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All right, it's time to get the party started here on a Monday afternoon. Welcome in, kickback, relax, enjoy yourself. We're here for three hours. It is coffee and Company, and we are fueled by Thornton's here on Sports Talk seven ninety. Take us with you wherever you go. You can listen live on the iHeartRadio app. Also listen live at seven ninety Louisville dot com. Nick Coffee. That's my name. I hope you knew that. If not, now you do.
The travel chief that's Austin Montgomery. He's alongside today as we get another week started. And I feel like we got we got lucky this weekend with I mean you were telling me right before the show started, you got well, I don't I wouldn't call it luck. You clearly knew what you were doing when you made those wagers. Yeah, you know anytime home run bet that cashed. Did you get in on any NBA playoff stuff?
Oh yeah, I uh went with the with the Warriors and who they played, the Rockets, right, Warriors and Rockets.
Also I know is that the games continue to be complete blowouts that like, I don't know how anybody like, how do you even bet on that? I mean, there was one game yesterday, I don't know who it was, but they lost with fifty one points.
Oh yeah, the Grizzlies and Thunder.
I mean, the format of the NBA playoffs has absolutely made it to where if your job is to not worry about ratings or worry about, you know, anything other than your team winning a seven game series, it is wise for you to concede and just accept the fact that we're going to lose this. Let's get everybody out and hope that we can live to fight an other day. That's brutal, even if that means we lose by fifty points. I'm not exaggerating. Fifty one points was the margin of
victory yesterday in one of the playoff games. So congrats to you. I'm more impressed than you would imagine, because I mean the NBA, like, I don't know how you. I guess more than anything, if there's like a decent spread and you feel like a team's gonna win, you would say, okay, well it's game two here, so you know they're probably gonna just accept Okay, we're gonna go down oh two before we go home and try to
win some games. So right, you know, maybe you just feel like they'll cover even if it's a big number because of the blowouts.
But it was one of those things like you know where you go in the sports book and they have like the automatic like here's the boost for tonight was at three point fifty, but we put some juice on it to plus four hundred, and usually that's a suckers bet, but I went on, had to did it. I think it was Jimmy Butler over.
The Jilly suckers. Hey, who's a suckers now?
Jimmy Butler over twenty five points and Steph Curry over three and a half points. And I also got in some action with the Cavs Heat game last night. But Tyler Tyler hero man, he just needed him. And Donovan Mitchell was the bet is at four to one odds for both of them over twenty five over twenty four points, and obviously Mitchell hit that. Tyler Herro was at seventeen at halftime, and when I was looking at it, I'm like, oh, we got this in the bag, finished with twenty one points.
Yeah, I tell you what, man, that's not luck. You know what you're doing. I mean, obviously that you don't win them all, but like the other bets, like, I apologize for insinuating that when I said we got lucky this weekend that it had anything to do with your wagers, because it's not luck. You know what you're doing. You're cleaning out the sports books.
And trying to good stuff.
When I mentioned luck, I'm saying like weather because I I mean, it looked like it was gonna I mean, the forecast was calling for good chance of rain all day both Saturday and Sunday, and we avoided it on Saturday, and it really seemed like one of those moments. And again I'm not following it super closely. I just know that, hey, if I pull out my phone and look at the weather app. It tells me that there's, you know, a certain percentage chance of rain. So I thought, okay, we're lucky.
Because my daughter's baseball game was at nine am. They have games all throughout the day up until I think like two o'clock, and I thought, okay, well, hey, I guess the benefit here is that we get it early and maybe we won't have to have our game canceled
because of rain. Well, did end up raining all day, and because we didn't really have any plans and we're like waiting out the weather, we ended up, you know, we ended up going with some friends to a winery, hung out let the kids run around, and that's just one of those It was a it was a first of all, it was fun, but also when you don't know you're gonna be able to do something and there's kind of some spontaneousness to it, you end up somewhere like, hey,
let's take advantage of the fact that it didn't rain, and we did that, had a good time. And then yesterday Easter Sunday, hopefully everybody had themselves a good Easter. I mean, it was it was very nice. I mean well, it wasn't sunny all the way through, but that's okay.
It didn't rain.
If you had the one thing you don't want if you got kids out there hunting easter eggs is rain, and we didn't have any of that, which was good. But man, it was muggy.
It was it was. It was sticky out there.
I feel like yesterday was the first day of twenty twenty five where I felt like, Okay, the humidity has at least arrived, then it'll be here. I mean, the humidity is, you know, is not great. It's blooming, yeah, I mean it's it's it's of all the different components to weather, cold, hot, whatever, humidity is the worst.
Yeah.
I mean I'd rather be breezing than be humid. I mean, maybe I would regret if I really got put in like the worst humidity ever and I was legitimately in temperatures so cold that I've never experienced it before, maybe I would side.
With being, you know, being humid.
But when it's just sticky, engross and you can't breathe, and we weren't quite there yesterday, but without the sun shining and it being as warm as it was, that's that's what really made me realize, Okay, sticky, yeah, I mean it. You so you grew up in Arizona. Is Arizona. I'm an idiot, so I just assume all Arizona is the same, and I know that's really not the case. But like Phoenix, outside of Phoenix, it's just desert. It's hot, it's hot, and you know there's that dry heat.
