a game seven between the T-Wolves and the Nuggets, which was a highly anticipated defending champions and the defending champion for up 20 points in that game, but then got blown out in that game bizarrely. Like, it wasn't a game. That series had moments. We had Nick's Pacers, which also, game seven did not a thing as Jalen Brunson's hand exploded. We had the Nick's Sixers series, which is like, as far as series goes, like the most entertaining one we had. We had game one Celtics Pacers where the Pacers frittered away a late lead and Pascal. So yeah, I can turn them all over and then watch Jalen Brown shoot over his head to send it to overtime. - I found him. - You sure didn't? They also didn't win the game, but it looks like we're headed towards a sweep. And if not like a gentleman's sweep as the Celtics are just the way better team. And Lucas is still the best player, but holy cow, it feels like Brent and yesterday's game in particular, all the positives of Luca making his first ever finals and him looking pretty great, although like not a great shooting night for him. Don't Kyrie Irving though had his best of the series hitting his first three of the NBA finals yesterday. It feels like all the positives that surrounded Luca Donchich headed into his first finals overshadowed now by the narrative that you just heard Brian Windhorse talk about that he is such a liner, such a baby, such a defensive liability that it's hard to envision him getting over that final hurdle of winning an NBA finals unless something changes. - Yeah, I mean, it's borderline impossible to envision it even if everything changes the rest of this series. You're just in such a deep hole, the Celtics are clearly better team. - Not even talking about this. - No, no, I understand what you mean. But the thing you look at with Luca is that none of this should come as a surprise. The lack of free throw attempt, sure he gets a line four times, that in and of itself is surprising, but I don't know. I remember watching Luca in the FIFA World Cup this past summer and guess what? There was a lot of whining and crying about the refs. Guess what? There's a lot of in a lot of Mavericks games, whining and crying. Guess what I was ringing the alarm bell on? His whining and crying about his injuries that were totally fine that he could play through. So this is a, this is not a bug. This is a feature of what the player is. And here's the thing, if he had a better team, if he had more help around him, he probably wouldn't feel so exasperated at this point in time to be lashing out in this way. He is still gonna complain for calls. He's still gonna whine about these things, but I think that this is the kind of breaking point of a guy who has, let's be honest, like carried this team, if not single handedly, him and Kyrie together to the finals. So I'm not, I don't disagree with anything. Windhoarse said, I hold all those same opinions, but I look at it as a failure of what's around him than more so than a failure of the player. - It doesn't feel to that point that the Mavericks are like some versioning, not even Dynasty because you'd have to win one. - Right, but it doesn't feel like they're like, oh, well, there's the, this is the first of like five consecutive finals trips for the Mavericks. It's like, oh yeah, Daniel Gafford and Derek Jones, like those, and PJ Washington. Literally just named three fifths as the starting five. - Kyrie Irving, keeping it on the rails for another 18 months. - Yeah, I mean, just compare the rosters, right? It's not close. I mean, give them credit. But now I'll tell you what I am doing now. It's the same thing I was prepared to do if the Celtics lost the series is going through their run up to getting here. And they beat the team, the beat, the chance, right? The beat, the T-Wolves, who in those moments, it just, it didn't feel like they were up to the moment late in some of those games. And, but Kudos to Luka and the Mavericks, they beat him, they beat the Clippers without Kawhi Leonard and they never have Kawhi Leonard, but yeah, we know that that's a diminished team without one of the great finals players in NBA history and they beat a Thunder team that didn't look ready for the moment. It's just like they're an inferior team to the Boston Celtics. God, I know they lost to the T-Wolves, but this could have really been such an incredible moment. And we could have had a real historic finals if it was the nuggets looking for their second consecutive against the Celtics team that's in its second finals and looking to win its first. But yeah, we don't have that instead. We have one team that's clearly superior to another. And again, the best player, but too whiny right now. It's just a bummer. It's a bummer because you can say what you will about the NBA playoffs and the early rounds, especially where it's like, it's, yeah, okay, you can be intrigued by some of the longer series of the middle teams. Yeah, the middle teams, they're not going to win though. The most intriguing and most fun part of the NBA playoffs is supposed to be the finals where you do like, it's not as random as the NHL, which is becoming less random, by the way, and say wait. But it's usually the two best teams. And usually you get a commensurate, close series performance and we just don't have that this time. Yeah, we've had some of this before, right? Like I'm trying to remember the exact year, but it was where we could have had a LeBron Kobe final and LeBron couldn't get there, couldn't get past the magic. Yeah, it would have been the magic and Dwight Howard. Like you just, we have had these moments before you say this is the final I would like. This feels like a true test. And I think so much of it goes to, you know, in terms of the lack of, or not lack of intrigue, but it's so much goes to what you're talking about there is the Celtics path in it all. We, we'd feel differently about it. We've done this in basketball. We've done this in other sports too, where, okay, the finals a little underwhelming, but we've done the thing where, well, the NLCS is the real world series this year. We did, there was not one fleeting second where