All right, let's get a drive time Thursday afternoon style, about fourteen minutes past the hour of two o'clock. It's in April day that feels like April, at least it doesn't feel like February. We're approaching fifty degrees. It is cloudy here in downtown Salt.
Lake City, Utah.
High speed ahead to a little bit of a warmer weekend and then a nice springtime week next week.
So you're almost there.
If you're waiting for the sunshine like I am, and as it is every single day, it's going to have you along for the riots.
Bence check. It's beyond the mic.
That is Porter Larsen behind the glass today producing the program a lot to get to Big Night in pro basketball, Big night in the NBA, Big Night in Los Angeles, says the Warriors and the Lakers are going to play a basketball game, and it looks like all of the players that are employed to play basketball for both organizations are going to play basketball and try to win. Because this is like a sneaky big game seating on the line as we are high speed ahead to playoff basketball
in the world of the NBA. Utah Jazz, Well, they showed up last night. Technically they were present. They played the Houston Rockets. They lost by thirty eight, and it really wasn't even that close. So five games left for the Jazz as the race to the bottom continues. The worst basketball team in Pro basketball plays.
It's basketball here in Salt Lake.
The Jazz are the worst team in the NBA, so we'll talk a little Jazz basketball, talk a little NBA. The Cavs beat the Knicks last night. We talked about this prior to the end of the show. The Knicks are now to eight against Cleveland and Boston, so the Eastern Conference feels like it is a two team race. Dallas Mavericks won again last night, so of course that prolongs the full time obligation of Alex Jensen landing here in Salt Lake to become the seventeenth head coach of
the Utah men's basketball program. Alex will finish off this season with Dallas before he really turns his full time attention. Of course, Alex has been on the job and he's made a couple of hires, and of course the news broke yesterday that Keanu Dawes has withdrawn his name from the transfer portal, and we'll play for Utah next year. Now today, in case you didn't know, and you probably don't, because why would you. Today Mark's the first day of
a week long dead period in college basketball recruiting. Essentially that means you can't have any in person visits, you can't have players visit on campus, but you can visit with players via zoom. And a report that a young man named Terrence Brown, who's a fairly Dickinson transfer, was on a zoom call with the Utah coaching staff today.
So got to hit the ground running.
As the transfer portal opened a number of weeks ago, and we already have heard decisions made by a lot of different basketball players about where they're going to play. And you know, of course, if you're Alex Jensen, if you're the University of Utah, got to try to get talent as soon as you possibly can. Latest on the transfer portal from Brigham Young. It was announced yesterday that Dallen Hall is getting on down haul in the transfer portal.
Kennon Catchings in the transfer portal, So a lot of rumors about who could be joining Kevin Young and BYU basketball to replace some of the transfers BYU were, according to most people that report on such things, as one of the top three NIL payrolls in.
All of college basketball.
So I do not imagine attracting talent will be problematic for the near future.
Down to BYU.
Well.
So the latest out of the college basketball side of things as we're high speed ahead to the Final Four coming up on Saturday. All four number one seeds in the Final Four for the second time in tournament history and for the first time since two thousand and eight. Shout out to our guy Ken Pom. I didn't realize this until I was looking at his metrics. Ken Palm
called the Final four and the Elite Eight. The top eight teams in Ken Palm ratings made the Elite Eight, and the top four teams in Ken Palm ratings are now in the Final Four. So college basketball high speed ahead of the Final Four. Rayl Saw welcomes in the LA Galaxy on Saturday at two thirty America First Field in Sandy Apple TV. You'll have that covered. Go to
RSL dot com for single game tickets. The Utah Hockey Club welcomes in the LA Kings tonight at the Delta Center for a seven o'clock drop.
Of the Puck Wild car Races over.
It was fun while it lasted, but it's not going to be a reality this year. And now the Utah Hockey Club finishes off the season and looks dead to a very important offseason. Kribill, Armstrong and his staff Gino Smith got paid today a couple of year extension with the Vegas Raiders, so little NFL offseason stuff. Were only three weeks away from the NFL Draft, so we'll do some draft stuff on the show. Caleb Loner is in Dallas for the Dallas Cowboys Pro Day, so the Cowboys
looking to former youth Caleb Loaner. So a lot to get to on the program today. Alex Soovechkin scored again and he's getting closer to a record that once upot of time felt unbreakable, the all time goal scoring record won Wayne Gretzky. In the world of the NHL, speaking the NHL, our first guest right out of the gates today is Neil Smith for our weekly conversation to talk Punk Talk Hockey, Talk Utah Hockey Club.
Howard Beck rolls by.
For some NBA from the Ringer, the TV Voice the Utah Jazz, Craig Bowler, Jack as our guest. Later on an RSL club legend, key member of the front office, my buddy Jason Chris in the four o'clock hour. We're gonna have to have an honest conversation about with Jay today about whether or not these players are going to be signed prior to the primary transfer window closing, which is three weeks from today. So Neil Smith, Howard Beck,
Craig Bowler, Jack, Jason Christ. So we'll do a little sports core with our friends from Handy and Handy coming up me, Spence, Jackets, all of you the great listeners. I do want to give a shout out for all the simps that filled out brackets and picked all the number one seeds to make the final four, because you're probably winning your bracket if you don't really think very deeply.
And let's welcome in Porter Larson. Happy Thursday, Pal. How are you doing I'm doing well.
How are you, Spencer?
Are you winning our bracket challenge comfortably?
Yeah at the moment. And why is that? Who's your final four?
The teams that are in it.
All the number one seeds, Yeah, the teams that made the final four, the teams that I picked to me.
Yeah, yeah, all the number one seeds.
Also, And hey, just to be clear, I'm not only up by a few points, but I'll leave that there.
So wait a second, is there any way anybody can catch you? Who do you have winning these games?
I have Auburn winning the title. Auburn Houston is my match of Auburn Houston. If that is the title and that is the matchup and Auburn wins, not only will I win the employee bracket.
I believe I win the whole thing.
So what is it?
Can you? Are you eligible for the prize? I don't think so. Oh that's too bad.
But yeah, if it goes Houston Auburn with Auburn winning, I think I pass up everyone involved. But hey, like you said, Ken Palm ratings, if you want to want a good bracketology, that's a decent place to look.
Did you enter a bracket anywhere else outside of work? I do have a ESPN bracket.
It's the same. I just did one bracket everywhere in good shape.
Though.
You know, all right, Final four coming up on Saturday, And as I said yesterday, if it's not going to be me, it needed to be somebody from the show. So good job keeping our streak alive. I think that's six straight years somebody from the show is once.
Good job.
And I was gonna say one of those years if maybe it was the year before, or maybe your first year here. I won it there, So I think you and I we got the bragging rights in the afternoon.
All right, we'll take it. We'll take it.
So some college basketball of course, Final four, both on the men's and the women's side.
All right, Neil Smith will be our first guest.
Right out of the gates today, we'll do a little hockey Utah, Little Utah Hockey Club before we get to Neil. Courtesy of our good friends at Prize Picks, 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. The opening tip of the Drive is brought to you by Prize Picks. Use the code ESPN seven hundred and run your game with Prize Picks.
Download that Prize Picks app today and you get fifty dollars on the house. All you have to do is use the promo cod ESPN seven hundred when you place that first five dollars bet. Do not even have to win that bet. They're just going to give you fifty bucks if you download the app, sign up, use the promo cod ESPN seven hundred. Check at checkout. Springtime is here. Baseball season is underway. Don't miss your chance to add your favorite players from the Diamond to your prize picks.
Lineup.
On Prize Picks, you can mitch mix and match player projections from different sports, combine your favorite baseball players with players from basketball, hockey, e sports, and much much more courtesy of our good friends at Prize Picks. All right, so, as I referenced earlier, there's no reason that you would know this, but today is the first day of a seven day dead period in college basketball recruiting, and essentially all that means is you cannot have players on campus.
There's no in person visits for the next week as the college basketball season wraps up, coming up this weekend with a Final Four, and then on April the eleventh, it will open up once again. So as we sit here awaiting word on who else could potentially play for Utah basketball, YU Basketball next year. We're probably not going to get a lot of news over the next week. We still could potentially get some news on the assistant coaches and as Alex goes about his business filling his staff.
I was told by somebody yesterday that the Andre stuff continues to simply be talked about. I don't think it's as much of a slam dunk surefire higher that we thought it was, maybe right out of the gates. No information that is tangible and real on that just yet. So I think they're still talking, and I think it just comes down to Andrea's desire to come back to this market and live here and coach for his alma mater,
as opposed to kind of continuing his own journey. Because when you're a head coach in the G League, you know, you probably feel like you're one or two breaks away from maybe being in the big show.
And I don't know where Andre's head is at just yet.
But the one piece of news that did come down yesterday is that Kiana Daz has withdrawn his name from the transfer portal and he will play for Utah basketball next year. Hunter Erickson high speed ed to Hawaii. Shout out to Hunter. He's going to spend his grad year on the Rock. Good for him, and we await word on players like Ezara Sar or Mike shrab Jamps.
Or Jake Waaleen Mira, little players like that.
How many of those players Alex wants back is unclear, and how many of the players actually want to be here also unclear. Ezrasar has children, I believe in the Midwest. I think he has a couple of kids he might want to get back home there. So that's the latest on the college basketball recruiting side of things for Utah. On the other side, for BYU, reports are floating out there the Richie Saunders is seriously considering coming back to play for Kevin Young and Provo next year with an
NIL offer that is seven figures. So it's interesting to consider this if you're Richie, if you're part of his support group, I'm sure he's got representation. All these young men do at this point family around him. At the age of twenty three, I think if you go through the pre draft process, and anybody that is even kind of a fringe pro prospect should always go through the process, because at the very least Brandon Carlson did this two years ago, and I can remember when Brandon declared for
the draft I talked about on air. I'm like, I'm not sure if he's an NBA guy, but Brandon might as well go talk to as many NBA teams as he possibly can, because what you do is you go to all these pro days, you go to the combine, and you have an opportunity to play in front of coaches and in front of scouts, and then they all give you feedback, so they'll say to it, Richie, Okay, at the age of twenty three, the clock is ticking to get to the second contract, which is always the
goal if you're a pro basketball player. I mean, rookie money is good money for normal people, but for pro basketball players it is the second, third, and then eventually fourth fifth contracts, depending on how long you can stick around and you're health cooperating.
That's when the generational wealth kicks in.
Richie will get real accurate feedback, yeg Or Demon accurate feedback. These BYU players, they are going to kick the tires on playing in the pros. If we hear that jeg Or Demon and Richie Saunders are coming back to play for BYU, simply means they went through the draft process,
didn't like what they saw and heard. And if you're Richie Saunders and the feedback is late second round or undrafted and BYU says, come back for one point seven million or whatever it is, maybe you take the seven figures, you play one more year at college basketball, then you enter the draft next year.
Okay. So it is kind of an interesting spot.
Kevin Young finds himself in in a way that Alex Jensen up here just doesn't where he probably has to wait to receive word from Yegor and Richie specifically because fus Treori's graduating. Trevinell of course is graduating down Hall in the transfer portal, they're losing a couple like I think the Isaiah Stewart kids a senior, so they know
some of the players that are leaving. But I'm sure as Kevin Young goes about as big and trying to fill out a staff, he's still waiting to hear from Richie Saunders and Diego Demmt about what they're going to do. And as we talked about yesterday, I have to wonder if the Dollen Hall decision is kind of draped in information that maybe Yegor demon is coming back, and of course he'll be the starting point guard again next year and Dallan coming off the bench. Not sure how much
Dallan made to stay at BYU. He entered the transfer portal a year ago. A lot of people thought he was just going to go to Lexington and follow Mark Pope. But down Hall probably for another couple of years of eligibility. Can receive five hundred and six hundred thousand dollars to
play college basketball, So we'll see where he lands. But again, if you're hoping for Utah basketball recruiting news, BYU basketball recruiting news, we have entered, as of today, the dead period in college basketball recruiting, where no in person visits are allowed.
This is all virtual, it's all zoom.
And so we kind of a wait word on Alex's staff and maybe some other pieces of the puzzle that will come together. The Jazz were in Houston last night. They got absolutely stomped. They lost by thirty eight, and it wasn't that close. The Jazz have five games left. They'll be at Indiana coming up tomorrow. We'll do some jazz basketball later on, but the Utah hockey club isn't
action tonight they welcome in the La Kings. Utah Hockey Club welcomes in the La Kings tonight, seven o'clock drop of the park down at the Delta Center here in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. Our next guest joins us on a weekly basis to talk about the world of pro hockey.
Little Utah Hockey Club.
Neil Smith good enough to give us some time on this Thursday afternoon. Neil, Happy Thursday, sir, How are you.