Yes, exactly, everyone's always everyone always says that dry heat. And if you don't even mean it means exactly how it sounds like you. I mean, you just said it when it's like not when the sun's not even out and you kind of just.
So wheel the moisture heat and moist heat is essentially humidity, right.
Yes, exactly the heat where you where you're just standing outside and it's just like low key, like the sun's not out and you're not expecting it, but what do you know? You're sweating in places, right, And but like it's compared to like an oven when being in Arizona, like it's just there's hardly like any any clouds. It's just like wide open terrain. It's just dry. It's dry everywhere because there's really no like there's really no trees.
There's not a whole bunch of shade. It is just like it's not like a sand desert like not like you know, but it is just flat lands. There's a lot of there's cacti and other succulents.
But everybody has their own, you know, preference, and some people are more so bothered by heat than others. But I've been to Vegas and I've been to Phoenix, and Vegas is essentially the same.
I don't like.
Again, I'm sure if Vegas was the same temperature and Phoenix was the same temperature that that that it was when I was there, and you added humidity to it, it would be even worse. But I'm just here to tell you that, like wet heat, dry heat, whatever, the heat when I was in Arizona and when I was in Vegas that hot as hell. Like yeah, however you want to classify this type of heat, I'm out on it.
Like it's so many times nick where there was just it was like one hundred and ten degrees outside with like no humidity.
It's just strictly from the sun.
That's dangerous.
It's the heat strictly from it.
It was literally when people would say, yeah, you can be able to go out and fry like an egg on the sidewalk. Somewhere it got pretty bad. I don't know if it's ever got like that.
Here. It does get sticky and humidity.
But like when you know, like how you could look outside and like see like the mirage it looks like, oh, like it's waving like it look you know.
That's That's how it was constantly in Arizona.
I'll tell this. I've told this story before. I flew to Phoenix. This is probably about ten years ago, and I was there for about five days. It was a work trip and I landed. I flew out of Louisville and I ended up landing in It fled a little early in the morning and I landed in Phoenix. It was I was a southwest flight. It was probably probably got there at nine am Louisville time, so it was
like six am there, so it was really early. And I went to get the rental car and I'd never been to that part of the country before, and I remember being asked, do you want somebody?
I guess they could.
They could get be on like a it wasn't really a shuttle, but they had some type of like I don't know if it was a big golf.
Cart or what.
Where they would drive you closer to where you could get to your rental car and you didn't have to walk away by yourself. And I was like, you know, it's fine, no big deal. I mean, I didn't I'm fine with walking and I didn't want to wait on you know, I just let me just tell me where it is and I'll walk there. If it's not like two miles away, I'll be good. So I ended up.
I was wearing you know, business casual clothes. I had on a polo shirt and you know, some slacks, and I made the walk and it was probably I don't know, maybe I don't know, maybe eighty yards or something from from from the desk to where I ended up getting
in the vehicle. And keep in mind, it's insanely early there at this time, and I didn't feel like that that that, you know, because when you open when it's when when the Ohio all area just gets real soupy and it's just disgusting, like as soon as you walk outside, like it's just it's it's thick, it's heavy, it's gross. You could feel it on you. It didn't do that at all, but I realized it was very hot, and
I thought, okay, pretty hot here for six am. Anyways, I ended up making it to the vehicle and I popped the trunk, put my bag in there, and as I'm walking to the front to get in, I realized, like, underneath my shirt and my pants, you would have thought I just got out of the pool and threw clothes on.
Oh w.
And I remember thinking like, okay, you know what, I didn't feel that humidity. It didn't hit me in the face. It was kind of deceiving, but sure enough, an eighty yard walk, it's six am with the heat they got out.
Here, like it's it's it's still hot as hell. That's a dry heat. Yeah, it's it's better than the humidity.
But still, like, I don't you know, if I could get somewhere where the humidity's low and we would be looking at you know, seventies year round, that's that's the sweet spot. But of course, you know, there's not many places like that, and the places that do have that kind of weather, that's you know, where people go to retire. So anyway, we got lucky this weekend and hopefully everybody had themselves a good Easter. I was hiding Easter eggs for the kids and see Easter Bunny good to the kid.
Oh Easter Bunny, I mean came through. Yeah, the Easter Bunny. You know, she she she did great this year. But she she signed me up for you know, it's not like it's not like it's it's not a chore necessarily, and I could be doing worse things. But she ended up getting the The Easter Bunny got Moose a second controller for his PlayStation.
He only had one.
And what I didn't, you know, realize, is that now he won't play any game unless I play with him. That's right, and you know, sometimes it's fun, but also you know, like I got stuff to do. I can't just sit around and play video games all day. But I will say this, if you ever, what was the first video game you got into as a kid like that,
you were just like all in on. And I guess a lot of people are going to say, like Madden or the NAA football game, take take sports away from it, because I didn't play many games at all that weren't sports.
I don't know about you, the I mean, I was a huge sports gamer growing up. I guess like when I first got the PlayStation, it was either like tomb Raider or WWE in your House.
Oh yeah, I forgot about the wrestling games.
But I would say the most video game hours I've ever logged on to this day probably has to come between two, either Mario Kart or Grand Theft Auto Vice City that has probably so many hours my legendary games. Oh dude, well, Grand the Thought of Five comes out this year, it's going to be crazy. You thought the college football hype with last year was wild. Whenever Grand Theft Thought of Five comes out this year, it's gonna be It's going to dominate the internet.
