Adam Sandler was trying to the Delta Center on October twenty sixth, twenty twenty five. That's his share tickets around sale. Now text Farley the three three nine eighty six for your chance to win. Porter, would you mind efforting the Sandman?
Yeah, I'll get in. Maybe in studio, we'll try, Okay, not just effering.
Adam Sandler's not in studio, but an old friend is in studio. We haven't seen her for a while. Amy Donaldson from Kesel, how are you, Amy.
I'm good. I've probably seen every Adam Sandler movie, not because I'm a fan, because I had step sons.
Sure, yes, yes, Indeed, there's like a generational gap between Sandler. Like people my age think he's funny, and I feel like the younger people.
Just to kind of out on him because he's made so many bad movies.
Yeah, I think that's right. Appreciate, I think it's I think there might be a little bit also of a gender gap for mister Sandler, although his recent affection for Taylor Swift because he has daughters, has brought him I think into the fold a bit. So there are some women now who are given given some movies ants.
Okay, they didn't age very well. I guess back from back in the day type of stuff.
Well, I don't think they've seen water boy.
Wall was the one.
What was the one where he was in the where he wasn't he had to go back to like elementary school or something.
Billy Madison. Billy Madison was great.
That was the one that my step sons loved.
Yeah, that was a good one. So what do you betut let's get an update. We were just talking off air. Eve been traveling. I following your Instagram.
You're all over the place these days.
I haven't haven't been very dedicated. I retweeted and re share what so other people are doing. But I went to Australia for a month and hung out with my My kid moved there last year and so I went there and the first two weeks Ed was with me, So we had to go one of the we wanted. He's a huge snorkeler beach guy.
That is.
Yeah, he loves I mean he I he considered like actually diving. But we didn't have a ton of time. So which sounds funny because we're there a month or I was there a month. He was only there two weeks. But so we did snorkel in the Great Barrier Reef and go out to some islands and I just love learning. I mean just especially like the mangroves, Like the nature is just so fascinating to me. And a beach entirely made of fish poop it's and it's the most amazing
beautiful place you've ever been. Yeah, it's super cool. So but yes, we did that. And then he's a huge Mad Max fan.
This oh cool.
So Mad Max Too was filmed in a place called Brooken Hill, Australia, and everybody knows who knows Mad Max knows that is an Australian film in origin. So uh. We went out to the museum out there, and everyone thought we were crazy because it's in the middle of nowhere. But it looked I'll tell you this, it was so it was like going to Delta, Utah. Really, it looked so familiar. I loved it so much. It's super cool town.
A lot of Aboriginal people live out there, a lot of old miners, I mean, miners are my family, Park City roots. So yeah, super fun and the museum was amazing. And then we went back to that I had come I had a pretty vicious case of food poisoning just as we arrived in Broken Hill. So we went back to our hotel room and watched men Max too.
Do you know what you ate? Yes?
I do?
Was it?
It was a spicy chicken wrap from the airport.
Oh, that shouldn't do it. Spicy chicken should be safe.
Well, I guess we just say that I have not eaten chicken since, and I'm not so sure I can eat a wrap.
And take a little bit of a break.
And then you were assisting your sister, who is a ultra marathon runner, try to get through a race in Alaska.
Yeah, she was running the Dnali one thirty five, and I agreed to be a pacer. I said I could maybe give you fifty miles, but she got pretty sick about oh fifty miles. In made it about fifteen more miles, and then after about the halfway point we called it. We so we more so called it, I would say. My mom and my dad and I collaborated to convince her because I don't know if you know an ultrarunner, but they're not. They they don't want to quit.
They'll die before I've got a couple of buddies. I've not like whenever they're telling me what, I'm like, what are you doing it?
I mean, I'm not a good ultraarunner because I will quit. I'm not. I want to hike another day.
You want to live?
I mean, And I like, I guess for me, the experience like walking through into your Alaska with my sister in the you know, the middle and it's not dark, like it never gets pitch black in the summer, right, so it's like eleven twelve at night and it looks kind of like dusk and it's just the most beautiful place. I just for me, that was so odd inspiring. I was like, this is the thing. It's not the finish. I mean, she was trying to go for that would have been her second finish and made her the first
woman to ever finish it twice. So she was pretty bummed. And I find know my sister she'll be signing up for that race again because she's not really good about quitting. The congratulations to my sister, I have to give her congratulations, say she was just promoted to lieutenant. Very cool teaches at the public Safety in South Carolina.
The state good for her, The state all right, Amy, I was excited to see you on the rundown because a couple of things going on that I want to get your perspective on.
And you know we were talking.
