All right, what's going on? It is drivetime on a Monday afternoon. It's about eight minutes past the hour, two o'clock. Little chilly today, a little cold today, little cloudy today, had some rain in the forecast yesterday.
It's gonna be a little bit chilly tomorrow before warming up throughout the.
Course of the week into the weekend where we're gonna have temperatures reaching eighty degrees. But as it is every single day, it's going to have you along for the ride. It's Bence Check. It's behind the mic.
That is Porter.
Larsen behind the glass today producing the program as we have a lot to do on a busy Monday afternoon. Where some unexpected news broke earlier today that the Utah Jazz have agreed to a contract extension with their head coach Will Hardy through the year of two thousand and thirty one. And honestly, this is somewhat unprecedented. We're gonna talk about.
It on the show today.
Will was hired prior to the twenty twenty two season after Quinn Snyder decided he did not want to work for this new ownership group. And so this means Will Hardy's gonna have a nine year runway as a coach in the NBA before he is potentially unemployed unless something wild happens prior to twenty thirty one. I think this is a no brainer for the Utah Jazz. I think this is a really interesting decision from Will himself, and I'll tell you why. We'll get into it on the
show today. One week from today is the next day that is interesting for the fan base of the Utah Jazz. NBA Draft lottery coming up one week from this Monday, next Monday, and we will have it live for you during the five o'clock hour this radio show. So that's when we will learn where the Utah Jazz will select, and then we'll have a pretty good idea of who the Jazz are going to be able to pick based off of simply their positioning. It does seem like the
top five in order is somewhat of a consensus. Of course, the NBA Draft comes right ound June the twenty fifth. We will have great NBA Draft coverage at night potentially out at about on location for Jazz fans to.
Come hang out with us to watch round of the NBA Draft.
Remember, NBA Draft is now two day events and used to be that way, so he got Round one on the twenty fifth and Round two on the twenty six. The second round will actually be during our regular scheduled programming on the twenty six, so we'll kind of stave Frost to keep an eye to find out what the Jazz is gonna do because they have.
A couple of second round picks.
As well, So some Jazz news coming down today. An unbelievable weekend of playoff action in both the NBA and the NHL. Couple of Game sevens in the NHL saw some unbelievable finishes hearts and mallows, to use the soccer term. Both the Stars and the Jets needed late game heroics to get past the Avalanche and the Blues, and now those two teams advance.
On for Round two.
The Panthers and the Maple Leaves will play tonight. It is the first game of the second round, as those two teams have advanced in the world of pro basketball. The second round begins tonight as well. Out East at five o'clock on the New York Knicks take their active on the road to the TD Garden to take on the Boston Celtics. This could not be a worst matchup for the Knicks. We'll get into it, of course, some playoffs.
And then the Nuggets, after embarrassing the LA Clippers at Ball Arena Game seven over the weekend, they advance on to take on the number one seed out of the Westoma City Thunder at Paycom Center and ok C Oklahoma. So a couple of game once tonight in the world of pro basketball and unbelievable gutty win from Stephen Curry from Jimmy Butler, from Jymond Green the Golden State Warriors Game seven on the road against the Rockets, and then I think the Calves are in trouble. We'll tell you why.
The Pacers just have a bunch of pit bulls on the perimeter. Much a tough, physical big guard to like to play defense. And Donovan Mitchell is a really interesting playoff case study because it's not fair to say he's a shrinking violet come playoff time. I've seen him drop half a hundred, but I've also seen him just disappear. Well, we'll get to what this could mean for Donovan moving forward.
And then out West we have.
A little bit of a rematch when it comes to Draymond Green and Rudy Gobert, two people, two basketball players that don't like each other at all. So the NBA Playoffs continue to be really, really cool.
We have some breaking.
News right out of the gates. And I was informed this, by the way, by Won Britain Covey.
At the spring game.
But I'm a gentleman. I do not like to break the trust of our guy. So sab Britain Covey at the Forever twenty two game, the Utah Football spring game, and of course his time.
In Philadelphia has come to an end.
He gets a Super Bowl ring, and he lands in a great spot. Britain Covey is now in La ram with a one year deal. Utah Football brings it a wide receiver via the transfer portal. And we do have some RSL news as well, maybe some reinforcements on the way. RSL went up to Vancouver and lost over the weekend.
So ton to do on the show. If you missed the press conference bouncing Will Hardy's contract extension, We're gonna bring some of that sound to you from Will and some of the other decision makers on the program.
Today.
Tom Haberstrow joins the show today, as Tommy wrote a piece over the weekend, and Tommy is all about the numbers, is all about the data, and I'm going to tell tom that I think James Harden is potentially the most pathetic clutch player in the history of NBA basketball. And Tom's gonna throw a bunch of numbers at me that indicate that I might be wrong. But James Harden again over the weekend, I know he had a number of assists, but he just did not try to guard it all.
He was not engaged to try to get his own offense. Another Game seven failure for James Harden. Will get Tommy's take on the news that Will Hardy has a brand new contract, and then after tom stops by, it's an hour in studio with Richard smith Smedy will stop by. He was at Black Desert last week over the weekend
for the LPGA Championship events. So we'll do some NBA and we'll see how Smity's experience was down South, what the golf tournament was, and then we're not you sure who are our sl guest will be today.
Which means it's probably gonna be Trey fair Enough, which that's kind of what I'm hoping for Just to be clear, you're hoping for Trey. Yeah, don't say that he's That might be like the the best guest possible scenario, like we had Deontay Wilder last Friday, right, yeah, with Gerald next.
How are you and a lot similar? How are you bridging the gap between those two people. I don't I'd love to hear this. Yeah that's I think that's maybe the joke they're in. Okay, but yeah, I'm excited. You know what, I'm not gonna make a short joke either Deontay.
Six to seven.
I'm not gonna do that to our guy.
But the problem is, since you said out loud into the microphone that you're excited for it to be Trey, that's.
Just gonna go to his head.
So maybe get someone else.
Yeah, I mean, let's get anybody else outside of Trey. But the days where we have an RSL guest slotted and we don't hear back and it probably means Trey is trying to make space for himself to be able to come on the show.
I can say also, Nuggets, sometimes the timing a lie when we don't get an RSL guest as well.
I don't want to talk to Trey about anything other than RSL because he cannot take his bias.
He can't, he can't remove it.
So you know it's yes, we're gonna win the championship again.
Yo, Kitch, the greatest of all time.
Whenever he goes into the space of any other content than RSL, I simply just cut him off.
Yeah, it's fair, it's fair. But hey, to be clear, while we've given him the space to do that, the year he went really hard on it, they didn't come away with the ring.
Yeah they did. Yeah, that's fair, all right. So we'll see who joins us to talk a little soccer later, but a lot of basketball football, some NFL offseason, some Utah football transfer portal additions. Our first guest will be Tom habershow we are going to bring u some sound from the Will Hardy press conference. But before we get to all of that, on this cloudy and rainy Monday afternoon, it is time now for your opening tip.
Welcome to the Drive with Spence check its on Utah's number one sports talk Now into the studios of ESPN seven hundred to set the scene for the show.
Opening tip of.
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Oftentimes in this business you wake up too unexpected news. You plan out a show, you want to do this, you want to do that, and then a news piece of news comes down and kind of cause you to throw out the rundown and reconsider what we're going to do. So Utah Jazz announced today that they have agreed to a new multi year contract extension with their head coach Will Hardy that runs through the twenty thirty one season.
Will is thirty seven years old. Of course, he was hired twenty twenty two after Quinn Snyder decided he did not want to work for this new ownership group. So far, Will has compiled a record of eighty five wins one hundred and sixty one losses with no playoff appearances, thirty seven wins year one when he actually had some adults on the roster, thirty one last year, and then seventeen this season, by far, the worst record in franchise history and the worst record in the.
NBA this season.
So interesting timing of this and interesting dynamics for a few reasons, So let's get into it. So, of course Greg Popovich, unfortunately he has had to step down as the head coach of the San Antonio Spurs, and we actually heard from Coach Pop today. He spoke for the first time since November of twenty twenty four.
And I'm not gonna lie. That was hard to watch.
It didn't look like the Greg Popovich that we've all come to know and come to expect. He looked like a guy that's been through a tremendous trial as far as the past two.
Or three years.
Now.
Remember it's not just his own personal health. Coach Pop lost his wife sadly a few years back. Then he had the stroke, and he did not look like himself today. It was actually somewhat sad in my estimation. I'm thrilled that he's getting better, and I'm thrilled for him that he can continue in a role with that organization. As the president of the Spurs, he was flanked by some of the legends. We had Tim Duncan on one side,
Monogenobili on the other. But one of the reasons I bring this up when it comes to the Popovich news is I'm not gonna lie. When Greg Popovich suffered his stroke and scept away from the team, I heard for more than a few people around pro basketball pontificating on the possibility of Will Hardy leaving the Utah Jazz and taking the job of head coach of the San Antonio Spurs.
Now, of course, Will is under contract next year.
Well, now, Will's under contract through twenty thirty one, But prior to today, Will was under contract next year and the year after. It was kind of a unique contract just as far as the format goes, where it was a five year deal, three years guaranteed, then two team options. When it became pretty clear that Will's pretty sharp guy, and the Jazz just don't really have good basketball players, and it's hard to win basketball games when you don't have players that are good at playing basketball.
There's your analysis for the day.
You can't really put much on the head coach, but I'll get back to that in a moment. So, when it became clear that this was going to be a long game proposition and that team forty nine year one with some veteran players actually kind of overshot expectations, and so the conversation was like, Okay, are they a player or two away from actually being much better than we
all expected. And that was when Bobby Marks came on our radio show and broke the news that the Jazz thought they had a deal in place to acquire Drew Holliday from Portland, but Drew Holliday did not want to play here because he was in the mood to win championships, and so he went to Boston. And then there were conversations that prior to Kristaps porzingis landin in Boston, Ryan Smith and the front office thought they could have had
a deal and bring porzingis in. Danny Ainge, you know, postseason media, big game hunting.
You guys all.
Remember the deal.
So for a minute there was a conversation about, wait, could they really expedite this? And I have no idea who over there actually decided to say out loud, let's go ahead. And trade for Paul d or signed Paul George and trade from mckel bridges, as if that was any possibility at all. I mean delusions of grandeur. But hey, I guess speak it into existence. That's what the kids do now and maybe sometimes it happens in boom you see a reiki healer in your life changes. I don't know,
I don't speak the language. But when it became clear the best laid plans aside this was going to have to be a long game, the front office and the ownership group decided that they would pick up Will's option next year, year four, and year five. Okay, so giving another two years of runway before they had to make a decision on Will, but in my opinion, more poignantly before Will had to make a decision on them. And I still believe Will has a decision to make on them. Okay,
that's what makes today a little bit surprising. So again Popovich steps down. Unfortunately he's not well. A lot of people around pro basketball wondering if if the San Antonio Spurs would reach out to the Utah Jazz to try to engage in some sort of conversation to get Will out of here, to have him become the heir apparent Greg Popovich. Ironically enough, during Quinn Snyder's last year here, longtime listeners of the program, Hello, how are you?
Thank you?
You might remember Tim McMahon hopping on the show and alluding to the fact that he's hearing Quinn is going to leave the Jazz to take over for Greg Popovich. Now, funny thing happened on the way right to this end game and this final kind of landing of the plane, because then San Antonio won the lottery and they drafted Victor weman Yama, which seemed to kind of re energize Greg Popovich, just like drafting Tim Duncan. Did you know obviously the Spurs were able to get David Robinson with
a number one overall pick. I mean, we can talk about Spurs culture all you want, all the championships, they wont all you want. None of that happens without their lot of lottery luck, which they've had plenty of with David Robinson, Tim Duncan, Victor wemen Yama, Spurs get when Manyama, Popovich realizes he now has the next big thing in basketball on his team, and he decides to stay and he even signs another contract to continue on as the head coach. So you know, Quinn alects to take a
year away. I still think if he waited another four or five months, he currently would be the head coach of the Milwaukee Bucks. But he takes the Atlanta job, Popovich grabs one Minyama, and so that narrative goes out the window. And so this year, after Popovich decided to step down because of the health situation, a lot of conversation about whether or not they would try to contact the Jazz about bringing Will Hardy in as their next
head coach. And now I don't know how much of that motivated the Utah Jazz to essentially do this right now, and I don't know how much of this messaging today. So the Spurs are going with Mitch Johnson as the team's new head coach. He's been an assistant coach for pop Foar I think ten years now and thirty eight years old, very well respected by people in the organization.
So San Antonio has their head coach.
So the timing of it today I think is interesting for a couple of different reasons.
I really don't know.
We'll have to get our ESPN stats and Info group on this. Will Hardy is going to get nine years, a nine year runway of guaranteed money to coach this team with no guarantees that he's going to have good players.
He's gonna it nine years unless something crazy goes down. Now, of course, we see it all the time in the world of coaching, and the reason their contracts are structured like this is most of these guys are hired to be fired, and when you lose your job, the only silver lining if you're a coach now in either college or pro is you're paid millions of dollars not to work.
It's actually not a bad gig. So this is a tremendous gesture from Jazz ownership and the Jazz front office indicating that they believe that Will is the guy to lead this team moving forward.
I am surprised that Will.
Decided to do this, because, as I've talked about throughout the course at the end of the regular season and throughout the course at the start of the postseason, whenever I hear some of these playoff droughts, whenever I hear some of these teams that are either in the postseason now or barely made it in for the first time
in a long, long time. It just reminds me of how spoiled we've been with the competitive culture that the Millers built for a long long time, with a Utah Jazz team that more often than not has been very competitive consistently. Yes we've never had a championship. Yes there were some down years, Yes there were some missteps, Yes there were some playoff failures. But we have been lucky to have really good basketball in Utah for basically almost
fifty years. And there is part of me that believes we're in the early stages of what could be a very, very long game in a way that we've never.
Experienced it before.
The Charlotte Hornets have gone twenty one seasons between playoff victories. The Sacramento Kings twenty one seasons between playoff victories. The last time the Detroit Pistons won a playoff game at home was two thousand and eight. It's been fifteen years since the Magic won an NBA playoff series. Can you believe that It's been a decade since the Chicago Bowls won a playoff series? Even the Wizards won a playoff
series prior to the Bulls. But it's been eight years for them, eight years for the Spurs, and we're coming up on the fourth year of a rebuild for the Utah Jazz. And if you're watching the NBA playoffs and if you're juxtaposing these teams to what the Jazz are now, you're aware that they are not even close to competitivists. They're just not They're not one Cooper flag away. Quite frankly,
they're not two pieces away. Quite frankly, there were probably four or five high quality pieces away combined with the good players they have on the roster, and there aren't many, but there might be two or three Lowry Walker and then after that who knows.
