It's time for coffee and company, fueled by Thornton's on Sports Talk seven nine day.
Now here's Nick Coffee. Well, I'm not exactly Nick Coffee.
I'm Scott Fitzgerald, if a filling in for the vacationing Nick Coffee. Nick taking well deserved two days off myself. John Alden down in studio, keeping your company here for the next couple of hours. I'll be back in tomorrow and then Nick will be back with you Wednesday to take you the rest of the way out, John, Do we know where Nick went this time? He went to Missouri last time, didn't.
He So he's down for his annual trip to I believe it's Jacksonville.
I maybe.
Oh, I think I'm incorrect about that. He's in Florida somewhere. Okay, Also, real quick, he'll be He's off all week the underdogs. I've taken over Wednesday through Friday.
Oh, I got you? Okay, Boss, all right? Cool?
Yeah, I was gonna say he's only going for a couple of days. That seems like could be a little bit Okay, good listen. Speaking of we got some announcements. We were talking about college football. Congratulations to Tyler Shook. He's been named one of the candidates for the eighty eighth Maxwell Award that is presented to the college player of the year that's been done so since nineteen thirty seven. People expecting big things out of Tyler Shook. Also is
it's Western Kentucky's quarterback TJ. Finley has been nominated to that watch list as well.
Have you seen the College Football twenty five yet?
John, the video game you referred? Yeah, right, So I don't have a PS five. I haven't played it myself, but I do have a lot of people in my circle that have been enjoying it, taking it in and I am a little jealous, to be honest. I haven't invested in a PS five or a new Xbox, but it's something that I definitely missed. The nostalgia trip. I talked about that earlier with some other things, but I think it looks like a good time.
I know a lot of people are.
Doing the Road to Glory, creating their own player, doing that type of stuff, taking dynasties, taking the smaller schools and trying to make him big name powers.
So that's a fun thing to do in that college football game.
It is my son is all. He bought the pre release. He couldn't sleep before it came out. I know it's been a big deal. I'm not a big gamer guy myself personally. We used to play when he was younger. To me, the circle, circle, triangle, dot dot, that becomes a little complicated after a while.
But he loves it.
And to your point, he's doing the Road to Glory stuff and he absolutely loves it. Tyler Shook's used him quite a bit on the game. The game does paint ellenn in a nice picture, as it does Commonwealth in any other stadium you want to go. They've done a really good job with that, So good on them. I
know that is a big deal. And speaking of college football, if you want to get out, whether you're a catfan or Card fan, and you want to see your teams, we're starting to get word now Kentucky fans are going to get their first look at this year squad. You can head to Lexington on Saturday. Open practice is going to start at eleven. It'll run through until twelve forty five. That'll be at the Joe Kraft Football Training Center. Admission
is free. Unfortunately, in the event of inclement weather, that event will be canceled. So Kentucky is asking fans go ahead and log onto UK Athletics for any updates before you hit the road, because, as we can tell why, they're gonna be a bit dicey here this week. In fact, they just got an alert on my phone telling me that severe storms are possible tonight. They are updating that timeline as well, and it's kind of washed, rins and
repeat all week. As you mentioned earlier, John, very humid out there as you make your way out or make your way home tonight. Now Cardinal fans coach bram is opening things up starting well, I guess is it Wednesday, July two days? Okay, So Wednesday to forty five they're going to open up on the grass practice fields off Floyd Street. Then August second you're gonna have a six
o'clock chance to see the cards play. And then it's on August third, twelve forty five, and then the fifth, sixth, and eighth of August are all nine forty five as well as the ninth of August, all nine forty five practices. They're open to fans. You can go in and check them out. You have to behind the ropes and do not video and do not take pictures. I wonder how many times guys like Roco have to walk up and down tell folks stop with the cameras, stop.
With the cameras.
But I certainly understand now in the event of implement weather for the cards, they may move that inside, probably I would imagine to the Tregger Center so you'll be able to see them. But again, they open their season August thirty. First, they're gonna host Austin pe The governors are coming to town.
So it won't be too long to remember I was here.
I think it was like the first year I was here at the first or second year when they opened Papa John's.
At the time Papa John's, it was so hot. I just remember people.
