And we continue on Fred Rogan, Rodney Pete Sports one Hour Down twenty twenty five. Upon us, it's going to be a great year. And you know why, Rodney, Why is that? Because we got no choice. Every year's got to be a great year because we got no choice. Got no choice, Freddy, I like that.
You know what I mean? Yeah? Do it? You got no choice.
Can't go back, can't go back, can't put the toothpaste back in. Every year we start with optimism. Every year, we start with a sense of wonderment. Every year we start with a sense of excitement. We're human beings and that's what we do. It is the beginning of a new year. For some of us, we get older. For some of us, exciting new life changes occur. And really, as we go through the year, it comes down to how we deal with everything.
Tossed at us.
I mean, last year was a good year for you, Rodney, and in some ways it wasn't very good. It was absolutely but you know, we start anew We carry our memories with us, but we start with renewed optimism and hope. Are you a resolution guy, fred I'm not that guy because I lie, and if you lie, there's no reason to make a resolution.
Yeah, it's almost better than okay, do you know, to have goals or whatever you do, and then you know, December thirty first eight, did I accomplish what I want to accomplish in Yeah?
Year? All right.
I'd rather do the end of the year situation rather than say okay, because situations change, you can say I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that.
Uh my New Year's resolution.
I'm gonna eat right, I'm gonna do that, and then you get invited to a vacation where you're eating steak every day, right, you know what I mean, there's a chef cooking for you. You gotta do that. So you're gonna break them. I always feel like they just if there's anything. And I don't do change for the sake of change or make false promises or anything like that. But I do try to change one thing. I try to do
one thing that didn't work for me. I try to change one thing, one habit, one thing that's all, and work on it. Not saying I'm gonna completely do it or whatever. But that's one thing I'm gonna focus focus on each year. Is I'm a focus on whether that's being organized, or getting up earlier, or being more prepared on certain things, or you know, connecting with people back. I mean, it's one thing and I write them down and I say that's this is the one thing I'm
gonna do this year. But you get into there's my ten New Year's resolutions, You're always gonna fall short.
All right, let me give you an example of something. Let me give you an example. You talk about resolutions. I think if you know me, you know that occasionally I enjoy a nice bottle of cabernet. You know I'm heart smart. Yes, red line is makes you heart smart?
Right, that in.
Itself read is half full view of the world. Not sure you're drinking cabernet, but you're drink heart smart, right right, That's what I'm saying. So I look at it like that.
Now, granted, three bottles a night is probably a little excessive, but I look at it like this. The more you drink, the more heartsmart you are. Anyway, it doesn't matter. So I made a statement, and this was my statement, January will be dry January. I am not going to have a drink, Okay, all right, So this is January second, correct, Yes, Okay, So after New Year's Eve, I said, and that's it. You will not see me have a drink for the month of January.
There there, Okay.
Went to the King's game yesterday, day one, day one. What the hell of the King's game? It's fine, I just won't have a drink at the Kings game. Right that that's going to be my plan. Now, my stream adjust. But here if it's the Kings, and maybe it's okay. That's why I don't make resolutions, right because your situation changes. Things change. Life is EBB and flows. You know, you
can't be so rigid. Oh, I'll never do this, never do that when you might be put in a situation where you know there's some I gotta a little compromise. I gotta do it now. Certain things you should never compromise with. But for the most part living your life, and if you're a good person, they're gonna be things where you fall short. You know, as long as you are working towards something positive and something new to better yourself, that's okay. But to suggest, oh, I'm.
Gonna be so rigid and this is it, and if I don't have these ten resolutions, and I don't stay to them. And it's February and I already broke three of them. It's okay, give yourself a break, give meself a break.
You don't.
I said I was gonna do this year. I was gonna play more golf. I really want to learn golf, and I was gonna play more golf. And that was my plan. I said it, I'm gonna play more golf. When am I gonna play more golf? I still have two jobs? When am I gonna play more golf? I'm gonna play more golf. That's what I'm gonna do. I said that. Yeah, Then I thought, wait, how can I do that? I have two jobs. I've had two jobs for like fifty years. How am I gonna How am
I gonna do that? But that was another one of my brilliant statements. Dry January, I had a drink January. First, I'm gonna play more golf. I have two jobs. I can't do that. Another reason I don't make resolutions.