But they need a ton of help.
And if you're Will Hardy, you're a guy that around the landscape of pro basketball carries a lot of cachet, a lot of respect. You could take another job if you wanted to. So I viewed this today as a real gesture from the Jazz ownership and their front office and a real real signal of belief that you're our guy, Will. But I believe this to be a very calculated and dangerous move from Will Hardy to believe in what's going on over there with not a lot of tangible proof
in front of them. All these coaches, at the end of the day are known for their win and lost record, and nobody gives a rip about the context. Okay, so Will at this point eighty five wins, one hundred and sixty one losses. They are not going to be good next year, and if I had to guess the year after that, it's probably gonna be another hole, Like we're
developing young players. And at what point does Will look around and get sick of entering gunfights with a knife every night when the other coach actually has legitimate NBA talent and they're serious about winning, and Will's asked to continue to develop young players.
So interesting news.
We will bring you some sound from said press start coming up on the other side, we'll get the thoughts of Tom Haberstrow, Will Hardy apparently not a rambling man.
Huh see what I did there right out of the gates.
Maybe he is a twenty two minute presser.
Well, uh doesn't there isn't the very definition of rambling man. Somebody wants to go up several places and yeah, you do you understand the joke that I was trying to make.
Her a little more literal. Yeah, did go over your head a little bit. I was thinking more more from rambling.
You know.
No, that's fair, He went on. I think I think we're both cracked. And look, I apologize. My humor can be a little high brow. It can be a little you know. Listeners say intellectual. I'm not comfortable with that. But what I don't say that? Listeners say it's kind of awkward.
Yeah, my my, my humor is very low bro, it's very like I'm a prairie boy.
Now, I don't be hard on yourself. Come on, I think you alluded. No, I wasn't eluding anything. You had your Wrangler T shirt on today? Did you get that with a pack of SIGs?
Though?
There you go?
Nice?
Uh No, no SIGs. That's that's a hard stop at this point in my life. I'm proud of you.
Thank you.
I'm proud of you.
All right.
Uh Will Hardy was an you know what porter, Give me give me your thoughts on, you know, kind of the way I started the show where I view this as a tremendous gesture from jazz ownership and the front office. I mean, no coach gets a nine year runway when you haven't wanted a high level I mean, this is this to me feels like a little bit of a no brainer because I think Will's very bright. But I do view this as a little bit of a risk from Will.
Tell me what you think, Yeah, No, I mean, as you said, maybe a risk from from Will in the sense that you just never know. You never know when a team is going to be able to strike when the iron's hot on a big free agent, or hit on a draft pick, or when you hit on a draft pick and he ends up having a career plagued with injuries a lah Grant Hill like, there's just so many variables in the NBA that you can't account for that, Hey,
isn't taking any job a risk. I don't know that one that's getting this kind of salary is super risky in spite of you know, the record, the percentage, the number that goes next to your name, which, as you said, yeah, that's huge when you're on the job market, when you're looking back on your career. But it does appear that Will Hardy is in good faith not worried about that at the moment. He's just worried about what's going on here.
With the Jazz, and and for the Jazz to have the kind of what clearly shows the kind of faith in Will to sign them to this extension. It looks like both parties are on the same page, which, as you mentioned, it's hard to be when you're in a position like this so much, losing so much, so much that you're not used to as an organization over the last two years in this regard they're handling it. I think, really well, I.
Just have to wonder, what will you know if we fast forward two three years and they're not close, you know what I mean?
You have to wonder what's going to go through his mind?
Well, and then how much does that right, right, maybe he's on the job market, how much does that affect how he's viewed around the league. I think there's folks here that are are very very high on Will Hardy, especially in the Jazz Front office, and I think rightfully so. But yeah, at a certain point you and I'm saying this is Will start looking after yourself. He hasn't done that yet, which is pretty commendable. And the Jazz Front officer are taken oe. So the weather's a little chili today.
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How that how to go?
You know, how content and how the conversations happened.
Yeah, I mean I have an agent, like most or all coaches, you know, Ryan, Danny and Justin are the ones that communicate with them, Justin being the primary communicator. You know, these are conversations that happen over a period of time. It's not a one day thing. And yeah, so they speak about.
You know, the.
Kind of the aim of the program and what their thoughts are. I'm fortunate that I work for this group. I think Ryan Ashley Danny Justin have been incredibly good to me from the first day.
We've been very aligned the entire way through this process.
And so calling it a negotiation, that word sometimes draws up this thought in your mind like it's a contentious thing back and forth.
And it's not.
You know, I'm very proud to be the coach of the Utah Jazz. So this is something that everybody was really excited about, Brian.
They will the year is a long time.
It will be what like nine years when this thing's all done.
How much does that help you, just as you're like looking forward to long term future, to be like, Okay, I will be here, this is my job for the foreseeable future.
Yeah.
I think that's ultimately a big sigh of relief for any coach. You know, we all see every day that this business is not It's not one where you see a ton of coaches getting long term commitments. I think ultimately the goal is to continue to build this program and ultimately hang a banner at Delta Center, and to get a commitment of that length shows the belief that you know, our group has in our coaching staff, and so it makes you feel the confidence from them.
That's not something that I've ever doubted.
I think the communication that we've had the entire first three years, I've I've felt that I have the confidence of our group. But to get that, you know, quote unquote put on paper is definitely meaningful. You know, I'm all in on the Utah Jazz. I'm incredibly humbled and
grateful to have this opportunity. You know, there are there are very few moments where I'm I'm really at a loss for words, and this is one of those where the the perspective on all of it, the understanding of the commitment that they're making to me and to our staff is really humbling, and we're excited to continue to work. You know, I love representing this organization. I love representing our community and our fan base. So it's it's a really exciting.
Right here.
Yeah, coach, if you have a connection with the guys.
You mentioned Ryan, Danny, Justin and yourself, you guys think.
Together to play ball together.
How board is that you need to have that connection with those guys.
I don't know if that he is.
In a lot of other.
NBA coaching positions.
Yeah, I think it's It's what sets us apart, is the alignment that we have every day. It's one constant conversation. I think I've said publicly, I'm not sure in three years we've ever scheduled a meeting because we don't need to. The conversation is ongoing. We all spend so much time together and are intentional about making sure we all spend time together that the perspective is always there.
For all four of us.
I understand the things that they're thinking about, the things that they're worried about, the things that they may be focused on in the current moment, and they understand the things that I'm worried about and focused on. So I think that connection allows us to navigate what is a hard landscape in professional sports. It's very much a business that is judged and reacted to in sort of an A or F manner. It's either great or it's terrible, And I think that it allows us to really block out all of.
That noise and stay focused.
On, you know, the intent of our group and why we're doing what we're doing. I couldn't be luckier to have three people like that that I get to work with every day, because, like you said, it's not lost.
On me that this is non normal.
An accounting.
Hey, coach, what does it.
Mean to you that you know this is you know, been able to get done?
You know in this manner you know just kind of a as efficiently as as.
As it it has been done.
And you know, as a secondary question, what's been you know, some of your favorite moments, uh, in these first few years of your year tenure.
Yeah, it means a lot to to.
Get this done and sort of put this part behind us. There's so much work to be to be done.
We have, you know, a a a lot that we have to do as a staff and as an organization moving forward to get where we want to get to. And so to have this element solidified in the moment is definitely relieving and allows us to focus on the
things that we need to focus on. I mean, memories of the first three years is that's a hard one to pinpoint because I go back to, you know, the first press conference when I got the job and meeting all of you for the first time and sort of starting to initially feel the weight and responsibility of this job. But also feel the passion and the support of our fan base. You know, the first home game at Delta
Center was a moment that I'll never forget. You know, the little things like the first time the team brought it in at the end of practice and training camp and you realize, like, wait, I'm the head coach. I'm the one that's supposed to talk right now. But also more than that, it's the time spent with everybody that's.
In our travel party.
There's so much time behind the scenes on the planes, on the buses. There's so many people who do incredible work for us who get no credit publicly, and forging
those relationships along with the relationships with our players. You know, it's a day like today when the news comes out and you're getting techs from guys that were on the team my first year here, you know, as a thirty four year old, first time head coach, and they let me coach them, and they embraced me as the head coach, and they were ultimately the ones that fed into my confidence in this job because of the way that they approached me.
Every day.
The games are always fun, but ultimately I think that this job and coaching in general, it's the relationships and the time spent are the things that run through your head when you really look back on it. And so I'm very very grateful that I've been surrounded by and I'm still surrounded by so many amazing people.
D Hey, well, the first extension kind of, you know, gave gave a glimpse that you would be here kind of through that first rebuilding part of the rebuild or first section of the rebuild of this team. And this extension gives you an opportunity to kind of look beyond what would be the rebuild and start of of sort of what it would look like when you guys are maybe trying for contention and I'm wondering, what are your worries, concerns thoughts about how maybe your job will change once it shifts.
Yeah, it's not something that I'm concerned about. I think that's what we all want, you know, you wanna be in the big you want to be in the pressure situation. You want to be competing for the championship. That's what we're all hunting. And I do recognize that there will be a lot of changes for all of us as our team continues to grow.
It's not just me.
It's the assistant coaches, it's the players, it's the front office, it's Ryan and Ashley. Like the feelings and the emotions attached to it all will be a little bit different, and I'm excited for that. Like I'm excited for our fan base to pack the building for a big playoff game.
I think that's what we're all anxious for and excited for.
Like I watched these playoff games at night, and you're just staring at the screen, going, that's that's what I want, And that's what we're building towards. Like we are, we're a group that's very committed to the process of building a championship level team. And we said in the beginning and we will continue to say that does not mean that there aren't hard moments, But I think that those hard moments are ultimately what makes it all worth.
It in the end. So I don't really have concerns about my job.
Changing as we continue to move forward, because I think that's ultimately what you what you sign up for when you're a head coach in this league is things are constantly changing around you, and you have to be a steady force throughout all that change.
Any the question for your first with the NBA or you put it out to Chicago for that or what you're.
Playing with that, Yes, I will be in Chicago.
And then one of that as we watch put out basketball and all, it's a different style of basketball, And.
How do you think your current team and young players especially are put to kind of handle what we're seeing in some really tough.
Yeah.
I think our our young players are on the right path of growing towards being ready for those.
The reality is this season we weren't ready for that level, and.
Some of that is outside of their control because there there is an element of some experience, but also some physical maturity and some of those things that stand out in some of these games. We're seeing a really really
physical playoffs to this point. But the part that I'm most excited about is that, ultimately, in my experience in the playoffs, uh and continuing to watch it all unfold, your mental toughness and your mindset is the most important thing to get through the playoffs because there are big emotional swings, you're physically exhausted, and you're getting tested every
single night. And I think that our group is building that resilience and continuing to improve and work on our mindset every single day, because that's what it's going to take. You know, if you watch the series after one game, the reactions are generally this team is playing great, this
other team is playing poorly. You know, Golden State loses two games in a row and everybody's sort of writing them off, and they go win game seven on the road, And yes, it's because of the ability of their players, but more than that, it seems like it's because of the mindset of their players. And that's the thing that we have to continue to address as a group as
we grow. Physical things are easier to measure, how strong you are, how high you can jump, how many shots you make out of a certain number, like those things are easy to measure. Your mindset's hard to measure, and so that's the thing we have to monitor really closely as a group as we keep going.
Yeah, yeah, you.
Mentioned need's are hard to come by the season, but fans and fans every time I want to gage, they're packing the area.
Which surprise me every time I showed up. That that make people there to watch what you want to say, then of how they support you, maybe where you are in this process.
Yeah, My message to our fan base, first and foremost is thank you. Their support means the world to me, It means the world to our team because we need them and ultimately we're trying to conduct ourselves in a way that represents.
Them. And you always want your fan base to.
Be proud of how you're operating as a team, and I think that ultimately that's why they showed up every night. I give our fan base a lot of credit. They have perspective, and they understand what we're ultimately hunting, and they understand what we're doing to try to get there and playing a lot of young players, trying to develop our young talent. The fan base understood that that was going to be hard from a wins and losses standpoint
at certain moments. But I do think that they continued to show up because they enjoyed watching our young players compete. There was not a lack of effort on the floor. There was not a lack of passion. I want to continue to thank them and to continue to to tell them and remind them that this is all gonna be worth it, and growing these young players is He's gonna give us the best chance to hang a banner at
Delta Center, and I understand frustration in certain moments. I understand that some of the losses are hard, and especially when you cared so deeply about the team, But their support does not go unnoticed. I'm very grateful for our fan base and their approach, and this is all gonna be worth it.
All right.
Well, as the season was ending, I I asked pretty much on everyone on the roster.
Is Will a good coach? And how does he keep you guys accountable?
And like, the general consensus was great coach. Everyone said calling things about you, So that's nice. But the thing that stood out was that everyone was like, well, he'll call Louray out in a film session or during practice or during game just as soon as he'll call out a two way guy or Cody or Isaiah. And so it's that even playing field. Is that a concerted effort kind of in your coaching philosophy and something that you.
Want to continue.
Yeah, that's gonna remain a core principle for us every single day. And that's because I believe ultimately everybody can improve, and secondly, we all want the same thing. We're all trying to win. My responsibility is to hold them accountable. It's not personal. I care very much about all these guys as human beings, but when we're doing the basketball piece, we're trying to improve as a team.
They're trying to improve individually.
And it's also a credit to our veteran players like you mentioned Lowry, and he allows me to coach him hard in front of the team because he understands that allowing me to do that lets me coach the young players hard and not have them bad an eye and they don't. We don't get into this situation of, well, you don't yell at him when he did this. You know he did this on that play and you didn't say anything. It's we want everybody to be held accountable
to the same standards. And that's something that you know, I was fortunate to witness, you know, up close and personal throughout my coaching career, the coaches that I've worked for, and I ultimately think it's the best way to build team cohesion is everybody understanding that the standards have to be the same for everybody, and just because you're on a different contract or you play more minutes doesn't mean that you get to just let things slide. And I
want them to continue to want more for themselves. That's my responsibility. And if that means that in certain moments they're all mad at me, that's fine. That comes with the territory, and there's that can be good for a group as well. But you know, our players deserve a lot of credit for how they've handled themselves. You know, I'm very grateful that they allow me to coach them as hard as I do.