You see people sitting in the stands and like the Grim Reaper was literally behind him and it was just like so they were like, can we cut out this? And that's when they you know, there was some talk they moved the rock. I like the rivalry game in the last game of the season, and maybe that's just the Michigan Ohio state guy in me. I never was a fan of rivalry games out of the get go. Never,
I just I didn't like. It just didn't feel right because you got rivalry weekend in college football, and it's always late in the year unless it's that maybe what the third Saturday in October. I believe that's when Alabama and Tennessee play. I mean, there's certain rivalries that don't play at the end of the year, but most of them are at the end of the year. And I like the fact that Kentucky and Louisville play at the
end because it works twofold one. If you're both in contention, there's a lot on the line when you play two. If one of you is out of contention, you can play no holds, bar and ruin their season and were at the We were at the game last year, and I mean, let's face it, Louisville fans were optimistic going into that game and Kentucky fans wanted nothing to do without optimism. And it was an exciting atmosphere. It was a crisp, sunny fall afternoon. It wasn't one hundred and
twelve degrees. I remember my son and I making the walk from we parked over by old Cardinals Stadium there, which is not.
A bad walk.
I actually prefer to do that because by the time you get to your car, you just get in your car and leave, as opposed to parking in the greenlight. And I just remember being just a crisp afternoon sun was out.
I mean that place was packed.
I mean people were crowded in there, and people were standing and it just was exciting as opposed to games where you go I've been to one Kentucky Louisville game where it was the beginning of the season. It was ungodly high. You can't enjoy yourself. You're just you're cooking in the stands. Those those plastic seats are just hot to the touch when you're sitting there. So I don't know I prefer it, but you know, to each through on some people like the heat.
Well, and here's the you mentioned being in contention and now you have the twelve team playoff. If that was in place last year, you could argue that Louisville would have been solidifying a playoff spot by that's Kentucky in that game. That Kentucky would have been the spoiler in that considering they did beat them last year.
Yeah, you bring up a good point, John, because I really am. I went kicking and screaming into the new expanded Playoff. But for the reason you just mentioned, I'm kind of like warming up to that. What was really hard for me to get used to growing up a Big Ten fan.
You're a note you guy.
You know the Big Ten is the Big Ten and old you being an original Big ten member. Seeing that new book Big Ten, that was hard to really wrap my head around. But I get it. That's the thing. I get it now. I get Texas and Oklahoma in the SEC. That makes total sense. And I got a kind of reverse course because on the air with Tony Cruz, I just was I'm like.
I'm not watching college football.
It's not the college football I knew, and this, this and this, and as the more I'm starting to think about it, and the more my son's been home for the summer, more I talk to him about it, he's kind of selling me on it. The thing, I wish the ACC would get together and get something figured out here, because quite honestly, I'm tired of hearing football. I'm tired of hearing about Florida State and Clemson. I just I've never been a Clemson fan. I've never been a Dabos
Swinny fan. I just I hope the ACC can find a happy medium here because I think Louisville fans with coach Brom have something special cooking. And I really think Cardinal fans deserve better. I mean, I remember, I remember when Paul Rodgers was with us in the atmosphere around the studio when they played that game with West Virginia. West Virginia came to town. And then that was also right around the time they played Rutgers. They were one and two. I mean that was when they were in the Big
East and this place was hoppin'. I mean, Paul was dialed in, Everybody around the studio was dialed in. I mean, this was big time college football, and Cardinal fans deserve that. I mean, look, Ellen N's a beautiful stadium. It's a beautiful venue. They've done a lot with the student center on the end, and and you know, Louisville's an attractive get for a lot of recruits, and having the Brom family here and having Jeff Brawm at the Helm, that's
that's just the cherry on top. So Louisville deserves better from the ACC. And I know that the AC. I watched a lot of the AEC. I listened to a lot of the speech. Speech is coming out of the a SEC kickoff event. They they've about had it with Florida State and Clemson, and this is the part. I don't know if Nick touched on this, So forgive me if I'm repeating anything Nick talked about. But Florida State and Clemson, you signed a contract. You signed the same
deal everybody. That was not a problem when you sign that, and now you want out of it because you don't feel you're getting enough.
You sign the contract.
So I hope that the ACC can find a way to make this thing work. Or if you're Louisville Star, I mean you start looking going, okay, we got to turn this thing around because we we got to get out of this clown car and maybe move on to something better, because Louisville right now is capable of doing that.
The portal has been very kind Louisville. We'll put it that way.
Guys like I mean, you know, you take like Ashton g Alotti, amazing, amazing player. I mean there's there's some players this Tyler show. We'll see what he's got going on. It's not like he's just a spring Chicken. He played some ball out in Oregon. I mean, he's got he's got some talent to him.
So we'll see what Louisville can do.
But as far as you know college football on the horizon, Cardinal fans should be excited.
I know they are. We'll see what they can do in year two.