No listen, I'm I'm with you, is that I want to play golf. You gotta okay, start okay, I gotta get up at five o'clock to go play golf. Right, And it's not even it's not even light yet. Nowadays you gotta wait until the spring because it gets lighter earlier. And then, am I really going to do that before my bay starts? Am I really going to get up five o'clock to go play golf? And then weekends? Now, am I really going to go just do it on the weekends?
No?
No, But my schedule doesn't permit me to play more golf. I'm the same way every year I say that, I say the golf is one of the things that's ironic that you said that. It's like, I got to play more golf. I see everybody, you know, folks out there playing golf. Are good, buddy, Eric. Every time we talk to Eric Dickerson, he's coming off the golf course. Yes, right, he's like going to play golf or coming off the golf course. James Worthy always coming from the golf course. Like, man,
I got to come from the golf course. I got to get to the golf course. But what does that entail? I got so much going on, we got the show and then during the week and then you know, playing golf on the weekends is not really an option for me. But you know, it's just it's it's things. Yeah, you want to say it, and you try, but you can't limit yourself to the resolutions.
Another thing you said, and then we'll wrap this up. But I do have to comment up. You know, you said, well, you want to get up at five o'clock in the morning, it's dark outside. But see, and people of a certain generation realize as you get older, five am is when you have lunch. I mean you're having dinner like at two in the afternoon. You're done by seven point thirty.
And get up for breakfast. He's got a full ten hour sleep at five am. Right, You went to bed at eight?
Right?
And then well, you know, at a certain age, you know you have lunch like at four in the morning.
Yeah, I mean.
Breakfast at four in the morning. You might have lunch like it. I don't know, ten ten, yeah, ten dinners at three and you're back in bed.
Right.
When's there time for golf?
Yes?
Because that that body clock is real. That body clock will hit you. It'll hit you. It's certain points say ooh, I gotta cout a bed and you look up and go, damn, it's only eight o'clock.
They would going to bed at eight? What am? I what am I doing? Oh god? Okay? So final? All right?
Final NFL games the regular season. Most don't matter, some do.
Uh.
Philadelphia is locked up, so there's no question they're good.
They're in.
There's a number two seed and the number two seed correct me if I'm wrong. But the number two seed, now it is the number one and number two seed gets has a bye, right or is it just the number one? No, the number two seed gets a bye.
To right number one since the number one team, right, only the number one seed gets the buy.
So just the one seed gets a bye that's correct.
Right, right? So only only Detroit really well Minnesota troter Minnesota. They troter Minnesota will get the buye.
So so the Eagles, and this factors into it. The Eagles will not have a buye.
Corrects. We know for sure they will not.
They were locking through the two seat and will go there.
In essence, thereby is this week correct. And look, I'm all for I'm all for records, and I'm all for going for especially if you're close, and but at the same time, it can't be at the expense of what the ultimate goal is, which is win in a Super Bowl. So let's just said this side. I'm sorry, Barkley could break Eric Dickerson single season rushing record.
Yes, he's one hundred and one yard short.
Right, and and there was you know, are you going to let him go for it?
Now?
How long has Eric's record stood? Are you going to let him go for it? And Nick, Okay, I'm gonna talk to everybody. I'm gonna talk to the owner, the general manager, the players, and we're gonna make a decision that's best for the franchise. And the decision they made was he said out this week, we can't afford him to get hurt going for the record. But we also know that this record may never be broken. This could be just one of those years whereon Barkley had that
kind of season. So then you have to weigh the options. What's more important. We put him out there in a game that doesn't really matter, he breaks the record and all is wonderful, or we put him in that game and he gets hurt. They aired on the side of Rodney. We're not gonna get him hurt. We're gonna sit him. Do you agree with that decision? This is a very difficult, difficult one because I don't think there's a right or
wrong answer to this. I think that if there is a consensus with the team of and this includes players, not just owners and coaches, we're gonna go for it, then you go for it. If there's a consensus that no, let's rest and be careful and not play anybody and be safe, then that's the consensus. Because I think that if you do it because you're.
