Where are we at in society today? Come after me. I'm a man, I'm forty. Go ahead, make my day every single week. I put my freaking heart and soul into this. I don't go out there and laugh. It's not funny. Nothing's funny to me. I don't wanna go out there and get embarrassed on Monday night football. For everybody, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. So I ain't nothing changed from yesterday. Still the same person I was yesterday, and I got the same
thing for you that I had yesterday. You know why I'm here. You play to win the day. You don't play to just play it. That's a great thing about sports. You play to win, and I don't care if you don't have any wins. You go play to win. When you start telling me it doesn't matter if you retire, get out for the matter morning. Everybody. Welcome on a Monday, May thirteenth. Hope you enjoyed your Mother's Day, and I hope you enjoyed the weekend. Appreciate Dennis fifty
and my friends filling in on a Friday. I was off on a destination wedding. You ever been on those those are those are interesting, aren't they? Maybe destination might be a little strong. It's one of those. The people are from here, everybody, for the most part, the primary people invited are from here. But the folks you got married someplace else. No, it wasn't a Ruba, it wasn't Hawaii, it wasn't California, it wasn't Florida. But it was still you shake your head just a little bit
and you're like, really, I mean, you can't. So the cost to fly there, to stay there, to rent the car there, to do all the different things you have to do, it's basically it's basically a weekend for you. Now locally, you go to a wedding boom, you're there, you go to the reception boom, you're back, you're driving back. No, not this case. It's an entire weekend. Spent a lot of money doing that. But that's where I was. Good to be back
and good to be back with you on ex'es and bros. Monday through Friday six till nine throughout the great state of Michigan. Again, hope you had a great weekend. Tigers did not. They lose two out of three to Houston Astros win that series thanks to twenty three win. Yesterday, they pounded out eighteen hits. Just In Verdlander, with stellar yet again, throws seven scoreless, allowing two hits, and he struck out eight. He retired the
first fourteen hitters he faced. I don't think players feel this way, but I think fans feel this way. There is an intimidation factor, even with a guy like Justin Verlander. I don't think the Tigers digging the box and go oh, I got no shot. But after a while, once a guy starts throwing in seeds and starts picking him up and putting him down, and then it gets to fourteen, there's something to be said there. He now has three thousand, three hundred sixty five career strikeouts that is twelfth all
time, two behind Max Scherzer, six behind Greg Maddox. He's a Hall of Famer, there's no doubt about that. And in seven career starts against the team that drafted him, Verlander is four and three with the two point three to five ere Tigers looked overmatched, didn't they Sure seemed like it didn't matter who it was. You try to get to the bullpen when a guy is really good on the bump. When a starter is really good, the goal is to make him throw as many pitches as possible to try and get
to the bullpen because you want him out of there. Couldn't do that soon enough for the Tiger's sake. Unfortunately. It's just one of those things where it seemed like it's not that he I've got their number, No, it's they just looked over completely overmatched. Look, they got a nice win, and Houston looked over matched against Trek Sueble Schooble the other day. That's great, Verlin through ninety five pitches. It took them ninety five pitches to get
through seven good, bad, and different. It's okay, and then you get to the bullpen just a little bit, but by then the game is over. I said in eight three It's night was nine to three. My apologies, thanks, Ben. So you get that situation and you're like, what are you gonna do? So team Houston that had been struggling massively, Look, they're better than their record would indicate. Is that fair to say? You think they're better than a fifteen and twenty five team, don't you?