I want to ask you this, Scott, and if you don't have an answer to that's totally okay, because Nicks talked about this a little bit and I'm curious if you have any thoughts on it. If the ACC were to implode, whatever that may look like. Yeah, just say Clemson in Florida State, find a way to get out of this grain of rights and that type of stuff. Where do you think Louisville would best be suited joining
the Big Twelve, the Big Ten, or the SEC? Which conference do you think would reach out to them first. It's a great question. May again on the spot that may be too much, but I'm curious about thoughts on It's a it's a great question.
I think ultimately probably the Big Twelve because I think the Big Ten is about tapped out.
That's what Nick's thinking, the same thing.
Yoah, I think I think the Big ten's tapped out, And to be honest with you, the Big Ten, I mean that alumni base is unreal. Not to say Louisville didn't have an alumni base. I'm not saying that, but I remember the year Illinois went to the Rose Bowl. And there's a tradition I had with a buddy of mine used to live here. We'd go out every no matter who plaid in the Rose Bowl. He and I would get up New Year's Day, New Year's afternoon, and we'd meet it one of the local establishments to watch
the Big Bowl games. On New Year's Day, man Illinois comes walking in with just a ton of fans. I'm like, how many Illinois fans live here in Louisville and they came into roves. They have some pretty big fan bases. Now you send Louisville down, like if you've been on the road for Louisville for a Bowl game, they travel real well. I don't want to I don't hear me
say that Louisville doesn't have a fan base. I'm just saying the Big Ten is kind of cut from a different bold right now, where's the Big twelve really suits Louisville? I think Louisville could excel in the Big Twelve the way Cincinnati couldn't. Of course, that may not be saying much because Cincinnati paid Louisville to take Scott Savage Field off their hands, and so.
I don't know. Cincinnati's got a lot of issues up there.
But I think the Big Twelve and I think winning cures everything, and the way the system is set up, as you just mentioned, you can go on and win a national championship.
It doesn't really matter what conference you come from.
And you know, I just don't want to see Louisville become like a note like Notre Dame is just come on, Notre Dame.
Figure it out.
By the way, I do think the Big Ten would expand again if Notre Dames, if they came calling and needed the place to be a player. Yeah, I get you, and I don't understand that.
I don't understand because look, I gotta be careful because I'm not a Notre Dame hater, but I'm just I grew up with I was glad when that rivalry with Michigan came to an end because I just didn't do anything for me. You know, Notre Dame played as a college hockey guy, Notre Dame played in Hockey East, which was at the time was kind of like the SEC for college hockey. Okay, that was where the good, good teams and good players were bubc you name it, yeaha
YadA yah. Well, Notre Dame went to the hockey They went to Hockey East thinking Okay, we're going to play over here, until they start getting the tailkicked and they say, nah, we want to go to the Big Ten. Okay, so now you want to go to the Big ten. Now you want to play in the Big ten. Not doing real well in the Big Ten, but you got nowhere else to go. It kind of reminds me that scene in Hunt for Red October. We're sitting there and he goes, wait a minute, you want us to find you another
missing submarine. I mean, it's like you'll get Notre Dame's kind of shopping around. Then you want to play in the AEC. But you don't want to play in the a SEC for football, but you want to play there for basketball. I mean, business wise, totally understand, totally understand, diversify yourself, diversify your investment, but that doesn't mean I gotta like it so.
But that said, the entire.
College sports landscape has changed and turned on its head as we know it. And as I was telling Tony, my old man would tell me about the day as the Big Eight. You don't know college football till you know at the Big eight Arkansas and Texas.
Okay, Dad, yeah, I understand.
I vowed I would never do that with my son, and I have it. So what he sees when he sees college football twenty five, he sees the new look Big Ten, he sees the twelve team playoff. That's all these folks are gonna know. That's all this next generation is gonna know. And right now, that's what they care about. They care about what this younger generation knows because other ones are gonna be spending money coming up. And so whatever college sports is doing right now makes total sense.
And I l however, has turned the world upside In fact, when we hear from coach Chancellor Dugan, she talked a lot about an IL and what's what that's done for her at Bellamant and what that's doing to college athletics.
Now along those lines, I was listening to.
I don't know, if you get a chance to listen to Geno RIM's conversation he had a while back on Dann Patrick, and he said, that's a big reason why I that's something he helps does not change in women's college basketball, because the women stay generally with the teams in women's college basketball, unless like a Hailey van Lit who just jumps around all over the place.
He said, there's there's truth to what happens there.