I'm good. I'm very good. Thanks. Coming down the stretch here of the NHL season and looking forward to seeing who matches up in the playoffs.
Yeah, for sure. And we'll get to some big picture NHL stuff in a moment. And I don't know if it's the pressure of the wild card race essentially being over, but ever since they're not officially eliminated, but if we're honest,
it's not happening. But they've won their last two games by a nine score of eight to three at Chicago and then Calgary here, and of course Calgary is one of the teams they were trying to chase in the standings, and we'll see if Calgary can catch Saint Louis who just doesn't lose all of a sudden But do you think it's kind of just the pressure off this young team that's allowed them to win a couple of games in a pretty impressive fashion ever since it became pretty
apparent that they weren't going to make the playoffs.
You know, there is a lot of pressure that comes off of the players when they know one way or the other what's going to happen. And I've seen often teams that are eliminated or know they're going to be eliminated to play with a lot more ease and play
a lot more relaxed, So that definitely can happen. But I just want to remind you of one thing for you and your listeners about the season, because I had said at the beginning what I thought would happen, and you have to remember that last year the Arizona Coyotes, which is this year's TA Hockey club season, and Utah currently has eighty with seven games to go. So if they get five hundred in those seven games, just to throw out a number, if they can go five hundred,
they'll end the season with eighty seven points. That's a ten point jump from what they did last year, and I think a pretty darn good improvement of the club from a year ago. So if there's a bright, if there's light at the end of the tunnel for this hockey team, I think that's it. That they made improvements and they're continually improving.
Really good point.
And also if we include in the dynamic the fact that all of these people got a phone call that said you live in Salt Lake, now you know, and they were able to make the move and not allow that to, you know, move the program in the wrong direction. And you've been enough to outline how the ownership complications in Arizona led to Ryan Smith being able to make this happen with the cooperation, of course, of with Gary Bettman and the NHL.
And you know, the commissioner.
Betman joined our show and said, the first conversation he had with Ryan about this was in March, and suddenly it was the first week of May and they're here.
So what does that say about the character of the organization that they didn't And I know that there were so many positives about the move, But you know, whenever we talk about this, and of course this is based off my background, I talk a lot about the personal angle here where you're moving families and you're moving children, and you're relocating, and you're selling a home and you're buying a new home.
It's I know, a.
Lot of these people make a lot of money, and so the complications might fall on deaf ears for normal folk.
But it doesn't matter how much money you have.
When you're moving around and you're kind of upsetting the apple cart with your family and you're asking people to settle into a new community, it can provide complications. So what is say to you that even moving into a new community, the hockey club was able to continue this incremental growth that Bill Armstrong talks about all the time.
No, I think it's I think it's great. I think it's a it's a It says a lot of things about the ownership of the club, down to the management of the club, down to the character of the players of the club, and of course the coaches. But that's a big adjustment, and you think people don't often think about it. You and I do because we've been through
it together. But you know, you guy has to move if he's got kids, they got to change schools, they got to go and make all new friends and you know how tough that is on kids that you know, they got their friends at school. It's a lot of people their their wife is from the city that they were in, they met them earlier in their career, perhaps in Phoenix or wherever, and now they've got to ask them to leave there where they've lived their whole life
and go to a new place. So it's not just the hockey player that it's you know, has to make a big adjustments, but it's the family of the hockey players that have to make a bigger adjustment because everybody's doing what they can do to support dad in his hockey career. And it is truly a big adjustment, and
one that goes unnoticed by the normal fan. All they know is that, well, he used to be wearing a coyote on the front of his jersey and now he's got Utah written down his jersey, and you know that kind of thing. But it can be traumatic.
So I want to put you in Bill Armstrong's seat as the roster constructor and the main decision maker. You're viewing this, I would imagine as a successful season and yet a you know, just another step in the right direction, And at what point do you kind of start looking ahead to start, you know, considering what decisions you need to make to make sure the progress continues the way you want it to go.
I think he's doing it continuously. I'm sure he's doing it continuously. So he's evaluating every day and every player and who's out there, and he's meeting with pro scouts and finding out what their thoughts are about the guys that could potentially be free agents or be gotten in a deal. That exercise never stops for the GM. They're doing that all the time. Now. Obviously, Bill is going to focus more on the future now than the present because of the fact that the president is sort of decided.
And I want to say one other thing about the present being decided. The only reason it's been this clearly decided is because you had a team win ten straight games, and that's the sing of those Blues. They played Pittsburgh tonight looking for their eleventh straight. They separated themselves from the pack by doing that. And if you remember when we spoke two three, four weeks ago about Utah and their chances to get in I said, if they could
get on a run, they could do it. And that's what Saint Louis did and so and that's what separated them from the pac Minnesota has been pretty good all year long, and now they've had a lot of injuries, so they've slipped back a bit and they're in the wild card. But it's not just Utah that couldn't keep up with Saint Louis. The Vancouver Canucks won the Pacific Division last year and just lost out in Game seven in the first round of Edmonton and they're going to
miss the playoffs. And Calgary, who's had a remarkable season from what we expected, it looks like they're going to make miss the playoffs. So it's really hard and it would be very unfair to think that Utah Hockey Club could keep up with a ten and oer record that Saint Lewis went on at this critical time in the season.
Let me ask you about how Saint Louis did this, because you know, as a result of my background, they're one of the teams that kind of loosely follow and for the majority of the season they were looking up at not just the Utah Hockey Club, a lot of the other the other teams. What what what clicked there? Because as you reference ten straight wins. It is the longest winning streak in in the NHL by kind of a long shot. Dallas has won six straight, but Saint Louis with ten straight.
What what clicked for them?
Well, I think there's a number of things, but the most visible thing is Jordan Bennington. They're start starting goaltender who played in the Four Nations for Canada. He was a starting goaltender for Canada in the Four Nations tournament. Canada won the tournament. Jordan Bennington was the winning goaltender of the Four Nations tournament and since then he's been eleven and one. He's won eleven and only lost one
since the Four Nations. So when you've got a goaltender standing on his head like that, that's a huge part of it. Now you've got to give credit to Jordan Cairo and to Jim Montgomery the head coach, and so on, and there's a lot of other pieces there, but the most visible piece to me is the outstanding play of the goaltender Jordan Dinnington. He's playing like he did when they won the Stanley Cup a number of years ago. So to answer your question, that's what I think it is.
Dallas, I referenced second in the Central and Winnipeg is still the class of that division. They're differentials plus eighty. But Dallas has turned it on too. You reference them not too long ago as a team to watch out for. What's kind of click for them over the past couple of weeks.
Neil.
Well I thinks is the goaltend. And of course I'm always going to start with the goaltender, because without goaltending, you're not going to win, so you sort of got to go there first. But I think Ottinger has been very good for them. They're doing this too without one of their very best players, Nero Heaskin and the defenseman who's a dynamic force for them, and if they get him back for the playoffs, they're going to be even better.
But I think there's been a number of things. Jason Robertson is scoring goals, why at Johnson has been quite well developed, and now is putting pucks in all the time. They've got a good combination there that are all coming together at the same time. And you know, we've said all season that Dallas is a good team. They seem to be peaking at the right time. I like the moves that Jim Nill did it before the deadline when
he got Granlin and Cci from San Jose. He moved early and got those guys, And you know, there's still a chance that they could catch Winnipeg. That's not out of the realm of possibility. That they're only four points behind them, and they have one more game than Winnipeg to play, so you know it's not out of the realm of possibility they could get there. It's going to
be really tough for Colorado to catch Dallas. Now there's six points back of them, So it looks at this point like it'll be Dallas and Colorado in the first round. And that's sort of sad Spence because they're both Stanley Cup contenders and yet one of them is going to be gone in the first round.
Of course, a ton of attention on Ovechkin's chase to break Wayne Gretzky's record, and he's only three goals shy of doing that, and I think he's projected to do that April twelfth or thirteenth, according to what I was reading earlier on the ESPN coverage. But kind of lost in Ovechkin's chase is that he's doing it during a good run for a team that has a chance to
make some noise in the East. I mean, oftentimes when a player is aging and he's chasing stats, and I'm thinking pro basketball, when Koreem broke his record and Lebron broke the scoring record during a pretty you know, mediocre year for the Lakers. Oftentimes, when a player is aging chasing a record like this, he's not playing for a
team that's contending. And I just kind of wonder what your thoughts are on just the fact that Ovechkin is close to breaking that record, but he's also doing it for a team that's in the midst of a run that could put them in contention to hoist the cup.
What are your thoughts on that dynamic?
Neal, I think that's a really good point. I remember when Wayne was breaking a lot of records back in his day with the La Kings. Is when he broke most of the records, that's what he got the book, the Gordy Howe goal scoring record, and the Kings, you know, were not up and contending teams. So I think what you're saying, and I want to agree with wholeheartedly, is Sovekin's doing this and they haven't taken their eye off
the ball. The Capitals. They haven't said, well, let's do all this for Ov and back off on our defensive responsibilities. Let's take every chance we have to get Ov the record. They're still playing great hockey now. Last night they got creamed by Carolina because they'd played the night before and Carolina was right on their game. They lost five to one, and guess who got the one goal. Ovechkin, of course.
So it is remarkable what he's doing at his age and how that is helping his team, perhaps when the President's Trophy, but certainly be a dominant force in the East. And I think that they really want to have this
record broken at home. I think that you may see it work out that he scores that goal against Columbus on the twelfth, or maybe against the I'm sorry, I'm the thirteenth against Columbus, or that may work out that way, or if he can score against Chicago and then at the Islanders, he could do it at home against Carolina.
But I think he's about four games away from doing it now, and if I'm right about that, that would put him right in line with doing it against Columbus either there they played back to back twelfth and thirteenth, so it would either be in Columbus or in Washington against Columbus. So Mrs Lincoln's, who is the goaltender for Columbus, has that to look forward to, like I'm going to be the one that's probably going to get beat for the record set a goal.
Well, we've been hyper focused on the wild card race out this way in the Western Conference to see if the hockey club can get it done. They're straight chaos in the East, Neo, isn't there. Looks like Ottawa was gonna pull away and grab one of the spots, but they've lost a couple in a row. Montreal's differentials minus twenty five.
Yet they're right there.
But my guys, the Rangers, they've kind of resurrected their playoff chances and they're tied with Montreal right now. Montreal does have a game in hand. Who do you think captures that second wild card? Looks like Ottawa was going to grab the first.
I think because on strength of schedule, you've got to go with Montreal only because they only have three more games left against teams that are currently in the playoffs, and they have five games left against non playoff teams. So and if you look at the Rangers schedule, they have five against playoff teams and only two against on playoff teams, and those two come back to back. So and I don't like the way the Rangers are playing.
When I look at them, I think, with the talent they've got on the team, they should be a lot better than they are. But their structure doesn't seem to be there, and every night something goes wrong for them. And even with the stirk and in net, you know, they squeak out wins like they did last night over Minnesota, but Minnesota got a point there. So I really do think that the Montreal Canadians are on a mission to
make it. I would have if my heart dictated who would make it, Spence, I would have had Columbus Blue Jackets make it because of what they've been through preseason and during the season for that franchise, losing Johnny Gidrou and his brother Matthew. But your heart doesn't set the standings. But I think it looks to me like the halves the Montreal Canadians are going to make that last spot.
We always talk about this time of year when the player are right around the corner about teams that find their form at the right time. So I want to go back to the Western Conference, and of course Winnipeg has been the class all year. We talked Dallas in Colorado,
there's Vegas, the Kings are in town tonight. But based off of what the Blues have done, do you change the way that you kind of look at them heading into the postseason since they have seen to capture the right form at the right time of year.
You know, they're at plus eighteen. They've really turned their season around. I mean that Ken and oh will end at some point because they always do no matter who the team is. But yeah, could they be a team that goes into the playoffs now with nothing to lose because nobody expected them to make it? Could they do what they did back in twenty nineteen and come in and start surprising people? Well, sure, I don't expect that,
but I think they could do that. I still think that the heavyweights are in Winnipeg, Dallas, call Colorado, and Vegas. I think then after that, you've got Edmonton in LA who looks like they're ready to play a fifth straight first round against each other. If you can believe it in l A and Edmonton, but it'll it'll all be
interesting which way it goes. And again out there, you've got those five really dynamic teams that have all got a shot in the In the East, you've got one division, the Atlantic Division, that's got three Stanley Cup contenders Toronto, Tampa, Florida. And then you've got in the Metro you've got Washington and Carolina. So you've got five in the East, five in the West. It's it's not a it's I can't say and be honest with you that it's it's anybody's game,
like it's anybody's Cup. I think there's still favorites out of those ten teams I just mentioned, but it's going to be a hell of a series, hell of a playoff, and you.
