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[Assistant] Tyler Pitlick got traded to Calgary for a fourth round pick. Uhm. But we knew that like yesterday. Yeah. Oh, uh, Pitlick was getting traded. A couple others too. Shane Gustafsbear got traded to Arizona with a second round pick and a seventh round pick for Arizona to take that salary. So, Ghost is gone. Uh, Alex Nadelkevich, who was, uh, third for the, um,


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[Assistant] Calder Trophy, really good. Carolina didn't want to pay him his arbitration. I think they only offered him 1.5 million. They trade him to Detroit.


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[Assistant] Yeah, Bernier's still active. He might be a hurricane. And, eh, yeah, you just traded, uh, a goal you emerged as a pretty decent option for next to nothing. So, uh, congratulations, Carolina.


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[Assistant] Maybe they thought they were the Carolina Panthers and thought they would have had Christian McCaffrey in that. I don't know.


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[Assistant] If, if Milwaukee had a hockey team, you would bandwagon that shit so much, Tom. Don't even get me started on that. Sure.


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[Assistant] Like, helping major players or any regular players. It just gave them like a few scraps. It's like, here, go do stuff. Or we can do whatever. And then that's why they add the 17th game and then a second bye week and then an 18th game and then the


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[Assistant] After just like, after going like a couple weeks earlier, just saying, oh, you can just do whatever. We don't care. Now it's like, I wonder what really changed their minds there.


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[Assistant] Like, they don't know who the fuck I am, I'll just get like shit thrown at me. It's like, dude, somebody's probably gonna throw like, like a big gulp at me. I know it's gonna be like, uh, well, that's the third, uh, uh, thing of, um, spit that has been thrown at me today.


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[Assistant] When is that happening, Tom?


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[Assistant] And a god damn Miles Garrett jersey and apparently a Brown's helmet. I mean Brown's helmet is a little excessive. Adam?


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[Assistant] Gee. I'm Gee Bush and I'm gonna let you know whether or not the Browns are going to make the playoffs and we'll tell you what Vegas thinks. McNuggets.


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[Assistant] And we've been down on the Cavs, trust me. No doubt. We've been down on the Cavs, but listen, there's playoff time, and there's nothing like playoff basketball. It's time for the city to get behind the team. And I guarantee you, if they win this round, everybody will be energized and fired up. Absolutely.


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[Assistant] Well listen man, this is no time for fake ones. I mean, you know, you gotta come out here and play ball. Listen, the quicker you get this series over, and I'm not saying Orlando Magic or a pushover, or I'm predicting a sweep, but,


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[Assistant] Superstars who may have nagging injuries, you know what they say to the team? Hey, let's, let's come out and jump on these cats at the house real quick.


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[Assistant] Get em down 2-0, figure out what they about game 3, and then if they lay down game 3, we got game 4. So, you know, he's saying he's 100%, he may not be 100% the series, but the quicker you get it over, the quicker you can rest while other teams are simple.


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[Assistant] They've gotta start 2-0. But I, but I do, I do believe that they got more leadership than they had. That's why you got Niang. Struce was just in the finals. You got Morris. He's a guy that's gonna do. Those guys are, have a plethora of playoff experience.


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[Assistant] They should. Hey, he talked himself into it. Sometimes you gotta talk yourself into it. Talk your stuff, man.


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[Assistant] The Cavs is way too soft. They be, they, they walk around. We know you good guys. But when you come to the playoffs, we ain't caring about Charlotte no more. You got Orlando Magic. I don't care. Well, nothing happened last week.


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[Assistant] Let's get into it. You guys gotta come out with some fire. And I like the fact that he's saying something. If y'all need to use your quotes in a newspaper to get fired up, by all means, say whatever you need to because you gotta come out with a different mentality than you did last year.


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[Assistant] It's all in the Cavs' favor. They've gotta win this series. Well, you know, the biggest example and the biggest thing that we point to is superstars. Superstars win final games in the playoffs, not regular guys. The Cavs got Donovan Mitchell, he's the best player in the series. If you have the best player in the series, you should win that series.


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[Assistant] I say yes, they make the playoffs. There's a couple teams in there that are just like the Browns in terms of question marks. They have the Chargers ahead of the Browns.


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[Assistant] They've lost some people. They have the Bills in front of the Browns. They've lost some people. They even have the Jets ahead of the Browns, and they got a 40-year-old quarterback coming off of Achilles' heel. Now, I like the rest of their team, but there's a lot of other teams, Bull, where they're kind of in that same level. I think this is also a referendum on what they feel about the quarterback.


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[Assistant] I'm going to go 40 with the bats. I'm going to go 40 with the bullpen. I think those are sustainable. I like what the new approach is at the plate. And I'm going to go 20. My last 20 chips is with the starting pitching and how that's failing.


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[Assistant] At this point, uhm, I think any day that you can see Mackenzie go out there, you can see him be, uh, put on a DL or say he's done because of that elbow. So I'm gonna go 40, 40, 20.


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[Assistant] Yeaah, man, I'ma go ahead with the Pacers. I think the Pacers, uh, they got what it takes to be playin' basketball. Halliburton, Giannis is up in there, give me the Pacers, alright?


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[Assistant] Hey listen, I'm G Bush, leader of the Kool-Aid Mafia, and I'm gonna tell you why these helmets are terrible that we designed, and I had nothing to do with it. Mikey McNuggets.


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[Assistant] Listen, you know better than anybody else, and I've had a lot of injuries, surgeries, ACLs, and you've had surgery on elbows and shoulders and things. Ligaments, uh, you can't strictly live with ligaments.


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[Assistant] Ligaments, you know, they have a certain amount of, uh, of torque and a certain amount of, uh, pressure they can be upon and before they tear. So you can strengthen the muscles around them.


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[Assistant] Uhm, but ligaments don't get stronger. And when you look at people now, and you look at some of these pitching videos, and I send some back on our chats all the time.


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[Assistant] You know, they teach this mass, maximum effort. They teach throwing the baseball as hard as you can. Uhm, they teach you to raise your velocity, the spin rate, all those different things. And then you mix it in with the fact that you're throwing a ball 100 miles an hour.


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[Assistant] Every 15 seconds, that has something to do with it. I think we're kind of reaching the evolution where you're at the high, uh, you know, threshold of what a human body can take. Yeaah. And I just think, you know, once you get up to around 100 miles an hour consistently, it's tough to figure out how to minimize injuries throwing a ball that fast.


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[Assistant] This is the plan. They want somebody to jump up and take it. Right? They want somebody, if Will Brennan can come up and give us some power numbers.


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[Assistant] Uhm, and hit a few home runs and put some stuff together. I think that they will be much more inclined to give him that, that role. But you know what they said earlier this season, they want to see what the young guys have. They want to see guys fighting out for these positions. And I think you're going to see this.


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[Assistant] Pretty much to the all-star break. I think they're gonna give all these guys an opportunity as long as they're winning.


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[Assistant] To keep platooning and doing their thing, switching in and out to see what the best move is. Nine and three right now, but if they get, if they get to, you know, three or four weeks into the season, four or five more weeks into the season,


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[Assistant] And they start to slide a little bit. I think they'll be more at to say, okay, let's put a guy in there, give him all the bats, you know, all the, uh, the opportunity to take the position. But as long as they're winning, I think Stephen Vogt wants to give everybody ample opportunity to see who is really going to drive, grab the position.


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[Assistant] Man, this is tough to say. I think he's underrated, but he had a breakout year. I think J.O.K. is underrated. I think...


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[Assistant] J.O.K. had a year that when you look back at it, you look at the amount of tackles Velocity had, and you look at the way he ended his season, right?


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[Assistant] Specifically when nobody else really showed up. I think J.O.K. is underrated because we talked about him possibly being cut the year before or a guy that was a bust. They jumped at him from year, uh, year, I believe it's year two to year three.


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[Assistant] And the jump that I'm expecting for him to have with another year and Jim Schwartz's defense, I think J.O.K. is a guy that's going to be underrated. And I think he's a guy, a pro bowler or all pro candidate this year if he takes that other step.


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[Assistant] And I think he's here for a while. Oh yeaah, he's starting. I don't know if they know it. Ain't no moving him around. He's starting. Jed Wills and Conklin got to figure the other position out. I got him pissler in the starter.


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[Assistant] They better go out there and play basketball. Like to denote that they have the opportunity to just sit around and say, we're not going to show you what we got. I don't think you got anything.


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[Assistant] Look, you better go out, what hand? Listen, listen, we got a couple pair in a poker game. You better go out there and play your tails off, play with some energy and effort and get a win because that's what you need.


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[Assistant] You do not want to be in a playing game for a couple of reasons. One reason is you might actually take a L in a playing game. That's like a game five or a game seven. Yea, what are you talking about? These guys gonna play hard and the fact that you get, you've gone from


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[Assistant] At the All-Star break with almost the second or third best record in the entire league, to now you're in the playing game.


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[Assistant] It's demoralizing. You don't even want to be in that position because guys can actually fold it up and pack it in.


