It's a podcast called twenty five wist fucking board and they were a whist so, yeah, it's too bad.
But what did you expect?
It's a podcast called twenty five whistles.
Everybody, alright, blood whistle. We do have Brian Howard coming up. Philly's great, so that's cool. We'll talk NBA basketball a little bit as well. The thing that I would never want to do, and I think a little bit it feels like when we made you do the testosterone test, is that I have people racing their sperm. You got have you guys seen this at all?
No?
Yeah?
What I mean?
Because they're fast swimmers, right, so what do they.
Well that's what they say. I don't know, fast compared to like us running. They're fast, they swim, so they but they yeah, they race them.
Wow, that's cool. You want to do it?
I don't. I had to get my sperm checked. I did before my wife and I started trying to have a baby, because I was forty five and I was like, man, if we're gonna like try and like every month, wait for that, I need to make sure. And so I did that and it was great, Luckily, thank I'm nervous for.
You, dude, that's crazy.
It was weird. I was nervous, but it was weird first because you're just yanking in a room and everybody knows what you're doing. It's it's bizarre.
Yeah, that's crazy.
You've done this.
No, I've never done it.
No, no, no, the whole the whole process, because you go and you sit in a room and they're like all right, Bobby, and they you know, the person working at the desk meets you. It's like all right, come on back.
And then you get a woman at the desk at the day.
Yeah, it's not all dude. It's not like a sports bar.
It's got to be all dudes. Like it'd be better if it's all dudes that I'd be like, hey, man, you know what's up. You know you gotta do this, you know what to do.
And they walk you back and you talk to a second like hey, to a doctor or a nurse, another woman and she's they call it a sample and they say what you're gonna donna go here your sample, And the whole time you're just going in my mind, I'm going you're looking at me and you know I'm about to yank it and that's weird. For about the last I'm just thinking that in my head. But they do it all the time. It just yankors all day to them, Do they know.
What you're you're using in there? I'm saying them looking at you and being like not, not only do you know what you're about to do? What you're about to do to this?
Oh do you have something?
Now?
Oh? Well, everybody everybody has the movies, but the movies where that the magazines in there?
Everybody has a phone. Now that's true, but no, I was just okay, just curious that didn't magazine things disgusting?
Yeah, I use the same magazine is gross.
No, So but you go in and there's an old radio that you're supposed to turn up, so so they don't hear you. I guess because I just I don't know. I picture like that because I was like three rooms, I guess while they do this the yankor halls, and I was calling it when I was doing Caitlyn the Yankor hall.
This is crazy.
Yeah, dude, it's no, it's a doctor's office. And oh I have a crazy story too, but it's not even me, but not only walking down the anchor hall but you hear music in the other room, so you know what's happening in your hall because I only turn the music up when you go in there. And mine was on a class. It was like four in a row, Tom Patty.
That's good.
And so then when you're done, you have your sample and the inside of the wall is it's like a metal square, and you pull it back and you put your sample on there and you hit a button and then you go out and you just kind of hang your head in shame as you walk out. Yeah, it's like I'm done.
Yeah, does anybody make eye contact?
So that whole process was odd. I was nervous about the results. But the results came back and is a plus. So thank god, plus is a plus.
Nice.
I would have told you if it's be minus is a plus.
So I was.
I was nervous about that, but I didn't get nervous until it was like when I got my ACT results. You take the test any way, you're not really nervous until the envelope gets there and you're like, oh god, when I pull the envelope, this justn be life changing.
And so I got an email saying, hey, your results are on the portal, and I went to the portal and if it was like sperm count I don't remember what the classifications were, but if it was like over ten thousand, that was good, over twenty thousand, that was great. And mine was like a million.
Wow, A bunch of guys in there.
Yeah, I wonder what ours would be. Dude knows.
I think Eddie would be like dust.
Does the five? Does the test have to do with the sperm?
I don't know. But my point was they do sperm races. Oh yeah, yeah, Oh, I'll tell you another story. The story that came to my mind. So men of the world are invited to put their sperm against each other in a race where the owner takes on one hundred thousand dollars. The twenty twenty six Sperm Racing World Cup. It's one hundred and twenty eight samples, each representing a different country that's facing off on a microscopic racetrack. I
guess it's next month in samp Cisco. It's the Kentucky Derby of Juices.
What on earth?
But they want one hundred thousand dollars.
Now that the payday is awesome, but so like, do they take just one of your guys, and that represents.
You under a microscope. The competitors will race each other along a customized micro fluidic track. I don't know, I'm sure.
And do they put like a what's what's the Okay?
Here you go the entrance. Are sent a kit which to provide semen sample which will be mailed back to California process through advanced lab technique such as incubation, sperm washing, pipe dding, and through a centrifuge. And I think it isolates and prepares the most viable cells for racing.
Okay, so it gets your fastest.
Finds your healthiest horse and puts them on the track.
And then you know how like when you do the dog races, they have flash and dash? Is there like an egg or something that like.
Tells them which way to go?
Point?
I don't know.
It's one hundred thousand bucks. I wouldn't want to be a part of this because I don't want.
To be last.
Can you imagine your last?
Like eight? Yeah, the country.
It's not just you, dude, you'd be letting your country down. That's true, you know, it's true.
I want to stand up there with my hand on my heart, knowing that my sperm just won me that gold.
Amen.
Uh.
Yeah.
My have a friend, a literal friend, a close friend who was doing a full physical type thing and part of it was they were checking his sperm too, and so he does the physical and they're like, hey, we needed to do a sperm test and he's like all right, didn't really know that was going to be part of the physical, and so they give him the cup for the sample and they just say go on, and he has to go into like a public bathroom. What he had.
They just pointed him at a stall and there are like three yearnals, three stalls, and he's like he felt like too, he could go to jail, like somebody comes in like there's a dude waka in there, I promise this for a sample? Probably no, no, no, the doctor, but he had to. He had to do it there.
Heck no, I wonder what's worse to do, like not knowing it's coming or knowing it's coming.