Gonna worry about getting hurt, you can get hurt in the first play of the first playoff game.
You can get hurt any time.
There's no guarantee if your player you don't play, you're gonna get hurt. I don't think you can play that way and make a decision that way. And I never liked that as a reason, Oh we're not gonna play. If a guy has banged up, Yeah, he needs to rest that ankle because it's been rolled for year, you know, played on it for several weeks.
Yeah.
But if people are healthy and you decide to play him and they happen to get hurt, I don't fault that. Oh they shouldn't have played that game because they got hurt. And then you got a factor in one thing with Sakon Barkley, he did get two thousand yards. Only what the ninth player ever to rush for more than two thousand yards, So he's already crossed that hurdle and put
himselves in himself in the record books. But yes, this is a forty year record that Eric Dickerson held, which many believe because the way the game is played nowadays, that running backs are not going to even get close to that anymore. Well, Saquon did Derrick Henry is another guy, probably the only other guy that can get close to it, and he got two thousand yards himself at one point.
But the thing that I go back to is when they interview Saquon, he said, I'm good either way, but if they want me to go for it, I'm ready to go for it. It was he didn't come out and say, nah, I'm gonna sit back. I don't only it's not it doesn't even matter to me. I don't want to do it. It's different for running backs and any other position than quarterback.
Quarterbacks are judged, you know, on Super Bowl rings and wins and all that kind of stuff.
Running Backs are judged on their place in yards and history. And Eric Dickerson has certainly been at the top of that for forty years, and you know, for Saquon to say I want to go after and accomplish this, I wouldn't fault him for saying that. But now everybody has to be on board. I think the problem that occurred in Philly was Lane Johnson, the All Pro soon to be Hall of Fame right tackle, said oh, I.
Like the rest, I like the rest this week.
And so when you have your starting offensive lineman who's a superstar as well, say I don't know if we should play or I don't know if I want to play this game, then it makes it difficult for everybody else to say, let's go for it.
Yeah, and you certainly can't send him into the war without his artillery.
Yeah, no, you can't send him out there playing with backup offensive linemen because all the offensive lineman want to sit out and they say, okay, but Saqua's going to do that.
No, it has to be everybody.
It has to be, like I said, it has to be a consensus that everybody wants to do that. And then there's the argument that everybody's making nowadays that oh it's you know, it's seventeen games versus sixteen, that Eric Dickerson did it in you know, and Eric has always been adamant and I'll back him up because there was a little controversy with another show that talked about Eric Dickerson and him doing it in fifteen games as opposed to fourteen games when he broke O. J. Simpson's record,
And Eric's always acknowledged that he did it in fifteen games and not fourteen. And so there's that debate that's going on right now. Well, even if Sakwan does it, he does it in one more game than Eric Dickerson did, which you can debate that forever. You know, in all sports, and like oh, times have changed, the game is the game. The record will be the record, whether it's seventeen games or sixteen games, fourteen games, as long as it's acknowledged.