it felt that way for the Celtics. The Celtics have won 10 consecutive playoff games. Yeah, we kind of did that with the Nuggets and T-walls, and they've both been sitting at home for a round already now. Okay, like that's the problem with it is I can live in a world where the NBA final is ho-hum. It's going to happen occasionally, but to not ever have the collision course series and not because it's interesting, not mmm, T-walls nuggets. This is intriguing, but an actual two peak of their powers, teams that are truly kind of ready to win. We just didn't have that. And I think so much of it goes to how different the NBA feels in this post, you know, I know both these guys are still here, but post LeBron, post Curry era forever. You could pencil it in, LeBron versus Curry for half a decade nearly. We had it in the NBA finals and hand up. I said, oh, I'm a little sick and tired of the preordained final in November. Take me back, but when it got there, like when you finally got it, it was amazing, right? Because it was a couple of guys trying to burnish their all-time resumes and not just, you know, become Hall of Famers, but try to enter the upper echelon, the top tier of Hall of Famers. And maybe we'll get there eventually with the Celtics core and Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown. And Jalen Brown is going to be the finals MVP, it's clear. What you just said about that is I don't want to diminish the Curry factor of it all. 'Cause obviously the Warriors added a ton of intrigue and Curry is an all-time great. But are we kind of diminishing how interesting every finals LeBron James was in because of the, it was not the state, like with Jason Tatum, we sit here and talk about the stakes of his career, but it's the stakes of how we feel about Jason Tatum. It is not the stakes of Mount Rushmore for NBA history. - It's literally like when LeBron James is in a finals, it's like, okay, well, does he make it more undeniable that he's the greatest of all time? - Right. - I guess it is a two or one. - Exactly. - Like, is it two or one? No, I didn't diminish it. - No, no, no. - I mean, it's, yes, it was tough to be following a team that wasn't, so the Cavaliers or the Warriors over that span. - Sippin' Wine, courtside, I will never not do it. - You're like, yeah, try to convince yourself that it was gonna be something other than those two teams in the finals, but what it finally got there? - And even the seven game series that the Cavs won and LeBron bringing a championship to that city, like the first six games were not close either way. - No, it's weird. - Game seven was an all-time, all-time game and the narratives that existed and the stakes that existed in those series were unbelievable. Steph Curry looking for his first finals MVP too and oh, the KD of it all, like they're, yeah. That just, it felt like we were watching history. - 'Cause we were, but what I'm asking is, and again, I'm not trying to diminish the Warriors' role in this, but do we kind of overstate it? Like, was that really just about the stakes we were watching with LeBron every single year? - It was bold, I think it was two things. - I don't disagree with that, but if we would have had, I mean, if the Warriors heard the finals this year, we would have talked about it like, oh, the old guy's still got it. No, don't we love that story more than anything, but yeah, I just, I keep coming back to the idea of just coming to grips with the stakes are still real. It's still a title. It's still finals MVP. It's still Hall of Famers you're watching, but we're not until Victor Wumbanyama is ready to do this. We're not sitting here talking about literally one of the at worst four greatest or three greatest players of all time. - And I don't think we're gonna be doing that with any of the Celtics players, but what we could be talking about in this season, in particular, I think we should be talking about one of the great seasons of all time. If they do complete the sweep and have two postseason losses on route to a championship after what, a 64 win regular season, where they're just dominant, start to finish. It's not a 71 season, but it's as close to that as you can have as far as dominance start to finish for this Celtics team. And maybe that, like we get more of that and they become more legitimized with another run next season, then perhaps that starts to become a more intriguing plot line than we've got so far. - Yeah, I think it's funny. I was actually thinking about this driving in is that Jason Tatum and the Celtics feels like in the moment they'll almost get no credit for this, but if they win another one in the next handful of years, it's, oh, they're two time champions, obviously. This is how I feel about like Bryson DeChambeau's U.S. Open win. Yeah, 'cause she was open week, got on the brain. It's like, yeah, he won a major. Go win another one and then I'll actually give you credit for it 'cause there were no fans there. That is kind of the tenor it feels like with this, with this Celtics team. And you know, we're all living in the moment right now of, we watched it. We all know what these series were like. We know the non-Gauntlet that they had to run through, but the farther we get away from it, there will always be old man, maybe I'll be lucky enough to be old man yelling at Cloud one day going, I was there, that Celtics run was no good. They didn't play anybody. And you know what they'll say? Shut up, grandpa. Pretty good. Two losses seems better than four or five. So that's the other thing is in the moment we remember the particulars of it and people will always be rushing to, ah, remember the narrative around this, but the farther we get away from this playoffs, the more impressive it'll feel. - Yep, if they get there again. - Well, yes. - Unless this is a one off, but it doesn't feel that way because this is their second finals. Like we can talk about the disappointment and the poor shooting that Jason Tatum had in that first finals against the Warriors and the fact that they were down three games to none against a very inferior heat team that got their clocks cleaned by the Nuggets in the finals