You probably just want to know it's coming. No, no fun.
After I said, I'm like, that's just not a good way to say it.
Yeah. So that's that thing, that's what that race is. That's my story.
That's crazy.
Yeah.
Times man, they're changing. Bob Dylan said it. They are, They're changing. So yeah, good luck to everybody. Yeah, all countries, I mean just in life.
Man.
Oh yeah, we need it, dude, we need it.
That crap's crazy, Eddie. I have a bunch of stuff from you. But I think have we not already all talked talked about this time?
We have not talked about any of this.
We for sure talked about meeting t Max mom on the other show we.
Did, but not on this show. But which Kevin doesn't know.
If people hear this, they're going to know about it.
It was more for Kevin because like if Kevin would have been there, he would have been like, what is happening?
I give you a quick version because a lot of people listen to this. Probably Kevin works in a back room and doesn't get to hear the show as doing it. Can you turn a volume up in there?
Yeah?
But I'm also editing all the time, so just be But if.
Like something you were just dying laughing, you could flip it up in here.
Yeah, because we have a TV. If so, if I see somebody dying laughing like you just said, then I'll turn the music or the sound up real quick.
We were going into the Arkansas Texas softball game at Texas and it was rainy and cold, and I had four or five tickets on my phone from DJ, who's hitting coaching Arkansas on my brother in law, and we were just like, oh, this one ticket didn't go through and a name should be on the list, and so they ended up sending me oh the other ticket, gotcha boo. Woman in Texas shirt next to us was like, hey,
do I know you? I was like, and naturally, I think it's from the radio show or television stuff've been on. Who knows. It's a grab bag out there, And I was like, I don't know. She's like, did you do something in Arizona? And I was like no, Like you did a sports thing at Arizona And I was like no, And I sort of thinking, well we did. She said, yeah, you talked to my son about his rating on Madden his Teamax. Mom.
What Yeah, sitting right next to you else.
Getting teket while we were getting in at the box office. Yeah. Really, yeah, he was his game because his girlfriend plays on the team Texas for Texas.
Wow, did you see him?
No? She face time with him, but the cell was so bad. I'm glad because he was. She was like, look who I'm with. It was breaking all up and I was like, he's not gonna know anyway.
But we were just like, how is this all happening? Like it's random.
Yeah, so so t Max mom to be in that spot and she recognized you. That's cool.
Yeah, she was like linger looking and that happens. But usually it's hey, Dandela Stars whatever, breaking Bybones radio shirt something like that. But no, it was that it was too much access.
Did she talk about her son's rookie year.
We didn't get it. It was cold and wet, dude. We stayed four and we're freezing our balls off.
It was cold, man, great seats.
I think Eddie was able to appreciate, like how fast college off ball is.
Had no idea like baseball. It's just a big field. So like, yes, they're fast, but I mean you can't really see how fast they are because they're just throwing the ball a long way. They're running far. With softball, it's so condensed in this small area, dude, it's like, wow, double play.
We were like, it's crazy.
And the girls hit the ball so hard.
And you remember how hard it wasn't hit when we didn't too much excess.
I actually enjoyed it. Other than the cold rain, I could have I would have loved been there for the whole game.
It's so much more action than baseball.
Yeah, and the girls are so positive, like we're you get.
To talk crap, except you're not talking crap, you're talking positive. But with your team, Like if you get on second base, you dance, you do baseball, they'll throw it at you next time you get up, or they'll be a fight. Unspoken rules. It's you get a hit, you get a first base, like, oh, it's awesome.
Did you catch a football that?
Sure it did? Sure? Well, well not.
Technically, Okay, this is why I'm asking this foul ball? Wait, what's the what happened?
We're walking not we're walking to the stadium, we're not in yet. And Eddie goes, it'd be so cool to catch a foul ball, that was all. And then you hear it and you see a ball come over the stadium and go tink clink and start rolling down the sidewalk and I'm like, dude, there's a ball, go get it. And he's like, I don't know. I'm like dude, there's a ball, go get the ball. You wanted a foul ball.
So he runs down and gets it. In softball, you have to give the balls back because I only have so many and it's not a sport that makes money.
So yeah, correct.
So someone from Texas comes out and it's like, hey, you just find that ball, and he's like, yeah, you can.
Here you go.
And so she goes back and she says to me, Hey, this at the pavement. Does your friend really want this ball or no, no way, And I said yeah. She goes I'm gonna make sure that it can't be had because if it's scuffed, it's done. And so she came back and she was like, it's scuffed, he can have it. It was like five year old, Yeah it up.
I know the picture.
You're like a little kid.
You'll hold it up well, because because I literally had just said like, hey, what I want out of this game is to catch a foul ball. Yeah, that's all I want. And then dude, it was like the heavens opened up and that ball came flying over the wall.
I wonder what. So it was actually from the game. Wasn't like somebody hitting.
It during the game. We got there in the first inning.
It was a little legit foul.
It was so cold. We did not have coach. It shouldn't have been that cold in May and Austin it did it rained all day. It's freezing. We liked the four innings and then we were like, it's too we have we're freezing our balls off and uh. We went back to the restaurant watching on the phone. But Archets won the series two out of three games.
I had a question about that. So like, so, so your brother in law DJ, he's coach there at Arkansas. We see him and so we're like, love you DJ. Yeah, go coach Guessa, right, like, like, does is that appropriate?
It doesn't matter, Okay, yeah, because I.
Know he's working, Like we don't want him coming here and banging on the window.
If we did it every inning when everyone walked down, but he was right below us and he walked out with Jay he loves Yeah. I mean, there's there's too much. We didn't do too much.
No, we did not do too much.
So it says says the guys who did it, and.
We didn't do We only did it one time.
You had do Celtics stuff on today I'm shocked.
I know, I know, you know, it's kind of like the Patriots, where I'm surprised they made it this far and I'm trying to be positive about it.
You're not surprised they were really good.