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[Assistant] That looked like a nasty box of Lucky Charms, bro. Like that is tra- well why is it all copper?


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[Assistant] Oh boy, that'll strike fear into the opponents. Take helmets. You have a grown man holding a giant...


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[Assistant] Welcome Adam the Bull. The Cleveland Guardians are off to a fantastic start. Who's the most, who has the most exciting start of all the Guardians young players? We'll talk about that in a bit. Gee.


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[Assistant] It was a tough call for me between Brian Rokeo and Tyler Freeman, but the reason I went to Tyler Freeman, even though Rokeo's ain't a little better than him,


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[Assistant] Right. Now I know he got the opportunity this summer, but he's been an infielder for most of his career. So he is adjusting at the big league level to playing center field.


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[Assistant] And for, you know, listen, everybody knows how I feel about Miles Strub, but one thing, the one thing Miles Strub did well was played a great center field. He's had his challenges a little bit, but for the most part though, he's done a good job in center field. And while the batting average is low, he's had some big time clutch hits early.


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[Assistant] I've been very impressed by his enthusiasm, his energy in the field and on the bases. I think it's carrying over to the rest of the team.


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[Assistant] That's tough to be a guy who's trying to find your way in a lineup and at a new position. Very tough and I'm impressed.


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[Assistant] Yeah, even Carrasco for him, like Carrasco gives up three runs in five, six innings, that's a win. That is, you'll take it. At this point in his career. You'll take it every time. Yeah, uh, McKenzie's start was bad, and I, I, I think it was two, because Bybie's first start was not very good either. Yeah, I can't remember, did he give up? Six out of eight, and we know the pitching is going to be there.


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[Assistant] In the past, the Guardians have traded him and players in situations like that. You can't.


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[Assistant] I thought it was, I thought you were waving the white flag. But in the long run, I think that made sense. We got Manzardo. Because you traded a good pitcher, not a great pitcher, for a guy who you think feels like a short thing.


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[Assistant] They will lose me as a fan if they trade Shane Bieber and they're in first place. I think as a fan, I could live with him walking out the door after this year for nothing. I can too. More than I can, they're in first place and they trade him for some minor league. Exactly. Don't rob us of the October experience. Because if the Guardians, listen, we'll see the hitting as the season goes.


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[Assistant] But if I got this Bieber for the whole season, with hopefully a healthy Gavin Williams, who should be back in a couple of weeks, and Bybee, I'll leave Mackenzie out for now because I don't know what he's going to be. I know. But the potential upside of a Bieber, Bybee,


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[Assistant] Gavin Williams, top three in the playoffs, can compete with anybody. I agree. And, and there's, to me, in the American League, the National League got the Dodgers and Braves who are ahead in shoulders above everybody. They are.


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[Assistant] In the National League, I don't think there's a team that's like that, that's that much better than everybody else. And Bull, only one of the Dodgers and Braves is going to the World Series. That's right.


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[Assistant] To me it's Jerry Judy, guys. Sorry. To me it's Jerry Judy, because...


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[Assistant] The Browns have been looking for the compliment to Amari Cooper for a number of years here. Jerry Judy is the most talented wide receiver


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[Assistant] They have paired Amari Cooper up with, right? And even though he's been a disappointment in his first four years in Denver, it's not like he's been...


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[Assistant] Elijah Moore, 400 yards. It's not like he's been Cedric Tillman and David Bell. I mean, he's been a adequate number two wide receiver, but the potential, and even if he is that, let's say he has


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[Assistant] He has what his average year was in Denver. That's still better than anything the Browns have gotten from the number two receiver. But his potential is more. His potential is to be a legitimate


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[Assistant] At the very least, a legitimate top 30 wide receiver on the back end. Maybe even a little higher than that. And if he can reach that potential, he's been paid now. Not crazy, but he's been paid.


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[Assistant] Then the Browns offense can, if, if, you know, obviously if Deshaun Watson's right, if Judy can play up to his capabilities, what we saw from the joku last year in Cooper, and having Nick Chubb back hopefully even if it's not week one, some point in the season, the Browns offense has the potential to be very special, but he's the biggest wide


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[Assistant] In these next five games before the playoffs, is if Donovan Mitchell all of a sudden looked 100% healthy.


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[Assistant] I was like, the season's over. I hate to say it, but with him playing like the way he looked there,


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[Assistant] Their only chance in the playoffs to make any kind of run was that Donovan played like he did during that 20 game stretch where he was, it seemed like he was the best player in basketball. And unless he plays at that level, they're just not good enough. As you said, Darius Garland is a shell of what he was. It has been, Mobley's been the one positive, I think.


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[Assistant] You finally saw some growth from him late in the year, but this does not look anything like a playoff team. I can't imagine there's anything that's going to happen in these next few games that would change my mind.


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[Assistant] So we've been, the show is normally Monday at 3 p.m. because the home opener is Monday at 5 p.m. We're gonna do our Ultimate Cleveland Guardian show next week, Tuesday morning.


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[Assistant] So it'll be a preview for the UCSS. So we'll be doing, uh, next week's Ultimate Guardian Show Tuesday at 10 a.m. We'll break down the end of the road trip and the start of the homestand and we'll talk about the opener. We're having a lot of fun doing it. The 33 minutes flies by too fast. It does.


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[Assistant] I am known as the women's basketball authority in these parts. So, uh, let's get to it because I got the answer to what's going to happen this weekend. Clarkland. Oh wow. Kaitlyn Clark scores 39 points to knock off undefeated South Carolina. That's the matchup I think we're getting in the finals. Obviously, UConn, Iowa is going to be a big one.


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[Assistant] Uh, South Carolina hasn't lost and somehow they're under the radar, even though they haven't lost all season. But come on, I can't pick against Caitlin Clark. She's the biggest story in college basketball right now. I think she takes care of business. She was raving about Cleveland yesterday. She was so excited about it. Rock and roll Hall of Fame. LeBron. Love to hear it. Beautiful. It's going to be a great weekend.


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[Assistant] You know who won't be at the 500? You and me. That's what they think about us. You know? You know it's like that.


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[Assistant] I got called for jury duty and literally they said like, is there any reason or you see any conflict? I'm like, yeah, I work in the media and I just started packing up a meeting. Like I'm like, and they're like, okay, you can go. That's it. All you gotta do is tell me you're working. Even if you don't just tell me work in the media, you get out of the jury. Now you're going to get in trouble. That's it. That's it. Why would you say that? All right. Keep that between us. Don't say that if you don't.


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[Assistant] Actually, I don't think they're playing particularly well. I think they just happen to catch an opponent that, you know, the Cavs have become


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[Assistant] Where the calves were last year, the magic are even actually worse. I was looking at some of the numbers last night this morning.


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[Assistant] The Cavs, Defensive Philosophy, and JB said they're taking the shots we want them to take.


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[Assistant] Well, that's three point shots. The Cavs are just packing the paint saying go ahead, shoot. And the magic are


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[Assistant] And they're not making shots. The magic are shooting. So the NBA has tracking data, right? On like very tight defender, close defender, open and wide open. Wide open by NBA standards is six feet or more.


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[Assistant] Now to put that in perspective. 25% period or just from three? From three. On these wide open, which is typically where you're getting wide open shots is from three. Now to put that in perspective, 25% are wide open shots. Now to put that in perspective.


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[Assistant] When the league started tracking this data like a decade ago, I think the 13-14 season was the first season they started doing this. No team in the playoffs has shot under 30%.


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[Assistant] And the Magic are 25% through two games. That's how bad. And even 30% is awful in that situation. And those are teams that lose in the first round. Actually, I'm sorry, I think I misspoke.


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[Assistant] One franchise has shot under 30% twice. You know who it was? Donovan Mitchell's team both times in Utah.


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[Assistant] And they were knocked out in the first round both times. That's the only franchise that's ever shot under 30% since the league started tracking on these wide open shots. So the Cavs are saying you can shoot those all day as much as you want and the Magic can't make them. They got it down to 10 in the fourth quarter.


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[Assistant] And had a wide open look from three that really could have made things interesting and missed it. Like they just, they can't shoot. So the magic now are where the Cavs were last year to where their off season plan has to be, we have to go out and find shooting to surround


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[Assistant] Thank Harrow and Wagner and some of these other guys because...


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[Assistant] Jalen Suggs is terrific defensively. He's made progress as a three point shooter during the regular season. It hasn't been there. Uh, Gary Harris ain't it. He should be coming off the bench. They have zero shooting. And until you fix that,


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[Assistant] But uhm, but I mean, Darius is shooting well. Like, you know, there's things that I don't think he's doing well, but in terms of three point shot, he's one of the few guys that actually is doing something.


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[Assistant] And part of that is this is Orlando style. This is what they do. They're a terrific defensive team. They're going to force you into bad situations. They're going to create turnovers. Yeah. And there was, I, we, I,


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[Assistant] I guess I haven't been on, so we didn't talk about it. In game one, if you go back to game one, there was about a first five or six minute stretch of the third quarter where it was like, that's what Orlando wants to do. It's exactly what they want to do.