last season. But yeah, I mean, they do need to continue to be one of the more relevant teams in the NBA for retroactively this year is if you're not wrong. - No, you're not wrong about that. And I think the other thing that's working against them is kind of what I just talked about, the idea that there's not the boogeyman lurking in the East that you can point. If Victor Wembanyama played in the East, I can sit here and live in a world where the Celtics just lose in the East final every year to Victor Wembanyama. And then we go, ah, that's tough, but it's Wembanyama. We're not going to say, well, they lost to Joel LMB. - I mean, Giannis would be the guy. And I mean, boy, maybe there's no sympatico there between he and Dame, but I think injuries more had something to do with them not being relevant. I think the Joel Embiid conversation's over, it's over and done. - Well, no, and you forgot, I've really played into your big fly factor. Remember the hex of holiday? So the box will never win a title again. - That's true. - So you have to remember that. - That's true. So yeah, to me, the story of the series is, it's going to be the Celtics finally breaking through, but like just right behind that is the Luca, what the hell happened to you? You melted down, this can't continue. That's not championship mentality, like, my God. All right, could the whistle have been put away on the last couple of fouls that he was called? I suppose, like in the annals of time and some of the worst NBA officiated games, like that's not in the top 10,000? - No, it's not, and I don't think Luca has much of a leg to stand on regarding the complaining, but a player have his ilk that plays the way he plays, getting four, three throw attempts in a game where his team is in that spot at home. - Yeah. - Just, I'm not telling you that this is how it should be, but I bet you if we go to the like basketball reference game finder and you put in the accolades that Luca has and the points he averaged and in a finals game at home, that few free throw attempts for a player who plays a style that Garner's contact, I don't like the whining and I'd like a better tact, but I can't sit here and say he has no leg to stand on regarding it. - Sure, but they could have won the game if he was still in it. - Yep, fouls out with four minutes ago. - Yep, totally. - And they end up cutting it to two, and boy, God. - Sliding doors, moment, how awesome would it have been to see the Mavericks win that game in the meltdown in Boston? Would have been wonderful. - I think it's a 21-point second half lead without Luca on the fly. Anyways, it's not a world we live in. - Couldn't let it sit down. - We got the Celtics on the verge of their 18th NBA title and honestly, for me, the story is what a masterclass of asset management over the last two decades for the Celtics who go after KG, they win a championship, they end up in another finals, and then ballot in the first round the year after, and then they say, "Oh, it's over." Let's bill Belichick this thing, trade these guys too early as opposed to too late, the Nets trade that set everything up, landing both Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown in consecutive years with not the first overall pick. - Nope. - Number three from both, and trading down to get Tatum and outsmarting the Sixers, and then using the third pick to eventually land Kyrie, which didn't work out so well, but to do that, to take a championship core and just understand, like, hey, I know nostalgia, we could keep running this bag, no one would fault us for holding on to Paul Pearson, Kevin Garnett, all time great, even though Garnett's obviously ranked with the Celtics, not the same as Paul Pierce. - Somehow feels equally as beloved. - Yeah, we could have done that, but instead, we just ripped the Band-Aid off and people will understand, they trust us, and it's one thing to do that. It's another thing to hit on two-third overall selections that are foundational, but a decade and a half later, we're talking about another championship core. It's just unbelievable, and it's just not really fair, honestly, for Boston sports. Every time you think that they're like down and out or on the Patriots or down, that, they do feel down. The Patriots feel down. - Drake May's coming, baby. - Yeah, okay, and the Bruins, maybe, you know-- - No, I can't say anything back, 'cause every time I think they're dead, they're zombie Bruins. - You're right, and this was supposed to, there weren't even supposed to be here this year, but yeah, maybe there's a decline on the way for them. Brad Marshan's not getting any younger, anyways, but the Celtics are doing the damn thing. - They are, and the fact that in his soliloquy monologue, whatever you wanna call it, that we played off at the top of the show, that we all know what the duck boats are is just proof of how painful it's been. Yeah, of the, you know, like the, what, two decade run. As much as I wanna give Danny Ainge credit, I don't give him credit for the trade, I give him credit for the stomach to move off of the assets, 'cause that is actually just more-- - Oh, yeah. - Than that's being terrible at their job and proof. - Yeah, kind. - Can we just live in the world where we're going back to like, oh, this Russian cajillionaire, and he's dancing with models on 60 minutes. What's he up to now? - No, no for the follow-up, I do not wanna know. - I'm sure his assets are seized if he has any United States. - I would think, man, what would the US government have done with the Brooklyn Nets? Oh God, wanna live in that world? No, I don't. - But yeah, that's where I look back on it is that you, and this should be informative for other teams, is not that you're going to get that haul. You're almost certainly never going to, but it's having a stomach to move off of at a time. And I do think part of it is, and we've talked about this here in terms of how much weight people in the front office have, part of it helps that Danny Ainge himself sells its legend, right? Like, it's easier to rip off that band-aid when you have the, you know, the bona fides within a city, within an org, like he did. But