Know, I mean, that's one of the great things about this format. And I'm not sure why, and we'll wait
into this area for a moment. I'm not sure what breeds upsets in the Stanley Cup playoffs in a way that the NBA doesn't see, but we do oftentimes see upsets, and oftentimes home ice advantage doesn't mean the same that home court advantage means any any thoughts on that, or you know, a new hockey market out here, why the Stanley Cup playoffs and professional hockey seem to breed upsets more often than pro basketball does.
Any thoughts on that.
Yeah, My thoughts are that there is a lot of pressure playing at home, and so it has turned from not being that much of an advantage anymore to play at home. I think because of the pressure. When you're on the road, it's you against the world. There's a traveling party of thirty people and it's thirty and twenty
thousand others cheering for the other side. I do think that there can be a lot of pressure when the expectations are high for your team, and certainly the teams that I just mentioned, they've all got very high expectations on them. If you take a look at Toronto for example, Lenise and you know this Spence, they haven't won the Stanley Cup since nineteen sixty seven. So the Leaf fans are just propping at the mouth to get them to do well in the playoffs and their whole season will
be judged by the playoffs. And the Florida Panthers want to repeat the Washington fans are going to think that they've got a Stanley Cup team because they're way up
in the standings. And we've already talked about these teams in the West, where you know Edmonton oiler fans think well, why shouldn't we win with Connor McDavid and Leon drysidele But to get to your point about upsets, I think that it's a pressure things sometimes when those expectations are that high, make you squeeze your stick a lot tighter and not play as loose as you should. So Winnipeg,
for example, hasn't been successful in the playoffs. They've been successful in the regular season, and they're going to be judged by their fans based upon what happens in the playoffs, and if they lose in the first round, well that six or seven months of regular season hockey will be out the window.
So the Utah Hockey Club has announced that after their final regular season home game, which will be April tenth VERSUT Nashville, they're going to hand out their postseason awards. Fans can vote on it right now, so check that out. If they asked you, Neil Smith, the MVP of the Utah Hockey Club this season, who would you go with Clayton Keller is they're leading.
He leads them in points kind of by a long shot.
I know a lot of people close to the club would tell you, Serga chef should be an option. And when you look at the unsure nature of the goalie situation, because Connoring has not had a great year, maybe Vimelka is in the mix as well.
Who do you think the UTA Hockey Club m VP is this year?
Neil, You know, I'm going to go back where I was at the beginning of the year because I like this kid, Clayton Keller, the Saint Louis native. I mean, he's been the captain, He's had a fantastic year. But you've got so much growth going on there. I mean you've mentioned it. You've got Mamelka, who wasn't it was on a contract that was going to expire, gets a new contract and has played really well for them and
has proven that he can handle the reins. This kid Dylan Gunter, what a player he is and what a shot he's got and able to score goals. He's got a fantastic future in front of him. So I guess I would go with the captain and say that if I had to vote or had to say somebody who was their m VP, it would be Clayton Keller because he's done a good job in both his roles there. But and and you mentioned chev and Sergachev has been
has been really a great acquisition by Bill Armstrong. And when I got to be honest with you, when I when they acquired him, I thought, I'm wondering if if they're getting damaged goods because you know, he'd had those injuries in Tampa, and boy, he has played great for them for Utah and has I think set A, you know, given them an element that they didn't have in playing tough and playing also good offensively. So you know, I think any one of those guys would be deserving.
Before I say you loose, Neil, genuinely curious. You know, there's a debate around the NBA right now, and it's prevalent here in Salt Lake because the worst team in the NBA is the Utah Jazz, and they're not alone in their approach. There's about ten teams. If I'm being generous, I would say six or seven teams. But if I'm being honest, I would say about ten teams in the NBA have stopped trying players have been shut down, they
playing the rest of the year. And the Jazz were in Houston last night they got smoked by nearly forty And that's kind of status quo. How prevalent, if at all, is tanking in the world of pro hockey, Well.
You know, we have the lottery, and so therefore, even if you do tank, it doesn't mean that you're necessarily going to end up with not only not the first pick, but not even be in the top three. I do think I don't think there's anybody in the league that tanks here because I think the rebuilders are obvious. I think that you know, for example San Jose and Chicago or in the middle of a massive rebuild. I think that the Ducks are a little bit ahead of them
in that. And you know they're over in the East. You got the Philadelphia Flyers that are in a rebuilding stage that they're not. Nobody's going to try to lose to get the first pick. It's not like when the old days, Mario lemu is going to become available. In New Jersey and Pittsburgh were the two candidates to be last, and New Jersey tried to win their games and Pittsburgh tried to lose theirs and guess who Mary Olemeu became iconic with this is the Pittsburgh Penguins. So it doesn't
happen as much in the NHL. I don't think it would do them any good to do that because they wouldn't accomplish a lot. I think what you have in the league is you have teams that are rebuilding and know they're not going to win that season, so they're just trying to do whatever they can to build for the future.
All right, Neil, where can everybody go find a podcast?
It's on every podcast platform and it's NHL Wrap Around and we've been having a lot of fun with it and it's going to get even more fun in coming up in the future. So you get it on Apple or Spotify or YouTube or anywhere where you get your podcast called NHL Wrapround. Please subscribe, Please give us a hit. We need all the numbers we get and we need the word to get spread. But we do have listeners in Salt Lake City. I've been looking at that. There
we go, this show. This show is helping us get listeners in the Salt Lake City, So I must be saying something right.
Well, we appreciate your presence every week. You've been good enough to help us understand this sport. We're all trying to get used to Neil, So anything we can do for you, we're happy to do that because you do so much for us. So thank you for the time and have a great weekend.
Okay, you two, thanks for having me on right.
Neil Smith stops bat today courtesy reference at IFA Country Stores. At some point the weather will get warm consistently, which means now is the time to start thinking about your lawn and care for your lawn. So any drive to the basket begins with the first step on the court.
That's the ultimate power move. IFA Step one.
Crabgrass Preventer and lawn food is the first choice to give your yard the healthy, thick green look you desire.
The neighbors will be green with envy.
Shop IFA online at IFA dot co op, or stop by one of their eighteen Utah locations today. The Jazz well, they were in huge did last night. Technically they were present. It didn't go well, because you know that's the deal. Five games left for the Jazz. I would imagine broadcasters just like players and coaches in front office staff and everybody involved is kind of ready for this season to end.
That's just my guess. Our next guest covers the.
NBA for The Ringer, one of my favorite NBA riders for a long, long time.
On a Thursday afternoon, it is Howard Beck.
Howard, Happy Thursday, sir, How are you well? I wonder from your your your perspective and covering this league for so long, what it's like for an organization at the end of a season like the Jazz are going through for the first time in the fifty plus years of the Jazz history.
They've lost more than sixty games.
They are, by record and by eye test and everything else, the worst team in the NBA. And look, losing takes a toll on coaches and players in a different way than it takes on probably everybody else involved, because they're the main actor.
They're involved, and these guys are competitors.
But from just an organizational standpoint, what sort of toll do you think this takes? Because it just feels like everybody I talked to you down there is kind of ready for the season to end.
It definitely takes its toll. And it's interesting because we can take the thirty thousand foot view, and obviously much easier for me to do so from a distance as a national writer covering the league. It's different when you're when you're there, if you're a Jazz fan, if you're working for the Jazz, if you're even a reporter covering the Jazz. I even know this just based on the you know, really bad years I covered the Knicks, where you know, I have no stake in the outcome, I
have no emotional investment. But being around a team that is mired in you know, that kind of of of losing for months on end, it just it just makes for a really depressing environment. Right, So it's everybody, like the players, you know, the players you definitely feel it from, and the coaches you feel it from, but even support staff.
It just it is just this cloud that hangs over an entire organization, and it and underscores why it's so tough to do and why it's so inadvisable perhaps to do what the Sixers did with the process ten years ago, because you do that year after year and you know that there's no end in sight. You know, this is
sports it's supposed to be about. You know, Yeah, there's there's highs and lows, but it's supposed to be about the joys of the game, and that's all just robbed from you when you have a season like this, or especially multiple seasons like this. So it there's no question, without having talked to anybody there recently, that it's taking a toll on everyone involved. I'm just about to get out of my car here, so it's give me two seconds.
Oh you're good. Howard Beck is our guest. The Utah Jazz were in Houston last night. They're going to be in Indiana coming up that is tomorrow for a Friday Tilts.
Only five games left for the Jazz. Oh you're good.
Only five games left for the Jazz. Howard Beck has joined us. So since you, uh, since you brought up Philly, what do they do? What does this offseason look like for the Philadelphia seventy six ers, Because it's not just can En beat ever stay healthy?
It's a lot more than that.
I think it starts with that though, because if you think about, you know, just the whole inflection point of this season and of their you know, their trajectory for the next few years, everything is just going to be about whether or not This next surgery that he's having on his knee does what it needs to do, clears everything up. If Embiid is even ninety percent of himself next season, a lot of other things fall into place right Like, yes, there will still be Paul George concerns
because of his age and injury history. But a healthy, thriving Embiid means that Paul George only has to be your second or third best player, and not your best, which was the role he had to play first for parts of this season and not very well. Everybody's back in their proper place if Embiid is himself again. So there's the glass half full potential for the Sixers. Not to be pollyannish about it, but there is a glass half full possibility. So Mbi gets the surgery, Embiid returns
to some semblance of his old dominance. Now you've got a player who's, you know, one of the top ten in the league. We know what Tyree Max is capable of. We know what Paul George, even at the stage of his career, is capable of.
You saw a.
Really nice debut from Jared McCain, their rookie before he got hurt. He was in line for potentially Rookie of the Year or certainly wasn't going to be in the conversation until he went down. They picked up Quenton Grimes from the Mavericks in a trade mid season. Grimes has been fantastic for them, So they've got some good role players, they've got some good youth, and they've got it looks like they're gonna have Now the lottery balls could be
cruel to them. If the lottery balls knock them out of the top six, their pick goes to the thunder. But if the Sixers just simply keep their pick after the lottery, now they also have a top six pick to play with, like maybe that's another really good young player, or maybe because they're kind of still in a win now mode as long as you have Joel Embiid and Paul George, maybe they're flipping that pick for something else,
for some immediate help. So there's a there's a there's a scenario here where the Sixers come out of this offseason in potentially good shape. But yes, everything still goes back to you. But can Embiid hold up, can he stay healthy and can he reclaim his dominance for any length of time?
Do you think there's any thought, because it's kind of like the fool me wants thing like. And I know there were some conversations about Embiid maybe wanting out of Philly last off season, and you know, to your to your point, I mean, look, when he is fully healthy, he's as close to as impossible to cover as anyone not named Nicole Jokic, and so he is that guy. Is there a possibility that Philly does their calculation, it's like he just he's not going to stay healthy. It's
time for us to move on. Because if they decided to do that, Howard, it just takes it just takes one, and I'm sure there would be a lot more than one lined up to try to grab Embiid if Philly decides to move on from him.
I've gotten no sense that he wants to leave, and I've gotten no sense that the Sixers what would want to move on other than the obvious of you know, feeling like maybe there's a ticking time bomb there right there.
But the sense I've gotten from the Sixers, you know, in recent months, has been that there's no reason to actually believe that this is some sort of chronic you know, or even worse an you know, a degrading injury, like I don't think it's the kind of thing where they're worried that he's never going to be Joel Embiid again. I think, you know, whether it's wishful thinking or whether it's just based on what their doctors are telling them.
I think the Sixers still expect that Joel Embiid is gonna be pretty close to himself again, So I don't think there's any scenario where he's on the move or where they're even trying to move him. I also think that if you did decide to go that direction, it'd be really tough because I think of it in the same way I think of Zion, who's obviously much younger. But there's certain guys who like the risk reward potential
makes it really hard to figure out what their value is. Like, if you're a team trying to acquire Joel Embiid, given the recent injury history, how much are you truly willing to give up on the risk that he's not going to be himself? And plus, if the Sixers are willing to move him, you have all that much more reason to think, well, they must want out of the Joel and Beat business for a reason. So now you're even
more cautious. And if you don't want to give up that much, well then the Sixers aren't going to want to move him, right that You're not moving, you know, a player of his caliber, even with the injury history, unless you're getting a boatload in return, or at least enough in return that makes you think you can, you know, kickstart a new future. Now, all that said, what if the lottery balls really go their way and they end
up with Cooper Flag? Is that a reason to keep everybody else and say that Cooper Flags now the missing piece. Who's going to you know, help Joel and b Paul George and Tyres MAXI make a deep run? Or is it now we've got our new guy to build around and that makes it more palatable to start over and maybe try to move Embiid. But again, I don't We're We're way ahead of ourselves. I don't think any of
those things are particularly likely. And I also think that given the size of Joel Embiad's contracts, I don't know that a lot of teams are going to be willing to give up a ton to get him, even if he were made available.
