2026 NFL QB Rankings, the Villain Dodgers, MLB Trade Deadline Lessons, and SummerSlam 2026 With Mina Kimes, Billy Gil, Anthony Dabbundo, and David Shoemaker

20:58Bill Simmons:But maybe they offered twice as much money as everybody else. Listen, I agree with you that Miami finally did the right thing. But I also can't congratulate a team for audibling after one of the worst contracts of all time, which was the Tua contract, which made no sense when it was happening. It was a complete disaster. It turned out even worse than everyone thought. And now you're like, okay, now we've got our shit together. It's like, do you? You just did the Tua thing two years ago when he was already on like six concussions. All right, so you have Miami one. Who's two? I'm tempted by... Raiders fans aren't going to like this, but...

21:38Bill Simmons:Raiders? Wow. Name their wide receiver one. It's tough. Yes, I know the answer is Brock Bowers, but at a certain point, you also need wide receivers. And then there's the name of the Raiders. A bunch of tight ends. lots of tight ends to throw to. A lot of short ones over the middle. How would you stack the Raiders offensive line last year? Isn't it a... It's better this year. I think that's one of... There's like five offensive lines that definitely got better and they're one of the five. They signed Linderbaum. They gave back Colton Miller, but the right side is the same. But last year, they couldn't block at all.

22:16Bill Simmons:So they're at least better than that. So I'm apprehensive of the entire right side of that offensive line and the receiving group. Are you going Raiders too? Really? I mean... I'm shocked that you have anybody over. I had Atlanta as the single worst situation. Drake London? B. John Robinson? I'm just talking about their quarterbacks are Tua and Penix. Oh, I thought you were asking me to rank the situation that the quarterback is in. Oh, my bad. I completely misunderstood me. I didn't clarify that enough. I'm so sorry. Okay. No, that's fine. I like that. I like that. The way you did it is almost a better question.

22:51Yeah, you're right.

22:52Bill Simmons:Because Atlanta has a ton of skill guys, but they have the worst actual quarterback skill guys. Yeah, if I was ranking actual quarterback situation, it would have been Cleveland with a bullet. So you'd have Cleveland over Atlanta? Yes, yes. Dude. Last time we saw Deshaun Watson play. I just think Sanders is going to win the job. I don't think we'll see Deshaun. I honestly think I would rather have Sanders than either of the Atlanta guys. I don't think Penix can play three games in a row. And I don't think Tua can either. And I don't know who the third string quarterback is, but I would bet that he plays more games than both of those guys.

23:30I think it's Cooper Rush. I might be wrong.

23:32Bill Simmons:I think Cooper Rush will play the most games of the Falcons. Tua has like four starts left in his NFL career, max. There's no way. He takes one more hit. His career's over. All right. Well, when healthy, I would take both Tua and Penix over the Browns. But the win healthy is not happening. No, it's fair. It's totally fair. And I want to go back to what I said with the Dolphins fans. If I'm actually ranking quarterbacks, I like Malik Willis. I just hate his situation. I think he's... Well, that's a good one, though. So you think the two worst situations are Miami? Yeah. And who'd you have for the second one?

24:04I picked Vegas. Maybe that's too harsh.

24:07Bill Simmons:But you still have Bowers for 1 ,500 yards. Dude, outside of him, it is rough. Are we sure Pittsburgh isn't one of the worst situations for a QB? What's good about their situation? I think Metcalf, Pittman, and then whatever, whoever the wide receiver, three, Bernard, or whoever, is pretty good. I think the offensive line is decent. The interior is really good. Kind of figure out the tackle position. Running game? I think it's a good run game. I think tight ends are good. You like that more than Tennessee? Yeah, 100%. Do you like it more than Arizona?

24:46um yes because of the offensive line but arizona's not bad although arizona randomly has like every

24:53Bill Simmons:running back on earth yeah it was weird when they were the coach was touting uh james connor it's like you guys just spent the third pick on a running back what is james connor james connor what's he doing in this i don't understand i think arizona the offensive line could be better but they were pretty bad last year. So my bottom three, just for actual quarterbacks situations, the only ones that got a minus two for me, where in the team rankings, you actually get negative points where Cleveland, the Jets and Atlanta. Yeah. Your guy, Gino, I'm sorry. He was a, he has to be a minus two unless we see something different.

25:27Bill Simmons:But I didn't have any other minus two, minus ones. That was it. Um, all right. I have one more question and then we'll take a break and go to the rankings. this is really important Eduardo get ready to cut this oh no Eduardo get ready to cut this okay no cut this for a social clip yeah I know I understand has Jordan Love replaced Justin Herbert as the football nerd king of the quarterback position has this finally has this been a subtle shift that we didn't acknowledge but it's happened I feel like I'm walking into a trap. Like you laid an elaborate like saw style. I did. There's no way out. Because you already know I love Jordan Love.

26:17And the way you set that question up makes it look like I'm falling for it. But yeah, he's a really good quarterback. And he has this reputation. as being this incredibly irresponsible interception machine that's not substantiated by reality. And I think, and the nerds of all, we had a quorum, we got together.

26:49Bill Simmons:QB Nerdapalooza. We had a little summit in the off season to discuss. First, we did our giant Justin Herbert presentation and everybody had put up slides about how we can defend him this year now that the circumstances are better. Somebody was sobbing at the podium about, he lost both of his tackles. He lost both of them. Ruiz had to take like a five-minute break. But Jordan Love, and this was widely discussed at the summit, like actually not a high interception rate. I believe bottom 10 or something in football. I posted this at one point. The problem is that when he does turn it over, it looks so unbelievably goofy that it sticks in people's minds and has a disproportionate impact on like the public imagination that makes people think he turns it over all the time.

27:45Bill Simmons:So you're talking about the concept of loud turnovers. Yes. So in basketball, I always called this the 90-10 guy where everybody's 90 % really good at basketball, but they're going to be 10 % not that good at stuff. And when it's somebody like Russell Westbrook, you really notice the 10%. And love is a 10, that love 10 % for whatever reason seems just the worst. He's also like the anti Westbrook in that all of his rate stats are unbelievable. Like when you go back and you look at everything, and I know everyone's always arguing about which quarterback stats matter. And my answer to that is it doesn't, you can literally take any quarterback stack, DVOA EPA QBR pass rate whatever you want he is like top five or better in all of them like he he is both from the film you talk about the film nerds the film nerds and the stat nerds both love him because he's been so good right and yet people talk about him like he's I don't even I think like they kind of talk about him like he's like late stage Brett Favre yeah they don't take seriously.

28:52It doesn't make sense to me.

28:54Bill Simmons:So last year, loses Kraft. The wide receivers are, you know, Watson gets hurt every year, but in general like the wide receivers were a mess. Top four pressure rate against him. So all these QB stats, you can go, you can overrate any of them. I think pressure rate's a really good stat. It just tells you what quarterback was under duress the most. He was in the top four. And EPA, I mean, you have all these different ones, but his EPA was 0.24 per play. I was like in the top four. Um, I, here's how I would, this is why I think he took the title from Herbert. Okay. I think, I think the nerd community is scolding us the most about love.

29:35Bill Simmons:And I think scolding is a huge part of this where people are like, you don't understand. Yeah. You guys are wrong. This guy's really good. And here's some things you have to, I feel like you're inadvertently right now making some profound political commentary. America and why we might be in the situation that we're in, but I'm going to put that to the side. Okay. So teach me how to be a Jordan love enthusiast in a way that doesn't alienate the every man. I want to, I want to be better. I want to, I want to defend him in a way that's not annoying to people. So here, here's the thing. This is just like, you almost have to go overboard with the look, either follow the NFL or you don't.

30:19Bill Simmons:If you don't see the Jordan love thing, I can't help you because he's that good. And if you're going to say he's not, then enjoy your Sundays, watch five games at once, eat chicken, chicken fingers, have beers with your buddies, and don't actually watch the games because that, because that's where you are. If you don't see it, you're, you're, you're veering dangerously close to watch the tape, which people don't but he has tape and stats. And when you backing into being a love defender, I am a love defender. To me, Love has a better case than Herbert because at least we've seen him play well in the playoffs.

30:54Bill Simmons:He had a really awesome playoff win. Herbert does not. We've seen Herbert fall apart in the playoffs and Love has not, as I don't think has. I always feel like he's in the mix. Let me ask you a question. Are any of his receivers better than Zay Flowers? Well, I think Kraft was a top four tight end before he got here. I thought he was always open and he looks like Gronk-ish to me. He's obviously not Gronk. The receivers. I like Golden. I don't know what happened with him last year. I had him on two fantasy teams wondering why they weren't throwing it to him. Maybe he's not good, but where they drafted him and what they wanted from him feels like he's the key swing guy for them this year.

31:36They have a lot of guys I like. Like, I think Watson's good when he's healthy. When he plays. Yeah. I think Golden has potential. Reed is a fun piece, But at the point I'm making, and I think this is another thing we can add to our Jordan Love public service announcement that we're putting together here is like we just made fun of Baltimore for their wide receiver one being, you know, Mina sized. Yeah, he would be easily the best receiver. Right. In Green Bay. So like, why doesn't Jordan Love get some credit for that as well? He ain't throwing a Puka Nakua and Jamar Chase and JSN, you know, so I just feel I mean, I'm like, I have.

32:15his numbers too. He's top three against the blitz top three on third down top three on third and long. Like what, what does it take? What does it take? I don't know.

32:23Bill Simmons:He's won the title. It's official. All right. We're gonna take a break. We're gonna go through the rankings. This episode is brought to you by chat GPT. Imagine you're running a professional sports team. Nice. That would be a dream of mine. Imagine the player contract report is due today. Not so nice. You've got performance notes from the coaching staff. You got a salary spreadsheet from your analyst, three rounds of back and forth emails with the agent, and all of it is scattered absolutely everywhere. Well, that's where chat GPT work comes in. It's a new way to use chat GPT for bigger multi-step projects.

32:58Bill Simmons:Give chat GPT work access to your apps and files and can create real work documents. For instance, spreadsheets, slides, structured reports. You can bring all those to your next meeting. And when you don't need answers, you need help just getting the work across the finish line. Guess what? ChatGPT work can move your projects forward while you stay in control. Put ChatGPT to work on your most ambitious ideas and projects. Get started. Just go to ChatGPT.com by selecting work mode available on plus and pro plans. All right. Highest you can get is nine points at the QB position and it can only be one person, the alpha.

33:41Bill Simmons:And then we go down and I have for the off of the second year in a row, Josh Allen as my nine pointer, 12 plus rushing TDs each year for the last three. I don't need to do his stats. The playoff win is the one thing that people are going to point to. And I gotta say, I don't think he choked in the playoffs last year, but it wasn't not a choke. Not great. It wasn't great. It wasn't great for the Allen thing. And like Sando did his QB tears and had Mahomes in the one spot, which we'll talk about in a second. To me, Allen is clearly still the best quarterback in the league, at least if we're just doing regular season only.

34:17Bill Simmons:And if we're going to go into who do you want from one game, that's a different category. Do you think DJ Moore changes anything? I do. Okay. And that's not me saying DJ Moore is 2021 DJ Moore or that he's going to suddenly become a top 10 receiver in the NFL. But they just have such, had such a lack of receiving option who could win on the boundary, who could beat man coverage, who can even threaten man coverage in any way. So if DJ Moore is even like a top 20 receiver, I do think that makes things a lot easier for Buffalo. Would you be scared if you're a Buffalo fan that the Bears fans were ready to drive him to the airport?

34:54I would be more mad about the deal. Like my objection to that was less trading for DJ Moore and more what they gave up for him and the contract part of it, which I thought didn't make a ton of sense.

35:02Bill Simmons:So two teams where he didn't seem like it went totally perfect behind the scenes are with everybody. They like two teams that seem like they were pretty happy to move on, which I think to me is a red flag. We'll see. I mean, the new coach who is a little more offense oriented, maybe that helps, but I don't know. Josh is just, he's the scariest guy to go against. He's the scariest guy to bet against and I don't think that's changed. So I have him at the top. Do you agree with that or no? Would you have Mahomes there? No, I think that's fair. I also think Josh Allen just doesn't get hurt. Like I know that matters.

35:39Bill Simmons:Durability matters. I keep saying this. It's I mean, he is literally like a linebacker there. And the fact that he's become unbelievably accurate and smart on top of that is ridiculous. I think when you compare him to my homes, it's a little tricky for me because even though I know I just said both don't have a receiver can be man coverage. They've had such a great offensive line in such a dominant run game. And my homes is we'll talk about him been in such crappy circumstances. So it's kind of hard, you know, to compare, but I do think it's fair to put out in there now. Top seven favorite celebrity relationship for you?

36:18We had a longest side about this because, you know, both him and Herbert dating or married to pop star. Herbert's not married yet. And I made the argument that I think the big part of the reason why Alan rose so high in the ranking, their fantasy guys rankings is because he's such a wife guy, which women love.

36:35Bill Simmons:Good couple pictures of them too. Yeah. There was a clip of him like tearing up talking about their baby daughter that went around. You can't have better publicity than that. Next category is the, uh, the blues. These are eight pointers and I have five and I'm going to do them in the order I have them. It's brave. Stafford. I have second. I don't have Mahomes second and I'll explain why I want to watch. Is it okay if we watch a couple games with him with the repaired ACL, just see how it looks. Can I just, can I just see like two games before I move, start moving them up the ladder? Um, especially somebody who has to in big games when I don't love their receivers and neither do you Kelsey's just got married.

37:23Bill Simmons:He's in his mid thirties, um, over and over again. When they play somebody good, he has to use the fact that Kelsey just got married. I don't know. I don't know if he's his eyes on the prize. He just had a wedding of 1200 people, 1200 person wedding. I don't know if he cares about the season. Almost all of these guys are married. It's just big wedding. I don't know. I don't know where his head's at.

37:46Bill Simmons:But if Mahomes has to use his legs to save games and quarters for them. Yeah. More relevant. Very relevant. I don't know if he can. I just want to see it. So I have him third Stafford stats wise was ridiculous. And yeah, you know. All right, let me ask you a question. Best year since 21. And the question for me with him, 38 years old. Yeah. Was that the peak? I got a question for you. Yeah. Those two quarterbacks, if you switch their circumstances this year. It'd be terrible for Stafford. Yeah. Well, that's why I think, I think by way for Mahomes. Imagine Mahomes behind the Rams offensive line with the Rams run game, Sean McVay, Puka Nakua, Devontae Adams.

38:31Like, what would that look like?

38:34Bill Simmons:That's fair. So you would have Mahomes second? No, not necessarily. I would. I would, yes. And Stafford, amazing. I don't think it's crazy. I would probably put him third right now. Can I give you a, maybe this is good for you. I went on your pod and I was saying I thought Seattle had the most talented team, which apparently was like a hot take. Dude, because the Seahawks fans were like, finally, somebody else said it other than us. They were like delighted. There's like no Seahawks, barely any in the NFL 100, which I know is an absurd sentence to use that as some kind of it is the players, though.

39:10Devin Witherspoon, who's like, he didn't crack the 100.

39:15Bill Simmons:Yeah, but that do you take that top 100 list seriously? Because I do not. I did my rankings in Seattle. I had 38 points, which was the highest I've ever done in four years. on a daily NFL show and it's July. Yeah, I get it. Okay. I just, if he's not on it, what list is that? I know it's anyways. And Cooper, Cooper was, I think I saw today he was like 45th. Does anybody think Cooper's jeans better than Witherspoon? At least it's like even. It's pretty awesome. Yeah, no, but I mean 45 and not being on the list is crazy. Yeah. Um, anyway, I made, I looked this up. I did some research for this pod.

39:52Bill Simmons:Okay. QBs 38 years or older, 38 plus QBs. Yeah. 10 wins, 4 ,000 yards, 25 TDs, seven yards per attempt. Seem solid numbers for a high end QB, right? 4 ,025, seven. It's only happened nine times. Six of the guys were Tom Brady. Brett Favre in 09 Manning in 14 on Denver and Rodgers 21 on Green Bay. So Stafford just putting up those numbers would be the 10th time it's ever happened at that age. 4 ,025 and 7 which isn't even remotely close to what he did last year. It was 4707, 46 TDs and it just I just wonder he's had a lot of wear and tear, a lot of injuries, knee stuff, back stuff. I don't know.