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[Assistant] The Cavs are getting the ball inside, but the, but the Magic were forcing turnovers or forcing Cavs into bad shots. They were getting baskets in transition. They were, Magic were getting easy looks at it. And there's about a five, six minute stretch in that third quarter where it's like, okay, this is how Orlando.


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[Assistant] The Cavs are winning despite the fact that they're not shooting it much better than Orlando is if you look at


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[Assistant] And he was talking about how some of the Magic fans were sitting courtside and giving him heat and


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[Assistant] He was trying so hard to hit one to shut him up and he couldn't hit anything. I think he's 0-4-8 in two games. Like, he's gotta be better. He has got to be better.


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[Assistant] Going forward, if they're going to make any sort of noise, you know, in the rest of this, you would assume that they're- I don't- I-


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[Assistant] I'm sure the question is going to come up as the series is over, right? You think the series is over. I think the Cavs are going to win. I don't think it's going to be a sweep. Orlando is going to play much better when they go back home. Some of these shots that they're missing on the road, probably you start making when you're at home. They'll have the crowd behind them. So I've thought all along the Cavs are going to win the series, but I don't think it's going to be a sweep. I don't think the Cavs are going to roll.


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[Assistant] I mean, he's going up against a rookie head coach making his first postseason.


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[Assistant] Here's what's interesting to me about this series is


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[Assistant] For whatever reason, Jamal Mosley, who I have a ton of respect for, I think he's a great coach, he has not used, uh, Jalen Suggs, their best perimeter defender, on Donovan.


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[Assistant] He's guarding, he's putting Sugs on Darius.


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[Assistant] And Donovan's getting hot early. We just talked about how Donovan's getting staking of these big leads. So on one hand, Jamal is saying,


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[Assistant] We have to be better at the start of the game. We can't keep letting them start out like this. And at the same time, he's not using his best defender on their best player.


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[Assistant] And, finally last night he was asked about it and he thought about how he was going to answer it for a second. And basically, his answer was interesting. Basically he said,


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[Assistant] That he thought the way that Mitchell plays in pick and rolls, it was going to be a lot of contact.


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[Assistant] for Jalen, and he was trying, and the way I read that, and Mike, tell me if you read it differently, was that


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[Assistant] They didn't want to run him through a lot of screens and wear him down that way, but I mean, I think


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[Assistant] I thought that was going to be an adjustment from game one to game two. I thought he would use Suggs on Mitchell and they didn't. They came out last night and played it the same way they did in game one.


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[Assistant] What's that? He should have been known that the blitzes is- Well-


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[Assistant] I remember that Orlando got it to 10 and thought like, okay, this could get really interesting here. Because we've seen the Cavs below big games.


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[Assistant] Like, you gotta be able to make threes to come back in this game now. You're not gonna come back from a 20 point deficit, usually.


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[Assistant] Unless you completely unravel, a team's not gonna come back on you from that big of a deficit, shooting mid-range and at the basket. You've gotta get, you've gotta get a flurry of threes. Speaking of comebacks,


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[Assistant] Step back. Step back on AD. But that's a perfect example of a team that can come back like that. Oh yeaah. Because they have the shooting. They have the three point shooting.


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[Assistant] Yeaah. And, and I mean, Ben Caro could get there. I mean, he's still a young player. This is his first time going through it. He's 20 years old. Yeaah. And he needs help around him. Like, he just needs, he needs something to open the floor up. They need some sort of shooting on that team. Someone that you fear. There is no shooter on Orlando's roster that the Cavs fear. Joe Engels makes me a little nervous.


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[Assistant] Uhm. Bogdanovich. Oh yeaah. Pretty much all the white guys.


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[Assistant] Because at first I rolled my eyes like, dude, you're down. On the, on the break dunk, like when he, when he, on the dunk on Jared, right?


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[Assistant] But no, but then I kind of realized what he was doing and he was saying like, guys, this ain't over, let's go. And he was, and he really was a big factor in pulling them back into it. So I understand. I mean,


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[Assistant] It's funny that, like, he's catching this much heat basically over one shove. One of our, one of the guys for, uh, Reds for the Athletic has covered the series for us on the Orlando side. He covered the Magic for years, Josh Robbins, now he's actually in Washington. And he said last night, he asked me, he said,


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[Assistant] Wagner does not belong in this, like, usually, a first round series against a team you're up 2-0 should not generate this type of heat. Like, Olynyk injured one of your best players and could have cost you a championship. Steph and Draymond, those were finals games.


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[Assistant] This is a first round against a, a nice player, but he's not, I mean, and Joe Kim Noah, like, just stood up there and just shot your city dead.


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[Assistant] It said, who likes Cleveland? What's there to do? Like I get that. Like that makes sense. The Vodger thing is just seems a little bit silly and over the top because it's a first round series against a team that you've whipped now two games in a row. So.


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[Assistant] I don't know. I don't think he belongs anywhere near the class of what we're talking about.


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[Assistant] He was here in like 2012. He basically rejuvenated his career here. Did he like mess his leg up or something? Oh, that was one of the worst injuries ever. Yes. What did he do? He tore it up, he blew out his whole leg. He landed, right? And then his knee went... Like the Paul George thing? Yeah, it was gruesome.


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[Assistant] Sean was a HUGE prospect, HUGE. He could do everything. He was tall, like, he had great game, and that knee changed his entire career. He was almost, look, Klukras had cut him, I think. Cavs picked him up on, like, Christmas Day.


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[Assistant] He really sort of rejuvenated his career. He played well. Went to Golden State, won championships. He was working for the franchise. He, I think he still is, like his special. Oh, he's still around now. Special assistant to the Warriors. To the Warriors? Warriors. Oh. Yeaah. He's still, I think he holds still some role for the Warriors. Like, sort of like Vergile is here with the Cavs and he's back with the Cavs. I think Sean has a role like that.


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[Assistant] Just because they're up 2-0 on a team that can't shoot, that's never been in the playoffs, doesn't mean all the problems are fixed and everything's great. Nobody's... They're playing well defensively. Right.


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[Assistant] And a lot of that's because Orlando has no shooters. Jared Allen has been terrific.


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[Assistant] It's a totally different game once the playoffs start. But I have more faith in that with veteran teams. Just because the Cavs is their second trip to playoffs doesn't mean they're this battle-tested veteran playoff group. They're really, I mean, go back to the Cavs teams that went to the finals year after year. Those teams


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[Assistant] Could go get drunk during the regular season and then show up in April and grow to the finals. Cavs, this team is not in that group.


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[Assistant] Listen, one of the things that's wrong with too many journalists is all we do is sit in an ivory tower and we are critical of everybody. And the first time somebody turns around and points the gun at us, we cry and freak out. It can't be that way.


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[Assistant] If Miami ever took a regular season seriously, that would help. But they don't. They don't. That's it.


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[Assistant] This is their comeuppance now. We're not taking the regular season seriously. Alright, let's talk some baseball here, guys.


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[Assistant] All Jason's missing is one of those beer hat helmets. Right? Yeaah. Like, I was just, I caught that. I caught what he said. But I'm like, they said be goofy. Like, maybe do these shots upstairs. But Mike is like, this headshot.


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[Assistant] Yeaah. That's how far I've come. He's hit two home runs off lefties in the last week that I've seen, maybe more. Lefty, he went from being unplayable


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[Assistant] It feels so prisoner of the moment to say that because Jose's a, Jose's a switch hitter. So I give him, but Josh has pounded lefties at times lately. I think I still need to.


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[Assistant] I'm not convinced to go there. I know the numbers right now, yes you're right.


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[Assistant] But it's still early. Hosey's gonna get hot. I have a heart, but you make a compelling case.


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[Assistant] I'm really torn on this. Like, I can't definitively say one way or the other. I know that's a cop-out.


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[Assistant] Yes. It's too late. I think it's too late for Josh. You think he's gonna be worth more? I don't think he's gonna sign. He's got one year. Why sign now? You're one year out. He's got one more year of arbitration.


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[Assistant] And you're in this position and you've been under team control all these years and you look and say, I've made $14 million in my career, which is by baseball standards, not a ton, but certainly enough to live comfortably for the rest of your life. I've made $14 million. I'm one year away from free agency. Let's see what I can do.


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[Assistant] Jose left it, the leader left the money on the table. Jose's like the only one. It's a new day and age. And there's a whole other, there's a whole other cultural thing that I don't really want to get into on who takes the deals and who doesn't with the guardians. Oh, we can get into it.


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[Assistant] The Latin players take the deals. Because generally the American players don't. And the American players typically don't, usually don't. And when you get this close to the end, when you're this close to free agency, why sell yourself short if you're a player?


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[Assistant] I'm looking strictly from Josh's side of this. Why sell yourself short? That offer will still be there. If I have another big year, that offer will still be there from the guardians. So maybe they gotta pay him more. So let me go out and test the market and see what I can get. And if I can't get any more, I'd love to come back and play with my brother. That's what he better do.


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[Assistant] But the window, I think, to get these deals done...