I think I may have asked you this about a month ago, and if I remember correctly, the answer was Shay. And it just, you know, watching the other night Jokic with a sixty point triple double, and every time I hone in on him and he has one of those nights, I just am seeing there. I'm like, I don't know that I've ever seen this in my entire life around the NBA. I'm not sure I've ever seen a player
quite like him. He is unique in every way. Where are you at today on the MVP debate between SGA and Jokic, Yeah, I mean.
Everything you just said about Yokich is obviously true. Like he's a truly unique figure in NBA history, incredibly dominant, and he's having another season that, by any number of different standards that you could apply, by any number of metrics you could apply, is historic and dominant and incredible.
But Shay is also having a historic and dominant and an incredible season, and he's doing it for a team that is still on pace to potentially win seventy and if they don't win seventy, it's going to be sixty eight or sixty nine. Like the Thunder are going to have one of the greatest seasons in NBA history. Obviously, only two teams have ever cleared seventy. There aren't even that many that have won sixty seven or more. It's it's you know, a half dozen or so that matters
to me. That has always mattered to me as an MVP voter, and so yeah, I don't think there's much doubt in my mind. I will always reassess everything before I actually fill out the ballot. But to me, it's been Shae for a bit here and it's still Shay.
I've got to follow up.
Since you are a voter, did you receive a sparkling package in the mail from our local basketball team encouraging to vote for Isaiah Collier as first Team All Rookie. It's all we got, Howard, That's all we got out here.
It was a lighter package than some years. Yeah, I did get that. I will say it's going to be hard for any team to top. And I always think these campaigns are a little goofy and they have no bearing on how.
We've actually vote.
But it's gonna be hard for anybody to top the Washington Wizards, who this year sent me three pints of very flavored ice cream, and it's really good ice cream. Oh man, I don't I don't even remember what they were trying to get me to vote for with that ice cream. I just can tell you that the ice cream's really good.
We have the best ice cream in the world.
We blew it.
I mean, I guess by the time ice cream from Utah gets to Brooklyn, it probably would be uh, it probably would be melted.
And look, I don't know if you packed dry ice.
Oh, so there's a way to do it, apparently.
Okay, Look if Washington, if the Washington freaking Wizards are doing things better than the Utah Jazz, we have an issue out here. But look, if you don't have anything here, we can punt move on quickly. This rookie class. I mean, I love Stefan Castle. I was praying he would fall to the Jazz. I loved him in college. You know, Rischache. But when you look at what Collier has done, he does have a case potentially for least being second team
All Rookie. I don't know how much you've dug on he you know, dug in here, and if you haven't, we can move on. But any thoughts on whether or not you think he has a shot to make these teams.
I have not dug in that far. And this is this is a tough rookie class in general, which probably makes his chances that much higher because in a year where there's not a lot of like spectacular rookies, it means that people are going to go in a thousand different directions, which means the boats will be split spread so far that it might not you know, the part to entry might be lower. So but I will get to that, hopefully by the time we talk again.
So, as a guy who did you cover the Mellow knicks some of those Okay, So you know, I felt like, and I don't know if it was just me as a Nick fan, you know, my childhood being intertwined to that organization. Just appreciating that Mellow took on the New York Challenge in a way that most stars seem to be either afraid of or they didn't want to work for that idiot owner a different topic, but Mello at least embraced it, tried to do it, and did it
at a very high level. Never made it out of the second round of the postseason, but for about I don't know howard five or so years, I felt like he was the best pure individual scorer in the game. And I don't know if it's because he came out when Lebron did and d Wade did, but it seemed like whenever anybody talked about Carmelo Anthony and whether or not he was a Hall of Famer, it was intertwined in this whole, like he's never won it and he's not Lebron, who he was drafted with. I think it's
a no brainer that he's a Hall of Famer. Of course, it's not just the NBA. It's a national championship at Syracuse, it's three gold medals with the with the US basketball team. But your thoughts now that it's a fisher, the Carmelo Anthony is a Hall of Famer.
Yeah. Also, by the way, really good dude. And he was always really good to the media for sure, which we all which we all appreciated, and kept his sense of humor through good times and bad too, Like you know, it was not all, you know, not all fun and games with with with the Knis in particular, he's a He's been a polarizing player and was in real time
as well. The Hall of Fame thing is is unquestionable, like I don't no one can even I don't know how anybody can question that, and you just you just
said it. People need to remember it's a basketball Hall of Fame and not an NBA Hall of Fame, and even by NBA Hall of Fame standards, if that were a thing, he'd be in, but especially with the Basketball Hall of Fame where your college resume matters, and he did win a national championship as a freshman where your Olympics matter, and he's got multiple gold medals, like all of that is baked in, which made him just automatic as a player for the Knicks, he was certainly polarizing,
like they did not have a ton of success, and they certainly didn't have the success that they hoped to have when they got him and paired him with a Mari Statamaier, Maury couldn't stay healthy.
They brought a Tyson.
Chandler, you know, but they didn't have the means to really fill out that roster, in part because Carmelo forced a trade to the next instead of waiting for free agency, and in doing so it robbed them of a lot of you know, draft capital and trade ships and so, like He's even mentioned at one point himself like yeah, maybe maybe that that made it tough on them, and it made it hard for them to build around me. So you know, they had more i think frustrating seasons
than good ones with him here. They only made the second round once. There were a bunch of seasons without the playoffs. It felt I think like overall, like like like that era was a bit of a bust in some ways. And toward the end, Carmela was getting booed at times because you know, of the obvious things like this, his shot selection at times was questionable, and you know, he liked to do a lot of one on one and and uh, you know a lot of dribbling, a lot of ISO and that style of play was also
starting to go out of fashion at that time. Like his style of play does not really sell well in today's NBA. You know, it's kind of a bruiser who's going to you know, post up and have the ball in his hands a lot in in the post area. So still an incredible score, one of the best of all time, and you know, the Hall of Fame, Nod is absolutely deserving.
The Knicks fall too.
I think it's own seven against Cleveland and boss, is that an accurate representation on kind of where they exist in the ecosystem of the Eastern Conference this year.
I don't think the record lies. I just I think it's not one where it's like, oh, they went two and five against these guys, right, Like there's a mixed bag. And granted, you know, the more recent losses are tough because they've been without Jalen Brunton, who might be coming back here soon. But yeah, the record is what it is, and like, I think those teams are just demonstrably better than the next and demonstrably better than Milwaukee and Detroit, Indiana and everybody else.
In the East.
So there's a gap. It doesn't mean that the Knicks at full strengths might not be able to take four of seven from one of those teams. I mean, I think they still got a better chance against Cleveland than Boston, and they did beat Cleveland this this you know, this version of Cleveland. A couple of years ago, the knickt smoked them in the first round of the playoffs, and I think that that was partially indication where the Cavs were at that time, and you know, they're young guys,
hadn't been in the playoffs before. Mobley and Garland just worked deer in headlights in that series, So they're a much different team now. Obviously, you know the standings, you know, are a test to that. The record attests to that, they're they're play attests to that. So yeah, I think the Knicks are a distant third in the East, but with a puncher's chance, it's they've they've got. They've got just enough to make it interesting and and to to
to make a plausible case. But I don't think what we've seen the season in the case that they're that they're ready to uh to get through Cleveland and Boston.
As a man with impeccable musical taste and an incredible musical palette, I'm surprised I've never asked you for a complete comprehensive breakdown of the musical chops of JD and The Straight Shot.
If you want to, if you want a good laugh, I hope it's a good laugh, go on the New York Times website or just use Google Google my name, UH and Dolan and JD in the Straight Shot, and you'll find an absolutely preposterous piece I did at the Times way back when, in which I used lyrics from his songs on his new album as a means for answering questions that he otherwise would not answer since he was not meeting with the media. It was kind of a Stephen Colbert rip off, where you know, Colbert would
pretend to have interviewed somebody by using other clips. That's what I did, except I used lyrics from JD in the straight shot.
Oh hell yes, Now there's nothing else I want to do, and I've got two and a half hours left in the show. Hey, before I say you know what, that's an excellent idea. I should do that. But before I say you loose, I want you to settle a debate I was having with a buddy of mine who is a Nuggets fan. As I'm watching Jokic, a sixty point triple double is so dumb it never happens. And then Russell Westbrook was like, Hey, good game, watch this and just fumbles it away. Are the Nuggets? Are they in
danger of Andrew Luckiness? Where the the cults were never able to surround Andrew luck with enough talent he got hurt. He's like I'm out are the nugg Look, they did win a championship and in Denver that's hard to do. I'm not taking that away from them. But he is so generationally special. Is he being failed by his team?
Oh boy?
I don't want to say yes yet. I think we're in that zone. I think they're on that trajectory. I think if it goes this way for another couple of years, we're going to have that conversation in earnest. But I'm hesitant only because we're only a couple of years removed from their championship. We did just enter this new CBA that made it tougher now. I think the Nuggets generally speaking, have been kind of a cheaper organization. They don't like
paying the luxury tax anyway. But you know, they have led talent the last couple of summers, and the system as it is now makes it hard to replace that talent.
But but that's the job. Like we can make all excuses that we want about the CBA and second aprons and all this, but like the job when you have a superstar of his caliber generational talent is to do everything possible to put them in the best possible position to contend for titles, and I don't think you can say that the Nuggets are in that position right now.
Now.
The West is weird. The thunder are the only you know, like they're They're clearly the favorite by a mile, and you can't make it a clear cut case for any of the teams below them as the number two.
Right.
It might be Denver, it might be the Lakers, might be it might be the Clippers, it might be the Warriors. There's it's just kind of a mishmash, and they're all they've all got a case to make. So maybe the Nuggets make it, and maybe they make it at least at the conference finals. But are they failing Jokics right now by not giving him the right kind of supporting cast to contend for titles. I think we're The conversation is legitimate, and we'll leave it at that for doth.
Howard, Thank you, my friend, appreciate the time, have a great weekend.
I'll chat soon.
Thanks, be touch you soon.
Howard Beck covers the NBA for The Ringer. Spent a number of years with The New York Times. He was with Sports Illustrated. He has been probably top three NBA rider in my opinion for two decades, mostly on Blue Sky Now, but you can find the links to his work off on his Twitter x I don't know whatever they're calling it. Doge website at Howard Beck is where you find it. Howard Stops Spot Today brought to you
courtesy of our friends at IFA Country Stores. The weather's about to get warm next week, and my guess is it's probably gonna stay somewhat warm to the point where you're gonna have to start thinking about your long care and do it now. And any drive to the basket begins with the first step on the court.
That's the ultimate power move. IFA Step one.
Crabgrass Preventor and Lawn Food is the first choice to grab your yard the healthy, thick green look you desire.
The neighbors will be green with envy.
Shopifanline at IFA dot co op or stop by one of their eighteen Utah locations today. Five games left for your Utah Jazz after the Rockets beat the Jazz last night by a lot of points by thirty eight at Indiana Tomorrow, at Atlanta on Sunday home against Portland and OKC before finishing off at Minnesota Sunday, April the thirteenth. Our next guest is the TV voice of the Utah Jazz, and I would imagine we find Craig Bowler Jack in Indianapolis, Indiana, on this Thursday afternoon.
Is that correct, sir?
As it is, we touched down about an hour or so ago, then bust in and trying to beat all these storms around the Midwest. It's bad. The wind has been really bad on all the stops, all the flights so far on this road trip. And I guess spring will bring that type of weather. But yeah, we got on the ground. That's all the counts. And here we
are waiting for another another game tomorrow night. And as you just set an early tip Sunday, late evening or late afternoon against the Hawks and then back home before we played two and then go up and see Gobert and Jingle and Joe and Mike Colling and the Kiel Alexander one more time.
Not going to make some corny analogy between the rough weather and the Jazz.
I will not do that.
I'm just going to ask you this, Craig, how are you man? How are you?
How are you doing?
Yeah, I'm you know what this is. This is a challenge I'm not going to cut corners on that spence. It is look. I like to win. I like to call winning basketball. Who wouldn't. I think most of these players want to win, but they also understand and bought in on what the task at hand is. And you know, that's what my job is too, to still try to find some positives. It's hard. We've kind of rinsed and repeat on occasion, you know, some of the talking points.