40:46I think he will be fine. His arm strength has not diminished at all. Clearly. However, that Rams offensive line is not deep. And if they were to lose one of those tackles and potentially a suspension might be on the left side for one of them, that's when I start worrying about Matthew Stafford because that's where the age starts to show pressure. Well, when you have

41:09Bill Simmons:a top-heavy team, it's tough to be good everywhere, too. We'll see. Anyway, Mahomes third. His peak year is now four years ago, 5 ,250 yards, 41 touchdowns, and 8.1 yards per attempt. And I guess the question is, was that the peak? Will he reach those heights ever again? He's in his thirties now? I don't think he will unless they actually find a wide receiver one. That's. Do they have a single wide receiver you completely trust? No. Do you have a wide receiver you partially trust? I trust Rishi Rice against zone coverage. But that's such a, like, I think he's, he's a totally useful receiver. I think.

42:01Bill Simmons:I trust him on a football field. yes specifically zone coverage between the two lines uh i do not i know i talked like i talked about how the bills and like man coverage you know everyone could win well now they have dj more who at least is like competent yeah i don't see that in kansas city so i i also like they the kelsey thing i mean he's hall fame player just got married just big 1200 person wedding at madison square garden doesn't that mean though that's not now that's off his mind and he's his mind is clear. The wedding's over. That's how I felt after I got married. I was like, oh, I never have to think about that again.

42:37Bill Simmons:Football has a life or death element to it that you kind of have to throw yourself into. You know, sometimes these guys, who knows? The thing I wrote down for my homes, Brady had this after he tore the ACL in 08 and then nine and 10, they didn't make the Super Bowl either of those years. And he kind of moved and he's still statistically was great, but it felt like he needed like a second prime to start. And then it finally started in 11 where he had like his second run. So the question with Mahomes is, is there going to be a second run or was it just that amazing first peak that was historic and all that, but that's going to be where we landed.

43:15Bill Simmons:Like almost like a Pujols thing. It's the circumstances that will determine it for me. And we can do the analog with Brady and what, Well, what happened? They drafted the two tight ends in 10 and that led to the second prime. The two tight ends. Well, the second one was good for a couple of years. That was so funny the way you talk about it. It turned into a multiple murderer. No, but like the thing, right. So it feels like Kansas City, there needs to be a total refresh. I think Andy Reid and the brain trust there, there needs to be some evolution on that offense, particularly the run game, particularly because of the injury.

43:56And I'm not just talking about, I'm specifically talking about this season. You talked about, let's see Mahomes in the ACL. His ability to run was so important. Obviously it's always been important and it's always been especially important the postseason. But earlier I mentioned like they can't, they don't have anyone who can beat me in coverage. They did have one person, his name was Patrick Mahomes because defense would turn their back to him and he would just take off on third down. If he can't do that, if you're a defense, you're not afraid of that anymore. And they don't have any receivers who you're scared of playing man.

44:24You're golden. So I just, and he was like, they're leading. So they messed a lot in the run game this off season. But that's something like, I feel like everything around him has to get better for a second golden age to happen.

44:35Bill Simmons:They missed a couple of picks too over the last couple of years, which is always bad. You miss first or second rounders. And this is what happened with Brady down the stretch where it was like, they just missed some drafts and you can't recover from that. Um, the Walker thing, getting Kenneth Walker, having a real running back, the running back stats were really, really putrid last year. I mean, some of the worst advanced stats for them. Anyway, so I have my homes third, but I'm ready to move them second. As soon as I see him run around, I have Drake may fourth, which I think people would think is high.

45:08Bill Simmons:Um, he made the Super Bowl last year and had crazy stats. Wait, you have Drake May over Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson? I'm going to explain why in a second. I'm a Drake May guy. You're testing me. Okay. Meaning you know what I like? Results.

45:25Bill Simmons:Drake May went 17 and four last year and he had crazy stats. It's not like it was like some sort of fluke thing. And they added AJ Brown, who is either the seventh, eighth, ninth or 10th best receiver in the league. They added Dobbs. They improved the offensive line. Why isn't he a top five QB again? Why isn't he a safer bet than Lamar Jackson? Who's like six years older than him. Because Lamar's done it for seven years. I just watched Drake Maynard last year. Yeah, it was one year, dude. Tell that to the Texans fans. I'm all in on Drake. I mean, I have taken my slings and arrows for my MVP vote, which I will still stand on and defend.

46:04But like, I don't think you can credibly after just one season, rank him above those guys. I just did it. He's okay. All right. I love him. I think he's so good.

46:15Bill Simmons:But Lamar, 349 yards rushing last year in 13 games. He's never been under 50 yards a game rushing until last year. He was injured. EPA per play last year, 0.07. just slightly better than Jackson Dart and Mason Rudolph. You need to take away your EPA privileges. Three playoff wins, career, which is the same as Drake May had last year. He's 30 years old. And I don't know. I would just rather have Drake May. I'm just telling you as a Patriot fan. I think, oh, dude, if we're talking about building like from ground up. I'm saying for this year, if it's one year only, I'd rather have Drake May. No, no, I'm saying if it was more than one year only, I would absolutely take Drake May.

46:59Bill Simmons:Okay. but I'm not going to take him for one year only over the two time should have been three time MVP. You know what? If Mallory Rubin's watching and listening to this, I don't care. Um, and I had Burrow last in this group. So I had, I had five in this group. Here's the thing with Joe Burrow that I don't love. So I have basically Stafford, Mahomes, May, Jackson, and Burrow. So not Lamar for all the reasons. No, Lamar. I just had in there. Oh, sorry. So Jackson, Jackson. I have Lamar fifth and May fourth, Burrow sixth. Okay. Burroughs played three seasons and three half seasons, and he hasn't won a playoff game since 2022.

47:37Yeah.

47:37Bill Simmons:I think that kind of matters. And I don't know if his offensive line, it's allegedly a little bit better. Who knows? I maintain it's better. Their schedule is super easy. Everybody loves them. There's been a lot of action on their over. And I don't know. He's had a lot of wear and tear already. He's had some real injuries, not like fluky, dumb injuries, like real injuries and i just kind of want to see it i think the injury thing is where you got to start it's the most credible reason to doubt both him and jackson but more him he's been hurt more yeah sometimes i feel like is not talked about in the same way um and it's a good reflection of how like getting injured doesn't it it's not necessarily correlated to you know being i think sometimes people say the dual threat quarterbacks y 'all get injured a lot it's like actually your your pocket passer here.

48:28I know he has scrambling ability. Joe Burrow had some pretty weird injuries along the way. Um, you know, when he's been on the field, I think top four or five, four is probably top four is where I would put him. Um, but he also, again, to go back to circumstances has been in pretty damn good circumstances. I mean, he's probably got the best one, two punch a receiver in the NFL. I do think the offensive line has gotten better. so I think that's fair I think Burrow versus Jackson is a debate most people have I'm higher on Lamar personally but I think you could argue both ways

49:04Bill Simmons:let's see it it's all set up for him this year the two easiest schedules in the league are Cleveland and Cincinnati and if he's a 10 win quarterback and can stay healthy this year I don't understand how he wouldn't win 10 games with the talent he has. All right. Next category is the light blue. We can move through these fast. Prescott, who I guess I have as my seventh best quarterback. Year 11 for him. He's got two playoff wins total. I think he has the mantle right now of would I rather have this guy as my fantasy QB or my real QB. We have this from time to time. You wouldn't want him as your real QB.

49:45I mean...

49:46Bill Simmons:If I'm trying to win the Super Bowl... But you have him seventh. That's pretty high. I know. I know. Okay. I'm just saying. Is his legacy going to be fantasy? He won some people some fantasy titles or he actually won some NFL playoff games? It's funny how he used to be like the most divisive quarterback in the NFL. Yeah, he kicked everyone away. Yeah. Why don't you guys cover the Dallas Cowboys bar? Every time I turn his pin on, They're not talking about the Cowboys at all. I don't understand. You know what? I'm on NFL Live today and we have zero Cowboys segments. So, touche. Yeah. You did it.

50:30Starting with the Ravens, Zay Flowers. But it is funny, right? That he now, everyone just kind of accepts that he's in this tier that you have him in. Like everybody accepts that he's in that, I would say six to nine range, six to eight.

50:43Bill Simmons:And yet if we got to a playoff game and he was like a three and a half point favorite at home, I'd be nervous to bet on him. I wouldn't be nervous because of him. I have love right after him for all the reasons we talked about. Love it. And then Herbert is the last person in this group. The playoff stuff is horrific. I really thought he was a noble season by him last year, though, with how bad the line was. And yet not noble enough for you to have him over. He's just running for his life. The question for him, and I think this goes for Burrow, too, is can you take too many hits? Yeah, that's fair.

51:19Bill Simmons:Can you run for your life too much? Is there residual damage from it? Okay, that's a fair... Speaking on behalf of the greater Justin Herbert supporters, film nerds, alliance, I feel I'm qualified to be the emissary. That's a fair criticism. I think, because I get worried about... I actually have a little theory that I've been banding around, which is when these quarterbacks have these meltdowns in the postseason, him, he was awful in that game, Stroud. Awful. I sometimes feel... And honestly, like May at the end to a lesser to some. He was terrible. He was bad. I do feel like there's something to be said about the accumulation of those hits and bad offensive line play building and building and building.

52:04And then a quarterback just kind of imploding at the end of the year. Like there's only so long you can shoulder a terrible offensive line. And I kind of think, and that's why I genuinely believe that's why those quarterback and some some of the other quarterbacks like end up being the worst at the end. It's because of, like you said, the accumulation of all. Yeah.

52:27Bill Simmons:You're talking about, it could be during a season. It could also be a career. Like when I was a little kid, we had Jim Punkett who's the first pick in the draft and just got the shit kicked out of him for six years. Ended up getting traded to San Francisco, waived and then took like two years to recover and then went to the Raiders and actually won a Superbowl. But you know, It's hard. It's, I mean, his line, it's not even just that they allowed a lot of pressure. It's the way they allowed pressure, which was like right up the middle. It felt like a jailbreak every other play. Well, I have good news.

53:00Bill Simmons:I had them in, I had them in the top eight for offensive lines. Now that they have their tackles back. Their guys back. Both of their guys are back. And they spent money on it too. I think their lines actually, then the McDaniel piece, he's the one that I could see. I think he's the stealth MVP vote. yeah there's a lot of what have you considered though that he's planning a wedding during the season did you factor when is the wedding i don't know after the season i don't like it maybe it's gonna be it might be on his mind i don't like it he's preparing for like the patriots game and his fiance is like oh my mom is being such a jerk she wants us to invite my uncle um Um, anyway, I have the totally stealth MVP.

53:47I totally agree with that.

53:48Bill Simmons:So seven pointers, Prescott, Love and Herbert. And that I like it. That actually is our top nine. I like it. Which leads to the next question, because now we're in the reds, which are five pointers. And I have Darnold, Goff, Purdy and Caleb Williams in this group. Darnold, Goff, Purdy and Caleb Williams in that order. So that was the tentative order. My question for you, because one of these guys I think is clearly the 10th best quarterback in the league. Cause I think the top nine is pretty set. Yeah. I think that's good. Who is the 10th best quarterback in the league? I can offer you Darnold Goff, Purdy, or Caleb Williams with six fourth quarter comebacks and, uh, pretty, pretty kind of basic stats, except for like how good he is when his back's to the wall.

54:37I would throw in another quarterback into this group. I would put Stroud for consideration, but I understand some hesitation.

54:44Bill Simmons:We're not even close to getting Stroud yet. I would put Trevor Lawrence in this group personally, as someone who just went back and re-watched Trevor Lawrence for a podcast. So I had Trevor Lawrence as a four-pointer, and my question for you was going to be, do you believe in 2026 last eight games, Trevor Lawrence, or what we saw in the playoff game, Trevor Lawrence? he wasn't even that bad first of all I believe in it because circumstances stay the same for the most part so you want me to move him up a point you want me to make a five pointer I think he was so awesome I agree with you I just didn't know if it was some of those but of the guys you mentioned I'm going to parse this out one year if it was multiple years I would put Caleb there but it's one year.

55:34I know. This season. I'm putting Jared. I would put Jared Goff there personally.

55:39Bill Simmons:Okay. I've Jared Goff is one of those quarterbacks where my estimation has grown over time. And I think he's gotten better over time. So that's a big part of it. I feel that like the lines, obviously incredible skill players, you know, we all know that. I do feel like a little bit lost last year was an appreciation of some of the struggles of that offensive line and what he was dealing with. and that's partially that's his sensitivity like that he is much better kept clean all quarterbacks are but the immobile ones shall we say are more but I just think his toughness and his ability to keep that offense that passing game going with some pretty bad line play maybe was a little bit slept on his stats are really good like his last three years per 17 games would be 4 ,600 34 TDs 8 yards a pass even last year without Ben Johnson by the way he still was good.

56:32Yeah,

56:32Bill Simmons:the question with him is always, all right, if he didn't have elite skill guys, where are we? Right? Yeah. He's got Gibbs, he's got Laporta, got St. Brown. I think everyone you mentioned though, right? Purdy, Darnold. I think he has the best skill guys out of all these guys in this group. All right, so Goff, I still have Darnold. I had him 10th, but I'm happy to move him to 11. 28 wins plus Super Bowl and he was 31 and 7 the last two years. We don't have to talk about him. We've talked about him enough, but Um, Purdy is, Purdy is my guy that I defend. I talked about this on your pod. I just like Purdy.

57:09Bill Simmons:Like when Mac Jones was pretty good for the 49ers, people were like, see, Purdy, it could be anybody. And it's like, I just don't agree. I think Purdy's good. Um, question for him is the receivers and then, um, the electric, whatever the fuck that thing is. They lost in a, Purcell. Just taking things out. I. I don't know what you do with this. So it's crazy. This I'm a big believer in July and August, setting a tone for shoving a team one direction or the other. I have not liked that. I think the Shannon car accident is like just a terrible thing that happened before this season for a variety of reasons.

57:48Bill Simmons:But it's just a weird kind of strange variable to put in versus what you have with some other teams who are like, yeah, things are going great. We're happy about this and this. and you have the Niners who are dealing with all the, I don't know. I just. I was so high on the Niners, like offseason, the moves they made. Yeah. When we did our power hour, I was like, look at this roster. And then you take a step back and you're like, wait, all of these skill players are either older, coming off an injury or have, almost all of them have injury history. So why am I, like I felt like hubris to assume, this is before Piers all got hurt, that they would all be fine.

58:24So I don't feel.

58:25Bill Simmons:At some point it ends for Evans. This is becoming unrealistic for a number one, kind of somewhere between a one and a two receiver, depending on how healthy he is. But at some point you can't, he's hitting his mid thirties, which is. Yeah. But yeah. Caleb. So I think out of Caleb, he's the one I could see jumping to a seven or maybe even an eight this season if he's just awesome, but maybe he's a year away. I like him though. I really feel like he really won me over last year and he's a good example of like sometimes you just need a good coach and good people around you like I think there's another version of his career where he's just basically like a more talented Kyler Murray and it never happens but I I don't know I he kind of won me over and then we talked about Lawrence so all right that's the five then we move into the light reds where I do not have CJ Stroud these are all four pointers Jalen Jalen Hurts Baker Mayfield Jaden Daniels and Bo Nix um question for hertz would you bet on this being a resurgence year or uh holy shit we got to get out of this contract year by like december where does this go more positive than we got to get out of the contracts i am i do fear that it might take a minute to look good though because it's just you know such a new offense yeah in philadelphia and i do worry that the criticism is going to be so intense those first few weeks if it doesn't look great immediately right um i this has been a tough one for me because you know i talked about daniel's like i kind of just want to see him in it before i come to any conclusions because again you know when you talked with egos fans about the fact that hurts doesn't really throw over the middle of the field and he struggled against certain zone looks and that they'll say well you know the scheme was so bad and the scheme was bad so they're not wrong but also you kind of want to see him do it throw with anticipation maybe make some riskier throws.

1:00:23So I'm a little apprehensive of it, but I'm never going to be fully out on him because he does have like a really legitimate and unique skill set. Like he throws a beautiful go ball. He's a really good athlete. I wish he ran more, but

1:00:35Bill Simmons:I just asked him. He actually won a Super Bowl. My question with him that I can't, and he's 57 and 25 as a starter, by the way. My question with him is why do they seem like they're hiding stuff with him? Like that, I always thought the pace of play that they played with Where they just very deliberate, like they're trying to shorten the game, you know, and they they kind of talked about it. They're like, yeah, we think we have better players than everybody else. We want to shorten the game that shortens the variance. And it's like, yeah, I don't know. It feels like you're hiding hurts a little bit.