Start to follow up, Yeah, you mentioned having seen the coaches that you work for and learning from.
Them, and kind of as it is recently that.
Pop won't be coming back like to a coaching badge, I'm wondering how much of your coaching style philosophy.
Was learned through him, and.
Is he someone that you think.
About or talk to when, like, you know, you get a big contract extension.
Yeah.
I I learned an incredible amount from Pop. H I think he really set the foundation of values for me that you carry into your team. I also recognize that I'm not Pop and our personalities are not the same, and so I'm not trying to emulate Pop. I do think that the values system, though, is similar. That being said, you know, he's taught me more than I could even explain allowing me to be a part of his program
and their program for eleven years. The opportunities that I was was given there, getting to learn from him, getting to learn from the players, getting to learn from you know, countless assistant coaches that I got to work with and for while I was there, has ultimately shaped a ton of my coaching identity. But I do have to remain true to myself and do it my way and with my voice. So I'm forever grateful to him, you know, that organization and all the coaches and players that I
was around while I was there. There's way too many to name each of them by name right now. And yeah, of course he's somebody that you know, I speak to. He's a mentor to me in a lot of ways. He's been a very prominent figure in my adult life. You know, I was in San Antonio from age twenty two to thirty three, which is a very formative part.
Of my life.
And so yeah, getting to to share the news with him is a you know, that's a great moment. There's you know, other coaches as well that you get to share the news with and you get congratulatory texts. It's one of the few moments where you take a moment and take a step back and.
Think about.
The journey to this point and all the people that have been very impactful along the way, Pop obviously being the most prominent.
All right, there you go.
Will Hardy addressing the media today after the news broke that he has agreed to a contract extension with the Utah Jazz going through the twenty thirty one season. Ironically enough, the same day that we heard from Greg Pepovich for the first time since November of twenty twenty four.
We've got Smitty Liven studio today.
He spent forty years with the Jazz front office and a number of different capacities. We'll do a little RSL later on Landing King has a new home. He has transferred to Duke, former Utah tight End. But our next guest joins us on a very consistent basis with a lot to get to. On a Monday afternoon, we welcome in Tom Haberstrow. Tommy, Happy Monday man.
How are we doing.
I'm doing great man. How are you?
I'm well, I'm well.
So some unexpected news dropped in our market today is the Utah Jazz and Will Hardy have agreed to a multi year contract extension through twenty thirty one. Now, as you know, when they signed Will in twenty twenty two, it was a five year deal, three guaranteed years, then two team options. They had already picked up both of those options. So prior to today he was under contract through twenty twenty five. Now he's under contract through twenty thirty one. Tommy, he gets a nine year runway. This
doesn't happen often. What are your thoughts.
I think it's a great indication of the trust between the front office and Hardy. Despite the record seventeen and sixty five, you get a six year extension basically through twenty thirty one after having the worst record in the NBA. This is very clear that everyone's on the same page
of what this is all about. Right, they all know what time it is is that Hardy given the personnel and the objective, which is very clear, you don't extend the head coach for having the worst record in the league unless that is the goal, or at least that
is part of the plan. And Hardy has had to deal with a lot of in and out players, differing incentive structures where you would think that a guy with not just this year, but last year going thirty one and fifty one, the year before that thirty seven to forty five. The Utah Jazz win count has gone down in each of the three years that Will already's coached.
But that's kind of all part of the plan. And they they I think, have the right process and they're sticking by him in the same way that the Portland Trailblazers did the same thing with Chauncey Billips this offseason, and these these organizations are I think looking after what Mark Deagnel and Emo Udoka did with Houston and saying, you know what, I think we should stick by our coach if he is demonstrating that he's about all the right things and getting the guys ready and all about
development long term. We're not just going to let this guy go once things start getting good. We're going to stick by them and let them see through this. And I think it's a new day in the NBA where
you're seeing guys get that opportunity. And on the other side, Will Hardy is in a profession in which Michael Malone and Taylor Jenkins get fired days before the postseason, so it's a very unusual coaching market right now, and I think it's an indication, it's a testament to Will Hardy and his professionalism that like he was able to see this through enough to get to the other side. And that's really exciting if you're Will Hardy.
And I want to be very clear, in a profession where you are essentially hired to be fired, when an ownership group in a front office offers you this opportunity, you do not turn it down. But Tom, I've been talking about this throughout the course of the past month or so. You know, when the playoffs roll around, you're always reminded about how many cities and how many organizations have had sometimes decades of futility and very long stretches in between competitive teams.
We've never had that here.
We just haven't.
We've had two and three years of a Scott Layden pivot or a Dennis Lindsay or a Kevin O'Connor pivot and a Dennis Lindsay pivot and pretty quickly have been able to get back to respectability competitiveness. And I do not think we are close here now to seeing that happen anytime soon. So is there a part of this where Will Hardy is taking a little bit of a risk because from my prism, Will checks all the boxes.
He's a great communicator, his players seem to like him.
He has maximized every piece of talent he's had here, and I badly want to see what an NBA team with good players looks like coached by him. But there is a risk here about committeing to this organization long term, where there's no guarantees on the horizon of talent landing in our market to allow the Jazz to get even close to where some of these Western Conference teams are. If we are honest and salient here Tom, they are three, four or five pieces away from the Minnesotas and the
Denvers and the Oklahoma cities. Is there a bit of a risk that's taken on Will's behalf? Even though, again with a profession full of so much volatility, if you have nine years a runway, you take it no matter what.
But is there a bit of a risk on Will's part here?
Sure? I think this is a riskless or I guess a profession that there is no safe job. There is not. I mean, we just saw two teams that had basically been at the top or near the top of the Western Conference at one point this season, either the number two or the number three seed for much of the season, and they get fired. So nothing's guaranteed in this league, especially when we're coming off the season in which Taylor Jenkins and Michael Malone seemed like everything was fine and
they were going through a little rough patch. But we're seeing Denver win fifty games with Michael Malone and they let him go. There's no I mean, outside of Eric Spolstra, there really isn't. I think now we're seeing Greg Popovich and the torch passed the torch over to mis Johnson. You know, Eric Spolster in Miami is the longest standard head coach in the NBA now and I remember covering him in twenty ten and he was just a baby.
You know, this league, if you're able to get this kind of buy in from the front office, even if it's long term, with some team options, what have you, I think that's as close as stability as you're gonna get. So Will Hardy, I think the grass is always greener in the NBA. You think that it would be better to be in a winning environment with the competitive juices flowing. Everyone wants to win. The priority is to win every game, but that also is very stressful and a lot of
times you butt heads with front offices. And it seems like Will Hardy's happy where he is in Utah, and I can't blame him for the security in a profession where there isn't much security. I mean, the Phoenix Suns are they just let go James Jones and hired someone who is a longtime coach under Tom Izzo to be the GM. They fire Mike Bundholzer, they fire Frank Vogel,
they cycle through head coaches. So I can understand why Will Hardy is opting for security rather than necessarily chasing the next big job that comes up, because certainly there's a lot of competition for those jobs. And as someone who lives in Charlotte, sometimes it's nice to know, like where you're going to be for the next several years, even if it isn't a New York or in Miami
or in LA so to speak. I don't know what the NBA equivalent, Maybe it is those teams, but I think happiness as an NBA head coach, I remember Stamping and Gundy talking recently about how on Leviatage Stow he was talking about you know, people were saying, hey, at least in when you got let go in New Orleans or let go in Detroit, you had multiple years of millions of dollar I was guaranteed to you. How mad could you be? How else could you be when you
get fired? And he really was hard on this and was like, if you have any sort of pride, any organization that says we don't want you here anymore, we think we can do better than you going forward, and we are willing to pay you millions of dollars to not have to deal with you every day, that still hurts, and it still hurts a lot. And so as much as we want to say, like will Hardy might be able to get a better job elsewhere, a better winning situation,
I understand the inclination to opt for security. Even though they could fire him tomorrow, there is still the security of the front office that he's the only front office that he's had as a head coach, and it seems like they're all aligned. I can see why there's a little bit of risk, But every job in the NBA, in this profession, I think there's risk involved for sure.
One more thing, are you agree with my premise that the Jazz are not close to being competitive?
Is that fair to say?
Yeah? Okay, you know, I was just thinking about this. Who is there, Shay Gils just Alexander? They don't have one like who is there Devin Booker? Right, the guy that, yeah they're gonna lose seventy games. But who's their guy that they can they can build around and say, okay, that is that is a young piece that you can envision a rebuild around. Evan Mobley, Shay Gilds, Alexander, Devin Booker.
These are types of guys that I think you can't point to Larry market In and say that's their version of that, because Larry is turning twenty eight years old this summer and those guys when they were coming up there twenty three, twenty four, And that's a huge difference. And so I think Larry markten is more likely to get moved, in my opinion, than being the franchise Cornerstone future star in the same way that Shake goes as Alexander is for okay.
See, oh well, then I continue to say, like I cannot analyze the twenty twenty nine Utah Jazz. I do not know what that team will look like. I can only analyze what's in front of me. So before we move on, because we got a lot to do. Man, the playoffs have been so fun. Let's get the Tom Haberstrow most optimistic approach on how long this is going to take for the Jazz to get back to competition at a high level in the West and what are the boxes that have to be checked?
Well, Cooper Flag would help. I think in this draft that guy is probably year three before you start talking to playoffs. I think in most situations about three year runway with Larry Mark and Will Hardy, I think you can look at year two as being a real playoff contender. That's how good Cooper Flag is in my opinion. He's that polished and well rounded that if he's on the floor playing thirty minutes a night for you, you're not going to have that many weaknesses. That's how good he is.
And so whether they are going to be contending for a playoff in the first year, I think not. No matter how good you are as a rookie, it's very hard for you as an eighteen year old, which is going to be eighteen eighteen, nineteen year old as a rookie. No matter how good you are, it's very hard to be a playoff team right off the bat. I think year two you can start talking playing and playoff potential for the Utah Jazz with Walker Kestler, Larry Markinin and
Cooper Flag. But we'll see about the backcourt. That's going to be key. But for this team without Cooper Flag, it's going to be four years, five years.
Yeah, yeah, Now, we'll see. We'll have to see how it plays out.
I mean, you know, every team needs that luck for all the and look, I'm certainly on a daylight today. We'll never speak illy you know, of Greg Popovich, but he'll be the first one to tell you Without Tim Duncan or David Robinson or Jenoe Bleer Pink, you got out players. You just have to have players. There's no other way around it. The organization walking line as well as our cornerstone. He's our big block. While he doesn't play, he coaches. This is a players league. Leading us to
the teams that are now in the postseason. What impressed you most about the way the Warriors went in Houston and won Game seven.
Buddy held man. I did not see that from Buddy Heeld. I could not believe that he was the guy who came up huge for the Golden State Warriors. Given the pedigree on that roster and that experience on the roster. What Buddy Heel did to punish the way that the Houston Rockets were loading up on Steph Curry is one of the best Game seven performances I've seen a long time. It's not just that he scored thirty three points, it's
the expectation level. Like Buddy Heel, has never been a playoff performer, and in fact, Buddy Heald coming into the last season, I'm not so sure he has won a playoff game ever. And so like Buddy Heald has never been big in this moment because he's never really been
big on a good team before. And so when you see what he did on Sunday Night, where he's coming in there as a guy who's never won a playoff game in his life heading into this series and then coming up big in a two seven upset where he's making everything and making the smart play, moving the ball when he has to, taking advantage, and being aggressive when he has to Buddy Healed and the way that he continued to make him so valuable on the floor was
something that I needed to see before I believed it. Like acquiring Buddy Heel to the regular seasons one thing, But to see that Buddy Heal can go thirty seven minutes in a playoff Game seven and be one of the best players on the floor and lead the game in scoring is another level and a weapon on the Golden State Warriors that they're going to need in this
next years against Minnesota. I don't know about you, Spence, Like I'm a Steph Curry believer, but I didn't realize that this is going to be the first series in which the Golden State Warriors are the underdog in the last decade. Like that's astounding to me that they've never been the underdog in a series until now in the last ten years, ten years, and part of that is the size advantage that Minnesota has. But I still picked the Warriors.
I have Warriors in seven.
They've won the last three games against Minnesota. That was even before Jimmy Butler. Kevon Looney was not a huge performer in the entirety of this series against Houston, But I think he's gonna be big against Rudy Gobert, and I just if we saw that from Buddy Heeld, I
needed to see it in a game seven. That's a new dimension for the Warriors that they're gonna have that release valve when they load up on Steph Curry with that size and they passed to Draymond Green, they can credibly passed the Buddy Heald and get an open shot and have him hit that. So that was man, that was a surprise. That was like in a a season finale where they reveal the killer and you're like that guy, like I did not know he had it in him.
And I was very impressed with Buddy Healed. And they're gonna need against Minnesota.
All right, let's go back to Saturday, and you know, there are there are simply stretches. And this might say as much about the Clippers as it does about Denver, but there's there was about a fourteen or fifteen minute stretch between the second and the third quarter. When Denver plays like that, you just go, they're as good as any team left, including Boston or Okay see, and maybe it was lack of effort from the Clippers, it was just a decent Kawhi game and you wrote on this
so I will stand in this microphone. It was yet another Game seven failure from James Harden and you have dubted in the cave. Maybe that's not the fairest narrative in the world, but was Game seven and ballery in Was that more about who Denver can be when they do what they did the clips over the second and the third quarter or was that an indictment on the clips or maybe a bit of both.
Man, I think.
James Harden is really really difficult to rally around in the playoffs when it gets deep into a series. For this reason, he is a three shot foul hunter the likes we have never seen in the NBA, and in the regular season that works. He is unbelievably good on the perimeter at hitting threes and being able to draw that three shot foul. He gets his legs taken out from under him, he exaggerates contact, he gets that call.