Absolutely? When you have guys like Kyle Tucker and Jeremy Panya and Jordan Alvarez and Alex Bregman and jose L two Va. They are better than that. Those guys are all better than what the Tigers have to offer, and yet the Tigers have more wins. Fair enough, Okay, I think so too. Detroit's bullpen is starting to get a little thin. Could Jack Flaherty pitched pretty well? Three runs, seven hits, six and two thirds innings. The bullpen allows six runs on eleven hits. That's a problem. Tough
to be teams that way. The good news, here's the good news, all right, I said this last week. Don't want to focus so much on the negative, do I Come on, man, It's easy to be negative in life, but especially in sports radio. Easy to be negative. Here's the positive. Arguably the worst team in baseball is coming to town. Miami is in town for a series. It's a Miami team that is second to last and run differential in all of baseball. They are a minus eighty
nine. Only the White Sox, who have one fewer win, have a worse run differential at a minus ninety. I'm sorry they have one more win, I said, one fewer win. Miami is eleven up and thirty one down. They've traded one of the best, if not the best, contact hitters in all of baseball in Luis Raise to San Diego. But here's what I would remind you. This is what happens. This is what we've been talking about for the last couple of weeks. Sparky Anderson used to say,
what, give me forty games before you judge. Okay, they're at the forty game point now. I don't know how much you take into account in that regard. All right, maybe you're not a believer in that. Just because Sparky Anderson said it doesn't make it right. Like I disagree with Jim Leland on team chemistry. He and I have talked about that numerous times. Pretty good debate. That's fine. I mean, one person believes one thing, somebody else believes another. So maybe you don't buy into that. Maybe
you're like, screw the forty games. When's enough for you to get a determination on what a team is. I'll be honest with you, personally, forty games to me not enough. Sixty Yeah, I think you get a pretty good indication. So I'm willing to give him a little leeway here. I try not to overreact, especially in baseball because it is such a long season. But they are twenty and twenty, they are underwater at home,
they have not played very good baseball. The offense is still a problem, and then it starts to leak over in to a little bit of the pitching, including the bullpen as of late time to get right. Look, you're four and a half back. Who cares Cleveland's off to a really good start. Give him credit Minnesota at one point one twelve games in a row.
Kansas City's probably playing above their heads. I say that with confidence. On the other hand, who says Detroit is not playing where they're supposed to be. Who says the Royals aren't better than what we thought they would be coming into the season. So there's deep concern and for some legitimately so when it comes to the tigers. Meyer hotline for you is eight six six eight three eight forty eight forty three. He text the program sports radio to twenty one
thousand more sports news. On the other side, this is Exis and Bros. On the Michigan Sports Network. Bill Simonson here from my good friend Josh Garvey. Now he's a managing shareholder at Dorn Mayhew's Grand Rapids office. Their world headquarters are in Troy, Michigan, on the east side of the state, and they have locations all around the world. They have over five hundred and fifty motivated accounting professionals ninety years in business, and I mentioned the ten
offices worldwide. So if you want to connect and partner with one of the top CPA accounting and business firms in the world, they're right here in Michigan, Dorn Mayhew's Troy office on the east side of the state, and Josh Garvey is a managing shareholder for their Dorn Mayhew gr Office. Right there by the S Curve, you'll see the new Dorn Mayhew sign. You can find out more just google Dorn Mayhew. That's Doe Rin m a y hwordorn dot
com. They're one of Americas and the worlds top CPA accounting and business firms. Their Dorn Mayhew. We're teeing off our tenth year at the Meyer LPGA Classic for Simply Give Get ready for the best who are yet to help neighbors in need while enjoying golf, food and family fun. Join us June thirteenth through the sixteenth at Blakefield Country Club for fabulous food, Discoveryland for kids, and of course, elite women golfers from around the world competing to help feed
our neighbors. Get your tickets now at Meyer LPGA classic dot com. Hey, back with you again. Hope you had a good weekend. Happy related Mother's Day to all the wonderful strong moms out there, so important to the household, vital to the community. Hope you enjoyed your day because you deserve it. Hey, Pistons are gonna pick fifth again. I know. I just I shook my head too. I was like, are you kidding me? In the NBA draft, Here's the thing that I tried to keep an
open mind going into the draft lottery. I said to myself, look, it's supposedly not a great draft anyway, like many are saying it's among the worst they have seen. That whatever you get at one, you could easily get at eight in terms of an impact player. So knowing that I tried to I tried to keep an open mind and say, all right, it doesn't truly matter where the Pistons pick one, two, three, four or five. It really doesn't matter. And yet they drop to five again.