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[Assistant] I thought last year, he was on my list last year, I did a list, I don't know if you guys remember, I went and tried like finding cops, and Jimenez was on the list, McKenzie was on the list, uh, actually Oscar Gonzalez was on the list, thank god they didn't do that one.


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[Assistant] And, and Naylor was on the list. And Naylor is a hard one to pin down. Very hard. He's had one major, major injury that he's overcome.


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[Assistant] Uh, obviously he's not an outfield anymore. They tried him in the outfield and that was a disaster. He is more of a DH and I really think...


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[Assistant] The Manzardo trade was their insurance policy knowing


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[Assistant] It's probably too late on Josh. We have to have someone else to come up behind him. It's a lot easier to replace a DH in the first basement. Like, you can rotate guys through the DH slot. Ideally, of course you want both. Yes! You want Manzardo smoking right now in Columbus.


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[Assistant] So you want Manzardo and Nader in that lineup, for sure. But realistically, I think the Guardians are looking at this and saying, he's one year out.


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[Assistant] He's not gonna take our offer. We have to have a contingency.


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[Assistant] Or if you come up early, if you're 20, 21 and you break in and you can hit free agency at 27, then maybe you can get back in at 32, something like that and get one more big deal. But Josh is gonna get one shot at this, I don't blame him.


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[Assistant] So I haven't done as much work on this one as I did Shane. I would defer to Zach. Zach would know that situation much better than I would. I don't know. All I know is...


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[Assistant] They, I would imagine they made an offer, they made an offer to other guys, and when he was asked about it over the winter, he said go talk to the front office. So my guess is, like they made an offer to Quan, how are you going to make an offer to Quan and not make an offer to Josh? My guess is he felt like it was a little ball off.


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[Assistant] Mike Clevenger, I think, talked about this when he was traded, that like, when you come up with the Guardians, you know you're gonna get traded.


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[Assistant] Like, you just know. They're not going to pay you. You're going to play here X number of years and they're going to move on and they're going to trade you for another package. And that was like the first player I thought that like said the quiet part out loud. You just know when you come to this organization.


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[Assistant] He knows he's got it good here in terms of responsibilities and duties and he's just left alone to do his thing. So he took literally tens of millions of dollars less or they would have traded him.


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[Assistant] Yeah. And it's different for hitters than it is pitchers. Like, the risk of a catastrophic injury.


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[Assistant] As a hitter is far less than it is obviously with the pitcher and Tommy John and touring this and that. As a hitter?


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[Assistant] Yeah, take your chances, man. Hit the open market. And then if it doesn't go the way you think it is, you can always go back.


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[Assistant] Not with us, it won't be. Well, no, I think he could do a one plus one. Two year, twelve million dollar deal.


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[Assistant] Okay. And if he pitches great, for the year and a half.


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[Assistant] I don't think it's coincidence because like they keep finding, like they keep hitting these. Martin Emerson was a freaking steal when I got him and the undrafted guys that they- Ronnie Hickman. Go Bucks!


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[Assistant] It's a whole department that's missing on just wide receivers. That's exactly what I was going to say. It's his name on it. So he gets all the credit or all the blame, but I'll give you an NBA example from when I was covering the league when the Cavs drafted Anthony Bennett.


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[Assistant] No, I'm sorry. Dan wanted Oladipo. Chris' choices weren't much better. It was a terrible draft. Uh, who did he want? That was the Yanis draft. Yanis was the Yanis draft. No, keep going. He wanted, uh, there was another guard who just got into trouble recently. Somebody no good also.


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[Assistant] Yes, it was Macklemore. He was between Macklemore and one other one. He did not want Bennett, but the organization, the vote internally,


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[Assistant] And Griff's actually the one that told me this. Griff's the one that confessed to it, that it was a 9 to 1 vote. Chris was the one vote that didn't want to take Bennett.


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[Assistant] And it is the biggest punchline to Chris's career, is he's the one who drafted Anthony Bennett. He got fired for it, but he didn't even want the guy.


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[Assistant] And he hasn't scouted these guys as much as some of these other guys have. Sure. And he's the one that has to, he's on the hook for the pick. And that's fair, but what choice do we have?


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[Assistant] But within the organization, clearly, there seems to be a blind spot. Yes, they don't know how to evaluate.


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[Assistant] Of aaaaanything you want in the club. If you wait til 1, 1.30, lights are starting to come on, they're playing Clothes in Time, now you're scrambling. Now you're looking for what's left. At 10 she's a 2, at 2 she's a 10. So... To browse...


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[Assistant] of what they, who have they really missed on with the guys that they've taken. It's not a long list of guys that they missed on, cause it was two o'clock and there weren't a lot of tens left. But if you go in the second round,


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[Assistant] There should be more fish in the sea that you got a bigger target to hit at. So I would have a little more confidence if they shoot in the second round than in the third. It doesn't sound like much of a difference, but we've done on the show. We've gone through. The list is like two guys, Pooka Nakua,


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[Assistant] Yes, but my point is from where they're picking in the draft and when they're targeting receivers, there's not a lot left to pick from. Go earlier, if you do draft in the second round, I would have more confidence that they're going to hit it because the target's bigger. Alright, we're going to switch gears and talk base.


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[Assistant] Mike, one thing I've always wanted to ask you, when you manage this team,


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[Assistant] The lineup was the same every day and the same guys played every day. I think you had, you were famous for saying like starters are starters for a reason. And now lineups are so different and positionality is such a big thing and flexibility and wanting guys to play different spots. Which way is better, do you think?


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[Assistant] 97 series losing to the Marlins. What do you say when you go back to the clubhouse and we've all heard the stories about how they were prepping and they were putting up the tarps and everything. They're getting ready for the celebration and then they had to scurry back in and tear them all down and everything. But as the manager of that team, when that game's over and that series is over, what do you say to those guys?


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[Assistant] Mike, I got two quick ones I gotta ask now that we're on the subject to Albert. The cork bat incident.


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[Assistant] Did you know it was corked? And just take me through that whole thing.


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[Assistant] Uh, and then there was, I don't know if you saw the clip yesterday, Aaron Boone getting ejected from the Yankees game when he didn't even talk. He didn't say a word. I'm just wondering.


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[Assistant] Yeah, it was. I'm wondering, first of all, your reaction to that, and then secondly, what's the angriest you ever got at an umpire? Do you remember?


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[Assistant] My favorite player when I was a kid. Oh, he was a good player. He was my favorite player. Why didn't you tell him?


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[Assistant] Chris, we've paid such little attention to the draft. Help us out. Where's the first surprise going to be on draft night? Have you got any inkling of a team that might surprise or a player in terms of where they go?


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[Assistant] Honestly, part of the reason I didn't want to like branch out in media and do other things is because I don't want to talk about the friggin draft for six months.


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[Assistant] So then they should give the pick back because there's no one worthy of the pick. Here, take it back. That may be the case. I don't know that that's the case. I'm just saying. That's why we're doing this.


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[Assistant] If I was, Josh Allen probably had to sign off on it.


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[Assistant] But man, I just, since they made that, since they made that, uh, you know, comeback, or since the Chiefs made that comeback at Arrowhead a couple years ago, when it was that great shootout, uhm, I think they've taken a step back.


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[Assistant] He's winning the football with a guy like, you know, uh, you know, CJ.


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[Assistant] I mean, there's other, and there's other miles to feed, like you said. Take Dell and Niko Collins, those dudes is homegrown.


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[Assistant] These teams is loaded. This is the, I know we live in recency bias, like,


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[Assistant] Look, Stefan Diggs to me, like, I need you to always say, what are you great at?


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[Assistant] So, are you, are you, are you physically, can you go up at high points of football? It's not really this game.


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[Assistant] Is he gonna really run past you? Nah, that's not really his game. Uhm, is he like a dude that's gonna be like physical and is a red zone target? Not really. He's like a... He's a Mario Cooper-esque. He's a Jarvis... He's a higher version of Jarvis Landry.


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[Assistant] I do too. Uhm, and you know, maybe, I think this has a lot to do with, I actually think, if you ask me, I think they think he's, he's gonna go off the cliff. Because his production is there. It's not like he's that big of a headache off the field where it's like, yo. That we know of. That we know of. Yeah. But he could be a pain in the neck in the locker room a little bit, but.


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[Assistant] Where do you put them now? You know, we talked about it before, we always got the Chiefs at the top, we talk about that, the Bengals in that mix, all the great teams in the F's, you know, where do you put the Texas?


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[Assistant] All the girls like y'all too, it's between you and him and you go to school and you see his outfit, then you be like, oh, okay, you went and got them J's, okay.


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[Assistant] Yeah, uhm, so I think the story of the season so far...


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[Assistant] Has been Shane, Shane Bieber. When you look at it, you know, watching his game.


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[Assistant] You know, Castillo was pitching, he was pitching well too. Six strikeouts over the first few innings that he was pitching. It was a pitcher's duel. Uhm, the Guardians got some hits off of him. Bode Nailer was able to hit a home run. I told you I needed 20 from Bode Nailer. One down, big fella. Let's keep it moving.


