Tuesday, May 28, Hour 2

This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jay Gonzalez Son Fox Sports fourteen to fifteen. Subscribe now to the podcast on the iHeartRadio while just surgery. I on the Ball. Hey, welcome back to My the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. I'm Steve, He's Jay, and now we have Ryan with breaking news. Let's get in right into it. A video click don't work. We're gonna start with the Arizona Ball first college foot ball game to offer in IL money to players, to all players from each team

for me from both teams. We gotta get more details on this. But Snoop Dogg went and put a video up on social media and the there was some comment from from Kim Aderer but that when the players come to town and they do this anyways, right, they go to hospitals and they go to you know, stuff like that, that when they come to town, they're gonna ask them to do some community work. But every play player will get

some ni L money by participating in the bowl game. You know, there's a lot of discussion about the implications of that because there's so many players, no players who opt out of their games, right because they you know, go off and do whatever they're gonna do. Uh. They don't want to get hurt. They want to get ready for the NFL. Whether or not, this would be the type of thing that could entice players to uh just

stick around and you know, play an extra game. Some maybe not because you know, like some of the guys that opt out, they're gonna make a lot of money in the end in the NFL or whatever, So it might not be but for other players it might. It might be enough for them to play. So this nile thing continues to evolve, evolved. I want to bring up a subject after when we have time at the end of the end of the hour. Yeah, so, uh, but an interesting

announcement. We'll have to get more from uh, from Kim and those guys, uh when that time comes along. So let's switch over to the MLB. Some news about one of the one of the games probably worst umpires is effective. Immediately that that brought a big cheer from a lot of people yesterday. He's been bad. If he's bad and we all know that he's bad,

how did you continue to be bad? That was my question. It's like, okay, if I'm doing I mean, the things they have video of his bad calls, Like, how did he how did he keep his job? I never understood that, Like I get and look, I'm not you know, I mean, you know, I've been laid off a couple of times. I'm not up for people losing their jobs, right, But on the other hand, if you can't do the job, then somebody else should be able to get that job. And it's it's not like you do

that job in private, right, you're doing it. This is people are seeing it. People are seeing it. And worst of all, over the last few years, people are gambling on it. And now you make a bad call, uh, and and somebody loses some money on it, and that's you know, that's bad. But he's he's you know, he's been widely considered possibly the worst umpire in the history of baseball, certainly you know, in this generation, because of like you said, everything's on video.

Now. I thought he was the umpire who made the bad call at first base on that perfect game that that Detroit pitcher had. Oh it wasn't him, that was somebody else. Yeah. Well, no, I think they're pushing back the automatic camera for the balls and strikes to at least twenty twenty six. Really, that's what I saw over the weekend. So it's not gonna happen anytime soon. They're gonna do wait another year after this. And we don't like it, right, you don't. I don't like it,

and I don't. I mean, yes, I yell like everybody else when when a batter for the Dodgers gets a ball called, you know, off the strike zone and gets called a strike, you know, in back to back at bats showy Otani last week was called got to call third strike on pictures that were a good two or three inches out of the strike zone. But on the other hand, I don't want to see an umpire sitting back and has to wait for a beep in his ear or whatever to call it

whether it's a ball or a strike. And I still want the human element in there, so and and you just you just suck it up and deal with it. Yeah, I mean. Another thing is like they need to be more consistent on both on both sides. You know, they need to they're going to call it for one team, they need to call it for the other team. Right, there's so many games where it's like, well, the biggest thing that that that that baseball. The biggest problem that baseball

players have with an umpire is when it's not consistent. They said, if you're bad, be consistently bad. Kind Well, it's kind of a sick way to think about it. But if you're gonna call this pitch three inches off the strike zone, call it like that for everybody, that's what they want. You just answered why you had a job for so long. Consistently bad for all these years. But I'm not saying allow you to continue to

be consistently bad. But I'm just saying that, you know, in the course of a game, if an umpire, you know that would see, okay, the umpire said strikes. Okay, that's the strike zone tonight. Yeah right, And that might not be the strike zone for that umpire the next time he's or maybe that's always his strike zone. And you know, if this umpire is umpiring, he's calling this pit. If I'm a right handed hitter, he's calling this pitch two inches off the outside corner every time.