1:01:09Bill Simmons:Like you don't want him to have 10 cracks. I would defend him by saying I think they were hiding the offense as a whole. Like they knew that the offense was a disaster by their standards. They had a top five or six line. They had Barkley. They had two really good receivers. They got her. Like, what are they hiding? Why are they? Why do they think their offense isn't good? Because it was bad. I mean, the run game was awful. The line was hurt. Doesn't make sense. No, I know. I'm just saying like a Patriots line, though. I know. But I think that they were very aware of how bad the offense was and that they would they had to win games with the defense, which, by the way, remains awesome.

1:01:48So not great. Yeah.

1:01:51Bill Simmons:Mayfield I feel like should be a five but his body is just so banged up and this feels like a make or break year for him I know they were doing the basically short-term deal which is what they did he's played 120 games as a starter is 58 and 62 when he's healthy though he's really good I just he's a he's a smaller guy and I just wonder this is who he's going to be every year by the end of last year he had like four different injuries he was injured he was I think they put too much on my shoulders last year like the run game was bad their offensive line was also really banged up and i think if they want to get things back to 2024 they need to calm things down bring down the depth of target get the run game going again play action he is a quarterback you can absolutely win with i think though whether he's like a quarterback you win a lot of games because of is probably what's holding them back from doing the long-term deal too and can you keep him healthy.

1:02:43Bill Simmons:And then Bo next, who knows? Why did they game manage with him so much? Why were they always behind? Why were they always scrambling in fourth quarters? Why were they basically a 10-minute team offensively? He's got way better weapons this year and should be better, but I have no idea. But I think he's a four because they won games with him. Alright, going into the twos quickly. The pink chippers. I have CJ Stroud, Daniel Jones, Jackson Dart, Tyler Shuck and Bryce Young. And I'm happy to move any of those back and make them zero pointers instead of two pointers. Is there anyone who does not belong in that group?

1:03:23Doesn't belong in that group.

1:03:26Bill Simmons:Stroud, Jones, Dart, Shuck and Bryce Young. You can talk me into Dart the most because we just haven't seen him play two months in a row. I thought, so I've gone back and rewatched all the rookie quarterbacks. I thought Tyler Shuck was the best of them. I loved him. You could have talked me right now into making him a four-pointer. I fucking love that guy. Dude, you came on my pod and you were like touting him and you were like, yeah, and Vele. And I kind of was like, Vele. I was like giggling. And then when I went back to watch the Saints, I was like, oh my God. There was a game in like week.

1:03:57Bill Simmons:Vele was a stud for three weeks. Vele was like the best wide receiver in football. No cam word consideration here? Not yet. Horrible, horrible situation. Not yet. I mean, just abysmal. Yeah. I'm ready to entertain it after I watch a couple of games, but I think for now it's got to be a zero. I felt like watching him, it reminded me of watching the different quarterbacks in some ways, but Caleb Williams is rookie season where there was something there, some really exciting plays needed to learn how to play on time and bad situation. And then Caleb Williams got Ben Johnson. And then I look at Tennessee and I'm like, okay, well, you got Brian Dable.

1:04:33It's better, but is it? And it's not, it's not, he didn't get the like Chicago glow up. So I, I don't know if we're going to see that. who I like.

1:04:42Bill Simmons:Yeah, I think he was last year's would have been a good two-minute Twitter video of all of his great throws. Cam Ward was a problem. And he just had like, what? Like 10 incredible throws. He was like weirdly unbelievable against Seattle and Kansas City. Yeah, there's something there. I'm in on Cam Ward. I just think for the exercise of this year. No, I get it. And I had to have, I had nine quarterbacks that were a zero or a minus two, because I feel like if you're getting, if you, if you don't have, if you're in the bottom 25 % of the position with your quarterbacks, I can't give you points. Um, anyway, CJ Stroud, here's the thing with CJ.

1:05:24Bill Simmons:I know. And he might be a four or five pointer by the end of the year. Here's the thing. We talked about this when I did your pod. This is the best defense in the league. There's a real case that they could just run through and the, and, if he could just, can he drive the car 58 miles an hour in the highway? I don't even need you to go 60. Just keep it straight. And you're going to have the lead. Your defense is going to, you're going to be at 10, nothing, 13, nothing. It's a little like the Seahawks in a lot of the games last year. Yeah. For the entire second half of the Seahawks season. 13-3, 14-0.

1:05:59Bill Simmons:You're just don't screw it up. And I think he'll gain confidence as the year goes along because of how good the defense is. So my hope is that he doesn't come back from the playoff disaster with too much of a just drive the car mentality. Like, I don't want him to be too conservative. You know what I mean? Because of the like. So you want him in the carpool lane every once in a while, just airing it out. Nico Collins, man. And he throws like a beautiful deep ball. Like, I just think he has to find that balance. I mean, the postseason was insane, but I don't. He's not a game manager quarterback.

1:06:33I really don't think he is. Like I feel.

1:06:37Bill Simmons:So you think he's a hitter? He's like a three point shooter in basketball. Like he's. I think he can be consistent. I think if I was ranking him, where do you have him? 20. Yeah. 25 or something. No, I had him higher than that. Okay. Sorry. So I would put him in. Personally, he's in my like 12 to 15 range. Wow. So you really. I think he's really talented. This is good. I like this. So you dumped Herbert for love and CJ Stroud is now. I dumped Herbert. is now your rescue QB. He is my rescue. I've adopted CJ Stroud. I love that. Yes, I will. I'm CJ Stroud's foster mom. We need to post one of those videos where there's like a time-lapse video of like...

1:07:19Bill Simmons:CJ Stroud. Me giving him a bath. That's weird.

1:07:25Bill Simmons:Daniel Jones. I don't know. That's a hard one with the injury. Jackson Dart, who knows? Bryce Young, is he a two or a zero for you? Man, I don't know. I hate, I, I hate talking about, I don't hate talking about the Banthers, but they were such a psychotic team last year, right? Like he would get it up for the Rams more than once. Yeah. And then look abysmal against divisional opponents. And I don't know where the truth is. Maybe the worst guy to bet on or against game to game last year. You just like fucking potluck. No, there was a lot of buzz about him in the training camp now I should mention the Panthers training camp it's like they moved that thing outside the San Francisco practice field that moved to Carolina they've already had like five injuries horrible vibes yeah horrible vibes that's they are on my bad vibes list along with San Francisco so far okay and then for the zeros cousins Mendoza Kyler I have Rogers as a zero I think he can fool you a couple games but I just think over the course those 17 games.

1:08:30Bill Simmons:I don't see it. Could he go 9-8 and sneak into the playoffs? Sure. Malik Willis, Cam Ward, Brissett, who had a successful hold then, congrats to him. I have them all at zero. I can't give points for any of those. And then the minus twos were Watson, Sanders, Geno Smith, and then Tua Penix were the three. Someone on Sandoz thing had Rodgers as a tier one quarterback. Yeah, I know. There were just games where he couldn't physically do anything. The funny thing about him is, like, I feel like he actually still can throw it downfield at times and make difficult, like, seam throws and whatnot. He just so clearly doesn't want to get hit.

1:09:14So that's why, you know, the average of the target is, like, right lowest in football. Yeah. He's either going to dirt it or throw it away if pressure's coming, and it's just so... It just affects the entire offense. I do think they've improved the circumstances around him, but... I think that's fair. Like I told you, I'm higher on Ward. Willis is a bummer because if he was in a better situation, I could make an argument for him, but it's hard.

1:09:38Bill Simmons:The Rodgers thing, anytime they went against a good defense, it just felt like they just played up on the line knowing that he wanted to get rid of the ball in two seconds or less. It was a little like the two on Dolphins. And there was no plan B if he couldn't find the... And it was so frustrating. I remember the Pats lost to them. He's just going to get rid of the ball in a second. I know. You just got tackle. Literally, when we were at Steelers games last year, I'd be like, just somebody tackle. And if they played, it was, if they played defenses that were bad at tackling, they could move the ball.

1:10:07If they played defenses that were good at tackling, it was nothing. And that was pretty much it.

1:10:11Bill Simmons:Who's your favorite backup QB before we go? Like the best? Who's your favorite? Who's your like, I've been quietly stockpiling stock on this guy, just in case. Mine is Davis Mills. I can't do that. I mean I'm not using this to detract from Purdy because I do think there's a difference but Mac Jones was legitimately quite good last year when he played that's fair I still have bad feelings about Mac have you gotten over it? are you ready to root for his success? I always root for Mac but it's just listen, this is the problem with this position is you can be in the wrong situation and it's like going to the wrong heist going in an 80s movie it just can just go horribly from day one or you can be in an awesome situation and everything's everything's peachy the funny thing with the nyers like i mean it was kyle like they were losing guys too when mac was out there but it didn't matter because shanahan's so good i think you're right that's one of the sneaky biggest things to my is like how's shanahan this season because he's such such a difference maker for them um yeah but yeah mac mac is my choice is there someone you like better?

1:11:23Do you have a backup crush?

1:11:25Bill Simmons:I've always been a Davis Mills supporter. Um, sticking your neck out for Davis. There's still, I still have some Tyler Huntley stock. I know he's bounced around and had some swings, but I don't know. There's, there's, there's been, he's had moments where I always wonder what would happen. Does Mendoza count as a backup right now? Cause I like him. When do we see Mendoza? Sooner rather than. He thinks It could be like a Drake May thing. I saw a Drake May thing. It's literally every first round. Drake May was like, yeah, we don't know. And then it was like week four or five. When does that not happen?

1:12:01Bill Simmons:Yeah. Right. Like I, I just, I think Mendoza would be a plus two. I think he'll be better. I like him better. Coming out of the gate. Cause he's older and smart guy. All right. Mina Kimes. Are you doing Rams preseason games? Not doing the Rams preseason. I am traveling some for now that we're with NFL network. I'm on the boots on the ground. I'm actually going to Seattle on Friday speaking backups. I'll see the just some Jalen Milbrow hype. So I'll evaluate that firsthand. Like him. Um, but I've done your, you came on my part for the power hour. People should check that out. It was really fun.

1:12:39Got the Simmons bump. Uh,

1:12:42Bill Simmons:Simmons bump. A real legit. It's, it looks, you can see it in the little charts. Uh, The Media Comic Show featuring Lenny. We're wrapping up our division previews and then we start our season coverage. And then also, yeah, check out the hot quarterback spanking, even though we spoiled it for you. Sorry. I was trying to do a rewatchables in Seattle because I love Seattle. And just the theaters are taken for like three years. I don't know what's going on there. They do a lot of... Hey, Seattle, we tried to do a rewatchables, but you have nothing available ever. So, sorry. Make it happen, someone.

1:13:11Bill Simmons:All right. Good to see you, Mina. Thank you. I'll see you soon. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters. Tremphaya offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tremphaya is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks. If your doctor decides that you can self-inject Tremphaya, proper training is required. Tremphaya is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis.

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1:14:14Bill Simmons:This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Whether you're racing to build the biggest sandcastle, seeing who can throw the fastest pitch, or competing in a championship match, it's always better when there's a prize on the line. Like Michelob Ultra, smooth, refreshing, and so satisfying after all that hard work. Superior's worth playing for. Michelob Ultra, Superior Light Beer. Enter for a chance to win Superior Soccer, Basketball, and Golf Prizes at MichelobUltra.com slash Superior Access. Enjoy responsibly. Copyright 2026 Anheuser-Busch, Michelob Ultralight Beer, St. Louis, Missouri. This episode is brought to you by ChatGPT.

1:14:53Bill Simmons:Imagine you're running a professional sports team. Nice. Imagine the player contract report is due today. Not so nice. You've got performance notes from the coaching staff. You've got a salary spreadsheet from your analyst. Three rounds of back and forth emails with the agent and all of it is scattered absolutely everywhere. Well, that's where chat GPT work comes in. It's a new way to use chat GPT for bigger multi-step projects. Give chat GPT work access to your apps and files and can create real work documents. For instance, spreadsheets, slides, structured reports. You can bring all those to your next meeting.

1:15:28Bill Simmons:And when you don't need answers, you need help just getting the work across the finish line. Chat GPT work can move your projects forward while you stay in control. Put ChatGPT to work on your most ambitious ideas and projects. Get started. Just go to ChatGPT.com by selecting work mode available on plus and pro plans. All right, we're going to talk baseball. Billy Gill is here. Anthony Dibundo is here. Before we start, Billy Gill just talked football with Mina for an hour. she claims that if you went on the street in Miami and asked people to name three wide receivers in the plans for the Dolphins people wouldn't be able to do it so I figured you're right here can you name three Dolphins receivers who might have 30 catches this year oh who might have 30 catches I was just trying to name three Dolphins wide receivers yeah uh can you name three Dolphins wide receivers Malik Washington is on the Dolphins still right uh Tutu Atwell Right?

1:16:28Didn't they just sign him?

1:16:29Bill Simmons:Yeah, they have two-two. Yeah. All right. Oh.

1:16:35Bill Simmons:Oh, man. This is, DeBundo, this is amazing. They have completely shorted the wide receiver position in an attempt to get the number one pick. Well, here's the thing. I only know because I did AFC East prep first this year. Yeah. And we're doing it on Friday on the gambling show. Who's the third one? Give me the third one. Malik Washington's on the Dolphins. He said him already. That's two. That was the one. Oh, you said him? Two-two Atwell. Tolbert? Tolbert. Jalen Tolbert? Yes, Jalen Tolbert. Oh, Dolphins. Billy's getting his book out. He's getting the book out. My Warren Sharp here that I've been doing through those Steelers research earlier today.

1:17:10Bill Simmons:Jalen Tolbert. Okay. All right. We're talking baseball. Trade deadline yesterday. This is the farewell baseball season until it comes back in 2031. Are the Dodgers ruining baseball? I have thoughts on this, but this has been the big topic since the Scoobal trade that this is now unfair and we almost have to have a lockout to regroup after this. DeBundo, you think no? I do think no. I think we've all gotten a little bit out of control here. I mean, if you want to argue that the Dodgers have certain advantages that could be legislated out, I would probably agree with that. But why? Because they traded some prospects for Tarek Scoobal?

1:17:53Other teams had opportunities to do that. and if your argument is that they're ruining the competitive balance of baseball, did we not watch the last two playoffs? Like, even though they were seen as the best team, they were the three seed in the playoffs last year. They had to win a wildcard series. They won a toss-up series with Philly. They needed a miraculous comeback to win the World Series. Two years ago, they were down 2-1 and had to pitch a bullpen game in game four against San Diego because they had no pitching. And right now, I understand in hypotheticals, they might have the best playoff rotation of all time.

1:18:27But right now, Otani's not pitching. Glasnow's not pitching. Snell's not pitching. And they're starting Eric Lauer, you know, regularly. So it's not like they didn't have a need. And I understand why. And my team just swept them. Right?

1:18:40Bill Simmons:They've lost four in a row since they broke the sport. It's crazy. Billy, my thing with baseball, it's not like basketball where it's like, oh, we signed this guy to a max deal and the guy's usually good. He's one of the top 40 guys in the league. In baseball, like the Mets have been spending money like crazy, and it doesn't matter at all. And a lot of times you get these dudes, and they're somewhere between 28 and 32. You give them a ton of money, and their career has already peaked. Well, I mean, it's kind of what's happened with Kyle Tucker this year, right? Like he is not worth like$60 million or whatever annual average.

1:19:11It's not kind of.

1:19:11Bill Simmons:He got booed at the game I went to on Saturday. Well, listen, Dodgers fans have no right to boo anything, okay? Like the idea that they think that they should be upset about anything thing and they should be entitled to boo people is absolutely insane because what is his what is his salary actually right because like this is also like prolonged so it's not 60 million they're paying they're probably like two million dollars like he's fine for a two million dollar a year player and to answer your question that you didn't ask me yes they're ruining baseball yeah so you're so you're and you're in florida where the marlins have you know you did win two world series but you're also you've been sellers a lot and then you've been buyers and you've been sellers again.