You're never really good during their regular season. I'm surprised that they're out, Yeah, especially being up three to one to like like that. I'm surprised that Missoula. Look, he's a great coach, awesome coach, but man like they just never changed anything and just kept jacking up threes. And they've been doing this, but then he's stopped playing guys that are on his bench that were key guys all year,
like the Shireman's, like the Jordan Walsh. These guys didn't really play in the playoffs, the same guys that got you that two seed, and he didn't really play and which surprised me.
They trow up that rotation though when it's playoff time they do.
But like when you're about to blow a three one lead, like yeah, let's try something else here, and then they throw out Shiremen and I think Garza for start this game seven. I was like, well, it's a little late now. Now these guys are just be nervous. It's Game seven and now you want to play. So I'm surprised that they really stuck to the guns that much and didn't really switch anything up. But yeah, I can't believe.
They I'm surprised that you're wearing the sweatshirt like I would think, like like when the Cowboys lose, they're out, like they losing the playoffs whatever, like Cowboys stuff is gone for at least a couple months.
Yeah, because you're embarrassed. Mostly, I just don't want to see it because it makes me feel bad.
Yeah.
I mean it's a good point, don't get me wrong, But I just this thing's just comfy, dude.
Yeah, dude is comfy.
You know, it's raining and we're just like just comfy.
I agree. Yeah.
Uh.
Something we didn't get to talked about was Kevin has two kids as twins, so I know you're dealing with a babysitter issue. Where is do you pay a babysitter double because it's twins or is it like one babysitting job because there it's two, but it's like one, you know one, it's kind of one because they're twins. What happened?
So last time we talked. I was going to meet her that weekend, I believe, and we met her and her husband. He didn't watch the kids with her, but we just wanted to meet and greet first. She was great, she's a nurse. To talk about that a little bit, and we felt super comfortable with her right away, like, all right, this is great. So then the following weekend, last weekend, we went to the wedding. She came over early after or late afternoon, and I was with the
kids because my wife was in the wedding. So she had to leave, like three or four hours before me to go do a bunch of stuff. And so I'm sitting there like, Okay, she's got to come here. I got to run her through. So we ran her through some stuff and I left. And this is our first time being away from kids without family watching him.
It was awesome.
I only got one text the entire time. We're gone for six hours, Yeah, about six hours, and the only text was Hey, where's your trash can? At That's great, that's it. And she's like, yeah, white nervous. Honestly, she was way like she handled it waybere I thought she would, because she's the nervous one for sure out of us too, like I'll be like, all right, see you later, Like I need this break where she'll be more of like I wonder what they're doing. I can't believe, like they're
just at home with this random girl. But she was great. I think it was because she was in the wedding, so she was so busy and her mind was going which hell, and she enjoyed the experience. She had a great night. It was a great wedding.
What do you pay?
We paid her thirty bucks an hour.
Oh, I was total.
I'm like that.
No, no, she's like thirteen. Maybe because we asked her, were like, you know, what's your rate? We just don't lose our first time. And she's like, well, well, at first she goes, well usually I maybe sit for like people with a lot of money, and we're like she said that all wow.
But then I'm here with you now and.
I'm like, well I've really dropped a few levels.
We're not usual people. So now she's like, my rate's like twenty five to thirty, and I was like, all right, we'll pay you thirty like two of them. Yeah, so yeah, I've paid thirty bucks. It was well worth it. Now could I do that every weekend? Absolutely not?
What was the total?
Two hundred bucks for six hours?
What do you pay? Nothing anymore? But I used to pay. It used to come out to like, yeah, like eighty bucks at night. M gosh, dude, little boys and then yeah, and then you would like go to dinner.
Like some child labor laws are being broken.
I had two hundred you paid eighty for four boys.
Yeah for like three hours. You were gone for how hours?
Six?
Yeah? Six? So like yeah, I was I mean, dude, think about going to dinner and spending one hundred and twenty five dollars on dinner and then come back and give a eighty dollars cash to like a young girl like, oh god.
Did you ever have any bad experiences?
No?
But this is something funny. Funny story is the first time we got a babysitter. I had no idea, so like she it's just like Kevin was describing it made me think about it when it's like, yeah, they come over and then you're like, all right, here is the fire stinguisher like any of that. But they eat at this time, what they need, whatever, they need to go to bed at this time, whatever, And then I just I don't know. I wasn't even trying to be funny.
But as we were walking out and like, hey, and there's beer in the fridge, help yourself or whatever, and my wife goes, no, no, don't help yourself to the beer. And I was like, oh, right, right, like I don't want my babysitter drinking. But to me, it was the first time I'd ever done that, and I thought like, why not, Like you're here all day, they fall asleep, and like, yeah, yourselet with brude. Like my wife's like, no, absolutely not.
Did you have food for your babysitter?
Okay? So I asked my wife that morning, I was like, hey, should we have food? It hit me that day, I'm like, should we do something food? I'm like, ah, she's a nurse and she does this all the time. She probably comes prepared and she's okay, and I regret it. We didn't get anything. She brought like a bag of snacks, and I was like, hey, you're welcome to anything in the fridge, anything in the pantry, whatever, And then she ended up just ordering a pizza, Like we should have got her food.
Did you pay her for the pizza?
No?
She could have the move for us is always like all right, we're gonna order pizza, should be here in ten minutes, and so when we leave, they get the pizza.
Yeah. See, yeah, we should have done that. I regret that, but hey it was the first one, you know. But she's also she's pregnant now, so it's like, okay, well she's not gonna last for you. We can't use her for long.
Oh the baby's babysitter.
Yeah. I told us that she's you know, early on, but she's pregnant.
Yeah, a few more months at least. Yeah, unless she's sick the first time. Atter stuff for a lot of people.
Yeah, that's what I was.
I was like, oh, okay, man, if you find somebody though that you trust, always do the little things like cover their freaking pizza after I.
Just just know, like babysitter usually you cover their dinner. Yeah, And if you forget, like like Bone said, yeah, give her a little bit of money. I'm sorry, I completely forgot.
Here is now, if you kind of a sucky babysitter and you just were using her one time because you got a straight by it, that's different. But if like, if it's something that you really want to be able to use a lot.