If you know that, you're okay with that, sure, I mean you wish you'd bring it in, You're okay with There's also the human factor of sometimes you're writing sometimes wrong and the opinions better. By the way, anybody, the person who tried to call us last hour, you go ahead and free fe feel free to call us now, Yeah you can. We'll break into this. Yeah, all right, let's switch you over to the ladies. PGA. Lexi Thompson twenty nine years old. She's retiring from golf

full time. What yep, Lexi Thompson's retiring. Yeah, she's twenty seven, twenty, Yeah, she's retiring. She's gonna spit her family and friends and all that stuff. She's got a lot of titles too, Like fifteen, she was. She was the the hottest golfer for a good period of time, not like Nelly Cord now who's won like six tournaments in a row, got beat. She's, you know, hands down favorite to win the

next major. So if she was, she didn't win like that. But she was the most dominant, you know, she was the dominating golfer for a couple of years. There really good one of those like six foot tall golfers that just can knock the hell out of it, hell out of the

boy. I think she tried to play in a I think she played in a PGA tournament and didn't didn't farewell, but twenty nine years old man, but she made a bunch of money, so she probably got You know, she can do it because you her fifteen career worldwide wins and eleven PGA Tour wins right there, you go, it's pretty good. Good number. The good thing is the good thing for people like that at any level, in any sport or life. Actually, when you're able to call your old shot

yeah and say goodbye and say yeah, isn't that the best? Yeah, I'll be living, I'll be working here till I'm ninety. Yeah. You know, maybe she wants to go have babies and stuff, you know, I mean esperiously, you know, raise a family and stuff. If you if you do that, you know the the you know, the the grind of a of an LPGA career. You know, it makes it tough to have a family, you know, and some players do, but it's hard.

And look, you and I know it's hard enough to raise a family without without being you know, traveling every weekend and stuff like without question. Yeah, yeah, well good for her. So sticking with golf, we're gonna move over to the University of Arizona Men's golf season ended this weekend yeap

over in Carlsbad. They were number fifteen and the end of their weekend fifteenth place at forty one over Park. Yeah, they were trying to They needed to get into the top eight to get into the final round of stroke play and then and they didn't get there, so to get into the match play and they didn't get there. So but you know, they got pretty far. So good, good season. Yep, We're gonna stick with. So

it was just recent news. Back to the Major League Baseball. The Negro League's statistics will be incorporated on Wednesday, so tomorrow, into the into the MLB. The MLB, so part of that will be part of their MLB stats is what you're saying, right, Because like players like Jackie Robinson, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron Hank, Aaron, Don Newcombe, all these guys. So I wonder if that gets Hank Aaron up past Barry Bonds for home runs. Has there been anything about that to look into that. It just

just broke. It just broke. I would have loved that. I would have loved that. Get out of here Berry the cheater. But I'm not bitter, no at all. You know what, I'm glad about that he never won a World Series. I'm really glad about that they never cheated his way to the world So I was gonna open up ten of WORL I know, okay, all right, And the last thing I got is just NBA

NBA playoffs. Oh yeah. The Celtics are now in the finals. So we're down to three teams in the playoffs, and I his Game four between the Wolves and the Mavericks. To lose any money over the weekend, No, I didn't bet because I didn't know which way to go with any of them. But let me tell you, I know who made a lot of money this weekend for the playoffs. TJ. I don't know his contract now, and no one's getting paid a lot of money. He's we were talking

about this last night. He's supposed to make nine million dollars next year. He's going to make more eventually, because the dude, as hard as he plays and as well as he plays, is going to land on a team that needs him and we'll say and we'll use it and come come with us. Unless he loves his place where he's not, and he probably does. But he'll be ten years into the league many people, probably including me,

didn't think he'd be one. No, yeah, and and you know, yeah, and he's wrapping up his this is his tenth year, right, so no, no, n this is so next year will be his tenth year. Okay. Well, and he's not an airport guy, definitely not an airport. Watching the game the other night, my daughter maid made the

comment of he's so little, and he's really not. But when you see him among the trees of the the NBA players right where even the even the the two guards are six six seven and six eight, you know you see him, right, he's what maybe six two the most? You know he does. There are times when you know, you just get a camera shot of him and they're shooting his head and then somebody walks by and all you can you can't see them from the neck up because they're out of the camera

shot. And then she would just say that he does seem kind of kind of little out there. I was just happy that, you know, he got this far with that team and he's doing so well. He's he's just one of those guys you cheer for. Oh is that it? So? So today's the twenty eighth I'm assuming I'm assuming correctly or otherwise, the klab Love will let us know tonight or tomorrow to the twenty ninth is the day, right, Yeah, whether he's gonna come or go or stay or do

whatever, because he's got he's got like three options. Come back to Tucson and play for Ubay, stay in the NBA and take his chances league, or go to another school, right or go to another school. I think he can do that, or or you know, G League Europe or whatever. Yeah, I imagine and Broadley too, because he isn't he hasn't said anything. I imagine that he's his goal is to get in the NBA. So he's not gonna leave Arizona to go play overseas for now. I don't.