1:19:49Bill Simmons:But so you hate this. You're in the same league with them, too. Well, I mean, so I hated the Yankees and I thought the Yankees ruined baseball growing up as a child because they would always go again, whatever free agent was out there. And it was like, OK, this is not fun. This is not fair. They can just do whatever they want. Right. They didn't actually ruin baseball. I mean, they went on their run. They had their dynasty there in the middle. And then it kind of just all fell apart when George went away and Cashman hasn't really been able to figure things out and the Yankees aren't really the Yankees they were when I was growing up like the Dodgers have now become the new Yankees but the Dodgers the problem with the Dodgers is that they don't really have a weakness that we can find in terms of like how they're running their organization because they have a great farm system they have all of the money in the world they can throw the money at people but if it doesn't work out then they could just trade away pieces and they're still loaded and they can go out and get more people analytically they're looking ahead of other teams like they just there's no way around it and i don't know if you guys have seen this so like one of the things that's been going around is because we're trying to figure out like well how are the dodgers doing clearly they're cheating one way or another june lee had this video that he put out in the offseason that was detailing what an advantage the dodgers have with their tv deal that other organizations don't because it went it goes back to the mccourt like bankruptcy of the Dodgers.

1:21:11So the Dodgers declared bankruptcy. They then had agreed to sell the team and they reached a deal with Major League Baseball because they had declared bankruptcy where instead of paying the standard like 33 % of revenue sharing from their TV deal, they would only pay around 10%. And that would be for the duration of their TV contract. So they ended up signing a massive TV deal that was something like$8 billion over 25 years or something. So instead of paying the 33 % of that, which would amount to like 95 to a hundred million dollars a year. They end up paying closer to$30 million. So they're already having$60 million that they would not.

1:21:48Just goes to Kyle Tucker. Yeah. Well, it goes to Kyle Tucker and they'll pay him that in like 2040 or something. And here's the problem.

1:21:55Bill Simmons:But they also have the Japan money too, because they're, they're basically like a double team. They have a whole Japan fan base and a California fan base. This is going to collapse at some point, right? It will be in 2039, 2040, where now their TV deal runs out. They have to have a new deal. They're going to go to the 33 % instead of the 10%, so they lose that extra$66 million. And then, by the way, I think this season have 55 % of their salaries deferred. They're going to be paying all of these guys 2035 to 2040. And at a certain point, if there is a lockout this year, which everyone will blame the Dodgers for, if there's a lockout, and then there's a salary cap imposed, which I don't see how they're actually going to do that, even though people want that.

1:22:37But if they do, in fact, impose a salary cap, this will blow up in the Dodgers face at some point in time because they're going to owe all of these people all of this money. And I don't know how they're going to be able to keep up with this, because when Otani retires, which, you know, is way down the road, then unless they have like a pipeline where they keep bringing in Japanese talent, there's this increased interest in Japan.

1:22:58Bill Simmons:I mean, it is it is they become the team you go to if you're an awesome Japanese player. but we thought that about the Mariners you know 15 years ago when Ichiro was there right and it didn't actually end up panning out that way like Ichiro was kind of like this unique guy and then when Otani went to the Angels we thought like oh wow this is going to be great for the Angels but it's the Angels so they mismanaged that situation entirely including not getting anything for him and just letting him walk away like down the street to his you know crosstown team it's insane I don't know if we're going to get to the Angels I don't understand the Angels as an organization we're going to get to them later I'm going to give you my take they're old too the Dodgers yeah they're old now well I mean so my here's my take I don't mind it I like having super teams we see it in soccer too I think a lot of the times it doesn't work out I think the only sport where it can really be damaging is if we had this in the NBA which we briefly had and they put in all the second apron stuff but I think half the time these deals are too long you end up getting a guy who has all this pressure on him.

1:24:02Bill Simmons:Who's all of a sudden making this crazy amount of money and he goes sideways. Like Tucker, even like the Mookie trade, which is the worst trade of my lifetime. Mookie has how many years left to bundle? Like seven, six, seven on his deal. And quite a few. And he's not, he hasn't played well for like a year and a half. Right. And they're, they're paying him 30 million, 35 million down the road. But I, in general, I like having the team you have to beat where it's like, here's the superpower. We have to take them down. This was the Yankees in the two thousands. And by the way, they didn't win until 2009.

1:24:36Bill Simmons:I think in baseball, you can beat these teams. So I'm okay with it. And I like complaining about it. The thing that's not fun though, is that they're so smart and they have the young talent that they can kind of just plug in or whenever they have a hole, if it doesn't work out, like Kyle Tucker didn't work out and he got booed and what it doesn't matter. Like there'll still be favorites to make it to the World Series. Mookie, by the way, is under contract with the Dodgers until 2032. Like, he becomes a free agent in 2033. So there's still like seven years, six, seven years of Mookie left. Right.

1:25:06Bill Simmons:Is Mookie a Dodgers Hall of Famer or a Red Sox Hall of Famer? Dodgers. Yeah, he's one more World Series with the Dodgers. Three now, maybe four. Mookie's 33, Muncie's 35, Teoscar's 33, Otani's 31, Freddie 36. By the way, Really fun team to go see in person. Where it's just like every guy that comes in, we're like, hey, that guy. Oh, that, you know. And when we, I went Saturday night, but when the Red Sox swept them, it felt like a real achievement. It's like, yeah, we've, the Saturday night game, which the Red Sox kind of tried to throw away because they thought that was the game they were going to get smoked.

1:25:45Bill Simmons:And then all of a sudden, because Contreras was out and they beat them and it felt like a real achievement. Next question. the, uh, the Adley trade, the Red Sox made where you have this guy you're trading for and they gave up a bunch of prospects. There's some debate about how great those prospects actually were. There was only one guy and, um, Keith was top 50, but, um, you're trading for a guy who you have for this year and then next year, and then he's a free agent, but there might not be a next year. So you're trading all this stuff for a guy. It might be two months and then next year might not even happen.

1:26:22Bill Simmons:Would you, DeBundo, would you even have gone all in on these guys when you don't know if next season's even happening? I talked to a couple of front office people. They said that that led to a lot more controllable guys getting dealt this offseason, this trade deadline rather, because they felt that those medium term deals might not have the kind of value they normally would have and thus they were more likely to move them. And I think that was especially the case with Rutschman where, one, he's already kind of getting pressed out for playing time. Yeah. The Sio coming up and maybe being better.

1:26:53Two, he hasn't been very healthy the last few years and he's played through injury and missed time. And three, like, did he want to resign with the Orioles even if there was baseball next year? I'm not so sure. So, like, I understand why Orioles fans are upset and I wrote about this for the ringer. Like, it feels like they're asking us to trust the prospects again and pushing the can down the road. But I'm not sure what Adley's actual value was to Baltimore anymore. But I think it's very clear what his value is to Boston.

1:27:20Bill Simmons:Well, but if he's healthy, he's a top five catcher, which was the single worst part of the team. Billy, what happens? The Marlins have done this a few times. The rebuild, but then it's another, the rebuild's supposed to pay off and it doesn't. So now you're in the re-rebuild? What do we call this? I mean, this is called my life as a baseball fan. So this is how it works. You go out, you get these guys, you develop them. It doesn't end up working out. So then you say, you know what? these pieces just don't fit together. But like, we're like, trust us, we're gonna, we're gonna really make it right this next time around.

1:27:53And then it just becomes like an endless cycle where you kind of trust them. And then what in my lifetime, what happens is then the owner eventually sells the team makes a giant profit, they leave, the new owner comes in and says, you know what, none of this is going to work out. Trust us, we're new to town, we're going to fix this situation. And then they end up going and they end up trading people. Do you guys think to go back to your question that you ask about the trades and you know whether it's worth it or not do you think there's teams that made trades taking on contracts thinking you know what maybe i don't have to worry about this contract next year like i could be taking on money that i may not have to pay if there is a lockout and it led to teams thinking like let's be overly aggressive because this felt like a very aggressive trade deadline compared to past years where teams were going for it or teams were saying you know what i think the weirder part where the team's kind of like right on the fringes there of like the third wildcard spot.

1:28:46They're like, ah, I'm not going for it anymore. Like I'm going to just take some prospects. We're two games out, three games out. It's not worth it.

1:28:52Bill Simmons:That was the Luis Castillo trade. Cause on paper and I, we're in first place in our ale keeper league. So I'm Castillo was one of the 40 pitchers we've been studying. Like Castillo's kind of washed and he was making, you know, I think he was making like 22 million this year, next year. They actually, the Mariners got a prospect back. got them to take the entire contract. It's like, that's crazy. You're taking two years of Castillo. But then, like what Billy said, maybe you're taking two months of Castillo, right? And there might not be baseball next year, and then you're not paying anything. Well, for the White Sox fans, too, I think that trade was more like, look, we're going for it.

1:29:33Even though, like, Luis Castillo is not going to probably be a different thing. He would not have been on my list. Oh, I mean, he's been on my fantasy team, and it's been a disaster. But, like, he's a guy that's a name. So it's kind of like if you're a White Sox fan, you're going through all these years of hell as a White Sox fan. You're like, wow, like this is a guy that they're getting. Like I recognize this name. He was good once. Maybe, you know, a change of scenery will do it for him.

1:29:54Bill Simmons:Right. I like the Adley trade, but the prospect of a lockout followed by having to give him like a crazy amount of money after the lockout. It's a little concerning. But I feel like you've got to put chips in, though. We have to. Look at the American League right now. You have to. This was going to be my next question. The Red Sox could go from being the worst team in the American League to being the AL champs in a four-month span. Right now, on FanDuel, they have the third best odds to win the AL. They're 6-1. By the way, the Yankees are the favorite at plus 220. We might not see Aaron Judge again this year.

1:30:32Bill Simmons:This has been the elephant in the fucking room. Right? And the way they talk about it is like, no, no, it's progressing. It's like all this googly duke. with him. It's just, yeah, he should be good. He's progressing well. He's got like a major rib injury and he's a 6 '7 guy who weighs 280 pounds and I don't think we're going to see him again. Do you, Dubundo? Jacko doesn't either. He was tweeting about it. I saw yesterday. Jacko is convinced that they're lying about this. They're hiding. He's more hurt than they're thinking on that. I mean, the Yankees still have the three starters. Those guys are back now and that's still the scariest thing in the American League is those three guys in a row in a playoff series.

1:31:14But their bottom 10 in offense, Judge got hurt. And they didn't push any chips in. Every player that they went for, they didn't do the bullpen upgrades, which you normally would do if you were pushing in for this year. They got two players who were going to be on the roster next year with Garcia and Ramos. It felt like a little bit of a let's not burn our prospects chasing 2026 if we don't know that Aaron Judge is going to be back. Maybe he's back for the playoffs, but But how healthy is he, right? In theory, he'd have missed four months by then. Right. He hasn't done any baseball activities. So I think the Yankees' actions speak a whole lot louder than their words.

1:31:49You weren't excited about Luis Garcia Jr.'s home run yesterday? Earning his pinstripes first game? I was. I actually slacked Ben Glicksman. And then five minutes later, the bullpen gave up five runs.

1:31:59Bill Simmons:That was one of the games of the year. They were down 6-0, came back, took 7-6 lead, and then gave up seven runs in an inning. and the same pitcher got lit up. He was right after the triple A. He was terrible. This Yankees, so the Red Sox, the thing flipped when they swept the Yankees at the end of June, right? And then Contreras got into it, the Nationals, and all of a sudden it's going. I will say this because this Red Sox thing has made no sense as it's happening. I've actually been watching the entire time as this has been happening. It doesn't, I was even, I went with, I took my wife to the Dodger game and I'm like, yeah this guy Monasterio like he'll have a big hit there in this game I have no explanation for it this guy's 29 and it's got like a 190 batting average career um but their bullpen's really good and they they got uh the Giants lefty which they finally gave up on Marcelo Meyer which um I think Red Sox fans had already given up but this this Red Sox they have this bullpen now that if they can just get to like the sixth seventh inning they did this against the Dodgers they can just keep bringing guys out that hold the lead if they have a one-run lead i'm i'm actually billy i'm i'm i'm weirdly optimistic i can't explain it if you still feel the way you once felt about the red socks especially like with the yankees like do you still hate the yankees the same way that just with every bone in my body really yeah like i have the yankees on i'll have the three tvs i always have the yankees on a tv to root hoping they lose and hoping like yesterday was a dream.

1:33:34Bill Simmons:Just this guy's just getting bombed. They leave him out. The crowd's going nuts. Another guy comes up, another two-run homer. It was awesome. It matters too, Bill. You got the wildcard race here. Maybe a division race. This is one of the questions I had for you. Who do you like in the American League? I know you guys are both National League guys, but you go through and the White Sox are plus 950 to win the pennant. Texas is 16-1 and probably they tried to sell Cleveland's 11-1, Seattle's 8-1 everybody thought they might completely gut the team really it's a three team race with a wild card that might come out of nowhere between Seattle, Houston, Young, White Sox Cleveland kind of dabbled around the edges I don't know about them and Texas but if you had to pick a team to bundle who would be the out of nowhere team in August and September?

1:34:31it's still Seattle if you base off priors all my Seattle buddies have given up they were they kind of soft sold with Castillo but again I thought they were just dumping salary there and then they they have prospects that can call up your guy Cade is in the waiting to probably come out of the bullpen and potentially save their middle relief in the playoffs because they're really shorthanded there this offense I mean it's like looking around at Josh Naylor hey man you gonna hit anytime soon Cal Raleigh you gonna do something

1:34:57Bill Simmons:at some point this season All-time flip season. They do. That's the team. And the way the bracket sets up, Tampa Bay, whoever wins the division, is going to be the one seed. Then four or five is going to be the other two. Boston, New York, probably. So they're going to be on one half of the bracket. So you have one of the winners of the West or the Central has to be in the ALCS. And I'm not sure any of them are any good. I mean, again, Texas tried to trade to Grom. Grom said no. The White Sox feel like a year early. They've had a great season, but I don't think their bullpen is competitive long-term in a playoff series.

1:35:32It's like Cleveland, maybe, because they've done it before. They have an ace and a closer, Cleveland at least. So I don't like anybody except maybe Seattle.

1:35:41Bill Simmons:I had Seattle too. I was surprised the odds were that high. The Cade piece is a wild card. Cade's having one of the great minor league seasons in the history of baseball. Keith Law made him the number one prospect on his revised list last week, and he said it was the first time he's ever had a pitcher for him. first, which seems notable. And he's going to come in, I think August 15th. He's on our keeper team. We really need him. And it seems like they're just going to use him as that, this guy that will come up every once in a while in the playoffs, the young phenom guy who doesn't start, but has these big innings, like, you know, and just as in the mix.

1:36:16Bill Simmons:And it seems like they're saving him for that, but they still have to actually get to the playoffs. Billy, is it, is it fair to be scared to Texas, even though they're 16 to one? Like they're bad. They've had some injuries. They have a, I think they play 12, their next 19 and home Texas in August is always a nightmare. They have a Valde. They have the Grom. Like I, I still have my eye on them as like a sleeper. I mean, it's hard to trust them when they have a minus 40 run differential. You know what I mean? Like I guess things could turn around, but there are only a couple of games out of the wild card, but not that run differential is, you know, end all be all, but it is kind of telling.

1:36:55It's like, if you're that much of a difference, how much of this is kind of like you've been getting lucky here that you're in the position that you're in. You know what I mean? Like if you go down, you look at a team like the Tigers, Tigers are plus 63. They're only a half game behind them, but there's so many teams. I mean, the AL really, like you were saying, has a couple of teams at the top and then it's somewhat wide open the rest of the way. And it's going to kind of be like, who wants it more? You see what Skip Schumacher did the other day, by the way, since we're talking about Texas, manager of the Texas Rangers.

1:37:23He was going out there. It was a game against the Astros on Sunday, and it was the seventh inning. They ran out of challenges, so they couldn't challenge the strike zone anymore. Goes out, starts arguing with the umpire, but it's the seventh inning. Take me out, the ballgame happens, whatever. Then God bless America starts. So Skip Schumacher and the umpire both turn, take off their caps respectfully, sit through God bless America. Then they go, turn back around, put the hats back on, and go right back at it. got him tossed out of the game immediately after. That's awesome. I love baseball, man.

1:37:55How can baseball, can these things happen? Yeah, I took... The Phillies wanted to walk off ABS last night. It was great. Ooh.