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[Assistant] But the thing for me is, I look at it and, you know, it's a point of frustration sometimes when you hear


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[Assistant] Uhm, especially when you see a picture, uhm, in Bieber that looks like he's getting back to, you know, that Cy Young form. The problem is...


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[Assistant] Every time you mention this name, the first thing we talk about is the trade. The first thing we talk about is moving them out from pieces and parts.


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[Assistant] And look, I like, I like the, the guardians have a farm system and they like to accumulate these parts. But let's be honest, the track record with getting these pieces has not been 100%.


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[Assistant] The track record for getting these huge halls of people for Cy Young award winners is hit or miss. It's not guaranteed that if they trade him for a bunch of prospects, any one of those prospects are going to be great. I think for me, and this may not be a really popular take is, look,


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[Assistant] If Shane Bieber continues to pitch like that, and you get Gavin Williams back, and then Bybee, Allen, uh, we haven't even talked about McKenzie, and if McKenzie is actually back to what he was doing a couple years ago, you got a team.


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[Assistant] That can definitely win the division. And you also have a team with that type of rotation that is formidable for anybody. So for me, if I look, if Shane Bieber continues to pitch this well,


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[Assistant] I'd actually take the non-conventional thought process and say, look, I might not get nothing for him, but it gives me a chance to win this year. I'm not moving. Like, we might just have to let him go.


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[Assistant] And I think it's good. His velocity may be down a little bit, but...


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[Assistant] How do you feel about his velocity being down, but he still added another pitch?


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[Assistant] I mean he's got him swinging at some bad pitches right now. And there's a couple of pitches, like he threw 92 mile an hour fastballs right now in the middle of the plate. Right. And I'm like, why are you not seeing, they didn't even swing at it. So you, that shows. Looks like a slider out of his hand. Yea, it shows me he's a little, he may be confusing people with his pitch selection and his arm angle.


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[Assistant] It looks like he's a little more in shape, like, you know, I mean, I had to pause this one, but it looks like his lower body is ready to go. It looks like he has, and you very rarely see Bieber showing that type of emotion. That was interesting when he did that. Right, right.


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[Assistant] And trust me, I need them to get off to a good start. I want them to have a good April or May because look man, we was talking about it before.


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[Assistant] I mean, we talk about these, these football topics. These football topics is a bunch of polls.


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[Assistant] Uh, you know, list. I'd rather be talking about some real live games. Like, you know, I need them to be good.


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[Assistant] Like, it's like, it's like three, like if you play start of April.


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[Assistant] The finals is in June. Yeah, it's too much. It's hot, hot outside by the time the finals start. That's right.


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[Assistant] What do you think about Volt looking like he's going to play everybody at DH? It looks like he has a propensity to play, I don't know, maybe it's me. It just seems like he's playing a lot more platoon guys early on.


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[Assistant] Especially when you got guys moving down the line that they move now. Now a lot of the throws is catch, turn, throw, and you gotta either scoop or dig at first base.


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[Assistant] And just start to start. Yeaah. Like, he was- I like it. He's been obvious. He wasn't- I didn't think he was gonna be like, uh, a guy that was gonna just come up and start, like, and do that.


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[Assistant] You know what I love as a casual? I like to see the same line up.


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[Assistant] I like to say, you know, back in the day, what I loved about watching the Indians was the fact that I knew who was playing in right field, left field, center field catcher. And I could rock with him and say, okay, well, you know, we got this lineup this year.


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[Assistant] We got the young guys, we got everything set, maybe a couple of guys, uh, uh, uh, flash during spring training. You might add them or a picture here or there. But for the most part, you line up is set and you got some people you can hang your hat on. If they can get to the point where they can, you know, bring those guys up and have them become a unit, I love it because next year you're ready to go.


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[Assistant] Still closer to the bottom. I potentially like this team better than the year they had when they went to the playoffs and surprised some people with a bunch of young guys. Yeaah, there's more potential. Yeaah, I like this team better than that team. That team, you know, won a playoff series. Yeaah. And if they did, should have won a second. Go ahead.


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[Assistant] You can't bet on it. You know, the Cavs are really good against these type of teams.


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[Assistant] They're good against teams that are, like, kinda look like them. Like the, the...


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[Assistant] You know, the jazz got a lot of pieces and parts, but you know, when you look at them, it's not like, oh my goodness, the jazz are coming to town and they got this person that's going to give you 25, this person's going to give you 22, and that guy's going to get you 12 rebounds. It's, it's, it's kind of a, one of those things where it's a collective where you don't know what they're going to get from each individual person. Uhm, but the Cavs, to me, uhm,


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[Assistant] They just remind me of the late 80s, uh, early 90s calves, right? Uhm, you know, looking at it and trying to figure out what these guys are and who they are. Uhm, and I was just looking at some stats.


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[Assistant] Uhm, and, and you look at from, from even some of their best years. So, so go to their 91-92. Uhm, that year, I believe they won 57 games, 57 and 25. They finished second, or third, excuse me, behind the Bulls and the Celtics in the Eastern Conference.


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[Assistant] Uhm, and you look at it, and you look at, you know, the guys they had on that team, Brad Doherty averaged 14 points, Nance averaged 13, Craig Hilo averaged 11, Hot Rod gave you about 9, Mark Price gave you, you know, 12 points.


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[Assistant] That's nice. That's real cute. You know, the guys, you know, good guys, the solid dudes played basketball the right way. But when you start to look at who they were going against in that era, it just wasn't enough. It just...


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[Assistant] You know, when you go into these playoffs and you got Pippen and Jordan, the best two players in the series, you're done.


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[Assistant] You go back to, you play the Celtics, you got Bird, or you got McHale, or you know what I'm saying, or Parrish, like they got the best three players in the series. So in the NBA, when you look at what the Cavs are able to do, Caris Leverdi and that look good right now. Trust me, I like it. But that's a middle of the road team in the playoffs.


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[Assistant] If you play a Celtics team, if you play a Bucs team, if you play, now Joel Embiid is back, if you play those teams, they got the best two players, arguably


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[Assistant] Because you need the other teams that they're playing against not to play their best. So I'm gonna ask you like I asked Bull. When I'm, you know, when I don't like the Guardians, I ask about prospects. I don't like this team. What can I look forward to? Imani Bates isn't helping this team.


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[Assistant] In the playoffs this year. He's not in the playoffs this year. No, no, no. We're not talking about that. See? He jumped the gun on me. What I need from you is, when they, by the time they made this trade,


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[Assistant] Last year, you gave up lorry marketing, right?


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[Assistant] Where, where in the trade machine, where in the, as a general manager, as you're looking to figure this thing out, assuming that you don't get


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[Assistant] You know, any picks or anything like that or you don't trade Donovan Mitchell. How, how do you go about making this team better next year?


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[Assistant] No one remembers those teams and we remember them wrongfully because I'm looking at some of the numbers and I'm like, but y'all didn't win nothing. But if, but I feel like we're in that place again where.


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[Assistant] It ain't enough. Like, we talk about people coming back from injuries and if this person get healthy and if JB figure it out and if they can play together in jail as a unit, man, look.


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[Assistant] These other teams, Joel Embiid is Embiid. He, listen, he, you don't have to.


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[Assistant] You don't have anybody that can do- Tatum is Tatum. You don't have nothing to rival Yannis. If they show up in your gym, you're dead.


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[Assistant] Especially as playoff time. So sometimes for me, I'm in a point where like, yeaah, I love it, I wanna, I, I, they right there in the middle, but I can't fool myself and, and think that like, that even the Knicks who don't really have a player better


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[Assistant] When Brad came in and he talked back after the season was over, we had Campy Russell on the show too.


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[Assistant] We, uh, you hear Kobe Altman talk, you hear JB Bickerstaff talk. When you get people that are saying the same thing and marching the same company line when it says, we won 51 wins and that's something to be proud of.


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[Assistant] I question whether or not you are really in the business of really, really trying to win.


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[Assistant] My thing is, I just don't know where to question. I don't know.


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[Assistant] How to read the room? Cause then Dan Gilbert comes out and says, I expect Donovan to stay.


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[Assistant] Tyrese Halliburton just woke up and was like, nah bro, listen, that's cool. I'm not a role player. I'm not an other. I'm not an other. And most of it is...


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[Assistant] Taking those shots with confidence, being like, so what I missed?


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[Assistant] I'm not an other. I get to shoot that and it don't matter. Jared Allen, you can't shoot this shot.


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[Assistant] You go down there and rebound, I'm, I'm out here shooting his jumper. And when you hear Evan Mobley, like he, I heard him saying, you know, I was listening to the radio this morning. He said, you know, I got the size, you know, I, I've been, you know, taking the ball to the basket, you know, aggressively and just, and making that contact and initiate contact and then hit my shots when I get him.


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[Assistant] That's a big part of it. Like, hey, I'm going to get this ball. I'm going to initiate the contact.