Man.
You really gotta make make them feel valued.
You know what she did. I just thought about it too. She actually did text me and she's like, hey, do you care if I uber eat something to your house?
Is that her way of like telling you didn't leave me food?
You'd like, do you want to order me something?
I don't think something? Or do you think she was just asking just be I think she was asking because if for some reason you had a camera somebody saw a car drive up, You're like, why is our car at the house? Why is it? Yeah? I just think it's a somebody. Also, she could be like, you know, maybe you don't want people know where you live. Maybe you guys purposely don't have stuff delivered to your house. I don't know.
Oh, I wonder if she was asking because of like allergies, you know, like do your kids have allergies or whatever? Like if I uber eat something?
Yeah, the kids were asleep by no.
No, But I don't know.
But I appreciate that.
But overall success, when do you think you're going to be dealing with this?
I don't know. Soon ish, we don't have any childcare now we have friends. One time we only left one time. We had to prank them over. We went to therapy.
I don't know, a man.
How how did your wife do? And you're gone for an hour?
It's only an hour, but still it's the first time I've been gone a lot, so I didn't even think of it as that, right, because I'm gone every day And we were in the car and we're driving. Is this the first time we've both been gone? I was like, really, because you're always both of us.
Yeah.
I was like, huh, how about that? Uh? I think she did great. She has a friend that she really trusts that has had a bunch of babies or that's important. I guess a bunch of two. But yeah, yeah, so yeah, I don't know. We haven't got there yet.
How was your your weekend away from the baby?
Did you easy?
Is he?
Yeah? So so easy? I mean yeah, yeah, I don't know. It was easy for a couple of reasons. One, her parents were there, so I was my fear would have been on her more than anything, like she just overwhelmed. So her parents were there, so I was good.
That's it. Yeah, that's good.
That helped.
Yeah, if you get a family, if she's by herself. Yeah, and her parents came in. They had planned a long time ago because I told my wife I want to leave for two months after she had the baby. This was the first trip that I was leaving on. Yeah, and so her parents were like, hey, when he leaves, this is like a month and a half ago, we'll come into town. He's gonna be gone for a couple of days, so we'll just come because it'll be time
for us to come back. Anyway, we had been there in a month, and so it was planned out a long time ago that they would drive in. So they were there, they got there. We left on Thursday evening. They got to like Thursday afternoons. So I hung out with them a little bit. And it was difficult because we got in Saturday night, but Sunday morning at three am, Yeah, super late, so I had to be up at like
six thirty withth baby. That sucked, But I did get to say bye to them, and then I'm I'm just now caught up on the week, Like where I'm feeling normal again.
Is your father in law pumped about the thunder.
They won last year? So I don't know if he's pumped. I think he just enjoys it. He enjoys having a winner. Now, he watches every game. I think he was pumped last year. Now, not that it's expected, but there is an expectation because they win all the time.
Pretty good, Yeah, right, really good.
So the Lakers didn't look bad last night, thunder just so they're just so good. They just so affoicate, suffocate you defensively. Yeah, and Chet played really well last night.
And Jalen didn't even play, right Williams one of the Williams, I don't know. I saw him on the bench in the street clothes.
Then that means he didn't play, didn't play. All right, let's break and we'll come back with Philly's first baseman, former Phillies first basement stud, Ryan Howard.
All.
We're going to welcome in Ryan Howard, Phillies' legend, two thousand and eight World Series champion, two thousand and six National League MVP, Rookie of the Year, really one of the greatest power hitters of me watching baseball. He has a new podcast now with another Phillies legend, Jimmy Rollins, called the six to one to one podcast. You love Baseball, You Love the Phillies. Check it out. Ryan is here now, Ryan,
first question, how much does a manager actually matter? And I think you know where I'm going with this.
Well, Bobby, I'm gonna say that I don't know where you're going. All right, Well, a manager does matter. I think the manager has to keep the mood in the clubhouse nice and calm and easy. I know with uh, well, I'm gonna let you take it there. I'm gonna let you take it there. I'm not gonna get ahead of you. But but but with a manager, it's it's just doing that. You're managing the game, you're watching the game, you're seeing
how things go. I think the great managers have a tendency of just letting their players play, do their thing, and then they make the moves as they need to make the moves.
I asked, because with the Phillies firing Rob Thompson and Don Maddingley taking over, you know it can and there'd be a culture change. I know we're not mid season, but early enough in the season that it actually affects team play.
I mean, there can be a culture change.
I think that obviously with with what's kind of taking place with the Phillies, it's you know, the guys were kind of underperforming.
I don't really know what was going on in the clubhouse.
You know, usually when there's something like that that's taking place, there's got to be some kind of change, and usually a lot of times the managers that the first one to kind of take the heat, so, you know, and in terms of that whole situation, there's one thing I always say too, is that players also have to be accountable.
I've been on teams, you know, that have had.
Bad stretches and the mannerier kind of takes the heat for it all. But the players also have to take accountability. And that was one of the things that I remember when I was kind of going through a stretch like that.
As a player, It's like, hey, what do we what are we doing right?
We've got to try to do better and be better, you know, at some point, you know, everybody's got to be accountable for their own actions. So, you know, I think the team has kind of turning around. They've gotten a few wins under the belt, and that team is just way too talented to have kind of underperformed the way they have. But luckily, the Phillies' history in April is not is not the best, but hey, that's why you've still got a lot of season left and it's a marathon, not a sprint.
How do you feel about the ABS system?
The ABS system I think is great. Actually would have loved to have it when I was playing. Probably would have knocked down some strikeouts or whatnot. But I think what it's all about is about getting the calls right. And I don't think it's tough for umpires to not take it personal. You can understand that, but I think ultimately it becomes a tool to where everybody can get better and you get a full understanding of what the strike zone is and a consistent understanding of what the
strike zone is. I think the umpires are going to continue to get better with that, catchers, the pictures, the hitters once everybody gets a better understanding of what that strike zone is in being able to utilize it and the challenges. Right now, all of a sudden, you're implementing these challenges, and you've got to be strategic with these challenges because you don't want to necessarily use their challenges up too early.
