You're listening to Later with Moe Kelly on demand from KFI AM six forty.
Let's go beyond the box Score with Jackie Ray. We're live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. Good evening, Jackie Ray, It's always good to see you on the Saint Patrick's Day.
Oh yeah, where's my green? Look? I got called anybody that.
I got a little bit of green on. I got some army green Dockers. But you know, my last name's O Kelly. How dona green? I'll get my fit free drink later on tonight at the Problem.
I love it. I love it. Speaking of green, how about that for a seguy.
The Philadelphia Eagles are officially committed to visiting the White House on April twenty eighth, and this is per Caroline Levitt, the White House Press Press Secretary.
Listen to this. I have two more quick notes before I wrap up.
April twenty eighth, I can confirm that the Philadelphia Eagles will be here at the White House to celebrate their Super Bowl victory. I know there was a lot of fake news about an invitation that wasn't sent or was sent. We want to correct the record. We sent an invitation. They enthusiastically accepted, and you will see them here on April twenty eighth.
Caroline Levett was very enthusiastic. She said that the Eagles were very enthusiastic.
They enthusiastically accepted the invitation to come to the White House on April twenty eighth. We all know that in twenty eighteen, the Eagles, last time they were Super Bowl champions, did not accept an invitation to the White House and decline to attend.
Should we make anything of this either way? Uh, that is a.
Great question, because I've been thinking about this a lot.
I was drastically disappointed to find out the Eagles were actually going to go to the White House because despite what she said, we know that the Eagles originally did say that as a team they had decided not to go, and I their reasoning for not going made since individuals on that team they know that in general there is an attack on them, not maybe specifically, but they're part of communities that the White House has long tax on, so it made sense that they would say no. So
there's no part of me that believes that in any way them declining the offer, because we saw them decline the offer that that wasn't a legitimate thing. I think what I'm concerned about now, though, is what's the turning point? Because we've seen this unfortunately a lot as far as this administration. People realize that the things that are coming out of the White House are very anti whatever, anti black, anti women, anti LGBTQ plus whatever. So they're taking stances
against that. So now my concern is what power is he wielding that is making an entire organization change their mind. That's number one and number two. Are there going to be individuals who say I'm not going, Because in my mind, Jalen and Saquan should absolutely not go because they're the faces of the team and who they individually stand for. I don't think that they should go. But then if they don't go, what does that mean for the team? I think everything is just in a very weird limbo spot.
For me, let's not get ahead of ourselves. And you touched upon it.
Just because the organization said that it has accepted the invitation to the White House, it does not mean that all the members of the team have accepted that invitation
and will show up. And also, as I said earlier, it's April twenty eighth, the whole world is going to change between now and then, and the Philadelphia Eagles individually as players and collectively as an organization, did not forget that President Trump talked a lot of trash about the Eagles and supported the Kansas City Chiefs because of their MAGA associations having nothing to do with football.
So I know that's still going to be an issue.
We know that Jalen Hurts, to your point, was asked about the President during Super Bowl Week and he brushed it aside in a very clear way that he was not a fan. What this looks like in April is going to look very different from now. We're going to have other controversies. The President's going to make other statements. We might be in the middle of an economic catastrophe. We might be in the middle of a war in the Middle East, you know, because of things which have
happened recently. We don't know what it's going to be. But this is my takeaway. According to our last conversation, I'm more of the opinion we need to be done with this tradition.
It should not be a part of a White House briefing.
Because clearly it's in all of our consciousness about whether the team is going to go or not, and you're putting these players in an impossible position.
Don't tell me everyone's going to agree with it. We need to dead this all together.
And I think the president that has made it his mission to say we should keep politics out of sports should be.
The one to dead this.
He should be the one who says, which now I'm being facetious here if you guys can't pick up on my sarcast, but he should be the one who says, I'm going to practice what I preach. If I don't want athletes involved in politics, I'm going to stop making this a thing where now people have to choose between their morals, their ethics, their ideology, and if they're going to stand with their team.
We are done with this tradition.
Congratulations for Philadelphia Eagles on your Super Bowl win.
Go with God. You know, I think that's it.
That's the easiest way to acknowledge them, to celebrate them across the sports. You know, we're going to talk about March Madness in the next segment. It doesn't have to be just the NFL, could be the NBA, it could be MLB, all the sports you have the President acknowledge that team and say, congratulations, wonderful season, you are champions, You're representing America in a great way on the world stage.