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[Assistant] And the, and the refs are gonna give me that because I'm, I'm aggressive. I'm, this is what I do. And a lot of times you see, like, I always wonder, and look, Donovan Mitchell wasn't drafted highly.


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[Assistant] He wasn't a national player a year coming out of Louisville.


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[Assistant] But at some point he just woke up and was like, oh no, I'm better than everybody. Like this is what it's going to be. And you start to see people's game develop. That, if they can get that.


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[Assistant] Think about it like this. This is devastating. And it's not refutable. Even if Dean Wade was the defensive player of the year, the Cavs still wouldn't be the winner. No. Thanks.


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[Assistant] That's crazy. If you just made him just turn, like this is a 2K argument. Turn his defensive ratings all the way up.


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[Assistant] The outcome is, that don't really matter that much, does it?


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[Assistant] Uh, Jensen, I've got a question. This is more of a, I guess, a training and a, and a, I guess, philosophical question. You know, when I played baseball in high school, you had one kid that made through 85. If you saw a kid that threw 88, you was like, oh my gosh, this guy's throwing heat. Nowadays, you know, they got these farm systems in places where


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[Assistant] They're getting guys who were throwing 92, now they're throwing 96, 97. What's going on with this revolution with pictures where they're finding out how to get guys...


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[Assistant] To turn up the velocity, even when some guys have, are a little bit older, longer than a tooth, and it seems like they haven't been, you know, didn't have that level of velocity.


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[Assistant] You know, Jensen, as a, as a pitcher, you've been able to watch, uh, the, the Guardians organization or the Indians back, uh, back in the day. Uhm, you look at what they've been able to do with Kuber and Bieber and, and even Cliff Lee and Sabathie and some of those other guys. Uhm, if you, you're Shane Bieber, how, how do you stay focused and go pitch when in the back of your mind you're like,


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[Assistant] I'm probably not getting paid here. How does, how does that work?


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[Assistant] You know, Jensen, to piggyback that, do you think, uh, you know, that Ohtani is pitching, uh, he hits? Uh, not this year. Not this year. But, but do you believe that you're going to see at younger levels?


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[Assistant] You know, managers and coaches give guys more of an opportunity to play different positions or to, you know, learn to switch hit or to learn to pitch and hit the ball at the same time.


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[Assistant] Even when we needed a quarterback, those years were like, even when we tried to get him, like, we would be in contention for a quarterback literally every single year.


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[Assistant] Well, they got some picks and I don't, look, if it takes, if they come out of this draft with one person, I'd be fine with it.


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[Assistant] Oh, no, no, no, no. They're not going to. I wouldn't make nuggets. For me, I think, you know, I was talking about this on Ultimate Browns, uhm, I think now there's more of a chance for them either to trade up or trade down. Like, I'm convinced they will do some sort of trade because the way this draft is going to fall,


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[Assistant] I mean, it's gonna be interesting and I like this draft because it always works out this way.


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[Assistant] If you've got a really good deep position group, like usually it's defensive linemen, there's usually a run on them because some guy that somebody has on the board is really excited about them. And this year it's receiver, which is what the Browns need. And then there's five or six quarterbacks that got either


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[Assistant] Like, just, like, even, you look at Troy Franklin, somebody just asked me. I like Xavier LeGette out of, uh, South Carolina. I like Troy Franklin a lot. I like Troy Franklin. Uh, I like, uh, uh, Lag Conkey, McConkey. He's gone, there's no way he's there at 53. Hey, he just ran a 4-4 or something. I like that.


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[Assistant] And I like Xavier LeGette at that position. I like him too. There's a, and we ain't even talked about it, the two receivers, the two neighbors in, in, in, uh, Harrison. Or Thomas. Brian Thomas. He'll be gone.


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[Assistant] These dudes are monsters. Did you got Adonis Mitchell? Did you still got the other kid that ran a four or two or whatever his name is? David Worthy? We didn't even talk about Harrison. You see how this works?


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[Assistant] He's a former basketball player, 6'4", about 220. I actually like him a lot.


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[Assistant] And think about it, they have him ranked the 45th best player. I don't know. Javon Bakers from UCF, 46th best player. We were all excited about Cedric Tillman last year. We were all into it. Oh no, no, no.


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[Assistant] It's like your fan duel, right? You lose so much and then you start to hit a little stride. You be like, man, I want these little money lines. Okay. I throw a four game parley. Oh, I didn't want a little hundred little, but by the time you look, you didn't hit your stride a little bit and you start to believe like, look, the Juan Jones was a lottery ticket. You scratch it off and you won.


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[Assistant] If you could get on, hit on a guy like Dwayne Jones, actually to be truthful, Nick Chubb was a lottery ticket. Nick Chubb was never considered the best running back in the league. Or ACW.


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[Assistant] That was a second round pick. Yeah. Comparatively where you took a guy, uh, uh, uh, which was his name out of Alabama. Trent Richardson. Trent Richardson.


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[Assistant] Like, you look at the two, Trent Richardson was more decorated, Trent Richardson was all that, and Trent Richardson was never hurt. But now you look back and be like, well that second round value, I'll take it. I think the Browns can find something there. Uhm, I like this guy too, man. You talk about the over, white guys or whatever the case may be. Hey, this kid named Peyton Wilson from uh, NC State?


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[Assistant] I mean, the packers have done this like three, four times. And it looked like it worked!


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[Assistant] Is there anybody in the draft, talent wise, at quarterback, would you say, if this guy fell to me, I just gotta take it?


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[Assistant] So no, I, so for me, I, you know, there's a couple of positions where people say, well, what is most likely to happen? I don't think they'll draft the linebacker that high.


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[Assistant] Uhm, I think that you could possibly see a receiver. I think you could possibly see an offensive tackle taken because there's a deep.


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[Assistant] And they may, they got two tackles that, you know, you might want to look where to get where the Conklin after this next year. Uh, Jed Wills is on his fifth year. You may not have in him. So that's another guy.


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[Assistant] That's so crazy, Project Stoppile is such a, such a rigging endorsement. Yeah. Like, if they draft a corner, that's definitely Stoppile.


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[Assistant] He must- I'm wait- I'm waiting for that bombshell to come out. What happened? Did he throw some soup at somebody?


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[Assistant] Uhm, did he, like, was he sleeping at the facility inside the meeting rooms? I don't know what's going on. 30 millions in dead cap money for that?


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[Assistant] Here, here's what, here's what the, the women's game is doing. And


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[Assistant] People can learn about, learn from what they're doing in other leagues. For so many years what we've told people is that we just want


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[Assistant] Guys to have sportsmanship. We don't want guys to talk trash. We don't want to see guys going back and forth.


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[Assistant] What really made this, this rivalry was the fact that you got Iowa, you got LSU.


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[Assistant] You got Angel Reese, you got Caitlin Clark, you got the, you know, two different play styles, both of them talking trash, they're flamboyant.


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[Assistant] They let them wear different color sleeves. They, you know, the ladies ain't afraid to wear the makeup on the court, but they out here still doing their thing.


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[Assistant] They're showing what they're doing on Instagram. They got NIL deals. And so what it's doing is they're embracing that. Like embrace the fact that you want to be different, that you have something to say, that you got passionate about your game and that you're multi-faceted.


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[Assistant] So they put these, these, these young women or ladies on a, on a pedestal showing their skillsets as well as showing a more road-rounded athlete.


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[Assistant] The college basketball for the men's did the exact opposite.


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[Assistant] All the coaches left because they said I couldn't deal with NIL. The, the portal was a nightmare. Blah, blah, blah. We can't do this. Let me go to, let me go to Congress and complain. No, step your people skills up.


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[Assistant] Step your salesmanship up. Stop being a dude that want to do, you talk about these players that don't want to do nothing and not really want to be all in. Be all in and inclusive. Just don't say, I just want, I want to coach this guy for now and you better go to school and I'm a Scott Paz 75 people. No, you got to retain your people.


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[Assistant] Like every single year, if this is capitalism, you gotta learn how to retain your players, you gotta keep your promises, you gotta learn how to highlight people, you gotta talk to agents, moms, dads, AAU people, all of them.


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[Assistant] You gotta have a program, a complete program, not just what's on the court. So you starting to see what the women have been doing year after year. They got NIO.


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[Assistant] They got all these other obstacles, but guess what their game thrived in the college


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[Assistant] The race angle is evident and it's there. Like it's just there. It's UNLV versus Duke.


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[Assistant] It's, it's, it's the Fab Five versus Duke. Right, right, right. The guys with bald heads, it's always Duke. It's always Duke. Right, right. The clean cut guys, but you can, look right here, come on, this, this is, this is Hoosiers, this is the female Hoosiers team.


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[Assistant] All different, cause there's always a thing where there's this misconstrued point where, oh well, are they gonna be intimidated by all these girls? Angel Reese, she's, she's, she is the, she's the Wilt Chamberlain. She wears it like, she's flamboyant, she's ready to go. Listen, are they gonna be intimidated by Kate McCark plays a game of style play?