I had Tim bon Tim Bontemps, excuse me on earlier from ESPN, and this the way the Ace Bailey story was covered. And I want to be clear, I don't know what's true and I don't know what's not. I mean, you and I have done this long enough where you know that you get messaging from players, you get messaging from agents, you get messaging from coaches in front off, and then there's what's really going on behind the scenes that they don't want to say out loud. So there
could be several levels here. And I'm one like you that grew up elsewhere, but it's made Salt Lake and adopted home, and it's basically been my home for twenty five years. I don't think that's changing anytime soon, but
I guess you never know. And I can get a little defensive when I hear people talk about our market, certainly juxtaposed with places like Cleveland or Oklahoma City, San Antonio, Like, I just prefer saw Lake over a lot of the NBA markets that I've been to over the course of my life, and maybe I'm biased here, so the whole thing comes out like, oh wait, it's not his preferred destination. And there were even people who said out loud, he's not going to report. He doesn't want to be there.
He refused to work out for any team. There was a report that he actually told not a So I want to be clear, this is his reps told one team in the top five do not draft him. He's not reporting, and obviously wasn't the Jazz because he showed up on time, he did a great job with his press conference, had his introductory dinner, and he seems like a sweet kid who.
Is exciting and durable. Right, yeah, So what's your.
Take on this entire dynamic.
Well, I think it's a collision of everybody wants to have a scoop and everybody hates us. It's our insecurities coupled with this twenty four hour news cycle where everybody wants to know something special. Everybody wants to give you something that you can't get anywhere else. I had the scoop. I mean I see it a little bit. Well, we see it on all these bigger stories, right, A little bit on the rets left thing in the last we'll get there the last twenty four hours. But yeah, so
I think there. I mean, we're competitive people report. I'm talking about journalists, and we want the inside story. You want something when you're going to these press conferences and everybody's getting the same you know, pablem. We want something different, and so you're trying to talk to different people get different things. And I will say this, nowhere in my journalism career has there been more irresponsible speculation than in sports journalism.
Interesting.
There are people I once traced there was some some rumors going around on a story, and I started to call the people who were reporting them, say you know, and I know everybody, I said, I'm not reporting, I want to know. I'm trying to figure out the roots of this thing, where this idea, where this information came from? Right? And what ended up happening was it was a circle. So somebody was quoting somebody else, but if you traced
it around, they were quoting each other. It's like if you and I told each other the rumor that we heard and we're confirmed it for each other, and then we both go out and say it's been confirmed by a source. For we are each other's source, we don't know anything. So that's what happened. So once that and that happened, I think it was around twenty twelve that that happened, so very early in my sports career, especially once I started getting out of high school sports. When
you're talking about Olympic sports or college sports. Definitely in the pro ranks, people want, I mean, that's your bread and butter. Being the guy or the girl with information is how you make your name. And some people are reliable about that, and they're very careful about that, and they check and second check, and some people say things out of turn, you know, But yeah, I my experience, because I come from a news background, is if you don't know, I'm not going to quote you, even if
you tell me something really solid. I know some really solid things I've never reported because I don't have a source on them. And I believe the people, but I just don't I don't have a firsthand source on it. So I think it was And then I think there's this natural and I think it's somewhat become a narrative in professional sports, especially the NBA a little bit in college. I mean it happened with aj when he committed to Buya, right, Why would anyone want to go there? It's Utah, right,
you know, what have they done? Why? Why do you want to be there? They're and also ran have they exist? But they exist for us to beat them on the way to something else. You know. It's like they call flyover States the center of the country. We are a flyover place in sports, and so there is this narrative and we are all super defensive about it, including our reporters here, and then these things all collide. Everybody's looking for information. Somebody repeats a room or somebody says it.
Everybody scrambling. I heard this. You got a boss. I've had this happen to me. You get a call from your boss at ten o'clock on a Friday. Somebody else is reporting this. What do you know? I don't know anything. And then saying I don't know as a reporter is like the worst thing ever, But it's the truth sometimes because sometimes there's not anything to know, and I don't know if an agent or somebody was trying to stir up some some interest or like again, how these things happened.
We don't know. I didn't. I wasn't doing initial reporting. I heard these rumors coming out, and I saw journalists saying, another person who doesn't want to come to UTAB, this guy will be gone in four years, you know, all these things, and I assume they don't know anything because they're not in these rooms having these conversations. I thought, I'm just gonna wait, I've learned and see what happens
with the kid, and couldn't have been nicer. Showed up, did his thing, you know, I mean, it happens every time, but I think it's just the collision of two really bad you know, sort of the insecurity coupled with this idea that like everybody's got to have a scoop. You know, yeah, I know something you don't know, you know, right.
I wonder what, because again, without knowing exactly what's real and what's not, I will say that I like that Austin just took him like, all right, maybe you don't want to be here, but we think you're the guy, and we're this is the best player available at five. Because I do feel like there's been this undercurrent of fear tied into certain decision making, and I actually wondered, and again, if we operate off the assumption, which is
never a smart thing to do. But there was so much noise around Utah not being Ace's preferred destination and so much reporting over the twenty four hour news cycle that I'm inclined to believe there's something there.