I played the maybe it was the original mini many years ago. I don't think I owned it, but I played it with a friend and clearly because the only games I ever really consistently played outside of the sports games was tomb Raider, which you mentioned, which I really liked. Yeah, really could, but I forgot about this game. And I this is before he even opened up his Easter basket and got his controller. But on Friday night he wanted to play, and he said, you know, can we get
some new games? So I downed him a couple of new games, and one of them was a grass cutting game, which which is.
Kind of a grass cutting simulator.
Yeah, it's it's in a way, it's I mean, does look fun.
I'm not gonna lie.
I'd like to think that if I, you know, if I played it, I wouldn't just you know, end up sitting there for four hours. But like I can see how somebody would because it's what you do is you end up like you're in a garage. It starts you in a garage and you have you have an iPad, and you walk up to your iPad like hit hit a button and it pulls up like where you're bidding on jobs to go cut grass, and you pick a job and you get paid per yard, and you get paid a bonus if you get the yard cut in
a certain amount of time. We've got we've got to push them over now. But once we start mowing more lawns, we're gonna be able to get us a bigger ritting mo over there.
You know.
It's it's kind of fun. Well, he got bored with that. So the other game I downloaded, I forgot about and I you know, talk about nostalgia crash bandicoot oh, yeah, do you know what crash band it is?
Yeah, that that's probably that's probably it.
So we downloaded it.
We played. I mean, it's like insane. It was a wee.
You know.
I'm sure everybody has, like if you're a parent, I'm sure you've had like a moment where your kid starts getting interested and asking questions about not just things that you know, dad and mom like because that's what kids do. That's one of the beautiful things about being a parent that a lot of times. Man, if you're if you like it, then your kids just they're gonna want to love it just like you. That's you know, That's that's how it is with my my son with U of
L and whatnot. Like he's all in on the cards now and that's really fun. He doesn't he didn't know it, but he was born into It's gonna be his religion.
I mean, it's just happened anyways.
But he's asking me about crash Bandicoot and I'm like, huh, glad you asked, son, because I played this game a lot when I was a kid. And uh, Maya and her mama went to bed about ten o'clock and sure enough, Moose and I were playing crash Bandicoot on Friday, and I felt I felt a little bit like an irresponsible father because don't all all next thing, you know, I look down on my phone, it's one forty five in the morning.
I mean, we were just getting started.
So we went we went to bed after that, and he's been he's been wanting to play.
Crash Out at all, like trying to complete the levels or did you do you remember it being that hard?
Because it is a tough game.
Yes, but there's also like, I mean, you know, you gotta there's like there's these flowers that you have to like jump over or they'll.
Eat you up right, Yeah, a little fly trap.
And I don't think there's real consistency on how you how you get past those, and that was frustrating for me. And then I had to realize, Okay, don't lose your mind on a video game, because then that's what your kid's gonna do, and you know that's not a good thing.
So I about two months ago, went on a crash Bandicoot. I got the Insane Trilogy series, and I start I got obsessed with it. I was starting to hear the Ooh book and all the weird things in like my sleep. So like I I, I think that's where my obsessive like need for completion came from, because I want to get to the part where you complete all the time trials and then you catch every single crystal. So I spent weeks and weeks hundred percent in the first game.
Man, you you just hit on.
What made that nostalgia pop for me is the like I had heard that and probably twenty something years and if you'd ask me music, if you'd asked me something that I remembered about crash, it wouldn't have been that bit. As soon as I heard it, I was excited. So yeah, this was a good you know it, It's always the plan. But I had a good, good family weekend. We did a lot of family and stuff, had a good time, had a good Easter. So hopefully all of you out
there enjoyed your Easter Sunday Easter weekend as well. And now what I'm going to do here is set the table because we've got a lot to get into. Obviously, the NFL Draft is this week, and I still think Tyler Shuck has a really good chance of being either the third or fourth quarterback taken but here's where we have to I guess, just guess and speculate. We'll find
out soon enough. But now you've got Chefty out there claiming that he's talking to people who maybe aren't in the market for a quarterback that say, it's not even a close, it's not even a question. Tyler Schuck is the best quarterback in this draft. And that's what is you get closer to the actual draft, that's when you start to think, Okay, I know he's been getting gassed up, and clearly we know there's a lot to like, but like, is this like could he be taken earlier than we anticipate,
Like would he be a top fifteen pick? I mean, I guess he could. I just you know, I've not really been this eager about a Louis of a Cardinal on draft night in a long time, because, I guess with Lamar, I just refused to believe that he was going to you know, I was in denial that Lamar really would fall the way he did to the last pick in the first round. But sure enough it happened.
So the lead up was he's going to be taken in like the top ten, and he's going to prove everybody wrong and then clearly it didn't play out that way. But obviously with Tyler Shuck, I mean, who knows, maybe he's a Day two guy, which could still and then that would probably be most I mean I would say
that would be my guess right now. But with the quarterback position, if Shuck was generating this kind of buzz and he had, you know, this same sort of story, but it wasn't a quarterback, it was a different position, I mean, one of one, it wouldn't.
Be talked about quite as much.