But as these games get deeper into a series and the referees have seen James Harden and the way that Denver's playing him, he's not getting that call, and Denver made them pay. Look, James Harden is not the biggest choke artist in game sevens in NBA history. I ran
the numbers, I've looked at the tape. This guy has had some duds, but he has shown up in Game seven before and his decline from his regular seat, his regular season performance, postseason performance to game seven, his Game seven drop off isn't nearly as seismic as some other players in the NBA. And it's crazy to say this on the surface, but Jokic just has some duds in Game seven, fallen off from his normal performances. I'm not saying James Harden is better than Jokic. Certainly we saw
what happened in Game seven. But the issue with James Harden is he can't shoot in these big moments. He was one of four from Downtown, two of eight for the game, and he I think lets the referees and the whistle get in his head a little bit where he's like, if I'm not getting these foul calls, I have to turn into role player playmaker. And you saw thirteen assists that just two turnovers. Wasn't looking for his shot.
Denver knew that he had another great first quarter coming out, and it just seems like he loses steam and the Clippers just aren't young enough to rely on Kawhi Leonard and be like, all right, when James doesn't have it going, we can just go to Kawhi. As the season goes on and the postseason goes on, I just think it's harder and harder to compensate for Harden in a game six or game seven, and when he shifts into playmaker mode and past first guy, he needs someone who's got
that Alpha in him. And right now at James Harden's stage of his career, look, James Harden is the all time leading steals guy in a game seven. He's one of the best shot blockers, is over a block per game in game sevens. He's fourth all time in assists per game in game sevens. He's got a really good efficiency metric in game sevens. The problem is he just
can't hit threes. And a lot of that I think has to do with the officiating and the fact that they were swallowing those whistles and saying we're not going to fall for it. We're not going to fall for the Oki dough. When you fall onto the ground, Denver is going to get that ball and they're going to go the other direction. There's a possession in the second quarter highlight on Tomdefinder dot Com that signified the problems when you build around James Harden. He's not getting those
foul calls. He's just another guy, all right.
Moving over now, if I told you that the Cavs are in trouble, would you? And I felt like this before Game one, I mean Indiana since January when Rick Carlisle made some adjustments to the rotation and they got healthy, they've just been kind of one of those teams that's
a total pain in the ass. And I always try to be fairer because I hear a lot of, you know, Donovan Mitchell playoff narratives, and Donovan has had his fair share of when the lights are at their brightest and when his teams have an opportunity to take that next step, he hasn't necessarily delivered. I've also watched him drop half one hundred in playoff games a couple of times, and I think he has five forty plus playoff games and two fifty plus up playoff game, so it's not like
he's never getting it done in the postseason. But there is something about this matchup and if I'm a Cavs fan, man, I'm a big concern.
Tell me your thoughts.
I'm not, I'm not. I think this is a makero miss league. And just like in Utah, when you have a team that predicated on three point shooting, you got to hit those shots. And you know what, that's true for every team in the league, like Indiana shut the heck out of the ball. Nineteen of thirty six made over fifty three percent of their three balls in that game. The Calves, led by Donovan Mitchell only at nine to thirty eight, one of the worst three point shooting performances
in Calves history. That's not going to do it. You lost thirty points in the three point calm. The team the Caves that normally kill you from downtown, they had a bad night. And look, some of that is scheme, but I think most of it is just the shots weren't falling, and Donovan Mitchell scoring thirty three on thirty
shot attempts is not going to cut it. I think this is one of those games where Kenny Atkinson just says, next game, let's try to get Darius Garland healthy and try to get those same looks because on the other side, I think Indiana hit some tough shots and they were playing harder, and sometimes that stuff gets rewarded by the
three point shooting. But I'm looking at the three point calm and the fact that the Cavs out rebounded them, they took care of the ball, they shot better than them on Tues. And the only thing really that they got beat on was something that they got romped on is the three point calm. And it was a close game until the very end, and if some of those
shots go the other way. I know it's not a very compelling answer, but in a make or miss league, when you lose by thirty points in the three point column, I just think you flush it down the toy and you go to Game two. They might get Terius Garland, one of the most dynamic backcourt players in the league. That will certainly help things. They need him healthy in order to beat the Indiana Pacers, That's for sure. They need to have a mobile healthy. They need DeAndre Hunter
to be healthy. But thos are more concerned about the health on the Cavs side than anything. Schematically. I thought that that Game one was as bad as they played, especially on hitting shots and shot making, and I'm not too concerned. I think the kas are I think the Kaws are going to still gonna win this series. But that was not a good first game out of that group, all.
Right, before I set you loose.
In ninety minutes, they're tipping off the TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts. And I love me some Jalen, and I love that the Knicks are at least relevant again and have been for a few years since, you know, basically in my opinion, not being relevant since the late nineties.
So I like this next team, you know.
I know that the Mikel Bridges acquisition and even og you know, acquired with the idea of matching up with Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown and maybe Drew Holliday's compromise, but they still have Derek White, and both those two guards are capable of really making it hard on Jalen and Tom. They just asked Jalen to do everything. I feel like nobody's giving the Knicks, even a Mike Tyson uppercut knockout random, you know, even kind of a chance here.
Do you feel the same? What you what are your thoughts as we started the second round series?
Yeah, I got Boston in five man. They got Boston in five I mean, I I look at this Boston five out system is way too good and on another level than what we saw with the Pistons that often had two guys on the floor that couldn't shoot. The optionality that the Boston Celtics offense has where they got playmakers at every position. They got guys who can shoot at every position, the guys who can play off the dribble in every position, and I just think that's so
much harder to defend. And then this Knxt team, it's and mckel bridges that I worry about. It's the fact that the Boston Celtics have a guy at every position that can hunt Karl Anthony Towns or Jalen Brunson on any given possession. And I'm sorry, but that offense, the Knicks offense, they were a bottom ten offense for half the season. They were not a good offense against the
Detroit Pistons. This Boston team is better in every respect, and I just think that the Knicks don't have enough on both ends of the floor with that five man unit with Kat and mckel bridges and og Josh Hart and Jalen Brunson. I just think that, yes, they were built to try to handle the Boston Celtics, but this Boston Celtics has a different engine in that car, and I just think it's going to be a different series
than Detroit. And a lot of the issues that the Detroit exposed about the Knicks but weren't quite able to capitalize on. I think the Boston Celtics are going to make quick work of the New York Knicks. I just think the Knicks defense isn't that good, and I think Kat and Jalen Brunson defensively are going to be really exposed in this series.
Where can people get to work?
Tommy Hey, Tomafinder dot com. I really appreciate people. Go subscribe to my substack also at Yahoo Sports with Kevin O'Connor and Dan Devine, two shows a week over at Yahoo's Sports. Go check out the YouTube over there, And of course I appreciate Basketball Illuminati listeners. Always a good time on that show. We got Steve Jones joining us, the former assistant coach and video coordinator for the Brooklyn Nets and Memphis grizz is going to join us this week.
You've probably already followed him on Steve Jones twenty on Twitter. He's awesome and we have another great episode coming up on Wednesday. As at Basketball Illuminati appreciated Spence as always.
All right, my man Tom Haberstrow. We will catch a quick break coming up. On the other side, Richard Smith rolls through for an entire hour. We'll get his take on the news that Will Hardy has been extended through twenty thirty one. We'll do a little lottery, little draft in some playoffs. It is time now to start thinking about your lawn. It's chili, it's kind of rainy, but the weather will turn and if you're not taking care
of your lawn now it's time to consider it. With our friends at IFA Country Stores, they have everything you need to care for your lawn to matter its size or shape. Their four plus lawn lawn care program can promote healthy green grass this summer. Visit with their team of pro turf and landscape consultants that help provide products and services to local baseball and soccer fields, golf courses, parks, and other city properties throughout Utah.
He's the pride of Norwich, Connecticut and an adopted son of Salt Lake City. After forty years with the Utah Jazz, there's no one better to talk some hoops. Richard Smitty Smith is back on the drive on ESPN seven hundred.
All right, coming up at the end of this segment, we are giving away one round of golf to Davis Park, which is a great track up north.
It is the.
Festival of Teas.
I have tasked Smitty with coming up with a trivia question, an NBA jazz related, maybe Draft related trivia question that
he's going to drop on you coming up. We'll call that about twenty minutes from right now, and the first person to text in the answer, We're gonna send you up to play Davis Park in honor of our Festival of T's brought to you by the UGA, So stay tuned for that and live in studio, fresh off a trip down south where he was watching some of the world's greatest LPGA golfers play at the Black Desert Championship.
Is Richard Smith, Smitty? How are you, man?
Man?
It was a fun weekend too, Spence a great golf You know, you you watch the women in the LPGA up close, and you recognize quickly how how precise they are and everything they do when they get over the ball and they get ready to hit it, everything is lined up. Everything is just textbook. I mean, and I
mean everybody, every single player. I was just you know, fascinated by by how precise and distinct they are when they get over the ball, you know, whether it's on the tea, in the middle of the fairway, on the green.
It's uh, it was fun to watch, fun to be a part of course.
In good shape, the highlights, it's awesome.
Course was in great shape. The uh, the Black Desert administrative people down there, they just they go all out to make sure that that that that tournament, the course is ready to go. And I think the players loved it and looked the winning score but by you was the it was twenty sixth under and the winning score last fall and the PG but Matt McCarty was was I believe it was twenty five under. And so the players love it. The players love the course, and it's
a scorable course. You know, it's not there's a lot of places you can't get in a lot of trouble. As long as you hit the ball pretty straight, I mean, you're gonna be rewarded.
Well.
I almost broke eighty there.
I can't.
I can't relate to what the pros do.
Is it hard for you to deal with your newfound celebrity status after coming on this radio program?
Am?
Yet?
Yeah?
This is tough.
I mean I'm sure people were coming up to you left and right like aren't you Smitty from the drive?
Well?
I had that, but you know, I fortunately the radio station here is kind enough to send two bodyguards with me where right go and for that that takes care of a lot of the crowd issues.
Good good, good, well good, great to have you in on a daylight today where some unexpected news drop that the Utah Jazz and their head coach Will Hardy have agreed to a contract extension through twenty thirty one and Smitty, as you know, Will was hired in twenty twenty two after Quinn left, and they gave him a five year contract with three guaranteed years and then two years of team options what they've already picked, which they've already picked up.
So prior to today, he was under contract through twenty twenty six. Now he's under contract through twenty thirty one.
This is pretty rare.
I mean for a coach you get a nine year runway, right, And so I wonder what you make of the decision of both the Jazz to offer and Will to accept.
Well, first of all, I think the Jazz are smart, smart because they have they have a guy in place that they they've worked with now, uh, every day for three years. So they've had obviously, uh, an expansive ability to look at you know, what they think about him. Not it's not so much obviously as we know Spencer, the current iteration of the Jazz on the floor, it's
not about the wins and losses. It's about setting a culture, setting an an approach, a philosophy that you feel your organization can can wrap its arms around and can be part of going forward over a long term basis. They've obviously looked at that the last three years and determined that Will Hardy is a guy they want to they want to work with long term.
Uh.
He's a guy that they feel fit what they're trying to to get accomplished there and uh. And so it's a great, you know, great idea for them to lock somebody up like that, uh, that that they feel comfortable with, that they feel is is doing things the way they
would like them to get done. On the flip side, For Will Hardy, it gives him, you know, obviously not just some coaching stability and longevity, but allows him the idea that, hey, these guys believe in me, and so I've got to do whatever I can to return that faith in that trust by working hard every day, by trying to get us better, by trying to get this program back on track the way we all want it to be. And so it gives him an inner peace.
And it's not just about the length of the contract and the money and all that kind of stuff, but it's about the idea that obviously, the people I work for have this kind of trust in me, so I have to trut the best I can to return that to them in terms of how I do my job.
So Smeddie as you know better than anybody, these coaches oftentimes are hired to be fired.
Right.
This is aion and an industry with tremendous volatility, and oftentimes a new owner comes in and it's like, if you buy the house, you're gonna put your own furniture in. If you buy the house, you want to remodel it, so it's what you want it to be because it's yours now. So I get Will Hardy jumping at the opportunity to essentially, like I said, have a nine year runway between the day he took the job and the day his contract expires.
Now, does it mean that he's going to be here for nine years?
No, we know the deal.
I mean he could be fired tomorrow and who knows what's going to happen. So and certainly this year with a coaching cycle, Taylor Jenkins losing his job after doing a great job in Memphis, Michael Malone wins a championship two years ago, and that's not enough to allow him to keep his job and coaching a team that was and still is in the playoffs and was really good.
It's a wild industry, and I get it that if you will, you jump at the opportunity to do it because you have security in a space where there really isn't security even for some of the greatest that we've seen.
But is this a risk for Will because and you know, I keep talking about this, twenty one years since the Charlotte Hornets have won a playoff series, twenty one years since the Kings have won they a playoff series, The Detroit Pistons, who once upon a time were a great, great team back in the day, have not won a home playoff game since two thousand and eight. You were part of several front offices that were able to pivot quickly to get back to competitiveness.
They're not close.
And whenever I talk about any of these really long playoff droughts, it's a reminder to our community how lucky we've been about how quickly front offices that you were a part of were able to pivot to get us back. If we're honest and we're looking at the Jazz roster and we juxtaposed it to the teams in the Western Conference playoffs, they're simply not close. With the talent that
Will has in the locker room. Is this a risk for Will to decide he wants to sign on for this long term and project with no guarantees that you've got the talent that you need to compete heading this way anytime soon?
Yeah?
I would. I would push back on that spence. I don't.
If you're a coach and you're getting offered a multi year contract extension with any organization, uh, You're you're going to take that Primarily because as I mentioned, I'm gonna go it's two things. One, you're you're getting that that kind of support from the people you report to that we like you, we believe in how you're doing it. You keep on doing what you're doing, and we're behind you and we're giving you this kind of of support
to to make that happen. And then the other part is as a coach, you want to be in a position where you can show that you can improve the situation you're in. You can get a team better, you can get players better, and the stability it brings and the confidence it brings to someone is really something that
you have to take in large measure. There's a smaller part of it, Spence, that nobody ever talks about, which is simply that there's a real world issue to this, and that is that if you're a will hardy and you're in a position like that, you have a house payment to make, you have children to feed, you have
a family to take care of. So you know, if you get an opportunity to sign a deal like this, to be able to be part of something that you believe in, that you think has a chance to improve with your input and your leadership and the organization is saying, hey, yeah, you're our guy. This isn't some what I call sometimes Spencer a fake extension where the guy got an extra year put on his contract because he had a good season, which we see a lot of times in professional sports.