I don't think it's the same thing as a team winning a title, which I pushed back against when people talk about the Dodgers and an asterisk in the pandemic year, because everybody was on the same playing field. It wasn't like the Dodgers played less games than everybody else or had to do something different. The Dodgers had fans and nobody else in the league had fans, so they had an advantage. Everybody went through the same criteria. A strike year,
everybody had to go through the same situation. But I wouldn't fall him any other way. Look, I was on a team. I just get a quick, quick story. I was on my rookie year. Barry Sanders had a phenomenal
rookie year. And we're playing Atlanta, last game of the season, and we're on the East Coast, playing in Atlanta, and we get word that the Kansas City Chiefs had just completed their game and christian Na Koye had finished the game with one hundred and whatever yards and Barry was only like fifty seven or something like that yard short of Christiana Koye, something that was really attainable. And Barry went off in the first half. He almost had one hundred yards in the first half, and we ended up
getting ahead of Atlanta pretty good. We're up by like twenty five twenty eight points in the third quarter, and word came down that the Chiefs game was over and Barry only needed fifty something yards to get it and the series before Barry came out of the game because we were already winning, and everybody on that bench, including the coaches and the people from the front office, came down said Barry only this month's yards away from winning
the rushing title this year. From Christi Nakoyer, let's go back in the game for a few series so we can get you the record. And he refused to go back in the game. Why he refused to because, first of all, that's who he was. He was just an unselfish guy, still is a very unselfish guy. Didn't care
about records. But at the same time, he looked up and there were guys that didn't play a whole lot throughout the whole season that were getting a lot of playing time, and backup running backs that didn't play were getting their time to play, and he did not want to go back in the game and take the moment
away from those guys who were getting an opportunity. So he refused to go back in the game and say this is not appointment, even to the to the notion that had he won that rushing title, probably would have got another million dollar in bonus, and he still decided not to go back into the game. And Christian Nakoya ended up winning the rushing title that year, and Barry was second. I say that, patis it's not important to every guy, but you go down. Sometimes there's records in history. Look, Eric,
Eric is known for twenty one oh five. Mister twenty one oh five, right, I mean, he's he's it's it's his legacy. And I think when you get a guy like Saquon who probably looked up to Eric growing up and watched him play, go like, if I could break that record, man, that would be that would be kind of cool.
So I get it. I get it either.
Way, and I would not fault him for wanting it or the team for wanting it. And I understand that there's a fear like, oh, everybody's not on board, and if somebody gets hurt, they're gonna blame that and hold that against us.
All right, So we have two NFL teams in the playoffs, two NFL teams in the playoffs, So you think.
Could win a game or two.
Who's had the better year, but who's got the better chance, let's talk about it.
That's right, Hey, twenty twenty five, y'all make it the best one yet.
Right to Pete Fred Rogan, glad to be back with you.
Hope you had a wonderful holiday, New Year, all of that good stuff. Let's get it in twenty five, y'all, everybody.
How about this? Both the Rams and the Chargers in the playoffs. Now, the one thing we can say about the Chargers, they will not defeat themselves. Brandon Staley is no longer the coach, so if you're facing like a fourth and twenty from your own five yard line, you won't go for We know that now. Jim Harball is not going to coach that way, No he's not. And really, both teams have had the Rams against all odds, and look the Chargers with a whole new staff and a
new culture. Both teams have had pretty good years. So the way it looks like this, the Rams will finish with the three seed, will win or tie against Seattle or a loss by Tampa against the Saints. Keep in mind, this is going to be a big weekend for the Rams. Jimmy Garoppolo is playing quarterback, so it's a good weekend. It'll be a weekend probably where a lot of women will be watching. Jimmy Garoppolo will be playing quarterback for
the Rams. And the only request they had and I checked this on some online comments as that he plays without a helmet. They just want to stare at him the whole time.
Oh that works.
Yeah, please tell Jimmy g not to wear a helmet because we want to fall in love with that. Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford in active for the game.
So that means so the Rams are and Kevin you're the you are numbers in Draft Guru and all that kind of stuff.
Rams are the third seed no matter what.
No, there's a chance that they could be the four seed as well. So if they could potentially, if they lose and Tampa wins, they'd be the four seed and they would host either the Vikings or Lions whoever loses that game. Yeah, okay, whoever doesn't win the NFC North, they'll host that.
Tampa can jump them if they lose and Tampa wins, correct, I got you, got you. But they'll still be the division winner what they've already done. Yeah, they'll still have a home home playoff game. What do you guys think?
Real quick?
Detroit and Minnesota both fourteen and two. And you said this before, Fred, I think you've said it in like
other sports. I think you said it in basketball. Seating wise, does it matter should you should should a division winner who is like the Rams, or we've had years where there's been a team with a losing record, but they are the division winner has the home field advantage over a team that goes fourteen and two like the like the Vikings or the of the Lions, and whoever wins this week coming up between those two because they play at the end of the season, will drop from the
either number one seed to the number fifth seed and have to go on the road to play their first playoff game. You think that's good earth fair? Should stay that way or should be based on record once you get to the playoffs.