But each day is different. Man, It's an amazing thing on who plays and who doesn't, and who has a you know, excellent who's excelled. You know, you had Isaiah Collyer, who you know was in the spotlight after passing John Stockton's rookie assist record. I like what Isaiah has done. He seems to have a focus that I didn't realize that he had. And you know, he runs and he's damn fast, and if you run with him, you get some rewards. But right now it's about youth and minutes
and how they're going to fare. And now I think the attention After talking to Justin Zenech last night on the air, I wish he could have stayed longer. But you know how you know how timeouts and all that stuff goes. Spence, Yeah, I think he's going to join us again Sunday in Minnesota. But you know, the focus now really is where the lottery selection will be. I think the lottery shows coming up on correct me if I'm wrong, the twelfth of May, about a month five
weeks out. I think they will give the Jazz, obviously in jazz fans, a direction of what's going down and what they will do, and then the rest of it plays itself out and in the draft. And I think the picks that Danny has in that bucket, they're deep. How does he use them? I do not know. Are the Jazz a player in the trademarket? Most likely? Will they try to bring in one or two pieces? I would say, yeah. Do they want to try to work next month next year's draft? I would guesstimate that that's
a real possibility. But again that's beyond my pay scale. But you know, it's a tough task to build a team through the draft and have to go through the process spence of losing to get there. I wish the NBA had another way, I really do, and we kind of used this time on the road to discuss those, you know, possibilities just to again entertain the fans because they deserve it, and you know, it's hard, it's hard.
I think Adam Silber has a real task ahead of how he wants to play this out with his new television contract and making sure players play when fans come to watch their favorite player play and that particular player doesn't play. So's I've watched it on the road a couple of times this past week, and you know, I saw a kid the other night wanted to see one of the jazz players and they had traveled in and
the guy's not there. So it's it's hard to explain to him and you show you see the disappointment on the young man face. But it's reality of what professional sports is right now, and even in even the amateur amateur game two spence. You know, that's what the portals all about, right I want to go someplace else and find a better home. So it's crazy world right now. Crazy yeah.
I mean, look, the incentive structure as far as the way that the NBA is set up is mandating that the Jazz do what they're doing, right Like that's they're doing what they have to do. As it's set up with the current incentive structure of pro basketball, and the hardest thing in the world is to convince very rich people that are making a lot of money that they need to do something different because they're going to be like, why right, And you reference the NBA TV deal, So
I think it's a problem. You think it's a problem, but I don't know that the NBA thinks it's a problem.
But I wonder, based off this incentive structure, you know, based off of conversations that you have with Xanak and Danny whoever else you have access to, if they have become resigned to the fact that this is the only option they have, because you know, early on first year of this, I know we're supposed to say tear down, but first year, I'll just say, of the post Quinn Snyder, jazz Era Lowry's an All Star, A lot of that was because he had some grown ups playing with him,
namely Mike Conley is his point guard, and I think that may have given them a false sense of wait, we still have a lot here, and maybe we're Michel Bridges or a Paul George or a Drew Holliday or Chris stapsportsing us away from kind of being back in a competitive space. And you know, now it's a situation where there's not a lot there there And I just wonder if you feel like they've just become resigned to Okay, we weren't able to get any of the big game
hunting done. We could not get any of these big names that we were in the mix for. And so does it feel like they're now resigned to this long game pain tolerance based off of the you know what we're seeing in front of us.
You know, I think they're in on that, as you just outlined perfectly. I think that Justin and Danny, you know, tore this team down for that particular reason. You know, after a couple of conversations and a couple of interviews and stories that are read concerning Donovan this year, you know, having quote the window was he thought the window now was kind of still open, but you know, the jazz
or he decided to go elsewhere. I think the twenty twenty bubble was really kind of the end of it, to be honest with you, I think we saw more issues. ESPN did a great timeline of that night in Oklahoma City, that big t and I were involved in, and yeah, it kind of brought me back to saying, yeah it was. It was a hellish night. But there was a lot of things prior to that, which I think is where
we are today. It's been a five year journey, step by step by step, I think, from where they were the best record in the NBA and the bubble and then just a slip slide on the slope and Danny came in and said, hey, you didn't like the way the guys responded, didn't think that they were competitive. I'm just paraphrasing, not totally putting quotations around it, but I think you know what I mean is that from his sense of where he was as a player and how
he built Boston, that this team wasn't really connected. So let's start again, and that's where we are. They were too good for a year or two with Olennock, too good, with Mike too good, even you know Simone Fontechio. They get a first round to expense back in return, and so here we are, and now we're gonna have They're going to have to judge on who stays on this roster and who does not, who stays in summer league. Who do they want to take another look at and
who do they want to release? As Will Hardy said, this is not an easy league and you better have some strong you know. Well, let's you know what I mean To survive in this league, You've got to be a tough guy. And that's where they are. Who's going to have the wherewithal to want to work hard to improve their game and then have the attitude to actually, you know, see it through and be a part of what the Jazz want to become. It's a tough journey.
I think this year is you know, looking around, it's worn on a lot of people.
You know.
I think I'd raise my hand to say, yeah, COVID to the year of COVID. And after COVID, I think we called a hundred games you know out the Jumbo tront and I thought that was difficult, and this is this is different because you're around players and you see the emotions and the highs and the lows, and mostly have been low. I haven't won a road game since January fifth in Orlando. That's a long that's a tough thing.
Spence for a team to try to continue to be motivated and go to practice, go to shoot around and still be a professional, especially when you're nineteen, twenty twenty one, twenty two years old. Right in the older days, you know, you know you we're already twenty two coming out of college, and now you're growing up in a totally different way. I think that's what's a challenge for Will is to motivate, try to motivate or keep some positive vibes going. And
I'll tell you he's a master of his verbiage. I think he still shoots from the cough. He talks about disappointments, the highs and lows, and he I think what he is hoping that the players listen to what he says in postgame comments because there's a lot of truth there and a lot of things to ponder and think about.
So I want to follow up about Will because you know, you can't be like for a year like this where for the first time in the fifty plus years of jazz history, they've lost more than sixty games. There's no way Will every single night can be completely honest about where he's at in this process.
He just know he would run out of energy.
I mean, but my guess is the way he expressed himself after the last Houston loss following getting dumb truck by Memphis, is more in line with the way he actually feels than the way he presents himself every night.
But I totally get it.
He has to be measured, He has to try to find positives. He has a young locker room where he's got to be careful about running down players that are being asked to do things that they're not ready to do.
But you're around him, You're around the team.
Like, honestly speaking, Craig, what sort of toll do you think losing likes like this takes on a guy that seems to win as much as Will wants to win.
Oh, it's look his staff and Will. I am amazed at this point in the season that they're still putting together shoot a rounds and off day practices, you know. But he tells me and I watch practice and shoot rounds on the road and at home, not practices, but shoot arounds at home that he maintains and he's been very consistent. Spence, I can say that straight up, man. Now, behind the scenes, I'm not privy for that, but in front of us and how he approaches it with his team.
He switched things up a little bit to try to have more fun at shoot around, get away from some of the just of the angles. And you know, you know, pistol grip, whatever you want to call it. You know I'm not you know in his in his verbiage, you know of how he calls place. Instead, they'll do five on five, they'll do some three on threes. And you know, I saw a really competitive practice the other day where the guys actually liked to get on the floor and
play against each other, but not the coaches. So I give him credit for trying to keep it keep the player's minds intact when a lot of them are drifting. And I think that happens again too with the age of the NBA announcements, where you just haven't really learned how to be a professional. Sure you still got emotions, Sure you want to win, and sure you're thinking about
your future and losing. Let's be honest, no matter what business you're in, if your sales are down, or if your ratings are down, or if your wins and losses don't jive, then that puts added pressure and you're thinking about your future. Now, am I going to make this squad next year or am I out of the NBA? Does someone see worse than what I do? And I think will try to give them some directions on how you make this journey and still survive it. But do
they listen. I don't know. And you know, some players are going to be gone, Let's just be honest. That's just the way it's going to be. And Justin and Dan, you're going to pick five or six that they think still have the ability to grow and developed during you know, you know, a three year window. I would guess. I think Walker probably passed the testy year right. Had it given up on him after year two, the sophomore slump, then you wouldn't see what Walker Kesser has really become.
Does he need work? Absolutely? Free throw line? You bet He's going to be a three point shooter, doubtful. But they want to give him an opportunity. So that's what I've been watching Spence. It's it's a complicated eighty two games that I've never been involved in in the worst season of the Utah Jazz. That's fifty one years of basketball, mind you, and no Jazz fan is used to having
sixty one, you know, losses in the column there. But it is what it is, and probably things will calm themselves down if the Jazz actually win the lottery, Right, they've got the same they've got their's. Three teams that have a fourteen is a zero point three percent chance of grabbing the number one pick. Maybe everyone just kind of says, oh, it was worth it. But if that pick doesn't go the Jazz way, then you have to ask what direction do they go? Right? What direction do
they go? And that's going to be interesting summer. Once again, every summer's interesting, but this one's maybe the most intriguing of all.
Well, the reason I ask about Will is in last night. It's only a vacuum, it's only a moment. But we'll use last night as an example. Like I'm watching the game and sensibah and call your just blow it on Like three straight dribble handoffs, like a really simple action from Houston led to wide open three point shots on three straight possessions for Dylan Brooks, Jalen Green, and I think it was Cam Whitmore who nailed one.
Yeah, Cam had checked in right.
And all they were, Craig, were dribble handoffs and both Bryce and Isaiah just like forgot to stick with one or the other. And I'm just watching this through the prison, like what does their head coach really think? Because it feels like Craig every night. If Will wanted to be really honest about what he's he could find because my guess is Will and his staff are coaching how to guard dribble handoffs, Like there's no way these players are
not learning how to do this. It's like coach Wit says all the time, all I ask for my players is are you physically capable of doing what we're asking you to do? And mentally do you understand the ask? And these players the Jazz have are certainly physically capable because they're pros.
But I don't know if it's just lost in translation. I don't know if they're young.
There are so many moments every night where I'm like, this looks like a team that's never played together before. And I just imagine if Will wanted to every night, he probably could blast them in the postgame presser.
Right. He hasn't, by the way, which I think is brilliant on his point because he doesn't want to lose one or two guys when they're when a coach will bark out someone in the media in a post game that's going to cause trouble down the road. But what he tries to do is address them as a group and not just single out one or two individuals on a given night. Spence. You know, again, anybody who's played sports, it is do you have the physical capabilities? Right? And
you just said it. You're in the NBA for a reason. You're God given talent, right. The other part of it is are you a quick learner? You know they always talk about I always got basketball IQ. Where are you in the learning process? And a couple of things too this year that has come up is how were they trained? How are players now trained coming up through team play
AAU ball and what is the fallout now? Spence, maybe we're actually living it, not only the Jazz, but many of the coaches around the league I've talked too have kind of hinted to the same thing. Youth is one thing, but do you come in and leave purely on your athleticism and then you get sold to goods that we're going to develop him? But I think there's a lot of coaches that are concerned overall about where basketball is going because the basics of basketball have been bypassed because
of TV great players who make it look easy Steph Curry. Okay, I'm not going to blame him, but that's what he does. And those are the highlights you see on a particular network. And it started with Michael Jordan actually, in my opinion, where that group started to see nothing but the greatness of highlights. But you know, oh, by the way, the Bulls lost by twelve, you know, but it was about the highlight and the entertainment. And now the three ball
has become such an important piece. I think the Europeans are taught at much younger age spens basic skills, how to step, how to pivot, how to pass, how to rebound with two hands, how to bullet pass it from the chest down. And some of this stuff gets lost because every young man thinks they have one skill and so instead of learning to play the post or learning play the two or the three. I know it's positionless basketball now, but you still have to have basic skills
for all those things. And sometimes a kid is picked out of a crowd just because he's a little bigger than the other and the other guy always goes to the point guard right because he's the shortest guy on the floor. And you know, they're never really taught the true skills of basketball, and I think that's a concern. That's me, that's just me. I know, you know, you learned it the right way. I had one year in
high school because I was more football minded. But boy, I'd say the basics were pretty simple, you know, dribble pass, rebound team. And again, I think strangely has been lost. I really do. With the Europeans, I think are way ahead of where the US players are, and they've gained a lot of ground. I should say they've gained a ton of ground. Look at some of the high level, elite players in this league and the skill set they have.
That's that's proof. That's proof of this conversation. In my book, I want to move.
Over now to your just kind of the feel on the player side of things, because one of the things that I don't understand, and I will admit sometimes I read too much into body language and too much into I just can't imagine get my head kicked in and like laughing and smiling and walking over the bench. So I look at the players and I watch the way that they're digesting getting their doors blown off every night. And I was actually told this by somebody over there,
and it tracks with what I'm seeing. Like the one player that really feels like this sucks is Walker, And I was told by somebody that's over there, like Walker's the one that takes this really hard.
Does that track with kind of what you've noticed.