The organization went out and said, we're going to give you this extent for another six years, you know, which is a long time for someone who quite frankly hasn't had a winning record. You can say we haven't had the players, he hasn't been able to do that, Okay, But obviously they believe in his approach and his philosophy enough to say the wins and the lack of wins to this point really doesn't matter. We believe in how you do your stuff. We've been around you for three years.
We know that you're the kind of guy that we want leading our group going forward. And all of that is symbiotic. You know, they help you, you help them. Everybody's in it together, and it's a big it's a big moment for the organization to all be on the same page.
In that regard with Greg Popovich stepping down, and I do want to get to that in a moment Eric Sposter is the longest tenured coach in Pro basketball seventeen years in Miami, Steve Kerr eleven years in Golden State. The third longest tenured coach is Tom Thibodeaux with the New York Knicks.
Five years.
There we go.
So if Will coaches through the end of his contract and it's nine years, it would make him the third longest tenured coach as we currently sit here.
And that underscores your point, doesn't it.
If you get there right, if you get to that right. I mean, so Tibbs is the third longest tenured five years. That just there's thirty teams in the league spense, So you're talking about the third longest tenured guy. There's another twenty seven teams that are after him who have had coaches less than five years. I mean, come on, how
do you expect to gain any traction? How do you expect to have any stability in your organization to be able to build upon something when you just keep stopping and starting, stopping and starting hiring a guy, firing a guy, changing general managers, changing the head coach. Like that's why you see a lot of these organizations can never get
anything going because they don't have the patients. They don't have the foresight to be able to see that if you get something in place that you think makes sense for you, that you want to keep that in place over an extended period of time so you have some longevity, so you have an ability to get some traction, to
get some footing to see what's going on. Obviously, the Jazz front office led by Danny Ainge justin Zanik, and then their ownership of course with Ryan and Ashley Smith, have looked at it and said, we.
Want will Hardy to be here long term.
That's the only way we can put some stakes in the ground and and continue to drive this thing brick by brick by brick.
And that's the commitment they made today.
I'm not even gonna ask you to guess who the fourth longest tenured coach is if you want to go ahead, but.
You would have about Tylu Dannel.
It's not he's sixth.
Okay, okay, I'm in the I'm in the vicinity right hold on, let me let me scan it quickly.
It blew my mind when I read it quick because I feel like he was hired yesterday.
Quickly.
Chris Finch it's Billy Donovan.
It's Billy Donovan.
I feel like they hired him last week.
Yeah, yeah, I see.
And Billy's had you know, they've had uneven results, right, they've had uneven results. And they've had a team that they put together a few years ago that they thought, you know, you know, it could be sustainable with a Lonzo Ball and and and Uh and Zach Lavine and and uh and the Big Kid and they just you know, they couldn't get any you know, they were okay but
not great. But they they've stayed in that gray area. See, And that's that's what the killer thing is in the NBA spence is if you're an organization, if you're an owner, you know, we always would would say you want to be one of the top five teams, or if you can't be that, you want to be one of the bottom five teams to have a chance to improve your your situation going forward. If you're one of the middle twenty teams, it doesn't make any sense. You're not going anywhere.
That's what's happened to this point with the Chicago Bulls. They've gone with Billy so far because he's proven that he's a winner both in college and in his days at Okay See. But you have to have some stability, you have to believe in what you've got set up in order to give yourself a chance long term to
have some sustained level of success. They haven't had it in Chicago, but obviously to this point they've stuck by their guns and part of it's their roster thing that they've started to remake also in this last year.
So speaking of Greg Popovich, we heard from Coach pop today for the first time since November of twenty two, twenty four, and I gotta say it kind of made me a little sad. And you know, I'm old enough now to have seen people and coaches that I loved
and respected in this league age. I can remember the first time I saw Jerry after I heard that he wasn't well, and Jerry and his wife Tammy were good enough to invite me to a playoff game and I sat with them, and it just it makes you sad, you know, when you see Jerry Sloan, who you used to being that demonstrative leader just kind of age and not look like the way that he did. And seeing Coach pop today kind of made me sad. You know,
he spoke very softly. You could tell he's been through helen back and he lost his bride a couple of years ago, his wife of you know, I think forty fifty years passed, and obviously he's had the stroke that
clearly has had a detrimental effect on him. I wonder, Smittye if you could put some color and context into a conversation that's happened over the years a number of different times, which is the synergistic approach between the San Antonio Spurs and the Utah Jazz and how Greg Popovich has spoken often about how he wanted to use coach Loan as a model. There was this great clip that was going around after Pop broke coach Sloan's record for
wins with an individual team. A reporter asked, I know that wins and losses aren't everything to you, but you did break Jerry Sloan's record, and Greg paused and said, I'm not in his league and I never will be. There was always this reverent respect between coach Popovich and coach Sloan. You had a front row seat. I wonder if you could provide some context to that.
Yeah, well, Pop would always say that. You know, early on, remember in the early nineties, Greg Popovich was the general manager of the San Antonio Spurs. He had Bob Hill as his coach. They decided to make a change ownership did in the mid nineties, and they put a Pop in the coaching seat for the time being, and he stayed there for, you know, for what seemed like forever. They also, let's let's let's call it the way it is.
You know, you can be a good coach and and uh, and I've heard many coaches, you know, say this along the way, you know, whether they want to take credit or not. But you know, what makes a good coach is good players. And Pop had the good fortune of of coming in right at the time when he had David Robinson in his prime. Uh, they the ping pong balls that year fell their way. They got Tim Duncan, happened to be in the draft that year. It just happened to be the year that David Robinson missed seventy
games during the season. And they go back, yeah, and they and and so they they they got in the lottery and they ended up put the number one pick in that year in that draft. Just happened to be Tim Duncan. So now they got Tim Duncan, and then they they they got Lucky, you know with the MONOGENOBILEI pick, which was late in the second round. You know, he was he was playing in Italy and uh, and they they took him as as kind of a lark and hopefully that they could get him over at some point,
which they did. And then they took Tony Parker, who everybody thought could be a decent player, didn't know if he could be a point guard at the NBA level or not, if he was an undersized two. And he came in with that group. And again, Spence, it's not just about you as an individual, but all the players that you're you're with and and how you how you coll ce with each other, and how you work with
each other. And Tony Parker was the beneficiary of playing with with three other Hall of Fame level guys as it turned out, and they had the terrific run that they did. But coach Coach Pop was always very a complimentary of of of Jerry Sloan and always talked in during the nineties while the Jazz were running the show. The Jazz didn't win a championship they played for two
of them in the finals. But also during the decade of the nineties spent a lot of people either don't know or forgotten the fact that the Jazz won more games in the nineties than any team in the NBA. They won more, they won more games in the Chicago Bulls. They won more than the Lakers, they won more than they won more games than anybody. Okay, they were they were a competitive team, and the championship level team for
a lot of years didn't work out. Had a couple of you know, last minute shots by a guy named Jordan that that won a couple of finals games. Okay,
that's the way it goes. But Pop always said during that time, we're trying to emulate our franchise after the Utah Jazz, the way they conduct themselves, the way they're coached, the way their front office runs their business, all of those kinds of things, which was always a very nice compliment, and and he continued to say that whenever the opportunity would come up, even after they were winning multiple championships, to say, well, we're just I remember I remember talking
to Sam Presty one time at a game we were both scouting down in Phoenix when when Sam was with the San Antonio front office before he went to Seattle, and that became okay, see thunder. And I remember him saying to me, well, Smiddy, we're just we're just trying to be like you guys. We're trying to figure out how to jazz do it and and and do it the same way. And you know, which is the ultimate compliment when when someone is saying they're trying to do
things away, your organization does it. But the Jazz had that that kind of reputation all during the Miller ownership because of the way things were handled, especially with Jerry being at the forefront, and of course the Laden's running the office in the nineties and then and then Kevin O'Connor in the two thousands, and Dennis Lindsay and the twenty tens and you know, had such a great run. But but you have to part of it is you have to have the players. You have to have good
players to be able to compete. That's the ain't thing. But behind that you have to have some level of stability and some continuity to what you're trying to do.
And the the the uh.
The announcement today that the Jazz have given Will Hardy this this long extension that says we want him to be the guy leading us on the floor and giving us that kind of continuity uh and stability.
Uh.
Says a lot about what they think of Will and also what they think about how they're trying to conduct their business long term.
All right, Smitty, youre ready to drop a trivia question. I'm gonna do my read, and while I'm doing my read, I want you to come up with a good jazz draft related you got one?
I got it, I got it in my head. I got you know, I got to think of uh if I get yeah, I got I got Okay.
I'll do my read and then you dropped the question.
It's time now for the ESPN Festival at Ease, powered by the Utah Golf Association. Each day of springd seven hundred is given away rounds of golf to the best courses in the state. Listening to The Down and Dirty with Scott Mitchell from ten to eleven, the Sean O'Connell Show from eleven to two, and of course this program which is called The Drive with Spence check Its from two to six for your chance to win. Each day from ESPN seven hundred and the Utah Golf Association detail is gonna.
Be found at ESPN seven hundred sports dot com.
Now, Smitty, it's got to be a good one because we are sending a lucky listener to Davis Park, which is one of the most underrated tracks that we have in the state.
I love that course. Hopefully I'm going there Thursday if I can get on out of guy. That's one of my favorite places.
Okay, So today's Richard Smith trivia question is what.
Yes, I'm gonna I'm gonna throw this out actually for our movie lovers as well and our Hollywood people. Okay, all right, there's a famous, famous actor in Hollywood. His name is Jason Siegel. He's worked in a lot of TV shows, a lot of movies. I think a lot of our our listeners may know him as a very successful actor. Well, Jason Siegel, when he was in high school, played on the high school basketball team with a former
jazz player. We want our fans to figure out who the jazz player is that Jason Siegel played with in high school.
Spence go that.
Well, I can't say it into the microphone, and I'll be honest with you, I don't even know the answer. Usually you drop a trivia question, like last week it was the second rounders. I knew it was millsap and mo. I honestly don't know what the answer is, so you
internet's loose, get to it. Jason Siego played high school basketball with a former member of the Utah Jazz First person who texts that into eight seven seven three five three zero seven hundred, We're going to send you to Davis Park, one of the best tracks that we have in the state. All right, we'll catch a break. We got two hours down on a Monday. We got two hours to go on a Monday. Coming up next, the
NBA Draft lottery is one week from today. What's the emotion like in the office when you have a lottery pick that could mean so much? We'll also do some playoffs. Round two starts tonight. Richard Smith live in studio for another big segment. Caught up on the other side right here on a ESPN seven hundred. All right, not to give you the answer to the question, but the former jazz man who Jason Siegel played high school basketball with. It's actually up on his Wikipedia page, so you can
find it. A lot easier than I thought you could. Smitty, I got to say, let's get Smitty's mic on. I got to say, the most surprising part of this little rabbit hole you sent me down is to learn that Jason Siegel won a slam dunk contest a senior in high school.
Wells, why why why are you giving like clues to people to go with find the answer?
Like?
This is, Smitty, I mean, this is like, you know, like the high school, like the high school teachers us. Yeah, I just want to get these kids out of the clown want to get out of here. So yeah, give them, give them the answers to the.
Test, and respectfully, sir.
Uh, my guess is that a listener who probably is our You've been able to get the answer simply googled Jason Siegel and went right to his Wikipedia page. I'm quite sure I did not wet some crazy clue out there. That would be my guest. Porter, Do we have a winner to go golf at Davis Park?
We do? We do?
Okay, so then we can you can you can expand so.
Then we can say that the high school the teammate of Jason Seagal was one Jason Collins.
Yes, yes, he played with Harvard Westlake, which is a very prestigious private high school in the southern California, LA area. And both Jason and Jarn Collins went to Harvard west Lake and from there obviously got recruited both of them to go play at Stanford collegiately and then had they both had very extensive NBA careers, and Jason Siegal decided to fake left go right and ended up going south instead of going north to Stanford, went south to Hollywood, and and that was it.
Do you know Seagull was a good player at all.
I mean, according to this Wikipedia page, those teams one state championships. But my guess is that's more about the Collins twins than it was about Jason.
I would I would say so, but I don't know. I don't know any of I just you know, I only know that because one time, in some conversation I was having with Jaren, it was just like some random thing that came out. I think somebody had mentioned something about a movie and a dinner one night when we were on the road, and and Jared Collins said, yeah, that's funny. He goes, you know, I gotta I get to call him and tell him that or something. I can't remember what it was about. And somebody said, what
do you mean, call him? He goes, you know, you know I played in high school with him. What are you talking about? You played high school with him, Jason Siegel. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, yeah, he's I call him up right now. We said, get out of here, and he said, no, I'm serious. You played with us at Harvard Westlake. Okay, that's what I knew of it. I didn't know anything about a slam
dunk contest. I'd heard that or something. Jason, Jason or Jaron one of them was supposed to be in a slam dunk contest or something, and and they deferred and said, hey, let Jason do it, you know, let him do it whatever.
Give him some give him some some props, you know.
Okay, I just Jason Segel has never struck me as like a great athlete, just like one of those big, you know, loopy Ben handlogged and type dudes.
Ben hand logged in.
Shout out, Ben hand LogD in, right, how shout out our guy?
Ben handloged that Monday out there. I want to see Jason Siegel dunk. I'm very curious about this. Uh, anyway, we can move on Smitty one week from tonight, and I just found out this morning we will have the draft lottery live on our radio station coming up next week five o'clock straight up. We will say good night a little bit early for our show so we can bring the draft lottery to you guys. And I can't remember a lottery as consequential for the Jazz as this
one could potentially be. Uh, As a guy who scouted and was part of four rooms for decades, what's it like over there, Prepper, you know.
As far as their preparation for next Monday, Well, I.