YadA YadA, yadah blah blah blah, thank you, good night. Yeah, you're very very good. You're very good. He could say anything he wanted to say.
But now here's the reason why I think this president specifically. Other presidents could have done the same thing, but it has been a more Typically when teams have gone to the White House, it's been funds. We get a lot of one liners from it. It's just this fun anecdotal thing. But that's at the time we live in right now. We live in a time where hate crimes are up.
We live in a time where older people are having a hard time getting medication, specifically because of this administration, they have wiped out history from black Mexican and women at the Arlington Cemetery. So we live in a very trying time where you're mere association with somebody or standing next to somebody all of a sudden puts you in their saying stratosphere.
Whether you believe as or perceived as an endorsement.
It's perceived as an endorsement, So I would be vastly disappointed. Like I said, if there's certain specific players on the team that go, in my opinion, the only person that should be there is the owner in the GM because I would feel like their ideologies might align with that. Everybody else should just stay home and watch it on television my personal opinion. But I can't be the only
one that's like that. There's people out there who are going to see certain people standing next to Trump and they're going to assume that this wave of destruction that we're seeing across our country they a co sign on that they agree with that and they support it. And that's not a fair assumption, but it is an assumption that's going to be made.
Let me put it in real terms, this is exactly what is going to happen. Jalen Hurts, the quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles, is going to be asked, point blank, are you going to the White House? Do you support the president when he's doing X, Y and Z. And then he is in the impossible position of having to make a political assessment and give a political answer having nothing to do with sports, having nothing to do with anything he's done.
It's now been placed in his lap.
And if he says anything other than I am happy to do this, I have no problem to do this and not acknowledge the actual question which is going to be asked of him. He's then going to be put in some sort of box that he endorses everything that Donald Trump has said and done, and it's unfair to him. And we say keep politics out of sports, but that is what's going to happen, and it's unfair to the players.
And let's just I know, we talk about gambling a lot. Let's make a bet. Because what I would assume, how I would assume Jalen is going to answer that question, is I am not going to support this president. I'm going as a member of this team and to support
my teammates. That's not going to fly to your point, no, because it's not going to be this blanket statement that might have worked in the past, because now there is a very specific overtone undertone, whatever you want to call it, in this country, and as a black man, you cannot deny the racist undertones. You have to say to me, you have to look a black journalist in the face
and say, I, as a black man, am okay? Shaking the hand of this man who has been very open that he doesn't even like diversity in the country.
Well, not only that, has made it very clear that he doesn't even like the Philadelphia Eagles, and drag Hurts has made it clear that he's not a fan of the president. So let's stop playing games here. We got to go to a break here. But on the other side, it's kind of a continuation of this conversation because it's now March Madness. The brackets are out, my team's not in it, but I know that the old country is going to be wasting time at work watching it. So
let's talk some March Madness when we come back. It's Jackie Ray with me Beyond the box Score Later with Mo Kelly CAFI AM six forty live everywhere in the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to Later with Moe Kelly on demand from KFI AM six forty.
It's March Madness. Let's continue to go beyond the box Score with Jackie Ray. Jackie Ray, I used to love March Madness, and my reasons for not loving it now are selfish because my team, my alma mater, Georgetown Hoyas, have been horrible for about a decade. They've sniffed the tournament once in the past ten years, so I don't have any reason to watch. I'm not invested.
Are you serious right now? Oh? Here you go. Here's some history.
The last time we made the tournament, we lost to Colorado in the first round. I know you remember that, yep. But all around the country people are filling out their brackets. It's easier now to watch the tournament than ever before. It's on like six different channels, and because of streaming, you're not gonna miss really any of the games. People are gonna be watching work or they're gonna call in sick. How would you describe the importance to March madness to our culture in general?
March madness is one of my favorite things in the world, because this is where you really to your point. I can remember being in school, on a job, whatever, and I would have either classmates or fellow colleagues that I wasn't really close to, but then March Madness rolls around and we're all talking brackets. We got a boss one time, two jobs ago, I had a boss that was like, Hey, are we all getting sick this day? So we can go to the local bar and watch games all day.
Fantastic.
It's one of those things that we all want to be the one person, which is I think the statistics are like point zero zero point one, you.
Have a better chance to hitt into the lottery.
But go ahead, yeah, yeah, I'm getting your home. Most people's brackets are going to blow up on the first day, but it's just a fun thing to really sit down, go through your brackets, talk shop. You can kind of tell who knows a little bit about has been following certain teams or certain players versus the people who are just doing that crash course trying to get the brackets done.