When players stay and fans can get attached, and they stay and they develop with a program, it does wonders for the program. But unfortunately, I think he even acknowledged to some degree, that's just not going to happen.
I think if you're eventually going to see it taper off with the men's sports too. That's kind of want to call it a salary cap, but there's going to come a point where the schools don't want to spend
as much money as they're asking for. And maybe it won't change with the biggest of the biggest names, but again, the biggest of the biggest names that they had that NBA town of the NFL town, they're gonna jump to the league anyway, So hopefully there comes a point of no return or diminishing returns if you will when it comes to this INIL stuff and having some more continuity with these teams.
Well, you're right.
And when I was trying to figure out there was a softball player that signed a million dollar deal basically ANIL deal, I mean a softball and that's not tall you look if you listen to the show in the morning. I love college softball. These one greatest games out there. Moves fast, I love the action. The athletes are awesome. I couldn't hit anything off them. You're throwing me a sixty five mile an hour pitch. I'm not hitting that,
bad boy, I guarantee you. But now they're talking about you're talking about a million dollar deal in college softball.
That's just insane.
Now, if NIL can get it to the point where and I've heard every coach say this, let's get some uniform standards, let's get this across the board, and let's reel it in, the problem is, can you put.
That toothpaste back in the two? I guess you could.
If you're the NCUABLEA, you can say, okay, okay, enough of this, we're done. But then against the NCUBA, so but then these athletes are driving the TV revenues, and the TV revenues are off the chart right now, Dude, they are off the chart. It is crazy to think what the TV revenues are doing, so I mean, you take those and college athletics in general.
I don't know where we're going with this.
I don't know what's happening, but all I know is it's a new generation and we just we as a fan base. And I don't want to use the word tolerate because I think that's too strong of a word. We as a fan base embrace it. And I think as long as a fan base embraces it because we have no choice, then it's going to continue to stay this way.
And the question is does.
The train keep roiling down the tracks, so to speak, uncontrollably until it actually implodes. And nobody wants to see that happen. I don't think it'll happen, but nobody wants to see it happen. It's just a different game.
And I told my.
Son, I said, the sad part, dude, is that you don't have he knows a little bit about it, but you won't be able to feel like, wait, why TBT is so special? It's special because a guy like Peyton Siva played his entire time at Louisville. Peyton Siva didn't jump around different programs. And David Johnson, a Trinity product, he stayed here, he stayed home. You know, with nil, you don't say I'm not saying that athletes don't do that in general. There are athletes that go to a
school and play there for their entire four years. But the best of the best. Well, I think when think about what Hayley van Lyth would be had she stayed at Louisville her entire time and excel. I mean, people loved her, and then she bails and she goes to LSU. Now she left LSU, and now all anybody ever does is kind of ridicul her because she jumps around.
So you know, I'm just saying that I don't I don't want to pooh pooh in athletes opportunity.
I don't want to tell an athlete, hey, you can't go out and get what's due to you. I'm a firm backer of name, image and likeness. I think athletes should be compensated. You can't just slap them on a video game and make a ton of money off a video game or you can't go out and pay these coaches these crazy salaries and let the coaches just leave whenever they want, and athletes got to sit out a year. We're in the right church, we're just not sitting in the same peer yet, and I think that needs to
happen when college athletics does that. But then again, part of the appeal for college athletics for me was these are college athletes.
They're not the NFL athletes. Dude, I mean you look at the NFL.
I mean I remember back in the day when players will play their whole career for the same team. That's unheard of. Ezekiel Elliott's back with the Cowboys. I mean he bails and then he gets back with the Cowboys. So sports is changing. We're embracing it because we're fans and we love the game. And we were just talking about in the last hour how we can't wait to sit and watch the NFL games on Sundays.
And the NFL is only a shred of what it used to look like, that's for sure.
But long story short, I don't want to put p with NFL training camps are rolling on and part of the stuff in the news is I know Bengals fans are getting excited.
Before we got a break, I went.
I did want to talk a little bit about NFL training camps as they open up and so many storylines coming out of it.
And I know, Bengals fans, you.
Had that taste you got right there, right there at the super Bowl, could have won the thing, and now you're starting to realize how hard it is to get back. I'm a Lions fan. Look how close they were last year. Am I expecting them to do that again this year?
Who knows?
But Bengals fans did get some good news at camp yesterday, however, A fourth round pick out of Biowa, Eric All returned after tearing his ACL.
He played for the Hawkeyes. He also played for Michigan prior to that.
The guy when he's healthy is phenomenal, and you've seen when you get Joe Burrow a healthy wide receiver what he can do. Eric talking at camp a little bit about some of his concerns as he gets back into the mix.