I wouldn't think. I would think he's either going to come back here or another school and stay on the radar for the NBA rather than go overseas. But his chances will get into the NBA are probably equal because he well, let me ask you, if he's not ready for the NBA today, today, tomorrow or otherwise, do you think he's going to be ready for the NBA in a year. It's hard to know, Steve. If you know, he makes other parts of his game better if he has better Let's

say he's a great shooting here. Let's say he's one of the top three point shooters in the country. Yeah, maybe because you can say, well, he worked on a shot, that's what he needed to do, But he's got to do a lot of things. Part of what you would hope is that in going through this process, both him, Jade and Bradley whatever he's been doing j lewis that they got a sense of, Okay, this

is what I need to do now. Flip side of that is you worry that are they going to sacrifice the team right, right right to do the things to help themselves. Sure, he's gonna shoot more, is he gonna shoot less? Is he going to force some things because that's what he was told he needed to do in order to be an NBA player, And he's

going to do those things to the detriment of what Tommy Lloyd wants. And there's the dilemma because if you you what he needs to do is work on a shot, obviously, become more consistent, right and maybe even he can't go into those right and become more of a point guard ball handling guy. I don't know if he's that guy, but the shot for sure. The thing is he gonna be one year older. No, he's gonna be twenty three, twenty four. And in the league where it's a young league,

there's a lot of things. Yeah, and don't forget Jay and I l how much budget deserves ought to have to pay all to pay him. Doesn't have the money to get him back. And if they might say, we won't have any money for you, he'll go somewhere. Yeah, And we don't know, We don't know the answer to that. I imagine he's gonna play college basketball next year. That's mine, that's my that was my guest. My guess he's playing college basketball somewhere. I think it's probably about And

I don't have anything to base this on. Sixty forty Yeah, I'm gonna say about a sixty five percent chance that he's coming back here. Oh no, no, okay, I was gonna say, what's the percentage of people who want him back? Oh, that's sixty four. I was saying sixty forty. Yeah. There are some people out there who think that they they'd rather not have the packed ball player of the year back and I don't. I don't get that, but okay, I know some of those people. Yeah, no, I do too. Okay, No, I hear you.

I think anything else. I think anything else breaking news? Yeah, real, real quick. As I saw this, you know it's not breaking news, but it's it's something I thought was very interesting. So there are six teams, six teams or six schools that had a team make an FBS bowld make the NCAA tournament, and men's and women's basketball, baseball, and softball. So those five things and the six are Tennessee, Alabama, Duke, Texas, A and M Texas and and pretty good company. That's pretty

cool. I mean you see these logos and which logo doesn't belong there? Right, there's a one two? Well what Texas if you count Texas is an SEC school coming up? You know four teams are going to be in the SEC next year, an ACC team and then Arizona. So there you go, all right, sacred break. When come back with Bryce Miller, the writer from the San Diego Union Tribune, I did call him on Bill Walton uh for the Tribune. I guess probably knows him very well from the

work he's done with him. So Sikarn will get some of Bryce Miller thoughts on that Billbob. The Window Depot is more than a Windows store. The Window Depot is a one softwarehouse with everything you need for your complete Homer model. Shop the aisles of pre built cabinets in a variety of colors, granite and courts, countertops, sinks, skylights and hardware. To complete your project.

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biggest running party. See run Tucson dot net for all the details. Steve Rivera and Jacin Salles they have their Eye on the Ball on Tucson Sports Stage Chat Fox Sports fourteen fifty. Hey, welcome back to Eying the Ball here on Fox sportsporteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera. He's Jackins always Snow on the phone. We have Bryce Miller, columnists for the San Diego Union Tribune. Bryce, how are you doing well? How about you guys? Fine?