Also, you know, it'd probably be Okay, Yeah, this guy's really positioned himself well to where he could be a third round pick. Can anybody be shocked anymore this day and age if a team just gets you know, there's everybody in the NFL is so desperate to find their next franchise player, their next quarterback, and Shuck's got a
lot to like. So I say all that to say that, like we could be in for maybe a bigger surprise than we anticipate, because it's not just maybe like that he's going to be taken rather early, but like who
takes them? That could be a big surprise, Like maybe somebody's sitting back not doing a whole lot of yapping because they know that, like, hey, we don't need a quarterback right now, but if this guy's going to be there, sitting and available as we as we have our pick, we're getting him so really excited about the NFL Draft coming up here in a few weeks. Also, Louislle Football landed a new addition at receiver, which of course was needed.
And I'm not only going to tell you about this young man and you know where he transferred in from me. He's started at Clemson, played at nc State last year.
But the coverage of this commitment there was something that really irritated me that I that I don't know, we don't think we've talked about it on the show before, and I certainly want to Also, Kentucky, not only have they landed another guard in the portal that a lot of people seem to think they overpaid for, they essentially have their roster set right now and their fans are
really really excited about the roster. And you know, I wouldn't expect anything else, because you know that's what fans do. But I just think if you go like piece by piece and there's no way to know, right, it would just be guessing, it would just be speculation. But if you compare Kentucky in Pope's debut season personnel to what now they have in the mix with this latest edition via the Portal, I mean, again, you never know. But
like I don't think it's even a question. I don't know how you can say that they'd be better that next year than this past year. Now, again, it's totally different as far as like the type of pieces they have, So again, none of us know. I've said many times it's not like an anti UK thing. I think Pope will make it work with whatever, because I think he's that good of a coach and they have good players. It's not like I'm saying, Hey, their fans are excited
about their team and they're lousy. It's not that, it's just, you know, some of the guys that they've added.
I feel like.
You'd have to be you know, you have to hope that they would make a big jump from whatever they've done in their career until you know, to next year to be better than some of the guys that they just you know, they just had. Hey, look if they're the same type of team were a little bit below were what they were just.
This past year.
That's not the end of the world, because clearly Kentucky was pretty good this year. They were Sweet sixteen team got a top three seed. But like Kentucky doesn't usually strive for that. They they strive for the you know, the championships and whatnot. So again we'll get into it. Also, the portal actually closes tomorrow, and I don't believe there's been a whole lot of late editions since last Friday that have been like big names like uh oh, look out, like this is crazy.
Who would have ever thought this guy was available? So I kind of.
Feel like anybody who was going to go is gone. But we shall see. Again, I believe it's tomorrow at midnight, is whenever it officially closes, and you've you know, you got to you got until then. So the good news is that Cason Pryor has not entered the portal and he's not even declared for the draft. Therefore, you know, maybe he's not going to give us any kind of
you know, graphic or video. He's actually he's actually playing into it a little bit on his social media, which I think is fine and fun because you know that's what you should do, right, Like it's a human it's a human nature kind of thing, like you want to be appreciated. You want people to say we need you, we love you. And clearly Louisville fans know that next
year they're going to be a good team. And when you look at preseason rankings that have him in like the top five, top ten, clearly Casin is a component in that. So it's not to say that if he did leave, they would wouldn't be any good at all. But obviously if you could end up, you know, and I think they know he's back, or they wouldn't be operating the way they are. But we'll get into all
that also. I mean, I don't really know what we can add to this, but there's a great breakdown from I believe Gary Parrish of CBS Sports that tells you all of the guys that have entered the portal that don't actually have eligibility, And I'm I'm kind of sad for these guys now because like this is some of
these dudes have a legit. I'm not going to say that they have a legitimate gripe and they should be eligible, but you would at least you at least know what they're positioning their waiver to be four right, like they've got an argument. Some of these guys are just hitting the portal hoping nobody realizes they've been playing college sports for six years.
And that's where it gets kind of sad.
That screams you're twenty about to be twenty one and you're showing up to the football games in high school with the letterman jacket, and again, like it's kind of sad. Now, clearly if you do that as a twenty year old at high school like that, that's actually really sad. This is, I guess, just a chance for these guys to see if they could get away with playing a little longer to make money in money, you know. So in a way, I don't blame him, who wouldn't try to keep doing
this as long as you can to make money. But I mean, come on, Like if you're in the portal and you have no eligibility left and a coach calls you seeing you're available, and they ask you, hey, like there's something we don't know, Like what are you gonna say? Like,
that's where it gets kind of sad. Also, Cooper flag not coming back to college, which I guess was always what was going to happen, but I was curious to see if if he really would, you know, leave the option open right like, Hey, he's going to go through the draft process and you know he's going to be the number one pick. So now just comes down to
like what who that team is going to be. But clearly he now knows that regardless of who has that pick, that's where he's gonna be, and he's content with it. Also something else we can get into if we need to. But Nata Mint ends up picking not Louisville, not Duke, and not Kentucky, not Arkansas, but Tennessee. And I can't help but wonder how that happened. Obviously money is the factor here, but.
I don't know.