I don't think it's with Ace.
I do think it's with this agent of his who isn't even like he doesn't have his right Well, he didn't have the paperwork file to be like an actual agent when Ace first hired him, So he's new with this and he's probably trying to figure it out. So if there's even a sliver of truth to it, you know, the Jazz had that intel. But I like that Austin just said we're drafting him. We think he's the best player.
But I also think Austin is savvy enough and everybody else at the Jazz that if it were true, if it felt true to them, I don't they're going to have conversations about that. Sure they draft him, they're not. I've this is happened before, where there's been a trade rumored or there's been an acquisition floated, right, and there's
been open resistance to coming here. Those are conversations you have to have because the last thing you want to do is trade for or it is use your pick on somebody who's going to then blow up your whatever your plan is. Right, that didn't happen, so that lead if you say it was like some sliver of truth, some rumor got blown up into something else, or somebody said something offhand and it got somebody ran with it.
Whatever happened, whatever the rumor mill was was doing, and whoever was doing it, I firmly believe, or at least I have this much faith in Austin Age, and that is that he had some conversations with people about whether or not or how much of that was true, or it may be. It may have been as simple as this, that someone said, you're probably going to go to Utah, or it looks like you might be going to Utah, and he's like, Utah, I don't know where the heck that place is. I wanted to go to X who
he's eighteen, right, I could totally see that happening. Sure, and then that began. That's all these other things he's not going to do. He didn't work out for anybody they're looking for and this is where brains work, you know, we look for evidence that we're right. This is why we have the politics we have. You don't hear all the information. You hear your whatever bias you have, that whatever confirms that for you. E.
Co Chambers.
Yes, and so I think that's somewhat, but I mean it's happened so often. I believe. I mean, and I watched the press conferences one hundred percent believe that we're there. If there was a whiff of this before, there were conversations that were had so that even if there was reluctance, it was understood what that reluctance was about, and so whatever was going on, if it was nothing, I mean
I heard somebody's it was nothing or whatever. How many times have we been the purveyors of an offen comment? I mean, I've been there when something like that's been said and people run with it and I think you got to be kidding me.
Yeah that was a joke.
Or you know, or that was just the reaction. Yeah. And again, the way things are now, this kid is eighteen, Like you have a kid, I have a kid. I hope nobody's holding my kid to what she says, you know, for sure. Sometimes me, sometimes I have a reaction like what I mean, there are so many things in a meeting or wherever where you're like, your initial reaction is that's stupid. I don't want that whatever, But like give people room to get educated and to get information into
maybe evolved. But I was super impressed with the press commerence. I liked all the picks. I thought it was really fun. I have tickets to the Summer League with my grandson and nephews, so we're going to go. And my nephew, who's an airman at Hill Air Force Base, has been in a depressive state since the lottery. Oh texted me immediately all caps and is beside himself with joy.
So yeah, good good.
However it works out, we're going to enjoy it well.
And the only time will tell. I. You know, when it comes to what I feel is really unfair messaging about the jazz and Utah and Salt Lake, it just makes it hard for those guys to do their jobs when they've got to answer all these questions misconceptions like no, it's not that weird here and again, you and I both grew up elsewhere. I'm aware of the oddities that exists here. I've never ran from them. They are real. Okay,
it doesn't make it a horrible place to live. You just have to find out how you traverse the space and respect the culture that essentially is intertwined in everything that we do here, whether you like.
It or not.
But it just it makes their jobs so hard when they've got to do this all the time. Like another kid doesn't want to come here, another player doesn't want us to trade for him.
Dennis Lindsay went.
On a podcast last year and said that he had a trade done for a star forward.
I know who is Kevin Love.
He had a trade done for Kevin Love, and Kevin Love's agent called him and said, don't do this. He will not come live in Salt Lake. He will not report. And so if Austin kind of has this attitude, and again to your point, conversation certainly took place that were not privy to. But if he's just going to go all in and be like, look, we're drafting you, we're trading for you.
And then you know, with Ace, they have seven years.
Okay, your rookie contract four years, then you'll pick up the option for the final three unless he wants to be traded. We saw with Donovan Gordon left. You know, we do have the PTSD of players that we really latched onto leaving here. But no, if you're Austin Age, if you're Danny, if you're Justin Zanik, if you're Ryan, and Ashley said, no, we think you're the best player, and we have seven years to show you that you can accomplish anything you want here in Salt Lake. Just go about it unafraid.
Yeah, and I think they knew they know something about these players that we don't. They know more about their background, their histories, what their other interests are, because these are human beings. They're not like, they're not commodities, right right, And it's not so simple as to say, look at the statu sheet, you know, and look at what we
need and let's go for this. I'm sure there was a lot of other input about how his personality, how you know, what kind of I mean, he's by all accounts everything I could read, he's a super gym rat. I mean, honest to god, he reminded me a lot of Karl Malone. You know, this idea that like I got something to prove and what makes What makes it more, what will feed that more is being in a place that has.