Really, I just been worrying about being confident with my knee and like just not being scared to cut on it, and I'm not, but that was really my main focus, Like throughout the inside recovery.
Yeah, and so he's he's gonna spend some time this week prioritizing things along the banks of the Ohio at Bengals camp, namely this he.
Just running routes and getting that feelback when running the routes and making sure that I can plant real, real hard on my knee.
And I mean, this guy's a player if you can get him to stay healthy and get Joe Burrow a solid wide receiver like he got Jamar ch. I mean, you got Jamar Change, you got and you got all those guys, right Eric All is under a sestimated Burrow can do some damage right now. Though right now that it looks like the odds on favorite to win the AFC North.
It's probably gonna be Pittsburgh.
I mean, you got Russell Wilson at quarterback, Jerry Pickett coming in behind him. So the question is will Jered Pickett start. Russell's gonna start, no doubt, but we'll see what happens. I think it is safe to say in the National Football League that the AFC North is the division to.
Beat this year.
So we shall see Bengals by the way up in the preseason A week from Saturday, the Buccaneers are coming to town. They're heading off to Chicago. They'll wrap up the preseason at home against Indianapolis. Their season opener is set for September eighth, when New England comes to town. Hey, you're gonna take quick break while we come back, get talk a little bit more. Mat We're we're gonna get you updated on these Olympic games as well. We'll talk
about that. He's John Olden, I'm Scott Fitzgoe. We're back after this on Sports Talk seven ninety. Oh yeah, is that my Oh well played, mister Alden, well played. They were just concert But I wasn't mistaken there. I think they were just in Cincinnati. Oh yeah, yeah, they played up in Cincinnati, and then we're going over to indian and then they were coming back there. You know, they were going to Chicago and then they were coming back this way. Oh it takes me back to my San
Diego days. Dude, we like bringing the California vibes when you're with Scott. Oh, thank you, bro, thank you give me some slightly stupid we're cooking with gas, which you gotta be careful when you play them.
Hey, as is John Alden.
Of course, I'm Scott Finstrawby with you next couple days after an underdog's going to take you home. The rest of the week is Nick Coffee is taking a well deserved vacation before his life gets real busy over the next few months. He's gonna go right out of Louisville football right into basketball. And as we were talking about TVT Mania hitting the airwaves tonight nine o'clock, they're gonna tip it off from down at historic Freedom Hall. Now I will say this, I did do another check of tickets.
There are plenty. I'll say there's plenty of seats. I use that term loosely in the end zones. I call them the end zones in the end. So I got one two. You're talking to section three twenty four, So those of you familiar with Freedom Hall, you got the upper rows are available there. However, section three twenty eight, No. Three twenty seven is pretty much sold out. Now, that had a lot of seats in it this.
Morning when I was on the air with Tony Cruz.
That you're looking at, it's probably got one, two, five, six seven seats left in that section.
So they're starting to sell out.
Gonna be a good time at Freedom wholl Nine o'clock is your tip tonight. General manager twenty Beckham as the general manager of the UK team Lave Familiar, admits it's gonna be a pretty electric atmosphere.
I mean it's gonna be electric.
I mean like we went and my assistant coach jas Mar Ferguson, we went out to the game last weekend. You know, just the energy with you know, there was in the building with day game and then seeing this is how many tickets and so old for this game.
It's gonna be crazy.
Former Ubel player Rees Gains admits everybody should be excited for this one.
You know, we had a little park atmosphere a little bit with the way things that referee and the physicality of the game and the attitude of the players. I mean, these guys just love playing basketball. So these are true basketball players have always played with the heart, always played with the soul, who did everything they had on the floor just for the game and not for much else. So this this is going to be an exciting for everybody.
And right now, thirty three dollars will get you in the door. So if you're on your way home, tonight, you're thinking, hey, let's go to the game. You dial it up and say let's go. Thirty three bucks can't beat that, though, I don't think. I don't think you can beat that. Not if you want to go see this robbery game, it's going to be on fire for sure. Also going on as we speak is the Olympic Games.
We've had them on all day here.
In fact, right now, I'm currently watching women's rugby sevens Team USA women's basketball.
Spoiler alert.
If you were dB ring it when you get home, tune out for just a few minutes. Right now, it looks like Team USA in commanding lead over Japan ninety eight is sixty eight two thirty six to go in the fourth quarter, so it looks like they're well on their way to winning that one. As I mentioned, I have no doubt that Team USA is going to win gold in basketball men's and women's.