It's a team fifty four wins over the last three years, thirty wins over the last two years, a league worst in a franchise worst fourteen wins a year ago. When people say that you've got a tank in a lottery system, it's idiotic. It is it's just dumb. There's no guarantee that you're going to get the number one overall pick. And by the way, this year's number one overall pick who You and I have no idea who it is? We all we don't know what it's going to be. And of the
names that you see, how many do you recognize? Honestly, because there's a more and more people who are struggling to follow college basketball and trying to figure out certain names of certain players. And you know, who is Donovan Klingon? Who is Castle? Who is Holland? Who is Rob Dillingham and Holland Ron Holland isn't even in college? It was a G League guy? Who's Reed Shepherd? Who's Dalton connect Who's Cody Williams? Did you see Cody
Williams play in Colorado? Or Dillingham and Shepherd play at Kentucky? Right? So that's kind of my point. But the bottom line is it's not supposed to be a great draft. So what these are the things that we're going through my head while I see this, and yet it still frustrates the hell out of me. The Detroit picks fifth for another year, fourth year in
a row, they've got a top five pick. This is a team that misses out on Paulo Bonkerro, they miss out on Victor Webbin Yama, and now I don't know if it's going to matter that they miss out on Alex Sarr from Australia seven to one to two O five, I don't but just the fact that they had the best odds to get one and yet the team with the worst odds, Atlanta, who had a three percent chance, gets it is frustrating. They go Atlanta, Washington, Houston, San Antonio,
then Detroit. San Antonio's got two top ten picks. Here's my other question. As I look at the Pistons landscape, I ask myself, who's making the pick? Honestly? But who's making the pick? Right now? I know what the rumors are, We've heard them. James Edwards came on, talked to us last week in a good interview. Who's gonna make this pick.
There's no president of basketball operations right now. You're going to allow Troy Weaver and Monty Williams to make the pick because they're the ones with their team, their front office doing the homework. Now, perhaps the person you have in line, whoever that may be, no doubt, is also in the homework. But what if it doesn't align with your general manager and your head coach. What kind of inter strife might there be taking place if something like
this happens. So you don't have a president of basketball operations, you get the fifth overall pick. You got a general manager who, even though they should be understanding no doubt, is got to be thinking in the back of his mind is my job safe? How much power am I going to have? Slash lose? Right? And you've got a head coach who, according to James Edwards last week, anything could happen with him too because they just
won fourteen games. That's it. I mean, you talk about a tough situation, tough situation on the floor, and then with all that said, seeing the unrest, that's what it is. It's unrest. Right now you have to be worried a little bit, maybe more than a little bit, about Cad Cunningham and his mindset about your organization. We all are making impressions
on people all the time, are we not. If you are and you believe in that philosophy, and I do, I strongly believe in it, you're sending quote unquote messages right, Well, if that's what it is, then hey, folks, what's the message being sent to a guy like Cad Cunningham with this type of quote unquote unrest? Quite a bit? Speaking of
basketball, Pacers beat the Nicks one twenty nine. That even the series two wins apiece, second biggest playoff victory in franchise history for Indiana, fourth greatest loss in Knicks playoff history. Tyres Hal Burton has at twenty points six Sports five. It'sists New York had the fewest points in a quarter fourteen fewest points and a half forty one. They've gone from a two to nothing series lead and now it's tied to two. Game five is Tuesday at MSG. Things
can change quickly, can't they. Indiana felt like they owned game two. I don't know how much it would have mattered. You know, if they win game two, do they win Game three? Do they win Game four? I don't know, but they were at more often times than not. They were the better team in Game two as well. If you look at it as a whole synopsis of the entire series, you would agree, I would assume if you've been following it closely, you would agree that Indiana has
been the better team. Fully expect New York to respond. Game five tomorrow night, Denver beats Minnesota one fifteen, one oh seven. Just when you think this is why it's tough to immediately be that first one in I remember early on in my broadcasting career people used to say, be right, not first. It's obviously changed throughout the years because everybody wants to be first. Now I told you so, But are they willing to go back and say,
but I was wrong? How many people rode off Denver because Minnesota owned the first two games. Well, the Nuggets have been dominant in the last two, although one fifteen one oh seven wouldn't necessarily say that when you have Nicola Jokic scoring thirty five getting seven at seven. To add to that, the series is now tied. It too. Hockey on the other side, almost at the bottom of the hour on a Monday morning on Exies and Bros.