Something to improve, right, Yeah, good point.
I think there. I mean Carl Kyle Whittingham, which, by the way, there's another guy who's had rumors floated every single year that he's retiring, right, But Kyle Whittingham is bread and butter. Is getting people to believe that no matter what, no matter who's on the rust or no matter what they're ranked, no one respects them. Right and in sports, that can be a huge, huge, huge bonus.
Yeah, no, for sure. So we'll see, we'll see how we'll see how it works out, all right.
You referenced the Jake Rehts Jake Rehetzlaf story. We'll get to a catch or break and then we'll do that. Coming up on the other side, the civil lawsuit has been dismissed and Jake, according to Pete Thamil, has plans to transfer because he believes he's going to face the seven game suspension for by lating the school's on a code. So we'll get to that with more local storylines as well. Amy Donaldson live in studio for another big segment coming up on the other side.
Right here on ESPN seven hundred. Amy Donaldson is live in studio.
I always appreciate Amy's time world traveler back on the ground. Have you been watching any RSL soccer? I know you've been traveling. You've been watching any any RSL?
I did. We didn't watch the most recent game, but the game before. And yeah, when I got back, like I said, I feel like I was living in another world, especially because rugby is so huge in Australia.
You were there for a month and they have.
This thing, this origins game where it's super cool. Actually, so all these professional players go back to their club teams, okay, and of like if all these NFL players went back to their colleges and they had a little tournament, oh like an East West East US West or like they go back to these rivalries and it's a huge deal. I had to kind of get an education about like who the rugby like because my daughter in laws family is so like, you can't cheer for the wrong team.
Oh okay.
And then of course, so my daughter and I were in this place called Cans. She was there for some training. That's when one of the origin games was the women's was the day before we saw part of that. But we went with a bunch of people from the training, a bunch of social workers. We go to this pub and watch rugby and it was a blast, and yeah, I just I love for me the cultural aspect, Like I watched the gold medal game in the twenty sixteen Olympics in Brazil.
Rugby, Brazil, no soccer, soccer, so they So.
Brazil was playing in the gold medal game in the twenty sixteen Olympics in Rio Macarina Stadium, and I'd been to one of the semi round games and then in a pool game at Macarena with her buddy Chris Camronnie very nice. That was when I was live using periscope and showing video of my ride and somebody flashed me. So that was, yeah, super cool. Learned my lesson about live video and so but I decided on the gold
medal night, listen, I want to go. And these people Brazil had not won a gold medal in the Olympics in their sport, I mean soccer. There the number of leagues, the number of teams, it's just ridiculous. And so I went down. They had this pier, they had these amazing TVs on the edge. I don't know how how they were massive. They were like a drive in movie theater size four of them in different locations. And I just ate Brazilian food and hung out and talked to people
and just soaked up the atmosphere. And to me, like the cultural aspect of sports is as interesting as what's happening in the game. Why did they win? Because I know that's what everyone expects from a sports writer, and so I was tempted to do that. It's so hard to not, you know, to not be there for the gold medal game. But I am so glad I did it.
It was really incredible, and especially because these are people who they couldn't afford a ticket, so they're not in the stadium, right and maybe they've never been inside Macarina Stadium, but they've been to the parties outside and yeah, and so I think it was a little bit of that. I love when I go somewhere to just even if I don't know the teams, I don't know what's happening. And of course you get into it, right, Like I got into an argument with a guy about whether or
not there was there should have been a foul. I'm like, oh my God, you're such a home or it wasn't a foul, you know. So and again I keep saying, I'm like, I'm not biased, so my opinion is right. But but you know, I covered rugby seven's in at the Olympics and a little bit of rugby here with the Utah Warriors, so I know the game and know the rules, I should say, but so much fun and everybody plays. I mean, little girls are getting their stuff to go to their footy practices. My little grand adopted
grandson over there, my daughter in lawst nephew. He's my little grand baby too. Now he's playing or soccer on one field with his buddies. And adjacent is these little kids playing rugby. Everybody plays. It's so huge, it's so I mean, my daughter has signed up for Who's this is a kid I could not get to play sports like she did cross country running and I coached her in softball for two years and she's like, this is not my game. She played little kids soccer, but yeah
I did not. But she's playing in a rugby tournament, you know. Oh it's also yeah, so it's just a huge huge. I did do a CrossFit competition while I.
Was there in Australia.
Yeah, so my kid, don't listen, your kids will rope you into stuff.
Well do you just.
You're so desperate to be with your children when you're an adult, right, Like, so they say do you want to take me a lunch? You'll buy lunch for them because you want to be with them. Right. So my kid was like, I want to do this CrossFit thing. We need a third do you think you could do it? And I was like sure, I've been lifting weights and I do waits twice twice a week. You know, our old people waits. So she sends me the word out and I was like, this is going to be hard.