Well, you guys argue with me on this, and I always say it about the NBA, so you'll argue with me here too. I understand the divisions are important. It keeps the teams in it. I understand the owners like that because they have a chance to make more money if their team is in it, even if it is a weak division in certain years. Tell you what, how many teams in the NFL playoffs? Seven top seven records are in.
Yeah, seven per conference.
Top seven records are in. First one gets the buy last two are wild cards. Thanks for playing. I don't care if everybody comes from It doesn't matter to me. NBA top eight teams, ten teams in, some are playing, some are in.
You're in.
I don't care what conference you come from, and it'll be quite out of it with you in the NBA. I don't even think you should have it in conferences, all right, Top sixteen teams are in. Let's go, doesn't matter.
A movement, by the way for that to happen. There's a movement for that potentially to happen from in people inside the NBA circles that once the playoffs begin, it goes by a record, not by conference. You still have to find a way to divide up the schedule.
So Austin could play Golden State in the first round. It doesn't have to be Eastern Conference playing rightfence.
Correct right, or it could be you know, to East, yeah, or it could be two Western Conference teams played too week. Just that's how it works. Best teams are in. I think the NFL should do that, so should Major League Baseball.
Best team to disagree with you on that, Fred, by the way, just because I mean, I go back to the one that stands out for a lot of people was that giant Beast mode run from Marshawn Lynch. When the Seahawks beat the Saints. The Saints, yeah, they were thirteen and three. The Saints were and has to go on the road in Seattle, one of the best home food advantages in all of sports. For a seven to nine Seattle team in Seattle ended up beating them. And
this happens every now and then. We'll have a team that.
Went beautiful though Kevin wasn't that beautiful.
It was great to watch as a fan powered the Saints and I won thirteen games. To be pissed off that I go from the super Dome, which is a phenomenal home for the advantage for me to go all the way across the country to Seattle fourteam that won seven games. That's ridiculous. So I think you probably should award a team for winning their division. If you win
your division, fine, you make it. But if you don't have a better record than the team that you're facing in the first round, that team should host the playoff games.
The playoffs is reward enough. You should not be doubly rewarded by getting a home game.
Yep, that's what I say.
Yeah, it makes sense.
It makes sense because both it's coming back to this year again with Detroit Minnesota clearly the two best teams in the NFC that they're going head to head at the end of the season, and the team that loses is going to drop to the fifth seed and have to go on the road to play somebody.
You can make the argument you played, so who better to comment on this? You canna make the argument. Look, you're in the playoffs. Sure you might get a softer draw at the beginning, but to be the best, you gotta beat the best. I mean, you could make that argument. What I'm saying is it's insane when you have a team, let's say from the NFC South. Okay, they're not one of the best teams, they don't have one of the
best records. You have wild cards with better record or at least equal to Why are you giving them a Why? Why do they get a home game? It does I don't care what conference you're anymore, It doesn't matter NBA, you know we're gonna play the top sixteen throughout the league. Sorry, nobody you know from Charlotte's Division got in too bad. Apologies to you guys. Sorry you didn't make it okay, Well that's too bad.
Sorry.
There's four teams from the West, six teams, eight teams, however, many teams from the Western Conference. There's fifteen teams from the Western Conference. They're all better than the East. Too bad, too bad. Best teams should be in the playoffs period. This we win our division, congratulations to us. Well that's pretty cool. Congratulations to you. But if you're not as good as the other teams, then what does that mean.
It's a consolation prize. Well we could get hot, yeah, but you weren't when it mattered, so you don't get in the What if the NFL went.
To that went into East and West as opposed to the divisions, they just went East, East and West division and thirty two teams, sixteen teams and the East, sixteen teams in the West. Best records in the East, best records in the West, or best records overall, and didn't do the divisions. Would that be something that you'd be
in favor of. Yeah, best records overall, and there's no there's no you know, Kansas City doesn't play the Chargers twice or it's just a it's a it's a schedule that doesn't require a division to play each other twice. You play multiple teams, so that takes that out of the equation as well.