They will be pushed, but they will win.
The US volleyball team, however, dropped the heartbreaker today, falling to China in five sets. They got off to a slow start, they couldn't get it back. And here's one big time spoiler alert. Might want to dial out for a few minutes. I know a lot of people want to go home watch this in primetime, so I'll give you a few minutes to punch out and then come back and join us. The US men's gymnastics team is back on the podium after winning the bronze medal in
the team final. Team USA finishing behind Japan and China with a total score of two fifty seven point seven nine to three. The US combined for forty four point zero three points in the vault for their lone victory in the single event. It was Asher Hong leading the way with the score of fourteen point eight three to three. It's the first time the men's team has earned a medal since capturing the bronze in the two thousand and eight Summer Games in Beijing. I did not know that.
That's an interesting stat and elsewhere. This warms my heart on so many levels. The women's rugby seventh squad made history. They became the first team to advance to the semi finals. They get a seventeen to seven win over Great Britain. Unfortunately, their next opponent is going to be New Zealand, and New Zealand knows the thing or two about rugby, just say it's.
A big deal.
And in the pool, the United States continues to collect medals. In women's swimming, it was Kadie Grimes coming away with the silver medal in the four hundred meter individual medley. Emma want came in third to take the bronze. Luke Hobson captured the bronze medal in the men's two hundred
meter freestyle that in the final. Ryan Murphy won the bronze in the men's one hundred meter backstroke final and a men's fencing, nick it Cain took down Japan's Kauzzuki Imura to take home the bronze and the individual foil competition. That's pretty fun watch. I got fencing on in here right now. John, That's pretty interesting.
There's a lot of obscure and maybe obscure. I don't want that to sound like a negative comment, but there's a lot of things that you get with the Olympics that you don't get at any other time of the year, and really once every four years.
You got me intrigued.
Want to watch some that's surfing, and not necessarily because I want to watch the sport of surfing, but you mentioned how it can be just a relaxing experience. I can imagine a cup of coffee on the couch, lazy boy chair, whatever may be, just watching some of them, some good old boys doing some surfing.
Well.
You know, it reminds me of back in the day when they used to have ABC's Wide World of Sports on and I used to love that as a kid because they would always go and show you the sports you never you weren't able to see.
There were a couple of surfing events they used to come on.
Jim McKay used to do that and as a time, of course, you only had three channels, so you didn't have all the outletting and the outlying venues to watch, and you had that to watch, so you were able to see that and it's exciting. I mean, this is what I love about the Olympics. It's not it's two weeks. You get two weeks to watch sports. I think is really cool about this is that there's gonna be storylines that come out of these games.
And that's why it's almost.
Sometimes it's not sad, but it's kind of it's melancholy when they have the closing ceremonies because you start thinking about the cool storylines that have become, you know, and so when the Olympics, everybody remembers Carrie Strug and what she did.
And there's people that come into the Olympics.
You never even heard of that become international superstars and the storylines that are awesome. In fact, watching fencing now and there's a Taiwanese fencer that has just won gold. It looks like it's one of the first time he's ever worn to metal. You see that excitement if you do watch in primetime tonight, watch the Japanese when they came home with the gold. I mean that stuff, that's just some money. You just can't replicate that stuff. I did want to mention, by the way, some University of
loisl swimmers that are in action to Ilia. And forgive me if I butcher these names people because I try, I really do. I just with women's tennis all the time. Ilia Subertsev. I hope I got that right. Is moving on to the finals of the eight hundred meter free. He finished with a time of seven fifty six sixty seven. He swims for Uzbekistan. He finished fourth in his heat that put him into the finals. And then anybody who knows. Louisville Swimming knows.
The Abiiro name. That's for sure.
Tomorrow with Nicholas Abiiro swimming for Brazil, He's gonna swim in the two hundred fly, and Dennis Loachdev swims for Israel, will Muriel sort So Tory swims for Brazil.
They'll be part of the four by two hundred relay.
Well, Dennis Petroshav will swim the two hundred breaststroke, and then you'll see a lot of the local swimmers that get into that. To your point, John, being an IU guy, I looked up some of the medals, like the universities and how many medals they won over the history of the Olympic Game trame the all time list.
Indiana is eleventh. That doesn't seem too surprised.
And you have a lot of guys, or to say guys, but the primary star right now Lily King. She haply got five gold medals and I know she's going for some more this time around. And I haven't kept up too much. I don't know how much she has done so far, if anything, but I do know this may be her final Olympics of her career potentially, so this'll be good to see what she does.