No, he loves to win, man, He's competitive. He has put a lot of work in. I think all these players are struggling right now just to say, Okay, I get it, this is my job. But Spence, i'd be disappointed. I can't speak for Danny and Justin, but I would guess that they want their guys to be competitive. They want this has to hurt. If it didn't, then get out. But it's a tough balance, isn't it. I mean it
has to be. I'd go nuts, because you're taught in sport that the work you put in, the blood, sweat and tears that you go through with teammates, whether it's on the bench, in the weight room, on the floor, in the huddle, on the football field, whatever sport you choose, baseball, soccer, whatever it may be, everyone's got a story about you sacrifice because you're part of the team, but you also have to individually sacrifice because you're working out, you're breaking
the body down and building a back up. Yeah, Walk wants to win, man, he works at it as much as anybody, and it does bug him not to play and to lose. Right now, the team is at a point that I think, you know again, you got five less spence and it's going to be a good thing
for this team. Just to take a breath and get away, work on a few things, stay in shape, and then come back for summer league and we'll get a better picture of what direction the Jats is going to go and with whom right still don't know who's going to be a part of this this continued process and how how the draft lottery is going to turn out in five weeks time. But now I'm with you. I see a lot of guys who have hopes to be great in this league, and this is not fun. This is
not a fun time right now. And there I think Will and the rest we're hoping that many of them would would learn the game better, become better because of it. Because of the minutes and not having John Collins on the floor, lowry market and sex and smissed his share at Games two and not put the heavy hitters in JC, you know, and let the young guys take. Probably since the All Star Breaker, probably ninety percent of the minutes
are played by about nine guys. And are they going to be better than they were when they started the season, Well, you better hope so. If not, they're going to probably be moved. And that's going to be the true story when the season comes to an end, and those decisions belong solely with Justin and Danny, and yes, Will Hardy does have a voice in that group.
All right, Bowler, before I say you loose, we'll end on a positive. Because you referenced Isaiah call. You're breaking John Stockton's rookie assist record ten more last night beings four to twenty nine, and by my calculation, he's only fifteen thousand, three hundred and seventy eight away from John's career record.
Oh I needed that laugh.
That's good man, And I'm not knocking on Isaiah.
I mean, ultimately, John played eighteen minutes a night as a rookie. He played behind somebody named Ricky Green. He only had five starts. But when you look at this rookie class. I really love this Stefon Castle kid. I was actually hoping he would fall to the Jazz, but Zachary Reschache, Alex sarkleil Ware has played.
Well as of eight.
Jalen Wells and the Jazz have started this campaign to encourage media members, including Howard Beck, our guest Last Hour, to offer up a vote for Isaiah to make first team All Rookie. I don't know that he can make first team All Rookie. He feels more of a lock for second team. But is there a shot? You think that maybe, based off of the way Isaiah's kind of responded to this challenge, that he could be or Rookie. He's the only candidate the Jazz had for a postseason award.
Yeah, I think there's a shot. You know, with six point two assists a game and some of the publicity that came with the name John Stockton. And you make a great point, John didn't start for three years. That was a Jerry Sloan way. You have to earn it, you know, That's what happened with d Will in the early days of his career as a rookie. You know, I'm starting coach, you picked me here, I'm gonna know,
got to wit your turn. And that's what happened to Stockton behind Ricky, and so I think again, sometimes people think that that record means it means a lot to Isaiah. He put his eyes on it and he said, I'm going after it. But but John didn't, like you said, his starts weren't there, his minutes weren't there. And Isaiah has taken advantage of his opportunity right to actually own that record now because of the time he's been on the floor, unlike John. But I think he's got a shot.
It's because I think his speed, his attitude. I think he's I think with teams around the league. When I talked to broadcasters, there seems to be a really intrigue about him. Taken late twenty ninth, had the relationship with Bronnie you know, at USC and he always comes back to say, no, Bronni played with me, I didn't play with him. You know. I like that because he's trying to take a you know, his take his own credibility to himself that he didn't write the Tales of one
Bronnie James. But I think he's got a shot. I think. I think he's become a more of a liability for teams to slow him down. They put more ball pressure on him, you know, at half court, at the top of the three point line. They seem to really try to engage him. But man, that first step he'll blow by a lot a lot of guys. And I think teams are beginning to realize and appreciate just how good he is developing in a very short period of time.
So yes, I think he's got a real shot. Is it going to be you know, well, surprise me if he's a second team er. No, but I think he's got a shot at it. But you know, I thought, you know, Oscar sibwe may be the G League MVP, and he didn't win that. So that guy had a tremendous year, by the way, and he's a great guy. I'm anxious to see if the Jets have plans for him to All.
Right, baller, well, enjoy the Windy City, have a good call tomorrow and enjoy Atlanta. And yeah, man, five games left, so get to that finish line. Thanks for the time, sir.
Yeah, we're trying to sprint down the finish line, you know. Yeah, five to go, and it's good talking to your pelf.
See you soon, all right, The great Craig Bowler Jack brought to you today by our friends at Prize Picks. Spring time is here. Baseball seasons underway. Don't miss your chance to add your favorite players from the Diamond into your Prize Picks lineup. Whether it's strikeouts, RBIs, first inning runs, take your pick of more or less for your shot to win up to one thousand times your cash.
Today.
On Prize Picks, you can mix and match player projections from different sports. Can bind your favorite baseball players or players from basketball, hockey, E sports, and much more.
Here's the deal.
If you download the Prize Picks up today, and if you use the promo code ESPN seven hundred, they're going to give you fifty dollars at checkout when you play that first five dollars bet.
Do you not have to win the bet to get to fifty. It's on the house.
So download the Prize Picks up today, use the promo code ESPN seven hundred, and you get fifty dollars courtesy of our good friends at Prize Picks, where you can run your game all season long. You're gonna do a little sports court today with our friends from Handy and Handy coming a bit coming up in a bit, we'll launching the five o'clock out of the program on this up Thursday afternoon, little chili, little rainy outside here in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. RSL welcomes in the LA
Galaxy Saturday at two thirty. Forecast is okay, should be all right on Saturday, a little early afternoon kick. And our next guest is a club legend, and if I'm honest, he's a life legend. Okay, so let's welcome him in. Jason Christ Thursday afternoon, Jason, how are you, sir?
I'm great, spence, even better when you give me such nice compliments like that. To start off with, well, I just.
Want people to accurately remember exactly who you are.
You are a legend, Jason. You understand that.
Yes, perhaps, But maybe even more understandable is the fact it was a long, long time ago. And I guess that's why we're concerned if people will remember it or not.
It was not a long it wasn't that long ago. I mean you were the coach of a team that won a title in two thousand and nine. You had a good Conka cafroon. It wasn't that long ago, Jason, give yourself some credit, please.
I don't know since I just keep feeling older and older.
Yeah, I know you're going to roll your eyes, but I'm with you at this point as I continue to agent, what's.
The us the favorite?
What's what's the one goal that you scored throughout your career when you're laying in bed at night you remember that one?
Is there one that comes to mind?
That's a tough question. And the truth is I have a very very bad memory, so I have oftentimes people bring up things that happened in a game or instances and I said, you remember that, and I, frankly, I'm like, no, I don't. And it maybe it comes across the wrong way A lot of times. I don't know what that is. Maybe I got hit in the head too many times with the ball or something. But if you had to make me pull one, I'll pull u. The hundredth goal
actually at Rice Cycle Stadium. It was obviously a special one of momentous occasion because it was the hundreds, but it was also a pretty darn good goal left the volley from outside the box that was laid down to me by Chris Brown. So yeah, i'd say, abou.
Shout out to Chris Brown. I remember that goal.
Is that the only good memory you have about playing soccer at Rice Cycle Stadium?
Be honest, I think yeah, I think so.
Yeah.
Well, no, I understand that was a rough time for all of us, but hey, we live and learn and we move on, all right, Jason, We got to start with the progress. We had Pablo on a couple of days ago, and last week Pablo hopped on and said he was told they were about four days away from potentially two different signings to add a little talent to the attack. And I hate to break it to you, here's my soccer analysis. We need to add a little talent to the attack with this club right now.
So just give us the update.
Man, I don't want to puld your feet to the fire, but our self fans wondering if these players are going to be signed.
Wait, did you say that he said we would four days ago or a week ago? We were supposed to have it and four days later we didn't.
Which is it a week ago it was four days away, and then a couple days ago have tapped out and said, I'm not really sure where we're at at this point.
I think that speaks to how volatile these situations are for us as a club. I think you know we have it is not for a lack of trying, Spence. I think all of us have been talking about it. None of us have been lying. We are very intent on adding a player or two in this window. We have gone so far as to make offers. Some of those have been rebuffed, some of those are still negotiations.
I feel quite confident that there will be additions. I just can't be that confident on exactly how fast it will happen.
So I know you have to be careful here. So I want to be careful how I phrased the question. And certainly I would never ask you or anybody else to talk about a scenario involving people that literally sign their paychecks. But they're clearly have been reports out there that we're in the middle of another ownership transition. Is it fair to say that that situation may be delaying the potential of adding pieces to this puzzle.
No, I don't think that that's really been a consideration, to be honest, We've had direction from really the moment that we found out that Elias Manuel wasn't going to be joining us. Even before that, you know, our direction we were going to add another striker on top of him.
So the idea was to come into the season with three strikers, one that would be the main guy, Elias as a secondary figure to replace Anderson Julio, and then we were adding a third young player, which we all liked in rspol And so when we lost Elias, I think that really sent us into a tailspin and kind of thought made us think about whether we needed to change that idea and go with more of one man and then two younger ones. And so that's the direction
we've been taking since then. The change in ownership that is imminent really hasn't had any conflicting opinion or conflicting ideas as to that, So absolutely not, I would say that that's not relevant to the situation. Suation.
The natural dumb guy follow up is what's the hold up? I know these things are complicated, and believe me, I've I've been a part of the scenario where feeling like something was close and then visa this paperwork that player change on mind that, so I know there are complications. But what would you say to the fan base as far as what the hold up is?
I would say it this way. Have you ever bought a car?
I have, I have, yes.
Yeah, And you went to the dealership and you said, Okay, I've got a budget in mind here that I need to stay within, and you negotiate and you make an offer, and oftentimes sometimes the answer is yes. They sail and goes to the manager, and the manager comes back with the salesman and says yes. But many times he says no, or many times it's a no as of right now, and then there's a negotiation. So I think the thing that probably people need to understand is that we do
not have a blank checkbook here. We are not the LA Galaxy, we are not into Miami, we are not the clubs. We operate within a budget and we have to we have to make budgetary decisions. So I think that does tend to make things a little more difficult, and and I think that has been the major delay. The other piece of it is that sometimes you can go down the road with a player that that you're really high on and you may find out that that
player actually doesn't want to come to m LS. So you know, there's there's just so many things that go into these these decisions that make it complicated. It is not because we are just sitting on our hands and not trying to move forward or nervous about making decisions. It's it's none of those things. It's just we have to we have to get everything aligned and we have to be within a budget.
I'll ask another dumb guy follow up. You've played eight games in total, You've scored six goals. Do you feel urgency to get this done?
Does the urgency go up? Is that what your question was? Sorry I broke up.
Yeah, yeah, I mean like like it's it feels like it's getting late early. It's not just lack of results, it's really lack of quality chances and finishing.
I mean it's clear.
Uh you know, Pablo, this week I asked them about Saturday. Any outlined the potential of playing like a false nine maybe and I'm like, well, that's tough because you know that means you're not really thrilled with the nines you have.
There disposed at your disposal?
Is the is the front office approaching these negotiations with urgency because you're leaving a lot of points on the table.
Jay. You know, Spence, there was a very good GM who one time told me that you should not do harm. So you should not out a player out of urgency or out of out of the feeling like we have to win this game on the weekend, because oftentimes when you do that, you make more decisions, and so we have to make a smarter decision that's going to be for the good of this club for a long period of time. And I think that that that's how we're behaving right now. We certainly aren't going to be pushing
into any urgent situation. I would not want us to add a player that I don't think is going to be a major difference maker, because you only get to add these types of players. You can only have three of them on your own, and for us, we can only have two because of the roster model we've chosen. So we do not want to get this decision wrong. We would hate to make a decision out of angst or urgency and then six months from now say, actually, this player isn't good enough. And by the way, we
can't just replace them. So we have to be diligent in our process.
In quotations you don't want to add harm credited to Steve Pastorino two thousand and five. Okay, moving on, all right, so let's just focus on what has happened so far and the players that are at Pablo's disposal.
What would you most?
Okay, So, if we removed what I perceived to be a clear lack of quality at the striker position, what else goes into this anemic offensive attack that has bred six goals in eight games.