In the game if you miss them.
So I think it's a cool addition to the game where it's just all about trying to get things right because it can change the flow of a game one way or the other.
I think it's fun for fans because it gives us something like it's almost like that cup thing where it's like which balls under the cup and they start spinning the cups and you got to watch it between innings. Like it's a little bit of that, but like game affected. What I do like about it the most though, is the people that are running that system are live in the umpire's ears. So even when people aren't challenging it, they're telling the umpires like, hey, you're a little outside today,
like you're a little inside. So the real game feedback I think is great for the game.
Yeah, no, absolutely, because ultimately, at the end of the day, you just want to have the insistency and you want to have the right call so that ultimately you get into a situation where now it's like the players can determine the game.
You don't want to have.
It be where you know there's a there's a big situation where you know a team's got runners on and they're either down and they can tie the game or they can go ahead, and then the umpire makes a call and it ends the game and ultimately can end
a season or do something like that. But again, you've got to be smart with your challenges because if that team goes and you uses those challenges up early in the game to where you get to that situation and all of a sudden, we need that challenge and we don't have it, then you just, hey, you're you're at the expense of the umpire and those guys are out there trying to so you know, they're they're human, They're gonna make mistakes, but it happens in the blink of
an eye, and you're just trying to do the best they can out there.
Was there a version of what the Dodgers are doing now in the National League when you were play not the same same, but like they just spend all the money and have all the players. Was there one of those teams when you were in the league?
Uh? NL? Not really, not really.
I mean the Dodgers always had, you know, great rosters and talented players, but not to the extent of what they've been able to go out and go do now. But I mean, yeah, I mean, if you had to look at a team, you'd have to say that team was the Yankees, even though they were in al.
The Braves may be the team that could play with the Dodgers. You feel like anybody in the in the NL can actually make it to the World Series other than the Dodgers.
Yeah, there's I mean, there's teams. It's gonna be tough. I mean, look, with what the Dodgers are doing and how they're playing right now, it's it's very hard to overlook them. But again, you mentioned it, the Braves. The Braves are playing really well at a very very high clip. This is the first time in you know, however many years that the Braves have been fully healthy and had, you know, their horses on the field all at the same time. I mean, you're getting great, great hitting, you're
getting great pitching. They're just playing great all around team baseball. Sneakily kind of back on the radar.
Man.
Look, it's it's a little bit of a of a of a long shot, but these guys are playing great baseball too. You can't necessarily overlook the Cardinals. It's it's just all about who's playing good ball at the right time. I think the Phillies, you know, get back on track with anything and any team, Dodgers included, Like, you've got to stay healthy over the course of the season. The Dodgers have so much depth, you know, you can probably afford to have guys you know, go down at some point.
But when it comes to September, October, like those later months, you've got to be healthy to be able to make it and make a big run in the postseason.
So it's going to come down to a lot of that as well.
How would you get out of a slump?
I would usually try to It depends on what I was doing.
I mean, I think a lot of the times, if I was pulling the ball a lot early on, I would try to just kind of back the ball up a little bit more and let it get a little bit deeper, maybe take a couple of abs and just tell myself, hey, I'm going to jam myself no matter what, and try to kind of stay back up the middle
of the field. And so by doing that, it's allowing me to let the ball travel and watch the ball and track the ball a little bit more into the bat, and then as I start to make that contact, then I can kind of start to push my contact point forward just a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more, and then boom, all of a sudden, there it is. And then starting to work my way back in the middle of the field, left center, right center, and to left field.
Would there be at bats where you're going up knowing you're just trying to get yourself out of a slump, no pressure to actually get on base, You're just trying to like progress a bit.
Yeah, sometimes you just you got to say, you know what, no matter what happens here, I'm just going to chalk it up because this is what my focus is right now. So it may take me a couple of bats to let the ball travel. As long as I can start tracking the ball again the way and get my timing down the way I want it to, I know that it's gonna start to come back, and then I'm gonna start squaring balls up these next two maybe three at
bats or whatnot, depending upon what the situations are. Is I want to let the ball kind of get deeper on me and start trying to track it and kind of catch it if I can.
I'm an Arkansas baseball fan Missouri state like quietly they're freaking good. They're always they're those boys fight, like when you play for Missouri State. Was it the same kind of team?
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, great, great program.
I think it's a very underrated program.
We would always play Arkansas every year, missoo Kansas schools like that. Now they're playing you know, they're playing the big boys every year, still playing those guys playing Oklahoma State yearly. It's always been a very gritty program. I mean, the guys that come out of there just you know, you look at Drake Baldwin. You know, We've had some guys Jake Berger, Luke Voyd, like a lot of guys that have come out of there. Brad Zigler. Brad Ziggler and I played together, we were we were there at
the same time. So it's it's a it's a program that is is a very hard working program and it's still i think on on the up and up.
How much time did you spend in the miners. Did you do the whole travel around on the bus thing?
Oh? Absolutely absolutely we were.
What was it started out once I got drafted Batavia, New York and New York Penn League and then went to South Atlantic League Lakewood, New Jersey, where we had I think at that time we were the furthest team North and we would travel down to Georgia, South Carolina, Georgia, you know, seventeen hour bus rides. So yeah, got the got the full experience. And I was in the minor leagues for three three and a half years. I got September call up in four, drafted in OH one, September
call up in O four, and then five. Was started out in Triple A and then Tommy got hurt and went went up for a little bit, went back down when he came back, and he got hurt again, was out for the rest of the season, and then was up the rest of the year and five and the rest was history.
Your call up moment, was it pretty cool or they tell you just like hey, you're up your head now?
No, it's it's always cool man. They they understand like this is what you work for. This is a dream come true. And I mean I understood just the opportunity right where I understood that Tommy was hurt for you know, he was going to be on the the back.
Then they called the d L.