It just seems like a head scratcher for Tennessee to be the one like the Tennessee If Tennessee truly paid more money for Nata Mint that anybody else was willing to. I mean, maybe this is just you know, me being bitter, which it's not. I've said it for weeks. Now, they get him, great, I'm not going to lose a wink of sleep if they don't. And it could be Native Man,
it could be Nate whatever. I just think when it comes to young freshmen, anything they give you as far as being a regular contribut to your team is just a blessing because now you got grown men that play this sport up until they're twenty three, twenty four. So I'm twenty five, so you know I'm not. It's not like I'm soh you know, we didn't want him anyway, but I just feel like the more he showed his lack of physicality, when that's mattered more now than it
hasn't a long time in college basketball. I think if you're a duke of Kentucky, Louisville, or even a you know in Arkansas, you know you'll take him. But if it comes to where he's going to be one of the most expensive pieces on your team or the most expensive piece, I mean it didn't worth it. But then again, like Tennessee, like are they willing to pay that? Like, clearly they've got money, they got a big fan base.
But I don't know.
I more than anything, I'm just surprised that of all places ended up being Tennessee that landed this guy. So we're loaded today. And I hope you guys will stick with us. We'll have some fun. If you want to join us on the show, you can five oh two four three eight ninety seventy three is the Ellen and Federal Credit Union tex Line. And you can also give us a call. We'll open at the Fallons now five O two five seven one seventy nine hundred if you want to give us a call. It's Coffee and Company.
If fuel about Thornton's right here on Sports Talks seven ninety.
Now back to Coffee and Company, fueled by Thornton's on Sports Talk seven nine day, three.
Point thirty Here on a Monday afternoon, Coffee and Company rolling along fresh off of Easter weekend. Hopefully you guys had a good Easter weekend and a good Easter Sunday.
So we are just a few days away from the NFL Draft, and you know, any time I've seen anything out there about Tyler Shuck, the only thing I've seen that like wasn't positive is that is that clip of him at the combine where I have no explanation as to what occurred or how it happened, but it was almost as if like he had the yips or there was a miscommunication because I mean it was almost like he was attempting to throw one of the worst passes ever.
Really wasn't even like a pass. But anyways, other than that, it's just been nothing but praise, and I assume all that's you know, it's good stuff, but you really never know if what's been put out there from agents, even if it's from legitimate people within these franchises. Right if they're talking to the shifters of the world, what benefit do they get out of giving information to anybody? Nothing? So these guys that you know, make a lot of money to be talking heads telling you what they are
hearing is happening with the NFL. And I don't act like it's not a legitimate gig. It is, but I just feel like nobody's ever said it out loud. Why in the world would anybody that has any influence within any NFL franchise give any information to anybody only if it was gonna help them, Right, well, what would help them telling them what they're gonna do. No, it's almost like, Hey, we want somebody to think we're gonna do this, so I'm gonna tell Adam Schefter or Ian rappaport, and you
know it'll be a smoke screen. I mean, to me, that's really obvious. It's not like it's not like I'm throwing out some crazy conspiracy thing. I mean, it just it makes no sense to tip your cat, you know, to show your hand in any way. So who knows just how.
Legit it is.
But Schefter earlier today, one of his ride ups says that some teams have Louisville's Tyler Schuck as their highest rated quarterback in the entire draft, and I don't know. I mean, again, cam Ward's the guy that is is going to be the first quarterback taken. And I mean, Austin, you know, NFL, you know ball?
Are you a believer of cam Ward in the NFL? Not really.
I just think there's a better chance of him being somebody who is, you know, average at best than there is of him being like, Wow, can you believe nobody saw this guy? I mean it's not that nobody. Clearly people know he's coming.
Now.
He's going to be the number one quarterback taken by all accounts. But you know, he started his career at what like was it incarnate word or something like that. But we're going to like so that'll be a wild story. So again I'm not saying I think he's gonna be like a big bust, but like I just I don't know. To me, he'll have a solid career at best. But you know, there's a lot of guys who I thought would be great stunk and then vice versa.
I think Tennessee's a dump right now too, So like I don't love their roster, I'm still like out on their head coach not necessarily is their guy now?
It's h is it? Bill Callahan?
Right, you could have said any name and I would have believed you. I think, look the Titans, I'd be wrong. I'm sure they feel like it'd run its course with Rabel right, like he'd been there a while and there was never really like a huge breakthrough.
Brian Callahan, Yeah, but.
I don't, like, do you feel like you have a better coach now than the one that you had? Like, and I know you've got to, you know, you gotta have some you've got to have change of pace, you got to have some new life in there and and whatnot. And coaches are very expendable now, right if you've got a bunch of money tied up into one big player, then you know coaches are going to be clearly not
a priority like your franchise player. But like Derek, Henry moved on, right, we all know that, Yeah, and they didn't want to pay him.
I don't know.
I just feel like the Titans, And I'm not that mad about it, because I you know, I don't like the Titans their arrival of my Colts, and I just feel like they they were going to restart, which they clearly are. They let Henry walk and they gave will As an opportunity to be their start of this past year.
I just feel like, if you're.
Doing all that, you don't need a coaching change. But maybe they knew there was going to be some resistance and that Rabel didn't want to do that. He wasn't willing to just completely rebuild. But now he's gone, he's in New England and here the Titans are once again kind of starting all over.
Right.
They went a little bit younger because he was the offensive coordinator for the Bengals back when they went to the Super Bowl, and they had a lot of success under Joe Burrow. But obviously they don't have that Joe Burrows amazing. There's only one of him, so like them going and really, I mean, I'm not getting the best draw with getting Will Levis because I never believed in
him anyways. But people, like I said this before, like when we're talking about the season, it seems like all a Tennessee has been so let down ever since Derrick Henry left. Like I feel like that was their identity and Vrabel's play style and that whole team was their identity for the longest time of that whole city. And now they're trying to go like switch over to the up and he passing young head coach sort of route, and I don't know, it's just not hitting under Brian Callahan.