Well, some of it has to do with just creating the chances, right, So the player that you're talking about that you would like us to add is the finisher of chances. And then if you step back and say, all, in fact, we haven't created enough chances, well, then we've got a different problem. And so I think that the
problem that we have isn't just about one player. I think the problem that we've had is a little bit of lack of consistency, a little bit of lack of performance by a couple of individual players over those number of games. I think some of the some of it comes down to the fact that we had Champions Cup and we rotated the team. I think some of it comes down to getting an ejection early in a game. In the very next game, you're really not in a soccer game. You're more just in a in a war,
as we were at Minnesota. So I think that we're just being a little bit a little bit anxious right now about things. You know, we've only played six games. There's there's still time in front of us. I think also that if we all as supporters and family members of the club start to talk about, you know, these new players coming in, we forget that that that we need to be focused on the players that are here since focused on making sure that the players are here
are playing their best. And so I think there needs to be a little bit more of a siege mentality here. And this is something that your father taught me, that that the players and the coaching staff needs to be operating from the perspective that there is no more help coming over that wall, and that we have to as a group and as a team, we have to band
together to make this thing work. If we're constantly looking for the next player and for the next help, and we are going to be focused on doing what we need to do to perform at our optimal level.
Okay, fine, I'll fall in line.
I hate interviewing people that have worked for my dad because you bring that up and now I'm just going to my room and I'm grounded for a week. Okay, fine, Jason, we'll focus on the group that is here. Okay, we'll have a siege mentality goodness, PTSD what what? I Ki'd obviously love love you pops?
What?
Okay?
So the players that are here, what have you liked if we let's w let's wax positive for a moment. What are some of the things that have stood out that are positive?
You know?
I think a couple of games ago Houston, we had a performance by a striker that I felt like was a very very high level performance in that game. And we had a performance from two attacking midfielders that both scored goals in the game. And we had a performance and for many of those minutes where we did actually create a very high number of goal scoring chances, we didn't take them all. If we had, we would have
won that game, for one. But that's There have been performances, There have been players showing what they're capable of, and when they do, I think we have a high level team. What we haven't had I don't think is real consistency
through that. So you know, have the players played well and then the next game played better and I like I went back to I think some of that comes through the fact that we were having to or the decision was made to rotate so many players and lineups, complete lineups through kN KAKAFT Champions Cup, so there just has not been any sort of rhythm or flow amongst the best starting eleven to really kind of establish how we want to play and who we want to be.
I would also say that I think in many of the games we have been making tactical adjustments very early on or even going into the game that were skidding away from a little bit about the identity and the game model that we formulated last year.
So you referenced early earlier. It's not just the finishing of the chances. It is the chances that are created, and on paper, it feels like, you know, with Diogo and Diego, you have two very dynamic chance creators. I want to go individually with both of them, and I want to talk about Diogo because on paper he is your designated player. Are you getting what you need from that silo based off of the paycheck he's receiving.
Would say that at the beginning of the season, I felt like he was sended in a really, really good direction. I felt like three games ago, like I said, at Houston, he scored a goal. He then had a chance he probably should have scored. Diego scored a goal. We were getting to the final third very very well, and I felt like he was really starting to perform at the
level that we had wanted him to. And then we had in the twenty fifth minute a silly ejection at home to Dallas, and then we went to Minnesota in the frozen tundra and hurricane that was supposed to be a soccer game, and those types of players are almost never going to have really effective games in those types
of conditions. So for me, the pot I would go back and just say, I think we're we were moving in a really positive direction, and I'm going to Holt that that's just roll right into things on Saturday, and then he continues to move in a positive direction because I think it's in there Diego.
You know, Pablo himself on the program has implied like this is kind of his show. You know, he kind of gets the keys to the Lamborghini and let's go. And you know he's had some national team call ups and to start the season he was wearing that mask because of the broken nose, and look, there's still so much quality. He's one of those players, like a hobber. When they get on the ball, you just get excited.
You kind of sit up and perk up and watch a little bit in a way that you don't prior to him receiving possession.
Are you getting what you need this year from Diego Luna?
I would say half of the games we have and half of the games we have not, and that is to no fault of Diego's. But I do think that the fact that he was without soccer for a month because of the broken nose that he took with the national team in January that set him back. Then you had a player out there wearing a mask who admittedly afterwards said I literally can't see. So a player that plays in this position that needs to have a three hundred and sixty degree perspective all the time that you're
asking a lot. So I think that affected his performances. Then when he moves the mask. I thought he had a couple of outstanding games and so again it's a player for me that we know the potential, we know the capabilities, it's just a matter of him starting to put those performances together back to back to back.
Same question about Mark Zouke, who you know during the summer window last year, after you guys brought them on board, it didn't take very long to see like, all right, there's something there. Okay, there's some juice there with this kid. Are you getting what you need from him?
Again? I think, same exact answer. So now I think we're coming up to the answers to some of our questions about why we're not creating enough goal spun chances or why perhaps we haven't scored enough goals. Because these players that are in these positions that are supposed to be lifting us and creating attacking, attacking chances and scoring goals as well, by the way, we need goals out of these three positions, their performances have been a little
bit inconsistent and a little bit spotty. And there's a lot of reasons for that. We don't just keep the blame on the players and say, well that's not good enough. No need to look at the reasons. We need to work with those players. We need to coax them. We need to bring their performances up. We need to draw all the consistency out of them. We need to give them some confidence. This this isn't just about them, and
then we all walk away. We identify the problems and then we try to we try to address solutions.
Could keep going down the list, but I'll just ask you. Are you getting what you need from anybody on the team right now?
Yes? We are. In fact, I think we have one elite performer in the team and his name is Rafa cabral Ye.
Yeah.
No, I think I think he's been dying to bite kid. Help me understand. And it could be just me being unfamiliar with this uh Sam Junco kid, But there's there there's a lot to like about Alex in my opinion, Alex Katrontas, I was unaware that we were going to be kind of in a battle in that position. It felt like Katronos had locked it in. Can you help me understand that?
Yeah? And again, I think this goes straight to what I said earlier. I think some of the issues we're having is because the beginning of our season was so tumultuous and tumultuous. I mean, what I mean exactly is we had four games in two weeks. Like nobody starts the soccer season that way. You just can't from a physical perspective, you can't build the fitness, the base fitness level to ask your players to play four games in two weeks in the very first two two weeks in
the season. So the decision was made, Okay, we're going to rotate whole sale. So it was like, well, here's one eleven is going to play the Conker CAF, here's the other level is the other eleven that's going to play the MLS season. And so you know, part of that decision to have two left backs was because last year we felt like what we ask from a physical perspective of that position is borderline in humane. So we have to have we have to have multiple players to
use in that spot. I still think that we have to have multiple players to use in that spot every single game because of what we asked. I'm not sure there's a human being, or not too many anyways, that are capable of performing at a high level when you're asked to sprint up and down the field for ninety minutes and you have to be on the highest line in the attack and on the lowest line in defense. So we brought in another player in fam to help
us alleviate some of that and compete with Alex. And so I think that competition is one that is, you know, it's pretty obviously open right now. The coaches have looked at both players for a lot of minutes, and I'm not sure that either player has really put their best foot forward and said and essentially said to the coaches, You're not going to get a choice because I'm going to own this position, all.
Right, final one here, because I will ask you about I'll say the two nines on the roster with respect to the brave kid who came in as a sub Piole got the red against Dallas out against Minnesota. Forrester has been more or less the first choice nine, more or less. But those are your two preferred nines as of now. What do you see from them that at least if you hope that they can maybe play better as we step forward, You know, I.
Think I would I would want to go back just a little bit here, Spence and say that that it's it's not everybody's opinion that that and certainly I bet you if you asked Hisses Breer, he'd tell you he is a nine. He has some some capabilities to play like a ten as well, but in college he played majority as a nine, and so I see I see
qualities in him. Not not from a physical perspective, because he's not a tall guy and he's not a super fast guy, but he is a guy that's really good around the goal, and he is a guy that's really good with his hold up play, and on top of that, he's really good at combining with other players around him. I think he has similar characteristics to what I I used to play as a striker, so he's a little bit different, but I wouldn't I wouldn't qualify him as a as a false nine in the way that Lionel
Messi has been asked to play that position. So I see three three three players there. I think all of them have had moments where you're like, oh, this looks really good, and then all of them have had moments like Wow, this looks really bad. And that's just part of being young players. So you know, we have to again appreciate who we are here. We are a club that develops players. We are not a club that goes
out and signs ten million dollars forwards. We're a club that goes out and signs players and turns them into ten million dollars forwards. So are feel like he's the one I was referencing against Houston. I thought he was fantastic for you know, the seventy minutes that he played and they subp them out for Forrester. But I thought he really didn't put us so wrong. He was doing everything that we asked off are nine. He just hadn't had a goal in the game, but he had a couple of chances.
Do you get nervous when you see me walk into the one hundred lions dinner? Do? I?
No, absolutely not.
You make things Sonner, Okay, I felt like you were mad at me after I peppered youth questions. But look know what, okay, what good to hear? Good to hear man, Thank you for the time. We'll be pulling for your Saturday, and yeah, well chat soon.
Thanks check appreciate it. Guys, take all right.
RSL in action On Saturday, they welcome in the LA Galaxy, who won MLS couple year ago. The Galaxy are off to the worst start in the history of their organization. They have zero wins, which quick math tells me is not good, four losses, two draws. They have not won yet this year, so hopefully oursel can get back to their winning ways. Coming up Saturday with a two thirty KICKARSL dot com is where you go for single game
and season tickets. A little rain a little earlier here in downtown Salt Lake City.
Talk pretty chilly outside.
It's about forty forty one degrees as we make our way towards the weekend. But as it is every single day, it's good to have you guys along for the ride.
My name is Spence check Its.
The name of this program is The Drive with Spence Checkets on ESPN seven hundred and ninety two NFM. We are proud to be part of Utah's ESPN Radio network. We've had a very busy show today. About an hour left in the program today and then we'll break into a little Grizzlies hockey.
Excuse jeuse me, Grizzlies basketball, Grizzly heat.
Tonight fun night in the NBA, we actually have a game that matters between two good teams that actually are employing basketball players that want to play basketball.
The Warriors and the Lakers tonight.
Both those two teams trying to jockey to stay in that top six and therefore avoid the play in tournament. The Jazz were smoked last night by the Houston Rockets. They are going to be an action tomorrow against the Indiana Pacers. Craig Bowler, Jack from the Road, will stop by today to give us all the latest on the Utah Jazz is. They're jockeying with the Washington Wizards for the worst record in the NBA for the right to get the number one overall pick and then hopefully draft
Cooper Flag. The five o'clock out of the program today is brought to you by IFA Country Stores. It's going to get a warm outside at some point. If you're new to our fine market, this is kind of the deal. You never know when it comes to March and spring weather, and sometimes May and April and June, you never know. Okay, So it'll get warm. Time now to start thinking about your lawn to take care of it. So when he drive to the basket begins with the first step on
the cord. That's the ultimate power move. IFA Step one Crabgrass preventer and Lown Food is the first choice to give your yard the healthy, thick green look you desire. The neighbors will be green with NV shop ifan line at IFA dot co op or stop by one of their eighteen Utah locations. Started things off with Neil Smith today to kind of preview tonight's Utah Hockey Club game. There is one local team in action tonight, that is
the Utah Hockey Club. They welcome in the La Kings for a seven o'clock drop of the puck here at the Delta Center in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. The Kings are a really good team hockey club. They won a couple of straight games, but they're not going to make the wild card this year. We talked about this couple weeks ago, even when they were three four points back of the final wildcard spot, before the Saint Louis
Blues just took off. Lose have won ten straight games, they have run their differential to plus eighteen, and right now the hockey club nine points beyond both the Blues and the Wild looks like the Blues in the Wild are going to be the two wildcard teams. The Flames do have two games in hand. Hockey Club Club beat the Flames the other night. Flames are seven points beyond both the Blues and the wild so it looks like they're going to run away with it. The La Kings
right now are second in the Pacific. They are five points behind the Vegas Golden Knights. The Golden Knights have locked in a playoff spot, the Jets and the Stars. Winnipeg Jets and the Dallas Stars have also locked in playoff spots. Were the real chaos now exists in the East with the wildcard race. There, the Rangers are tied with the Canadians at seventy nine points. Both those two
teams are five points beyond the Ottawa Senators. The Columbia Blue Jackets are two points beyond both the Rangers and the Canadians. In the West, it seems like everything is pretty much settled in Hockey Club did announce that after their final home game of the regular season, as there's only a handful of games left, they will handle out their team awards. The final home game is going to be Thursday, April the tenth. Nashville is in town, so something to look forward to if you're a Utah hockey
club fan. But if you're going to the game tonight, be safe and enjoy it, as only a handful of games left before our first season as a hockey market will be behind us. So that's kind of the main local storyline today. We also brought in Howard back for a little NBA basketball again. Kind of a big night tonight, certainly on TNT where they will have Memphis Miami first.