yeah, it is, that trade set them all up. It was the biggest heist, arguably, in NBA history. I did just pull up the Jalen Brown draft. God, like, what a weird one. Ben Simmons goes first overall, then Brendan Ingram, nice pick, second overall, it's fine. Jalen Brown, Dragon Bender, Chris Dunne, Buddy Heel, Jamal Merit, like just not a, not a star stud to top 10 there, by any means. Yeah, fertile to the wraps of that. - Yeah, and it was the next one. The Tatum, like getting Tatum at three instead of taking Mark L for Foltz was like, the genius of all genius moves. He's not going to win finals MVP, but that's fine. Like, it is? - Is it? - I think it's fine. I do think, yeah, you're not insane now to have the Jason Kid take of Jalen Brown being the better player. And you get the trouble with the left hand is an issue, but God, he's all over the place. He does feel more ready for the moment. - Well, I mean, I'm sure the story has been told a ton about all of the like Jalen Brown is very smart stuff, but I do wonder how much of that plays into it. Like, you know, this is a guy who went to Cal for basketball. He's like lectured at Harvard. He got offered internships at NASA. There was, you know, the very dumb-minded stuff of, I think basketball's going to be too boring for him that when you have so much kind of coursing through your brain at any moment, I do wonder how much it prepares you. We've also seen the exact opposite with athletes where you go, you could not-- - Yeah, you do wonder, you wonder, right? - Well, you could not. Can you hear? - Yeah. - And you hear the hallowness inside? They're like, that's the secret, man. Not a thought in there. So it works both ways. But I do kind of wonder that about Jalen Brown and it's going to be fascinating to see how this kind of plays out with the subplot between the two of them. Not like they're going to be like fighting at a championship parade, but there was a clear pecking order established there in terms of this was Tatum's team and Brown was the running mate, Batman and Robin. And now you have like, Robin's become Batman. Batman's like, "Hey, I'm still Batman." It's like, I don't know. You don't look that strong. So I'm curious to see how it plays out. This is another thing though, where if the Celtics continue to have runs, it's going to be a run where Tatum needs to be that dude and Brown's going to be slightly lesser backs. This is one more where it's even more important for them to, again, we're saying this about a team that's up 3-0 in the finals, like, they got to get one more. They can't rest on their morals here. - I mean, the Brown Tatum thing is going to be such a test for how people view the sport. And I harken back to the Kevin Durant discourse. - Yes. - It's like, what do you want? Do you want the guy to be good, you know, individual best player on a team or to want to rack up championships? And, oh, we didn't like quite the way he did it with Golden State. It's like, well, what do you want? Do you want Jason Tatum to make it to do it himself? Or do you want him to just acquiesce to the betterment of the team? Like, what do we want here? I think my natural, like, sports brain is, hey, if they're both getting paid and it's not like Jason Tatum's getting no accolades, can't they just make it work? And it does feel like they both are so friendly to each other and get along so well and are enjoying playing together and have for as long as they had, that this will continue, that there won't be a, okay, I got to do it on my own. I got to have my own team here for my either of them. - As long as they're, again, I also think this goes to that it shouldn't be an insult to call someone the, I don't know, like eighth best player in the NBA. But the reason we had that conversation about Kevin Durant is because he was not the eighth best player in the NBA. He was at worst, I don't know, like third best or second best for sure, the best score in the league. That's why we have that. There is such a, when we think of the teaming up aspect of it, we're only mad at Chris Bosch here 'cause he left. No one else looks at Chris Bosch and goes, "How dare you join the Heat?" You got mad at LeBron and Wade 'cause they were the best, two of the best five players on the planet at that time. So I think that's the thing with Tatum is that he, when we're trying to give him his do, he's not in the perfect spot. He's like, "Hey, talk about me well." And we go, "Yeah, you're just not as good as these five or six guys, but you're great." And he doesn't wanna hear that. But in this particular circumstance that could be, they could be searing down the barrel of where he gets to share it with Brown and it's kind of both their teams. There's gonna be moments where Brown's going, there's gonna be moments where Tatum's going. No one's gonna begrudge him that because of who he is, I think. So sometimes the spot Tatum occupies in the NBA hierarchy can kind of hurt him. I actually think in this regard, it allows him to kind of seamlessly meld the two of them together. - Yeah, and they've been good before. They've had good regular seasons. They've had deep playoff runs like a season ago again, got to an Eastern Conference final and a game seven on home court against an inferior heat team that couldn't pull it off. But yeah, they're gonna win their first championship under this core. It's hard to imagine them just falling off the face of the earth in subsequent years. They're gonna be the team to beat in the Eastern Conference going forward. I want to get to this before we take a break. Andrew Marshan, the story on the athletic yesterday about how he thinks this NBA finals feels small and partly that's to do with the broadcast crew, Dorsburg, JJ Redick, along with Mike Brain on ESPN. ESPN's gonna continue to have the finals. They're gonna, as part of this, the new media rights deal, they're gonna have 11 more years of NBA finals. Of course, Turner's gonna be out, but they're gonna continue to have the finals. I mean, he posited the idea of ESPN doing the Tom Brady thing where it's like, hey, LeBron, here's all the money. - Right. - For whenever you decide you're