Glad you're with us across the great state of Michigan. Huge Here for the Michigan High School Athletic Association. You can stay up to date on the latest from Lansing twenty four to seven at MHSAA dot com, at MHSA on Twitter and MHSA on Facebook. The latest news, press releases and stories connected to every high school in the state of Michigan available for you twenty four to seven from the Michigan High School Athletic Association. Log onto MHSAA dot com,
at MHSAA on Twitter and MHSAA on Facebook. And if you're looking for archive boys and Girls high School Sports m h s A A dot tv. That's MHSA dot tv twenty four to seven everything you need to know about high school sports in Michigan. Log on to MHSAA dot com. Imagine this a day filled with indulgence, bursting with excitement, the impacts, with extraordinary moments that build memories to last the lifetime to day. There's unmistakably university at the place
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On WMBN one oh four point seven FM. The Ticket Northern Michigan serving Potowski and Charlavoie, Middle of the State, Midland Sagada Bay City tuned in on the mid WLN one hundred point nine FM. I'll be Grayling gay Lord, w gr Y one o one point one FM, up North Sports Radio in Cadillac, WKD The Ticket, ninety three point seven FM in Flint, The Story, WTRX Sports Extra thirteen thirty AM. Of course, in Grand RAPIDSMAX ninety six point one FM. The Game, Many of these great stations.
The Huge Show. Later on today three until six with my friend Bill Simonson talked a little bit about the NBA, and we'll get more into that here in a moment. First, the NHL Panthers come back to beat the Bruins and lead at three to one. Did you see this game? By chance? Florida scored twice in the third to win Game four three to two, so they're up three to one in the series. But they won Game four
three two. The game tying goal was reviewed and for good reason. Picture this if you haven't seen it. Jeremy Swayman is the goalie for Boston. He shaded to the left of his net with puck pressure on that side. On the backside of that, Sam Bennett is there and he shoves Charlie Coyle into Swayman. Swayman can't move left to right, he can't get the push he needs to move left to right as the puck rotates there and Bennett slaps
it home and perhaps saying the puck rotates there is a little unfair. It's quickly fed over there with the loose puck. Bennett slaps it home. No problem there to tie it at too. It was a massive goal, and now Boston's in a massive series. The hole that goal right there, that goal was big to tie it to. Florida would then shortly thereafter score and win the game three to two. Boston appealed. They looked at it in New York and they decided it was a good goal. No dog in the
fight. I don't see how anybody can see that's a good goal. When Bennett shoves Charlie Coyle, the defenseman into his goalie, disallowing that goalie to move into a position freely, it's clearly goaltender interference didn't go their way, and neither has any other series they have ever played when trailing three to won. In the history of Boston Bruins playoff hockey, they are zero. In twenty five when trailing three games to one, Vancouver edged Edmonton for to three.