Thank you? Before the show started about an hour ago. I'm taking and one of my buddies from a long time ago USA today is uh uh, I forgot your name, Bryce, Bryce? You forgot your name right? Just get an old Bryce. You know that you know? Yeah? Yeah, Well it's always nice to know that you've left kind of a lasting impression. Well you did yesterday when I saw your call him on Bill Walton. What a fantastic story on him. You've known him for a while. How

many stories have you done on him? Oh? I don't have any idea. I would guess I don't know. Maybe at least ten, maybe, well more so. I tried to I tried to lean on him when I could because he's just such a fascinating guy. We will will we'll have our different impressions of him. What before you go into the story, what was your blasting impression of him? Just how how singular he is he and I mentioned it in the column, he's kind of one of one. Uh,

there there won't be another Bill Wilton. Sometimes people say there will never be another this guy or that guy. But but in Walton's case, it's true. The combination of his you know, Hall of Fame basketball success and then the humanitariany was the philanthropist that he was just the kind souls particularly meaningful in San Diego, because like I had written, he's not just the biggest cheerleader

and ambassador for this city. He's kind of the soul of it. He's he's as San Diego a thing about San Diego as there is in a lot of ways. But he just even though San Diego is the eighth largest city in the country and people don't always think of it being that size, it kind of has that reputation of a you know, sleepy coastal found out here in the corner. Despite that, almost everybody in the city seemingly has a

story about meeting him. He was just out there. He was available, he interacted with people and just giving money and supporting causes on every level. He was just a completely singular human being. Was he was he able to you know, be around town and you know, live his life and that kind of thing. Or was he just a guy that attracted folks everywhere he went? I mean, how did San Diego handle him as far as that

goes? Well? And everybody wanted to be around him. But he was kind of known for you know, he had nearly forty surgeries in his life related to all his injuries and everything from foot to back to almost everything in between. And he had told a colleague of mine years ago that he had considered suicide because the cane was so intense and unrelenting. And but once he got a surgery that allowed him to get back on his bike. He loved

his bike. In fact, there's a statue that was commemorated in twenty sixteen to him and the statue it's a huge bronze statue. It's him and his bike. The bike is part of the statue. But once he did that, you just couldn't keep him off that bike. He would even in my little community. We see him come through, and so many people have stories about, Oh I saw Bill on his bike today. You know he didn't. He didn't hide in his house on the edge above the park. He

got out and lived life. If there were community events, if there were plays, if there were concerts, if they were charity events, it was just Bill was always there. He was unbelievably, unrelentingly there. And so he lived his life and he lived it right in the part of this city and among people. And that's why so many people were affected by this, and it was the sense of loss was so profound because again, almost everybody felt like they knew him in some way. Yeah, no question, We

talked about that. Yeah, everybody has a photo of him. How I made him at this place or that place. There was a there was a quote in your story that struck me, and I got a screenshot of it. You can tell me who said it, And this was about him. Athletes usually aren't very good about giving back because they're trained to take all their life, and I thought that was brilliant. But if you get it and realize that the real honor is to give back to your community, Bill Relish

is that that was fantastic. Yeah, that was the late kind of iconic broadcaster. Dick Embert he had told me at the time when I was writing that piece about Bill, and I think it was in relation to the statue being unveiled. They became great friends. Obviously, Dick covered him during his the heyday of the u c l A winning all those national titles, so they had that exposure between them in the UCLA days, but then both living in San Diego, that developed into something more. And you know, Dick

brought up a really good point. You didn't hear a lot of from a lot of people as athletes at that level of success. For him not to be selfish, for him not to have a gigantic ego that matched his size, that's another thing that made him special. Thank you. You mentioned you thought you had ten, maybe a dozen stories about him. What were the when you want when you needed to do a story wanted to do Stroy. Where were some of the things that you felt you needed to talk to him

about or that you needed to bring to your readers. What did you want them to know about him? Well, I, you know, the statue of veiling. Not to keep going back to that, but I took that opportunity and ended up on one A and the sand Union Tribune back at twenty sixteen when we did it, partially because I just did a deep die and talked to a lot of people that he knew and didn't just write, Hey, there was a statue on veiling. Here's Bill. He's happy about it.

It was try to understand his life, try to understand how much he and his wife Laurie had done for the community. Try to understand a little bit of what made him tick. And so if you go online and you find that story, I think you'll get a sense of him there. And and then the column I wrote yesterday is kind of a more broad brush sense

of what he meant here and the type of person that he was. But I talked to him about anything I could almost at any point, you know, when the Celtics were back in the NBA Finals, he's fallen up and he'd have great stories. He's told this story. But the time he was running late with kids and he's going to this playoff game and might have been the finals, but he got with it a few blocks of the Boston Garden and he was going to be late. So he just met these guys on

the street. He rolled down the window and he gave that got out of his car and he gave them his car, and they said, if you can, could you drive this behind the garden and ask for I forget the guy's name, Tony or whoever, and he'll know what to do with it. Because it was deadlock, bridlocked traffic. So these strangers he had never met. He just gave them his car. And he came out after the game and there was the car because they were like, well, it's Bill