done and we're not putting a timeframe on it, like clearly at 40 years old, like there is, how dare you? - There is. - How dare you? - There is a moment in the not too distant future where you're gonna call it quits, maybe a couple of years with Bronnie. But when you do, here's all the monies, and you don't have to call all the games, but like maybe like 20, but the finals. It's you and Mike Brain and probably a third person in the finals. Does that change the scope of the NBA finals for you? - It undeniably makes it feel huge. I just talked about it. The NBA that we glowingly remember of, I guess it's not even like a half decade ago, God, we're getting old, but of the LeBron era, it felt big 'cause LeBron was there. Again, there are other people involved, but any time LeBron showed up in a big game, it felt 10% bigger because legacy stakes, everything LeBron, the heliocentric nature of what the NBA is having the best guy at the beginning of it. It would make it feel big, but I don't know that I'd like it or I don't know that I'd want it. I think LeBron needs space to stretch out. Part of the problem with JJ Redick, and I have liked his work as analysts, I love the podcast clips you see from him, is he can be a little dry in terms of his like on air delivery for me. And then I also think the other part of it is that he is not yet used to the kind of flow of a game. He's still trying to get in his like minute and a half long podcast point in the throes of a game. I would much rather, and like, you know, I'm not trying to kill the NBA and TNT, but it's like they've already done that. I would much rather him in that setting where it's like, hey, stretch out, take all the time you need, joke around, be funny. He is charismatic. I know like people's mileage may vary on that, but I think he'd be good on TV, but it needs to be in that setting. I think the idea of him calling games would be terrible for him, quite frankly. And the last point on it, it's hard to call games when you own one of the teams in the NBA. - Yeah. - That's gonna be the hard part of it when they give him an expansion team. - Yeah, when they give him the Vegas expansion team, it's gonna be pretty tough for him to be calling games. My aces, no regard for human life. - They call him the aces as well. The same name as the WNBA team. - Yeah, I actually do, I've seen people, I don't know why I'm ending up here, but I do like the idea of like, you see this in overseas all the time. It's like, yeah, Bayern Munich, they have like a soccer team, but it's like, you know, they have like other sports as well. It's like the basketball team as well. So I don't know, I actually would be totally game with that of like a Toronto, like, you know, whatever. - Yeah, I hear you. Anyways, to a larger point about whether it would make it feel less small if LeBron James was calling it, maybe for a moment. I think it's mostly the matchups that you get and the history that you have, I guess, with the broadcasters, right? Like if it was, Jeff N. got knee next to Mike Breen, I think maybe it feels less small. I think George Burke and JJ Redick are great. Like I, and Mike Breen's the best. Like my God. - Well, I mean, there's a reason I only criticize JJ Redick. And again, I like him. I just think he like doesn't have the reps that the other two have. And obviously Mike Breen is the gold standard for that. - Yeah, the first time we see LeBron in a finals? Sure, that would be intriguing. I mean, it won't be the first game he's ever called at that point, right? Like we'll have a regular season run up to LeBron James, but it's the match of honestly. Like we overdo this thing and I don't want to be two naval gays you gots in the media there. It's like, yeah, I think people calling the games and the analysts that are surrounding them are important and add to my enjoyment of the game. The game is the thing. If the game is the number one thing, not the people calling it. - Well, and if we're talking about the feel of it, that actually matters so much more with the playback play guy and you can't get more of a big time feel than Breen, right? That's who sets the tone of the broadcast. Like, of course he's going to-- - He only had one bang yesterday. - Yeah, well, get it together. Should be banging the reps when they've completely bought your call on Luca. What a miss call bang! - Bang, yeah. God, bang. - It's good. - Hey, you took vacation, we talked to him. - Yeah, friend of the show to me only, Mike Breen. - I mean, I'd like to be his friend. - I know, but then you took vacation, so priorities. - I'll be taking vacation. - I know. - I'm sure you'll get him back. - I don't think so. Tomorrow, although Danielle is filling him with me, so you honestly never know who's coming on tomorrow. - All right, Santana, here's what I know about them. They're coming to Budweiser's stage this summer. June 26 with Counting Crows as part of their oneness tour, we've tickets to give away to enter. Listen daily to the fan morning show for the codeword, then text the codeword to 59590 to enter today. Text the codeword freedom to 59590. Again, that's freedom to 59590. If you don't win with us, tickets on sale at ticketmaster.ca. When we come back, another failed attempt by the Blue Jays to get to 500, because despite being, according to the numbers, the best offensive team in Major League Baseball, that's mostly the fielders. - That and more next, as the fan morning show continues, Ben and his brand gunning Sportsnet 590 to the fan. - Dive deep into Toronto Sports and the NFL. The JD Bunk is podcast. Subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music) - The fan morning show Sportsnet 590, the fan man, and his brand gunning, no it doesn't. Okay, I just want it to start here. No it doesn't. They could have eased, okay. This is not the first time we've heard that from John Schneider, and I'm sure he's not the only manager that says it. Would have been easy to pack up the tents and say, forget it, we're just going home and like walked up. What are you talking about? - Yeah, just do it now in the whole year. - What are you talking about? Would have been easy to pack up and say, forget it, we're losing the, like what? Like, so you just literally stand at the plate, swing three times and what, it's, okay, whether you think the season is lost or not, all these guys have millions of dollars on the line with each and every at bat, right? - This is also the team that can't score a run in the first inning to save their life. So they're pretty much behind all the time in ballgame. So why would they ever play? If that's the way we're going about it. I also just really enjoy our, we haven't planned this out, but I do feel like we have perfectly alternated being mad at stuff John Schneider has said, 'cause we can't, there's no way we could both do it every day. That would be too tiresome and irksome. And I wasn't even so perturbed by that. So I'm happy you took the mantle today to be irked by it. 