So I really I put my mind to it for a solid months. I worked really hard. We get there, and what I learned is that's one of the workouts. It's across the competition. There is a series of workouts. Yeah, and that was one. I thought that was the whole thing. In fact, when they said you have to climb a rope and touch the ceiling, I just looked at my husband and was like, what is happening? Where are we?
It's a big ass.
And then I started assessing I was the oldest by fifteen years and I was like, this is not happening. But I'm telling you there is something about your competitiveness never goes away. Because they told me what we had as a team, we would have had to do these burpies. If I didn't do the rope climb, Oh, my whole team has to do it. And I was like, I'm not penalizing my team. I did the rope climb, broke, I did it. Yeah, So but yeah, it was super fun and the now I'm super I want to watch
more rugby. It was really fun.
Yeah, And you point about the cultural significance of things that are away from the competition.
I find to be.
Very applicable for sports like rugby or soccer that I just wasn't raised with. Right, Like when we first brought Ursel here in two thousand and four, I was, I've told you very lukewarm to the whole endeavor. I'm like, what are you doing? Soccer doesn't work in Like I told my father, I'm like, this is a bad idea. You know that now obviously he was right.
I was wrong.
And my friends who were soccer fans still soccer fans that you know, they all said the same thing. You've got to go overseas, you've got to see something in the Premiership.
You got to go to Germany. You got to see what it's like over there.
And my first eye opening, oh wow, okay soccer means everything to these people was seeing a Tottenham game in London, you know, seeing a Premiership game.
Because I think we have some parallels here.
You and I have talked about like football is our soccer, Football is America's soccer.
But like, I don't even know that that does baseball.
I mean, I think I grew up more with baseball, but you know, and when I was like boxing, my dad was super big into boxing. I mean, I think it's probably whatever you grow up around, right, like whatever, but baseball was the thing, and I do think there's a big I mean, and then when I went to
high school in Alaska, hockey is bigger than football. I mean, like I can't it's hard to imagine, but all the cute girls wanted to be hockey cheerleaders, right, And I was like, why would you want to wear a skirt in a hockey arena? Right? Right?
Right?
Yeah, But you know, we took hockey for pe Like there was just this culture of toughness and like eighty blow, Well let's play hockey. You know'st's outside. We need to had you know, I don't need gloves, you know it. It was uh and there is this whole cultural you know. Watching the gold medal game between the USA and Canada here in Salt Lake in two thousand and two, yeah, one of the greatest. That was one of the greatest
sports experience in my life. And totally because I had done a previews, I had done the story about the scalpers outside, so I just was My assignment was sit and enjoy the game. So I just watched the game. I did end up writing a feature about Wayne Gretzky Canada one, but that was the last minute call from
the boss. I was just sitting at center eyes eating my cinnamon covered nuts, thinking like I've died in gun Heaven because you grow up with this culture of like we would play hockey on any surface, like we would fall down one thousand times because the ice was so crappy, but there's this toughness that comes with it. And that was in the women's game too. It was just so much fun. So yeah, I love watching sports in other countries and other cultures, and again the difficulty is understanding
what's happening, but being with people. If you understand the game a little bit, or even though the rules, there's nothing like it.
No, for sure.
And I was actually talking about this with Pablo last week because Diego, Diego Luna, who has been the lone bride spot for this soccer club that just can't figure it out.
Not lone brice spot, I mean Johnny Russell. When I came back and found out that Johnny Russell had come to RSLU, I was like, wait, what, Yeah, but that's one of those things that could be cultural, right, sure, sure. And then the two games I think I've seen him score. He has two goals.
He has two goals games.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So so the reason I'm bringing up the Diego I was announced last week, right before Pablo jumped on the show, that Diego was named an All Star, Yeah, for the second straight year.
And then you pull up the list Diego will.
Be playing in that game next to Lino Messi, and I fully admit that I don't think I have frame of reference for what that means in the ecosystem of of who Messi is in the game of soccer World football.
But imagine meing Diego.
That's what I'm saying, like that it's Michael Jordan, it's Tiger Woods. But that might not even do a justice with how big the sport of soccer is worldwide, and most people believe he is the greatest that's ever done it.
It's a really cool thing.
Well, and I just saw someone made a TikTok about Diego when he broke his nose. Yeah, and I don't know if you saw this, but he said, like if this is the mentality of our US men's team, this is he said, this is American, you know, And I thought, it is that like we love that sort of you know, as much as we love the like lone Wolf, you know, individual is rugged individualism type of thing. When it meets that,
I'm not I won't quit. I could have a broken nose, put a put a rag up my nose, and send me back in the coach game, you know that that idea. I saw people going nuts and he's like all these floppers and you know, fakers and whatever. And then we got this guy and I was like, that's actually, like that is a thing that's a crossover because that's one of the reasons people love football so much. My dad loved about boxing. Is you get, as I used to say,
losing in football so painful because it's so painful. You know, you don't just lose, you don't just walk off and say that was humiliating. You also then feel it in every bone and ligament in your body for the next week. But that that was I thought that was an I thought, oh, this is this is that moment. I'm looking for that, like where Americans see themselves in an international game, where they see themselves in players who are steeped in this international games culture.