Walton. We're going to go park his car. So I mean, who does that? But you know that's just one of a million slipvers of life that explained Bill Walton. Yeah, no question. I'm sure you talked to his kids as well, who he loved tremendously as part of the stories. Well more, you know, I did some stuff on Luke when he was you know, coach of the Lakers briefly, and you know some other things

for sure. But you know it was if you guys dealt with Walton, which I know to some degree you did, and I'm sure he did. You asked him one question and it was twenty minutes later before he came breap. So if you were writing about Bill, it was more or less talking to Bill. You didn't you didn't have a lot of time or bandwidth to be talking to a lot of other people. But that's what made him really

interesting. If you want to see something really funny, go online and searche Bryce Miller, Bill Walton Festival of Books and we have a festival book thing and there's a video I taught again. He just said yes to everything. My paper said, can you get him in to talk about his book? He had a book out about his wife, and so he tried into the paper and all I wanted to do, all my goal was because I know

once he started talking, he wouldn't stop. And I wanted to just say, I'm Bryce Miller's sports column with san Diego Uch and this man needs no introduction, but I'll give him one anyway. A Hall of Famer, NBA champion, now best selling author Bill Walton. Bill, you know than you go to the video and here's what happened. I go, I'm Bryce Miller, and he goes and I'm Bill Walton, and I'm the luckiest guy in

the world. And he goes on for like two and a half minutes and I haven't explained why we're sitting there and what we're doing, what this is about. And I'm just laughing because I lost control of this, like in the first five seconds. And that was Bill too. He was just so energetic about everything that, as his late brother Bruce Walton told me once, you know, he overcame debilit any stuttering as a child, really paralyzing and

made him shy and reserved. And Bruce said, once he started talking and he never stopped. And it's it's true. He had so much he wanted to stay to the world and then if he got a window to do it, he did it. Well, we laughed because the last time he was on our show, this is back in December of twenty two, Steve says, bringing me in, Steve says, Bill, how you doing? And he went for seven minutes. Oh, and it's hilarious and it was all

great stuff. Yeah. Of course, I don't know if you guys saw the Scott Van Pelt review on ESPN, but that's worth looking up too. That they're talking to him after a cow game and he just starts talking about bears and it's not like talking about like bears. The animals and you look at Scott van Pelt. There's a photo of Van Pelt just slumped over his arm like I've never seen a broadcaster on live TV, and he looked so

defeated. He's like, well, I've lost control of this interview and Bill's going to talk for ten minutes about bears and it's just everything was an experience with Bill, and that's what made it interesting to talk or do your own so you can kind of get an image of what's in his head. I'm sure you went to the house where the famous TP where the TPE is and

the collective. It's just so eclicktic, well, so many things. Yeah, yeah, he went is there was a range of things I needed to talk about at one point and he said, just come to the house. And of course, you know. The other thing is he's just everybody knows

he was the biggest grateful dead fame in the world. We'll get over there in his house and we're sitting there at breakfast and there was this kind of moving tray thing that had these breakfast items on it, and we both sat there for like two hours talking about two or three things, and the little napkins were grateful dead Napkins, of course, and then he points over to a landline and he goes, do you know you know what call I took on that phone? And I'm well, of course, I have no idea.

And he goes, that's the phone where I got the call oh help me out here, the lead singer to Jerry Garcia. Yes, he said, he said, that's the call I got from one of the band members that Jerry had died and so. And he also had in the area of his kitchen which kind of blended into sort of the living room, but he had a giant drum bongo kit It just kind of awkwardly sat in the middle of all this stuff. And he would play sets with a group called the

Electric Waistband in San Diego when they do grateful bed stuff. So, you know, he dove into music, he dove into bike broadcasting. Just he no one made sure they they did not get cheated into life as much as Bill Wong. You know. One of the interesting things that we we talked about earlier Steve was that, you know, the people were mixed in terms

of what they thought of him as a broadcaster. Right. There were some people who just couldn't listen to him and that, you know, but nobody since he passed has said they didn't like him, right, you know. I mean he he was an acquired taste as relates to what he did on UH on a on a game broadcast, But you didn't hate him for it, you just you know, And and that's that That's what's the amazing thing to me about it is that people who really disliked how he did a game

still liked it. Yeah. He the traditionalists who just wanted to score and some analysis because he understood the game of course, you know the level he played it at. Yeah, it was frustrating for some and he knew he wasn't for everyone in the sense of that, but nobody wasn't entertained, a bit, a little bit informed. You talk about anything and you just appreciate it. A kind of kind of person, even if even if that's not