1:38:01Bill Simmons:Yeah. I took my wife Saturday. We hadn't been to a baseball game in a couple years, and we did the take me out to the ball game. First of all, she had a great time. It was a great date. But to take me out to the ball game, and she was just like, is this the best tradition in any sport? Did she do the one, two, three strikes, you're out? No, we did. With the hands? We do the, we do, we yelled Red Sox when it's a, and it's root, root, root for the, for the Dodgers. We, we yelled Red Sox. Red Sox. Yeah. She did not do the hand for the one, two, three. No. But I was wondering, does basketball need this?

1:38:36Bill Simmons:Could there be a six minute timeout? Could there be something that unites the crowd? Do they need like their own unique song? Yeah, something. Let's see. Could something happen there? It has to be more organic though. Right before crunch time, just something... I guess not. I think it's better if it's team-specific. We saw this at the World Cup, even. Certain teams had their songs or their moves or the drumming or the rowing. Wonderwall was revived. Right. By the way, I really missed the World Cup. It was like a real void. The next... When there weren't games every day, it was withdrawal, almost.

1:39:14I'm getting an MLS bill. I'm doing it for the first time in 10 years. I'm locked in the union of one three in a row. I'm trying to fill the void somehow. I don't see this thing.

1:39:25Bill Simmons:I've made a decision on the Premier League, by the way, because I am getting back this year. I'm going to announce now, or should I save this? I'm going to go back to Tottenham. Let's go! Yeah. All right. My buddy David Nyman, who lives out here, is a huge Tottenham fan. and he sent me, and he's like a very nice, like gentle, congenial guy, never gets mad. He sent me a long text. He's like, what the fuck? You can't switch teams. You picked a team. You have to come back. Like, we'll watch games. This will be great. And I was like, all right. So I'm doing some, I'll be leaning on you to bundle, but I'm doing some recon.

1:40:04Bill Simmons:I will be going back. This is my official announcement, Billy. I will be returning to Tottenham Hotspur. honored to have been here for this. Sound the alarms, baby. It's celebration time. The first biggest problem is they don't have any stars right now. They need another star to galvanize around. It was Kane. It was Sun. It was Dele. Now it's like, I don't know, Richarlison. Well, they need me this year. They need some star power. They need more celebrity fans. Who else do we have? Who are the celebrity fans right now? Other than me and Dabundo. Adele. Steve Nash still into it? Adele? I think he is.

1:40:40Adele like a real fan

1:40:41Bill Simmons:or a fake fan? That's up for interpretation. I know someone could ask. Who? Rich. I could ask Rich. I'll ask him. Does Adele still care? I mean, she lives here now, right? Anyway, I'm back. What's their coach situation? You guys happy with the coach, Bill? You want to bring in a coach of your own now that you go to Tottenham and say, you know what? Like, I have my eye on the soccer situation. I got some pull here as a celebrity fan. I'm going to save this organization and bring in a coach. Yeah, who do I suggest, Abundo? I'm sorry. The coach that Tottenham fans would want back has just signed a four-year extension with the U.S.

1:41:17men's national team. So we are... Oh, I saw that. Pochettino was our guy for many years. Now we have DeZerbi. He's a very intense Italian man. He doesn't take shit from anybody. He's been known to accost his players in training and that has run him out of a couple of jobs in the past. But he's a damn good coach. So we're happy about that. National jobs are like full-time jobs. Like you can't go coach, you know, like in the NBA, like you can't coach another team.

1:41:42Bill Simmons:I agree. I thought that was weird. I don't know how that's his only thing that he does. Like, what does he do for the next year? Yeah. Just looks at under 17 footage. That's weird. They're supposed to like travel around to see the players in person. It's like when you want to take a vacation, but you still want to get paid lots of money. You go coach an international game. And so we've actually seen a lot more of the club guys, especially since there's fewer top club jobs open. And they just were like, well, I'll go coach Brazil or I'll go coach England or I'll go coach the USA, for example. And now Pacha signed on for four more years.

1:42:15Bill Simmons:Yeah, it's funny going through the entire World Cup and getting excited about America and be like, and then it gets to like the last few games and the skill level is so dramatically better. It's like, oh my God, what were we thinking? Like Spain's connecting on 58 passes in a row. It's like, what were we even thinking? We had a chance against anybody. why aren't we good as a country at soccer? Like, why can't we be better? The Chinese communist revolution, Billy Gill. I get it. All right. No, that's what Chuck close to. I got a great email that I really want to dive into at some point for real.

1:42:52Bill Simmons:Um, and I, I, I can't remember who sent it, but I'll, I'll give them credit when we do it about, do we designate one of the 50 States as a soccer only state? All they have is soccer. And like, if you're good at soccer, you actually, so it's like South Dakota. It's just like, we've designated South Dakota as our soccer state and that's it. There's no other sports. You can't play basketball. You can't play football. All you have to do is play soccer from day one. And do we, and then that becomes like our little mini country within the United States. That's soccer. Billy's, I can see Billy's wheels turning on this.

1:43:26I mean, I'm kind of wondering what like the ramifications might be for like, you know what also no schooling, it's just soccer in this state. Like this is what you're going to learn. there'd have to be a lot of money like thrown at, at them. Right. Or do they not have a choice? Like there's just no option. You literally can't play any sport.

1:43:42Bill Simmons:I don't think it's a, not a choice. No, no, it'd be soccer only, but you could do it with a small state too. Like you just pick Rhode Island would be tough because the weather, but you could go smaller state and just be like Rhode Island or Maine or Delaware. One of those. But, but I, so we're sending kids there or are we bringing them up? Yeah, this is getting problematic. No, it's like hockey. Families are moving there. It's like in Canada how the people move to different cities. But I thought as a half-baked idea, I thought it was tremendous. Back to baseball. We must. What a tangent. That was great.

1:44:21Bill Simmons:Well, I had one more big baseball thing for you. Because you talked about this in the piece you wrote for the ringer, DeBundo. There's like five playoff teams in the NL. and you can see their odds for Fando to win the pennant. The Dodgers are minus 115. It goes all the way through. It's Milwaukee, Atlanta, Chicago, Phillies 10 to 1. And then the six best odds are San Diego 35 to 1. So we have a five-team race, basically, in the National League. Is that just where we're going to end up or is there going to be an out-of-nowhere team? No, I think that's very much where we are. That's it. And I think that kind of informed the deadline.

1:44:55It's like, you know, I know Billy is persona non grata on Marlon's Twitter now because he's not happy with the team. Is that true? I upset Marlon's Twitter because I wanted their manager, Clayton McCullough, to be fired after he took out Yuri Perez during a perfect game. It was a whole thing. I really, really upset them because this is like right when they were, you know, getting hot on their nice, you know, month of June where they were kind of showing everyone like, wow, this is like the real team. Everybody ignored the first couple months like June. That's that's the real team. Then there was a 12 game losing streak that like, you know, kind of derailed that whole thing.

1:45:29But like in the process to getting 10 games over 500, which is not common accomplishment down here for the Miami Marlins, particularly that point in the season, I was very upset at the idea of pulling Yuri Perez during an attempted perfect game. How many pitches? He had 92 pitches, but their whole thing was it was his third start back from injury, but it was a leg injury. And I have lived my existence as a Marlins fan with the excuse making of we need to save these arms for October. Knowing full well, October is not guaranteed for the Marlins. And like longevity of these players career, as bad as this may sound, is not of my utmost concern.

1:46:13Like, I don't really care if they have a long and healthy, prosperous career that will get them traded to another team. I would like to see a no-hitter or a perfect game. This is why I hate Don Mattingly. And, Dabundo, I'm sure you love Donnie Baseball because he's come in. No, no, no, no. Really? You hate Don Mattingly? I don't think I've ever disliked a Philly manager. They hit him? Because I dislike Don Mattingly's managerial of the Philadelphia Phillies right now. Really? He still feels the same way. We've discussed this on the Philly special. He, I mean, it's like a reverse Nepo. His son is the GM, sort of.

1:46:45It's a very weird power situation. Reverse Nepo? Yeah. Hold on a second. He came in and he completely turned around your season. They conveniently fired Rob Thompson the day before Zach Wheeler came back from injury and has pitched like a Cy Young and all the players started playing better. I think that would have happened with or without the great Donnie baseball.

1:47:07Bill Simmons:I was going to say the Red Sox manager, Tracy, who took over for Cora. And he's like a scramble for runs guy, which we haven't had forever. like somebody will double and he'll bunt the guy over like we're like a suicide squeeze threat small balls back Bill it's really fucking fun I love it Cora was very holier than thou about all that and this guy will just be like we're bunting people over we've won games with like sacrifice three sacrifice bunts in you know the last four innings and it's really fun it's energetic I enjoy it there's more variance in baseball now Ben Lernberg wrote about this like Brewers have broken clutch hitting.

1:47:47Tampa Bay invested in a bunch of dudes who hit the ball really hard, but on the ground or line drives, not homers. And it's worked for them. And you've got the Red Sox doing this. So there is more variance. The Phillies just traded for a haul for Luis Arise, who never strikes out. Billy, what would be your strategy?

1:48:03Bill Simmons:Would you be an all-line drives guy? Would you be a home runs and strikeouts GM? What would you be? I like small ball. I like the stolen base. I think it's fun. I like the idea of a triple. or, you know, like something happens and, whoa, could we get an inside the park home run here? Like the home runs and the strikeouts, like they're fine, right? But like, I like the, it's kind of like instant gratification with the home run. Like you immediately have that feeling and then it's gone where like a stolen base, like a triple, or, you know, you have a team that, you know, like anything can happen here.

1:48:32Like this guy's going to be like a demon on the base path. I like that kind of baseball. That's why I don't understand why, like, why do games go beyond the 10th inning when you start with a runner on second base with no outs? Like it's very easy. Just move them over, let them over, sacrifice fly and you score a run. But we have games going beyond the 10th all the time because there's no like, they said, just stop teaching small ball. And it's coming back now, thankfully, but we had like a generation of people who are just discovering that you can steal bases and bunt people over. It's incredible.

1:49:05Bill Simmons:You also had people when they're bunting looked like they had never attempted a bunt in their entire life. And this felt like it was like for 15 years, just people would be like, yeah, it's second and first no outs. They're going to bunt them over. And the guy would be like holding the bat like it's like a broomstick. Well, I mean, with the shifts, you would have like everybody on one side of the field and it's like you literally just have to put it down the third baseline and you could hit a double here. And nope, sure enough, you hit like right into the shift. And then if there is a bunt now, we have the opposite where no one knows how to field a bunt.

1:49:36So like if you're going to bunt it, you're probably going to get on because they haven't been teaching people.

1:49:40Bill Simmons:Freddie Freeman's the only one who knows how to do a bunt anymore. Do you hate the Arise deal, the bunt, though? I'm very lukewarm on it. Really? They moved Bryce Harper to the outfield, so for comedy's sake, it's going to be amazing. It's literally... What position do you want to play now? You'll play third, play first, play right field? Arise adds on-base value to a team that's 28th and on-base percentage, so that's exciting. I'm excited to watch him hit. He's like annoying to play against and fun to have on your team. He's gotten better defensively, but like you said, you know, Bryce Harper hasn't played outfield in five years.

1:50:14He got injured last time he played the outfield. That's why he stopped playing the outfield. This is the Aaron Judge problem, too. Yeah, and he wasn't a good outfielder in 2021, and I don't think he's going to be a very good one in 2026. And some of the metrics already say the Phillies are the worst defense in the league. I think I can't wait. Again, it's going to make it a TV for me.

1:50:33Bill Simmons:I can't wait to watch them play defense. I went down an arise rabbit hole yesterday for you to bundle, but I wanted to save it to talk to you today because I don't like what is this guy's deal that no team wants him he's about to win he potentially could win if he keeps his average up his fourth batting title for his fourth different team like he just is constantly moved because all he does is get on base and that's essentially it I was like how in the history of baseball how many people do you think have won four batting titles that are not in the hall of fame do you do you know off the top you wouldn't know that I would be amazed if there were any I used to know things like this How many have won four batting titles for four teams?

1:51:14I don't think that anyone has That has to be a record So there's one guy that has three batting titles that is not in the Hall of Fame and that's Pete Rose but I don't think it has anything to do with his play and then there's a guy that has four batting titles Pete Rose?

1:51:29Bill Simmons:Fuck yeah, all these guys should be in This is ridiculous What's the point of the Hall of Fame? I like the Punish fan You're watching the history of baseball here by not including they're in there please come on put like make his plaque a separate wing yeah make his plaque put on the plaque what he did like we want our kids to learn about the past we're gonna pretend it didn't happen like he's in there he just doesn't have the plaque i like the punishment i'm very unpopular on this situation but like the fact that like i know this eats at barry bonds and i know this eats at roger clemens like i kind of like it you know why can't we put it why can't we have like a basement and it's not nice.

1:52:04Bill Simmons:You're like going in a dungeon. Yeah, that's what I want. Cheaters and gamblers. I have an idea. What if we put up their plaques like in an infirmary? You know what I mean? Like if somewhere inside the Hall of Fame, there's like a first aid station where you can go and you can get like all the drugs or whatever. And then in there, there's like a whole wall with like the Palmeros and the Meguires and everyone. But like you have to go into like a place where they're going to sell you drugs or give you like medications. Can I go one step further? Put them in the bathrooms. There's like 15 guys. There's 15 bathrooms.

1:52:37Bill Simmons:Each bathroom, there's just like the Barry Bonds plaque next to where you dry your hands. But like in the bathroom or like would you put a plaque like as a urinal? In the toilet? Yeah. Like over the urinal? Yeah, yeah. No, no, like in the urinal, like the urinal cake thing that catches it so it doesn't like splash back. It's like all of Barry Bonds' stats or whatever, you know? I think there's something here. Listen, Barry Bonds is the best left fielder I've ever seen in person. I can't believe he's not in the Hall of Fame. He was unbelievable. It bothers him. Look, he cheated, right? Like, we know he cheated.

1:53:07He did it. He got the stats, which is what he wanted. He got the money, which he was going to get anyways. Why not take this little thing from him knowing that it's just going to drive him crazy that it can't go in there? Like, Pete Rose is obviously, like, an extreme situation because, like, it was literally all he cared about. And then he died. So it's like, he's never going to see this now. And then immediately after, he was like, you know what, maybe it's time for Pete. It's like, guys, this doesn't mean anything to Pete anymore. Like, he's gone. He's not going to be there signing autographs anymore.

1:53:33Anyways, back to what I was telling you. There's one guy that has four batting titles, not in the Hall of Fame. It's this guy, Bill Mad Dog Madlock. Do you know him? Oh, yeah.

1:53:41Bill Simmons:The Cubs. Yeah. So he wins four batting titles. He has a career 300 average. He was good. He has World Series that he won with the Pirates. He didn't even get 5 % of the Hall of Fame vote and was gone off the ballot after one year because apparently he was so difficult with the media and he was such a jerk to like umpires that i guess they sent him this point i mean he has over 2 000 hits but it was like 1800 games so it's not the best but in a baseball season now where you have like five guys hitting over 300 the idea that you have a career 300 hitter with four batting titles that didn't even make the second year ballot in the hall of fame is crazy in 1996 so 93 was when he was up they they he didn't make it past in 96 the uh like veterans committee or whatever the baseball writers association they got together and petitioned for him and like three other guys including larry boa who didn't make a second year after uh a second year of election they wanted to put like five guys back on the ballot who hadn't gotten the five percent they approved it then the ballot came out and they changed their mind they just left them off the ballot so they said you know what we approved this but no we're not going to ever vote you into the hall of fame garvey's the biggest miss for me when i was a kid garvey was the best first baseman for like a decade i don't understand how he's not in well don mattingly's not in either right he's another guy he didn't his peak what he had the great peak but his career i don't think was long enough i had another topic for you guys i watched four red sox games when they played the a's in sacramento i love that i kind of loved it i love sacramento and i love it was really fun i love when they played in las Vegas and everything was flying out.

1:55:23Like that stadium was, I just told you.

1:55:25Bill Simmons:There was parts of the outfield where the ball would fly out and then other parts where you had no chance. And it just, it felt like more of, it felt like honestly, like a double A game. It was crazy to watch on TV on like a, you know, a nice widescreen TV and HD. And it was like, it seemed like people were at like the park and not like at a baseball game. When they would hit the home run, it would be so like hilariously over the fence that it's like, yeah. Like this ball just went 480 feet somehow and it went two parking lots over. It kept you on your toes every single at bat because he was like literally anybody could hit a home run.