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[Assistant] That even the African American community traditionally embraces the, the, the flamboyancy, the, the, the, the passion, the flash, the pulling up from half court. I'm Steph Curry.


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[Assistant] They need to, they need more characters. I, I, I challenge, you know, the ladies coming up, and the women coming up.


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[Assistant] So somebody, you know, the WNBA, I think, you know, I always go back to the, you know, sometimes I, you know, you think about it, like, you know, back when the whole Brittany Griner thing had happened when she was detained in Russia. My thought process was always like, wow.


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[Assistant] Your best athletes have to go to other countries to make a living.


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[Assistant] We embrace the NIL thing, but for our attendance and getting people interested in the game, he said we do.


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[Assistant] We give financial packages to family and friends who want to come to the game.


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[Assistant] And I said, dang, that's crazy. Like they flying people out. And then, and then you think about it. Like, you know, you got 12, 13 different people on the squad.


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[Assistant] That helps also retain, you know, some of those people to come back because it brings their fam. It's hard to transfer schools when your people love school. Right.


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[Assistant] A $200 ticket. No, I just made it up. Still a $200 ticket. You know, this is one of the G Bush's wacky questions of the day. If, uh, Iowa said, look,


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[Assistant] We ain't trying to have Kaitlyn Clark leave. We gonna give her an IL deal. Somebody gonna give her a deal to pay three million, four million dollars to play for Iowa's men's team. Would it be allowed?


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[Assistant] Just throw this out there. If, if I gave somebody, if I gave Elijah Mitchell a hundred million dollars for a year, right, for one year, and it didn't have, and it didn't affect the Browns against nobody else ever, who do I care?


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[Assistant] They just gave him a bunch of money. He can still get cut next year.


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[Assistant] My man, listen man. If you had a ticket, you got a shirt, you got a gift box. It's a beautiful gift box. Cleveland Company Caramel Corn was in there, that was real good. Real good, bro. You hear this, Mike?


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[Assistant] No, I'm being dead serious. Hey listen. The Cleveland Company caramel corn that was in there was on point. Do you see what I'm saying? He got the honey.


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[Assistant] Those things, people are like going nuts for those cops.


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[Assistant] I know, but everybody upstairs wanted it. Everybody.


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[Assistant] watching, I am backpedaling hard today because my colleagues on the ultimate Cleveland sports show did not receive the gift bags. So, and they, they do this like five times a year. They send stuff, shirts, remember the chains? They sent that last year. They sent, they regularly, that's, yeah, there it is.


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[Assistant] There's so much to dissect from game one. It was, it was nutty. But the bottom line is the Cavs did what they had to do. They didn't just win. It was an emphatic win. There were some, there were some valleys.


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[Assistant] And we'll talk about all that. Uh, also, the Guardians just keep doing it, man.


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[Assistant] I know they do. And they get paid too. And they come in here hot.


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[Assistant] And the guardos just shut them down with great starting pitching, unbelievable bullpen pitching. Their bullpen is just, it's just like bring them in one after another and you're throwing up goose egg after goose egg. And the clutch hitting has been, it was crazy. Every time the A's would bring it close, something would happen and the guards would score three or four.


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[Assistant] Right now, they've got the best record in baseball.


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[Assistant] But for the most part, at one point or another, and it's only 22 games, but everybody has contributed. Everybody. Everybody. Austin Hedges isn't hitting a ton, but I think he's got a home run and he's been great defensively. And he's throwing people out. He's throwing people out and that's cutting down rallies when you do that.


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[Assistant] We're going to talk about that. So to put it into perspective, which is I always try to do this, 22 games is the equivalent of an inning and an out in a game.


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[Assistant] That's how deep, so in other words, when you're four outs into a baseball game, a nine inning baseball game, that's how far the guardians are into the season.


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[Assistant] And so is the season, and look, I'd much rather be 16 and 6 than 6 and 16, right? So there's a lot of positive, but are we ready to say this is not fool's gold, that this is sustainable, and that this is who this club is? We're gonna talk about that later in the show. And Mikey's gone in on the Cavs game with some concepts.


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[Assistant] What this team did, what might be coming in game two, things that Orlando did that actually worked, and they did some things that worked.


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[Assistant] Uhm, we'll get into that. Also, we're gonna talk about the Browns. Uh, there's a new rating out, uh, ranking that has, uhm, Nick Chubb. They ranked the AFC backs. You might be surprised where Nick Chubb comes in. We're gonna talk about that. Is that warranted? Is that unfair? We'll get into that and we'll also talk


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[Assistant] Couldn't agree more with the physicality part. Uh, they'll face teams that are more physical than Orlando in the playoffs for sure.


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[Assistant] I don't think, I think what they did was they matched Orlando's intensity, which is what I wanted to see. I didn't want to see what happened last year where the Knicks came out at the opening tap, they punched the Cavs in the mouth and the Cavs needed a standing eight count the rest of game one and really the rest of the series.


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[Assistant] Bring the physical style of play to them because of what happened to us last year in Orlando. That tells me they learned the very valuable lesson that when the playoffs start,


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[Assistant] The difference between the regular season and the playoffs is similar to the difference between NFL preseason and NFL regular season.


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[Assistant] It kicks up a lot. And it's the same thing with the NBA playoffs. So the first thing that really struck me was, oh, the Cavs aren't about to be pushed around. And I love the Nyang technical. Love it. It was, you know, whatever you, okay, you give up a shot. Who cares?


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[Assistant] That exchange better off because they got two shots and the ball.


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[Assistant] Uhm, you don't want to do something stupid. You don't want to get a player ejected. You don't want to do that in a late and close situation where you're giving them free points. But in the first half, when you feel they're starting, and they were starting to push the Cavs around at that point.


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[Assistant] And the Cavs said, no, that's not about to happen to us. So that was my biggest takeaway. A couple of other things. Uhm, the three point shooting is inexplicable.


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[Assistant] Donovan Mitchell hit one with the shot clock expiring off one foot, falling out of bounds, 30 feet from the hoop. Backwards. Nailed it. I'm like, oh, they're going to hit everything they throw. Well, from that point on,


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[Assistant] And it was pretty much take em. It was take em. So.


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[Assistant] And Mike, I'll let you get into this when we start looking X's and O's.


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[Assistant] I was asking myself, did they change their defense so much on our perimeter shooters that we can't, but I don't think that was the case because they were getting open looks. And they just kept missing. So when they started five for five, I said, that's not going to continue. I just didn't think they'd miss their next 18. So on the positive, you shoot 12% from three after the first quarter.


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[Assistant] I know, I don't expect, well, we were 12% after we made their first five.


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[Assistant] Because it was hard to look at. And we expected it to be ugly. We expected it to be physical. We expected it to be low scoring. Check, check, check. However, I think that the Cavs


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[Assistant] Am I concerned moving forward in this series? Not really. But the series will change when it goes south. It will change, we know that. And that building, even if they come home 02, that building is going to be cranked. And they're going to be ready because it's been a minute for them.


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[Assistant] I still think that this is a series they should and will win relatively easy. Five, six games, something in that order.


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[Assistant] And we're gonna talk about Evan Mobley when we pivot here, and I don't know that we're ready to do that yet. But Evan Mobley, again, was Jekyll and Hyde.


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[Assistant] And after that, he disappeared. See, I think, well, we'll look at it offensively.


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[Assistant] I like that because he did defensively. What I want to ask Mike is, so Mike, is this a situation where the Cavs said, we're going to see what you guys want to stop?


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[Assistant] And it was clear that they did want to stop Mobley offensively.


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[Assistant] And then they said, okay, pick your poison. You can take Mobley out of the game, but we've got Allen and we've got Mitchell and we've got Garland that can step up, pick up the slack, and you can't stop everyone. Is that what happened?


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[Assistant] And after that play, I said, okay, that's the explosion. That's what we haven't seen from Mitchell. He went to the rim with authority.


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[Assistant] And that was the four minute mark of the first quarter.


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[Assistant] Then they hit a scoring desert of 10 minutes.


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[Assistant] They scored nine points in the next six, uh, ten minutes with six minutes to go in the second quarter. They just, and Mike, I wanted to lean on you here.


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[Assistant] And I like that by the way. Listen, I've been dying to see that. It makes the game more watchable. But I didn't notice that in the other playoff game.


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[Assistant] But it reminded me of the late 80's NBA. Mid to late 80's NBA where they just would let them go stretch after stretch and you'd be like, wow, no whistle there, no whistle. It'd be two or three times where there was no whistle. And it, first of all, it keeps the game moving along. It doesn't stop at every 30 seconds.


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[Assistant] And I think the players, once they understand that, oh, that's how we're gonna play,


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[Assistant] I think now they know and they're gonna see if that, if that officiating style carries throughout the series, I think that's a huge benefit to the Cavs. I just do. Even though Orlando is probably by nature the more physical team, it will allow the Cavs to retaliate and to jack it up to that same level without fear of foul.


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[Assistant] Yeaah, he needs it. It sounds like he's... Because in the post game comments I also heard JB talk about how everybody was trying to get Darius in the right place before the game. That tells me they all know that he's...