Canucts lead to two games too and when Connor McDavid had his ten game playoff point streak snapped. And then Rory McElroy comes back to win the Wells Fargo Championship. He shot a six hundred sixty five, playing the final eleven holes at six under, closing at seventeen hundred five for the tournament. He beats Xander Shaffley by five shots. It's the twenty sixth career PGA Tour win for McElroy and a record fourth at Quail Hollow. When I saw this immediately
I thought, did McElroy win it or Xander Schaffley lose it? Because Shaffley was not great. Now these guys are I love watching golf. I think it's one of those sports that you and I not that we're like this, don't take it out of context, but we can truly relate to We go out there and we play similar courses, but recognize just how good they are because we can't hit it as far, shape it as well, lag putted
as perfectly. We just can't. Not the people I know, And even though you may be a champion at your club, you are nowhere near what these guys do. However, with that said, Shoftley led the final round by two and failed time and time again to take advantage of opportunity. She shot a seventy one, a one hundred seventy one. It would be easy for me to say, you've got to go low on Sunday, but because I can't shoot a sixty five, just can't. I'd love to, but
I don't possess that type of putting talent or chipping talent. I can get it down the middle of the fairway, I can get it back on the green. I can do that old man's stuff on in two, but then I always end up two putting or maybe three putting more oftentimes than not. So I can't do that. It's easy for me to say, why don't you go you got to go low on Sunday. Well, I'm not playing
Quell Hollow. I'm not looking at a course or playing a course that is seventy five hundred yards closer to seventy six hundred and a par seventy one. By the way, it was a par seventy one. Showfley shot an even par in the fourth round, shoots a sixty four and round one, sixty seven in round two, and then the weekend comes and he's just there. So I couldn't help. But wonder did Showfley lose it as much as McElroy won it. I know it's not always fair to think that way, but
I couldn't help it. So let's get back to this lottery. There are Do you believe in jinxes? Do you believe in jinxes in sports? Here's why I ask. Remember when the cub let me rephrase that you've read, you've read about the Cubs and they're jinks back in nineteen forty five, right, they're playing the Tigers. Guy shows up with a goat, a billy goat at Wrigley Field. Crowd wants him gone. Because the Billy Goat stinks so badly. What he was trying to do is promote his business with the
Billy Goat. He curses the Cubs. They don't win another title until twenty sixteen. Now, they didn't win in forty five. Tigers beat them, as you know, second World championship for Detroit out of four. Way too few. But that's the way it is. And the Cubs struggle in mediocrity, if that at all, until twenty sixteen when they win the World Series championship. So people believed they're there, right, there was a Jinks. Let me fast forward nineteen fifty eight. Believe it or not. At one
point, the Detroit Lions were the best team in football. They'd won the championship in nineteen fifty seven with Bobby Lane. Nineteen fifty eight comes Game two. What do they do. They trade Bobby Lane to Pittsburgh. As he leaves the Detroit Lions clubhouse or locker room, what does he say, this team won't win again for another fifty years. Well, I'll be damned. They didn't win. They still haven't gone to the Super Bowl, let alone won one. Right, here's another jinx. If you believe in them.