1:56:01Bill Simmons:But I don't know. I kind of enjoyed the vibe. The other funny thing is where the clubhouses are located is different from a normal like major league setup. So last year when Katsai got thrown out of a game, he had to do like the walk of shame down the third baseline. So he like milked the walk. He's like walking super slowly because he just wants to make his point clear that he shouldn't have gotten thrown out. And then he veered off down the left field line, I guess, where the medical store, the clubhouse is. It was so funny. It was such a weird series because we traded for Curtis Mead and then he got hit the second time he went up on the hand.

1:56:36Bill Simmons:He had like a suit of armor on. It was like three inches of his body where a ball could have actually hit his flesh and somehow ends up breaking the wrist. So it turned into the Aaron Rodgers Jets game of Aaron Rodgers coming out with the flag and getting, that was it, he's gone. That was one of our big trade deadline moves. The Sacramento crowds are also kind of great because they're not really invested. Like, they're going out and they really like it. Yeah, they're hanging. The A's mean nothing to them. So they're going out there just to have fun. The perfect game that I was telling you about, Yuri Perez, that I upset Marlins Twitter.

1:57:08So they take them out of the game. This is in Sacramento. The A's fan or the road team that's being no hit and hasn't even gotten on base is just letting the Marlins manager have it for the rest of the game. They're all in unison just chanting shame at him over and over again. So the game's going on and you just hear chants of shame, shame, shame. And they're like pointing at him and he's like on the top step. Eventually he's like, I gotta like get back in the dugout here. But they were letting him have it for three straight innings because they're just there to have a good time as long as they have baseball there.

1:57:41Bill Simmons:I like it. I think it's been a bit, Sacramento probably shouldn't have a major league baseball team. But I do like when cities get a cameo for a year. Like, yeah, here's what it's like. I don't know who the next team would be, but I think the Vegas thing is going to be bizarre. It is going to be weird. I don't think like, it's not like football or it's a destination or like basketball, even where it could be a destination or hockey where they have their own team, like baseball, like, you know, of all the places to travel to go watch your baseball team, are you going to pick Vegas? There's too many games.

1:58:11Like for even the tourist. They're not going to have a home field advantage at all. It'll be like a road tourism environment. And then like, yeah, in the middle of June, who's going to Vegas to watch their team play the A's?

1:58:22Bill Simmons:All right. So before we go. Is there an out-of-nowhere team these last seven weeks? I know we talked about a couple candidates. You know it's going to happen. It's August 4th. We know somebody's going to get hot, so who is it? And it could be either league. My guess would be the NL just because the NL has the top five and then everybody else. And everybody else seems suspicious to me. I don't think... Well, you're saying like come out of nowhere to do what? To like win the... Just to make a run and be like, What's going on with these guys? It always happens. I don't know if they'll win a pennant, but somebody throwing their hat in the rain that we're not expecting.

1:59:02I mean, the crazy case would be that Detroit's only two and a half games out. A little school blue school blue Ewing theory. And they metrically like they are underrated. They've got a bunch of younger players coming through that have, that have popped for them of late. They, you know, there was a little bit of malaise early in the season. And I do wonder how much of it was related to the fact that the clubhouse was just kind of pissed off that school didn't get paid and they were pissed at ownership and pissed at kind of the inability to negotiate this situation. So just getting him out of the picture, of course, it hurts their pitching staff, but just getting him out of the picture helped them.

1:59:39Now, you know, you, you're not dealing with a ton of starting pitching anymore, but we've seen Detroit do this before two years ago. They were dead, dead in the water and got hot and managed to pitch their way into the playoffs. it wouldn't be shocking just because I just don't really believe in any of the teams in the American League Central.

1:59:56Bill Simmons:Honestly, I would have kept them. I think for what they got, because you get, if he leaves as a free agent, you get draft picks and it's okay. It's not, not getting two top 60 prospects, but at least you get something, but then it, it gives you a chance for, uh, I don't know, for some sort of playoff run. Plus, you know, next year's gonna be a lockout anyway. So I don't know. I just, I, if I was running Tigers, I would have kept them. I mean, it's two and a half that they're out, too. It's not. They have to jump like five teams right now to get into a playoff spot because everyone's so tight. But like you did kind of punt on the whole scoobal thing.

2:00:32And and like we haven't talked about it, but doing it two days before the deadline was weird. Like it. Yeah. I know that we don't want to say that the Dodgers have ruined baseball, but like something's fishy here with that situation because now he goes to the Dodgers and now they're already probably starting the contract negotiation situation and I wondered how much like he do you think he's motivated with the impending idea of a lockout with a salary cap to let me extend before this season's over and just get a ton of money before there isn't a ton of money to be gotten so like I'm happy to be going to the Dodgers I would have wanted to go there anyways I'll have a lot of money they can give me like let's do this either like during the season or right after the season.

2:01:18And let's not risk the idea of I can't get paid because the problem with the salary cap is the salary floor. Like in my thoughts, everybody says, I guess it's going to be great. All of the bad teams are now going to have to spend$150 million. But what ends up happening is the bad teams end up spending that money in the dumbest way possible. And you get it happened in the NBA.

2:01:41Bill Simmons:Remember 10 years ago, the cap spike and all of a sudden Portland and the the Nets, all the, like Alan Krabs making$71 million for four years. Yeah. We saw this. No business making the money that they're making, just getting thrown money because they're the free agent at the time. And the team that's bad, that's not going to reach the salary floor is afraid of getting, you know, like a slap on the wrist or whatever from the league. So they just throw dumb money at players. You're almost better off not spending the money. Yeah. You're almost better. Like, yeah, penalize me versus me having to go get Luel Dank.

2:02:17Bill Simmons:So you said it was fishy that he went to the Dodgers. To me, it's... There is a weird angle there, too. No, but to me, it's beyond fishy. I think the rest of the league just assumed he's signing with the Dodgers. Like, to me, it reminded me of the Giannis situation when Giannis said, I'm either going to Boston or Miami. Other teams could have traded for Giannis, but he had already said, I want to go to these two teams. I think Scoobble was just, I'm going to the Dodgers. Like, you can trade for me, but you'd be renting me, basically. He must have made it. But teams have traded for rentals before.

2:02:48I mean, the Rays and the Brewers are the two teams everybody is kind of pointing the ire at.

2:02:52Bill Simmons:Well, so the Brewers were the team that felt like they should have gone after him. Yeah. You know, teams have traded for rentals. The Dodgers just paid two, two and a half prospect, two, three prospects to get him early, right? To get him for one more playoff run. Why didn't Milwaukee do this? Why didn't Tampa do this? The conspiracy that I am open to is from a pure politics angle. Oh, it feels very rare that like the negotiation politics, not politics. from a pure negotiation angle, like the fan fans are very split and very angry about this. And a lot of them are going to side with the owners because they're mad at the big, bad Dodgers.

2:03:25So there is a theory of like, if you're the owner of the raise or the owner of the brewers, and you want to sell that this happens, you're thrilled that everybody's pissed the Dodgers. It's like, yeah, yeah, get mad at them. So we can try to get a salary cap, which is what all of them probably want because they get to cap the earnings of their labor, which is ideal in an environment where you have, you're the billionaires fighting against the millionaire players. So that I am open and sympathetic to the idea that not everybody loses from the Dodgers being seen as this unbeatable behemoth, even if they're not.

2:03:57Bill Simmons:I'll tell you this. First of all, it's so much more fun to go to baseball games now. I just can't, it can't be said strongly enough that you're just in and out in two and a half, two hours, 45, and you're not just sitting there watching somebody grab his groin and step out of the batter's box and they have a song you could sing. It's just so much more fun to go with that said, if they do have a lockout and baseball disappears, it is just not going to, like when this happened in 1981, this was, I was, I was 11. It was catastrophic. Like we didn't have nearly enough other stuff to do. So just taking baseball away, even in 94, when it happened and it was awful, there was slightly more stuff to do.

2:04:41Bill Simmons:Now there's so much. I just think people move on to different things and, you know, it could go away for a year and it'd be terrible, but I don't think it would have the same impact that it did 40 years ago. I just don't. But does that then benefit the players? Cause like the owners are going to be the ones that are going to be more incentivized. So like we cannot have this be a prolonged lockout and lose kind of the momentum that the sport has had the past couple of seasons. It's the other way though, because for the owners, And these are all the people that buy teams now. And we're seeing it in basketball and football right now, especially.

2:05:13Bill Simmons:There are all these rich dudes. These teams are assets to them. They're not. They don't have a connection to the city or the fan base. They're these things they buy the same way they would buy companies or whatever. And if they could hold the asset for a year, not have to spend any money, they get to write off all this stupid shit for it, try to break the players a little bit and get a cap. Like they're going to they're going to do that. They're not going to care about the fans. I don't feel like these professional sports teams care about the relationship with fans in the same way that they used to.

2:05:43Bill Simmons:It's not just fans. I mean, think about how much of the local economy is between stadium workers to team employees to the fact that smaller U.S. cities around the country have 80-plus events every year that are guaranteed, that provide local broadcast rights, local TV. They don't care. It goes way beyond billionaires. Because the one thing you'll say is like, oh, you're choosing the billionaires over the millionaires when you side with the owners, which is true. And I'm pro-labor, but there's labor beyond just the millionaire players that go into the entire baseball ecosystem. And people kind of leave them out of the mess.

2:06:17They're not the ones that are actually the most impacted out of anybody. If Bryce Harper doesn't get paid next year, he'll live. But if stadium employee number 326 loses their job, you're talking about massive ramifications.

2:06:29Bill Simmons:Well, also, you think about all the bars around the stadium, all the restaurants, all the stores that are around there. Yeah, you're decimating these different locations. Well, and then people will have to turn to the Savannah Bananas, and we can't have that be something that overtakes Major League Baseball. I will make that my mission in life, to make people... I feel like I had a little bit of an impact on pickleball, because it feels like people... Just a tiny bit, if I helped in any way, great. but people are down on pickleball now, which I'm delighted by. The Savannah Bananas are next. I don't know about that, Bill.

2:07:03Anecdotally, pickleball is alive and well. What are your biggest pop culture places where you have kind of flexed your muscles? So you got the UCLA coach fired, or hired, I should say. Yeah, you got the UCLA coach hired.

2:07:18Bill Simmons:I mean, that's going to be my legacy. Yeah, well, hold on. You've contributed in your mind to the downfall of pickleball. No, just small, just a small contribution. Just, okay. Just a little, if I was able to help in any way, great. I think people are annoyed by pickleball now just takes a little cut. And all of a sudden the reflecting pool is green. You know, you just need a little thing to kind of get the ball rolling downhill. I think the one thing that I feel like I actually really helped was Friday night lights. Weirdly. The TV show, I think it was going to get canceled. And I wrote the CSP and the magazine piece about it and they decided not to cancel it.

2:07:57Bill Simmons:And Peter Berg, and I don't know if this is true or not, but Peter Berg, the creator of the show, genuinely believes that the column saved the show. So who knows if that's true, but I'll take that one. We never would have had Landry and Tyra accidentally kill the guy outside the bar. The show just would have been gone. I don't know if you guys watched that show. DeBundo doesn't seem like he did. Do you know when you're - I've never watched it start to finish. I've seen episodes. Just watch season one. It's great. do you know the impact that you're going to have when you do these things or do you just like find out after the fact like when you go to sit down the friday night lights thing you're like you know what this is going to do it and you sit down you say this is how we save the show that was just happens that was literally the column was i need to help save the show this is the best show on tv that was 12 bunch of words of me playing like please please watch this show um yeah so so what What's my new thing now?

2:08:49Bill Simmons:The Savannah Bananas. Yeah, you got to stop the Savannah Bananas from taking over Major League Baseballs. If they go into a lockout, all the attention will go to the Bananas. It's really wonderful. I was at a bar the other night and I was tempted to ask the bar to just put something else on because it was on. But I literally went through the guide and I was like, there's nothing else that I could even recommend right now. The Phillies weren't playing. I was like, man, this is dark. Not the Banana Ball. I will say ESPN feels like it's reverting back to the 1980s with some of the stuff they're showing.

2:09:20Bill Simmons:They had the pillow fight championships last weekend. I don't know if you guys saw. This is summer programming. There was like flag football on the other day. Flag football. Our friend Kyle Brandt was the color guy in the flag football. Really? Under 18 championships. But it feels like, I don't know whether they lost rights to different stuff, but it feels like they're definitely throwing stuff against the wall lately. What's the basketball league with the trampolines? Slam ball. Slam ball. Slam ball. That was on last summer. And my buddy's at the bar, like kind of getting into it for a second.

2:09:50Yeah. It's back.

2:09:51Bill Simmons:My question for any sport is my question with all of these things is will the bundle bet on it? Will the bundle and Sal actually think about wagering on this? That's when you know you've arrived. I don't see that with the Savannah bananas. Saturday night, I was in an airport delay in Dallas for two and a half hours getting home from Montana. And my friend and I sat down and there was USL, which is second division American soccer on it. it was Louisville versus Tampa Bay and Louisville was up three, no at the half. And Tampa Bay had this crazy comeback. They won five to four. And I will say, I did check to see if they had a betting odds up.

2:10:26They did not. So there were no wagers placed, but it was a, it was a curiosity thing, but yeah, I have never bet on slam ball, never bet on pickleball. This is the dark days of gambling August. No. Yeah. I take some time off.

2:10:38Bill Simmons:It's nice. Yeah. Cause we have no, no golf majors yet. The FedEx playoffs is here. all the tennis stuff is done there's just baseball US Open's coming up US Open's coming up no but I mean for right now there's nothing yeah there's some preseason football which is like preseason football is a clear indication whether you have a gambling problem or not well you see Bill the Sharp people will tell you that's where they find their big edges yeah exactly that's just proved my point it's a lot of work and it's payoff has never been clear to me even I don't bet preseason football like that's like yeah that's like a next level thing All right, guys, this is fun.

2:11:16Bill Simmons:Baseball. I'm actually paying attention and watching, and I care. So we'll have to do this again. Billy Gale, how's college football tailgate going? We're gearing up. We're a couple weeks away, right? We're like less than a month at this point before we have actual games going on. Exciting stuff. Exciting times. DeBundo, we'll talk more about Tottenham. Come on, you Spurs, Bill. Come on, you Spurs. We are 17 days to the opener. All right. Thanks, guys. Good to see you. This episode is brought to you by Mazda. There's driving and then there's driving with peace of mind. Knowing you're behind the wheel of Consumer Reports' safest new car brand, Mazda.

2:11:54Bill Simmons:The Mazda CX-50 hybrid comes standard with a suite of proactive safety features. So confidence isn't an upgrade, it's a given. Mazda, move and be moved. Visit MazdaUSA.com. Discover how confidence comes standard. Consumer Reports does not endorse products or services. Visit mazdausa.com to learn more. This episode is brought to you by Workday. Guessing is for game shows, not your business, especially when your margin for error is zero. Workday is the enterprise AI platform for HR, finance, and IT with a deep understanding of your organization's context and guardrails. So every AI action is permission aware, giving you accuracy 24 seven and the ability to not just get work done, but get it done right.

2:12:41Bill Simmons:It's a new work day. All right, my friend David Shoemaker is here. We've been working together for literally 15 years since year one, Grantland, all the way through the ringer. Did you go to SummerSlam last week? You must have. I didn't go. I didn't go. It was my first one I missed in a while, but I've been moving and doing all this kind of stuff. And, you know. No Minneapolis for you? Yeah. I spent a couple of summers in Minneapolis growing up, so I'm not anti-Minneapolis, but I heard it was one of the most fun Summer Slams in a while in terms of just, you know, the hanging out and the vibe and stuff.

2:13:14So, yeah, I wish I'd been there, but I didn't go this year.

2:13:16Bill Simmons:Did we definitely need a two-night Summer Slam? Just curious. Is that a thing that needed to happen? I appreciate the shorter shows, you know, like each night. I appreciate that my like seven year old can stay up and watch the main event, you know, and not be three in the morning or whatever, when it finally drags out. Cause they were getting to a point. Some of those WrestleManias before they went to two nights were just slog. The New York one was the longest one. I actually think I might still be there with my son. Yes. I think, I don't know if we've ever left. I think we entered the seventh circle of hell.