But like the I L for like two weeks, so I knew I was only going to really be up for two weeks until he came back, But was really just going to try to go up and just do the best that I could and.
Soak it all in.
And uh, once I once I got up up early on in five and then like late in four, was really like looking at like, Okay, this is the big leagues, Like this is this is awesome, Like this.
Is what you aspire to. So having that opportunity was.
Amazing when you got up. Was there anyone you thought it was really cool to actually see in person that you'd watched as a kid.
Oh yeah, everybody. Just the whole experience.
I was like when when I first got called up in September, I think we went Gavin Floyd and I were same draft class and we both got called up September of four, and I think our first road trip was to Atlanta.
And you know, you're you're you're in the minor league.
So like you get to the to the hotels like you're usually you're bunking up with somebody, right, you got to you got a roommate, and we get in, we get we checked in at the hotel and I walk in and I'm looking and there's like a king bed in there and I'm was like, wait, but there's no we don't have roommates.
So that was the that was cool for me. I was like, oh man, we don't have roommates. We get our own room. Oh this is amazing.
So you know that that was kind of the first first part of getting up there. But I think just seeing all the guys that you've grown up watching and now you have the ability to be able to step on the same field and play with and against some of these guys was was an amazing feeling.
Is it the six on one podcast? Because you guys numbers? Because that's not the area code?
Is it what?
Because you guys?
The funny part about it is is that, yes, it is our numbers, because I was number six and Jimmy was number eleven. But it's also and we didn't necessarily realize it at the time, but it's also the street exit for Broad Street in Philadelphia. So the whole thing just kind of came together with like that and just all made sense.
When you guys do your podcast, I'm assuming you're like across the board with baseball, right, it's not just Philly stuff, but it's you guys both played for the Philly c you have very you know, in depth knowledge of the Phillies, but you're talking to other other players and like clubhouse stuff right inside baseball.
Yeah, there's there's definitely the baseball base but we've talked to We definitely talked to entertainers, rappers, other baseball players from other squads. We've talked to business moduls, entrepreneurs, so we diversify the portfolio.
So we h.
We definitely have the baseball talk, but we definitely want to have the outreach of being able to reach different genres and different people.
Final question for you, and I was a big fan of yours while you played, but do people ever come up to you and go, hey, you're that dude from the office.
Absolutely.
I've had some people I'd go get coffee at morning in the morning sometimes and and they would recognize me more so from that than ever playing baseball. They wouldn't have known that I played baseball, but they were like, hey, you look familiar, Like have you.
Been on the Office.
And I did a couple other shows where it was like, you know, always Sunny and and then Entourage, and so it was just funny because people would recognize me more so from some of those than actually playing baseball.
The office thing was legit though, because you actually acted a bit, because you had the role of like, hey, I got this script. Like it wasn't just like you showed up and it was a cameo. You actually acted. Did you prepare for that or were you just good at it?
I mean, there was a little bit of preparation.
But they made it easy for me, you know, it was I mean, it was me basically kind of, you know, being myself, and yeah, there was there was a script. So you know, if I can't be myself, then I don't know what. I don't know what I'm doing. But but it was it was easy. They they made it so so smooth and effortlessly like fun.
I mean that was the first thing. The guys were like, hey man, just do yourself.
Have fun, like say things how you would normally say it, and they that's all we're gonna do.
We're just we're gonna have some fun with this, and that was it.
I really appreciate the time and hope everybody checks out the six to one one podcast. Uh Ryan Howard, you guys follow him too on Instagram. Ryan Howard Underscore Double six. Really appreciate the time, and again I was a big fan. I'm a massive Cubs fan. We weren't in the same division, so that was good so I could be a fan. But uh yeah, you were fun to watch, Ryan, So I really appreciate the time, Bobby.
I appreciate you man. Thank you for having me on.
See you Ryan. All right, let's welcome in Mike Workanov, national NBA reporter for the Athletic Basketball Business Reporter, someone who I look to whenever I can't really understand how the NBA works behind the scenes. He also hosts Business Decision, which is the podcast he does where he breaks down all of this the intersection of sports money power, so be sure to go check it out. Mike, really appreciate
you jumping on. I do want to talk about tanking first, if you're ready to tackle that with me.
Sure, I was gonna say, I don't know if I always understand how the NBA works, but I'll give it a try.
Yeah, that's what That's what I need help with because I've read the you know, the meaningful changes from Adam Silver about tanking, like what are we doing here next year?
Well, I'm trying to figure out how to just shortcut this answer. Basically, they're gonna try to find a way or they think they found the way where they can kind of, you know, try to incentivize teams to be better versions of themselves.
Right, let's put.
It like that, and instead of trying to be as bad as they can be to maximize their lottery odds, like they will. You know this Sunday when we got we got the latest draft lottery coming up. They're changing the odds basically, where you're trying to be middle bad instead of horribly bad and hope that when it gets to March in April, you're trying to win more games than you are, just like benching all your best players, and we see an elevated version of college basketball in those months.
When I was reading about it when it first came out, it definitely was if you're the worst, you have worse odds. It's weird to say worst versus better, but your odds aren't as good to get the first pick if you're the worst team to incentivize yeah, those teams not finishing last last, but then what if you literally have the absolute worst team and you need to get one of those top picks.
Well, yeah, that's the problem with this, and I think this is something that there have been complaints about even this current lottery system, which is that they watered down the odds for the worst teams. And you know, some people said, like, hey, isn't the whole point in the draft to give the best prospects to the worst teams,
right to try to make them better? And I think that you could argue, like, hey, there's a reason that some of these teams like the Jazz and the Wizards are in the lottery for a longer period of time is because they're not getting the top pics, so they're not getting the best players, and so they're just worse for a longer period of time.
And this probably will not solve it.
Right, Like, if you're if you're authentically bad, let's say that, right, you have lost with integrity because you are just really bad at putting out rosters and you're the worst team in the league.
This is not going to help you.
It's trying to stop the teams that are tanking, not the teams that are just like bad by their own you know, bad decision making.