Yeah, that's exactly right, and that's a great observation on your apartment.
I you very strong.
The top the top colleges to put universities into the Olympics, of course, have been They're all West Coast schools.
They're USC, UCLA. You know, I want to say, is you see one of the UC schools.
I'll have to go back and check, but you know, you see those those storylines, and those are the school Stanford puts a lot of folks in routinely into the Olympic Games. So it's exciting and it kind of dovetails the conversation we have surrounding international sportsmanship. And you know some of the international amateur stars. Now, the big reason why everybody is watching some of the numbers behind the
Olympic Games. They have fourteen worldwide Olympic corporate partners. Now, NBC Universals spent seven point six five I have billion dollars to renew their broadcast rights.
You're not going to spend that kind of money if people aren't watching. I mean that goes without saying.
According to this, According to wallet hub, NBC has already made one point two billion dollars from ad revenue domestic ad sales. This is what they sold before the game started. I mean, that's just crazy. So they're gonna have nine plus hours of daytime coverage each day for the Olympics. Fifty nine percent of US plan to watch at least part of the games this year.
So that's over.
Half four billion global viewers are expected for the Olympics.
But here's the telling stat. Because I do this, I didn't think so.
Eighty five percent of the viewers are going to use second screen devices to watch the games.
I have the app on my phone, I watch you. I sit on my phone and watch.
Them, and I'll watch like right now, I'm watching via the I've got the Peacock app up here in the studio. We got beach volleyball, we got women's basketball, rugby seven's, and fencing, which is awesome because I'm sitting here watching all these at the same time.
Seventy four This number was a little higher than I thought.
Seventy four percent of people prefer to watch Olympic action live when their schedule allows, as opposed to primetime. Because I was worried, I told John Off the arr I was worried about giving out scores because I didn't know people we getting DVL right, And.
It kind of goes back to what we talked about earlier when you were talking about people who sit and watch games and stuff, like they maybe at their child's game, sitting at a bit, you know, they're sitting in the stands, that type of a thing. Now that streaming is so much more accessible and it's not hard to get good
quality video, people can watch it anywhere they want. They may be sitting down and work while they're listening to us, also watching the Olympic games, there could be a I mean you mentioned earlier it's the time of the year. If you're bored at work, this is the time to just get your phone out and do other things.
Right, Yeah, and it's right right. In fact, Tony asked me today on the show. He says, do you think people are doing the March Madness thing at work? And I said, no, there's no boss button on the Olympic streams. I don't think people are tuning in the way they do at work with March Madness, especially in these parts.
But I do think people pay attention.
But then they go on to say fifty percent of people watch TV highlights and replays of earlier events. I'll go home tonight after we're done. I'm gonna go home, take care of the puppy, get a shower, sit down on the couch, and I'll watch stuff I watched today. But what's cool is we as a family consider on watch this stuff. We kind of geeked the Olympic games in our house. So it's one of the few times, like I put out on X last night, that we
were all sitting around the dinner table. And then like my son, especially since college football twenty five came out, he never comes out of his room when he's home when he's not working, which is cool. I don't have a problem with that. I mean I did the same thing when I was a kid. But even in the Olympics, he comes down and sits with us, and so we all sit and watch the games together, even sometimes we've
seen the events. My daughter got up yesterday morning and she was watching watching gymnastics, but then she was sitting with us at night watching games. So a lot of people viewing these games, and that's why there's so much money spent on these They said that if you wanted to go into and you wanted to see these games live. Two point five million tickets were sold to overseas residents. And I can testify that because when I was watching the rugby sevens France, I'm talking about the men. Now,
France is a huge rugby country. They're a rugby country like Louisville, Kentucky's a basketball state. And even in the sevens game, and they sold out their stadium. In fact, I'm watching Australia in Ireland right now to perennial powers in rugby in general, and that stadium is packed. And this is for women's rugby seven and Australia has a twenty six to nothing lead on Ireland, but that stadium is packed. People are going to those now if you did want.
To go to the games.
By the way, two percent increase in hotel prices, that shouldn't surprise anybody.
And just waiting, it's four years'll be here in the US, right, that's exactly right, And that'll be coming off of two years removed from the World Cup. That's that's exactly a lot of big years coming up for the United States, dude.