Before we move off of RSL.
I'm just realizing, because you've been away for so long that I don't think I've talked to you about the ownership transition.
The Millers are now the majority. You know, we may have we.
May have discussicked a little bit because I went out to the press conference.
That's right, That's right, we did a little bit.
I think it's super exciting. I think I told the Larry Miller stories.
Yeah, that's right.
It also appears to be a bit of a paradigm shift. Now I've had three different RSL guests with three different messaging you know, three different messages about this. It was kind of funny because Pablo joined the show, and I always complain when RSL sells great players that they've developed, like why can't they play for us? I understand the economic value, Andres Gomez proof of concept twelve thirteen million, you know, goes over to I get it, but like, Diego is the guy that I do not want to
see go anywhere. He's so bright and he's so young. So Pablo hops on the show and he's like, Hey, we're not looking to sell our young players anymore. Jason hopped on the show and he's like, well, that's not entirely true, and then Kurt kind of echoed jason sediment.
But it does appear.
With Steve Stark's and the Miller family now running things, there might be a bit of a paradigm shift where if we develop some of these young players to the academy and they turn out to be good players for the senior team, maybe they'll be around here for the long at least that's my hope.
Yeah, I think that paradigm shift you're talking about has something to do with what we talked about at the beginning of this whole thing. And that is they understand how hard it is to convince people this is a great place to be right, And so internationally it's a little bit less of an issue because coming to America such a culture shock, there's playing in the MLS is
so different. But I think there is still when you're trying to trade for players and when you're trying to get respect, there is still this underdog you know, nobody wants to play here thing. And so if you can grow them yourself and they and they have loyalty and they have roots here, that is I think the thing that the Millers understand maybe better than anybody else.
Well, and talk about proof of concept. I know the Jazz never won a championship under the Miller regime, but they were more often than not really good and really competitive.
We got spoiled, we did, we did.
Were we going to talk about Jake?
Oh, we're getting there. Yeah, we're getting there.
I'm keeping it still about ten minutes. I figured we end with that, So let's move over.
Now.
We were talking about, you know, football tribalism and when a story like this surfaces, and let me just say this right off the bat, I've never loved covering honor code violations at BYU. I don't really love discussing it, like I just think it's weird societally where people are obsessed with who other people are sleeping with.
It's never been like a thing for me.
I look at the honor code as team rules. So like when a coach talks about somebody being it happens in every program they broke team rules or whatever. So the honor code is just a probably more strict than most team rules and more personal. Right it feels more personal? Yeah, you know, yeah, for sure, those are the things that make us uncomfortable.
So for our listener's frame of reference, Jake Rhetz Laugh had the civil suit filed a few months ago, and our friends of the Tribune have done a good job with this, uh, and the civil lawsuit was dropped. It has been dismissed. Excuse me, probably a settlement, you know, I think it's okay to say.
That out loud.
I have no idea, but that would be my guess. And then Jake has elected according to the Tribune. According to Kyle Bonneger and Pete Thamil from ESPN, Jake has elected to transfer because he's facing a seven game suspension, and all.
Of these things are reports there. Nothing is direct from that correct, and nothing is directrom school because under Tom Holmo, that used to announce when an honor code violation had occurred and what the punishment was. Yes, they wouldn't always tell you what happened, but you would know his honor code. So we would all be like, something has to do with sex or drinking right right and then, and that's
a bad assumption because we don't know. But whatever. So Tom Holmmell and I think very wisely said look, this is not this is not necessary. We're going to let you know that you know, there's been a violation of team rules or whatever, and the discipline will stay private. Yes, And I think that was a good call. I don't
know what I heard. What I heard and read, and I was reading Jay Drew's stuff from Desright News as well, and that is that he was telling friends and family a couple of days ago that I think Saturday nights when I read it that he was going to be transferring because he had a meeting with coaches and administrators and they had said, hey, you're probably gonna have to have a seven game suspension, And I mean I think everyone's question was and I think one thing that's important
to note is that his attorneys responded to the suit, and that response was incredibly detailed, and I people were having many feelings about the response and the detail of it and what was alleged and what his def was. And I think that it is not surprising to me that after that response, which was really brutal, two things happened. He gets told you're going to get an honor code violation and decides to go, and the suit is settled or dropped.
Yeah, and that's where we're at. That's that's what's happened.
It's just, you know, I can remember when these things would kind of either publicly manifest themselves or there'd be rumors of what's happening behind the scenes. A lot of people that do the jobs that we do in media would cry that this thing needs to be changed.