I was looking at all the number one picks over the past few years and I really felt bad for the Atlanta Hawks, Like they finally get the number one pick and it's like the one year, one year that it's not a player that would actually change an organization.
Yeah, the timing is so much of it too, Like, you know, it's funny this is happening now because all the smart draft people say the next two drafts.
Are not gonna be that great either.
So it could be another, you know, version of that situation like the Hawks had if you had, you know, the number two pick in twenty twenty. The Warriors had that and James Wiseman right, Like, imagine if they got a great number two pick and how that team would have looked now. So timing matters so much so when your bad really matters, there's just so much that goes
into it. Not to mention the MVP shake. Gildis Alexander was the number eleven pick, Yokich was the second round pick, like Gianna's number fifteen.
All great players come from everywhere.
Let's talk expansion. Are the Seahawks, excuse me this, the Seahawks? The Super Sonics? Are they going to exist again?
They very well may.
It is looking like the NBA is going down the road for expansion, So the Sonics maybe a team in Vegas. I don't know, maybe though I don't know what that nickname is going to be. But like the NBA is looking at it, it looks like they're trying to get a good price for teams there, and they're really this is the closest they've ever come to expansion.
They've been dancing around it for so long.
But I think we'll know an answer well may like I would say, by the end of twenty twenty six, we should know where that's going.
A lot of the Las Vegas talk has been possibly Lebron would be part of an ownership group in Las Vegas. Do you think the NBA would allow a guy to play and also be part owner.
Well, they definitely won't allow that. That's part of their CBA and their rules. And you know, Lebron seems like he's out on it too. Mi Collie and I Joe Varden we reported earlier this spring like he's out on trying to get an expansion team, and it had been something he had wanted for so long, right, and he talked about publicly for so long. But the firm that he's a partner in fenwly Sports Group which owns Liverpool
and the Red Sox. They're out on trying to get an NBA expansion team, so Lebron for now is also out on trying to get one.
You hear from a lot of people, I feel at times ill educated people about how the ratings of the NBA have dropped so much. But I think for me, what I've been able to see is people are consuming the NBA differently, and I could be completely wrong. What are your thoughts on the NBA and just generally ratings talk.
I'm tired of it, honestly, for a lot of reasons.
One is the ratings don't matter, right, Like, the ratings were down and the NBA still got this behemoth seventy six billion dollar media rights deal despite all that, and now ratings are up this year, and that's for a.
Number of reasons.
One of them is that there's a lot of games on NBC and it's easier to watch games on NBC than it is on TNT. The other there's some inflation going on with Nielsen ratings and how they count it. But honestly, like if you're an NBA fan, just watch the basketball or don't. Who cares how many other people
watch the basketball or don't. I feel like this is wholly individual to the NBA as opposed to baseball and to the NFL and hockey, Like sometimes just enjoy the sport that you like and who cares who's along.
For the ride with you?
To me, when that headline comes up, when those stories come up, it feels a bit like whenever the story is that a movie studio paid four hundred million to make the movie and only made two hundred and thirty million back, Like that's so inside. It's like, I don't know. My friends like watching the movie. I really don't care how much the movie studio spent on the movie and how much it made back.
Yeah, exactly, Like that's their money and not yours. If it was a good movie, that's you know, then you like it, and if not, like you don't you move on?
I think, I don't know. That's the same thing.
I think there are better questions to be had about the state of like what the actual Encourt product looks like and where that's going, and how you know and tanking and how teams are built than there is about the rating stuff.
I was reading an article about shoes and how you know, some of the shoe companies aren't selling as many shoes, especially basketball shoes, because of one of the theories was limited star power. What are your thoughts on that.
I think it's interesting.
I think it kind of like, I mean, not to bring it back to the ratings thing, but it's also just about it's harder to build stars nowadays.
Right, there's the monoculture that everyone talks about, so it's harder to break through. So it makes sense that if you're depending on stars to sell shoes, and it's harder to build a star, then it would be harder to sell shoes, right.
And I think just looking at you know, that whole business, it seems like everyone's kind of trending towards ath leisure and all that, and you know, influencers are now selling shoes or selling shoes or selling apparel and all that. So I think everyone is just looking for different places to have sponsors sell their products, and so maybe the sponsorship from the Mad Player it just doesn't go as far as it used to.
It feels like if I were thinking about it now, like whose shoe would I want? It honestly would be Kaitlyn Clark. And that's crazy to say, because like, I don't play women's basketball. I'm not a woman. But it's if it's pick a star who'd put out a shoe that you genuinely because I'm a shoe guy, I think I would like the Caitlyn Clark. I think she almost transcends all the dudes that aren't that last we'll say last generation that still play the steps the Lebron's because
the new guys. You're right, everything is so fractional now, it's so hard to be famous generally in media, in basketball in general, and like Caitlin Clark has a bit transcended that. Am I insane?
No?
I think you're totally right.
Whenever her signature shoe drops, like, I bet that's gonna sell a lot of pairs. Like the Sabrina I and Escu shoe super popular, right, like both among NBA players. You see a lot of NBA players wearing the sabrina Is on the court and then also just you know, selling to folks too in stores. And so Caitlyn's probably one of the biggest most famous athletes in America period, right, So why wouldn't she be the great person to have a great selling signature shoe.
I know you used to work with the Knicks. They're pretty good.
I got it.
Ye Are you a Knicks fan? I know because I know you were covering the Knicks. Do you like the Knicks?
I listen, I grew up in the New York area, so I was a Knicks fan growing up. But then when you start covering the Knicks and you're covering sports, that gets sucked out of you real quick. But I'm a fan of g I think that arena is great. So, like you know, I was there for game one for Nick Sixers and that that was an awesome place to be and that place was awesome when the teams I covered when they're horrible and the place was still like thriving in the fourth quarter of a tight game.
Yeah, that's like a thirty nine point win, right that that game won?
I mean, that was that was wild. That was blow. I did not expect that.