He's kind of a maniac.
Yeah, I don't even really know what they're like, Like what do they want to be?
You know what I mean?
Yeah, Like they were trying to air it out a lot last year. They did that a lot to the other team.
Yeah, they did.
I mean I was in Nashville when the Bengals played the Titans because I went with met some family. My cousin Mark is a huge, huge Bengals fan and he lives in Arkansas. So when he goes to watch the Bengals. Oftentimes he'll go to watch them in places that aren't Cincinnati because it's closer to where he lives. And my I guess it would be my second cousin, his son. You know. He he made an observation that I thought, you know, I wouldn't have thought about it, but it's true.
He said, you know, this is the This is like the most lifeless atmosphere I've ever been in an NFL game. And I think it's because the Titans fans like they'll tighten up, as they say, but like they don't know who they are right now, like yeah, there's no identity their coach they hired. You know, he may he may work out, but like he's he's cutting his teeth too, right, He's he's not somebody who you can look back at previous stints he's had at other places. So uh yeah, the Titans, I gain, I.
Need some more weapons around him, sure, because the best that they had was that Nick Westbrook at Keene last year, who at one point had a stretch of like five six straight games or scored a touchdown. It was like an automatic any anytime TD bet. But they're gonna they're gonna need some drafting a quarterback to come in and just save your franchise immediately when you don't have the
resources that that's what kills quarterbacks. And I think organizations fail quarterbacks more than quarterbacks fail organizations.
I could not agree more. I feel like there are some some quarterbacks that they are destined to fail based off of just the situation that they ended up in.
I mean, yeah, and it hasn't happened yet Johnny Manziel, but Daniel jo.
But it'll happen at some point where a guy can make a lot of money to stay in college and he will not go because he just realizes the three teams that are you know that would take me, no thanks, and you know used to be able to. I mean, Eli Manning is the last that really forced the issue where he went pro and was like, yeah, you all can do what you want with your pick. I'm not
going there, and you know worked out for him. Well, now you can go back to college and make a lot of money, right, I mean, it's it's so you know, it's not happening this year. But I think what you just said is one thousand percent true, is that some of these quarterbacks yeah, you know, they don't do they don't handle their business the right way. They're not truly professionals. But you have to be at that position in the NFL. But then sometimes, like I don't know what they could
have done, you know what I mean. Like that's why I've never once understood why it just became a thing to where, yeah, we got a first round quarterback, let's just throw them out to because you could completely ruin a guy's career by you know, completely killing their confidence, getting them hurt. I mean, like Tim Couch that's long before your time as far as probably remembering watching him like he was destined to fail in Cleveland and he
was really really good, you know. So anyways, back to back to the Shock conversation, you mentioned Joe Burrow, who clearly is one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL. Well, this is from is it Freeman? This isn't the athletic Yeah, I'm sorry, Bruce Feldman. He's got to write up here about the quarterbacks in this draft, and he's got some quotes from different NFL offensive you know personnel. One's a passing game coordinator. I think one is uh an oc. Let me pull it up here just I can make
sure I can give a reference. But again, these are like this is the kind of thing that I love hearing that this stuff is being said about our man, Tyler Shuck. Also, I just have a hard time thinking that, Like what does I was reading for this is this is from the Athletic dot Com. While there's been a lot of talk about the old miss Jackson, about old missus Jackson Dart being the next best prospect, the coaches I spoke to didn't see it that way. Quote I
like Tyler Shuck better, said OC number two. I'm not saying he's Joe Burrow, but he's got some Joe Burrow to him. I think he has the best feat in this quarterback class. I know he's had injuries, and if he didn't, I think he'd be a first round quarterback end quote Like I'm like, hell yeah, I agree. But also, but in OC telling Bruce Feldman that leading up to the draft, at what benefit is that?
Like? What do you like?
Now a good text that comes in, that's a great you know, it's a great counter as far as like
why that could be said? People willing to yap about you know, people will because again they don't say who this is, but obviously Bruce Feldman knows who he's talking to, so I would and this is you know, sometimes you guys probably listen to me and realize you're a lot smarter than me, because this would make sense that if you're Bruce Feldman or Schefter or somebody like that Ian Rappaport, and you're gonna want to go get legitimate, quote like
real information, real honest opinion feedback about the quarterbacks. You know what you're gonna do. You're gonna go to a team that you know is not drafting a quarterback because when they got to lose, right, Like, they'll tell you the straight truth because they don't care, like they have no Like if you know that you're like, if you're the Bengals, you know you're a good at quarterback, right so you might be willing to give honest opinion and that that you know, that could that that would make
it make a little more sense. Here's more from the article. The sixty five two hudred and nineteen pounds Schuck ran a four point sixty three forty at the NFL scouting Combine does have a lengthy injury history. He began his career at Oregon, where he spent three season four, transferring to Texas Tech in twenty twenty one. He started three years there, but each was derailed by a season inning injury.
His age has also become a talking point. He'll be twenty six in September, making him older than Trevor Lawrence, brock Purty and c J.
Stroud.