Mean, you know, they're preparing just for the draft in general. Sure, obviously they have no control. This is one of those things we've talked about before, Spence, where the Jazz have certain things under their control that they can work at to try and get their team better, which is, you know, you know, how you draft who you draft. Obviously they've had several picks in the last couple of drafts and
this the jury is still out. I think I think, at least my own opinion on all of those guys, whether they're going to be you know, substantial NBA guys of any of any sort. But you could control those things and how you do your your scouting and how you do your evaluation. But then there are things that you don't control that just happened to you, that could potentially fall in your lap that can help or hurt
you know what you're trying to get done. And of course the draft lottery in a week is going to be one of those things that can help or delay what they're trying to do. If they get the first pick, which is they're going to go into it with a fourteen chance of getting that first pick, then they would, most likely, as everybody would think, be looking hard at drafting the freshman out of Duke Cooper Flag, who I think is gonna be a very good pro. I think
he's gonna be a very good player. He's gonna remind people when he comes in the league whoever he plays for of a to me some kind of a combination of Gordon Hayward slash Larry Bird type skills, because he passes the ball, he's a team player, he's a smart he gets he plays both ends of the floor. He's not the shooter that Larry Bird is, you know. I think he might be a little bit better defender maybe than both Larry Bird and Gordon Hayward early in their careers,
because he's a very competitive guy. He's a tough guy. He also has some ability to actually uh be a rim protector at his size at six', nine he has a very good instincts as a help. Defender and so he's he's a guy they're gonna be looking hard at whoever whoever gets the number one, Pick AND i, THINK i really think there's there's a there's an argument to be made between him and uh and The Dylan harper kid out Of, rutgers who WHO i think is gonna be a terrific uh N b a point guard because
he has the size at six five sixty. Six, uh he has the, mentality he has the. Toughness uh he's a great pick and roll. Guy he's a very good free throw. Shooter he doesn't mind getting in the, lane taking, hits getting back to the, floor get, up go to the free throw, line knock him. Down he's got some toughness to his. Game SO i like both of those. Guys if The jazz end up with the first or second, pick it's gonna be.
Interesting nine times in the draft lottery for The, jazz which is stunning if you think about. It fifty years of jazz, basketball nine lottery. Appearances of, course the lottery as we know it started in eighty four with my Guy.
Patrick Ewing lady In New.
York Sagra meno has been in it twenty seven, Times Golden state twenty three, Times charlotte twenty three, Times philly nineteen, times The lakers fourteen, times nine.
Times is pretty.
STUNNING i mean that goes to what we were talking about, earlier how quickly you guys were always able to pivot and get back to being good well.
The jazz over the years during The miller, ownership obviously they had great teams With Stockton, malone who a lot of people know about Their hall Of fame, careers but a lot of people aren't aware of the fact that the reason they were good for so long is that for thirteen of the eighteen years That stocked in To malone played, together neither guy missed the.
Game so they say that into that.
Microphone, well the, Thing, spence at that, time we used to play eight preseason. Games they would always play in all of the games because they wanted to play and get ready for the. Season jerry wanted them to play to make sure, everybody everybody around, them you, know knew how to play with them and all that kind of. Stuff so they would play eight preseason. Games they would then play eighty two regular season. Games they get them up to ninety and then they were always in the.
Playoffs so every, Year, spence for thirteen of the eighteen years they played, together Both John stockton And Carl malone played in the neighborhood of one hundred games every, year and then next year they played in one hundred games, again and then the next year they played in the one, hundred and then the next, year and then the next. Year and So jazz fans became spoiled by, that, obviously because those guys never got.
Hurt you.
Know john's one injury had during his entire nineteen year career was his was his knee in ninety eight in the early season ninety eight where he missed sixteen. Games and uh and And carl alone during his eighteen years with The, jazz missed a total of twelve. Games and and the thing that a lot of fans don't, know spensers of those twelve games he. Missed eight of them
were because of league. Suspension they weren't because of. Injury they were because he knocked Down Isaiah thomas, elbow this guy and, whatever and got got got whacked a game or two here and, there you. Know but but carl missed four games because of injury or illness in eighteen. Years and it was funny because during that time it was almost like they were competing against each other to see who could be the most, Durable, like, well he's he's he's got the, flu right is?
He is he playing?
Tonight? Yeah well Then i'm. Playing i'm. Not i'm, Yeah i'm not gonna let. Him i'm not gonna let him get ahead of, me you know this kind yeah yeah. Yeah and so then you had the changeover when they left in three to, Four and then you had the quick turnaround in the summer where Where kevin O'Connor was able to convince Both Carlos boozer And met o'cor to
come To utah and and and a quick. Turnaround then the following year Draft Darren williams moving up from the sixth pick to the to the third, pick and then have a quick turnaround With Andre kerlenko And Ronnie brewer
and had a very competitive team. Then and then of course the re the turnaround when those guys were gone With Dennis lindsay and Drafting Donovan mitchell at thirteen and making the trade With denver h and Drafting Rudy gobert of course at twenty seven and buying that pick also From.
Denver you, know that's always a thing that's interested. Me spence's all the with all the Success denver had With Tim connolly at The helm In denver in the twenty, tens they would have the exact same team that they have. Now the guys they, Drafted they Drafted, jokic they Drafted, maury they Drafted. Porter they could also Have gobaer And mitchell on those. Teams all they had to do was draft them or or evaluate it the same way as
The jazz. Did they, didn't you, know but those are guys that they could have had just by picking them when they had their picks come. Up and that just illustrates how how fluid the draft can be and how different teams evaluate and look at. Players when you get into that situation where you have to make a decision BETWEEN a AND b it becomes it becomes very.
Interesting jazz have moved down three, Times they've never moved up and they've Stood PAT i misspoke. Earlier this will actually be the Tenth lottery appearance for The, Jazz so they've moved down three. Times they moved down last year where they had the eighth best odds and they picked. Tenth they Took Cody. Williams year before that they stayed, nine they Took Taylor. Hendricks going all the way back to two thousand and, Four Chris humphreys was the pick at.
Fourteen Martel webster technically the pick in two thousand and, five but that was the deal you guys made For.
Darren yeah, right, yeah, yeah so you moved up to three to take.
D will let me ask you while we're in that, space how early in that process were you guys On Darren because for our listeners that may not, remember that was The Chris Paul Darren williams, debate, right and, like how early in the process did you guys identify we WANT d Will.
Well it was you, know it was a debate because also in That mixpense Was Raymond. Felton that's.
Right so we had so the top point guards in college at the time were Considered Darren williams From, Illinois Chris paul From Wake, forest And Raymond felton From North. Carolina and so it was it was a race to the finish, line if you, will between those three guys as to who teams thought might be the best or pro who teams liked and you, know and you, know in different, regard you, know D will he wasn't the so called slam dunk.
Pick it wasn't. Him all the.
Time there was a lot of internal, debate a lot of discussion about the different you, know pros and cons of those. GUYS i would say That Raymond felton was a little bit Behind Chris paul and D will in terms of the heart horse race to the finish, line so to. Speak and at the end of the, day The jazz made the decision they liked D will's size a little bit. Better, uh they liked his you, know maybe his toughness a little bit, better you, know and and,
uh you, know, hey you can argue it either. Way, now you, Know Chris paul is still playing and has had A hall Of fame. Career, Obviously Darren, williams you, know the first four years or five years where he was with The jazz or, something our teams Played Chris paul's.
TEAMS i think d will was like seven and two Against Chris paul or something or.
Whatever but a lot of that has to do with the team you're on as. Well but and and and Deren willis is also part of Two olympic teams that won gold and and so you, know people forget how good of a player he was early in his career with with The, jazz you, know but you could Argue Chris, paul, yep he's had that, career and and he, was you, know would be a jazz type of.
Guy and.
Uh at the end of the, DAY i think it was just decided, that you, know we liked the idea of a little bit of a bigger, guy a little bit more, size, uh that that we could put on the.
Floor and that's that's how that that decision went.
Down who did you?
Want i'll be, HONEST i was really mixed with those. GUYS i you, KNOW i could see the argument for both of. THEM I i like the d will size thing a little. Bit you, Know Chris Chris paul is six feet you, know and and but he showed some toughness WHEN i saw him playing college at Wake. Forth he had a couple of games where where they got into a little skirmish on the floor and he was right in the middle of it and wasn't backing down from. Anybody so you could see that he had some internal
toughness that, that you, know would would serve him. Well, uh but you, know looking back on, IT i would have never, said, well one guy's going to finish his career and then the other guy is gonna play, five, six seven years after that. GUY i would have never said that either, way because you can never know how those things are going to play.
Out but, yeah but it was it was A i would say it.
Was the room was very, mixed and it was very, uh you, know it wasn't like, lopsided like we got to have this guy and whatever and table pounding and all that kind of.
Stuff and you, know AND i.
Think, JERRY i Think jerry liked the idea of the of the size a little bit too in the, lineup you.
Know so that's actually WHAT i wanted to ask you BECAUSE i had always heard and, LOOK i Just Chris paul has always been my, guy you, know so LIKE i think two thousand and five may have been my first year on air full, time and SO i can remember draft night without any knowledge of what you guys were going to. Do WHEN i saw that you had traded, UP i stood up off my couch AND i, Said Chris paul is going to be a jazz, man AND
i was so pumped for that. Possibility but you had heard over the years that it Was, Jerry and, LOOK i know you guys all collaborated.
And kevin was that type of.
Leader So i'm not saying it was a, monolith but how much truth was is the old adage That jerry is the One it, SAID i like the bigger, GUARD i want to go With.
Darren, well, WELL i think that's what he felt, like you, know But.
Jerry this was one of the great things about working With Jerry sloan all the years THAT i was fortunate enough to do. This he was great during the draft in that he would watch film of. Guys he would come into our group, meetings he would be prepared to offer, his you, know his take on what he saw and what he thought on.
Film but he was always.
Spent the first guy to stand up and, say, LOOK i have an OPINION i think this about you, know play or so and. So but you, guys meaning the scouts and the guys who go out and research it all year and see them in person and do all. That you guys work at it much harder THAN i, do and you guys have studied it much longer THAN.
I, have and you have a better feel for.
It SO i will give you my opinion about, this BUT i am not going, to you, know try and override anybody's. Opinion you guys have do, it you, know
for your day to day. Business you, Know i'm gonna end up going with what you guys think because and that was one Of jerry's great attributes was that whatever job you, Had, spence whether you were you, know the front office scouting personnel, guys whether you were one of the guys who worked for the public relations, group whether you worked for the marketing, group whether you worked in the in the ticketing, office whatever your job, was that
happened to intersect with What. Jerry's jerry's responsibilities were as a head. Coach he was always the Best i've ever been. Around it's, saying, HEY i could override this decision to you, know make some public appearance for the team on A tuesday afternoon or whatever and, say, no we're not. Going But jerry would, say, Well Patty patty bally R, pr, yeah community relations person for a long. Time patty, says we have this thing tomorrow at. Three so we have
the thing tomorrow at. Three and you, know some players might, go, oh you, KNOW i don't want to, go OR i got, something and he would, say, HEY i don't know what to tell. You patty, said we got to be there at, three so we'd be there at. Three and that's why everybody loved working with him because, everybody no matter what your responsibility, was everybody knew That jerry had your back because he understood the time and the effort that you put into doing your job to the best of your.
Ability so you, know and, likewise when it came to the, draft you, know he would have an, opinion but he would always finish it by, saying but you guys know it better than, me so whatever you guys.
Think so, ultimately final call back then made By. KEVIN i would Imagine kevin was the. Guy, yeah, yeah it Was.
Kevin you, know it would Be, kevin and you, know if there was any kind of you, know pulling tug or you, know you, know nose line at the, finish you, Know jerry and And kevin would would hash it out and then just you, know and and But i'm telling, YOU i can't remember a time When jerry ever, said you, know, hey this is the, guy come, on what are we talking.
About he always would say at the, end, Well, kevin you, guys you guys, know so you guys just, whatever Because jerry, felt you, know very comfortable saying, that because he also felt like at the same, time SO i hope you will. Reciprocate When i'm the, coach don't tell me Now i'm making a decision in the fourth quarter of the, game right. YEAH i don't want to hear after the game that you're second guessing me or you, know saying well you
should have done this or. THAT i, mean that was never, said but it was always understood that That jerry's giving you your, space and he's allowing you to do your, job and he's with you in that, regard and he hopes that you, reciprocate you, know with the same kind of the same kind of, support you, know for him.
And the job he was trying to.
Do.
SEE i find this to be really fascinating AND i don't know how it works currently over. There Will hardy was asked during his post season media, availability how involved are you during the draft, process And will, Said i'm very. Involved he will be In chicago for the draft. Lottery BUT i Believe i'm a firm. Believer i've Already i've always been a firm believer in just front offices That i've had a chance to be, around that it is important to have one final.
Voice who does make the.
CALL i do think the best roster constructors have a team of people around them who they talk to and they take input. From but at the end of the, day you've got to have one guy who's brave enough to say, no this is my, call even if he doesn't necessarily, agree and that can bring mixed. Results and you know the way That Ernie grunfeld And Pat riley worked, together you, Know pat was very much a part of,
it but he Allowed ernie to make the. Call and then it was the same thing With grunfeld And Van gundy until it wasn't and those two got loose and this decision had to be Made i've told you.
BEFORE i can remember being in the war room When Ed.
Tapscott went rogue and just Drafted Frederick, weiss when most of the Knick scouts wanted run our.
Test what is the best way for that to?
Work BECAUSE i think it's probably fair to say if there's one voice that makes the call over, there my guess is that It's. Danny's it's never a good idea for the own ownership group to have the. VOICE i don't know If ryan wants to be the guy that actually makes the. Call if it, IS i think that's horrible. News my guess is that the voice Is. Danny's that's my. Guess but there's Justin, zanik There's Will. Hardy any thoughts on the synergies over there?
Now, NO i.
Don't i'm not, There. SPENCER i have no.
IDEA i would assume that that's Why Ryan smith brought In Danny ainge and and who's been in THE nba at all levels and has made his life's. Work and and you bring a guy like that in who had, retired who was living his retirement life and In Utah county and and, uh just trying to have a quiet.
Life And Ryan smith went and got him and convinced him to uh to take up this this project with The, Jazz and SO i would make it just a guess that you know that he's relying On Danny ainge's you, know ability and instincts and and uh knowledge and all that stuff of the league to to be the final
decision maker on BETWEEN a AND. B you, know with our groups THAT i was part of all the, time it was always the the the the person who sat in that decision making, seat whether it Was Scott laden or whether it Was kevin, O'Connor or whether it Was Dennis. Lindsay you, know they were the guys who had the control of. That and they were all very collaborative. Guys they listened to everybody in the. Room they gave everybody
a chance to have their voice. Heard you, know they would you, know and you, know we even had a couple. Instances you, KNOW i can remember where We're kevin O'Connor made decisions on some stuff that he didn't tell anybody, about and then after the, fact you, know we would, say, hey you know a week.
Later a month later or, Whatever, hey what was that thing about?
That what was that?