That is a team though, like the Sixers, and you can give me your opinion. They just played seven games, so usually game one after a seven game set usually doesn't end well for that team that just played seven. But a thirty nine point defeat, that's a that's a bit disheartening if you're if you're a Sixers player.
Well, yeah, and like the Knicks are rolling right now. I was looking up after that game. They've like they've got the largest four game margin of victory ever in NBA playoff history. Like they're doing things over the last four games that teams just have not done in the league before.
And so how long does that last?
Because if you're gonna win every game by thirty, you're probably winning the title, right, Like, it's just there on this hot streak that we haven't seen.
What's with the Knicks? And I'll just sit here for a second because I'm so curious ownership to coaching that it feels like it'd be a tough place to have to work under that ownership group. Your thoughts for working under that ownership group.
I mean, that's a that's a really tough job for them. James Dolan is a you know, demanding owner. He is a very peculiar owner. Look, he already set the expectations for that team for this season when he set out he thinks it's a title winning team.
So you know where that's going, right.
Tom Thibodeau got the team the furthest It's gone in twenty five years last year and got fired anyway, So Mike Brown knows the expectations and New York is demanding place, and I think, yeah, I mean, look, you get a lot of resources, but man, you're walking a tight ship there.
I think you got to you gotta get what the owner is looking for.
Are you watching every game?
Am I?
Well, yeah, it's the playoffs?
Now?
Why not?
Well, I mean some of them are late. I don't know where you live, but.
You met every playoff, every playoff game, every next game.
No, I'm not watching it.
I mean listen, I I pass out on the couch at nine o'clock. Sometimes I'll admit to that and then I'll catch up the next morning. But I can't always stay up till like two o'clock in the morning.
Yeah, I'm watched same spent Those West Coast games kill me. And I have League Pass and I try to even during the season watch as much like it just stays on even if I'm not watching it, like I'm trying to absorb through a bit osmosis even you know, watching some of these teams. And it's interesting that East is So I'm going to say wide open now because I don't think anyone expected the Celtics to especially to blow that series like they did. But the Knicks a real shot.
It's interesting, the Pistons a real shot. Who do you think comes out of the East.
I still give the seventy six Ers a real shot.
Like, I know, they got blowed to smithereens in Game one, but that happened in the Boston series too, And to your point, like they talked about it afterward, they're going from highly emotional, high leverage Game seven to Game one forty eight hours. I think took a lot out of them. So I'm kind of curious to see what they're going to do tonight at MSG. But I think it's between the Pistons, the Knicks, and the UH and the seventy Sixers to come out of the ease.
Yeah, I guess. I just don't trust embiid ever to even show up for the game. And it's just something's wrong and it's it's not his fault, like in an appendix, his appendix ruptured. So but yeah, if EMBD plays, Yeah, I agree that the Sixers are really good. I just don't have any trust he's going to show up and be able to play. Most games.
No, I mean he could he arrives the NBA games and one of those boxes label fragile, right like, But it then when he plays and he takes the court and you watch him move pregame and you're like, how's this guy gonna do it for forty minutes?
And then somehow he does and when he plays, he's just a huge difference maker.
But you just you don't know if he's going to play, you know, if it's a seven game series all seven or this is the last game he plays.
One final question. How how many more years you think Lebron has?
Oh man, oh h that's top. I feel like before this year I would have guessed none. But I feel like the way that this year is gone, he's going to attack on another year after this.
He's been the Lakers. I mean he won that series that that that it was him, right, because I mean Austin Reeves none, Luca none, So it definitely was Lebron. Hatchiemura. I don't know if you count that if you know, but Lebron was the dude. So yeah, do you think he does a farewell tour? He loves Lebron loves you know, the adulation does Lebron do announce it.
I feel like it because then you could just like, you know, help all the things, all the companies he partners with just like leverages into this long farewell tour. Nike does a whole thing. He can record it behind the scenes. Yeah, I mean, like, when was the last time someone just suddenly shockingly retired a star of that magnitude. It was like, I think it was probably Tim Duncan. I want to say, like Tom Brady tried to just up and quit and then he had to do it again.
Anyway, I really appreciate the time business decision with Mike working op and get you do such a great job. And yeah, thanks for hopping on with us and and teaching us a few things because sometimes man that I still don't think that the tanking thing is gonna work. I don't know how you fix the tanking thing though, Like I don't have a good idea. It's not like I'm sitting here from the rafters going I know how to fix it. I don't know how to fix it.
I mean, it's a trial run. They're going to run it. They already said it. They'reright.
We look and you know, well we're gonna do is for three years and twenty twenty nine. We're gonna see what works and try it again. And if maybe there's expansion and they have to put a new thing out there. So I don't know that they're thinking it's a long term this fixes everything solution anyway, all.
Right, check out Business Decision. Hey, Mike, thanks for the time. See later, man. All right, that'll do it. Thank you guys for being here. I appreciate you listening to the podcast. Appreciate your leaving comments down in the comments. If you're you know, listen to this on Spotify, leave a comment down there that helps us. I don't know, maybe back this week. Maybe we won't. It's just a weird time. There's nothing going on.
Yeah, maybe a playoffs and then it's gonna last forever.
Well, I'm closer to football is when it really starts rocking. You gotta hear us have to do an NFL show and when there's nothing going on.
Yeah, but that's tough.
Well, what's your favorite dinosaur.
Team logo? That's tough. Yeah, that gets the draft was probably fun for a little bit.
What's the most fun letter? Well, do that for thirty minutes. We're like, all right, we'll see you next week.
Go to the alpha bit.
All right, that's it. Well, we'll see you guys soon. Thank you very much, thanks to our guests. Thanks to you guys. Blow the whistle all right by Everyboddy. Theme song written by Bobby Bones That's Me and performed by Brandon Ray. Follow Brandon on socials at Brandon Ray Music.
You can follow the show on Instagram at Bobby Bones Sports. Thanks to our crew co host at Producer Ready, Segment producer at Kickoff Kevin, and executive producer at Mike Gestro.
The most importantly, thank you for listening.
Bobby Bones.
We'll talk to you next time here on twenty five whistles