B WHYU needs to change the honor Code? It is too punitive. They're not going to do that, Okay.
I don't ever think people shouldn't change their own, you know, whatever their rules are exactly. I just want you to apply your rules fairly and consistently. Yes, that's always been my issue I had one of the my only interest ever in the honor code was when it was applied more strictly or more unitively to women than to men, And that was a problem. But outside of that, like you know what you're signing up for, I mean.
One hundred percent.
I mean think about like Duau was Jake's third school, right right, So the fact that I mean, and that is the way it is now was it was it Walt that had been to three schools also, I mean like two.
Florida.
And then who's the second round pick the Yeah, he's a four or three. He's a three school. So I mean like that's sort of the way we're going now. So I don't I don't know who's going to take. I think it's the timing that's the problem for Jake. But I think that response was as they say, it was no holds barred, that he was defending himself with every everything he could throw at this woman.
Do you think the weight of his response motivated her to try to come together and just get this thing figured out?
So absolutely absolutely, Because here's the thing. Sexual assault victims don't report crimes because there is as you said, there's this uncomfortability with reporting on on our code violations that have something to do with premarital sex. Imagine trying to report a crime that has something to do it's a crime, but it's also a personal violation that people still see as a purity or a moral failing that this happened to you, right, And so there's so much tied up
in it. There's so much psychologically and emotionally, and I'm sure physically that I think it's difficult to deal with a system that wants to deal with facts and evidence. Your body is a crime scene. Think about that, right, That is a difficult thing to even for me to even fathom. And so that reality was a struggle for her, and that she admitted that in her suit when the response came and it was allegations about there were he wasn't the one who did it. It was a different player,
and the other player was famous. You know, it wasn't first, it wasn't a nil money. The brutality of the of what you can do to defend yourself in civil court, I think that was probably I think it was a
painful thing to realize it. Now. I'm not saying that you didn't say I want to go and you know whatever, I don't know any of those details, and I can imagine that reading that was incredibly whether it's true or not, whether however you see it right and and listen, I don't fault Jake's attorneys for doing what they did, ye rightee I everybody there were people who were critical and talking about how brutal it was and unfair. Look, Jake would make you the same argument. We don't know if
what he did. We don't know if we don't know who's telling the truth. So that's what the courts are for. But hashing out something like that is so emotionally painful, and it's going to go on for years. And so I imagine that if there was a settlement that was incredibly persuasive thing because that I can't imagine reading that stuff about myself, my loved one and thinking I can sustain this kind of fight for years.
No, it's good perspective. You know.
One of the reasons I always don't really enjoy covering honor code violations like this is it's a sports soccer radio show, so there is a sports angle to it, but it feels like it's so much more heavy. There's so much weight to it as opposed to like, all right, let's debate who the backup quarterback is and who's going to start. Like, No, there are very serious allegations that were alleged, and to your point, we don't know what's true and what isn't. That's not for me to litigate
on air. I just try to look at the information and then just try to go from there. But as far as the optics of how this looks for the school, what are your thoughts on that there? Because I can remember when Brandon Davies had his suspension in twenty eleven. I mean, that was a basketball team.
That's the one that I remember them changing the policy.
And it's hard to say like they would have won the national championship because the NC DOUBLEA tournament is.
Ridiculous that way.
You just felt like, well, they were good.
You know, he was so good and Jim Er was full Jimmer at the time, and Brandon was a perfect compliment to him. And I can remember when that came down, when Brandon was suspended for the NC DOUBLEA tournament. We had two factions. One faction was what are we doing here? We have a really good team, and the other faction was no, this is who we are, and so I don't really know where to land with that. I wonder what you how you feel about the way a story like this with Jake looks for BYU in.
The athletic department.
Well, I think, like.
Does it dissuade kids from wanting to go play football there?
Well, I mean it might disswade some kids, for sure, And it might disswade some kids from going there and thinking they can get away with it, right, And it might dissuade you from, you know, as a coach, it might dissuade you from recruiting certain types of people or you know, or how. But I think Sataki is cut from that same cloth. This is who they are. They're not changing the honor code, and they're going to embrace the fact that everybody abides by the same rules. It
doesn't matter if you're the superstar. It doesn't matter if it costs us the NCAA championship or or an NCAA championship run. It's brutal, it's sad, but it's not It's not any different than a star player pulling up injured, you know, right there and costing a team or you know, and I would say this that if you embrace the idea that you hold yourself to these standards and you really do it, then I think that that becomes more
meaningful thing. Yeah, that's all I think. I feel like people who say have been saying a long time, be why you can't keep competing if they don't plan on Sunday b why you can't keep competing if they have the honor code. They're not getting rid of either one. And they're doing pretty well.
Yeah they are.
Yeah, And now you see teams accommodating their Sunday play. You see people respecting the fact that they if you follow. All I'm saying is whatever your code of ethics is, just follow it. Because I know programs who have a code of ethics, but they are quick to violate it if it's their star player.