Deal and he would, Say, HEY i had, TO i had to make a.
Decision BUT i didn't want to implicate any of you, guys because if it didn't work, OUT i felt, like that's not fair to. You i'm the guy in the hot, seat SO i deserve to get all the, blame you, know or all have all the slings and arrows you, know aimed at me if if it didn't work. Out SO i didn't want to tell you guys that we were going to do that BECAUSE i didn't want you to be part of that, process because that's that's my
job to have to deal with. That and so you, know and, again those are the kind of guys you want to work, with because those are the guys who who have your back and and respect what you bring to the process and how hard it is to make those kinds of.
Decisions all, right BEFORE i set you, loose nobody is giving the next a. Chance nobody believes the next have a chance to be The celtics four times and seven. Tries neither DO, I neither DO. I All, Right So New york goes out and they make the move for og and An. Obi they sacrificed their draft capital for Mckill, bridges two big wing defenders, that in theory can at
least provide some pushback For tatum And. Brown WHERE i think this is just untenable For New york Is Drew Holliday Derek white on On jalen because look At Tom thibodeau has.
Forgotten more about basketball THAN i ever.
Know but WHEN i watch The knicks, offensively there are so many possessions where it's one four flatter isolation And jalen has to do it, all and he's so good at times he's able to pull it. Off but four times and seven tries against WHO i think the best team in basketball is round two starts. Tonight do The knicks have A Mike tyson uppercut chance four times and seven?
Tries, Yeah well you always have a, chance be so you, know look that, everybody everybody's starting with a clean. Slate you don't know somebody's gonna have a buddy healed night and go off for you, know thirty three points off the, bench or somebody's Gonna Jason tatum is gonna twist his ankle In game two and he's gonna miss several.
Games, YEAH i, mean you have to play it.
OUT i think the, knicks you, know made the right moves and getting guys like you just, mentioned and and then it will be in bridges because if you have a chance to get those kind of guys and you have a chance to be competitive with whoever the other teams, are then then you have to take that. Opportunity that's what you're in the business. For you're in the business to. Compete you're in there to try and give it your best.
Shot maybe it's not good, enough but you take it and you go you go to to the jump ball and you see what we got. Tonight and then if it doesn't work, tonight then we make some adjustments and we go to the next game and so. Forth but
that's what it's all. About and so you, KNOW i think they have a. CHANCE i don't know what that will look, like you, know but again you're gonna have to have the best version of the guys you, have you, know for a vast majority of each game in order to have a. Chance but that's you, know as they, Say, spence that's why they play the.
Games, yes, sir great to see. You are you in town for the foreseeable future or you're on some?
Anxiety Look i'm Gonna i'm gonna be on pins and needles a week from today to see what happens with the with the draft. Lottery i'm gonna Be i'm gonna be sitting in my lucky seat and have all my fingers and toes crossed and do whatever and and uh and we'll see how that all plays.
Out all, right my, Friend, well great to see you as. Always we'll see you next, week came. Man all, right the Great Richard. Smith you know it just works on so many levels when you start listening to the, lyrics you, know it JUST i don't, know, man it's one of the BITS i can't.
Quit and you know the.
Deal when we Play Limp biscuit on this radio, show it's time to welcome in club legends Future hall Of. Famer, Uh Trey. Fitzgerald who's The hall Of? Fame by the time you got the, intro, right who's the hall.
Of fame named?
After?
Again that you're gonna be inducted to SOME nwsl like you told us this. WEEKEND i better beat when you're inducted into the whatever hall of.
Fame, oh there is A Colin Jose Media. Award okay at The National Soccer hall Of fame And Colin jose was A.
Nws now the archive.
Is for the NASL, oh the league that form the foundation for the sport in this country over the last fifty.
Years how do we get you on the list for that award or do you actually have to work for? It good, question just out of. Curiosity, Hello, trey how are?
You i'm?
Great how are you? Great to see you live in.
Studio if you've ever wondered What trey looks like and why The olympus get music works so, well don't do.
That don't produces up log on our YouTube. Channel trey is in. STUDIO i always appreciate your time coming.
Down all, right let's just start with some big picture stuff with the, club because it's been it's been a rough start and it's been a little chaotic behind the scenes with the ownership. Transition the primary transfer window comes and goes with a couple of, additions but no additions THAT i think a lot of people were either hoping or.
Expecting when it came to A.
Dp The bosanik deal with The portuguese club falls apart at last.
Minute so what's the?
Past you, know a month month and app been like for you.
Guys, yeah it's BEEN i think, energetic it's been. DYNAMIC
i think in all ways it's been. Positive even The bosenig deal falling, apart it was you, know that happened as a result OF i Think kurt and company drawing a line in the sand and saying you're not going to change from euros or dollars to euros at the last minute and ask for a bunch more money that was the, deal and move the goalposts and change the, terms and you, KNOW i Think kurt got to a point where he felt like if we met their, demands it would set a bad precedent and it would also
kind of hamstring us a little bit in the. Summer so The agata trade was made With Sporting Kansas. City we haven't really seen him much. Yet he did play forty five At, vancouver played what twenty, two twenty three At San. Diego clearly he's a talented. Player he scored two goals AGAINST us last. Year you, KNOW i guess in my mind maybe he ends up being over the longer, term more of The Anderson julio. Replacement and you, Know chicho was really good For San. Jose the other, night and,
UH i think that'll Be kurt's focus in the. Summer is is a killer nine and you reference the ownership. Change every Experience i've had with anybody on The miller side in the months leading up to the official public
announcement has been nothing but amazingly. Positive and you, know, Look, SPENCE i never once thought THAT rsl would Leave utah or move From, utah but you, Know Commissioner garber and others they, said with The miller family being the majority locally engaged, owner there's never a. Doubt and you, know The blitzer group is still very much, involved especially on
the sporting. Side we've got some young academy products that are over In denmark With bronby right now and they're going to get some cups of coffee around some of the different teams in the continent. There that's exciting stuff for the development of a. Kid it's not probably super exciting for our fans that are worried about first team
performance over the first third of the. Season BUT i guess the saving grace right now AS i try to look at things glass half, full as we've got twenty five games left across all, competitions so there's plenty of time to kind of turn the ship. Around four, wins seven losses IN, mls we're ONLY i think six points out of second, place which is. Amazing seven. Points maybe go To dallas this weekend at the end of a
three game road. Trip dallas just got, Smashed so if we can get the three points, there take six out of. Nine The vancouver loss is, disappointing but they're the best team in the, league so for us to have kind of maybe not embarrassed ourselves against them is a moral, victory which obviously don't count for.
Anything seven points out a second in, fairness two points out.
Of Fourteenth, okay, yeah tightly.
Packed but, LOOK i bring it up for context because over the course of the twenty years, now which is still wild for me to think about of the existence of the, club some of our best teams had horrible starts and some of our worst teams had awesome. Steves this, season almost unlike any, other is an absolute.
Marathon this is not a.
Sprint So i'm not ready to anoint or, dismiss BUT i do think there is a faction of this fan base that looks at AND i want you to walk us through this because you've been around the league forever and it is a single entity policy, Continuously so you cannot draw a straight line by doing all of the math of every player you let go and, saying why don't we spend every one of those dollars on a player. Transfer that's not how the business model. Works however it
it IS i think understandable for a fan. Base it saw potentially fifteen to eighteen of the most exciting games that we've ever seen here last year with that group of attacking players be broken down brick by brick without adequate.
REPLACEMENTS i think that's, fair, True, yeah, YEAH i think it is. Fair the whiplash from a year ago to now is CERTAINLY i think exacerbating the. Situation because you do go fifteen games in the league unbeaten for the better part Of March april And, may you're in first, Place you're in the supporter shield. Race chicho's got seventeen goals in seventeen. GAMES i think at that point you sell Andres chicho scores one goal in his final what twenty,
games let's say maybe a little. Less over the second half of the, season.
It.
Was it was a stumble to the finish after you sell Andres now it's NOT i think people forget. That, okay you Sell andre's for eleven, million it goes to thirteen with some. Bonuses all that money isn't paid up. Front you take five million of what you get from him and you Buy, diogo you Buy DOMINIC, marchuk you Buy Lachlan, brook you Sign Javane brown off of waivers From. Vancouver so it's not like no resources were used and everything was. Pocketed that's just not how it. Works because
some of these dollars are real cash. Dollars as you've Heard kurt, explain some of the gam is not real. Cash it's fictional kind of, capology if you. WILL i think you, know the Chi cho move was. Calculated The Matt crooks move was maybe a little, late and it was right by. Him he's doing very well in the in the championship over In. England BUT i think now through the first ten eleven, games we've realized how much work he did for everybody, else and you're missing.
That.
Now what it's done is you're Allowing Diego luna to become the. Man As pablo said a couple of weeks, ago he's not on the ascent. Anymore this is his. Team he's the. Man maybe that's a lot to put on a twenty one year old. Shoulders you, know Maybe dominic has Not he's BEEN i think, positive but he hasn't been as consistent as he was in the final seven games last. Year aripol clearly learning on the. Job
agata And russell we've hardly seen box to. BOX i think everybody feels really good about the core of the, team And annelli And ojeda And glad And vera And junka And catronas and you, know maybe right back we've had a rotating cast of. Characters Rafael cabral has been, phenomenal but we don't have those difference, makers The chico And andres that we had a year. Ago nobody other Than diego has really stepped up in that category.
Well and WE i think it might be time and maybe pastime to have a, salient honest conversation About, diogo who has the same amount of goals As Sam junko right, now right he has a goal and he has two assists in eleven. Games and you, know last year he rolled into town with a lot of fanfare and was not productive and the walking line was we need a preseason with. Him, yeah he's your ONLY, dp and from
my vantage, point he hasn't been good. Enough so maybe you guys are seeing things in training or moments where you know he is providing the quality that you want from that. Position but at what point do we look at that and, SAY i don't, know, man it's not A it hasn't worked straight so.
Far, yeah AND i think there's a couple of ways to look at. It and you, know talking To pablo And Kurt daily AS i, DO i Think pablo looks At diogo and, Says, okay this is a guy who played thirty One Champions league. Games clearly there's quality and, pedigree different, league different style of. Play he was not the man in any of those situations At copenhagen Or. Benfica he was the man behind the man or the
man behind the man behind the. Man and the other thing That pablo has said consistently in His apple production calls Is diego is a very smart technical. Player he's an incredible. Finisher when he's on the, Field he's seeing the game In pablo's estimation two, three four steps, ahead but nobody around him is seeing the game at the same cadence as he, Is so there's a disconnect. There,
Right he's surrounded by an awful lot of. Youth and, again these are all just making excuses for, him because if he didn't have those TWO dp initials next to his, NAME i think the perception of his contribution as performers would probably be very. Different SO i would expect in the summer you add A, dp maybe THAT, dp that presence of that OTHER dp would hold him accountable in such a. Way maybe he. LEAVES i don't, know it
could be one situation or. Another his wife just announced On instagram a week ago that they are expecting their first child, Graduation so you never know how some of these off field things are. Happening like you, know you've heard the guys talk. About you, Know dominic's kind of choppy start to the beginning of the season can be attributed to as fact his dad has been very unhealthy and he's been five thousand miles away from that, situation
and you, Know dunny's been talking about this for. Years you just never know, how. Guys some guys are very good at compartmentalizing the ninety minutes on the field and everything else off and and the other, guys it bleeds through and it affects. Them so the good news is things haven't frayed, Right, like guys haven't turned on each, other and all you can hope for is improvement day by, day hour by, hour and game by.
Game so the explanation For diego is that he's too, good he's too.
Smart and that's too of. All it's just not on the same.
Page, Okay, well he's got a kid next to him who clearly is seen the game the way he supposedly. Is but the Least diego is producing six, goals two assists another goal over the. WEEKEND A. Pk Finichigainst. Vancouver you've had a front row seat to watch this kid. Develop AND i know that SOME rsl fans don't love THAT i wax poetic and talk about some of our great superstars back in the. Day but for, Me trey he has the ability to be better in all of. Them,
yeah AND i hope most of those years are. HERE i get the deal that that probably isn't the. Case but what's it been like for you to watch this kid blow up and evolve into really a rising star in the ranks of soccer across the entire.
Country, yeah it's. AMAZING i Mean diego clearly came here as as an older team and he's a man, now he's got a. Kid he's very serious about his. Craft he. IS i think the biggest area of growth for him is maybe holding teammates, accountable whether it's in training, sessions it's in film, sessions it's in the middle of the, game and they respect his. Voice oh, yeah though he will grab a guy by the collar Like Jason christ used to do and say wake, up let's go what is wrong with?
You Matt.
Bank it Was Luke Krammel, meyers the vivid one in my Maybe Tino nuniez as, well shout OUT i can keep, going you, KNOW i can play this game All diego Like apple is asking him to be an. AMBASSADOR mls wants to use him in. Everything Landon donovan And Tim howard want them on their on their. Podcast he's.
Done you.
Know he did the And or thing with the Actor Diego. Luna Travis scott had him out To. Coachella these are things that don't typically happen to A Raal Salt, lakey no matter how many goals you. Have and and the thing is is Like diego's, matured but he hasn't really.
Changed like he's still a good guy that you can walk up to and and dap up and just have a good conversation with His IF i was twenty one and suddenly the world was acting LIKE i was, IMPORTANT i would expect my ego to probably uh outgrow its, efficiency you. Know and and, look part of what's great About diego is his belief in himself and you know that quiet. Confidence but he really has put this team on his. Shoulders he's got what two two goal, Games he's Made team of The week three. Times SO i
think he's. AGAIN i don't know what's gonna. HAPPEN i expect him to be here for a. YEAR i think that gives him the best chance to go to The Gold cup here in a couple months Under pochattino and then and then really give himself a chance to make That World cup team a year from. Now and THE us soccer assistants that have been around Clearly pochattino loves.
Him they love his, grit his, grind his attitude on both sides of the, ball and he's not afraid to try, stuff and we saw it in The Nations league whatever semi final and final or third place GAME i should, say where THE us lost To panama In. Canada he was the lone bright. Spot he was the only guy trying. Things he was the only guy making things happen for himself and for. Others so sky's a limit still for a twenty one year Old Diego.