And you know, and it's funny you were talking you're gonna take us down the World Cup road. It's funny, how did you see what's so exciting because and I'm glad you mentioned that because I was going to bring up with it. We've got a lot of soccer to talk about. This it's getting ready to happen. But Louisville has been selected is one of the cities where these World Cup teams are going to come over and they
can make Louisville their home. And what they do is they come here and this is kind of their home base. And so if they're playing a match somewhere in North North America, they'll practice, they'll train here, they'll stay here, and then they'll simply just fly out to wherever the match is. What it's in Chicago, it's in Mexico City, wherever it is. But that's a testament to the facilities that Louisville has at Lynn Family Stadium.
And that's why tomorrow night.
You're going to see one of the top tier teams in Germany coming here and play. In fact, they they're going to feature the guy who scored the winning goal for Germany in the World Cup in twenty fourteen, Mario get And of course we're talking about I intracked Frankfurt, who are coming in from Germany's Bundeslig and for their head coach Dino Todd Moler aces they're just impressed with what they see here in Mavo.
We are really happy. So the people are a good the facilities on top. Also the stadium here is really nice. I have been to the game on Saturday. It was a good atmosphere in the stadium and we like it here.
And he's talking about the facilities that are here.
It's impressive, but I mean if you compare to Germany, I think it's the same. Also in the second division they have also top facilities. But like I said before, it's amazing here and I think the coach here and also the team they have very good opportunities here to train and.
You know, so, I mean, this is what you're getting from the Germans.
And it's been interesting to watch everybody in race LuSE City and the success. Now they currently move back into the top spot with their win over Mono Ray and now they have the best parker in the USL. And it's my daughter who just met her boyfriend. He was not a soccer fan either and then became a soccer fan. Living here in Louisville and now he's a season ticket holder for lou City and our producer Joe Jackovino, she I can tell you this.
I worked with her for almost ten years. She doesn't do sports.
She is a season ticket holder for Racing Louisville, which and if you go to the games, the thing I like best about the gives Have you been to a game yet? Job?
Cool?
Yeah, that's right, I remember you saying that. You know what I love is I love standing in the end zone.
Yes, I sit in the regular seats.
Right, I mean, I love that fact. And then I love just going and standing like I'll go to the other end of the stadium and stand with the supporters group and just take that all in. And I've been to places like when I lived in Germany, I saw Dortmund play. I've seen the wall of Dortmunt. I've seen that environment and it was just the coolest thing ever. And to see Louisville put itself on the map now with I mean, I hosted the National Championship for soccer.
You got Louse City, Roland, Racing is getting there. Racing is right, They're right there and you look at all the players on the world stage out of the NWSL. Sophia Smith yesterday for Team USA, I mean had two goals and it's captivating everybody.
But it's a lot of fun.
I mean, Louisville is a really cool place to be right now on so many levels. And even Lexington's getting it going to as well. Lots of good stuff, that's for sure. I'm Scott Fitzgerald. He is John Alden. We are filling in for the next couple days. The Afternoon Underdogs are going to take you home Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Nick Coffee is back with you on Monday. We're back after this on Sports Talk seven ninety. Oh yeah, there you go, brother. There's my slightly Stupid.
I tell you, I love the acoustic guitar.
Oh dude, if you like them, give them, give them a hard listen.
There's some there's some lyrics in some of their stuff, but but it's it's not done in a bad way. We'll put it that way. If you're in a mellow mood, bro, that's all the mellow mood vibes. That is a California.
This isn't quite in the same vein as slightly Stupid, but this Friday, I'm seeing Creed Scott, Are you really Creed's kind of a devisive band over the years in terms of howl Now they're kind of treated like a Nickelback type of band, but they do they bring similar vibes, not to the same level as slightly stupid, but they're a good band to kick back and relax.
To every now and of course, dude, of course, yeah, that's Pride Motion Beach, California. It takes me back to my San Diego days. And I was lucky enough to live in San Diego for years. And man, I told my wife and said, if we ever do win the lottery, it's a winter home in San Diego, summer home in Macina Island. That's where we're living. Hey, listen, we're gonna
take a break when we come back. Coach Chancellor Dugan, women's basketball coach at Belloman University's gonna talk to us about the state of women's college basketball, in the state of women's athletics.
Why is it so popular now?
She'll talk about that they just gave her a contract extension. And Fletcher Long and I with Kentucky Prep Gridiron dot Com, We're gonna take a look we're gonna preview three weeks from Friday is the high school football season. We're gonna look at not just life inside the Waterson but around the entire Commonwealth of Kentucky. Fletcher and I are out with our weekly reviews every Saturday morning, too, so you'll hear that. I'm Scott Fitzgerald. He's John Alden. We're riding home.
We did today and tomorrow afternoon. Underdogs will take you home Wednesday, Thursday and Friday back after this on Sports Talk seven ninety