how you generally want to watch a game. And and Bill was just gonna again, even if it was in his work life, he was going to live life on his own first. Yeah, no question. Anybody who wants to read Bryce's calling, please do just kind of Bryce Brycemailer, sendye your Union Tribune. You love it. Thank you Bryce for joining us telling us about it. Yeah, I'm glad to be good to talk to you. Well, take care of our guys. Yeah, Ryan, uh yeah, yeah, yeah. He told me today that that you guys were in some

football pool or something. You're gonna be talking to my guy today. Yeah, we'll be sure. Tell them me be sure. You know, we know things about Ryan, so you know, if you ever need something like that, feel free to share anytime. Thank you. Okay, guys, you got it. You know what are the great writers in the West Coast? Price stuff? Google him if you haven't had a chance. There's plenty of stories, yeah, all over the country about it. All right,

so we're gonna take our last break. We'll be back. We'd love to take your cause if you called earlier and we didn't take your cause because we were right up against the top of the top of the hour. So we will be right back. If you're an Arizona men's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for nearly forty years. Now. Take a look back at

the Ludolsen era in my new book, Lessons from Loot. It was a labor of love through the eyes of twenty five former players, coaches, and friends to give insight to the coach and the man who led them, competed against them, and inspired them. Twenty five chapters for his twenty five years as Arizona's beloved coach. Lessons from lut is an insight to how he built the program into a national powerhouse. What one email me at Steve dot RIVERA

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I mean iHeartRadio. Wapp Hey, welcome back to I on the Ball Hero Fox Sports fourteen to fifty of Steve Rivera. He's Jacobs Awa, Scudder guy Ryan after Control. We're gonna try it again. Yeah, I think we hopefully have fixed a problem. I think we've got this thing cued up. But we're gonna play the first the first seven minute clip, so you can't. We're gonna take a call, right so our lines are busy right now. We'll take a call after after this if at plays, So bear with

us. We're gonna hit play. And this is the from December of twenty twenty two when we were talking to Bill got Bill on the show. He was talking about that team. But you'll you'll see still here in the beginning and you'll just go, this is gonna be a seven minute clip. So here we go. Let's give it a shot. Hey, welcome back to my on the ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. I'm Steve Romera, He's Jiginsaws, and now on the phone we have the great Bill Walton.

Bill, how the heck are you? Oh my, I'm sitting in my own desert garden with the long shadows on a cool, actually freezing cold afternoon, and I'm underneath the proteas and the euphorbias and the cacti and the succulents and the aloes and the dragon trees, and I'm thinking about the incredible experience I just had watching the World Cup semi final France two nothings over Morocco. It was just absolutely spectacular. I'm a huge World Cup soccer fan, and

to see how hard. Everybody tried to see the fans. They're passionate, their passionate commitment and their willingness to go to such lengths to help their team win. And I was just reminded one more time of the big red Army of the West. And when I come over there to michale and I can't wait. I know there's snow one mountain Lemon right now. We just had a big two day dump of some much needed rain, and it's just been so beautiful here. Even with all the problems that we face on a constant

basis, so many of them self inflicted. But if we can find some piece, if we can find some solace in the world of sports, in the world of community and coming together, and we can find that sense of that sense of normal sea that the desert gives us, and that inclusiveness diverseness and the animals and the plants and the sun and the air and the nature, and somehow we find that way to look at each other and say,

hey man, we got to get this done. And to see what Tommy Lloyd has been able to do. And the team is just on fire right now. I was shocked, shocked at the loss of a Utah. But Utah, like so many of the teams in college basketball. Man, when they got it going and they got their crowd behind them, we saw what

Morocco did. And then last night or whenever it was, you lose track of time in my life, but to see to see the Arizona Wildcats come right back, and with the big game coming up on Saturday nights, even though it's a late tip off, eight thirty Mountain time, Tennessee, don't ever forget what Tennessee did to the University of Arizona a year ago when Arizona went in undefeated on just a remarkable run and start, record setting start for

Tommy Lloyd. But then they were not ready. They were not ready to play. And one of the great things about being the champion being the best, which Arizona, Tommy Lloyd, Dave Heikey, Bobby Robbins, all the guys, everybody in the community of Tucson. It's just what the standard of excellence is. I mean, that's what lude Olsen created there and to be able to carry that on and it's not just happening in the city of Tucson, it's happening up in Phoenix with the Suns. It's happening in Tempe with

the Sun Devils, and so it's just absolutely fantastic. I watched the Sun Devil's play I know this is a UFA station. I watched the Sun Devils play man, and they are really fun because they play free, they play easy, and they make it exciting as can be, and they're not looking over at the coach every time for a structured play. They're saying, hey,

look, this is what we have. We may now have the big, huge studs and so many of the superpowers like Arizona, like maybe UCLA C certainly has, but this is going to be a remarkable Pac twelve Conference A champion seasons. And just as we were coming on, I was told that there was news of the day coming out about Sean Miller and if you guys can clarify that for me, so I don't say something that is not accurate. But I'm a big Steve. I'm a big Sean Miller fan.