It really is a great way, in my opinion, I feel the same way about fantasy football, when you guys can get together and it just brings people together who normally wouldn't hang out together. So I do like the unifying spirit of it. I've never won it, I've never even gotten close to. My bracket always is blown up the first day.
Same with mine.
I've never been adept at choosing brackets, and my team usually never goes far in the tournament. And also when my team is out of the tournament, I usually tune out because I'm not rooting for Duke. I'm not, For example, I'm not rooting for some other team from the Big East Conference where Georgetown plays in the case of this case, would be Saint John's. It's the number two seed, it's a great turnaround story for the university. And also Rick
Patino can't root for them, so yeah, don't care. There's nothing in it for me. But I'm so invested personally in college basketball it's hard for me whenever my team is out, I can't even watch ESPN.
It's a painful reminder.
But that's how serious it is for a lot of people, and I don't know if we for me. Here's the question, is there anything more exciting than an NC two way final four?
I don't know, absolutely not, especially if there's an underdog in there that kind of flew under everyone's radar.
What was it like five six years ago.
Villanova was the underdog and that just had everyone glued to the television.
Who are these people?
You know, those kinds of storylines that help you fall in love with the kids? Now, I do feel like the men's game specifically, and I know I've said this before, they need that, they need that underdog to try to push that storyline because a lot of the kids, we're not gonna know who they are next year.
We're gonna have a whole different lineup next year. Yeah they're going to the pros or transit, Yeah they're going to the Pro.
So we don't really have the opportunity in the men's game to build those relationship and build those fandoms. So the NCAA men's game really does, in my opinion, rely on those underdogs to kind of carry the story. So if we don't have one of those great storylines, I don't even know how interested I'm going to be in the men's game just in general versus the women's game. You know these players, these women, they have been with their teams. A lot of these players have been two
three years, some of them even played four years. So you have the opportunity to just really become a fan of that player in that school. So it's an easier storyline to carry. But either way, I absolutely love it.
Question was USC women's team disrespected by getting a number one seed but the lowest number one seed? In other words, the most difficult path to the Final four, largely on the strength of losing to Ucla, who they already beaten twice in the Big Ten Championships. Was USC disrespected by their placement?
I think so.
I don't think you really can say, oh, they've lost to UCLA when they beat them. But I've also have been one to say for my entire life, this whole decision by committee thing is just weird to me. There's a lot of things that don't necessarily make sense. People will say, oh, well, they lost the last three or four, so that's why whatever. None of this is actually logical.
It is based largely on feelings. However, even though I think they were disrespected and their path is going to be harder, I think they're going to come out stellar, and so this specific path is going to solidify that, Yes, this is the team that we think they are.
Yeah, they weren't ready last season to take that next step. They're definitely ready. It's all laid out in front of them, and it probably would be even more satisfying yes, to.
Say, hot, look you try to make this hard, and here we are. Last season we saw a glimpse of who they were who they are. Now we kind of know who they are. I think this is going to be a fun series to watch.
I will be tuning in because I definitely won't be tuning in to the Mids because I am petty, I'm salty.
Name your face favorite NCUBA men's basketball player right now.
You know what I don't know about favorite. I'm curious to see if Duke's Cooper Flag is the real deal. If he is, because he's forecast to be the number one pick overall, I like his game, I don't know if he is as not necessarily as good as advertised, will have as an immediate impact as.
Thought right, And that's that's one of the problems we see all the time in the nc DOUBLEA men's game.
It doesn't It takes a couple of years.
It does Leangelo in my LaMelo and you know, I get the LaMelo ball. Lamela he's the exception to that rule in my opinion. He translated seamlessly, but he was always also born with a basketball in his hand, so that's probably not a fair comparison. But it does take a year or two, probably two or three actually for them to catch up, but it's because they didn't spend enough time in school.
Yeah, they're only eighteen, nineteen years old.
You know that's what college would give you two three years of legitimate pre NBA experience as opposed to going from basically high school to NBA.
You know, you're jumping two levels in one year, So that's what I'll.
Be at, Alonzo, speaking of the Bob Brothers didn't work out, Alonzo, he definitely could have benefited from another year or two in college.
Absolutely chasing that money. It's Later with Mo Kelly, Jackie Ray, I'll see you soon, See you soon.
You're listening to Later with Mo Kelly on demand from KFI AM six forty