Yeah.
And nothing will teach you entitlement quicker than having a coach cut you some slack when they really should sit you on the bench.
Yeah. No, I think it's good perspective.
So ultimately, when you look at to your point, the spot BYU is in as an athletic department, they're in a very healthy spot. Yeah, Because and I said this my old producer Brady sent out a tweet because I'd forgotten that I'd said this when I said it. But about five years ago when Nil kind of started to become like, wait, this is going to be real, and then it became real about four years ago. Now I said, if you're a BYU fan, this is excellent news. This is a way that you can And this was before
the Big twelve. They were still independent. Now they got the Big twelve in by which is also even the playing field. But when Utah had their PAC twelve invite and BYU in a reactionary move because it was they don't level When I say that went independent, it allowed Utah to evolve past Bergham Young and football in the way they quite frankly it never had. I mean I grew up in the Lovell years. It was nineteen and two,
I think over twenty one years. And then coach Mac comes in and kind of evens it up a little bit. But two things, when Kyle said no to his alma mater and yes to Utah and Utah gets the PAC twelve invite, that sent Utah football kind of on this path where it was a generation of dominance in a way that I never thought it was possible.
So now we have house.
VNTAA, we have nil and with those two things combined, it feels like there are a lot of very rich people writing a lot of checks for Byu'd add talent right now?
Yeah, I think there were a few other things. And I'm going to give Tom Holmo massive credits.
As you should, because in a great job, I.
Was completely opposed to independence. I was a worry this is a kiss of death, because I feel like you need something to play for, especially in football, Like you know, the minute you're not in the running for a conference title or you're not in the running for now we have the playoffs, right, there's just less incentive to play in bad sport, especially in combat sports. There's just this idea that what are you playing for? Why are you suffering?
Why is this happening right? What are you sacrificing for? And so I felt like taking away not just the chance to win those conference titles, but get conference awards, you know, have those rivalries, like all the stuff that goes with it. The culture be creating this culture, right. I was like, I don't think they have notre Dame.
Level culture, and they don't. No one does.
But yeah, but I would say they have their own version of it, whether it's less or not, it's still theirs. But the one thing that independence allowed Tom Holmo to do that I think was it led to this situation where in now, including the Big twelve invitation, was he could play during COVID Yes, everybody else was subject to was subject to conference rules. And the Pac twelve shut down, they were all those West Coast schools were like, we're
not playing. You can't come here. Everything's remote, and Utah suck. And Utah is in a state that politically was very different than the West Coast, right, and so you have your biggest rival BYU. They're independent, they can leave over there. And that game against Coastal Carolina in the postseason was, I think, such a light, such a moment. I remember just feeling so much joy and thinking because we're so much should we be doing this? Should we be playing?
And now people are like we shouldn't. And I remember thinking, like there's so much grief and loss everybody's because in sports, especially combat sports, you get a limited amount of time. The average career length for a running backs four years, so every minute does count. And somebody said to me, the reason football so special is it's you know, in high school, it's ten Friday nights. You know, that's it.
That's what you get. You might get eighty two games in a basketball season, but football is like fifteen, sixteen games now or eight. I think it's up to eighteen now. But like it was, it's just so limited. It's so it's so delicious because it's so rare. And then and Tom gave us that he could play because they were independent, and they played good opponents, and they played and they played well, and I think it was I remember thinking I talked to him. I did an interview with him
in a story for the Desert News. But I remember, you know, talking with him throughout that and it was a terrifying, stressful. I can't imagine being an ad during COVID, right, But he said, we have to make money. They laid people off dream as everyone did.
Right.
But he was like, we have to figure this out, we have to navigate it. Because they didn't have anybody to rely on. They had this like creative innovative ability and opportunity that other teams didn't because they were in a conference. The conference dictated what happened. Yeah, and I think that led to them being seen in a way and maybe they hadn't been seen.
It also helps that they're writing very big checks to attract talent.
No, no, I think no, listen, but I think that was it was like, look at this invest Look how well they are, look at these ups. So then you have these people who want to get on board with us. The nil thing comes out that next year. The settlement takes a couple years, but you know this is going
to be an opportunity. The collective started forming I think at twenty twenty two, right, Yeah, So I just think that that there were just again a few alignments, but like I went from like this is a worse mistake anyone's ever made to being like genius.
Yeah you know.
Also you know Domino's follow in your favor too.
Yeah, that happens. That's our time. This is not a podcast. Unfortunately, we do have to break to keep the lights on. Amy, It's always great to see you.
We'll see you soon, okay, Yeah, for sure, our friend Amy Donaldson from case we've missed her, it's been too long. ESPN seven hundred welcomes Maroon five to the Delta. Center coming up on October the twenty fifth. Tickets go on sale on June twenty seventh,