2:13:50And they, well, and they had like four really dramatic main events in a row at the end. So like, and they were all long. the big thing this year is there was just a ton of ads and the matches weren't that long and and if you were just there for the wrestling you know it was a nice fast moving show or whatever but um there's just a lot of other content they could have fit it all into one night i don't know if they could have fit all the ads into one night but they could have fit the content and there were a couple of matches like i'm a big dan housing fan but that dan house and don match would have worked a lot better as like the third to last match in a in a really long show you know kind of the popcorn match as opposed to it sort of trying to hold its own.

2:14:28So anyway, they could have done with maybe a little less time.

2:14:31Bill Simmons:I zoomed through both of them after the fact, after they happened. And the ads were an issue, which I get. We all have ads, but it was just different than the old pay-per-view experience of just being able to rip through it. But the one I cared about the most was the Lesnar match, which was on the first night in one of the... you know, I thought was the main event. Yeah. Yeah. I thought it was the single most compelling storyline. Like how many times can Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns have to have some sort of reckoning? This was like a clear torch pass to have a new guy and this whole legacy of, you know, going back to Andre the Giant and Undertaker, Lesnar, now Obafemi, like the, the big unstoppable force.

2:15:18Bill Simmons:So it feels like they finally found that, right? It does. I mean, I was going through the list myself and I mean, there's a little bit of a, you know, blurry line between the next big thing, monster edition, and just sort of the next big thing. You know, like where do you put Diesel in this conversation, I guess, but like, you know, you can definitely put Sid Vicious in that category. Oh, that's a good one. Diesel's good too, by the way. Yeah. When Drew McIntyre debuted, this was his gimmick. He was the next big, he was the chosen one. You know, he was Vince's thing, but he was really slight. Like he wasn't the same Drew McIntyre he is today.

2:15:50Bill Simmons:Right. But it's been, you know, and you can put a little bit of Bobby Lashley, a little bit of Randy Orton, a little bit of even John Cena, Roman Reigns. You know, those guys are in that category as like, we have our eye on you. We know, like, you know, contract negotiations be damned. We're going to say out loud that you're our next star, you know? And it's a really, it's a huge moment. You know, I've known Obafemi to talk to him, to say hey to him since his NXT days, obviously. And... And he's just a really great dude, man. I mean, just really, he's like, he's a true believer. He's the exact kind of guy you'd want in that spot.

2:16:24And it's really amazing to see how quick his rise has been and how justified it's felt.

2:16:30Bill Simmons:Well, and from a real life standpoint, six foot five, six foot four. He's a big dude. Six six. Yeah, he's probably six foot, probably six, like legit six five. Like he was, he was, you know, noticeably bigger than me. And that's not usually the case when I'm hanging out with wrestlers. Well, in wrestling, he's 7 '3", 7 '2". Exactly. 7 '2", 500 pounds. I said the NBA agents should send their players just to go hang out with wrestlers all the time during the pre-draft stuff. Because according to the tape, they're all like 7 1⁄2 feet tall now. Hogan was 6 '6", 6 '5"? Sure. Hogan in his prime was probably a legit 6 '5", 6 '6".

2:17:11I mean, he was a really, really big guy. and by the time that you know I interviewed him on cheap heat back at Grantland and certainly by the time that we interviewed him for the Vince Doc he was declining in size a little bit he got a lot of hip surgeries I think both hips were placed a couple of times and I think some back stuff too and that's just general shrinkage he had come down quite a bit Andre was listed

2:17:38Bill Simmons:at 7 '4 was probably like 6 '10 6 '11 at his peak and then after like the vertebrae started going on him, it probably ended up at around six, seven. But yeah, but the big show, probably six, nine, six, 10. And he's keeping it together for the most part. A lot of these big guys have leg, have, have not just knee surgeries, but like Kevin Nash just had a corrective leg situation a couple of years ago. He got a lot of like blood, pat, whatever, like shot up into his knee in Mexico. He's a whole new man. And I mean, obviously, Andre turned down some surgeries that could have prolonged his life pretty significantly along the way.

2:18:15So, I mean, and that's a medical condition as opposed to, well, I think Big Show has it a little bit. But there's a lot more you can do to keep going, you know, to like stop from curving over or whatever.

2:18:26Bill Simmons:The more fun is when they try to anoint the next giant unstoppable guy, but the guy's terrible, like Giant Gonzalez. Oh, my God. I mean, even all the way up to like, I was Vladimir Kozlov. Like there's so many just like weird, gigantic, like scary dudes who we just thought were going to be. But, you know, during the Hulk Hogan era, there were so many feuds. It was just Hogan versus a monster. And you had to keep finding people who looked physically imposing next to a guy who was already the biggest dude, you know, in the business. You know, one of the biggest dudes in the business. So, yeah, there were a lot of he I think Hulk Hogan is responsible for skewing the size charts for a whole generation.

2:19:07You know, like in any other promotion, Hogan, a guy of Hogan's size would have been the heel. And they would have kept the 5 '10 guy that they were calling 6 '1 as the hero, you know, and it, but it all got thrown.

2:19:18Bill Simmons:Well, that was the irony is Hogan was one of the best, like when Hogan was heel, he was one of the best heels ever. Big John Studd was kind of the underrated one from that whole era. He had two different runs. But he was legitimate. Like if you saw him in person, he seemed like a legitimate 6 '10", 6 '11". Yeah, I think with a lot of these dudes, you get the impression of their size, even in person, even if the size is fake. Like John Cena and Stone Cold Steve Austin, I'm probably an inch taller than both of them, but both of them feel twice as big as me in person. Right, right. You know, and Giant Gonzalez, I'm sure, did not feel as tall as he was.

2:19:58He's a very wispy seven-footer. And then you get the CM Punk guys

2:20:02Bill Simmons:who are shockingly not as big as you'd think they are. Yeah, but Punk is also tall. I mean, like, he strikes you as tall in person, too. And he's gotten into crazy good shape over the past, you know, several years or whatever. But, yeah, it's just that it's when you've just carried around all that muscle forever. And then it just sort of congeals into asphalt as you become an old man. You know, those guys are like, I don't think I think I could work out for five years and not be able to pick up Steve Austin off the ground. You know, he's just he just the guys like that are just so intimidating.

2:20:34Bill Simmons:where WWE is it's this is right after the hot streak which has happened a few times in history where it's like we had this incredible run everything's going great and then it's like it's right after you're still sustaining it but you kind of know it's not the same and it feels like a little bit of a lull right now right so I wrote my book why Hulk Hogan matters I have to wave it around that's my job but this is but but Hogan was the like for people of our generation Hogan was the original apex, right? It was the rock and wrestling, the Hulkamania era was so big. And at the time, it seemed like it'll be like this forever.

2:21:10But of course, we know now what every wrestling promoter prior to Hogan knew very well, which is that wrestling is incredibly cyclical, right? It's like boxing where you got to have the right fight, but it's a broader, almost like, it's inexplicable. It just goes up and down and up and down. And I think that if you're running a wrestling company, the real, I mean, there's basically like two knobs that you can control. One is delay gratification. Put it off as long as you can. The way Cody Rhodes lost his first WrestleMania match against Roman Reigns, right? Right. And two is just keep, try to drag out the top for as long as you can.

2:21:44That's why we had Hogan-Andre at WrestleMania and then Hogan-Andre again at the first SummerSlam. You know, they found ways to keep the thing going and going and going.

2:21:51Bill Simmons:Well, then they made Macho Man the champ, but Hogan was still the biggest draw. Yeah, that's Hogan's whole career. comes in get him yeah they did the squash matches with andre the giant all over the place to build him up but yeah by 91 they kind of ran out of moves they yeah there's not there's only so much you could do and so right now yeah i think we're in the post peak from the moment that we're all saying i can't believe it's this big again with roman reigns and cody rhodes relatively new that wwe and cm punk very new to wwe that was the real peak um and then and and i'm sure that i guarantee see like you know the folks at the tko headquarters are not saying well we all know it's a cycle but you know they're they're saying how do we stay this big forever how do we get bigger yeah but it's just now i mean you're kind of riding the wave and it's really it's going to be interesting to see like how far it goes down and how far and how quickly it can start going back up it's not a bad spot right now at all but i think it's i think it's notable that we had cm bunk versus Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns versus Seth Rollins at SummerSlam.

2:22:56These are two like, quote unquote, WrestleMania matches. And they're just saying, let's just put it all out there and let's see what we can do.

2:23:02Bill Simmons:They also very smartly are picking weekends better now. Like this last SummerSlam weekend, nothing's going on, right? You can really kind of own ESPN, who when I was there and I'm doing Running Diaries, I think I was the only wrestling coverage they had in the mid 2000s. Yes. Now they're doing three hour pregame shows before night one of SummerSlam. It was on ESPN proper, the number one ESPN for three straight hours leading up to the pay-per-view. So I'm obviously happy that wrestling is getting more mainstream coverage. We both, this has been a big part of our lives, less a part of mine lately, but it's weird when it's on ESPN.

2:23:46Bill Simmons:I cannot get used to it. I just, it's just weird. you used to watch like the the like the old world-class stuff and awa stuff on esp and news or whatever like like decades ago right like that was the last that was the last time that was on esp1 it was awa yeah 84 85 yeah uh and so i mean that that was that was the last time and it never it never so it never really felt out of place to me but i get everybody saying i can't believe it i mean you know when i talk about media stuff on press box with brian it's all in the context of everything being a show, right? It's all, it's all like, like every, everything filmed in a studio sports or news or whatever.

2:24:24It's all kayfabe, you know, it's all, we're all doing a job here, you know?

2:24:28Bill Simmons:And, uh, they're using the ESPN infrastructure, the way they talk about like the NFL and we're watching like Joe Tessitore with our old friend Rosenberg. And it's like, what would this mean to Roman Reigns? And it's honestly like watching NFL live. It's just weird. Well, and you have Lee fit. I mean, you have a, you have an army of former ESPN producers running WWE's, you know, production wing now, which is, which has predated their ESPN relationship. Right. So for the past several years, fans like me have been watching saying, oh, now that's a college football camera angle. Or like, that's a, that's a pregame thing they would have only done on real sports, you know, and these things start trickling in.

2:25:04And so now it's all sort of the same thing, but you're right when it's like, you're watching ESPN. And the weirdest part is that it doesn't seem totally out of place just because the production is so high, you know, and, And, and, and, and also it's just like, you see these wrestlers just wandering in and out of the set of like, get up and first take, like there's so much weird synchronicity that are like synergy that like, it's, it's almost hard to process. I mean, when you were there, you remember that people were in the highest seats of power who would have just quit over WWE being a WWE story, being on the homepage of the website, you know?

2:25:38And now it's just seamless. It's the, it's all part of the product.

2:25:41Bill Simmons:It was a great opportunity for us 15 years ago. right? When we were covering wrestling and really throwing ourselves into it, there was nothing else going on. So do you feel - I remember, I remember very well the first time we talked at Grantland and you, and you called me on the phone and we were just like, what does a wrestling column look like? Like, I, like we didn't know what the, what the world would want, you know, or like what, what could even happen. And so, you know, we've come a long way, I guess. So do you think the ESPN thing's helped or it's neutral? I think, I think it's helpful.

2:26:13I think, go i think more than anything it's it's thrown a lot of these questions into stark relief you know it's like now every single insidery wrestling conversation is like trying to read tea leaves about how excited espn is and or or unexcited or how pleased or unpleased they are with the numbers they got last month i think if it weren't espn it probably wouldn't feel quite as dire every time new numbers come in or whatever but um you know the the acquiring wwe is an interesting move for ESPN, I think it's worthwhile, but it's always been very transactional. All of their various over-the-top homes, it's always been...

2:26:50They had the WWE Network, and then when they went to Peacock, it was like, because the Olympics got canceled because of COVID, and suddenly Peacock was like, how do we get more built-in subscribers? And WWE at that point came with like 1.5 million diehard fans that would follow it anywhere. Same for Netflix. Monday nights, Netflix. We're doing live.

2:27:09Bill Simmons:This is a good fit for us. yeah they're always in the right place at the right time but i think that actually in terms of just like like the synchronicity affecting the bottom line like does the espn wwe partnership like make like increase wwe's numbers in any sort of crazy way we haven't really seen evidence of that so far um i think i think the audience is always the audience yeah that's why i said neutral i just think the audience just moves to wherever the product is and that's it now i think if the product, you know, if something, if it catches fire again, if the cycle, you know, goes back up quicker than maybe we would guess, I think it being on ESPN is a huge help just because people know where ESPN is, right?

2:27:49They're like, they're more likely to, potential fans are more likely to stumble across it, you know, in places like ESPN and even Netflix than just being on TV, like in the old.

2:27:59Bill Simmons:The biggest thing they need to figure out with all the family is. If you're going to be the good guy, unstoppable guy. That's really hard to pull off. So hard. It's incredibly hard. It's way easier to be... It's way easier to be the I'm actually... There's a darkness to me. I'm a bad guy and I'm a bad guy who is unstoppable and you just keep throwing these baby faces at me and I'm just going to keep nailing them. And I wonder long term how they play that with him. I think you see this in the way he's been booked already. They had him win the King of the Ring tournament because he was the most deserving, I guess, in terms of what people thought backstage.

2:28:41But the winner is supposed to get a title shot at SummerSlam and they just had to say, yeah, forget about that stipulation. Let's have him fight Brock Lesnar instead. I mean, the Brock match is a bigger match.

2:28:49Bill Simmons:Yeah. But I think the distance from now till at least WrestleMania, the entire booking strategy has to be keep Obafimi away from the title. Right. Because it's, because you're right. It's hard. Once he gets the belt, you know, I mean, The Undertaker got that title run early in his career when he won from Hogan, you know, Tuesday in Texas or, you know, lost it back immediately. Sorry. And and but that wasn't that in the Hogan era, it was really hard for someone to feel anointed. You know, now this is a real anointing. You know, this is also if he's the biggest attraction you have or potentially going to be that you don't necessarily need to give him the title anyway.

2:29:28No, you don't. But it's, you know, it's just harder and harder to come up with reasons for him to go out and fight at big events when the title is not involved. So it's just a matter of, like I was saying before, it's delayed gratification or whatever. You know, you have to figure out a way to stretch it out.

2:29:43Bill Simmons:Here's what I would do. As you know, I'm an amateur WWE booker. I think he needs, I think he needs a little bit of a group. I think he needs to, like, I still feel like that four horsemen type of type of thing. Like he needs unstoppable people around him where he's the leader of it. And then you could kind of flip them being a bad guy, or he could be the guy he wants this so badly. He wants to own WWE and be the power. And these are his people. But now that his sidekicks are starting to push the envelope a little too hard. Is this who he wants to be? And like, I would go that direction. I like when somebody like him is flanked with other people.

2:30:23I agree. I mean, listen, you're kind of describing what Roman Reigns has figured out that worked over the past, you know, five years or whatever. So it's, but I think you're absolutely right. I mean, you said four horsemen, the worst legacy of the four horsemen is at any time four wrestlers get together on screen, people say like, Oh, it's like a new four horsemen, but not as good. Right. Right. But like three, four, like four competent wrestlers being friends seem is, should just be a renewable resource, right? You know, just like, let's put these guys together.

2:30:48Bill Simmons:It would have to be somewhat genuine. Yeah. Yeah. I think so. I mean, listen, they sowed the seeds of him being a Paul Heyman guy last night. So, you know, maybe Heyman had the Dangerous Alliance. There's always opportunities. AEW? Just kind of over here now? Is this a battle anymore or what's going on? I don't think it's a battle. I mean, it's a... Listen, I don't know a lot of people that choose not to watch one or the other because of time, but I'm sure that's a real thing for people. I don't really know what the battle would be aew has a really good product and they're still doing things that wwe's not doing yeah and i mean i just think that my that that you know the ceiling didn't quite come off the industry in the same way but aew's making a lot of money from turner and and you know i think their next contract negotiation will be interesting because they don't put it past wwe to try to somehow like get in between the two parties or you know whatever but but that's more of a business thing that's not about like content i think aw does really really great stuff um and i but i think that that both companies kind of are where they are right now you know like i don't people talk about ratings all the time i really couldn't care less if like now it's triple a worldwide beat aw or like what i mean it does it's just it's it's just a vibes thing you're right i watched so i did watch the Reigns the Reigns Rollins match we watched that Ben and I I wrote Ben into watching at least some of it he's too cool for all this stuff now he'll circle back because this is what's happening age 24 I feel like he'll come back a little but I you know I did have Dean Ambrose in the back of my head as the big surprise and I don't think I was alone and the shield coming back but that didn't happen.