'Cause yeah, don't say that. - I don't, like, I get it. - No, no. - They can't win every game or even half the games, it turns out, as they're back to two games under 500. - But, my God, I don't need to hear the team with the top 10 payroll and baseball didn't decide to forfeit the game and they'd take their ball and go home. - They did, in fact, try. - Good for you and came a fly ball away from-- - You took their cap to him, they did, in fact, try. - He didn't say that. - No, no, I'm saying it about him, though. You got to tip their cap to him. He said, "No, no, you're not going home. "We're gonna stay here and tell it's over." - I will say, as irksome as I find those comments, it doesn't have as much of a tangible effect on the outcome of the game as deciding to throw through on a first and third two-out situation up one nothing with two of the speediest players, not just on the Brewers, like in baseball, the Brewers are the fastest, best base running team in all of baseball. So, like, obviously, down one nothing and they're organized chaos, that's their whole thing. Grace Austin's like, "We're just, stuff happens here. "We're just trying to make stuff happens." So, like, clearly, they were gonna try and do something at that point, considering their lack of success with runners in scoring position against Chris Bassett before that. The idea that you're so smart and so good defensively, that you can run your little pet play where Isaiah Kiner-Philepha steps in front of the bag and then throws home and then you cut off the game tying run at the plate. Instead of just letting it play out, trying to get the third out, which didn't happen anyways, but sliding doors moments. Anyways, more on it, more on it. 'Cause that's the thing, there is a scenario. In theory, there is a great beauty, honestly, in playing baseball, prioritizing pitching and defense. I guess it's not as beautiful as the way the Yankees do it, which is play pretty good defense and have great pitching, but also hit a quadrillion home runs. By the way, Aaron Judge Juan Soto and John Carlos Stanton, more home runs than all of the Blue Jays combined. I'm actually not remotely surprised by that. No, you shouldn't be. You shouldn't. I'm a little surprised you had to throw a third guy in there. Yeah. That's actually the surprise of that stuff. Yeah, anyways, that's the best. But like, when the Blue Jays were actually winning the occasional game in that fashion in April, it's like that's kind of beautiful, right? Like, it's intense and, boy, you got to be on your pews and cues every single day because every game is a one-run game. But there is some beauty in that. Playing clean baseball, that's beautiful. Getting great pitching, nothing like it. You're talking to a coach now, remember? So I'm very on board with this. And like I said, going to break, there is a metric that will tell you the Blue Jays are the best defensive team in baseball. That is coming on the strength of a couple of positions. Centerfield and catcher, which are very important defensive positions. That's two thirds of the middle. That's a very important duo to have. If you were going to choose where your defense would come from, you'd also throw short stuff in there, too. But like, yes, centerfield, catcher, very, very important. And if it's a day where you get Kevin Kiermeier and centerfield and Dalton Vartio in left field, then man. And George Springer isn't the same dude, but he's like a league average, at least defender in right field. Great outfield defense, catching, whether it's Danny Jansen or Alejandro Kirk and guys do the different things like Danny Jansen's more. He's more adept at blocking balls in the dirt and Alejandro Kirk will steal you strike. Anyway, great defense there. The rest of it, though, ain't that. And I know Isaiah Kiner-Foleff has won a gold glove before. We've seen Matt Chapman play third base, and I don't know why he's playing third base. Yesterday in the United States. Vladimir Griner Jr, he wasn't starting in yesterday's game, but it doesn't matter. He won a gold glove. Who cares? He's a first baseman. He's not, he's not done mattingly over there. Okay, I think we can all come to that conclusion. He's like, okay, he's a first baseman, by the way. Boba Shedd is, at times, I thought he was a league average defender there. This season, he's got a horrible start defensively, and maybe those days have passed him by. This is not an elite defensive team. And when you don't score any runs, and when you have three hits going into the ninth inning, and you try and salvage it because you have such incredible, intestinal fortitude that you're not laying down and dying, you have to be perfect. And you have to make the perfect decision. So yeah, everything's magnified, I get it. So there are a lot of teams that would make stupid decisions like the Blue Jays made yesterday, or make a non-perfect play like the Blue Jays did in giving up the game tying run on a botched first and third two-out play. But for this team, that's it. They have no margin for error. They're not at the peak of their powers defensively, not capable of winning enough for three, five, four games, because their defense outside of the outfield ain't otherworldly, which would have to be to win these types of games. >> Yeah, that's the infuriating part, and