And I got to have a little bit of contact with him up at PK eighty five, and it was just a spectacular run for his new his old Xavier team, and they got a really good squad and I like the fact in college basketball, the good teams are playing each other one more time. And I don't want to leave anybody out. I'm a big guy about inclusiveness, about diversity. So you guys can maybe tell me what Grand Canyon University is doing and Bryce Newell is doing as well. Well. I take a

quick breath and adjudge my sunglasses here as the shadows keep getting longer. And I moved myself over under the purgeon there and see all the Bonzai specimens that I have right there. Oh, there's the tpe right back there in the corner. What a beautiful day we have in San Diego, and I hope you're celebrating the wonders of nature and life as well. Thank you, Eve. How are you guys? Well? Thanks for doing us. Bill, we've run out of time, the t says Bill. We're freezing over here.

For Hey, Bill, you had that freezing the other day. And I'm super sorry that I was not able to make the show on whatever day it was. But I was scheduled and my car broke down and I couldn't move and I was stuck and I couldn't get anything, and it took four to five hours out of my life to get back to my dance, to get back to order. But finally order was restored in the universe, and

I'm back at it now and good to be on your show. Eye on the ball, because that's always what I try to teach, is to keep your eye on the ball, because if you're going to ever get the ball. And when you look at these guys like, oh my gosh, ma Bappi and Hernandez and Girard and oh the greaseman and all these guys from France who were just playing so hard in Morocco. Morocco was playing with such spirit.

But the goal is just in the fourth minute of the game, and there was a very dangerous attempt defensively and then you know, in soccer, so many of these games come down to just one play and one mistake, and the guy went for a steal that he didn't need to do. They

had the French guys under control. He went for the steal and all of a sudden, now France is wide open in front of the goal and they got the goal, and oh man, and from then on they just eventually wore down the Moroccan team, which played with a lot of spirit, a lot of pride and hearts, the kind of things that I look for in all kinds of athletics, but really look forward to in the conference. A champions pack, twelve basketball wow, vintage. But we didn't even get to

what we wanted to talk about. I don't even remember what Shaw the sewan breaking up? Yeah, what that break was here, So it didn't really matter, h Yeah. And then we had one more question right now, Jackson, you asked him a question about the Arizona big man. It just said you might. You started to ask it, and then and then he kept going. He asked him that it's another seven minute clips, so we

can't play the whole thing. But it was again, it's not so much what he said in these things, it's just that how he said it, right, and just the conversation. And you know, yeah, I mean, as he's painting a picture of his backyard to us, right sure, talking about you know what he's doing, and we never mentioned the backyards.

No, And that's what he wasn't in the broadcast. Right. It's funny because I could I get it when I didn't travel with the team, obviously, we listened to the games at home, and I could understand and why people got frustrated. But Jay, when you go to a game, right, when you go to a game, physically go to a game, what do you do? You watch the game? I watch the game. You don't need anybody telling you about the game, right, Why don't they just

turn down the TV and watch the game. Well, that's what some people would do. They'd say, I've got to turn him off. I actually showed somebody you can listen to Brian Jefferies and watch the game. You just got to time your you know, your your your TV with with you know where it's coming over the over the radio or whatever there was. You know, I never did that. I loved I'm not gonna say I loved listening to him. I I would listen to him and watch the game, and

he was he was kind of like background talk to me. You know. I would kind of I would kind of hear him and and and uh, you know, sometimes I'd pay attention to what he was saying. I'm like, what's he talking about? But it was fun for me. There were other people who just said, I absolutely can't listen to him. Well it was nice story from seven nine years ago. I think it was he knew everything about Ducsan, the birds, the species of birds, the weather tempts,

the Mountain Lemon because he wrote it. He said, I know there's snow on Mountain Lemon right now, remember, because that we were it was cold that day, is what I recall. And the funny thing about is Arizona fans the ones who you don't hear from now. He said all he hates us. He hates us because all he does is rip us, right. And the funny thing about it is, I probably think that every team in the conference felt the same way because he that's who he was. You