2:32:42Bill Simmons:There was no big, in the two-day SummerSlam, there was no big, holy shit, oh my God, this guy, it didn't happen, right? Like crazy comebacks or whatever? Just like, oh, he's back? Or this guy's back? No. Whoa, this guy. Raw last night, Raw last night we had big cast. I think they saved that. I think the Raw after SummerSlam is now just as, you know, big a thing as the Raw after WrestleMania but no, SummerSlam didn't have those moments and I think that was because they wanted Reigns and Rollins to feel final, you know, to feel like, you know, like a real serious thing. And by the way, he'd had a post Reigns after he won, did like an interview outside the ring, just like he's a real, you know, like a real athlete would do, like a basketball player would do.

2:33:23But yeah, I mean, the Dean Ambrose thing, my co-host on the Masked Man Show, Kaz, came away saying there's no way they would have done that if they didn't think that Dean Ambrose might come back. Dean Ambrose, by the way, is wrestling under a different name, is Jon Moxley in AEW and seems very happy there. He's repeatedly they said how happy he is there he would never come back and all this kind of stuff i mean uh you never say never in pro wrestling um i don't think that what we saw at summer slam when they were winking at him doing his moves you know doing i'm referencing him vaguely on air to me that was less of a you know of wwe having a secret deal with him and probably more of a sort of long-term contract to go long-term like wooing process you know it's just like hey just so you no, we haven't forgotten you.

2:34:09So if you ever want to come back to do, you know, WrestleMania 50 for like a billion dollars, we'll be here, you know? And, and I think that's always going to be on the table.

2:34:18Bill Simmons:A shield reading would be a big deal. It would be huge. It'd be absolutely enormous. That's the biggest thing I feel like they could do. Um, all right. So, so why'd you write this Hulk Hogan book? So why Hulk Hogan matters? I mean, you listen, you and I are, you know, are both writers who don't write a whole lot anymore. But when I wrote about, I mean, obviously I've been writing about wrestling for 20 years and been writing about dead wrestlers from the very beginning and sort of what the wrestlers mean to me when they die. When I wrote Hulk Hogan's obituary, I was just sort of floored thinking like, well, it was a lot to get out, but it was also a lot to think like, this is the last time I'm ever going to write about Hulk Hogan.

2:35:00And so the idea came up to write a book. our friends at Harper, Sean Desmond, who's edited a bunch of Ringer books, who was willing to take a shot on this. And so just sort of cranked it out. It was a lot of a for me, it was like. Like, I think for a lot of wrestling fans, there's so much that he did late in his life that I just hated, you know, that like really just killed me. But it killed me because of how much I loved him in the 80s, you know, how much he was, how meaningful he was to me. And, you know, the title, I think, is deliberately a little bit of provocative. just like in the reverse way that Dead Wrestler of the Week was provocative back in the day, right?

2:35:37Like people saw the title and they thought I was going to be offensive. It's like, no, I'm talking about how much I love wrestlers. And this is why, and so why Hulk Hogan matters to me is both exploring why he's really meaningful to me and, you know, through much, so much of his career and, you know, kind of coming to grips with the, with everything that happened in his post-wrestling life and what it means when like one of your idols can break your heart like that.

2:36:02Bill Simmons:Yeah, I went to that, it was the night before the fires, the first rot on Netflix in LA. And Hogan came out and the response from the crowd was like one of the most shocking things I've ever been in an arena for. Couldn't believe it. Like people were fucking furious and booing him. He didn't know how to audible in the moment to it. And that old Hulk would have immediately been like, oh, I'm going to be, I guess I'll be a heel for this and just figured out. And he was too old and couldn't. Um, but was really like mostly despised. Now this is LA, like, you know, maybe that wouldn't happen every state, but then the fires happened the next day and it, and you know, out here.

2:36:44Bill Simmons:But I just felt like that was such like a weirdly big deal that Hogan got treated like that. And, but that was where it had gotten to with the last 20 years of his life. People were just fucking out on him. Yeah. I mean, listen, he never, I think there's a lot of people who rightly believes he never really apologized for you know his racist uh um you know video the video of him saying racist stuff whatever and and um you know there was a point where he famously came back to have a talk with the locker room when wwe was letting him back in and instead of saying i'm sorry for what i said i'm a changed man he said be careful of video cameras right you know just like the worst the worst advice and the fans knew about it too you know so because all that stuff gets out But I really think for me that the icing on the cake was him coming back on that episode of Raw.

2:37:31And instead of saying, I love this business, I just want to wish you guys good luck. He said, buy my beer, right? The whole thing was like a promo for real American beer. And I think that was just the bridge too far. Jimmy Hart waving the flag behind him. And you can't really audible a heel turn when you're like hawking your new alcohol endeavor. You know, you got to stay. It was really, really rough. And it's crazy that it happened. It's crazy that nobody, him or WWE, saw that coming, you know? And it's just one of the most surreal experiences for a long-time wrestling fan. And especially that being the last time you really saw it.

2:38:09Seriously, it was. Like, that's like the ultimate warrior who had just, I mean, almost as turbulent of out-of-the-ring life, you know, he's not a great dude by a lot of estimations, came back when he got, you know, put in the Hall of Fame. And the fans, myself included, went absolutely bonkers cheering for him. and then he passed away like the night after Raw. Like, it was right. It happened right away. But he went out on a high, comparatively speaking. And, you know, Hogan's was, Hogan just got booed out of the arena. Like, like literally. It's pretty tough in wrestling to turn a mass audience off

2:38:41Bill Simmons:with any behavior when there's been so many shaking people over the years or behavior that people have expused. So many. Yeah, it's pretty, uh, well, going back to the 80s, I mean, we do these movies sometimes in the rewatchables, but that whole popcorn hero era. And to me, Hogan was right there with Stallone and Schwarzenegger. Yes. And everything he stood for was also happening in the movies simultaneously. Yes, it's funny because he never reached the success. And I write about that in the book, but he never reached the success in Hollywood, obviously, of Stallone and Schwarzenegger, despite being lumped in with them all the time.

2:39:20But, you know, looking back, Like, Hogan was more of the American icon than the bigger stars were. I mean, he represented this country more. You know, as you look back, and we've had these conversations for years, right? You look back and it's like, like, you know, the Reagan era or whatever. Hulk Hogan was the Reagan era. You know, Hulk Hogan was like everything that we aspired to be at that time. Well, and how full of shit everybody in the 80s were.

2:39:44Bill Simmons:It's like, take your vitamins. And meanwhile, he was like doing more steroids than everybody. That was the 80s. But that's it. he's the most quintessential American icon of that decade so part of when I was writing Why Hulk Hogan Matters the thought process is like am I just sad that he's not like me now or actually does he say more about me now than I want to admit you know is he still what America is but yeah I mean honestly that 80s the popcorn movie era was just it's incredible I mean you talk about rewatchables there's like there's never a time where you say no to a Schwarzenegger movie or you know an 80s Schwarzenegger movie or Stallone movie when they pop on.

2:40:21Bill Simmons:Yeah, it was weird that Hogan never was able to put the puzzle piece together for a movie career because I think he was so big of a personality on the wrestling side, you couldn't kind of buy him playing a character where Schwarzenegger didn't matter. Yeah, Schwarzenegger. And the stunning thing is when you look at how bad Schwarzenegger was at acting in the beginning, like could somebody not have held Hulk Hogan's hand through a movie like this or whatever? Well, but think about Thunder Lips is probably a better... five minute scene than any scene Schwarzenegger ever had in a movie, but Hogan couldn't figure it out.

2:40:55But here's the thing. I think Vince Sr., Vince's dad, who told Hogan he couldn't be in Rocky III, was kind of right. I think wrestlers on the scale of Hulk Hogan, we just feel like we know them too well. And it's harder even than with an actor to see them play another role. I just think there's a weird disconnect there. And that's part of what I came to, why Hulk Hogan, why wrestlers in general can affect you so it can affect me so much it's because you feel like you know him it's because you feel like even though he we i logically know he's playing a character i feel like hulk hogan is like a figure in my life you know and and it makes it hard for him to be a to be a movie star

2:41:35Bill Simmons:yeah it's weird this is happening in professional sports too where there's guys that were everybody idolized who are some of the best people ever played and then they just turn out to be pieces of shit it's like well how do you reconcile like pete rose was the most famous baseball player when I was growing up. And then it's like, oh, he's actually a piece of shit. And it's like, well, what does that mean when the Reds won two World Series in a row and you just kind of have to move the pieces around your head, but it never feels great. And I think with Hogan, just, and it's not even just a racist and all of that side of it.

2:42:10Bill Simmons:He really seemed to be reviled by all the people behind the scenes for how selfish he was and how he always put himself over other guys. Yeah. I mean, listen, I always say that he, I mean, he was, for fans like me who were like on the internet during those days, like Hogan, stories about Hogan is how we learned about backstage politics. Right. You know, all the weird stories about Hogan refused to do this job. At the same time, you had like Ric Flair refusing to do jobs. You know, like everybody refused to do jobs, but Hogan became like the icon of it. Well, he had the famous quote, that's not going to work for me, brother.

2:42:46That's what we say all the time and when he and yes when he was doing the nwo like he had a he had a a contract and the piece is contract that said he had creative control right i mean that generally is a thumbs up thumbs down part of me thinks that like you know people that had the champions had had de facto creative control forever you know if back in the day just i mean you didn't have to show up you know like you want to hold the belt like you know you you can do whatever you want but um but i do think that things were moving too quickly in the in the in the monday night wars era And those sorts of like, I'm not losing to that guy happened.

2:43:18That doesn't work for me, brother. It was happening like 20 minutes before showtime. Right. You know, and like they're alive all the time. And so this becomes such a huge problem. And also when you're like, when you have that kind of power, you can't see the forest for the trees. You can talk about how, you know, all you want to do is make money and build the business. But like, it's hard. If you're the one making the calls, you can't tell. You can't tell what's working. You're always going to be selfish.

2:43:42Bill Simmons:Well, it was a LeBron-like career. where you have the whole long peak, right? Which is the eighties and early nineties for Hogan. And then you have the NWO heel turn, that whole thing, which I think is the greatest moment in the history of wrestling in terms of impact, shock value, the crowd reaction. I just think that's number one. But then you have that last thing, which maybe for LeBron will be the Sixers if they win the title. But when Hogan has the great match against The Rock and then finally ends up winning the title and has this one last kind of moment that I think seemed inconceivable.

2:44:19Bill Simmons:You're talking at that point, that's almost a three-decade career of him being relevant, which for wrestling is really unusual. If you, I mean, I don't disagree about the turn, about the heel turn. It's certainly, you know, a top two or three moment of our lifetimes. I mean, and could very easily be number one. Hogan versus The Rock, I mean, you wouldn't have to bend yourself too hard to say that's like the best wrestling match of all time. It certainly wasn't the best like technical wrestling match by a long shot. And then him versus Andre is the biggest wrestling match. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's in terms of what wrestling pro wrestling can accomplish.

2:45:00You know, I mean, the fans were such a part of that rock match. You know, I mean, that is peak wrestling to me. You know, to have the fans that involved in it. And yeah, I mean, he's obviously one of one in terms of his impact on the business. And it's just crazy to think that like, you know, for the last decade of his life, he just wasn't really a part of it.

2:45:22Bill Simmons:Also, I don't think anyone ever held on to a receding hairline better than Hulk Hogan, like to the bitter end. He was like holding off the cliff, just like, I'm not going to give up, brother. When they did the book cover, I was like, just make sure we get an angle that doesn't expose the hairline. um there bruce britchard you know who's a who's an exec over at ww was their big producer for a while said that they would spend like tens of thousands of dollars back in the 80s trying to find the camera angles that didn't show his bald spot until vince realized how much money they were spending and he was like stop doing that but like but it is it is incredible man i mean it is you know there was a there were a couple of periods i feel like in wcw where he had a hairpiece and it was like it was he was doing it for a movie but he was also sort of like the jason alexander like I'm also sort of trying this out for the real life.

2:46:11He bandaned it.

2:46:12Bill Simmons:He really settled on the bandana, which I guess would have been super glued on there. Well, when he sued Gawker and put them out of business and that whole travesty happened, you remember there was a whole thing about whether he could wear a bandana in court. And they eventually allowed him. They said the black bandana is the formal bandana. That one was amazing. It's like, we know you're bald, dude. Just shave your head. yeah look I'm not wearing my baseball cap for this for this conversation so if I can do it Hogan can do it man well it was it was quite a career there will never be certainly another one with the ups and downs that that one had I will say I mean he's we said this you came on after he died and there's just no question he's by far the most significant wrestling figure in the history of the business and doesn't mean he was the best wrestler doesn't mean he was the greatest champ, but he had the biggest impact.

2:47:04Bill Simmons:And that's just, it's kind of inarguable, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's absolutely true. I mean, we come from, from, from our generation, if you want to like put our generations together, you know, there's some memory for people a little bit older than us of the, of the big names of like the East coast, you know, of like the, you know, the, the big MSG icons before Hulk Hogan, but even before Backland and, but, but really for, for our generation of fans, we get, we've got to see a lot of giant stars. And so it's tempting to be like, Stone Cold was bigger than Hogan. The Rock was bigger than Hogan or like, you know, whatever.

2:47:40But in terms of just the lasting impact and the whole arc of the career, I mean, it's totally feasible that like wrestling might not exist the way it does today without The Rock or without Steve Austin. Yeah. But to get, to get to them, Hulk Hogan was necessary, you know? And, and, and the heel turn was another huge thing. Heel Hogan, I think was really necessary for, for those, you know, casual fans. Because when he turned heeled and the casual fans were like, oh, we're all in on the joke together. Like, I want to be, like, I want to, like, outsiders always think wrestling takes itself seriously, and we don't, you know?

2:48:16And so I think Hogan was great in the 80s because he was silly. Like, there was no way you could watch Hogan and say, like, wrestling's real, you know? That's what made it, that's part of what made it so accessible, you know? because then everybody's like, oh, wrestling gets it. And I think there was a sort of reverse of that too when he turned heel. He was just so, he changed everything, like, you know, two different times for pro wrestling.

2:48:38Bill Simmons:And he couldn't have a friend in wrestling because that friend was always going to turn on him, usually in the ring with a clothesline to his back. I write about that in Why Hulk Hogan Matters. There's a whole chapter called Hogan the Bad Friend. It was Hogan's fault, man. All those guys stabbed him in the back. But if you go back and watch it, like Hogan was in the wrong every single time. The first one was Zorndorf, which was shocking. but then it just kind of kept going and going and orndorff orndorff had a match with that he wanted hogan for his partner and he called hogan and the assistant said hogan can't come he's lifting weights right like that come on hogan like get on the phone with your best friend paul orndorff yeah it's a little like daniel son in the karate kid series like you look at it further away it's like maybe hogan was the dick the whole time maybe all these people had the right to turn on i mean maybe that's why the heel turn worked because we're just like yes thank you thank you you finally embraced it.

2:49:26He's been a dick this whole time?

2:49:26Bill Simmons:He was definitely a little inappropriate with the Macho Man and Miss Elizabeth. No question. Oh, more than a little. Yeah. There was some blood on his hands. Anyway. All right. Name of the book, Why Hulk Hogan Matters. Why Hulk Hogan Matters. It is available everywhere. You can get it on your iPad. You can buy it in a bookstore. You can get it online, whatever you want. And you can listen to Shoemaker on the Ring of Wrestling show. How's Kaz doing? Kaz is great, man. Kaz is still in the Knicks afterglow. man. I mean, when he was there, he went to the raw after, um, after the Knicks one and he had Jalen Brunson and Roman reigns, like hugging him and letting them hold the title, the trophy.

2:50:03So he's done. Like he's done. Yeah.

2:50:06Bill Simmons:All right. Good luck with the book. Go buy it everybody. Uh, thanks shoemaker. Thank you, man. I'll talk to you soon. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to shoemaker and Mina and Billy and the bundo and Gahal and Eduardo as always. Uh, Remember, Karate Kid 2 is up for rewatchables, and we might be doing two next week. So you might want to prep for Italian Job and about last night, 40-year anniversary of about last night. Just an incredibly important 80s movie. So that's all coming up. I don't think I'm going to have another podcast this week unless something crazy happens. So I will see you again on Sunday.

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