Since nineteen sixty, the Masters Championship has had a par three contest. The winner of that par three contest has never won the Master's Tournament. That might be a stretch, but I had to throw it in there. Do you believe something has happened? I don't know what it would be. Do you believe something has happened that has jinxed the Detroit Pistons anything at all? I know, I can't think of it either. Here's the only thing I've come
up with. When's the last time the Pistons had a winning record? Been any idea I do? Twenty sixteen? Oh, okay, okay, they were forty four and thirty eight twenty sixteen. When's the last time they played at the Palace of Auburn Hills twenty sixteen. Since they have gone to Little Caesars Arena, they have been one of the worst teams in all of basketball. That's the only thing, and I know I'm reaching the only thing I'm
coming up with. There's some type of bad luck. It was a massive shock that the Atlanta Hawks bucked the trend three percent odds at getting the top pick, and yet they got it. Atlanta Washington then Houston via Brooklyn, then San Antonio, who got the number one overall pick a year ago,
and then Detroit. Now again, I'll reiterate, just because you get the number one overall pick doesn't mean that you're suddenly getting the best player, because there is no Victor Webinyama, there is no Anthony Edwards, and from what I can tell, there is no Polo ban Caro coming out. So who Atlanta takes it one, Let's just say it's Alex Sar compared to who the Pistons may get Mantas Bzellos might be completely different. I don't know, but
you look at my drafts and that's what you're seeing. That the Pistons would take a guy from the G League. Ignit. Let me read you what his bio or here is what the scouting report is on the six nine, two and fifteen pounds forward. That's what he is. It's hard not to bet on a player like Bzellos at the NBA level, with his length and how well he finishes above the rim. That sounds that promising, doesn't it. Yeah, the Pistons following to number five gives them options to add length
and defensive versatility because he can play multiple positions. Look, that's great. Here's here's what I would like to see for the first sentence for Detroit's first round pick, Sky can shoot. His shooting translates to the next level. Dead eye from the outside, clean stroke can create. Those are the things that I would like to hear, with all due respect, not about length, not about finishing at the rim. I don't want to sound disrespectful here.
If you can't finish at the rim and you're six' nine, there's a problem, right. The Scotty report says he struggled from the outside this year with the Ignite, but showed a lot of improvement defensively guarding multiple positions. Immediately, my thought, so what, honestly, so what? Defensively? It's this team's not going to make the big jump. They're just not. It's not going to go from fourteen wins to fifty four. Okay,
you're not making a forty game improvement. All I want, all I would like to see them do is improve incrementally in certain areas, and one specific area in an offensive minded game is to be able to shoot the damn basketball. When you and I looked at this team, let's take first of all, let's take you and I out of it. When scouts, okay, when NBA scouts and analysts, you know, past players, when they looked at this team, what do you think they viewed as this club's biggest deficiency?
Shooting? Right? Yes, you know what this team shot from the floor this year, forty among the worst in all of basketball. You know what they shot from three thirty five percent, and I'm rounding up among the worst in all of basketball. Those are the things I look at and I think, how do you fix that? How in the world are you going to go about drafting a guy who's going to help improve those statistics, because
they're important statistics. This team averaged one hundred ten points per game. There's only three teams who averaged less, Charlotte, Portland and Memphis. You need guys who can score. So this is not an indictment on the Pistons this year or coming up for this year, I should say, because we don't know who they're taking just yet. So I'm not going to sit here and get all pissed off about a team taking the wrong guy because it's defensive abilities
when they need offense. Because defensively, they weren't very good either. They allowed one hundred and nineteen points per game. Only Washington, Utah, Atlanta, and Indiana were worse. Indiana and you're thinking right now, well you have but wait a minute, cheb Indiana is even with New York in the second round of the playoff. Yeah, but they also average one hundred and
twenty three points per game. Let me read you some of the teams who are the best offensive teams in basketball Indiana, Boston, Oklahoma City, Milwaukee, Lake, Mavericks. What do they have in common? That's right, they made the playoffs. Now you could you could probably do the same thing defensively. Minnesota, New York, Miami, Orlando, Boston, Denver, Cleveland all made the playoffs. New Orleans, Philadelphia, Yeah, they all
made the playoffs. Clippers, Oklahoma's top eleven defensive teams in the league all made the playoffs. But you have to be able to score the ball. You have to be able to threaten to score the ball. And teams are not worried about the Detroit Pistons when they have the basketball in their hands because they know how deficient they are on that side of the court. Phone number on the Meyer hotline eight six six eight three, eight forty eight forty three.
The texta line is sports Radio to twenty one thousand. This is ex'es and bros. We're not across the great state of Michigan and proud to be brought to you on the Michigan Sports Network. We're teeing off our tenth year at the Meyer LPGA Classic for simply gives. Get ready for the best who are yet to help neighbors in need while enjoying golf, food and family fun.
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