Here's another quote. He's probably the most pro ready to go in and run an offense and be able to operate. That is a passing game coordinator who said this to Bruce Feldman. The rest of the quote is of this quote. Some people bring up his age. Nope, don't care. This isn't baseball where you're drafting eighteen year olds. He's athletic, he's a good interview, smart arm. Talent is good. So I know that I just said this what last week when we talked about Chuck, But this conversation gives me
reason to say it once more. Why is his Why is his agent an issue? What would make you say we shouldn't draft this guy? Because I feel like it's a benefit, it's a bonus. He's a grown man that you know is mature, like you know this isn't about age, but like he seems to have a personality to where like he'll he'll handle himself and carry himself for through right way to where it would be. You know, it
certainly won't be an issue for your locker room. If anything, he could be a benefit to your locker room because he's you know, he's mature, So.
Get bow necks.
Last year, I was a big doubter on him because I mean, my god, he went everywhere around the sun in college and stayed until he was this exact same age. But he also fell into the right hands of Sean Payton and fell into a pretty a decently ran organization in the Broncos, and they gave him time and they developed with them. And now like now you got to look at these guys want reps, Like you said, it's not like drafting a seventeen eighteen year old out of
high school. Like they want reps on the field, And there's a lot like I mean, there's a lot with my team JJ McCarthy and a lot of questions internally about how many reps has he had going into this season because he didn't have much last year and at Michigan he didn't pass a lot, So teams are starting to look at how much you're throwing the ball and
how much the game flow relies on the quarterback. And now, when you've been doing it for as long as he has and bo necks last year, it seemed to be a benefit now a few years ago.
I'll tell you what, I doubt he's aware of this, and if so, he probably wouldn't, you know, put it on his list of accomplishments. But bo Nick's earned a lot of respect from me last year with not only his ability to to get it done and show that he could be a quarterback in the NFL. Obviously he's he's got work to do, but he had an awful
start to the season. If you remember, yeah he did, I mean he, I mean not only were they losing and he was putting up like there was some hilarious type of you know, goofs out there on the field, miscommunication, terrible throws, threw for sixty yards and again.
So so you know, he.
Bounced back, and I'm telling you, I'd be highly shocked. There's no way to know for certain, but I'd be highly shocked if he wasn't able to overcome that and move on and still finish the season as a really good rookie quarterback if he wasn't mature, right, if you've got to mean, I just think that's a fact that that's something that can help you bring a guy along the you know, maybe he not maybe he won't play
untill he'st fifty. But there's a lot that I think when it comes to experience and maturity, that's a factor in why it takes some of these guys to eventually, you know, find their footing in the NFL, and a lot of them that never do. I just always wonder had they had they had some time to kind of sit back and not be thrown into the fire. I mean, maybe it would have been different for him. So let's get too a quick break. We'll come back on the other side. What do I want to get to next?
Louisville landed a commitment from the Portal over the weekend. A talented receiver joined the mix, which of course is I think an area that they needed to focus on in the spring.
Portal.
Also, Kentucky, their roster seems to be set in basketball, and I would say the latest commitment here for Mark Pope, it was a real surprise to not maybe not Kentucky fans as much, but you know, Florida's losing a guy who is set to become the starter after being a reserve for a national championship team. Well now he's going to Kentucky to be a reserve again. It really is a puzzling situation. But I imagine money is a big
factor there. But we'll get into a lot more. Stick with us right here on Ward's Talk seven.
Ninety Now back to coffee and Company, fueled by Thorntin's on Sports Talk seven nine day.
So we talked a little bit about the NBA playoffs at the beginning of the show because our man Austin the Travel Chief was able to cash in, which you know, good for him. I would watch more if I was betting on it, and I may do that, but I also there's a level to the NBA for me, and I've used this analogy before. Anytime I win when I bet on sports, I always know, deep down like it's just luck because if I was like really good at it and great at it, then you know I would
be much more successful. So it's more fun when you can, you know, get lost in the moment like yeah, you know what, I really knew something that the books didn't know. That's what makes it fun. That's the payoff. Obviously, if you can make money, that's fun too, But it's really entertainment more than it is anything else for most people.
So when I bet on sports that I don't know a lot about, I win, I'm still happy, but it's not as enjoyable because it's just luck, even though deep down again I know all of it is really luck.
So when I go to play blackjack or roulette, like, that's fun and you know, you got to make decisions, but it's all luck, right, So but I enjoy that more than if I just go yank a slot machine, because to me, that's just what yanking the slot machine a little tug, you know what I'm saying, little poll and I I mean, again, you win, you win, it's fine.
But like with slot machines, it's directly in your face that that's just that's just you know, it's basically like you know, roll the dice like you just don't know, and I get it. So that's sort of my mindset as a gambler. I realize in every way, if I win or lose, it's really just luck. But I will enjoy it more when I can at least convince myself that I was you know, my my strategy or my
decision played a bigger role in it. So with the NBA, actually know, like I know the NBA enough to where I you know, I know who's awful, and I know who's good, and I know I have some I mean, in fact, there's a lot of guys in the NBA that I know who they are. I mean, in fact, there's there's probably not that many in the NBA where I couldn't tell, Oh, I don't know who that guy is, but I probably would be like I didn't realize I got played for that team. Now that guy still in
the league. Oh wow, I forgot about that guy, you know.