I'm in favor of that.
I know people say yeah, but you know it's those matchups, those division matchups that mean so much. Yeah, Chargers Raiders means a lot to a lot of people. Chiefs Chargers, Chiefs Raiders. Absolutely. I get that. You know Rams forty nine or sure, I got that too. I got it. Giants, Eagles absolutely, Cowboys.
Jam every year. Boys, but you just don't play them twice every year, right, right, right, And that's all I'm saying. You don't play them twice.
And that's it. Let everybody play everybody. That's what baseball is doing. Let everybody play everybody. It's not nineteen fifty three. You know you're not wearing leather helmets anymore.
Listen, listen. I used to be a proponent of that, and I agree with you. I think if you happen to end in football, if you happen to win your division, yes, okay, keep the divisions. You win your division, you get a home game. I mean, you you make the playoffs, but that does not that does not entitle you to get a home game and entitles you to make the playoffs, but not a home game, and their home games are determined by the best record on.
Each side, mom in favor of that team has got the best record.
There's no way in the world, Minnesota, if have them to lose a Detroit should have to go on the road to play a playoff game. Otherwise, what does the regular season matter when you win fourteen games in the regular season?
Exactly? I agree with you. I agree with you so but you know it's it's the philosophy that at least I've had for a long time, and the best teams should be in their period. The argument is, yeah, but you're knocking out so many teams and it hurts their home business because they don't have a chance. And then get better, get better. It goes back to people upset with the Dodgers and and you know they spend too much money, and it's unfair. It's not unfair if you
don't make the playoffs, get better. It's not unfair. It's not our job to make you better. It's not our job to give you what the other people have. If you can't figure it out, guess.
What you are.
You lose you're a loser. You didn't figure it out. That's professional sports. Yeah, but the fans will get upset. You shouldn't have any fans if you're a loser. You shouldn't. And that's not on the players, it's not. It's not on the players. It's the organization. The players compete every time they go on the field, on the court, on the diamond, they compete on the ice. But if you're putting out an inferior product and asking people to pay, and boyd if fans are upset, well why do you
have fans who support that crap? Go back to the restaurant analogy. If you went in and every time you ordered a steak it was burnt, would you go back to the restaurant?
Well?
I just love it for what the walls? What do you like the way the boot if looks the food will break your teeth when you bite it. You wouldn't go back, would you?
No?
So why would you sit here? And I'm with these guys live or die? Well their dad, why are you with them? Go live with somebody. And That's what I'm saying about the playoffs. Best teams, make it period, en done, make it simple. Well, this is the year We're gonna simplify everything.
We're gonna simplify it so it doesn't matter if you're you know, Dodgers win the West and it's no divisions. It should be all just National League, American League. Who's got the best record in each league?
Done?
Who topped the bottom? Don?
What's the problem. This is gonna be the year of simplification. That is what we're gonna brand this. We're gonna simplify everything, make it easy, make it quick, and then we can figure it out. You want to be in the playoffs? Who are the best teams? Put them in there.
Yeah, and if the Dodge and Padres happened to have the two best records in the National League, they should end up in the NLCS as opposed to NLDS.
Yeah, well quite frankly, if the Dodgers and Padres have the two best records in baseball, they should end up in the World Series. Oh okay, you want to cross it. I'm saying the best teams period.
Across American League and National League.
Right, I want to cross football. I want to cross basketball. Give me the best sixteen, give me the best seven, give me the best eight.
Whatever.
Who are the best teams in all conferences, in all divisions.
Line them up.
That's it. That's how I would do it. And then if it plays out that the Dodgers and Padres playing in the World Series, they were truly the two best teams, they should be there, which a lot of people believe that they were. This year they were on What did I tell you when they beat the Padres? What did I tell you? They just won the World Series?
Yeah?
And they did because they were the best team and the Padres were the second best team, which makes the Padres the first loser.
You would have to do that to the Padre fans.
Come on, if the door's open, Am I gonna walk in?
Or no? Yeah, I go walk You You got kick that bad bits open, Fred, That's what I'm saying.