talked about the teams right well, the schools. Yeah, he did it and you no, and he didn't hate anybody. Yeah, it's just the perception that people are right right. Yeah, you know again, we're gonna miss him, We really are. You know, when when they're when when you know Arizona is that playing wherever they're playing, and and you know Dave Pash maybe maybe doing a game, or Roxy Burns, he might be doing the game and they're not with Bill Walton, you're gonna go, wait a

minute, there's something missing. Yeah, yeah, well I remember the one. There's two big stories that I remember. The most so nineteen ninety two. I think it was had to be ninety two. He was here with to do a game somehow, and he came in and he was talking to

Lute on the court. That's when we were able to go to practice blah blah blah, and Damon, Damon, who was from Portland, Yeah, was on the floor and he he kind of acted like a two year old a ten year old when he went to go shake Bill Walm's hand for the first time, and he was like, holy crap, I get to meet mister Bill Walmen, who of course paid at port in Portland, right, And Damon must have been a kid back then, yeah, and he was like, holy crap, I'm meeting Bill Walden for the first time. Yeah.

That and then when he paid, uh, when he paid for the airplane ticket and got Richard Jefferson in trouble, I remember, and he was very very because we had to do the stories, right, he was very apologetic. He's Rich's one of my sons. Yeah, I'm buying it together for one of my sons to see my other son, right. I remember all that. I remember all that, and he was just he just he

had good intentions always exactly. Always, even in his commentary, you know, on a game broadcast or where he was on our show or somebody else's show, the intentions were always good. He was never trying to make anybody look bad. He was never mean, he was never you know, he just was You could tell he was just having fun. Yeah, without realizing he was having fun. He did it because he was just doing what he became natural together, right, He wasn't trying to create fun. He was

just that's who we were. The funny thing is I did that story nine years ago. I think it wasn't And I asked him, what do you think about the fans kind of like loving you and not loving you at the same taxes. I don't know. I'm just trying to be me, trying to be me, And I don't know how to answer that, because again, I'm just trying to be me. And he was so polarizing. People

loved him or hated him. But Larry Scott's the one who kind of brought him to the PAC twelve Yeah, and says I like what I see and I'm going to keep him. Yeah, So you know again, and he's one of those guys that you don't you know, you don't think about him in terms of am I gonna miss him when he's gone? But then once he's gone, you go, okay, yeah, you know I do miss I do miss the one. The thing. I sent Luca a note yesterday.

I feel bad for their sons, obviously, you know what. He was only seventy one, and you know, I don't know if that's old. And he's only six years older than me, so well six and change. You would think that, uh, well, but the thing is, he's only sent me one. But he had a fantastic life. He had a fantastic life, but in a lot of ways, a tough life, very much right. First of all, living in that spotlight is hard, no matter what, whether it's good or bad, it's hard. But then

you know all the health issues that he had. We saw that, and very well known health issues. And Bryce said forty forty and not simple. Yeah, how many back surgeries, foot surgeries and all that stuff. I mean, you know, I've told you know again. Having breakfast with him in those times in chime, he would get two chairs from the table and back them so he could sit there. He was already tall enough. And then you're sitting with him at breakfast. You're looking up at him. Well,

you get a kick when you watch the show. Eventually, when you watch the show, and then we'll read the other Mouchy story. On this trip homework, he talked about having to sit in chairs like for kindergarteners. Yeah, oh, in these kindergartener chairs, you know, just normal chairs that you and I would sit in because he couldn't. His legs were too long and his knees. I can't even imagine him getting in airplane and stuff.

Yeah, he got tired of doing that With the NBA. They finally said, sorry, you can't do this anymore because he was traveling so much. Right, all right, well again we're gonna miss himself. Yeah, but you know the thing is we're talking about him and it's all fun and fun. Yeah, fun and good stuff, you know, because that's who he was. That's who he was. Yeah, So celebration of life, Yeah, very much. All right, we're out here. I'm out here

for a week. I will be back a week from tomorrow. I'm going down to Rocky Plat and spend some time on the beach, get my summer color, and uh so Steve will be here with some great guests, already got some guys lined up for tomorrow. You have color? What are you talking about? I need more, I need more. And then I will see if they let me back in the country. Well might look might be looking for a new all right, I'll see you guys in a week.

Steve will be back tomorrow with some great guest host and some great guests, so we hope to see it. Thanks a bunch