So I just tyjer Erome. He went off Yester.
He was so he actually had he was one of the bigger He might end up winning Most Improved in the NBA this year. He had a big breakout year, which is cool to see a guy that had been removed from college so long at this point kind of break out.
Right, Yeah, we were just talking about him a few weeks ago.
So anyways, you know, sorry about that mistake got a Yeah, well I tried to open up something on here that was already open and it gave me that stupid prompt.
So my bad.
But anyways, with with the NBA, I think if I made a bet and you know.
It, it hit, I'd be happy.
But if I made a bet and I ended up losing and it was like, you know, a three leg parlay and the one leg that would have got me didn't come close, I think you're an idiot, Nick, Like, why did you trust any logic with the NBA, Because again, you know, these teams come in like if you're betting on an underdog to cover, Like, don't you feel like that seems really unlikely because the NBA is so top heavy and the issue is that they're strata. Again, I've
talked about this before. If the NBA wanted to make their product better, there's some simple things they could do, but we know realistically they will never do. They need to eliminate as many games, they need to eliminate the amount of teams they have in the playoffs, and they need to shorten the series that they have. They'll not do any of those three things because all that would do is make them less money, and that is unless that check. That's not really what anybody in business is
looking to do. So society has evolved in a way to where the NBA is just not as attractive to a lot of folks when it comes to just really consuming the overall product. It's not that competitive either, But changes to that, I mean, I don't know if there's a plan where there's something they could do to make the league much more attractive and much more competitive that
doesn't include what I just mentioned. I think they would have already done it, to be honest with you, now, the biggest story in the NBA is still the Luca trade, right, I mean it has to be, and the GM of the Mavericks, Like I'm starting to think that that, you know, Nico, I'm starting to feel sorry for Nico Harrison in a way that like maybe this is is this a publicity stunt?
Like is this because you would think that like since the trade happened, everything that can be done or anything that can be said has gone terribly wrong to make this even like this continues.
To get worse.
Right, Like last week they had the meeting where the media could go and talk with him, but they couldn't record any of it and couldn't have any video or audio. Like that's just a terrible look. It looks like you're trying to like butter them up or intimidate them, and you don't want them to record it, like you know it just it is a really bad look. And then there's a part of me that says, Okay, I can appreciate honesty, but then again, like who would do this?
I mean, here's a quote from Nico Harrison today. I did know Luca was important to the fan base. I didn't know how. I didn't know quite to this level, Like I mean, your job is to know, as the GM who is most important to your fans, and you can't make every decision based upon that, but you have to.
I mean, in that role, you you would be foolish to you know, and I don't know how you would have these scenarios in front of you, but keeping your fans happy or I guess maybe more than anything, it's better to say avoiding them hating everything about you and being you know, in the situation Maverick's fans are in now you need like fans are customers, and you know the momentum of your franchise a lot of times is dependent upon the energy from your fans, right, And I
mean it's pr one O one. It's a business. So to to not have a clue just how important and Luca was to Dallas and you felt like you were going to get better without him. First of all, that's
just silly to think about. But if you're the GM of the Mavericks, you should have the ability to understand we could make a move that might make us know a little bit better, but if that move resulted in us not having Luka Doncik, there's no way we should ever consider it because you know, he's the franchise and our fan base will be happier with Luca. Here, like
a ten game winning difference is not worth it. I mean it's crazy to say, because you want to compete, you wing to win, But like Luca is Dallas, and this guy, I mean, he just keeps putting his foot in his mouth. I mean, I don't know how he's
supposed to respond to this question. But here he is doing a press conference today because now he had to do another press conference because of such a bad PR hit he got from having the closed door when nothing could be recorded he was asked why he shouldn't be fired, and this is what he had to say.
Why shouldn't you be fired?
Well, one, I think I've done a really good job here and I and I don't think I can be judged by the injuries this year. You have to judge from totality from beginning to end.
And so so we get like, what's he supposed to say there?
Like, you know, I think the better pr would have said, I understand the question. And I'm sure there's many that want me to be fired, and I get it. Fans have their job, and you know, my job is to prove them wrong and get this thing turned around. And obviously life of that Luka Doncik is going to be a change of pace for us. But I'm of the belief that this organization, we have the right people making these decisions to where we will get back to where we.
Want to be. And I mean, I just that's off the that's off the top of my head. Is that not? Is that not great?
Like I don't mean like that, but like you, when you get put in certain situations, you're not gonna give an answer that is going to change the whole situation.
Oh yeah, he went into fight mon.
Yeah, so so just so just you know, again, if you if you say that and then you continue to make dumb ass decisions to put the franchise and even worse than a worse place, then that'll be you know that, that's obviously you know, something that could happen. But like to just say, I think I've done a really good job and I shouldn't be judged this year based off injuries.
You traded your franchise player who was beloved like nobody ever has been in Dallas outside of a guy named Dirk Dewitzky for a star who quite literally when you check the back of his basketball card, they're probably gonna mention he has historically been injury prone. You dumb ass? Should I be running the Mavericks?
I think I should be a lot better that answer.
Off the top of my head. I was pretty proud of that. I mean, obviously I'm not a PR expert, but like.
That was I mean, it's your way around a microphones and don't do that, you know what I mean? Like two hours left, so stick with us.
I can't even speak, but you know, I'm probably more qualified to run the Dallas Mavericks than this clown