Luna bit of a non, Sequitur but you're REFERENCED arsa players At, coachella and So i've got to ask you About Nick rimando being inducted in The hall Of. Fame nick is a known music festival, guy, absolutely but you
know little history. LESSON i can remember one of my wake up calls To, okay professional soccer In america is much different than professional professional, basketball professional, football the SPORTS i was raised, around WHEN i found out that our starting keeper in two thousand and, Seven Scott garlic had elected to retire because he had an opportunity in real. Estate good For, scott apparently it's worked out for him just,
fine it seems like. It but ULTIMATELY i can remember, thinking, like, wait a athlete in his maybe later prime is retiring when he has a contract to keep playing to work in real. Estate so we were scrambling to get a keeper and ultimately went and Reacquired Nick romando from D C New york Where Bruce arena. Correct, okay so we were able to Acquire romando in the deal that also brought Us Freddy Freddy You, do which did not work
out as well as we were. Expecting we did not know that the better piece of that deal was actually the keeper that we were, receiving who turned out to be one of the main, conduits two lifting trophies and by most, accounts the greatest keeper this league has ever. Seen so your thoughts ON nicki getting inducted into The National hall Of, fame the ONLY rsl player to have this OCCER i would Imagine kyle gets there at some.
POINT i would Hope kyle can get in in the next year or.
Two.
Yeah Nick romando inducted in The National Soccer hall Of fame In, Frisco texas this. Weekend we will Celebrate nick On june fourteenth AGAINST Dc united At America First field In sandy And nick will get his name put up in The ring Of honor next To jason christ And Javier morales and. Clearly the three of them were teammates together on THAT Mls cup two thousand and nine championship. Team Nick rmando was named The MasterCard Most Valuable.
Player.
Uh they were then up In seattle Against, galaxy And nicky's just been for a guy that never won The goalkeeper of the, award which is. Insane he should have wanted the following year in twenty, ten WHEN rsl only ALLOWED i want to, say twenty goals in thirty four. Games and the Reason nick didn't win that, YEAR i was, told was Because forcher's And lave were ahead of him and they both made best, eleven But nick. Didn't, whatever it was very. Silly but, anyway you Know Nick nick's
second act of his career was, here. Right he won A cup IN, dc but he had suffered a knee injury and he was considered damage. Goods and to your, point we traded For Freddy adu FROM dc in Like. November Nick romondo was a throw in in that. DEAL i think we sent J nalli and a draft pick the other, way and Then nick ended up moving To we traded him To New york because he wanted to play For arena again and we Wanted, garlic and, they,
well we Had garlic from the first couple of. Years and Then garlic retires two weeks before the, season And Bruce arena Told John ellinger AND i don't, Know march of, seven who do you. Want you can Have nick, back or you can Have John, conway who was a decent keeper at the. Time And ellinger, GOES i guess we'll Take. Nick and Then nick plays for us for another fourteen, seasons LEADS mls all time in minutes, played games, played games, started, saves,
wins all the important goalkeeping. Categories and some of these record spans are most likely untouchable Because Kyle nick others were kind of a rare breed pablo that played their entire fourteen fifteen years professionally IN, mls.
And some of them.
Have played the majority of those years for one. Team we're seeing it. Now Diego charra up In portland has played his entire career with The. Timbers so there's a few examples here and, there but we're so glad That nick made a home. Here he operates businesses, here he's the goalkeeper coach for The, monarch spends a lot of time with Our academy kids as. Well and you, KNOW i Think Gavin beavers and every other young keeper that's come through our club would would Credit nick with some of their.
Development so moving back over to here and, now because there are some bright spots other Than. Diego AND i talked To pablo about this last week, because as you, KNOW i was on the road with the club In San. Diego you're good, luck. Charm, LOOK i, mean folks are saying That i'm not saying, that but folks are saying that you elected to ditch me on the, trip which is.
Fine the trip worked out just fine for your. Boy we'll leave that off.
There but watching the win Against San diego and A mecha has been good for a.
While. Dude he controlled the entire flow of the. Game AND i talked To pablo about.
This and you remember this funny anecdote THAT i always share About, kyle About Kyle beckerman BECAUSE i can remember this was two thousand and. Seven jay took the head coaching job In, okay so four, games so he Had kyle at holding, mid which Is, kyle's you, know the position that he became a legend of the. Club and of course me still learning the game of, Soccer kyle scores one of His becker. Bombs we used to call him this thirty yard, blast and we were having trouble.
Scoring so on the postgame, SHOW i say To, Jason, hey, Dude i've got a great idea for, you, Buddy kyle needs to be playing up. Top he needs to be playing strike or central attacking. Mid And jason gave me this look LIKE i will strangle you right, now But i'll never forget what he said to me because it turned out to be. Prophetic he, said If kyle embraces this position and What i'm asking him to do in this diamond, formation he will play in A World, cup
which he. Did and so after that conversation With, JASON i Watched kyle in a different way THAN i had prior to because you, know like people focus on the, ball they focus on the, touchdown, pass the, dunk unless It's jokic it's a layup because you can't, dunk or
in soccer it's the. Goals you focus on the, moments, Right, so after Watching kyle just dominate the way that he did at that, position it gives me a different set of eyes to watch A mecca evolve the way he's and there's a Little kyle in A. MECCA i, thought so as far as bright spots that we're going to go. THERE i Think amecha continues to.
Evolve, Yeah and What pablo consistently praises A mecca for is his, brain his, intelligence his ability to process. Information and you, know A mecca has the fortune of playing the same position That pablo And kyle played for fifteen years at a very very high level in this league
and in this. Country and A mecca is constantly taking What pablo is teaching, him whether it's in film, sessions training, sessions are just grabbing him during the game and, say, hey when you're in this, situation check over your left shoulder because that's where they're going to try and. Whatever and you, know A mecca twenty five years old in the national team, MIX i think he's played the second
most minutes for the field players FOR us this. Year, clearly our Leader Johnny russell's presence now is going TO i think help A mecca accelerate his leadership side of his game and his. Captaincy but you, know we wouldn't we wouldn't even be in the middle of the pack in The west without A mecca And, ojeda WHICH i think are one of the better midfield tandems in the.
League and, finally another bright SPOT i do think has Been. CABRAL i do you know the keeper That kurt decided to bring. In it was it was just difficult last year Watching, zach who at TIMES i think stepped in here as a veteran and played some really really good, soccer looked like it was orange slices and juice boxes. Like these mistakes that he was making were just, wild AND i think most people Believe gav is going to
be great once it's fully cooked and he's fully. DEVELOPED i was glad you guys addressed it because you needed. Too so tell us a little bit about this new keeper and we'll finish.
It. YEAH i, Mean Raphael cabral is a little older before we Got Johnny. RUSSELL i think he's our only player over the age of. Thirty With zach on the shelf rehabbing his. Shoulder cabral won a Copa bertelories when he was, young very Prestigious South american, competition won titles With napoli In, italy played In england at a high, level and then played in his home country Of brazil the last couple of year at a very high. Level
he is a consummate. Leader he is not a, perfectionist because when he is trying to teach people how to learn from their, mistakes he's very cognizant about acknowledging his own or that he will make them that he's not. Perfect he loves his, family he loves his, faith and he's really been extremely. Solid we saw this weekend he's now saved two of the four penalty kicks he's faced this, year which is big when it seems like there's a game changing penalty or vaar call almost every week. Now
AND i think we're lucky to have. Him so if we Get Brian vera, back you Have justin glad. Healthy you know that's a very good. Spine when you can go Cabral, vera Glad Oheeda annelli and Then Diego luna at the central ten up, top you've got to build around. It we need guys to step up around. It, xaviergozo eighteen year old homegrown From Eagle, mountain is clearly rising to the. Occasion hopefully that lights a fire under. Dom he can get back out. There there's a lot of soccer.
LEFT i think everybody's, together everybody's, optimistic but we will see what what Moves kurt and company make this summer.
Port are you gonna be tuning in to the playoffs, tonight because here's Where i'm. AT i have so much respect For jokic That i'll, say, gentlemen. Sweep but do you Think okay Sweeps? Denver do you think it's in?
FIVE i think. THIS i actually think the series or it goes five? Games it's five? Games, okay five.
Games he.
Doesn't dunk because he shares the ball with a g because it's as you, know assists makes two people. Happy it's great to see, You nuggets and six stop. It, see this is why we Keep you're going to get a split In Oklahoma. City they're going to win the two at, home they lose one and then they win. Game this is why we. Think this is why we can't. Talk let's put a Black desert round on.
This.
Seriously, Yeah i'm let's Bet let's bet seventy. Seventy let's bet one. Hundred you're going to pay for all my golf for the rest of my.
Life let's bet.
Five million dollars right now On, okay don't have access to that kind of fund we on. Either but that's Why i'm happy to go ahead and and lay it. Down, Look i'm pulling for your guys BECAUSE i know it makes you happy to See denver.
Win have you Watched okay so you get all this? Show, yeah they are, impossible impossible to watch with a shameless Grifter alexander shooting twenty five free throws a? Game are you hitting?
Me? See that's all going to dry up in the. Playoffs this is why we can't TALK nba when treys.
Here He.
He has a small point about the the fact that the translation is harder in the playoffs to get to the free throw line that much to rely on its. Crouch but is that going to play into an account against This denver? Team who do?
You?
Who do you anxiety watch more than any other?
Team anxiety? Watch?
Yeah like when you're what is IT?
Rsl is It? Denver Like i'm ACTUALLY i don't have a ton of anxiety BECAUSE i know That murray Or gordon are gonna you know WHY i get it? Done never, mind it's PROBABLY rsl okay still to this, day and maybe the you, know there were a lot of Rough bronco watches over the last eight.
Years yeah, YEAH i mean they finally got a. Quarterback at least you have some, hope all. Right so It's dallas coming up this. WEEKEND rsl has been on the, road but they will be back home for A.
Wednesday, Yeah wednesday the fourteenth at home Against, portland and then we head off To, colorado WHERE i will be At Ball arena For game six As denver clinches the. Series two nights BEFORE. Rsl you.
Turn i'm trying to give you guys a little love. Here, okay you get back for four or five at home In. June, okay just feel like the club has been on the.
Road we'll get back For, ACTUALLY i think it's nine out of eleven at home after this long road. Stretch, gotcha good to see, It thanks for the, Time thanks for having. Me Kenny atkinson has.
Been named The coach of The year In Pro BASKETBALL Nba Playoffs Tonight nix and The, celtics and then it is The nuggets And Oklahoma. City so round two getting. Going The Utah Hockey club did not win the draft. Lottery they will draft fourteen at a one point five percent chance of winning the Lottery Porter trivia time THE nba Flat, yeah here we. Go THE nba flattened their
lottery odds in twenty. Nineteen so we've had five drafts where the worst team in pro basketball has a fourteen percent chance along with the other two teams in that. Category how many times in the five years has the worst team in THE nba received the number one overall pick zero?
Zero not one? Time so we are one week, away will The jazz become the first? Team, well you're telling me there's a, CHANCE i sure, am, YEAH i mean that's that's the funny. Part we can. Prognosticate but it literally is based on a couple of ping pong balls flying in the right. Direction and you know, what what do they have as good a chance as two other?
Teams?
Right fourteen point three percent between three different. Teams utah has that. Opportunity AND i don't, KNOW i got good vibes about. IT i don't think they're gonna drop a, Bunch like there's there's SOME ptsd From jazz fans THAT i don't know they should have because they always. Are they look at these numbers where The jazz have never moved up in the draft, lottery they've always moved down. Right, yeah, well they've also not really been in that situation very.
Often so you're looking at a very very small sample size that doesn't really have much historical historical. Significance, because, hey The jazz have been in the playoffs like every year of their, existence and the lottery wasn't even a conversation for two.
Decades SO.
I have good feelings about. It but you know that doesn't go, Anywhere, no it does. Not we'll be hoping for good.
Things Having Cooper flag in our market might make our NATIONAL nba guests pay attention to The. Jazz, yeah, yeah they, would, well because the past couple of years when we have them, On i'm, like, hey let's do a jazz. QUESTION i got tim what do you want to talk? About johnny Jews in getting minutes, LIKE i don't. Know all, right before we catch a, BREAK i want to tell you
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or visit at vancewindows dot. Com don't miss out twenty five hundred dollars off when you buy ten windows or. More all, Right, porter before we catch a? Break what comes our way on A tuesday edition of the radio.
Show on A, Tuesday, Spence, well we'll talk you a LITTLE nba, hey maybe some jazz With tim, McMahon THE Nba daily assist talk SOME nba. Playoffs Tony park stops by the. Program we'll talk some, hoops talk some, baseball go all over the map WITH tp plenty to get to with our Friend Spencer. Linton no, football no, basketball nothing, ongoing but still a lot of rivalry talk that we can we can dive into. There and we heard today
From Will. Hardy in the meantime between today's show and, tomorrow we're gonna hear From Bill armstrong Of Utah Hockey. Clubs we'll go.
There wait a, Second wait a, second let's not catch a break just, yet BECAUSE i may have. Misspoke i'm watching THE Nhl draft lottery live, here AND i think The Utah Hockey club just got the ball they needed to move.
Up The Utah Hockey club has moved up to number four in the draft.
Lottery, okay so WHAT i saw was they were eliminated from the first or the second. Pick The Utah Hockey club just moved up to number. Four there's a Smiling Bill armstrong on. Television holy. Smokes, well there you, go little draft lottery luck on This.
Monday and we'll get the reaction From bill on the show. Tomorrow yes we.
Will So Bill armstrong will join us, tomorrow the day after The Utah Hockey club moved up from fourteen to number.
Four in the.
Lottery some good vibes, here we need it one week. Away maybe OUR nba team will get some good luck as. Well All, right we'll say good. Night special thank you today To Tom, Haberstrow Richard smith And Trey Fitzgerald forrady the. Sound you may have missed from the show, today log onto the, website which is HE espn seven hundred sports dot. Com make sure to download our mobile app and take us on the. Go THE espn seven hundred app is
available in The App store in The Google Play. Store, then, finally for what we do every day in our space four hours every, afternoon check out our podcast.
Page give us your.
Support The Utah Hockey club moves up ten spots in THE Nhl draft and we'll get the fourth overall pick.
In the first.
Round, man that's some cool. Stuff, Reporter i'm spent saga night and enjoy Your monday. Evening we'll talk to you on a jam Pack tuesday edition of the program Featuring Bill armstrong and The Utah Hockey, club who will have the fourth overall, pick have a great, night talk to you tomorrow right here ON espn seven hundred