You're going to hear that on our radio station.
Then the late night game will be Golden State and the Lakers, and it is kind of a sneaky big game. We only have five or six games left in the NBA as the playoff chases behind us. As far as the college basketball storylines, we discussed this a little bit earlier, starting today. It's what it is what is known as a dead period in college recruiting. On the basketball side, it simply means there are no visits allowed in person,
no on campus visits. The University of Utah found out yesterday that Keanu DAEs has removed his name from the transfer portal and he will come back and play basketball for Alex Jensen, Raphael Chileus, Wes Wilcox. But because it is a dead period right now, we probably won't hear a ton of news now. Terrence Brown is a transfer from Fairleigh Dickinson. He was a twenty point per game score a year ago for FDU, and there's a report out there that he met with the Utah coaching staff
today via zoom. Okay, so we are still waiting word. We only know that Hunter Erickson is going to spend his final year in college in Hawaii as he should. Good for him, and then Keanu DAEs is coming back to play for Alex and his staff.
No news on.
Players like Jake Walleen or Miro Little or any of the other players that have put their names in the transfer portal.
Ezrasar is another name to watch for.
You think a lot of people believe that as is a guy that AJ should look at to bring back to play for the Utes next year, But no official word just yet. Of course, if anything our way, we will bring it to you Prior to signing off air at seven o'clock tonight, BYU found out yesterday that Dallan Hall has entered the transfer portal, joining Kennon Catchings.
So we'll have to wait to see where Dallen ends up.
I think Dallen leaves BYU as a player that should be looked at as a real legend in a lot of ways, a key coog for two NCAA tournament teams, one of the first choice players off the bench for Kevin Young for a team that went to the Sweet sixteen, something that BYU has only done I think three times in their history. BYU of course holds the unfortunate honor of making the NCAA Tournament more times than any team
without advancing to the Final four. With aj Debanza in the fold, with his Xavion Stanton kid from Vegas in the fold, and the potential to bring back a bulk of their roster, I think BYU could start pre season top ten, top fifteen thereabouts. There are a lot of
conversations about negotiations, and that's what's happening now. These are negotiations when it comes to trying to get these young players come back and play for you, and BYU apparently is prepared to pay Richie Sonders seven figures to come back and play for them, which makes sense. Richie Sonders played like a player that could start for some of the elite teams in all of college basketball, and against Alabama, he was like the only one that looked like he belonged.
And against some of the other teams at BYU faced this year where they had elite strength and athleticism, Richie was kind of the guy who shined. So what does it mean for Richie Saunders, who at the age of twenty three might be very ready to come back, or excuse me, it might be very ready to get his NBA experience started because the timeline. I mean, look, remember Cooper Flag, this prospect who everybody is going all in on to try to lose games in order to draft.
Cooper reclassified he turned eighteen, like three and a half months ago. He should be a senior in high school. And the deal is, if you're a college basketball player with the NBA interest, you want to get the clock ticking as soon as you possibly can on simply your contracts so you can get to your first max deal as soon as possible.
And I just have to wonder if Richie.
Saunders at the age of twenty three, is eager to get that thing going, if he does get the feedback during the pre draft process, and my guess is Richie will go through the process just like Diegor Demon will just like Brandon Carlson from the Utes did a couple
of years ago before deciding to come back. You go through this draft process and you have the opportunity to get invaluable feedback from pro scouts, pro coaches, pro general managers, NBA front office people that will tell you exactly what they think about your chances of being a pro and they'll let you know whether or not you have a chance to be drafted in the first round or even
if you're drafting the second round. But if Richie Saunders goes throughout the pre draft process and the feedback is your late second rounder undrafted, he could make more money staying at BYU as opposed to leaving and trying his hand at the pros. Conversations about whether players like Dawson Baker, Mihailo Boskovich, that kid apparently is getting some nil interest.
Yegor Demon I think is probably gone. That's just my gut because unlike Richie, Yegor is a first round lock, and he might be a lottery lock depending on the max you're looking at. Early on in the season, he was struggling to make his threes and his outside shot didn't look great, and he really cowered away from pressure from teams like Iowa State or teams like Houston. I
think that affected his stock a little bit. Yegor at this point, at the age of nineteen, is certainly a prospect that you draft as a project, a player that might play for you in three, four, five years BYU will lose Trevin Nell, Mowatt mag as well as Fos Treori and Trey Stewart. Those are the players that are graduating. But what does it mean for a player like Kaba Keta. Will KBA come back? Looks like he's probably got the
inside track to start for them at center. Canon Catchings is rumored to be looking at North Carolina, and with aj Debansa coming into the fold and the potential of Richie Saunders coming back, this could be a case where there just simply was not enough minutes for Cannon Catchings, who has pro basketball potential and.
A desire to play in the NBA.
But as far as the college basketball recruiting news, it's going to be quiet for a little bit at least, that's my guest as a result of this quote unquote dead period where you cannot have players on campus for in person visits right now, it's all zoom calls, it's all you know, virtual meetings, and we'll see if AJ and his staff announce any players from the transfer portal signing to play for the Utes. Of course, we'll be tracking that interesting peace today from Jeremy Wu on ESPN
dot com. So, if you've listened to the show in the past, first of all, thank you for that. Continue to do that. We need your support, We like your support. We appreciate your support. I don't love the player comp thing. I don't love comparing the play in college to a player that plays in the pros or used to play in the pros. I just think it gives I think
it gives the fan base unrealistic expectations. If you're expecting a prospect to be a generational player right away, reminds you that there are very few eighteen year olds like Cooper Flag, who is eighteen, who look like they belong right away.
In fact, the list is very short. It's the unicorns.
It's guys like Lebron Garnett, who Tom Haberstrow has compared Cooper Flag to had a good rookie season at the age of eighteen, but didn't burst on the scene as the ticket, as the KG that we all became to know, we all kind of came to know and love as an NBA player. So Jeremy went throughout his business of talking to NBA scouts about who Cooper Flag reminds them of.
And as a Jazz fan, I continue to say, if you want to know why the Jazz are doing what they're doing, it's the right thing to do with the infrastructure of what pro basketball offers, with the incentive structure that the NBA is built. If you're the Utah Jazz, you should have done this two years ago. But it's
better late than never. And I just think they've become resigned to the fact that whether it's the modern day and age of the NBA or simply what the NBA is and has always been, if you're going to build this thing, there is not a magic bullet. There's no big game hunting. My guess is Danny Ainge will never utter that phrase again. After they said we're going big
game hunting and then two months later signed Drew Vubanks. Right, there are rumors that for whatever reason, people down there thought that they could trade for mckel Bridges and sign Paul George. I don't know what level of delusion that was, but they clearly have been resigned to this reality that in the infrastructure of the NBA and with the way that the league is set up, this might be their
only chance possible. And I will say this if May twelfth comes and goes and we're all watching the lottery and the Jazz do win the thing for the first time in jazz history. The Jazz have never had the Lady Luck shot upon them, They've never had the ping pong balls bounce their way. And if they do, I will say that this has all been worth it, even though it sucks. They're doing the right thing. It's just
really hard. So the comps that Jeremy goes over and I'll encourage you to go to ESPN dot com to read it if you want to learn more about Cooper flag Kawhi Leonard is one that we've heard quite a bit.
He talks about lamar Odom.
Now before you roll your eyes, lamar Odom coming out of high school and college was thought to be generational. He just had some off court issues. They never really fully allowed him to live up to his potential. But he did have a good NBA career. I had never heard the Jason Tatum comp, which I kind of like. And Jason Tatum, of course a Boston Celtic who was drafted by Danny Ainge. There's a Scottie Pippin' comp out there. The one that I don't love is Andre Andre Kierlinko.
It feels like those are scouts that are looking at measurables and measurements and just like, yeah, he's white, he must be playing like Andre Kerlinko. Andre was a really good player, an excellent player. But if you're drafting somebody number one overall, you just want to make sure that it's a better situation than drafting the next Andrea Karlko. I'll due respect to Aka, who is a good player here for a long time. So ESPN dot com is where you find it. Good story by Jeremy Wu on
the pro comps for Cooper Flag. You know I'm okay, Porter If a day in April feels like April, I just don't need a day in April feeling like December or February.
And it also kind of throws you for a loop when you don't know what it's gonna look like when you wake up and then two hours later it's sunny. You go for a walk in the morning and it's like nice seventy degrees, and then you're you know, you're up for a little walk, and all of a sudden, it's a blizzard that is springing Utah. So I guess if you're not used to it, you haven't been here real.
Jan Brownstein, who kind of is in charge of the golf portion of the radio station, has brought in our list of golf courses. We are going to be giving away rounds two starting on April the seventh. And all it does today is depressed me because I look at that list. I'm like, I want to play there. I want to play there. I want I'm ready to get out and play.
You're close, You're you're getting very close to that time. Obviously, some of those courses are open, some of them are ready for play, but I bet all of them will be here in the next couple of weeks.
Well, we'll have to see. It's the Valero Texas Open right now.
It's the final tune up before the Masters Augusta coming up next week. Tony is in a good position at the Valero. He's got a good year, so hopefully Tony can show well at Augusta. Did you ever watch the McDonald's All American Game growing up?
Yeah?
Yeah, I watched it pretty pretty intently.
I would say, I want to say.
Up until I was out of high school. I guess it kind of kind of plays into you're really into the mc donald's All American Game when you're you know, thirteen fourteen and there's au ball going around, you're doing the circuit stuff. That's kind of when I was mainly into it. But I still check it out depending on who's there. If there's a prospect like a Zion Williamson, If there's a prospect like a Cooper Flag, for sure, I'll check it out.
If if not, yeah we'll see.
Aj Debants is seventeen points five boards to assist to lead the West to a one oh five ninety two win over the East.
It was at Barclays. Seems good.
I always wanted to play in it. I used to watch it when I was a kid. I'm like, oh man, that would be so fun. Britton Johnson. The McDonald's game that Britain played in was stacked. It was like Tracy McGrady lamar odom I don't know how many Utahns have played in the I think Frank Jackson played in it?
You did?
I think Britain did Frank Jackson? Is it? Aj Debants is not a Utah. We can't count him as a Utah. He's not.
But he played prep ball here and if that is what your you know, what your litmus is, then in some form he is. Now how he got here and you know the workings behind that story. You know again, money is doing a lot when it comes to the sports world, the college sports world, and now even the high school sports world.
So is he a Uton?
No?
No, but he played high school basketball in Utah.
That's something, claiming aj de Band says. A Uton is like the golfers are like, Hey, Utah's Mike Weir like, and he's not from East lives here, but he's from Canada. There's a flag next to his name that's Canadian. Yeah, our fifty first state. How the tariffs with Canada right now? Dude, let's not let's not do that.
I was watching my four O one K today.
Not great, Bob, great, but hey, no, there's no hay, there's no way to spin this positively. No matter what the propaganda is you see on Fox News. All right, let's say night. We've got the Grizzlies in the heat coming up. It's a big one between the Lakers and the Warriors. Two good teams that might have players that are employed to play basketball show up to play basketball and try to win. I know it's wild, all right, Porter,
what comes our way? Let's get our weekend started out the right way and hopefully a day that has a little more sunshine than today.
What comes away? On a Friday show.
On a Friday edition of The Drive, Zach Harper comes your way for the NBA Daily Assists. We'll chat with Paul Pugmyer. Of course, one week out from Augusta Thorton, Nystrom drops by talking some NFL draft, a little offseason football, and the Goat Adam Miklic joins the program on a Friday.
He is the goat, I'll be clear about that. And by the way, a little Bertie is telling me that Paul pug Meyer is on his way to Augusta National Golf Club next week to enjoy a little Masters.
So we'll do that with Paul on a Friday.
Get your weekend started out the right way and join us for a Friday Driving Well, say good night for a Thursday edition of the show special thank you today, Neil Smith, Howard Beck, Craig Bowlerjack and Jason Christ for the sound that you may have missed from the radio program today Good news. It's all up online for your digital consumption. You have a few options. ESPN seven hundred Sports dot com is the website on the world wide introwebs. Download our mobile app and take us on the go.
It's the best way to listen to the station.
It's the way I do it. It's the ESPN seven.
Hundred app, available for free in the App Store and the Google Play Store as well. Then, finally, for what we do in our space, specifically every afternoon for four hours, you can check out our podcast page, which is called The Drive with Spence. Check its. It is available wherever you get your shows. Please subscribe, rate, review, say nice things in the comments, give us all the stars. It
helps hees porter. I'm Spence saying, and I enjoy your Thursday evening, enjoy a little NBA action and we'll talk to you on a weekend edition a Friday edition of the program. So join us right here on ESPN seven hundred ninety two ANDEFM. We are proud to be part of Utah's ESPN Radio network at