We gotta kick it open. Okay, what's gonna happen with Roki Sazaki? Let's talk about that next, all right? Fred Rogan Rodney Pete on a five seventy LA Sports. Uh, before we get out of here, just some thoughts on Roki Sazaki. We kind of touched on it earlier. He is the Japanese right hander. He is going to be posted on the fifteenth, then everybody gets a crack at it.
Here's the thing he said. And there were meetings at his agent's office in Los Angeles, no players invited, by the way, so you have a Mooto or Otani weren't there, nor was you Darvish of the Padres. But after the meeting, the sense was he wanted to go to the one place, the only place where he could be better, where he could be the best, where they would make him the best. That was number one on his priority list. He wants to be the very best player, period the end. And
that's what he indicated. You know, he's not as concerned about being with other Japanese players, and maybe market size is not as important to him. But what is important is he wants to be the best. And I thought about that when I read it, and I thought, well, then why are you meeting with anybody else? I mean, did anybody ever say the Boston Red Sox made me the best player I could ever be? I went to Boston problem they fixed me. Sometimes yes, maybe, but that's
not a destination for that Rodney. Nobody comes out and says that, hey, if there's one team I can go to that'll make me the best. I don't see anybody going it's a Cincinnati Reds. I don't see anybody going. Yeah, that one place for me is they don't even say about the Yankees. No, there's one place where people come to get better, and that place is right here. That's the only place where am I going to be my best? What are your best here?
What do you think the notion and the reason behind no players? I don't want to talk to any of the players. You think it's he already has relationships with a number of players, and he's already got the individual conversation to one on one conversation. So in these meetings, I don't need I don't need the You don't need to bring Otani and Yamamoto and Suzaki or whoever else, any other Japanese player. You don't need to bring them into the meeting because I speak the ones that I know.
I speak to him on the individual basis anyway. But why do you think he decided he didn't want the players in there.
Because, as the story goes, he gave everybody a homework assignment. There were specific questions he wanted it answered. He presented those questions prior to the meetings, and then he wanted to.
Because most guys say, I want to talk to the other players. I want you know, guys, even the Dodgers brought other guys in when they met with some and so someone sewed up, whether it be Kershaw showed up for somebody who was a Kershaw fan, or you know, anybody who's a star somebody looked up to when they're free agent. Hey, they're good friends with so and so. Let's bring him in there and when we meet with him or have him go pick him up in the airport.
You think he didn't want to be influenced anymore, or he's that influential that he can't have another player in there that makes a decision for him.
What I think he wanted is, here's what's important to me. Who can fulfill this part of it? Okay, if I now believe that you can fulfill what I'm asking you to do, now we'll go to the next step. I don't want to be influenced by anybody at this point. I just want to know can you accomplish these goals? And if you could accomplish these goals, I'm ready to go to the next step. Okay, that's what I think, and I think that's why he played out that way.
Yeah, do you think he made a mistake by taking this long? Because there are other there are teams out there making happen, making deals happen, and have been since early December, right, and that the fact that he's waiting now some teams are off the market. I mean even with the even with the Dodgers, who's still in it, right, Obviously they go out and sign Blake Snell. They got their eyes on other people. It's putting them in a box. They're putting them in a hole by waiting this long. Yeah,
but here's the thing. I think they're back timing it so he can be posted on the fifteenth. Then I think it's ten days where we're gonna find out what's going to happen, so all the activity and fireworks will start.
Then.
I think they just back timed it so when they hit the magic date, you know they will have gone through the reports, say we'll discuss what each team told them. Maybe then these guys go and take another look, go to the stadium, meet the players, whatever they decide. I think they want to get done pretty quick, and I think they just back timed it so, I mean he's
posted the fifteenth. I don't know, maybe the sixteenth it's done, maybe it goes a little longer, but by that time he'll have a very good idea of what he's.
Going to do, a very good idea.
Oh yeah, all right, well we're back. Happy new Year everybody, Happy new year everyone, Ronnie, thank you, Happy new Year to you, Kevin, Happy new Year to you, and Rodney. We're back tomorrow, yes, sir,