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[Assistant] in, in perhaps not the best place, confidence wise. And so I think those games, like you said, that can carry over game to game. Don't let this man get on a roll now.


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[Assistant] Because if he, if he turns back into the best Darius Garland, the best version of him, which we've seen sporadically, but not nearly enough this year, if he can get back to his best form, which was really, we saw I think a year ago, this team is going to be a tough out.


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[Assistant] There were still just a couple of turnovers that I thought were sloppy.


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[Assistant] Phenomenal on the boards. And they limited Orlando a lot of times to one and done. And that's, that's, that really was the difference.


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[Assistant] And I have to keep reminding myself how young this kid, he's a kid.


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[Assistant] And I have to keep reminding myself of that because sometimes my criticism of him is over the top and unfair. Now, I say that to say this.


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[Assistant] I fell off the Evan Mobley hype train 10 games into this season, and here's why. We were told


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[Assistant] He went to the lab with the pen and the pad and was gonna come with all these low post moves and he was gonna recreate and, and, and we, we were gonna see a different Evan Mobley. I want that so badly. And I really didn't. I saw the same guy. And so for me,


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[Assistant] The hype train was a bullet train going 500 miles an hour and I was on it early on.


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[Assistant] But now it's kinda like a commuter train and it's going 120 and it stops at a lot of places. And that's where Evan Mobley is to me and his progression.


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[Assistant] I've seen small steps, him hitting threes with confidence. He had a three, I think it was against Indiana late in the year that was the game winning shot. And my mind was blown. I said, that's not the Evan Mobley I know. Against Philly. Philly, you're right. That's the, that's the guy I want to see.


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[Assistant] The guy who's not afraid with the game and the balance to take that 25 foot shot. I was stunned at that. I'll be honest. I was, I was blown away.


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[Assistant] And the fact that he made it, you can see how much it meant to his teammates. Not in the micro. It was great. They were gonna win the game.


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[Assistant] They were excited about that, but they were also looking at the kid who we were told was going to be a home run hitter, but he hit a lot of doubles and then he finally hit one over the fence. We're like, oh, the lid is, you know, the cork is out of the bottle now and there's no putting it back. And then we saw those two threes early yesterday and then he just stopped.


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[Assistant] Yeah, and I know where you're going with this because the ball isn't in his hands to start so much that that is the flow of the game is dictated by the point guard.


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[Assistant] It's up to the point guard to know when someone's got a fever and you keep, you keep feeding the fever.


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[Assistant] Was it going to him and they weren't forcing him to get involved? I'm not sure what it was. I really want to hear Mike talk about it because I don't know. But for me, like, I fell off the hype train around game 10. I still love the guy. I still think he's going to be a very, very good player.


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[Assistant] What I've moved on from is that he's the unicorn and he's gonna be Kevin Durant reincarnated. I have moved on from that. And I'm not back. Look.


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[Assistant] If he comes back next year and actually does add some low post moves and he does have a little bit more confidence in the three and can shoot around 35% from three, then okay, he can be that guy. Yeah, but right now.


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[Assistant] That would, that would be, that would be. You get seven or eight more points per game out of him. Right. A three more per game out of him. Yeaah. Uh, the defense is there. What's, what's crazy about him is, defensively, he is a superstar. He is. He is a defensive superstar.


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[Assistant] To round his game out to where you can say he is a league superstar and by that we mean he can be the guy that in any given moment in any given series can say jump on my back boys, I'm taking you there. Donovan does that. I don't think Mobley is there yet.


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[Assistant] And he can beat you multiple ways. The reason he is the golden key that unlocks all of this team's potential.


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[Assistant] Is because he's the guy that teams know, or we can stop him offensively. We can shut him out.


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[Assistant] And until he gets to the point where he can at any given night go for 30.


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[Assistant] I don't think this team will ever crawl to its highest potential.


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[Assistant] So Mike, uhm, I'm really gonna lean on you here to shh, tell us.


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[Assistant] Who you think made the best adjustments throughout the game? You know.


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[Assistant] Who would you give the gold star to from a strictly coaching standpoint?


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[Assistant] Now also kudos to Garland for recognizing the huge size mismatch and knowing I've gotta get the ball into the paint to Evan.


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[Assistant] And here's the other thing. There was eight seconds left on the shot clock. Now I know what you're saying. When he caught the ball in the low post, he had no idea that the switch happened, so he didn't know that Isaac was on him.


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[Assistant] What I'm saying he should have kicked it to Okoro is after he pump fakes, Okoro is standing there, watch what happens here. So he's gonna get it, dribble, pumps right there, he could have


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[Assistant] He could have kicked it to a quarrel and tried again. There's eight seconds left. Reset and try something else.


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[Assistant] Four seconds you don't do it because now Coro does have to shoot the ball. But with eight seconds left, and all this is happening so quickly, I agree with Mike, he had no idea the switch happened, but he did know once he put the ball and turned to the hoop, he knew that Isaac was in his face.


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[Assistant] I know someone that went Saturday, I know someone that went Sunday, they said yesterday was like going to a game in December. They said it was freezing cold.


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[Assistant] Are you a cl- you know, you got the guardian's hat on now.


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[Assistant] You're all in on Cleveland sports teams, right? Are you a de facto Cleveland sports fan now? Yeah, absolutely. Them winnings good for business. So yes.


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[Assistant] Yeah, but I think it goes beyond that. I think you're attached to these teams. Not just because it's good for our show when they win. I think you like root for these teams. They haven't become your teams. When you have to watch a team.


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[Assistant] They are offensively challenged and that, I'm being nice. Like if he went for 45, it would be a problem. But outside of that, I just don't see how this team


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[Assistant] Can beat the Cavs in this series. I don't. I'm not talking about a game. They can take a game.


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[Assistant] I don't see how they can beat us four times with a team that is this offensively challenged.


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[Assistant] Uh, yeaah, yeaah, we want to see that. I said earlier that things are going to change when it goes south. It will absolutely change.


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[Assistant] You know, the momentum that I think carried the calves to that hot start.


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[Assistant] Really propelled them to the win. Mhm. And the home crowd had a lot to do with that. They came out, they were fired up.


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[Assistant] And everybody, including JB, talked afterwards about how we made it a point to come out high. Well, you can take that away in game three. They won't be able to do that. Now, it'll still be the mission, let's come out and put our foot on their throat, start on a 10-2 run, and let's take this home crowd and send them home early.


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[Assistant] The series does not start until the home team loses the game.


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[Assistant] You know, right now, it's all about holding serve. And if everybody holds serves...


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[Assistant] Then we've got game seven in Cleveland in a week and change. To your point of getting rest.


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[Assistant] Miami disappointed me a little bit in game one against Boston. Oh, they took, they took that. Boston hit him with that knockout blow early. Yeah, I was, I was kind of surprised. I thought, you know, based on what happened with these two teams last year. But Boston is saying the same thing Cleveland's saying. Last year, we got kidnapped.


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[Assistant] So I know what you're doing here is you're trying to look ahead. Oh yeah, that's my calculus. But that's how you win chess. Yeah. If you don't play three moves ahead when you're playing chess, the game's over pretty quickly.


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[Assistant] I set that up three moves ago and I'm like yeaah, I wasn't even, I wasn't paying attention for that.


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[Assistant] That's a great point. Uhm, when they were 18 and 2, they were getting contributions from everybody, you know, and much of that stretch was without Mobley and it was without, without Darius.


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[Assistant] But Merrill stepped up and became a force.


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[Assistant] They win by 25 and the game is never in question. They got it. It was like a 14 point lead in the fourth quarter and then all of a sudden it was like 6.


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[Assistant] The thing can flip on you really quickly. Make your three-pointers. It's a make it league. It's a three-point league. The playoffs are here now. You're gonna need Merrill to be hot. Nyang to be hot. You're gonna need Max Struse to be hot. If those guys shoot well from three,


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[Assistant] Yeah, we've been talking as if tonight is in the bank because of the way game one went. You know, you...


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[Assistant] You dramatically change the mood, the outlook, the feel. If you lose, cause Orlando's mission was simple, coming to Cleveland. We've got two to win one. Right.


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[Assistant] And there's no back against any wall yet because they know they're gonna get their home games. But if for some reason...


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[Assistant] The calves take their foot off the gas. And Orlando sneaks out with a dub.


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[Assistant] What is the recipe for Orlando? I don't like the way this thing goes. What's the recipe for Orlando getting upset?


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[Assistant] Well, number one, they have to do something that they just traditionally don't do, and that's make three-pointers. They've got to score. Because this Cavs team, even though they went through a ten-minute scoring desert, they still damn near hit a hundred points against a really good defensive team. So the one thing that the Orlando Magic can do is


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[Assistant] Force the Cavs to turn it over. There's two things. Force them to turn it over at the rate they did in game one. And also,


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[Assistant] The reason that's such a scary stat is because Orlando does like to score with the clock stop.


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[Assistant] Like they know that that's in their DNA. They're gonna get that night to night to night to night.