you mentioned it, but the idea of a center fielder, like it's maybe not the first position you would pick, but it very well might be if you could just say, hey, you get one elite defender, and then you build your team out from there. The fact that you have two of them should prop up your defense, and that's what it's done metric-wise, but also look at the way that this Blue Jays staff has been built, like Bassett is a guy who pitches the contact. And yeah, occasionally that can help them with the outfield defense, but if it's a bunch of ground balls in the infield, he needs guys to be sharp there. Gossman with his splitter, he feasts on getting guys to barely topple over on that thing, and then you're putting the infielders in a precarious position. The infield's putting him in a precarious position. If you're gonna be the pitching and defense team, you gotta be it. And unlike if you're a team that's gonna have offense, there are gonna be times where the offense slumps, and you say, it's okay, this is part of the plan, this is how you build it. Defense is not supposed to slump. Pitching, okay, to a certain degree it can, but it's supposed to slump in a less way. That is the concerning part about this, is that it is much more of a high-wire act if you're gonna build this team, and it is also the type of thing where you can't kinda build a pitching and defense team. You can build a team that rakes, and then try to turn it into more of a pitching and defense team. But if you're gonna be the team where your strengths are your pitching and defense, you have to lean into that. And this group just hasn't done that. They've been kinda half pregnant in all these scenarios of how they wanna build their team. Like I'm getting breaking bad flashbacks here. No, half measures. And there's been a lot of them with this group. - Yeah, I mean, they've leaned away from being the defense team because they are not just a bad offensive team, but like historically bad. And the history of the franchise. I understand baseball's changed a lot over the last 50 years, which is almost as long as the Blue Jays have been a franchise, by the way. 50-year anniversary coming up in 2027. Should that be informative of moves that will be made? This would go in when they wanna peak for, I wonder. - So the Blue Jays, after yesterday's performance, hitting a robust 232 this season. Where would that put them in all time franchise history, as far as batting average? - Well, second worst, but the worst performance this team has ever had offensively was in the 1981 season, which was not a full season. It was a strike short in season where that team only played 106 games that was split into two halves. They hit 226 that season. 232 would be the worst batting average season long for any Blue Jays team in history. Again, this is a team that has a nearly 50-year history. They're quite bad when they entered Major League Baseball in 1977. They're slugging percentage after yesterday's performance. 366. We're now just a point above the slugging percentage of the first Blue Jays team ever, 1977. A Blue Jays team that was abhorrent lost 107 games. Horrible, horrible, horrible. Had a slightly lower slugging percentage. They were 365, one point lower than what we're watching here. It's not just that this Blue Jays team ain't it offensively in Major League Baseball, comparatively. In the long, and now it must be said, storied history of the Toronto Blue Jays. We were talking about a half decade of results here in a couple of World Series championships and a great resurgence in 2015 and to a lesser extent, 2016. The Blue Jays are doing something we've never seen in the history of this franchise and not an expansion team with no expectations. It's a team with the top 10 payroll and baseball. It's a remarkable, I think you kind of lose sight of it and you're like, oh, they're very bad for the expectations. No, no, no, they're like one of the worst offensive teams in the history of this franchise. - Yeah, and I actually think the, I shouldn't say the only point in that that matters, but for me, kind of the only point in that that matters is the payroll. Like you will have teams where you will have years where the offense just does not hit. And I understand you wanna, you know, you look at the where the dollars are spent on this team and yeah, you have spent some money on the rotation with burrios and gauzman and even Kakuchi and Basset. Like we certainly understand that, but to have spent the amount of money that this front office has spent on this team to be where they're at in the CBT threshold and to have nothing to show for it offensively. How many times we talked ourself into the season Vlads having and is this, you know, enough or whatever. We're doing that because there's nothing else surrounding him. The idea that we're trying to squint and make, you know, make a diamond out of this Vlady season or try to figure something out, it is just proof of how little there is around him. And yeah, part of it is they're spending a ton of money on George Springer. And he's in the last couple of years of his deal and you knew it was gonna be like this. But the other guys are supposed to be picking it up. It's the payroll part of it that makes it the embarrassing number that it is. Teams can have down offensive years. You don't like it. I'm not gonna tell you you should cheer for it 'cause you shouldn't. But the idea to do it with a payroll that looks like this, that's the part of it that is quite honestly abhorrent but I just can't wrap my head around. >> Yeah, it's also going great when you're selling yourself or I am and we'll see if anybody else is on the return of Joey Votto, which is apparently like, okay, it's been out of sight out of mind and a very curious situation for a guy that rolled his ankle stepping on a bat, was expected to miss one day and, you know, three months later, he hasn't appeared in a minor league game. But apparently that's coming. According to John Schneider, he's getting pretty close to playing in minor league games. He's been doing everything in terms of base running hitting, live BP's feeling good. I think you'll see him in some games. Very, very soon. Okay, I don't think Joey Votto is Joey Votto but considering what we've seen from Daniel Vogelbach, what we've seen for the rest of this lineup and even if it's not just performance, the idea of something new, I'm actually like, I'm hanging my hat on the potential major league debut as a Bluejay for Joey Votto as being the next injection of intrigue to a team that hasn't had a ton of it. Yeah, it also, I don't know that I should tie them together but it does make the non-DFA of Daniel Vogelbach to make space for Horowitz on the roster, like make a touch more later. No, that's the thing. It's like, everyone in the office is like, obviously DFA, Vogelbach then said, no, we have to save that one for when we do it with Votto. So I do wonder if that was kind of tied into the decision as well as that you, you knew you were a couple weeks away, potentially from making that change anyways. Yeah, speaking of DFA's, yeah, of course, Kevin Bijo was DFA'd this past week. How can we not lead? Yeah, the trade was consummated and the Bluejay's due factually gets something in return, a fellow by the name of Braden Fisher, who's a pitcher, who has an ERA over five in Triple A, but has high strikeout numbers like I imagined. In this situation, you're not probably getting a future Hall of Famer. I mean, they get something instead of nothing, which is what they would have gotten if they exposed Kevin Bijo to waivers, but instead consummating a trade with the Los Angeles Dodgers, well, where he will be teammates and already has been a teammate with Teoska Hernandez. Got a start yesterday as the nine-hole hitter, playing third base for the Dodgers who are, I mean, I have to check the betting odds, like if they're not the favorites to win the World Series, that's the second favorite. It's like them and the Yankees, right? That it is, listen, it's I know interesting to see what Teoska Hernandez has done in Los Angeles and painful and considering the return on that. Half of it is in the minor leagues because of demotion. The other half like Adam Mackel might be something, but whatever Teoska Hernandez is one of the better sluggers in the National League and now Kevin Bijo is joining that team. It's also, to me, intriguing that it's like, okay, the team that has scored, so like been one of the most underwhelming offensive teams in all of baseball, most underwhelming wins and losses teams in all of baseball didn't have room for Kevin Bijo. And I understand it's Spencer Horowitz, if you're gonna have both, okay, they become superfluous. Blue Jays don't have room for Kevin Bijo, but you know who does? It's like one of the best teams in all of baseball. We one thing, more palatable. It's not even that like, oh, it's like him and Teoska Hernandez is gonna win a World Series. It would have made more sense if it's like, oh, someone also ran is going to finally give Kevin Bijo his one full season or runway here, and we're gonna see what he is as an everyday player. It's not that, it's a team that has World Series aspirations like that guy helps. - Yeah, I actually, I'm not remotely surprised by this. When he was DFA'd, I said that he is the perfect 20, he is not the perfect Blue Jays, but he is very much the perfect 26th man on a really good team, and maybe they don't even see him as much as that. And the Blue Jays already traded away a guy who went on to win a World Series MVP in steep here, so it honestly can't get any worse. And Gabby Moreno was in the World Series last year, so really, it's like, this is old hat. - Seeing Cav in there, it's actually a feather in their cap that they just continually trade away World Series studs. Maybe not. - Yeah, I don't think anybody has, hey, and they did end up with San Diego Espinal as part of the Steve Pierce. - All star, San Diego Espinal. - Dealio, but yeah, a little bit more intertwined with the history of the Toronto Blue Jays is Cav and Bijo than Steve Pierce was, but yeah, we wish him well. Dodgers are, in fact, World Series favorites according to Sports Interaction at plus 300, the Yankees plus 475. All right, time now for the Canadian football report brought to you by Securian Canada, the official life insurance partner of the CFL. Week two in the CFL are goes after their big win in week one, are on by this week. Meanwhile, match ups this weekend are as such, the Grey Cup favorites, Winnipeg, trying to rebound after their loss to Montreal, try to get in the win column as they play in Ottawa tonight. Red Black's first game of the season, they had a week one by, that's a tough one. The two teams met last season, week six in Ottawa, with Ottawa winning that game to snap the five game, losing streak against the Blue Farmers. Friday night football in the CFL, seeing the reigning Grey Cup champs, the Montreal Allowets, want to know, after their aforementioned big win over Winnipeg week one, their want to know to play the Elk, their O and one, that game is in Edmonton. Want to know Calgary Stampeders taking on the O and one Lions, at BC Place in all West match up Saturday night. And finally Sunday night, you got the one Ando Saskatchewan Rough Riders going to Hamilton, taking on the Tiger Cats. They were in the news this week after signing American QB, Talia Tongavailoa, who of course is the brother of Tuo. We love a good NFL name in the CFL and we got one. - Yeah boy do it. We also love a guy with some big time college pedigree, played a Bama, played a Maryland, so fun to see in like quasi my neck of the woods. I don't know, maybe I'd have to make the pilgrimage, might have to do it. - Absolutely have to. All right, that was the Canadian Football Report brought to you by Securian Canada, the official life insurance partner of the CFL. When we come back, all right, Mitch Marner has not yet been traded. We don't know if in fact there has been a conversation directly between Brad's for living and his representatives, but that's not stopping people from coming up with potential trade partners. One makes a whole lot of sense. We'll talk about it and more next. As the fan morning show continues, Ben Ns, Brent Gunning, Sportsnet 590, the fan.
